Sprint Night and a Throwdown in the Dirty 'Couve

I finally got around to attending an actual match sprint night last week now that it's almost the end of the season. It was pretty rock. Walker showed up as well to fly the flag of endurance, and things got interesting right away. First round was an all-Rubicon battle with Walker and I both looking to advance into the next round. I jumped him when he wasn't looking from a lap and a half out, led out a damn long sprint and almost got beat on the line. Honestly, he came at me so fast in the last 5 pedalstrokes that I thought I was doomed for sure... It looked to be a long night.

One of the semis ended up being Mclaughery vs. Zac Copeland. That was quite the event. McLaughery tried to do the old 200m afterburner trick, but Copeland fought the power well and ended up riding Stephen all over the track, up to the rail, back to the apron, back up to the rail, around the block a few times and by the time they made it back to the finish, Zac barely held on for the win. Dude's got skills.

So the final was old school dude vs. young dude trained by old school dudes. ROCK. I've been waiting to race this cat for months and I certainly wasn't dissapointed. I pulled first, sat up on the backside and took a hard right turn uptrack right into his burly little frame to show him that I was up for any shenanigans he could throw at me. I turned so hard that just about anyone outside of Brian Abers would have had a few fillings knocked out, but Zac just flicked away and smiled at me. This guy sprints the best way; he's got a huge bag of tricks and he can use any of them. I knew this well enough to jump him long as soon as he gave me a little room, so I did with a lap to go, and made it stick. Wicked. I'll definitely have to rock a few more sprint nights before they're over this year...

VANCOUVER CRIT

Now that's a cool course. About a billion corners per lap, a little uphill drag that wrecks some people's rhythem and a super-short finish straight make for a killer course. Too bad only 30 or 40 people showed up for the 1/2s. The complete lack of prize money may have something to do with that... (Windows XP upgrade for Windows 95? What am I supposed to do with that? Can I buy food with it?) Anyway, it was a rough day for Orange to say the least. Not 20 laps into the race we're coming around a fast, downhill corner and SCCRRRASH Aaron goes down. Dammit. That looked like it hurt. A small group takes off just after that crisis, and fortunately Walker the Stalker's in it, so I can relax and follow counter-moves. However. Not 5 laps after Tuckie tastes asphalt, Scotty's sliding across the street in the SAME CORNER. What the f@#$! WTF! Seriously... this corner is eating our team alive.

Laps go by, the group laps the field with maybe 8 to go and Curry and I drift back to drag Walker up to the front of the field. We get separated somehow and end up with Adam and Walker cruising up through the inside, while I'm on the outside, just as Walker gets pinched, hits the deck and goes skidding across the pavement. Dammit. He gets back in, Scotty and I go to the front thinking everything is sweet, Scotty rips it up with 2 to go, I nail it on the front with a lap to go, pull off and see Walker right on Mikel, and everything looks good. Bummer thing is, because it was inside the last 8 laps, they didn't give Grunter the free lap, so he gets 6th instead of 1st or 2nd. Drag.

Before the race, Norrene told us how there were tons of sponsors at the race, so we shouldn't crash.... COINCIDENCE? probably not. DT