Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Goldsprints! ATL

Goldsprints have made it to the south - and they are painful. I raced a few heats on Saturday night and i'm still a little sore.

this was all part of the Faster Mustache 3 Year Birthday Party and Fundraiser. bands, djs, mustache contest and the main event - Goldsprints... it was a really good time and after a couple good heats and knowing what was left in the bracket - i was feeling pretty good about the competition. i wanted that Kazane! (sorry Chicken). i'm called up for round 4 after Night Moves finished their set. at this point it was about 11PM and i had been at Lenny's since 5:30 with no dinner.... we had to register by 5:30 and run qualifiers at 6 to build the brackets... so - in round 4 they call me and Scott Hodge to the stage. Hodge never shows up and apparently had bailed - much like his lunch after round 3. after some confusion, they decided to call up the late arriving Billy 'the East Point Outlaw' Santana to race against me. whatever - he just happens to be the #3 points holder and Elite/A racer at the Velodrome - spent all winter with his coach riding 20-25 hours a week - and it would be his first heat since he didn't come to Lenny's until after registration, qualifiers and 3 heats were in the bag - so, yup. this was intense and people were putting money on it (i think there was a $3 pot to go to me if i won). they decided to level the playing field a bit and fatigue Billy by having him chug a PBR. so - they count us down and we're off. spinning like frigging crazy and we have people seriously about 5 inches from our faces screaming at the tops of their lungs. fun stuff... i'm being screamed at that i'm ahead and then everyone yells for us to stop. the program had crashed (not the first time) and we were going to have to start over. apparently i was ahead and it crashed right at the half way point - so - they make a rule that if the program crashes at the halfway point or beyond they call the race to the spinner who was ahead - starting now - like if it happened again - not for me. thanks. so they remind us that the program crashes when people jump the count and they begin to count us down again. i listen to the entire count and give too long of a delay (i wanted to be certain that the program would not crash as i was into the last efforts my body would possibly allow). Billy got a jump and i had to catch up. i caught him and kept it really close and lost. something about some hundreths of a second at the finish. i was toast and quickly proceeded to the bar in an attempt to replace the fire in my legs with the cool comfort of a pibber. Billy went on to take home the frame in the final.

i'll share one of my heats... this is what it looked like to race Skip of No Brakes ATL:




This was not the last Goldsprint to be had in Atlanta.

a good report from Kurt at FM with links to photos.

**edit: the party and sprints were given mention on How To Avoid The Bummer Life!! one of my favorite blogs! see if you recognize the photo**

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