Wednesday, mid day report

Danny, what time is it? Crap missed breakfast again! Tuesday night had Dan C doing a standing start 750 meter event and Mark Stewart and Dan Schuller each doing a standing start 500 meter event. All three were later in the evening so there was a lot of waiting around from warm up time that started at 5 until the race events. Rollers and trainers to stay warmed up is all there is for any one. There is no extra time in the schedule for on track warm ups. The officials must have had some complaints or realized some racers were not getting warm up time prior to the start of the evening due to the large number of competitors. They only allow a maximum of 30 on the track at a time so there has been a line up of riders waiting while one or two come off. Now they call everyone off after about 10 minutes and put another group back on immediately. You can get back in line right after you come off if you want and as many times as you like. This was the first race for Mark, second for Dan S. Both are in the same age group which is huge. Dan C wasn't so sure about the 750 meter distance. All three had good rides but mid field results with our world champ getting 16th with Schuller edging out Stewart by less than a second leaving them in 27th and 30th place over all. Our Aussie friend Nick collected 26th place just faster than DS. I got a chance to do some easy rollers for about 30 minutes before all the races started. The UCI has been doing bike checks on and off before race starts. They seem to be focused on the pursuiters especially, making sure the saddles are precisely level as well as making sure forearms are level to the ground if there are aero bars on the bike. They won't let you race if either are wrong. Bike weights are also checked. No one is even looking at helmets this year. The sprinter bikes had to go in the jig to measure seat position, bar drop, etc, all the basics including weight. Dan C is at the rack doing a qualifier race for his points final, I am relaxing at the hotel again, legs up just about ready for lunch. Tonight is my 500 event. My plan is to take the shuttle to the track this afternoon, early enough to watch some of the British team again and be ready for a proper warm up and then wait around for a long time before my event which is closer to the Ned of the evening. That is my schedule for the rest of the week as week, pints race Thursday night, scratch on Friday night and then a fun race for Stewart, Schuller and me, a 135+ team sprint mid day Saturday. I've lost track of when Schuller and Stewart do their events, tough to keep track of all the races and times. There is a good schedule in the program, very helpful but you need to check at the track the day of your event to make sure of the details, especially during the timed events so you are ready a few riders ahead of your scheduled time. It's been fun to see all the NSC related discussion about next summer's challenge races for the Champ. Casper is getting a big smile out of the plans and thinks it would be great fun but says he gets to pick the team make ups if there are team challenges. I haven't heard what Schuller and Stewart have said about their grudge matches yet. The weather here is still cloudy, rainy and cooler, maybe this is the norm for this time of year here.