Festival of Speed at Dick Lane (9/20/08)

The Kudzu duo of Joey and Oscar skin-suited up for Saturday’s Dick Lane Velodrome Festival of Speed, which was the final track event of the season. The pair was fresh off of a trip from collegiate track nationals held in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Even though they were tired from a long season of racing, the two were hoping to pull off an upset to end the year. Oscar’s right hand man and track speedster Thomas ‘Crash’ Brown, was at home riding the couch, hopped up on more meds (pain killers) than his bike collection, after breaking his collarbone a few weeks earlier. With one man down, the two Kudzu boys were wary to think about success against such strong teams as Team Type 1 and Jittery Joe’s; plus a number of strong out of town ‘trackies’ that made the drive to Atlanta for the final event of the season.

The night started with a few 5 lap scratch heats (5 lap race to the finish) which qualified riders into the night’s handicap finals and keirin finals. With both Kudzu riders in the same heat, getting one qualified for the later races was a must. Oscar went straight to work with an early attack to stretch the field and kept the pace high to deliver Joey the win.

Since Joey advanced to the finals, the game plan was to keep him high in the overall standings by winning as many points in the remaining races as possible. The next event was a 60 lap points race, with point sprints every 5 laps. Oscar spent time covering moves from the field and chasing down strong attacks from a Fiordifrutta rider. Meanwhile, Joey was able to grab enough points in the sprints to take second in the race behind multiple time masters national champ Kenny Williams.

The trend continued through the night, as Oscar kept the field together while Joey light up the sprints. Joey place second in the 20 lap scratch event behind masters world and elite national kilo champ Steve Hill. Next on the bill, was the fastest and scariest race known on the track, the keirin, an exciting race where about 10 riders are brought up to speed, paced behind a motorcycle, and dropped off at one and a half laps to go, for an all out sprint. Positioning is key in the keirin, a full contact event, and Joey showed his true colors as an all around bike racer by fighting off some good headbutts and pushes from the big Joe Eldridge of Team Type 1, to hold onto his spot and place third in the 40+ mph event.

The only slip up of the night from the Kudzu duo came in the miss-n-out (an elimination race where the last rider of every lap is out) when a few miscommunications under the roar of the large crowd saw Joey out early. Oscar renewed the team’s hope by beating two time Giro di Italia finisher Trent Wilson for second place behind Kenny Williams.

The final event, the madison (teams of two compete in a sort of ‘tag team’ points race, complete with tummy turning high speed hand slings to exchange riders) was the only thing stopping them from a nearly perfect night. The first exchange was bungled by trying not to crash in the chaos of 10 teams exchanging at once. Consequently, the two lost about half a lap on the hard charging Jittery Joe’s duo. After about 15 laps of crisp exchanges and full tilt riding, the Kudzu boys caught the front of the detonated race which was controlled by Jittery Joes.

Everyone else was a lap down on the two dominate teams of the night. After missing the first few sprints, the pressure was building as the sprints were close, none closer than the mid-race $500 ‘crowd prime’ where Jittery Joe’s pro Tim Henry narrowly edged out Oscar by the width of his front tire.

Joey and Oscar kept tough, holding on through the insanity to end up second in the race. After a dramatic finale and successful night of racing, Joey finished second overall in the omnium with Oscar close behind in fourth.