traknights 19.3.2010

the first ever full smokkelaar TRAK event was a nite of knights. Fridays 8pm ensemble carpark intro mr and mrs mullholland— aka Kristi camera ready and cheersquad and debutants HP ben wilkinson, stephDOS daughter of syd, thundaFlatTrakBully and depot —gunners et posse, jaylo and brendan 'suparoo', phil daniel[boon], ZIGGY jones. the doctor and junior original smokkelaar squad members had some experiencing to do. nervousness leads to numbness and the trak steed selected carefully from under the trak HILLBRICKS—something about the gravity in the name. rowdy, skipper, billy, syd all swagger in front of their nerves. Dootch in sandles calms, yet hyped as nick and lee take the reins for the nights themed event. NICK FERGY's aim to get everyone on the pine and rolling confidently. no mean feat with 16 starters 3/4 of them debutants. after 'hours' of bike fitting. LEE set the pace line at 24 secs rolling warm up...syd, rowdy, billy, jlo and skip confident they can refind their previous prose and pattern. the blue line marks halfway up the embankment giving the newstars space and trak to test their acquaintance to traps, fixwheels and compact riding positions and those nerves. PASS on the RIGHT. ie higher up the boards. HOLD YOUR RIDE LINES>...HP and ZIGGY tested this theory and soon discovered the floors in their delivery. Nothing much. A moment on the pine. Water and leg burn linked. Skip did his best to wipe out he pace line— it's hard to guage the pace you need to be! at 20 laps rolling 20's we called that in. Every one was up and running. The first of the olympic sprints had team pursuit style 3 member teams going head to head against the clock. First of the three swings up on lap one, the second takes up the lead mantle and leads the third rider home, for the 1 lap dash to the line. Against the clock and on reverse sides of the trak the teams set of in pursuit of each other and the time keepers. Their were some impressive displays of speed and bike craft. the time tumbled from 1.06 to 58 for the bullitt nick and his er dead weights of skipper and the race thrashed styled 'schleck' doppleganger. For me it was like hitting the wall when the tow cable broke had skip running third for some sort of parity, was truly hurting and busted up to make anything near a sub 20 sec lap. The stage sprints were followed by a match race. DOS was offered trak position but just turned down the offer flat. shes a fast bike rider. 20 laps first across the line honors. which allows for sprinters to break up or lap the pack, domestiques to grind away, crafty tacticians to place their careful course and or bribe the BULLITT into false breaks and or chases which ever he felt like bridging. The pace soon intensified and if you got off the back its a long hard road to recovery. Doc and depot tangled and hit the deck hard and the peleton took impressive evasive action. Doc re'laced' both front and back wheels in the manoeuvre and depot sported a significant knee wound that 'little sympathy from home would cure!' The pace settled again billy blew up paying for energy spent all night, HP grew wings of power. Mullholland drove it home and yet brendan, rowdy and jlo fought it out for the line honors. Some say this and some say that but i am pretty sure the trak knights won! Junior is hooked. Doc was still sparking post bingle. and yet the Bullitt was hardly breathing. The wind up had jlo, rowdy pacing the motorbike and timed a standing start 4 lap kilo for brendan and then the celebratory ale, carpark. Shall we do this again? You bet. May 21 TBC.

thanks to all who came out, to LEE and NICK many many thanks for your skill and confidence. see you all again sooner.

pure gold!
skipper
ps check these supadrome action photos by Kristi and dootch. +