Madison Night at the Track

Man Butt. Mike and Dan before the Madison.

For the third consecutive week weather delayed the start of racing at the track and made for a long night. The schedule was shortened and women ended up doing a tempo, scratch and unknown distance. I won the first two then sat in the bleachers to watch the P1/2 men. The featured event of the evening was the P1/2 elite qualifier in the Madison.

The Madison is an event in track cycling, named after the Madison Square Garden in New York, and known as the "American race" in French (course à l'américaine).The race format is a variation of the points race. Teams of two (seldom three) compete, but only one rider needs to be racing at any stage. Periodically, the teams change riders by "tagging" their teammates, usually performing slingshot action with linked hands to transfer as much of their momentum as possible to the racing rider, though a team-mate may also be propelled into the race by a push of the rider's racing shorts. The non-racing team-mate then moves to the top of the circular banked track to recover before his next stint.Team pairs are ranked according to laps gained or lost on their opposition and by points obtained by performing well in sprints which occur periodically during the race and are signalled by a bell on the preceding lap. Thanks to Wikipedia for the definition...

My teammates, Dan and Mike in the chalet before the Madison. LOVE the magenta jerseys, boys. They make a great Madison team - Dan is a strong sprinter and Mike works to keep position on non-sprint laps.

Dan, warming up.

Watching the race was incredibly cool. The speed on the sprint laps was amazing - NBV is a 'slow' track but those guys are FAST. 12 teams of 2 were on the track and thankfully there were no wrecks. I was so impressed - Dan and Mike finished 5th in the company of some very strong competition. Nice job guys!! I'd sat there shivering for nearly a half hour when I decided to take off the skinsuit and just spectate for the remainder of the evening.

Mike leading out of turn 4 in the Masters race.

Track racing has been mostly fun this season - which is my primary objective for all things racing for 2009. I opted to not do the Tour of Elk Grove for a few reasons this past weekend - most importantly, I don't particularly like the course which would have made for some bike hate if I'd guilted myself into doing it. Instead I did a time trial Saturday (which I won), a hard training session on the track Sunday morning and then spent some time at the beach on a fantastic day. It was definitely the right choice for me.

Next up is a criterium in Grayslake on Saturday and a TT on Sunday. I was torn about doing Glencoe Grand Prix next Sunday but the state TT is coming up and I have a title to defend. The following weekend is Downers Grove - I'm hoping for a good finish there. Crit racing is often a crap shoot and positioning is everything in Downers Grove so hopefully I can race smart, get a little lucky and place well.

I started reading 'The Girl Who Played With Fire' by Steig Larsson, a sequel to 'The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo' which I really liked. So far, so good.