Louisville Masters Race '08 from glenn m on Vimeo.
Last Thursday, July 3rd, Louisville hosted the 2008 USA Cycling Masters National Championship event. My friend Jack came up all the way from Alabama to race in the event. I decided to meet him there and take a few photos of the event. I brought my son Shawn to watch and meet Jack again. We haven't seen Jack since his wedding a few years ago.
Jack was racing in the tandem event. His partner Randall was his teammate. Randall came with his wife and son Wes, all were very nice people. I met Jack at his hotel and well all drove down together for the race.
The race was held at a park. The terrain was hilly, but all through the day it had rained on and off. At it's worst, the race course was drenched by drizzling rain. The length of the race was expected to be 2 hours long.
Randall's wife video taped the event. I also, took some digital footage with my handheld camera. I also took photos with my high end digital SLR.
The pace of the race was quite fast. They were probably averaging 25 mph, up and down the steep course. Jack and Randall stayed in the back to conserve energy. Jack wore a helmet cam to capture video footage from a racer's point of view.
On the 8th lap, with two laps to go, Jack and Randall turned a sharp corner past the finish line and wiped out. It seemed that a patch on the road became very slick after a constant drenching by the rain. They were the second team to fall at the same spot. I yelled to the organizers that two teams where down and they soon rush to pick them up.
Jack had a bloody arm and leg. His teammate Randall took the brunt of the fall, bloodied arm, hand and leg. The worst part was that one of his finder nail was just hanging by a small section. We drove them to the Emergency Room. Jack had to get his arm stitched up, but Randall had to get his finger nail surgically removed and had to say in the hospital longer while the rest of us went out to eat.
By this time it was around 9 PM, but we soon found a chili restaurant that Jack loved, since there isn't one down where he lives. We followed a GPS directions that seemed to have taken us all over Louisville, some sections were very shady. At one point the lead vehicle turned into a one way street going the wrong way, but we all survived.
Jack and I updated each other on current events. Shawn played with Jack or rather Jack played with Shawn. We soon said our goodbyes and I drove home with my son Shawn in the back sleeping away.
No comments:
Post a Comment