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Ladies and Gentlemen, meet Kelly LeRoy Sparks, aka Sparkie. He's the chap on the top step of the podium in the yellow jersey. He was an off season acquisition by the Delta Faucet Cycling Team. He was brought aboard, chiefly as a track racer - USCF 30-34 points race national champion in 2005 - and a capable but not spectacular road racer. It's no secret that the majority of track specialists struggle on the road. Oh, there are a few who can successfully cross over, but by in large, there is a reason you'll never see Marty Nothstein win a hilly road race and you'll never see Floyd Landis win a pursuit medal in the Olympics. Sparkie had won a few races on the road, Elgin Criterium and some other races but those were as a Category 3 (three). I witnessed the points race last August. It happened nearly exactly a month to the day after Sparkie had gotten popped from a not too difficult Category 1-3 warm-up crit in Terrible Haute, Hooterville. The following night, Sparkie was on the front of the Category 3 (three) crit nearly every lap with the field strung out behind him. It made me wonder what he was thinking as I watched, but he was on another team in a different category so what concern was it to me? In between Terrible Haute and Track Natz I saw Sparkie attack a break and ride away with a win in the Elgin Category 3 (three) race. It was a good effort. When I saw what Sparkie did on the track, I was duly impressed. I've said before, it was the coolest thing I've seen athletically since Bo Jackson ran over Brian Bosworth on the goal line during a Monday Night Football game. Sparkie bridged to a break of 3 riders, took points from them, attacked them and proceeded to lap the field solo. He further humiliated the guys that were left in the race by continuing to take points in the sprints every 5 laps. That said, and not to take anything away from Sparkie's, Starz-n-Barz performance which was a thing of beauty, it was track. Only about 60 guys in the country aged 30-34 even understand the archane rules of the track points race and roughly 25 of those guys showed up to race. Of the 25 that showed up, I counted at least 5 that I knew personally to not be exactly proficient bike racers on the road or the track. Sparkie decimated the field simply by pedaling harder than they did. Fast forward to the Anderson Stage Race at the end of April: You hopefully read the report. If not, this is a quick recap: We had Sparkie disguised as a Category 5 (five) newbie, in the masters field wearing Wal Mart Fishing goggles and a Danskin leotard on the outside of his bibs. He was also wearing a pair of heavy cotton work socks. Sparkie went toe to toe with The World's Strongest Man and got shelled. He redeemed himself a bit with a super TT effort, and then spent the next day attempting to ride the likes of Harry Clark, Curtis Toalson and Spanbauer off his wheel, just like he did to the guys on the track in August of 2005. The race would slow down and Sparkie would move to the front and just go and go and go. The World's Strongest Man and the rest of the field would line up behind him and when Sparkie ran out of steam, they'd attack him, leaving Stony Pony and the rest of the team burying themselves to close the gap. Druber would bark like a Drill Instructor but he didn't seem to be making any progress. Sparkie was a Hammerhead. DRUBER:
Sparkie, you know this isn't a Cat 3 race, right? And so it goes. You can't fault enthusiasm. Sparkie has a ton of it. In truth Sparkie who is 10 years my junior reminds me exactly of myself when I was his age. Enthusiastic, impatient, strong and possessed with the belief that there isn't a bike racer in the Country or maybe even the world that can't be rode off his wheel with just one more solid attack. It's a mental quality he shares with the likes of Vampire, Pre and dare I suggest Tafi? You can't help but love it and be frustrated at the same time. I had the Rhino who tied desperately to help me see the light. I'm trying now to be Sparkie's Rhino.
After winning in 2005 and swearing off forever the caged death match held every Memorial Day in Rock Island, IL Team Delta was looking for an alternative. On the home page of Truesport, I spotted something called the Edgar Soto Memorial Stage Race to be held in the Nashville area of TN. I did a quick compare/contrast and it looked like this. IOWA
MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND EDGAR
SOTO MEMORIAL THE BIRTH OF A BIKE RACER Stage
One: 7 mile TT. Race Bible called it technical and hilly. We
opted not to bring aero equipment. Turns out it would have been
a good choice. Despite the lack of funny bikes, Delta stuffs the
top 10. Stage Two: 50 minute Crit plus 2 laps on a .8 mile 6 corner track with some terrain. Aggressive as every 5th lap, time bonuses and sprint points are offered for the green jersey and it was cranking. Sparkie wanted the Green Jersey in the worst kind of way but he kept riding on the front and not getting anywhere. Tired from those efforts he didn't win any of the bonus sprints but a funny thing happened on the way to the green jersey….He picked up enough time bonuses to put him in yellow. Stage
Three: 3 hilly laps on an 11 mile circuit The race began, I moved to the front to ride tempo. Sprint points and time bonuses every 11 miles. While attacks went off, I stayed forward with Moso and rode a hard tempo and none of the attacks stayed off for long. At the first sprint Sparkie took 2nd and was in good shape. Then…it happened. The race quelled after the 1st sprint and Sparkie got impatient. Instead of being content with riding in the pack on same time as every one else, Sparkie decided that he'd ride the whole group off of his 6'2" 185 lb wheel by going hard up the hills! Of course when this happened the GC guys would sit in Sparkie's most generous draft and ride him until he petered out. Then, they'd attack. The team would shut the gap down and no sooner would that happen and the group would get strung out again. A glance up to the front would reveal the yellow jersey jamming on the front with the GC contenders all contentedly sitting on the wheel waiting for the pace to slow so they could attack again. DRUBER:
Dio Mio! What in the hell? Moso, go to the front and tell Sparkie
to never ever put his mug in the breeze again. After slowing Sparkie down for 30 seconds, a chance for Moso to attack opened up and he went good. Only problem was, 3 top GC guys were on his wheel. DRUBER:
Moso! KILL IT!! FERCHRISSAKES!! KILL IT!! SIT UP!! The exchange was confusing Moso. Moso had his head down and was applying full gas. I could see him look back at me pulling the pel after I told him to attack, and he could hear the GC Guys telling him that his team was yelling for him to go. Eventually, Moso sat up and as expected 3 GC threats attacked and started to ride away. This spurred a turn me inside out chase effort that eventually the yellow jersey (Sparkie) had to participate in. With 1k left in the 2nd lap, the three were caught and right out of the text book, Stone Pony attacked hard when everyone else was gassed and he got away with a guy who was at that point 3rd in GC. Stony took the sprint points and time bonuses and eventually dropped the guy and won the stage. It was an object lesson that couldn't have illustrated the point any better. In the post race de brief, it was pointed out that Stone Pony is perhaps the best RACER on the team. Make no mistake he's strong, but he rarely will, if ever spend energy when it doesn't gain him an advantage. We lost yellow, but we were still in good shape. Stony put 1:45 into the pel and had moved up in the GC. Delta
now had the GC stacked. Stage 4: 77 miles with 6500 feet of elevation change and a finishing climb of 5K at 6.75% avg grade. It was 90 degrees at 9:30 a.m. The green jersey wearer only needed 9 more points to lock up the competition for that jersey. The first sprint was - according to the Race Bible at 20 miles. The head official told us it was 14 miles. The green jersey attacked right off the bat. I jumped in to keep things in check and then Sparkie bridged up to contest the sprint. It was perfect. The yellow jersey and his team were caught out and they had to chase. Our group of 6 riders was flat out laying it down for 12 miles and we built a lead of almost 2 minutes while the entire Chattanooga team with the exception of the two in our break was drilling it back in the pel with Stone Pony sitting pretty. Based on the word of the head official I attacked the break at mile 12 in order to force the green jersey to chase me and lead Sparkie out to the sprint. I built a 10 sec gap near as I could tell and I kept it nailed. I passed 14 miles with no sprint line. What? We'd been nearly taken off course by the lead car only 3 miles prior, so I began to doubt that we were on the course. 14.5 miles, 15 miles, 15.5 miles. Where is the line? I was burning matches that I would need later. I took a peek under my arm and saw the chasers, now numbering 3 only about 5 seconds behind me with…What the hell?…SPARKIE on front and just pulling off?! I was caught about 1 k before the sprint line which turned out to be at 20 miles just like the Race Bible told us, which teaches me to always believe the Bible, not how it's interpreted and relayed by "officials" who pretend to know it… DRUBER:
You made them do all the work to pull me back, right? Shortly after the re grouping, Stony, our top GC guy got a flat. Moso dropped back to help him pace back up as Sparkie and I tried to put the brakes on the Chattanooga guys who upped the tempo when they learned Stony got the flat. All was good about 10 miles later when Stony and Moso rejoined the bunch. Over all the rollers and hills and into the next time bonus sprint, attacks proved fruitless and the bunch was together at the top of the major decent of the day. The head official had taken great pains in the pre race instructions to warn the racers about the dangers of this decent. It was fast, long and full of blind corners. Traffic would be coming up the other side. There was no assurance that traffic in the same direction could be controlled. "Take great caution" he said. "The race won't be won on the decent, but it can be lost", the implication being crashing and/or dying. I knew immediately that Sparkie would take this instruction as a challenge, not a caution. He would attempt to prove that indeed the race COULD be won on the decent. Once there, Sparkie used gravity to his full advantage and made a death defying plunge down the mountain. At the base, he was alone with 3 other riders…One rider 20 seconds down to him on GC and 2 riders well out of the top 10. When the pel regrouped at the bottom of the mountain, the 3 leading teams all had riders in the break and the other teams didn't have the horsepower to chase. We rode slowly and the gap grew quickly to over 2 minutes, making the lead group the 4 leaders on the road or with a good climb by Stony, 3 leaders. I suggested to the yellow jersey wearer that it would behoove his team to at least keep the break pegged to 1:30 in order to maintain the yellow; otherwise, Sparkie had it wrapped up. He "guaranteed" me that if the break was going away; it's all due to the efforts of Sparkie, not his guy, who would most assuredly be sitting on. Given the pattern of the spring up to this point, I had a vision of Sparkie, face crusted in salt, head down and arms hung over his handlebars, aero style, driving the break with three passengers all sitting on eating Clif Bars and drinking from their bidons with smiles on their fresh, dry faces. I was horrified. I told Stony what I heard. He cussed. We moved forward and spent the next 15 miles trying to make some progress in getting the break to come back at least a bit. No avail. The gap was growing. We had no choice but to shut it down and hope for the best. Ten miles later I paid the price for believing I could do a 77 mile race in 90 degree weather without drinking. 50 miles into the race I realized that I'd only downed a small water bottle and a sip or two from the second. I started cramping. Massively. Stony and Moso shared some fluids that they could spare and I even got a swig from one of the Chattanooga boys. It was gracious display. Or, he just couldn't stand the sound of my yelping. I was cooked. Up ahead, it turned out that Sparkie had learned his lesson. He forced the guys down on the GC to earn their way up the leader board. He took a few token pulls but saved himself for the climb, knowing that one of the breakaway riders with him was only 20 seconds down. Sparkie rode his wheel all the way up the mountain and finished on the same time. In so doing, he regained the yellow jersey and became a bike racer. I felt like a proud Papa who being forced to employ tough love, watched his formerly wayward son graduate magna cum laude. I told the boys after the race that I have never felt like such a flailer* in my life (*The term "flailer" belongs to MKA and has been used without his consent). I lost contact with the pel on the climb, with the groin cramp that can't be fixed; every pedal stroke for at least 15 minutes was torture. I dropped like a rock from 6th to 14th in GC, the next to last paid spot. Stone Pony took 4th and Moso finished 10th on GC. After the race I took on 5 qts. of various fluids, vitamin water, Coca Cola, straight water. I did not void for nearly 4 hours. PLUG Look for the Edgar Soto Memorial next Memorial Day. It's a must do race. It is without question, the most organized event I've ever done, including most of the NRC races I've been to.
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