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Gateway
Cup Happy Labor Day From where I sit, it seems the world has turned itself upside down. You can't count on much of anything anymore. We are dead center in the end game of a high stakes election season where the party of fiscal conservatives and small government is lead by a free spender with a track record of huge budget deficits, enlarged Federal programs and a foreign policy built around imperialism and nation building. The Christian Right is steadfastly behind this spendthrift who is a known warmonger despite Christ's Sermon on the Mount, which tells us "Blessed are the Peacemakers for they shall be called the Sons of God." On the other side, the party of peace, love and understanding is backing a decorated veteran of the war in Viet Nam. A war most passionately protested by the party's current leadership during their youth. The Viet Nam vet has as much admitted being party to war crimes and is running on a platform of strong defense and fiscal restraint. Terrorists attack school children; a former president's love of Philly Cheese Steak sandwiches has caught up to him causing more harm than skirt chasing ever did and Florida, depending on your point of view, is either having it's Christian Faith tried and tested or is reaping divine judgment for election rigging, disenfranchising minorities and allowing college football players onto the field despite commission of crimes ranging from sexual assault to robbery. I don't know what to hold on to any more. Labor Day has rolled around. Speaking of - Did anyone else read the AP news service story about the Alcoa Aluminum smelting plant in Wenatchee, WA? Seems that in lieu of shuttering a plant employing 400 United Steel Workers and ruining yet another small town economy, Alcoa made a decision to keep all employees on at full salary and benefits for a year to clean up and maintain the smelting factory. Eventually the work ran out so Alcoa continued to pay the employees for an additional six months to do volunteer work through the County United Way. Alcoa was selling excess electric capacity from the plant for a profit while it was shut down so keeping the rank and file on while doing so was a win-win. When the aluminum market regained strength recently, Alcoa announced the factory would be re opened to the great pleasure of the employees who had benefited from this unusual bit of corporate largesse. The employees were looking forward to earning overtime wages, on top of the $41.37 an hour that Alcoa was paying, including benefits. Alcoa asked the local union representatives to put to a vote a proposal asking that the back to real work employees pay 10% of their health care insurance costs - about $73 bucks a month. The employees were in favor of the concession, recognizing that benefits costs have risen dramatically and also being appreciative of the good will that Alcoa showed in the previous year and one half. However, the national union in Pittsburg has stepped in and forbid the local representation from bargaining or voting for the concession at the risk of losing United Steel Worker benefits. As of now, the factory is set to close and the 400 employees have lost their jobs anyway. Another small town bites the dust. I'm sure there is a nearby Wal-Mart where the workers can find a job. Happy Labor Day. What does this have to do with bike racing? Everything. It gives us the unpredictably predictable. It's a diversion from the misery going on in the world around us. On Labor Day weekend the College Football season opens. This year the Mormons have overtaken the Catholics as the best college football players. This turn of events was not predictable. What is predictable on Labor Day weekend is that The Gateway Cup in Saint Louis highlights the late season. In 4 days of racing, folks come from all over the country and gather at venues in and around Saint Louis for some seriously hard racing in a great atmosphere. People not associated with racing even watch the events. It's a spectacle. Day one, rather night one, is a nighttime crit around Lafayette Square. It's a one-mile, 4 corner track around a large urban park just south of downtown Saint Louis. The course is lined by stately homes. The homes in this neighborhood are restored Antebellum Victorian row houses. It wasn't always this pretty. Less than 10 years ago the owners of the homes were urban pioneers who moved here after the city moved the crack whores and bangers out. For a purchase of $50,000 and restoration costs of another $100-400k or more you could put a roof on a row house, install flooring, gut the interior, remove asbestos, insulate and generally rebuild and own one of these $1,800,000 properties yourself. That is, if you had the timing and nerves to wait out the gang squatters. As the value of the properties and safety of the neighborhood has increased, the pioneers have mostly cashed out and the current inhabitants of Lafayette Square are Brewery Executives, Plaintiff's Attorneys and the Surgeons they sue for a living. The neighbors get together over a bottle of Chardonnay to watch the Category 3 racers stack themselves into piles of scraped up flesh, twisted frames and broken carbon fiber components. Some people call it crashing. I call it a performance art installation. It's the predictable element in bicycle racing. The unpredictable element? This year, a naked man on a bike wearing only an Afro wig and a pair of cycling shoes chased the women's race for a couple of laps. If you believe the rumor mill, he was prompted to do so by the organizer of the race, with the promise of bail money if arrested. The hope was that the naked man would inject some drama into the normally formulaic women's race, in which the group rides around in a cluster similar to a youth soccer match in which all competitors are tightly clustered around the ball. Eventually the fast riders get bored and ride away solo, which happened again this year despite the efforts of the naked man to stir things up a bit. Druber did not enter the Pro 1,2 race this year. It usually averages 29-30 mph making a break away impossible, besides which, starting at around 9:15 and ending after 10:30, it's past Druber's bedtime. Druber has not felt the need to put himself into this race since turning age 40. Failing night vision and all. During the race, a much faster but only slightly younger bike racer from HealthNet who rode in the World Championships last October got kidney punched for yapping at an amateur. Seems he yelled at the wrong one of the many testosterone infused amateurs who takes the sport seriously enough that they're willing to throw punches from the saddle. I missed that part of the race. From what I hear, no one had sympathy for the Pro. An Olympian also represented HealthNet along with a fast sprinter native to Saint Louis named Schmatz. Schmatz won the race edging out Elite Crit champ Frank Pipp for the V, which only seems appropriate as one is a highly compensated professional bike racer and the other is a mere amateur. The next day the racing moved to Kirkwood, MO. Greentree Park is the site for the criterium. The course is a one-mile loop one half of which is a 4% uphill slog, with the remaining half being equally divided between descent and flat. Druber loves this course. It's not for climbers and it's not for crit monkeys. Druber woke up with mud butt. Not a good sign but it does help with weight control. The condition didn't worsen or better over the course of the morning and a Venti Sumatra roast from the Starbucks in the Renaissance Hotel and two Power Bars served to keep the digestive tract in distress. As is tradition for Labor Day weekend Druber does the old guy race on Saturday. 45 minutes is enough when it's 90 degrees and humid. The sMACKs were omnipresent. Eventually one of the half dozen sMACK riders in the race went up the road with a Big Shark. Druber bridged and to his surprise made a clean bridge without half the field in tow. The next time up hill toward the start/finish Druber and Flick&sMACK found they were all alone as the Shark was shelled. With a 5 second gap Druber wasn't altogether convinced that at this early juncture a break was secure so he and Flick&sMACK traded indifferent pulls waiting to get caught. Eventually the gap was 20 seconds at which point Flick suggested some effort be put into this thing. Agreed. Behind, the sMACKs organized, moved to the front and rode slow, which by default caused the gap to the break to jump from 30 seconds to over a minute in two laps. Securely away with the gap growing, Druber and Flick&sMACK worked well together to put themselves within lapping distance of the pel. Flick suggested it might not be a good idea to get into that mess. Agreed. Flick is a classy rider. Honest and always willing to do his fair share of work in a break. With 3 to go Flick congratulated Druber on a good race and said "lets both race to win". This was predictable. Druber understood this to be sMACKspeak for "I'm not taking any more pulls." Not surprised or distressed with this news, Druber agreed and rode the front. Normally in a flat sprint, Flick&sMACK will best Druber 11 times out of 8. With a long uphill sprint as the equalizer between explosiveness and power, Druber felt he had a chance in a two up sprint. At least a 50/50 shot. Druber led out the sprint 100 meters into the climb. The HeadsMACK who depending on who was telling the story had either dropped out of the race to coach Flick or was officially asked to withdraw from the race for taking unauthorized free laps on the bottom side of the course out of sight of the wheel pit and official's stand had been coaching Flick from the last uphill corner for the previous 15 minutes. "Take him in the sprint!" "Attack him in the chicane!" "No pulls after 3 laps to go!" Etc. With just 200m to go HeadsMACK saw Druber round the next to last corner up the hill with Flick a bike back ready to pounce. "NOW FLICK! NOW!!!!" Druber kept Flick at bay as long as the road was uphill. When the road flattened just before the line Flick&sMACK made up the bike length but Druber crossed first with about 3 inches to spare. Had the race been 10 meters longer, it would have been Flick. Behind, New York Metz and the Moleman attacked out of the field for 3rd and 4th. Saturday night, Tim Ranek the Gateway Cup promoter hosts a pasta dinner for the riders in the neighborhood of the next day's race. The dinner is at the Italia-American Bocce Club. The neighborhood is called simply "The Hill." Settled by Italian immigrants, the 'hood still holds onto it's Italian heritage with much pride. The Tricolore hangs from every lamppost and the fire hydrants are red, white and green. The neighborhood spawned baseball legends Joe Gragiola and Yogi Berra. For my money the mostaciolli and marinara could use a bit more garlic and basil, but the hospitality is awesome. Bike racers mix with locals who belong to the club and graciously teach the game of Bocce with all of its subtle strategies as we overrun their club and drink their Chianti. The Chianti by the way is $2 for an 8oz pour. It's dangerous. Druber and Kathy used the setting to renew acquaintances with Butt Head, Jimmy Mac and Crazy Tracy who like Druber have each either engaged, shacked up with or married women that they're not worthy of. Good stuff. The races on The Hill were fast and furious. The HealthNet rider from the World Championships won. Butt Head participated in an impromptu sit down strike at turn two with about a half dozen other racers, demanding fair wages and an end to the violence in Sudan. They didn't get their wish but the Blue Coats did grant a free lap. Labor Day brings an end to the Gateway Cup. The races are held in the trendy neighborhood of University City called "The Loop". The Loop is a mix of restaurants, bars, shops and awesome homes. It also seems that more than a few of the former residents of Lafayette Square, displaced by the gentrification of their old 'hood, have taken up residence on the streets of University City. Druber did the old guy race. A mole from the sMACKs clued-up Druber that HeadsMACK had it out for him this day. What HeadsMACK didn't know is that Druber had an edge. The Lovely Kathy had slipped into her lucky "groovy" underwear earlier in the day. Druber has yet to lose a race when Kathy wears these '60's Flower Power print panties. Regardless, win or lose it was going to be a good day. Druber attacked from the gun, won a prime on the second lap and stayed on the offensive. True to the intelligence received earlier, HeadsMACK was glued to Druber's rear wheel. Eventually a 3 rider break formed after a GU prime with Druber, New York Metz (he took the prime) and HeadsMACK. NY Metz is a fast finisher, a principled, quality rider always willing to do his fair share of work in a break. He is strong enough to work a break then win at the end. The same cannot be said for HeadsMACK, well known as a wily flim-flam man prone to chicanery and a wheel suck who wins races by being the only unworked rider at the end of a race; an advantage gained by cajoling break mates to pull him to the line. Or, irritating them to the point of making repeated attacks - which he quickly covers- in order to get away from his steady stream of yammering. Druber has more than once fallen victim to his soulless thievery. It was predictable that things would unfold this way. HeadsMACK had won this race last year in a sprint out of a 6-rider break, besting Druber at the line without having taken a single pull the entire day. HeadsMACK had visions of a repeat. Despite the entreaties of Metz and Druber, HeadsMACK resolutely refused to take a pull. Druber suggested to Metz that perhaps it was best to sit up and let the field catch, reshuffle the deck as it were. NY Metz valiantly declared his desire to keep the break going, even claiming satisfaction in a potential 3rd place finish (knowing he was the fastest finisher in the break) but he would only share the work if HeadsMACK worked. Druber, being impatient and not in the mood for gamesmanship on this day after a poor night's sleep, not just attacked but attacked hard. NY Metz did the wise thing and forced HeadsMACK to close the gap. Once back to level, HeadsMACK still refused to take a pull, because Druber would attack off such pull. HeadsMACK is no dummy having spent many years besting riders far faster and stronger the Druber by frustrating them into wasting their energy with fruitless attacks. Druber offered assurance to HeadsMACK that no attack would occur if HeadsMACK would stick his nose in wind. HeadsMACK offered "not today." Druber and Metz, loath to pull HeadsMACK to a V took two laps to decide what to do and to allow plenty of opportunity for HeadsMACK to find some honor and take a turn at the front. Druber even tried to embarrass HeadsMACK in front of God and Everybody by pulling aside and making a very animated sweeping gesture with his arm at the start/finish line in front of the chatty announcer and 1000 spectators offering his place at the head of the 3 rider line to HeadsMACK. This move only served to teach Druber that a person with no sense of shame couldn't be embarrassed. To his credit, HeadsMACK had a strategy and was sticking to it. On the headwind, false flat backstretch, Metz took a turn, and Druber rolled through a bit hard. Metz did not follow and Druber had a gap. HeadsMACK very insistently demanded that Metz close gap to Druber. Metz refused or was not able it doesn't matter. Druber didn't stick around to find out how the argument ended. With the attack, Druber didn't want to drop NY Metz so much as to gain some clean air between his rear tire and HeadsMACK's front tire. Druber moved into full on time trial mode. Astonishingly, despite having a large contingent of talented riders, the sMACKs never organized a team chase to bring Druber back once their leader was dropped. Eventually Druber lapped half the field and finished 25 seconds off the back of the main field for his second V of the weekend. The HeadsMACK "got a flat" on the last lap and nearly caused a wreck when he sat up. This was predictable. Everyone had fun.
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