Big hugs

Team Specialized / Sierra Nevada somehow managed to pull off promoting a crit race last weekend and it's time to hand out a heaping of thank you to all who made it happen:

Specialized, Bicycles Plus (BP), and Voler came through in a big way allowing prizes 5 deep. It was joy to see the racers faces when we loaded em up with the goods. Well ok, the pros and the sourdough-threes were too jaded and cool to show any emotion but the other classes were like “your giving us what? We get those glasses... and all this cash?”. Thanks Dave at Specialized, John at BP, John and Linda with Voler. Also shout out to Adam from BP who manned the Bike Plus mechanics tent all day and another shout out to Dave for lending us the Specialized super tent!

You Velo Bob when he was dropping the stuff at my house (another thank you); “How do cities feel if you paint a line on their road”. “Uh, they usually don't like that”. But he told me about temporary traffic striping tape. We got a guy on our team, John Hancock, who works for Caltrans. He'd know all about that. I call him. I can't finish my first sentence before he cuts me off. “You want traffic tape. I used to have some of that...” And so we got a beautiful yellow finish line. He gave me the inside tip on how to make it stick too... drive your car over it.

Such an insignificant detail, could easily have been overlooked. But someone thought of it and someone took care of it. As racers we expect a top notch experience when we plop down our greenbacks. But as promoters, we're just a Mom & Pop operation trying to create a venue for ourselves and our friends to race because we're passionate about cycling. Below are the passionate people who made our little race a reality:

About a month ago I was ready to give up organizing the race. Keith gave me a shove toward getting it done. Without Keith it simply would not have happened. Thanks for providing motivation to get me going. Also, thanks Keith and Lance for doing the early work to put the race on the NCNCA calendar. In addition to some stellar course setup and marshaling, you both did some extra pre-event work to prepare the course.

Jason, Sara, Matt, Zach and John handling the registration in addition to being the medical angel (Sara), load'n the truck (Jason & Sara), providing the race HQ (Matt's poptop). Roy on the prize payouts and registration. You might have had the best job of the day... getting to give out the schwag.

The crew from Chico; Tim, Kevin, J.Spotts, Mike T. Always good to see you guys and hope we kept the legs fresh for racing by letting you marshal in the shade. Kevin and Tim, thanks for represent'n in the P/1/2 with Brown and Rozek. Good to see more 'n a couple o guys in the Pros'ies for once. And Spotts was the highest placed rider on the day with the 3rd place result.

Angelo, I thought you weren't gonna make it to the race but you did and created great photos as well as making those two go'fer runs. After all the work you did on the website and flyer you show up for duty on race day too. Over 'n above.

Andrew, Eric, Banks, and Dr. Parker... left you out marshaling for hours and not a peep from you the whole time. 'Cept for Lancashire who called me three times before his race. Hey, I got you covered.

Dan and Mike Brown, thanks for marshaling, covering reg and representing in a couple of races along with Matt, Tim, Kevin, Lance, Zach, Andrew, and Spotts.

Did I forget anyone? Well, if I did, I'm sure I'll hear about it.