Final Update

Monday, 19 Sep 2005

I am sorry for the delay on this final World Championship update. I am now in Spain and it has taken a while to find an internet cafe.

On the final Saturday of racing the big news.....or should I say the HUGE news is Marsha winning the World Championship in the pursuit. I was no easy feat either! In the qualifying round she won the top seed pretty easily by over 2 seconds. Liz Randall of Australia would be her competion in the final. The final proved to be much harder than the qualifying round for Marsha. Liz went out very fast starting with over a one-second lead after the first lap. By the third lap she had a two and a half second lead. We expected Liz would start to slow down as her speed had been very high. Sure enough Marsha started to work that time down each lap. With two laps to go Liz's lead was 1.7 seconds. I yelled at Marsha to really go as we wondered if she could make up that time. Marsha took off another second and had to make up .7 seconds on her final lap. She took out another second winning by .3 seconds!! I almost had a heart attack! It was a very exciting race with Marsha fortunately on the winning end. She had her second World Championship in two years.

In the team sprint Vic Williams, Warren Geissert and I had a problem with our team start and qualified fourth, getting us into the ride for Bronze. We were unable to win in the final finishing fourth. We rode hard, just not hard enough.

I am now vacationing with my wife and will be back in town in a week. See you all then!!

Marsha Wins!

Saturday, 17 Sep 2005

[In the absence of an update from Rich as yet, I would like to direct your attention to Saturday's results, in which I noticed that Marsha Macro has won her second rainbow jersey by taking the Women 50+ 2000m pursuit. I'm sure we'll see details soon. - Webmaster]

Vic Williams's Pursuit

Friday, 16 Sep 2005

It's 10pm here on Friday evening. We had a good workout and did our openers this morning. Marsha felt very good and strong, and my workout went well too. Geoff Stoker arrived today to do the Team Sprint with his Australian team. This make another very tough team tomorrow. It will be some very good competition. After all, it is the World Championships!

This afternoon Vic Williams had his pursuit qualifiers. He was 2.5 seconds out of the Gold medal ride and will go for the Bronze tonight. He is to be going against a Pursuiter from Japan.

After 3 points races it was time for Vic to ride his pursuit final. Vic had a very good start and was up over a second after the first lap. He raised his lead to 4 seconds before losing some in the last few laps and winning the Bronze medal by 2.5 seconds! Woo Hoo!! This was Vic's first World Championship Medal!!

We are now awaiting the awards ceremony so we can go back to our rooms and rest up for a big day tomorrow. It is the last day of the Championships. Marsha has her pursuit and I have team sprint.

Rest Day

Thursday, 15 Sep 2005

Today was a rest day for the three of us (Marsha, Vic Williams, and myself). We had a nice leisurely breakfast and headed to the train station for a trip to York. It was cold and rainy today (very unusual weather for England :-)) but we still were looking forward to the road trip. The train ride went quickly as it only took one and a half hours to get there. York is a good place to visit as it has many historic buildings, churches, towers and an old stone wall around the original city site. It was very cool! We rode the tour bus around town and stopped occasionally for lunch and to see some sites. After several hours in town we headed back to Manchester for the night's races.

We arrived at the track at 7pm, just in time to see Terry Spradley's points race. I was amazed at how competitive and exciting the 70+ category was. Terry took a flyer midway throught the race and held it for the sprint lap to pick up 5 points. Later he earned 3 more with a second place in a sprint and ended up with a bronze medal. His first Worlds medal of his life! He was very happy!

Later in Dick Keller's points race he jumped from the back of his pack and his front wheel got clipped by a rider coming down causing Dick to crash. He ended up with some road rash and a good bump on his head. We kept an eye on him all night to make sure he was OK and he seems to be just fine.

Tomorrow is Vic Williams's pursuit qualifying and hopefully a final for him. Saturday is the Pursuit for Marsha and my Team Sprint.

Tourism Day

Wed, 14 Sep 2005

Today was a no stress day for Marsha and I as we had the day off from racing. Vic Williams of Vitamin Cottage had a points race tonight.

After a good breakfast we relaxed for a while and then went downtown to check on trains to Wales as we are planning our field trip for tomorrow. We then walked to City Hall to visit the tourist bureau for more info. We decided on going to York instead of Wales tomorrow. After a good lunch at a new (to us) Italian restaurant we grabbed a cab back to our rooms. It was a nice mellow afternoon which is just what the doctor ordered as my legs were screaming for recovery after yesterdays sprints. Marsha, of course, is the energizer bunny and the racing never seems to faze her. When I grow up I hope to have her energy!

In the evening we went to the track to watch Vic Williams race his 80 lap points race. Vic is amazing! He started conservatively and ended blazing. He was always there and always flying. The pace of the race was very fast right from the start all the way to the finish. He picked up some sprint points midway through the race and tried to get off the front a couple times. The pack always went after him and chased him down. With 8 laps to go he went again and quickly had a half lap lead with 4 laps to go. The pack went after him, but he held on to the finish for the first place points. This moved him up to 4th place overall for the race. He looked very strong and comfortable out there with the other 25 riders. Congrats for a good race to Vic.

We are off to York tomorrow so we will let you know how our trip went tomorrow. We are planning on getting back in time for Terry Spradly's (Geezer Racing) and Dick Keller's (Midwest Masters) points race tonight.

Rich's Sprint Rounds And Marsha's Second Silver Medal Ride

Tues, 13 Sep 2005

Phew!...... What a long day it was. It started with a warmup at 8am and ended with Marsha's 500 Time Trial and my sprint final (a clue how the sprints went) at 9pm.

My warmup went very well but I didn't feel the explosive power in my legs like I did at Nationals. I still felt rested and strong, just not at the peak you want to feel at the World Championships. My 200 qualified my 4th with an 11.712 (just a few thousanths off last years time). I was disapointed as I had hoped to go 11.5. My time at the slow Indianapolis track last month was just a tenth slower.....hmmmmm, how would this affect my sprints? I had the fastest, deepest field I have ever raced against! Any one of 11 riders were capable of winning (except perhaps Al Whaley, who most would call a shoo-in to win, including myself).

The first round started with no easy ride. I faced Keith Williams (bronze medalist from last year) and a fellow from South Africa. It was a hard fought sprint with me winning by a bike length or so. I was relieved to be able to sit out the rep round as I watched Keith Williams make it back to round Two and to face me again. Dominique Sioul from France was the third rider in my round two heat. Dominique qualified right behind me in fifth, so it would be another tough round. Keith led out and Dominique boxed me in. I waited patiently for an opening and with a lap to go I had my opportunity. I pushed around Dominique and on the back straight my acceleration was good enough to sprint past both riders to take the front all the way to the finish line. Woo hoo!! I was in the Semi finals. Here I met perennial medalist Ken/Dean Todd. He had won silver in the 750 TT the night before, obviously a very strong rider. With Dean leading out and with a lap and a half to go (remember on a 250 track a lap and a half is about a lap on our track) I jumped him, got a good gap and rode it to the win. Woo Hoo!!! I am in the final. Now it's 4pm and break time between sessions. We relax, eat, and take it easy waiting for 7pm.

Marsha has her 500TT first thing in the evening session. She gets in a very good warmup and looks relaxed and ready for her event. She is in heat 3. I have never seen Marsha do such a good, strong, perfect start! Next we will have her sprinting :-) She started perfectly, kept the power going in the corners, sat down and flew to a 43.4 time and........drum roll..........her second SILVER medal of the Championship. Woo Hoo!!! She was only .3 seconds off the Liz Randall of Australia's winning time. Her hard work this year has obviouly paid off.

My Sprint final was an all USA final with Al Whaley (no suprise there), and Larry Nolan of the Discovery Channel's Masters Team. Definitely a World Class final. I thought about being conservative and going for the silver, as my best chance was to place ahead of Larry Nolan. Instead I went for it all. I had an opportunity with a lap and a half to go as Al and Larry were a couple bike lengths behind me and seemed to be watching each other, so I jumped HARD. It took Al Whaley setting a World Record for a 200 during competition (11.3) to pass me for his win. Unfortunately, Larry rode his wheel for Silver, leaving me with the Bronze. I was still very happy to be on the podium with these cycling stars. I thoroughly enjoyed the rounds of sprint against such top competition.

Vic William's of Vitamin Cottage arrived today and started his preparation for tomorrow's points race. Vic will be riding with me in the Team Sprint on Saturday. We have high hope for a medal in that event.

Marsha's Points Race

Mon, 12 Sep 2005

First the big news. Marsha kicks butt in the points race!! It was a 45+ category as they couldn't get it changed to 50+. The rest of Marsha events will be 50+ however. Marsha started the 50 lap points race pretty conservatively, staying high on the track and in back of the field. After several laps she got tired of the slow pace and went to the front and the pace noticably quickened. She made a few short attacks and the field now knowing the famous Marsha Macro quickly reeled her in. After the first points sprint the field pulled up as they were pretty gassed. Marsha dove underneath and all of a sudden she had a quarter lap gap! Liz Randall of Australia pulled hard for a couple laps and the field started to make some gains on Marsha. After Liz pulled up to let the field pull through, the field didn't! It pulled up too. Marsha soon had over a half lap on the field as the next sprint came up. She held a little less than a half lap after the sprint and she gained 5 points. The field again pulled up after the sprint and Marsha caught the field in 7 more laps and gained 10 points. She took a final one point on the last lap to finish second to the 45 year old Dutch rider, Marion Bax. Marsha beat both riders that had beaten her last year in the points race. It was AWESOME!!!! It was a very exicting points race. Marsha did Hammer Racing Team very proud. Larry, you missed a good one!

Jim and Carol Kloss say hi to everyone! Jim picked up his Fifth World Title today in the 500TT.

Dave LeGrys won the 50-54 category in the 500TT just missing Roy Simonson's World Record by a few hundreth's of a second! Al Whaley CRUSHED the World record in my age group going 49.616 ub the 750TT. His 500 split for his 750 was 33.8! Just amazing Al just get's faster with age. I face him in the sprints tomorrow. Wish me luck!

After the races we had dinner in the track cafeteria and are going to watch the Kilos, before heading to our rooms to rest up for Marsha's 500TT and my sprints tomorrow.

First Full Day

Sun, 11 Sep 2005

Last night after my last update, we got my bike's seatpost fixed and Marsha and I had a good workout on the rollers. It was so humid I must have sweated 3 pounds of salt (probably from the burger in Philly!)

Once we got back to our hotel we had dinner and a beer/wine. By then it was quite late and we passed out at 10pm. Considering how tired we were all day that was quite a feat staying up that late.

We awoke at 8am to our wake-up call. Breakfast was served until 9 and we didn't want to miss that! We had eggs, coffee, toast, coffee, ham, and more coffee. We started to come out of our jet lag haze and had a very nice breakfast with Terry Spradley (Geezer Racing) and his daughter.

Then it was off to the track for our traininig session. We had an hour and a half to get in our warmup and our openers. It went very well as Marsha and I had some good legs and good lungs. I was able to do a standing start with Warren Geissert (my team sprint starter), and it went very well. Warren is a big guy at 210 pounds and puts out a great draft. Marsha did a couple starts and looked very good on the 45 degree banking. She has her first event tomorrow, which is the points race. I expect to send a good result tomorrow. She looks and feels very good on the track. Larry you should be here!

After our workout we had dinner with Dick Keller, Reid Schwartz, Terry Spradley, Shelly Spradley, Warren Geissert and Bill Thompson. We went to the bandstand. This is a restaurant we started going to 3 years ago with Mark Pelletier and Dick Keller, and it has become a tradition. Mark, we miss you this year :-( And no, still no spotted dick for dessert.

We are having a good time and wish you were here!

Arrival

Sat, 10 Sep 2005

Marsha and I are at the track and just finsihed a short workout. We had a good trip here. Our layover in Philadelphia was 6 hours, so we grabbed a train and had lunch in downtown Philly. We had the biggest burger ever made. I swear it was at least 3 pounds of burger!! It was good we had the train to take us back to the airport as I doubt I could have fit into a car after that burger.

After landing in Manchester we arrived at the track and set up our bikes. My seatpost clamp stripped out so we headed over to Harry Hall's bike shop for a replacement. This is the second year in a row they saved me from some broken equipment. We then had our traditional lunch at Pasta Italia and then went to check into our rooms. A little while later we came back to the track for our roller workout which felt very good!

We have already seen many of our old friends and looking forward to seeing many more.

We are having a good time and wish you were here!