43. Bremer 6-Tage-Rennen, Day 4

Stadthalle Bremen, now the AWD Dome.

The crew
Five and a half of us went to the races today. Besides Bob and myself, some good friends of mine came along. Holger, who was with us the previous day, brought his girlfriend Sarah, his new daughter Marlene, and his sister Constanze, who all enjoyed the racing very much.

Holger, (Marlene), Constanze, and Sarah.

In fact, today was family matinée, which meant that the audience was larger and younger than on any other night thus far. As you can see in the picture below, the organizers even opened up another set of stands, higher up in the hall.

The family matinee filled the hall.

Later, we ran into Kurt and Karen, who were here from North Carolina. Kurt has a company called Ergotech Cycling Dynamics, and in his free time takes care of the track in Asheville, a converted Nascar track, which is sometimes used by the crazy riders from Lees-McRae college, of which Luke Winger is clearly the craziest.

Kurt, Bob, and Karen

As it turned out, Kurt had some business with Erik Zabel about a custom bike Zabel had ordered at Interbike in Las Vegas last fall, and they actually managed to meet up after the races. Zabel then invited him to have dinner with all the other riders, which was pretty exciting for Kurt. Bob, Karen, and I just waited outside until Kurt was done. That was slightly less exciting, but Kurt will be back on Tuesday, and there is a good chance that we will meet the big man himself. Expect a report.

Kurt did ask Zabel if he was going to win. To which: "That's the plan." So there.

35 years of sixdays racing experience on one cot.

The race
Once again, not too much to report here. The official results are here. Today's session started only eight hours after the previous one finished, and the riders were instructed to save themselves for Monday, which marks the biggest day with the final madisons. And save themselves they did. The racing was not slow, of course, but lacked the fire of Saturday night. Once again Kappes/Mohs took the lap record, but even they were unable to go below 9 sec. Compare that to their time to 8.86 seconds on Friday. You get the idea.

Of course, the leaderboard changed a little bit, but it could not be any closer, and Fulst/Lampater will not stay on top for long.

The old guard and the new.


The other race
Not only the pros were racing yesterday, but also those far from pro. The stationary racing clearly reached its climax when I challenged the old man to a duel, eye to eye, two minutes, just man against machine. Well, two minutes came and went. Bob and I both went about 1.5 km during that time, although really we didn't. That's virtual racing for you. We then spent another fifteen minutes or so trying to keep our Currywurst mit Pommes down and went back to the track, where Klaus und Klaus und Klaus had finally finished their show.

Ben "Fatman" Richter and Bob "Grandpa" Williams, eye to eye in a 2 minute time trial. No records were set.

A tribute to Bonnie Tyler
Today we shunned both Bonnie and the Klauses. Enough is enough, to be honest. But for you, dear reader, I must keep the legend alive. If you have not yet seen the following homage to Bonnie by Hurra Torpedo, please enjoy.