Mornin' Pirates! The BMX scene has awoken. After a long winter
break and a cancelled National Association Championship two
weekends ago, we competed in the first race of the Federal League
in Erlangen with a new team, last weekend.
Old faces like Jenny, Simon, Melissa and J-J and the new ones,
Stefan, Thorsten and Sascha joined us there. Unfortunately,
Steffi couldn't participate in this race, but will definitely
be in the one in Esselbach.
We arrived Friday in the afternoon, so that they could ride
a few practice laps.
The first evaluation rounds took place on Saturday, starting
with the 20" division, but first they ran the track training.
Der ersten Wertungsläufe starteten am Samstag mit der 20" Klasse,
vorab lief aber noch das Bahntraining.There was quite a commotion
amongst the riders, because a heavy wind was sweeping across
the track. Clearly the big double and the step-double would
be the challenges of the day.
After conversations with the riders the consensus was: "Not
enough training over the winter and then right into the whole
Federal League program".
In the Junior division 20", 33 starters were registered
and all of them had one goal; to stand on the podium at the
end. Simon and Stefan were amongst them. Simon made it to the
semifinal on both days, where he was eliminated in 5th place
on Saturday and in 6th place on Sunday.
Stefan did not give away a single place in all of his runs,
despite an injury (ski accident) and came in 1st on every run.
His intention was to sell himself as well as possible, which
he obviously accomplished. No one could mess with him on Sunday
either. He won every run ranked number 1.
Melissa (Women's Youth, with 32 starters in the Women's Elite)
has to compete with the Women's Elite starting this year, where
she has some pretty fierce competition. However, she did a good
job and went into the semifinal in third place where she was
just barely eliminated in 5th place.
On Sunday the group was mixed a little differently, but she
made the semis again. Unfortunately, the final was not in the
cards.
Jennifer (Elite Women) was also able to keep up well with the
competition and made it to the semifinals too, coming in in
3rd, 4th and 4th, where she reached the end in 6th place on
both days.
Thorsten, a climber to the Elite Men surprised everyone with
his preliminary runs on both days, which he absolved in 1st
place almost every time.
On Saturday he made it beyond the quarter and semifinals into
the final, where he came in in a passable 6th place. On Sunday
he did similarly well, but here he was forced to admit defeat
in the semis.
Jens-Jörg (J-J) was a double starter (20" Elite Men and
24" Cruiser Elite) on both days. In the 20" J-J made
it to the final on Saturday, where he left the race in 5th place.
Unfortunately, it was over after the semifinal on Sunday. Starting
this year J-J is backed up by Sascha in the 24" Cruiser
division.
Wow, what a team!
On Saturday, no actually on both days, nothing was stopping
those two.
Luckily, they weren't riding in the same preliminaries and so
they were both able to run in some 1st places and points.
On Saturday there was a semifinal and they both of them went
on to participate in the final.
J-J flew out first, while Sascha slept through the start, because
the stoplight wasn't working correctly. J-J stayed in 1st all
the way across the finish line and Sascha made up five places
and crossed the finish line in 3rd.
On Sunday they only had preliminaries and a final.
The preliminaries went just as they had on Saturday, but the
final was aawwesome.
J-J took off in 1st and Sascha was glued to his bike. The two
guys distanced themselves from the rest of the group, which
could only watch them disappear, all the way to the end.
1st and 2nd place for PIRATE.
The weekend was a complete success for me.
Greetings to the riders. Keep it up.Viele Grüße an die Fahrer,
macht so weiter.
Of course, also greetings to all Pirate fans
from
Jürgen
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