infield scene

The last lazy days of August. This is the guy who just beat me in the Keirin. Hmmm.

Dgc

Dan Currell Executive Director Corporate Executive Board 571 303 6946

The Underbelly

I wish I could upload a sound - you can hear the riders rolling about you from underneath the track. It sounds like - well, like a bunch of bicycles rolling on a suspended wooden floor.

Dgc

Dan Currell Executive Director Corporate Executive Board 571 303 6946

What is the Track?

A few track racers have been kicking around ideas on what the track is and means to us on an email discussion, and I thought I'd post my comments here.

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The track is a minority culture, akin to people who keep a small language alive, the Birkebeiner, the Irish monasteries, or baroque chamber music. It's part of who we are, but we can't do it alone, and you can't teach it to yourself. It can only happen in a group, and it's too rich to master. It is an end in itself, and causing it to happen can be a life's work. There is no economic explanation for why anyone does it; it's above commerce. It doesn't put food on the table; it's why we eat. This describes anything that's a piece of the culture - it makes us better because we do it, and that's all it needs to do.

I think about it this way because I'm too old to consume our culture; at this age, I need to produce it. Dave and Bob and Bruce and Linsey and several others are essential to producing this piece of our culture, because without them there would be nothing but a track - and having a dead track would almost be worse than having no track at all. It is a soul-sucking experience to talk to someone in L.A. about the state of track racing there at the Carson facility. They've got Carnegie Hall and no musicians. It's literally tragic. I realize they're trying to fix this now, but the fact is that Carnegie Hall has been predominantly silent there for years now because of a failure of the *culture*. They have the facility, but that doesn't make track racing happen. Track racing is a cultural occurrence, not a thing. The track, while necessary and expensive, is a dependent arising - it depends on people.

If we lose track racing in Minnesota, we will lose one of the healthiest pieces of track racing in America. This is equivalent to the extinction of a species, the loss of a minority language, or the disappearance of an artisan skill. Those things are ends in themselves, so the value of the loss when they disappear can't really be calculated. It's not to say they are infinitely valuable - just that the loss is on another plane.

There's obviously more to this conversation, but my point is that we are more indebted than we know to those who have made this a piece of their life's work, both as racers and as officials/organizers/supporters.

Dan Currell Executive Director Corporate Executive Board 571 303 6946

Match Sprint Videos

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XVZdXZwEc8&feature=plcp

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiycKbWnuEM&feature=plcp

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfIEUFeEtpQ&feature=plcp

Rain

We succumbed to rain after getting a few races in. Too bad - but we did get the womens' state points race championship done, and GP's Abby Ruess won it in a squeaker - it was a great race!

Dgc

Dan Currell Executive Director Corporate Executive Board 571 303 6946