Last Season
Not much to say about our local track that finally came to it’s final season besides a lot of sadness that the powers that be could not see the value of this fantastic place. Built in 1990 to be used for the USA Olympic Trials prior to the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, it was a duplicate to the Barcelona track which still exists.
The local cycling community raised a lot of money 5 years ago and made a deal with the NSC Board to allow use for those 5 years and then the track would be permanently closed and demolished. In reality, 30 years on an outside wood track with no covering that was designed to last 20 years is quite impressive. Lots of volunteers spent numerous hours replacing surface boards in those last 5 years and realistically the surface was getting to the point where repairs were constantly needed to allow us to race. Just sad that the board could not figure out how to continue that 30 year tradition.
Looking back at 2019 we can also say, glad our last season wasn’t 2020. We got a full season of successful races, weather wasn’t much of an issue, not sure if we had any race night rain outs. (For those who don’t know, if it rained the track boards got really slippery and dangerous to ride) The last night of racing brought back a number of racers that hadn’t been around for a while, a huge spectator crowd, lots of local TV and print press plus a chance for all involved to say goodbye to a good friend.
It took awhile but the track was finally demolished August of 2020. I would like to say something better will take its place but as far as I know, that isn’t the case. Another open field for a while and then maybe some kind of local school related building. Certainly nothing like the world class facility that existed. The only wood strip Olympic size (250 meter) open air velodrome in the USA.