Its official..

I wasn’t going to talk about it much till the season was over but since most people know already I’ll just put it out there. Yeah, I’m switching to Haymarket for next season, for a couple of reasons. They are closer to my home, the shop has kept me going and I feel I can pay them back a little for all their help, I have been envying teams for the past 2 years and I’m really excited to be joining one (the biggest reason). I really liked all the guys at Evo and they helped me become a half decent racer, and that was the hardest part. I know they want to have an Elite team and they really wanted to keep me but I don’t think an unknown cat 3 who has been racing for 2 years could recruit an elite team so I took the easy way out. I’m looking forward to being able to do some work for my new teammates. I really think that I’ll make a good addition to the team as I think I’ll be the only TT specialist.

About the Bar and other racing..
So I found myself in contention (if the stars align) for the bar without even thinking about it but with only 4 events left it seems like a possibility. After my complete failure at Page Valley Brandon Lumm (nice guy) scored 9 more points. After spending a night sorting thru all the bullshit I have heard about these bonus points and I have heard a lot. I’ve been told I get them from moving to 3’s from the 4’s and or Brandon would get them if he upgrades to a 2. I heard anywhere from 10 to 35 point. Well, here is the rule in question.

7.b. Any Novice rider who moves from the Novice class to the Senior class as a result of a voluntary or forced upgrade of USAC racing category receives a o­ne-time 25 point bonus in the Novice BAR In addition, Novice class riders may not earn more than 150 points in a single season. Any placings in excess of this level will not score toward the BAR

So, unlike I had thought from what people had been saying that my current 65 point had an additional 25 added to them and Brandon and I were tied with 90. WRONG , I get 25 points added to my placing in the cat 4 bar and zero in the 3’s. So as far as I can figure Brandon now has 99 points 34 more than I do and still 36 points back from Win Elliot. And unlike what people had been saying I can’t find it anywhere that getting upgraded takes you out of contention for your BAR (looks like you where right Pete). But going from a 3 to a 2 has no reward, the bonus only applies from novice to senior.

There is still another 86 points to be had. I will screw myself right now by saying that I should have 51 points in the bag unless someone else has been doing 52 minute timetrials using an alias or I flat again (guaranteed to happen now). But that only puts me at 116 so I’ll need to get 20 more points from the hill climb and turkey day. Fuck this is going to be hard. So at least if I fail at the hill climb I can just say screw it and upgrade after the TT and start working at getting points for my cat 1. Yeah I want to be a 1, that is another reason why Haymarket was my choice. I want to race in the big races that are invitation only, and they get invited thanks to Jared. So on Tim Rugg’s cue my season goals where
1) Go from cat 4 to 2 (Check)
2) Win every type of race ;RR, Crit, TT, GC (Everything but the GC)
3) Make an elite team (Check)

My lifetime goals coming out of this season.
1) 4 more years of Base Possible if my knee can take it
2) Cat 1 I think I can get it with GC result from my TTing
3) Sub 50 minute 40k Just a dream but better to dream big
4) Masters Nationals TT see above
5) Get on the track Just have to drive 3 hours so should be easy
6) Be in a break that makes it with Rugg, we must have been in 5 failed breaks this year.