ABA Dixieland Nationals - Powder Springs, GA

Made the trip down to "Hotlanta" this weekend. The race was held at the Powder Springs outdoor track for the second year in a row. Before that, it was held in a covered arena at the Cobb county fairgrounds. The last time I'd attended the Georgia national at Powder Springs they had a tornado warning that send everybody scrambling up to the nearby school's gymnasium.
Fortunately, there was none of that this year. I really don't want to harp on the weather this year due to the fact my last two race reports have opened with weather conditions. I will just say that it is amazing what the hard work and experience of the ABA staff will do for a soggy track
There has been a good stretch of nationals the last few weeks and many of the double A's were taking a break. With five double A's in attendance that meant every rider makes it to the main. That was a good thing for Hyper's Lance McGuire.

Lance went down hard in practice and gave the paved turns took a bit of his skin as a souvenir. Lance rolled the gate in order to receive the fifth place finish money.
MCS's Jonathan "Mosquito" Suarez came to the race to pick up a little first place prize money before heading back to Venezuela to see his "hijo de quatro meses" (4 month old baby boy).
Suarez and Psykopath rider Augusto Castro made the racing exciting. There were last straight photo finishes and plenty of bumping in the turn. There's a thread going on over at Vintage about "Rubbing is Racing" and I think that's shown in the photo here.

Castro flew into the first turn and nailed Suarez. You can see it almost ripped Jonathan's shirt off. It sent the two riders high in the turn and ABA photo/editor Dan Mooney got a nice shot of some people standing on the top of the turn jumping for their lives. Luckily nobody went over the turn and, as far as I know, none of the spectators that made the 20+ foot leap got hurt.
One Bike's Harley Kelley and Clayborn's "T-Bone" Tyler Wells stayed in the mix in double A but it was really Suarez and Castro that put on the show. Congratulations to Jonathan Suarez for his FIRST EVER double A pro win.

A Pro had a pretty good turn out with enough riders both days to have semis. UFO/BMXEXTREME brought Eric "The Gangsta" Meyer out from Washington. Eric must have liked the Atlanta scene as he won both days. Eric didn't go unchallenged however. Psykopath's Damian Lopez pulled in the second place behind Eric on Saturday and won one of the mains on Sunday (3 mains for the pros in ABA which are then averaged out). However, the points would put Lopez in the third for Sunday's race. Switching places with Damian on Saturday and Sunday was Barry Nobles. Barry is a former Clayborn rider that now is partnered with John Andrews (Winner of 19-27 Expert on Saturday) developing product for Welham bikes. Make sure to check out their Gnar new web site at WWW.WELHAMBIKES.COM.
Atlanta is one of the rare paved ABA tracks. They are popping up more and more. The cost is significant but the man hours saved in upkeep far outweighs the cost. The only caution for riders however is that you really need to wear gloves and other extra protection when racing at a paved turn track. The surface tends to eat knuckles, palms and elbows for lunch. This was made evident as many riders got up from collisions in the turn checking for lost epidermis. A pro Tim Kniep went down in the first turn on Sunday and got up showing us a bit of his posterior exclaiming "OUCH - My A** !!" (Edited for content).

In the amateur ranks I have to ask myself "What is up with the Minnesotans riding for the Texan Hurricane/Crupi team?". Whatever the deal is with this North/South conglomeration, it's working. Samantha Brethiem pulled off a huge triple on Saturday. Sam won the 13-14 mixed open, 13 Girls, and 11-13 Girls cruiser mains. I believe this is not Sam's first time doing that either. Sam is not only a fast rider but has no fear of the camera as is evident in the photo.
Another of the Minnesota riders who's showing skill that is amazing for his age is Derik Bergh. I noticed Derik's riding ability back at the Minnesota national I covered for the BMXer last year.

This kid is only 9 years old and can peddle over any obstacle with the best of the 17 Experts. I started calling this kid "Double A" when he was doing his "Winner's interview" with Matt (Make sure to check out the site for all the races and interviews with the winners from Atlanta). I hope he gives me some props for calling it when he's racing for the prize money. On Sunday Derik was going for the win again. However, when you have the likes of Alex Jones, DJ Stephan, Richard Doctor, etc. in your class you're not going to have a cakewalk. Unfortunately, many of the riders mentioned locked up in the second straight and went down. I've got to give a BIG UPs to Alex Jones for running his bike the entire third and forth straight showing some awesome fortitude and perseverance.
Even though there were only three riders in the 28 and Over Girl's class, there was some great racing. Revolution's Janet McBride and Iowa's Anna Appleby riding for the Texas Roadhouse Regulators went head to head all weekend. Janet made a great effort but came up a bit short on Anna's power and experience.
Talking about Girl Power, Flyin' Felicia Stancil made her Vendetta sponsor proud by winning 9 Girls and 10 and Under Girl's Cruiser with no problem. Felicia's only problem this weekend was summoning up the courage to go over and talk to the wild style hairdo of our interviewer Matt "Mohican" Hendershot. We'll keep working on getting those interviews from Felicia though. I'm sure there are plenty more wins in her future.
Ok, one thing I’ve noticed lately are the kids starting to try to perfect the "Slingshot" gate. Meyers, you need to LOOSE that gate. Or, maybe try not starting before the cadence button is even pushed - GEEZ! If you want to see a near perfect slingshot, check out Revolution's Ken Gustafson. That kid commits fully and is throwing so hard on the comeback that if the gate doesn't go down he's heading down the starting hill face first. That never happened though. He's definitely got those down. That was apparent in his domination of the 10 year old expert class. The only riders close to “KG” were Colton Carmack and the winner of 10 Cruiser Cameron Lowery.
The 11 Expert class was another standout race. All three winners on Saturday were from West of the Mississippi. Hyper's Chad Kerley, who also rides with skill beyond his age" took the class with Linder's Anthony Lopez and Bellflower's Paul "Balls to the Wall" Wassanaar in second and third. You gotta love Wassanaar's nicknames. I remember last year I had to censor his "Punk Ass" nickname from the BMXer. I think announcer Jim Reilley ended up calling him "Punk Booty" or something like that.

Local boy Brandon Murphy took the win in 12 Cruiser and in his winner's interview we joked with Brandon about cheating 'cause this was his local track. I have to interject here that we were definitely joking. Not only is Brandon a great kid that would never demote himself to cheating, he's also got the skills needed to where he would never have to resort to that.
In 16 Expert Hurricane/Crupi's Jamarcus White and Josh Meyers battled it out all weekend. These two are great friends off the track. However, when they're on the track all bets are off. They didn't ever bang each other or pimp hard in the turns. However, lines were definitely stolen and the racing was exciting.

Meyers pulled off an incredible lap on Sunday after having what I would call the worst gate EVER. Josh took off so early that he had to stop, unclip, take off his helmet, turn around and say "excuse me" to the person behind him who he'd hit with his back tire even though they were about 12 feet behind him. OK, that might be a slight exaggeration. But, it was a bit early to say the least. With that bobble, Jamarcus took the lead easily off the gate. Meyers proceeded to ride with the skill everybody is constantly amazed by. Well, that and he rode with fervor knowing he would get an ear full from his dad all the way back to Treasure Island, Florida if he didn't win - which he did. Anyway, it was some of the best racing all weekend between J-Mar and Meyers.
28-35 Expert has been the home of Spinners/Redline co-TM Bob O'Gorman for the last few years now.

Most of the first place trophies from that class have also ended up with Bob. Sunday was Bob's last national win in that class. He will join his brother and co-TM Shawn in the 36 and Over Expert class by the next national he attends. Seeing as Shawn tends to own the 36 and Over class, this will be some great racing with the "OG" brothers in the same class. Both Bob and Shawn won their respective twenty-inch and cruiser classes both days.

We had a surprise guest/racer this weekend in the form of Atlanta Falcon's defensive end Gabe Nyenhuis. Gabe was signed January 18th 2005 and has played with the Seattle Seahawks as well as Jacksonville Jaguars. Gabe was a Elgin, IL ABA local who dominated his class until the time in which he set off for college. Once Gabe got into the sports scene at Northwestern he put his bike up. However, Gabe has been known to spontaneously show up at tracks and get a couple wins; only to not be seen on the BMX circuit for another periouc. Gabe's mom Sue was instrumental in not only working with the Elgin track but also spent some time over in Europe setting up BMX tracks and organizations. I have not spoken with Sue recently but I'm sure she's out doing good for a great organization today. I asked Gabe if he thought it was risky to race. He just shrugged his shoulders and went up to the gate for his main. Gabe proceeded on to win his 17-24 Open main.
Atlanta was a great race and the people that attended were nothing short of great to the ISTV crew. We had an awesome time going through the audience and doing the interviews. The track has been beaten on by the weather before the national and you have to commend the track operator and staff for pulling it all together to make for a great event.
Make sure to check out the photos from Sunday. Saturday's are good as well but the mix of early morning sun and a perfect Atlanta day really adds to the photos.
Next stop for the ISTV crew and myself is Beaumont, Texas. The track, I'm told, is always built up big. It will also be weather free as it's in a Desoto type covered arena.
See ya there - Jack.