October 06, 2012 (London, ON) – The Coulier Memorial 6Day continued on Friday evening at the Forest City Velodrome in London Ontario. The atmosphere was tense as the riders arrived for the second night of racing, many of the athletes are just getting their track legs back and a few of the teams are struggling with the pace of the race.
The tight 2 1/2 hour show, puts a ton of pressure on the riders to be able to race and recover in a short period of time. Each evening has over 90 minutes of Madison action with Elimination & Scratch races to add variety to the program. The comments from the racers over the first two nights of racing is that the racing has been clean and green with only one mishap in the “B” Elimination race on night #2.
The racing action continues on Saturday evening at 7pm. Featured on Saturday night Program will be our youngest racers (ages 9 – 14) our Velo-Kids will be taking part in a Hand-cap tournament.
How Night #2 unfolded:
From the opening whistle, the teams were interested in one thing and one thing only, that was putting Team London #1 (Aitcheson & Mason) on the defensive. They had to chase every move in the opening 30 minute madison. The Can-Am Team (Joe Brennan & Quinn Hanam) were the first team to attack after the initial neutral period. In the first 4 minutes of racing the Can-Am team had a lap back which they lost on the opening evening. The attacks were relentless in the first 15 minutes…. this reporter thought “tired legs…. what tired legs”.
After the first set of sprints, the teams settled into a tempo pace until the first crowd Preem was announced…. $50.00 for first only. The cards went in the air and speed immediately put 2 of the teams in trouble. The Preem came down to an all out sprint for the line between, Team London #1 (Cam Mason) and Team Delhi (Mike Renneboog), both teams had put a sizable gap on the field and took the advantage into the final 1/2 lap when Team Delhi, came over the top on the home stretch and took the cash by .021 of a second (tire width).
In the second Madison of the night, Team Niagara (Chris Singleton & Brian Trafford) went into the race wanting points to get back on even terms with the leaders. They were successful, as the attack that went away after the first 10 minutes lasted a solid 14 minutes, they gathered up maximum points, and put 2 team (Team London #2 McDonald & Power) & Team Toronto Mike Nuttall & John Hueston) in a world of hurt, they lost 2 laps in the process.
Four teams continued to battle at the front to stay on even turns with the Niagara boys. After 30 minutes of all out racing where many subsitutes were used by several teams, Team Niagara closed the gap on the leaders by scoring 30 extra points on the night. Team London #1 has a lap on the field, however once Niagara scores 10 more points they will on the same lap.
Saturday night will be the night where there will be a separation of teams as the legs will start to get very heavy. The racers will have to be 100% committed to attacking and counter-attacking during both Madison’s.
The Aylmer Express has an interesting fundraising initiative going on the for the next week. An autographed 2010 World Champion’s Jersey, by Thor Hushovd (Norway) is being raffled off over the next week, and will be drawn on the last night of racing.
Racing starts at 7pm tonight, Adult admission is $10.00, Seniors $5.00, Kids are alway “FREE”.
Full results HERE.