Junior Track Cycling

Last Sunday was the first day that the Bay Area’s juniors got to ride on their newly remodeled track. When the Santa Clara County closed down the Hellyer Park Velodrome earlier this year, many track regulars like me were upset. But good news! Even though track refurbishment is not complete, it has now been reopened for riding on the weekends.

There were not as many people as usual, which surprised me, for the track reopening. There were three coaches today, Mr. Jensen, Mr. Kubacki, and Mr. Bohl. Only 10 riders showed up, 4 of which were new to the track, but experienced cyclists. I think that there were less people because of the earlier NCNCA Road Championships.

Coach Jensen said that special priority was being given to the juniors. Instead of having the normal twice a month sessions they would be attempting to have sessions every Sunday, in order to get ready for the State Track Championship on June 16. Updates on session times are at www.ridethetrack.com

Some warm up cycling and basic instruction was done. Then Joel Shaffer showed the younger and newer riders the right technique as he rode around a 40 second 500M. Everyone appeared to be having a good time. The new apron, warm up circle, and pad look great, I can’t wait to be riding on it again.

Andrew McIntire

Well, the season is over for the younger juniors at Hellyer. The last session of 2006 brought warm weather and a great turnout. I’m sure they are looking forward to an even bigger season next year.

Thanks to Rob Jensen, Andrew Lanier, and Glenn Kubacki for running this session, and to all the juniors for making it exciting. There are more pictures on Flickr.

The sessions for ages 10 to 15 are winding up for the year. The last session will be November 5th, and sessions resume on the third Sunday in February.

MikeJ of Chain Reaction Bicycles took some pictures of the session. It looks like quite a good group.

I’m pleased to see that the sessions I helped start (with Steven Woo) are going strong.

This was our first really good turnout for the Spring, thanks to especially wet weather. 11 riders, plus parents and siblings found the back way into the velodrome and got rolling.

We had some regulars, familiar faces from the past, and several brand new riders. Keeping such a diverse group active kept us very busy, but it’s always worth it.

If some of the pictures look a little odd, it’s because I handed off my camera to someone else and didn’t notice it was in full manual mode. Some of the shots were subjected to a lot of processing.

Our fledgling junior program squeezed in another good but small session between storms. We had just three riders, but things may look up when the weather does. The flooded access road isn’t much of a problem currently, since the rangers have agreed to leave the back gate to the park open during riding hours.

Here are a couple of the riders.