Gold Cup Finals - North Central

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Mankato BMX has been around on the Minnesota BMX scene since the early
80's, and after out-growing their original locations, the City gave
them a new patch of cornfield around 2016 - where they finally got to
host a "big one" - the North Central Gold Cup Finals. They've been
waiting over three decades for this opportunity - and their
hard-workin' crew of volunteers were anxious to show off the fairly-new
Mankato BMX facility, with it's fresh asphalt turns and super-wide
straightaways!


--- up 5 weeks, 1 day, 6 hours, 50 minutes
* Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (24:150/1)

Gold Cup Finals - South East

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Story and pics by James Pennucci

This year the DK Bicycles Gold Cup South East Finals were held at one of the fas
test BMX tracks in Alabama - Circle City BMX, in Dothan.
If trying to claim one of the coveted Gold Cup Plates brought you to Circle City
BMX for your first time you might have been surprised when you first saw the tr
ack layout. The track starts out normal with a huge covered staging area, which was great for this weekend with the threat of all-day rain on Sunday, but when y
ou get
into the gate, that’s where things start to change. Not only is the starting hil
l very steep, but that grade continues all the way down to the first turn. White
knuckle high speed first straight
drag racing at its finest, then you mix that speed with an assortment of jumps a
long the way and it turns up the excitement level to an eleven! The first turn i
s not very tall however it is
about two hundred and seventy degrees of fun, and when you go into there two-wid
e it is hard not to bang bars with your opponents. Now you might be doing some q
uick math in your head
and thinking two hundred and seventy degrees that almost sounds like you are goi
ng to run into the first straight, and you would be correct. Just like the racin
g on that 70’s era Criss Cross
Crash Hot Wheels race track you may have grown up playing with you are heading r
ight back across the first straight, and that could have been exciting enough by
itself, but not for the
team that designed this track. The giant tabletop on the first straight is reall
y a four way intersection style tabletop so you jump it on the first straight an
d hit that exact same jump
diagonally on the second straight. The landing from your first straight crossing
sends you speeding into the entrance of turn two and sweeping you back in the s
ame direction as the first
straight. The third and fourth straights are made up mostly of super deep rhythm
sections, so you really get a workout after the thrill ride of the first two st
raights ends.

Unlike years in the past, Friday night this year ended up being a Last
Chance Qualifier not a pre-race, so you could come to the finals with
only one Qualifier and pick up your required second one the night
before the finals. The first two days of racing had perfect weather it
was warm and sunny, but Sunday started out raining and rained almost
until the end the main events. Now with it raining on Sunday, that
really changed things up because that downhill first straight into a
low turn was downright treacherous when it was wet. The slip and slide
nature of that turn took out a lot of riders, especially inexperienced
riders that tried to run low, and I am sure changed the finish order
for a lot of moto’s jumbling up the points. After short while the local
track volunteers went out there in the rain and dried the first turn
with some propane flame throwers and leaf blowers between moto’s, while
others pushed the water off with a broom on the flat spots, and that
really made a huge difference for the remaining laps.

Overall it was a great weekend of super-fast racing with about 120
moto’s Saturday and Sunday, and a lot of happy riders going home with
Gold Cup Plates.

--- up 5 weeks, 1 day, 6 hours, 50 minutes
* Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (24:150/1)