April submission

(Note, for whatever reason the magazine used last month's headline on this article, an act not duplicated here.)

Track volunteers are (not) like television detectives.

Few things in life match the reality of a television detective show. You know the bit: Well groomed people in cool cars wearing $1,500 suits (on a detective's salary, no less) and, and this is the part that's most annoying, the way stuff just kind of falls in their lap. You got, what, 40 minutes plus commercials in a one-hour show, and in television detective world that's all the time you need to resolve the impossibly complex situation of the moment. It all just comes together: Important clues are left lying out in the open, the super-duper hacker detective breaks into the master computer system to find the crucial bit of data, the rental car had a tracking device (what luck!) or whatever – it just falls into place.

Just like life.

Wait, scratch that: Life does not just fall into place.

Don't believe me? Open a BMX track.

“Now all we have to do is print off motos,” and the printer bursts into flames and, if it's a typical day, figures out a way from behind its wall of elector-mechanical inertness to fire poison darts at anyone in the tower.

“Moto number one, get in the gate,” right about the time the air compressor decides that whole “working” thing is just too much and instead reverts to a paper-weight frame of mind.

On and on, and that's just race day.

If you're reading this magazine you probably already know the sort of last-minute mayhem being referenced, and you also know that BMX – just the rocking on the track part -- takes commitment. Oh sure, it's giant fun getting your moto on and being all groovy while everyone's watching and applauding your awesomeness (really dude, you looked good on that lap), but if you're consistently finishing well then what you really know is that you've been working a lot outside of your (awesome) lap, doing the stuff you need to do to make groovy look easy.

Don't believe BMX takes commitment? Open a BMX track.

Harry Leary once made a statement in an interview, here paraphrased, in that the reason he's kept coming back to BMX, the reason he's kept it up long after most people have moved the bikes to the attic, is because of the way it feels when you're wheeling a bike into the gate.

Yeah man, you know what Harry's talking about: You ducked all the poison darts from that (vile) printer, another role of duct tape and the compressor's happy, and now it's time, race time, time to rock it out. Helmet's on, glove's on, bike's ready, sliding the bike into the lane, fixing to show those other clowns your mad pull as you take off down that smooth front straight and into the first turn .....

Wait, what?

Yeah, the track looks good, good enough to race on. But check it out: Dirt, in its native state, is not smooth. Dirt does not just fall into place and left to its own devices will never make a good BMX track. Dirt, in its native state, is in fact the opposite of smooth. It has stuff in it, not-dirt stuff, and rain makes it sad, groovy in a bad way and too sad to race on.

What makes dirt happy enough to race on? People with rakes. And where do those people come from? They volunteer, and those people make your racing possible, they commit, in this case to do the work outside of race time to get the track in shape enough for you to be groovy.

And I know, if this was a television detective show, that right about now I would (from inside the comfort of my expensive suit) type exactly the words you need to tearfully, but with the joy of newfound resolve, go out to your local track and put in more hours raking, sweeping and grading, ducking the poison darts from the printer or duct taping a possum carcass to the compressor so it'll last for one more night, but seriously, let's not kid ourselves, this is real life. Here in real life time sometimes doesn't work our way, maybe physicality gets in the way, things happen and you can't make it out to work the track and it's left to other people.

So here's what you do: Just walk up to those people, the ones who made the commitment and volunteer, and say “thanks.”

Is that so hard? That's all it takes, just thank a volunteer. And buds, if your track is raceable, it has 'em. You'll be amazed, experience talking here, what that'll do to keep the vibe positive for everyone just by saying thanks. Everybody's happier, even you, from the magic of spreading good vibes.

And hey, no cheating, no sending someone else to do it for you, no waiting 'til next week, and if you're not sure who to thank, ask the track operator, I bet they got a list of names, a long list.

And for doing that, for when I come in from out of town to rock your track which is raceable smooth with a positive vibe, thanks.

So whaddaya' think? Got something you need this column to cover? Got a question you need asked? A subject explored? Bikes? Tracks? People? Stuff? I don't care, I'll ask anybody anything (warning, this also means I'll type up whatever they state, which may include you being a jerk for asking it). Just Email just use the link to the right This is a private Email address so nobody other than me, including the ABA, will see what you wrote. Anonymous Emails to me (“I can't give you my name, but ...”) will be ignored, or possibly mocked.