I'm here to help

Cars are pulling out of the parking lot 25 yards from the finish of the time trial, so I stood there for a bit to make sure the kids who were finishing didn't have to take evasive action a second after crossing the finish line of a time trial. After a few minutes of this, I was told "Please move away from the road. We have racers finishing."

* * * * *

While at the crit, and with the second race on the course, a racer from a later category calls me on the phone and tells me there is a problem on the back side of the course, and hangs up. I'd just seen the field come through, and no kids were hollering "rider down" or anything, so I'm thinking we have an upset local.

Anyway, I run over to the other side of the course and see nothing. I stop, sort of scratch my head, and a rider about half way down the straight waves me over. I walk to him and he says, "If we move these cones and send the racers this way, we can add 600m and two turns to the course."

What would Steve Knight do? I said, "Thanks, but the course is what it is today. Maybe next time. Thanks for coming out. I've got to get back to work on the other side. Sorry."

* * * * * * *

It took until 3pm, but my battery finally died on my phone, so I couldn't take any more calls about "is the bike race still on?" "is the 4,5 race full?" "how many people are registered?" "Is the race at the football stadium? I can't find anyone here." (this particular person went to the UNT stadium) "what's the payout in the 3,4 race?"

* * * * * * * * *

The last call I took was from someone asking what time their race started. He gave me his name and his license number, as if I would have all that memorized. "Oh, license number 123456, your race is at 330."

All I could come up with was, "Ok, did you get my number from the race flyer?"

He says, "Yes" and then he reads me my number.

I said, "Ok, and that flyer is has the list of races and the start times. Do you see it?"

He says, "Yeah. Got it. Are these right?"

And then I just hung up. Bad customer service, I know. But I didn't want the next question to be, "will you chew my food for me and wipe my ass?"


* * * * * * * * * * *

And someone came up and said they won one of the cakes. But they didn't. I really, really hope this was some guy who really thought he'd won it and was mistaken than that he just lied to steal one. I can't believe we have to now have a system for cake prime collection.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

BUT, we had a record turn out for the venue. Some crispy and tired volunteers, but nobody seemed to be saying, "I don't want to do this anymore", like I usually say after putting on a race.


Ok, venting over. Back to work.