Elvis Gets the Final Word on Desoto
KY models the newest hoodie-over-helmet fashions. Goggles, in this case, were doing more to keep warm in than roost out.
We never really closed out our coverage of the ABA Super Nationals in Desoto. First it was thawing out, then spending 15 hours in a confined space to get back to base, then the inevitable cold & flu that ensued. But Elvis dutifully, and immediately filed this report within hours of the last gate. We were just waiting to post it until we had a more robust report to tag along with it. Well, that ship has sailed, so we submit, for your approval, the following missive from Mr. Elvis.
It was cold in DeSoto, very cold.
The Titanic got wet, very wet.
It was freezing; it was nuts.
Friday was typical Texas weather for the day before the first day of Spring, pleasant, mild, all that. Then, it came. “It” being some mad-dog cold front moving in the mad-dog tradition, just ripping across the Texas prarie and smacking the central Texas area up the side of its head.
The temps dropped, and kept dropping, and the wind came up, way up, howling up. Then, oh man, it snowed, beginning Saturday night and on-and-off into Sunday morning as flurries blew through, carried by that cold relentless winds knocking that early Spring weather out of the way, way out. Bears repeating: It was nuts. Sunday morning, second day of Spring, scraping the snow off the windshield to drive to the track through flurries.
In the middle of this Spring-Winter madness: Sunday motos. Actually surviving Sunday motos despite the cold. The trick was to do everything you could not to interact with the weather. Listen on the radio for the motos. Everybody has a routine, and time to start getting ready, little rituals to warm up, but that was out the window. Instead you sat with the heater going until the last possible minute, then quick, helmet on, gloves (hoodie already under jersey since leaving the motel that morning), out of the car, grab the bike, staging, trying to time it so you’re there with as few motos as possible between you and get-in-your-lane time.
Stretch? In this cold? It’s 32 on the dashboard thermometer, stretching is for warm people. Just get this over with, wait ’til the last possible second to get out in it.
In the staging area hiding behind a vendor’s trailer trying to block the wind as best you can, tight-lipped jokes with your buds, “We must be crazy to be out here.” Already the cold numbing fingers and toes (mesh shoes seemed like a good idea once).
There it is, your moto called, out from behind the trailers and up and around (“excuse me, ‘scuse me, ‘scuse, coming through”) now in the lane trying to find something to duck behind, keeping the wind off as best you could, some guys are taking off outer jackets now. You’re up, rope up, climb the hill MAN it’s cold.
Time to get racy, shut the outside world part of the brain off, it’s race time, focus, move up, behind the gate, focus, clear, (MAN it’s …. stop it, race time) sliding into the gate, clip clip, set steady, cadence.
The racing was racing, except the cold effect made everyone move a little slower overall. And if you let your brain relax you’d really feel it coming down the third straight which had an open shot at that mad-dog prairie wind.
Finish line, quick nods around then back to the car, get the heater going, get in, gloves off, helmet, warm, please, the first puffs of not-cold from the vents and set the fan to stun, trying to get as much heat, and feeling back in toes, as possible before you have to go up again.
Listening to motos on the radio, feeling the occasional gust shake the car. Everybody’s got a routine, nobody’s got one for this weather.
Yes, it was cold in DeSoto.
