Holeshot goes to the #661
Daudt takes the lead and Shawn is following close behind. Unfortunately. Mechanical forces Shawn to get the black flag and his race is over. When Shawn and two others collided his side panel popped loose and after a quick lap of 'the wing' flailing around it finally came off and because it was the clutch side they had to DQ us from that heat.
Sport Heat One
Because of a clerical error Shawn was left off the "racers board" and had to get pencilled in as last gate pick for every race today. Which kills my strategy for gate picks and kills Shawn's confidence since we basically don't get to pick our gate.
And with that, Shawn gets pinched off the start and is in last going up the hill again. But in a show of true Mountain Riding fashion Shawn KILLS it going downhill and passes himself into 3rd!!! One whoops section later and half way around the next righthander Shawn tips over by himself and gets pinned under the sled....dejected, he gets help from a course worker and finishes his laps by himself. This meaning that we don't make the night show today.
Two last place finishes in his first two heats does not bode well when there are 90-some people vying for 10 spots in the final. However, we still have some racing before the day is over and I want Shawn to put every effort into finishing well as he can. Our last day of the season is Sunday. And every race he's getting better and better. We'll use these last two heats as practice and go into tomorrow with a head full of steam. It's our last kick at the can and our last chance to show everyone that the boys from the WestCoast will be back for another year!
Well the second heat of Amateur didn't go as planned. Altho Shawn crested the start hill in 2nd and held onto third coming down the hill until the chicane portion of the track where he got booted off track by a kamikaze move by another sledder. Instead of using the race line and jumping out of the chicane the 4th place rider cut the corner and dove right underneath Shawn. Shawn basically landed on the guy sideways and that's all she wrote. Two different lines converged and only room for one sled. He came back to pass one more sled and was hot on the heels of 5th place but he couldn't muster any better in the short 3 lap Heat. Amateur is done for the day and Shawn has that fire lit for the second Sport Heat. He's worked up pretty good so hopefully that means he comes out for the final race of the day guns a blazin'.
I was kinda thinking this may happen, a repeat of bad gating and a jacked up elbow saw Shawn ride to a 7th place finish to round out the day in his last Sport race.
Meow it's time for a hot tub, maybe a lazy river run and some pizza. Then back to the track to watch tonight's finals.
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