Episode 65
Join us for the very first podcast of 2023 as we invite our very own Community Programs Manager, Dave Underhill, into the Studio. Dave is excited to tell us and the Valley Preferred Cycling Center Community all about the new additions and changes to the current program offerings, as well as sharing a little bit about his history in the sport. As a bonus, listen all the way till the end to hear about the nuances of officiating an Elimination race. It’s a great way to start off the year.
Thanks to B Braun Medical Inc. for sponsoring the Talk of the T-Town Podcast. BBraun is a global leader in infusion therapy and pain management, B Braun develops, manufactures and markets innovative medical products to the healthcare community. They are also strong believers in supporting the quality of life in the communities where their employees work and live.
Transcript
Maura Beuttel:
Broadcasting to you from the Valley Preferred Cycling Center. This is the Talk of the T-Town podcast where we discuss all things track cycling. Hello everybody and welcome back to this week’s Talk of the T-Town episode. I am this week’s host, Maura Beuttel stepping in for Andrew. And our guest this week is someone that if you’ve raced here, if you’ve come and done programs here, you’ve definitely seen him around the track. He’s raised here himself, he’s been an official, and now he is our community programs manager. And without further ado, our guest, Dave Underhill.
Dave Underhill:
Ah, good morning. Good morning.
Maura Beuttel:
Thanks for coming on the pod, Dave. So we wanted to bring you on the pod to talk about the community programs for people that don’t necessarily know what they are, if they have kids, and want to get them into the programs here at the track. And I also understand that we have some changes coming to what those look like this year.
Dave Underhill:
Oh, yeah. 2023 is going to be a big year. Our community programs have a long history at the track. I’ve just started last year and had a quick trial by fire and I’ve learned a lot during last year’s programs and we’ve taken what I’ve learned and what Andrew and I have discussed and learned. And we’re going to create a much fuller program for this summer. A lot more opportunities to get kids on bikes.
Maura Beuttel:
Yeah, I know we’re definitely looking forward to it. Starting to climb back out of the hole that was COVID and seeing more kids on the track and getting them through the programs and seeing that filter into racing as well.
Dave Underhill:
I’ll just jump in and talk about some of the programs, some of the things we’re doing. So for our youngest folks, the Squirts & Wee Wobbles and the Pee Wee Pedalers, not much is changing their. Last year, we got feedback from new parents and we’ve extended, we went through September. We will do that again this year and give more opportunities for the little ones that maybe don’t have a great sense of balance yet.
Get them off their training wheels and then as they get a little more skilled and little more independent, get them on our track. We also teach them basic bike rodeo skills, stopping, starting and ensuring that they fully understand how to use their brakes and ride their bike safely. Even drills such as turning back and looking, that they’ll know to look for cars and things like that. Once they’re old enough and ready to venture on roads, it should be second nature.
Our big change for this year is our youth cycling the eight to 16 year olds. We have our traditional Monday, Wednesday mornings in the summers from 08:10 to 10:00, but we’re also adding weekends. So we’ll have a Saturday series that runs from May through September. And then we’ll actually have two Sunday series.
We’ll split them up. And again, it’s the May through September, we’ll just have a divider line in the middle of the season. So [inaudible 00:03:22] more opportunities to get kids out there. And that’s the real fun group with that eight to 16 year olds. And then we also have our BRL changes. Which, last year we did the spring BRL. And in talking with the kids, the parents, we said, okay, we’re going to try to do a fall BLR. That was quite successful and we had a lot of fun.
We had a lot of kids. Again, I’ve learned some lessons and so we’ll change the format a little bit. But in realizing these opportunities, what we’re going to do this year is add a summer BRL. And this way we’ll have more opportunities during the summers. It’ll be in the evenings. And also listening to feedback from parents, we’re going to shift the hours a little bit. 5:30 to 7:30 to help folks to get off from work, be able to bring their kids to the velodrome.
And we’re going to change the format a little bit. Each BRL, spring, summer and fall, we’re going to have our individual competitions, but we’re going to have a season long competition.
Maura Beuttel:
I like that.
Dave Underhill:
And so when you join one team, whether you’re here just for one season, one session, or if you participate in all three, we’re going to keep scores throughout the season and we’re going to have winners for the overall season, whether the Bolts or the Flames. We will have the award ceremony.
And what we’re going to do is for each session, spring, summer, and fall, we’re going to have special activities for the last day. So the spring and summer will have their big races on Friday Night Under the Lights. In the fall, we don’t have any more Friday Night Under the Lights, but we’re going to have a season end picnic. It’s something we want to do for our community and we want to bring in our volunteers and the people that worked with the track, worked for the track and have a big year end picnic. And that’s where we want to showcase our BRL. For the final races. And that’s where we’ll have our season championships and ceremonies and it’ll be in front of the velodrome community.
Maura Beuttel:
Very nice. Always good to foster a little bit of friendly competition and have that in front of the whole community, cheering them on. That’s great. So going back to the Air Products, youth cycling changes for having those Saturday and Sunday extra sessions in there running from May through August. We have racing on Saturday. So is that going to be after racing then or?
Dave Underhill:
Yes. So we actually will have very full weekend schedules in 2023. So after Masters and Rookies, our traditional Saturday offering, what actually we’ll have next is part of our new try the track program. And that will run for four hours total on Saturdays. And then we will have our youth cycling after that.
Maura Beuttel:
Very nice.
Dave Underhill:
So I guess since I mentioned it, our try the track is going to be changing. So we traditionally had a single four hour class and some folks thought it was kind of long, so it was split up a couple of years.
Maura Beuttel:
A lot of information all at once.
Dave Underhill:
Yeah, yeah. I’m going to get this all done in 10 minutes and then you’re going to say, “Okay, what are we going to talk about?” You’ll have to listen to me a reminisce about the old days or something. But we had split it to one and two, whereas one was kind of focused on getting on the track and two was kind of focused on getting you ready to race. And the reason it’s always been a four hour session was to meet a requirement from USA Cycling to be upgraded from category five or what’s now called a novice racer to category four.
And in looking at the past couple of years, we really haven’t raced category five separately. We’ve been combining them with the fours. And it’s been four, five racing. So we started looking at, okay, how can we make try the track program one a little more informative, a little more open to casual riders potentially. Because folks may want few hours of lessons and education but not necessarily have to feel obligated to have to jump into racing.
And so we decided to make it a six hours series total, two hours each. We’re going to call them, try, ride and race the track. And the try will be, hey, this is what a velodrome is, some interesting factoids, some history. And get folks on a track bike. Get them to see what it’s like to ride a fixed gear bike with no brakes. And then get on a track and get a feel for it. And see if it’s something they like or not. And without any need to push people and say, okay, we’re going to pair you up and race against this person.
It’s going to be just kind of a casual, hey, this is what it feels like to ride the bike. And anyone that has a minimum amount of balance should be able to do try the track and have some fun. So that’s a two hours session that we’re going to have separately for the try system. And then the ride and race are the two classes that we’re going to use to qualify people to become category four racers. And those two classes, well, the ride the track, we’re going to basically give you orientation onto riding a track, doing pace lines. How to maneuver on the track, how to react to different speeds. Proper etiquette while riding on the track.
They don’t have to scream rail half a lap away, but if you hear the word rail, know what it means and be prepared.
Maura Beuttel:
And act accordingly.
Dave Underhill:
What’s coming from behind you. And then the race the track that will be dedicated to learning different types of race formats and practicing them and doing them and getting firsthand experience. One of the key things that anyone who’s doing the try the track with me is, we’ll also teach you how to keep pedaling after you sprint. Because after you sprint, you’re done and you want to stop. And on a track bike you got to keep pedaling. And I will go pedal, pedal, pedal until my throat is course. But it’s a new opportunity to maybe encourage more people to try the track.
And then a certification program will help make our cat four or five type racing safer. Because we’re looking at having everyone to be cat fours to race with us on Saturdays. And so in order to accomplish this, these programs are being offered very frequently. In the beginning of the season it’s going to be every weekend starting in April. And it’ll taper off just so that in September, we’ll probably only have one complete series. But we always have people that are always, “Oh, yeah. I want to become a cat four.” And it’s September and it’s [inaudible 00:10:38].
Maura Beuttel:
We’re like, we’re not having racing until next May.
Dave Underhill:
Well, so we don’t normally offer it that late, but we are trying to have a full season to maximize the use of the track during the warm weather. We might start off chilly in April, but we’re going to get out there and try out. Get folks out there that want to do it because I’m coming here to the velodrome, 30 degrees outside and I see people riding their bikes leaving [inaudible 00:11:04] velodrome. So if it’s only 55 in April, it’s still good to ride the bike.
Maura Beuttel:
Hey, as long as the sun is out and there’s no rain or snow, have at it.
Dave Underhill:
I mean, we do have some of our enthusiastic riders here that will shovel snow off the track in order to get their training going. Which is, when you’re actually shoveling snow off the track, my first hand experience, it is quite slippery. So I don’t recommend that for the faint of heart and I now have my lesson. I know [inaudible 00:11:41] when it’s snowy. Maybe I’ll supervise or something like that.
Maura Beuttel:
Right. Yeah, I think the try the track program is probably the most well-rounded thing we can offer to the community in really getting people in here and understanding that we’re not just a place for elite athletes to come and watch racing. And I think a lot of people don’t necessarily understand that. So breaking it down into smaller, more bite sized chunks and having that first class being like, “Okay. Well, this is what the place actually is and what it actually does.”
And then filtering into the next section of it and teaching them how to train on the track and what all of the etiquette is and what the words mean. That I think filters into the next area, not necessarily… Well, yes. Going into the next racing part of try the track to get that certification, but also into the next change that we have coming for this season, which is switching to more of a membership based model. So getting those people knowing how to train so then they can actually use the facility and come get a good workout in.
Dave Underhill:
Yes. Let me think. I’ll say that mid-January probably we’ll have most of this finalized and on our website. So this is basically a preview. But yeah, we’re looking at having a low cost membership for riders. It’ll be in tens of dollars that will basically give you an opportunity to be able to ride on the track. And we have some confidence. We’re still going to have some public hours if people just want to come by themselves, but they’re going to be limited because we will have a lot of programming. And we will have basically members only time for people to ride on the track.
And then we’ll actually have different types of times, we’ll have training times, we’ll have motor times and we’ll also have structured training classes. Which will be led by coaches and we’ll have exercises and drills or lessons for folks. And they’re not necessarily only for racers.
So we’ll have three levels of structured training classes. The highest level will be motor pacing and it’ll be a motor pacing coach that will run the class. It’s open to basically the membership and the folks that are part of that class structure. And it will be an opportunity to also learn how to be motor paced. And of course not anyone coming off the street could jump into motor pacing right away. So that’s why we have three levels.
And so the level one could be basically the non-racers, an exercise class. Kind of more fitness oriented. We’ll have some drills, you’ll be able to apply some of the skills that you may learn in ride the track, in those types of classes. So that when you’re doing pace lines and things, you’ll be able to do them properly and safely. And we’ll also have some drills that get you comfortable riding with other people and close to other folks.
And the level two would be more of a training specific, hard efforts, sprint type things. Be good training exercises. And level two is kind of the cross between, okay, we got some racers that are getting in training, and maybe we have some advance folks from the area. Lehigh Wheelmen and different organizations that, hey, they want to ride 25, 30 miles per hour for a few laps and if they’re going to ride, if they could ride safely.
And we’ll work on making sure that all that does happen safely and be able to have more opportunities to ride the track and enjoy themselves and have fun. So that maybe the Derby isn’t the only place where people go out and go hard.
And then I guess we’ll jump back to the try, ride and race is I’m actually going to open up the age groups a little more. Bring it down to nine years old because part of what we want to do for BLR, which is nine to 16, is have an introductory session that’s equivalent to try, ride and race in the evenings for BRL kids. Well, I want to open up our [inaudible 00:16:04] try, ride, and race so that they could also, if they’re only available on the weekends, be able to basically qualify for BRL. And then the last way is if you do youth cycling in the summer, you could qualify for the fall BRL after that because BRL is kind of community racing. It’s not hardcore. You have to have a license. You’re in training and you’re going for the BRL National Championships.
But we also want folks to have plenty of opportunity to be smart, be able to ride a bike, be able to react when you’re maybe going fast and people are going slow in front of you. And we want to be able to use the dynamics of the track and expectations, other riders so that you can come up on a group of folks that are going slower than you and properly react to the situation. So we’re going to have a lot of opportunities for kids to get smart enough and qualify for BRL. And part of that is rather than going from 12 to adult, we’ll drop it down to nine to adult.
And the question I got asked most last year was, wherever we put an age limit, “My son or my daughter is one year younger, two years younger.” And, “Can I get them in? Can I get my child into this program?” And that’s been a question over and over again. So I do want to make it more feasible, more possible to have more kids in the programs, but we also want them to be old enough and mature enough to ride safely on our track.
Maura Beuttel:
That’s definitely the most important thing is safety. And then it’s just, it’ll be nice to see this summer having a full track. Seeing people here all the time utilizing the facility and just having those opportunities available for everybody.
Dave Underhill:
And also part of the new format of what we’re doing with membership is that… I don’t know if either of you know that my nickname… But most people called me the tax collector this past summer. Because whenever I showed up they knew that they were supposed to pay their $5, but there’s a number of folks that did their best not to pay their $5. And when I showed up they knew the tax collector was there and they’d have to pay their $5. So hopefully I won’t be doing that too much this year. So you can just call me Dave. Rather than being the tax collector. The tax man. Different variations to that.
Maura Beuttel:
Oh, no. Dave is here I have to get… The Bike Reg page didn’t load for me. Oh, I forgot.
Dave Underhill:
And I got very handy at working on Bike Reg on my mobile phone because at first I was like, oh, boy, I got to go back to home to get on my desktop and figure out how to do this. And it’s like, okay, now I can figure out all these different dropdowns. The app is always different than the web version and it was just like, okay, I know I could change this. How can I change this? Because for some reason it might have closed the hour that the training started and it’s like, ah, no, no, I got to move it and open it back up.
And then I also, what I had to figure out is an IOU system that worked. If you couldn’t get your Bike Reg to work and I still got you to sign the waivers, but then your waivers sat at my desk until I got the $5. And my memory isn’t the greatest thing in the world, but when I have a piece of paper and I have someone’s name on it, waiver and their name on it, I know that they owe me money. But so hopefully most of membership and the way we’re going to price things out, that $5 per session is a thing of history. We won’t be doing it.
Maura Beuttel:
Right. Yeah, I think the listeners will definitely be happy to hear that and see that we’re making that change.
Dave Underhill:
So part of the reason, being able to drop the $5 is we’ll have the track membership. And then we’ll actually have base… I don’t know our final terminology, but training passes. And for the structured training we’ll have costs per course. So the training passes, it’ll be a monthly pass that gets you into the open training. The motor sessions and structured training classes. And we’ll offer a discounted annual pass.
And then the structured sessions, you could pay for those individually. But ideally if I was donning my cleats and racing again, I would definitely be all over the annual pass. It is a pretty good deal. And that’s what we’re also doing with the youth programs. We’ll have the session fee, but if you want to sign up for everything, if you want to sign up for the complete season of BRL, there’s a hefty discount for that. Complete season and youth. And if you’re in that kind of nine to 16, eight to 16 range, you want to sign up for everything.
There’s an incredible deal on that and you could be on the track all the time. And so the track will be programmed from early morning to a little bit later at night, 10:00, 10:30.
Maura Beuttel:
Hey, that’s what we have the lights for.
Dave Underhill:
Yes. We’ll turn off the music at nine so we’re quiet but we’ll have lights on and I don’t think we’ll hurt [inaudible 00:21:43] light pollution because we have plenty of that here. But it is an opportunity that we will have coaches on hand and we will update our coaches page. There’s some changes coming to that. We’re going to get a small raise and we’re going to change the credit system that is basically something you earn per hour rather than having to reach certain thresholds. And so that makes things a little more straightforward and more easy and more predictable.
And we will expand our training beyond just CPR and AED to basic first aid. So coaches always had the first aid kit, but maybe we haven’t been using them the most effective manner. And so that’s some first aid training that we’ll receive from the EMTs that support the track and be able to help our head coaches better address the minor wounds and more quickly assess anything. So that if help is needed, we know we could act very quickly on that.
So we’ll have the new coaches page up, we’ll have the credit program explained and I think it’s still an attractive program. And then for our assistant coaches, generally the folks who are under 18, don’t have a USAC coaching license, we’ll have a enhanced credit program for them. And then those that are looking for community service time, we’re more than happy to sign off on that. And so it’s an opportunity, even for the younger folks to give back and contribute to the track that they’re actively participating in very frequently.
Maura Beuttel:
I think that’s one of the coolest things is that a lot of the coaches here, assisting coaches, a lot of them are either athletes that race here or they’re people that have gone through the programs themselves and getting back into coaching. It is a great way to give back.
Dave Underhill:
And I’m enjoying it. I mean, when I hung up my cleats for the second time in my life, I got into officiating. And since I’ve basically retired and moved here, I got into coaching. And it is a lot of fun. It’s very rewarding to see kids on bikes and have kids pretty excited and want to tell me that they got their first track bike. And I was like, oh, this is great. Or even some of the declarations like, “I’m going to be doing this the rest of my life.” I was like, oh.
Maura Beuttel:
Yes, you are.
Dave Underhill:
And there are some folks that have done that. So it’s interesting. It’s a lot of fun I think. And there’s a lot of enthusiasm. And sometimes there’s some chaos. Like BRL, one third of the kids were on the track racing, two thirds of the kids were running around like they’ve had too much sugar, too much caffeine. And so that’s part of the little bit of the structural changes that we’ll do also to BRL is that we’ll have a race director, dedicated race director to run the races. Whereas then each team will have a dedicated head coach and then hopefully we’ll have an assistant coach or two of each team.
And we’ll also kind of formalize a little more. We’ll have race numbers, we’ll do some officiating. Not necessarily USAC officials. Maybe parent volunteers. Hint, hint.
We’ll get out the mics and the PA system and have a pretty good race environment for the kids. And you mentioned Air Products but also Schearers, sales and service that our BRL sponsor… We’re very thankful for them helping us out on this and basically make it, I don’t want to say the premier kids racing program. It will be a lot of opportunities and hopefully the BRL in itself is a great program. They have a lot of fun.
But hopefully number of kids will say, “Yeah, okay. I want to take it up to the next level. I’m going to become a junior racer and race elites and race in national championships.” And as our history of the track is showing you, Pan American Championships, World Championships, Olympics, the things start in our community programs. And so that’s a lot of opportunities and it’s a great path to take.
Maura Beuttel:
And speaking of that pathway, this is a perfect segue into the one program that we haven’t necessarily talked about yet, but I understand that there are some changes coming is Team T-Town. Because naturally you finish BRL and you’re like, “Okay, I love the sport. This thing is really great. Where do I go next?”
Dave Underhill:
So yeah, as a person who was kind of away for a long time and Team T-Town came back to here and it’s a junior team and someone mentioned a rider aging out. I was like, what do you mean aging out? “Well, he’s turning 18. So he’s got to leave T-Town.” I’m like, what? And that kind of chuck me aback a bit. Because I’m definitely a club oriented person. I’ve been a member of Somerset. We won for decades. And now I started asking the question, why is Team T-Town limited to juniors?
And so Andrew and I spent a good amount of time talking and I’ve talked with some of our community leaders, longtime cyclists and folks that are coaching and leading teams and saying, hey, what does your club do? How do you support folks and what are the benefits of being in your club versus something else? And do you think there’s a benefit for another club or something? And so based on that feedback and discussions we’ve decided what we’re going to do is Team T-Town is going to become a more traditional club.
It’s going to be a natural place for kids coming from BRL that if they don’t necessarily say, “Okay, my goal is to become an Olympic champion right away.” Is kind of make that transition into a community supported club. And so we’re going to heavily recruit some of our mentors, people in the community here and see if we can get them to join Team T-Town with us. The club basically will be sponsored by the the Valley Preferred Cycling Center and we will basically have club like structure. We’ll try to have race support, food, drinks, things like that for different races.
The heart of it is track racing, but that doesn’t mean we won’t go to some crits, won’t do some cyclo-cross. If someone could point me to a mountain bike race, I might try to find one to see what that’s all about. Sorry, I’ve never been to a mountain bike race.
Maura Beuttel:
Me either.
Dave Underhill:
It’s something new to me.
Maura Beuttel:
Oh, just kidding. No, I have been.
Dave Underhill:
But we want to open it up. There’s a lot of folks here that race all the time. I think they have a lot they can contribute on an informal basis and/or potentially a more formal basis. And so I still want to support junior riders and have them grow and fulfill their cycling dreams as best they can. But Team T-Town, a lot of Ts, is a good place for folks to start and basically grow themselves as a bike racer. And we’ve been talking with Lehigh Wheelmen. We’re looking at partnership with that group. It’s a very longstanding club in the area and also I am a member of Lehigh Wheelmen.
Maura Beuttel:
Shameless plug.
Dave Underhill:
And we’ll look at some collaboration that make their rides available for our folks and some of our rides could be available to them. It seems like half the rides in Lehigh Valley leave from the velodrome anyway, so why don’t we all ride together and there’s some insurance benefits to be riding in formal club rides. And so we’ll be looking at that for Team T-Town. Trying to set that up so that we’ll have additional coverage when we’re out there on the roads. Once we leave the concrete crater we don’t want people necessarily be only on their own.
So there are some benefits to having that. So we’ll look at Team T-Town, it won’t be very expensive to join. It’ll be on par with other club like structures. It’s not Olympic training, not dedicated professional coaching 40 hours a week, but it is a good opportunity to transition and be part of a community. And as the community programs guy, I definitely want the velodrome community to be together and have a welcoming environment that folks could come, they could race, they could ride, they could spectate, they could coach, they could share wisdom.
And then we have a lot of track racing experience here at this velodrome. And we have just a depth of knowledge we could tap into just walking across the street. We don’t have to go far.
Maura Beuttel:
Right. Yeah, I just think again, the whole thread that ties this episode together is highlighting that sense of community because in the grand scheme of things, if you think in the entire world and all the different sports that there are, cycling is pretty niche. And I think playing into the fact that the name of the place here is the Valley Preferred Cycling Center is making it that cycling center, not just necessarily having everything be super track focused. So welcoming those folks with different backgrounds, mountain biking, cycle-cross, all that sort of different stuff and just kind of being a melting pot of things here is cool.
Let’s just ask Dave some personal questions because he’s just been a pillar in the cycling community here for very long. When did you start racing here? Not to date you or anything.
Dave Underhill:
I think my track racing started in ’80 or ’81.
Maura Beuttel:
Okay. And how different are things now compared to when you were racing?
Dave Underhill:
Well, it wasn’t so bad on Tuesdays as a junior, but when I got to Fridays I definitely learned it was a contact sport. And there may have been some initiation that happened when, “Hey, there’s a junior in our field now. Let’s go see how he feels up on the wall.” But I stayed upright every Friday I raced.
Maura Beuttel:
There you go. That’s the goal.
Dave Underhill:
But yeah, the gears were a lot smaller too and it was all about spinning rather than pushing. And so we had astronomical leg speed then, but our legs were much spindlier and smaller back then too. So when I watched some of the young juniors wind out their junior years, I was like, oh, yeah, that looks familiar. That’s the way racing used to look. Rather than pushing these 120 inch gears and just massively pounding away.
Yeah. So raced here in early ’80s. Went into the Navy afterwards and started getting that adult figure. I started growing that adult figure that I have now and no longer looking like a bike racer. And then basically it came back in the 2000 teens, and wanted to get back into bike racing. And in the ’80s, okay, I raced track twice a week. But I raced, rode in crit three, four times a week.
And so bike racing was pretty big and you could race some almost every day of the week. Monday was usually the only real dead day of the week. You could find two races on Saturdays and then you had training races Wednesdays and Thursdays. And so I was like a full-time bike racer back then. And so as an old guy, I started losing weight and I said, I’m going to get back into bike racing. And I was like, yeah, I’m going to start with the track. I really loved the track [inaudible 00:35:16] racing. And in three years of riding as an older guy, I only did two crits.
And one was actually a Virginia… It was International Raceway automobile racetrack, which was to me in my head kind of like track racing until they got to the final sprint. I had never seen such chaos and I placed at a decent spot in that, but I was dodging people left and right because they had leadout trains and guys were sitting up in the middle of the field because they were done and. It was like, oh, my God, this is crazy.
And then I did a proper four corner criterion. And for the life of me, I could not understand why I was hearing squealing brakes in every turn. I was just like, go around the turn. You could just put your right leg down, left leg up, go for the turn. There’s no need to hit your brakes.
Maura Beuttel:
You’re like, “There’s four turns. You think you would’ve figured it out by now.”
Dave Underhill:
And it was just like… And road racing or crits, I just… It’s crazy. So when people come to the track and they’re like, “There’s no brakes. I can’t do that.” I’m like, oh, my God, this is so much safer than riding on the road, riding a competitive road event. Because there aren’t unpredictable people hitting the brakes. There aren’t. And the track racing rules are pretty clear, pretty specific. You always have officials looking at you. It’s not like a road race where maybe the motor ref won’t catch me crossing the center lane.
Most of the officials don’t see you, most of the race. Crits, the same way. You have most that officials sitting on the home straight and you’re hoping that motor might catch something. But track racing, it’s much more discipline, it’s much more predictable. Sprints, almost might want to say they’re boring because people do the same thing. You don’t have to decide whether you want to dive to the left or the right of a rider that decided to stand up. [inaudible 00:37:22] stood up.
So it’s much more predictable and I’m like, oh, my God, it’s so much safer. So after those two crits I’m like, I’m not doing this anymore. And so all I did was race track. And felt much more safe pursuing. So as older guy, we don’t bounce so well anymore. And so stayed upright for three years without any concerns. The only time it scared me were those two crits.
Maura Beuttel:
Right. Well, now that you’ve been on both sides of the coin as a track racer and now you officiate track, what was your favorite track race to race and what is your favorite track race to officiate?
Dave Underhill:
I always like the elimination. It was a race that you could sit there and play the devil. The person that sits in the back of the field and just tries to pick off people. And it’s usually reserved for sprinters. But you could play the devil or I was able to get on the front and hammer along and try to get in that number two spot. And just sit there and just have a long, long enduro pursuit type event where you’re just going hard the whole time and you’re listening and counting the laps down to see how many people you’re losing until [inaudible 00:38:43] is like, okay, at some point the surge is going to happen.
And if you’re the guy sitting in the number two spot, you’re part of that surge. You’re in the number one spot, it’s like, “Okay, I’m getting fifth.” So that’s always been the most fun of race because there’s a lot of tactics and there’s just a lot of different ways to do it and it’s a very different type of workout if you try to play the devil versus if you want to hammer at the front. And one thing I never like to do is just sit in the field and get picked off when getting stuck in traffic. So I had a tendency never to be there.
Maura Beuttel:
That’s always been one of my favorites to watch and sit underneath the judges’ stand right at the line and be like, okay, can I call the right person that’s gotten out before the officials call it? But it’s a fun little game. Both for racing and officiating for you, the elimination?
Dave Underhill:
Well, elimination is a little bit more scary as an official. Because on a Saturday, Masters and Rookies, I’m afraid if you don’t quite get it right, the consequences aren’t big. But if you’re doing a national championship or something like that, the consequences are very high. And you want to absolutely make sure you want to get that. And so one of our visiting commissaires basically said, “Dave, you’ve got the call. But if I hear a moment of hesitation in you saying that call, I’m calling for the camera.” And that’s if I said four or 104. Yeah, he was fine. Happy with it. If [inaudible 00:40:25], “Camera.”
Maura Beuttel:
Camera.
Dave Underhill:
And we want to be able to make that call quickly and get it out…
Maura Beuttel:
Whatever did we do before cameras?
Dave Underhill:
We made the call and sometimes it was a committee. Basically, ultimately depending on the level of the racing, who has that call responsibility. And if it’s the commissaire or president of the commissaire’s panel, they’d pass it on to the chief judge perhaps, or perhaps they’d want to make that call.
Or if you’re no camera like, “104.” Your assistant judge says, “Well, no. It was like 103.” “[inaudible 00:41:10] 103. Okay, 103.”
Maura Beuttel:
103 it is.
Dave Underhill:
Two out of three [inaudible 00:41:13]. But we don’t want to do that for national championships and things like that.
Maura Beuttel:
No, certainly not.
Dave Underhill:
And it’s a race that’s happening real time and you can’t go back. So if you accidentally call a wrong number, you have, at least on a 333, one lap to figure out how you’re going to correct that. Because you may have just cost someone a medal or a place. How do you fix that? And you need to fix it within 25 seconds or so because they’re going to be there. And at a 250 you have a little bit more time but not a lot. So some of those decisions have to be made and whether you’re the chief judge or the starter, because you may fire the gun, if you fire the gun, you started a cascade of events that not everyone may agree with. And so I was like, I stopped the race. Then you might have someone going crazy. I’m sorry I’m doing hand motions here.
Reacting very quickly and passionately as to why did you do what you just did and you shouldn’t have done that. And so there are some split second decisions and the elimination is the one that really, really requires it. A points race, okay. Cam review, we got second and third wrong in the sprint. We correct it. Race goes on.
Maura Beuttel:
Right.
Dave Underhill:
[inaudible 00:42:47] elimination, you just can’t correct something. You pulled the wrong person out or there’s some confusion in the number. You read the number wrong. How do you react and how do you react quickly that you just don’t basically throw off the results of the race?
Maura Beuttel:
Right. Yeah. The elimination is not something that you can stop the play, stop the race, review the footage, and then just click resume like you can with a lot of other sports.
Dave Underhill:
So I’ll say for the Nationals we had a couple years ago, the chief judge spent an hour with the photo finish people because there was a disagreement on how many laps down the person was. In post processing you could always figure out what that result is in something like a points race. And figure out, “Okay, why did commissaire two thought this person went down but others didn’t?” And you could actually lap by lap do a replay and figure out what happened. It’s not the quickest thing to do. But it’s something that if you’re a national championship, then you want to make sure that result is right.
Maura Beuttel:
You take the time and you do it.
Dave Underhill:
You take the time to do it. And other formats have that ability to do that. Elimination, no.
Maura Beuttel:
What would you say that as an official is the biggest faux paw, I guess you see riders or athletes make?
Dave Underhill:
That they don’t know the rules. So the riders, with coaches are pretty much coached that the coach will come talk to me. Riders who don’t want to come up on their own. And I’ve had riders tell me that’s not a rule and that they’re allowed to do this. And I’m like, okay, I’m the official. And by the way, I do work at the nationals. And if I see you doing that in the nationals, I’m going to call it because you’re violating this particular rule. And if I have to pull out the phone and get the rule number for them, so they can go back and read, I usually do.
Maura Beuttel:
Oh, it’s not a rule? You mean this rule, right here? On my phone?
Dave Underhill:
And part of the challenge, and it’s been learning experience for Andrew of the USA Cycling rules versus UCI rules that they don’t match. And there’s slight differences and that’s a challenge. And it’s good that our national championships, the elite are UCI rules. So we bring in the most senior officials. Everything is by UCI rules, everyone has a common playing field. But if you’re doing a different level event, a Masters Nationals potentially, or Friday Under Lights, technically we’re under UCI rules only for the UCI weekends. And then we switch the USA Cycling rules when we’re not, because why should we enforce UCI rules? Technically that’s not a rule set.
So that was always… My example is in sprint races that the UCI walking pace for the slow part of the sprint is not in the USA cycling book. And USA Cycling is, you shall not stop.
So you could go pretty darn slow and not stop. And then there’s actually another rule book for American Track Racing Association, which actually says you shall not go backwards. So technically you could stop, but you can’t go backwards. And if you do a track stand, you roll half an inch backwards, then you’re going backwards, I assume. But there are nuances on rules and officials spend a lot of time, especially in the spring, dusting off and reading the rules and then officiating at T-Town with our international racing here.
Okay, I’ve done a couple of Masters and Rookies, I’ve refreshed myself on all the rule changes for USA cycling, now I have to shift to the UCI rule book and look for the rule changes there and refresh my memory. And it’s actually a very common thing is that before an event, I’m going for the rule book. One, looking for changes. And two, refreshing my memory so that I don’t have two events mixed up. We want to make sure we get it right. The riders put a lot of time, a lot investment into racing. So as officials, we want to respect that investment and make sure that we’re doing the right calls. Not making up rules or misremembering rules. So we spend time, want to make sure we have them right.
Maura Beuttel:
So you could say there’s a lot to keep track of.
Dave Underhill:
Yes. She’s been holding that one for a while.
Maura Beuttel:
I had to.
Dave Underhill:
But that said, the more stressful parts are kind of falling onto the senior officials. So I don’t want to scare away potential officials out there. Junior parents, racers, former racers as an assistant it’s basically, “What did you see?” And you are slowly learning the rules, but when you’re the starter chief ref, the judge referee, that’s when you really have to have the rules down because you’re the person making the decision.
And I was just going through some pictures. And I saw the one from a couple of years ago, it was a picture taken from the judge’s stand and it was a circle of the officials, the race director, track director, the photo folks, all in a circle. Because something had happened and that we were trying to figure out, “Okay, how are we going to rule on it?” And it was okay, everyone had their perspective. And basically how were we going to rule in a situation. That turned out to be kind of a sprint situation where folks were catching the field as the field was crossing the finish line.
And I was like, “Okay, how do we want to interpret this?” And it’s a nuanced thing. Well, a new official doesn’t have to make that decision. But I was surprised that as a new official working at one of my first UCI races, I was on the back straight and the international commissaire called me up on the radio and said, “Dave, what did you think about that sprint?” Because we had two riders riding up on the rail and wanted my input as to whether there was enough room. And I was like, you’re asking me?
I’m just out here hanging out in the grass in the back straight. You want me to help you make that call? But I had the angle, because the commissaire was on the other side of the track and they’re relatively perpendicular. Whereas I was able to see that, yeah, they were both close to the wall. But the rider left enough room. So it was a case of whether he was impeding or not. So I was like, oh. That was a big day.
Maura Beuttel:
Right. Oh, I get to give my input.
Dave Underhill:
So that was something, and that’s one thing that here at T-Town is, we do have the international racing. And so there is a high level of racing that new officials get exposed to very quickly. We have tremendous depth of experience. Andy, Ellen, Sally that have all mentored me, helped me out quite a bit to get me up to speed. But most officials, as a new official, you don’t get exposed to international racing. That’s something that potentially you might be able to do an apprenticeship with and travel across the country to come to T-Town to kind of witness an international race.
But here it’s kind of a little bit unique in the US. So we’re the only track in the country that has a consistent international racing schedule. The only other one is LA. We will have Masters Worlds from time to time. We’re going back to the UK this year. So we’re it. But it’s incredible experience and it’s incredible racing to watch. So when we have a good international field and they’re strung out, and you have 30 riders in a single pace line going as hard as they can. It’s a sight to see.
It’s like, wow, they’re just flying. And then people in the back are holding on for dear life. Trying to stay with this line because it is just going so fast that it has just stretched out everything. And that’s something that, it’s kind of rare. And being able to witness that here at T-Town is just incredible.
Maura Beuttel:
It still blows my mind after working here for however long that out of all of the places in the world, people come to this small town in Pennsylvania of all places and it’s known across the world. And I tell all my friends that and they’re like, “What?” I’m like, yeah, exactly. All of these really cool, talented, fast people come here.
Dave Underhill:
Well, we do kind of have a legend status.
Maura Beuttel:
But going off of that, just to wrap things up, Dave, I think you probably have sort of a legend status here too. Going from racer to coach to someone who officiates racing here. You’ve kind of run the gamut of it all. And I think we’re very lucky to have you here as a part of our community kind of heading that area of the track here. So thank you for taking the time to come on today and explain the list of changes that we’re making here in our programs for this upcoming season.
Dave Underhill:
Oh, thanks. It’s been a lot of fun. And anyone that’s seen me track side knows as I like to talk. So don’t be afraid if you see the big guy. Come up, ask me any questions, anything you want, and we’ll see how we can help you. Whether you want to ride the track, try the track, race the track. Just, hey. If you just want to ask me when this place was built, I’ll answer those questions.
Maura Beuttel:
You’ve got all the answers.
Dave Underhill:
What are all those little lines painted on the track for? So yeah, I’m looking forward to 2023. I feel like I’m a little more knowledgeable and a little more prep time. And we’ve got a lot on our calendar and so it’s going to be a pretty good year. We just get everyone out there and get them on their bikes.
Maura Beuttel:
So we will have all of this information updated on our website under the community programs pages as well as you can see all of the changes reflected on the calendar when that goes live. So be sure to keep posted for when that goes live. But this has been another episode of The Talk of the T-Town. We hope you enjoyed it and please subscribe, give us a like, give us comments. Any sort of feedback to help us grow the podcast on your favorite podcasting platform. Thanks so much for listening and we’ll check in next time.
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