Tuesday consisted of qualifier runs in the morning, a display of the streamliners for the local school kids, and then the evening 200 meter races. The day was cold and still windy. Nobody actually wanted to do a qualifier run in that weather, so Garrie didn't set up the timing equipment. Steve Delair hadn't had a shakedown run in his new streamliner yet, so Dean and Garrie taped him up and sent him on his way. Not very far though, seconds after launching they yelled at him to stop, as the fairing was flexing too much.
Dean Pederson just wanted to go for a ride, so he hopped in his Rotator "Coyote" practical streamliner and rode down to the cattle guard and back. This very cool tub bike is based on the GoldRush Colorado molds, has a titanium front wheel drive subframe, and only weighs about 35 lbs.
	Mackie Martin was considering doing a qualifier run in the Easy Racers Virtual Rush, but decided it was to cold and windy. Gardner Martin made "crash guards" out of Kevlar for the sides of this streamliner which protect the paint job while the teenage pilot, Mackie Martin learns the fine art of video piloting.
At the Battle Mountain convention center, the racers all gathered to show the bikes to the local kids. The schools brought many of the grade school and high school kids to see the bikes. The Smithsonian crew taped the kids reactions to the bikes and some of their many questions.
	Here's the Mango on display. The White Hawk rider tried to fit in the bike, but he was a bit too wide in the shoulders to fit the top over him.
Mack Martin checks out the Mango, and provides a good reference to show just how small this bike really is. Rob English says that the Mango is a bit too wide for him, and that he rattles around in it a bit... Mack is Gardner Martin's brother, and Mackie is Mack's son.
	The bikes are lined up to show the wide variety of streamliner shapes. Front to back are the Virtual Rush, Coslinger, Mango, and Barracuda. Sean Costin has been having problems with the Coslinger video system, and was considering punching a hole in the top and running it with a canopy, but decided at the last minute to send off for next day delivery video parts to rebuild it.
Front to back are one of the two White Hawk streamliners, and the Coyote. Ellen Van der Horst races this White Hawk, and Jan Van Eijden races the other blue one. The German White Hawk team here at Battle Mountain consists of about 10 people.
	The Smithsonian team had us all put our bikes on the stage, and took a sequence of video that they will dissolve between to show the difference between the bikes. Here's the 'Cuda cheese shot.
Here's the Virtual Rush without the crash pads. This bike, which was designed and built by Matt Weaver, has the potential to be one of the fastest bikes at this event.

 After the bike demo, everyone feasted on a giant Subway sandwich provided by the Battle Mountain chamber of commerce. Yum.

At 4:00pm everyone drove through the rain to the SR 305 course. It was windy, cold and raining. We set up the timing anyway. Just before we gave it up as a lost cause, we saw a chunk of blue sky in the distance that looked like it was heading our way. The blue sky came, and the wind died. The race is on!

Though the road was still wet, Steve Delair made his run. The wind was holding and the two White Hawk racers headed own the course next, followed by their chase vehicles. I was next, and I cruised down the wet road on one of the slightly drier wheel tracks. One of the kids that I let sit in my bike must have kicked my sensor loose as I had no speed reading. I felt fast but after a couple slips I moved to the wetter part of the road. That must have been a good idea, as I passed Ellen who was off in the sage brush a couple miles down the road. I cranked it up to as fast as I felt safe and went through the traps at what I hoped was about 50MPH. Later I found out it was only 46MPH. I need a bigger chainring! After sliding to a stop, I found out that Jan had crashed too, due to the slippery pavement. Mackie Martin was launched next, in the Virtual Rush. We soon learned that he crashed rather spectacularly at approximately the same spot that Ellen did. Everyone was fine, though the bikes are a bit scraped up. Ellen was on a record setting pace at almost 60MPH before her crash, and her husband Hans who was in the chase vehicle said she rolled about 3 times and "got air" before sliding off the road and scooping up a fairing full of gravel.  Mackie crashed at about 47MPH, and rolled too. The Virtual Rush will require some reconstructive surgery to the the alignment pins and camera pod. Steve Delair roller through the timing trap at about 30MPH, but his chase vehicle was following to closely and the timing was tripped by it. After all the crashes, Garrie canceled the evenings races, and we packed up and retired to the convention center for debriefing.

-Warren.

Wednesday Results