By Brad Cloutier
The brand new SW Racing/SteelWheelsBMX.com racing team made the trek east to the Empire State Nationals this past weekend. We brought nine riders to see if we could pull out a win in the trophy division, and were able to do just that both days, with scores over 150 points. All of our riders rode with a lot of team pride and determination. Team mom Jackie Altizer showed why she is sporting the NAG #2 plate with wins both days in 46 and over Girls Cruiser. Also on Cruiser, “Smiley” Maslanka rode her way to a third on Sunday.
In the younger ranks, Patrick Blake rode to a couple of solid 4th place finishes in 9I. Also, our resident little 7X ripper who couldn’t find his way into the Saturday main, put the move of the century on another rider in turn 4 to find himself a spot in the main on Sunday. With another stellar move in the last turn, Denver Vaughn earned himself a main event 4th place finish. In 10X, Christian Cloutier battled it out with tough competitors E.J. Pascowiz and Alex Russel and picked himself up a couple podium finishes. The Pritchard sisters rode hard all weekend but came up short of the mains. They had a blast with their new team though. Did I mention their dad is the owner of one of our awesome sponsors, Dragon Wheels ? Our resident 13 girl was on fire all weekend as doubled up in class and even better, topped it off with two Junior Development Open wins on Friday and Saturday.
Our newly signed A Pro Brandon Brown made the trip as well to test the waters. If it weren’t for his four crashes, he might have seen some better results. Either way, Brandon finally found his way to the money with a 3rd place finish on Sunday. We are very proud of our little crew as everyone showed a lot of heart in the way they raced and represented our sponsors. Speaking of sponsors, this years team sponsors included Security Industries, Inc., Race Engineering, Fly, SteelWheels BMX Pro Shop and Dragon Wheels.
Look for us making some noise at the ABA’s Land O Lakes National next weekend in Isanti, MN.
Photo by Dexter Pritchard, Dragon Wheels Racing