Local Hero Story
A guy I know is making a nice local comeback success story that someone else other than me might be interested in…no drugs or fancy stuff even! Not even a HRM!
Nick Durrie did some racing 7 years ago, won some Cat4’s then a Cat3 maybe, won a bunch of triathlons. Then he settled down to real life and construction.
Now he’s 36, back in Michigan after a long stint of hard carpentering and starting cycling again as a hobby. So he got his Cat3 license again and did a Master’s race where he went off the front with a top Cat2 local who is very serious and who looked at him the whole time like ‘do I know you?’…he couldn’t recognize him and was NOT used to strangers up riding with him in local races. That was a funny one coz they had met years ago and Nick knew this guy coz naturally the other guy is regionally famous. So the mystification was amusing.
Hello! I’m back! Nick loses the sprint but says ‘I’m going to work on that.’
Next race State TT Champs: Nick has never done a USCF TT: gets 53min unseeded, no speedo, no HRM, no fancy bike, nada. Pretty good for 3rd alongside some nat’l caliber monsters, well ahead of all others (the rest in starting at 55?).
Then comes the State Crit, Nick goes Masters and against it’s same fast and Nick in the breakaway only this time the guy says ‘don’t worry, I’m toast from the previous race’ (he did the Cat2) which might be greek for saying ‘I’ll be nice and perhaps you might owe me a favor sometime’. However, maybe Nick had the tiniest notion that his companion might ought to have been ASKING if he could be there since he took not a single pull. So Nick put a further hurt on him to make a race of it. Didn’t want no deals or gimmes that way yet.
Cute, I thought. So Nick won that one. State Masters Champ first try.
Not bad!
Next weekend is a big Pro-Am. Nick’s *first ever* Cat1-2-3 event.
Never ridden with the big guys before for the big bucks. Result?
Nick is trying to bridge to Mark McCormack (sp?) the whole time, and eventually goes solo up to the lead duo, but goes into corner at 35 instead of pack’s 30 and slides. First USCF crash. Hey, but not bad anyway. Wow! I’m just an old cit racer, but it would be NEATO to be racing with Mark McCormack. And even NEATER to be CATCHING him! Go Nick go!
So those are Nick’s 1st four races of his comeback after 7 years.
A nice comeback start-out, I’d say!
Let’s just say that if you’re a Michi racing buff, you won’t go wrong to root for Nick. Very polite and friendly. Zero racer-dude attitude.
Also I’m sure he’s smooth as slick on the road and has a gas tank that we haven’t seen the bottom of yet, so if you get a chance GO WITH HIM off the front. He won’t be a bad companion! : )
PS: And he’s still doing construction and jackhammer work to pay the bills.
