Yesterday was an incredible day for my family and I. The races today were held at the Volusia short track and I was finally able to mark my place here in the States. Today was bittersweet though, as I will not being doing the full AMA circuit and I met some pretty nice racers there today. I also got to meet the very popular racer Dave Aldana (above) after seeing him in the movie, ‘On Any Sunday.’
After a lengthy rain delay I went out in my heat for the Open Singles class. I was really taking it easy and didn’t know how some of the riders were going so fast on such a slick track. My second heat was for the Open Mod class and I was a little more comfortable and made some slight bike changes between races. I got off the start in second place and was able to pass fellow Canadian Shane Corbeil for the win.
In the Open Singles final I had made some very last minute changes to the bike which I was not too fond of and ended up getting last but still had fun. In the Open Mod class I had second gate pick. After slipping back to fourth off the start I made an aggressive pass on my buddy Shane, slamming into the side of him in the last corner of the last lap for my first ever AMA top three finish. We were having quite the laugh about it afterwards as he knew I was coming and tried his best to block me.
Other than the rain delay lasting for about four hours the show was very well run, as Steve Nace always runs a good program. Along with the regular classes, Mike O’Neil from North Carolina brought seven mint 1949 Indian 250cc bikes for people to race! They looked like a lot of fun and they put on quite the show in the final!
It sucks to be done racing for the next two months but I know that this experience has made me faster and opened my eyes to the amount of talented riders I was racing against. I am super happy with how the racing ended and I can’t wait to hit the track again in Canada.
Go Fast Turn Left
Braden Vallee#107
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