More inspiration: paracycling

I'm posting this a bit late, but I wanted to share some pics from the UCI Paracycling Track World Championships that I went to a couple of weeks ago.

  
Although I like to ride, I bike camp or go or day cruises.
Road racing is intense.
Track racing is even crazier.
One gear, no brakes, your feet are clipped in and the banked walls are insanely steep.

Tandem stokers are blind.  They were hitting +70mph.

So how did I end up sitting in a velodrome for two days?
Thank to my friends Bernadette and Shawn.
Unfortunately our night of track racing ended up being only a few heats (scheduling snafu), but watching riders with missing limbs travel at +40mph had me hooked so I made my parents take me the next day. 

You wouldn't believe how helpful it is to see athletes like these not just surviving, but dominating.

These Chinese riders did not have hands and kicked butt!

If you want to see more (and higher quality) photos, check this slideshow out.
http://velonews.competitor.com/2012/02/gallery/2012-para-cycling-track-world-championships_206267/attachment/uci-paracycling-track-world-championships-2012-18