On August 3, CRCA Junior Development rider Khary Ward won the match sprint at the Atlantic Regional Junior Track Championships held in Trexlertown, PA. Khary, who joined the team in 2006, sent us the following report.

The day started out pretty well. In the first event, the flying 200m TT, the seeding for the match sprints, I clocked a 12.37s. It’s not my best but it was good enough to give me the number one seed for my age group. So I got to skip the rounds of repechage. For those not familiar with the match sprint, two plus rounds of one-on-one sprints came next. Based on these results, the best two sprinters go against each other for the final.

In the first sprint leading to the final, I went against a junior from Westwood Velo who was second seed in the flying 200. We went toe to toe from about 200m to the line and I nipped him at the finish.

After sprinting against him I had to go against Colavita Sutter Home’s best junior track sprinter, Saillot. He’s also a good time trialist, lapping the field in the 10k scratch race. Knowing that he’s a good sprinter and time trialist his coach was telling him to start his sprint early, thinking he could tire me out by the end. So I made sure I took him as high up the banking as possible, flying down to the pursuit line and then going back up the banks at random to counter any such effort.

At 400m I took him as high up the banking as possible and did a track stand so he could lead. At that point he shot down the banking into the sprinters lane starting the sprint from about 400m, which sucked for me. I had to put 110% effort to catch him back, he had about a ten-bike-length lead on me and I really wanted this win so I had to dig deep like my life depended on it. At the 100m mark I caught his wheel and used his draft to slingshot past him to take the win.

I got the title and the attention of one of the head coaches on the prestigious T-Town Express U23 track team, Gibby Hatton, so hopefully he can take me under his wing and lead me to track greatness next season.

Congratulations, Khary!