Flat Trackin'

Saturday afternoon State Fairgrounds mile oval, beer flows through the crowd like the collective blood of morbid curiosity.

Ancient water trucks lumber around the track, like pissing primordial beasts, knocking down the dust for the featured race.

White knuckles grip throttle and lever as the flag drops and riders launch with bunched-up anxiety, steel-tipped leather boots bouncing over dirt clods and oil-soaked clay, into the fray of first turn mayhem.

Twisted bales of straw are only a thinly veiled facade against an unmerciful concrete wall, unyielding and ever-present...

Maniacal screams and hot dog wrappers float down from the drunks in wooden grandstands, but the intrepid riders hear only the syncopated rhythm of their screaming iron, see only the burnt rubber etched into the jagged-edged grooves of sunbaked clay.