From teammate Josh Sakofsky:
I have had the pleasure of seeing Josh the past couple of months on Wednesday nights at Kissena. He was racing in the 4/5’s and literally riding away from the field whenever he wanted with unbelievable ease, speed and finesse. Everyone in the infield would just watch him go and be blown away, even more so when they found out he was only 15 and still riding junior gears against guys more than twice as old with no gear restriction.
I got a chance to talk to him after a race one night for a few mins and was surprised at how humble and excited he was to just race and talk about bikes. When I heard about the "big crash in the qualifiers" at RHC, I was really hoping it wasn’t someone I knew. Once I found out it was Josh and the extent of his injuries, my heart sank. Fortunately, one of the people affiliated with the Major Taylor team has setup a fund for the medical bills, which are going to be substantial. Please do what you can, we need kids like Josh racing, not in hospital beds.
Josh’s GoFundMe site is here.
Done.
Any chance Dave Trimble is going to chip in a few grand of his own money? After all, this kid is paying the price for Mr. Trimble’s messenger fantasy extravaganza. It would be an awful shame to see all that RHC branded fixie junk bringing in $, but none of it going to help this kid out.
One word, liability…
hey JoshS, Alan, maybe we could set up a benefit race of some sort at kissena is summer?
Limit the prize pool and put all proceeds towards young Josh’s fund?
Thanks for posting this…Sean
I didn’t do the RH race…but damn – as an outside Cat 1 observer, there’s too much animosity towards the promoter (more so in other strings than this particular one on this website)
because people occasionally complain about dieter or avd? geez, grow a spine. free market, baby. They are offering a product, we are free to take it or leave it, or take it and complain about it. What makes them so special?
Is Jarne Cat 1 in observing or in racing? Unclear. Though I like the suggestion that being a Cat 1 gives him some higher authority to comment on RHC.
yes its a free market but a responsible race promoter will make every attempt to make the course as safe as possible. and, have insurance in case something goes wrong.
What EXACTLY occurred in the race that caused this crash?
going full tilt into a turn like that makes me wonder if someone blinked or brain farted for just a fraction of a second and attempted to coast into the turn. that fraction is all it takes. if you’re not a full or near full time trackie and have those reflexes, sh!t sure can happen.
i’m agreeing with you numbskull.
re: full time trackie, a) the kid raced at Kissena all the time…way more than half those people, and b) that wouldn’t cause you to crash, there would just be slightly unpleasant reminder that you can’t coast.
Just a thought hear. This race was unsanctioned and part of that allure is you can have all types of riders with varying backgrounds and abilities. I wasn’t at the race, so I can’t say too much on how it happened, but I want to put this out there. A junior rider in the same race as guys like Chabanov and Bezdek is just asking for problems. A junior without much road experience at reading corners is not used to the speeds in which the more experienced riders are able to take corners. These other guys really know their limits and when and how to slow for the turn. A far less experienced junior in that field is going to have trouble and risk having something happen. Since there are no categories and anyone enter the qualifiers there should really be a ban on riders under 18. There are only a small handful of junior riders that can ride single speeds and have also done Cat 1/2/3 crits. Just my two shekels.
The navel-gazing and Monday-morning quarterbacking is getting out of hand even by NYVC standards. Clearly we can expect some changes going forward, and Saturday’s race at BNY was such a shitshow that I highly doubt it will be used as a venue next year.
If you’re offended by the “hipsters” at RHC events and the attention they’re getting, you can find your kicks elsewhere.
What happened to Josh is a real shame. I didn’t see the accident happen and can only go off of what I was told, but I can tell you that it wasn’t an especially dangerous or even technical part of the course. It was an unfortunate accident, and now all we can do is stand in support of someone who by all accounts is a great kid.
I wonder whether the poor Marshall who got crushed gets free lifetime CRCA marshalling duties taken care of, even though it wasn’t a CRCA event?
Lance comes through with a $1000 donation… A nice gesture
Why was he aloud to race in the first place? Don’t you ask for ID with minors… Shows that it is all about money…. And what the FUXX is up with the cheering every time a rider went down.. Is that funny that people get hurt? Bunch of assholes. And to you Shen, the comment about” hope it was anyone I know” sucks. Shouldn’t happen to anyone.
I didn’t write that, Josh S did. But you are right.
sanctioned races have categories
unsanctioned races don’t have categories
they both have crashes
you are entitled to your opinion about my comment, but this is about getting josh and his family help, not what you think about my feelings or my ability to disassociate when i don’t know someone that has had something terrible happen to them. so let’s keep it on track, yes? and Sean, great idea about the race man. Going to reach out to the Major Taylor folks as well about it.
yes sanctioned races have crashes. worst case scenario 5-8 guys go down out of a 50 man field. The majority have no crashes, especially in higher category races. You can’t compare that to an uncategorized, unsanctioned crit on track bikes, in the dark, on a very technical course. That’s just suicidal.
It wasn’t just that RHC had a crash. It was that there were crashes every gawddam lap. It was crash after crash after crash with a bunch of assholes laughing every time. Each time the lead group came around it was smaller and smaller, each time the chasers came around they were fewer and fewer. Not for having gotten dropped, but because people kept tagging pedals and wiping out.
What bugs me is people getting all psyched about how hard core RHC was. I think it is fair to concede that last saturday was, indeed, a total shitshow, and it is really sad that this kid got so seriously hurt at that novelty race.
Transparency would be useful and would likely help meet the goal of raising what funds are needed. While it may be very true that the family will need support, a goal to ‘raise lots of money’ for medical expenses the family will ‘likely incur’ leaves a lot of holes. Does the family have insurance? If so what are the gaps?
USA cycling provides $25,000 of medical insurance for sanctioned events. Unsanctioned events provide an opportunity for a lawyer to get a nice payday. I realize that IF the family has no medical insurance (why not?) they may need the cash today. This “fund” should be set up as a loan so that we can all get repaid when the lawsuit is settled.
Yeah, “…”, not going to disagree with you here. Saturday was bad and way, way worse than RHC at Red Hook. Hindsight as 20/20 the BNY course was not suitable to 100 guys on track bikes with no brakes.
RHC is definitely billed as a hard-man’s (and woman’s, though no women qualified at BNY) race. It’s seen as good street cred if you’re able to finish. But I had too many friends lose skin/get hurt for me to be happy about what went down, and obviously what happened to Josh was tragic and unnecessary. The jackasses who cheered for crashes are scum, and I guarantee you that they were the (vocal) minority at the race.
The culture around the race was arguably a contributing factor to Josh’s tragic accident, but I’ll repeat my own observation with the caveat that I didn’t actually see the crash and was told by someone who did. The curve on which it occurred wasn’t especially dangerous nor technical, and it was during qualifiers not the actual race.
I have no doubt that some changes will happen as a result of this tragic accident, but I don’t want RHC thrown out with the bathwater because of what happened at Navy Yard.
Josh, heal up soon.
Are RHC qualifiers actual races, or like solo timed TT laps?
Solo timed laps but drafting is allowed, and you’d be dumb not to take advantage of said fact. If you have friends/teammates it essentially becomes a TTT.
even if they have insurance there will be lots of expenses, guaranteed. coinsurance, things not covered….insurance companies will find a way to screw you and if his medical bills total $200,000 (not inconceivable) the family can easily be on the hook for $40K of that. I donated something i could care less about getting it back.
They’re not trying to raise 40K though. They’re trying to raise ‘lots.’ And the number on the site is 200K.
There’s simply a request for transparency as to what the situation is and what’s needed.
Even presuming insurance (who knows?) and even presuming halfways decent insurance (again, who knows?) the coverage for rehab tends to end with basic functionality. There’s a huge gap between that point and the physical and mental rehab needed to even begin training again. If the insurance is not good, the family could easily be looking at 100K in co-pays, co-insurance and deductibles. (Remember, co-insurance can run 30%, co-pays can run $20 per visit…not all plans have (or have had) an out-of-pocket maximum, though that will be changing in 2014, where except for some grandfathered stand-alone prescription drug plans, the OOP maximum will be set at $6350 a year/individual, and roughly double that per family plan).
And for sure insurance will not cover any of the incidentals that are so important to healing. A healthy kid can snooze comfortably just about anywhere. That same kid with skull and spine injuries might need, say, a better mattress or blackout curtains–and I’d consider either of those a fine use of my $50. If you don’t agree, you don’t have to donate.
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Solo timed qualifier laps around that course is the dumbest thing I have ever heard. You are basically selecting the best TT riders and throwing them into a technical crit. A fast solo lap around that course would bear almost no resemblance to completing a lap with the pack in the finals.
Also, I was standing in the corner where most of the crashes occurred in the finals, and I can confirm that nobody nearby was “cheering” for crashes. In fact, everybody was pretty freaked out about what was taking place.
This is not a USAC sanctioned event, so that doesn’t apply. Does anyone know if RHC had a separate insurance policy?
In civilized countries there is no need to raise money for medical emergencies
man, peter b has really flipped out over this issue on facebook
They have been doing this race for a few years now. Generally people are big boys (and girls) and can decide whether or not to risk it. The only issue here is that this kid was permitted to race. If his parents signed a waiver they need to think about being more careful in the future.
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