Mirra impresses Chicago

E-mail this story

Print this story

Share

CHICAGO – Dave Mirra is known as the “Miracle Man.”

The 35-year old BMX Park veteran didn’t use divine intervention at the Nike 6.0 BMX Open at Grant Park on Saturday as the Dew Tour opened the 2009 season.

But he did use an iron-clad will to pull off a first-place finish in the Park finals on Saturday after suffering a brutal fall in warm ups. Standing on the podium, Mirra’s face had swollen to the point that it looked like he was wearing a mouth guard and dried up blood lined his nose.”

“My face hurts, my nose is bleeding every once in a while,” Mirra said. “I was riding well this morning but slipped, landed head first and got knocked pretty silly. At first I wasn’t going to ride, but this is the first show of the year. I’ve got to give it a shot. I wanted to be a part of the show and have fun, finishing first is the last thing I thought I could do.”

The height and speed Mirra generated allowed him to stand out from other riders. His fluency in pulling of tricks and transitioning from ramp to rail was flawless and his signature move, the Air Traffic Controller, sent the sun-saturated crowd into a frenzied state.

“That’s one of the coolest tricks to do and visually watch,” Mirra said. “It doesn’t always work at every contest, but it worked today and I’m psyched.”

While the majority of the field was 21-years old and younger, Mirra, the grizzled veteran, gutted out a tough win against riders that grew up idolizing his skill set and mimicking his every trick.

“You could see it in their eyes that these kids are hungry,” Mirra said.  “Just to ride with these young guys and still be apart of the scene is awesome.”

Jamie Bestwick won the vert competition on Saturday night. Bestwick has won all five vert Dew Cups.

Race Across America
Team Type 1 and DeKalb resident Alex Bowden are back in the winner’s circle.

After a second-place finish in the Race Across America in 2008, Team Type 1 won the eight-person division in the cross-country cycle race. The 3,021 mile transcontinental race was finished in record time.

Team Type 1 finished on Friday with a time of five days, nine hours and five minutes. It has won the RAAM in 2007 and 2009. Look for a story on Bowden in next week’s outdoors column.

My Take
After watching BMX for the first time live, I walked away incredibly impressed by the ability, toughness and dedication displayed by the athletes.

During the vert preliminaries, Zack Warden lost control of his bike and flew off the 13.5-foot vert ramp.

He was headed at full speed straight at a contingent of reporters and photographers that I was standing with. Warden ditched his bike, which went sailing past our heads and eventually landed head and back first into steel scaffolding.

Another rider and myself were instantly on the scene, followed a moment later by Medical Personal. After a hushed silence, Warden walked away. Roughly five minutes later, he made another run.

At that instant, I place BMX athletes in the same category as any main-stream athlete for toughness, desire and a willingness to compete at less than 100 percent healthy.

A battered and bruised Mirra and Warden, athletes pulling tricks sometimes as high as 20 feet in the air against the awe inspiring city skyline and a festive village, will be the lasting images in my mind form the Nike 6.0 BMX Open.

With a large, eager crowd and an interactive village surrounding the event sights, I hope the words of a spokesperson that the Dew Tour could return to Chicago next year prove to be true.

– Compiled by James Nokes, sports@daily-chronicle.com