The Encino Velodrome has a new website. Volunteers built it, like everything else here, and it tries to answer the questions people actually ask: what's on this week, how do I start, and did I really finish third in that points race in 2011?
Here's what's on it.
What's on, and when
The calendar reads the club's Google Calendar every half hour, so race nights, beginner classes, youth sessions and one-off events show up here as soon as the board posts them. The home page lays out the next seven days as a timetable, colour-coded by the lines painted on the track: black for led sessions and classes, blue for open sessions and motor-pacing, red for racing. On a computer, the top of every page shows today's date, the current weather near the track, sunset and what's on today.
Starting out
Getting started covers the $40 beginner class, the $10 session fee, $5 bike rental, track etiquette and how 200 m timings work. Training sets out the weekly pattern, what each session is for, and why we ride behind a motorbike. Riders 17 and under have their own youth programme on Thursday evenings, and it is free, thanks to the LA84 Foundation.
You can register from the site for a beginner class, a junior session, a dated event, membership or a track rental. Nothing is charged there: a board member gets back to you by email.
The archive
Race results from 37 race days between 2003 and 2014 are back online: 7,136 results for 787 riders, rebuilt from the old website's spreadsheets, the officials' own sheets and pages saved by the Internet Archive. Search a rider's name or browse by year. The fastest times page lists the quickest timed rides in the archive, event by event.
Reading
The glossary explains 72 terms, from the côte d'azur to the Madison. Why the track covers what track riding does for your fitness, and who it suits. This blog has race reports from 2005 and news from 2013 and 2014, recovered from the club's old websites, and it's where new race reports will go. History tells how four friends turned a patch of the Sepulveda Basin into a velodrome, and the rebuild explains the plan for the track surface.
Photos and video
The photo library has race nights, morning sessions, motor-pacing and a few pictures from the old websites, with three short clips and the club's YouTube playlist.
Help us fill the gaps
The archive is missing results from 2006 to 2008 and anything since 2015, and many photos still need a photographer's name. If you have result sheets, flyers, photos or video from any year at Encino, or you know who took a picture on the site, tell us. Every image here should name the person who took it.
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