With the Little 500 — Indiana’s annual 100 and 200-lap bike race — less than three weeks away, final preparations from the qualifying teams are underway.
The deadline to cut down each roster to its final four riders is nearing, as each team has to submit its final roster card by April 17. One of the biggest challenges this year, like last year, will be the general inexperience within the race. All riders racing will only have raced once at most with fans in attendance. Discussions will be had between coaches and captains as teams will choose who they believe suits them best. It’s a conversation that no captain or coach wants to have with the riders that ultimately won’t be riding in this year’s Little 500, but in the end has to.
“I’m not looking forward to making that decision,” senior Paul Smith of Beta Sigma Psi said. “We’re friends first and teammates second.”
Although someone will have to be cut, Smith, just like any other upperclassmen riding in their last race, is proud of the progress all riders have made just to get to this point.
“I don't think anybody should be disappointed with whoever the final four are because I do know and truly believe that everybody has been working as hard as they can to get on the track,” Smith said.
One of Smith’s teammates, fellow senior Benjamin McKeown, spoke of the close relationship between the riders.
“I live like a block behind our fraternity house, so it's awesome to have them come over anytime that they want to get away from the house,” McKeown said. “I cook for them. We just hang out and watch sports together. It’s awesome. I just text everybody and all of a sudden they all pull up on my porch.”
Beta Sigma Psi is one of many teams that year in and year out fields a team that is competitive and has no issues recruiting young riders who wait their turn to compete on the big stage.
But, for a team like Evan’s Scholars, that is not the case.
“We’re just guys that want to step up to the plate and make sure our house has a team,” junior Jack Law said. “That way everybody can just kind of come and enjoy being out here on that Saturday.”
Law admitted that he didn’t even plan on racing this year, but after some bad luck in last year’s race which caused two riders to crash out, he’s returning this year in the hopes of finishing higher than they did in 2022, which was 32nd place.
Amidst the grueling days preparing for the largest collegiate bicycle race in the U.S., there’s a brotherhood that has been created throughout the last 12 months.
For some riders, like those at Tau Epsilon Phi, it’s a relationship that would have barely existed had it not been for the bike team. Tau Epsilon Phi qualified for the first time this year and features four rookie riders.
“As a senior, it’s nice to get to know these guys,” Stephen Franke said. “I think I've talked to all these guys maybe a combined three times before this year. It’s really great relationship-building.”
As hundreds of bikers prepare for one of the most memorable rides of their lives, they will attribute their performances to the hard work accumulated from spring break trips, road rides around Bloomington and laps around the quarter-mile track at Bill Armstrong Stadium. But, what makes this day so memorable is the bonds created during the preparation for the World’s Greatest College Weekend.
