I don’t answer. I don’t see a reason to.
“Hey, kids,” I say once I finally make it over to them. The mom is standing entirely too close to me, so I step to the side to put some distance between us. I don’t like that she’s here. I already have no idea what I’m doing and the last thing I need is an audience. All six kids turn to me, their eyes barely visible beneath their helmets and goggles.
I clap my hands together and make something up on the fly. “We’re going to practice holeshots today.”
“What’s a holeshot?” one of the kids says.
Seriously?
“It’s the start of the race. All the racers line up at the starting line and when the gate drops, you take off. The person who gets to the front of the line first has just gotten the holeshot.”
“That’s a weird word,” the mom says.
I ignore her.
“So let’s get started,” I tell the kids. “Everyone line up at the gate but keep one space between each of you, that way you won’t crash into each other on your first try.”
All the kids roll their bikes to the starting line. The one on the Yamaha raises his hand. “Are we going to practice big jumps?”
Yeah, right. The last thing I want to do is have some kid get hurt on my watch. I shake my head. “Not today. We’re going to practice holeshots because, guess what? That’s the single most important part of any race.”
They all look excited.
“Really?” the mom says. “I didn’t know that.”
I nod, keeping my focus on the kids. “It’s much easier to stay in first place if you’re the first one there. If you end up at the back of the pack, it’s so much harder to work your way up, passing everyone until you’re in first place. If you can master the holeshot, then you’re already way better than your fellow racers.”
“You’re so very talented,” the mom says.
Great. The fangirls aren’t allowed in today, but there’s nothing stopping the moms from becoming fangirls. I make a mental note to tell Marcus to keep the parents the hell away from me at the next training camps.
As I suspected, all six kids are terrible at holeshots. It’s a hard thing, even if it just seems like pinning the throttle and going fast. It’s so much more than that. The starting line was my biggest weakness when I first started racing and I’ve spent hundreds of hours practicing it over and over.
I give them as many pointers as I can, and I stand at the gate each time, holding out my arms and then dropping them to signal the start of the race. The kids take off, get to the end of the straightaway, and then turn around line back up at the starting line again. They’re all really enjoying it, I think.
It’s actually slightly more fun than I thought it would be, teaching kids. Only one person in particular is making it annoying as hell. Her name is Kassie. I know this because right after the kids rode off on their bikes the first time, she put her hand on my arm and introduced herself.
“I’m Kassie, by the way,” she had said. “And I’m a single mom. Always on the lookout though!” she had said it with a fake ass laugh that makes me want to puke. Yeah, thanks lady for throwing it out there, but I have no interest in you.
If I were truly the jerk that people think I am, I would tell her that to her face. But I’m not, so I just keep my distance and avoid talking to her at all costs.
It doesn’t work.
Kassie is on my nuts every single second she gets. I start walking around, talking to each kid individually, hoping that all the movement will make her want to stop following me around. I’m about to lose my damn mind, and when I check my watch, it’s only been thirty minutes. The training camp lasts three hours and then we have a pizza party for lunch, a Q&A Session, and then we’re finally done.
And it’s only been thirty minutes.
I’m trying to think of a polite way to tell Kassie to leave me alone because I’m not into her, and we’re not going to hook up, when I notice someone else is walking over to join us. Avery is wearing one of the new Team Loco training camp shirts, which is different from earlier. She’s also wearing black shoes with denim shorts and even though the girl is short as hell, she’s got some pretty nice legs.
I pull my attention away from her and focus on the kids, who are all huddled around me while sitting on their bikes. I pull my hand across my neck, signaling for them to turn off the engines. All the rumbling goes silent.
“That was really great,” I tell them, and I mean it. They’ve all gotten better at this in just half an hour. “Now we’re going to go one by one so that I can time you, and I’ll save it in my phone and then we’re going to shave five seconds off each of your holeshot times before our day is over.”
“Really?” one kid says. “That’s awesome.”
“That’s impossible!” the girl says.
I shake my head. “It’s totally possible, and I believe in you guys.”
