I was in the field at Summerville N.J. in 1978 with almost 200 other road cyclists. Summerville was one of my favorite races cause it had a huge crowd every Memorial Day of about 20,000 watching. It was also short and fast at 50 miles, it sorta bridged the gap between being a roadie or trakkie race. I was definitely a roadie and better at hills, but 50 miles started to spread things out, and my only real hope of doing well was maybe getting some kind of small gap right near the finish, or having great position in the field sprint.
It was getting near the finish and I was feeling good and getting more pumped with every flat fast mile lap. I noticed that Jim Ochowicz, a well known trakkie from Kenosha and the Schwinn Wolverines was sitting in on one of my Indy USA teamates and local friends Wayne Stetina. Now Wayne was like the premier road rider in the '70s having won a handful of road titles, and we all knew that he'd probably be trying to get off the front near the finish. I knew that Ochowicz was going to try to spoil any of his breaks, and then as usual would probably lead Roger Young, his brother-in-law and well known match sprinter, out in the sprint from a lap or two from the finish.
So I thought I'd help Wayne get free maybe, and if things got broken up, I'd sit in and counter if any break was caught then later on. So I started getting next to Ochowicz and then simply telling Wayne which side to move to, which cleared his wheel to allow him a clean break with no "enemy" on his wheel. After a couple of times, Ocho got real huffy, and started threatening me to stay away. I sorta got windy back, because I wasn't doing anything but positioning, and you really can't lay a permanent claim to someone's wheel in a bike race, so we were exchanging words. So it was winding down, and a little late for any breaks besides, but I blocked for Wayne again, and don't recall if he ever got off that day. But what did happen- and only three or four laps from the finish, while we were all in great position near the front, really- was that suddenly going through the third of the four corners, Ochowicz came past me from behind and started grabbing at me- I don't know what he really intended, but before I knew it I was going down. But I wasn't going down alone, and I grabbed him as I fell.
So here we are, both down on the pavement in front of a huge pack of winding up racers, just a few short miles from the finish of one of the most important races in at least my own mind (and about 5 or 600 miles from home) So it was real stupid, and almost miraculously no one else hit us or fell. I had some skratches that luckily weren't worse, and after the race Wayne told me that people were coming up to ask him who his "kamikazee teamate" was, which was amusing- but not really true- I was just bike racing, and quite legitimately until it became personal with words.
Marathon Man 1977