Some of the more astute observers out there may have noticed that after last week’s coverage of 1988, there is only one more men’s course record to recount, yet we have two more weeks to fill in our countdown to raceday. Some might say we miscounted the weeks when we started and now we’re covering to make it look planned. The more diplomatic buggy fans out there would recognize that during the 20 year break in men’s records, buggy fans witnessed 5 new women’s records, and that deserves some recognition.
In fact, in the 30 years that women’s races have been held, 14 of the champions have won with a new course record. Compared to the men’s historical probability of breaking the record 30% of the time, you’re 50% more likely to see history made in the women’s races.
2004 was one such record breaking year for the women, with PiKA posting the first ever sub 2:30 time on the women’s leader board. PiKA’s women had an undeniable advantage on the uphills posting times on 1 and 4 that many of the men’s teams wouldn’t have wanted to compare themselves to. In the end, their strength was evident as their margin of victory was exactly 10 seconds over a suprising effort from Beta’s women who placed 2nd.
2004 also put Abbie Bednar into a pretty exclusive club of being a driver who won both the men’s and women’s races in the same year. The feat is so rare because it requires one org to sweep the races, but also because most orgs run different buggies for their Men’s and Women’s A teams. In 2004 however, PiKA’s men’s A spun on day 1, and they moved their A team pushers to B team (driven by Abbie) to successfully salvage an unlikely Men’s win when Fringe missed the pushbar on hill 5. I couldn’t find any other record of a driver winning both races in the same year, if you know of one, let us know.