Velodrome rescue effort at $100,000 BY IRV LEAVITT STAFF WRITER 10/2/2003 Northbrook Star
The fund-raising effort to save the Northbrook bicycle track that started two months ago with a
boy's lemonade stand has topped the $100,000 mark.
"Every time I show up at a meeting, he has a check for $50," said Northbrook Cycle Committee
president Pete Janunas, referring to 10-year-old
Pete "Sweet Pete" Wright. "All of us who have real jobs should be able to come up with some real
money, also."
And some real money has flowed copiously from one source, head fund-raiser Pat McNamara said. An
anonymous benefactor committee leaders have dubbed "The Angel of the Track" has given the velodrome
reconstruction fund $25,000, and promises more.
"For the remainder of the year, he will match every dollar raised 2-1, and for 2004, match the funds
on a 1-1 basis," McNamara said Tuesday.
No one's revealing the identity of the mysterious angel, including Doug Pence, the Northbrook
certified public accountant who keeps track of cycle committee funds.
"I can't tell you who he is, because I don't even know him," Pence said Tuesday. "I don't even know
it's a him. Well, no, I know that much, but not a lot more."
Considerable additional largesse will probably be needed to save the Ed Rudolph Velodrome.
Northbrook Park District commissioners vowed in late July not to renovate the rutted 40-year-old
track unless the Northbrook Cycle Committee came up with enough funds to pay at least half the
bill. And that's a lot of money, considering there was then only one, informal, bid, of $325,000 to
do the work.
Commissioners said that most of the users of the track -- the only certified bike racing track in
Illinois -- are from outside the district, so the cycle committee has to step up.
Although committee members say there are a lot more Northbrook users of the track than commissioners
think, they're raising money fast. McNamara said that they won't stop after they pass half of
$325,000. He said he and Jan Hincapie, the Park District's superintendent of leisure services, are
working on a plan to sell advertising rights at the velodrome to businesses, in contracts that would
span from three to five years.
"Those dollars will be divided between supporting the project, and establishing a future projects
fund so we're never in this position again," McNamara said Tuesday.
The plan won't suggest renaming the velodrome, a la Comiskey Park's recent conversion to U.S.
Cellular Field. District rules forbid that. And committee members want to keep the late Ed Rudolph's
name on the track, because it honors the Northbrook man who built it with employees of his own
landscaping company in 1960.
Instead, letters advertising one product or another would be emblazoned on the track's turns in
letters 8 feet to 10 feet high, for payments in excess of $25,000. Ads on banners or on the roof of
the Chalet -- the nearby structure built years ago with Committee funds -- would run $2,500 to
$10,000, and cheaper ads would be posted on the scoreboard and along the rail, where ads have been
painted for years.
Ad customers paying totals of $25,000 or more would get space on a sign measuring at least 4 by 8
feet on the corner of the velodrome property, which faces Northbrook Junior High, and the parking
lot for track and Meadowhill Park Aquatic Center visitors.
Committee leaders guess bicycle equipment suppliers would be the likely advertisers, just as most
donors to the fund-raising effort have been from the cycling world.
George Garner's bike shop in Northbrook and Brendan George's Rides and Rags bike shop in Highland
Park have raised $11,000, and each owner also has contributed, Pence said Tuesday. And an Internet
auction of autographed jerseys arranged by Robbie Ventura, a top professional racing cyclist who
lives in Lake County, raised $3,300. Another Internet auction of cycling memorabilia, on Janunas'
peteslist.com site, will debut in mid-October.
Cash donations also can be sent to Box 1101 at the Northbrook Post office.
Contributions also are coming from non-cyclists with Northbrook addresses.
"I haven't had anybody from Northbrook come up to me and make anything other than a positive comment
about the velodrome and how much they're proud of it, as part of Northbrook," said McNamara, who
lives in the village. "These are people who have been there since the '60s and '70s, and remember
this as the focus of Friday night before everything got complicated."
The Park District has responded, by preparing a new request-for-bids that is expected to be
published this week. That's not fast enough for some committee members, including Northbrook Park
District Hall of Famer Stephen Cohen, who told commissioners at last week's board meeting to "get
off their duffs" and make a commitment to fixing the track. Commissioners didn't do that, but
Hincapie later assured Cohen that progress is being made.
Cohen, long a stalwart volunteer of the committee and other local sports programs, found a second
contractor about a month ago who said he'd do the paving job for $182,000. Park District Executive
Director Ed Harvey said that figure doesn't include restoring the rail and the infield, which boasts
one of the park district's best soccer fields. He said those are big ticket jobs, because it's
difficult to pave a banked track without harming what's above or below it.
Cohen and most other committee members hope the restoration work can be done before next spring's
racing season starts in late May, 2004.
The Park District's Harvey said although doing the work then would be best for the track's racers,
it could disrupt the soccer season and the village's Fourth of July celebration, because the infield
is used for band concerts and seating during the town's fireworks show. Harvey said it is likely the
work, if it is done next year, might postpone the cycling season's start by a month or so.