Goodbye, Dave.

 This is very hard for me to accept, let alone write- one of our former team riders has passed away suddenly. David Wyandt was a star long before he was on the team , being a very talented junior MTB racer and a top US CX racer and road as well. Dave had experience racing at the highest level but quit when he started a family. 

I saw dave around 2007 watching a race at Aptos high school and asked him if he would consider joining the team as I had seen evidence in race results that he was riding again . Dave humorously wrote in the results that his team was the "John Basedow spinning clinic " -which of course didn't exist. Dave put in a few years of great racing on the team before he retired again to raise his family. 

Dave was universally liked and was a natural leader, although he never appeared to actually be leading-people just followed his path and trusted his wisdom. Dave was an original thinker who left school early to pursue racing. In spite of his limited education, Dave was a store of knowledge on many subjects and would always surprise people with his insights. He didn't talk that much but one could tell that whenever he did talk it would have thought and depth behind the words. 

One thing Dave did talk about was '80's pop music, a subject he was well versed in. I remember at a team party an animated discussion about one song in particular-"Baker street" by Gerry Rafferty. Dave seemed to hold this particular song up as one of his favorites. Whenever you hear "Baker street" come on in a super market , elevator or anywhere, think of Dave- He would probably like that .