Missing a race wasn’t ideal for reigning Pro Stock Motorcycle world champion Jerry Savoie. 

But what he gained in return more than made up for it.

Savoie, who already has one win this season, returned in Chicago after missing the NHRA stop in Norwalk. It certainly wasn’t scheduled, either, as Tropical Storm Cindy in Louisiana caused Savoie to miss the race, but not for reasons one might expect.

Savoie expected to fly into Norwalk on Thursday, but pushed it back a day with rain persisting. That plan quickly changed, however, and the alligator farmer was forced into a situation where he had to choose business over racing.

“By Thursday night the weather started turning to where I had to get to west Louisiana, which is pretty much on the Texas line,” Savoie said. “We all agreed that without business, you don’t have the funds to race. So it was a wise decision. We went to west Louisiana and picked up roughly 40,000 eggs and saved every one of them.”

It was an impressive feat, but also incredibly impactful. Savoie lost close to 50,000 eggs to Tropical Storm Cindy and said that close to 250,000 alligator eggs overall were lost to the storm. 

Savoie estimated the value lost on that many eggs in the hundreds of millions of dollars, meaning saving as many as he did made a big difference.

“The day after we left it rained nine inches and everything flooded,” Savoie said. “So, it was a really smart move. Now the southeast Louisiana area from I would say Morgan City, Louisiana to Venice, Louisiana we lost just about everything. The water came up, and Tropical Storm Cindy sat off the gulf coast for like four days straight and never moved, and then it brushed the whole Louisiana coast and pushed that tidal water in with the southeast wind. If I had to guesstimate, you probably had a three and a half foot tidal surge. When it does that, you know, these nests just can’t sustain that kind of water. You’ve got four hours. If you don’t get those eggs picked up in four hours, you lose them.”

It’s an intricate process of retrieving the eggs, but also a critical one in Savoie’s line of work, which made skipping the race in Norwalk a necessity. 

Savoie compared an alligator nest to a small beaver dam with a big hill or mound of grass. The female alligator will open up the nest with her nose, make a cavity and sit on top until she lays her eggs. 

The process lasts about four weeks, but Savoie said 20 percent of the females were late in laying their eggs, making the time crunch even more urgent. That played a part in the massive number of eggs lost, but Savoie knew it was critical to save as many as he could.

“She only lays once a year,” Savoie said. “If you get enough bad weather, stress is a really big thing with alligators and the way they determine whether they’re going to lay or not. She’ll have those eggs available in her ovaries and ready to go, and she’ll actually absorb them. After summer’s over, the whole process will start over again, producing new eggs and it takes a whole year before she’ll be ready again. So once you miss that boat, it’s over with.”

The good news? With Savoie saving eggs, teammate LE Tonglet continued his dominance, winning in Norwalk and then again in Chicago when Savoie, currently fifth in points, returned. 

The two-bike team has won five times thus far in 2017, with points leader Tonglet taking four of them, meaning those back-to-back championship aspirations are still very much alive for Savoie.