uncle sammy's birthday bike-a-thon

sunday july 3, 2005
way to go andy, andy's parents, and jp for putting on one riot of a good race down in washington. all of my curiosity as to how he would pull a course out of that maze of trails that are down there was answered, and answered well. ie) the course rocked socks. literally. it was a great laid back atmosphere: best part = we got to pick our own race numbers. i chose number "john p" and a picture of a bunny and some flowers and a sun. when i added clouds john was upset. turns out the clouds were appropriate... i still win the "best-race-number-ever" competition.
started from the meadow, were forced to climb the hill of death right away, and twice more...up to the top, where the singletrack began. the singletrack was well thought out and equalled a nice, fast course. 3 laps, at something over 4 miles made for about a 13 mile race. john lost me on the first climb of the hill, and i wouldn't see him again until the end of the race. although i did race his colors. eventually the trails spat us back out smack into the meadow again, we crossed to another corner of said meadow back into the woods. which in turn once again spat us out into yet another corner of the meadow. 4 corners + 3 used in the race = criss crossing race traffic!!! awesome. we don't need no stinkin' safety measures. actually it worked fine. everyone was super nice about it, and people who were farther ahead were declared to have right of way at the pre-race meeting.

i traded places with another nice tall guy (notice shameless plug for self) for the first 2 laps. had a glorious crash on lap 2. on a nice fast gravelish downhill that becomes a nice slow gravely uphill in the middle of a nice off-camber turn = brian sliding out on the aforementioned turn. 2 guys right on my tail, and i somehow managed to snag the top tube, haul my bike out of their way, and stand back up before i was done sliding. hopped right back on the bike, and in no time was right back on their tail. managed to find some energy on the 3rd climb of hill of death, and wouldn't see anyone except singlespeeders dq and lee for the most of the 3rd lap. although, completely unknown to me, some guy rolled into the finish literally seconds after i did. found that out upon looking at the results. how i missed that i'm not so sure. i ended up placing 6th, about 3+ minutes down on john in 5th. really happy with my result. about a third the way through lap 3 the rain commenced. heavenly rain. i was sooooo happy. nice cool rain to cool me off. plus, rain made the trails a whole new ball game, of slippery sliding. rainy mtn bike races are the best. snow isn't too bad either. turns out i kind of like riding in muck.


a soggy post-race john

schwag-wise i made out like a pirate. i couldn't have looted and pilaged for better booty. i walked away with a new, much needed tire to replace the worn rear on the mtn bike, a new set of rims for the soon-to-be re-fixie (i actually paid for those), and 2 t-shirts for me, as well as a couple more for gifts. i did however, forget my cooler. i'll have to drop andy a line about that.
all in all a fantastic race.