Appitite Seminar 2008! YUM!

so real bright and early this thanksgiving, the Pink Lidded Wonder and I, johnny b. and wendy-bird and little taco all went out on the annual thanksgiving ride in fairfax to do the pine mountain loop. we met up with our local fav's nick f., and hooked up with our own steve papa-lok and i-boy, joie and a whole host of villainy met us up on the climb. it would seem that if you ride a bike regularly in marin and or SF, everyone you knew was on this ride, as usual.

here are a couple of photos:





after this we went to Emily's mom's house and demolished a whole turkey and a giant ham.

may woo! woo! keeps making cool videos!

may made the soundtrack on this one just for me!


Pilarcitos CX 2008 - Race #3 (Murphy's Painkiller Version) from May Woo on Vimeo.

thanks may!

Bay Area Supersprestige #3 Report: Sierra Point

Not my bestest day ever. This course is (as we say in the Bay) hella flat. There's like one section that's 10 feet higher than the rest, and the course gets routed over it as much as possible, but 90% of the course is a very bumpy pancake.

I came in thinking I might race both Masters Bs and singlespeed, so I had two bikes. Before my masters race I stashed my SS in the pit. I had an OK 3rd row starting position, and avoided the opening crash. I started to claw my way up through the pack very slowly. Unfortunately, on the third lap, I realized that my rear shifter had broken, sticking me in the small cog. Flat the course may have been, but 38x11 was a little high, I think.

Fortunately, I had another bike in the pit. Which, as it turned out, was undergeared for such a flat course. I spun like mad for the rest of the race, ending up 40th out of 60-something. One thing the race did do, though, was cure me of wanting to race singlespeed on the course. So I hung out and heckled for the rest of the day.

I think the highlight of the day for me (other than teammate Barb Howe winning the women's race) was the debut of our ridiculous new skinsuits:



Sheila's really outdone herself this time.

SSCXWC Day 1

The Sheila Moon team sent four people to the Single Speed Cyclocross World Championships in Portland last weekend. Unfortunately, we only sent three singlespeed bikes, but we still made a successful showing.

Saturday was qualifying day. It was also really wet. We met in the intermittently pouring rain at the Chris King HQ, before setting out on a half-hour ride to the Time Trial site. The Time Trial started at an intersection of a couple fire roads, which got muddier and muddier as the day went on. The climb to the start warmed me up really well, but as I waited for the thing to kick off and for my start time, I got cold. By the time I started, I was frozen, and my performance showed it. The time trial started out as a 7 or 8 minute climb up a wet fire road. It was a pretty consistent grade the entire time, which was unfortunately just in between sitting and standing comfortably for me.

After hearing so much about last year's Tequila Shot Shortcut, I was thrilled to find someone handing out tequila at the top of the climb. I eagerly accepted the capful of liquor, only to be sent off along the main course, 15 seconds later and a half-ounce of firewater warmer. The downhill from here was advertised as really sketchy. The organizers even gave us 10 reasons why we should take it easy on this part. It was certainly slippery and twisty, but I don't think it was that dangerous. I managed to eat it on one turn, but popped back up with no real damage or time lost.

There were volunteers stationed along the side of the trail warning of sharp turns or whatever. At one point, one of them cautioned of big rocks coming up--pinch flat risk! I girded my loins, ready for a slick, nasty series of rocky drops, something like you'd get at Skyline (or on Alabama Street coming down from Bernal Heights). I was amused to find that the scary, rocky part was like 3 rocks, one of which was kind of pointed. I guess they have mud, we have rocks.

I finished kinda strong, after finally getting warmed up. I almost caught the guy who started :30 in front of me, and felt pretty wrung out at the end (not to mention pretty muddy).



Kathryn



and Jason



went later, and both felt pretty good about their run.

After a lunch at Rogue Brewpub (chipotle ale: yum!) and a shower, we eventually hit the party at Vanilla bikes, only to hear "last chance race starts in 5 minutes!" I quickly checked the morning's results and found I was 121st for the time trial. Since only the first 100 qualified, I realized I needed to do the last chance alleycat. I hadn't brought a bag or clip-in shoes, but I was able to borrow a pair of shoes (thanks, Tristan!) and got ready to tag along with Jason (who also hadn't qualified) for the race.

Out of towners were given a 5 minute head start, and we took the opportunity to head to the top of Mt Tabor, which was the first stop. We made it without much incident (although Jason had some trouble hauling his Big Dummy up the hill), right behind the first clump of folks. On the way down, Jason had somehow sussed out a dirt path which we bombed down, saving a good couple minutes over the paved way.

With little incident (just some getting lost and misreading the map) we got back to Vanilla in time to be the second and third out-of-towners to finish, and were assured we were in. We then did some damage to the keg, and then headed home for the night to get ready for the following day's madness.

Bay Area Super Prestige Race #2 - Candlestick Point

Check out these fresh videos that May Woo!Woo! made from our race this weekend. One of our A's men, Stephan, broke his collar bone this week and is out for a month! Heal fast buddy! Spephan's injury means our three Men's A's are all on the Injured Disabled List right now...
Check out Brain from Lost Coast Brewing jump the barriers too!

Pilarcitos CX 2008 - Race#2 Candlestick - Men's A, SS, and B Racers from May Woo on Vimeo.

Here's Kathryn and Arena on their way to matching 4th and 5th place finishes! They totally cream the field going for the hole shot!

Pilarcitos CX 2008 - Race#2 Candlestick - Women's A and B Race from May Woo on Vimeo.

I'm still stuck in the pit nursing a shoulder separation, so I did my part by serving up 20lbs of smoked BBQ pork sandwiches and 13 gallons of hot spiced cider. See y'all at the next race... the NIGHT RACE.

Here's Jeremy and Derrick have a pre-race carb drink: