Rapture In Misery

We left STL heading for the far reaches of Missouri on Friday afternoon. Brian Busken followed with young rider Caleb Hulsey. With only beautiful skies ahead of us we pulled onto the highway and merged right into traffic and found ourselves immedianlty drafting Team Seagal. We began to take pulls at the front, alternating between Momentum cars and Seagal cars, time trialing if you will, all the way to the Highway 65 interchange. That is when the chain broke.

The fireworks/gas station was almost as bad as described by Team Seagal. Keith bought, what he called later the worse sandwich ever, (he seemed to enjoy it immensly at the time). I pondered for a long time over the immense firework selection. I really do love a good smoke bomb. As I checked, out the charming ladies at the register had a hard time ringing me out with all the complaing about what time they wanted to shut the place down. Fuel in belly, we pushed on.

Trenton was a nice enough town. The people I encountered seem nice and genuine. Lakeview Motor Lodge was going to be home for a couple of days. I think their slogan was "you get a free breakfast.....and I ain't meaning one them continental ones neither." Leaving behind the Motor Lodge we headed for greenier pastures. Crowder State Park was only a few miles away. There we met up with Mitch Johnson and Greg Ott and pre-rode the course. Great course full of rock gardens with names like "the boneyard", downhills with names like "humpty dumpty", open fields, super fast descents, and leg punishing uphills. Just over nine miles of pure R.I.M waiting.

Next morning we had breakfast with Mitch, Greg, The Holtmans, Busken, and Caleb. Twus no contitintal breakfast at all. Over all, really just about as good as Denny's is when you not drunk. We finished up and headed out to Crowder to begin the days festivities.

Just finished bombing down the 'humpty dumpty' section. If you look close you may see smoke coming off my rotors trying to make that hard left at the bottom of the hill.

The six hour 30-39 podium

Wed. Night Ride

We left Bromm park off DD after one lap and headed over to Busch Wildlife to get a feel for the cut-off. As the sun went down the temps dropped and the night became cool. I need to do more night rides, I forgot what a blast they are. When we got back to Bromm Keith and I headed out for another lap, totalling just under 25 miles for the night. I think I could have done at least another lap, my legs were just starting to feel good.I just love to ride at dusk and into the dark!

Stitz nice enough to show us the way from Bromm to Lost Valley via the Busch Wildlife short-cut.

The dusty roads of Busch Wildlife.

Finishing in the dark, passing lake 38.

Castlewood Challenge

Big crowds and lots of racers made for an exciting Sunday of racing. The course was fast and in great shape from the bit of rain on Saturday. My pre-ride went great and that was about the best thing that happened to me. I was leading by over a minute on the second place rider after the first lap. Climbing Grotpeter I saw Brian Buskin changing a flat. It was then that I realized that I had forgot my pump at the car. I told him I thought I had a big lead and powered up the hill. I hit the first false flat and realized that I had flatted. A good guy in a Gorc jersey loaned me his pump and some 20 or so guys passed me on their way up the hill. Things only got uglier. I did not know how to use that guys pump so it took a few extra minutes to pump it. I rode out the rest of the race looking at the flowers and the trees. Flatted one more time before the creek and walked the rest of the way across the finish line. It was a great day to bike and hike the woods of St. Louis County.