Is it here yet?

It seems like it's been ages since I've toed the line in a race. Sure I HAD a race two weeks ago but when you only hit squirrel for 15 minutes before DNF'ing it hardly tempers the desire to get out there and do battle. This coming Sunday is my favorite race of the year, the Maine Sport Run-Off at the Camden Snow Bowl. Wheels and I had planned to ride the bowl on Sunday but with threatening skies Wheels bailed fearing another rained out ride.

What's that blue stuff in the sky ahead???

Too bad for him because it turned out to be a pretty good day for a ride. Sure, the woods had womb like humidity and the rocks and roots (of which there are many!) were slick as snot but most importantly, it didn't rain on us and we actually saw a bit of sun towards the end of our ride.

In the end, Steve, Mike and I did two complete laps on this weekend's race course, I got to ride, re-ride and re-re-ride several tricky sections AND I ate shit hard on two greasy, rocky descents on the second lap. Effectively negating any gains I may have made because now, if it rains, I'm going to be completely sketched out. I guess I'd better get there again this week to reverse the effects.

After the ride, while enjoying a couple of post ride libations, Steve, fresh off his successful completion of the Tour Divide (you know, just in case the Great Divide Race isn't long enough for you) showed us a trick he learned while on the Tour. Somewhere along the way someone showed him that Shimano clipless pedals work perfectly as bottle openers, crappy pedals (I'm a Time guy) but great bottle openers. I didn't believe it would work so I took one for the team, chugged the remainder of my beer and pulled out a freshie to give it a try.

Sure enough, it worked like a charm.