Holloween weekend

This write up is brought to you by Rob Roberston - Top Rookie
Thanks Rob for providing this for the group.
here’s a recap of Saturday’s ride on 10/30/10.


Riders included:
Gary Millichep
Todd McBride
Robert Renke
Marianne Mahn - #1 in the Bush
Lee Duncan – Sonic Boom
Shawn Richardson – In his Green Flash incarnation
Jim Coughlin – Domestique
Chris (I think - apologies if name’s wrong)
James Lavin – Nickname suggested, see below.
Rob Robertson – Top Rookie

Sorry if I missed anyone else.

Everyone milled about until around 8:40. We talked about the route and decided to do the Big Woods loop, but without Lystra this time around. This, we figured, would give us ~45 miles. Weather was quite brisk, and everyone was taking extra care to bundle up.

We started off and ran the basic route to highway 55. At this point Domestique, still on his heavy hybrid, decided that he didn’t want to try to keep up with the stems/thorns and peeled off to ride a shorter, more relaxed distance. We offered to have someone ride with, but he insisted he was okay, so we continued on course. Things picked up very quickly after crossing 55, and we raced toward the lake. Todd and Marianne did a great job of keeping up with the group; Todd in particular was riding like a madman, and he burned several matches sprinting toward the Chatham County line. Your humble correspondent flatly refused to joined in this sprint, as he was encountering severe flashbacks from his tire popping experience the week before. We waited at appropriate points for everyone to catch up and rolled into Lystra gas station as planned.

During the break at the gas station, James announced that he was freezing and heading back. Attempts to encourage, then beg, then reason, then insult him into continuing on had no affect; his mind was made up. Further, more intense encouragement, pleading, reasoning, and insulting ensued, but was again ineffectual. At some point during the proceedings, Green Flash suggested that we get James a “widdle blankie”, or, better yet, a SNUGGIE! From there, things went downhill quickly… we immediately began thinking up the appropriate designs for James’ snuggie. An NCSU snuggie was suggested, then a Carolina snuggie, then (appropriately) someone shouted, “I’ve got it! He needs a TREK SNUGGIE!!!” This got us on a whole different tack, suggesting Shimano Snuggie, Gyro snuggie, carbon-fiber snuggie, and other, cycling-related snuggie designs. People who were pumping gas into their vehicles thought we were nuts, but I think everyone was laughing too hard to care. And, in the end, James still went back on his own – to a chorus of, “You Wuss!!!” Reports that Lee Duncan is looking at investing into a niche market of biking related snuggie designs could not be substantiated. As a result of this incident – your reporter suggests that James Lavin can only be known henceforth as – SNUGGIE-Boy!

From there, we headed to Big Woods, and on to Wilsonville without further incident. Todd continued to impress, but looked a little tired at the next rest stop and Marianne was starting to flag a bit also (even though she had ridden strong up to this point). These two really did a great job, hanging with the thorns. The thorns left Wilsonville, with Todd and Marriane running a little slower behind them. Sonic Boom led the charge, and pushed a 20+ pace most of the way back. In fact, he was getting pretty annoying about the whole thing by sprinting ahead, then waiting, then sprinting ahead, then waiting, etc. Unfortunately for him, we finally found out his stamina/riding secret. After catching up to him at the Strawberry Patch, we noticed him pouring a suspicious white powder from a well worn baggie into his water bottle. We suspected that he had been doing this each time he had sprinted ahead. We crowded around to get a better look; but he wouldn’t let us see and definitely refused to share. Accordingly, we can only conclude that he has gone over to the dark side along with Contador, Landis, et al and that he is using a Columbian imported, performance enhancing product. Shocked by this revelation, we proceeded on and came in the standard route through the Sisters, etc. The thorns ended up running 46 miles at almost 18mph. Todd and Marianne came in a couple minutes behind. Good ride on a chilly day.


Rob