Greetings und salutations. The last time I, The Crotch, had the chance to participate in a CX race at St. Vincent, it was one of those inspiring moments where the course was unlike anything anyone had seen in our microcosm of amateur bike racing. It offered features and an environment that had everyone super excited and re-invigorated to race, especially those of us who come from a mountain bike background who hate gravel-crit style courses. Not to mention the t'aint-destroying mud bog that offered a like-minded, fun-filled group of us to lay down the heckles.
This time however, was different. It was very much in line with how this whole season has been - uninspiring. Despite a very technical course that used more features of the park than last time, I was about as excited as Criss Angel at Ram's Cheerleader Tryouts. (I don't blame him though - NFL cheerleaders are about as useless as an grammar testing at an ICP Gathering of the Juggalos.) That being said, it isn't like I crushed the course - in fact, I got my wrists snapped handily. My purpose in this race was to provide another oversized-rung on the bloated ladder of sadness for the C racers as they climbed their way past me, despite having started like a minute behind.
This sign was not needed, as there was no one cheering.
As I cried my way along the course, the only two guys behind me flatted on the first lap, which immediately had me riding by myself - this focused all the attention from the handful of people at the start/finish on me as I tripped and fell over the barriers. All of my tears flowing down my skin made the sand from the volleyball pit stick to me, and make its way deep into my cavernous va-guy-na, effectively creating pristine beach-front property - a veritable tropical island paradise in between my legs. Fortunately, the fun ended for me when I flatted my worn-out tubie on the last lap, leaving me to unbuckle my helmet strap and finish my laps on foot. Don't worry though, I re-buckled it as I passed the start-finish so Buddy wouldn't DQ me for not wearing a helmet. (That's actually not a joke.) To sum up my race, it was like a hit of jenkem before the fermentation has started - just tasting like plain shit without any euphoria.
After cleaning up and eating a PBJ, I went back down and blew the horn in the face of a few people alongside Justin White, eliciting varied responses from people:
You're welcome, Torrez!
We then headed to the woods to watch the man-train chugalug its way up the staircase:
It wasn't long before this train became unhitched from the Professor/Butthead engine, which quickly separated themselved from sight of everyone else. Justin and I were fortunate to be at the top of those stairs as Professor really was trying to drive home the point of his lecture, and just put several seconds of hurt on Butthead and climbed to the top like a Sprint missle. This move stuck, and he went on to take home another convincing win. Notable was that Brett Heuring came in 3rd, just a few seconds behind Butthea. Nice work.
By the end of the race so many people had left that I thought it was bedtime - but since I forgot my new pillow, I couldn't get any sleep:
How could I not buy a pillow from this guy?
Since I couldn't sleep, I helped break down. In the process, I dropped one of my leather work gloves without knowing it. For about an hour, my only hope that it would be found was that Nico, who manages to zero in on every single glove left on the side of the road, would find it and bring it to me. However, I beat him to it by finding it by chance before leaving. That was close - a single glove is as pointless as a D.A.R.E Officer at a Gathering of the Juggalos.
I'm not sure what it is, but the local races this year seem to be populated by a different crowd than there was 2 years ago. For example, most of the people in the photos from our previous account from St. Vincent no longer come out. Perhaps this is because, as Mr. Farinella pointed out to me, CX is, according to Alive Magazine, "... the latest two-wheeled fitness trend to hit St. Louis." Kind of funny that it is a trend, yet there seems to be fewer people - despite very organized races and course lay-outs that have been as good, if not better, than ever. There is hope. Next weekend, the State race in Jeff City, brought to us by our Brothers in Booze - Team Red Wheel, should provide ample opportunity to get a little crazy. JUST REMEMBER NOT TO OFFEND ANYONE - PURELY ENCOURAGING HECKLES ONLY. I mean, cross should be a strictly positive experience. Heckling and Cross go together like off-road recumbents and speed metal:
-Casey Fryback
One good turn deserves another - watch this stupid fucker eat shit:
Greetings, Team Seagal seed repositories! It has been a little while since I, the Crotch, have come to you with useless news of our ridiculous team. I apologize for that absence, as I had to go out and find a person, club them over the head, drag them back to my cave by their hair, and get married to them. Fortunately for me, I managed to bag a female.
Anyway, that is all well and good, but what about this past weekend? There was a cyclocross race this weekend, once again at the Mt. Pleasant Winery. Guh. That sounded terrible. So instead of racing there, we decided to ride to it, or near it, and hanging out to heckle and watch the race after we were finished.
Except for Dr. Roland Sallinger, who would valiantly race, despite the course being Equivalent to prison-mouth-rape.
So the Mayor of Pizza Town and Titty would drive out to the winery, crush some badass singletrack in the area, while myself, and Stankward Toscani would fulfill Stanky's contractual obligation to himself to complete at least one century each month this year. This would be a modified-Hurricane Century route, which has us going up the RFT to Alton, crossing over the Alton Bridge, coming through St. Charles either on the Katy or the farm roads, and towards the Page. Instead of crossing over the Page, we would rendezvous with Stoveward and choo-choo our little man-train out to the winery to get a ride back from the singletrack-minded jerks that were waiting. Whew. What a plan.
Completing 100 miles in time to see a decent amount of racing would require Jerkward and myself to leave super early - like before the hairy ass-crack of dawn. So in preparation for such an early departure, a customer of mine loaned me the largest tail-light I've ever seen:
Jerky and I met at Jack in the Box since Hardee's hadn't opened yet. We had to go through the drive-thru since their dining room wasn't opened yet. The clerk, we'll call him "Tyrone," was super helpful and totally awesome:
Go to the Jack in the Box at Hampton and West Park around 6AM on Sunday for the best service you'll ever get at a fast food joint.
After getting served up nicely with sausage and egg biscuits and extreme sausage sandwiches, we headed east on empty dark streets, the whole time watching daylight start to rest its warm t'aint squarely on the Arch. The river was calm, and we got to see just how much progress has been made on the new I-70 bridge:
Speaking of progress, we continued northwards along the river, and it only became moar and moar ominous:
The fog had me worried that slow-moving zombies would start to emerge and try to eat our brains. But then I remembered that we weren't in some isolated farmhouse, so we were safe from a fog-zombie attack.
Since Leg Titty wasn't with us, our first piss break wasn't until the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge at their porta-a-johns. But the highlight of that bridge isn't the shitters, it's the view:
Talk about a crisp, still day! The river water was like a mirror. Before shoving off, we noticed a group of people in the water doing something, probably some kinda of polar bear aqua-zumba class:
We continued up the trail, becoming moar and moar warm from the glorious sunlight, and before long, a couple of major landmarks came into view - the huge lock and dam, and the Alton Bridge, which we would cross shortly:
After crossing the Alton Bridge, and managing to not get a flat in all that shoulder debris, we found ourselves staring at many, many flat miles ahead of us, coming south/southwest through St. You're-Alright-Charles County. The roads were smooth and traffic free, however they were as flat as the chests on the boys locked in Criss Angel's basement.
It was along these roads where we had a lot of time to reflect. We marveled how this was the most gears that The Jerk and I had ever had between our two bikes - both of us riding 10-speed equipped road bikes with doubles. 40 fucking gears! That's like 38 more than usual.
The biggest excitement came as The Jerk and I were wistfully passing in front of the Casino, wondering what all the people milling about outside were looking at. As I looked to my left, I found my answer:
B-B-B-B-B-B-BOOOOM!
That was crazy. More crazy than the look in Criss Angel's eyes as he opens the sliding door of his parked, windowless van, holding ice cream cones. We opted to take a pass on Bangert Island, in the interest of time. So we continued the pain-train down the Katy, where we would eventually find the esteemed Stoveward P. Stovington at "Bejing Bench," a memorial bench near the Page where many scrolls have been translated.
With our man-train having grown in size by 50%, we were now at full force. We snapped the wrist of many-a-hybrid rider, one incumbent rider, and countless others. Nothing boosts your ego like snapping the wrists of retirees riding full-suspension Giant Cypress hybrids.
The next landmark was yet another bridge, though this one was not being blown up:
A quick stop to see Harley the Cat in Defiance, a possible Matt Hayes sighting, and a chance meeting with Sasha's brother Jeff, and we were nicely rested:
From Defiance, we had to break of the Katy Monotony by doing a slightly modified reverse partial Class 9 Hot Mission. We climbed up some roads past the Matson Hill Trailhead, and continued down Duke Road - making sure to piss off those stupid dogs, and also yell into the woods, hoping that Gino or Titty would hear us in mid-shred. This would be the first time that any of us would have the "pleasure" of riding down Duke Road NOT on a singlespeed mountain bike. This is significant, because if you've ever ridden Duke Road from Matson to Terry or Schlursburg Road, you'd know that it defines the phrase "totally fucked." But you know, after all that flat riding, it felt kinda good to crush those hills, even though we had already done 90 miles.
We bombed Schlursburg like C-Dubs bombs his shitter in the morning - like a fucking boss. My speedo touched 50mph, which was tons of fun.
Wouldn't you know it, we would be in Augusta before you knew it. Jerkward had to scope one of these beaut's:
Having received up-to-the-second updates from Delivery, I knew that my clothing would be waiting for me atop the 'Stro's roof. And lo and behold, that 'Stro was parked next to the Rolla Giant's Honda, so as I provided service to that public parking lot, I made sure to brush my bare ass cheek on his quarter panel. Come to think of it, part of the hitch rack may have also been inserted into one or more of my orifices. (Sorry about the curly-q's, buddy.)
Finally at the destination and out that my ravaged chamois, I found my way to my people on course, the hecklers. There was a hill over by the fence that has become rather infamous as a place to get totally fucked. There I found Strove, his better half, and a number of others giving Chablis, Merlot, and Shiraz hand-ups. FEAR NOT, WE SAID NOTHING OFFENSIVE AT ALL. EVERYTHING WAS COMPLETELY ENCOURAGING, AND NOT IN ANY WAY INTENDED TO MAKE RACERS FEEL BAD OR MAKE THEM LAUGH. AT ALL. NO CURSING OR FOUL LANGUAGE WAS USED IN ANY WAY.
"I say my good man, care for some aged Gruyere?"
And that was that. Devin crushed fucking souls, Sam Moore rode a triple, and Peat got ripped.
The next race that is going to be totally fucking awesome will be the State Race in Jeff City, as there will be some good party people. That's the race to go to.
In the meantime, know the enemy: Your best chances of finding them are in the unemployment line.
See you in Jeff City.
-Casey F. Ryback
P.S. If Michael Jackson could travel backwards through time, do you think he would try to molest himself as a kid?
As many of you know I am a huge Trailer Park Boys fan, maybe too much so. That is why I am proud to say that I not only got to witness a police standoff in the trailer park next to the shop, but I was misquoted on the front page of the paper regarding said standoff. In addition to that, were you to scroll down to the comments on the internet link to the story you may notice that some of the names are those of Trailer Park Boys characters. I am not at liberty to say if I or my co-workers wrote any of those, but we totally did. For reference puurposes, Phill Collins, Jim Lahey, Randy,Ricky and Julian and J-roc. are all characters on the show, and I assure you that the standoff lived up to every stereotype on the show. One of the hostages was wearing a leopard print t shirt night gown, another a sleeveless guns and roses tshirt. Do you really get up in the morning and put on a sleeveless appetite for destruction tour shirt and think your day is going to end well? WTF? ?Anyway the reporter made up my entire quote, the original was much better! Fuck Off. Tomorrow the story will have moved to the latest news section. Here's a link:
Hello loyalistas, connoisseurs and rabid fans of the Team
Seagal movement. With your esteemed author and blog Svengali, Crotch, away in
the land of coconuts, grass skirts and Maui waui enjoying the first sips of marital bliss, the
task of capturing and relaying to one and all, the vivid ugly truths of this
year’s Burnin’ at the Bluff has been passed on to a relative neophyte in the
Seagal movement – Mr. C-Dubbs. I will do
my best to convey all that happened and leave it to you, the readers, to
determine just where that blurry line of reality ended.
Following standard operating procedures, the wheels at Team
Seagal HQ were put into motion long before the race with the plan to deploy an
army of warriors who had been starved of meat and women for the better part of
a month to ensure maximum carnage on the field. Among those signed up for the
operation were defending SS team Nicwad, Leg Titty & Nadly with Sasha she-manning
up once again for the full 12 hours of self inflicted pain, the Lawman shamuing
once around the clock in the Clydesdale class, while Punchor of Cocks, Scooter
and Gino Fellino smartly opted for the opportunity to ride all day and party
all night in the 6 hour class. Winging in from the Eastern front I was in a bit
of a scramble as Taggort and Schlomo Axel bailed and elected to race in the
Sand in My Mangina Classic leaving me hanging like a big booger. Rather then
wipe I did the only thing that made any sense (to me that is) and immediately
signed up for 12 hours of self-abuse. It sure made a lot of sense – no riding
for the past 6 weeks and little in the way of single track riding – maximum
suffering. Thank Energor my moment of stupidity was saved by Mrs Titty and
Stove who were going through a similar crisis as Josh “Mr Waffles” couldn’t
decide if he should shit or get off the pot. A few calls of encouragement from
Arm Baby and Toscani and the deal was sealed, Messy Marla and the Missouri
Mountain Men would be racing for the rock star award.
Thursday - Arriving in St. Louis I was warmly greeted by Senor
Arm Baby who immediately set about having me translate my supply requirements
before setting out to the largest Target I have ever seen where after wandering
around in a daze we procured these politically correct taint wipes.
From there it was off to visit one of our esteemed sponsors,
The Hub, for the usual supplies the airlines won’t let you carry on and of
course one of those lovable little packages of Degree pit stick. Rolling in the Arm ‘Stro, stops were made at Casa de Titty
to procure the necessary supplies to keep us going for the weekend, pickup the
ex-Toscani/C-Dubbs St Louis based Kona Big Unit then heading to Nico’s digs for
consultation on the impending weather and route to our destination – Mark Twain
National Forest. Excited at the prospect of traversing the most dangerous
highway in Missouri and witnessing the onslaught of Bathtub Mary’s that line
the road providing safe passage I hid my disappointment at the safer Highway 55
passage but was rewarded with the sight of that beautiful blonde pedaling cars
for Sparks. If it hadn’t been for Jayson’s focus on getting to Council Bluff I might very
well have had a new used car to go with my new used Big Unit.
Finally rolling into Council Bluff young Edward greeted us
with the hammock city having been established (unlike previous years, Campground
C had been hijacked and we were stuck in the leper colony know as Campground
D). Making the best of it the all important bike stand was centrally located
and quickly put into action by our top mechanic while C-Dubbs and Nico went in
search of wood in to fuel the eternal flame of Camp Seagal and serve up the
infamous braquito.
A quick visit to drop off my own brats at Mt Kohler and it
was off for the assault on Council Bluff summit, thankfully Nico had made sure
I was properly set up with the right hydration system to get me there.
Arriving in the dark Eddie showed his potential to become the next Ansel Adams
with this beautiful shot of the summit view and an equally compelling portrait of
C-Dubbs and Mr Titty. Soon after arriving back at base there was a scramble for
shelter as thunderstorms swept the campground.
Having survived the night the house of Mt Kohler was
pushed to it’s limit Friday morning after a round of braquitos before we
headed out to mark the course. The fall offered up some spectacular views,
and an excellent social log at the top of the second climb as well as an offering from
Energor in honor of Coach.
Having been so overwhelmed with view from last night we made
the trip up the elevator to the bluff where Nico served up Coach summit style.
A four hour social course marking/ride later we rolled into
Camp to find most of the troops, PBR Dave and most importantly Mrs Titty.
Unfortunately for Stove, arriving late has it’s drawbacks as Mrs T and I agreed
he would get the first lap on race day. As should be expected when the sun went
down the IPAs went down as well and the bonfire roared.
Race day weather was akin to the turd in the punchbowl,
rather then sunny and 70 it was cool and cloudy, staying warm in camp while
Stove, Jayson and the crew were out working up a sweat on the trails was going
to be hard work.
With smoke grenades and Sex Pistols screaming the battle was
under way. Immediately I rolled up my sleeves, set about translating
the day’s strategy, eating, generally fucking off and having a good time with
Mrs T. Leg Titty rolled into camp with the Jerks holding onto a 20 second lead,
Gino was manhandling the 6 hour race with Punchor, Scooter and the rest of the
crew snapping a few wrists. Nico’s departure into battle meant Stove’s arrival at
the camp and yet another jerk to party with until my first lap. Nico was in
with close to a minute lead, Punchor was out after hitting the deck,
registering a 7.2 on the Richter scale Lawman was crushing laps fueled goji
berry brownies and Sasha was deep in the pain cave and not really liking life.
Well, as the hands on the clock closed in on 9:00 Nadly, Nicwad and Arm Baby
had snapped the wrists of all competition winning with almost a 5 minute lead.
Gino was firmly ensconced in the PBR throne of champions with a 6 hour victory
and Lawman bagged 2nd in the Clydesdale division.
Such domination of the podium had the troops in full party
mode with Scooter using moves only seen in the dojo as he danced up a storm.
Perhaps it should have been referred to as a tornado and apparently the owner
of the amazing boots was unimpressed with his dancing skills taking our beloved
Scooter to the grass in a full naked choke hold.
The podium showers of PBR were soon replaced by the mother
of a storms driving the troops back to base. Somehow Scooter managed to make it
into the hammock only to find a swimming pool, showing superior attitude and
super state of mind it was right to the Subaru Inn for a solid night of rest
before the Sunday Cx race.
As for your author, well it was one tremendous weekend and I want
to say thanks to the team for showing me yet another great time. See you
at Cxmas (one more time Gino)!
Greetings, Team Seagal Hombres. We are currently ensconced in near-perfect weather, which only makes the riding and racing that much bett0r. A titty bit nipply early in the morning, which slowly transitions into perfectly mild temps by mid-morning. The leaves are starting to crisp over, and the balloons on my late-season jenkem harvest are almost at full-expansion. I love this time of year.
Of course, this is also the time of year where the Tall Oak Challenge rears its drunken head. Having not missed one of these since we first started attending a few decades ago, I was sure mark this as "Top-Steven Priority." I mean, how can you not want to take part? It's not that far of a drive from the STL, and the race loop is just like one of my least favorite hook-ups in college: "Tons Of Fun." (Funny thing was, she wasn't *technically* a ton, and she wasn't much fun either.)
Over the course of 6 hours, you can get in some big mileage, without having to be hours and hours away from the start point. Then drink afterwards. Everyone has a genuinely good time, except for that dude who snapped his derailleur hanger before even entering the singletrack at the start. Poor bastard.
The wheels were set in motion at Team Seagal HQ, and the plan was to deploy 5 members of our elite strike force. Punch0r, FrozenPizzaPie, KneeCorn, Sandwich, and myself, CFR. Unfortunately, due to one of the very few forces beyond our control, Punch0r was called on to a different mission of an even higher priority, thus getting served by the best. Needless to say, he was no longer going to be part of our Jefferson City Landing Party. Myself and ItsNotDelivery would be in the 6-hour Mario Van Peebles Class, while Kneecorn and Titty would be in the 6-hour Danny Devito/Arnold Schwarzenegger (Twins) class (The Duo class.) Our man Scooter was also riding dirt bikes this sunday, but his bike was equipped with drop bars, and he was riding in the Alton Superprestige CX Race at La Vista Park. 11th out of 18 in the Super Badass Class. Nice fucking work. May your post-race turds flow like lava out of Krakatoa.
I rendezvoused with the other three at an undisclosed location, where we set sail. On the way over, we passed a tanker carrying what must be a load of "Unobtainium" from Oakley:
We took a southerly route to our destination, and arrived on target just in time to not have to play catch-up with the rolling start. All business prior to the start, we had no time to schmooze. Didn't need any arm warmers or emBROcation, as it was perfectly mild. Tons of dudes lined up, and I got to see Peat for the last time for the next 6 hours. There were tons of people, which was awesome, and Larry Pirtle sent us out.
Usually I end up jam-jobbed for most of the first lap at this race, but this time I put myself in a good spot in the open field which had me into the woods ahead of the bulk of riders, and both Titty and Grorg were just within sight of me. I also managed to keep my effort reigned in so that I didn't bury myself into a hole too early. Didn't even have to drink much.
Quick Product Review Section:
What was a little sketchy was riding on two brand new tires, not knowing how they handled yet - Continental X-King 2.2" with the "Protection" Sidewalls, which I had never gotten a chance to ride prior to mounting them tubeless 3 days earlier. The mounted up easily to my (dinged-up) Velocity Blunt SLs, and I started the race at around 28-30 psi (according the the pump that I borrowed from some dude who didn't even know it.) The tires un-mounted are very stiff, and un-flexible. They easily keep a round shape in your hand without folding over. I may have had the pressure a little high, but I'm also like 215 lbs, so I err on the high side. I was expecting a softer ride, and was wondering if my fork was even working. Maybe it was the fact that I haven't really had much time on the MTB at all in the last couple of months, but the bike was feeling a little nervous-handling. I wasn't pushing into the corners as hard as I would like to. I eventually learned how to ride them properly after a few laps. They did roll fast, but then by the 2nd lap I had to stop briefly and burn a big air co2 cartridge to replace the air that I had been burping out in the rear tire. I had to stop one more time to top off my tires 2 laps later due to burpage. I'm ok with that, as long as they don't get sliced to death, which they didn't.
Anyway, laps rolled by, eating gross Clif-Shots that I got for free, and downing water, Hater-ade, cute little mini CocaCola cans, chocolate milk, and Bolthouse smoothies. I haven't done any endurance mtb races this year, so I didn't really have much of a plan for this event other than eat and drink sugary/caffeinated bullshit each lap. My teammates were using this race to get a little more dialed for the upcoming Burnin' effort, whereas I was just riding since I sadly can not make Burnin' this year.
Whatever their plans were, they worked beautifully, because by the end of the day, Gino had placed fucking 3rd in the Mario Van Peebles class behind two seriously fast dudes - one dude on a Felt, and another dude who is the newest cutie-bumpkin on DRJ. Nico and Titty got 4th place behind the Ethos twins, Ploch and Albert, and two other broski's. I don't know where I placed, but it was somewhere in between the two Peats - one place ahead of Peat Goode, but behind 4th place Peat Henry.
I managed 9 laps, while Gregward and the Twins got 10 laps. That's a lot of fucking mileage. More impressive, was Nico's mustache winning the prize for best mustache. It was especially meaningful with previous facial hair champions Josh Carroll and Peat Henry in observance.
The post-race much enjoyable with lots of beers being drank, lots of meat being consumed, and much discussion had. Our van had one more destination in it's sights: Shakespeare's Pizza for the best fucking pizza, the JOBS:
Holy shit, that was good fucking pizza, accompanied by 22oz Ranger IPAs and 22oz Bell Two Hearted Ales. And a homeless guy in the shitter.
We decided that for Burnin', we decided that Taggort, Punch0r and C-Dubs should be on a team entitled "Crotchety Old Fucks." With an emphasis on the crotch.
On a side note, this blorg has seen much activity, and I feel that we are fortunate to have been able to keep at it this long. But alas, this post marks the end of an era - the bachelor Crotch. In a few weeks, after returning from honeymoon, I expect to not be able to write worthwhile posts any longer, the life having been sucked from my married ass. Hopefully I shall overcome.
-Casey F. Ryback
P.S. After a 6.5 hour thrashing, my hands are more tired than that time I downloaded those topless photos of Bea Arthur.
Greetings, Team Seagal Holdouts! Oh boy, is there a lot of crap going on. Between CX starting, Tall Oak Challenge next weekend, Burnin' a few weeks after that which also coincides with C-Dubs triumphant return to his spiritual homeland. And let us not forget the ongoing challenge to continuously get fucked.
And for how much has been going on lately, we would like to extend a laurel, and hardy apology for our lengthy hiatus of porsting on this blorg. But today, mainly on special request to Punch0r, I'm going to chronicle Sunday's goings-on.
Nearly all of us (Except Mr. Roland Sallinger, good man that he is) had to miss Hermann CX, however some of us (myself included) had to go and drink a lot on Saturday night on account of my looming nuptials. So waking up in time to make it to Hermann in time for some racing on Sunday was a tall order.
That left open the option for a long ride, leaving mid-day from South City. Holy shit. I met with FrozenPizza at the Store that Sells Only Jerkwards' house in Dogtown. Our plan: to leave, and then return, having reached triple digit miles. And since we left around 1:30-2, we made sure to bring lights. This was sure to get our juices flowing even faster for an all-out assault on the Burnin' competition. (FYI: Just because Snurb broke nearly every bone in his body like 1-2 months ago, his mustache has reached its fighting weight - which means only one thing. The top of the Burnin' SS podium will be defended.)
Back to our heroes.
We set off up Midland, quickly achieving escape velocity. As we dropped down Marine Road into Creve Coeur Lake Park, we heard the sound of a whip cracking. I immediately thought of the salesman who sold Homer the snow plow using a whipping sound. But then I looked to the right, and there was whip-cracking contest happening right before our eyes. We all were staring in confusion trying to figure it out, but as we merged onto the bike path, we quickly were snapped back into reality - when riding the Creve Coeur Lake path, you need to be on full alert - it is the land of shirtless rollerblading badasses, wind-bladers, and triathlete wannabes. Fortunately for us, PizzaTown has recently installed a bento box on his bike, so we were pretty confident that we would be accepted by the locals, and they would grant us safe passage to the other side of the Page Bridge.
We did manage to pass over into the St. Charles County safely, but not before seeing the smoothest and most rhythmic roller blader we've ever seen. (Shirtless, of course.) We also were passed by a true human centipede of a triathlete paceline. These dudes were all in their aerobars/restbars, and they were definitely pacelining. I was hoping to witness one of these:
Anyway, we dropped onto the Katy, and this time went north, with our sights set on the end of the line in Machens. Passing the Family Arena, we got to witness another cool contest - autocross in their sprawling parking lot! Very cool stuff. I'd never ridden north on the Katy past downtown St. Charles. I quickly found out that it ends up being relatively twisty and with much more up-and-down, compared to the rest of the trail - definitely a plus. Our man-train plodded along, always keeping the pace strong, and before it, we hit the end, which was pretty underwhelming:
We were on a route that had previously been traversed by our own Toscani and Boyd, on a recent vampire century on the night of Hurricane Isaac, so we knew we were in good hands. This route, after leaving the Katy, went through miles and miles of nice, quiet farm roads, as we pointed our handlebars at the Hwy 67 bridge into Alton. Not long before reaching that bridge, we saw yet another fun community activity - an honest-to-Energor tractor pull. Using normal, everyday tractors. I didn't take any photos, because I got the feeling that the fat dudes in overalls already didn't like the less-fat dudes in spandex stopping to watch.
So we kept moving, and were treated with a nice view of Alton (if there is one):
We stopped at the last gas station for provisions, and then headed across the bridge in the bike lane which, for a cyclist, was only slightly better than no lane at all. Whatever. We were back up on the levee and riding back south in no time:
Good to be on a fat-tire pavement bike for all the gravel we encountered. No big deal, we crushed it, handily. Riding along the Chouteau Canal, we had one of the only glimpses of the sun the entire day - and it was a nice one too, as it set:
We were brapping the shit out of this trail, and at the last possible moment of gravel, Jerkward's had to get a flat. which was good for me, because I was in the process of getting my wrist snapped, having slowed down to take that sunset photo, and then being unable to catch back up on account of my corpulence.
As we returned to pavement from the gravel levee trail, I was able to hear the faint sound of three t'aints rejoicing in unison. However, that would be short lived, as we passed through the outskirts of East St. Louis on the way towards the McKinley Bridge. Passing underneath the arch, avoiding the horse piss and shit all over the ground, we turned briefly up Chouteau, and made a quick stop at this nearly forgotten church, which has the most ominous statue out front:
Whoah. Dude.
It'sNotDelivery and Toscani made it evident around this time that their legs were made of pure Quantanium, as I was unable to answer their impressive accelerations over the bridge, down the River Trail, and then all the way down Broadway. 90+ miles in with our lights on, I was just watching their blinky tail lights from a distance. To better paint a picture, while I was passing the entrance to Bellerieve Park, those two jerks were already passing (and thankfully not turning into) the entrance to Sister Mary (You're Alright) Charles Park.
We thankfully regrouped and rode up River Des Peres Road, and made a stop at Walgreens for actual frozen pizza, right before getting back to Casa Croach, where we drank the rest of the Hamm's that I had previously bought at Quicktrip:
That's fucking cheap.
We relaxed well, having ticked over 100, and enjoyed the recent rain that our region has received, which allowed us the luxury of riding dozens of miles on the Katy Trail and other gravel, with hardly ANY dust at all. Oh man. September's century: done.
Now on a side note, as this cyclocross season gets underway, you might end up having to suffer someone as they complain about how hard (or easy) the day's CX course is, or how it doesn't suit their style. I would like to offer some advice - that you simply tell them to:
that's good advice.
Don't forget to come to The Gateway Cross Cup. Since there is a decent chance that you don't know anything about it this year, it is at Heman Park again, and it is on Wednesday, September 26th. Don't fuck this one up.
Hello Jerks and followers of us Jerks. Sasha Pestrovich here. Just wanted to let you know that our fellow teammate Scooter is in Colorado right this very minute, shredding some of the sweetest singletrack trails known to man. Yea, lucky bastard. On that note, he is racin' this Saturday, in one of the toughest mountain bike races around. It's not the DK200, but I guess it will pass. Team Seagal member, Scooter, had decided to man up and ride the Leadville 100. His plan of attack is easy. I am not at liberty to tell you anything, so I won't. Superior Attitude and Superior State of mind always prevails. KRUSHIT!
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