CXMAS - When Well-Adjusted, Respected Citizens Go Bad

Greetings, Champions of the Team Seagal Cause! I bet you didn't think it was going to happen. Neither did I. In fact, having been in somewhat-of-a-daze these last few months, I didn't think much at all was happening, besides losing battle after battle to the Troll of Laziness that lives in my belly. After many inquiries and continuous trip to Mt. Kohler, Lawman made it happen at nearly the last minute. Only slightly less ambitious of the more recent versions, this year marked a return to the site of, in my opinion, what was the best CXMAS - a CXMAS rife with controversy and butthurt. This year, we were moar subtle and discrete about our indiscretions and secretions.

Last-minute status aside, there were still somewhere in the toilet bowl of 100 like-minded jerks that showed up. Hard to believe that many people had nothing else to do and nowhere else to be on the weekend in between Christmas and New Years, and therefore elected to ride their bikes in some dreary, windy, frozen-ass, gas-ass-sheep weather.

The Ultimate Jerk, dispensing instructions

 As usual, Rudolph the PBR-nosed Dave was in attendance, to make sure that people were able to receive some badass Pabst shwag:

This year also marked the glorious return of Santa-Boz, who has a new, titanium sleigh that has improved snow-handling characteristics:

Note the fender hopeless tasked with defending against spray from a tire much wider than the fender itself

Not only was Santa-boz on his fatbike, but I believe that this year's CXMAS may have coincided with the local chapter of the national Dudes-On-Fatbikes Club, otherwise known as "Dudes on Fatties." There were more than a just few of them, and I was actually surprised to have not been lobbied for a "fat bike category," especially after an unsuccessful attempt at an official one in the Bubba races.

I suspect I know the real reason for all the fat bikes cropping up lately. Despite the lack of conditions in Missouri that provide a platform for them to be fully advantageous, they want to have the excuse I hear at the shop on a regular basis when the customer insists on purchasing a mountain bike instead of a road bike - even though they admit they'll never ride off pavement. "Well you know, if it's harder that's fine, I'm just getting a better work-out that way. You know."

It was windy as fuck (WAF) at the mound this day, and I think that served to motivate us to depart promptly. Fortunately, I had my new windproof uber-thermal tights, and oooweeee, I was in comfort-land. This is in stark contrast to Mark "Hardman" Grumpke's thermal leg-wear:

Seeing Mark's ability to give the weather a huge middle finger reminded me of something:

 Hell yes.

Continuing on in our jerk-infested escapes, I passed by one Nick "Red Wheel Bikes/Baby Clothes" Smith who had simply this to say:

I love riding through Busch Wildlife:

Stopping for a minute, I could hear the sound of a monster trucks coming down the road in a group:

It wasn't long, before I was fortunate enough to run into Bob "Disqualified in The Past For Attempting to Race Shirtless" Jenkins, and he had what may be the best CXMAS "get" evar:

Yeah, that's a 1990 issue - coincidentally one that I remember getting to look (somehow) when I was but a wee jerk. You shouldn't be surprised - seeing something like that really "sticks" to your memory, not unlike so many pages of this very magazine. Ah Playboy, thanks for the mammaries memories.

After about 15-20 minutes taking turns behind a large tree, we had to get back on the road as we were behind. We vowed to NEVER GIVE UP, and continually reminded ourselves of how motivated we are to succeed, because it is only ourselves that can keep us from being who we want to be. Don't Forget, Bob.

A few miles down the road, and further into the woods, we came a large group of people huddled together, much like emperor penguins on a glacier, shielding themselves from the wind. As it turns out, we found the obligatory Egg Nog station, and the start line of the only bicycle race to ever take place completely within the confines of Busch. I had to stop for some moonshine, courtesy of "The" Mitch:

Fortunately, that wasn't the only bottle of it.

These three weren't even aware of CXMAS: they were already drinking alone out in the woods and we happened to show up. What are the odds!

Claire, Tom "Foolery" Marsh, and (Marty?)

After some general rabble-rousing, hijinks, funny business and shenanigans, the CXMAS Dirt Crit was about to start:

And it was on:

What were we thinking? What a terrible idea. Fortunately, I was able to turn to Rock, who would be the voice of reason and responsibility:

I'll be honest, I don't even really know who won what, but we gave away some pretty shweet Pabst Shtuff to the chicks, the dudes, and the one-gears:

By this point, we had all been standing around for quite a while, and the slow trickle of body warmth escaping my nice, expensive breathable cycling clothing had left me with little heat in my body, except for in my colon, where my slowly-building steamer was maintaining the necessary heat required for a proper jenkem high, later.

So we had to depart, leaving no trace that we were there. But very shortly down the trail, we had to stop again, and revisit CXMAS's past, specifically the site where Mr. Jenkins originally set the bar (seemingly) un-attainably high in terms of egg-nog ingested:

2009

2013

Let's not forget the fat coiler that some human left there that year as well.

We didn't have far to go now, and most of that distance we'd be going with the wind at our backs. Up until now, that wind had been more annoying than the thought of having a saddlebag mounted like this:

This next picture encompasses a sort of "white whale" for me. In Busch Wildlife, there are countless of old munitions bunkers, scattered throughout the hills. And they are all numbered, usually with three numbers. I have been dreaming of finding a bunker with the number "666" on it for years. I am proud to say, that on the ride back to the car, I finally found it:

So what if the last 6 was spray painted. It exists, and so I'll be heading back out there to set up a death metal recording studio in the coming weeks. FUCK YES. \m/





I was very glad to finally reach the vehicle, at which point I pissed on a concrete block, and then Brett and I followed the leader to a nearby eatery in Dante's outer circle of hell - AKA The Chesterfield Valley. At this eatery we found several dozen more CXMAS'ers eating and drinking. What an excellent way to finish a ride which is already an excellent year-finisher for everyone around these parts who rides.

Stay tuned, for there is more to come. In the meantime, get familiar with the Bluff View Trail.

-C"Rot"ch


P.S. Digiorno and Titty are fucking jerks.

CXMas Teh 6th special edition

http://teamseagal-cxmas.blogspot.com/

that is all.