From The Team Seagal Culture Desk

Greetings rabid Team Seagal fan. I must apologize to you, for this year seems much more quiet than recent years. There have not been as many races (unless you're a road fanboi) due to an inordinate number of weather cancellations, AND the unfortunate lack of KC-area XC/endurance races from our jerks/buddies over at Heartland Race Promotions. Man, those Landahl races were the shiznit. We would be all over the upcoming KC Cup in September, to be held at the newly constructed Swopes Park, but that is the SAME weekend that we'll be riding the D9 Bulldozer! Nothing personal, just business; especially since all first-hand reports of Swopes to me have been fucking glowing. At least there's still Rapture in Misery. Oh mama! Things will pick up soon, as Short Track draws near, as do some of the endurance races of later in the season, and the CX series comes back this fall.

So until the next badass race report, fear not: we have something for your mind. One of our esteemed sponsors, Kona Bikes, is awesorme. Even moar cool is our man at Kona, Cory, who regularly keeps us rolling on this sickest bikes out there. He's even cooler than the Corey's - yes, THOSE Corey's. Well has a few things to talk about, as do a few other cats over there. Check out their site for random streams of consciousness and occasionally well-constructed thoughts:

The "COG":


Cory:


While perusing those places, I suggest listening to Sepultura's album "Beneath the Remains" or "Arise." Holy shit, talk about some of the best shredding to come out of the '90s speed/thrash metal scene. The type that would make Jack Johnson's perfect beach life less "chillin'."

Pssst! Short Track soon...

-Casey F. Ryback

The Sunday TC Man' Ride

Greetings to all jerks, specifically Jerkward and Jerktor. (Let's see... Jerkson Storm, Casey Jerkback, Jerko Felino, Jerk Ministor, Cockjerker/Jerkpuncher, Jerkall Lawson... I could go on forever.) In an effort to reduce overall weakness, we shall be continuing the inconsistent tradition of a Sunday morning ride into greatness, leaving from the TC Man. This isn't quite a mythically epic ride, but rather, a good solid 2.5-3 hours with some West County Hills. I have to be at work at 12, as do several other people, so the aim is to be back by 11:15, 11:30 at the very latest. Something to keep in mind though, this ride is:
When: 8am, this sunday 6/14 weather permitting. I'm not showing if it is raining, which it might. keep an eye on the forecast.
Where: TC Man (14367 Manchester Road)
Where to: Westward bound

Why: Because what are you going to do, spend time with the family? Just look at what could happen if you do that:Or even this:
I think you know what needs to be done.

In other news, congrats to our Soldiers who ventured over to SoBoCoMo to compete at the MWFTS #5! Gino in 3rd place in SS Class, and Jonathon Cold (our newest inductee) taking home 1st place in Beginners! This race saw Jerward and Cockjerk/Jerkpuncher finish 6th and 9th, respecively, in the SS class. So if the SS class only counted multiples of three, we would have podium sweepage! Jerktor snapped wrists all day for a 5th place finish in a stacked marathon class. The marathon class also saw the return of Marshall Lawson, who heard something about there being a nearby skatepark that is frequented by young boys, and couldn't resist. Whatever his motivation was, it was good enough to take 16th out of 24.

Don't forget about Short Track... only a few weeks away...

-CFR

(This post was made moar teh funnies by awkwardfamilyphotos.com)

Mr. Jones: "Ahh, man." Craig: "Hey dad. What happened to you?" Mr. Jones: "I got bit in the ass today son, by a stinkin' ass filthy dog."

It's Friday. Many greetings to all you jerks out there. I am Nico Toscani, we will discuss the title of this post in just a minute here. First, I better come clean...I am the one who skipped town without finishing the Rhett's Run post. That race was really rad and some cool shit went down, most important of which is documented in the new header photo located just above these words. Kickin' Ass up there on his Big Unit is newly acquired team member Jonathan Cold. Team Seagal's first pick in the 2008 draft, Mr. Cold spent the past several months in our farm system under close supervision of Team Physician, Wes McLaren, MD. Administrating a restricting regime of Chubb Monday's and fine Chinese Herbs, Dr. has cultivated in young Jonathan an insatiable desire to distribute wrist carnage throughout the beginner class. Last Sunday June the seventh young Jonathan lined up for his third ever race and went ahead did exactly what we told him to do: he snapped every damn wrist he encountered on his way to becoming MWFTS Missouri State Champion!

Rhett's Run was tempting enough attract four other Seagal soldiers and one Robort to its various starting lines as well. Myself, Gino Felino, and Cock Puncher signed up in the Team Seagal Class while Doctor and Robort raced their SS's in the endurance category. Thank you to the ninja photographers [that we never saw] who took the following baller photos of your favorite heroes administering destruction throughout their respective race classes. Team Seagal fan please take note, the '09 kits have arrived!

Start of the SS Race. I got a nice jump at the start and entered the singletrack in great position.



'Puncher in Pursuit



XTR DR is totally Rad



Gino/ #3 punched someone in the foot with his face just before this one



This is Jonathan Cold's Wrist Snappin' Machine, aka HOG JAWS



Finally, here are all the big dogz lined up for the PRO/expert race:



Those photos were grrrrreart! Now I want you to know what was so important that it kept me from finishing my blog post. Me, my Dr. friend, and Jonathan Cold got up in the early am hours and drove for nine hours until we were deep into the interior of good ol' Rocky Top. Knoxville, TN is where we finally stopped our car in order to have our minds melted by some of this:





The following day it took another nine hours to return ourselves safely back to within Missouri state lines. It was really good for me to return to my own bed, I slept great and when I woke up and it was Friday. I determined an easy ride on my new Kona Major One would be awesome, perhaps leaving me feeling good and ready to kick some ass at work later on in the PM. I pedaled into Forest Park and had rattled off a few 4.5 mile FoPo Century Laps before I ran into Davey B, aka PRO-as-they-come Rhett's Run champion. We jumped on the bike path and chilled out until we hit his exit and he left the park for work. I continued on alone and soon came up on a woman walking her dog. She was within her lane and her medium-sized, mixed-breed dog was certainly leashed. I moved over a lane and began to ride around them, but was met with much resistance. The woman glanced over her shoulder and thought I was 'coming in hot.' She totally freaked out, yanked on her dog's collar and pretty much sicked his ass on my ass! No shit, as I swerved around them he got a piece of me drawing blood and tearing my shorts:



I was pretty rattled and the woman immediately starting blaming the incident on me for not calling "on your left" soon enough. I guess she could not hear my smooth-ass SS drivetrian as I approached and then resorted to desperate measures when she realized her frail wrists were about to be snapped. Either way, work was pretty cool and I am going to BBQ braquitos tomorrow with D to the R at the T.C. Man. PEACE!

Penrose # 5

Well the 5th of 6 races has now come and gone, and all I can say about track racing is...well I am hooked! It's bike racing in its purist of forms. To all those reading this post who have yet to make it out there, you are missed, and are really missing out on some serious action and training. Budski Photography came out to shoot some pics, and you can check them all out on STLbiking. Big props to Dave(our Pabst rep) for making it yet another cold beer filled event! Also shout out to our homies Team Trail Monster for making the long drive from O-Town to come enjoy the evenings racing! Results here. Next week is the last regular season race....will you be there!?!

Storm

Wilson Lake, Kansas Ride Report - There IS riding in KS!

Greetings loyal Team Seagal Fan! I have been in teh middle of an unfortunate racing-drought as of late, mostly due to a fairly shitty work schedule. Fortunately, I actually DO have a work schedule, unlike many people these days. My only days off are during the week, so I have to jump at any chance I get to ride new places. This past Monday, I had the opportunity to get introduced to a new trail system with an old college riding buddy. And if there's one thing I enjoy, it's getting the opportunity to snap moar wrists in other parts of the country.

My buddy (who lives in KC) calls up and says "I have the day off, and we're going deep into the depths of Kansas to do some badass riding."
"Waaa...But Dude, I only have a day off, and that is like 8 hours (one-way) away! Waaa..." I replied.
"Shut your goddamned mouth and pack your shit. We're going."
"Yes sir."

Once you get to Wilson Lake, it is just as far to go to the Rocky Mountains as it would be to get back to St. Louis. It's a little tempting as you're getting ready to head home.

So this would afford me a chance to finally get to ride my new baller-ass cranks:

Next up, a headbadge made out of diamonds, or maybe a hot midget for a saddle.

In a nutshell: This trail is laid out around a small corner of Wilson Lake, which is huge. There is a 15 mile main loop, with several bail-out options for those who only feast on weak sauce. Very easily singlespeed-able, with huge amounts of awesome available at each turn. There's a handful of super-fun technical sections that make you want to get off your bike and try it again multiple times, even though it is a mostly fast, flowy trail.

Some photos taken on/of the trail:







Two photos taken of the same section of trail, from different points of view (open full-res for full effect):



Some more shots:

I nearly ran over about 20 of this little dude's brothers and sisters (look carefully):
If you're wondering what my facial expression looks like when I'm sharting (not that I ever have) it probably resembles this one pretty closely:



Did I mention who is a major creator/caretaker of this system? One Mr. Doug Chambers, whom we met and spoke with on the trail - super friendly dude who was giddy with excitement that out-of-towners were riding his trail. Arrow points to him:

This trail was a fuck-ton of fun. I think I know why Doug Chamber's son, Cameron, is so unbe-fucking-leivably fast - he always has a trail like this to ride. If I had easier access to this place, I'm fairly sure that I'd be on the mountain bike a little moar often, especially since they don't see much rain there. Shit, here in St Louis our trails get more year precipitation simply in the form of tears from people crying about cancelled races than Wilson Lake gets in actual yearly rain.

We rode for hours, got super sunburnt, and returned to the car nearly out of water. Then it was off to Denny's, though we did discuss the possibility of making the drive to Dos Primos. The fun factor on this trail is through the roof.

My day was nearly spoiled at the gas station though, when I happened to lay eyes on this piece of shit redneck truck with the testicles (or "truck-sticles" as a friend of mine puts it) on the bumper:If you have these on your truck/car, you should know that YOU are the reason why hamsters eat their young - because hamster parents don't want their offspring to have a chance to somehow develop the ability to own a vehicle and attach these things to the bumper. Let's think about this some more - ours is a society where you can't see breasts on TV, but you can see a big fucking nutsack on a bumper.

I was a little shaken up from the nutsack incident, but my day quickly turned around when I coincidentally came across an interesting warning label on my jar of peanuts. I was relieved because it looks like the good people at Kraft are doing what they can to keep Robort from causing more damage:

Let's recap: next time you are going through Kansas on your way to the mountains, take a few hours to ride Wilson Lake, since it is only like 10 minutes off Hwy 70.

In other news, coming up soon is the MWFTS race at Cosmopolitan Park in Columbia on the Rhett's Run trail. Sounds like there should be a great turnout. And don't forget - the Castlewood Dirt Crits are coming in July! BE THERE OR BE A SHITHEAD

-Casey Fucking Ryback

MAJOR ONE

The rumors are true, and our wonderful sponsor has delivered yet again! I give you the 2009 Kona Major One CX frame. Just like it's geared brother the Major Jake, but sans gears.......Now thats what Im talking about! Looks like I will have a nice new bike for the Dirt Crits this summer!
-Storm

Win & Out

Here is a video from week 1(Thanks STLbikegeek.com.) For some reason I can't get the B race videos to load, but the A races are super fun to watch! 3 more weeks left and I have yet to see ANYONE else from the team there!?! Penrose is the SHIT, and take it from me you will be kickin' yourself if you don't come out and give it a try....I am still wondering why I haven't raced track till now. More videos at stlbikegeek.com.
Storm

Miss and Out

Greetings Team Seagal Fan. Did you know we are 1 of 20 cities in the US with a Velodrome? How about that every Thursday for 6 weeks in May-June there are races there from 6pm-8pm? I bet you also didn't know that 2 Team Seagal members have been there for the first 2, and will be there for the next 4. I bet you didn't know that we roll up to Penrose every Thursday with a cooler full of ice cold Pabst, free cold delicious beer......If you knew that I bet we would have seen you there. Well tomorrow is race #3 Mason Storm and Forrest Taft will be there racing, and you should come and enjoy some adult beverages and really exciting racing action. Wait what ways that...you say you would like to race but don't have a fixed gear bike.....Well you should contact Robert at A&M bicycles. He has put together just about every size Track bike ready to be raced. You must supply your own pedals, and the rules are you break it you fix it....simple! Penrose is located at the intersection of HWY 70 and Kingshighway (South of 70 and East of Kingshighway) See you there!?!
Storm

Syllamo's Revenge 2009: No More 68 Camaro

For all of you waiting, we here at Team Seagal have finally been authorized to inform you all of this past weekends goings at the 2009 Syllamo's Revenge. Being the bunch of jerks that we are we don't have any pictures to show from this trip. They still haven't been declassified (or taken) so you all are going to have use whatever brains you've got and do a little imagining. Just don't think too hard.

The Team Seagal transports left town at varying times throughout the day to keep our enemies at bay. Nicorn and I (Gino) left in the am followed by Masorn and Doctor in the later pm. Of course Nico and I were the first to make it to team headquarters for the weekend assault on the trails of Syllamo:


Held within this cabin is the worlds largest collection of horrible John Wayne movies. However they can be the perfect trial to see which teammates can outlast the others for a delicious helping of finishers crowns.

Back to the mission at hand: leaving a trail of snapped wrists along the Syllamo Trail System. We headed to the race start a little before 7 and parked next to the STL crew of Christian Stitz and Matt Keevan. After a racers meeting held in front of the best Chevy pickup wrapped with the giant head of an insurance agent/race promoter ever, we made our way to the start line and got ourselves some good spots up front and center. At the start, John Matthews turned right as we all started to go left. And this was before his unfortunate cabeza to ground impact later in the morning. Start line mayhem behind us, we made our way down the pavement to the opening salvo of the mile long gravel climb. At the base your Team Seagal heroes shifted down, oh wait, no we just pedaled harder and made our way up that climb. Dwayne repeated last year and made it into the singletrack first way in front of the rest of us, dancing on his singlespeed. I chased up and squeezed in 3rd in front of Furhman with Nico several spots back, the Doctor several spots behind him, and Mason doing some slow grind wrist-snapping behind the Doctor.

From the singletrack start on, its 48 miles of no holds barred mountain bike racing. Big rocks, sharp rocks, slimy rocks, mud, muddy rocks, fast flowing streams, incredibly flowy trail, tight turns to rip, stairs to climb, and giant holes from fallen trees to run around. Yes this past winter's ice storm did a number on parts of the Syllamo trail system, but our singlespeed steeds care nothing about a few sticks littering the trail snapping though them like the sound of so many broken wrists. Plus we had our finely honed dismount and remount skills accumulated during a fall of CX racing.

There were flats encountered, derailleurs ripped off, chains sucking and snapped, hard crashes to the ground, and rocks to run over in Keen sandals. Yep that's rights racing in sandals. The most ballerific rider out there was Arkansas native Clayton Bell tearing it up in SPD sandals on a bright green Niner singlespeed. Insane.

For the Team Seagal crew Syllamo's Revenge 2009 was mission accomplished, but in the pre-2001 sense of the phrase. You know, we actually did something. We're still waiting official results, but here's the basics: Mason knocked almost an hour of his time last year in this years much tougher conditions. Nico took home fifth in singlespeed (possibly season SS champion in the Arkansas MTB Marathon Series) and a top 20 overall. The doctor battled back from 2 flats to finish a little behind Nico. I came in eighth overall and 3rd in singlespeed.

Anyone got a fireplace mantle I can rent out?

STL came to party as is now tradition at Syllamo's with Ploch, Matthews (nasty crash and all), Mitch, man no one could touch Dwayne, Scotty, Zach, Christian and numerous others all finishing strong. And props to Keeven for ripping it for two hours, fully rigid, before the stitches in his hand gave way.

So how does one celebrate a day on a trail like syllamos? Well killing a cooler full of delicious Pabst followed by a little bit of mexican food with some fellow trail conquerers sounds like a plan to me. 2010 Syllamo's Revenge- I'm ready now!

So has anyone seen my sunglasses? Last seen around a blue Nissan Sentra somewhere in Northern Arkansas.

UPDATE: Results are posted. Nico officially got 16th overall, the Doctor was 9th in SS, and Mason was 15th in SS.

If You Can't Race, Fabick

The nation's MENSA authorities called for enough precipitation this weekend to have Bob and the DRJ boys postpone today's Castlewood race. So what's an overweight crew cut sporting crossdresser to do? Well, I don't know, but a Team Seagal soldier thanks the weathermen for their dutiful service and heads for the cobbles. Yep that's right: cobbles.
I took a ride down to Fabick Lane and the "Fabicksburg."

Upon entering the lions gate you know that you're about to ride a stretch of road unlike anything else you'll find in St. Louis.

Looking back down:
The roughest section of cobbles is on the other side of the hill. It's short and pretty flat though.


And for those of you who have yet to experience Fabick Lane:



No comments about how long it took or how hard I'm breathing at the top. Otherwise next Team Seagal non-race is a climb where you have to ride with one hand while filming. That and we'll throw crap at you or something.

It's less than 1 week until Syllamo's!

-Gino