Milk Chug Monday Challenge

A few weeks ago Gerry made a drunken wager with Mikey Green that he could consume an entire gallon of milk in one hour. Later, he sobered up and did some research on the Internet and learned that while it was physically possible, the results were often unpleasant.

Faced with the facts, he did what any sane, reasonable human being would do...he tried to get himself out of the bet.

Mikey Green would have none of this, so a date was set and a venue was chosen. A couple of friends stopped by for a few beers to watch the spectacle. Good times were had by all...well, except for Gerry.

Here, for your viewing pleasure is video documentation of Gerry's attempt at consuming an entire gallon of whole milk in one hour:

Course de Marlton-Evesham-Marlton

Mikey Green and I took a ride over the Ben Franklin today for some Jersey-style crit racing at the Course de Marlton-Evesham-Marlton. This is a fancy name for a bike race held on a course in an office park that most area racers have spun around thousands of times. The course has two right angle turns and a sweeping S turn on the back end. It ends on a slight uphill that probably rises no higher than 20ft, but thins the herd a lot more than you'd think.

After taking in the first Master's race, we signed up and lined up and were off. In a lower category race, this is the time of the season where most racers have good fitness, so unfortunately a lot of sketchy riders who would be getting shot OTB in the spring are now strong enough to wreak havoc at the front.

And by wreak havoc, I don't mean getting up to the front and setting a hard pace or breaking away, I mean sitting up in the middle of hard efforts, taking hands off the bars when they should remain on the bars and plenty of unpredictability in the corners.

Mikey and I did our best to stay at the front and stay out of trouble. I haven't raced a crit since the first week of May, so it was a bit of an adjustment at first...a little closer, a little twitchier. However, when you go through the same loop 20 times, it makes it really easy to pick out the right lines and the places to be when it gets fast.

There were two crashes...one in the middle of the race right by the start/finish line and another in the final third of the race on the backside of the course. Mike and I stayed out of trouble and found ourselves 1 and 2 going into the last lap.

Mike played the dutiful teammate and led out...I was right on his wheel, which was going to force someone else to make the first move. A QCW rider and another dude jumped past on the right in the final half mile and I was able to get on their wheel. The finish was on an uphill and I started my sprint a little bit to early. I picked off the other dude, but the QCW rider and two other guys passed me from behind when I faded a little bit at the line. I came in fourth, but just missed the podium spot I was aiming for.

Mikey was pretty spent from his leadout and got swallowed up and came in 45th (it was a pretty big field.) Big ups to Mike because he definitely put me into a position to finish well and I am positive that without that leadout, I probably finish in 10th at best.

All in all, a good day. A good result and both Mikey and I kept the rubber side down and keeping with tradition, we enjoyed 11am Lionshead Lights immediately following the race.

Also, I threw down one of my best murderfaces to date in the final sprint...I really hope the photographer was able to get a shot.

Grass Track!

The Grass track was a real good time. I'm going to blame my being bad at it on my tires. My lack of ability, taking turns to wide and forgetting to put weight on my outside hand could have also contributed to me sucking. Mike Mast would go pro if you could go pro in grass track races. He's been saving up his legs all season and he's now found his true calling. Willem is a jerk and you should never let him get his handle bars infront of yours. Nice to see such a large showing of team therapy tonight. had everyone but Brendan and Jack there.

Rumor has it that cross practice will start in early September thanks to our friends at Wissihickon cyclry.

Race of the Race pics, your second chance to win big.

After much deliberation I've decided that this last weekends prize of being in the right place at the right time is...

Brendan looking the fastest,
and Jack at a close second, both with the side views. One of Jacks typical murder faces would have pushed him over and given him the win.

Mikey getting a third place. Great photo but it loses a few spots because you can see his bike in the picture and sharp eyes could tell that its a Trek.
And hear are some of the others. Better luck next weekend .

Doylestown Circuit Race Report...

Team BT brought a full squad to Doylestown for the 4th Annual Cyclesports Circuit race. We had three in the 5 race and three plus a secret one in the 3/4. The weather was for shit so the 4 race ended up getting cancelled and the 5 race was shortened. I only saw the 5 race go by a few times, but every time I noticed that Andy, Ansel and Miguel were holding it down in the front...and a lot of dudes were getting popped off the back. In the end, Miguel took 4th, Ansel took 7th and Andy came in 8th. I'm sure one of those dudes can fill in the blanks about what it was like. Anyhow, Kudos to Miguel for his first top 5 and kudos to Ansel and Andy for top tens in the their second and first road races.

Gerry, Brendan, Dan and I lined up for the 3/4 race in what was probably the worst weather of the day so far. It's funny...they cancelled the 4 race, but it would have taken place during the best weather of the day. All in all, it was a pretty uneventful race. It rained on and off during the first few laps and then came down insanely hard at the end. The rain pretty much neutralized the race save for a few premes that Gerry went for. I think he ended up second in every single one. I felt bad...if I knew that was what he wanted to do, I would have tried to be more helpful.

At the end, we were all up towards the front...I lost my nerve on the last corner and didn't try to really carve it to get myself in a good position for the sprint. To be honest, I was stoked that I had made it that far in a rainy 3/4 race without crashing out so I felt like I had already won. I think a lot of other people had the same idea...I'm pretty sure that if it would have been dry about 23984702398470 people would have tried diving into that last corner and stacked everybody up. Gerry and Dan ended up in the top 15, I think and Brendan and I rolled in not too far back. I didn't check the results as it was basically a torrential downpour at that point.

Enough about the race, though...the real highlights involved a bunch of dudes in wet spandex flying down a giant slide intended for 60-lb kids and then CRUSHING an Indian buffet. I ended up in a food coma for the rest of the day and didn't eat again until the next morning.

Awesome dudes, awesome day.

Spectracross

Well this is what the mild action of the first "B" mens race looked like. It was unfortunate that there wasn't more people racing but if there had been I won't have gotten 3rd. Another unfortunate part of the race was that some of the races had a pretty big payout while other races, like the one I was in had no cash, no merch, just the reward of self satisfaction. One last unfortunate thing was the feeling when your finished with your race, that your not covered in mud, but in shit. Luckly there were lots of places to wash livestock near by. But the race was flat and hot.
After the race, we went into the state fair to look around. We saw chickens.

Goats and sheep.

And people that didn't really get how to use sunscreen.

All around awesome day.