Summer Bummer Sunday

When Sunday morning rolled around everyone was moving a pretty slow. I am not sure if it was due to the 48 miles
of gnarly single track that we raced the day before or the 50 lbs of ribs that we ate after Saturday’s race. By 8:00
am the pits started to come to life with people signing up for the days race and doing some final bike prep. Speedy,
myself, Deano, and Smooth would all be riding together and had the luxury of keeping the same minute as the day
before. While we kept the same minute, Moss and Hoffman changed minutes and found themselves starting only a
minute behind us. So for most of the day I knew when I heard a 2 stroke on the gas behind me that it would be
Moss.

When the race started we had approximately 3 miles of road to get the first section. I went in a little early knowing
that we had a couple tenth until the first possible. Sure enough 2 tenth in there was a hot check and we hit it right
as they were flipping to our minute and just like that, the race was on. I was in the lead with Speedy hot on my rear
tire. It was a fast flowing section and we were on the gas. We checked out with both of us only dropping a one.
Deano took a wrong turn and ended up dropping 2.

Now when we started the race I noticed that Scotty H. had a rear brake lever strapped to the outside of his fanny
pack, and I thought to myself, “Hmmm, I wonder why he doesn’t just put the brake lever in his fanny pack?” But
knowing Scotty and his mental condition I didn’t question it any more and wrote it off as normal Scotty behavior.
Well after the first section when Scotty rolled up to us, with his goggles dangling and brake lever broke off, I finally
realized why he had it strapped to outside of his fanny pack. It was because he had 12 more brake levers in his
fanny pack and was completely out of room but knew that he would probably need a total of 13 levers to actually be
able to finish the race. So Scotty, what are the Beta brake levers made out of, Silly Putty?

The next couple sections were your typical Roselawn terrain, some fast flowing stuff, logs, and tight saplings.
Deano tried to pull a sneaky stunt and go into a section early, but it didn’t quite work out for him and he burned it by
a minute. The section after gas was Miller’s woods, followed up by a short little section with a check at the end. I
hope Janus zeroed it, because he was working the possibles when we went by him about a mile into it.

The night before the race Greg Moss was asking if we wanted to race the 12 mile section that we raced on
Saturday for the last section on Sunday. Seems they were questioning the racers to see if we wanted to race this
last section. Since this question was asked of us immediately after we got done racing this loop 4 times in row the
common answer was, “Hell No”. Well, when we were at the riders meeting on Sunday we were informed that the
Bares had vetoed our vote and suggested we ride the last section. Seems they have veto power since they own
the land our something. When we started into this section I reminded Speedy of our last years experience and how
we burned the hot check going in and that we should really not try to repeat that stellar behavior. So in we went,
right on time and there was the check. Speedy and I were locked in pattern for the first 6 miles until Moss went
screaming by and that was enough for him to pull 20 seconds on me and held it until the end. (good enough for a
minute)

When we got done, we were all hanging around the race trailer and BK Senior was commenting on how BK jr (aka
Whopper jr) went 9 minutes in the last section to our 13 and 14. Now while this is not unfeasible and Whopper jr
was riding like a man on a mission, if this was true we would nominating him for the AA class. Some slight
recalculations put him at a 14 or 15. Damn respectable for an up and coming B and soon to be A rider. (Stick with
it man)

So the conclusion of another Summer Bummer is upon us and the weather was great, the bares were in the woods,
and the Hill and Gully Riders put on another great event.

Hey, one armed wonder, if you have the picture of the bare on your bike from Saturday send it on over. Not sure if
we can post it on our site as we are PG rated (no pun intended) but it would be good for our files.

Until the next race,

Gus