Frankly, I should know better. But that doesn’t stop me from doing it over and over. After a prolonged wet season (which doesn’t seem to be giving up) we finally got a weekend of sun here in Portland. Two weeks after the Westside the remainder of the food was bbq’d at Ken’s while we watched the Mississippi Crit. Sitting right on the course we spent a couple hours drinking, heckling, and shouting.
As can be expected, the sun fried our collective brains and bad ideas became good ideas. Tradition stands for something right?
Full of meat-on-a-stick and number of tall boys I headed home to prepare for the 6 hours of Mt. Hood.
We woke up at 5 and hit the road at 5:30. The weather was top notch the whole day. Hot in the sun, but a nice breeze kept the staging area cool for the most part. The course had a good flow, although the climbing started to really wear me down by the 5th lap. By lap number 6 I had reached my goal and felt perfectly ok with calling it a day. The other riders in the solo singlespeed category did more laps, but I was really only racing myself. Being that this was my first “endurance” race I kept a reasonable pace and enjoyed the work.
Team Beer had a strong group out, most notably being that English fellow who completed 8 laps from what I understand. And he was part of a two man team. Balls!
After the sixth lap I devoured a giant burger and polished off a couple beers. I was babbling, exhausted, and in a state of euphoria. Partly sad it was over, partly looking forward to next week.
Finally we made our way down the mountain. I was drained. Misia was sunburned. We were both happy that we had spent a nice day in the mountains among friends, but it was amazing to get home and pass out.
Damn, I really miss bike racing.
What’s the scene like in SC? I’m sure there’s gotta be something good out there. We miss you in Portland Chuck. Come visit sometime.