Keeping Tempo: 6-19-07

Straight to work here:

• Celebrate with Heidi with ABRT - she scored herself a 32nd at CCC and is damn proud of it. (If her mom reads Heidi's journal, she'd be proud too.)
• From Jay at the Raw Talent Ranch, on the Parade Lap for the pro men at CCC:  "...the 7 kilometer loop presented some nice photo ops, although I haven’t seen any pics of it, but oddly there were no folks lining the route which was mostly on barren highways and parking lots. In that sense the 'parade' aspect was negotiable." He sets you up for a laugh, and then he snatches it away from you: "Toward the end of the ride, after passing the memorial we hit a decent size down hill and the rolling momentum of the pack over took the U.S Air Force lead riders. Apparently one of them panicked and braked causing a chain reaction crash... I skinned up my knee and drew a little blood but it was mostly slow motion low impact... Apparently some others were not as lucky."
• You read Jay's account of CCC and you're right there in his head. You read about the Unholy Roleur's day at RFK and you really don't want to be within 10 feet of him.
• This race report is brought to you by Haymarket Bicycles, and stars Jared Nieters as The Domestique.
• Sue Estes gave me a lip whipping for leaving her RFK photo album out of the "Coffee and Clicks" update this morning. Shame on me, and profound apologies to you, Sue. It is a fine collection, once you get past the fact that it contains no pictures of me.
• Now this is more like it. JDAWG mentions me 4 times, and his report gets linked here within minutes of its posting. Coincidence?
• I think this supports the point that "recreational" and "cycling" are mutually exclusive. Put ANYONE on a bike at a startline, and it's a throwdown. This is from Channel 9 Meteorologist Howard Bernstein, who competed in the Celebrity Trike Race at CCC: "The gentleman to the left me in the picture is WJLA and Newschannel 8 meteorologist Joe Witte. Joe is an avid cyclist of the 2 wheeled variety. Joe is a very nice guy and it was a pleasure competing with him. Actually, I really didn't care how I finished as long as I beat Joe. After all, he's a meteorologist on a cross-town rival. How could I walk in the doors of WUSA if I lost? There was a lot at stake here." There always is, my friend. Every damn time. GamJams.net welcomes you to our ranks of the hungry and merciless.

And there's some upcoming race and event news:

• Reg for the Tour de Toona is now open. Road Tripping may now begin.
• Reg for the $15,000 Tour De Weekend, featuring the Tour de Port and the Tour de 'Peake is also good to go.
• The Artemis Track Clinic is July 8th in Trexlertown. Clinics are the only time you can rent a bike at TTown (only $20!), so this is as good a excuse chance as you're going to get to add another discipline to your two-wheeled pursuits.
• There are kids' races at Hagerstown? Sweet. That means it counts as family time.

Comments

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The Air Force guy really took it face first in his fall. When he finally showed up, me and the rest of the photog pool almost raised our cameras for a pic, and then dropped them after we all realized that we'd feel bad for snapping a pic of this guy's freshly scraped face. (Obviously, we all have some ethical shedding to do before we enter the ranks of professional photography . . .).

~

But speaking of actually feeling bad that day - can anyone pass along the appropriate details of what happened in the Masters race that morning? Honestly, it really put a damper on the day, for me, and I didn't even know the involved person.