Mug shot

Podium mugs from Big Bear!!! Mandi 2nd woman!!! Joey 4th overall!!! Great way to start the race season.

Joey

Motown Road Race...

Words and Photos courtesy of Mike Stennes

We all met at the offices of Anger and Downs (Arbor Medical, of Elkins) at
4pm on Friday, and, after packing up the RV with bikes and supplies, took
off down the road to Mt. Morris. Eric was behind the wheel, Matt was the
co-pilot, and the rest of us (Jeff, Sid the Smoothie, and Stennes) sat in
the back, talking about how we would stick together in the race on
Saturday. We all agreed to stay in a pack and use some kind of clever
drafting strategy.

We had to make a quick stop at Sheetz gas station in Weston to buy some
pepperoni rolls (needed to start carb-loading), before hopping onto I-79
north. Sid was drooling over the Krispy Kreme display case there, but I
pulled him away.

Back in the RV, we all shared the pepperoni rolls, and guzzled some
gatorade. No beer yet - that was to wait until Cindy's jug-fest later
that evening.

The trip went by quickly and without incident, thanks to Eric's crack
driving skills. We made it to the Mt. Morris campground in record time.
We were met by Larry, who manages the campground. He pointed us to our
assigned site (number 22), so we drove over and parked, and set up the
tents and picnic table.

After setting up the camp, Eric and Matt (I think) prepared some spaghetti
which we swallowed down in a hurry. After dinner, Stennes went in search
of free wifi. Talking to the campsite managers, we were able to get the
secret security code for their wifi connection, and began our emailing,
facebooking and general web browsing.

Later, Larry offered us his huge $60K truck, to make a grocery run.
Gillispie and Stennes took off to the market, leaving Mr. White at the
laptop.

I won't go into much detail about what happened later in the evening,
except to say that it involved peach moonshine, beer, Jagermeister, and a
sundry of other beverages - all courtesy of our campground managers, Larry
and Cindy Loo hoo. Oh, and of course there was an endless supply of
chicken quesadillas. It was a late night. For some, very late. To my
surprise, Jeff and Sid the Smoothie retired early (is it any wonder that
Sid and Jeff were the first of us to cross the finish line?). Wait a
minute, did Sid finish the race, or did he stop back at the campground, 1
mile from the finish line, to change his shirt again? We'll have to check
the official race results to see if it says DNF, or 2:40.

Even with the noise of the tractor trailers growling by on the interstate,
we managed to get a decent night's sleep. In the morning, we were treated
to Matt's famous oatmeal (I drenched mine with the honey that Cindy gave
me at the previous night's shindig).

It was time to start hydrating. We all spent the next two hours drinking
water, pumping the bike tires, mixing our Perpetuem, and adjusting our
saddle heights with such precision that would make Eddy Merckx look like
an amateur.

We took down the tents, and cleaned up the campsite, before rolling out on
our bikes, escorted to the starting line by Cindy - driving her shiny
black H2. Making our way to the registration table, we checked out the
competition. There was a good sized crowd there; estimates were around 200
riders. We had a long wait before the start of the race - about one hour.
Most of us spent this hour under the shade of a big tree nearby, talking
about training, bikes, etc. Sid, on the other hand, found it necessary to
spend that whole hour back at the campsite - evidently trying to choose a
different bike jersey to wear at the race.

Jeff, Eric, Matt, and Sid were in the Cat 5 group. Stennes registered in
the Masters 40+ group, which was to start 5 minutes ahead of cat 5. As
mentioned earlier, we all agreed to stick together through this race.
Since I was to start 5 minutes before the others, I said that I would ride
slowly until the others caught up.

I positioned myself in the back of the M40+ pack, and rode fairly slow for
the first 10 miles. Soon, Jeff and Sid passed me on a hill, like I was
standing still! "C'mon Michael!" they yelled. I kept up with them for
maybe two seconds, and faded back to my slow pace.

The wind was brutal at times. After making a long climb and cresting the
top of the hill, I was looking forward to reaping the benefits of gravity.
But this was not always a sure thing! On one descent in particular, I
could not go faster than about 15mph, even while pedaling hard, due to the
strong headwind. On other descents, strong gusty cross-winds made it
tricky to negotiate turns while riding fast over loose sand and gravel.

On the next ascent, Matt caught me. He was looking strong. Judging by
his speed, I decided to not try to catch him either. Let him go, I said
to myself. As I climbed this hill, I could almost hear Joey's voice
saying "stand up!".... "sit down!".

The weather was quite warm, in the low 80's, and sunny. I had two bottles
with me: one containing sweet sticky Powerade, and the other Perpetuem.
What I really needed was some plain water. With both of my sports drink
bottles empty, I could feel dehydration setting in.

Soon Eric Caught me, and offered to get a bunch of us organized into a
peloton. Four of us worked together (Eric, me, and two other guys we met
on the way). After a while though, we had to drop those other two guys
and break out on our own. Eric and I finished the last 15 miles together.

The post-race area was well-stocked with cookies, bananas, water and
gatorade. I downed about six cups of water, grabbed a banana, and then
joined Matt and Eric who were resting on the grass. Sid, Jeff, and Cindy
came by later, to give us some cake and bottled water. It was then that
I learned that Jeff was the first of us to finish, with a speedy time of
2:20-ish. Rumor has it that Sid finished a few minutes later. We'll see
about that.

Back at the campground later, we were treated to a nice meal of chicken
quesadillas! We then said our good-byes and headed back to sweet home WV.