How May Days until 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo?

It’s almost here. Damn, I mean it’s almost on – in Tucson. Tedd and I leave on Feb 10th. Maybe the 11th. But not the 12th. LtCol may leave on the 12th, but not the 13th. We are all racing on the 13th. The 2010 B.P.R. team uniforms are taking shape. Just waiting for one more important piece.

Last weekend I participated in a wicked 60 mile ride with Lenny Goodell – from the Big Wheel Racing team. Those Big Wheel guys (and gals) are nuts and definitely fast, but we all knew that! Yeah, now I know what happens when you combine freaks of nature with mental instability – you end up on a brutal ride, in brutal conditions and you get your ass kicked in a big way.

I knew the conditions would be questionable, but I needed a big ride and I wasn’t going to be a no show. So on Friday I decided to go check out the track, from my 12,000 ft office. There was significant cloud cover, you could call it a storm. So I went up, and up, and up. Well, clouds are clouds.

So, I decided to chill out and wait for some clouds to clear. Just as I thought. Snow. Everywhere. Yep, my 60 mile ride was scheduled for ‘down there’.

Do you think the Lt Col is allowed to wear the B.P.R. team gear during work hours? Probably not. But I represent the team where ever I go. Someone must.

At mile 35.6 (or 36.5), I decided to take a picture to document the powder that Lenny was busting through. I decided that it would be best to hang back and ‘widen’ the track for all those other riders. Oh, no other riders showed up. Well, I still tried to widen the track.

And I just had to take a picture of the wicked mountain mustache bars. The best design in the world of single speed mountain biking. Actually. I thought I was dead meat during this ride. My feet got wet early on, then froze. Not like ‘Mommy my feat are frozen’, more think ‘holy s*^t amputation is a possibility’. My feet were so cold that I wiggled my toes non stop for ~ 2 hours to keep the blood flowing. Didn’t feel a thing. When I got home I realized that I had major blisters on my toes – and a few sores where the blisters exploded and turned into holes in the skin. Never knew it due to the ‘frozen’ feet.

Well, since I didn’t have enough on Saturday I hit the north foothills on Sunday with Tedd. I quit after 10 miles. Wicked trail conditions. Tedd went on, and on, and on, and on. So he says. This weekend before the big race should be easy. Just some easy miles, on easy terrain. But with the snow cover and weather the plans may evolve. That’s OK, I’m all about evolution. Yeah right.