The Paranormal Cometh

Four Fridays between here and The Paranormal, time to uncork the spooky music a little bit before the season gets away from us.  I've been lucky enough to hear Counting Crows play "Ghost Train" live twice, once just last year amid a macabre drizzle and fog here on our own downtown mall.  This one never ceases to haunt me in the most terrific way.

You'll likely notice, if you haven't done so already, that The Paranormal is a benefit again this year.  Though last year we cut a check to our friends over in the Valley for the development of ripping, purpose built singletrack, this year we've got a more important cause in mind.

I've been heretofore unable to find the right words to convey how I feel about Scud, and mountain biking, and danger, and living life with the throttle open, but it's my hope that some of what I'm trying to say is universally understood.  And I do love that picture.  I took that one of Scud on our harvest moon night ride, September 2011 way up on Flattop mountain.  That smile, man.  

The Paranormal, appropriately enough, should have a barely waning full moon.  

Better get back to the haunting music before I get choked up.  But you know that I know that you know what I mean, and I appreciate that.  

The Boss, walking undead in his own right, knows a thing or two about a comeback.  

You will shine again soon, brother Scud.  

Up, up, up.  

The only two excuses for missing the Boys and Girls Club Cycling Challenge

Here we are, edging up on a fortnight after the Boys and Girls Club Cycling Challenge came, succeeded, and went, and I'm just now getting around to covering it as old news, which is on par with who I am, what I do, and how I ride these days:  slow.

But if you're not in the know, surf your Friday-work-avoiding browser of choice on over to big blue, or check the local coverage, or just ask around and you'll likely hear the same thing:
1)  The whole scene kicked ass.
2)  Rowan beat all of Fortuna, Panza-Boonen, and even Ben King across the finish line, not once, but six times, presumably because he sampled a little too far into the finish line beverage selection on his first trip to the podium.

not really sure who to credit for this photo other than the B's and the G's themselves.  But nice show.  

Sticking with my belief that if you're looking for accurate coverage of any such event, you should not seek it here, (albeit a local one that I could have been way more on top of) - I'll henceforth trail off with a lack of real detail.  But I do urge you to show up next time.  In fact, the only two real excuses for missing the ride this year were:
1)  I got shitfaced at the Taylor Swift concert on Saturday night and lost my car which happened to have my bike parked on top of it.
2)  I volunteered/supported it in some other way.

Left to right, good people making the world a little better.  

And though I don't know Ms. Swift's schedule 357 days in advance, I suspect she won't be back on the eve of this fine event next year, thus narrowing your list of potential excuses to just one.

The world is run by the people who show up, up, up.

Physics

Here's a little lesson in physics for you, kids:

Trunks like the one on the right here:


will get you more of this:

And this...

and even a little of this, which is not quite as vertically superior, nor is it wearing teal shorts, but it's still pretty remarkable:

and this...



and just so I don't sound repetitive, this:


On the off chance (and very poor choice) that you get your bike racin' news here, I'll summarize that by saying Quadsworth has been up on the box a time or two these past few weeks.  It occurred to me - in a sort of embarrassing and yet mathematically inevitable way - that he actually gets on the podium more than I write on this blog which is actually not that much necessarily, but as a matter of podium finishes, it's quite a lot.

So congrats, Gordon.  We are very proud of you.  Not so proud as to prevent me from hastily, shoddily photoshopping a picture of Arnold Schwarzenegger's body on top of your gigantic manlegs atop the SM100 podium, mostly as an artistic experiment in proportions (that went quite well), but still, really, profoundly proud.

Now my skills in photoshop might be pretty basic.  And my time to actually use photoshop is minimal.  But you can't argue the proportional relevance.  

Yeah, OK, you can.  But that's physics for you.

Get in the squat rack or get the hell out of the way.

Up, up, up.