Pantani Prep

OH MY GOD.  That Pantani Ride is in 8 days, and I don't even have an excuse picked out yet.  This has really gotten away from me this year.  Even the most basic shit - road conditions, weather forecast, picking the winner's name out of a broken, sweaty helmet - I haven't done any of that.  I also haven't fully addressed even what the Pantani Ride actually is for those newcomers to the non-scene that is Il Pantani.  So snuggle up, buttercup, pour yourself a nice hot cup of HTFU, and read on if you need something to distract you from the truth, the awful truth, that you'll be climbing brokenback 8 days from approximately right now.

 What is the Pantani Ride?  What, indeed.  Wait, I've already done this.  Read all about it here:
http://blueridgeracing.blogspot.com/2015/01/what-is-pantani-ride.html
Clear as mud, then.  Wait, except for the fact that the date is Saturday, Feb 13th, and we will go live as a hoofshot horse at 11 AM.  As your attorney, I advise you to arrive early, get on the trainer, and self-medicate on your own interval.  This thing goes out hot.

What bike should you ride?  What, indeed.  To answer this question - and I've answered it many a time mind you - I might quote a younger, stronger, wiser-assed Gordon Wadsworth back when he was on a peyote-induced vision quest for greatness:

We're in the spirit world, asshole, they can't see us.

"The Pantani course is a lot like this sex dream I keep having about Joan Rivers.  It starts off pretty hot, she's young, I'm into her, she's digging me.  But then I get her up to my room, and all of the sudden it's more like one of those naked at a public election dreams, but Joan is still there, and holy shit, she's way older than I thought, and then the whole dream goes Sci-Fi, and she's got this huge green lizard tail growing out of her tits.  And then it gets really violent, and I have to escape, and I won't go into details, but it's moments like that when you're glad you're not on a road bike.  That's how the Pantani ride is."

If Buschi has to walk this, I'm going to need a harness 

I could also just cut to the chase and tell you to ride your hardtail mountain bike, but that would be cheating you out of a potentially really terrible, life-altering, I-saw-bigfoot experience in the mountains, which is what makes a story, so I won't do that.

Road Conditions: So, as of today, it's buttery smooth and clear, top to bottom, front to back.  OK, well, the back might have a little crust on the fringes and what not, but who doesn't.  It's Wyatt Mountain after all, and anything better than post-holing through thigh deep snow back there counts as clean this time of year.  But, it bares repeating - that's TODAY.  It's a different world back there, and some rain in town could be a Donner party devouring blizzard in the wilds of Greene County.  So dress warm and watch the sky.

Weather Forecast provided by Jim Cantani

Forecast: Well, it's a long way from here to Pantani day, but The Weather Channel now offers a no-bullshit, 100% accurate 15 day forecast, and here's that for Greene County.  https://weather.com/weather/tenday/l/USVA0239:1:US
From where I sit, that says snow showers on Tuesday the 9th and then clear and sunny after that (but cold.)  I'd estimate that's about normal.  But again, you know that they don't actually know, and they know that, so they give you the lies 15 days in advance because screw you, you don't believe them anyway.  I'll prove it.  Watch the sky.

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner: The talent that is joining us this year will likely outperform the combined level of talent we've had if you combined all of the past 10 years into one mashed up substance, put it in your pipe, and smoked it.  You'd get higher this year.  JB is coming, it's been whispered on the obscure edges of big blue.  Chaz Michaels, winner of yesteryear, is a maybe.  How 'bout Bryan Lewis, past KOM winner who was once outsprinted for the win in a devious move by Qwadsworth himself?  Or newly BRC-stickered pro, Keck Baker?  Ben King, according to Strava, has been riding the ever-loving shit out of his trainer indoors as his leg heals - so will he show up and hand out beers or show up and hand out beatings? Our own Will Leet?  And many others...If you put all of those guys into a cage match in their current forms, and spun the thing at 140 rpm, who would emerge victorious?  My pick: John Petrylak.  He's my guy, and he's Foof after all.  You just can't be 2nd as many times as he's been 2nd and not eventually come up aces.  Plenty of wrong turns, feral pets, and empty bottles out there to dismantle any of the arguably superior competition enough for Petrylak to get over the line first.

That's about all I have for you at this point.  Remember, that sense of panic you're feeling when you're considering that you haven't actually climbed anything more than 200 feet in the last 4 months is normal, useful, and a vital part of the survival instinct that is naturally supposed to kick in when you're faced with something terrible.

Ignore it.

Keep looking for that right hander onto brokenback mountain rd, and up, up, up.