Miscellaneous Baggery

So the local bike racing season started a week or so ago without me. I haven’t been able to get my collective crap together well enough to act like a bike racer yet this year. I’ve had a number of lame excuses, and some not so lame, but ultimately it doesn’t matter and I have been left observing the first few races from afar.

No, I didn’t go watch. For me watching bike races that I could be in is kinda like watching your kid get circumcised. Yeah, I stand there with my knees locked together holding my junk in my hands and my breath in my lungs. Right, so I have issues.

Well anyway, yeah, didn’t watch – I just looked at who signed up and checked the results afterwards.

One of the most interesting parts of spring racing is seeing what has changed from the prior year. There are all kinds of different guys in the first few races…

There is ‘oh thank god that guy cat’ed up guy’ – yup sometimes there is mercy in cycling and it comes when the guys that made your lungs and legs burn the previous year move to a new category. Of course there are all the other ‘oh thank god that guy cat’ed up guys’ that just moved up into your category to make your lungs bleed this year.

Then there is the ‘OMG that guy cat’ed up guy?’ – when someone cats up and it clearly will not end well. You know, unless they got a new doctor in the off-season.

And of course there is t‘sandbagger guy’ – you know, the guy that won three spring series races last year and looks o do the same thing in the same category this year. Yeah, mix in an upgrade bagger. Not that it particularly matters to me – I will finish 13th regardless who is racing – but If I were finishing like 2nd- 4th I might be hunting your pets. Just saying.

Of course there is also ‘OMG that guy cat’ed down guy’. Usually this is accompanied by an unfortunate turn in health or situation, either of which is sad to hear about. Sometimes however the move appears to be related to a shuffle in the racing groupings – which rings of miscellaneous baggery.

Oh yeah, and there is also the ‘that guy is racing for them now? guy’ when someone changes teams from the previous years. It is usually tied to one of the first two guys above, but can also sometimes be tied to miscellaneous baggery.

Anyway, it has been interesting to watch from the outside looking in this year. In the Jason Broome TT I was pleased to see that Kristo Jorgneson was ‘oh thank god that guy cat’ed up guy’ and has moved on to kicking other peoples asses. Actually I think I only raced against him once or twice last year, but I definitely remember him being ‘oh god that guy is on the front again guy’ during the Slammer last year.

And speaking of the Slammer, props to anyone who showed up to this years Slammer yesterday. I couldn’t even seem to get my bike out of the garage yesterday. It was a bit breezy. I am pretty sure if I were racing that the minute the race turned into the wind I would have flipped the u-turn and rocked that tailwind all the way home and come back for my car later. I have to admit that it cracks me up a little bit that we got an email earlier in the week pimping the forecasted good weather for the race. Yup, light wind, like I said I wasn’t there but I am guessing it was a light 40 mph, with an occasional kiss of 50 mph? Refreshing.

So I am planning on integrating into the racing seen sometime around the Chicken Dinner RR. Yeah, I think I am going to go for a solid DNF in that race and try to follow it up with another stellar 13th or so at Emmett-Roubaix. Of course I haven’t ruled out any miscellaneous baggery myself yet.