Bring on 2ö1ö

Okay, yeah, so updating blogs and sites isn't really our bag. You know, what's better sitting in front of a computer, which we all seem to do too much already, or racing? So, now that cross season has ended for the Gründel just maybe we'll actually do some updating. Maybe...

A weekend of racing and a new hatred for the SRAM chain

Saturday saw the OBRA Championships down in Salem. Clayton and I headed down for the fun. Clayton rocked the C race to a 6th place looking really strong for sure. He spent the whole race in no mans land just behind the lead group of guys in a headwind that would knock you over if you weren't careful. Solid. Then, just in time for the B race the rain came. At least the wind died down, but it made for a very wet affair. Worked out well for me and I snagged a spot on the podium, hard work for sure and quite a battle with the Portland Velo boys. Now a few beers and on to Sunday...

All lined up and ready to rock the B race at Cross Crusade number 7 and luck was not on my side. The call up had me sitting nicely in row two on a course I knew I would love. No real climbs, 3 run ups and miles of mud, what could be better? Fifteen seconds to go, bring it on, stoked. Racers ready, oh yeah. Go, snap, not moving, wtf, oh, stupid chain. That sums it up. At least I had a spare bike there for the WCSSCX so I yell to Clayton, get that SS to the pit as I start the jog. I get to the pit and mount the trusty Voodoo. Um, what was I thinking when I put this gear on, good god. That hurt. 32x13, bad idea. That about sums that up. And then, on to the WCSSCX race. I pull out the short shorts and throw on the Grundel formal kit and have, well, a lot of fun. Hamer and I hung out in the back for a while then he decided to call it a day, um, crap, I guess I'd better race then. With Brian so far up the road krushing it at the front I suppose I'll just try to make some friends out here. For some reason no one was really into chatting, odd. I even had someone throw down for a full on sprint finish for what must have been like, 100th place or something, really? Um, it's yours...

Hats of to the designers of that madness, short cut, nuff said. All in all, a fun day of racing out there. The Grundellegion saw the return, straight off the IR, our very own V-Power bringing home some glory in the womens race. Welcome back Lid. Saweet. All in all a day of a few mishaps, some strong racing by the boys, and perfect cross weather. Now on to the recovering from racing two races with gearing that should only be used by Magnus Ver Magnusson. Bring on Barlow.

Photo by Stephen Fitzgerald

Gründelbarriers and Oh so much fün

So really, when the idea hit us to rock the Halloween weekend as the Gründelbarriers who knew it would be that much fun. Really though, the fun started Friday night during some seriously awesome cross weather. Hanging with our great friends from Team Beer proved to be nothing short of wicked good times. I'm pretty sure wind and rain actually make it better. And then, well, racing, really? It seemed so far from a good idea to race on Saturday, but we went for it, and had a blast doing so. That course was fun. A couple of top 10s for us even, who knew. And well, that leads us to the rest. If you were there you've got your own awesome stories, and if you weren't, well, you should have been. I'm willing to bet that all the Gründel have some bruises from the barrier throwdown but it sure was fun. Perhaps the best and most fitting end to the fun was the Lana/Ambeer ass slapping followed by a french maid dustdown. They knew we were dirty. A big thanks to all y'all that were out there in Astoria for one heck of an awesome weekend of racing and mayhem. I have a feeling this weekend will be no different as a few of us prove to the world we're rad singlespeeders...

Alpenrose

Oh the joy. Just a little over a day from now we'll be racing the Cross Crusade. Rumor is Dan is gonna webcast it just in case you can't make it. I'll go ahead and embed it here. Stöked.

Rapha Gentleman's Race and other news

Okay, yeah, this is way overdue, there's just been so much going on with Cross season getting going and all. But yeah. We so raced the RGR. Man what a good time. 140 miles and only 1 flat, not too bad. No lights for us this year as we finished 13th of the 23 teams. Other than that, the usual awesomeness that the Rapha boys bring. Just another reason why bikes and Portland go oh so well together. These pics are courtesy of the ever awesome Holty, perhaps when our pictures actually get looked at from this day I'll post something more insightful, but for now, we raced, we had a blast, we finished. More later.


The following week I was the lone Grundel out in Hood River for our season opener. The highlight was certainly the superman diving over Team O's Patrick Gerke after his roadie ass ate it heading into the barriers with me on his wheel. Ouch. Still not sure exactly what happened, but I flew kind of far. Fün. Knee still hurts a bit, but I ended up finishing in front of Pat so I suppose it worked out fine in the end. He would have taken me for sure...

And finally, last week was the blind date at the dairy opener. Wednesday is usually our weekly ride so why not race instead? I found myself in a battle for 2nd place with 2 Ironcladers. In the end Trevor got me and I got Drew. What fun. I will say though my legs are still shredded which should make Barlow tomorrow a bit tough. I didn't know hamstrings could feel like this unless you played football, that's why I don't play football. That and my complete lack of skills. Larry did some serious krushing of his own in the singlespeed race and Stoli and Clayton were in the mix as well. Cross is üpon us.

The Gründel takes RAO

Back in July, we took on the Race Across Oregon as a four man relay. Armed with a crack support crew, two Westfalia VW vans and a case of Mexican Coca-cola, the we embarked on the 516 mile, 40,000 foot, non-stop campaign. Nearly 29 hours from the start in Hood River, we rolled into Cooper Spur (via Tygh Valley, Moro, Heppner, Dale, Spray and Maupin). Highlights include temperatures reaching 100 degrees, intermittent radios, knocking U-joints threatening to break, hallucinating bikers, white knuckled drivers and +35mph crosswinds. Sounds like fun, heh? Well check out the two video clips below:








For more on RAO, go to http://www.raceacrossoregon.com/

Hehehehe

What does it mean that rubber makes me giddy? I dunno, but I'm pretty darn stöked as the Rhinos showed up yesterday. So, I've got some wheel building to do, I'm thinking King hubs laced up to some Velocity rims. The old question of whether to go brass or alloy nipples is upon me again. Man. Maybe I'll rock it with brass on the drive side rear and alloy everywhere else. That's kinda ol skool. And what can I say, King hubs for shizzy. To race cross in Oregon and not give back by rocking those hubs, c'mon. I'm thinking about forcing Stewie to make me another frame just so I can have a reason to buy a brown headset and hubs. Brown. Sexy.

Soon

I've got the Stewie all cleaned up, re-cabled, and ready to go. For now, to tide us all over for the next 6 weeks or so...

Cross, soon, really?

Alright, so short track just ended right, um, bring on cross. All I'm sayin...

Race Around Oregon

I know it's officially called the Race Across Oregon, but um, it's not. One big ol 527 mile 40,000 ft. of climbing loop. We start tomorrow. Ouch. That is all, saving every last bit of energy for the race. No more typing...

The Return Of Short Track

Monday night marked the return of the ritual that is short track mountain bike racing. Nobody told Chip, so he showed up with a single-speed 'cross bike and kicked ass anyway. Eric Stolberg also made an appearance, racing in the beginner class and instantly threatening to move up to 2's and ruin Geoff's fun.
All in all, fun and challenging. Everyone stayed upright. Strangely, many people found the whoop-de-doo's to be the most challenging part, as they tend to throw your rear wheel into the air. The ruts were good fun, too.
Kinda like cyclocross, but without the long drives to get there and the freezing-your-ass-off part.
Get out there if you haven't already. And don't brüise your gründel.

3 For Tabor

As promised The Murderhorn had 3 of the Brüisers out there. Larry and I tried our hardest to take the Cat 4 race, but nothing doing. Larry tried to lead me out, but instead just had to keep going as I was all the way spent. Clint saw all this going down and jumped on the Slöan leadout to rocket past both Larry and myself and bring his Beer ass up into 3rd. Nice. Larry slotted in 4th and I 6th. Not bad. Still thinking I should start spelling my name Slown, but 2 top tens for the Gründel, that'll do. And for dessert we had Brian cruising around in the Cat 3s. I was still catching my breath from my race when I looked up to see him grab a 3rd. Nice. There was tons of roadside cheering again, how rad.

Then it was on to the track with me on Thursday. Some seriously sketchy riding, as is proving to be a usual occasion for a certain team, but fun nonetheless. You know, when both team members get relegated for seperate occasions...

Nevermind. Jeremy Garbellano proved too much for me yet again snaking my 2nd place and pushing me down to 3rd. At least he's nice about it. And as a highlight, K-mac was in the stands. Man, how rad seeing her back out there. Her first day out the hospital and she wants to go to the track to cheer. One cool girl. Keep on getting better K.

I heart bikes.

Tabor is here, müst be sümmer.

So that's it, summer is officially here now that the Mt. Tabor series is underway. Yeehaw. I must say I wasn't really as ready as I should have been for the suffer fest, but who cares, it was fün. There were injuries and meetings keeping some other Grundels from being out there racing, but that didn't stop em from cheerin. Next week is looking good for a bigger turnout of your favorite Germanic maniacs. Believe it.

Little vacation for the posting

First off, Ironclad Kristin McCarthy was in a bad crash last night at PIR. Dave is posting updates on here condition here. Of course our best go out to her and Clint. If she heals anything like she races she'll be back really soon.

It's been a bit since we got a post up and well, that's because we've been just too busy racing. Crap. So, I'll just start trying to catch up. There's been some PIR, whatev. There's also been the attack at the track. I raced a couple of beginner races and am now up in Cat 4s out there. Weeman and larry joined in the fun last week and I'm sure we'll see them out there more soon. So, track seems to be the focus for a while. What fun. Watch for me and the hammer in some madisons, that's all I'm sayin...

PIR

So yeah, um, you know road racing is what it is, PIR too, is what it is. Today what it was, well, um, I'll just call it cross practice. I'm the first to admit that I just get way too bored racing road to ever really do well. So today was no different. I bridge across to a 5 man break on lap number one, yeah really smart. Just as I get there we get caught. That was worth it. A couple laps later a whole bunch of guys can't hold their lines on the corner out back and me and a few others are forced over the curb and onto the grassy knoll. I'll admit, I finally felt at home, I mean it was dry, but felt good anyway. I bunny hop my way back on to latch up with the back of the group, wow, that was fun. Then more boredom until the last lap, I'm sitting maybe 20th wheel or so going into those last few corners and it turns into wwf style positioning. I've got guys leaning on me from both sides. Good times. I then proceed to pick the wrong wheel and I'm getting left behind for the sprint. Just as I start to sit up with 2 or 3 hundred meters to go I'm again getting the elbows of some over achiever sprinting like Boonen for a Cat 4 25th place or so. Wow. But hell, broke a sweat in the sunshine so really nothing to complain about. Was cool seeing my friends on a Tüesday night. Wërd.

Kings Valley Road Race

The Hammer and I show up in the parking lot to all sorts of people telling us that this was a road race and not cross. Right, well, lets give it a go anyway. 2 hours of a fairly laid back pace and the boredom started to set in. We tried cracking jokes, nothing. Well, how about Weeman goes for a 1k sprint, sounds like fun. If the finish line was 300 meters closer he would have had it. All in all a fun day and while not as good as mud, I suppose this time of the year it's all we've got. Gööd times.

Oh yeah, a blog

The Gründelbrüisers now have a blög, believe it. More to come soon...