ain't hibernatin'

Bull City Cycling's not dead. It just smells funny.

Okay, so we've been negligent in our blogging, but it doesn't mean we haven't been riding. But speaking of not riding, one of the things we've been working on (off the bike) is round 13 of the North Carolina Cyclocross Series: The Counter Culture Cup, Saturday, January 22nd, 2011, Orange County Speedway. Big props to Regulator Cycling (sweet blog, guys) who secured Counter Culture Coffee as the title sponsor. Here's the proposed course map.

Back to the bike, Linus has made it his goal to hit all the NCCX races he can. After some bad luck with a broken wheel at Hendersonville day one, he bounced back for a solid Sunday ride in the CX-2/3 and returned to his good form with a 6th place in Statesville. For me, the Hendersonville races were kinda hectic. After a 4 hour drive to compete in a large combined CX2 and 3 field, they gave CX3 guys call-ups and left the presumably faster CX2s with the crummiest start positions. It was kind of disappointing, having to battle up past slower guys while the race leaders rode away. Not that I would have won, and not to be that guy who blames a crummy result on everything except himself, but I would have liked to see how I would have done with a better starting position. My li'l brother, who has abandoned the BCC for a local New Jersey team has still been rockin' his BCC hat to podium finishes in the NJ series. He's threatening to come down for the Durham race, so we can see the battle of the NC vs NJ CX3s.

In addition to Linus' busted wheel, Daniel cracked his SECOND Stumpjumper frame (which Specialized promptly replaced). But our most troublesome mechanicals have been occurring off the bike. I rolled into the Charlotte race with a rapidly deflating tire on my car. I ended up dropping several seasons of Dugasts worth of dough on new car tires. But this was trivial compared to Linus and Margaret's timing belt explosion on their drive back from Statesville. Fortunately they were able to get off the freeway and secure a ride home with out any major trouble, but unfortunately, they are probably in need of a new car. Subsequently, if any automobile repair shops and/or dealerships are interested in sponsoring Bull City Cycling, either with free car repairs or loaner vehicles to drive to races, please contact me. (BMW, Mercedes, Range Rover? Any of these would be acceptable.)

Cold weather is making road riding somewhat unpleasant, so many of the gang have been trying to avoid the windchill by hitting the trails on their mountain bikes. In the meantime, it means more time hanging out indoors and hopefully more blogworthy updates.