No More Yellow Tuber Fruits.

Thanks to Rapha and Jeff Mitchem for another fine Banana Belt series, one Mother Nature saw fit to let us compete in without the rain or snow we’ve grown accustomed to in previous years.

A fine third race was turned in with the headlines being another podium finish for The Ace with a 2nd place, and Harwood in the men’s 3’s with an 8th. By our picture count and completely unofficial, we might add.

For the Men’s 3’s we had Harwood finishing best along with a seaworthy Willis, Crawford, Weber, Gerow, and Spahr. We read the early move right and got Johannes in the break, but a flat scuttled that move.  Unable to bridge the gap to the break, we got a sneak into the top ten in the bunch sprint to the line. Congrat’s to Ironclad sponsored Portland Velo’s Mitch Lee on a well deserved win after spending all damn day in the one and only break group. Well done!

For the women’s 3’s we had Anona going solo and trying some stabs here and there in a small field. Good racing prevailed with our girl coming home just off the pace after some attacking, and Leia Tyrell coming home for her 3rd straight win, to take the overall prize. Good racing, ladies.

maggie the dog got sick, but hung in to cheer us on

In the women’s 4’s we had Ace, Steph, Lana, and Alana all duking it out. Skipping across to the solo break, The Ace hung on for a fine 2nd place finish well ahead of the field, after some good set-up work by the team. What a start for the new bike racer!

Men’s 4’s saw Leineweber and Koller going at it, with Joe getting a bit of a respiratory snakebite, and Mark sticking it out for a long solo sojourn after losing contact on the early climbs. Good job to both for flying the flag!

Tons of pics from the day right HERE.

Every Team Should Have At Least One Foreigner

Album. I mean album, and if you’re getting one, it should be Foreigner 4, no doubt about it. If you want the other kind of foreigner, grab a German. Or an Italian. In our case we haggled the dealer down to a half-and-half. Swarthy but precise, Johannes brings to our team a wealth of cultural depth, and a never ending hunger. I swear, half of this kid is hollow. This photo was from roughly 9 a.m.

And the true wonderment of these moments lies in the fact that afterward, you get yourself a nice serenade.

It’s Tough Being Second Banana

We can’t keep coming up with the horseshit banana word plays, so we’ll stop after this. Besides, we’ve used them all by now.

Anyhow the team had a fine day today ’round ol’ Henry’s waterhole for the second Banana Belt race in the series of three. Trevor Spahr takes headlines with the win in the men’s 3, free and clear after bridging to, then dispatching the breakaway. Good job kid. I smell a 2 upgrade coming in a bit. Anona Whitley scores her first podium since joining OBRA with a well earned 3rd place finish in the 3’s, and Stephanie Croy also gets her first podium in OBRA with the same position in the 4’s. Well done ladies, well done indeed!

Bunch of pics uploading – rather slowly, too – right HERE. More blah blah later. Beer now.

the early bird gets the worm

Ravens Are Pretty Rad

Trevor Spahr brung us a nice podium finish today, clocking a time of 26:37 at the Raven TT which was good enough for 3rd place in the 1/2/3 race. Well done Trevor!

On to Banana Belt #2; here’s to hoping for a dry, safe day.

One Banana Two Banana

Remember that old show? Where the Monkees met major league mascots I believe. And I bet dollars to doughnuts there was some serious amyl nitrate abuse going on on that set. No doubt about it. Just look at them. I’d be taking it all day if it were me.

Well, we’re off to Banana Belt #2, the rogue Banana, being it’s going against the grain, a true maverick. Don’t believe us? Look at what #2 is doing to all the other ‘nanas.

crying shame, he used to be as normal as pumpkin pie

So I am sure we’ll be seeing your smiling face there, won’t we? We hope so.

In other news IRONCLAD.COM has relaunched! It looks a lot better, don’t you think? You sponsored teams out there clamoring for your base layers, just simmer for a sec, we’re uploading the product offering in dribs and drabs and having all the attendant BS go along with it, so we promise to be up and running at full speed before you know it.

CHD4L

And The Hits Just Keep Coming

Up the ladder with another platter that matters, playing you more stacks of wax, pumping more wattage into your cottage, getting another podium finish. Wait, that doesn’t rhyme. Nevermind.

But seriously folks….

Mark “The Silver Fox” Crawford busted open his 2010 season by taking a fine 3rd place in the men’s 3’s race at Banana Belt #1, after the team suffered some bad luck trying to bridge some mechanicaled or flatted riders back up to the group. Mark stayed cool, made his own plan, and came in 3rd in a tough field sprint. Other riders on the day were RVD, Shaun Conley, Willis, Haywood, and Dizzy.

peace plus one

Training Camp II

4 hours of pure beauty on the way to Pendleton, with great weather and good friends. Kinda worked over right now, so we’ll send more words later. Must gorge now. Check out some really rad photos from today’s ride (and the whole weekend) right HERE.

Training Camp

And…..we’re off.

Training Camp 2010 is underway and we’re all up in it now. Rain, wind, cold, all the good stuff you need for a cycling team camp. Who needs warmer climes? Phooey. We’re eating road paste and huddling together for warmth. Gaining strength, killing the weak.

And you know what? The Phoenix herself is here and on her bike and lookee, here she is on the front pulling us around.

Bananas, Keg Stands, And, This One Time, At Team Camp….

The mighty Banana Belt is upon us once again. Early weather forecasts look to foretell what we’ve come to expect for this series. Probably wet and kinda cold. Hopefully we can avoid the race-canceling snows of last year, as seen here.

We’ll be splitting the squad this weekend, with those of us who are going well right now racing the Banana Belt series, so look for us in the mens and womens 4, and mens and womens 3, and the rest of us will be off to a secret location to attend the Ironclad Training Camp, a mixture of speaking in tongues, snake handling, bomb making, and bike riding. There may or may not be some beer intake there, but you know we’re so incredibly serious about our racing, we’ll be weighing our MGD 64. Or not. We expect the bomb making to end up something like this, with adoring chicks and all:

Chicks go for the bomb diggity

For all of you racing, we wish you good luck. For all of you east of the Cascades, we also wish you good luck and advise you to stay off the roads and to double lock your booze.