MK47 Returns, Ditto Breaks Cherry, Levo Makes Podium, Ace Dominates A’s

Them’s the headlines. Marylynn King returned from France to race hard, Jenn Levo managed an impressive 3rd, Vanessa Ditto did her first ever Cross race and did well, and Ace dominated the A’s race on the very flat course – on a single speed.

Barker, Dezellum, Dave, Brianna, and Sharon also raced, with a bunch of other Ironclads riding out to cheer, heckle, and give away singles.  As in dollar bills, yo.

Fun day today, lots and lots of laughs and good company on an EXCELLENT course. Well done, Zone 5 productions! Here’s a bunch of pics for you to look at.

And Will Walle took a bunch of excellent photos, and those are here.

Ace, left, winner A’s. Levo, right, 3rd B’s – both on single speeds

Who’s The Fast, Spinny Kid?

Why that’s Trevor Spahr! Trevorcakes! Spahrticus, that’s who! He’s the only one we’d let your parents meet since he’s so darn polite, and last night he took your daughter on a blind date and brought home 6th in the Singlespeed race in the darkness.

Willis, Cristina, and Lana also went and fumbled around under ill-fitting clothes in back seats of parental-esque sedans. Or some shit. On another note: Go Timbers!

TPS Reports, Mmmmmmkay?

Word comes in from the wire from this weekend’s mud-centric feats of bicycle strength, and the word is good. Large squads went to both Ninkrossi to take on the dreaded “N” climb built into the course, as well as PIR’s Heron Lakes edition.

Tales of woe and pain seem to dominate the Ninkrossi race reports, with mud, elevation, and ouch being the keywords. The 2nd year of this race, but whereas last year was sunny and hot, this year had plenty of goopy mud.

At PIR, a lot of wolves made the sojourn since it was so easily accessible to the Portlanders. Lots of points finishes for our ladies, and our men turned in some great rides as well.

As usual, you can find lots of visual evidence on ye olde Obra chat board for tons of photos, Dave Roth, Jose Sandoval, Pat Malach, – they got the scoop, yo.

But here’s one from Jose Sandoval of Team Cthulu of our Sharon and Levo.

smile sleeping, it’s an art

Where Does The Time Go?

Your humble author lives on an aircraft these days, and I have nothing but text messages and rambling drunken voicemails to relay the team’s activities lately. By and large we have a few men and women out there plugging away at cyclocross, yielding some good results. We expect more to come.

And though we didn’t make our usual yearly change to a different themed skinsuit (instead opting to keep our rad Wolf motif going) we are happy to tell you that we’ve come up with perhaps the best themed costume idea for the Halloween weekend. Wait ’til you see what we got for you.

As for me….well, I’m kinda like this guy (except pasty “airplane” white, and reeking of beer):

Blind Dates, Heiser, Rainier, Now With Less Salt

We got a lot to say, but too knackered to talk about it yet. We’ll write some action up soon, but know that Sharon Sandoval and Cristina Mihaescu are fighting the good fight and bringing home some lunkers, as are some others on the team.

More later. Sleep now.

Alpenrose is an Alpenrose By Any Other Name

Or something like that, is what Shakespeare meant to say. The Cross Crusade kicked off its insanity horde Sunday routine with the customary 1st race at Alpenrose Dairy, and a few Ironclad went down to contest the matter. We had Penner, Willis, Alana, Barker, Saudan, Dizzy, Mihaescu, Pressey, Levo, and Thompson all heading down to give the ol’ grey mare a run. Or a fall. Or a slip. Or a flat. Some shit, I don’t know.

Most of us couldn’t face up to the hordes, and some of us are still on recharge mode from a super long road season. You’ll see the usual wolf pack soon enough, but until then you just get pictures by Jose of The Fuz to look at, and one of Lana feeling the pain. Hooray to Jose for taking some rad pics. And of course Pat has a pile of evidence as well.

recovered from the Mad Dog 20/20 guzzling of Thursday

Lanabear gets after it

Canby? Can Do!

Super small contingent (2) went down to Canby, Dave and Killer. The Colonel showed up on a road ride, bringing Carnitas Burritos for good recovery action.

Great race, awesome course, several thousand less people than tomorrow. Thanks Word-RCB for putting this cool race on!

Good luck Alpenrosers!

In The Hallowed Corridors Of Forest Park

There will come a horseman, and his name shall be Brody, and said Horseman will ride through the trails, spreading pestilence and disease, along with warm canned beer. And with the Horseman shall ride Esmerelda, Queen of the Undead, and she will cast spells on all the woodland creatures and spread enchantment through the two wheeled brotherhood.

A bunch of other dicks will fall down and bloody themselves drinking mad dog 20/20 and eating salted goods.

Training for Cyclocross is so much fun! WOLFPACK STYLE.

Crawford Closes Out The 2011 Road Season In Style (and Beef Jerky)

Thanks to Josh and all the folks at Bridgetown Velo, Castelli, Cyclepath, Hammer Nutrition, and Matador Beef Jerky for putting on the Cat and Mouse series again this year. Anyone that has raced it can tell you it’s a real zinger hum dinger, where your heart rate becomes a punching bag and lactic acid fills up your legs like a shopping cart at Costco. Holy flying fuckles, that race can hurt.

We brought Mr. Mark Crawford into the last event of the series carrying a lead in the points for the overall, and he defended in style against a hard charging and classy Bicycle Attorney.com squad, securing the series win. Last event of the month, of the series, of the whole cotton pickin’ year – now road season is 100% done and dusted for all of us.

For us, it was our winner Crawfy, Rob Thompson, new recruit Cristina, Dave, McCoy, and Trevor all drawing swords (and the occasional silly dick picture on a dusty windshield) to assist. Our recovering recruit Erik Bakker made the trek to sit in the stands and quietly heckle through his broken ribs.

Kiel Fletcher nabbed a nice picture at the end of the race, so we’d like to show that to you now.

Ole!

Barlow Battles Back

Some days you’re the hammer, some days you’re the nail. Our dear Stephanie Croy was a whole box of nails it seems. First, she got rear ended in Gresham on her way to the race. Pressing on, she made it to the race, pinned on the numbers and donned the silly clothes, and jumped in the fray, where two crashes saw her dislocate her pinky – twice. (check that, word from the doctor is finger’s broken. Possible torn ligaments in shoulder) Poor kid. She got wise and exited the race.

tape job courtesy Mike Murray, greeting courtesy Levo

A bunch our other wolves donned our exclusive wolf suit and began falling down in the mud. Sharon Sandoval picked up her teammate after her fall with a sweet 2nd place in the MST B race, and also racing were Ace, Trevor, Anona, Levo, Barker, and Willis, seen here just before he broke the sound barrier.

sound barrier’s gonna take a whoopin’

In other bicycle related pursuits, this author went to the Chris King shindig for the Oregon Manifest with our sponsor Stevil Kinevil from All Hail The Black Market, which meant titty bars and lots of beer. It also meant seeing Tony Periera win the event, congrats Tony. On the other side of town and decidedly more difficult, Robbie Carver and Rob Thompson took part in the Echelon Gran Fondo, rubbing shoulders with the likes of Greg LeMond and 1,000 other riders. Here’s all smiles before the start:

good day, good friends, good ride

So all in all, a pretty busy weekend, and it shows no signs of letting up anytime soon. See you folks around the ol’ two wheeled pursuits. Y’all come back now, y’hear?