Flying Clydesdale

We kicked the off the 3rd Annual Bike, Bonfire, and Beer Exchange last night with the customary night ride.  After about 45 minutes banging around on slick but passable trails, our imposing 9 rider express train bombed the Quarry Trail and  started accelerating down the Struble heading for home (and of course the beer).  As most of you know, that section of the Struble is straight and level and encourages excessive speeds.  That stretch is also very muddy and when frozen is littered with rock hard ruts and gullies perfect for twisting a front wheel and violently ejecting a rider over the handlbars.  And yes, the "days since last crash" counter on the mo7s blog has now been reset.  Quipped one of our riders who had a bird's eye view of the crash - "it's never pretty to see a flying clydesdale from behind." 

Yes it rained...and it sleeted...quite a bit.  But that did not appear to dampen spirits at all, possibly due to some other spirits and our 8' rip roarin' bonfire stoked with a kiln dried treehouse.  I would like to recap some of the high brow competitions like the synonym game, the Angelina Jolie game, or even the other "game that doesn't have a name yet" but honestly I would not be able to do them justice, so I will focus on the less cerebral competitions:

Fire jumping.  Not that anyone we know would ever attempt such an insanely dangerous feat, but hypothetically, if some were to attempt this, it is apparently best to use someone else's bike. Also some extra momentum will apparently make up for insufficient altitude. 

Competition for best beer presentation:

• Entry #1 (reigning champion) - very large in scale (striking resemblance to a parade float) festooned with festive images not appropriate for this blog.  Very high marks for combustability.  
• Entry #2 - festive holiday theme, nice attention to detail, demonstrated high quality joinery and woodwork.  Bold use of family hierloom, almost backfired.  Very high marks for execution.
• Entry #3 - creatively combined carnal knowledge and sisterhood/brotherhood without quite crossing the line, very elegent in it's simplicity.  Very high marks for incorporation of negligee.  

Unfortunately entry #2 had to be DQ'd due to the "must burn to win" contest criteria (read the small print).  And while last year's champion was definitely competitive, the judges agreed that entry #3 set a new standard in debauchery and therefore must be awarded 1st prize. Congratulations CD.

Kudos to us because we managed to fit all this (and more) in well before the 2am deadline. Thanks to Kirk and Mike for cleaning this morning - it couldn't have been pretty.  By the time I got down there after lunch today, the only evidence was a still smoldering firepit.  

Chris

"All problems in mountain biking can be solved by going faster, except the ones that are caused by going too fast."