Elkhorn!

Elkhorn! Somehow, the completely unpredictable weather and ambivalent locals of Baker City have charmed me back for this race for the third year running. Quick Elkhorn Redux.

2009: My first 1-2 stage race! Piled into Daifuku's MLR (Mobile Living Room) with Adrian and Jake MacArthur, packed a 1-bedroom vacation rental with 8 racers, got made fun of for wearing these to bed, got dropped on the first hill on stage 1, couldn't chase back on, started right after Steve Fisher in the TT, caught up to him and chatted about this and that, beat the eff out of Steve for the town line sprint during the TT, got penalized 30 seconds for drafting off Steve, survived the crit, and drilled it on the front of the final stage for Adrian, who both won the race and went faster through a corner in the aerobars than anyone I've ever seen:

(me: "'ees fast as!")

2010: Part of a motley crew of aimless racers, until Sam decided to ditch Nature Vally and flew out the morning of our departure! Decided on the Oregon Trail Motel option, begrudgingly at first, until we learned of the breakfast voucher offer (source of much confusion). Tiny Alan provoked the ire of our surly, 5'4", pigtailed waitress by conspicuously smuggling his flavorful, dark coffee into the diner* , the standard procedure of which was to serve only a thin, brown, transparent liquid (albeit in limitless quantities). I gave Sam a reverse leadout in the crit, helping him close gaps through each of the unbelievably slick corners while Steve Fisher went OTF, natch. Sam took runner up to his other half, Chris Hong**.

*prepared with his Whisperlite and a Moka Express in the motel parking lot each morning
**I mean someone half his size.

2011: So far, everything has gone smoothly, save for continued confusion about the meaning of the Motel's breakfast voucher. More on that when I can upload a pic of it. That's part of the problem. The voucher uses ambiguous language, but by the time we've bumbled our way through our order, they've taken our vouchers and we can't figure them out.

(Spinning on the TT course)

Right now, we're sitting in the hotel before the crit. Lang rode his way into the leader's jersey in the TT this morning (wtf?), so we got some work to do. BOOYAH!!

(Today we are looking for the best possible result, which is to bed the leader's jersey.)