Call me superstitious, but I think there actually might be something to this "Curse of the Skulls" afterall. For those of you that don't know, this is the old mysinglespeed team kit. It was said once that bad things happen if you ride a geared bike while wearing the skulls. So the story goes...I was headed out for a nice Thursday night ride, was looking for some clean spandex and came upon the Skulls (queue Brady Bunch Tiki Necklace noise). The thought crossed my mind that perhaps I should leave them behind, but the day was wasting away and I needed to get on the road.
This skull looks angry, doesn't it?
With my full Skull kit (there's that noise again!) on, I loaded up my bike and fired up the garmin. A quick look at the GPS and it somehow factory reset itself. All of my settings were gone. Great!
The next 40 miles were fairly uneventful. A coyote passed about 10ft. in front of me on McKetchie Rd. which was a pretty cool sight then some hot-lapper douche cut me off on at PLRA on Jay Hill (where Jay crashed a few years ago and looked like QuasiMoto) and about killed me.
The scene of the crime
On the way home, my hardtail started to feel like a full suspension...and then a unicycle. I looked down and ffffffffffffflat! Pulled over into someone's driveway, took the back tire off and found this nail completely wedged in there. People, I NEVER get flats. Cure of the skulls continues!
I'd much rather run over a penny than a nail...
Some of you may have remembered my railroad track incident from a few weekends ago...Note the skulls in the photos. Food for thought...Otherwise, an excellent night for a ride!
Around the campfire at the Kalkaska Campground, both Hot Dog and I were busy on our smartphones searching for a weather website that would tell us that tomorrow's forecast would be sunny and 85. We obviously never found that site and started planning our drive of shame back down state just in case. With the threat of possible severe weather on the horizon, we were both losing hope for the Ride Around Torch.
A few hours after the fire went out and my Sierra Nevada pain killers wore off, I stumbled out of my tent to take a wizz on Hot Dog's tent. I happened to look up and saw a full night's sky of stars, not a cloud in the sky. I thought that maybe the biking gods felt bad for punishing me the previous day and wanted to make up for it...Maybe, just maybe, we would actually be able to get the ride in tomorrow!
We packed up camp and headed out in search of breakfast around 6:30am. When we pulled into McDonalds for a healthy pre-ride breakfast, an ominous Rainbow loomed in the distant horizon alongside some real pissed off looking clouds. At that point, neither of us wanted to be the one to back down, so we decided that we were going to Elk Rapids to at least sign in and check out what other people were doing. When we pulled into the parking lot at the High School (RAT Central), there were a few older people on comfort bikes heading out for their ride....That was enough motivation for HD and I to dig deep, spandex up and ride on.
The first 20 miles slowly meandered around the west side of Torch Lake. The miles ticked by as we were treated to some nice shots of the lake and some amazing looking "vacation" homes. Along the way, I lost count of all the FOR SALE signs I saw, numbering in the thousands I`m sure. The road was wet and I was riding like a scared little boy after yesterday's incident. We stopped at the first feed station for a photo op on the pier and then headed back out around the northern tip of the Torch. The weather started to clear up and the roads dried up nicely just in time for a little bit of climbing.
We breezed in and out of the second feed station as the rain picked up again for a few miles. The road then took us away from Torch Lake towards Lake Bellaire and around Clam Lake (pam lake?) and then joined back up with Torch before heading into the town of Alden for some snacks on snacks. I downed a banana and a fig newton and HD choked down a brownie and some blue mystery juice. Had I not cattle-prodded the Dog, I think he could have been perfectly happy staying there forever...but we pressed on.
The push to the finish line was fueled by stories of the cook out filled with hot dogs at the end of the road. We hammered up some rolling hills, alongside miles and miles of cherry trees and made it to our final destination on the shore of the Grand Traverse Bay. When we hopped in line for the awesome spread of food, the number of roadie douchebags that were cutting in line in front of us caused us to get pissed and leave in search of real food, Ronald McDonald style...
All in all, just a hair over 100 miles for the weekend, 63 from the RAT combined with a free bike wash courtesy of Mother Nature on the way home...
Coach Steve and I made a last second executive decision to toss the road bikes in the car and spread hot dog cheer throughout northwestern Michigan last weekend.... specifically, 62 miles of road biking bliss at the Cherry Capital Cycling Club's annual Ride Around Torch Lake.
This blog report will be broken into 2 parts. Mine will be part 1, detailing Saturday's events. Steve's will be part 2, detailing the Ride Around Torch. I took pics Saturday, Steve took them Sunday cause it rained alot and I wasn't whipping out my cam.
The ride was Sunday, so we drove up Saturday morning and planned on taking an easy stroll around Traverse City. After a quick jaunt up I-75, we fueled our cycling engines with the finest spicy chicken sandwiches Wendy's was capable of offering. We decided on rolling the TART trail, from end to end. It was a gorgeous sunny day.
The East Bay in all her glory on a fine summer afternoon
We started out, and took it easy riding the TART trail as far east as the trail went, out to Williamsburg near 72 and almost to the casino. Things were going well. It was beautiful out, our road bikes were smooth, and our heart rates eventually recovered from the beating lunch at Wendy's gave our bodies. We even saw a family consisting of father, mother, and daughter not realize the trail splits… and decided to ride their bikes down a freaking live set of train tracks!
Coach heading back on the TART trail towards Acme
We headed back, in hopes of taking the TART as far west as we could, where pavement turns to gravel somewhere on the Leelanau Peninsula.
Little did I know the events that ensued next almost derailed the whole weekend. As we approached Acme on the TART trail, the trail crosses 5 Mile Road as well as some train tracks. I didn't think much of them. I was going to continue along the trail and ride it as the civil engineers who designed this had expected millions of cyclists to ride this section. As I approached the road crossing, a blur of blue and black shoots off to my right, accelerating and zipping across the trail, over the road, running parallel to the train tracks at an uncomfortable angle. I realized it was coach, and was thinking... "that little bastard" cause he was going to shoot out of this corner and up the road, forcing me to put in an effort in to catch him.
Then, I forgot I was riding for a second, and thought I was at home watching Joseba Belocki on Versus, circa 2003 at the Tour de France bouncing off the asphalt. Apparently Steve still thought he was riding fat tires. His skinny road bike tire got sucked right into the train tracks. Down he went in a glorious spill around 17 mph. I didn't see any sparks from his frame gliding across the road. Coach bounced right back up like no big deal. He decided to get off the road asap cause cars were coming.
Steve with a finger that rivals that of one ET
We took inventory on the side of the road... Steve had quite a bit of fresh hamburger on his side, a finger that looked like ET’s, and was staring down at some jacked up handlebars. The curse of the skulls struck again. It knows when you ride gay-erd.
Here's Coach clearing out the cobwebs post ashphalt bounce
We were able to ride back 4 or so miles to the car so we could invade Walgreen's for supplies and put Humpty Dumpty back together again. Steve's accident took a decent amount of clean up. From there, we loaded up the Escape and cruised down to McClain's for a little bike repair. Steve walked in the door of the shop with his bike, and as an employee approaches, he says, "Let me guess, train tracks?" Almost like he's seen this kind of thing before. We were in awe. Luckily, there wasn't much damage, and some realigning and tightening of things put his steed back on the road.
Humpty Dumpty clean up time
We then cranked out 30 more miles, heading up the Leelanau trail and back to the car for a ride of 38 miles. Steve's toughness allowed us to get in a decent ride in fear our 62 miler around Torch get rained out the next day.
Cruising the Leelanau Trail
Wheeeeeee!
From there, we had some real shitty steaks from Ruby Tuesdays. Their menu incorrectly advertised they had Fat Tire and Yuengling in stock, pissing us off even more. Nothing a little camp fire and some Sierra Nevada couldn't fix. Some tents on tents, and we’re ready for part 2, courtesy of Coach…
What's wrong, Hot Dogs? Having trouble playing Ketchup on the trail? Looking for a place to rest your buns? Want to hang out with the weiners, not the losers? Well look no further because it's my pleasure to introduce to you " La Casa De Los Hot Dogs!"
That's right, boys and girls...Crash and I picked up this beauty tonite and we're looking forward to rockin' this bad boy at the Novi Tree Farm Relay on July 24th! The only thing missing from this photo is a few packed coolers, a grille with some of the finest of tubed meats, bikes, chairs and YOU!
I came across the following picture after my third job interview at the same business today. The interview went well and it was time to turn the brain off for a while to do some pointless surfing of the interwebs. This photo was taken by a friend who is an over the road truck driver. I will caption it with the following.
"Pontiac would still be in business if they thought of doing something like this"
Ok, sorry for the late notice but here's the plan for tomorrow's ride...10am @ the big parking lot by Rochester Mills Beer Co. and the Clinton River Trail/Paint Creek Trail intersection. Planning on some rail trail, back roads and some singletrack at the end. See all of you weiners there!
In order to keep up with our demand for beer and beer salt, it looks like Michigan Brewing Company has decided to add on a whole new silo for Beer Salt!
Well, the 2nd annual Bike, Beef, and Beer Festival is over... it will be a long 365 days until we do this bad boy again. 45 miles in 95+ degree heat never felt so good (once it was over!) The conditions weren't bad at all, we had a nice breeze, and good company, which made the ride pretty manageable. Special thanks to Fast Hot Dog (Shaun) for offering up his crib for burgers and dogs. Everything was fantastic. Enjoy a few of the pics I snapped:
Is that a beer silo over Steve's shoulder?
The gang riding in some heat. Wheeeee!
Bronchos makes me always want to say "nachos", which always makes me want to eat nachos. WTF?
Back country roads
$3 flavored table salt never tasted so good
tHD hits the open road
Julie no hands it home
My delicious Nathan's dog with bacon, ketchup, and mustard.
Sitting around the house tonight and watching No Reseverations and came up with this idea. A Team Hotdog road trip. Not just any road trip, but a road trip for a great urban ride sponsored by a beer company and the search for wonderful unique dogs.
Happy 4th of July Team Hot Dog! I hope you all have been having a good weekend. Hope you've been able to ride in this glorious weather, eat some bbq, and drink some beers. If not, strap it on for tomorrow, cause you're gonna get your fill. Looking forward to it!
Like that bar that used to be in Pontiac, Shenanigans, (wee Shenanigans) where the "strippers" only stripped down to a bikini, (teases), I present you with a little teaser of my own. A quick snapshot of just a few, a mere few of the items that will be available at Bikes, Beer and Beef Monday. Yes, that is bacon, yes those are Nathans all beef hot dogs, (hot dogs fav) and yes, that is 5lbs of beef... Hope you are all hungry. If you dont make it, you may just be a choad, and reduced to Club Hot Dog.
July is National Hot Dog Month According to the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council, Americans will be consuming the infamous little red tubes of "meat" in record numbers this summer. The Council estimates that over seven billion hot dogs will be eaten by Americans between Memorial Day and Labor Day. During the July 4th weekend alone (the biggest hot-dog holiday of the year), 155 million will be downed. Every year, Americans eat an average of 60 hot dogs each. They are clearly one of the country's most loved, but most misunderstood, comfort foods. Below you'll find some frequently asked questions regarding the hot dog. For more information, visit the Council's website at http://www.hot-dog.org/. Bon appétit.
How did the dog get its name? The term "hot dog" is credited to sports cartoonist Tad Dorgan. At a 1901 baseball game at the Polo Grounds in New York, vendors (as well as male hookers) began selling hot dachsund sausages in rolls. By law, a hot dog can contain up to 3.5 percent of "non-meat ingredients." Don't be scared. This is usually just some type of milk or soy product used to add to the nutritional value. Many hot dogs may be relatively high in fat and sodium, but they are also a good source of protein, iron, and other necessary vitamins.
Steve and I's lunch today
What is the most popular condiment for a hot dog? Council research shows that for adults, mustard is the condiment of choice, while children prefer ketchup. That said, preferences do change from region to region. For instance, hot dogs in New York are generally served with a lighter mustard and steamed onions, while Chicago hot dogs can come with mustard, relish, onions, tomato slices, or pretty much anything at all. Kids were also asked what condiment they would use "if their moms weren't watching," and 25 percent opted for chocolate sauce (HD prefers Jagermeister)
Do I spread my condiment on the meat or on the bread? Always dress the dog and not the bun. The Council also recommends the following order for condiment application: first wet (mustard for example), then chunky (relish or onions), then cheese if desired, then any spices.
Is every hot dog bun the same? The short answer is no. In the U.S., there are two kinds of hot dog buns that are popular in different regions: top-loaded and side-loaded (In San Francisco, they like them rear-loaded). In New England, hot dogs are served in a top-loaded bun. Top-loaded buns are buttered on the side and split open on top. These buns are also often used to make lobster rolls. Outside of New England, the common type of hot dog bun is the side-loaded, meaning they are split open on the side.
What should I drink with my hot dog?(answer edited by HD himself) Are you kidding?! BEER and only beer!! If you are a pansy, go knock down a lemonade. Just don’t let a fellow hot dogger see you do it!
Coach Steve enjoying the start of National Hot Dog Month!
