deerhunter 2011

so i guess its been about a year since i started this blog and that means another round of a now valentines tradition - the heartbraker alley cat. a race that combines your scavenger hunt manifest score with your teams gold sprint times. brutal to say the least. colin and i took first place overall last year and were only 5 points short of defending our title this year for the best manifest score. the guys with 5 points more then us also killed it on the sprints BUT we still got first place couple! more to come on this event, but for now here is a photo i found from last year's race:

team deerhunter 2010!

bike wall!

we have been needing this set up at our home practically since we moved in two years ago. it finally all became a reality on saturday with the help of my wonderful boyfriend colin who put this whole shindig together for us. we got rid of an awful green couch that had manifested into pierre's burrowing cave to dedicate the space to the bike wall. besides the endless search to find our nonsensically placed studs it seemed to come together quite nicely and we got the cardboard from a new neighbor moving in down the street. it hangs 9 bikes with ample space below for extra bike shit, bmx bikes or boxes. it seems crazy to think that we still have like 5 bikes in the basement but one can never have enough. right?

ronde van retaard part ii

finally! part deuce to one of the most awesome things i have ever had the pleasure of doing. such a great day and seriously one of my proudest accomplishments. i hope that one day i can return to sweden and do it again, only this time on a bike that doesn't crap out and probably fixed gear.

number tjugo

goth siting!
 she was walking somewhere with her animal backpack and we were literally in the middle of the bush. if i wasn't racing at that moment i would have loved to see where she was headed.

patrick.
an expat from humbolt county who's english was so choppy you would have never guessed that he grew up in california. he's been in sweden for two years, and was the only other american that i met on the ride, besides my cousin of course. the majority of the riders were swedish but there were also people from germany, the u.k. and australia.

hans rollin

so european...
in the sack: homemade power bar, cheese sandwich, chocolate bar, a mini spirit and a single cigarette. somewhere along the way there were people lined up on the path so we could scoop this life saving satchel and keep on rollin.

lunch buffet! half way there! oh, and because this was in europe it tasted a million times better then you can even imagine. check out that can of pickles!

and we ate on a boat!

me rollin

sausage!
cooked by the homie bad wolf. he had some mutual acquaintances from pdx and east van due to the mass plosion of the bike polo community.

after lunch the ride started to take an interesting turn. we had already gone on some back roads and through farmlands but the routing for the next bit was so untouched that i swear the race plotters blazed it themselves. being towards the end of the pack had an advantage for me this time, as one of the flaggers was not at his spot when the first group cycled by. they ended up doing a big uphill loop but by the time i got there i was ushered to a path that went directly into a swamp. after trying to get the bike to pedal through 6 inches of mud i put it on my shoulder and climbed over logs and such. there were tiny frogs scattering away at my feet and luckily there were striped markers randomly stuck in the mud so there was a feeling that i was headed in the right direction. suddenly the more serious riders are all behind me, racing to catch up. i heard the commotion of them but also random applause and yelling in front of me. at this point is was also pouring down rain and i was so confused. i saw white cardboard families, dogs, and human like shapes ahead of me and realized that this, like the poet in the field, was just another push to get you out of the swamp. these stationary figures were the ones cheering us on.

carbo load. 
beer, bread and bikes.

although this carb stop was only a few hours after our lunch feast it was much needed. it had been pouring and the flats were nailing everybody, including myself. i rolled up on a girl right before i got my flat and she had just propped her bike on a barn fence to fix hers. i did not realize that there were horses on the other side that wanted to check it out. they came fucking galloping down the hill. mom, dad, the kids. it was kind of intense because they came right up to the edge but it was also really amazing to see how majestic horses can be. i never liked them that much, but these guys were alright.

bitches rollin.
there were only four or five other females on the ride but we held it down. the girl directly behind me fell early on and ended up riding until just the very end. the next day at polo she told me she had broken her collarbone. bamf!

cousins. yay! we made it.

end with a bang. fireworks!

the day ended with a nice, slow ride back into town. hans and i were lucky because the post race gathering was down the street from his flat and so we got to go home and shower before heading to the free beer and lasagna. not everyone had this luxury and hans joked that we could charge people 10 bucks for a shower. its probably a good thing that we didn't because between the two of us we washed away an entire beach's worth of sand and grime and his tub looked like shit. i ended up throwing away my beloved converse because there was really no way they would ever be clean again. all in all a great fucking day that i will never forget. here is the route: ronde van retaard race route via google maps

ronde van retaard part i

shit balls! i was meaning to create this post a long time ago but just have not gotten around to it. anyhow, while in sweden i competed in the ronde van retaard which roughly translates to a round of retarded. although it is a swedish event the origin of the name is dutch. i have not idea why. the race tries to emulate the conditions racers had back in the day. single speed or fixed gear off roading madness. geared bikes were allowed, but they had to tape their shifters.

my retaarde bike!

there were about 100 racers that boarded the train at seven in the morning to a completely random countryside location outside of gothenburg. lots of awesome bikes to see, most of them specifically built up for the retaard and one of which had been iodized in copper as an experiment. it looked fresh. my cousin observed that there were definitely more brakes this year then there had been in the past. apparently it was typical for someone to give up or break a bone so riders were getting wiser.

see the copper!

we received our numbers and after a short swedish announcement we continued as a group to the official starting point. the ride was split up into 10 bouts with a total course length of about 62 miles. sounds like a piece of cake but don't be fooled, this had some extreme terrain to conquer. me and my janky ass bridgestone that my cousin hans and i put together the day before. the bike itself wasn't janky but the spring in my chain tensioner was not cooperating and practically every time i pedaled the chain would jump. without toe clips and through the rain and mud, my feet kept slipping and i found myself becoming quite frustrated but i was determined to finish.

we rode through the farmland and i saw in the distance giant scottish cows which reminded me of jim henson creatures. during the 2nd bout we were rounding a corner along one of these fields and i heard an amplified voice. a solitary figure was standing on top of a boulder with a megaphone reciting swedish poetry, and unbeknownst to us, was filming everyone ride by:

crazy swedes.

sykkelen norge

so it has been forever since i last wrote but no body reads this anyhow so no worries there. i am in norway and will travel to sweden tomorrow. my cousin is building a bike for me to ride during my time there and he is quite an expert so i can't wait to see what he has put together. it will either be a fixed or a single speed because the race we are participating in is an off trail fixed/single speed event. i do not really know what to expect but i know it will be an awesome time. here are the guidelines. ahhh! i cant wait!

i have rented a bike three times here in norway and each trip was very different. in balstrande i rode along the beautiful fjords on a narrow european highway and ended up having to turn back after about 10 kl due to my fear of getting ran over by the speeding drivers. it is true that everyone in europe drives like a very skilled mad man and a girl on a bicycle would have no chance, although i suppose i could have trusted them since they know what they are doing. i am just not used to it. i rode along orchards and pastures with sheep. each of the individual farm houses had a subtle detail which seemed to identify them from one another but was still among the traditional norwegian style.

the second trip was in bergen which is one of the major cities and it was fun bumping around on the cobblestones and finding little shops and cafes behind twisted alley ways. once again this expierience justified to me why traveling via bicycle is truly the best option. its all about the ground you can cover and the details that you can observe. in the city the drivers are very aware of cyclists but like in portland i found myself being too passive with them. another "i am used to seattle drivers" advancement issue. 

in voss (like that fancy water!) there is a lake with lots of lovely trails but unfortunately i did not have the time to ride around the whole thing. my trip to voss was by mistake because i messed up my dates, etc., etc. but regardless, it is a really nice little town and was a pleasure to see on two wheels. i even got to visit a family owned farm and lodging house called skjelde gard which my great aunt bitten has been running for years and has been in the family for even longer. definitely a bonus and worth the extra day that i unknowingly already had in norway.

here are some bikes i saw in bergen:

  

flat thirty three appropriately.