All ORAMM, all day, all night

Warning: Long post ahead, but still autoplay Don Henley free.

The best thing about Will Black signing up for ORAMM is that I feel as if the pressure is off me to win. I would be speaking of the pressure I put on myself to win the single speed class, not some external force or presence of massive amounts of tifosi lining the trails on race day. Will's pretty freaking honch, but even with riders like Dave Hall, Eric Hagerty, and Geoffrey Bergmark in the SS class I woulda had some work to do in order to win.

Wait...

Stop the blogpress.

I just checked the registered riders list and Geoffrey Bergmark has moved into the Vet Men (30-40) class since the last time I looked. Hmmmmm... he had told me he was in the SS class as long as I was going to race. Something about if I wasn't there and he won it would be like Lance's first Tour win in 1999 when Pantani and Ullrich couldn't make it. The critics would always say "Sure Geoffrey won, but there really wasn't any competition. Dicky was too busy doing coke and wrecking his sportscar driving home from the club." So I sign up to make Geoffrey's win legit and he skips out on me. Shame shame Geoffrey. Don't forget....

Hmmm... looking at the prize money there might be a financial reason for Geoffrey's flip flopping. First place single speed only pays $120 this year (it was $200 in 2009), but you can earn that ($120) with a 3rd place in the vet men category. With folks like Sam Koerber signed up in the Vet class that's gonna be a tall order as well. Scratching my head I looked to see if I should seek greener pastures, but the Masters Men (40-50) only get schwag. I've got schwag coming outta my ears, so I'm gonna stick it out, take my loss, and wrote it off on my taxes (a benefit to being a 1099 unprofessional cyclist). Not to mention Andy Applegate is signed up for the Masters Men class... who the hell is racing in the Open Men's class if people like Andy and Sam are riding in with the age groupers? I don't see Adam Craig on the list, so why is everybody hiding out in the age groupers??

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that there are also a bunch of people signed up in the SS class, and I have no clue who they are. In the past I mighta googled them, but with Will Black in the mix why bother. If I failed to mention your name on my list of potential favorites and you end up beating me, my apologies. I'll know who you are then.

If and when Will Black beats me I will breathe a sigh of relief. Maybe next year in June I won't have this overwhelming urge to "defend my title". Another great benefit about Will Black signing up is that normally I can't think about anything but ORAMM once July rolls around. Knowing that I am now a 10:1 underdog I can now just go out and do what I do... have fun and try to ride fast. No need to obsess endlessly and race like a coke fiend looking over my shoulder every three seconds. The race will definitely be in front of me, so I'll be scanning the side of the trail every so often to see if maybe Will is standing in the weeds changing a flat.

Speaking of fast, I looked at the results from the last three years. Here are my finishing times:

2009 ~ 5:56:06
2008 ~ 5:51:05
2007 ~ 5:40:30

The records do not go back any further so I can not see my times from my second place finish in 2005 or my first win in 2004. Those records were kept on stone tablets and Todd Branham (ORAMM Promoter) didn't wanna break his scanner trying to email the results to me. It doesn't matter since I'm pretty sure we ran different courses back in the old days.

I have a bad memory. Looking at that 2007 time I can't remember if we did the standard course or not. If we did I ran my fastest time on my small Zion when I was 38 years old. If we didn't do the standard course (that would make more sense) I feel slightly better. I am getting slower as evidenced by the last two years, and I'm wondering if that's just a part of getting older or the decline in interest regarding "training" for races.

So I have goals. I want to lay down my fastest time ever since I don't know if I'll be back again in 2011. That will be a tall order. I also want to beat Geoffrey Bergmark out of spite, and I also also want to use this opportunity to crush Harvey Minton so I can check him off my list. My list? I have a list, just like Stuntman Mike but slightly different, of people I'd like to kick when they are down. Many endurance luminaries are on that list, and many of them have been crossed off. Weaknesses, bad days, mechanicals, dehydration, injury... I will take advantage of any unfortunate situation with absolutely no remorse to defeat you if you are on my list. Harvey says he hasn't been training much... excellent. He was eighth overall in 2007 when I was ninth... so close, but this year Harvey your ass is grass and I'm the vaporizer.

My "training" has been haphazard at best. Overload my body at a stage race, try to recover, do another stage race, try to recover, and then hit ORAMM. I have no idea what I should be doing right now, but I'm riding as little as possible during the week and I might have overdone it last weekend.

I went on a mountain ride with old friends. I wanted to go on the ride even though my legs felt like shit. I wanted to have fun (that's all us girls just wanna do), and I was testing some secret equipment (as Big Worm alluded to on Monday).

A mountain ride with two bottles... Victory!!!

Yes, I'm pulling out all the stops. I'm doing a bunch of shit this year that I've never done before, and I'm even digging up some old skool stuff from days gone by.



I went ahead and wrote the next part providing full disclosure of my sinsiter plan, but Mike Piazza was watching over my shoulder and he said we were laying down our hand a little early. As Press Relations Director and Minister of Misinformation here at Bad Idea Racing he took it upon himself to edit the following in order to keep our advantage until after ORAMM is over.

This year I will be:

_________ only _________ _________ between _________.

trying out a new _________ that only elite _________ _________ have been using.

putting my _________ in my _________ along with my _________.

refraining from _________ my_________ as I usually do before a race.

_________ closer to the _________ the _________ before the race.

_________ beavers and goats until the _________ hours of the _________.

He added the part about the beavers and goats. He said it's all part of his job as Minister of Misinformation. He said "Next year just watch all the wannabes start _________ beavers and goats. They'll do it if they think you did. Lemmings."

Next week more ORAMM shit, a Camelbak review with 50% more CORRECT information provided to me by Seth of Camelbak, even more ORAMM shit... and perhaps a look forward to the Breck Epic and Crank the Shilled, I mean Crank the Shield.

Viva Mark Renshaw!!! Beware Will Black. There will be no cameras in the woods next weekend. The ORAMM head butt revolution will not be televised.


VeloCenter: TdF Stage 11 Extra