The Tour duh Charlotte '17: Part Deux

Same preface as yesterday.  Putting on the Tour duh Charlotte is a big team effort.  I am but a cog in the Faster Mustache machine.  My tale is the only one I can tell tho, as I only spent the entire day with myself.

The stage I'm in charge of making a working thing seems much bueno.  I'm delighted to see people ride up a decades-old, rock-strewn line nobody even looks at anymore... more delighted to see them fail tho.  I get a chance to finally relax (a little).

photo cred: Scott Pagan

Jeebus.  I stress too much to be cut out to do this.  Worried about things like having enough beer to hand to spectators, lap counting, tape pulling, sagging to the next stage...

I can't wait to be removed from any and all responsibility.

The stage ends and everyone is unscathed... well, at least moving and not ded.  My two impromptu volunteers help me scoop all the tape, and we head to Stage 3.

A mostly uneventful ride over with a small amount of saying "you're sagged and I'm sorry," and we roll into our one stage that's not exactly a real mountain bike trail.  We regroup with everyone waiting to hear if the stage is ready to go.

Colin is in charge and had been out marking the course before we got there.  He and I are the most "intimate" with the area.  He says that it's so impassable that they haven't even been able to make their way around the entire course to tape it yet.  We're going to have to cancel the stage.

Colin's bike.

Well...

Fuck.  Fuck.  Fuck.  Fuck.  Fuck.  Fuck.  Fuck. Fuck.

Fuck.

What to do?

I scratch my head.  Think.  Ummmmm.

I thought I was done thinking?

Realize that no matter what we have to get from shitty point A to shitty point B and as shitty as things are, just getting from one place to the other will be hard.  Fuck it.  Get the party pace as far as they need to go and have the racers battle it out in the mud from here to there.  No laps on the planned loop.  Straight point-to-point.  It won't be fun, but it will be hard. I grab all the Faster Mustache teammates I can get my hands on so I can deposit them along the way as human course tape... because this is going to work?

photo cred: Ben Ullman

Jeebus Crackers.  The way we have to go to get to where we need to be... it's normally the best conditions of the entire place.  Tires are freezing up and clogged with mud.  People are at the side of the "trail", pulling and scraping mud off in an effort to get rolling again.  It was pretty surreal.  Lee gets the Party Pacers all in place, and we get the human tape where it needs to be, and the racers fight their way through 1.5-2 miles of pure shit.  It was... amazing.

And then we move on to lunch.

photo cred: Greg Cole

Which was still sorta a slog but not so bad?

A few miles later and we ended up at Noelle's house under blue skies which went dark and then wet and the bright flashes and rumbles of thunder and what the fuck?

photo cred: Greg Cole

Noelle kicking at everyone in sight and demanding grass seed.  Okay, not really, but the team owes her something big time.

With 250 or so people, we quickly realized we needed a four man team on two taps to keep the beer flowing as fast as possible.  Two guys pouring and two guys moving poured beers to the table, pumping the kegs and getting more cups desleeved (I'm a born natural at desleeving).  All tasks being performed one-handed, of course.

photo cred: Erik Minman

photo cred: Weldon Weaver

But two if need be.

And just as fast as we had been deluged with some strange rain at the most convenient part of the day, the skies cleared and we were able to move on.  Somehow, I was once again pressed into service, although I had been consuming at a rate that did not incorporate the possibility of more responsibility.  Easy job tho.  Just get the racers from point A to point B with almost zero logistical thinking.  Okay.

I get the racers where they need to be and lose my phone for the fourth time, but for the first time, I just lost it in my backpack and not on the ground or in a puddle.  Phone, keys, money... move on.

Part three of the saga... soon?