Cinci CX: We brought the awesome.

Ben and I rolled into Cinci past riders caked, covered, and otherwise made to look sasquatch-like with mud hanging off of them. It was raining off and on. We were not in a very good mood. We recognized Mike and Jessica of the My Wife Inc crew from the Madison weekend and said hi, they invited us to share their Pink Tent of Doom with attached restroom facilities. It was an awesome offer, since there was nowhere else out of the rain, and we were happy to join in. We had no idea what shenanigans would ensue over the weekend, but by the time we walked out of the Cancun "burrito joint" Sunday night, we were in love. Ya know, that cx-fueled 'those people are so darn much fun' love.

Friday Was a Mudder.
I'm not one to be down on promoters for much, but hot damn, the set up for the pit on Friday was woefully inadequate. Sure, you couldn't plan that it was going to rain, but you might have surmised that rain was a possibility, and UCI regs say two pressure washers for the pit, not one droopy hose with crappy nozzle that sort of cries out a trickle of water that takes 5 minutes to fill a bucket (and that you have to cross the course to get to). Oh, and it was a wrong-side-pit, which I guess Cross Vegas had too, but it's still annoying. It was such a bad setup that the Kona guys used a freaking handtruck to wheel in several huge plastic tanks of water, a pressure washer, and the requisite extension cord. Serious.

So it was a mudfest. Luckily the mud wasn't too sticky and most riders took just 3-4 bike changes in the whole race, with the exception of Parbo, who worked his My Wife Inc volunteers to death. Ben came in for a bike about 3 laps in, and we did the usual perfect-handup-with-kiss, and I was happy to see that the bike he handed me was just dirty but still totally tuned and ready to roll. I waited in the "wash" line, where a cyclocrossworld.com dude had taken over as SprayMaster to keep folks from detailing their bikes while the line grew. Back to the line, Ben comes through.
"Don't give this bike back to me." The rear wheel (which wasn't perfect earlier but certainly wasn't like this) had developed a serious hop in it, it was rubbing the brakes, and really wasn't going to get fixed quickly by my muddy hands in the rain in the pit. I opened the brakes up, it was ready to go, but he wasn't going to take it anyway.

I was trying to encourage him just before he was lapped, and he shouted LOUD back at me to leave him alone. It was unanimously decided in the pit that there is no ice cream for whiny bitches. (Ben thus got no ice cream on Friday.)

So, I did all of three bike washes, and that was the day. After the race we drank in the PeePuddle and then rolled to the kind of party that only happens in CX season... a local trail racer (who doesn't even race cross!) set up a party with build-your-own-burritos and beer. So awesome. We had a good time plotting the Half Wife Cramhole challenge and drinking Burger beer- actually, there was an umlaut over the u, which makes it German, I guess.

Then, several beers later, I attempted to use Ben's bike as a truing stand while I struggled with that wheel. I made it passable and functional, but it'll need work once we hit home.

Then we flew to Atlanta.
It was Ben's Cousin's wedding, and it was awesome. We enjoyed some quality time with the family, and there was pole dancing, and we missed the Saturday race, where Chris, Zach, and Dave handed up Half Acre Beers and lawn darts (!) to the pros. Eep.

Sunday was a really good day.
We were up in Atlanta at 6am to make the flight back to Cinci (well, Dayton, actually). We rolled straight to the race after a Big Boy breakfast. There were little spots of mud but nothing really to speak of, and it was going to be a boring day in the pit. I rode down the pavement to the start on the B-bike (aka Race Day Transit) and noticed there's some far worse fork shudder going on this season. Need to do something about that one... did some playing around and it's a little better.

Anywho. Podium Insight's Lyne was telling me about my teammates' beer and lawn dart handups from the previous day and I was sure more awesomeness was coming. Chris confirmed their plan for wine and cheese handups. I, however, got to miss that fun but instead join Betty and my My Wife Inc buddies doing nothing in the pit. Oh, so much nothing! Just shouting. Dirty, dirty, sexy shouting. But that was all. The leaders traded bikes once or twice, but that's all that happened.

Naturally we weren't done with the awesome just because the race was over. We all headed out to a local burrito joint and destroyed some bad, slow Mexican food and giggled at a superfan. I can't wait till Louisville, where we get to see those MWI folks again. Seriously awesome.