Smells Like Team Spirit

Saturday was our annual team banquet. Classy bunch of serious athletes we are, this is held in the karaoke lounge of a large Chinese restaraunt. What better way to start the season than by drinking like Mickey Mantle and Pelle Lindbergh while devouring a nutrionally void and calorically loaded meal? You will have to use your imagination as to how this played out, but yes, myself and several of the mates formed a quartet and rocked the house with "One Bourbon, One Scotch, and One Beer," as well as several other favorites by Johnny Cash, AC/DC, and others. We ended the night by having a pair of our newly found female fans model some of the team clothing that we had along while we bought them drinks. Like I said, we are a real classy bunch.





This is an annual event, so I knew in advance the sort of things the evening would bring. This motivated me to get out on the MTB for a bit longer than I would have otherwise ridden on such a frigid day. I rode the local trails, as I am lucky enough to be able to ride the woods almost from my house. Staying more or less on my normal morning route, it was comfy in the woods, out of the wind and getting some hard pedalling in spots where the ground was not quite frozen. There were a few remaining areas of snow, and of course roto-tilling the knobbies through six inches of crust takes a bit of effort. I went easy-medium for the first hour, thinking that I would pick it up later, but a surprise lay in store for me.

The local state park is not exactly Yellowstone, but it is 1000 acres of woods and swamp in the middle for suburbia. Lots of people walk dogs in there, but most stay on the main fireroad that circumnavigates the pond around which the park is situated. Even on a chilly weekend day, there are still enough walkers to make me try to avoid this and stick to the more remote parts of the park. I was on a loop about as far into the woods as I could go when I came upon a small black lab mix, looking frightened and cold. I stopped to check the little girl out, she had a harness and tags, but there was nobody around. I rode the loop once very slowly, and the dog tagged along, but found no one. Great. I couldn't leave her there, but she was not big enough to keep up if I rode hard. So off we went on the trip back to park headquarters. The way there was mainly a bike-a-hike trail that I normally avoid because it is too technical and has a few wet spots. At least the numerous portages kept me a bit warmer. I spoke with some hikers on the way out who said they heard that a dog had been reported missing. We made our way out, and Avery, as she turned out to be named, perked up a bit when she seemed to pick up the scent of her human. Sure enough, the guy was waiting at headquarters, and was quite thankful, although not exactly the most scholarly guy I have ever run into. By then I was pretty cold, as the past 45 minutes had been pretty low intensity.

Wrapping up the ride with another 45 minutes of more spirited riding, I finished with 2.5 hours. Longer would have been even better, but by then my water was frozen and I called it a day.