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Vigilantes Kill It at Echo
Hey Vigilantes!
We forgot to shout out from Echo Red 2 Red a couple weeks back. A few of us were out there representing.
Jet setter Nick Gibson dualed with big fancy pro (bfp) DJ Birch all day. He survived a full-ejection wipe out and a poke in the spokes with a sharp stick and still brought home second in the Pro category. Nick even made it onto the front page of the East Oregonian sports section.
Dave Condon delighted the hometown crowd with a podium as well. He was nipped at the line but still got a third in the Cat 2 younger men division.
Jason Crago, James Buckroyd and Tony Ohotto also raced like crazy.
See you at Hornings
More pics here
SNOW, MTB, n GUNS
It was a sunny spring day in Willamette Valley so the Vigilantes headed out to the hills for some dirt riding. With the Mini’s rack capacity maxed out with three mountain bikes on top, we rolled out to the Tillamook Forest.
One Mini loaded for adventure
Due to some late winter weather along with a lack of planning on this posse’s part, our dirt ride at the Historical Hiking Trail near Brown’s Camp turned into a snow hike. A couple of feet of wet snow over the whole trail changed our plans and we settled for riding dirt roads and loops past the shooting range. For this ride, skis and guns would have been a better fit than bikes.
CRUSADE ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
Jake Salcone, of the Yakima Vigilantes/Ride More Wear Less Team, took home the season win in the B category of the worlds largest cross series, The Cross Crusade. Since he was out of town for the year end party an acceptance speech was clearly in order.
THE NEW VIGILANTE, BIG BOI
This time of year is all about recruiting folks for your perspective cycling teams. And, over at Yakima head quarters we’re doing just that. You can always tell if someone on the street is a true blood vigilante by the full red Adidas track suits.
photo by arobinslife
Note how Ryan Weaver shown here in black is clearly an impostor. If you see his bike locked up at the grocery go ahead and deflate his tires. If he rides up next to you jam your pump in his spokes. Do whatever you can to take out the impostors. Big Boi on the other hand is clearly joining the blood line of the vigilante ranks.
CYCLING, CYCLOCROSS, EXTRAS, MOUNTAIN, ROAD
TEAM BEER PIZZA RACE
Team Beer Pizza Race from Dylan VanWeelden on Vimeo.
Story by Mike Z.
Portland, Oregon is famous for many things. Our microbrews are world-renowned, the local cuisine is top notch, the weather absolutely blows in the wintertime and the cycling community is always ready for an adventure.
How could an enterprising team put all this together…? Well it turns out Team Beer managed to do just that.
The email came across my desk about a month ago. “The Bike Yakima Vigilantes are Invited to the first annual Pizza Race”.
The note went on to describe an event that tours Portland with four stops. At each of the stops, each team of five riders (with at least two girls) must each one large cheese pizza and drink five 16oz. beers. Oh and, by the way, it’s going to be at night. K?
Fabulous. Terrific. Suberb. Brilliant. Alcohol, pizza AND night riding. “What could possibly go wrong?” I thought to myself.
Well for the Vigilantes, things started to go wrong right away. We had racers to spare, right up until the day before the race. Then the excuses started flying. Dead mother. Out of town. Gotta watch the kids. Dog sick. Homework. Too cold. Wife won’t let me. You get the picture…
So seriously, I had no intention of racing this stupid thing. It was about then that Dylan, our intrepid team captain, fearless leader and favorite cross-dresser came to my desk and said, “Z-Man, you are about my last choice for this shit, but we need someone who can balance on two wheels. I’ve seen you eat, it’s impressive. You drink like a big pussy, but we can get through that.”
This is exactly 48 hours before the race starts. How could I resist?
“Uh, sure dude. Let me check with the bride.”
- ring, ring, ring.
“Yeah, honey, it’s me. Soooo, there’s a race this weekend… Yeah, I’d like to do it… Saturday… Seven O’Clock… No, no. Not early, it’s at night…… Hello? Hello? Yeah, it’s, uh, downtown I think. On the road. Yes, I’ll bring my lights. And blinkies… uh-huh… Well, it’s kind of this thing where the teams are supposed to drink a pitcher and eat a pizza and…. Hello? Hello? Anne? Hello?”
“Dylan? Yeah dude, she said it would be fine.”
Photo by Dave Roth
So the plan is to meet at the start, Seven Corners Cycles in SE Portland at about 6:30. I have been starving myself all day for this event, so I’m a little loopy. At about 5:30, I check the weather and start to get dressed. 35 degrees, chance of rain. Perfect.
After putting on basically every piece of lycra I own, I feel like the Michelin man, but am ready to roll.
I get to the area at about 6:20. I drive right by Seven Corners and park a couple blocks away to at least pretend that I road here. I get to the shop at just after 6:30 to find a sea of bikes outside. I walk in and find Team Beer, Rapha, Grundlebruisers, IronClad… and of course the Bike Vigilan… No, no Vigilantes.
No problem. I’ll just go warm up a bit. One block, two blocks. “Hey Fee!” Awesome, David Fee arrives. Level-headed executive, IronMan athlete, spreadsheet god, marathon champion arrives in full team kit (nice touch) with the double beer coozie strapped to his helmet. Perfect.
We roll for a couple laps and then get inside. Sign our lives away on disclaimers and wait for the rest of the dudes. Where’s Dylan? Where’s the girls? Where’s the official Yakima Team Car?
Briefing starts at 7:00 sharp. The rest of our team arrives at 7:01. I am looking around at the collection of people in brightly colored jerseys, purple feather boas, blinky lights, glo-sticks and pink wigs. We are about to drink a bunch of beer and ride through downtown at night. The briefing continues and the ride organizer tells us not to “draw unnecessary attention to ourselves.” Right…
Photo by Jose Sandoval
7:05 – Pizza is thrown down and beers are cracked. My first thoughts are “This is a good fucking pizza” and “I’d forgotten how much I really like PBR”. These were quickly followed by, “What do you mean the other teams are leaving already?”
Photo by Jose Sandoval
Fortunately, pacing ourselves was part of the strategy. That’s what we told ourselves anyway. Dylan distracted himself from shooting video for long enough to pull out the beer bong. The beer bong helped the Vigilantes make up some time and would prove to be either the secret weapon behind our success or our complete undoing.
Once on the road, the Vigilantes were in their element. We were fit, we were fast, we looked good, we felt good, we were pacelining, we were drafting, we were echeloning. We were lost.
In our hurry to de-ass the bike shop, nobody got actual directions to the second stop. We long ago dropped the slower teams, cough, cough, Rapha, and we found ourselves somewhere close to our destination, yet not quite sure.
A mental picture is in order here. It is 8:00 at night. We are wearing spandex. We are on bicycles. We are in North Portland. For our gentle readers who are not from around here, North Portland can best be described at urban blight on a stick, but with less charm. Now if you needed a hit of meth, bad ink or a skanky stripper, you had come to the right place. But for bike racing, this was not quite it.
We located the second stop through a magical combination of cell phones and luck. We pulled into a nice residence of Tony Pereira of which the garage had been converted to a bicycle fab shop and the front entrance had been (temporarily) converted into a pizza / beer bar.
Photo by Dave Roth
When we arrived, we were unceremoniously alerted to the fact that we were either late or last. I couldn’t quite understand which, nor did it really seem to matter. Either way, the plan was to gag the pizza and beer down and get down the road to the next stop, which was Wax-On.
Again, for those who don’t know (I didn’t) Wax-On is a waxing (hair removal) salon. I thought it was a surf shop (SoCal boy). So down the road we go. Slower this time, but at least we know where we are going since one of the girls goes to this place. I make a mental note of this, but am not sure why.
Wax-On is located in a relatively trendy part of town. Right next to a pretty high-end restaurant whose clientele seems a bit put off by a pack of drunk cyclists rolling into their dinner. No matter, in we go. Pizza, beer, lather-rinse-repeat.
Photo by Dave Roth
The party ended at a pet store called Meat at Burnside and 21st. This place is like the Silence of the Lambs meet the Donner Party. I was in heaven. Apparently, there are people who feed their dogs meat. Real meat. Like the stuff I cook up on the BBQ. In this store, you could decide if Fido wanted cow or pig or duck or even alpaca. I have never wanted an alpaca burger before this, but now I must have one. The “Not for Human Consumption” on every label doesn’t dissuade me in the least.
By 10:00 the party is just starting to get out of hand and it’s about past my bedtime. The Vigilante beer bong was flowing as we were lighting off firecrackers in the store. The combined smell of spilled beer and cyclist funk in resulting in bad college flashbacks. I walk outside to find two racers high fiving and barfing in the gutter, which completes the entire flashback. None of this draws a second look from the passers-by.
So thanks Team Beer for a night to remember (or forget, as the case may be). We’ll be back next year.
If you want to waste some more time on the internet check out some more rad photos from Jose Sandoval and Dave Roth.
SSCXWC VIDEO
So that was the race, don’t really need to tell you much more. We had 4 vigilantes (Marylynn, Emilia, Mark and Dylan) in the race and I think we all got 2nd place. If the results don’t show that oh well, we’re all the first losers. Dylan may have actually won due to the face he crossed the finish line far more than anyone else. Apparently the judges don’t count the backwards laps. Who would of thunk?
Let’s rewind a bit though. Saturday started with a qualifier race which toured Seattle’s most respected construction sites, stair cases, tunnels, syringe droppings and homeless sites. In between it all were beer pit stops with the likings of thigh masters and shake its. Great times all around. Here’s a POV video to give you an idea.
Saturday speedo’s were wore, ass spankings were had and blood was exposed all at the same time. It’s great to also ride with celebs like Brett Farve, pro hockey team, Britney Spears and those Mexican wrestlers.
After we all won our qualifier heats the vigilantes headed to to some dirt ball Seattle club to spray some graffiti on the walls and spank some Seattlites on rollers. Once again we lost our pants but managed to take home some gold and get a couple more official SSCXWC race #’s to post up on our headboard at home.
Main man Dave Roth documented the entire weekend of beer drinking, qualifying, beer drinking, roller racing, beer drinking, speedos, beer drinking then some muddy racing followed by you guessed it, more drinking. All photos are property of Dave Roth.
If you haven’t been bored out of your noggin with this posting so far, check out some photos and articles from Bike Magazine and VeloNews. And more on the OFFICIAL site, http://sscxwc.org/
SHERWOOD CROSS VIDEO
This week we brought a special friend out to help us shoot some rad video. You may of seen our remote controlled helicopter out on the course with GoPros on the front and rear. Luckily our driver Lyle didn’t graze any racers heads and cause any more blood shed than needed.
Photo Credit: The Dave Roth
Photo by Dave Roth
Vigilante Results
Master A – Eric Roesinger 38th
Master A – Kris Jamieson DQ
Cat B – Jake Salcone 4th
Cat B – Dave Condon 23rd
Master B – David Fee DNF
Master C – Mike Zoormajain 76th
Singlespeed – Dylan VanWeelden 29th
Singlespeed – Chris Sautter 43rd
CALLING ALL PORTLAND MTB RIDERS!
Northwest Trail Alliance is organizing a group ride in Forest Park at 9 am on Saturday, October 16 to demonstrate Portlanders’ desires for increased singletrack bicycling opportunities in the park. The ride will take place on the access road that winds through the park, which is legally open to bicycles, and will be preceded by a short rally, fueled by free, fresh-brewed coffee.
Forest Park is currently bursting of fall colors and the weather is shaping up to be nice, so this will be an excellent opportunity to get in a fun and leisurely fall ride, show your support for mountain biking in the park, and make some new friends while you’re at it.
“The ride is intended to be a peaceful show of support for off-road cycling in Forest Park,” says Northwest Trail Alliance President Tom Archer, noting that it is also a forum to voice the group’s disapproval of Commissioner Nick Fish and Portland Parks and Recreation’s decision to delay implementation of the recommendations of the Forest Park Singletrack Advisory Committee. The committee recently recommended that the City increase bike access within the park.
“We invite all those who share our passion for riding in Forest Park to join us,” says Archer. “We resolve to make Forest Park a place where cyclists don’t feel excluded, but instead are treated at par with hikers, runners, nature watchers, and dog walkers.”
Northwest Trail Alliance was founded 21 years ago to protect bicycle access within Forest Park, and though it has since expanded to create partnerships for building off-road riding opportunities on public and private land throughout the region, the Forest Park issue remains a priority.
“We believe that improving the overall conditions of the Park and increasing bicycle access could be accomplished simultaneously,” wrote the Alliance’s Board in an official response to the September 30 announcement from Commissioner Fish. “For the mountain bike community, increased bike access to Forest Park will remain a benchmark of how much the City of Portland is committed to treating off-road cycling at par with other forms of active recreation.”
On Saturday, riders will gather at 9 am at the Thurman Gate–the far north end of NW Thurman Street–where statements will be read and coffee imbibed. At 9:30, the ride will commence on the Leif Erikson access road. All ages and abilities are encouraged to participate. If driving to the event, Northwest Trail Alliance encourages riders to park down the hill from the Thurman Gate so as not to clog the access.
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