CX Trashionals (FakeWorld Championships)

Cycling exists in a weird, anachronistic middleground between a much easier way (driving a nice safe car, riding a fast motorcycle) and a much harder way (walking, crawling, doing the caterpillar). But is this stupid, largely arbitrary compromise that makes it so great. This contract essentially says: well, okay, we’ll let you have a bike, but we’re going to make everything else as difficult as possible. These are the things of cycling legend and lore. Terrible weather on the hardest climbs during the toughest-fought grand tours. The bone-breaking cobblestone stretches of Paris-Roubaix. And, of course, cyclocross. The sub-discipline that does everything it can to make the bicycle more of a hindrance than a help. Mud, sand, snow, barriers, steep dirt embankments, and those damn cow bells.

And yet, we still long to make things more difficult. This was the genesis of the first Cyclocross FakeNationals in 2005. In lieu of going to real nationals and getting our asses kicked by professional riders who happen to be in college (and potentially getting our asses kicked by our advisors for skipping work to go to a bike race), we stayed in Durham to get our asses kicked by each other. Plus a couple of cases of PBR. (No, that’s actually not true. Madsen showed up with something called American Beer, cheaper than PBR and never seen before or since that fateful day.) Jonah held-off all competitors to take home the trophy.

And so, a year later, we missed nationals yet again. However, determined to finish the season off with a bang, we decided we all qualified for Cyclocross Fake World Championships, which happened to coincide with real world championships. Stepping up from nationals to worlds required a more intense challenge. The course was about the same. Dryer, actually, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing. We tried to avoid traffic and lacrosse practice and the parkingticketmobile patrolling the lots. But since we are all magnificent cyclists, we knew that simple bicycle race would end in deadlock. So we introduced a scoring system, too complicated to explain here (or precisely remember) but that involved points awarded for laps completed, doughnuts eaten, PBRs consumed, plus anything else our lovely and talented scorekeeper, Robin, fancied. (This all may sound somewhat dangerous, but I can assure you, safety was a priority. We were hoping for less of a Tom Simpson on amphetamines dying from a heart attack on Mt. Ventoux [read: tragedy] and more of Jan Ulrich on ecstasy crashing his Porsche in Berlin [read: comedy].) After a ceremonial procession through K-ville (it was noon so no one was awake to even notice us) the race began in earnest. Right at the gun, we hit the drinks and doughnuts. Tom moved with reckless abandon. Brandi and Annie, Johah, Scott, and I tried to follow. After we all were feeling pretty gross, we jumped on our bikes and hit the course. One lap, then back to the pits for more snacks. Two personal observations: (1) I love doughnuts, but they weren’t worth enough points to eat as many as I did, and (2) I only felt really bad for about the first minute on the bike, then my stomach mellowed out. Jonah and I discussed whether or not this was more painful than a real cyclocross race. With about 15 minutes left to race, Robin pulled out the opportunity for some bonus points: expired egg nog. Two more points: (1) I bought the egg nog right when I got back from break because I thought they’d stop selling egg nog pretty soon and because I thought we’d have the race before it expired, and (2) I didn’t think egg nog really expired. You know, like Marshmallow Peeps or Twinkies. Anyways, Robin went to pour it into cups and it glugged out in lumps. Not quite cottage cheese consistency, but obviously expired. I hesitated and Jonah took a fast swig, then a fast step back while his stomach decided whether it should regurgitate or gurgitate. Scott assessed the situation, realized that expired egg nog could make us very sick, then started drinking. Each were given full points for drinking half a glass, at which point Tom rolled up and downed an entire glass. Meanwhile, Annie and Brandi had taken up Robin’s scavenger hunt offer and had persuaded some K-ville campers to give them their sleeping bag, which Annie crammed into her jersey and rode most of a lap with. The sleeping bag netted them both some valuable points and the race was tightening up. Tom, however, cemented his victory by winning the Valentine writing competition by wooing Robin with some nerdy biology jargon.

Tom was so excited by his Fake World Championship Trophy, he ran around a bunch and challenged everyone to a somersault contest. I had to go home and sleep the rest of the afternoon. Congratulations again to Tom and thanks to all of the participants. Hope to see you all at the upcoming Entire Solar System Cyclocross Fake Championships and Cookout.