We Gonna Celebrate Your Party With You

John riding his race bike and his pit bike to the venue.

Okay, so what's left, but to write about Jingle CX. It was pretty spectacular. Originally, I thought I would be doing radiation treatments and I figured I'd be too tired to do much of anything, so I didn't really sign up to help or do the gran fondos and certainly not to race. When I found out I didn't have to do radiation treatments, I decided I was still pretty tired and overwhelmed and it would probably be best to just go along for the ride. and what a fun ride.

Parking was an issue since there were way more people there this year. So, on the days when John raced, we parked at an old airport runway and rode our bikes from there.

 About 5 minutes after we got there on Friday, Helen Wyman, one of the awesome pros from England came by just as my friend Paul was getting ready to take a photo of me. Talk about Kismet.

 John raced at 5:40 that day. Since it had rained the day before and much that morning, the course was a big mud pit - one that had a lot of clay and grass in it that tended to make bricks in people's forks and drive trains. We could have made an entire village of adobe homes that day. The problem with that for racers, is that when their bikes get too clogged with mud, their derailleurs snap and they can't ride them anymore until they get it fixed. So, John asked if me and our friend, John if we would run his pit for him. I had never done it before, so I was a little nervous and glad that our friend John was helping out as well.

John's race was crazy muddy and he came to the pit for a new bike almost every half lap. Which meant that either John H. or I would grab his muddy bike and run to the hoses to clean it off for him and the other would hand John S. his clean bike that we had just hosed off and we would switch them out every time. It was a little stressful, especially since the second "half" lap, was way shorter than the first and I was afraid we wouldn't get the bike back to John by the time he reached the pits.

As it happened, we did a bang-up job, but John's derailleur broke anyway. Luckily, it happened at a good place. He was on the his way to start his last lap. After it broke, he got off his bike and was slowly running, trying to figure out if it was worth it to him to try to run all the way to the pit to get his other bike, when the winner of the 30+ race, who started a couple of minutes ahead of him, passed him and that ended his race. He said a couple of other guys passed him too and he wasn't sure if they were in his category or not, but either way, he got 8th out of 40 some racers and it was his best result at Jingle CX ever.

The dance party that night was even more festive for us. Our friend, John H. ended up with a megaphone (bad, but hilarious idea) and he would comment on the songs that the DJ played. During "Celebration", he said, "Okay people. We have two objectives: One is to celebrate good times, and the other is to come on.

Saturday brought the World Cup races. Both my girls were there and Coadster's boyfriend and a bunch of our friends and it was a blast.

Stinky celebrated her birthday with her friends at the Northside Oktoberfest before she got there, so I was a little worried about what kind of shape she would be in, but she wasn't too bad at all. she still had to study when she got home, so she was pacing herself.

The races were great. Because my girls were there, I didn't get to move around the course quite like I wanted to, but that's okay. How often do I get to hang around with both of  my daughters at a bike race?

I got to spend time with friends who cracked me up...

...When I wasn't cracking myself up taking dorky selfies during the races.

As you probably know, one of my favorite parts of cyclocross, or anything in the world, really is the costumes.

What's not to love?

I was so happy to see a lot of my Des Moines friends at the race. Most of the women racers from Des Moines are so inclusive and hilarious. I just wished they lived closer to us.

John's cousin came back from Colorado to race, and got 9th on Sunday. She definitely won in the costume department too. I'm not sure why she's holding "The World's Largest" pair of underpants in her hand, but with the monster mask, it's a great image.

On Sunday, John H. and I were back working the pits again. It was a lot less muddy by the time John raced that day and it turned out that he didn't need to pit his bike at all...Which was good, because he didn't get his derailleur fixed on his bike from Friday, so he would've had to ride his single speed CX bike.

As it was, John had another great race and finished 10th out of around 50'ish racers. Very impressive.

By Sunday evening when the races ended, I was ready to get home to quiet and cats. Our friend Burne came over and I made us all some nachos with black beans and salsa and guacamole and I finally got to put my feet up and relax. It may take me a few weeks to fully recover from all of that socializing and being away from home, but man, what an incredible weekend.