GREAT PUMPKIN CHAMPIONSHIP AND MUNSON NIGHT RACE

Yesterday was indeed a Championship Saturday. Not only did a bunch of Bastards slay the Tailwind Night Race at Munson Park, some of us were also lucky enough to be their for the Great Pumpkin Weigh-Off (the second annual) where a WORLD RECORD WAS SET! I'm just proud to say that Cupcak (aka Laura M) and I were lucky enough to stumble across this World Setting event on our way to the race - which was located just this side of Hell. And by Hell I mean pretty close to both Canada and Ohio.

Here's the World Record winning pumpkin, grown by a Mr. Ken Sweet. And Sweet it is! This monster weighed in at 1,735 pounds! Cupcake loved this pumpkin and was seen here dreaming about how many Pumpkin Cupcakes this baby would make.

Here's Laura consoling the pumpkins that didn't make the podium on Saturday. Perhaps if they had used more performance enhancing drugs ... there were 50 pumpkins competing, coming from all over Michigan.

Not only were there humongous pumpkins all over the place, there were also huge-ass watermelons. It was like being in the land of the giants, let me tell you.

There was even some pretty fancy pumpkin carving. These guys were so good they didn't even go inside the pumpkin. On the left you can see a small child offering a sacrifice to this monster in hopes that it won't eat her family in the night. BOOOOOOO!

On to the race - though it was difficult after the all the buzz and excitement of the Great Pumpkin Weigh-In (second annual) Here's the first race going of while there was still daylight. A big bunch of Cat 4 men followed directly by ...

A pensive, yet ready to go Amy H (aka Muejer de Machete, Wife of Slayer). Amy was right there for the win until some mid race bobbles, but came back to step on the podium once again. Great ride Amy!

Everybody was rocking some hardware last night. Here's Laura (aka Cupcake) taking home her first Elite Women Podium! By the time her race rolled around it was dark, raining, with a strong wind blowing across the course. Yeah it was a real cyclocross race and cupcake hammered it from beginning to end. In a post race interview she said, "This is the greatest day of my life. First I get to see (and caress) the world's largest pumpkin, and then I get my first Elite Podium. It doesn't get any better than this!"

Here's a dark and murky shot of Laura's podium.

Biggest win of the day, not counting the World Record Pumpkin, was Jeff Haney, (aka Slayer, aka Machete) who took the whole shot and ran away from a super strong 45+ field and to take the win by riding in first place from the gun to the end of the race. It was quite a performance and Jeff put huge time into some of the best riders in the nation.
Here's Jeff on the top step. Killer performance by the Slayer. He's now leading the Series over there by a good margin with two wins and third.

For the Bastards we had a racer in almost ever race (there are 4 races with numerous waves in each race) except for the Elite Men's Race - Tom Burke was a no-show. Everybody wanted to know where he was - they also wanted to know where McKenzie W was as well. Hopefully she'll be there to show them some of the big power she's got, soon.

As for my race, I was happy with it, rolling in somewhere in the middle after another slow start caused by slow riders that couldn't get out of their own way. I'd move up, crash, move up, get run into the barriers, and so on. The strange part of racing Cat 3 (Killer Bs) is finding myself racing around college boys. Yikes!

Anyway, looks like there may be another race in two hours. Better get ready, I guess ...