Ice Weasels Cometh Promotion Report



I've figured out the progession, now, every year Ice Weasels gets bigger, and every year I ride slower. This year, there was almost no point to lining up -- I was on 5 hours sleep, sick, and barely ate all morning.

Luckily there's more to bike racing than what place you finish in -- like the fact that this year's course was AWESOME. I really didn't care how I did, I just wanted to do some hot laps. Kevin is part badger and had dug out an entirely new back section; we had a new tree section; we had hoppable barriers; and we had as much flow as you can possibly squeeze out of the house section without killing your lap length. The flyover allowed for the figure-eight course layout, which means tons of HEY BUDDY sections. Hell yes!
So much fun!

Seconds before this photo I told Sally I was putting her in the tape
As predicted, I didn't have any legs, so I hunted down a few (illegal) beer feeds, cornered as hard as I dared, messed with as many other racers as I could, and then rode the last lap UCI-race-hard to catch my tenant Andrew.  Lapped traffic bailed me out, slowing him down just a tad into the last few turns, and then I did my THANG on the last straight to win the sprint.

Then I rode directly back to the start line, put the promoter hat back on, and staged the singlespeed race.   Then I got chewed out by the officials for the amount of debauchery that the "fans" at the barriers had gotten into.  Then went inside and dealt with results and other crises until the sun went down.

I hear there was a sweet party outside, though.

The future of Ice Weasels is pretty hazy right now -- for all of us promoting it, it felt like "Crisis Weasels Cometh."  Throughout the day we had the Wrentham Police, the Wrentham Health Inspector, and USA Cycling threatening to shut things down in one way or another.  While everything worked out in the end, it's not something we're looking to repeat.

When the race started in 2008, we were like "wouldn't it be fun to put on a cross race?"  150 people showed up and we were thrilled and amazed.  I raced Matt Myette on the last lap for a beer feed (there was only 1 cup), and it was all good.

Since then it's been bigger and crazier each year.  In 2009, it snowed, and Kevin's Harpoon schmoozing got us two kegs -- which we promptly finished off in under two hours, with 250 racers.  In 2010, the scene exploded, with almost 400 racers, and a whole new level of handups, heckling and ridiculousness.

If we keep following this trajectory, in 2015 we'll have to call it Burning Man Weasels.

And there's a reason Burning Man is in the middle of the desert, and not the Town of Wrentham.

In related news, if anyone owns property in the middle of the desert, yet close to Boston, that we could run a cross race on -- let me know!

Comments

Bob T. said…
If I ever win the lottery, I'm buying a huge piece of cross race-worthy property ... and Ice Weasels will have a new home.
12/18/2011 8:55 PM
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