Day 18: Battle Mountain NV

Oh waily waily waily, 'tis the last day of the 2017 Get A Bit Odd In The Desert Wossname and things get off to a cracking start when the Compressed Stupid that is Fox "News" interviews a horribly familiar Thing upon the anbaric distascope about the terror attack on the District Line.  Yes, 'tis the non-leader of a non-party with (at the last count) the Poundland Goebbels himself, Nigel bloody Farage.  I am very much afraid that anything the gurning oaf may have had to say was drowned out by a fortissimo yell of "FUCK OFF" followed by a slightly quieter "Sorry, it's just I don't like him very much" to the nine or a dozen Dutch PSOs who happened to be in the lobby at the time.  After which, as the professor sang, Things Can Only Get Better.

It was cold, oh yes.  Zero Celsius in the little cold spot on the way out of town, rising to about four on the course.  With this in mind, all the runners scheduled for the 07:30 heat scratched leaving the volunteers hanging around in the cold for an extra half-hour, the gits.  Apart from that it wasn't a bad morning, with no wrecks and nobody drownded.  Todd once again launched Barbara, in French, and she got away much more cleanly than had been the case previously.  The wind only refused to play nicely with the 08:00 starters, which was a shame as Shinsuke Kouzai has been getting quicker all the time now he's got the Super Ketta Machine 162 to recognise who's boss.  His 76.22 was the fastest of the morning; Ken and Andrea were next up with runs better than 73 mph.  Aniek continued to creep closer to Barbara's world record with a 72.68.

The Man paid a visit to spray us with mind-control kemikulz

Erik Gunderson takes over as sweeper

He may be both the world record holder and an Intrepid Birdman but just look at the state of his shoes...

Look, Mum, no camera!  Mike Mowett in "Chuck Norush"

After the debrief World+Dog¹ assembled in the parking lot for the now-traditional mass photo-op, with everyone trying not to knock pro snapper Bas de Meijer off his lofty stepladder.  Failing to realise just how lofty the said stepladder was, Mr Larrington's hand can clearly be seen holding up 2D Thomas, while the shot Bas made available for public consumption features the back of Barbara's head.  Oh.

Junior Pocket Microscope (model 3a) required to pick out the Western Half-Devil Monster Face.  Photo by Bas de Meijer

We also had the equally-traditional visit from Sergeant Aten in his company car with all lights a-flash, to handcuff Calvin and Aniek and cart them off to chokey.  He also "arrested" Barbara for being a serial offender or something.  Cries of "Lock her up!!1!" ensued but you have to be careful about making sarky comments about the tribble-haired neurosyphilitic loonspud currently occupying a golf course near you in these parts.  Following which, I got dragged into the Liverpool mob's private shoot, presumably because I have the right accent.  The "We Hear" Department has got wind of a project tentatvely referred to as "ARION Prime" as a collaboation between divers members of the groups behind ARIONS 1-3, as the official University entry is definitely going to be a handcycle next year.

Aniek, nicked for Crimes Against Practically Everyone

O noes!  It's the Western Half-Devil Monster Face again!

The weather was glorious for the photo business.  By the time we got out to the 305 it had clouded over and was blowing a bit.  Arse.  The bikes prefer things the opposite way round but 'twas not to be and of the eight riders who actually got down the course only Aniek got a wind-legal run.  She recovered from a fall during her first launch to clock 75.51 mph, just shy of Barbara's 75.69.  Prompting one noted commentator to ponder what effect the extra scars picked up by that fall might have been.  HPT are already recruiting female riders for VeloX 8, presumably because the outright record has been deemed Too Hard.  Our heroic BRITONS both made their quickest runs of the week, with 71.48 and 77.40 for Yasmin and Ken respectively, but as noted previously, with illegal wind.  Sadly Calvin Moes was deprived of the chance to earn the coveted 80 mph hat as Alan Petitt stacked Eta Prime most bigly in an early heat, rendering the bike hors de combat and Alan's specs Missing In Action.

Ellen was back to her usual impeccable starting form

Yasmin about to give ARION 3 some beans

Ken prays for the wind to drop

Considering the possibilities, with two strong newcomers taking on the three fastest women in the world the week could be seen as a bit of an anti-climax, but I doubt you'd get many people who were there to admit it this time next month.  Or possibly sooner...

Yasmin appears to have recovered from the disappointment of the evening's weather

Finally the awards bash.  Most of my pictures from this were shite, probably because I still don't know what all those controls on my camera do in spite of owning it for eight years, but the usual fun and games with cheap tat door prizes, the Sarge issuing tickets to traffic offenders - not just those who broke the speed limit or deviated from the traffic lane, but also those who failed to stop and those who impeded traffic by riding too slowly.  Shinsuke-san got ticketed for three of the four, thereby demonstrating great enterprise.  Or something.  Shortly before the main prizegiving I managed to hijack the mic in order to embarrass Marieke and Arnold Ligtvoet by handing over 2D Thomas for a road trip to Memphis and parts beyond.  I am expecting to see him at Graceland this time next week.

Soz 4 teh Rubbish photo but it's not every day you see Marieke in a dress...

The Collegiate prizes were rendered somewhat redundant this year since the top three places for both men and women were taken by university teams, viz.

Wimminz:

1. Aniek (HPT Delft/Amsterdam)
2. Iris (HPT Delft/Amsterdam)
3. Yasmin (University of Liverpool)

The world's five fastest women: Ellen, Barbara, Aniek, Iris, Yasmin

Mans:

1. Calvin (Univeristy of Toronto)
2. Andrea (Team Policumbent, Torino)
3. Ken  (University of Liverpool)

Andrea, Calvin, Ken

John Mumme having already got his awards for the arms-only division, that left only the multi-track honours which went to Peter Borenstadt ahead of Adam Ince.

After the officalese was done with, things began to get too rowdy for us sleep-deprived oldsters so I departed, as detailed in the placeholder post from last night.

A wretched hive of scum and villainy, yesterday

It was almost a shame to waste the uncongested network caused by a lack of Young People at the Super 8 - they're all having been still at the Civic Center performing some bizarre Satanic ritual involving a cardboard box, as well as playing some obscene mashup of AC/DC and the Manchester Eyebrow Monsters², but, well, you know the rest.

1. Rocky
   
2. Oasis, obv.