Day 8: Battle Mountain NV

A morning of dodging showers and sneks¹, mostly successfully though I did get a bit damp while hanging around at the 5 mile start while everyone else was moving down to the short course.  Natch the road was completely clear for the sweep on every run, Paul, Marilyn and the motor-car having gone home yesterday.  Bum.

Possibly for the first time ever we had legal wind speeds for the entire session.  We swapped the order around today so that the long course heats were first.  In the first one Matilde in TaurusX made her debut over the full monty with 60.17 while Noah got Marlow up to a new high of 61.89 mph.  Not so very long afterwards Adam set a new PB with a 72.01, only to be eclipsed minutes latter by Russ with 73.79, elevating him to second-fastest BRITON evvah.  Peter completed the heat with a 54.21 mph run.  "Very hard work after 50!" he said.  "Too humid!"  Derision ensued, at least from Frank "Runs With Scissors" Lem.  In the final heat Martina clocked 65 dead in TaurusX and Wild Bill cranked the Milan velomobile up to 55.93.

Wild Bill Thornton readying himself for take-off

As noted above the caravanserai moved two and a half miles down the road for Diego to try to tame his wayward three-headed doggo.  Sadly 'twas not to be as gremlins attacked his video display and flipped it to a mirror image, such that trying to correct a swerve to the right resulted in going yet further thataway, and off into the sagebrush.  The same gremlin had earlier sabotaged Phoenix' electronics, preventing Andrea from getting a run in.  Last to go this morning was Alyssa, running from the 600 metre start again but this time on an unfaired ICE VTX converted to arm- and leg-power by Robert Barnett.  19.54 mph.  Aerodynamics rule, OK.

Back to town for the usual pleasantries.  The bike built by Mark Anderson and Eric Ware for local lass Teagan Patterson and left behind when she went off to college in Colorado is up for sale.  Genuine 65+ mph capability, but rider needs to be not much more than five feet tall.  If interested, contact Paula Tomera at the Lander County Convention & Tourism Authority.  And no, I've no idea how much they want for it or whether they'll post it to you.

WAW veolomobile that popped up at the morning meeting

Calvin's somewhat Burrowsesque road bike

The rain held off until we got back from brunch and after going very black and thundery and short power cutty for a while it seems to have wandered off to the west, wherein dwell the unrighteous.  And that rumbling noise you just heard was not more thunder but rather Frank Lem tripping on the stairs.  Relax, kids, he's OK...

Although the rain saw fit to go water the burghers of Winnemucca and Points West the wind stayed determinedly in place.  Nevertheless we dutifully trooped back out to the course in the hope that it would get the message and drop.  Which it didn't.  No-one wanted to run in either of the first two scheduled heats but the blow finally began to subside just as the sun began to drop behind the mountains to the west.  Thusly we closed the road at 18:40, which in theory would give us time for four vehicles to run.  But both François and Andrea fell at launch and didn't restart.  Matilde had a few wobbles but ran TaurusX through the traps with a non-legal 65.72.  Then she crashed heavily approaching catch, which was invisible in the gloom.  The bike went down, slid a fair way and rolled a couple of times, though without damage to either the rider or the bike's internals.  Team Policumbent have the odd replacement slide-on nose section so although the old one looks like it's run its last race they should be out again tomorrow.  In the midst of all this drama Lincoln had a steady run after a slightly tense start and did a wind-legal 55.19 mph.  No pictures from this evening because by the time there was anything worth snapping it was too dark.

The forecast for tomorrow morning is for low winds until midday and low temperatures first thing so the consensus is to delay all runs by an hour.  That this gives us all an extra hour in bed is, of course, merely a happy coincidence.  Also, my milk has gone off.  No tea for me tonight.  Bollocks.

1. Chief flagger Gerri-Ann heard a rattlesnek out at the five mile start while we were waiting for the mob to get ready for Diego and Alyssa.  Natch I immediately jumped into the Blackstang and closed the doors and windows.