Day 18: Battle Mountain NV

Eeeuurrrgh! Half past five-thirty of the clock and a breakfast area full of Italian Penniless Student Oaves.  Call this a holiday?  So we all shogged off to the 305 in tim for the first road closure at 07:00 only for it to not happen because of some issue with the traffic control signs not being where they were supposed to be, but although we were about twenty minutes late getting things under way we managed to finish pretty much on time.  Also there was acertain amount of cowflop removal required in the parking area at catch since we'd left a dozen or so bales of hay there overnight, thereby providing an unexpected feast for the neighbourhood bovines.

Cows.  Nevada.  Sunday

Heat one was kicked off by Team Policumbent's Matilde Vitillo, whose slightly wobbly start was not altogether surprising given she had only arrived in town eight hours previously, as wasn't the fact that her 43.16 mph was the slowest run of the morning.  First of the Aussies to try his luck was Al Haslam - nice smooth start and 47.67 mph, followed by Daniel Löw in the Milan RS velomobile with 50.75.

Daniel waiting, Niklas with tape.

First launch for Bilby, Al at the controls

Heat two had only two riders scheduled.  Kit Kirby made Bilby's second run of the morning with 49.42 mph but the luckless Diego Colombari only made it about 200 metres down the road before the chain tensioner inside the Cerberus handcycle b0rked, putting an end to his day somewhat prematurely.

Taping Cerberus

The third heat went more smoothly.  IUT Annecy team boss Guillaume de France clocked 53.29 mph in Altaïr 7 just to make sure everything was working OK, Chris Hall made Bilby's third run of the morning with a 47.66 and Niklas Bostelmann the second run for the Milan at 50.42.

Guillaume suited and booted

Heat four should also have had three riders vehicles but the gremlins struck Team Policumbent again with transmission woes and a fall preventing Enzo Yokota from getting away in Phoenix.  Oscar Varney was Bilby's engine in this heat, hitting 49.77 mph before the Sprocket Rocket made its eagerly anticipated return to the 305.  The five rider behemoth has a new nose and tail and fewer tyres than on its last appearance as well as an all-woman crew, inevitably dubbed the "Sprockettes" and not by me either.  Their 51.53 mph run would have been a women's multi-rider record had the wind coöoperated which - natch - it did not.

Sprockettes away!

In the final heat François was clearly confident that he had the measure of Altaïr 7 by elected to run without the Kevlar crash panels in place.  Not sure whether his 72.53 mph is an unofficial record for the 2.5 mile course but it's certainly up there with the rude boys as well as being ~3 mph faster than his run last year.  Enzo had more problems getting away and was again unable to complete his run, Kit made his second - and Bilby's fifth run of the morning with 59.75 mph - also running without crash panels.  Closing the morning runs were the two velomobiles.  Wild Bill Thornton ran first in the Milan, forgot to fasten his seat belt and had it get caught in the chain, limiting him to 46.62 mph.  Lanterne Rouge was Peter Borenstadt's DF, which ran a respectable 50.29.

A confident François

Oh.  Bugger!

No drama for Peter in the DF

The wind wasn't legal for nearly every run - only Niklas, Bill and Peter getting legal speeds chiz.  Hoping for better this evening...  Second breakfast/first lunch at the Colt, which has fully recovered from a fire a couple of weeks ago when the extractor fan motor in the cooker hood caught fire during the storm that lashed¹ much of Nevada and turned this year's Burning Man festival into something variously renamed "Drowning Man" and "Burning Mud", before chaining myself to a lukewarm laptop for much of the afternoon.  Also, DONKEY!

DONKEY!

After lunch and an afternoon spent mostly discarding photos for being twenty variations on the same theme we were back out on 305.  Because Reasons there were only there machines running so they could afford to leave it as late as possible in the hope of getting legal wind.  First off was François, a little wobbly of the line and having to be caught and relaunched.  The second attempt was successful, but the launch crew didn't complete the procedure inside the prescribed 15 metre distance.

Annecy's jack man in position

And then the fun began, when an irate woman in a pickup truck ran the road closure at the first ranch road and turned south, heading straight towards the start and an Altaïr rapidly gathering speed on a collision course.  Fortunately François was able to figure out that something was amiss and switch lanes but then Mrs Angry reached the start yelling up a storm before blasting past Matilde and Peter awaiting their turn to start and zooming off into the distance.  Some of the details are probably sub judice or something, but not even Hollywood-OS can read the license plate of the truck chiz.  Fortunately other officials around the start did manage it and the Annecy team have both video from inside their chase car and a rider's-eye view from Altaïr's video system.  All this has been supplied to the Highway Patrol along with witness statements from flaggers Melissa and Geri-Ann, Arnold Ligtvoet, Mike Sova and "Battle Mountain Mike" Engel.  François still managed 83.55 mph, albeit with non-legal wind.

Silly cow.  Nevada.  Sunday.

After a bit of a delay for heart rates to return to normal and information exchanged by radio between start and catch, Matilde in Phoenix launched successfully but went down with a flat tyre at the three miles marker.  Rider OK, bike a bit scratched on one side but appears otherwise OK.  Last off was Peter, who clocked and uneventful and fully legal 55.85 in the DF velomobile.  Back to town for the wrap-up meeting followed by extended hanging around for the rozzers to appear.  Hopefully we won't get this sort of excitement tomorrow...

1. Apparently that's what storms do.