MS150 and the Week in Review Quiz

Congratulations to all the COMO MS150 cyclists out there. You put some good miles on your legs, and gave your bikes some sweet love they deserved. And you raised money for a wonderful cause! Many of you wrote to me asking if I would be there, but alas, I was stuck at work this weekend and unable to join in the festivities. Boo.  Before we get to the Week in Review Quiz, I thought in honor of everyone's participation in the MS150, I would put together an MS150 Cyclist Style and Etiquette rating scale. Tally your scores.

1) Did you ride all 150 miles?
If yes, give yourself 50 points. If you rode anything less, you get 35 points for at least showing up. If you rode the double century option, answer the following question: Did you tell more than 3 people about it? If 'yes', deduct 10 points for being smug.

2) Did you wear a jersey from a UCI Professional Continental, Continental or ProTeam (Examples include Garmin Slipstream, Astana, Columbia HTC)? 
-Were you NOT on a road bike? Deduct 5 points for clashing cycling cultures.
-Were you on a road bike? Deduct 10 points: you are a poseur.
-Deduct 20 points if you were sporting the full kit (team jersey AND bibs).
-Add 10 points if you were wearing retro pro-kit from a team that has been defunct for more than 20 years (not including 7-Eleven or any team Greg LeMond raced for, because he’s gone weird on us).

-Add 20 points if the above non-LeMond, now-defunct team kit was made of wool.

3) Were you sporting a Garmin Edge 705 GPS unit on your handlebars?
-Deduct 10 points: Seriously, the roads are well marked, there are like 1000 other cyclists to guide the way, and this is a fund raiser in mid-Missouri. You're not training in the Dolomites.

4) If you were riding a road bike, did you attempt to draft off of anyone on a recumbent, mountain or hybrid bike?
-Fail. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200. Go directly to FAIL.

5) Did you drop anyone on the ride that 1) you didn’t know and 2) you were initially drafting off of for more than 20 seconds without permission?
-Deduct 10 points for each occurrence, unless:
a) You said “nice pull” to them as you passed: Then only deduct 5. You still should have spoken to them before you started drafting in the first place.
b) You said absolutely nothing as you passed: Deduct 25 points UNLESS one of the following situations occurred:
-1)The rider you dropped was older than 17 but younger than 40 and you receive mail from the AARP. Add 25 points.
-2)The cyclist in front of you was riding a road bike valued at more than $4000 and he/she had hairy legs and/or an inverse belly-to-calf diameter ratio. They don’t ride enough to deserve their bike so you get grudge points – but not a lot. Add 5.
-3)They vomited and/or snot-rocketed and/or crop dusted you while you were drafting. You dropped them in self-defense. Deduct 5 – you still should have spoken to them before drafting off of them.

6) If you were the person in #5 above that had an unwelcome wheelsucker that did not greet you and drafted for more than 20 seconds….
Add 5 points for snot-rocketing them.
Add 10 for crop dusting (but deduct 15 if you hit mud. Not cool. Ever).

Ok – on to the Week in Review quiz.

Question #1: What is this?

a) Mark Cavendish's Dimple Rumpy

b) Fried flopped Mutton

c) A half-eaten Clif Bar

d) A deep-fried Oreo Cookie

Answer: d).  As featured on VeloNews' coverage of the Tour of Missouri, they highlighted some fine Missouri cuisine and included this delicacy.  Something for all of us to be proud of - eh?  Watch it here.

Question #2:  What happened to this cyclist (Anibal Borrajo) during stage 5 (the time trial) of the Tour of Missouri?

a) He hit mud while trying to crop dust.

b) He double-punctured.

c) He got hit by a car.

d) He set a new Tour of Missouri Time Trial speed record.

Answer: c)  Yup.  Borrajo races for Colavita-Sutter Home and inside the last two kilometers of his time trial run, he was hit by an event VIP car on the course, knocking him off the road.  He was fine other than a little road rash but the crash broke his front wheel.  Because he had no team chase car, he ended up waiting10 minutes at which point Columbia HTC's support vehicle actually stopped to help him so he could finish the stage.  Nice.  Read about it here.

Question #3: This bike was photographed on Ninth Street by yours truly.  What is the name of this handlebar configuration?

a) The double flop-and-chops

b) Pork chop and flops

c) Flip-flop and chops

d) 'the pronghorn'

Answer: d)  I've never seen this configuration before, and honestly, cannot understand it.  Does the rider really feel the need for extra bar-end extensions inside the flopped chops?  I think this beast is as yet, unclassified, so I get to name it myself, and I'm calling it 'the pronghorn' for the obvious similarities  to pronghorn antelope.

Incidentally - the above photograph is actually a cropped portion of a larger photograph (seen below), which is the original version I found on the internet when I did a search for images of pronghorn antelope.

As you can see, this pronghorn is no longer with us.  But his head is.  And it has been mounted and then posed in the great outdoors.  So let's see...it was shot out in the wild, brought inside, had all of its internal structures replaced with sawdust and glass eyes and shit, and then taken back outside into the wild to be photographed up close as though it were still alive.  Wouldn't it have been easier to just leave it alive and in the wild and photograph it with a telephoto lens?  Maybe I've missed the point.

Question #4: Identify this object:

a) A six-pack cooler that attaches to your bike.
b) The new, slightly less hip, front-end messenger bag from Chrome.
c) The new insulated carrier for pizza-delivery-cyclists.
d) A dog-carrier for your bike.

Answer: d) It even comes with a little sunshield so you don't burn your Chihuahua.  Check it here.

If you scored 4/4, take your oreo cookie for a ride in its front-end basket and help yourself to a deep-fried Chihuahua...wait a minute - reverse that.

Pedal on!