The Bonebell Crew made it out to Manistee, MI to race the Lumberjack 100 alongside some fellow Chicagoans and Michigan friends. Stiggity is drumming up a race report for all to read – he’s good like that, unfortunately for me, I have no real race to report since I met my demise early on in the race and couldn’t complete it. Such is the difficult task of race preparation, race planning, and day of race tactics to combine and formulate success that the failure of a few items can definitely ruin a good effort. I was seriously bummed and heartbroken over the amount of training I put in, the hours in the saddle, the half-days of work to get hours in the saddle, and planning for the race that didn’t come to fruition the day of the race. Luckily for me, the race was also start of my family vacation, and it meant one week away from the Chicago downtown chaos, a computer (well mostly of course!), and my phone which decided to take a power dump and fail its way the same weekend of the race, perhaps in tribute to me. The positives will always outweigh the negatives – and one great positive I had in my mind as I sat in a foldable chair under the tent awaiting for Nevada Dave to bring home the Chicago glory at 7 hours and 57 minutes for 100 miles – was that I was going to spend a lot of quality time with my family who’d cheer me up greatly despite the outcome. I sat calmly and let the thoughts of a restful week of cold beer, sandy beaches, and no biking play through my head and started placing the race behind me immediately. A ‘DNF’ is not something any racer takes lightly – and moreso when its a target race, but a week of Bells will most likely erase that shameful feeling.

It seems even on vacation the storms still brew. Only this time, I don’t care less. The western Michigan coast received some brutal storms, but with the protection of the dunes nearby, and the beauty of the nearby forest preserves, the lightning, and the howl of the wind have brought about a beautiful calm and fiery night show that has been cathartic to watch. There, in the storm, hides a struggle of peace and the brute force of nature’s personalities. The weather’s struggle to reach this summer day perfection that becomes evident if for glimpses at a time, and with great luck a few days of gentle warmth with breezy air. It’s what we wait for – like impatient children that we are with knobbies at the ready, and helmets in hand, waiting for that perfect day to perform our little feats for no one but ourselves and with each other. Ahh- yes, the beers have been good to me this week.

So good in fact, that my father-in-law and I visited a local bike shop, and there she was hanging from the rafters, in my size, this. The sickness moves on, getting back up and dusting myself up ready for another trail attack feels evident. I look to my father-in-law, and I smile, and he responds simply with – “it looks badass!”. Yes, it does, and so are the dreams to keep on keeping on the dirt, working towards the goal of being the best I wanna be. Thank you Sara and Mia for cheering me up and a special shout out to my father-in-law who has been very cool hanging out with sharing good times with me, I have no idea what day it is and my socks say “Beer:30″ because its always time for a beer.