Single Speed Cyclocross World Championships
By Ben Herken
Friday: Packet pickup at a brewery, I bribe the officials with embarrassing photos of Tobin from when were raced together in high school and receive my first qualifying token. I lose the pixie bike relay race after getting tackled while cutting the course. I find some people to go play minigolf at the boardwalk where I get a hole-in-one, guaranteeing my second token.
Saturday Qualifiers: Me and 400 of my closest friends meetup for a parade down the coast on the way to our first challenge, at main beach. I pass on the skinny-dipping and instead opt for the le mans start across the length of the beach. After much chaos we’re finally on our way in the alley-cat scavenger hunt. We must complete Feats of Strength at each stop on the manifest to receive tokens to qualify for the race on Sunday. These feats include beer chugging, carrying sand up a cliff, spinning around a bat 50 times then playing darts, helping finish a jigsaw puzzle, riding a bike with no brakes around a pump-track, etc. I leverage some local knowledge to visit each station efficiently before any run out of tokens then have time left over before the party to go ride the Giant Dipper for an additional bonus token.
Saturday Party: Circus themed at the Boardwalk’s Cocoanut Grove. Giant four-person pedal-powered elephants, mechanical sharks, burlesque acts, and three local bands make for a great night. Towards the end of the festivities, they announce who has qualified (I made it!) and finally we’re allowed to go to sleep.
Sunday, the World Championships: The course is very similar to the Surf City races from two weeks ago, except they added more run-ups and the focal point of the course, a cesspit of disgusting water with ramps on either side inhabited by a man with a luchador mask that would mercilessly tackle you into the water and steal your bike. Halfway through the women’s and non-binary race, the smoke from a (very) close prescribed burn drifts onto course where it lingers for the duration, occasionally getting so heavy as to limit visibility to 50ft. A massive le mans start gets us going and immediately it’s complete chaos everywhere. I take the tequila shortcut on the first lap and nimbly avoid the luchador. After a couple laps my bike starts to make some weird noises and I decide to walk it in, take all the handups I can and call it a day after one final trip through the cesspit. I cheer on Tobin as he is crowned World Champion after a brutal final lap in which he and Lance Haidet fight off an all-out assault by the luchador with help from Christopher Blevins and Howard Grotts. Everyone travels back to the city where the winners get their tattoo and the rest of us limp home to begin to recover from this wonderful and wacky weekend.
