Sea Otter Saturday! Matt and Oscar Race, Lyd and I Get Loaded!

So today's page is gonna cover Saturday. It was cold. So cold in fact that things that are cold said "Damn. It's cold."
Lydia was trying to use her finger to push the camera button. It was frozen, and so many of Saturday's pix are scary at best.
We had the young ones up on this frozen dawn, many riders deciding whether or not to run vests/arm warmers/ etc. for their race. Matt Thome was up first to the starting line, and he had a great start. Somewhere along the line, Lyndsay Lohan was out on the course making out with toothy Miley Cyrus(?) and Matt decided to watch. That's cool, I would have done the same thing, I am not afraid to admit it.
Oscar Rodriguez showed up with his crew to race the Sport class as well, and it was really great to see him out there. Lyd and I got LOADED with him in Fisherman's Wharf later in the day, but back to the story...Oscar had a great race, and apparently caught the tail end of the "Fire-Crotch vs. Toothy" make-out session with Matt. Both boys finished without a wreck, but Oscar suffered some major mechanicals on his NOT Tomac bike. We'll have to talk to Oscar about that. That was all the racing action, so Lyd and I boned out for some sight seeing. Roger stayed for a while and tried to get a lockout en-route from James
installed on Vanessa's top-secret stolen Soviet Magnesium hardtail bike.
Lyd and I rolled down to the waterfront in Monterey. We visited the Maritime Museum, where I dutifully and dorkily explained how the USS MACON went down, how old lighthouses worked, and how diving helmets used to work....oh, and how we took California and other territories from Mexico in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Cali was handed over in the harbor at Monterey, in the old Customs House.



Camp-N-Ride attendee and long time friend, Heidi Bowen racing the Otter.








































































































































We had drinks at Fisherman's Wharf, then watched the hippies in the park as we strolled down to Cannery Row. We drank margaritas there, then stumbled back to meet oscar for more drinks back at Fisherman's Wharf...where Lyd got in a fight with the restaurant owner. It was awesome, you guys really shoulda' seen it.
We returned from a rousing game of Pigeon Chasing to the rental house. Brant and Bob were preparing to go out for a night on the town, and we heckled him relentlessly for ogling the underaged Giant Devo. team's wunderkind Essence Barton. It seems that Brant had been chasing her all over the XC course in practice, and was unaware who she was. It would have been OK in Kentucky, I guess...but Cali just won't have it. I explained to Brant that if the girl in the next room asks you if "...you want any sweet tea??"" it's already too late to run, and the guy's name is Chris Hanson who just came out of the kitchen.
It was a great day, but seriously cold. We retired to the room for the night, and we all prepared for the final day of racing. Vanessa, Vegas Bob (NOT BERT, though...and I am as of yet unclear why???), Heidi Bowen from Idyllwild...and Darth Tedro's bag of sand, Johnny what's his face. A fun tidbit...at his start, the announcers called him up to the line as the defending National Champion.


At that point, everyone is SUPPOSED to cheer. Nothing. It was dead silent until the gun went off. I smiled for a good hour....