It’s always a good idea to get to Europe a week before the World Champs and do a bit of racing to sort yourself out on the time schedule and get the body movin’.  Usually this opener race involves a Swisspower Cup or Bundasliga race or something proper with some UCI points and the guys you’ll be racing against at Worlds the next week.  Over here at the Fun Giant Mountain Bike Team, we decided to mix things up a bit this year.  Instead of proper racing somewhere on the continent, we took advantage of the fact that the SingleSpeed World Championships was taking place a mere 70 miles up the road from Fort William in Aviemore, Scotland.  The fact that we’re always scheming a way to go to SSWC anyway made it an easy choice to pull off our shifters and deraiulers, install the magic gear, grow some inappropriate facial hair and wear goofy-ass clothes while partaking in possibly (probably) the funnest race of the year.

    Upon arrival in the Glasgow airport (with all of our stuff, yes!) we immediately ran into Jimbo, organizer of the SSWC ’05 that we attended in State College, PA.  He and a his buddy Matt, who had just completed the Paris-Brest-Paris bike tour, were waiting for their bags, which arrived with ours, and were going to take the train to Aviemore.  We volunteered the (windowless) back of our Transit van and they ended up sleeping on the couches at our place all weekend.  Keeping the bikes of our fellow American bike touring vagrants running in the meantime…  Those guys rode up from the airport, as they should have, neglecting to tell us that the knobby tires we brought for them to replace their touring slicks needed to measure 29” in diameter…  No worries though, Jimbo had them fixed up with new rubber just as the last singlespeeder rolled out of the Bothy Bikes car park on race morning.  Well played.  

    But let’s back up a bit.  Before the seven mile social hour/roll-out to the race site proper on Sunday morning, we spent a couple days enjoying the atypically nice Scottish weather and did some sweet exploring in the Cairngorm Mountains.  Good stuff out in them hills for bike riding, complemented by excellent maps, knowledgeable and stoked singlespeed locals and foreigners rolling about.  Various activities, mostly centered around drinking and riding, took place throughout the week as folks rolled into town.  The highlight was the Saturday evening SSWC ’08 host decider.  Our girl Elke represented her homeboys in Durango, CO in the ADD event.  First a 500m sprint on a roller bike, then a double shot of local scotch whiskey, then an interpretive dance of a jig.  All judged by a panel of experts and their peers…  It came down to a tiebreaker between Napa, CA and D-Town.  Cali won.  Boo.  I hate poison oak.  

    Sunday morning came soon enough and we all kitted up (I use that phrase loosely…) and rolled on down to Bothy Bikes for the formal rollout.  It was pretty sweet to have a seven mile cruise through the Rothiemurchus State Forest on nice gravel paths through the forest and moors before finding out exactly where the secret race location was, wondering how cool it was.  Turns out it was one of the coolest race courses I’ve ever had the pleasure of riding around.  After, of course, we ran down a forest track and around the “Auld Man of the Woods”, one very scantily clad Dr. Jon (event organizer) and back to our bikes, wherever they were. (mine ended up hung from a tree about 50 yards up in the woods from where I left it…)  After catching a very obvious (and hauling ass on her pink chain) Kelli Emmett at the top of the first climb (I ran really slow) and moving on through the throngs, I eventually saw a classic red Scottish kilt flowing through the woods, Carl.  We posse’d up with Travis Brown and rode around for a couple laps, marveling in the amazingly perfect pitched climbs and all-time great black dirt singletrack descents.  It was amazingly perfect.  Sunny skies to boot.  After a mid-race snack of Hob-Nob’s (nobbly, oaty, honey biscuits), I decided to ride really fast for a bit.  Carl and Travis faded back, so I figured I’d stop at the impromptu beer garden to avoid heckling and get a beverage.  They caught up, I rode fast, we had fun.  Another gap opened, another garden stop happened, etc.  Starting the last lap I made a pit-stop at the finish line for a beverage, which I handily stuck in my denim vest pocket just before hitting a rock at about 25mph and pile-driving myself on a gravel road descent.  Oops.  That’s an impressive amount of blood on my arms.  Denim kept the rest of me safe and sound though.  Should have gone for the jacket…  20 minutes of wondering if I should wait for Carl so he got Tattooed later I crossed the finish line victorious.  Carl arrived just in time to see me getting stern directions from Marty as to where and when to show up for my tattooing…  He did, to his credit, say at the start (before pounding a beer), “if you don’t want the tattoo, don’t win!”  A few minutes later an impressively fast riding (with a 2:1 gear, she really didn’t have a choice) Kelli appeared in her red “onesie” to take the women’s honors…  Which meant I’d have someone to commiserate about sore skin with…

    An hour later we were sitting in a small flat down by the tracks with a tattoo artist from Glasgow who had some options for us.  Unfortunately, by far the coolest one was also by far the biggest one…  We figured it’s a life-long thing, so we bucked up.  Two hours later each and we had matching his and hers SSWC logos on our asses.  Kelli’s a bit lower than mine…  A fine weekend of World’s prep indeed…  



If you want to see photos, www.singletrackworld.com  



Have fun out there.