Team meeting, MMBA annual meeting

This weekend was set aside for annual meetings. First our Cannondale Midwest Racing team meeting and dinner held Saturday night and then the MMBA meeting and swap meet on Sunday.

I didn't get a chance to do any riding on Sunday but I did get in a 3.5 hour ride on Saturday morning. The back roads for the most part were still snow covered but worn down, even icy in spots. On one hill that seemed to be mostly ice I lost traction on the way up and when I put my foot down it had no traction either so I fell over standing still. In fact I had trouble even walking up the remaining portion of the hill.

Saturday evening most of the team gathered over at the Scurr's for our annual team meeting where we get a chance to see all the old team mates as well as greet new members. We also go over the various sponsorship requirements and place some initial orders for parts. This year we are changing uniform colors and logo for the first time in 4 years so everyone got a preview of what the new uniforms will look like. I think they will be pretty sharp. A lot of the work for the layout and design was done by team member Joel Miller.

Sunday's MMBA annual meeting and swap meet brought together mountain bikers from all over the state to check out the swap meet and the vendor expo area. I set up the Hammer tent and sold product and answered questions on their product. Robin and Shari Scurr along with Chris Werth assisted me in handling the crowd. There was a good turnout as bike enthusiast use the event to kick off the season, or at least help get rid of some of the cabin fever for those who haven't been riding much yet. Sort of like the boat and camper shows that are also going on this time of year.

I met the guys for Team Sandbag that will be putting on Nutrition Seminar in March that I will be helping them with. They had flyer's to help advertise the event that were pretty impressive. But for the record I don't work for Hammer, just help out at some of the shows and events.

The MMBA annual meeting usually has an interesting guest speaker every year and this year it was none other than Gary Fisher, considered one of the founding fathers of mountain biking and also the manufacturer of his own bran of bikes. Gary is known for his unusual attire and today was no exception, he wore a purple leather suit.

One of the final event of the day was the awarding of the race series awards from the last season. The top three winners of each category were given a trophy. Cannondale Midwest Racing was well represented, the first six winners in a row were all from the team. I received my award for 1st place in the Sport 50+ class. This year I will be moving up to the new Expert 50+ class. I don't expect quite the same results this year as last, plus I may not do enough races to qualify for the series.