Photo: Einer Traa

Washington County Fairgrounds – Hillsboro, Oregon.

Flat, bumpy, grassy, with a hint of farm animal. I arrive on the scene and survey the long lines of red and yellow cones. Those within eyeshot wind out and back, out and back. Rutted grass, half-assed mud, an uninspiring lack of off-camber turns, absolutely zero climbs or descents. This is going to be a guts-out leg burner. All power, no passion.

So far, I’m not impressed.

I pre-ride with friend and photographer, Rob Finch. The kidney-jarring meadows prove as treacherous and soul-sucking as they look. Thick grass, slightly wet with morning dew, rides like Velcro.

I can feel the ground sucking power straight out of me through my tires. Slog, slog, slog, bump, slog, bump, bump, bump. Repeat. A few more miles of mind-numbing grass and we hit a set of turns that takes us through the middle of a series of stables.

The smell of farm animals gets stronger and as we take a right turn out of the last stable, we find out why. A corral.

The kind of corral where you might watch a rodeo. The kind of corral where you might keep a big passel of stinky farm animals. The kind of corral that is probably filled with piles and piles of shit from said stinky farm animals.

Feces. Feces and dirt and rain, mixed. A brown, sloppy fecal soup. A cyclocross course.

I accelerate toward the liquefied shithole and plow into the first horrendous line that I find. Spin, legs, spin! Grinding forward, I clear the initial 7-inch deep bog slide toward the left where there appears to be more traction, and then head off into a deep mire that everyone around me has thus far avoided.

Into the heart of darkness!!

Rob has abandoned me and is soft-footing his way off course and through the middle of the corral toward the exit. Sissy.

I am pedal-deep in animal matter and praying to god I don’t have to put a foot down. Ignore the spray off the front tire. Keep the mouth firmly shut. Pedal!

Just when I think I might make it, the front tire starts to spin out. The bike stick in place for one horrific, solitary moment and then begins to tip. The right foot lands with an unceremonious glop.

“Shit!”

Literally.

I dismount, shoulder my crap-covered racing bike, and make way for higher ground. As I trudge along, Rob no longer looks like a sissy. He looks smart. I can feel the bacteria squishing between my toes.

Back at the tent my mechanic, who also moonlights as my boyfriend, takes a look at my cross machine and rolls his eyes.

“You had to ride it, didn’t you?”

“It looked fun.”

“Heidi, it’s a pile of shit! You could have waited until the race to have your fun – now I will have to clean your bike twice today.”

My shoes will not come off. The ratcheting lever that holds them snug is lodged with grit and grime. I find a water source and clean off the suspiciously slimy layer of crud. Back in the changing tent I peel off layers and execute wardrobe change number one. The pile of discarded pre-ride items is steaming in the morning chill.

At 9:00am, the racing starts. Burnt corpses of former demolition derby cars line the starting shute. The beginnner men’s field flies down the opening straight-away into thick, white fog and then disappears around the first left-hand turn. T-minus four point five hours until I revisit the House of Excrement.

The day rolls on and racers emerge at the finish line spattered and spent. Ironclad racer Brian Barker flies past his team tent screaming, “I AM COVERED IN FECES!!”

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Whiskey and beer in quantity. We theorize that perhaps enough alcohol will kill whatever microbes are surely assaulting our internal organs by this point. My race approaches so I refrain from getting wasted and take my chances with the bacteria.

Finally, around noon, there is sun. White, hazy, blinding sun that comes from everywhere. Remnants of low-hanging clouds are backlit. A racer in the Masters C Mens field takes a birthday cake hand-up and smears it all over his face, shoulders and back as he rolls through a pile of woodchips.

The party is starting in earnest.

Today is not only the final race in the 2008 Cross Crusade series, it’s also the state championships, so with every completed race, a new Horseshit Conquering Champion is born. The few and the proud return from the podium with medals and french fries and celebratory beer. Waffles and nutella abound.

My race is the second to last of the day and so while the party rages, I ride a trainer and eat liquefied synthetic energy-goo with angry, angry music in my ears.

The start line comes and, with it, the Pain. Before the race, two other mid-pack riders and I form an alliance and vow to storm the front of the race together. Mud and shit equal glory today but my calculator is broken and I can not produce a good start or even a good middle. I ride in the drops with my body curled into a cockpit and try to look faster than I am.

The long stretches out and back are lonely and uneventful – instead the crowd clamors around the corral, waiting for someone to face plant or at least tip over. I find that I can run it faster than I can ride it so I take to the bog on foot, swinging far to the left to pass riders in front of me.

A rider who is still miraculously on her bike teeters up ahead. Long blond hair in a ponytail underneath her helmet. Small-waisted. Delicate. Gleeming in her skinsuit. The crowd is rabid for her to clear the entire shitpile in the saddle but it’s not meant to be.

She goes down with the ship. Bike and body and helmet and hair straight into the E-coli soup. Coated, soaked, slathered. Stinking.

Cowbells rung by madmen find a new, urgent, frenzied rhythm. Their irony is not lost on me as she resurrects from the mire and finds her feet.

As I pass her I catch a glimpse of her face. A perfect cheekbone partially coated in black – an uncontrollable grin revealing a row of shining white teeth.

Amid the deafening roar of a now-satisfied, sadistic throng of spectators, I battle my way through the final few feet of Lake Vile, find traction on a bit of grass, hop back on my bike, and dream of post-race beer spiked with antibiotics.

*

Foggy morning pre-ride… before we hit the cow shit.
Photo credit: pdxcross.com

Author, mid-ride, contemplating the upcoming trip into the Fecal Swamp.
Photo credit: Gregg Rouse

Teammate Kristin Wille makes her way through the Corral of Crap.
Photo Credit: pdxcross.com