News: Colin's World Cup Shuttle

Parked between a hard place and a hard place Colin Meagher

I think we drove through about 15 million tunnels. Seriously. OK, actually, it was about 50 or 60. We lost count. Colin Meagher

So the van isn't really supposed to carry 3 people in it, so we put a cusion on the floor in the back. It's remarkably comfortable to sleep on, if you are ok with sleeping in a fetal position with a towel for a blanket. Colin Meagher

So Madrid was in the can. I had 3 weeks to kill in a sun drenched land filled with amazing food and even more amazing wine. So what’d I do? I left. For the DH/4X race in Maribor, Slovenia (formerly Yugoslavia). One look at the track in Alex Rankin’s latest Earthed flick, “the Law of Fives” had me hooked; I had to go.

I hitched a ride aboard the Specialized rig with Ryan Palmer, one of two wrenches for Specialized, and Nate, the wrench and team manager for the newly formed Specialized/Decline team. But since Spanish customs agents were holding Kyle Strait’s DH bike—no, he didn’t give up racing last year, the Qashqai schedule conflicted with racing, and it was better money, so he opted to do the Qashqai—we had to cool our heels for a day waiting for them to decide that Ryan wasn’t trying to smuggle black tar heroin into Spain in a bike.

Anyway, we got the bike from Fedex, and did a straight push to the Maribor DH/4X races from Madrid in Specialized’s VW panel van extended—think a Sprinter van only with a VW on the front—with a trailer in tow, both packed to the gills. For any of you who are curious, that translates to a bit over 1300 miles, a bit over 600 Euros in fuel, and 279 songs on an ipod. In about 24 hours. In a vehicle that’s not really set up to carry 3 people for an extended amount of time. But we made due, got in, and set up the tent in record time. Then beers and sleep.

Stay tuned for a pre race report on the venue Friday.

Yeah. this is a ghetto set-up, Just a couple of tents... Colin Meagher

...It's so you can bolt the tent down. Nothing like chasing a tent down in gusty winds to ruin your pre race prep... Colin Meagher