Black Breath Razor to Oblivion

4 songs of Portland D-Beat. Sometimes I get a craving for Taco Bell. Not Mexican food, but Taco Bell. D-Beat is the same. Give it to me executed exactly to the winning formula. Discharge and Motorhead as the main ingredients. Don't get to slick or original. Black Breath deliver. 4 songs in 15 minutes or so. Totally raging. Perfect interval music. Peg the heartrate for the length of the jam.
Portland has always been a "metal-punk" town in my mind. Poison Idea, Accused,and on and on. Everything had a metal edge or look to it. Portland always reminds me of this. Black Breath keep that tradition alive. The label is name checking the right bands, but then going a little too far with the Celtic Frost/Bathory allusions.The mighty Repulsion from whom they jacked their name are an better comparison. Stick to the formula. Shredding D-beat that will have you coming back for more.

They self released this on vinyl and southernlord has the cd. Full length on the way.

Last Gasp for CSI

Here are some shots from my wife, who is actually a photographer. This will be the end of the NoHo overkill. I need to try and get healthy for Plymouth this weekend.

Master Killers


Barriers

Action in the Pit! Bike Exchange.MM Racing style.




And that's a wrap.

Northampton 09 Run Up Video Test

How many more posts can I milk this for? Keep counting....
This is from the Cat 3 race. 2nd lap maybe? c

Sunday Photos

I woke up sick and didn't race. Pretty much sat at the October tent all day and took lazy photos from that position. Once again. Fast. The grass sections looked like a crit. Single file with guys dying to close gaps.
Elite Women's start.

Mary McConneloug was dominated. Leading a group on the 1st lap. After that she just road away.
Lap one.

Lap two.

Timmerman gets a great start, but rolls a tire. The crash at the start slowed down a lot of dudes.


Myerson got a great start too, but it seems like if you didn't get caught up at the start, you were guaranteed an issue later. Myserson flatted and drifted back.

Noho CX Words

Even though we had driven out the night before, I was still up too early and ended up at Look Park ridiculously early. One treat of having the first race of the day is the unique course conditions. Warming up was like riding through a field of frozen shag carpet. Wet grass can slow you down-so can frozen grass. As the sun came up, the dew melted off and gave the corners a little more slippery excitement than they otherwise would warrant, The dew also made the railroad crossings something to pay attention to.
Race started with the weird wrong way/parade lap and then turned around back down the finishing straight and up the run up. 100+ dudes will bunch up pretty good at that first run up and it was chaos. Again, we hit it in better condition than latter races-but did our best to chew it up.
The ride down was not a strong point for me. I was riding the brakes way to much, but was sketched out by it until maybe the last 2 laps.

Sand pit-road it in practice. Ran it during the race. Better safe than sorry. Watching the pros latter in the day was pretty mind blowing. They hit the sand pit so fast they could basically just coast through the first part, peddle through the turn and then stomp out. Pros are fast.

Barriers-were pretty basic. Not super tall.

2nd Ride up/Run Up. I ran it during the race. Again, it was pretty crazy to watch the later categories just power up it.
I started to feel the pain about half way through 2 to go and my reliable redline dry heaves kicked up for a minute. Smashed my knee of my seat coming out of the sand pit as well which sucked. Not a total implosion, but it took me most of the lap to get it back togehter.
Bell lap and it was game over. 64th.
Spent the rest of the day hanging out-which may not have been so smart as I woke up the next day with a horrible cough and sore throat.
Rolled over the the park early and took a couple laps-felt like shit. Coughing, hacking, no power. Packed my bike up and went back to bed. Some how I got placed 94th in Sunday's race-even though I was in bed and my number(which I got Friday night) was in my glove compartment???
All in all an amazing weekend.
Adam Craig was hanging on his uber prototype Giant Di2 next to me for most of the day, but I didn't geek out and take any photos. Wish I did.
Based on the number of crashes, I think they might want to rethink the start. It was a little sketchy.
I will be back next year with file treads.

barriers

Powers and Driscoll into the barriers.

Northampton Saturday. Run Up

Run-Ups are my favorite obstacle in cross. They reward struggle and guts as much as finesse and they are usually (at the start of a race) pretty chaotic and fun.
Here are some shots from the Sat Men's Pro race. Since I am lazy, you can expect the same thing with 3s and a plethora of shots taken from the confines of the October tent. Lazy Man photography at its finest.




This photo is blurry due to the stealth nature of adam craig's giant with Di2...




Despite the run ups and sand pit, this was really a grass crit. Check out how narrow that line is compared to the width of the lane. It was strung out and you clung on until you popped.

(this photo is from Sunday, but conditions were similar on Sat-just colder.

Cyclcrossworld weren't the only guys holding a cross clinic. Embrocation's duo was dominating in the 3s. Orange gloves must make you fast!


Spooky know how to roll. Did you bring a coffee table to your tent?


Thanks to Adam Myerson/Cycle-Smart and everyone that helped make a great race weekend. Also big thanks to Andrew/October for helping us out with Clive! More pictures and talking later.