Secondly we'd like to thank everyone who came out and rode with us on Saturday, you guys and gals rock and made this event the huge success that it was. Now without further interruption lets get back to the blog.
As long time readers most of you are aware that Cycle Works has a regular Saturday Morning No Drop Fat Bike Ride that we like to have on Saturdays... so as to not cause anyone confusion with the title. If you haven't been out to this ride you really should, it's always a good time and we've gotten a pretty good usual group of core riders with a few coming and going as time permits. Anyway, about mid October I dropped an innocent email to Rick and Damon asking about orange Pugsley stickers for my newly acquired ride to replace the factory white ones, little did I know at that time that this simple email would cause probably the busiest month and a half in recent memory that would all come to fruition on December 5th. Stickers were ordered and have found a home on the Pugs but then Rick mentioned, in passing, that we should think about doing something for Global Fat Bike Day. So began the planning stages, to be fair all that he said was that we should think of something to do for Global Fat Bike Day not lets do something BIG for Global Fat Bike Day, so I suppose the rest was on me but if you're going to do something you should do it right. And just like that a virtual email storm was started as we began reaching out to several companies that we thought would be a great fit with Global Fat Bike Day.
To my surprise the first big name to get on board was Walz Caps, who sent out three rad caps for us to give away. Most people that know me figured out early to not respond to texts, emails or phone calls if they came from me as I had all these prizes coming in and needed bodies to "model" them for me so that I could adequately display them on the event page. Luckily I have some awesome people in my life and a few of them were gracious enough to help out.
Close behind was Surly Bikes who sent a myriad of great things, a crank set, flasks, patches and t-shirts just to name a few. Also during this time I received a slew of stickers from the guys at Fat-Bike.com which I am completely embarrassed to say I didn't get any pictures of before giving them all away (pure amateur hour on that one) I promise you though that they were no less appreciated.
Beard Head was a product that I had previous experience with as I have had one for almost three years and thought that they would make a great addition to the prizes for GFBD but to be honest I was a little surprised, but in a very good way, when I got a reply form then stating they were sending out four Beard Heads.
Rounding out our prizes were three sets of SPD compatible pedals from iSSi, these are a QBP house brand pedal that I've heard are a big hit with several of the employees at QBP. If you've sided with SPD in the SPD vs. Crankbros debate you should give them a look.
Finally after a month an a half all the planning, stressing and promoting was done and it was time to see what we had created. Arriving an hour and fifteen minutes early there was some time to enjoy the calm before the storm.
Couple of last minute safety items and another shout out to all the sponsors and everyone who helped make this day what it was, then it was time to ride.
We had an amazing turn out, other than the Tour de Brew LNK rides that have become super popular this has to be one of the largest group rides I've been on in Lincoln and it was rad!
The ride was open to anyone regardless if they had a Fat Bike or not, it was pretty rad though to see that 90% of the bikes were big boned. The sound all those fat tires made on the pavement was music to my ears.
The group was really flying and it wasn't long before we made it to the first regroup and second card spot.
Hill climbs and hot chocolate awaited everyone at the second regroup.
Selfies, group photos and the fourth card awaited us at the third stop.
A quick spin back to Cycle Works and the ride portion of the event was in the bag.
Fire, food and drink awaited us back at the shop and in another moment of embarrassment, I failed to get any photos of the spread that we had to feast on. With all the contests, raffles and schmoozing time just got away from me... next year I promise. While there might not be pictures of the food I can tell you it was amazing, lots of folks brought bacon dishes and they were all fantastic. Bacon Mac-n-cheese, bacon wrapped little smokies, chocolate covered bacon, bacon cheesecake and several other great dishes were consumed by all.
After the food it was time for the contests, here are the best beard contestants.
Fuzziest legs competitors.
Winners of the Beard Heads! While Mark technically didn't enter a contest, he had to live with Jamie's fuzzy legs for a month so we figured he deserved a little something... those things were fuzzy.
Winners of the poker ride who all walked away with an awesome Walz Cap.
A few of the raffle winners.
Those who left before the slow bike race missed watching a really fun event, the goal of the competitors was try to go as slow as possible without stopping or putting a foot down. It wasn't the quickest event but it was entertaining for sure.
Winners of the slow bike race.
Thanks to everyone that came out and joined us for the event, you guys made all the planning well worth the effort. Let's do it all again next year, it'll be hard to top this years but we are going to try our best to make it even better for version 2.0.
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