KÜCHEN RENNEN

Team Messerschmitt and thirteen other teams met at Crank Saturday morning for an "unsanctioned street race".  After signing in, teams were instructed to choose their cake from a long line of white boxes. 

Ready, set, eat!  Each team of five had to finish their cake and two cups of chocolate milk before being released to ride to the next stop.  This first cake was red and sweetly frosted and actually kind of delicious.

Next there was a mad scramble to get over the Burnside bridge and to Western Bikeworks in the Pearl.  My coworkers cheered me on while downing the next cake.  Not even one crumb could be left on the ground.

From downtown, we headed a good clip south.  Terwilliger hill felt good after the calorie surge.  A light mist descended on us and other teams started appearing.  The sprint was on!

Next stop was at someone's house in Southwest.  Fourteen more cakes waited for us, this set with sprinkles.  I used to love sprinkles!  I had already puked a couple of times and felt ok about downing a bunch for the team since it'd be on its way back out shortly.

Down the cemetery hill, over the Sellwood Bridge and around the back of Sellwood Cycles, more cake awaited.  This time, we bought out.  We learned that teams were allowed to pay $50 to skip an eat.

The plan was to get to the Springwater, but the displaced Sellwood Bridge confused us, or maybe it was all that sugar.  We found ourselves on Milwaukee instead.  Turned out to be a nice straight shot, up through Lloyd, with only a quick stop at a light to put sparkly valve caps on my teammates' bikes.

Now Williams and a bottleneck of racers.  I turned off to take a shortcut and lost half my team.  Alley Cat racing has taught me you rarely stop for lights - just turn instead.  Arriving at the finish line on Mississippi, I was stunned to find more cakes.  We sat, slowly masticating these horrible desserts for the final race to the finish. 

And we tied.  For third.  It was agreed that two from each team would down a beer to break the tie.  I had the Texan on my team and he was pretty thirsty.  So was I.  We killed that beer like it was a glass instead of a liter.  And won this.