Pacific Pedaling as Team DEVO for a misty morning race. Thanks to Grimace 2/9 for the photo!

Last year at Astoria, we needed some tunes for our bikes. We were rolling out as Team Devo and wanted a soundtrack to go along with our smashing costumes. Normally if I’m listening to any kind of music riding, it’s with an ear bud in my right ear, turned down, so I can still hear traffic with my left ear. I don’t do that all the time, but occasionally I will to help keep a rhythm.  However, for the Astoria race, we needed tunes we could share with everyone, so I had to hobble something together that could withstand the terrain of the course, be loud enough to blast out, and not keep me from being able to dismount for barriers. Here’s what I came up with:

Needless to say, it’s a little on the ghetto side, but it worked. (Thanks Ira for a beautiful matching rack for my bike!) Anyway, if you don’t want to bungie your tunes to your bike, you can check out this review in the NY Times of sound systems made specifically for bikes. Thanks to Jonathan Maus for tweeting it this morning. (PS – my makeshift system ROCKED! Crack that whip!)

Pacific Pedaling as Team DEVO for a misty morning race. Thanks to Grimace 2/9 for the photo!

Forget the podium. Forget coverage in a real life publication. Forget bringing home cash or medals. I’m not sure I’ll be able to be any more proud of our team than when we rolled around the course at Astoria as DEVO, complete with booming DEVO soundtrack strapped to the back of the bike. Thankfully, there are enough ‘old folks’ still racing to know DEVO, even though I did hear someone say, “I brought it up on my phone, apparently they were a band from the 80′s.” Yes! (Thanks to Grimace 2/9 for his Flickr photo above.)

Sunday was truly out of control. A lot of fun, and a day that would end up stirring up controversy about how much fun is too much fun, especially at the expense of those who were the recipients of boos, catcalls and mass amounts of all kinds of bottled liquids flying across the gauntlet of barriers. This being my first Halloween cross race, I had no idea what to expect, and the day lived up to the hype. Hundred, and hundreds of racers dressed up in every outfit imagineable, and some you wouldn’t want to imagine. Guys making SPD compatible high heels, and some who dared to wear complete furry outfits. Team DEVO lost the costume contest to a chicken, but I’m pretty sure the photo above will warm the hearts of many, as it has mine.

Couple hundred photos from Sunday on our Flickr page – click here. And just a few of my favorite shots from the day below. And yes, there are two of the robot below…Rasca had me laughing all day long.