No Animals Were Harmed

Last night I attended the new member orientation meeting of the Racing Greyhounds, a cycling team to which I applied and, shockingly, was accepted.

Since receiving my acceptance email last week, I'd been concerned there had been some kind of mistake. Perhaps they had accidentally sent the email to everyone who applied, rather than just the smaller group of those selected for the team. When filling out the application, I was somewhat embarrassed when filling in my "race resume" - a short list of 5 or 6 category C cyclocross races and a 100-mile "time trial" with less than impressive results - sure that my lack of experience and barely competent performance would ensure that my application would be quickly sorted to the "NO" pile. Despite this nagging concern, I managed to convince myself to go to the meeting. Not only was I not asked to leave, but they were, in fact, expecting me to be there.

The meeting was held at Woodland Lanes - a bowling alley that is one of the team's sponsors. I was one of the first to arrive, and as I made my through the smoke and bowlers, A couple of guys approached me and asked if was there for the cycling team meeting. I'm not sure how they could tell. I guess I stood out like a cyclist in a bowling alley. Regardless, I said I was, and they showed me to where we'd be meeting.

The evening itself was largely procedural, yet fun. I enjoyed a glass of beer while I filled out the necessary paperwork and learned of the benefits and obligations of membership.

We then broke out into our individual teams, in my case the road team, to meet the team captains our teammates and to talk about the team's goals for the year. One goal is to move Cat 5 racers (such as myself) to Cat 4 by the end of April 2010. I didn't really expect to be thinking about upgrading yet - I have only been licensed for two weeks - but team's captain seemed confident that there would be enough racing opportunities to move up to Cat 4 in the spring, which he insisted was a much safer category to race in - as in personal safety. Less experienced cyclists are less predictable and make more mistakes that place you at greater risk when racing among them. Okay, make sense.

The rest of the evening was spent trying on the kit samples for size, getting my "mug shot" taken, and just chatting with the other riders.

It was a good time, and I'm excitedly looking forward to the 2010 season to be racing and training as part of a team for the first time.