The Who’s Who from the four day camp!

Solo’s

Scott – The Cannibal – Youngren
What is with these guys from Mount Vernon? Is there something in the water up there? Like, Tom at the three day camp, Scott is fast, consistent and determined to lay down one seriously impressive performance at RAO. While not yet RQ, Scot will be returning to RAO with his seasoned S2S crew, knows the course like the back of his hand, he’s going to be one serious contender and wouldn’t surprise me one bit if he walked away from RAO highest honors.

Super – Luigi Barisone

When you think cycling, there is one country, more then any other that comes to mind. Italia, the moment I saw Luigi’s name on the roster I knew we were all in for a serious challenge. This guy has experience. He’s crewed RAAM at least twice. He’s slammed BMB. On the first day of camp, Luigi’s queue sheet was misplaced but this hardly stopped this Italian power house, no queue sheet, no problem! Lugigi followed the signs towards Hood, logging an extra 30+ miles in the process. If he can do this on his own with a crew he is going to be unstoppable.

Wade Baker – “Wade’s World, Party Time, Excellent, Woohohohoo!”
Wade first caught my attention down at the PAC tour desert camp, where he logged more miles and climbed more hills then anyone else. This guy is serious about “On the Bike Time”, and gets off for nothing, passes through stops faster then you can fill a bottle with heed. On the four day camp, Wade was an absolute animal. He logged the fastest times each day and walked away with camp bragging rights each day as the first one in. Man, can this boy climb, weighting in 50, yes five zero pounds less then “chubby beef cake lard ass”, yours truly, Wade is one serious climbing machine. I expect to see Wade just rock the RAO! 40,000 ft of climbing is not going to be a problem. I truly expect to see Wade twice at RAO, once at the start, and then on the podium.

Rick E Martin “Liven Lavida Loca”
Where did this dude come from? All of a sudden on day 4, Prinevill – Timberline, I rounded a corner starting the climb up towards the casino, and there was George and Rick just chilling on the side of the road. There are fast riders out there then there are super mutant smoking fast riders. Ricky falls into the latter category. For the brief segments that I rode with Rickey, I could tell he was thinking to himself, “Tartan Boy, is this all you got?, cause if it is I’m going to smoke ya!”. If Rick a veteran of the ultra mountain bike scene has a weakness it can only be one thing. The dude used to paint his toe nails to match his mountain bike. A serious warning to all other solo’s this guy isn’t RAAM qualified yet, but mumbled something about course records being weak. Sheeze man, I just want to finish! The qualifying window is going to be very tight this year.

Mixed Two Person
Team Escargot Speedwaggon (Anne Schneider)

This Davis Diva, is going to give the llama’s a serious challenge. Anne road each day with a purpose and in the process lay the smack down on many of the boyz at camp. Climbing’s no problem for her, in fact it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if this lady finds her resurrection up Ochico

Four Man
HeadHunters - Bill Nicolai
Four man team’s watch out; Bill’s Head Hunters are coming to RAO with one thing in mind, bringing trophies home. Bill’s ride of choice, beam soft ride, seemed to glide almost effortlessly over the course. On day four Bill got truly serious, was the first camper to the TIMBERLINE even beating Wade! Over the course of the camp Bill bounced race ideas off of George and now has his team’s strategy down pat. I just hope I can keep my head when the head hunters catch me!