By definition, I am the furthest thing from an athlete. But when you have any hobby that dominates your life and also involves some form of exercise, you tend to collect friends who are athletes. I have some friends that are into running like I am obsessed with bicycles and they occasionally try to mix drinking and running. It’s almost comical. What they call “hashing” the average drunkcyclist just calls Tuesday night. But they try, so we will go easy on them. I have noticed a recent trend amongst the runners they call a Beermile. The idea is to have a beer after every lap ran around a track until you complete a mile. You end up drinking four beers, that’s cute. I thought this idea needed a little drunkcyclist twist and I filed it away in the “potential bad ideas” folder for a few months until I could come up with something worthy.
Then one day it hit me. What about a beer century? Ride 100 miles and drink a beer every 10 miles . I spread the word and ended up with a solid crew of 5 other thirsty drunkcyclists willing to sacrifice a Saturday in the name of my bad idea. It was decided that we would ride from Tempe to Tucson which is actually 120 miles and 2 more beers. Perfect!
The 7:30am roll out was a little early for most of the crew but thank god for bars that open at 6am. Everybody woke up a little as soon as we finished our first pints and we were on our way. The ride started with a pleasant stroll on a bike path through the sleepy suburbs and at mile 10 we stopped for our first official drink. Ice cold Tecate at 8am is never bad.Then the tone was set for rest of the ride when LoLo came out of a port-john asking “Why is my dick greasy?” Once we all stopped laughing we realized that in his sleepy state, he forgot that he put chamois cream on and was quite startled by the mess in his shorts.
Feeling good, we kept moving south and just before mile 20 we picked up the last member of our crew. We were now a gang of six. Myself, Scandinavian Jesus riding his new Kona cargo bike, LoLo, Nebraska Scott, JS, and The Wizard riding his fixed gear. We were a sight to be seen rolling down the road. Every 10 miles we would stop wherever we were and have our drinks. Somewhere between miles 50 and 70 it seemed that the beers and the heat started to catch up with just about everybody. We made the necessary adjustments and got ourselves all filled up on the best local fare we could find. Gas station hot dogs and Indian frybread.
With my stomach not handling the heat and beer very well, the pivotal move for me at this point was to switch to shots instead of beers. Once again proving that whiskey fixes everything. We slogged along the highway frontage road for hours as the sun got lower and lower in the sky. I separated from the group at one point in order to buy some fireworks and ice cream because it seemed like the right thing to do. The last three rounds were drank in the dark and we rolled into the Tucson city limits with a few warm beers and almost out of booze. The ride took all goddamn day, but after a few shots, 14 beers, and 116 miles we finally arrived in Tucson ready to party.
We met up with old friend of DC,Pistil Pete, and pointed it towards 4th Ave. We lucked out when the first bar we went to had some kick-ass live music and dirt cheap drinks. The rest of the night gets a little foggy but I do know that it was a damn good time. Check out some Pork Torta if they come to a town near you.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvC83JpVsgc[/youtube]
Grab some friends and give this a try, it was more fun than should be legal.
*if you want to see more pictures, I documented each beer stop on Instagram @dirty_biker and #beercentury
Keep it dirty…
Once again, you are my hero.
At face value your adventure seems a worthy endevour. When my daughters ex was residing at the Malmbabury detention center, I would head country. Malmbsbury hotel, Elphingstone Hotel (&lunch), Red Hills Hotel (great beer), Commercial Hotel (Castlemaine) and lastly the “5 flags Hotel” at Campbell’s Creek. At this point my daughter would pick me up and drive back to Melbourne. I really got to know the locals. As opposed to driving, you could smell the smells (of cooking And forests) and hear people talking as you rode through towns. It’s a great way to experience the country and get to know the locals. I’m feelin’ you.
this type of tallywhacking makes a mockery of cyclesport, which i find both repulsive and refreshing.
Cheers, and thanks for the inspiration.
On the 15th of December we will do a rail trail ride on road bikes here in PA.
40 miles out 40 miles back. starts @ a bar and there are multiple watering holes along the way.
sounds similar
I can’t wait.
Incredible. Dirty, you’ve outdone yourself.
And way to represent Cleveland with the Pork Torta show at the Beachland. A fantastic place to see a show a throw a few back.
the way you play follow the leader beats all others.
..”and was quite startled by the mess in his shorts.”
That IS a typical Tuesday night around these parts.
Well done, sir.
Thou shalt not mock the beer mile… It’s not the alcohol that gets ya. It’s the bubbles. Half way through the second lap you start to feel like a 2 liter bottle of soda that has been shaken a bit too much. Half way through the third lap, all of that running has jiggled the beer in your gut to the point that you feel like the Hindenburg. Half way through the fourth lap, the beer has reached critical mass, and is looking for an escape route… Most runners cross the line and immediately do their best impression of a champagne bottle on top of a tour podium. Foam goes everywhere. EVERYWHERE. It’s freaking hilarious.
Nice work.
I’ve been boozing so hard; i needed a scapegoat.
I found that a steering stabilizer off a street bike keeps me pretty straight. It keeps me right in the sweet spot of my biopace. In one of my recent binge drinking stupors, I made a rule to myself that I had to put in 10 miles before I could start drinking on any given day. The end result? I just took my computer off my bike and whipped it somewhere into one of my many junk piles.
10 miles, 10 blocks, whose counting?
The Beer Mile is NEW? Shit…we used to do it every year in college in the mid 90s…only we called it the Molson Mile, and you had to consume a 6-pack in four laps. The event usually involved the entire men’s and women’s track teams, and was held at night at a middle school track. Vomiting = disqualification, and since it was at night, you had to have a “puke official” run alongside to make sure the rule was enforced.
My freshman year I witness one of the more impressive feats of my entire collegiate experience when one of my fellow distance runners scorched the field with a finishing time of 6:47. As for myself…I “warmed up” a bit too much before the event usually…
Biking and drinking is MUCH more fun than running and drinking, tho.
Sounds like RAGBRAI
Excellent idea. Ten beers is more than most of my friends drink in a week, though. I might have to modify it for those weak of constitution…
Ten beer is more than I can handle, too, but you’re right, Dirty, whiskey makes everything better. That, and bacon.
You never have to tell me to keep it Dirty, honey. That’s always what happens when I’m just doin’ what comes naturally.
Thanks for a wonderful, very good, very bad idea. I love bad ideas. I’m stealing this one and making it my own. A tour of the vineyards south of town might be just the thing… :)
(jumping to my feet)
HALLELUJAH!
and sex. bikes, whiskey, bacon and sex…
best mix ever
The ballsy tact of this adventure is beyond galore. It reminds me of how much I usually get done before noon on a monday. All whilst top shelf liquor sits at room temp. Very nice work. While you were out there in the car fields, I chased a similar tale towards the north.
There just isn’t anything like doing a shit tone of nothing via bike.
That’s cool.
Double cool if you did it on the 616 Fatso.
Dirty. I like where your head’s at. Let’s do it in Colorado in the spring.
Fucking awesome! My friends are lame.
…jeez, dirty…the idea is awesome but personally, a few beers in the morning & i’d end up snoozing in a ditch by the side of the road about noon…
…now, “…back in the day…” before the advent of mtb’s, we did stuff like drop a few ‘mics’ of lysergic acid diethylamide & ride around in the dark all night, ending up at the back door of the fairfax bakery about 3:30, 4:00 in the morning, eating fresh donuts straight out of the oven…
…fucking food of the gods when you’re THAT stoned…damn…
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BGW – I tried half a tab of that once, and when I found myself naked at the top of a very large tree six hours later, I figured maybe that’s not my drug of choice…
I respect anyone who can do that stuff and keep their wits about them.
I thought doughnuts were deep fried?
…babble on…“… I found myself naked at the top of a very large tree six hours later…”…
…sounds like the ergot brought out your primal bad-ass self, ya ???…
…& as far as keeping ones wits about them whist being ‘stoned, immaculate’, some didn’t & never really recovered from that & for others of us, it was the opening of a door of perception…
…i never took acid often but when i dosed, i dosed hard & i never saw it as something to be taken lightly, literally or figuratively…
…& baked, deep fried or pooped out by fairy princess from that colorful 5th dimension, it was no matter…the healthy diet was ‘back burner-ed’ for the occasion & the sugar rush seemed to suit coming down from the ‘trip’…
…“…strawberry fields forever…”…
Yup, and my primordial bad-ass self resides just beneath the veneer society makes us wear, too. It needs very little coaxing to come out and play…
Opening the doors to perception regularly is essential to our development and evolution…
Um, and I try to stay away from Faerie princess poop in all of it’s many varied and enticing forms. It wreaks havoc with my skin.
…babble on in babylon…you don’t needlessly shotgun pine trees to shed that veneer & then get all aggressively defensive to justify it do you ???…never mind, needless question ‘cuz i know you’re not the type…
…& you’re absolutely right regarding our development & evolution…i would consider the ingestion of certain ‘compounds’ throughout time (prob’ly other than alcohol – heaven forbid & i’m saying it here on drunkcyclist) that may offer quicker steps up the evolutionary scale, for those that can handle them, wherein the collective consciousness can benefit…
…hundredth monkey theory, ya ???…
…that’s certainly not to suggest that being stoned out of ones mind does anybody any good other than offering a good time but for some there seems to be an introspective period post-experience that can benefit others, if you will, going back to albert hoffman himself…
…anyway…yes, the sugar thing…in comparison to less refined substances, it’s generally kinda intense on various organs…