Opening Ceremony

Before diving into the Opening Ceremonies I should fill you in on some details about this race.

RAAM is a bicycle race formally known as the Race Across America. It is 3000 miles in length with a start in Oceanside California and distant finish in Annapolis Maryland. I am a rider on Team ViaSat which is an eight man team. While teams are free to devise whatever division of labor is fastest my team has chosen to break the eight men into 4 working subgroups.

Each sub-group (hereafter "Teams" 1-4) rides for 5 hours and then has 15 hours "off" to race up the road in a car and position themselves for more bike racing. In short, a 20 hour racing cycle which continues 24 hours a day until we complete the 3000 mile course. Sound confusing? At first, it is. I'll bet by the end of this it will become second nature.

The opening ceremonies for RAAM were held at the Oceanside Pier on Saturday June 20, 2009. To make things interesting, I threw my hat into the ring to play the National Anthem before the riders took off. All the RAAM officials were completely cool and seemed to "get" my take on the event. I would play my version on the electric guitar and wanted to make it an event nobody would soon forget.