Updated List

Updated List
The following riders have been selected (randomly) from the stack of 183 postcards. If you see your name on the list congrats! You now have a winter of training in front of you. You also must notify us (Jake) by 11:59 PM on April 6th if you cannot make it to the race. There are 78 people who would love to be racing, so if you can't make it. Please don't take a spot needlessly. Thanks.


For those not on the big list, we have pulled your cards randomly to set the "reserve" list. As people drop out, you will be notified in the order that your card was pulled and you'll then be in. We'll post the top twenty, and as that starts to dwindle we will update said list.


2011 Ragnarok 105 Starting List


Alan Oscarson
Andy Tetmeyer
Ben Oney
Bill Franken
Bill Nelson
Bob Shepard
Bobby Brown
Brad and Kelly Skillicorn
Brad Cole
Brandon Manske
Brandon Parr
Brandt Elson
Brent Bruessel
Brett Swenson
Brian Dukek
Bruce Pletka
Chad Millner
Chad Sova
Charlie Farrow
Charly Tri
Chelsea Strate
Chris Oswald
Chris Larkin
Chris VanErt
Craig Irving
Dan Dittmer
Dan Hansen
Dan Steeves
Dave Asp
Dave Tyler
David Bruning
David Cizmas
David Meyer and Julia Peek
Derek Carlson
Donald MacNaughton
Eddie Karow
Eric 'The Red'
Evan Tweed
Gerald Hansen
Grant Braasch
Heath Weisbrod
Hunter Sheldon
Hurl Everstone
Ian Nancekivell
Jack Donovan
James Bialas
James Foley
Jason Buffington
Jason Vinar
Jay Pitts
Jeff Austin-Phillips
Jere Mohr
Jeremiah Jazdzewski
Jeremy Kershaw
Jerry Bilek
Jim Palmer
Joe Meiser
Joel Nichols
John Pike
John Struchynski
Jon Kern
Jon Loye
Josh Peterson
Joshua Schneider
Justin Coyne
Keith Peterson
Kelly MacWilliams
Larry Marx
Larry Sauber
Leah Gruhn
Lonie Sauber
Luck Francl
Mara Larson
Mark Benishek
Mark Emery
Mark VanderWoude
Martin Rudnick
Matt Johnson
Matt Muraski
Matt Riley
Mick Carlson
Mike Larson
Neil Cary
Nick Oswald
Paul and Janna Krawczyk
Paul Marietta
Pete Bell
Phil Dech
Ray Nickles
Rich Hendricks
Rick Cleary
Robbie Morford
Robert Held
Ross Hargrove
Roy Vosberg
Scott Erickson
Scott Kinderman
Scott Meulebroeck
TC Worley
Ted Clausen
Tiffany Foley
Tim Ek
Tim Norrie
Tim Stark
Troy Lawrence




Alternate Top Twenty (in order)

Todd Sample
Mark Kowaliw
Rick Kompelien
Ed Boltz
Chewy Tottenhall

Taken from http://ragnarok105.blogspot.com/

Sunday, sunday, sunday!

Some of you have horrible hand writing and others decided not to give me an email address. This means make sure you check back here often! When the list comes out and your name is highlighted it means I need contact info. I'll give those people 2 weeks to get it to me.

Good Luck check back soon!

Taken from http://ragnarok105.blogspot.com/

CRUCIAL LIFE LESSONS LEARNED AT STREET LEVEL

They say you’re built upside down when your nose runs and your feet smell, so forgive me today for dipping into the “archives” while I battle the remains of a pesky flu that, like our gang problem here, refuses to go away.
Given that the Special Olympics B.C. Summer Games started last night in Abbotsford and runs all weekend, this “encore presentation” seems appropriate:
My former neighbour Kevin, once the Roberto Luongo of winter street hockey in Yorkton, Sask., would be high-fiving my folks today if his kind heart didn’t stop beating three days shy of his 16th birthday.
Later this evening, Kamloops Immigrant Services will award 19 people – including this shocked scribe – with a Community Diversity Award. If truth be told, my mother’s name, not mine, should be inscribed on that cherished certificate.
Adele Mildred Kurenoff, my awesome mom, taught me early, and often, about tolerance, goodwill, compassion and decency. (She joked that these things didn’t apply in today’s workplace.)
She also taught me to not let the ignoramuses of the world hijack my outlook or lofty dreams. And, more importantly, she forced me to play street hockey with Kevin when nobody else in our small Saskatchewan neighbourhood would.
Kevin was mentally challenged. We looked at him, as naive kids would, as being very different. And odd. And weird. We never asked him to join our hockey games, even though it was he who often got up earlier than Prairie roosters and shovelled the one patch of road to make the entire exercise possible.
Mom asked one morning why Kevin wasn’t allowed to play. I confessed nobody wanted him to join us. Visibly upset with me for going along with the “lame-brain majority,” she ordered me to change that the next time we played – “or else!”
Well, when I picked Kevin for our team, the other kids on the street mocked me big time.
“Kurenoff, are you completely nuts?” yelled the neighbourhood mouthpiece, encouraged by the others’ non-stop laughter and catty shots.
“No. We’re both nuts,” Kevin blurted back unexpectedly. “And we’re going to beat you boys bad!”
What we didn’t know until he played was that Kevin could stop lightning from getting past him. It didn’t take long to figure out that the team with Kevin playing goal usually won. Darn neighbour even got cocky about his near-perfect record. When he passed away, the church was filled with his ragtag “hockey buddies.” His foster mom thanked each of us for making a much-too-short life full of so much joy.
We all got seriously choked up when she told the funeral gathering that Kevin thought “we were all pretty odd, lousy goal-scorers, but the nicest friends in the whole wide world.”
When my first editor – Dick DeRyk of Yorkton This Week – molded me into a weekly columnist, he explained that people sitting behind a keyboard have a lot of power and responsibility. Used incorrectly or dishonestly, our words could become weapons of mass destruction. Just like closed or narrow minds.
My mother encouraged me to use this special privilege to make people smile, to make them think and eventually make them tolerate everyone around them who may be different. Like Kevin.
My mom continues to encourage these columns. Allow me to offer loving thanks to her for removing my blinders and, of
course, a big high-five in the sky to the best street hockey goalie I ever knew.
Rest in peace, Kevin. This award’s for you buddy.

Gord Kurenoff is editor of the Abbotsford-Mission Times. He was a nominee last fall for an Abbotsford Diversity Award. To comment, e-mail letters@abbotsfordtimes.com.

Taken from http://myextratwobits.blogspot.com/

HOT DISHES FILLED WITH PRIDE!

Tracy Watson remembers a less stressful time in her life, albeit she hides it well behind a smile that would melt a tax collector’s heart.
She was hosting Canada Day golf tournaments as a beer rep for Molson when the country was infatuated with her company’s "my name is Joe and I am Canadian” patriotic pitch
The economy was on Viagra, people were drinking, eating out and buying big toys. Heck, even Santa Claus was having trouble keeping up with The Joneses.
Watson, now 40, had a regular paycheque boasting impressive numbers. Tums and Rolaids were for everyone else. If only the happily-ever-after story ended right there.
Tearing a page out of Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream speech,” Watson did an about face – it’s pronounced about not a-boot – and decided to try working for herself.
“So Canadian, eh? Worry more and work harder than ever for less money,” she laughed Friday while charming customers at her Hot Tommy’s eatery on Townline Road in Abbotsford.
It will be a year this August since she and business partner Michelle Esau dipped into the restaurant business, having purchased the quaint place from Tommy Kelly.
There are no plans “yet” to change the name to Hot Tracy’s or M-m-m Michelle’s – customer suggestions – but everything else is under review as the owners grapple with a sluggish economy and more competition.
But optimism is my dear Watson’s strength – and the No. 1 challenge, she figures, is getting people to her industrial park location for the first time. Getting them back has been less an issue, thanks to excellent food, atmosphere, homemade sauces, salsas and reasonable prices.
To that end, Watson has been visiting businesses in the ’hood, dropping off menus, letting them know about her takeout service and offering encouragement.
“There are a lot of small and new business owners right around us doing what we’re doing – growing slowly, hoping for better days. And it’s so encouraging when you see companies really take off.”
Her small eatery is open Monday to Friday, serves alcohol and “attitude” and tinkers with its menu and décor, inside and out on the patio.
There are minor sports pictures, murals, newspaper clippings, a Tracey Street road sign, some racing posters and a new Bring on the Heat towel stapled to the wall near the bar – behind all the Vancouver Canucks paraphernalia.
Watson promises to change the look over time, but filling the restaurant is her immediate priority.
“I have to admit, it drives me crazy when we’re not busy. I know more people are eating at home these days to save money, but it still makes you worry.
“. . . I have staff to pay, food to prepare, bills to pay. Sometimes it just sucks being an adult!”
Her mission is to spread the good word about the safe, Cheers-like atmosphere at Tommy’s.
Watson will be out promoting Hot Tommy’s next month with a golf tournament and she plans to have a crab bake at this year’s air show.
She also has plans for Friday afternoon barbecues, private parties and some form of catering to go with the new takeout service.
“The mind is working 24/7. I’m trying to stay really positive, seeing people fill the seats.”
Perhaps her “gamble” and the grand opening of Chances Abbotsford down the street is telling her something.
Either it’s sometimes you have to be lucky to be good, or in small business – as one Canadian poker star stated recently – “I hope to break even this week. I need the money!”

Taken from http://myextratwobits.blogspot.com/

OPTICS OF PICKING OUR POCKETS

It has been widely suggested by legions of abused taxpayers that the more accurate definition of redundancy these days is an airbag in a politician’s car.
Maybe it’s just the freakin’ heat, but my b.s. detector has been going off more than a car alarm in Whalley as our Elected Ones in Victoria pitch “better new taxes” while stripping away services with the other side of their shameless mouths.
Maybe it’s just the heat, but how can they celebrate an expensive Olympic party for an elite few and not blink as they examine ways to downgrade Mission Memorial Hospital? Do you believe?
Why do they keep telling people to move to the Greatest Place on Earth if there is no room in our doctors’ offices, hospitals, schools or enough affordable homes? Is the invite for the rich only? Or those who don’t wonder why there are tolls on every new provincial project except the Sea-to-Sky Highway?
Do people know, for example, if they relocate to the Broke City in the Country that they will have user fees added to all the other increased costs? Or that they will subsidize dressing rooms, or pay a special (wink, wink) gas tax to do the job the other gouging gas taxes don’t?
How can our premier justify giving himself and his ministers humongous raises – and bring back gold-plated pensions – and then saddle the rest of the peons with a 12 per cent harmonization tax grab? And was it really necessary to increase the size of government during this recession, while telling our underpaid paramedics to get a grip on today’s economic realities?
How, we wonder, can our government justify having 223 people work in the Public Affairs Bureau as spin doctors telling us everything is fine, and yet not one person can offer a ballpark figure on the deficit?
And, if TransLink is really going to get people moving around the Lower Mainland without using their vehicles, how will we pay for the new Golden Ears Bridge and expanded Port Mann Bridge, given the need for increased vehicle traffic to pay for the structures and monthly bills?
And speaking of tolls, why are out-of-province vehicles exempt from paying, but there is no break for the working stiff in the morning as he or she waits in traffic lineups, burning valuable gas and time?
Why do we not have a better grip on B.C. Rail as everyone else is told to tighten his or her belt and share the pain? Four people make more than $100,000 per year to run a 40-kilometre-long railway.
And B.C. Rail’s CEO made a $275,000 base salary in 2008 but with perks, including a bonus, pocketed $494,182. No wonder “urgent care” is the buzzword in Mission these days.
Over in Ottawa, the governing Tory suits are upset with the Bank of Canada honchos for suggesting the recession is over. For good reason – these are the same feds who, with the Canada Council for the Arts, spent $40,000 to fly a giant inflatable banana over Texas. Good thing the monkeys were thrown in for free – heck, you elected them!
The feds and CCA also spent $15,000 to help bring a Belgian art exhibit to Quebec that produces a poop-like substance when fed with food. So, that flushing sound is another $55,000 of your tax money going down the drain.
And, I wonder how our prime minister’s promise to abolish the “irrelevant senate” is going now that he’s added to the numbers of bums in the not-so-cheap seats?
Yep, maybe it’s the heat.
Maybe it isn’t a coincidence that our governments raise the taxes on alcohol and then make sure our country and province are in such a mess that you drink more.
Enjoy the long weekend gang!

Taken from http://myextratwobits.blogspot.com/

Last week!!!

THE GORD REPORT AFTER RIDERS' GREY CUP LOSS

OK, I confess: I'm a diehard Saskatchewan Roughriders' fan, despite living here on the Olympic-crazy Wet Coast.
Was raised in the awesome city of Yorkton, which calls itself the Treasure Chest City of the West. I left when I couldn't find her – think about that one and don't explain to the kids until they're old enough to know better!
After Sunday's stinging setback in Calgary – which felt like an early showing of the Christmas ballet The Nutcracker – I whipped up this list to show we are very good losers, if not good counters!
As reporters and football critics look for someone to "blame" today for the 13th Man Debacle, because that's what they do when they're not blaming their bosses for the sorry shape of today's media business, it says here that Rider Nation and Rider Pride does not live or die by final scores, albeit we do suffer a tad after unfortunate losses on the freakin' last play of the freakin' championship game.
Kudos to Montreal for a great season. And for what it's worth, the Als had 80 people show up at their airport, while Regina had more than 300. You tell me whose fans rock more!!!
And to everyone else who bugged me and other Rider Nation faithful on Sunday and Monday about counting, exactly what was YOUR team doing on Sunday? Who's your caddy, indeed!

GORD'S TOP 10 POST-GAME QUOTES FROM SUNDAY

(Was going to make it a Top 13, but it's kinda too soon to go there!)
Top 10 things heard as Rider Nation faithful filed out of chilly
Calgary on Sunday:

10. "Our special teams gene pool could really use some chlorine!"
9. "Ever stop to think . . . and forget to start again?"
8. "Hey, I'm hung like Einstein and smart as a horse!"
7. "Too many freaks, not enough circuses!"
6. "Hey 13th man, I souport publik edekasion, too!"
5. "I killed a 6-pack of Pilsner just to watch it die!"
4. "Our special teams coach used to have an open mind, but his brains fell out!"
3."Our special teams coach suffers from CRS - Can't Remember Squat!"
2. "Don't feel bad coach, 4 out of 3 people in Saskatchewan have trouble with fractions, too!"
1. "There are three kinds of people in this world: Those who can count and those who can't."

Taken from http://myextratwobits.blogspot.com/

Updated and Official Race Roster

Female Open
Brokaw, Sara
Sauber, Rebecca
Waxmonsky, Nicole

Female Singlespeed/Fixed
Henry, Kate
King, Susannah

Male Open
Bean, Calvin
Beck, Bryan
Bell, Craig
Bell, Pete
Boecker, Sascha
Braasch, Grant
Cahalan, Joel
Dittmer, Dan
Elson, Brandt
Gustafson, Chris
Haberman, Paul
Herringer, Zachary
Jeppeson, Shawn
Karow, Eddie
Kinderman, Scott
Larson, Doug
Lawrence, Matt
Lawrence, Troy
Mahoney, Lonny
Meyer, Dave
Million, Porter
Muraski, Mark
Muraski, Matt
Omdahl, Rich
Peterson, Josh
Pitts, Justin
Pramann, David
Sauber, Larry
Sauber, Lonie
Stock, Pete
Tri, Charly
Zadra, Jeff
Zeigle, Paul

Male Singlespeed/Fixed Gear
Braun, Craig A
Dukek, Brian
Everson, Hurl
Petersen, Andrew
Pierre, Andrew
Robb, JJ
Skogen, Chris
Weisbrod, Heath
Zipfel, Jeff

If you don't see your name listed let me know. I may have missed it. I'd prefer to not let more people in until more people officially drop out, but if you make a good case and make me cry I'll probably let you in (as long as you realize that only a small percentage of people will actually think that this race is fun while the race is going on).

Taken from http://ragnarok105.blogspot.com/

The postcards are a comin'

I will take the opportunity to thank Guitar Ted of Trans-Iowa fame and Chris of the Almanzo 100 for inspiring this race. Training for TI last year, and competing in both TI and the Almanzo are probably the highlights of the year. If you haven't ridden on some remote gravel roads, you haven't ridden. So get those postcards in and commit yourself to a day of fun.

Another note: Since this is the inaugural year we are going to try and keep the size to about 30 people (if we get that many!). If you've already got your postcard in, you're in for sure. From this point on, if we get a pile of cards (way more than 30) we will be having a lottery/drawing from a hat. At least that's the plan for now.

Thanks for reading. For your trouble, here is a picture of one of the first climbs of the day from a few weeks ago:

Taken from http://ragnarok105.blogspot.com/