Figured it was time to break the radio silence once I received the following awesome t-shirt design:

Designed by the one and only Christopher Vaughn Gay of Artcore Studios, these shirts are bound to make your co-workers envious. Or scared. Or confused, I’m not sure which.

Printed on black American Apparel t-shirts. Pick one (or 3) up here.

Kittens and Friends,

The kits are available for order again. It is open to the public via KitOrder.com. We decided to to a chance and make long sleeve jerseys and jackets available for those who want them. The order closes in May and will take about 8 weeks from there. Once the order is closed, it’s closed. We are not getting extras. Make sure you get in on this if you want something.

We are having a party at Loretta’s in South Park on Saturday, April 14th at 5pm for those of you who need to try on kits and/or like to drink. You should come.

I’m getting as many kit samples as I can, but there were lots of things that they didn’t have on hand right now (sadly, lots of the women’s stuff), but the men’s sizing is almost exact or very close across the board. This will be everyone’s first chance to try on the new jackets and long sleeve jerseys to see if you like them too.

If you are comfortable with the sizing and what you need, you can order here:
https://www.kitorder.com/solutions/slk

We are working with Hincapie again to get another round of kits ordered for you all. We know some of you have torn bibs or jerseys or skinsuits from all of the awesome. New stuff is on the way (as soon as we order it and you pay for it)!

We’ve also had some interest in long sleeve jerseys and warmup/wind jackets. We am honestly still gauging the interest on those pieces, but we are probably going to pull the trigger on some jackets at least.

It’s going to work just like last time. We will have a order up on kitorder.com so you can pre-order the pieces that you want. Once that deadline is hit, the money is sent off to Hincapie and they get things officially started. Their turn-around these days is around 8 weeks. This isn’t set in stone, of course, but is typically for this time of the year. Nobody will have anything in time for road or MTB season, but definitely in time for cyclocross season.

More info coming soon.

Expect to see some kegs out at a few of the upcoming local races (most likely during the MFG series). Remember to bring some extra water bottles, kittens.

Goodness, this is starting to look like a legitimate enterprise…

It’s August 13. The first race of the season is 23 days away. Despite the fact that we’ve had an unreasonable amount of cyclocross-worthy weather all “summer” here in Seattle, us Kittens are getting pretty damn excited for the Fall.

Shiny new parts have been ordered through team sponsor Recycled Cycles. Race bikes are getting reassembled. Our skinsuits will be en route to Seattle any day now; Big George just has to finish hand sewing each chamois on his Tour of Utah rest days. We as a team have been out in the field every week dialing in our cross skillz.

There’s also been a whole lot of practice racing. Cross Club is at it again this year and though it’s getting a little too big for its britches (30 racers + spectators apparently draws the ire of Seattle’s upstanding park dwellers) it’s been great for the fitness and a solid reminder of what it’s like to race around in the dirt elbow to elbow with a bunch of other jokers in spandex. Some of our Kittens are looking mighty fast this year. If I was a betting man I’d put some money on seeing pink on the podium this season. Not me, of course. I’m pack fodder, but John, Andrew F, Noah, and Dylan are pretty quick out there.

And, finally, I’ve been engaging in the most important pre-season ritual a self-respecting cyclocross racer can do. Watching cross videos on CrossTube. If this doesn’t get you psyched up for cross, you might just want to reconsider racing:

The race was up in Roslyn, WA, on the other side of the Cascades from Seattle.  That fact, coupled with the fact that it was July instead of November, meant that the race was a much drier and dustier affair than your typical Seattle-style CX race.  In fact, after passing one particularly fitting road sign on the way back from the race, we dubbed it “The Big Dirty”:

After blowing dirt out of my nose for 2 days, I couldn't agree more.

Jason Dul kicked off SLK’s CX racing career by destroying the beginner men’s race and taking the win.  The race announcers were quick to pronounce Soft Like Kitten a team composed entirely of sandbaggers.

Jason Dul showing the beginners how it's done.

Seth Howard and Christopher Gay represented in the Cat 4 races (sorry guys, didn’t get any good pics!), with myself and Michael Mabale putting in solid efforts in the Cat 3s.  Hardly a race went by all day without a pink-clad heartthrob in it.  This team’s spectating/heckling/handup scene is going to be great this year, I can already tell.

Yours truly running up the Big Dirty

Just look at those quads!

John Whitenack, one of the fastest kittens around, put in a pretty stunning effort in the über-competitive Singlespeed race, coming in 11th in a field full of wicked-fast racers.  All this, despite eating shit a couple times going down the Big Dirty’s tricky descent.

John is singlespeedy

I think the general consensus amongst the team members at the end of the day was something along the lines of “holy shit, I forgot how hard cyclocross is……when can we do this again?”  It’s tantalizing to see what this fall is shaping up like, and having a kick-ass team to share racing and beers with is the icing on the proverbial cake.

All race and no relax makes Jack a dull boy

Big props to Raleigh and MFG Cyclocross for putting on a really fun race, and thanks to kitten Seth for all the pics.  You can see more of his shots here.

Now, if you don’t mind, I have to go blow some more dirt out of my nose.

The clothing is made by Hincapie and is their highest quality stuff. I’ve been really impressed with my kit so far. We even had a chance to put it through the ringer on a 24 hour ride this last weekend.

http://bit.ly/mTWuzi

The deadline for the orders are Sunday, June 19th. They should be back in time for the beginning of cyclocross season.

Spread the word.

Thanks for all of the support. You all are awesome. FACT.

The kits arrived even sooner than I expected. My lowly camera and weak house lighting isn’t doing the pink justice. They are gorgeous.

We are getting together to collect them on Sunday, May 1st at Loretta’s. We should be there around 5pm drinking and burgering and what not. I’ll bring all of the kits (all 50lbs of them, apparently) and we can run around the bar with spandex creeping the locals out more than usual. Chris, Dylan and I will just be making our way back up from Olympia after a 400+k fleche, so we should be cheap dates.

If you can’t make it or are just desperate to get your stuff early, I’m willing to meet up with the local folks as needed. Just shoot me an email and we can work something out. I’m getting together a skinsuit order very soon so we can have some in time for cyclocross season. They are going to take a little time since we are technically “changing the artwork” with a new sponsor on board. I don’t have a firm price yet, but expect it around $150. If I get enough interest, we can do a second order of normal kits (bib shorts + jerseys) for anyone that didn’t make the cut on the original order. We have to meet a minimum of 10 pieces per item though, so make your voices heard if that’s what you want.

Kittens

Our fans

Don't scratch my bike.

Shell shocked

Last Sunday, the kittens were loosely wrangled for some slow bike riding and lots of drinking. Needless to say, it was perfect training for cyclocross.

We gathered together and piled the bikes at Hooverville in south downtown around 4pm. I didn’t take a head count, but there were well over 20 people on hand. Our Portland chapter even drove up just to get their slow rolling drink on with us.

Drinks were drunk. Peanuts were destroyed.

There were hundreds of teenage girls lined up outside (waiting for us?). It must have been the spandex.

After about an hour of face time, the team got together for a photo-op and hit the road. We were heading south to our lovely sponsor Loretta’s.

I made the group stop midway at Schooner Exact so I could fill my growler that I had on board. They have $6 fills on Sunday. You can’t beat that with a stick. Unless you had a stick on hand, I guess. Growler filled, we started rolling again.

Dylan managed to run a flat about a mile away from our destination. It gave us plenty of time to straddle our bikes and look PRO while he fixed it.

Loretta’s is always a magical destination. This is coming from a man that lives 5 blocks away from it too. They have burgers that are like a sweet cross between Dick’s and In-N-Out. The airstream trailer out back is always ready to cradle our filth. It is a very fine addition to South Park.

We hung out for hours while the rain pelted our poor bikes outside. It was lovely to have so many friends on hand to spend a lazy Sunday evening with. I really appreciate everyone that was able to come out.

Andrew Francis is going to be hosting a screen printing party soon with some one color kitten images that I put together.  Expect to see some info on that very shortly.

I can’t wait to hit the dirt with you guys.

Airstream = Love

Lorettas