Shootout at Farmall #2

Exciting night of racing last night at Farmall #2. Weather was much cooler than last week and it brought out a few more racers. After last weeks throwdown with my teammate Casey; I figured he would be hot and ready to go again. Legs were a guessing game as to how they would function after Highland.

I took a few second lead through the first lap, I was suffering like hell though and felt some pretty bad heartburn. Never experienced that on the bike before. I bobbled on a steep section in the woods, and Casey snuck by on the 2nd lap. I had to cool my jets as the heartburn was zapping me. I fell into 3rd and recovered for a few minutes. I recharged the ol batteries and the chase was back on. Quickly pulled 2nd place back and the chase was on to reel Casey in. He had about a minute lead on me which is super tough to close on a course like Farmall. I just put my head down, and gave chase after we both were running through lap traffic I finally caught him halfway through the 5th lap as he got stuck behind some riders. Passed him asap and worked on putting a gap between us. I ran it up but he is a fighter and closed it down to within a few seconds but their wasn't enough course for him.

It's been a blast and Geneva Bikes has finished 1-2 the last 2 weeks.

I got stung by a bee in the left quad on the 6th lap, luckily adrenaline kept it away till post-race.

Next up is the Suicide Six, looking forward to that.

~J

Highland Forest Classic

Wrapped up a decent weekend of racing at the Highland Forest Classic. Small showing for the semi-pro class but that didn't mean the racing was small. Unfortunately as nice as it has been around here it was flashbacks to the Highland Hex as the course was in really good shape in some spots and absolutely atrocious in others. As a result drivetrains everywhere were crapping the bed. We were on tap for 4 laps (28 miles); Haven't really raced a true xc race since Mt. Snow so I was in for it for sure. Was able to grab the holeshot; but as I was a little late to the venue I hadn't previewed the start, so naturally made a wrong turn, regrouped and dumped heading right into the first section of singletrack. Hopped back on the train and we rode around for a lap together; dropped 1 rider on lap 2. Rode around lap 2 and most of 3 with Matt D. We weren't really pushing it too awfully hard by any means. In fact I thought we were easily going to be caught by a few of the experts. Anyways as I was chasing Matt down I ended up getting a huge chunk of mud in the ol eye. Had to stop and pull the contact and clean it all out as I couldn't see a damn thing. That pretty much took the wind out of my sails and I gave a half-assed chase for the last lap. Ended up 2nd out of our huge group of 3.


Shout out to the rest of the Geneva Bicycle Center Team (GBC): We kicked some serious butt!
1st Female Expert: Suzanne Hartman
2nd 19-29 Expert: Casey Conte
4th 30-39 Expert: Mark Hartman

Rob where'd you finish?? email me...

Fed Up

Well, No Suprise

Here

, Steroid Floyd's B sample tested positive.

My POV I'm done with road cycling. Fed up; every incredible ride I've seen since I began cycling (96') is now under question. I have no faith that anyone's victories are clean. As far as I'm concerned Professional Road Cycling can go the way of the

dodo bird

.

I have some faith vested in US Pro mountain bikers, but not the Eurodogs. There is no other reason to explain why we barely make the podium in the World Cup's other than no one is on drugs.

NMBS visits Brian Head this weekend

, so we will so how things go there. I can remember when I was in Sandpoint and the new broke about Filipe Merhaige...

At least mountain bikers smoke their dope. F@ck road racing!

Farmall #1

Hot, Hot, Hot. That was what was on tap for yesterday's Farmall #1. Numbers for the race were a little low considering the brutal heat. But we lucked out, temperatures cooled a little bit halfway through the race and all the climbs were mostly in the shade.

Having not raced in about a month, I needed the hard effort to refresh the legs for the race upcoming Highland Hex. Boy, was the pain there. I don't think I'll let myself forget how to suffer like that again. Combined with the brutal heat, I almost bailed a few laps in. I had to stay out there and finish the race considering what happened in the last series (3 dnf's).

It ended up being a ball busting race with Casey riding my ass the whole time. He dangled just behind me for the first few laps, then closed the gap on #4. That light a fire under my ass and I had to ask the engine room for some more power. Luckily there was a little in there and was able to throw down and actually ran my fastest lap to get away from him. I managed to get my gap back up but only for him to remount another charge on the last lap. Luckily I held him off and crossed the line for the V.

Hopefully next week the heat dies down a little bit and some of the missing riders show up.

~J

Time to kickstart the bus

August is gonna be a barn-burner for sure. Racing is back in full swing after a light month of July. The

Farmall Series

starts up again, Highland Forest,

Suicide Six

and then another solo 24 hour race up in CA;

Hot August nights

. A perfect set of tune-ups leading to Hot August nights. Right now there are over 40 solo men, and it'll be nice to bust out a good ride without having raced the day before.

Been packing in some long rides this past week to get myself ready. Wednesday I hit the Naples area for a nice 6 hours off-road including some time at night. Was sweltering hot, but trails were in good shape and the shitload of climbing that is down there makes most climbs at any race around here seem pretty short. It was a little freaky at night when I was out there in the woods all alone, didn't help any that I was listening to a Widespread Panic show and it was a little Doors esque freaky solo session as I was cruising along. That always helps the mind get right at ease! I was pretty spent after that ride.

I recovered in time to head out for a nice 6 hours on the road bike this Sunday. Left G-town with a decent group of riders heading towards Watkins where Casey and I peeled off to head West across the ridgelines where a boat load of climbing awaited us. Was a good day of working on the tan and getting a nice bit of a workout in there too. We had a good time; and the 2 of us are usually treated to some rare occurances such as the kid faking the fall out of a wheelchair that cracked us up. But nothing has ever been better than coming across the Dungeons n' Dragons group at Cutler. It was a little bit surreal with the costumes and language, but we still get kicks out of bringing it up.

My

bro EJ

hooked up me up with some new sweet ass stickers for my ride. Come check out the paragon at any of the above races if you wanna see em. (I'm too damn lazy to get any pics up right now)

Landis Fails Drug Test!!

"Tour de France champion Floyd Landis tested positive for high levels of testosterone during the race, his Phonak team said Thursday on its Web site."

In related news... teamates realized something was wrong with Landis when he started approaching females near the finish line asking if they wanted a "pizza and a f#@k." When they answered in the negative he proceded to ask "What?... do you not like pizza?"

Well? Time will only tell what the truth is. IT was a pretty amazing turnaround.

Just say NO
~J

Dryer

Headed over to Dryer yesterday for an easy day of speedwork on the trails. Been a few weeks since I've been there and had a good time. Brought Lizzy along with me so she could have a bit of fun too. I was pretty tired after tuesdays ride as I had pretty much crushed it for 3 good hours. But somehow the more intensity I start to add the better the legs feel each day. Yesterday was no exception and I was rockin the trails.
I had perfect flow workin the whole ride, it was like the lines were painted for me as I was just smooth. I love those days when everything comes together perfectly.
Lizzy was even having a great time, it was a little bit warm for her so I let her take a few baths in the giant mud puddle. She loved it. I tried to take her over to the creek to wash up and cool down with some fresh water, but I saw a buck running through the woods. I had to make a quick stop and grab her or I woulda been waiting a while for her to chase him down and then come back. She had already done her fair share of chasing as she came super close to catching a squirrel. What she would do with it though I'm not sure of.
Bummer that I missed out on this morning ride, everyone was heading down to Casey's place for an early morning singletrack session followed by a breakfast, then heading out to hit some g.n.a.r. trails (home grown acronym: Greater Naples Area Riding). I'm thinking of rocking the lights tonight and heading to Spencer to pull of a 6 hour epic. I haven't been to Spencer in a bit and it will be great to train on the course as the final

NYSERS

race is there in a few weeks. I think I will hold out on an epic in Naples till this weekend.
~J

Discovery is making some moves

Ullrich admits Discovery interest

Jan Ullrich is reportedly in talks with Discovery Channel after it emerged that the German will have one last pop at Tour de France glory.

Eurosport

7/25/06 11:12 AM Cycling

Armstrong: We'd have Floyd back

Seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong insisted he would be happy to welcome Floyd Landis back into the Discovery Channel team.

Eurosport

7/25/06 2:48 AM Cycling

Leipheimer leaving Gerolsteiner for Discovery

Levi Leipheimer is leaving Gerolsteiner at the end of the season, and will sign for Discovery Channel, which is expected to confirm his signing later today.

Long Stretch

This has been my longest stretch of not racing in years. Its been what 2 weeks since 6 HOP and I'm getting the jitters! I need me a dose of the good stuff. Gonna be a bit before I can taste it too as this weekend is off again. Hopefully by then I won't have me the shakes.

Over the weekend Erin picked up a mountain bike so she could start doing some riding with me and lizzy girl. Naturally as it's her first time on clipless pedals; she falls hard and takes a nice chunk of skin off her arm. I give her credit though, she jumped back on the next day and had no problems.

I beat my brother again today in another round of golf. No longer a fluke I am just plain kickin his ass nowadays. Hell, I even had a few pars in there!

Congrats to Floyd!

Good Job Floyd!!!

(photo: AFP)

Go Floyd! Go Floyd! Go Floyd!

What a stage! What a day! What a way to never give up! Today's stage of the tour was absolutely incredible. I haven't seen anything better ever. After losing everything yesterday Floyd pulls one over on all the contenders and is set up perfectly for the time trial Saturday!
Hurrah for Floyd! I'm rooting for him

CyclingNews Report

Another page in the Naples Trail Handbook

The amount of trails and area of riding in Naples keeps getting better. Yesterday; Casey, Mark, Suzanne and I hit mostly all new stuff down in the Naples area. We were out scouting and working on figuring out how to link it all up for the Horrible Hundred (nickname for the 100 mile epic in Naples). I need to start carrying my camera with me on my rides and get some good pics up here for everyone

Conditions were still a little sloppy as the rain that poured down last wednesday left quite a few mudspots but other than a few tough sections, everything was ok. Temperatures yesterday were freaking brutal; tough to start a ride at 11; even tougher to do it with a hangover from my buddies 30th birthday party. As Suzanne said after we crossed a field "Remember in Poltergeist when the guys face melted? Thats what I feel like". It was hot, thats for sure.

As usual the DEC descent caused its normal rate of carnage. I got a nice chunk of mud right in me eye at the top and had to spend a few minutes cleaning my contact off with good ol' spit. After I saddled up to continue I came across Mark fixing a flat and Casey putting at new der hanger on. DEC 3 Riders 1. It's very rare that you make it down the descent without it causing a problem for someone in the group. The descent is gnar and eats bike parts for lunch.

The highlight of the day was dipping the feet in Naples Creek and washing up a little bit at the bottom of the DEC. Always a great summer time fave. The other highlight was taking a break at the Hanglider jump-off and chillin out for a few minutes checking out Italy Valley.

I did manage to see a few hangliders ready to jump ship off of the Stid Hill jump-off on my way home. Those guys are insane!!

~J

Golf

Played some golf on this past Tuesday as my brother was in town. It was a grudge match for sure. For several years now, he has whupped me with no problems. I think that I have maybe defeated him once in all our matches. Well this match was close to more of the same as he was beating me down with the clubs. I was 4 down after 6 holes! But then his "Mickleson Meltdown" started to come around. He was hitting the ball left, right, everywhere but where he should. After 9 holes I was only 1 down, giving me a little bit of confidence. On the back 9 he continued to crumble as we diced back and forth. I brought the match over to my side and was 2 up with 2 holes to go. He won 17 and I headed to 18 with a 1 hole lead. He scared me with a a great drive, but I matched it, I got in the green within 6ft and putting for birdie as he was chipping on for par. Naturally I missed the birdie putt cause I suck, but still managed to make par and my victory was complete.

It was amazing, he came tumbling down like a house of cards. Cracked under the pressure! Can't wait for the next match to defend the title, hahaha!!

6 Hours of Power

Finally broke the 3rd place curse at Ellicottville. The past few adventures I finished 3rd and thought that I was destined for another one yesterday. In a weird prize arrangement, I was given 1st place in my age category. Technically I was 2nd, but 1st had won the overall so is ineligible for age base prizes. I finished either 4th or 5th overall out of 75 or so competitors. I'm pleased about that as I thought I was having a really bad day (more on that in a bit). Finished with 7 laps at 6:41, 1st overall was 7 laps at 6:05?. With the placing I pretty much wrapped up the NYSERS race series title as its only 3 races long and best 2 count. Looking forward though to the Suicide Six at Spencer Park and hopefully I can keep the streak going. I haven't raced there since it was an xc race and looking forward to going back.

6 HOP breakdown.
After a shitty Lemans style run that seemingly goes on forever, I was dogging at big time I slammed it up the climb to end up 3rd wheel into the singletrack. Had a tough time getting a decent rhythm in the woods. Coming down the 1st descent and out onto the super fast ski slope descent, I forgot it was a hard 90 immediately into the woods; carried way too much speed and to the photographers delight ended up tangled in some bushes and trying to get back onto the course. Came through the line around 5th place, about a minute down. 2nd lap was more or less the same as the first; lost a little more time, by the finish of the 3rd lap my lap time had dropped off by a few minutes and I was dying hard. Thought I was going to pull a "Levi" as it was feeling like my worst day ever. I finished the 3rd lap and wanted to just lay down and die; my stomach was a little bloated from drinking a bit too much gatorade in the heat and every inch of my body was aching, I grabbed some advil and a little caffeine and by the end of the 4th lap was feeling much better and saw that I was on par for 7 laps. I continued to push hard and my body started to come around and with the switch to water so did my stomach. Lap 6 I was chasing a few riders around the course and almost killed myself on one of the infamous waterbars. I had forgotten that the last one was pretty major and hit it full on with as much speed as possible. As I soared about 15 feet through the air, I was wondering how they were going to get a stretcher up her into the woods. I could feel the front end of my bike lowering down a bit too much and just figured I was going to kill myself at this point, but luckily I leaned back just enough and pulled it out. I let out a big "whoooo" when I landed. The rider on my wheel gave a "Holy Sh#t; how did you land that one?". Lap 7 was just a final run around, but I must've pulled out a few passes as I moved up quite a bit in the overall. I did manage to jam my chain in the spokes, was passed by a solo rider but fixed it quick and gave it everything to get up and pass him back.

Right now I'm just looking to recover, My man Casey wants to do some scouting for a 100 mile off-road route down in Naples and has some nice new singletrack that he's found. I'm sure that'll be a bitch of a day; 100 miles on the dirt with 15,000 feet or so of climbing. Might get us ready as were going to attempt to pull off the Mountaineer/Highlander Double in September. 35 miles/7,000 ft climbing off-road followed by 100 miles/10,000 ft climbing on the road.


Later
~J

A Nice break

Took a nice little break for a while there. After that huge week with 2 24 hour races and a 200 mile road ride in between, it was time for a little R & R.
My family reunion was on 7/2 and it was nice to see everyone and hang out and drink some beers. It was a long weekend though...
I did manage to scoot out on monday morning for a quick road ride to loosen my legs up. They were quite a bit rusty, and the few extra pounds from the beer swilling and grill fest didn't help (not that much though!).
Yesterday though, I got back on the paragon for a nice ride and to blow everything out with the

6 hours of Power

coming up this weekend I needed to get my head (and body) back in the game.
I took off for a ride down in the usual Bristol/Naples area. Plans were for a nice long one finishing in the dark. I had brought my light with me, but the riding at night thing ended when I crashed on OCP and busted the lens so I had to cut er short. Hopefully I can get it fixed. Trails were in pretty good shape considering all the rain, but damn someone needs to get a weed whacker out there. Mid-summer growth on some of that stuff is unbelievable. The weeds at points are over your head and you are just praying you don't hit something. Not to mention that my arms look like a wild pack of family cats attacked me from all the pricker bushes. I did manage to take a few pics.
Don't gimme any crap, they were taken with my phone! I'm working on getting a good digital camera
I'm too lazy right now to put in all the code to get the fancy stuff working so you get what I give ya!

The setting sun from the top of Ontario County Park (OCP)

Stid Hill Trail



The Long climb up Stid Hill, The pic accurately reflects my vision at the time

Stid Hill Final descent comes right down the ridgeline

Cutler Shale Rock Climb-Cleaned it for the first time in a while



Cutler Orange Trail Overlook

You F'ing kidding me right!!

Ullrich out, Basso out, Mancebo out. Out of the freaking Tour!! What is happening!! These guys are scheduled to go off tomorrow!

From

Eurosport

Ivan Basso and Francisco Mancebo joined Jan Ullrich on the sidelines of the Tour de France after organisers dumped two of the race's top riders. Ullrich had already been suspended by his T-Mobile team Friday morning when Tour director Christian Prudhomme announced the exclusion of Giro victor Basso.

"The enemy is not cycling, the enemy is doping," Prudhomme declared less than 24 hours before the start of the sport's greatest race.

Prudhomme praised T-Mobile's earlier decision to suspend Ullrich, sporting director Rudy Pevenage, and rider Oscar Sevilla, while at the same time promising fortitude on the part of the Tour's governing body.
"We have been in contact with T-Mobile since the start of the week, and since yesterday we've been waiting for the official document, finally we received it, from the Spanish Civil Guard and the Interior ministry."
Prudhomme said that after a unanimous decision by the association of sporting directors, the riders who have been banned will not be replaced.
"This morning there was a meeting of the AGCP and they decided to respect the ethical code 100 percent, so it means that the riders who will be asked to leave the Tour de France will not be replaced by other ones."
During a grim press conference Prudhomme sat alongside longtime Tour boss Jean Marie LeBlanc and AGCP chief and Quick Step sporting director Patrick Lefevere.
"I'm not very proud to be here today," Lefevere declared, adding that the decision not to replace the banned riders was a unanimous one taken "to send a strong signal."
"The sporting directors of each team are informing the riders concerned right now," Prudhomme said.
Basso, the Tour's runner-up in 2005 and this year's favourite, had already been warned by CSC sporting director Bjarne Riis the Frenchman added.
"I am cool, I am waiting for someone to bring me evidence of my guilt," Basso had said earlier on Friday when leaving his hotel for a training session.
Prudhomme said that Vincent Lavenu, the AG2R team boss, was also talking to Mancebo, who finished fourth overall in last year's Tour.

What the hell is going on in the pro peloton?? Now I know why American mountain bikers suck ass in Europe. None of them are on dope. If they were don't you think we'd have a podium finish on a regular basis, rather than once in a blue moon!!!

Mt. Snow to host 2007-2008 MTB Nationals

Will they have a marathon event??

2007-08 USA Cycling MTB Nationals to Mt. Snow

Colorado Springs, Colo. (June 15, 2006)—

USA Cycling announced today that Mount Snow Resort in West Dover, Vt. will host the 2007 and 2008 USA Cycling Mountain Bike National Championships. The two-year agreement brings the event to the east coast for the first time since the inception of a single-event national championship format in 2004.

Scheduled on the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) designated mountain bike national championship weekend, the 2007 edition will be held July 19-22. Dates for 2008 have yet to be determined.

“Mount Snow has a solid and rich history of hosting world-class mountain bike events for nearly two decades,” commented Steve Johnson, chief executive officer of USA Cycling. “The decision to award the national championships to Mount Snow was an easy one across the board. The courses are traditionally challenging for all disciplines, the venue and organization is second to none, and an Eastern United States location is something that should be well received by our membership after three years in California.”

The American-only, “winner-take-all” format will feature a full slate of disciplines and categories. The event schedule, as well as qualifying events and procedures, will be announced at a later date.

The USA Cycling Mountain Bike National Championships is the latest high-profile event to come to Mount Snow. A mainstay on the international mountain bike circuit, Mount Snow has hosted numerous world-class events including UCI World Cup, NORBA National Championships Series and National Mountain Bike Series events.

“Mount Snow Resort is honored to have been awarded the 2007-08 USA Cycling Mountain Bike National Championships,” commented Matthew Zogby, communications manager of Mount Snow Resort. “We’re excited to again welcome the mountain bike community and thousands of competitive cyclists as they compete for the title of U.S. National Champion at what has historically been one of the top mountain bike venues in the country.”

24 hours of Summer Solstice

Just finished up my 2nd 24 hour race in 2 weeks. This time it wasn't a solo affair but with a few teammates just north of Toronto, Canada. What a blast. I haven't done a 24 hour relay in a few years

Amazing is the number of people that were in attendance. Something like 2200 people. There must be something in that canadian water.

The course was pretty close to the Albion Hills O Cup that I did earlier this year. Not a ton of climbing, but loads of incredible singletrack. Because there was so much singletrack it was awfully tough out there with something like 300 people on the course at one time. I had to have passed at least on average 75 people each lap. To note I was only passed once out of 7 laps. We had loads of fun out there. We led for a large portion of the race, but it was always super close. Our lead was only counted in seconds at any point. Somehow the 3rd place team must've swapped up the order as they jumped up into 1st in the late morning.

Infamous Incidents to remember:
- "Blame Canada" from SouthPark blaring in the campground
- Casey and the "tailbone incident"
- Losing my contact at night and somehow finding it in the tent
- Casey shoulder checking a rider down the hill
- Literally plowing through a group of riders caught up at a technical section
- Dinner at Fuddruckers with some Spanish flair

Our team turned in 25 laps. Had some great fun with the boys.










Our team SignsandLogos.net: Casey Conte, Jim Vreeland, Myself, Ej Rosipayla

Summer Solstice

Longest Day of the year = Longest Ride of the Year.

10 of us pulled of a 200 mile road epic this past wednesday. Weather was perfect.

We started at 5:30 am at Casey's place in Prattsburg, headed up to Lake Ontario then back down to Bath and up to Prattsburg. Rolled into the driveway at 9:30pm.

There is more to it than just riding; but putting it into words is tough (especiallya few days out). We had a fun ride

Weekend Wrap

Whoa, finally wrapped up one of the toughest weekends I'll ever do.

I hit Mt. Snow this past Thursday, got in a nice pre-ride and got hooked up by SRAM for a few nice parts. The course is basically the same as its always been. One minor exception is the addition of the feed zone to the opening climb. As usual it goes up and up and up and then comes right down. By far one of the most technical courses around. Conditions were actually really good for mountain. Mostly dry with a few mud spots. Race went off Friday afternoon, I had a good position and didn't blow sky high on the climb too bad, came off the first descent and up the next climb pretty well. Started slipping back a little bit on the upper part of the mountain but for the most part I was holding 20th position but wasn't really feeling hot. I ended up pulling the plug after 2 laps and save the energy for the Hardcore 24.

Hardcore 24-Solo
Damn brutally hot; Awesome course. Ended up getting just nicked at the line by Mark Hartman for the fastest lap of the day. I held the lead in the solo class for around 6 hours. Stopped to pit and get some food for around 20 minutes or so and lost the lead. I regained it till night fall when I pitted again. At the 10-11 hour mark of the race; I was pretty haggard. I was having a tough time just riding a straight line. I took a break again around 13-14 hours in and was having a hell of a time. I was crashing on everything and lap times were brutally slow. I finished the last 1/4 of my lap and figured that it might be my demise. I was gettting a pretty bad saddle sore and needed some time off. I ended up sleeping for 3 hours or so. I was ready to toss in the towel. I awoke to find out that not too much had changed and I was still sitting in pretty good position. So I pulled the kit back on and headed out for a few more laps. I had fallen into 3rd but was revitalized by the sleep and turning some good lap times again. At 11am on Sunday I retook 2nd place and the two of us agreed we didnt need to go out for another lap. I ended up with 16 laps, the winner turned 20.

Would I do something like that again?...I'm doing a team 24 hour race this coming weekend... Solo racing, I might be up for it :)

Almost Time

Getting close to time to do or die.

Leaving Thursday AM to head to Mt. Snow and get the typical pre-ride in. Snow is one of my favorite places to ride. I love the course and how technical it is. I just hope its sunshine and blue skies for race day. It's going to be one hell of a weekend.

I just plunked down the cash for Hardcore 24 and Mount Snow so I'm definately in. Am I ready for a 24 hour solo race a day after the NORBA Nationals? Only time will tell us how it goes.

I will work on getting a bunch of pics up from snow and H24. If you browse down a bit you'll see I added some new tricks to the thumbnails below.

Sugar Mt. went off pretty good for JHK, he is slamming it right now! Lets hope he does it again at Mount Snow


If the website ain't working go here

No Boulder

Doesn't look like I'm going to be heading to Boulder, CO anytime soon. It's a pretty big decision to make so close to d-day. Unfortunately the timing just isn't right for Erin and I. Hopefully in the near future the timing will be right and we'll be able to make the jump.

The one thing that really sucks is we signed a lease and even made the 1st month's payment. Doesn't look like we are going to collect that anytime soon. It's been pretty distressing but that life. Sometimes you gotta play the cards you are dealt and make the best of them77

So I'll just have to stay around here and keep spinning the cranks with you guys. That doesn't sound so bad!

Man was my bike ever hosed from the Highland Hex! I couldn't even deal with it, so I just brought it down to the Geneva Bicycle Center and let Mark work on it. Gonna go with a new set-up too. Getting rid of the trigger shifter on the left and putting a grip shifter on there. Mark's run that set-up and loves it and so don't a bunch of the SRAM sponsored pro's. Due to the bike being trashed I didn't make it to the Park Ave wed night series, and not sure if I will make any of them. Real Busy Schedule coming up!

With such a heavy schedule, I'm taking this weekend off and Erin and I are heading up to Old Forge, NY for a relaxing weekend. Rented a little Cabin, some dinner action and going on a canoe trip down the moose river Sunday morning. Should be loads of fun and just the relaxing break I need. I just hope I don't get too rusty though...

This coming Friday is Mt. Snow NORBA XC, and I have to pack up and haul ass back to NY for the HardCore 24. It's going to be a tough weekend of racing!

Highland Hex

Just home from the Highland Hex 6 hour marathon. Freaking brutal conditions. I went to bed hoping the rain was going to hold off, but awoke to a treacherous downpour and cool temps. The only bonus was that the rain was going to stay all day, keeping the trails nice and wet and the mud from sticking.

Started off pretty well; was in 2nd overall after the 1st lap and slipped into 4th overall after the 2nd. I fought my way up through the field back into 2nd after a few more laps and then found out 1st place dropped out due to the conditions. I pushed it to increase my gap and stay out front. I came in from my 6th lap and still had 20 minutes, so I jumped out for one more lap and ended up with 7. BTW, major chainsuck and had to mash the middle ring the entire freaking race. On the last 2 laps I pretty much had zero shifting and whatever gear I was in I was stuck in till I could force it out.

Course conditions for the race were awful. The course was dramatically different from last year and was no where near as much fun. There were streams of water just rushing down the trails. I was pretty psyched about the conditions actually as I've raced 2 marathons already in similar conditions so I was prepped and ready to handle whatever was thrown my way.

Here are a few pics:


Nice and clean at the start line





Taking the hole shot




EJ gives his review of the course





Getting a handoff from ma





Off for another lap




VICTORY!!!




Thank gawd thats over



Hilarious! We are know staying at my fathers house, and I went out for a quick road ride the other day. Well, lizzy is a bona-fide escape artist. The front 2 windows to the house were open and she decided she was going to come out and join me for a ride. The windows are about chest level and with the aid of chair in front of them she launched herself through the screen only problem is the house isn't on the level and she came through the window expecting the ground to be only a few feet, instead it was a good 8 feet. She must've hit the deck pretty hard cause the neighbors heard her and managed to get her into the garage. She is all good though :)

~J

Finally an update...

Ok, so I've been slacking but I have been super-freakin busy. I'll go right down the list

Moved out from Apartment
We are one step closer to moving to Boulder. Finally out of the Fascist Villas of Victor. That place was a real treat, they had a rule for everything and some of the dumbest broads running the place. Right now we are chilling at my fathers place back in my old hometown of Waterloo.

Rain Ride Monday
I rode super early monday am; got caught in a massive thunderstorm at 6:30am. It was crazy how hard it was raining. Thunder and lightning , and all that. I had to toss the towel in after about 1:30 into my supposed 6 hour ride and bail. It was crazy cold and I was scared I might actually get hit by a lightning bolt.

Wed Ride
Death march with Casey and the Sunshine Band
I met Casey, Matt and Jeremy at Cutler yesterday. Almost missed them as I descended opposite of what they were climbing. We hooked up and raced thru cutler. Matt wrecked hard at Cutler and messed up his wrist and his crossmax, I've never seen one of those that f'ed up . Luckily he has insurance on those. Matt and Jeremey split after Cutler and Casey and I were on our own. We hit the Nature Preserve, then grabbed some food then headed up Parish hill. I hit the hill pretty hard in the beginning and succumbed to the heat halfway. It was brutally hot, Casey gave in a little earlier but he had been out 2 hours longer also. I haven't been that hot in a long time. I like hot but damn that was tough. We came down the DEC and called it a day.

Highland Hex
Time to really kick off the season with a nice 6 hour marathon thru the woods in Fabius. Looking forward to this race for some time. Finished 2nd there overall last year to ol Ernie Marenchin. 20 minutes he beat me by, now he's a runner up at least years 24 hour worlds. We will see if I got anything come this saturday

0 for 3

Didn't even finish a race at Farmall this year. Major Bummer. This last race I was following A. August around the course and on the 4th lap passed by someone smoking a pipe (there was tobacco in it sheez!). It ended up giving me a major asthma attack and I had to pull out. It sucked big time. I went to an acupuncturist yesterday and taking my meds as usual, but its been really bad this season.

Yesterday I had to keep the normal routine alive and headed south for a round in Bristol. I ended up hitting 4 peaks (Stid Hill, Cutler, OCP, Bristol) and got 4 hours of ride time in. It was a nice epic solo affair, probably my last one.

I did manage to score free beer in the parking lot from Doug who takes care of the scoring for the NYSERS series, then had to skip out on the post ride festivites and managed to score free slices of pizza at the gas station. Couldn't have been happier.

No racing for me this weekend as I'm packing up and we are moving out of our apartment this weekend. Heading to my fathers place for a few weeks until we make the dash out west.

~J

Plattekill/Willy Lake

2 days of racing in some downright shitty weather over this past weekend. I don't think I've raced at Plattekill in decent weather in years. The races dropped off the calendar, but came back last year. They are working hard to bring xc racing back as they are more known for their downhilling. I enjoy the new course at the top of the mountain, as you have to ride the lift to the top, but the old course where you rode to the top did the loop and came down was quite a bit more fun. It is a really technical course and even though it was cold and rainy, traction was excellent due to it being the top of the mountain and quite rocky.

I really rode the course quite well, I had a decent lead right off the bat and up the first climb, then disaster struck and my chain went over the cassette and into the spokes. I tugged and pulled and yelled at the bike while every single rider in every class rode by me. That was alotta time to loose, but I finally got it out and charged as hard as I could back to the front of the race. I managed to move thru the field pretty quickly, but still had the chain jump into the spokes 2 more times. I ended up 1st in my age/ 3rd overall. I was only down by 3 minutes. Even with the chain problems, if I didn't get an asthma attack on the 3rd lap (of 4) I think I would've made that time up. I was coughing so hard and couldn't breathe. I had to slow to a crawl for half the lap and stop to take my inhaler. It was crazy as they usually hit me after the race and not during, so that definately sucked a big one.

Williams Lake, there was actually a separate pro/semi-pro field for this race and the weather was nice at the start of the race. I prerode the course and it was brutally technical, by far one of the most technical I've ever ridden. I was liking my chances, and got a good start and into the singletrack without the legs exploding and falling backwards like a lead balloon. The 1st part of the singletrack was tough because there were lots of run-up sections to deal with, but I moved up after the 1st lap and the start of the second was going fairly well, but the rain and the 100 or so riders thru the course had torn it up completely. I was getting no traction, and sliding all over the place. I crashed pretty hard and took the handlebar to the groin, after about a dozen more crashes on the rocks and having to run about every section, I gave in and decided to just call it a day. I was either going to get hurt bad or spend the 4 + hours out on the course as we were set to do 4 laps, and the 1st one I did in 50 minutes or so with good conditions. I wasn't the only one who pulled out. I'd have to say 75% of the fields abandoned. It was just too hairy in those conditions, and not even fun.

I would have to say the course was kick-ass and would've been awesome had it not rained. The cool part was the 100 meter or so section thru the cave. You drop into this cave and all of a sudden its pitch black, can't see a damn thing only a few red flashers marking where to go, then out and back onto the course. It was cool, but freaky as you lost your sense of sight and hand to literally 'feel' the ground with your tires.

BTW, during warmup at Plattekill, I broke my chain again!! But fixed with a spare powerlink I had.

I'm racing farmall tues night, hopefully I can actually finish this time.

No racing this weekend as we are moving from victor to my father's place back in the 'loo for 6 weeks before we head west!

~J

Bristol/Naples Ride

Wednesdays are quickly becoming my favorite day of the week. They are reserved for Epic rides. I made sure to throw my Hac4 onto the Paragon and get some data to share. Can't wait till we can get a full ride in and hit all the peaks, plus our 100 miler will be incredible. Our final descent down to the Lock Stock and Barrel, was in the pitch black dark.

At least I didn't break my chain, I only lost 2 bolts on my small chainring so everything after cutler was in my middle. My legs were starting to crack near the end...

That will teach me

Well, the streak of bad luck continues. Broke my chain at Farmall AGAIN last night....Lesson learned; dont' buy the cheap stuff.

I also got DQ'd from the O Cup #2. I flatted about 7 miles into the race, no co2! So I asked some fans for a pump, well a marshall at a road crossing overheard and even though I continued and finished I was DQ'd. The good news is I got a good portion of the course down for the 24 hour race their in June.

BASSO is the man Hands down the best rider in the pro peloton today!

Bristol

Been spending alot of my off road riding time down in Bristol/Naples area. I don't think that I need to ride my bike anywhere else. There are tons of trails and we are finding new ones all the time. Pulled the usual ride off down there this past Wed afternoon and found 2 new killer sections on Stid hill. Found a killer descent, but also found a major fire road climb that takes you right to the hang-glider jump off. It is directly across from Bristol Mt. and has one of the best views I've ever seen. Plus the major bonus is the insane descent that goes on forever. You ride right down the ridgeback and the trail just gets steeper and steeper and steeper. I was literally descending the trail in full drift as both wheels were locked up and I was just hanging on. I also got shown the snowmobile trail descent off of bristol which takes you right down to the post-ride party. The post ride at Lock, Stock and Barrels is just as much fun as the riding. Going to ride there this wed again. I will work on getting some good pics up and maybe a video...

With all the trails we've found down there we are making plans for a 100 mile off-road epic. Last year we easily pulled off a 100k, now its time to do 100 miles. Hell the mountaineer is 40k with 7,000 ft of climbing, can only imagine what we will get in 100 miles.

I found the giro online for free, probably not quite as good as the OLN feed , but I don't feel like parting with another 20 bones as I already paid for the premium subscription. I'll just work on my Italian.

How about Lance dissing Ullrich and touting Basso as the new face of the Tour?

Them's the breaks

I raced the Farmall hill Challenge #1 last night, I had taken the lead over on the 2nd lap (of 7) from the Champion of North Huron and was whipping myself to increase the gap and take over his title, but alas he still retains it as I frustratingly broke my chain while climbing on the 3rd lap. My chain tool wouldn't pop the pin out correctly after I had ran my bike all the way to the start line where I had left it (doh!). So I had to sit on the grass and be a spectator.

Oh well thats just racing....

I am excited that I have decided to attend the 24 hours of Cutler race. I'm planning on doing it solo. Let alone doing it solo, I am doing it after racing the NORBA Nationals XC at Mt. Snow the day before! It is going to be tough and will be my first attempt at a solo 24 hour race. I just want to get through it. Immediately after that I have another 24 hour race up in Canada, but this time I'm doing it as part of a team, as I'm sure that I will need the rest.

Thats it for now I gotta get some work done and then go riding

~J

Boulder

I was away this past weekend doing some house searching in Boulder. All plans look good so far for a move in mid-July.
we arrived on Thursday and immediately started our quest. We were lucky enough to stay with some friends and were able to skip out on the hotel. Friday was the super busy day, we must've viewed at least half a dozen places, we were pretty whiped out. But the saving grace for the day was having dinner over at Frank and Claudia Overton's house.

Saturday we decided to cancel all our apts and spend some quality time out and about in Boulder. Erin attended a local yoga class; and I hooked up with Frank and rented myself a ride and we headed up into the mountains. Here are a few pics from the top of the climbs, there were some good climbs and some awesome descents...



We also ended up signing the lease for our place in Lafayette, its a nice house about 10 miles East of boulder. So it looks like we'll be heading out sometime in early July!

This is gonna be our new place !


Don't forget that the Farmall Hill Challenge starts this Tuesday...hope to see you guys there.

Oh Canada

Headed up to the Great White North, for the Ontario Cup #1. What a well run and awesome event. As many people at their races as I see at the NORBA nationals! And USA Cycling needs to take a look at their sign in process. Pick up number plate, initial sheet...BAM that's it, no rider release to fill out for the 10,000 time.


The course and conditions were perfect, it was extremely dry and dusty and the trails were some of the best I've ever been on. They had that perfect u shape to them which means every time you corner there was no need to really lay on the brakes.

It was hectic at the start and my lungs filled up about halfway with dust. I had forgot how incredibly hectic and violent the start was to a mtb race compared to the easy rollout of the road. I suffered like a dog and was dropped like Britney's baby heading into the singletrack. Didn't really make much of a difference as it was all bottlenecked up. It was a tough course 5 laps on a 10.5k course. I finished around 2:24, not even sure where the leaders finished at, I'm awaiting the results. I did manage a pretty good sprint at the end and edged the rider on the left out by a tire width.


I'm still coughing up dust and my throat and lungs are pretty irritated from all the coughing.

The word on the street is that Roland Green and several other top Canadian pro's cut their teeth on this circuit. There were some good riders here and many were looking to impress for spots on the Canadian national team.

As soon as I get my results I'll post em

~J

Bad Luck Tuesday Night

Just finished up a good block of training. I attempted to race Tuesday night at the Rush Course, It was going be a nice hard one, but I didn't even make it one lap in as my Derailleur cable fixing bolt snapped right off on the climb. I didn't panic and just threw the bike on top of the car and headed over to Dryer Rd to hit the dirt. Ripped it up

Yesterday, I headed down to Naples with Casey and we pulled of the quadruple, 4 massive climbs.. We essentially did the entire mountaineer course from the Highlander. It was a long day. See pics below

Today I jumped out and hit it early in the am for a good ride.

I'm going to head up to the great white north this weekend and do the Ontario Cup in Ottawa; we'll see how that one goes as its the first true xc race of the season. I've been feeling good the past few days so I hope to do well.

Stid Hill, our first climb right off the bat



Bristol Mountain, the final climb is up over the backside and then descend the ski trails, yup we had a few snow crossings to deal with.

Gary Fisher Demo Days May 5th-6th

Demo Days at Dryer Rd. More information is available from Towpath Bikes or at Victor mountain bike club.

Unfortunately I will be out of town ;( But I am going to connect up and see if I can't get my rides over there for you boys and girls to play on.

Word on the street is there will be plenty of chicks on hand, so shave those legs and chammy up looks to be a good time.

Pictures from Bristol

I put up a video on my site, it is of the flooded road when I was in Alabama; more of these to come!

I have a few pictures that I took on my phone on 4-15, thought I would share them.



Can't figure out how to throw text between them so; In order
1. Gannett Hill from the view looking down the finish line climb on the Bristol Course
2. Canandaigua Lake > North looking at Vine Valley (between the hills on the right)
3. Canandaigua Lake > South Naples Valley
4. Bopple Hill > looking at the top of the climb
5. Bopple Hill > The top, this is where you go when you die as you hit the 24% gradient at the top

Finally Back home

I disappeared off the radar for a week as I was down in Birmingham, AL for some work. Man was it hott down there! A few days it was in the 90's, of course there were also some pretty heavy thunderstorms. I'll try to see if I can upload the video that I took while I was driving my rental car thru the flood! Pretty amazing as you watch the water come right over the hood! Good thing it was a rental.

But I'm glad to be back. I worked in that it was my rest week for training so that worked out good. I hate rest weeks. For some reason for me they only make me sluggish. I love my 3rd week of my training block, usually tired as a dog, but somehow thats always when I tend to have some good legs.

Speaking of good legs, mine were definately missing today at the GVCC Spring Classic, I got popped hard about the 5th time up Furman hill. I just had no legs at all, never found my rythmn. Usually on the climb I dig it as it suits me well. I rode around for another lap then bailed as it was cold and wet. Just another sign that if it's missing rocks and dirt, I should be somewhere else...

Hopefully my legs show up tuesday night.

How about the intense racing that went on this weekend. Tommy D diced it up with Floyd at the Tour of Georgia or How about Valverde pulling off the double! I think he could be a real contender for the tour this year.

Link Dump

I don't feel like a real entry; It's time to get off my ass and out the door for a ride and my knee is killing me from crashing at Dryer Rd yesterday. So I decided to grab a bunch of links for ya to read thru if you'r bored.

The New Gary Fisher Race Day at Sea Otter

Eurosport Feeds

Twentyniner.net

Twentynineinches

Ok to lazy to keep going time to go ride while the sun is nice..

~J

Paris-Ancaster

Sunday was my own Version of Paris-Roubaix, or more precisely Paris-Ancaster.  60k mix of road/off-road riding from Paris, ON to Ancaster, ON.  Most everybody was on cross bikes or fat tires.  Seeing as how I have 700c rims on my mtb, I put a set of cross tires on.  Perfect set-up.  1400!! racers registered.  I was in the first wave of 400, corraled up like a group of wild mustangs hungry to charge out of the gates.  They let us out onto the road and quickly we hit a dirt carriage road.  
Super narrow, it's hard to move up in a pack of 100 riders, how the hell do you do it with 400 other guys.  I got as close to the front as I could.  After about 10k we hit a 90 degree right, right onto a farmers field, total chaos, lost about 50 spots as everyone had to shoulder the bikes up the hill, and I hate running, especially with a bike.  Thru the field and onto the roads, it started to split up here.  I was giving it everything to make contact but the early pace whipped my legs and my stomach was grumbling.  After lots of mud and roads I put out a huge charge at the 30k point straight down an elevated railroad bed for about 10k, I made a huge move and gained tons of ground ala Van Petegem on the cobbles... I got into a group of 10 guys and another guy and myself were swapping pulls, I got mad  and biatch slapped em verbally to get working and we started to gain on all the groups in front of us.  

Soon a tandem came by and myself and another jumped on the wheels and we were flying away from our group and I was running out of gearing.  Ugh oh, my stomach was hurting again.  Headed down this huge mudslide where you had to run, and stomach got worse, time to emulate Bob Roll, (think switzerland, family picnic...anyone getting the picture ;)  After a 10 minute time out somewhere in the woods I lost 70 spots or so, jumped back on the bike and groveled my way to the finish hoping nothin worse would happen.  

Ended up 120th 21 minutes back on the leaders...

I made it home just in time to catch the 2nd half of Paris-Roubaix. Poor Hincapie, man does that guy have zero luck in that race. At least he has a hot wife to comfort him while he nurses his injury back.

So, seeing as how 2-4 were disqualified for crossing the tracks with the gates down, why wasn't Boonen and the 2nd chase group? There gates were down also...

~J

Saul Raisin in Coma after accident

Well, I was going to write up about the Wheelman's cup and then the 1st G-series race from Tuesday night, but then I checked the Eurosport feeds...seems kinda trivial compared to this

Credit Agricole's Raisin in coma

Today, 08:11 AM

American Credit Agricole rider Saul Raisin has slipped into a coma after crashing on the first stage of the Circuit de la Sarthe race.

Read more…

BTW Congrats to Frank and Claudia Overton on the Birth of their Second Child!!

Been online for 1 year

Hey, Happy Birthday to my website! Been online for 1 full year.
I just renewed the domain and the site, so hopefully you guys will continue to stick around.

I think I'm going to do an entire site revamp this weekend for you. Stay Tuned

I've found some pics of the new xtr, looks pretty sweet

available here

although, I've now switched to SRAM myself, it's all good stuff.

Hoping to head out here in a little bit and get a little suntanning action working. Not too often in March can you ride in just shorts and jersey, at least not here in Upstate NY. Sunshine is one of my most favorite things, can never get enough of it.

Going to skip out on the last weekend of the Giros as I'm heading to the annual Wheelmans Cup race in PA. It's a fun race, a few clubs all named 'wheelman' race in an industrial park or something for the honor of taking home the Wheelmans Cup Trophy for a year. Each year our club the Dutch Wheelman, gets thumped, but we are getting closer and closer everytime.

Don't forget to set the clocks back on Saturday night. A whole extra hour of riding!
The

Rochester G-series

also starts up on this Tuesday night, right around the corner from me.

So as I missed the Central Park mtb race it looks like next weekend is going to kick off my off-road season with

Paris-Ancaster

. Should be interesting, they get around 1000 people or so every year. The flier calls for a mtb, while some friends have raced it on cross. But I think I have the greatest advantage with my 29er. See you boys at the finish line, I'll be waiting!

Loving the forecast

Man, Absolutely psyched about this weather we are getting right now. Sunshine is an intoxicating drug. Seeing as how we usually get so little of it I'll be spending as much time as I can these next few days outside soaking it all up.

Yesterday I had a good ride, then met up with Matt K., the Fisher/Trek rep. His boss was in town and took the Geneva Bicycle Center and myself out to a nice meal. Huge thanks to them for the meal and everything else they've done.

Matt and I were talking that there needs to be a central hub for cycling in NY. Someplace online where info is gathered and distributed and a community of riders can be brought close. Sounds like a good idea, but I'm a long way from able to do that...Anybody else have ideas about it??

Better get back to work so I can sneak out for a ride later

~J

Can't even go one day without caffeine

So I was going to try giving up on caffeine for a while. Mostly so when I used it before a race, it would have a super effect. I have managed to quite drinking a 6 pack or so of diet soda a day, but I skipped the cup of coffee yesterday morning. Yah, that didn't work out as planned, It's 11am and I had to go make a pot of coffee, couldn't take it anymore.

Need a new alarm clock

It was a pretty good weekend for riding, even though I only managed to make it to the Giro and overslept for the mountain bike race. I had set 2 different alarms on my cell phone for 4 am and neither one went off. When I managed to check my phone to see what time it was the alarm started going off, only problem it was 5:35. Whoops, the dog new I should've been getting up as she woke me up around 3:30 and refused to go outside when I tried to take her. I hit the bed to grab the last 20 minutes, and the rest is history, oh well wasn't meant to be.

Giro-
Not too bad of a day, an early break got formed, but was reeled in pretty quickly. A second break took off that gained the interest of series leader Jay Josslyn so I jumped on his wheel for a ride up to the break. Our group of 8 worked together really well and we stayed away the entire time. Only problem for me is that I was suffering like a dog, I took a few turns off then jumped back in after I recovered. Last lap, Scheske attacked, I covered it too quickly as it put me in a hole and ended up getting popped off. I put in a big effort on the long hill and re-bridged. Quickly a solo attack went and the group took its time to cover it, as he was caught, Jay Delillo launched with 1k to go and looked like he was going to hold it, but Josslyn had different plans and the sprint was on. I was gassed from bridging and then just hanging on and had nothing in the tank for any sprint. But I'll take my 7th and be happy.

Sunday, Casey and I decided to punish ourselves for sleeping in with a nice epic road ride down into Naples. We headed down south into a solid headwind, picked up our buddy Henke (sp?) and rolled back into Victor, only to have the wind turn around an defy us the whole way north. We did manage to catch an awesome glimpse of the city of Rochester from afar, while at the top of one of the climbs, it was quite breathtaking. My legs were pretty crushed on Sunday, I don't know where the hell they went, maybe I spent them up on Saturday?

I'm excited about this week as it looks to be nice and warm and I have the traditional Wheelman's Cup coming up this Sunday!


~J

No Giro for Landis

Phonak have announced a change of plan for recent Paris-Nice winner Floyd Landis who will now skip the Giro d'Italia.

www_eurosport_com

Eurosport

3/26/06 2:16 PM

18

Basso wins Criterium Stage 2

Already second on Saturday, Ivan Basso won Stage 2 of the Criterium International Sunday morning, taking the reins ahead the afternoon ITT.

www_eurosport_com

Eurosport

3/26/06 6:42 AM

18

Freire repeats in Brabantse Pijl

Oscar Freire ran an impressive race Sunday to win the Brabantse Pijl for the second year in a row.

www_eurosport_com

Eurosport

3/26/06 12:23 PM

18

Cunego clinches Settimana Internazionale

Damiano Cunego sealed the overall win as Riccardo Ricco outsprinted Paolo Bettini to win the final stage of the Settimana Internazionale.

www_eurosport_com

Eurosport

3/25/06 1:46 PM

18

Racing Weekend

Is everybody bored at work on Friday's?? Funny how the hits on my site quadruple on Fridays.
Tomorrow is the 3rd GVCC Giro race in Rochacha, will only be my second as I bagged last weekend. Weather looks to be fair, but not great. Right after that I'm heading to Schenectady on Sunday for my first mtb race of the year!
Yup time to put the 29er to the test. I can't wait, I'm super psyched to see what she can do on a race course.
I'm pumped up and excited to kick off the mtb racing season so early, Usually its not for another 2 months or so that I'll make my off-road debut. Hell, the past 2 years it hasn't even been till June that I've put the knobbies to the dirt.
On a side note;

Happy Birthday OSX,

yes the greatest OS is now 5 years young. It looks like it's gonna be 5 years before

Vista is even released

. (BTW, VIsta was originally scheduled to release in 2003!!)

Premont, Killeen take golds in Commonwealth cross-country

New US Endurance Series

Six times the challenge in new US endurance series

By Steve Medcroft from

Cyclingnews.com

And they're off!
Photo ©: Jim Tullis

Five 100-mile mountain-bike race promoters announced the formation of a U.S. ultra-endurance national series this week. Comprised of the Mohican 100 (Ohio), the Lumberjack 100 (Michigan), the Breckenridge 100 (CO), the Wilderness 101 (PA), the Endurance 100 (Utah) and the Shenandoah Mountain 100 (Virginia), the National MTB Ultra Endurance Series runs from June 3rd to September 3rd of 2006 and will be awarding National Series Championships in Open Men, Open Women, Singlespeed and Masters 50-plus categories. As presenting media partner to the series,

Cyclingnews

will be providing reports and results from each race.
Formed, promoters say, to fill the void in national-level competition for ultra-endurance athletes, contenders for the series will face some of the most challenging and popular 100-mile courses in the country. "Ultra endurance needs to be represented on the national stage,” says Ryan O’Dell, promoter of the Mohican 100, the first race in the series. “And although most of the participants in these events aren't trying to win but simply to finish, there is a whole class of athletes - like Garth Prosser, Jeremiah Bishop, Chris Eatough, Tinker Juarez and Mark Hendershot among others - who have a unique talent to push themselves over greater distances. They deserve a national series as a way to recognize their talent."

Click here for full details

. or you can go here

www.ultramtb.com

for the series page

Looks like this could be a great series, wonder if it will get some real recognization or not? Maybe I'll dip my toes into one of these bad boys. The only problem with these races is that they only allow so many people to enter and it always seems like there is some sort of waiting list. Maybe with this series they will allow some more entrants?

Also up this weekend is the NMBS Marathon down in AZ. Good luck to everyone down there. I'm wishing I was basking in the sun...

~J

Neither Rain, nor snow nor sleet nor hail

Is it the motto for the USPS or the GVCC Giros? Ha, Forget that. Plus from the recap of the race it looks like the Preferred Care boys are getting a little bit frustrated at the fact the Shikluna's are taking it too them.

I slept in did some work on the mountain bike and then hit the trails out at Dryer rd. Casey, myself and the lizzy-girl (my dog) hit the trails for some good riding. We both decided to bail on the icy roads and hurricane force winds for the shelter of the woods. We spun a few laps around then decided to try to make our way over to Ganondogon via Fort Hill. Well, we actually did find our way over there only to end up losing the damn dog. Pisses me off everytime she goes off chasing after deer. Spent the next hour or two riding up and down the same trail looking for her. After Casey had to bag due to shifting problems, I finally found her. She was a bit shaken up and tired, poor lizzy-girl, she was so tired that she could barely make it back to the car :(

It ended up being a good ride and I found a nice climb that will be perfect for doing some hill repeats on, plus found a nice full dirt route right to Dryer. Adds up to be quite a nice little loop.







Ale-Jet? or Ali-Ganesh?

No GVCC Giro

Well if the Giro's are happening I'm not there. A few inches of snow this morning has swayed my decision not to race so I'm packing up my gear and taking the dog mountain biking over at Dryer Rd.
~J

Milan-San Remo

Pozzato claims Milan-Sanremo

Filippo Pozzato shocked Quick Step teammate Tom Boonen with a breakaway at the Poggio to win Milan-Sanremo in front of Alessandro Petacchi.

www_eurosport_com

Eurosport

3/18/06 11:09 AM

18

I've been playing around more with the site. Now you should have access to a list of links on the sidebar.

How was your St. Patty's Day? Was it eventful? Ours was a nice little trip into Canandaigua to Eddie O'Briens. Had some fun, drank a beer or two and none of us had eaten any real dinner of sort so we ordered up 7! different appetizers for 6 of us to eat! We mowed through those apps like a bunch of starvin ethneropians. Ah well, it was calorie loading for the giro tomorrow. So that makes all the bumming around today a nice resting period, eh?

Speaking of the Giro tomorrow, I wish we had the same weather as last weekend. It's not looking like it's gonna be nice out. I better break out all my extra layers.

I threw the Bontrager carbon goodies on my Paragon today. Had to at least drop about a full pound off the setup. Without any real weight measuring system and just by feel, it felt like the Bontrager carbon crankset was quite a bit lighter than my XTR crankset. Is it the truth? I'll have to do some research and find out.

Time for bed!
~J

This is working out nicely

Ok, so I posted about wanting more info on mt. bike races. BAM! there it is. I posted about wanting an easier way to use my endo RSS reader, BAM! there it is. I think I'm onto something here. All I want now is for decent training weather so I can put the end to indoor training season. Let's see if it works. If not 2 outta 3 ain't bad.

I just picked up a nice handful of Bontrager goodies to trick out and lighten up the Paragon.

Hondo free to race again (

From Cyclingnews.com

)

By Susan Westemeyer

Danilo Hondo announced this morning that a Swiss court has set aside his two-year doping ban, allowing him to start racing again almost immediately. In November 2005, the Swiss Cycling Union had issued the ban, citing Hondo's positive doping tests, which was

recently upheld and extended by a year

upon his appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, following advice from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).
"The court took our arguments seriously, and I am very happy about it," Hondo said on his Web site,

danilo-hondo.de

. "I have been training all along and am in good shape. Now I have to see what happens, so that I can start riding again as soon as possible."
According to Hondo's Web site, it was the first time ever that a civil court has overturned the decision of a sports court. He further claims that this action "could have a decided influence on the entire sport and puts to question the WADA's strict two-year ban."
Said Hondo's attorney, Michael Lehner: "We were rewarded for not giving up the fight." However, he noted "The verdict has only been set aside [not entirely dismissed - ed.]. A definitive decision by a higher civil court will come in about six months."


Makes you think what is gonna happen next with the dopers?

~J

RSS Feeds

I'm addicted to RSS feeds. Is anyone else out there? I get feeds on just about everything that I am interested in; Cycling, Apple,

Digg

,

Engadget

, News, etc. The one feed I wish the most was available was

cyclingnews.com

They update their site all the time. I hate going to actual websites to just read articles. Gimme my freaking articles delivered to me! It's all I ask.

Speaking of which I tried using Firefox and its various plug-ins for feeds, it sucked. Safari does a real nice job of updating feeds and displaying them in a nice window. I was using

NetNewsWire

. It did a really nice job, but now I am hooked on

endo

. Hopefully they add some nifty features that are missing soon, such as auto-collapsing the feeds, etc.

Oh well, gotta go read the feeds as they are starting to back up...

~J

Open Mouth Insert Foot

NORBA East/West pages now online

Colorado Springs, Colo. (March 7, 2006) –

In an effort to improve communication with members, the NORBA Regional Managers have developed  

Eastern US MTB

and

Western US MTB

sites with information specific to each of the NORBA regions.

“We needed to have an area where we can communicate to organizers, riders, and officials on a universal basis instead of just mass emails,” said NORBA Eastern Regional Manager Kelli Lusk.

These pages can be found near the top of the Mountain page at

www.usacycling.org

 or by visiting

http://www.usacycling.org/norbaeast/

 or

http://www.usacycling.org/norbawest/

.

Yup not a second after I post my entry I get this on coming across the feeds.

Could Mountain Biking in the US be on the Upswing

News coming in that US NORBA National Mountain Bike Series (NMBS) has now gained UCI status and prize money for its events. Plus, USA Cycling has thrown some money out there for the pros.

What does all this mean for mountain bike racing in the US. Can the flood of top riders who are heading to the road scene be stopped with the fingers of USA Cycling or are there just too many holes to plug? I'm not sure I think NORBA needs to step up what they offer to racers. There needs to be state organized series and championships. Each series and Championship needs to be shoved into the faces of racers. It's incredibly difficult to find races anywhere, let alone a decent NORBA race. The National Series is great, but spread it out. Add some more races, establish AMBC races as the minor league for the NMBS. State Championship info should be mailed out with racing licenses.

It's all about getting races to the racers. It's not all that hard. It's the Information Age. Can't USA Cycling hire someone to set up a decent race calendar on their website?

What are your thoughts?

~J

Links for ya

Everything is coming up fast. Are you guys prepped for the racing season?
I was filling out my racing calendar for the 1st half of the season and ended up gathering a ton of links to different race series. I'll pop those up here at the bottom of the entry so you can pick and choose the ones that you'd like to hit.

I'm starting to get a little excited. Hopefully the weather should be back to mild by the end of this next week and I can get back outside and rack up those miles again.

Here is a listing of XC Racing Schedules within 1 day driving of NY. I'll try to get these over into the sidebar sometime soon so they are permanent.


NYSERS 6 Hour Endurance Series

Plattekill Series

CAMPMOR Hudson to Highlands Series

RVE Bike and Skate Farmall Hill Challenge

Park Ave 24 Hours of Cutler and Summer Series

Masters of The Mountains

Chico Racing Series, Ontario

Mid Atlantic Super Series

AMBC Schedule

NORBA Series

BikeReg.com

Giros are coming

Has anyone been watching the Olympics? Me, neither...

I just finished up rockin the 29er for a good solid few hours over at dryer rd. It was nice to see some actual dirt under those wheels instead of snow. Conditions were great, wasn't even muddy. I'm loving how quick the 29er picks up speeds on the flats. Also climbing some of the lesser grade stuff it just rolls up the hills like they weren't there. I know they were there cause the legs were burning.

Looks like the GVCC spring Giro's are coming up quick. Has everyone been doing loads of training to get ready for them?? I know that it might take me a few of them to get my legs back under me but I'm looking forward to seeing how everyone has made out over the past winter.

Hopefully I won't get dropped on the first climbs....

Go Floyd Go...

~J

29er days are here

That's the new ride. Thanks to Matt at Fisher/Bontrager for hooking me up. Soon to be lightened up with all the Bonty carbon she can handle

Marky Mark, pulled a special covert op and built her up for me this past Friday night. We ran her through her initial paces on saturday morning. I was a little dogged from some catch up training after being away for a week, plus the fact it was 8 degrees and snowing harshly. So it wasn't much of a great trial run, especially with the damage done to the trails after the recent crazy windstorms. But I wasn't satisfied so I set her up for another test run.

I pulled the rig out for a nice solo ride on the frozen tundra of dryer rd. (not to be confused with the fisher singlespeed 29er "rig"). What can I say, I was quite impressed. Where have these bikes been? Coming from a 5" cake I rarely missed having the rear suspension as the big ol wheels soaked up all the bumps and spit em out. Once that bad girl gets moving she hauls balls up the hills and over anything in er way.

I'm quite impressed overall with the entire ride of the bike. I'm new to the SRAM world of shifting and can say so far I'm liking the shifters. I can't wait to line her up at a start line soon.

Where did I go?

Whew! been quite a long time since I been here to update (about a month exactly) Sorry for the sluggish updating. I've been training from my new job, which included a stint of time in Charleston, WV; Manchester, NH; Boston, MA; and Albany, NY. Been traveling just a bit.

I've been working from home for almost a week an a half now and it seems to be going pretty well. As soon as I get away from my kindergarten esque work desk and get a nice home office desk things should be quite a bit better. The only downside is that I'm stuck using a dull, I mean dell laptop. It's nice and big and fast, but it runs xp, gawd how I loathe the user interface of windows. I mean what is the point of making it so difficult to use? You can see now that people are actually figuring out that Apple computers and their software are the way to go; just take a look at Apple's current net worth. They are now worth more than Dell!

Oh yeah, how is my training going...Well I fell off the wagon a few weeks back. It was mostly due to the huge build up of stress in my life. But, I am glad to say that I'm back on my bike and training again, but damn are the legs a little bit slow right now. Hopefully they will come back in due time. Right now time is on my side, yes it is. While all you bums are reading my blog right now, worried that your boss is coming any minute; I'm sitting in my underwear at my desk with no stress at all...