Feeling like crap

Not sure what's going on, but seem to have come down with some kind of cold. Perhaps this weekend was a bit too much volume for me? I felt fine on Monday and even fine yesterday, however, this morning I awoke with some tightness in my chest and a little head congestion. I wasn't feeling 100%, so I decided to sleep in a few extra hours. I still have my little cough, perhaps something was there all along and yesterday's short little ride weakened my immune system just enough for it to unleash all holy hell on myself. Hopefully it'll go away...

Yesterday's ride was short trip over to explore Bear Creek Park, found a few new trails that I had just been skipping past on my way to Green Mt. My legs felt ok as I rolled out the door and I, did 2 loops around the lake next door, fairly easy so Lizzy girl could run a bit. She was pretty excited, and took off, I actually had to ride a good clip to keep up with her. After her 2 laps, I headed over to Bear Creek and explored. My legs felt like crap. I ended up with an hour of ride time and it was nice to get outside for the day.

Hopefully, a few days off will allow me to get out for another good weekend of riding in the mountains again. After this weekend, I plan on taking a solid week or so off from the bike, regenerating some CNS credits and getting ready to kick-start the 2009 training season.

Bridget is coming out here this coming monday, cannot wait to see her!! It's gonna be pretty exciting time!

Big Weekend

I'm retired to the couch for the rest of tonight. It's been a big weekend of some great riding(for the end of the season anyways). I'm hosed currently, but I'm at least not coughing anymore!

Saturday, I finally finished my first cross race!! I'll happily take my place as the last finisher (at least I didn't get lapped). Last time I finished dead last was the first road race I ever finished. 2 years later, I was a Cat II. So I'll take it as lessoned learned. I rode all the way down to the course as it was just south of c-470. It was a good 45 minute ride down, and then I got in a good 30 minute warm-up. I put on a great show rolling to the set of barriers near the beach. My left foot never unclipped, and I barrel rolled right into the barrier and went down pretty hard. It was a nice display of form for all the fans, that were congregated in the area. After I dusted myself off, I was dusted in the race, but grunted it out and rode hard. The course was more mt. bike-ish with lots of singletrack, some fire-road, a paved bike path and some barriers thrown in for good measure. It was a super fast course. After the race, I rode back home. Within 10 minutes all the food I had brought was scarfed down. It didn't make much of a difference. I was bonking hard on the ride home, as I slogged up a little rise, I located a gas station and filled my stomach full of hostess orange cup-cake goodness and a snickers bar. Man, did it ever hit the spot. Within a few minutes I was back at it and hammered home. All said and done, I managed a good solid 4 hours of riding!

Today, I was up early and decided to grab the road bike and head up into the mountains. It was an awesomely beautiful day, warm and sunshine. I headed up to Evergreen, then decided to switch my route and head up towards Mt. Evans. Didn't make it to Mt. Evans, but made it up to around 10-11,000 feet or so before I decided to turn around.

Elk Meadows From Evergreen to Squaw Pass

Getting Colder as I get Higher From Evergreen to Squaw Pass

I climbed pretty much for 2+ hours till I decided to turn around, I was getting chilly just climbing as it was mostly in the shade. The views were just incredible, and the roads were lightly traveled and super twisty and fun.

Beautiful Views From Evergreen to Squaw Pass

The Rockies From Evergreen to Squaw Pass

There's a bunch more pics so click thru to view the album

The descent down was incredibly fun. However, I didn't expect to head that high up and was only wearing a vest and arm-warmers. Descending at 60kph and 25 degrees in the shade meant instant brain freeze. I had to stop a few times in the sun, take a few minutes to warm myself back up. I made it to Evergreen, teeth chattering and hands numb and hit up Starbucks for a coffee to warm-up. Once the blood was flowing again, I floored it the final 11 miles down to Morrison. It was an awesomely windy descent, mostly in the sun and the lower I went, the warmer things were, which made me happy!

All said and done, I managed another good 4 hours. It was a heavy front loaded ride as I hit 1800kj in the first 2.5 hours and only 400 in the last 1:30!

Cross Practice

Yesterday was good hard day of Cross Practice in Boulder. Up early to make the drive up and to be there by 8am. At least waking up in the morning, there was a great reason to smile. I'm proud to be a believer.

But enough of that, wed was a tough hard day. My sinuses finally cooled their jets early tues night so I was set for the ride. I'm not sure what the name of the first park was, but it had a decent hill and some good climbs up and down it. I worked on my accelerations out of the corners, each time and was holding my own. I felt pretty good for the early morning lactic acid bath. From there we took a good ride over to E. Boulder park. En Route, I was hacking up a lung again. I did have my inhaler along with me and was able to use that to help keep it down, but it wasn't working that great. I sat out for the re-con lap then jumped in for the real deal. My legs didn't feel like much at this point, but at least the riding stopped me from coughing. Afterwards a small group of us put in some x-time rolling around some open space in South Boulder.

I've realized that I haven't been taking my singulair meds for the past month. The bottle of pills is sitting in my car. Completely forgot about them, most likely all my issues have to do with forgetting to take the little pink pill. Hopefully this hack will go away before the weekend. I wouldn't mind trying my hand at actually finishing an entire cx race down at Chatfield State Park. I'm not planning on racing sunday, even though there is one, and quite a few more coming up after that.

The plan for Sunday is to go out and do a nice long easy z2 ride in the hills, mix a good ride with some sightseeing. That sounds like some good fun!

Busy past few days, but some great riding

My last post was a bit ago. Ever since moving out here to CO, things have been a bit of a whirlwind. It's been a super busy last 5 days, that's for sure. But it doesn't mean I haven't ridden my bike at all. How can one not when the weather is 75 and sunshine (meanwhile it's snowing back in NY!!)

I managed to get myself in gear and do a cross race this past sunday. Nothing like lining up against the pro/1/2 guys having very little time on the bike, at altitude and a lack of fitness. Somehow, I mistimed the start and was spit out the back immediately. I swear I never heard a countdown or anything similar. Chase hard, run up the sand, ride in the sand, run up the sand. It was a tough course, I ended up flatting at the start of my 4th lap and called it quits. At least I wasn't in last place though. So as if that wasn't enough, I went and signed up for the Boulder Super Cup Weekend, 2 UCI races in Boulder this weekend, Running with the big dog's again! Hopefully I'll do a bit better.

Speaking of dog's I managed to get Lizzy out on her first trail ride since she broke her pelvis. I took her over to Green mt. on the singlespeed on Monday. I'm guessing the loop was about 12-14k, but some good climbing. This isn't east coast trails, as she's stuck running the whole time and no place for short cuts. But, she did great! Even when she saw a herd of mule deer, she managed to heed my command and not chase!! Maybe that truck she hit, knocked some sense into her!

Today was a bit of an epic day. I was in Boulder at 8am for the group cross practice ride. There was around 100 people or so! We rolled over to the Elks club in town and did a nice 25 minute or so effort. Mine, was cut short as my tire was soft and I had to steal a pump and get some air in it as I was banging my rim all over the place and didn't have a spare tire. After some air in the tire, I managed to get some good quality work in. Shortly after we re-grouped and headed over to North Boulder Park and did a quick loop on the grass. I felt much better at that then at the Elks course, but I'm still getting used to the high intensity efforts.

The ringer for the day was the road ride with Jeff Kerkove. We met up after the cx ride, and he dragged me up Sunshine Canyon to Gold hill. Head over to his site for a nice video of me suffering in my 39x25. I need a compact.

How Badly? Here's my cadence from the ride



The little town on the top was pretty cool, and had a nice little store with some awesome homemade goodies and a kick-ass cast-iron stove!

Little Village of Gold hill

At least when I was grinding up the hill slowly, I was able to take in some epic scenery

Wasn't the only one suffering though!

Tomorrow night should be interesting, gonna meet a group for a night ride at Green Mt!

Beautiful Weekend

Even though yesterday was an incredible day, by the time I got home from the Coaching Summit, I was wiped out. I caught up on laundry and a few other household chores and generally just lounged.

Though Today, I made up for missing out yesterday. I was up early and took lizzy for a quick run around the reservoir. 2 laps x 2 miles. It's her first real run since she broke her pelvis. She did great, I was on the cross bike and had to work a few times to keep up with her. I ended up flatting and that pretty much took us home.

After that I kitted up and headed thru Bear Creek up to do a quick loop on Green Mt. Just put some time in and rack up the kj's.

From Bear Creek and Heil Ranch

I hooked up with the new boss, Frank from FasCat Coaching for a spin around Heil Ranch. After riding at Green Mt. My idea of Colorado trails was blown wide open today. The trails were frigging awesome and super tech. Super rocky and requiring you to really work the bike the whole time. My pics really don't do the trail any justice. It was far too much fun picking the lines and riding the trail, than to stop and snap some pics. I might need to grab me a helmet cam sometime soon!

Ended up with about 2100kj for the day! And pretty worked over. Hopefully the weather holds out

I have no friggin clue why a blue line shows up on my pics, could be time for a new camera. I'm too lazy to go through each photo and touch up in photoshop. Click the link for tons more photos of the day

From Bear Creek and Heil Ranch

From Bear Creek and Heil Ranch

From Bear Creek and Heil Ranch

Another day at Green Mt

So I decided to give it another go at Green Mt. I mean what am I suppose to do other than ride my bike out here on the trails right? After feeling like death yesterday, I kitted up and felt like a million bucks. Didn't feel at all like I was dying or not getting any air in.

I headed thru Bear Creek (quickly) and climbed the switchbacks up the Green Mt. Trail, then descended the fire-road and hit the outer loop. Somehow, I missed the singletrack I rode up yesterday, as that's what I was really looking for as it woulda been a sick descent



Ride time was short, but I did nearly as much as yesterday in almost 40 minutes less ride time! That's a huge difference, plus my wattage numbers were up a ton as I was feeling great.

For the rest of this week I'm down in Colorado Springs for the Coaches Summit. Should be fun, but a bonus is that we are done around 3ish each day and plenty of people to ride with. And the weather looks great!

1st Ride in Colorado at Green Mt!!

I'm now officially in Colorado. Made it here this past Saturday. I've since gotten settled in here with a friend in Littleton and managed to get out for a good ride yesterday on 2 trails that are right outside the door (Bear Creek and Green Mt.) Conditions were great, it was a little bit cool, but the sunshine was warm.





I'm gonna head out the door right now for another quick trip over to Green Mt., then I'm off to Colorado Springs for the Coaching Seminar for a week. Should learn some great stuff to make people fast! Hopefully I'll get in quite a few nice road rides while I'm down there.

Please, send oxygen instead of comments. I'm in need of some until I acclimate!

Busy, Busy

Been just crazy these past few weeks. Don't even know where to begin here on the blog. This past wednesday I did manage to get out for a good ride with the GBC and Hollow crew prior to my departure.

We hit up Shindagin Hollow for a few hours of play. The night prior we had played hard at the Hartman's. Suzanne served up some great chili, then it was time for some pool and mod racing. The mod crit quickly grew into a who could do better donuts. With that, we preceded to open the garage door and try to do them out on the wet driveway.

Needless to say, there was some fun that we had. Wednesday down at Shindagin was a great day. Fall foliage was in full bloom and the trails were in perfect shape.

We managed a huge crew (Jer-Bear, Casey, Der-Kaiser, Hanggi, Fry Guy, Marky Mark, Suz and I) for a wednesday afternoon. Mark was kind enough to lend me his Hi-Fi 29er. I made sure to put it to work hitting some gap jumps, riding 6 ft high skinnies, north shore bridge drops (and subsequent crashes) and tearing up the trails. Could a dualie be in my future?

The past few days were spent at a Coaching Seminar in Ypsilanti, Mi. I learned how to go real fast, and learned boat loads of info. It's going to come in real handy. Next week I have the Coaching Summit in Colorado Springs and plan on learning even more info. Believe me, if you want to be fast for next season, hit your goals, and have fun, there's nothing better than a coach

Feeling good

Yesterday, despite not wanting to truly get back on the bike, I managed to get in a decent road ride. Running late for the group ride as usual required the no warmup straight to tt mode for the 8 miles to the shop. Managed to get there only to find no one was there. So Jim and I headed out the door together and put in a good hour + into the wind heading south and chatting about the current political situation. It was a nice late summer/early fall day (not like today as it's raining).

The legs felt pretty good for the most part. I was able to put in a nice test on them for the ride home as it was hitting dusk (I did have lights though). I slammed it home and kept having to double check my numbers that I was putting out. I was feeling good and looking at the watts going, is that right? I managed my 2nd best 10 min power of the season for the ride home and it was dead flat! My best power was only 10w higher and that was while climbing! 2 100 milers back to back, I guess does a body good!

I've got one of these on order as the new Fisher Presidio is not going to be here in time for the cross season. I'll be looking forward to testing this bad boy out asap.

Also, going to be putting a Origin8 Black Ops Carbon fork on the Singlespeed. Will be looking forward to testing her out this weekend at the Burning Bike festival at OCP. Might be riding it all weekend!

Back in the swing with the Singlespeed

So it's been 2 days of sleeping and eating loads of comfort food after the Humbler. Seriously think I could have easily consumed 20,000 calories a day if I didn't stop myself.

Yesterday I pulled out the Singlespeed and headed over to glenwood in Geneva to stretch the legs a bit. Temps were cool and comfortable and the trail was in great shape. I had the 32x20 on and was a little bit overgeared for the place. I like the 32x19 a little bit better there. But it was good as I just needed to spin and keep it easy. It was a fun ride to just sling around the trails solo and whip out some laps. I felt really good physically, but didn't feel like going hard at any point.

I did however realize upon inspection that the front fork is bent and the wheel is mis-aligned. Tomorrow I'm going to swap it out with a Origin8 Black Ops Carbon Fork!

Tonight I'm going to pull out the roadie, hit up the group ride, and then get some xtra ride time in with the lights on the roadie.

2008 Humbler

2008 Humbler is in the books. I'm completely wiped out today.

111 miles, 14,030ft of climbing, 12:19 of riding, 6229kj, 4 finishers. It took us 3 friggin years to finally complete our grandiose plan of ultimate misery.

Mark, Casey, Hanggi and myself soldiered on for the final loop. Spent, exhausted, sleeping in the middle of roads. We surged, we struggled, we finally slayed the dragon.

I'm exhausted today, far too exhausted to do a full write up currently. Pics and more to come

In the meantime, go buy my bike

Laurel Mt. Classic

Headed down to Northern, PA this morning for a little xc action. Having last weeks SM100 in my legs and a tough week of training, I knew the race was going to hurt.

This little guy gave me one of these so I could flog myself up the climbs

Race started out on a nice long 4 mile fire-road climb. Having never ridden the course, we were told it was about 3 miles. I paced and readied for 3 miles. Group quickly split into about 10 of us, shortly I was in the front group 4 of us and the chasers scattered. But soon, I popped off as it continually went up. The legs weren't comfy nor was the taste of blood in my mouth. I was picked up by a few stragglers and slogged the last 3/4 mile up the climb and into the singletrack about 7th. Picked off a rider right away and set to work on chasing down another.

Headed into a straight down descent, just a chute literally, I was cooking and came up so fast on the rider, I put the brakes on but started sliding into him, had to lay it down. He for some reason looked back, then laid it down also. I managed to get up and drop him on the descent and out into the fire road climb.

Some fire road action and a long, straight fast descent had me increasing the gap. At the bottom was a slow grind against the grain in a techy creek side trail. Criss-crossing the trail and slowly heading uphill. I realized my saddle bag was open and had to stop, took a few secs to get the zipper to close fully and ended up losing a spot. Attempted to chase said rider in front of me, then we headed out to an open grass climb. 2-3 miles of uphill, wet tall grass. I was hating life and hating my legs for not wanting to put out a decent effort and give it a go. Ended up getting passed on the climb by a single speeder and was being chased down by 2 other riders.

I had only 1 bottle and saw an aid station, was super happy to refill and grab a few cups to slam. I had to let the 2 riders slip by, but gave chase. Dropped the 1st shortly, and the 2nd rider hung on. Pushing it in the singletrack and he kept sticking, attacked on the powerline downhill and got a gap, but he shortly closed it. I had to let him go by as my saddlebag was open again. I reached around and put everything in my pockets. (I'm done with saddle bags!)

I closed the gap back on the road, and into the gravel road, I was sitting about 20 yards back. I made a huge surge and caught him off-guard and dived into the singletrack. It was all slightly down and I was flying and floating. Caught and dropped the singlespeeder, and had about 5-10 secs on the rider chasing. Continually surging on the flat fast singletrack to try to increase my gap, it was holding steady. Shortly after though, it pointed down, straight down. I slammed it into gear and just let her rip. All out downhill high speed, flying and floating. Checked over the shoulder, no rider in sight, gotta push incase I flat. Check the computer, I'm close a few k away. Keep pushing, killing it and flying. Hit the dirt road and sprint the last 200 meters to the line. Rider shows up about a minute or 2 later. He was on a dualie, I was on the superfly. He said he never chased on the top because he thought he could catch me on the way down. No chance, nada gonna happen on a downhill at speed.

Ended up 7th overall/6th age group. 1 spot out of the money.

Reflashing my System

I'm ready to move onto the final bits of training this month. It's going to be a tough month, and I have only a few races left. I'm pretty much going to bust my ass as I want to leave this season with some top finishes.

Yesterday, with some tired legs, I went out and hammered down some Steady State Intervals. Hanging around 85% of FTP for well over an hour, was sure to put a hurt on me, especially with some heavily fatigued legs.

But I needed to just kill this workout, if not for some personal justification. I felt like I drilled it. A few times I had to back off as I was going a little harder than I should be, but in the end it'll pay off dearly.

Up this weekend, I think I'm going to head to the Laurel Classic mt. bike race in Wellsboro, PA. Then it's finally time for The Humbler BABY!!!

Wednesday's Moonlight Ride in Naples

This past wednesday saw the band get back together again. Mark, Suzanne, Casey, Hanggi, myself and even Brandon Furber and Chris Frey! We had quite the group. We decided to meet down in Naples and traverse the first loop of the Humbler, aka "dirty thirty". 30 miles of brutal climbing and insanely ripping descents.

We started off attempting to bush-whack our way through a newly built trail that overlooks the Naples creek, but the gang forgot that things grow during the summer and not during winter/spring. It was like Jurassic park, trying to get through a jungle. I nearly ripped my rear der off, and ended up bending the hangar and having a bunch of crap wrapped around my cassette. After we got through and to East Hill, we decided we'd have to skip that section because there is too much work that needs to be done in too little of time. After our usual grind up East hill, we decided we'd do a bomber run down the Hanglider trail (not in the Humbler as technically it's not rideable)

The hanglider is one of the fastest and fun descents around, super steep, lots of twists and turns, mud, jumps, etc. Casey showed us all how not to ride a water bar as he thought the best way to do this was only on your front wheel, with your chest on your stem. He managed get ahold of that bucking bronco, but the trail eventually wrestled him down when a good set of thorns reached out and wrapped around him and tried to drag him into the earth. Luckily; Mark and I were following closely enough and could rescue him. It took some saws and clippers, but we eventually defeated the mutant thorn bush. Casey wasn't the only victim though as Hanggi destroyed a wheel (just riding along!) and Chris flatted.

Our next adventure had us taking the long climb up Italy Hill to clear that trail, and then descend back down. Luckily, the anaerobic olympics had been held earlier this season as we climbed a little easier this time around, but still had quite a few major trees down that we had to clear. At the top after doing some good trail maintenance we managed to catch an incredible evening sunset.

It's awful difficult to explain the beauty, but a nice pine woods backdrop, with a fire engine red, fading to an incredible indigo blue, fading into an inky black, with stars peppering the scene. All this while standing in a tall field of white carrot flowers. It was quite mesmorizing and will stick with me for a long time.

After that, we got to firebomb down the trail with our lights. Descending at night, on high speed tech is just incredibly thrilling. Your reaction times need to be ninja quick at high speed, because you have a flash of a second to react as most likely, you really can't see what's coming up on the trail. Suzanne fell victim to Italy Hill and managed a pinch flat on the way down, after a quick fix it was time for the last climb.

Basset/Brink hill would brings us up to the top and ready for the DEC descent. Our non-chalant group ride quickly turned into a testosterone fest on the final climb. Hanggi took off early and established a gap, while Casey, Brandon and I rode tempo. Upon seeing Hanggi no longer increasing, I started to up the tempo to catch. Brandon followed and we caught Hanggi and accelerated up Brink Hill. As we climbed the steep pitch of Brink, Hanggi dropped off the pace leaving Brandon and I to ride side-by-side down the road, neither of us able to drop the other, nor willing to provide the shelter of a draft. In the end it'd have to be a draw.

The ride finished off with the DEC descent, bone-jarring, cliff-traversing, super tech. All at high speed in the dark. Mark decided to take the lead and I followed. At such high speeds and the light bouncing around, I was truthfully riding completely blind. Working only on instinct and the feel of the rubber to the dirt. After having followed Mark's wheel for the past 10 years or so, one has a good feel for the rider. I trust his lines and followed him and can read his body movements perfectly and adapt to the trail just by watching him and never looking at the ground. We all managed to make it down and out of the trail safely.

It was an incredible ride, and I'm bummed I forgot my camera :(
Best of luck to Mark/Suzanne and Ej and Jimmy this weekend at the Hot August Nights. I'll be finishing off my final weekend of prep work before the Shenandoah 100

Poor Lizzy

I was all prepped up Friday afternoon and ready to head to the God's Country Marathon at Ski Denton in PA. I was dialing in the Superfly, ready to put the pedal back on and all would be good. Then disaster struck, literally. My dog, Lizzy, who was sitting next to me took off suddenly. Darting for the end of the driveway at full speed. Mind you, she's a hound mix and in that short distance she'll top out at 30mph. As soon as Lizzy took off, my spidey sense went crazy and I took off after her. I was a bit late as she entered the road she plowed into the side of a vehicle. Yelping and barking, I managed to get her to calm down. An overnight stay at the vet with some major painkillers and she was back home on saturday am, limping and sore. She's still yet to put weight on her right hind leg, but all seems ok from what could have been a major disaster. Guess she is gonna be laid up for a bit and that means no more riding for her for the rest of the summer :(

On a good note though, I did manage to get out saturday after I made sure she was home and settled ok. I headed down to Honeoye Lake where this weekends NYSERS finale, the Suicide Six will be held and put some laps in the newly modified course.




The course is completely changed for the 2008 race. I'm not in agreement with the changes as I thought the course was one of the best ever the original way it was run. The infamous "rattler" 800ft super technical descent has been completely removed and the course is run backwards. This essentially makes it an entirely new course as the trail is hardly ever ridden backwards as the 8 mile loop is almost always run in the original course direction.



I can't complain though, it's going to be an awesome event and after putting in a few laps I was able to get the flow of the course.





Naturally though as I was onsite, I had to take a run down the "rattler" for old times sake.

Sunday, I pulled out the road bike and headed for the hills. I don't think I've pulled of a road century this season? So it was a good time to put in a nice hard one with ginormous amounts of climbing. Having saturdays efforts in my legs left me a little tired and weary, but I managed to drill it for the majority of the day. I headed south to some of my favorite hills into Penn Yan then over Naples for even more climbing.

It ended up being a great day (no pics as rain was forecasted) and by the end of the ride the legs finally loosened up. I was quite a bit tired post-ride, but damn excited as my newborn nephew was in town and I got to hold him for the first time!

Here's hoping the legs are good and the rain holds off for tomorrow nights Farmall XC!!

Farmall Rain Out

I showed up at Farmall on tuesday night, slightly unaware that it was going to rain. Conditions had called for rain possibly later in the evening, but en route, I realized was going to be a massive thunderstorm.

I kitted up, and took the singlespeed out for a few laps on the slightly slick course as it was drizzling a bit. It made for an interesting course. The course is tough enough geared, because if you lose traction you're walking. I did feel a little bit overgeared with the 33x19 and just planned to dismount and run the 3 sections I couldn't conquer.

The few of us that were brave enough to start headed out on the course. I took the early lead into the singletrack, getting off to run. Only to find the off-camber side-hill was unrideable and unwalkable. We pretty much all fell on our asses trying to just walk up the hill. I had a slight lead after the first lap, and was overtaken halfway through the 2nd. I was really struggling on the climbs and could feel the previous days efforts in my legs. About the time we rolled through the 3rd lap, I'd decided I had enough. The super slick unrideable and even unwalkable sections had taken their toll. As the group of us hit the woods, the heavy, heavy rains came down. It was absolutely pouring, the wind kicked up. The trails became super saturated and I actually felt great. I kicked it up a notch and was ready to really race at this point. It was one of those really intense rainstorms where, it's you vs mother nature. As our group rolled to the line, we were yanked off the course.

I headed back to the car, thunder and lightning cracking all around. It was coming down so hard, I had to pretty much change outside and risk my clothes getting soaked, rather than opening the door and flooding the car! I guess I'll be back next week, and with some gears!

Hopefully, the Superfly will arrive by Tuesday. I got word from Fisher that they are getting a replacement out asap. I'll have to pull out the Supercaliber for this weekends marathon race down at Ski Denton. Looks like a good fun course and should be a good test of fitness prior to next weeks NYSERS Finale at Suicide Six.

Meanwhile, that gives me some time to perhaps replace the CD's in my car. I've got a 6 disc and the same ones have been in their probably a year or more. I just hit play and the small amount of driving I do, I let the swap themselves
They are:

• Clap Your Hands Say Yeah: Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
  
• The Editors: An End Has a Start
  
• Dinosaur Jr: Beyond
  
• The Twilight Singers: Blackberry Belle
  
• The Kooks: Inside In, Inside Out
  
• The White Stripes: Icky Thump
  

Head for the hills

Yesterday after work I packed up the road bike and headed to Canandaigua. I loathe having to drive to ride the road bike, and would much rather just ride alot longer, but I needed to get into the hills. Particularly wanted to test my self on my favorite climb; Gannett Hill. It climbs up out of Naples and shoots up 1200ft or so over 6 miles. Average gradient is around 6% or so. The beginning of the climb is a nice consistent 10-11% grade that suits me well. It's the latter part of the climb with the flats and steep undulations that usually zap my energy.

Rolling South, heading for the hills

Heading to the hill behind the barn

Rolling into Naples just before the climb starts

I was feeling great, and really put out an awesome personal best normalized power of 4.85w/kg up the entire climb. I really wish it was more consistent, because I lost a bunch of wattage on the flats and the little descents. It's the best I have though. I put out a 2nd personal best time of 24:15 with no wind whatsoever. My best is 23:30, but that was with a major tailwind that def helped on the flats!

Afterwards I just drilled it home, enjoying the lake and the scenery.

Late evening Sky

That's a Boat House, not someplace someone lives! Oh the money on CDGA Lake

My only disappointment is that the sun wasn't out/little warmer. Every now and then on a good summer day you can catch one of the hot rich wives out sunbathing in a skimpy bikini! I would've taken pics of some of the mansions, but I would've never finished my ride.

Tonight is Farmall Summer Series #1, and I'm going to run the rigid singlespeed. We'll see if I have any legs left after lastnight.

Unexplained Phenomenon

Just some random thoughts that I clearly have no explanation for:

• Why I wake up at 4am and am totally awake for an hour or so, go back to sleep, and I don't ever want to get up


• I rode down a road that was closed yesterday due to paving one side of it. The opposite direction I was traveling was freshly paved so no cars could use that side. A car was heading towards me in my lane due to the paving, clearly aware I was there. The lady barely slowed down, and almost ran me off the road, WTF!?! At least slow down a little bit


• Spending most of my road ride dodging piles of horse dung


• The Hay-bale that was randomly sitting in the middle of the road


• Drafting the trailer of the missing hay-bale, and subsequently passing him at 40kph because he was far too slow


• Why my legs felt like crap for 90 of the 105k I did yesterday? I mean couldn't have come around just a bit earlier? Maybe on some of the hills I was climbing?


• The dog on Wabash road, that ran past me so fast I had no idea. I sprinted, it sprinted, I chased and chased. Side by side at 45+ kph. I think I may have found a new training partner.

The winner of them all. Closing all the windows and doors in the house, only to come home and find that my dog, Lizzy, had yet escaped. Pawed through the screen door, pushed aside the baby-gate that was double insurance, slid the kitchen sliding door open, then jumped the 4ft high pool fence. She then spent the next few hours while I was out riding, apparently looking for me. Never venturing too far from home though, as the neighbor said she kept checking back. It took all of 5 minutes for me to arrive home and she showed up.

Seriously, I should've signed up for America's top dog. I think I might leave the laptop open and record some video of her sometime just so I can figure out how the hell she escapes every time.

Currently playing in iTunes: This Is How I Disappear by My Chemical Romance

Mount Snow Pics and some Road Riding

Here's the pics of the men's pro XC Race. Enjoy the slideshow



I actually have some pretty cool pics of my road ride that I did while I was there, but they decided to save to my camera memory and not the SD card so I can't get them off.

This really cool chicka I know, just hooked me up with a nice pair of DOT Orange Oakley's. I'll for sure be sporting them at the 6HOP this weekend!

I got my powertap wheel back on the whopper. I really haven't been doing much training on the road bike this season. I really need to. It's just so much more fun to go for a long mt. bike ride. But the Superfly can only handle so much and the parts are starting to show their racing and training age. I replaced a bunch of stuff on the whopper and she actually shifts to a gear when I do. I can actually see the teeth on the cassette rather than just a solid block of grime! To celebrate the tour and all that is road worthy, I'm gonna join up for the Thursday night road ride!

Hopefully a few show up!

Currently playing in iTunes: Kids by MGMT

Mount Snow

Back from Mount Snow, VT. Fresh from the green mountains of vermont. A bit tired and still not fully unpacked from the whirlwind that was the past 2 weeks of racing.

Ej at Crankskins was gracious enough to offer me a couch in exchange for working and helping out at the booth. I certainly hope it was a success for him. It's a great product and I think with some time it will take off.

We arrived Wed Night, set up the booth then hit the course. I laid down 2 laps on the new style course. It was ok, nothing super special. But I preferred the older "original" course. This one just seemed a bit watered down. The climb was just one long climb to the top, and the descent was shortened up and missed out on some of the fun stuff. I rode the course a bit over the next few days and even managed to get in a decent road ride in.

I did end up signing up for a race. I forked over my $75 for the pro Super D. I ended up climbing up to the top of the mountain with Chris and we hit the course, it was a blast and not super technical. So on early sunday am, I got in line for the lift and headed to the top. On my practice run, I was feeling awesome and killing it. Then a few people were standing on the trail in a tight section, I torqued it and broke my chain. Luckily some guy in a Giant Jersey that won the race where you ride up and down the mountain gave me his tools (I didn't have a chain breaker). I fixed the chain and finished my run.

I got in the huge line and got to move to the front as they were waiting for me at the top. On my way up, I chatted it up on the lift with the chick who would go on to win the really hard race where you ride for only 20 minutes. Funny, I didn't even know who she was. As I was the last rider to line up, I had a crappy starting spot. The run sucked and I was pretty much fighting it out for last place. Running, especially with your bike uphill is not fun. Seeing as I was so far back, I basically just sat in and didn't try to kill myself or anyone else by trying to make some crazy passes. On the homestretch, I was fighting for 3rd to last and managed to just stack it around 35mph on a huge waterbar. I landed on my head, and bounced a few times. It was right in front of everyone. It was awesome. I haven't had a crazy crash like that in so long. I wish I woulda crashed a few times in practice, I kinda enjoy being sore from a good crash (I'm a sadist). Anyways after a few people came over to see if I was still alive (or just working on an audition for superman) I got back on and finished up. Dead last! Awesome. Did I mention I did this on a hardtail, while everyone else was pretty much on 5-inch dual squish? I gotta get some street cred for that, right?

I'll have some pictures up later tonight.