Life at 13 MPH...

Excited about space...

2010-06-15T09:32:00.000-04:00

As many of you know the past few years of my business life has been dedicated to exploring asteroids and meteorites. As part of this I lurk on a meteorite newsgroup. The list traffic is mostly garbage about items for sale but every now and again something interesting pops up.

This past weekend the Japanese spacecraft Hyabusa returned to earth after a very long trip to asteroid Itokawa and back. One goal of the mission was to collect material from the asteroid for analysis. Over the past few days the list has been buzzing with video links of re-entry and the associated spectacular fireball. NASA probably has the best video:

But this morning I read a posting of that said simply this:

Is it just me or did it sound like they were having sex while watching the
re-entry?
Anita

With regard to the following video:

I'll let you decide for yourselves.

Race updates...

2010-05-25T21:25:00.010-04:00

Hey all, It has been a while between updates, but I've been busy racing my bicycle.

The plan at the start of the year was to step back from the bike a little bit, race less, spend more time with friends etc. As my co workers would say the goal was to let "fun Jamie" live a little more this spring and summer. Thus far I think the mission is going well, and surprisingly I'm racing as well or better than ever. I've had a handful of top-ten finishes including a 9th place dig at my first NRC crit of the year. In addition to personal exploits, the team has been killing it. We've won a few races and had been on the podium every weekend up until a week ago. Furthermore we've got a little swagger and are driving the race action.

A few weeks back I went up to Delaware to race a crit solo. I had forgotten how the dynamic changes when you are the only person from your team in the race. I liked the course, despite a spooky last corner with oncoming traffic (like the Marian crit). It actually reminded me of the winfield twilight with a less technical downhill. In any case I figured it was a day to let small groups go and use the climb to launch bridging moves. A little over halfway in a group of 4 rolled off and got a good gap. A few laps later I bridged solo. Two more came across a lap or so later and all teams were represented so we rolled away. With two to go John Minturn took a solo flyer from our group and stuck it to the line by ~10 sec. I took the sprint for second. For my efforts my teammates awarded me with the "brass balls". We've been passing these around amongst the team all season.

Race like you got a pair.

Two weekends ago several of us rolled north for the Bear Mountain spring classic in Harriman state park, NY. Our drive took us through NJ and really close to my old hood. So close that we took a detour to stop at my favorite bakery Calandra's in Fairfield. I had tried to explain how awesome this place is, but Jake was dumbstruck when he walked in. Cookies, pastries, bread, gelato, coffee, you name it. It took us 15 mins of browsing to decide what to get. I opted for the traditional Italian canolli and sfogliatelle while Jake grabbed cookies and gelato.

The course was a 21 mile "out and back" of which we did 3 3/4 laps. Each lap had a fairly steep 2-mile climb. This is where the action would go down for sure. The race never got too aggressive until the last time up the climb (which occurred with 18 or so miles to go. We hit the base of the climb and things started to heat up. I started to fade and just couldn't keep the pace. This is a strange experience as most of the races we do have short steep climbs. On those you pretty much ride all out until you pop. here I just couldn't keep the pace and slowly drifted out the back. I ended up in a chase with my teammates Jeff and Nate (who was in a break that got caught at the base of the climb). Up the road, Jake, Kevin Todd and Blair did battle. A two man group slipped away and despite our boys chasing with AXA, and Jamis the gap was never closed. They set Jake up for the sprint and he ended up taking 8th. Not his best result, but it was good enough to get him a free ride to the Nature Valley Grand Prix this summer. Super pumped for him.

This past weekend was the start of our big east coast crit season with Wilmington (NRC) and our home race, Bike Jam.

After getting shelled last year (save rick who was in the top 20) the rest of the squad was out to redeem themselves at Wilmington. The course was changed from last year to include an extra one-block square turning the course into a figure-eight. I welcomed this change as it would give a little respite from the long uphill and downhill false flat stretches that are always strung out single file.

I officially returned to bike racing by hitting the deck with ~15 laps to go. It was a low speed crash in a corner but i got run into by another rider (i think) taking a knee (?) to the head. I've never been so dazed after a crash. I made it to the pits and got pushed back in only to have it start raining a few laps later. Apparently I'm a trend setter and the entire top 20 of the field decided to fall en mass on the rain slicked downhill of the course. I was able to slip by without any trouble and stayed in the top 20 for the rest of the race. A few guys took flyers off the front a got away. It was just too hard to chase as a group with the wet turns. I ended up 5th in the sprint and 9th over all. The rest of the guys got shuffled back in the crashes and todd was just out of the money in 31st.

Sunday was our home race, Bike Jam. The team had some great results with Nima wining the masters 35+ race out of a 4-man break including Rick. Probably the most impressive win of the day was by Michael Choen in the Cat IV race. He went solo with 5-6 laps to go and stuck it by 8 seconds at the line. Alex and a few other teammates did a great job defending the break, somewhat unusual for that level of racing. It was great to see our team represent at home.

In the P/1/2 race the plan was to be aggressive and try to spring a break that we could win from. We were aggressive but the pro teams there were looking for a field sprint so despite our best efforts it just wasn't to be. We certainly animated the race with lots of attacks, and Evan and Nate were able to grab some primes along the way. We all got a bit bunched for the finish and ended up 14th (me), 15th (Jeff), 19th (Jake), and the rest of the squad back in the bunch. I'm really proud of the way we raced and think that we are going to get some great results at the upcoming big races (CSC, AirForce Classic, etc).

The highlight of the weekend has to be racing at home in front of friends. I have to give big shouts out to my Housemates Laura, and Stacy who showed up with signs.

I love my girls.

Stacy was also bold enough to bring her Father (visiting from out of town) and her Beau, Chuck to the race; they all had a good time. Lastly the crew from Team That's What She Said was there in force. While they are mostly runners they always have a good time watching us ride in circles.

Why...

2010-05-19T20:59:00.003-04:00

That is pretty much my only response to the news that Dewey Dickey is likely to receive a 2-year (actually probably lifetime) ban because he refused to take an out of competition doping control. I raced with Dewey for several years while in the midwest. Note that this was after he served a 2-year suspension for testing positive for banned substances in 2001/2002; thus the possibility of a lifetime ban. Dewey was always a gritty, hard nosed racer who was always willing to push the pace and animate the race. Despite his former doping offense I've always had a good amount of respect for him. This is partly due to his style of racing, but mostly due to the fact that he was generally a nice guy.

The last time I saw Dewey he was on a stretcher being loaded into an ambulance at the Tour of Ohio. He had not crashed, rather he was weakened due to blood loss related to the removal of his colon several years prior. Knowing that he is no stranger to adversity I knew that he'd be back. Since that time I've seen his name at the top of the results pages at several races in the midwest including a win at last year's Snake Alley Crit.

So back to the main question...Why? It sucks that USADA was dragging ass with processing his updated (Therapeutic Use Exemption) TUE, but why refuse to take the control? Dewey said that he refused the test because he knew he would test positive due to his medications. Had he agreed to the test (and he was only taking the meds specified on his TUE), the worst that could happen is that he tests positive for the drugs that are listed on prior TUE's and the one that is (was) currently being processed. At least then he could fight the positive on grounds of procedural issues. Now we are left to wonder if there were more nefarious reasons for refusing the test. It is possible that he's using a banned substance that is not on his TUE and he figured it was better to hide behind his pending TUE. I hate to say it but to me that sounds like the most probable situation.

Dewey's life revolved around cycling, and he was a fighter. He's come back from the abyss several times, why not fight this comparably small hurdle? Sadly we'll probably never know the real story, and as a consequence many people will question all of his accomplishments on the bike. Dewey, If you did fear testing positive for something else, come out and say it, and do so soon. That may erase any respect I have for you on the bike, but it will reaffirm my respect for you off of the bike.

Fuggin BS...

2010-05-17T10:04:00.004-04:00

WOW, I was not at this race but the majority of our local racers were. Apparently some one took the liberty to throw tacks on the course several time throughout the day. Below is a video of a rider flatting his tire (tack was still in the tire after the crash) just as he enters a corner. I think that most everyone came out without any serious damage to body or bike, but I hope that the people that placed the tacks are caught and brought to justice. If anyone popped a collar bone and the idiots get caught I figure the tack dropper(s) are gonna get sued by the insurance company.

Leonardtown Crash from Bryan Vaughan on Vimeo.

Spring Break days 3 & 4...

2010-04-15T21:12:00.007-04:00

After arriving at the NOC a little after 1:30 AM on sunday night I settled into my diggs for the week. I was sharing a room with Tank and Alex. Tank took the loft while Alex and I shared the double bed on the main floor. Being pretty exhausted I fell asleep within a few mins of my head hitting the pillow.

We got up ~7:30 as Alex was on Breakfast detail. I have to say that I was floored by how well organized the trip is. Every night a new group of 5-6 people cook dinner for the masses. They are also in charge of breakfast the next morning. The food was always good, and prepared on time. Also there was no bitching about having to cook and clean. Those that were give a job, did it and did it well with no bitching.

After breakfast we got prepped for riding, picked a route, and rolled out. We had a solid crew of 6-8 strong riders. THe route we picked out had a few decent climbs including a six mile jaunt up Junaluska. Pretty early in the ride the rain started and again I was in the middle of a cold wet day on the bike. Fortunately I had my rain jacket and was not freezing for the most part. We rolled steady tempo for the most part, but got a little chippy up Junaluska, which was fun. At the summit we stopped for some road sodas (Natty Boh), and decided that climbing the route we planned to take would be a mess as the forrest road (711) was old broken pavement. Thus we cut the ride short which was a the right call.

For Tuesday's ride we decided to head up to 711 for some fun dirt/broken pavement descending action. To get there we climbed for 30 miles with only a few flats/downhills. It was great pretty much locked it in at a tempo pace for 2 hours. After reaching the summit on the pavement we descended a mile or so to 711 which started out with another 15 mins of climbing on moderate pavement. At the top we snapped some photos and Alex gave himself a double-calf chainring tattoo (aka CAT X Tattoo).

After we finished poking fun at him we started our descent. It was about six miles of breakneck bliss. Gelling and I went to town bombing the downs and trying to avoid the huge craters in the turns. Below is a google maps terrain view of this portion of the ride (on the right side). You can see that it was pretty twisty. This is probably the most fun I've had on a bike in a long time. The whole ride was a blast, but this was the icing on the cake.

When we got back to the cabin the shenanigans began. Tank called dibs on the shower but he realized that he needed to take a leak before getting the shower. He turned the water on and came out to use the toilet (in another room). While he was pissing I slipped into the shower (still wearing my bibs) and pulled the curtain closed. He returned and I scared the shit out of him when he pulled back the shower curtain. For this move I have been dubbed the sneakiest of rhinos, and can now be followed on twitter @SneakiestRhino. I plan to deluge all of my followers with silly hip-hop lyrics and other nonsensical musings. I hope you join me for the ride.

Spring Break days 1 & 2...

2010-04-07T21:07:00.003-04:00

As some of you know I took a little vacation this past week. I headed to the mountains of North Carolina for a little bike riding with the U of Wisconsin cycling team. One the front end of the trip I swung through Charlottesville, VA for the beginning of the racing season: the Jeff Cup Road Race.

I had a relaxing saturday morning which consisted of an easy spin and packing my shit for a week long bike vacation. Lots of spandex and a few t-shirts was all I really needed. Tank on the other hand brought a full suitcase and a laundry basket full of clothing. I got on the road in the late afternoon as I was to arrive in C-Ville a little before 8PM, where I would rendezvous with Sophia for some dinner.

It had been about 2 years since we had last seen each other (bike and build?), and it was nice to catch up. Sadly, she was in the middle of a big mid-term review for one of her arch classes so her time was limited. This may sound strange but this is one of the first times I've noticed the one of my friends is growing up. I think mostly this has to do with our age difference and the long gap between seeing each other. In any case Sophia is not the same girl I remember from our days in C-U or at bike and build. A lot can change in a few years. It is not even a level of maturity (she has always been mature), it is more her perspective in life; a little more far sighted. Though the time spent was brief, it was good to catch up, and I'm glad to say that one of my friends is on her way to a good life.

After spending the night on Sophia's floor I stumbled out into a cold rainy morning in search of a proper bike race breakfast, while she ran off to the Gym and then back to the studio. I located the nearest diner and ordered the largest breakfast plate they had to offer. After eating I headed over to the race course to do some last min bike maintenance and suit up for the race.

The weather was chilly with light showers coming and going, the day had potential to be brutal, but only time would tell. We had a solid crew of 8 in the 1/2/3 race and planned on playing it cool for the first few laps and then trying to get a few of our strong guys into a good break. I was on escort duty, with R, to shepherd our two protected riders (Evan and Blair).

For the most part things went as planned, We covered early moves, and then started to animate the race. About halfway through the 77 mile race the skies opened up. A cool day quickly turned into a downright frigid one. Low 40's with cold pouring rain are not the ideal race conditions. Shortly after the rain started we put the right guys up the road with Blair, Evan and R making the winning break. Back in the field we did our best to shut things down and let the gap get out to a comfortable margin. Up front things got interesting with the main break fragmenting into several smaller groups. Blair ended up in the lead break with two others and finished 3rd. A little ways back, Evan and R took 5th and 7th, while Jeff Took the bunch sprint on my group for 9th. I was 17th and pretty well destroyed I tried to sprint, but my legs just struggled to turn the pedals over. To sum it up I think we raced really well. We put the right guys in the right move(s), and while getting 3rd out of a 3 man break is a little disappointing, it is a bike race,and sometimes doing things right is not enough. For sure the weather conditions played a factor in the outcome.

In typical L@13MPH fashion I'll drop some lyrics:

"Charmed but the weather broke me sober. I've never been colder"

--sneaker pimps, flowers and silence

I can honestly say that I've never been colder on the bike, even in all of my days of winter riding in Illinois. I'm also fairly certain I was not the only one experiencing problems. On the last lap I had to use my right hand to shift my front derailleur because my left hand was too cold to move my wrist and fingers. After the finish I rode back to the cars (~2 miles) with Blair who apparently developed a nasty case of cold induced Tourette syndrome. We're rolling along when he starts blurting out guttural noises and shaking uncontrollably for a second or two, then back to normal. This continued about once per minute on the way back to the car. He was in a pretty bad way. We also passed a NCVC rider that was shaking so badly that he fell off of his bike (well it looked like he was trying to stop and dismount), but the end result was him on the ground.

After changing and warming up a bit I hit the road to Bryson City, NC and the Nantahala Outdoor Center; cycling home base for the next week. I'll post some recaps of my week down south in the next few days. For the most part is was a pretty typical spring break trip: booze, nudity, fights, toothbrushes, condoms, mustaches, people shitting themselves, and some pretty killer bike riding. Stay tuned.

Happy pi day...

2010-03-14T23:08:00.003-04:00

Just got back from training camp in Lexington VA. We dropped 12-13 hours of riding in three days. All of it was pretty intense. Friday was a wet 90 mi jaunt in the mounains that put us on the blue ridge parkway for a while. The descent into buena vista was awesome. A bit sketchy but there is something about bombing downhill at 45+mph in the rain. It made the climb up Vesuvius worth it.

It was a shame that is was cloudy most of the time we were there as the area has some awesome views. Below are a few pix of the hills surrounding our weekend home base.

But the sun did come out for a little while on Sunday morning. Lovely.

The grass...

2010-03-05T03:58:00.001-05:00

"the grass is always greener so I want to hop the fence and bask In what my neighbor has grown".

I think that is a pharcyde lyric but I can't remember. In any case I return to bmore tomorrow night and am expecting some drama. I'm not one to give relationship advice but things are getting a bit out of hand in my crew. I just hope that I manage to stay out of the fray.

NASA furries...

2010-03-02T23:34:00.000-05:00

Not sure what is going on here, but this interview was taking place across from my poster at the conference. There was free beer so pretty much anything goes.

Pi...

2010-02-27T04:32:00.005-05:00

4:35 AM, re-state my assumptions. 1. Life is meant to be enjoyed. 2. This enjoyment should directly affect those surrounding you. 3. This shared enjoyment should improve the overall quality of life. Conclusion: Fun Jamie should stick around for as long as possible.

I spent most of the day stressing about small things in the grand scheme, and entertaining perspective graduate students. I'd like to think that honesty trumped entertainment value in both these situations, but we'll have to wait and see. With the latter it is pretty apparent that these students need answers that are to the point and above all not BS. I think that our department showed that life as a graduate student is not "all work and no play".

See the lonely boy out on the weekend...

2010-02-24T21:37:00.003-05:00

With the roads in the greater (lesser?) B-more area still being iffy, the boys on the team decided that it would be a good idea to head south for some miles on the bike. The plan was simple, drive to Richmond, VA and set up a cyclist shanty town in out teammate Jeff's new house. I'm fairly certain that his wife had no idea of what agreeing to host us would entail. The short of it is that six smelly bike racers monopolize nearly every square inch of the house, eat every of morsel of food available, and keep her husband from doing work around the house while we ride our bikes. She was probably less then pleased to hear that I found out that I could throw their french bulldog (Monty) a good 10 feet across the room from a seated position. I'm guessing that we won't be seeing Jeff for a few weeks.

The riding was good. I met up with a local shop ride that left at 9AM. This required me to be up and about my house at 5AM, but I logged a few extra hours of chamois time by kitting up before I left the house; over all a net gain. After 15-20 mins the rest of my teammates met up with the ride. It took a while to work our way to the front but once there we went into a nice smooth rotation. Some other guys pitched in, but many were just there to suck a wheel or eight. For the record , I'm fine with this behavior. We all have different abilities and goals. That said, I have little patience for guys who sit on and then complain that the pace was super high, and then dropped off after "like 20 mins". Yeah, well get your ass up there and put in some turns, or shut your trap.

We logged 55 or so miles at a good clip (22 mph) with the group and then rolled back to Jeff's place to refuel. Then we sat in the sun outside of Starbucks for a good hour or so while Todd drank espresso and Steven's tire went flat. After caffeinating and re-inflating we put in another solid 40+ miles of eight-man double-paceline work. We were all pretty cashed and were looking forward to some good eats by the end of that ride.

Sunday brought warmer temps, and a more relaxed 70+ miler. Big props to Rick's buddy John who set me up with his bike for sunday. I had suffered a bike malfunction at the end of Saturday's ride, and would have been S.O.L. with out his assistance.

Overall it was a great weekend. It was nice to get most of the crew back together for some team bonding. Racing starts in ~4 weeks and then it will be time to get down to business winning races.

Why I love messenger bags...

2010-02-19T17:40:00.001-05:00

Underdamped dating...

2010-02-15T23:20:00.004-05:00

Turns out that my interactions with people can be roughly approximated by an underdamped harmonic oscillator. This is especially true when it comes to interacting with the opposite sex. Below is a plot of my typical response when dating.

Characteristics such as the degree of overshoot and number of oscillations can vary significantly depending on external factors (e.g., how much I've had to drink, how cute the girl is, etc.), but eventually I'll end up at a response level that is mostly appropriate, mostly.

P.S.: My apologies for the crappy excel plot. I don't have a proper plotting program on my backup computer.

P.P.S: I realize that the fact that I've distilled my love life into a plot pretty much confirms that I'll be alone for the rest of my life.

words: spoken...

2010-02-14T19:04:00.003-05:00

Molly: "If I keep drinking I'll be hungover, which may have the same effect as making out."

Me: "Kinda nauseated, with feelings of regret?"

GoldenCheetah 1.3.0!!!!

2010-02-08T21:33:00.003-05:00

To all of my bike geek friends. I'm super excited to share the release of the latest version of GoldenCheetah with you all. We've added a crap tonne of features, many of which provide functionality that many of you WKO+ users are fond of (e.g. performance manager).

If you use a powertap, SRM PCV, Garmin, iBike, or polar device to record your data please download and give it a shot. We also support WKO files so you can import your old data if you want to make the switch. We've got some really cool things in the pike too including the ability to plot data over long time periods (days, weeks, seasons) as well as an integrated tool to evaluate your aerodynamic profile (AeroLab).

Handlebars...

2010-01-20T22:36:00.011-05:00

While perusing the blog of the one and only Bike Snob NYC I came across this lovely tattoo.

That's right folks, this girl has a handlebar themed tramp stamp. I've always been under the impression that most lower back tattoos were purely for decorative purposes, and generally increased one's chances of acquiring a mate and a STD. Upon consulting wikipedia I see that I'm mostly correct, "Generally, a lower back tattoo will be designed to emphasize the shape and curvature of the figure". If were purely about accentuating curves she certainly would have gone with "Mustache bar".

In the case of the above handlebar tattoo, I feel that the owner is trying to say something more. Aside from the obvious suggestiveness that one should grab on for a wild ride, her choice of bars gives us some hints as to what type of mate she is looking to attract.

The bars pictured on her back are clearly those found on a mid 1980's MTB which harkens back to the birth of off road riding. The extra crossbar and protruding nub of a "moto-style" brake lever (far left) are dead giveaways. Clearly she is looking to find someone with experience and a willingness to forge into unknown territory. Preferably someone with mustache like Tom Ritchey; one of the godfathers of the MTB scene.

If any of you are thinking of getting a handlebar tramp stamp lets take a look at some of the various styles of bars and what a tattoo of them would say.

Standard road drop bars:

These are the all purpose bars that most of us have come to love. They offer several hand positions, and thus imply the need for a versatile partner. Wether cruising along on the tops, on the hoods hammering up a climb, or deep in the drops for the final sprint, the owner of a tat of these bars is saying "I want a guy (or girl?) who knows what to do and when to do it".

"Wing" carbon drop bars:

While similar in appearance to the standard drop bar these are differentiated by the "flat tops" and carbon construction. Despite costing about 4x more they offer no real benefits other than "cool factor". A girl sporting these bars is looking for a guy that has deep pockets and an affinity for form over function. She'll likely have other "Upgrades", and is willing to accept the fact that he'll probably stop mid "ride" for a latte and continually bitch about the fact that no matter how much he spends on equipment he's still not getting an better. Trust me, she's well aware that you're not getting any better.

Track Drops:

While it may appear similar to it's aforementioned cousins these bars are strictly business. You may notice that the bars are devoid of brakes/shifters, and they are only wrapped halfway up. Having a set of these tattooed on the small of your back screams, "put your hands here and go all out to the finish". The owner of such a tattoo is looking for someone who treats sex like a professional sport (without the need for special shoes).

Wide Riser bars:

These bars are all the rage on mountain bikes and come with the promise of a more upright position and enhanced control due to the increased width. Proper application as a tattoo requires a fairly large canvas, so these are probably popular with the plus sized ladies. Similar to a MTB these ladies are often not the swiftest or flashiest, but they generally know how to have a good time. A girl with this tattoo knows that every now and again you'll need the extra leverage the these bars offer, but for the most part you are best off going with the flow and enjoying the ride; just like riding a MTB.

Aero bars:

At first look you might that these bars scream one thing, "speed". Of course if you've ever ridden a TT using these bars you know that the word really is "suffering". A girl rocking a tattoo of these is looking for a guy that is capable of enduring intense efforts for extended periods of time. The arm rests and extensions are just waiting to be used by a guy who's arms gave out long ago but is willing to soldier on resting on his elbows/forearms.

This tattoo could also mean that the owner is a masochist looking for a triathlete to inflict bodily harm on anyone in the general vicinity (i.e., her). We all know that a triathlete riding aero bars is a disaster waiting to happen.

Skinny "hipster bars":

You may have seen these bars on fixed gear bikes that have become one of the biggest fads to sweep major metro areas. While originally employed so that one could squeeze into tight spaces in traffic, when employed as a stamp it pretty much invites one into a not so tight space. This tattoo screams "Come on ride me, it's the latest trend, everyone is doing it (err me)". All the while the owner of the tattoo knows that she'll discarded to the corner of your apartment (like your fixie) while you sit around being mopey and emo.

As seen on the local listserv...

2010-01-20T16:46:00.002-05:00

What follows is a posting and the response to a fairly innocuous question posted on the local bike racing mailing list.

On Jan 20, 11:08†am, [name removed] wrote:

> Hi.† Can anyone recommend an internist or dermatologist? †I have been

shopping for a new internist but I have an immediate need for saddle sores.†

I live in Bethesda so something close to the area would be ideal.† Thanks.

Reply:

contact [name of Doctor]. he no longer rides but he enjoys that type of stuff.

Perhaps it is in my head, but I got a good chuckle. This Doctor is a pretty sick puppy if he enjoys looking at festering pustules located on some dude's taint, AKA sandbar, AKA tween etc.

Scattergories...

2010-01-10T10:39:00.003-05:00

Upon returning from the 'stretch last weekend I found Laura, Stacy, and Stacy's mom playing Scattergories. They attempted to get me to play, but I was not really feeling up to it. Conversation went like this:

Stacy: Wanna play Scattergories?

Laura: Yeah, I'll be fun.

Laura: We just finished "Things you find at the beach".

Me: Dead hookers?

Stacy: Silly, It has to start with an "a".

Me: A dead hooker.

The end.

I'll eat up all your crackers and you licorice...

2010-01-03T22:14:00.003-05:00

Another Sunday at the Backstretch and yet again it never fails to disappoint. As Robin the bartender said, "you never know what to expect here." Tonight there were several people that seemed to be interested in dropping lascivious tracks on the juke. We had it all, ...well MC Paul Barman was noticeably absent, but several tracks from Barry White, James Brown, and Digital Underground were all played. I'm hoping that most of my readership will recognize the title of this post as a line from The Humpty Dance, by Digital Underground. Incidentally, Tupac (AKA 2Pac, AKA that west coast rapper that got caught up in the east coast/west coast beef that also claimed the life of the notorious Biggy Smalls) was a member of of D.U. at the time that this song was released, and can be seen singing the chorus in the video. All of this music was accompanied by the lack of rhythm and horrible dancing that one could only expect in Baltimore's whitest neighborhood.

Banner year for sure...

2010-01-01T02:02:00.004-05:00

Its about 2 AM on the east coast and I've already smoked a cigarette and been kicked in the nuts. This is gonna be a banner year for sure. Happy new year and more later.

The sample is the flesh and the beat is the skeleton...

2009-12-30T22:14:00.004-05:00

Listing to music in iTunes on shuffle is fantastic because every now and again a song that I have not heard in a long time gets played. Most recently that song was MacArthur Park by Richard Harris (note that i've embedded youtube clips that won't show up in the RSS feed).

You may ask why I have this song in my library. Some of you may recognize the Fact that this song is by the same person who played Dumbledore in the first two Harry Potter Films, but that is not why I have this song. The real reason is that it was sampled in the Song "Dreamy days" by Roots Manuva.

I get a certain amount of pleasure when I can match up a sample from a hip-hop song with the original. It is like a light bulb goes one "so that's where that came from".
I generally come across these connections while listening to internet radio stations playing classic rock, oldies, etc. I have two more parings that I'll share with you. The first is "in a broken dream" by Python Lee Jackson (Feat. Rod Stewart).

which was used to form the bassline of the Lovage song "lifeboat".

The vocal combination of Jennifer Charles and Mike Patton (Faith no more) make this entire album killer.

The last pair features the classic Beatles tune "across the universe"

The opening guitar riff is sampled and slowed down in Eligh's song "makeshift message". The new tempo/pitch is kinda haunting, and works really well with the rest of the song.

Best present EVER...

2009-12-25T13:51:00.004-05:00

Mom is out of the hospital. Fortunately it was noting major, but her Crohn's flared up and she was in enough pain to spend a day or so in the ER. She's much better now and it finally feels like Christmas. Due to theses complications and the bad weather, Grandma and our Aunt and Uncle will be arriving tomorrow. Best wishes to you and your family.

Can you dig it!!!!

2009-12-20T20:09:00.003-05:00

Baltimore slowly began to dig itself out from under the 20" of fluff that we received over the past day and a half. Most of the neighbors were out shoveling walkways, a welcome change from Urbana-Champaign where nobody shovels their sidewalks, and the expected banter of "where the hell are we gonna put all this stuff" was had. Back when I was in school at Binghamton we had this thing called "alternate side of the street parking". For those not familiar on odd days of the month, you can only park on the side of the street with odd numbered houses, and on even days, the even side of the street. Normally this is a huge pain in the ass, especially if you don't drive on a daily basis, because you have to move your car every day from Nov. to March. However when it snows it is a godsend as the plows come through and you move to the other side of the road into a nice clean parking space. It is kinda like the quote from Jacob's Ladder:

So, if you're frightened of dying and... and you're holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace, then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the earth.

Baltimore does not have alternate side of the street parking rules, which means that I'll be riding in slop for the next few days, blah.

After digging out, I met up with Alex in fed hill for an espresso a some snow biking. After downing our black gold, we headed over to Federal Hill (the hill/park for which the neighborhood is named). Kids were out sledding which brings back memories of my youth as the big spot to sled in our town was just across from my back yard. It was a bit cold, but all in all it was a nice day for fun in the snow. Here is a shot of Alex rolling toward the downhill.
While at the park we watched at least three kids slam into parked cars at the bottom of the hill. All parties involved were OK, but it was a little disturbing seeing a kid go face first into the grill of a Ford. After cruising around the neighborhood for a while, I rolled back to Medfield. It was delightful to have more than one gear on my bike, as I'm used to rolling on the single speed madwagon within city limits. While the gradient is pretty steady from the harbor up, i'm usualy a bit over geared (and under geared on the way down). It makes me consider other options for a commuter, but I doubt that I'll take any action in the near future.

Buffdown...

2009-12-19T16:12:00.004-05:00

Having kept the rubberside down during the season, I figured my ass would be meeting pavement at speed in the near future. Remember it is not if you'll fall, it's when.

The most recent when was on my way to work yesterday morning. I was rapidly approaching the right hand sweeper at the bottom on the hill on 41st where it joins University Pkw. As I approached the corner I see that a sewer cap has burst and is spewing water into the intersection. Cars had been going through and creating a fine spray that had coated the pavement in black ice, bollocks. I threw a quick look over my shoulder to check for cars coming from behind, and I attempted to take the corner wide, but it was no go. Front tire pushed, and I'm sliding on my hip/shoulder/forearm faster than I can say "cocksucker". The good news is that I came away with just some bruising and abrasions. The bike took a pretty good hit as I managed to bend the steel riserbars and stem. Call me prejudiced but black ice just sucks, while clear/white ice is fantastic. The latter makes your drinks cold and helps reduce swelling when applied topically. However, the former often leads to situations where one needs to self-medicate and reduce swelling.

It seems that my sacrifice to old man winter was not well received, as he has taken it upon himself to dump a crap tonne of snow on the the mid-atlantic.

I figure that we've gotten about fifteen inches of snow, which happens to be three more inches than Canadian Hip-Hop/Reggae artist snow's debut album, there is something about a white kid from Canada toasting/chatting reggae vocals, but I digress. The snow is still falling and we may get up to 30 inches out of this storm which might be B-more's single storm record. Now I can look forward to more black ice from the typical thaw/freeze cycle that the moderate temps of Baltimore provides.

The holiday spirit...

2009-12-14T19:58:00.004-05:00

With Hanukkah in full swing and x-mass just round the corner it is hard for me to not get caught up in the "spirit" of the season. That is until I see a gift like this:

I understand that this is a quote from a Winnie the Pooh book (said by Pooh to Piglet), and to most people it is a sweet and loving sentiment. To me it simply says, "My dearest, I'm a selfish bastard and I hope that I die before you so that I don't have to spend my last day in misery. No, my love, I leave it to you to die a miserable sod."

Happy Holidays.

Naughty...

2009-12-13T22:43:00.003-05:00

I just got back from the "Naughty" launch party for Chesapeake Roller Derby. They are going with a holiday theme, with the "naughty" party being held at a local strip club, and the "nice" party being held later in the week at a more family friendly arena, the skating rink. Tronica (AKA: Tron, K.O., etc) is a member of the league so a few of us showed up to help support the league and their charity: The American Breast Cancer Foundation.

We didn't have the entire club to ourselves, but most of the people were there for the launch. That said, the club was still open to the general public and there were still girls working. I'll say working and not dancing as some of the girls had not flow or style. Jess agreed and she knows her stuff. She was even allowed up on the amateur stage to strut her stuff which was a big hit with the derby crowd.

Anyhoo, at one point I'm having a conversation with some friends and one of the girls from the club comes up and is just standing next to me for a few seconds. I break off my conversation and she starts in with some small talk in an effort to move some bills from my wallet to her garter. Not interested I play a long a bit. After a short while she lifts her garter dropping a not so subtle hint. I glance at the garter then back up to her eyes dropping a subtle hint that I'm not interested in tipping her. The rest of the conversation when like this:

her: "no?!"

me: "sorry."

her: "really!?"

me: "really."

her: "If you're gonna come to a strip club you should be ready to tip!"

Then she stormed off. It is best that she did because the bouncers were probably looking for an excuse to tap dance on someones skull, and bad mouthing a girl that works there is a sure fire way to get your teeth kicked in. Needless to say I was a little miffed. I'm there to support a friend and a charity. I mean if the "nice"event was held at the local nursing home would I be expected to sponge bathe every octogenarian I see?

Anyway all in all it was a good time, and if I'm lucky I'll win a raffle for a giant basket of booze.

T-givins...

2009-11-29T09:22:00.006-05:00

I opted out of the Sokolic–Kimberley thanksgiving feast this year as it was taking place in Cali and I was not wanting to deal with traveling on such a crazy weekend. I figured that I could provide a pretty good spread for some friends with the cash I would have dropped on a plane ticket. Most peeps had gone home to be with family, but I was able to muster up a few stragglers to partake in the feast. Nitin brought the traditional green bean casserole which was good seeing as it was Buyang and Jian's first time having Thanksgiving dinner. Tronica (AKA: Monica, Tron, Knockout Rose, or Tina Fey) and Ryan brought some taters and homemade cranberry sauce to round out the fixins. I cooked the bird and a few sides.

Da Bird

Ryan dishing some soup

After dinner and dessert bChan and Dylan (AKA Axel) stopped by. These are friends from UofI that have recently relocated to Philly. Becky has family just west of B-more and they were able to swing by for some pumpkin cheescake at the end of the night. It was really great to catch up with them as I has been about a year since we had last met up. Dylan is thinking about joining the ranks of LSV which would be a lot of fun. It has been several years since we raced together.

Anyhoo, Thanksgiving officially marks the start of the season for me. I've actually ridden two days in a row, and am planning on a third. Expect to see some more regular posts here as cold lonely winter rides are my muse. The stupidity shall flow.

Maf can be purty...

2009-11-15T22:36:00.003-05:00

While I'm trained as an experimental scientist/engineer, and have a visceral rejection of pure mathematics, every now and again something worthwhile (in my narrow view of math) appears. Actually as I've touched on before I don't think I have the capacity to have a visceral reaction to anything as my logical side generally overwhelms more low level reactions, but I digress.

While cruising /. I stumbled upon this interesting bit on the search for a 3D Mandelbrot set. A 2D Mandelbrot set leads to pretty stunning images that have a fractal nature, and the 3D "equivalent" is pretty mind blowing. the overarching basic concept of a fractal is that is comprised of smaller building blocks that are of the same form, this is self-similarity. This patterning holds at any scale so as you "zoom in" the structure is maintained. A classic example is the Sierpinski triangle.

The Mandelbrot set is a more complex fractal, and someone has tried to create a 3D analog. This is what it looks like:

While this is a pretty interesting looking "thing", it gets better as you zoom in:

Checkout the rest of the site to see some other really cool images that are found by zooming in on different parts of the rendering.

I Know that dude...

2009-11-09T21:50:00.007-05:00

While flipping through images of SSCXWC 2009 I found myself saying "I know that dude" in my best Jeff Spicoli impression when I saw this image.

That is the one and only Dirty Mike dead center with the bills stuffed in his undies. Glad to see that my old crew is keeping it real. There are some really good shots at CXmag so be sure to check them out.

Some kind of happiness is measured out in miles (or lack thereof)...

2009-10-19T21:28:00.003-04:00

Yet another Beatles song graces my blog with its presence, the title is a lyric from "Hey Bulldog". As you may guess from the title I've been enjoying my lack of miles. Lots of social events, and all around good times. Tank bought a house a few weeks back and we spent the better part of two weeks gutting the place down to brick and studs. He's finally started to frame the place out and I think I'll try to get down there to lend a hand again. There is a certain satisfaction that comes form partaking in a task that involves manual labor. At the end of the day you can often see a measurable change in the state of the project. This is a pleasing contrast to my work life where I can labor for a week and not have a damn thing to show.

I'll be getting back to riding soon as we have our first team meeting on Oct. 31st. We've got a few new riders, but the bulk of the crew for 09 is returning. It's gonna be a good year.

All the lonely people...

2009-09-28T21:42:00.003-04:00

Tronica and I were at our new local stomp, The Backstretch tonight, talking about days past and those to come. The girl next to us asked if we wanted to hear anything on the juke as she had some extra credits. Seeing as this place reminded me so much of Les's Lounge I started racking my brain to recall a song from back in the day. It was pretty broad list: You never call me by my name by David Allan Coe, Policy of Truth by Depeche Mode, Slip Away by Clarence Carter, but I finally settled on something I hadn't heard in years: Eleanor Rigby performed by Ray Charles. I'm not sure if I like it better than the Beatles version (one of my Fav Beatles tunes), but it is still pretty good. See (hear) for yourself.

If you are fortunate to find a place that you can surround yourself with friends on a regular basis, cherish every moment; as it may soon be a parking lot.

Cycling geek tidbits...

2009-09-24T09:27:00.003-04:00

As many of you know I'm a bit of a bike geek. Not in the sense that I need to have the newest equipment, but in the way that I get excited in advances in technology. Since getting my powertap a few years ago, I've been pretty interested in the advances in power measuring technology. While traveling down that road I came across a neat open source software project called Golden Cheetah. It grew out of the need for a better analysis program for the mac and linux.

I got involved with the project by helping with testing and debugging as my coding skills are not really up to snuff, and it has been a pretty fun journey. In any case the project has grown a lot over the past few years, and it in now running on mac, linux, and windows (as well as a few other *nix type systems). This cross platform compatibility is the key to an exciting new project/device that is being developed by Quarq: The Qollector. It is a data logger that will record data from any ANT+ device (speed, power, heartrate). It is essentially a USB stick on steroids, and you can plug it into your computer to download the data. The coolest things is that it has a lot of storage (4 GB) and you can actually run golden Cheetah directly from the usb stick. away at a race and don't have you computer but want to looks at some data, no problem, find a computer, plug your collector in and you are good to go.

Here is a short video showing a little more info on it.

Congrats to all of the developers and the folks at Quarq for having the vision to put this all together.

This is my Autumn. This is my introduction to winter.

2009-09-22T04:52:00.003-04:00

"I just wanted to feel normal, important, warm, I wanted to feel cozy when it rains, instead of depressed by a storm. I wanted a hand to hold when my heart skips, maybe worth a tear in your eye, I just wanted one person to love me so I wouldn't be so afraid to die. So I when I'd sleep I'd rest, not a psyche to fuck, but a comfort to kill anxiety, so I could swallow without it getting stuck. I just wanted to breathe so I decided to pretend to be another reason you'll learn to never trust...lord forgive me."

Ink by Cubbiebear

It's 2 AM and I'm a bit restless. I've got a lot on my mind as of late. Some of the things running through my mind have probably been piling up over the past few months and possibly the events of the past few days have brought them front and center. In any case I was feeling a bit introspective and dug out my Journal from 2001. While it started in the dead of Winter the journal was about my Spring, a time for rebirth. I'm not sure if that was the case as I often find myself in the same trappings of old.

I began reading with he hope that I'd find some wisdom buried deep within the quad-ruled pages of the marble notebook (yes, only an engineer would use a quad-ruled notebook for a journal). 2001 was a pretty tumultuous year in my life, I was single after breaking up with my girlfriend of several years, starting a research project for my masters degree, and trying to figure out If I was cut out for a Ph.D. I was also not racing (running or cycling) for the first time in my adult/adolescent life. The combination of all of these factors lead to a period of soul-searching that provided no real answers, however the journey was still worthwhile.

The actions that were chronicled during that year were mostly fueled by alcohol and lead me down some roads I never should have traveled, but at the same time some very good memories were captured in the pages of my journal. Looking back through the pages of booze addled ramblings sometimes I am shocked by what I had written, as the clarity that I peered into my soul was a bit too much. I'm also a bit taken back at how dark and depressed I was at times. Here is an entry from 5/27/01:

I'm kinda fed up with the way things are. I'm pretty unhappy with the way life is unfolding. I feel shallow. There is so much to life & i just don't think I appreciate it . I'm just frustrated. I just realized that I don't like people that sit around a question everything. They lead me to question myself, and I don't like what I see.

While a bit spooky I think it was a very honest entry. The short sentences were blurted out via pen as quickly as possible. in some respects this is a really uplifting entry. I shows a willingness to let my guard down to myself. That may sound silly, but ask yourself when was the last time you really took a deep look at yourself.

I'm also a bit surprised to find entries expressing rage, lust, jealousy, and genuine love. While these are common human emotions, they are not ones that I express on a regular basis. People describe me as laid back, and I often wonder if that is a polite way to say "dead inside".

A recurring theme is my willingness to put others needs before mine. I think this is a virtue, but only to an extent. Eventually you have to be selfish, or else you end up at the back of the line, alone. That said, you have to pick your selfish moments wisely as they can have devastating repercussions. I hope that 8 years on I have the wisdom to pick my battles more wisely than back then; for actions cannot be undone, and regret is a bitter pill.

It is now almost 5 AM, and I'm pretty worn out. While writing the above I've been trying to take stock of where my life is right now and where I'm heading. I'm in a pretty good position, certainly better off then I was in 2001.

As an aside, while writing this I received an e-mail to join the "Les's Lounge Alumni" group on facebook. Apparently an old friend was suffering a bit of insomnia too and decided to create the group as a tribute the the local bar we called home several nights a week (Thursdays and Sundays to be specific). My journal is peppered with entries related to Les's, and I can say that many of the best and worst situations I found myself in that year involved the Lounge in some way. My nights at the lounge led me to broken bones and broken hearts, but my luck never really ran out.

And in case any of you are worried about my mental state here is a picture of cute little bunnies, This is what I feel like on most days. Just had some things running through my mind as of late.

It's all over...

2009-09-21T21:07:00.003-04:00

My bike racing season is over, that is.

Overall it was a really fun year, and I felt like I was racing at the level I am capable of. Since it has been a while since I've updated here is a quick rundown since July 15th:

Sterling turned 21, we drank lots, and I offended the new girl that works at STScI with Alex.

I turned 32 shortly thereafter. It was a gala affair and the girls at work made me some goodies. Sadly The festivities were cut short as I came down with the Swine Flu (yes, really... I was diagnosed). The university deemed that I would get a 7 day "vacation" as a present, and I went batshit crazy after a few days of solitary.

I nursed myself back to health, and started racing again just in time to see my teammate Nate really come into form. Fresh off the podium (2nd place) at Junior Natz, he nabbed 2nd at our regional championship road race.

From there it was on to Millersburg for a two day three stage race (ITT, Crit and RR). Nate was a rockstar and ended up winning the RR and was 2nd on GC. I felt pretty snappy, and managed to win the bunch sprint behind Nate and his breakaway companions for 4th on the stage. The team races so well at this race. We were in every move and animated the hell out of the race. This is becoming my new favorite event. The racing is great, and our host family (Duane and Juandeen) are the best. They took such good care of us the past two years, and I can't wait to go back.

With the season winding down our team numbers started to dwindle but I was able to hook up with a few teammates for a few races. My last weekend of racing would be a Twilight crit in Wiles-Barre, PA, then PA RR championship, and a crit in Basking Ridge, NJ.

Wilkes-Barre Twilight: C-Dubs and I were the only guys from the Amateur team, Shane and Clay were there representing the pro squad. We started in Twilight, ended in pitch black. Bryan Vaughan had his helmet cam on, so check it out. If you've never raced a crit this will give you an idea of what is going on. If you have raced a crit forward to the last 10-15 mins and you'll get an idea of how dark it was. I felt pretty crap, so I decided it was not the night do get in a break. I gambled on Hunting for primes and the hope that it would be a bunch sprint. I kinda pushed on that one as i nabbed a $50 crowd prime, but the winning move of 7 went away shortly thereafter. The sprint was hairy with a big stack that ate curtis on the last lap, but I kept it upright and finished 16th. Not a great result, but ending up in the $$ seems to make it seem like a successful race.

PA RR Championship: Todd, Blair and I lined up for 91 miles of rolling terrain on a pretty fun course. No huge hills, but enough up and down to thin it out. The boys were active early. A group of two got away, countering either Balir's or Todd's move. They got a gap quickly, Two more slipped away and then I jumped across. After a little solo effort, I grouped up with the two chasers and we caught the leaders in short order. From there it was a long day of paceline work. Our gap was sitting at 1-2 mins for most of the day. Apparently the big guns were happy to give us some leash, but we never ballooned out. We got caught with ~15 miles to go. I felt good at first, but the pace dropped and my legs shut down. With ~2 miles to go there was an attack up a small climb, and I just popped. Todd battled it out and was just inside the top 10.

Basking Ridge crit: Blair and I were the only representatives of our squad. Todd needed to spend some QT with the wife. This was my first time racing in my "home" state of NJ. The course was hard, with a few long false flat drags and a blazing downhill finish. Blair took an early exit when some dude stacked in front of him. I was active and had a good gap with one other guy in the middle of the race, but we needed another rider or two to make it stick. I was hoping for a bridge, and he seemed to be interested in not working too hard so we got caught. I countered as soon as we were caught, but no one else came along and it was a short lived move. A group of 4 got away and stuck it. I was 5th in the bunch for 9th on the day. Got some bills for my hard work, which was a bonus as the race was pretty fun.

I ran into an old friend, Jeff Lenosky, who is still killing it on the trials bike. He was doing Demos a the race and we shot the shit a bit after my race. The cycling community is so tiny, it is always a blast to show up to an event and see some people you've been out of touch with for a few years.

With that I've decided to hang up the wheels for another year. Next year is going to be interesting as I'm looking for a Job as a professor, and I might have to take a step back from racing for a little while.

Banner weekend...for falling down...

2009-07-15T22:31:00.003-04:00

Man, it was a bad weekend for my two wheeled brethren. I suppose that it all started mid-week with Rick getting an infected saddle sore excised. I guess that it was so bad that the doc ended up removing a 2"x2" piece of his ass. Rick is about six feet tall and weighs a buck-forty, so by my calculations they removed an entire cheek.

On Saturday, Ryan M, of Team That's What She Said fame, got in a car accident...sort of. He was out for a spin getting ready for a triathlon on Sunday when some dude pulled out in front of him. Ryan t-boned the dudes car, destroying his bike. Initial reports are that Ryan is mostly unscathed, which is good news. This incident is further proof that God hates triathletes. I've railed against the tri-peeps for years now, but I've given up on it. You see, tri-peeps treat their sport like a religion, and if I've learned anything during my stay on this earth is that you don't try to change peoples views on religion. I've also learned that worshiping false idols (or at least lesser deities)is a bad idea, and from time to time the guy in charge must smite a person that has strayed from the flock to remind people who is boss.

A little closer to home (Hagerstown, MD) was the location of another bike related injury. While racing in the MABRA championship crit, my teammate Blair got tangled up (rather ran over) another rider that wanted to test how hard the pavement was. Apparently Blair didn't believe the results of the first test, and decided to take a closer look by smashing his face into said pavement. The numbers have been crunched and with a small margin of error the pavement in turn three is "fucking hard". Now most of you are asking, "how hard is that?". Hard enough to leave a two inch gash over his eye, an nickel sized hole in is chin, and a jaw bone that is in two pieces. I'm super bummed as Blair has been riding well and we'll miss him in the field for the next few weeks while he is eating out of a blender (scroll to 3:58 and listen). I'm telling you man, pea soup is the bomb.

I've already poured libations (I was dying for a mint julep on Monday night) in the hopes that the gods will allow you all to heal quickly, and keep the rest of us out of harms way.

Updates...

2009-07-12T20:29:00.005-04:00

Sorry for the lack of updates at Fitchburg. Internet access was sparse, and I was pretty worn out from the race action.

I forgot to mention that le TSK graced us with his presence during the 40-44 RR on his way to visit his fams on Hilton Head. It has been a while since we'd seen each other and it was nice to catch up. I think we are both nearing a point in our lives when bike racing is going to take a back seat for a while. John starts medical school in the fall and he's thinking that he'll be transitioning from face smasher/axe murderer to med student that can still win bike races.

On Wed morning Todd Raced the Masters Nats Time Trial while I chilled in the parking lot in preparation for a marathon session of driving to Fitchburg, MA via my parents place near Bling-Blinghamton, NY. Oh yeah the TT starts were delayed by 2 hours because the course was not able to be secured. Obviously someone (promoter?) screwed up bigtime with the traffic control.

Todd in the start house.

We got to my 'rents by 11:00PM, grabbed some grub and hit the rack. We had to be on the road by 7:30 or so to make our TT start times. The drive went well despite some crazy rain. Along the way we saw this van.

WTF???

Apparently the scooter store thought that having a picture of a WWII vet dressed in his bomber jacket, leather cap and goggles "tearing ass" at 5mph on a scooter through a forrest of cartoon cacti was a good marketing move. That or it is just a medicare racket and they painted the van this way to give the finger to the government. Neither option leaves me with a good feeling.

The TT at Fitch was interesting as the fog was pretty thick, reducing visibility to a few hundred meters at best. The road surface was good, and we al kept the rubber-side down.

Todd and I were pretty exhausted so I went into max recovery mode; I was in bed by 8:30 that night.

Friday was the fitchburg Circuit race. This race was insane in so many ways. 24 laps of a 3 mile loop with a super steep climb, and wicked fast downhill. 175 guys getting argy bargy trying to stay in good position. Oh yeah, about half way through the race the skies opened up. Lots of people fell down and I think I picked up 4 pounds of sand from the road spray. I felt like crap and ended up losing a lap to the field, fortunately we were allowed to reintegrate with the field so the time loss was minimal. Jake, and Jeff finished with the main bunch, while Todd and Blair had some mechanical issues and lost a little time.

Saturday was a 110 mile RR on an 11 mile loop with a pretty serious climb to and after the finish. There was also a stupid fast downhill. I set a new record for speed on two wheels, this was on the first lap while surrounded by 170 other racers.

58.7 MPH, silly fast.

I often comment on motorcycle riders that don't wear helmets and leathers, but I guess that I'm just as dumb. Spandex is not gonna help much if you come off at ~60MPH.

The pace was ballistic from the gun and I got spat out of the bunch the second time up the climb. Fortunately a good number of guys got shelled the first time up the climb so I was able to ride easy and ended up in the autobus for a 25 person group ride. Blair and Jake hung tough and finished with the main group.

Sunday was a 55 mile crit with a slight uphill drag to the finish. The pace was pretty chill for the first six laps. After that some attacks animated the race, and a small group got away. It was still pretty easy to sit and move in the bunch, but with 15 or so laps to go the the chase heated up with Bissell and Kelly vying for the overall. I was tail gunning and had to close some gaps, but I managed to finish in the bunch, as did the rest of our boys.

All in all it was a good week of racing. A bit too much time in the car and being ill before we left lead to some crap legs, but it was good training if nothing else.

Geriatric nationals day 3: USAC shits the bed, several times...

2009-06-30T22:02:00.003-04:00

Today was a low down dirty dirty shame. With championship jerseys on the line race organization should be top notch, but today was a mess. There were several events that took place that directly affected the outcome of two races.

In the 35-39 race there was a group of 5-6 off the front. A crash took out two or three riders and in the fray, The break sat up a bit to try to figure out what to do, but one rider decided to keep the hammer down and rolled away. He was solo for a few laps. He was at least a minute up on the field when he flatted. He pulled over toy get a wheel from Shimano neutral support, but they just drove right by. Apparently they though he was a dropped rider. Would he have stayed away? probably not, but if nothing else he would have gotten back in the field and had a chance at the win.

In the 40-44 race the officials screwed big time. The race had 100 starters, and it was on from the gun so people were shelled left a right. lap traffic was a problem. with 2 laps to go a group of four had a 40 sec lead over the main pack, and there was chase of 5 or so in between. With one lap to go the lead had shuffled a bit with 2 riders leading the chase group of 7-8 and the field charging hard. Apparently the moto refs and the lap counters can't keep track of the leaders the two leaders did not get the bell lap. It is not clear what the chase group had been told, but i think they got the bell. Coming into the finish, the two leaders were about 5 seconds up on the chasers, that is within sight.

The course was a bit strange with the finish line not being part of the main loop so that you had to go straight/right at the top of the hill instead of making a left to continue on the course. The lead moto took the two leaders left for an extra lap, and a few of the chasers followed. Some on the chasers were paying attention and went right/straight to the line. One of these smart men won. Rick put in a huge solo bridge and managed to close the gap to a few seconds by the finishing climb and ended up in 5th passing some of the people that made the wrong turn.

After the debacle that took place at U-23 nationals last year I've pretty much lost all faith in the blue shirts. Officiating is a difficult and thankless job, but today the officials stole something from a few riders, and cheapened the national champion jersey that was awarded in the 40-44 Road Race.

Geriatric nationals day 2: Road Race flail, epic flail...

2009-06-29T21:46:00.004-04:00

Ugghhhh, That pretty much sums it up.

Todd and I lined up for the 30-34 age category road race today. Weather was pretty much perfect, and we had 13 (lucky) laps of a 5 mile course that was pretty much like every roller-coaster ride i've ever been on. Slow grinds going up, stupid fast descents, and corners that make you hold on for dear life. Also, I felt as if I might vomit a few times. This course would be a blast to do a group ride on.

It was a bit of a reunion as I ran into Luke Seemann from CBR before the race and then I lined up next to Tom Burke (former West Mich. Coast Rider). Cycling is such a tight community that It you're bound to run into several people you know at just about any race you attend.

The race started off quickly with DC velo sending Josh Frick from the gun. The gap quickly grew to 40 seconds and then the bridge attempts started. It was pretty much a bar fight from this point on. I chased a dangerous attack through the feed zone on the 4th or 5th lap which damn near killed me. I finally recovered only to have another dangerous group roll off. Todd had been really active and I thought that I needed to pitch in as the field seemed content to let it go. I kept the group in striking distance until we hit the base of the major climb. The group went ballistic up the climb, and I got shelled. I chased through the chaff that was shed on the next climb, and ended up in a three man chase group for most of the day. Todd continued to battle, and just missed getting across to the winning move. BIg ups to Rick and Nima for getting me bottles, it was a warm day and every ounce of liquid was needed.

I'm not one to call people out over the internet, but today something happened that stuck in my craw. On the last lap, our group of three started picking up riders, none of them even attempted to contribute to getting to the line as quickly as possible. Let me make this very clear, I HAVE NO PROBLEM WITH PEOPLE SITTING ON IN THIS SITUATION. We've all be shelled and just want to get things over with; some times sucking wheels is the only option. What I do have a problem with is when some ass, Jacob McGahey, decides to sprint for the line. I made my displeasure known to the folks around the finish line by sitting up and pointing at Jacob McGahey as we crossed the line and shouted something to the degree "That dude is awesome, he just got 15th place after sitting on for an entire lap". I was hoping that Dave Towle would publicly chastise him over the PA, but no suck luck. More so than any other the race, at National Championships the only place that really matters is first. I truly hope that the 16th place finisher, Jacob McGahey, will be remembered for being a feckless weenie

Geriatric nationals day 1: Travel and the assisted living races...

2009-06-28T22:59:00.005-04:00

Todd and I (not "the Todd") packed up and left for our tour of the eastern half of the U.S.A. We are going to the old peoples bicycle racing national championships, and then to New England to race Fitchburg against the youngsters.

I'm excited to be going to nationals, but more excited to not be peeing out of my butt every hour on the hour like old faithful. Last weekend goes down in history of the worst weekend of racing...ever. Two mechanicals, riding 55 of 65 miles of a RR solo with two gears was a bad start. Then my TT bike "ate" my rear derailleur while warming up 5 miles from the start. Needless to say I got my second DNS ever. At this point I didn't think it could get much worse, but tuesday I came down with a 102F fever and the runs. I didn't eat a "normal" meal until saturday night. Just about everyone in our race picked up an intestinal bug from the cow poo laden run-off water that resulted from the massive downpour during the first hour of our race. But enough whining, I could have swine flu like Bloomer.

Anyhoo, on to the task at hand. We're at masters nats chasing jerseys, not like the the "jersey chasers" at superweek, rather we are actually trying to win a bike race or six, and get a fancy red white and blue jersey (or six) for our hard work.

Todd pulled the long haul and drove the ~10 hour leg from B-more to L-ville.

Forty miles outside of Louisville. I call Rick for a status update on the tandem RR. call goes as follows (sorta):
Rick: Hello?
Jamie: Rick, It's Jamie.
R: We got our first national championship jerseys.
J: Sweet.
Todd: Awesome.
RN: Gotta go mack on podium bitches.
(Click).

Here is the photographic evidence:

Rick is the on the left, and note that this is the first time I've ever seen him smile after a race.

Kids say the darnedest things...

2009-05-19T22:38:00.002-04:00

On our way back from lunch on monday, Alex and I overheard a young woman utter the following into her mobile phone, "I hate my sister cuz she looks like a dude."

I slowly came to a stop as I tried to wrap my head around what i just heard. Alex just started laughing.

Podium(s)...

2009-04-19T19:21:00.003-04:00

Yes kiddies, It has been a while since I've had a finish worthy of standing on some numbered boxes, but my luck changed this weekend. This weekend was chock full of good racing and circuit race courses. Saturday was SoYoCo, a 2.5 mile loop with a nice mile long false flat to a steep kicker 300 m to the line. We had limited numbers (with Just three of us) so we tried to mark/jump into moves rather than initiating them. Todd had some bad luck and flatted out about halfway into the race. The short of is is that I got frustrated with the team tactics and killed it for most of a lap. One dude came through when I swung off and boom, we had a group of eight, with the right teams represented. Some guys were sitting on so I tried to shake it up by attacking on the kicker each lap, but never got a smaller group to work. It looked like we were going to come to the line together, so i started preparing for the jumps/ last ditch attacks. An Alliance rider (Mike) dropped a bomb with a little over a km to go and no one reacted. at about 800 to go a Landrover guy jumped after him and got a good separation. I got boxed in bit and by the time i got out he had a good gap on me. at this point it was a bar fight and we just motored to the line. I picked up one rider on the way to the line and despite my best efforts he grabbed my wheel, at about 200 to go we caught Mike and the dude on my wheel attacked. I clawed my way back to him and past him to finish second. The Land Rover guy won. His attack was well timed and he earned that win fare and square.

It was a great feeling to be competing for a win again. It was a little weird, there was a point where I wasn't sure if I would know how to "finish", but offseason training and experience came through.

Today (Sunday) was the Carl Dolan Circuit Race. We had mostly a full squad and were ready to try to rip the race to shreds. The plan was to let the early race action keep things fast and then start dropping bombs. Things didn't go exactly as planed as Rick and Jeff got off in a group of 5 on the second lap. That quickly turned into a group of four as one dude got dropped. This was a break that we wanted to support so it was all hands on deck to shut things down. The next 5-6 laps consisted of a flurry of attacks with out team siting one or two guys on every move. The gap slowly creeped up to 30 seconds, and then there was finally a lull in the filed letting the gap grow to a little over a minute. The attacks continued, but they never really made a dent until about 5 laps to go. The break had dropped to three riders and the field was still full of motivated guys that wanted a field sprint. It was a little touch and go, but Rick drove it hard to make sure that they stayed away. In the end, Jeff came up about a half of a bike length short of the win and Rick held on for third. I tried to lead out Marc F. for the sprint, but hit the front a bit early and didn't have the gas to get him to 300m.

At the end of the day we raced really well and will get that elusive win shortly. Next weekend we have the Tour of Ephrata stage race. It has an 8 mile TTT with the last 4 miles being a significant climb. It is gonna be interesting.

Philly 2-Day recap...

2009-04-12T14:15:00.001-04:00

This a a week late, but I was laid up with my annual "spring cold". Hopefully this year I'll recover from it a bit better. I've got my physicians in a row and we're being very proactive with respect to my asthma so that I'm not still hacking up a lung in the middle of June. Anyhoo, last weekend, Bloom, Nate and I headed up to Philly for a 2-day omnium, Circuit on Sat., Crit on Sun.

We had initially though this would be an easy race to nab some upgrade points for the young-uns, boy were we wrong. Empire showed up with a full squad and were ready to throw down. Bobby Lea and Choderoff from OUCH/MAXXIS were there too. To fill out the field there were squads of 8+ from GPOA, Pitt. Elite velo, and Indiana Med center. That last squad included my old housemate John Rowley, It was really fun to see him again and not surprisingly he can still ride quite well. To add to the drama, Sat was stupid windy, with gusts upward of 30MPH.

The race was pretty fast from he guy, with lots of attacks. There was a lot of "follow the pro" with tons of people scrambling for Bobbies wheel. I understand that he's likely to make the selection and following him is a smart move, but if you make that selection you are racing for second place. This was especially baffling as the bigger squads should have tried to get something away without him and make him/Choderoff work. In the end Empire got two guys away with Bobbie and it stuck. GOPA chased but were not organized enough to do any damage. The gap settled at about 1 min and that was it. I took a flyer after a prime and spent a few laps out there solo, but it the group behind pulled me in. At that point I tried to shepherd Bloom to the line for the sprint. I dropped him off at the front with about 500 to go and he was able to jump on the surge up the left side and grab 7th. I rolled in for 13th, Nate 21st.

Sundays crit was fantastic, it reminded me of Winfield (saturday) except the finish was at the top of the climb. It had some good technical turns and a nice steady big-ring uphill. The plan was to try to get Bloom a good finish and hopefully a top 5 in the overall. I was on the Hunt for some primes; my legs were really sluggish on sat and prime hunting is a good way to get the snap back. The race was a little more negative than saturday as Empire was trying to isolate Bobby, and noting too major ever developed. With a handful of laps to go, Nate got in a move of four that go t a gap of ~20sec. Empire and I went to work shutting it down. The break was not super organized and had a few guys sitting on, but it still looked like it would stick. Bloom got on my wheel with 2 to go and it was on. The leadout from empire stalled a bit on the last lap and I lost Bloom. When things got rolling again I was a little further back than I should have been, but whatever. The front of the sprint actually caught the break a the line, but Nate held on for 3rd place. I ended up 10th which was good enough to end up 9th overall. Overall we raced pretty well especially given the competition and our small numbers. Also a big shout out to our teammate Jacob who let us crash at his pad outside of philly. He raced on sunday too and Nabbed a prime and helped keep the race active.

Next week I'll be racing the Carl Dolan crit/circuit. Pray for better weather than last year (the photo at the top is from that race). We're out for blood and win so it's gonna be a barfight. I can't wait.

The Shaving...

2009-03-30T22:17:00.003-04:00

The season has officially begun. Legs have been shorn and them pedals have been turned in anger for the first time this year. This is by far the latest start to any season that I can remember as I'm not allowed to race the collegiate stuff any longer.

The season opened with a bang and a crash at the Jefferson Cup race in lovely Charlottesville, VA (the location of the University of Virginia). The weather was perfect and the 1/2/3 field was filled up at 125 riders. Things got started off fairly quickly with some attacks going on the first climb. Strong headwinds/tailwinds and oddly enough little cross wind kept most of the field together. Our guys had some digs but it was pretty clear that nothing was getting away. That was till late in the race when a group of four slipped away. We held them within striking distance with the plan to reel them in so that Jeff and Jacob could mix it up in the sprint. With about 2 miles to go they "mixed it up" in a bad way and got into a huge stack with several other riders. It happened just in front of me to my left and I swear that Fuentes from Harley was flying through the air level with my head. The pace let up as teams tried to figure out who was left in the pack after the crash and we never got as organized as we should have. I didn't see the finish but apparently the sprint caught two of the four off the front and was ~50 yards behind the other two.

All in all it was a fast tough race and while we didn't come away with the result we wanted, I think we rode fairly well as a team.

In related news, Rick and Lusby went to town on the masters 35+ field with Rick taking the vee.

In the coming days I'll post some pix of my new rides. If you though my road bike last year had a big head tube, you need to see this years frame.

P.S. Thanks to Sophia for getting me off my lazy ass and updating this here blog.

wow...

2009-01-31T02:49:00.001-05:00

"It has been at least three weeks since I've touched it." -geo

"It has been a while since I've pulled it out." -geo

"as a woodwind player I only make about $40 an hour" -some girl

Yeah, music speak.

Holla at the Chief...

2009-01-20T09:09:00.004-05:00

I've been down in DC the past two Fridays looking at space rocks for some experiments I'll be running, and that place is going to be a mad house today. I was on the Mall and almost very inch of the perimeter was flanked with at least one row of port-a-johns. Two million people create a lot of waste. Anyhoo, the town has Obama Fever and the only cure is overpriced booze as evidenced below.
That's right Obama has his own P-Diddy approved cocktail.

I have several friends that are attending the ceremonies today. They are all prepared to walk back to their homes in VA and MD as I have a feeling the Metro is going to grind to a halt when the masses attempt to leave.

I'll get back to catching you up on my life later, but first a picture of a sloth (two-toed).

Updates: Cali pt. 1...

2009-01-11T21:03:00.007-05:00

It has been a while and I'll probably split some updates up over the next few days. As you may know I went to Cali to visit my sister and brother in-law Adam. My Parents came out for Christmass too and a good time was had by all. Adam and my sister are always great hosts, and It was nice to get out of the cold weather on the right coast.

Travel was uneventful, for a change, other than the fact that I had the aisle seat next to the shitter on the 6 hour flight out. The most interesting moment had to be whie sitting in Newark airport hearing one of the airline workers ask for "Dylan" to come to the ticketing desk. Upon hearing this I started to laugh and I noticed several others starting to break up. I even saw one guy count the five best rappers of all time on his fingers.

Once in Cali, all was pretty chill. I took the Ibis out for a spin down the coast.

The rest of the week was nice, with Adam and I getting out for some good miles. Here is a nice shot of Adam and I at the top of PID, a bugger of a climb but worth it for the view.

The Pacific Ocean is behind us and there were some nice views of the mountains inland to our left.

Stay tuned for a deep-fried christmas, ice cold NYE, and rocks form space.

Happy Fugging New Year...

2009-01-01T03:10:00.002-05:00

25 Degrees and 20 MPH winds, way to cold to ride home. More later.

Jamie

Dz-nuts...

2008-12-17T20:27:00.003-05:00

After years of hearing DZ talk about protecting our junk, it has finally happened. Lets just hope this shit is recession proof.

There are tons more Dz-Nuts commercials on you tube, enjoy.

I personally am an Assos man, but I'll have to give this a shot. Gotta keep our domestic riders employed. Get some here.

Good Pour...

2008-12-13T01:35:00.004-05:00

Most of my friends respect a good pour. That is when you are at a bar and you order a reasonably good drink and they give you a healthy amount of booze for your $$. The following picture is a prime example of a good pour.

This is a healthy serving of woodford reserve bourbon, served to me at "no idea" or "don't know" in Fed Hill. Frankly I can never get the two places straight. That had to be four shots of whiskey. Hopefuly this will be enough fuel to hang on to Rick on the AM race pace ride.

Busted...

2008-12-02T19:08:00.003-05:00

I'm not one to get too caught up in the mess that is doping in cycling, but the latest news about Kayle Leogrande has been a long time coming. Info can be found at velonews and cyclingnews and if you are interested you can read the USADA decision. Just after winning the USA Elite crit Championship at Downer Grove, the rumors started (or continued) to fly that Kayle had been popped for doping. In the end the test were inconclusive and he was not sanctioned. A year later more problems cropped up. I was at stuporweek in 2007 when he was asked to submit a doping control. The word on the street was that he was taking something as he seemed to be a notch faster than he should be. A few months later rumors were abound that he had admitted using EPO after being tested at superweek. Now about a year later he's been suspended, and it seems that there was a lot of truth in those rumors.

I like the part where he says that he was targeted by USADA, frankly because he is right. There was a bit of an uproar amongst some team directors when USADA was not at 'Toona because it had decided to go to Superweek. Now we know why.

I can understand why Rock Racing did not suspend Kayle before USADA issued judgement, but they need to look at the people that they now employ and the specter of doping that surounds virtually all of the team either directly or via association. I'm all for second chances, but the parties involved have to understand that the moment you are associated with doping all of your results will be questioned wether you were clean or not.

Refuel...

2008-11-28T10:35:00.006-05:00

In an effort to stave off future late-ride hunger knocks my extended family pitched in an supplied me with an opportunity to build my calorie cache–Thanksgiving desert. I'm still having trouble reaching the keyboard due to my swollen belly, so here is a pictorial recap.

Pumpkin Roll

Vanilla Ice Cream

Apple Pie (Kosher)

Chocolate Chip Cookies (Kosher)

Chocolate Delights (Kosher)

Pumpkin Pie

Pecan Pie

Sweet Potato Pie

Apple Pie

More gluttony to come, Heidi is cooking some Gumbo tonight, and there will be more deserts (pumpkin cheesecake???).

Running on empty...

2008-11-23T20:26:00.004-05:00

It until today it had been quite some time since I've bonked on a ride. Frankly I had forgotten how much it sucks. Upon hearing reports of my "buffet disorder" several of my midwestern friends have chastized me for fogetting to partake in some sweet treats that can only be provided by that whore that every cyclist knows all too well, Little Debbie.

Oatmeal Cream Pies, Zebra Cakes, Cosmic Brownies, etc. we all have our favorites, but surprisingly most of the folks out here are not big on convenience store runs mid ride. Hell, I even get odd looks from my teammates when I buy a 48 oz fountain drink, pound half and then top off my bottles with the balance.

Rest assured my my midwestern friends, I have not forgotten your teachings, rather it was some bad luck and an unwillingness to smack the taste out of a cashier's mouth that led to my demise today. We stopped at a store mid ride and to my dismay they didn't have ANY of the aforementioned trollop's wares for sale. I settled on a big ass cookie and a bottle of coke that was supposed to be $0.99 but rang up at $1.49 after some debate with the cashier over the price of said cola, I was forced to buy only the coke as it was all that my postdoctoral salary was able to afford. Two hours later my cola buzz wore off and I stared to fade.

All in all it was a four on the bourbometer:

Whitey...

2008-11-19T21:00:00.000-05:00

Whitey, that is who owns and operates 95% of the RV's (recreational vehicles) in the US. Asians make up the other 5%. This little nugget of truth is something that my long-lost friend Toph Wedge discovered while driving from Illinois to Squamish, B.C. for some MTB madness. While this might seem to have come from left field what follows is the chain of events that sparked this memory.

Up at 6:00 AM to ride. Out the door by 6:15 into a balmy 26ºF dark Fall morning. This is cold enough to numb my brain to the point of thinking of odd things on the bike. ~6:20 AM I am passed by a black man, driving a VW Vanagon. While not an RV, it is probably the closest vehicle to an RV that I've ever seen an African-American drive. If any of you smart asses say "bus", I'm talking about personal vehicles, you racist.

In other news, It is finally cold enough to say that "Winter" rides have begun. Thus the coming months will be full of long rides and frozen extremities (including my brain). In an effort to quantify these rides I'm introducing the "bourbometer". This simple metric distills (pun intended) the pain and mental anguish of Winter riding into an easy to interpret scale based on fifths of bourbon.

Here is the rundown, by no means in the bourbometer a fixed rule, rather it will adapt as time goes on:

One Fifth: Short ride, not cold enough to freeze your bottles. No need to drink after this ride, but you still do for good measure.

Two Fifths: Cold enough to make your toes and naughty bits chilly. A few nips of Makers should help thaw you out.

Three Fifths: Serious pain in feet and hands. Drink until your feet are thawed enough to get into a hot shower without screaming, or you pass out on the couch.

Four Fifths: Temps below freezing with either wet roads or active precipitation. You can see the souls of past roadies trapped beneath the black ice al la "The Divine Comedy". I recommend a hot toddy to thaw out, make a pot full instead of a mug full.
Five Fifths: 5 hours of being dragged around by Rick Norton in sub 20ºF weather, or 30 mins on the trainer. You'll need a gallon of booze to recover from this ride.

Second spring...

2008-11-16T09:05:00.002-05:00

Bizarre weather yesterday. Tons of rain overnight lead to a damp day on the bike. Fortunately the temperature was quite balmy, in the upper sixty's. While rolling through the countryside of B-more county, I was struck by how green the fields were. That coupled with the lack of leaves on the trees and the warm temperatures made it feel like spring again. Unfortunately we are back to more seasonable temps today with the high projected to b in the low fifty's. Still good enough for a spin, and I'm currently waiting for loud Mike to get his ass up so we can head out.

Back in the game...

2008-11-11T21:47:00.003-05:00

It has been a while and quite honestly not much is new in my little corner of the world. I still have papers to write and jobs to look for, but the off season is almost over. I've added a few beer pounds and it is officially now brown liquor season, the time of year when I drink slowly and ride even slower.

One interesting note is that in the past month I've put in more miles on the commuter (A.K.A. madwagon, car, etc) than on my road bike. Some of these miles were accumulated during this past weekend's "Hubs of Fury 3" which is a bar crawl that traveled to and fro many areas of Bawlmer by bicycle. While it was not the rolling debauchery that Dirty et al. partook in at the SSCXWC it was still a good time.

In the coming days i'll start training again it is cold enough out that my brain will certainly crap out some silliness that only an long cold winter ride can induce. For those that have been here from the beginning we've come full circle.

Lazy days of Summer...

2008-09-07T16:54:00.003-04:00

Hey all, That is if anyone actually reads this thang anymore. I know that is has been some time since I've posted an update so here goes...

Work has been pretty good. It's a bit tough to get everything done, but I've got some pretty cool experimental results. Now I just need to figure out what they mean.

Bike riding/racing has been a bit of a struggle this year. I feel like I'm close to having some good form, but also close to having another major setback health wise. No really good results to speak of, but the racing has been pretty good at times. We (the KBS/LSV team) did the Tour of Millersburg stage race a few weeks back. It was a very well run event and we are all looking forward to next year. It was a two day, three stage race. ITT, Crit and RR. Headwind Hong had the best TT out of all of us, which is pretty amazing seeing as he is 110lbs soaking wet. That said, the kid is stupid aero and has a big (relative) engine. Kinda like a motorcycle. I went as far as getting some serious aero equipment for my rig.

That pic is mainly for le TSK as he has an affinity for TT rigs. Granted mine is not nearly as cool as his.

The crit was a throw-down with our guys animating it. We got Rick in a good move late in the race, only to get brought back with just over a lap to go. I put it into sprint mode but had to shut it down when a few guys decided to lay it down in the last corner.

The RR was 90 miles with nothing to selective. Bloomer was on early duty and got in the first real move. That came back after one lap, Rick countered taking some big guys up the road with him and that was all she wrote. ~70 miles on a break while we shut it down in the field. Rick attacked the break and came to the line with one other guy. It was close, but Rick got pipped at the line. Back in the field all hell broke loose in the last 2 miles with two big crashes taking out handfuls of riders. One crash was on a downhill and we were going near 40 MPH, spooky stuff.

After M'burgh, I traveled to Bling-Blinghamton to race in the Chris Thater Memorial Crits. The Masters 30+ was the strangest race I'd done in a long time. Things got hard, but not enough to get a good break going. The guys in our race had never heard of a counterattack, that is unless slow rolling off the front after I attacked for the 5th time is your idea of a counterattack. All in all 8 guys got up the road, I sprinted for 10th, blah.

Sunday was the Pro-1 race. I was excited as my parents were able to come to their first bike race. The short story is they got to see me tail gun most of the race after I laid it down in a corner. I tore the ass out of my shorts (literally) and walked past them on my way to the pit. Kinda funny, I just waved, and said "I'm ok".

I've got two races left and I'm looking forward to the offseason. I have a lot to do, papers to write, conferences to attend and academic positions to find and apply to . I'll try to keep you all updated.

Happy Birthday... you don't have cancer...yet...we think...

2008-07-21T19:50:00.002-04:00

So I turned 31 years old today and as the title states, I don't have (the) cancer. I've had a few suspicious moles taken off of my back in the past 6 months or so. Let me tell you it is a lot of fun having about an inch long/ half inch wide lenticular patch of skin removed just to find out if your mole is cancerous. Then again, having full blown cancer is no walk in the park. The labs came back and there were more "abnormal" cells than the lab would like, but it was not a definitive diagnosis of cancer. My dermatologist told me "I don't think you are going to die, but we'd like to track you for changes." So I get to see him every six months.

In other news, JP and Julie, friends from bling-blinghamton, got married this weekend. It was a blast catching up with the old crew. We shared memories of the good old days, like the time that we put JP's head thru the wall (see it was true Sophia).

H-town...

2008-07-14T20:27:00.005-04:00

This past saturday marked my return to racing. It was the district championship crit in Hagerstown. The course was fantastic, one technical turn, a short rise, and a headwind/false-flat drag to the line made me feel like I was back in the midwest for the summer long crit fest that is racing in the Chicago area.

The plan was to keep things together so that our sprinter Shane Kline could go for the win. Things were aggressive early and we had one or two guys sitting on every move. My job was to chaperone Shane and help him move up if needed. Additionally I would lend an hand if tings got messy up front. Here is a shot of me bringing Clay across to a break midway thru the race. I look a bit chubby, and am suffering into the headwind.

Late in the race two Harleys and Ramon rolled off unmarked. The gap was opening and I tried to drag Rick across. I got within a few seconds, but could not get there. Fortunately Rick is a hoss and was able to make the junction. The bad news that along with Rick, I took two guys from the teams already up the road leaving Rick to do battle with three Harleys and two Artemis guys. Yet again, we ended up stacking the odds against one of our best riders. Rick managed to get 4th place which is nothing short of superhuman. Shane did his job and took the field sprint for 7th.

Rick used to race pro for Navigators, and though that was a few years back he still shows that most pros are a notch above even the best amateurs. A prime example of this occurred at the Cascade Cycling Classic this past weekend.

Yes, that is Chris Horner giving another rider a "lift" to the mountain top finish. Click here to see more photos and a description of the above event. I think my favorite picture is the shot with another group coming to the finish. I'd be pissed to find out that someone literally carried another rider up the climb and handily beat me.

Ughhhhh....

2008-07-09T21:35:00.005-04:00

So it has been some time since I've posted, but I've been busy attending various wedding and bachelor party functions. The weekend of June 28th I was in lovely Rockland County, NY for JP's bachelor party. Ro-Ro works at a camp for children with mental disabilities and he was able to secure the venue for our shenanigans before the kiddies showed up. We had a mobile keg of beer and were set to have some fun.

Things went pretty much as expected. Lots of booze was consumed, pong and flippy-cup games ensued, Shultz passed out and got sharpied, and JP vomited. A solid performance all around. It was a blast to catch up with the friends that I left on the east coast during my Illinois years.

This past weekend (4th of July) I was back in the Midwest for (sober) Craig's bachelor party and wedding. The B-party started off with some poolside beers 5 mins after I arrived at the hotel, nice. Then we cruised to Naperville in a limo bumpin "beam me up". We met up with the bachelorette party and had a fantastic time.

The wedding was a great time too. Mandy (the bride) was a picture of beauty and the ceremony was really well put together. Craig is a lucky man as Mandy is the total package, smart, caring, beautiful, funny, and has a smile that will knock you out. The picture does not do these two justice.

More bike racing this weekend. Till then toodles.

Ohio recap...

2008-06-24T22:24:00.003-04:00

The last stage of the tour of Ohio was the exact opposite of last years final criterium stage which ended in a bunch sprint. The 50 mile circuit race had us scheduled for 4 loops on rolling country roads and then 10 laps of a 1.3 mile finishing circuit with a big climb and a technical descent.

Things started off as expected, Inferno let a group roll off the front to protect the sprint jersey. With one big loop to go the weather took a turn for the worse. Wind, rain, hail, lightening, you name it. At one point the cross winds were strong enough to blow Bennett off the road and he is probably 185 lbs, our flyweight Chong managed to keep it upright by drafting off of my billboard ass.

The run back into town was pretty uneventful. We did our best to escort Chris to the front so that he could be on the pointy end of the race when we hit the finishing circuits. I think that the guys executed perfectly, and we looked like we had a clear purpose in the race. Th finishing circuits were a right bitch. they started with a short paved incline that took a slight left-hand bend onto a super steep brick climb. It was not quite snake alley, but close. The climb was followed by a false flat/rolling descent and finished with a super steep bumpy concrete downhill with a 180 degree turn at the base.

I cracked pretty hard the first time up the climb, but toughed it out to finish in the top 50. I actually felt better as the race went on, but whatever.

Overall the guys rode pretty well, with Chris being the most consistent. He ended up 16th overall and 3rd in the collegiate standings.

John Rowley managed to hold on to his Cat 3 jersey, and Le TSK was second in the collegiate and points competition. It was really great to race with these guys again.

After the race, we had Pizza and some beer. Tank, Lemur and I ventured out to THE bar in Granville for a few more drinks. Upon arrival, Bennett and a few friends of his stumbled out. Me being the jackass that I am threatened Bennett with bodily harm, and fisticuffs nearly ensued. I "boxed" his ears a few times and even threw a leg kick at his head thinking that we were just screwing around. He then grabbed my head and came away with my hat. Walking away from me he refuses to give my hat back and is swearing at me. I now realize that he didn't recognize me and I'm flat out lucky that he didn't flat out punch my lights out. After calling him by name a few times he realized it was me and the hat and hugs were exchanged.

The trip back to MD was uneventful (other than a detour to krispy kreme, and cute waitstaff at Panera).

George Carlin, R.I.P. 2008...

2008-06-23T23:24:00.002-04:00

I was gonna give a recap of the final stage of the Tour of Ohio, but since Mr. Carlin kicked the bucket today I thought that I'd share one of my favorite Carlin quotes.

"And now, in the interest of equal time, here is a message from the National Institute of Pancakes: It reads, and I quote, 'Fuck waffles.' "

We'll miss you...you cocksucker.

Tomorrow, recap of the last day in Ohio or How I nearly got my ass kicked twice in one day.

Closer...

2008-06-21T13:05:00.002-04:00

Stage 4 of the Tour of Ohio was a good hard race. Things got started shortly after the first bonus sprint when a group of nine riders slipped away. C-Dubs, and G-mur were in a small chase group that never quite got there. After they returned to the field, i threw an attack to try to get across to the lead group. In doing so I brought a few other riders with (10 or so). With representation up the road more than half the group just sat on. After a few laps we had the leaders within 15 seconds, but then the attacks out of the chase started killed any chances of us getting across.

Late in the race, things got pretty serious with Dewey and le TSK dropping some bombs and bringing back the leaders with about 5 laps to go. I got into sprint mode and started to find the right wheels. I ended up in 8th place. By far the best result I've had this year. More importantly I felt like I was racing, and had a chance to win.

The guys on the team rode their best race yet, as they were active initiating and covering moves throughout the race.

One more stage to go,and it is going to be a doozy. The first 40 miles should be really easy, rolling terrain, but the eight finishing circuits are going to be insane. They are 1.3 miles long, with a very steep climb, and a tight descent. I expect to see some shake up in the GC. Probably not in the top placings, but there are a lot of guys grouped closely from 6-20th. If any of them have an off day it is game over.

Ohio Stage 3...

2008-06-20T12:57:00.003-04:00

While My race results have been less than spectacular. Some of my Friends have been killing it. Le TSK, managed to nab some sprint points in stage 1 and 3 and is now wearing the green "points" jersey. Some people call it the sprinters jersey, but seeing as John is wearing it calling it the points jersey makes a little more sense.

In other news, my old housemate and all around hard man, John Rowley, is wearing the white jersey (highest placed cat 3 rider).

It has been a blast catching up with some friends over the past few days. Tonight I hope to get something going in the crit. A top 5 finish would be nice.

Stupid recovery tricks...

2008-06-18T21:19:00.003-04:00

So after a miserable day, A-mac, C-dubs (the chubs) and G-mur (the lemur) decided that an ice bath would be a good idea to speed recovery. A few bags of Ice and an eight-dollar kiddie pool later this happened.

Absolute piss...

2008-06-18T19:13:00.003-04:00

That pretty much sums up the first two days of the Tour of Ohio. I'm just not feeling great on the bike. Stage one was a 30 mile crit on a 1/2 mile course with 7-8 turns and a section of brick. Thankfully the officials decided to negate any time gaps and give all riders the same finish time less time bonuses. That said, this caused some serious issues as guys were just sitting up wen a gap opened that they didn't feel like closing. I spent the first half of the race picking my way through the chaff and made what would end up being the final selection of 30 or so riders. I was working my way thru the remainder f the field when a Target Training guy got tangled up and wend down on the bricks. I T-boned him pretty good, but didn't hit the ground. I thought I could case back on but got to within 5 seconds but never any closer. After getting pulled, I coughed until I vomited and my nose was bleeding. It is time to go back to the doctor as I'm still not over what ever is up with my lungs. The only good news is that Curtis (C-dubs) had a good ride and finished 13th.

Stage two is the Queen stage of the tour and a right bitch. The first 25 miles are chill, but then it is one steep climb after another until you get to the line at mile 66. I tried to be a good teammate and patrol the front of the race. There were several times that a dangerous group was off and I rode hard to keep them close or pull them back. I ended up cracking pretty bad with three major climbs to go. I was able to chase back, but the writing was on the wall as probably the hardest two climbs were left. I rode the last 10 miles or so solo or in a small group.

Frankly, I'm really disappointed with my race. I didn't ride smart at all, and it may have cost me chance at a good GC placing. I'm guessing that I'm at least 10 mins down and there is no way for me to make that up. I really have no idea if my lungs are the problem, or if I'm just slow. Regardless, I need to have a good race soon or I'm gonna be fried mentally. I'm sick of feeling helpless on the bike.

The other bad news is that Chris Hong was the only guy from our team to make the selection today, and while he is a strong rider, It is going to be hard for him to make up any time as the rest of the stages are pretty flat.

On the positive side, Tank had a pretty good ride. He is a Cat 3 and a big guy (about my size) and he was a second placed rider on the stage.

Bike and Build...

2008-06-17T09:48:00.007-04:00

I took a few vacation days to meet up with Sophia and thirty of her new friends that are riding from Providence, RI to Seattle, WA with the Habitat for Humanity Bike and Build program. They travel about 70 miles a day, stopping few days in a community that has a active Habitat for Humanity project to assist with the build. It just happened that the route that they are traveling had them passing within three miles of my parents house.

On Thursday morning I met up with Sophia in lovely Roscoe, NY and prepared for the 70 mile ride through the southern tier of NY with the final destination being my old college town Binghamton, NY. The ride was a lot of fun as the scenery in the area is amazing; lots of steep hills rising from the Delaware river valley and dense deciduous forests. About 20 miles into the ride we hit our first SNAFU. The road we were to travel was closed. We had two options for a detour: 1) take the long way around adding 10-15 miles to the trip. 2) ride on Route 17 which is pretty much an interstate (in fact it is in the process of becoming interstate 86), and it is illegal to ride a bicycle on it. To make a long story short, we got a police escort form a very kind state trooper.

You can just see the squad car in this photo of the group getting off route 17. This guy saved our asses big time.

After another little detour that took us on some nice dirt roads along the river we got to Hale Eddy which is a few mile from my parent's house. A few of the group decided to take a break and cool off in/by the river.

From there it was a few miles to Deposit, NY where we stopped and snacked some eats. After lunch we had about 30 more miles to Binghamton which included a few long steady climbs.

Once in Bling-Blinghamton, I met up with my old roommate Doug who lives in the area. He and his wife, Jimae, are expecting their first (and only from what she says) child in a few weeks. It was nice to catch up as It has been at least a year since I saw either of them.

On Friday morning I met up with the Bike and Build peeps for a few hours of landscaping fun at a build site on the south side of Binghamton. This was one of the more interesting parts of the trip as i got to speak with many, but regrettably not all, of the people on the trip. I must say that these people have some serious motivation and direction in their lives. I takes a certain type of person to up and leave their comfort zone and ride across the country helping out the disadvantaged. What is even mare amazing is that 90% of the people on the trip are not avid cyclists.

After the build day, Sophia and I stumbled around Binghamton for a few hours taking in some of the bizarre architecture of the area. We even went to Beethoven (recreation) park and took a carousel ride, which is a bit of Binghamton area history/culture.

Best wishes to all those on the Providence–Seattle route and all the others that are out there making this world a better place.

I'm (almost) back...

2008-06-05T22:43:00.003-04:00

So it is semi official. I'm a bike racer again. This has nothing to do with riding well and getting results, rather the opposite. After a year of keeping the rubber side down, I came off the bike this weekend. The incident occurred at the Murad RR. It was a nice course, slightly rolling with no big climbs to lug my ass up. The weather on the other hand was not so nice. Once again, it poured buckets shortly after the start of our race. I was on early duty and the guys were out to give other teams hell until something good got away. After a few failed attempts I was off in a small group at the end of the first lap. I'm second wheel going into a slightly off camber down hill right hander, and boom front wheel pushed out and i'm on the deck sliding before I know what has happened. I didn't even get my hands off the bars, and thus ground my knuckles pretty good. I slid thru the corner, but my bike ended up in the middle of the road, and I couldn't get it until the entire field passed by. After getting things straight (saddle, bars, stem) I chased and chased. I caught the group at the start finish on the next lap when the officials stopped the race due to weather. after standing around for 30 mins they canceled the race. That is twice this year!!!

The following day was the CSC invite down in Arlington, VA (D.C. for all intents). Our race was fast and aggressive so much that the field went from over 100 to about 40 in short order. We tried like hell to get a break going but nothing ever materialized. One dude rode off solo and won. The rest of us tried to bring it back but got no help from the other teams, and or guys were pretty gassed for the sprint. Rick hung tough and nabbed 14th. I'm still missing that little bit of form that is the difference between driving a break and hanging on for dear life, but I'm getting closer.

Now I have a few weekends off, before Tour of Ohio. I'm hoping that training through these past few weeks of racing will pay off.

Shaken...

2008-06-02T22:26:00.003-04:00

It is not too often that I see pictures of something that really knocks me for a loop. We are constantly barraged with shots of death and violence, and that has probably made me a little numb to most things. There is also a certain detachment as I have never be victim of a violent crime, war, or natural disaster.

I was sent a link to some photos of an accident involving a drunk driver and a bicycle race in Mexico.

This is the first image I saw.

This image is especially terrifying to anyone that has ever ridden in a road race. The car on the right is a police escort, so the riders were still in the "protection" of the race caravan. I can tell you that in the middle of a race you certainly let your guard down in terms of interacting with traffic because you rely on the escorts to keep you safe. The victims here probably had no idea what was going on until it was too late.

This image was pretty bad and I knew that the aftermath would not be good, but i was not prepared for what I saw a few images later.

That image is what shook me. It just reeks of death. No heroic efforts at CPR, no ambulance. I could have handled an image of massive trauma and EMT's doing what they could, as that would have given some hope that the guy would pull through. Nope, just a bunch of people looking at a pile of meat and bone covered by a blanket. If that doesn't remind you that we are mortal, I'm not sure what will.

DRK+NRC=DNF

2008-05-26T09:40:00.002-04:00

Bike Jam is over and it was a huge success. Our amateur racers had some good rides, and the pro team notched the Vee in front of the title sponsor, the Kelly family. I was in the pro race and it was fast from the gun. I was stuck mid pack for the majority of the race and unable/unwilling to move up as the field was strung out. In the last 1/4 of the race, the gaps started to open and I after closing a few, I cracked. End of race.

Sunday was a Crit down at RFK stadium in D.C. It was on a 2 mile long pan flat course through several parking lots around the stadium. Again it was fast, but the course was so wide open it was pretty easy to move up. It came down to a bunch sprint and I was 14th. Still a little off my form, but getting better. I actually felt like I was part of the race today, which was a boost for the morale.

One last note on how small the cycling world is. I ran into some old friends that I expected to see. Baumann and Bennett were both at Bike Jam, and it was nice to see some of my old racing friends. Then there were some surprises. Liz F. from Ohio state and her man Ben just got back form spending 2 years in South America and are moving to DC. They found some time to squeeze in some bike racing while out east looking for a place to live. It never ceases to amaze me at how close knit of a community the cycling world is.

More updates...

2008-05-23T21:32:00.004-04:00

It has been a hectic few weeks for me.

I'm still not recovered from getting sick after "The Dolan Deluge (parts one and two)". The same thing happened last year, i got a bad sinus infection, then my allergies just kept my cough and congestion lingering. Modern medicine has not been much help either. With nearly five weeks of feeling like poo, the doctors are just flabbergasted. Not much seems to help.

The other big news is that I finally graduated with my Ph.D.

Yup, drinking a 40 oz. in full academic regalia is mandatory.

In the meantime, my midwest boys have been killing it on the bike, with the TSK, The Earl of Skeet, AY , and Nick Dornik getting some good results over the past weekend. TSK bagged his first P/1/2 victory so I owe him more malt liquor.

Tomorrow is my new home race: Bike Jam/Kelly Cup. Lots of big name are slated for the 40 mile pro/1 race and It is going to be tough for sure. I think i'll be trying to hide most of the day. As a bonus, some old friends form the midwest will be in attendance. I look forward to mixing it up with them, or at least having a chat on the line.

Bed time, I've got to be up at 6:00 to go help work the race.

Updates...

2008-04-27T17:39:00.005-04:00

Hey all, Not much is new aside from the fact that I've been really ill for a week now. Apparently hard races in the cold rain are not good for my immune system. Since there have been some comments about my new ride and kit, I'll post some pictures. enjoy.

So, yes Skeeter, I am on a sloping tube Lemon-D. As to whether my kit matches my bike, I'm color blind but even I think that the match is not too close.

Good and bad...

2008-04-21T20:23:00.007-04:00

I suited up for a stupid wet afternoon of racing at the Carl Dolan Memorial race. It was on a nice, but a bit boring, course about 20 mins from Baltimore. 2.1 miles per lap with only one real corner which was at the bottom of a hill. I was to line up for the masters 30+ and then the 1-2-3 race later in the day. It pissed on us in the 30+ with several inches of standing water on the lower parts of course, but it was pretty safe with no one falling down till the last kilometer. That said, I did have a close call whit some dude who though his spokes were tougher than my rear derailleur—my derailleur won. I felt bad for about 20 secnds and i got squeezed a bit and may have drifted towards this guy. Then in the next flurry of attacks this guy does his best "Moses parts the red sea" impression by screaming "MIDDLE!!!!" while trying to push through the center of the field about 20 guys back.

Anyhoo, as a team we were pretty aggressive either initiating or covering just about every move. WIth a few laps left we got to the top of the climb and i could feel the lull coming. Below is a picture of me taking the situation on to my own hands and throwing the attack.

This turned out to be the winning move as two big players in the field decided to join me. Here is a shot of the break a little later in the race. notice two things: It stopped raining, and I'm not there.

I was packing up pretty bad and still trying to work, but I guess the guys thought I was trying to be disruptive. I swung off a pull and the guy in the back let a gap open and then jumped me. I was pretty much pegged and couldn't close the gap, game over. I got back in the field and was pissed off and put that to use in the sprint nabbing 4th over all.

The 1-2-3 race was fast and furious. then the rain/hail/wind/thunder started. The wind took out the tent at the finish line and the officials called the races due to the large amount of lightning. Kind a bummer to not get to finish the race, but racing in that shit twice in one day was enough for me.

The fitness is coming along, and I think in a month I'll be rolling pretty well.

For more images of the race check out Jim Wilson's photos.

caminar de berguensa...

2008-04-17T22:01:00.002-04:00

At the end of my ride today I experienced the dreaded double flat. I hit some piece of an automobile that was lying in the broken pavement of the bike lane I was in. This resulted in a double pinch flat and a huge gash in my front tire. Despite having a spare tube and a patch kit, I didn't think I could boot the front tire. Couple that with the fact that I was about a mile from my home I said fuggit, popped my shoes off and walked it in. This is the cycling equivalent "walk of shame" that takes place most every saturday and sunday morning on college campuses.

You may note several similarities between the two walks of shame referred to above. Clad in spandex walking around baltimore is pretty much the equivalent to walking home past the sunday morning churchgoers in a cute dress with nookie hair. My choice of footwear was also ill-suited for the trek home. I'll never understand why people insist on wearing good shoes out to the crappy campus bars. For one they hinder the walk home that night or the next day. Second, they are just bound to end up covered in dirt and various bodily fluids. Seriously, you should all start wearing your flip-flops to the bars, better for walking and you can wear then directly into the shower to wash the filth off them and your soul. But I digress.

As anyone who has performed the walk can tell you, you biggest hope is that you will not cross paths with anyone that you know on your journey. I was not so lucky as a co-worker, Emily, passed me in her car a few blocks from my house. She yelled and waved to make sure that I was properly shamed. Thankfully she didn't attempt to stop and make sure I was alright as that would have furthered the shaming.

As the worm turns...

2008-04-13T21:05:00.004-04:00

So I'm finally feeling "normal" on the bike again. I've had some good workouts this week including some 2x20 action followed by 3+ hours of riding through baltimore county yesterday. It was a little over 4 hours on the bike and I felt good the whole time. It is a bit of a relief for sure. I think a lot of it has to do with my body finally adjusting the shedding a few extra pounds that I gained while finishing my dissertation. Now I just need to build a little more fitness and I think i'll be ready to mix it up proper with the new team.

Also I'm an idiot and forgot what order my upcoming races are. The Poolesville RR is May 3, not this weekend. This weekend I'll be doing the masters 30+/1-2-3 double at a local circuit race. Then it's up to Bling-Blignhamton to do another circuit race and visit my fams. I'm pretty excited as Mom and Dad will be coming to watch me race. They came to a lot of my track races in HS, but have never seen me race my bike so i'll have extra motivation to race well.

Dopers...

2008-04-10T21:44:00.003-04:00

Apparently both my livelihood (work) and pastime (cycling) are riddled with doping link.I can't wait until some professor who is all hopped up on Ritalin powns me in a competition for NSF funding.

On a completely unrelated note I went to the local "Wed. Night Worlds" last night. All in all it was a solid 3+ hour ride, with 1.5 of it being during the training race. We had a good group of 25 or so. We ended up whittling it down to 5 of us at the end. The attrition was partly due to the strength of the riders, and partly due to sketchball descending antics by our local MTB hardman Chris. I swear I was sitting on John Rowley's wheel.

The "finish" is at the top of a long uphill drag and is not marked. I tried to ask for info about the line but due to tactics or more likely oxygen debt i got no response from my group. The jump came and I was a bit flat footed. By the time I realized that this was a "sprint" and not an "attack" it was too late. I probably didn't have the legs left anyway. It was a fun ride and just the right amount of suffering.

I return to racing next weekend at the Poolesville RR. 72 miles of fun on 9 mile loop which included a 1.5 mile stretch of dirt. I can't wait. I just hope I don't break another spoke like at Michigan State last year. Then again, I'll settle for a third place finish if it takes breaking a spoke.

Keep your head up...

2008-04-08T21:55:00.002-04:00

Remember kiddies, try not to drop your head in the middle of races. I know that when things get strung out, putting your head down is the natural reaction, but try not to, or shit like this happens.

Chute Tour des Flandres
by Petit_Brun

My teammate ET did something similar at Stuporweak last year hitting a barricade at 30 per. Pieter O. From xXx racing died in a similar incident last year at Matteson. No more of this nonsense.

Big ups to all of my MW peeps that had good results this past weekend, especially C-Bach and Skeeter, who didn't grab stellar placings, but are starting to find their place at the front of the pack. Boo-hoo to le TSK who laid it down and snapped his bike in twain. I guess that is an acceptable reason for his first non-podium of the collegiate season.

As for me, I'm battling some allergy/illness shit that is leaving me pretty fatigued. I feel like poo most days on the bike, which is not helping me get into shape in the least bit.On teh plus side, I got a new bike. It is shiny and has carbon bits hanging from it. I christened her proper by riding in the rain on Sunday. Pix to follow.

Pwn3d...

2008-03-30T18:08:00.003-04:00

Yeah, so yesterday was the debut with the new team, and overall it was a pretty rough day. Rite Aid (pro) was there and decided to drop some serious bombs early in the race. The majority of our squad was still caught up in the mess that was the field when Rite Aid got three, yes three, guys off in a 5 man move. By the time we got our guys up to the front en mass the gap was at 1:00. Despite our best efforts we just didn't make much headway at bringing the break back. In related news I gassed myself pretty badly and went from taking pulls on the front to sucking hind tit in the bat of an eyelash as we hit a steep little kicker. Racing is not so much fun when you are not at the fitness level you are accustomed to, so I plan on hitting it pretty hard in the next few weeks. I hope that the team fared a bit better at Jeff Cup today. I know a lot of them were busting their ass yestarday and It is frustrating that I was not able to b of more help.

On the brighter side of things, Bloomer, my LSV teammate who also races for Hopkins notched the Vee in the 3/4 race attacking out of a four man break with just under one km to go. Propers.

The racing here is pretty competitive and we had 99 guys and one lady (Van Guilder) line up for the start. The centerline rule is not observed or enforced. We had two moto-officials in our race and they were doing their best to push the riders back over the line, but it was all really in vain.

I hope that all of my midwest-peeps had fun at hillsboro. I was a bit sad to not be there with you all, but at the same time i didn't miss riding in the gutter for 88 miles. I did 60 at my race and that was enough.

THe real season starts tomorrow...

2008-03-28T20:18:00.002-04:00

While My midwest peeps are lining up for the official season opener at the Hillsboro-Roubaix, I'll be heading up to PA Dutch country to race with my new team. I'm a bit excited to throw down with the new team, but I'm a bit of an outsider as I'm not an official "Elite Team" member. I hope that the good karma that I built up with the non elite Turin guys pays dividends this year. I'm not in great form so I think I'll offer my services as a worker bee.

It has been a long time since I've been to that area of PA and it can be a little like going back in time. here is what the promoter had to say:
"Lancaster County is one of the most conservative places on the planet and as such curse words, public nudity/urination and definitely public fornication are frowned upon."

I can buy into the first two, but if these people are not down with public fornication, there are gonna be some disturbed citizens when the orgy breaks out after the race.

Good luck to those doing hillsboro.

God: The rainmaker and the provider of blind dates...

2008-03-10T23:30:00.004-04:00

So I'm at a conference this week and that means I have some free time in the hotel to update this here bloggy. The past few days have been pretty hectic with travel and all, but I've got some good stories.

1. I put in a nice 2.5 hours in the rain on Saturday. I really like riding in the rain. This probably has to do with the novelty of it all, but in some respects it reduces the bike ride to simply a bike ride. Often times we get caught up in the training rut and forget what it is like to just go out and ride. Rainy rides allow me to just go out and slog away with no motive other than it is better then sitting in my house getting pudgy.

2. Traveling is always a good time. I usually manage to come away with a few good nuggets. On my flight from Jackson MS to Houston, TX I sat next to a nice couple about my parents age. Conversation was pretty mundane, the usual what do you do for a living etc. That was until the topic of religion came up. The woman, Cathy, politely asked for my view on evolution/creationism seeing as I'm a man of science. My Number one rule is that I don't discuss religion with people. There is really no point to it all as faith is based on... well faith. The Hitchhikers Guide has an interesting take on this.

Anyway, I deflected the question by stating that IF you have faith you don't need an explanation and that everyone is entitled to their own beliefs blah blah blah... Apparently I made a good impression as she proceeded to set me up on a blind date with her niece. Fucking bizarre. Well there is no date set per-se, but she has my phone number.

3. Lastly I hung out with some Brown people tonight. That is, people from Brown University, and not the brown people of the Indian/Pakistani persuasion. A new colleague of mine that works on the same project is a recent graduate from Brown and invited me along for dinner with her former group. To make a long story short it was a good time. One dude was just like Patchett (for those who know him). Completely inappropriate and a great time to hang with. It has been a while since I've had a good laugh (since leaving C-U) and I felt very much at home.

Props...

2008-03-08T17:31:00.004-05:00

You've earned it...Looks like I've got to win a P-1-2 race soon to keep the 40 oz tally even.

Back to Skoo...

2008-03-02T20:57:00.004-05:00

So I started my racing season this weekend with some good old collegiate racing. Seeing as I'm back on teh right coast, I raced in the ACCC races hosted by Navy. Sat was a crit and Sun featured a nice long ITT.

The crit was a hard day for sure. Things started to blow up, and I tried to force the split with a Navy and VA Tech dude, but I was pretty much blown after one pull. We got brought back, the counter went and that was the move. The two guys I was with made the selection, but I'm lacking in the area or recovery, and I ended up in the second group. There were a few guys with teammates up the road so the pace started to drop as the group was pretty unmotivated. I decided that a workout was more important than a good finish and went to work at the front. I sat up (actually lead out the last lap) for the finish and ended up 12th.

The TT was a sufferfest and I never got into a good rhythm. My power numbers were pretty paltry. That said, I've not really done any threshold work thus far so I suppose I can't expect too much. For those that care I ended up 12th again.

Lastly big ups to the kids from the Hopkins team who have accepted me as one of their own despite me rocking the orange and blue. It was a good time traveling with them this weekend and I look forward to a few more trips with them. They've got a nice group of riders and some good talent. The ladies racked up a win in the A's and a 1st, 2nd's, and a 5th in the B's, while the guys got a 3rd and a 6th in the TT.

It sounds like I missed a interesting weekend in the MWCCC. Props to my old teammates D-rock (who notched one and a half wins), the TSK who was 2nd in the RR and 3rd in the Crit, and mademoiselle Cole who was 3rd in the RR.

Loop-de-loops with ice cream scoops...

2008-02-28T21:46:00.003-05:00

Sorry for the lack up updates, but work has been handing me my butt. I'm reading a lot of literature and trying to design my new experimental set-up. For those that care, I'm working on large scale impacts, specifically asteroid fragmentation. It is some pretty crazy stuff as I'm trying to run a lab experiment (cm length scales) and scale it up to asteroid impacts with lengths on the km range. I'll be at a conference in Houston next week so I'm sure I'll be bored in my hotel and update frequently. Perhaps I'll catch you all up on the past month or so.

In other news, I've been riding my bike a little more. Three days in a row in fact. I did 45 mins of tempo at a local park called lake Montebello. It is a nice paved 1 mile loop with separated bike and running lanes. A little boring and repetitive, but with only an hour or so of daylight after work it sure beats the trainer. It felt kinda like a 1-man crit, bizarre. I actually rode the 20 mins back from the park in the dark (i have lights).

Racing starts for me this weekend at Navy. I think I'm ready to rip it up as long as no one attacks in the crit and the TT is downhill with a tailwind both ways. The TT profile is here. I predict that last 2 miles are gonna hurt a lot.

3...2...1...

2008-02-17T20:37:00.002-05:00

So the Tour of Cali kicked off today. The big euro-pros hare in town, but I hope that our domestic boys can add tot he mix. There was a little drama with Rock Racing and I think that they mishandled the situation by lettting the roster issue stick around till the last min. That said, I'm starting to like Mr. Ball a little more. I watched him address the press and while he is a bit of a maverick, and while he over used the phrases "first and foremost" And "period", I think that he is genuine in his intentions to improve the sport of cycling. Velosnooze has the interview here.

For those that care, you might notice that I've dropped the moniker "Old Balls", while calling myself "Dr. K" is a bit pretentious I don't think that old balls is appropriate any longer. The new group I'm riding with has a large contingent of riders 5-10 years my senior, and they are faster than me. Case in point this weekend, new teammate and fast man Rick Norton put me in the hurt locker. About 2.5 hours into the ride after some nice rotating paceline riding we start climbing. The pitch increases as the climb progresses and eventually it is just him and me. I'm starting to pack up and decide to sit on. He flicks and in my state of oxygen debt I blurt out "I'm just gonna sit", his response, "OK". Then my lizard brain realized that that was the biggest mistake I could have made. I could literally hear the countdown...3...2...1...boom. Rick stood up, accelerated and left me clawing after his wheel. Needless to say I could not match his acceleration and blew up pretty hard. All in all it was a good ride and getting handled from time to time is a good thing.

In other news Sean "sweeper" Keefer was visiting his chica in B-more this weekend. We had lunch today, and he filled me in on the haps and the craps back in C-U. I't is gonna be a bit strange not being with the Illini kids (and other MWCCC peeps too) this weekend at OSU. To those there, have fun at the races. I'll pray for warmer weather that usual.

Links...

2008-02-10T23:07:00.000-05:00

To facilitate your time wasting, I've added some links to the right side of the blog. Notable additions that have not been mentioned on this blog before are Mademoiselle Cole and Craig Erbach. Jess is still slummin it in CU while C-Bach have moved to the land of cheese.

As for me I put in another good ride today. It was really windy today--like Illinois Windy. At one point I was going downhill pushing about 250W and only going about 25MPH silly stuff for sure. Alright I need to get to bed as I can feel the start of an ear infection and I don't have access to the JHU health center yet due to some paperwork issues, more on this debacle to come.

Allow me to re-introduce my self, my name is Dr. K

2008-02-09T17:38:00.000-05:00

Well, as most of you know I've finally finished my Ph.D. That was just over a week ago. Since defending on Feb. 1 It has been a bit of a whirlwind. Here is a short (or not) rundown of my last days in Champickle: Making changes to the dissertation on Thus. night, filling the Blind Pig with friends on Friday (thanks to all that came out), Surviving the ride home in the snow, renting my breakfast on Sat. morning and barely feeling good enough to go out with my research group and advisor for lunch. Packing most of my shit and leaving town by 6:30 on Sat. night. I arrived in Baltimore on Sunday afternoon and moved in to my new place. Pretty hectic.

I started my post-doc at Johns Hopkins on Monday at 9:00AM. This my friends is probably one of the dumbest things I've ever done. Fortunately my boss and research group are super cool and have eased my moving to baltimore a great deal.

My new housemate is very cool too. She is an architect and a bustling socialite. I went out for happy hour with her and some friends last night and it was a blast. I rode down to the bar from work which is ~5 miles one way. Being new to town I went thru some pretty rundown areas, and have since adjusted my route. I'll be sure to give some updates on life in baltimore in the coming days.

Today was a great day on the bike. I met up with Paul, Ken, and Susanna a little south of my house and we rode about an hour north to meet the team group ride which leaves from the sponsoring shop, Race Pace Bicycles. Then it was a 2 hour ride with a sizable group throgh northern Baltimore county. The terrain out here is fantastic. Lots of rollers, and good road surfaces. I ended up with 4:15 of saddle time today, not too shabby.

The people on the ride were really nice too. There was one guy (Mike) who has even looked at my blog to get an idea of who I am after I posted to the team listserv. Perhaps the comment of the day, which was said on two separate occasions, was , "They ride bikes out there???". this was in response to me telling them that I had just arrived from IL. Pretty amusing to me.

Allright, I think I'm off to eat some dinner before I pass out. Thanks again to all those I left behind in C-U. I'm missing you already, and i fear it will get worse after the "newness" of Baltimore wears off. Also big thanks to the LSV/KBS team who made me feel as comfortable in the group as I did back in IL.

Joyful christmahanakwanzzaka to all...

2007-12-25T16:42:00.000-05:00

Just wanted to drop in an wish you a Merry x-mass and all...

Things have been interesting here. First I got an early x-mass present.

No clue what happened there but the short story is that I'm out $500 bucks for a new rear window. Fortunately Grand-ma-ma dropped some serious loot in my stocking.

Other wise the things have been good. My sister, her husband Adam, and his parents have been here for a few days so it has been lots of eating and drinking. Good times all around. I'll be on the bike next week to try to shed the pounds.

No more updates till i get back to Ill as I'm rocking out on dial-up which is like hitting myself in the head with a tack hammer. The other good news is that i've pretty much finished the entire first draft of my dissertation. revisions thus far have been minor so i'm still on target for a Jan 31st defense.

Midwest margarita...

2007-12-12T21:37:00.000-05:00

So over the past week we've had some spectacularly crappy weather. There were several inches of snow, and then everyone's favorite freezing rain. The roads were some serious shit for quite a few days there. I fought through the poo for a few days and managed to keep the commuter upright despite the black ice. Then the thaw came.

The roads turned into a messy bowl full of cold, slushy, salty liquid I've dubbed the midwest margarita (MM). Instead of the usual tequila, triple sec, and citrus; you get a tasty helping of grey-water, petroleum, and bum urine (seriously, I watched some hobo piss all over the side of the library across from my apt last night). Throw in some salt, ice, and a paper umbrella and you're set.

Oddly enough the midwest margarita has similar effects on me as the original, after a few sips I usually feel like I'm going to vomit. Neither tequila or the MM are real alcoholic beverages, no one really wants to drink them, and tequila is really just a sporting booze to be consumed only on dares, or directly after (or during) a bike race. Try to remember that kiddies and you'll get pretty far in this world.

Winter is here...

2007-12-07T21:53:00.000-05:00

We got our first real snow accumulation last night, and that means as soon as I start riding again I'll be bitching an a more regular basis on how the winters here in CU suck for riding.

But...since I'm not riding (busy dissertating, and healing from minor surgery), I have to find other ways to relax. One way is to reminisce about the lovely days of summer (and being a watermellon).

Be sure to checkout the other episodes of the Meth Minute 39, especially Mike Tyson's Brunch-Out.

Piss poor at updating...

2007-12-05T23:53:00.000-05:00

So i've been a bit busy writing my dissertation. I'm probably about halfway done with the first draft, and am on schedule for defending on Jan. 31st. Several of the Kiddies wanted me to waste time posting here so they could waste time reading it, so here you go.

This is some crazy shit that happened in a 4-cross race. Peeps are all about ghostriding, but this is another level.

In other crazy shit, lets look at a google map showing all of the homicides that occurred during 2007 in Baltimore.

Fortunately, the area surrounding JHU is pretty safe, but I'll be sure to try to get myself oriented before I go riding the commuter bike thru certain areas.

More to come in the coming days/weeks.

Boozin...

2007-11-17T03:37:00.000-05:00

So After staying at work 'till 7:00pm today the crew decided that the office in Urbana was the meeting place on account of Gina being back in town from Wasington (state). I needed a beer or 8. It was a fair time. The band was horrible, though they attempted to cover some really great songs. To all the highschool (college) garage bands out there here is a little hint, Lets not try to cover Hendrix or CCR right off the bat. These guys did their job really well and you are just bound to fuck it up. Forchristsake, they covered the beastie boys "fight for your right" and managed to massacre it.

So I get home and I see that the dirty has left me a nice comment refering me to his new favorite blog (aside from mine). Here is what a recent post had to say, "It's Friday Night. Time to go out, pound some PBRs, and liberate a hott or two from the clutches of a greasebag." Fantastic, this was pretty much my plan except I ended up at bunny's drinking old style with my friend Paul 'till 2AM, prophetic not so much. The kicker is that there were no more than 8 people at bunny's including the wait staff.

Aight, it is off to bed for me. Also, I'd like to announce a weekly event. I've named it the, " get Jamie Drunk on Friday nights extravaganza so that he can forget that he has to finish writing his thesis in less than a months time", for the time being. Please join me for copious amounts of PBR and old stylo to hlep drown my sorrows.

Lates,
JK

Pre Halloween...

2007-10-28T15:43:00.000-04:00

Last night several of the crew ventured into pampers-town to drink with some alumni as it was homecoming. It also happened to be the weekend before Halloween, so the costumes were out in full force. There were the usual suspects: Pop cutlure references, Slutty nurses, slutty maids, and slutty sluts (wait, those were just the girls from Kams and CO's). However, there were some good costumes in and around town. A bunch of people from the dance department dress up in full costume and dance to Michael Jacksons "Thriller", pretty impressive.

Some of the knuckle-heads from the team went as pac-man and some ghosts. the beauty of this is that they made huge cardboard cutouts and chased each other around town on their bikes (i'll try to get some pictures posted).

There were also a bunch of kids dressed up as "traffic cones". They would run put into the middle of an intersection when the lights were all red and "block" traffic.

There was also some dude dressed up as hello kitty.
oh yeah, hello kitty must have been having a bad day, she was toting a machine gun.

I've never been a huge fan of getting dressed up on Halloween, and I think I finally figured out why. I seem to lack the raw creativity to come up with a good costume. My muse encourages me to work with the situation at hand, but lets me wallow in front of a blank canvas. Now if someone draws a portrait on that canvas, I'll be there with a big black marker to make my additions.

Yup, I updated my blog...

2007-10-24T20:06:00.000-04:00

...and you shall feel my wrath.

So about 6 months ago, the TSK said, "hey, you should really update your blog, that stupid picture of me has been up there for way too long." my response was to go dormant and let him suffer. I was ready to let this pass, and start an new with my new round of updates, but if it aint broken don't try to fix it. That said, change is good so here is an even more embarrassing photo from earlier in the year.

Now you probably can't tell from the photo, but this is Skeeter going "nuts over" the TSK. Words were said, a fracas ensued, and the TSK was saved a tea bagging by a few millimeters of denim. The horror.

FWIW, this image was taken during the MSU/U Mich race weekend. The MSU race was pretty cool. It was a 5.5 mile loop with about 1 1/4 mile stretch of dirt road. THe kicker was that the race pretty much started on this stretch and all hell broke loose. I think at least 15 guys never made it out of that first sector of dirt. Oh yeah I forgot that it was raining that day, so the dirt road was more of a mud pit.

The sun actually came out for our race, and mad the mud really tacky. The results of the race were pretty good too. I was the last guy across to the 6 man break that went on teh first lap and stayed away the whole time. Freshie and Matt from ND rolled me in the sprint, but I did pretty good seeing that it was the longest ride I had done in several months. The TSK picked up the scraps for 7th???

The next day at UM was another hard day in the saddle. It rained which mad the course a bit interesting. Lots of corners and some paint lines for good measure. Most everyone kept the rubber side down. TSK was aggressive, while i was a fat sack of shit worn out form the day before. It came down to a bunch and we came in 4th and 5th.

The off season...

2007-10-22T19:52:00.001-04:00

Hey all, I know it has been over half a year since my last posting (yes there was snow on the ground), thus it is high time for some updates. many of you (or the one of you that actually might read this) might wonder what sparked this sudden re-entry to the blogging world. I've had several people from back in the day get a hold of me, and I figure that this is a good way for me to to keep you all updated on the haps and the craps of my existence on this planet. One of those peeps is Dirty Mike, he's just started a blog and it will certainly be interesting. He is a mainstay of IBRC history, so kiddies respect your elders and check it out. Oh yeah, i'm also pretty bored and writing here beats writing my Thesis.

So check back (or add my rss feeds in the sidebar on the right) in the near future to hear about the exciting past few months. A lot has gone on: I raced a bunch, didn't fall down, won some tall cash, got published, went to my sisters' wedding, got a job for next year, stole a boat, and pretty much stopped riding my bike as it is now the "off season". The recap begins soon. Till then, enjoy a fine malt liquor

Snow Blower...

2007-03-04T21:44:00.000-05:00

So I used to think that the best part of racing was getting to travel with your teammates. Hours logged in the car/hotel room certainly lead to some fond memories, but the events that transpired this weekend make me think that it is just not the same without the racing. Perhaps the fact that I was not in my typical post-race nutter phase —when I have no blood sugar and everything seems really odd to me—has skewed my view a bit, but here goes.

This weekend the Illini Cycling kiddies spent several hours in the car driving to and from races at nearby DePauw University and got in zero mins. of racing. Well, that is except for the TSK busting a hot lap (and later his nutsack) on the snow/ice covered crit course.

The RR on Saturday was canceled due to snow, but we thought the crtit might be held so we drove back the next morning. Overnight snow covered the course, but the promoter seemed determined to have the race.They even had guys with shovels, leaf blowers, and push brooms trying to get the course in a race worthy condition.

With the chance of racing looking slim we packed up and headed home in search of better weather.

Now I'm not saying that the trips were not fun. Lots of dead baby jokes etc kept the ride entertaining. Hell, Skeeter even made me spit water all over my dashboard at one point, but not racing left a void in my soul. Fortunately, my teammates helped me fill that void with pain and suffering on the afternoon group ride. Joy.

Next week we travel to Mizzou, and hopefully it will be a touch warmer there. We have an ITT on sunday, and frankly I'm gonna get my butt handed to me. There is nowhere to hide in the "race of truth" and any lack of fitness will be exposed.

Drum-roll please...

2007-02-28T23:19:00.000-05:00

OK, so many of you have suggested meanings for FITB as pertains to FITB Mike, but sadly none of you were correct. It stands for Fill In The Blank Mike. I know that is super boring, but the point is that we have like upmteen mikes on the team each with a different preceding adjective. For example: Clean Mike, Dirty Mike, Shitty Mike, Hawaiian Mike, even bearded Mike who oddly enough is really some dude named mark that is on the Mizzou team. So following this lead is was looking for you to fill in the blank and give mike a proper name. Perhaps we just have to give it time, but now you should all be on the lookout for something apropos.

As for the others, Here is the breakdown:
Jared: The Breeze
"Well now they call me the breeze, I keep blowin' down the road". -Skynard
You must weigh about 12lbs soaking wet, not a lot of ballast to keep you from getting blown down the road.

Sean H: Sonar
This came out of the redneck fish-finder Incident at the Gander Mountain mountain store. Sorry to say that racism is still alive and well in our culture.

Alex: Boo
Not sure why, but you just seem like a boo. Seems to fit well with your housemates; Claus, Stoney, and the Boo. Like a bad 70's sitcom. Sadly, I lived with you for a year and you never did anything stupid enough to warrant a nickname. You need to work harder.

Steve: Tube Sock
"You do it to yourself you do, And thats what really hurts" -Radiohead.
You had to go and open your mouth and say "i better not be tube sock, they're nasty!" The powers that be (namely Boo and I ) decided that you get tube sock.

Again, none of these are set in stone. more like set in pudding (mmmm pudding). Drink heavily and maybe, just maybe, you'll do something stupid enough to get a better name.

In other news, Illini Cycling got some good press coverage today in the Daily Illini. Pretty nice stuff.

Keep 'em coming...

2007-02-26T22:07:00.000-05:00

So I've received a few guesses as to the meaning of FITB Mike. Please feel free to make these as public comments even if they are quite lewd. For example a certain Female graced my inbox with these two gems: Fuck [her] in the butt Mike, and Fun In The Bath Mike. I'll ask him if he is looking for a date.

I've also had a few people asking to connect the monikers to the respective persons, but that will have to wait till later this week, as I still need to consult with the powers that be.

And so it begins...

2007-02-25T21:09:00.000-05:00

The MWCCC road season got off to an interesting start this weekend. C-bach, TSK, Claus, Skeeter, Skeefer, the breeze, waffles, FITB Mike, boo, tube sock, sonar, Brett the photo guy, the juicy girl, and yours truly packed up and headed to Ohio for a Crit and RR hosted by The Ohio State University. I've placed emphasis on the "the" ( an awesome 80's band BTW) as anyone that attends the Ohio State University will have no problem reminding you to add that oh so important article to the beginning. Right now most of my readership is wondering who all of the nicknames above belong to. Quite honestly I made almost all of the newbies nicknames up. Some of them have relevance to events that transpired during the course of the weekend, and others I just flat out bullshitted. If you've made it this far, please leave comments trying to match them up with those who attended. Bonus points if you can figure out what FITB means, there are some super secret double bonus points related to that as well, but you'll have to figure that out on your own. Also feel free to suggest some nicknames.

If you have a metallic taste in your mouth right now, feel free to remove the gun barrel as I'll make the race summary mostly pain free and I do not wish to be responsible for the death of all three people that read my drivel.

Skeefer and Waffles (that is a freebie) represented in the C's placing 9th and 6th, respectively. This is very impressive seeing that it was Skeefer's first race.

In the A race, one dude went really fast, TSK went faster than all but the guy who went really fast, Claus and I went pretty fast while skeeter and C-bach went just as fast as claus and I but were "le tired" and the officials told them to take a nap, then fire the missiles.

The RR was canceled due to the poo storm of ice that fell overnite.

Karma...

2007-02-22T00:20:00.000-05:00

So in response to yesterdays post about stiff goats the fates decided that I needed to be taught a little lesson. About 8:30 AM, while riding to go see the doctor about my continuing medical troubles, I was smote by some deftly placed black ice. I was in traffic going about 2 mph while standing up waiting for the car in front of me to get moving when I hit said patch of ice. Man, I went down like a sack of grits falling off the back of a pickup truck. Fortunately, traffic was moving slowly enough that i didn't get pancaked by the car behind me. To add insult to injury, while staning on the side of the road trying to get make sure that my body was still working properly, some chick came cruising by on a hybrid, and didn't even bat an eyelash at the ice I hit.

Moral of the story is don't make fun of goats or people that fall off of their bicycle, no matter how tempting it may be.

Tour of Cali and goats...

2007-02-20T20:32:00.000-05:00

So I was watching the coverage of Stage 1 of the ToC and witnessed the HUGE crash that took out much of the field (click the "peloton pileup" video on this page). I couldn't help by think aobut those silly little fainting goats. These adorable little buggers freeze up when scared, and if they are moving, they often just topple over. A little news clip on fainting goats is here. Be sure to watch till the end to hear a "goat lover" describe how they "get stiff".

Busy!!!!!

2007-02-16T21:39:00.000-05:00

So it has been over a week since my last posting and a lot has gone on.

Last weekend, the majority of the Turin Squad got together to talk shop about the coming race season, meet some of the new staff & team members, and get some testing done. The big surpirse was new member Erik "E.T." Tomlinson showed up with a new hair style. Eric is on the right in the image below. He used to rock a ponytail, now he's gone corporate.

Aside from planning out our race season, we all got our body fat percentage measured. It was a little painful, but not too bad. THe results are in and it is official, I'm in a good range at 7% and the TSK is indeed skinny with a whopping 4.2%. Crunching some numbers that comes out to about 7 lbs. of fat on his skinny frame. I'm willing to be that there are women with at least seven pounds of breast. Oh hell, I just googled "7 pound boobs" and this is the first hit listed. The link is safe for work, and points out another use for a kitchen scale (aside from weighing various bike parts).

Anyhoo, On tuesday we got a shit tonne of snow. Actually it was only about 15". Growing up out east and going university in upstate NY, snow is not really a big deal to me, but the metropolis of C-U is not prepared for such amounts of white stuff. Sidewalks are not shoveled, roads are not plowed and good luck trying to find a rack to lock your bike to. I think we need to make bike igloos out of the six foot piles of snow where the bike racks used to be.

I'll leave you with an image stolen from weatherunderground. It shows the Temperature history for the past month along with the average High and Low for this time of year.

You probably can't tell, but the two smooth semi-horizontal lines are the average high and low, not that the daytime high has been lower than the average low, bloody cold. THey keep calling this weather pattern an "Alberta clipper". Canada, take back your fucking weather!!!! —we'll keep your cheap prescriptions.