RYAN IDDINGS

Bored

2011-01-17T14:24:00.001-08:00

Now I realize why I race bikes. Just working then sitting around is sooooo boring. I always think I’m lazy deep down because normally any chance I get to veg out is highly sought after. Now that I’ve done it for awhile I’ve realized I have way too much energy to be legitimately lazy. I currently do random weird things to pass the time like doing super high quality water color paintings. I tried to paint a landscape scene but it didn’t really work out, it kind of looked like a crappy tie-dye shirt. Turns out the only thing I’m good at painting with water color is water and that’s still questionable. I’m really trying to take a break from riding so I’m not cooked come March. it was tough on some of the sunny days but when I walk outside and it’s 38 and raining I re-think this whole bike riding thing.

Heading home

2011-01-17T13:17:00.000-08:00

I decided to stay up all night because I thought I’d get started on this crappy time difference thing. In theory it wasn’t a bad idea. I made it to about 4 am then fell asleep then woke up late and panicked. Joseph arrived to pick me up at 7 am. He quickly realized the mechanics room lock was broken. Unfortunately the only keys to the van were located on the other side. Since there were tens of thousands of dollars worth of bikes and equipment past those doors, it had been made virtually impossible to break in. Joseph had ridden his bike to the house and even if he did have his car we couldn’t fit my bike case in it. Hmmm this could be a major problem. I really wanted to go home so after about 20 minutes of frustration I kicked the door. It opened. I was a little worried about the airport as I wasn’t sure I would have enough money in my account to get all my bags home. You never really know how much you’re going to be charged and I wasn’t sure if it’d be in Euros or dollars. I had decided I’d make an extra effort to get my fees waived as they did lose my bags and bikes for a week. I arrived at the ticket counter and the first thing I heard was “is that a bike?” Yep, need to check it. Okay the bike is going to be $225 and the bag an additional $35. Seriously? Okay, well you guys lost my bags so it’d be cool if you waived the fees. Yeah that’s a different department; you’ll have to contact them. Hmmm seems a little shitty you guys lost all my stuff and now your charging me an arm and a leg to get it back home. Yeah sorry, here’s the 1-800 number to file your complaint. SERIOUSLY? I obviously needed to bring it up a notch if I was going to get anywhere. I could tell she was a nice enough lady but I really didn’t want to pay the damn fees as I knew it would be difficult getting them reimbursed later. So I was in Belgium for over two weeks, I came here to race cyclocross, my bags and bikes were lost the WHOLE time, I paid absorb anent fees to get them here and they were finally delivered last night just in time to drive them right back to the airport so I could pay more fees (slightly exaggerated). This whole trip was pointless; I sat in a house for two weeks watching crappy American music videos. OH, that’s horrible! You came here to race ‘cross? My husband loves cyclocross; I can’t pull him away from the TV on the weekends. Here, let me make a call. She talked to someone in French for awhile and hung up. Alright sir, I’m waiving all the fees. Here’s your ticket, I’m sorry about all this, have a great flight. SICK! I was waiting around to board my flight to O’Hare so I could be last and avoid all the chaos. I looked down and realized I was row 7. Hmmm that’s pretty far towards the front; usually I’m row 36 or even further back. So I got on the plane and realized she had upgraded me to business class! Nice. My seat folded down into basically a bed, I had a nice big TV right in front of me, a small toiletries case for cleaning up. Sir would you like a beverage? Yeah, I’ll have wine. What else do you have? We also have Stella. Hmmm I’ll take one of those to. Awesome, while I was double fisting my drinks everyone else was trying to find a spot for their carry on. I was being waited on hand and foot! I dozed in and out of consciousness, awoken by nice flight attendants putting mini table clothes on my tray and bringing me food then I’d doze back off for a while. My final awakening was “seatbacks and tray tables in their up-right and stowed positions.” For the first time ever this announcement gave me a sinking feeling. NOOOOOO!! I loved it there, I wanted it to continue. Turns out it did. My next flight was first class and I stayed awake the whole time to take advantage. My mom picked me up at SeaTac, “are you drunk?” NO! Hmmm wait, maybe…

Monday

2011-01-03T17:42:00.000-08:00

Today it was only Jim and I left. I woke up at noon and we decided to take the train to Brugge to do some tourist crap. It was totally worth it, when I get home I'll put up some photo's, it's a very cool city. Currently I'm trying to stay up to go to the airport at 7AM. The primary reason for this is I don't have an alarm clock, a working phone, or someone else to wake me up. I'm a little concerned at this point that I am going to pass out, miss my flight and be stuck here. I'm also figuring that I can sleep in the car and on the plane so it'll be better for jet lag as it's closer to my destination time zone, I'm doubtful of this though. Usually when I try crap like this I end up just being really, really tired, feel shitty and don't sleep anyways. Yeah, actually now that I think about it I'm pretty sure that's going to happen. I'm really hoping the airport goes smoothly in my tiredness. I know it won't but It'd be cool if it did. I really don't want to pay $250.00 to the freaking airlines to get my bikes home. I'm going to mention, actually more than mention, that they lost my bags and my bikes for a week!! The only reason I have them has nothing to do with them doing their jobs. I know for a absolute fact that when I arrive in Seatac my bikes will not show up. I will have paid $250.00 to stand in line at baggage services to fill out forms. I'll try to be more persuasive than this, but I have a feeling it's going to be tough. I'm really not sure if I should try to bike part thing, I've heard it works but I'm doubtful, "no, it's not a bike, it's just a big box of parts." Then when you open it to take stuff out because it's overweight and see you're lying you look like a major douche. I'm willing to take that risk.

Sunday

2011-01-03T16:22:00.001-08:00

The numbers are dwindling here in Belgium. Today it was only Sean, Mitch and I heading to the Fidea Cup in Teuveren. We were all motivated to do well, as it was our last race here. It was really nice having a smaller crew, 2 mechanics, 1 sougneur and 1 coach for 3 riders, nice!

This course was epic, I say this every time but this was epic in a totally different way. The course was set primarily in the woods and it wound around everywhere, I didn’t even know where I was on the course half the time even after 4 or 5 laps on the thing. We had a long pavement start stretch with a right-hander into a giant field with a big museum in the background. The grass looked like it’d be easy to ride but you could only make it about 50 yards until you’d get bogged down and have to start running. After slogging through the mud you went into the woods and it got real difficult. The mud was super slippery and incredibly deep with clay ruts all over. You had to get off a ton of times each lap, you were basically transitioning from riding to running constantly. There was still snow on many parts of the course and deep puddles with ice chunks floating around. It was a tough course.

I had the usual start down the pavement; I was more aggressive than previous races and got around a bunch more guys, when we transitioned to running I got around quite a few more. Eventually, when I got back on my bike I noticed Nys was just ahead of me, he had a bad start and I was having a good start!! That didn’t last long. I held my position well, I felt good on the bike, and for once felt like I was racing. I had finally started to pick up the racing style in Belgium. Flat out drag race to every single corner. No joke, sprint as hard as you can, and chop the dood like the race ends right there. This is accepted, almost appreciated over here. I’ve learned that if you let one by easily it becomes a feeding frenzy, it’s kind of like they can smell weakness and weakness is not putting up a fight for the corner. I had pre-ridden the course with Niels Albert, not that we are buddies or anything, we just happened to be riding at the same time. I used those lines and was able to ride a lot of stuff the other guys were running. I caught a decent sized group and had finally made it up into the top 30 for once! I probably wasn’t going to get lapped! Thought that a little too soon I guess. I hit a sharp downhill, took the rut that I had taken the previous three laps and I guess everyone else did too because it had become about a foot deep and was mostly clay. My front wheel stopped and I went flying off into the crowd. I landed on my hands in deep clay type mud. I was fine and my bike was still standing upright where I had left it. Nice! I got back on and kept going. The group passed me again, dang. I worked my way back up but realized I couldn’t hang onto the hoods with my greasy mud hands. Time to get the gloves off. Hmmm I’ll use my teeth, ugh, that was a lot of mud in the mouth. I pulled over and got the gloves off. Damn it was cold on the hands! They were so frozen I couldn’t feel my shifts. I got going again and just tried to ride smooth. Just when I was about to catch back on and YOUR DONE. Damn it! I was just starting to feel better. No more chances, going home Tuesday.

Saturday

2011-01-01T07:35:00.000-08:00

Another rest day today. I didn't sleep last night due to New Years. Not that I did anything cool, the main problem was everyone else in town was doing cool stuff and keeping me awake. My day consisted of eating breakfast / lunch, and going for a ride. It was raining pretty tough here so we set out to ride for 1.5 hours easy with a few openers to get the legs going for tomorrow. Mitch's pedal had unthreaded and popped out when we accelerated from a stop sign, it was almost a nasty crash. We made it back in time to shower eat and watch the GVA Sven Nys on TV. It was a pretty sick race to watch, looked really hard, a slow motion slog through the mud with hard core climbs. I could see the power get sucked from their legs for tomorrow, excellent... I'll post it when it comes up, it's one of the better ones I've seen lately.

I'm sooooo bored. This is how my day goes: Wake up, check email, eat, ride, eat, eat, check cyclingnews, velonews, facebook, email, eat, see if something new is on cyclingnews, check velonews again, write on blog, facebook, eat, email, bathroom, eat, check cxmagazine, watch race, eat sleep, check podium insight, do laundry, check email. Seriously, that's what happened. I'm getting serious cabin fever.

http://www.sporza.be/permalink/1.934728

http://www.podiuminsight.com/2011/01/01/second-impressions/

Friday

2010-12-31T07:23:00.000-08:00

From being completely toasted I didn't sleep last night, I just laid awake sweating. My roommate Mitch was having the same problem and ended up going downstairs to make food. I stayed in bed and eventually around 4 AM fell asleep. When I woke up I felt like crap and laid in bed until almost 11. I made a big breakfast then just rode the rollers for an hour as I was late "making my trainings" as they say here in Belgium. I took a shower and accidentally put on the Belgian deoderant I bought when I didn't have my stuff, the smell burns my eyes and I can't get it off. I may be taking another shower soon. I've been in bed most of the day trying to recover for my attempt on Sunday to not get lapped. There's some hardcore board game playing going on these days, with Scrabble (We play the Urban Dictionary version) and Monopoly. Apparently we're having rabbit for dinner.
I'm fine eating pretty much anything but the juniors painted me a vivid picture when they told me Ells came in holding the rabbits up by their feet, heads and all, with their eyes jabbed out. She hacked of their heads and there's a bloody mess in the sink now. I'd rather have been blissfully ignorant on this meat product. I'm sure it'll be fine...

I ate the rabbit, it tasted fine. It was hard to get past the head floating around in there. As you can see it looked more like stew.

Thursday

2010-12-30T11:19:00.000-08:00

Today we raced the Sylvester Cyclocross in Bredene near the coast. For a lower “B” race, which was still a UCI C2, we had most of the top guys show up including the current World Champ, Albert and Nys. There was still a very large spectator turnout and the course was fairly high quality. This is my 5^th cross race in 6 days and on top of that these are the hardest cross races I’ve ever done, I’m really tired to say the least.

The course had a long pavement straight, a 90-degree right hand turn then it got narrow. We then took a right onto a series of four 180-degree turns. The barriers were not very high so I was able to hop them, which I was happy about, as I have had a phobia since I fractured my thumb in September hopping. We had a few steep runs, a long sand section which I could ride and two ditches which Nys and Stybar hopped, I was jumping it pre-riding but knew I was pushing my luck while racing.

I didn’t start back row this time, I was third from back. We started and I got up as far as I could before the 180’s started which was super slow if you weren’t in the top 6 or so. I basically just moved up slowly throughout the race and tried to ride everything smooth and not screw up or crash. Mission accomplished, I had my first race of no screw-ups, rode everything well, hopped the barriers and rode sand well. I had just caught a big group and knew I could get them when I got to the technical sections; we were starting our 2^nd to last lap and YOUR DONE. Damn 80% rule. I’m finally starting to feel a bit better, I’m totally fried beyond belief but it’s not like I have any bike racing for a while anyways. We have one more race Sunday then we’re done, so I have a few days to recover before the next race.

Verslag van de Sylvestercross

Wednesday

2010-12-29T01:25:00.000-08:00

Today was the GVA Trofee - Azencross in Loenhout. There was still a fair bit of snow out there but it was warm enough (warm being low 40's) that the snow was melting into 6" plus deep stinky mud. This race is really big in terms of spectators, bigger than Diegem was. We had to plan ahead leaving our warm up area 200 yards away because it took so long going through the crowd to staging. I've actually started to perfect my autograph I've signed so many cards lately. Lot's of photographers from newspapers and stuff want you to pose for pictures. Knapp time was sent rider cards with his picture, those things are a hot commodity! Everyone want's them. Some people even come back saying they didn't get them trying to get more.

The course was a really long straight paved start into a 90 degree left hander then some cobbled streets into basically a farm field. The mud was crazy deep with ruts mixed with snow, so it was really cold. You basically slogged through the mud for the next four minutes then hit a bunch of fly overs, some table top looking things, some turns through the woods with some big barely ridable dips and back into the mud. The spectacle of this race is a series of woops. They're fairly tough to ride fast, basically big pipes with astro turf stuff over them, kind of a rythm section. If you go in too hot, you're gonna go down - HARD. Eventually you made it back out to the pavement which is the worst part over here as guys here don't use the pavement to recover a bit, they drill it. It was actually a really cool course, a bit of everything as usual. I'll link a video once it's up it's hard to describe it.

I was pretty motivated for this race, I had finally got a full nights sleep and seemed to have decent legs warming up. My goal for the day was to get up there at the start. The starts here are scary, I'm normally a fine starter but here it's different, it's crazy and pretty scary. The UCI rules here are different then back in the states which is funny (same rules I guess, just enforced differently). The front rows are called up and they know who they are, the top 30 - 40 guys are known and super fast. After that people seem to do what they want and just roll up even if they're not called. They don't check anyones number like in the US, they haven't measured our tire width etc. Mitch and I snuck up and were feeling pretty good about of ourselves for learning the ropes. We looked back, still on the back row. Damn. I was ready to go for it, I was going to look for the openings, not be scared, Belgian turn signal some dudes, and pass them all on the deep mud running section (running on the first lap anyways). The plan was good. The light turned green (a big stop light thing like a drag race, no whistle or gun) and we were off! 15 seconds later a 20 plus rider pile up. Nice. I'm already slower, these guys don't need more of an advantage. I got going again and drilled it as hard as I could, I hit the mud and rode all out. I got off and ran as hard as I could for as long as I could. I caught the back of the field eventually and started making my way through. Normally this isn't too difficult, in the US the guys at the back just let you by because they know they're slower. Not here. Every single dude will fight you tooth and nail to every single corner, elbow you, chop you and straight up push you over. Eventually I made it back up to a few of my fellow Americans, nice at least I knew I wouldn't be last. I started to make my way up and recover a bit from the effort. My bike stopped working because of the mud so I pitted, smoothest pit I've ever done, didn't lose any time and it felt really nice to have a clean bike. I made up some more time and was starting to feel better and better. Finally a good race with decent legs. I came into a turn a little hot and my tire folded. Damn a flat. I rode it the best I could but was losing places, just get to the pit. AND YOUR DONE. Damn it! That happened quick, freaking Albert and Nys need to slow the hell down I was just starting to feel better.

621,000 people watched the race on TV today plus the 15 thousand spectators who made the journey to watch in person.

Tuesday

2010-12-28T07:48:00.000-08:00

Yay a day of rest! Last week I was bored as hell, no bikes no clothes just trying to fill the days. Now I’m so happy to have nothing to do. I couldn’t sleep last night, none of us could as we’re all over tired. The normal shit talking and rib jabbing has subsided because we’re all too tired to do anything. Dinner last night, the normal rowdy time was almost dead silent. Our rooms are getting messy as we’re too tired to pick up anymore. A few of us went for an hour spin out in the cold. I was frozen when I got back then got a massage and took a shower.
It’s so nice having an awesome crew. Our mechanics are amazing. I really don’t see my bikes unless I need them. They show up at the races, in perfect condition and mechanically flawless. My bikes are re-cleaned after my pre-rides. The tire pressure I’ve decided on is matched to all my wheels. My #1 bike shows up on the trainer with a road wheel and my #2 bike ends up in the pits, ready for the first lap. After the race I park my bike get dressed and don’t see it again until I go to train the next day, where it’s hanging up like brand new ready to ride. I get done training and it get’s cleaned again and ends up at the race, ready to go.

Cyclingnews blog

http://www.cyclingnews.com/blogs/euro-cross-camp-viii/hard-yards-and-locals-smoking-cigars

Monday

2010-12-28T02:52:00.000-08:00

Today was the Diegem Super Prestige night race. I'm pretty sure this is where U.S. promoters got the idea for races such as Starcrossed or Cross Vegas. This was a whole other level though. Cross Vegas and Starcrossed are cool races but compromise having a "real" cross course to have a race under the lights. This race, however, did not. This was the 2nd most difficult cross race both physically and technically that I have ever done (number 1 was obviously yesterday) and it was at night. The lighting was crazy, they had lights mounted on trees, portable light stands, the street lights etc. There were tons of spectators, not quite as much as the World Cup but close. The race was literally right in Diegem. They block off all the streets and you have to pay 15 euro to get in. The race started on one of the cobbled climbs in town and took a left into a park and then into soccer complex with a running track. We weaved through the woods, did a long climb, a hard run up, a crazy snowy descent and wove around through the woods. Lights and a speaker system were mounted on trees. At one of the hardest parts of the race, after climbing for 3 minutes all out on cobbled streets followed by compacted ice/snow and a run up, they tossed in 60 yards of 6" deep un ridable sand, 30 seconds on the bike then a barrier section. You got a few seconds to recover on a downhill then hit a deep mud section with two 180-degree turns, just in case you weren't tired enough. It's tough to describe the difficulty of these courses and pictures or video really don't do this stuff justice.

The start was the scariest I've experienced. It was dark, narrow streets ice and snow, full gas up hill maxed out in my 46x12 all while bumping elbows and getting chopped. The turn at the top of the climb was sketchy enough, then we hit a 30+ MPH downhill all out into a deep snowy slush section. People were all over the place. Mitch and I were shoving each other until we both realized who it was and worked together. Finally after about half a lap you could start to ride your bike normally. I worked my way up a bit on the first lap then hit the deck hard on what turned out to be the sketchiest turn in the race as it was frozen icy ruts. I slid out under the barricades, got up and going again and realized I dropped my chain. I got off and messed with it but couldn't get it on. So I was running pushing my bike trying to get my chain on and minimize my losses. While running a German dude hit me full speed, took us both out. I was luckier than Ryan Knapp, He got caught up in a crash and the dude karate kicked him in the stomach then rode off. I got going again and started to move up, got to the same turn, took a different line, same thing. Sean and I ended up riding together and moved up a fair bit, we had just caught a big group when at the same damn corner, totally different line, I ate it hard. What the hell! I got up a little more slowly this time because I messed my shoulder up a bit. I went around the turn and “YOUR DONE!” Damn it! One of these days I'm not going to get lapped. That day hopefully is tomorrow! Couldn’t’ help but notice I had number 13, I had just read JP’s blog about “Learning To be Superstitious”and didn’t think much of it because I’m not. On the start everyone was like WOW! You didn’t flip your number over! DOOOOD! Okay, do what ya want but I would right now… Nah it’s coo, don’t worry about it. NEVER doing that again!

Podium Insight Photos

http://www.podiuminsight.com/2010/12/28/photo-gallery-superprestige-diegem/

CX Magazine Coverage

http://www.cxmagazine.com/euro-cross-camp-diegem-superprestige-2010

Sunday

2010-12-26T14:07:00.000-08:00

Sooo this blog updating is getting tougher and tougher as the races begin to build and take a toll. I was feeling good until I layed down, now I can't really move. My brain hurts, my arms hurt etc etc. Another big race tomorrow night, then one day off. Okay, so the Zolder World Cup was really big, got the first big race out of the way and now I know how they are. There were thousands of people, traffic getting into the race, people hanging around wanting rider cards signed. It was seriously crazy how many people were at this bike race, it was like an NFL game or something. The course was epic, it was 90% deep snow, lot's of icy patch's and a long asphalt straight down a F1 race track. It's tough to describe the difficulty of this course. There were too super sketchy downhills, they seemed near vertical, sharp rocks and were ice/snow. You come around a turn and can't really see what you're about to do, my first pre-ride I came around and just dropped in not knowing what I'd just done. I should've known because of all the people gathered around at that point (watching the crashes). Bart Wellens was standing at the top looking down, the spectators were giving him a rough time so he tried to hand them his bike saying "you try it!" I managed to keep it upright - barely. I slid all the way down straight into a giant inflatable pad. I decided I'd ride it in the race, it was less scary than running it. The runners usually fell on their asses and slid over sharp rocks all the way down, being on the bike was better in my opinion. The run up was insane, it was so steep you had to use foot and handholds to make it up, it felt like you could fall over backwards.

The start was going to be tough, we had a really long paved start straight which had been salted. The straight went into a left and bend into 6" slushy snow then two 180 degree turns. I was on the back row and was fine with it as it was going to be a big cluster being mid pack, front row or last row were the best options in my opinion. I was DFL going down the start straight, I actually gave them a few seconds, we hit the snow and chaos, bikes flipping, people running, yelling, shoving. We got to a long snowy straight with people all over, I just got off and started running all out, I passed about 30 guys and made it somewhere into the top 40. I was feeling pretty good, I was in a good group with last years U23 world champ and figured I'd just try to stay there. I rode the downhill, a dude crashed at the bottom, I piled into him then 7 guys crashed into us. Crooked stem, dropped chain etc etc. I got going again but was riding like crap, I kept crashing, couldn't ride stuff I rode before. I drifted back a ways then got my shit together and started riding well again. One mistake costs you soooo many places in a WC as everyone is really fast. In the US you can have a crappy day and get around the same place, here 1 small screw up and 20 dudes will go around you. Eventually I got pulled. I wasn't too bummed about it either. I was sooo toasted, not so much physically but mentally, it's hard on the brain concentrating that hard. I had to constantly steer the bike and it just starts to were on you. Seriously, if want a little taste of what this was like, go up to a ski resort, buy a lift ticket, forego the skis and bring your cross bike then multiply that difficulty by 10.

Watching the race later made us all feel a bit better as many of the top guys were having the same problems, they were just going way faster.

Saturday

2010-12-25T01:44:00.000-08:00

Woke up to a sunny Belgian, looks cold though, I see ice on my window. Pre-race ritual time, first euro race this afternoon. Oh yeah it's Christmas, totally forgot...

We left around noon and drove about 30 minutes to the little town the race was in. For this size race registration was in a smoke filled bar, it was 5 euro for my Belgium “brown card” and 8 euro for the race 5 of which was refundable if I returned my number. We did a little pre-ride of the course before the juniors took off and were all a little shocked as the course was treacherous. Most of the course was a solid sheet of ice, a little powder type snow or frozen mud with ruts. The race was right in a town, we raced by a café with people eating inside, it was a little strange. I guess it was 5 euro for spectators, this was a smaller race but still had more people than a USGP. About 50 percent was frozen single track, and the rest was long paved straights or frozen paths. The course was next to a canal, which currently was frozen over. They ran the course up and down the embankment, some hills were ridable and some weren’t. The one run up was so steep you had to support yourself with a free hand and claw your way up. We lined up and handed off our jackets, I was prepared for mass carnage, as the start straight was about 300 meters or so into a right turn onto solid ice. On one of the descents they had a guy standing so people couldn’t go off the edge and drown. I was a little worried as we have the Zolder WC tomorrow and I didn’t want to hurt myself. The whistle was blown and I managed to get to the lead, mostly out of fear of not wanting to go down hard, I hate crashing on ice. Some dude got around me and went crazy hard and got a bit of a gap. I was expecting a bunch of guys to come around me but no one did. At some point I hit a metal post really hard with my shoulder, it didn’t bother me too much while racing but its hurts pretty good at the moment. I heard a lot of yelling behind me, didn’t know what they were saying but I’m sure it was encouraging… I was going around a 180, still in 2^nd and some guy came on the inside and put out an arm and basically just pushed me down. Normally I wouldn’t fall so easily but I was on compact snow, turning and was definitely not expecting to be pushed over so blatantly. Once I realized how shit was done here it wasn’t so easy for them to get around. These guys could kill it on the straights, but we’d get into the technical stuff and they were all over the place. I spent the first 20 minutes or so in and out of the lead group, the next 20 minutes in the top ten and then took a decent digger. I just kept racing, a lot of guys were getting lapped or quitting from too many crashes but I didn’t want to pull out of my first race here. We were supposed to leave something in the tank for tomorrow so I chilled the last few laps and finished the race. I ende up 20th. I'm really glad I raced, some guys opted out to save it for the World Cup but I was pretty flat today so I think it was good. Also, I found out prize money goes 20 deep so I was happy that I basically raced for free and had enough left over to do my laundry!

Tom Roberts Photography

http://portfolio.tomrobertsonphoto.com/#a=0&at=0&mi=1&pt=1&pi=10000&s=2&p=9

Friday

2010-12-24T02:15:00.000-08:00

They found my stuff!! By they I don't mean the airlines, they're F-ing retards. I had given up hope, we got a bit more snow last night, about 2 mm and they shut down the whole damn country again. I thought these people were hardcore. They're not. Oh NO! It’s snowing we can't do anything, oh shoot we have too much work to do with all these bags but we still need our two hour freaking lunch break. So we had a mechanic flying in this morning, Geoff had asked him to check around baggage claim to see if he could spot our stuff. He sent a pic this morning of a bike box chillen in the middle of the floor, it was mine! I gave him my tracking numbers and he stood in an hour long line to check on my duffle bag. They we're able to track that down also. It seriously would have been Weds or Thurs before they would have figured out they had my stuff and probably the day before I'm flying out until they delivered it. I spent most my cash on miscellaneous items to get through so I'm going to put up a fight when they try to charge me $300 to fly my shit back. Mitch and I cleaned our room today; it looked like a pigpen. Actually, I was there for moral support, I don’t really have anything so all I had to do was put away my toothbrush. Apparently today we have a room inspection (kind of like they do in prison), Steve told me that if a Belgian checks our room we may need to make a few changes because the bike racer customs here are a bit more dramatic. For example, a bike racer never, never has plants in a room as it takes away oxygen needed to recover (a little counter intuitive in my book…) not that we have plants anyway. You never hang clothes to dry in your room (not sure the logic there, probably because you didn’t pay to use the dryer, that’s what I think anyways). Unrelated to rooms, a racer never ever eats frites, especially at the races as the frite stands are plentiful. A junior kid ate frites after a race last weekend and you woulda thought he stabbed someone. It’s a little confusing; because I think frites are much more healthy than a lot of the horsemeat stuff we end up eating. According to Fox (Normally Team BMC sougneur but ours for cross) we don’t rest enough or read enough and are on our computers too much. He also says we eat too much, every time he walks in he gives us crap for always eating. I've hidden my Nutella. I listen to him because he’s been a sougneur for 20 years (the Belgians go to school for this), he works with top racers, and basically knows everything involving bike racing.

We even have a Christmas tree!! I guess USA Cycling sent it a few years ago.

Table set, ready for Christmas dinner... We got BMC hats for Christmas from Ells. We were even allowed soda to celebrate the holiday.

Here's a little CX Magazine photo action

EuroCross Camp Pics

Podium Insight

Here's a link to a video of the Kalmthout WC, Yannick comes through in the lead.

Thursday

2010-12-23T06:47:00.000-08:00

Still no bags or bikes... I did however get a loaner bike today. Proctor got up around 5 and drove to god knows where to pick two Ridleys up for Mitch and I to ride for the time being. I woke up early about 6 then went back to sleep and had a dream that my bag and bikes were delivered, I also had a dream that I had Nutella. I woke up around 7 and was the first one downstairs. I have a new paranoia that all the food will be gone, which explains my new found ability to get out of bed early. I made a part of my dream a reality by going to the store and buying myself a big jar of Nutella. I rode the rollers in the garage for 1.5 hours to test out the new bike. I was going to ride outside but I don't really have enough clothes plus my shoes were still pretty wet from yesterday. I got a massage a little while ago, it was interesting. Definitely different than at home. The trainer is an old Belgian dude from Brussels, he didn't really speak English so I didn't have to talk much. My legs feel great now so he must have done something right. I've given up on my bags so I went to the store and bought the rest of my supplies. I got some deoderant, shaving cream and razers. On a side note, Belgian razers suck. I saw the normal Gillette Mach 5 crap but those are like 15 euros. I sprung for the cheap ones but decided to live large and get one with TWO blades. I really should've noticed the warning signs, two crossed swords on the label that looked angry and stabby. So I shaved and cut the crap outta my face. Now I look like I got attacked by a cat or something. There was definitely something wrong with that thing, the blades were lose and maybe a bit rusty. I also learned about a yellow bus that drives around Belgium doing doping control so we have to ride with our passports. It's run by the Belgian government so you can't get out of it. If they see you riding they'll pull you over and make you pee in a cup. Also, I guess you get put in jail for making a right turn on a red light, apparently Trebon had to get bailed out for this offense.

Here's a site with photography for the camp (under events)

EuroCamp Cycling News Blog

Wednesday

2010-12-22T11:08:00.001-08:00

Bags and bikes still not here... This morning I decided to go find a new wardrobe. I went to a discount store and found 2 t-shirts, pants, socks, underware and slippers for 15 euro. I needed to get a bit more cash so I asked around for a bank. Turns out the only bank I could find was members only so I had to wait until an old lady walked in and snuck in behind her and used the ATM. I had wondered pretty deep into town and I don't really know it that well but usually I can see the giant church and get my bearings. This morning there was too much fog and I couldn't see the church and I was in an unfamiliar area so I ended up lost as hell. After wondering for quite awhile I found my way. When I got back we had to get ready for our team training race. Proctor had set out a course for us a few miles from the house on the canal. We had about 20 guys plus Trebon showed up to get some training in before the World Cup this weekend. The mechanics got the 10 year old Salsa ready for me to ride so I could get some training in. We started the race all lined up and the winner got out of the house chores so there was a lot on the line. It was Trebon, Zack and I for most of the 30 min training race until the Salsa's shifting crapped out. I rode another 40 minutes on the road and called it quits. I was riding in borrowed gear so I didn't really have the proper 30 degree riding clothes on so I was completely frozen. To top things off the hot water heater busted when we returned so I took a freezing cold shower. I got a brain freeze when I washed my hair. After Lunch we went to a pastry shop and had a few things before dinner. Ells had found orange peelz made to look like dicks stuck in a drawer for her to find. She was pissed off. We're not allowed to have oranges anymore which sucks because we like them. The funny thing was she thought we were just being lazy and putting orange peelz in a drawer and not throwing them away and was oblivious to the obvious shape they were in. After dinner 10 of us plus Geoff went to the Izegem bowling ally. It was fun, the best part was when Bjorn tried going high speed then tripped or something and flew through the air and landed on his back. Now I'm back on my bunk trying to stay awake, my goal each night is nine. Also, I can't spell check this stuff, apparently my blog is Belgian over here because it highlights every word.

Tuesday

2010-12-21T11:25:00.000-08:00

Surprise surprise my stuff still hasn't come... Today Mitch, Cody and I decided to take a train to Brussels and search for our bags ourselves. They have so much misplaced luggage at the moment that they can't even sort through it, so if your ambitious enough you can find your own bag. We ran to the train station for a workout and bought a 50 euro pass for the 3 of us. The trip was about two hours and took us pretty much right to the airport. We had to convince security to let us back into baggage claim because you can't just walk into that area in Belgium. We looked all over then waited in a long line to talk to someone again. Finally we got to the desk and the guy told us that with there complex tracking system they've narrowed it down to somewhere between Seattle and Brussels. Nice. I'm guessing my stuff is sitting in Munich. They've cancelled basically all the Munich to Brussels flights since Saturday so they have a big pile of stuff waiting to go to Brussels. The guy at the counter was luckily a cross fan so when I told him I needed my stuff for the Zolder World Cup on Sunday he was a little more eager to help. Instead of letting stuff sit there when it comes in he'll actually call me immediately when it arrives, which was nice. We hopped back on the train thinking we knew what we were doing. turns out getting back was much more complicated. We messed up a connection and ended up heading the wrong way. We had a few stops in some fairly sketchy terminals but finally got on the right track and made it back to Izegem. We had missed dinner and got made fun of for being retarded and not even finding our luggage but it was still way better than sitting around all day. We still have some tickets left so I think we're going to check out Brugge a little later next week. Apparently there's an old cross bike in the storage area that'll fit me so the mechanics are working on getting it dialed so I can do our team training race tomorrow. I need to at least keep the legs going a little bit I guess. Maybe at some point on this trip I can stop talking about my stuff being lost.

Monday

2010-12-20T04:09:00.000-08:00

Bikes and bags are STILL not here. I broke down and convinced a junior to toss my one pair of clothes in the washer and am sitting around in my skinsuit. I rode the trainer for an hour this morning in the freezing cold garage, it was awesome. This little bag situation is really pissing me off, I'm hoping they'll refund the hundreds of dollars I spent on getting my bikes here only to not have my bikes here. Europe is such a cluster right now with these storms coming through that the airlines are not even answering the phones. I guess it's the worst winter in Belgium since the forties. It's really not that bad it's just that they freak out. It's like maybe 4-6 inches of snow, the roads are a bit slick but nothing crazy. There's still a few guys stuck in London somewhere so at least I made it here. Wow, the sun just came out!

Sunday

2010-12-19T04:55:00.001-08:00

Today I would be racing the World Cup in Kalmthout but my bikes and bags still haven't shown up. I don't even care about the bikes at the moment I just want some clean clothes! I'm stuck in the t-shirt and jeans I flew over in which sucks. Cody and Mitch have the same problem so instead of staying home and cleaning we left. We couldn't figure out the bus system so we walked outside and spotted one coming around the corner. We chased it down and it stopped and we got on. It took us to Kortrijk which was a pretty cool little town. We wondered around awhile until a place opened up for lunch and we ate a bunch of pizza. We couldn't figure out the bus system so we waited at the station for a really long time in the cold. Oh yeah, it's still crazy weather here and everything is basically shut down. The bus driver almost hit a car and got in a fight with a dude who wouldn't get out of the way.

Travel day

2010-12-18T06:08:00.001-08:00

Day 1:

The day started early, 3:30 AM and I was up making breakfast. 4 fried eggs and 4 English muffins washed down with a protein shake would hopefully hold me over until I got to Seatac. I arrived with plenty of time because whenever I fly a larger airline it turns out to be a fiasco. This time was no exception. What’s in the box? Uh, bike stuff… There’s gonna be a fee for that ya know. Yeah I know. Okay, well put it on the scale. Yeah okay. Um… that things 75 pounds, we can’t take it. You can’t take it! I’m flying to Belgium to race my bike, sooooo I kinda need my bikes… Well take something out and put it in your other bag. Shoot, now they’re going to see I have TWO bikes in there and really stick it to me. Hmmm… I’ll just wheel it on over to this corner and take some crap out, even though it looks suspicious as hell. I brought it back and put it on the scale. It’s still 72 pounds sir, we still can’t take it, sorry. Could you make an exception? I really can’t get it any lighter without a major overhaul and some specialized tools. We’ll let me ask my supervisor. Can we just check this? Nope. He needs to take more out and get it under 70. When he was gone I asked again, could we just let this slide, just this once? Yeah, don’t worry about it. Okay, I’m going to need a credit card. No probs, here ya go, wait… where’s my card. CRAP! It’s gone! I must of left it somewhere in Bend! Okayyyy I’ll just use my debit card. This is not good; hopefully this is not going to hit my dwindling checking account too hard. Okay sir we have to charge you for checking a bag, so your duffle bag will be $25, we have a bike fee of $100, the bike is over 62 linear inches so that’s an additional $50, the bike is over 50 pounds so that’s going to be an additional $50 and your checking an additional bag (the bike) so that’ll be an additional $35. Wow, are you kidding me? I can barely do the math in my head to add up all those fees! There’s fees on top of fees! Yeah, about all those fees, do you find this a little excessive? Yeah I’m not sure why they have all these fees, I’m not sure why they don’t just have like a bike fee or something? I dunno, you’re the one that works here. Okay, I’ll waive the extra bike/bag fee for you. Thanks! Okay, got the bike checked, off to security. I was told to make TSA give me a pat down instead of going through the body scan thing so creepy dudes couldn’t put naked pictures of me on the internet or maybe it was something about radiation… Turns out they had filled their internet quota so I just got the metal detector.

While at REI, after significant testing and pondering I procured my self a nice fleece covered inflatable neck pillow. The damn things faulty. I was trying to get some shuteye while over the Atlantic after watching a chick flick movie on a blinky screen that made my right eye start to twitch. I took out my trusty neck pillow eager to test it out. I woke up an hour later partially laying on the German dude to my right and kinda smell like mothballs now. Awww man! The damn thing deflated. I think it may have been operator error but I’m not sure. Okay we’ll I should try getting some sleep again. My internal clock is so screwed up. The monitor in the isle keeps saying: current time at destination 3:47 AM. That’s messed up! I don’t feel that tired, this world cup TOMORROW is going to be rough… then I see on my computer 6:47 PM, wait what! I’m so confused, should I be sleepy? I don’t even know what’s going on anymore…

Okay, done with the long flight and I’m chillen in Munich waiting for my flight to Brussels. For some reason I thought it’d be warmer in Germany, not sure how I got that idea? It’s about 12 degrees out with a bunch of snow, I hope it’s a bit more tropical in Belgium but given that it’s not very far away I won’t keep my hopes up…

Well I made it to Izegem finally. It’s snowy here so the airlines are all screwed up and lost both my bikes and my bag. I brought extra stuff to race in preparing for my bag to get lost but who would of thought they'd lose everything. I really should’ve at least put a toothbrush in my carry on… Geoff talked to the baggage guy and told him I was racing the world cup tomorrow which he thought was pretty legit so he gave us his cell phone number and said he’d get my stuff to me ASAP. Givin the thousands of bags sitting at Brussels baggage claim I’m not holding my breath. Most of the other guys are still waiting for their stuff too so it looks like the world cup roster is dwindling for tomorrow. I sure hope they find my stuff really fast.

Marathon blog session

2010-12-14T20:08:00.000-08:00

Well a lot has happened since that last post...

The first big race of the season I fractured my thumb pre-riding the Starcrossed course with Francis Mourey. I thought I just jammed it really bad but it turns out that if your thumb swells to 3X it's normal size and turns black, it's not usually a sprain. I tried racing Starcrossed despite my better judgment but the pain started to radiate up my arm and I couldn't hang onto the bars anymore so I had to pull the plug. I tried starting the Rad GP the next day thinking I'd miraculously have a different outcome, I was wrong. I had to take a few weeks easy just messing around on the road to let it heal up a bit.

Hmmm.... what else?

I won a few local races

I flew to Kentucky to race the Louisville GP, didn't have a great go, ended up getting caught in a bunch of traffic like the days before I had any UCI points, wait... I don't.

I flew down to LA for Dam Cross. There was a pretty decent turnout as everyone was trying to "poach" a few points. The course was crazy twisty and really hard to move up but I managed to snag a few points each day.

I flew over to North Carolina for the North Carolina GP's. I woke up on Wednesday with a little tickle in my throat but got on the plane anyways. Bad idea... Turns out what I thought was allergies, umm... wasn't. I was trying to stay positive thinking "no probs, I've won races with a cold before," not this time. The course was super fast, PURE fitness, exactly what I needed, cool. I hung on to the 15 rider train which lasted until the last lap and ended up 9th and even that was hard fought. I was faking it most the race but on the last lap when the going got tough I had nothing, actually I had less than nothing. The race took it's toll, I went back and laid in misery in the hotel room with a fever and went to bed hoping I'd feel a bit better in the morning. NOPE. I started the race hoping it'd be one of those days where you feel super crappy warming up but then you have an awesome race, turns out the reason I couldn't do a 5 minute opener was because I actually couldn't go hard for 5 minutes. I spent 30 minutes in the pain cave, barely hanging on but telling myself I couldn't give up. A guy in cut offs and a flapping purple t-shirt passed me, I tried to stay on his wheel to no avail. Time to pull the plug. I made a doctor appointment for Tuesday and started a course of hardcore antibiotics as I had no time for being sick.

I got home from NC threw all my clothes in the wash and put them right back into my bag. I headed out for Jingle Cross in Iowa City on Thanksgiving. Last year there wasn't too many guys that showed up but this year everyone showed up. Friday night was rough, antibiotics made me feel about as slow as being sick but at least I could feel myself getting better. Saturday went a little better as I ended up 10th which in that field wasn't too bad. Sunday was a C1 and I ended up 11th. I wasn't stoked on the results but I wasn't too bummed given that a few days before I didn't think I'd be able to race. Jingle Cross is one of my favorite races, thanks to Nate for awesome host housing which makes things so much easier.

Being sick messed my training up a fair bit so I decided I should just try to rest as I only had two weeks until nationals. The Portland GP's were in a week and I was debating whether or not I should race. I was getting a little nervous because I hadn't been able to get in a solid week of training for a few weeks so I decided I'd hit it hard then rest a few days going into nationals. I trained through Portland which ended up being a suffer fest, I knew this would be the case going in but was bummed when I wasn't going too well.

A few days at home and I was off to Bend for Nationals.

I was feeling motivated for Sunday and felt pretty good out on the course. I had a 3rd row start which was acceptable givin my season thus far and lack of UCI points. The first 30 seconds were okay-ish, I knew it'd be sketchy. I was knocked off course on the first turn but managed to stay upright. I got up into the top 10 to 15 and was slowing down into the next turn, everyone piled into me. Damn. I was knocked off and got caught up a bit in the course tape. I got going as quick as I could but had lost 1o spots or so. I settle into the race a bit and was starting to work my way back up. Guys were starting to fade 10 minutes into the race so I was able to pick a few guys off each lap. I wanted to get myself at least into a respectable top 10 finish when I felt my rear tire getting soft. SHIT. I had just past the pits and just rode it for awhile. I ran some of the rocky sections so I would totally destroy the rim. I finally made it to the pits after getting past by about 20 guys. I was pissed. I rode as hard as I could the rest of the race but the damage had been done and the gaps were too big. I caught as many guys as I could and finished on the lead lap at least but I was super bummed. On a side note, the racing in the US goes up and up and up. I'm pretty sure this was the fastest nationals I've done. The big race of the season had gone to shit. I'm trying to not be too depressed about it.

I'm really glad I was selected to go to EuroCrossCamp as I hate ending my season on such a low not after all that hard work. I'm really exited to go race all the super fast guys Belgium and gain some experience. I'll update the blog ideally everyday in europe as I'm sure I'll have some interesting stories...

MFG #1

2010-09-12T20:50:00.000-07:00

First series race of the weekend today at Big Finn Park in Kirkland. The course was pretty brutal because there was very little recovery. It came down to Nick, Spencer and I pretty quick and we stayed together for most of the race. The course favored groups of two or three as there was a lot of road sections to work together or reel in a loan leader. I figured it'd be a late race attack once we were all softened up a bit. I was thinking I'd go on the last lap on a muddy technical section and drill it all the way to the finish. Nick was thinking the 2nd to last lap and Spencer was always in a good position to hang on. We started lapping riders about 3 laps in which added another level of difficulty. I rode on the front a good portion of the race and had to let someone else do a bit of work. Nick was drilling it on the front going into the one technical muddy section. Nick and Spencer made it then a lapped rider stopped in front of me and I had to dismount and run. I lost about 10 seconds which I couldn't close down with everybody going all out into the final lap. Bummer.

Wednesday

2010-09-08T21:13:00.000-07:00

Today was a pretty tough day, especially with the rain. Okay never mind, I don't give a crap about talking about bikes, I saw a freakin Big Foot!! Holy crap!! Any one who knows me well knows about my (some say) irrational phobia of Big Foot (AKA Sasquatch). Well let me tell you a little story... I had just completed a cross workout then decided to head up and ride the Rim Trail at Mud Mountain Damn. It was very dark and dreary today with a slight yet constant drizzle. There was absolutely no one around up there, not a car in sight. To be honest, I was actually creeped out a bit being up there all alone in the woods. It was getting dark and there was no one around and I was having more rational fears of cougars and meth addicts. I continued down the trail and finally got to the end (4 miles into the woods) it ended up raining a little harder and got a bit foggier, perfect scenario for a werewolf attack. I'm in a slight grass clearing at the edge of the woods with a giant wooded bank going down towards the White River. I was just chillin for a sec sipping some water. All of a sudden I hear a crazy loud crashing through the woods and I look up to see some something crash through the trees maybe 50 yards away and knock a small tree at least 5" in diameter over, it crashed down through the fog, a chill went down my spine and a huge wave of adrenaline, then complete and utter silence. All I could hear was my heart beat. It was over in second. I could see something, almost a blur off in the trees but I wasn't sure what it was but it looked to be standing incredibly still. I had the distinct feeling it was watching me. So it turns out, if Big Foot chased people down and killed them I would've been completely screwed. I completely froze, 22 years of child hood (and adulthood) fears froze me solid. Turns out Big Foot is worth 500 watts for a solid 5+ minutes. The trail was crazy slippery with all the wet roots and mud but I didn't care I rode ballz to the wall. I crashed hard on a slippery bridge, fastest I've ever ridden that trail. Finally I was back out at the road. Safe, for now.... No joke it was Big Foot. If you don't believe me that's coo, you just come with me on a little bike ride and by with me, I mean without me, no way in hell I'm going there again but I'll draw you a nice little map with a big red X where you can find Big Foot.

So I did a little research, many a sitings in that area, in fact one exactly in that area... Oddly familiar...

http://www.bfro.net/GDB/show_report.asp?id=26255

http://www.bfro.net/GDB/show_report.asp?id=9447

Labor day cross

2010-09-06T22:54:00.000-07:00

First race of the season today. I usually consider labor day way too early to be racing cross but with so many big races early on I've had to set all this aside and try to be mildly prepared for these early races. If anything it's a great opportunity to work some of the bugs out of the body and bike. I decided to race hard to get an idea what my weaknesses are so I could work on them in the coming weeks which worked out because I won.

Day 5 - Got lost

2010-09-04T09:35:00.002-07:00

Today Cat my dad and I tried to do some ride out of a book. Turns out we were riding the wrong trail (no wonder the map didn't coincide). It was supposed to be an easy ride with 600 vertical feet of climbing, 3000 feet later we arrived back at the truck.

Day 4 - Fox Creek

2010-09-04T09:35:00.001-07:00

Today Cat my Dad and I rode up to Fox creek from the condo. It was pretty mellow with a smooth fast descent. My phone got sweaty so I didn't take any pictures.

Day 3 - Baldy

2010-09-04T09:34:00.001-07:00

Today Dan my dad Rob and I rode Baldy. It was a good climb with great views. At the top Dan gave my dad another lesson on descending before headed down.

Sun Valley - Day 2

2010-08-31T20:09:00.000-07:00

Today we rode around Green Horn. Not sure what trails we rode exactly but they were awesome. The single track was super fast but not too technical. Probably some of the best mountain biking I've done. At the top Dan gave us some descending techniques. We ended the ride at Grumpy's with some giant beers. Next we headed to the Power House which is a bike shop/Restaurant which was awesome.

Dan's 100K Race Experience

2010-08-30T21:21:00.000-07:00

Due to Dan having karate skills I am adding a Disclaimer: This is not actually Dan's butt however, I did google "old man butt rash" which IS accurate and I have seen Dan's butt (on accident) and this isn't far off...

Sun Valley - Day 1

2010-08-30T20:20:00.001-07:00

Today we rode Fisher Creek which was super buff, high speed, awesome single track. It was primarily in an old forrest fire so you could see way ahead, this lessened the chance of a high speed death. Then we took a lunch break and drove out to ride Potato Mountain. Two sick rides one day. Potato Mountain contained 3 major river crossings, major enough that if you were playing the Oregon Trail game from the 90's you would've paid for the ferry for sure. My dad and I rode it no problem but someone who's name rhymes with Dan didn't want to get his feet wet. Too bad there were 2 others a few miles away with no other option (video below..). Oh yeah and it started hailing.

First Ride...

Second Ride...

Cross Season is here

2010-08-29T21:12:00.000-07:00

New bike came today. I haven't had the chance to test it out yet but I think this could be the best Redline so far...

Sun Valley - Day 0.5

2010-08-29T20:34:00.000-07:00

We arrived in Sun Valley today for a week of mountain biking. The drive from Ogden wasn't too bad besides Dan realized I left a window open at his house and a band of rabid raccoons got in and tore the place to shit. He doesn't forget things very quickly, even with his dementia, so it could be a long week.

Mt Ogden 100K

2010-08-29T20:23:00.000-07:00

Dan my dad and I drove 14 hours to Ogden Utah to race the Mt Ogden 100k mountain bike race. I was feeling pretty good then I flatted. I had decided that since I forgot flat changing stuff that if I flatted I wasn't going to win anyways so it didn't matter. Turns out my thinking was severely flawed because even if you're not going to win you still have to get back. My dad passed me while I was walking and gave me his tube and C02 which blew up and froze my hand. I got enough air in there to get going again and borrowed a spectators mini pump to finish it off. Then I flatted again. Done. I'm really glad Dan wasn't prepared for a flat either because he couldn't give me too much shit. My dad ended up winning which was cool because he got a sick watch.

Ugh..

2010-08-20T17:41:00.000-07:00

Today has been a super long day plus its hot. I drew a really detailed sketch of a buck for someone to frame plus a wizard hat. I'd say the wizard hat is a little nicer looking but the picture of the buck was a lot harder to draw. It took me forever to get the shading just right on the antlers.

Hmmmm....

2010-08-12T12:10:00.000-07:00

I understand his frustration. Enumclaw water sucks super bad, it tastes like pool water.

Marathon blog session

2010-08-08T11:41:00.000-07:00

Yeah I changed my mind, not doing a marathon blog session. Looks like a stopped blogging after the Mt Hood Cycling Classic prologue, hmmmm... why was that? Oh yeah I remember, I got some sort of stomache parasite and well, I won't go into details but it was rough but I finished. Lets see.... I also did a two week trip to Montana then up to Banff for a stage race. Next I took some time away from racing then randomly decided to do the Cascade Classic stage race in Bend OR. I'm thinking next time I'll train a little more before tossing myself under that bus... It was fairly tough, I managed mid pack for the most part (besides the TT... not so good, may need to work on that a little). After Cascade I took a nice two week break which is just about to end, then cross training starts tomorrow.

Prologue

2010-06-01T23:40:00.000-07:00

Awesome. I crashed on the first day. Glad that's over with. Turns out PIR is rather slippery in the rain, I'll make a mental note of that for next time...

It would've been fine if I hadn't been on a damn TT bike, I felt the front wheel slip a bit and next thing I knew I was hydroplaning across the track. It wasn't too bad until I slowed down, then it hurt. Shawn and I didn't get chance to ride the course so it was fairly sketch, I think we both could have done a lot better if we'd got a chance to pre-ride and maybe I wouldn't be soaked in blood. Shawn lost his truck for a long time, this is him wondering in a giant garage trying to find it. I gave up quickly figuring hipsters stole it, then I decided they probably didn't and continued the search. I took a picture of my hip but it's gross so I won't put it up. Actually it's not because it's gross it's just because I suddenly got really tired and

Random stuff

2010-05-10T16:18:00.000-07:00

It's always a great day when I learn something valuable. First of all I got 600 cups for under $30.00 at Costco, this is sickly awesome because I drink a lot of water while making giant cup fortresses. A very important thing I've logged away is to be very careful with free samples. I went to Costco very hungry but quickly remembered you get free samples of food all over the place, which would conveniently take the place of a lunch I'd have to buy. Bad idea. Turns out fish, pop tarts, hot dogs and some sort of pineapple shit doesn't mix well in my stomach. Good thing I have two containers of tropical Tums.

Nicknames that definitely don't suck.

2010-05-06T15:31:00.000-07:00

So at Cherry Blossom we were thinking of nicknames. I got stuck with Eeyore because I was tired all the time and moped around. I really wanted a badass name like Eagle or Dragon. Nope. Apparently you can't come up with your own name. Lame. I don't even care, I'm coming up with names for you guys and myself. I got a new lable maker at work so I took the liberty of making some stickers for your bikes. Don't worry guys, I'm super good at this. I had a pet naming business I started on Craigs list, 5 bucks a name. Took a little too much time outta my day so I had to toss that talent to the side. Trust me, with names like these you can't go wrong. Trust the expert.

Oh yeah, Stanko you're definitely stuck with this one...

Tour of the Gila - Stage 6 (the drive home...)

2010-05-06T12:23:00.000-07:00

25.5 Hours straight through. F-ing brutal.

Tour of the Gila - Stage 5

2010-05-06T11:06:00.000-07:00

Stage 5 was gonna hurt. I knew it. Thunder clouds were rolling in and the temp outside was in the low 30's. The stage was 103 mi with two major climbs, totaling around 9,000 ft. The group started out unusually peppy and I was looking forward to throwing down a bit to see what the legs would do. The group started to come apart early on from the fast pace and tired legs. We made it to Emory Pass which was the toughest climb of the day. It topped out at about 9,000' where we'd flip a bitch and head back down the way we came. I set a decent tempo towards the top of the first grade. Anytime I heard wheezing from behind I'd try to up it just a little more. The group was whittled down to about 5 guys, and we continued with a hard tempo to the top. On the descent, a lot of guys caught back on and continued to catch on all the way into the valley. The group wasn't so peppy anymore. We meandered through the valley at slow speeds. My legs felt pretty good so I had decided I'd just go hard on the final 15 mi climb to the finish. About 10 guys went off the front. I figured they just wanted a head start on the climb and would get caught. I knew this scenario from all the other road stages. Again, no one wanted to do anything and when I'd take a good pull and motion for them to come round, everyone would sit up. The GC guys weren't too worried, as they had a lot of time to play with and didn't care about a stage win. Turns out there was a strong pro guy up front and he and the others ended up with over 7 minutes at the base of the climb... As we were approaching the climb I shed my armwarmers and vest, ate all my gels and was starting to cramp a bit so I took a bunch of endurolites. We started the climb and I was a bit uncomfortable with the pace. My legs suddenly felt heavy and I thought I was going to get dropped. As it turns out, they couldn't hold it long and I just kept going at that same pace. Another guy hung onto my wheel and we hammered for what seemed like forever. Halfway up the climb a snow storm started (shorts and jersey not such a good idea...). We passed 7 guys out of the break and I could see a few more on the straight stretches. I ran out of road and had to settle for 4th. Turns out there was 1 guy way up the road. He started the day in 6th place GC and gained enough time to take the lead. The GC leader was a bit too confident and wouldn't work to close down the gap. Freaking hilarious. This guy has been trying to win Gila for the last 3 years and he lost it by 26 seconds when he had a 9 minute lead because he was being lazy. Ha!

Tour of the Gila - Stage 4

2010-05-06T10:57:00.000-07:00

Stage 4 was a one mile crit course in downtown Silver City. There was a slight hill on the back side with one really fast turn onto the main stretch. Not all that eventful. Wes followed a fast wheel to the line with a slight gap and got around the guy for a second win. I sat up and blocked a bit to help with the gap. I also ended up with a $60.00 prim which we put towards the local Chinese Buffet. I figured we needed calories for our big final day. What I didn't need was a sketchy dog walking out of the kitchen trying to take our food.... ugh.

Tour of the Gila - Stage 3

2010-05-06T10:36:00.000-07:00

Stage 3 was an 8 mile out and back TT. The start was into a brutal headwind with a few miles of climbing, then a couple rollers and a fairly major climb on the way back in. The way back was said to be really fast with the huge tailwind and descents. If you were serious about this TT, you needed at least a 56. I heard of some guys somehow fitting 58's on their bikes. I hadn't really ridden my TT bike much, since I built it up at Cherry Blossom. I started pretty easy, because I didn't get a great warmup. I usually don't do all that well in the TT's, but I figured I'd lose time on the down hills and be spun out in the tail wind as I only had a 53t. I'd go all out on the climbs and gain on my 30 second guy then spin the downhills and he'd pull away a little. On the major climb on the way back I dug deep and passed 4 guys and kept it going the last 10 minutes to the finish. I figured I'd be last-ish, but managed 21st. Wes ended up third on the day, but lost some time to some of the GC guys who were really good TT'ers. I was glad that crap was over with.

Tour of the Gila - Stage 2

2010-05-06T09:04:00.000-07:00

Stage 2 was 78 miles with no major climb, but a fair amount of 5-15 minute stuff. This stage was characterized by incredibly strong winds. The race started out tough and within the first 15 minutes, before the legs even got going, the field was strung out and shattering. We drilled it up the final climb just as everything went to shit and thus the front group was formed. A few minutes later I flatted (damn goat heads...). The wheel car was way the hell back, basically behind the last place guy. I figured I at least needed to get back to the main group or it'd be a loooong day by myself in the extreme winds. I went as hard as I could for I'm not even sure how long, passing guys every few minutes who had been dropped. Every so often I'd end up with a little train of guys on my wheel and I'd pull off for them to take a pull. They'd just sit up. Lame. I told em I didn't care if I pulled them around if I could take a minute break every now and then because I wanted to get back in the race. They still wouldn't help me out so I'd punch it and drop em on the climbs. Eventually I made it back to the front group, but I was cooked. Turns out I made it just in time to see a bunch of the GC guys from the day before roll off the front. It was only about a 30 plus second gap, so I tried to close it up. I found out pretty quickly that my legs were cooked and it wasn't going to happen easily. Wes and I were basically the only ones trying to shut this thing down. We chased as hard as we could for as long as we could, keeping it around 2 min. Eventually the winds wore us down and the gap went up to 5 min or so by the end. Lame. Oh yeah, by winds I mean basically hurricane force winds.... For instance, climb into a head wind working our asses off at 5 mph, then get to the top and keep turning em over in the 39 at literally 7 mph on a 12+ percent grade. I just finished with the group (which wasn't very big). It was a tough day....

In other news, New Mexico has wild F-ing boars called Javelinas that kill people. You're supposed to climb a tree, BUT... what if there are none....

Tour of the Gila - Stage 1

2010-05-06T08:39:00.000-07:00

After I got a solid night's sleep on a caved in futon, we headed out for the start of stage 1. This stage was a 94 mile point to point race with one major climb at the end. I was still hurting a bit from Cherry Blossom, plus the drive, so my plan was to chill until the end. Turns out everybody else was thinking the same thing. A group went up the road about halfway through and after they got a decent gap, Wes and another guy bridged up. I was thinking, um... that's gonna hurt when you get chased down right before the climb.... Turns out it was a good move. As we found out, when there are no teams and everyone rides for themselves, there is absolutely no chase! If you get a minute or two up the road, game over. No one wanted to tire themselves chasing, knowing we had four more stages and a major climb at the end. Oh yeah, and there were major head and cross winds. Soooo basically the break got about 10 minutes on the pack and no one really cared. I just sat on, drank a lot of water, got sun burned and ate 10 gel packs. We got to the final climb and I rode pretty hard up it but didn't kill myself knowing tomorrow was supposed to be tougher. Turns out Wes got the win out of the group and we had the leaders jersey for the next day. SICK. Bummer thing about a point to point race is you have to get back to the start.... No, we didn't ride, but it was a pretty long drive. On the way back I remembered it was my birthday. Oh yeah... Our host house was haunted. I got super scared at night and hid under the covers... for REALZ.

Tour of the Gila - The long drive

2010-05-04T18:32:00.000-07:00

The Internet apparently didn't make it to Silver City NM where the Tour of the Gila was taking place (at least where we were staying...) Sooo I'm doing a marathon blog session now that it's over. Of course this is almost purely for my own enjoyment and I prefer not to get the facts straight.

So since this section is fairly boring, I'll just go through my notes hour by hour so you can feel the pain of a 28 hour drive.

Hour 1 - Sitting in car after stage race...
Hour 2 - Sitting in car
Hour 3 - Sitting in car
Hour 4 - Sitting in car and nodding off. Got a hotel in Baker City. Met a rock band at crappy continental breakfast.
Hour 5 - Sitting in car
Hour 6 - Sitting in car
Hour 7 - Sitting in car
Hour 8 - Sitting in car
Hour 9 - Sitting in car
Hour 10 - Sitting in car
Hour 11 - Sitting in car
Hour 12 - Sitting in car
Hour 13 - Sitting in car
Hour 14 - Sitting in car
Hour 15 - Somewhere around this point we stopped in Salt Lake for massages and food.
Hour 16 - Sitting in car
Hour 17 - Sitting in car
Hour 18 - Following GPS. Takes us onto Navajo reservation. Horses wander into road.
Hour 19 - Wes gets tired so Ryan takes over driving. Wes electrocutes his legs.
Hour 20 - Ryan starts falling asleep at the wheel. Wes notices this and takes over.
Hour 21 - Sitting in car. See UFO (Un-identified Flying Object for the lay person)
Hour 22 - Very tired again. Find super shady motel. Wake up angry man. Doesn't believe Wes is giving him the right phone number. Very odd...
Hour 23 - Sitting in car
Hour 24 - Eat awesome breakfast at a restaurant with lawn furniture inside. Sheriffs in this town wore JEANS! Bad ass. Oh yeah $5.00 for Pancakes, eggs, sausage, coffee, butter and water!! Sick.
Hour 25 - Sitting in car
Hour 26 - Sitting in car
Hour 27 - sitting in car
Hour 28 - sitting in car
DRIVE OVER.

Next we rode the TT course then found our host housing, which is a whole other story....

Animal of the week x3

2010-04-03T21:22:00.000-07:00

I work at a college as a janitor even though I feel like I'm smarter than most of the people who go there. Sometimes I see an equation written on a blackboard, like half an equation and... I just figure it out. Once I quit as a janitor I decided to make my own chalkboard. I draw an animal of the week to stay current with scientific stuff....

Surgery

2010-04-03T20:39:00.000-07:00

Alison had wrist surgery this past Thursday. It was touch and go for awhile but thankfully she pulled through. Too bad about the hand. I think silvers a bit more versatile but it'll be good to mix it up a little.

Ooops

2010-03-11T20:54:00.000-08:00

Yeah so I basically forgot to write on my blog for awhile, mostly because I've been super busy with building a life size statue of Gandalf for our entry way. I guess not much has happened, besides the bronze statue, to tell about. Oh wait, a homeless guy got up in my face with his scary pointy teeth and said "what you laughing at? I'm gonna break your F-ing nose" it was weird and made me want a bagel. I'm contemplating getting a haircut. I'm not totally sure though, I might bail on it and cancel my appointment, but I'm fairly committed. At this point I'm pretty attached to my hair, no pun intended, but it's become too long and is becoming a safety hazard. When I look down for what ever reason, usually to pick up coins on the side walk for conditioner, I can't see because it gets in my eyes and blinds me. I've also noticed a significant hearing loss due to it clogging my ears and I have extra trouble with anything related to the Doppler effect. So I haven't decided how short but it'll be at least short enough that I can find money and not worry so much about ambulances.

Hmmm...

2010-02-14T00:10:00.000-08:00

This doesn't really have to do with anything but it was weird. I was walking past the homeless guy that taught me to kill a man with two fingers when he said something extra weird. "Hey what pant size are you? Uh, 32 34, what... why? Boy have I got some pants for you, brand new, still gots the tags on em. Uh yeah... coooool, I don't really want your pants. No brand new seriously they'd look great on you, 32, 34's, your size! Uh no that's cool man I don't really wear Wranglers, sorry." Odd. Looking back now I should'v bought em, cuz they would've.

2010-02-14T00:05:00.001-08:00

I had one of those rides today where I felt like crap. I'm not sure but I think I somehow depleted something important. Just to be safe I ate a super huge hamburger, fries and then ate a whole bunch of ice cream. I'm positive I'll feel way better tomorrow. I know people say this all the time but normally I eat pretty healthy, however, over the years I've learned that if I feel crappy on the bike I have to eat crappy. It's some sort of weird double negative thing, I don't know... it just works. I've been into arts and crafts lately, well not art really but crafts, actually not even crafts per se, I mostly just planted some cacti but it seemed arts and crafty. If you think planting stuff isn't manly you're wrong because when you plant stuff that can kill you it's, well, manly I guess. My cactus is the most deadly cactus known to cactus experts. I'm not sure what kind it is but it's super poky so I'm pretty sure that it could kill someone under the right circumstances. I'm a little worried about the cat though, oh yeah that's the reason we got a bunch of cactus. Floyd hates things that are beautiful, like potted flowers, it's weird. I think it has to due with the separation from his mother or at least that's what Freud would say. He absolutely hates flowers and he destroys them, NOT ANYMORE. He he.

Developing a new talent

2010-02-01T12:03:00.000-08:00

For my next phase of base I'm really going to try hard to not have one of those miserable days in the rain. I know many cyclists this time of year have turned to the NOAA hour by hour forecast for weather support but that as steered me wrong on more than one occasion. I don't think modern meteorologists are very good at predicting because their lives aren't dependent on it. So I've decided that I'm going to learn from the REAL weather experts, the sailers. I'm going to try memorizing these sailer proverbs for my own well being.

Rain before seven, fine before eleven.
Evening red and morning grey, two sure signs of one fine day.

The sudden storm lasts not three hours
The sharper the blast, the sooner 'tis past.
-this sailer was not from Washington

Sound travelling far and wide, a stormy day betide.

When the ditch and pond offend the nose,
Then look out for rain and stormy blows.
-not sure what this means but I'll remember it

When the chairs squeak, it's of rain they speak.
-damn squeaky chairs!

Catchy drawer and sticky door, Coming rain will pour and pour.
-Well now I know why it rains so much, I have a dresser drawer that's difficult. Fixin it tonight.

Sun sets Friday clear as bell,
Rain on Monday sure as hell.
-Yep, experienced that one.

Red sky at night, sailor's delight;
Red sky in morning, sailor take warning.
-I seriously saw this one and thought oh what a nice sky. Now I hate nice sunsets.

When clouds appear like rocks and towers,
The Earth's refreshed by frequent showers.

Dew on the grass, rain won't come to pass.

Here's another....

The lenticular cloud or "cloud cap" on Mt Rainier means rainy weather. I see one right now so I'm bringing a rain jacket today.

Another weekend

2010-01-26T09:51:00.000-08:00

Saturday was another team ride. Last weeks ride was longer than I had anticipated so this week I prepared and made a super awesome nutella, banana, peanut butter sandwich to get me through the tough times. Just as I had figured it was a tough one, I had a little over 5 hours 98 miles and 7000 feet of climbing, not bad. Wes showed us some new territory out in dueling banjo territory where someone in flannel might knock you off your bike and try to make you "squeal like a pig." I saw a really nice house out there, It was conceived in Appalachia by the renowned architect Billy-Bob. The only bummer was the rain and the fate of my sandwich. It was the consistancy of crushed slugs but it still tasted good. The highlight of my day was when I got home and Alison had homemade chicken pot pie since she knew I had a long cold ride. I had only ever had the boxed kind but they suck compared to homemade ones. Totally hit the spot, plus I think they're about 1500 calories a piece so that's good.

Yay it's not broken!

2010-01-20T17:38:00.000-08:00

Well I went to the doctor. Turns out I had some little tiny yet important muscle in my neck tighten up like a guitar string and not let up. I started to figure it was something like that because I could only turn my head to the left and couldn't look down which would have been a little strange if I had broken it, so that's a relief. I received a muscle relaxant shot in the butt which I'm fairly certain was mixed with muriatic acid or something because it burned really bad. I also got a super sweet neck brace. At first I was thinking WOW! I look like a retard, because I did. Turns out I don't even care if I look retarded because this thing is bad ass. Seriously, you don't even realize how much work it is holding your head up until you don't have to anymore. I expend enough energy everyday without with added task of holding my head up, so why not use advances in medicine to help? So I've decided that I'm going to keep this thing around, it works great for watching movies, typing on your computer, sleeping and getting attention. I have my eyes on 2010 Miami J Collar with moldable foam for when my current brace wears out. The one and only drawback is that I look like I got whiplash and that's for wussies, so I have to set people straight with "I'm a violent sleeper and this is what happened," or the usual I was attacked by ninjas on a roof top. I'm a little worried about my internet diagnosis, I think I have parasomnia which is where you get all crazy in your sleep (I think). My diagnosis fits because according to the internet I have a bunch of other related syndromes. The one that gives me the most grief is my Restless Leg Syndrome or RLS. I keep telling myself a cure is just around the corner but for now I just have to live day by day.

Shoooooooot I injured myself

2010-01-20T10:46:00.000-08:00

I woke up this morning and couldn't move my neck. I'm a pretty crazy sleeper so there's a good chance I broke it. I couldn't even lift my head to get out of bed and when I finally and painfully made it to a standing position I got stuck there because even a slight movement caused excruciating pain. Not the little oh I have a kink in my neck slight cramp feeling. This is like I have a sadistic cougar with torture expertise in my neck that bites important neck stuff and then borrowed a flame thrower. I'm going to the doctor later which is a bummer because I haven't been for awhile. I'm pretty sure they're just going to tell me to rest or put heat on it. I'm not sure why I pay them for what I already know. I'm mostly just want to make sure it's not broken I guess.

Be super careful going through cougar territory, I think this one came from Bellevue.

The weekend

2010-01-18T15:56:00.000-08:00

I went for a team ride Saturday, it was fairly painful as I haven't done much outside of zone 2 for quite awhile, I ended up with a quality 5 hours and just shy of 100 miles. Everyone on the team is riding pretty strong for this time of year so it'll be an interesting season for sure. This last week was horrible in terms of weather, I keep telling my self that it builds character but I'm not sure, I'm starting to think it fosters a hatred for wetness. Everywhere I lived I've had something to be concerned about. In the country it was rednecks with shotgun racks wondering why "you're wearin them tight pants." This past week in the Seattle area I was a little concerned with mudslides. They were pretty much everywhere (okay, one). This was the Burke. I didn't listen to the ROAD CLOSED sign because normally they're just planting flowers or something, but this time they were actually serious. Unfortunately, when I rode around the slide I flatted. I hadn't used my mini pump as I've had good luck lately in terms of flatting. As it turns out, I was wrong. Bigger IS better. At least in terms of bike pumps. This dinky thing took forever!

What did Ryan do today?

2010-01-14T09:10:00.000-08:00

Onto the second week of base now, the longer rides have started. I really, really hope it doesn't rain today. Yesterday I did 6 hours in the rain and it was fairly brutal, I'd rather not do too many of those. My Powertap wheel finally crapped out on Tuesday and I had to have my dad come pick me up, it was really only a matter of time as it had a ton of miles on it. The real problem for me lately has been leaving from work to train. Since I'm down south I head up and do my normal northern rides. On the really cold wet days it's a little demoralizing sometimes because I'll be riding across the I-90 bridge or something and subconsciously I'm thinking I'm almost home but I'm not. It's really only a problem when I'm soaking wet and cold because I'm such a short distance to a hot shower and dry clothes. Yesterday I thought pretty hard about cutting it short and just going home and taking a cab or something back to get my car but I didn't, mostly because it'd be super expensive and I'd be a wuss.

Everybody's special...

2010-01-11T22:29:00.000-08:00

So Sven Nys killed it this weekend and won the Belgian championship. His fans are even cooler for taking out some of the competition. Speaking of Nationals, I got a present in the mail today from USA Cycling. At first I thought it was a monetary fine as is usual but instead I was given an award. YES! I love awards. So apparently if you get to the professional level after years and years of hard work, training and sacrifice you now get a participation award after nationals. I don't want a participation award, TAKE IT BACK! You give those to third grade soccer players not pro bike racers! It's a slap in the face, why didn't they smear dog poop all over it or send me a dead rat, at least that'd be a cool story! It's a joke. I'd be much more forgiving if it had been someone who didn't know better but it was USA Cycling not an over zealous soccer mom. Yeah I know a little harsh but seriously. I'll bet there were plenty of racers at nationals who framed their participation awards already, which is fine, just be sure your mom hangs it up next to the B+ you got on your last spelling test. I wonder if Sven got a participation award after the Belgian championships? NOPE.

Weekend

2010-01-10T22:51:00.000-08:00

I had a high quality weekend of training. Got in some solid miles, went to bed early, ate pretty healthy etc etc. Today I rode with Alison to Seward Park. We were going pretty fast and passing tons of Sunday toodlers. Once we reached Seward Alison headed back and I continued on my route. After a few miles I passed a guy who asked me where my riding partner went (and creepily smiled.) I was slightly confused, then realized he was talking about Alison as we must have passed him earlier, definitely a little creepy. He stuck on my wheel and wouldn't leave me alone. I hate picking up riff raff! I really don't understand how people think this is okay? If you were walking down the sidewalk and saw someone you didn't know, would you follow them around, two feet behind, staring at their butt? NO! Ya know why? Because that'd be incredibly weird. Anyways, it's always a little awkward because you don't want to be a douche and throw down an attack on a training ride, plus there's always the off chance they got super fast from the STP and your ego goes to shit, plus it'd be WAY more awkward than before. I chose to slowly up the pace like boiling a lobster or whatever, eventually he cracked and I didn't see him again.

Awwww man!

2010-01-08T20:35:00.000-08:00

Today wasn't such a good day. I worked all day, it poured down rain and I broke some stuff. So yesterday I got done riding, took off my jersey and realized my ipod was in it. I wouldn't put it past myself to wash my ipod, a fate experienced by way too many of my phones. I figured I'd put it in my bike shoe, a logical place because I don't put them in the washer and I could find it easily because I wear them everyday. I was about to go into our front door when a guy came up behind me and said I had dropped my shoe. I grabbed it and put it back in my bag. I realized my other shoe wasn't there. HOLY CRAP! I need those things. So I ran back down the sidewalk and was about to cross the street when the light turned green. Shoot. Then I realized my shoe was in the street. I watched as car after car drove by and miraculously kept passing over it, leaving it unscathed. I tried to run into the street to grab it, but cars kept speeding by and wouldn't stop. I finally got into the street as a guy was pulling up to make a right hand turn. I had my arm out to stop him but he wouldn't. He looked right at me as the A-hole ran his front tire over my precious shoe. Finally a BMW driver stopped traffic so I could get my shoe. I had forgotten I had put my ipod in there until I saw my headphones hanging out. Damn it! Why did I do that? Shimano soles are pretty durable though, I'm impressed they didn't get more damaged. On a happier note, my ipod still works and I found out some BMW drivers are okay.

Sock problems

2010-01-08T14:19:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure what my problem is or if it's common but I go through socks like no other. Yes, for the most part I trim my toenails but honestly it doesn't even matter, in fact it makes it worse. I have a hypothesis that cutting your toenails makes them sharper and more similar to razer blades and thus more likely to cut through your socks. I go through a ton of bike socks probably because they rub on the end of my shoe or something. Anyways, I'm basically out of sucks and I don't really want to buy any because I'll just ruin them until I find a solution. I could just start wearing sandles or something like this lady, I'm not sure that'll catch on in the fashion world but could come in handy if you needed to climb a palm tree or something. Atleast mine aren't that bad yet. Oh yeah, in my extensive research I have found that Alison's kitty socks are incredibly resistant to razer blade toenails so I stole them, plus they're super compfy.

Back to training

2010-01-07T22:56:00.000-08:00

Well the breaks over, the training started up this week. Man is it hard to get motivated to get on the bike after a break, especially in this weather. It always gets easier after a few weeks, once my fitness becomes "my precious" and I won't dare think of pussing out on a workout for fear of the ensuing mental flogging. Since I'm doing a lot of road this coming season I'm
becoming increasingly worried about developing T-Rex syndrome (small bird like arms, hunched shoulders yet developed legs.) So I signed up for yoga classes. I think they may actually help since I neglect most other parts of my body. We did hot yoga and apparently I was "that guy," but I don't know who that was or is because I haven't been before. So people try to be all relaxed and meditate and stuff beforehand and I walked in and said not so quietly that it was really hot but apparently your not suppose to mention that it was hot, it was a secret. Anyways, I was basically a yoga prodigy. The instructor even used me as an example to all the super experienced ninja type of yoga people, she even asked me to be an instructor next time and that maybe I could help her to become really good like me. Now I'm super dehydrated though. I don't own yoga wear. I think S/P/C on the tag must mean small, petite, children's sizing or something.

Lyrics to go with this outfit are:

My sugarlumps are two of a kind - sweet and white and highly refined Honies try all kinds of tomfoolery to steal a feel of my family jewelry My cannonballs cause a kerfuffle - the ladies they hustle to ruffle my truffle If you party with the Party Prince, you get two complimentary after-dinner mints.

--- Flight Of The Conchords

Morgans Birthday

2010-01-05T00:49:00.000-08:00

Morgans birthday was Saturday. I was planning on a mellow night, some food and an early bedtime. NOPE. Woke up with a pocket full of crumpled $1 bills (not talking about it...) and this pic. I'm not sure why you would get wedding photos late at night on a Saturday at Pike Place Market? If the photographer wasn't such a douche we would've left them alone.

Insomnia

2010-01-05T00:30:00.000-08:00

Crap! I have insomnia or maybe something worse. I haven't slept more than a few hours for the past 3 or 4 days and training starts up again tomorrow. In my on going search for a cure I found out one thing I've been doing wrong, apparently you're NOT supposed to count sheep. I think my primary anxiety with sheep counting stems from when I came across a laser eyed demon one.

I also tried: "Pick a song that you know very well and sing all of the lyrics in your head." I didn't fall asleep...

Movie night

2009-12-24T09:33:00.000-08:00

So I went to see a movie this week in Bellevue. Since it's Christmas time the parking garage was completely full but I found one spot. I'm not sure why but BMW drivers are always parking all shitty and crooked. I usually just assumed they had an expensive car and just wanted to protect it by blocking other cars from parking next to it. This is flawed thinking, all it does is piss people like me off when I can't find a spot. Hopefully for them they don't leave a smidgen of space for another vehicle to fit in because I will. I don't really care about getting a dent in my door because it already has a huge one. My windows are glued up with Fast-Tac and my side mirror is held on with 7-11 brand duct tape. Anyways, BMW's aren't even cool anymore mostly because so many BMW drivers seem like arrogant assholes. I've been more forgiving lately as I found out it's a disease. Apparently it's called BMW Driver Asshole Syndrome or BDAS.

Here's a description:

Many psychiatrists believe that owning a BMW is a reflex action to draw attention to the owner. Having no "physical attributes" to speak of, BMW owners must compensate somehow and 1/2 ton of metal seems to do the trick.

A: "That guy just cut off an ambulance, gave the finger to a bus full of nuns and parked by the no parking sign in front of a school for the blind"

B: "Oh, don't worry about him, he's got BDAS - did you expect otherwise?"

Not too bad but still... It's worse because it's a shitty BMW.

I left a note, I think acceptance is one of the first steps to recovery.

More is better

2009-12-22T11:50:00.000-08:00

So I was in Walgreens buying some stuff and realized I needed a new razor. I've been using these cheap plastic one's, I'm not sure if it's lack of coordination or what, but I usually cut the crap out of my face. So I decided to spend the money and buy a super nice one. I don't have T.V. so I don't see many advertisements, but to my amazement Gilette has moved on to 5 blades. Wow! I'm pretty sure the razor market must be incredibly fierce, it reminds me of the space race or something. I mean, I used to have a Mach 3. I thought that was pretty cool. At some point Gilette decided, to hell with the Mach 3, it's shit, we came out with this little thing called the Mach 3 Turbo and that's what you need. I haven't figured out what exactly the Turbo or Super Turbo does differently, but they must be BETTER! This whole turbo and super turbo thing as I later discovered was a diversionary tactic to what was really going down in the Gilette factory. They weren't even working on turbos anymore, oh no, they had their sights set high - the addition of a whole other blade. I thought this was absolutely crazy. FOUR BLADES! Holy crap that's a lot of blades, how'd they do that? Wow. That was the last ad I saw before the T.V. was gone. So to my surprise and amazement when I saw a Fusion which had 5 blades, I couldn't even believe it! I live in a world where we have the technological know how to get 5 blades on a razer! I wanted one immediatly, but couldn't afford it. Stealing it even crossed my mind!! Turns out this thought process is common because they were the only thing in the store locked in a case. I think I might just hold out and get a Mach 10.

I'm buying this for Dan Norton

2009-12-21T10:17:00.001-08:00

Fact: Chuck Norris only recognizes the element of surprise. Let people know where Chuck stands on this issue by wearing the shirt. If you don't buy it, Chuck will either kill you or impregnate you.

So I bought it.

Traditions

2009-12-20T23:33:00.001-08:00

Today Alison and I were bored and decided to chop a tree down. There's not too many tree's in the city so the cops, for the most part, notice when your chopping them down. We decided to drive out to the country where there's plenty to choose from and less law enforcement. After an agonizing search we found the perfect tree to cut down! I carefully analyzed the mighty tree looking at the lean, the branch distribution and of course limb weight. I licked my index finger and held it high, a northeast breeze, perfect. I told Alison to stand back for safety reasons, even though in my expertise I knew exactly where the tree would soon lay. I made my horizontal cut, and as I was making my wedge cut, I grew a slightly nervous. There's always a mixture of nerves, adrenaline and excitement when falling a tree. Now the scary part, I began to make the critical back cut. Within moments I began to hear the tree trunk crack and splinter as it strained to hold the tree upright, with it's last few fibers clinging, then finally giving way to the force of gravity. I dropped the saw and ran for safety as the mighty Fraser Fir fell to the ground. I picked it up and drug it to the car where I securely tied it down and were off, on our way back to Seattle. The next struggle was to find a new tree stand. Every store was sold out! Eventually we got one but it took about 3 hours. My job is to put the lights on, 2 out of 3 strands were burned out. Apparently this was not going to work because I was given instructions to put on so many lights that the tree was to look "radioactive". Off to look for new lights. Of course everywhere was sold out and it took 3 stores until we found some. Finally, mission accomplished!

We don't have any special ornaments to put on top of the tree and I thought it looked bare and sad. I've created homemade stars and angels before but this year I wanted something more in tune with the season.

Alison took him off the Christmas tree repeatedly, so I put him on my own tree that she's not allowed to touch.

Not sure...

2009-12-20T23:06:00.000-08:00

We didn't realize the name until we were ordering. It's a great place to go after a bad race or something.

My computer sucks

2009-12-16T10:57:00.000-08:00

It's hard to type on my computer, it starts deleting stuff randomly, shuts off without warning and is super super slow. Sometimes I want to huck it out the 6th story window of our condo, but I don't because I need it and I don't want to kill anybody. So as I was doing my morning ritual of hiding my car from the meter maid/lesbian that hates me, I came upon this and realized other people must have similar problems... (Seriously, 10 seconds later and my head would be in that mess)

Nationals

2009-12-16T10:10:00.000-08:00

This was the first time I have ever been fully ready and motivated for cyclocross nationals. Normally at this time I am completely burned out from racing every weekend and riding in 35 degree and raining weather. I came to Bend about as motivated as I could be for a last minute goal. I had an issue this year year where I was achieving my goals too quickly. "I really want to win at least 1 local race" (I had no wins last season) First race of the season I won, goal achieved. Well, I'll aim to win one of the local series then, achieved. Hmmmmm... I really want to get top ten at a UCI race, achieved that my second try. Shoot, I guess I need to aim higher. Well, I guess I'll shoot for the podium at a UCI race, that'll be tough! Did that twice, goal achieved. Damn, this sucks now it's almost the end of the season and I keep achieving everything too quick, now I need to think of a new goal. Hmmm... well top ten at nationals seems like a good goal, reasonable yet difficult. This was two weeks before nationals so it's hard to be super motivated for a specific goal like this in such a short time. I guess I was wrong because as the race drew closer I got really really nervous and unusually serious as I really, really wanted to do what I told myself I would do. Anyways back to the actual race. The course had thawed out (it had been frozen and snowy) but at least the turns were still slick. I had a 3rd row start so in terms of starting position I was set to get that top ten I wanted. We started the race and all I could think of was getting up into the top ten and I was going to stay there no matter what. Well I basically did that only I slipped out on a turn and dropped my chain. This wasn't even one of my normal cool crashes where I'm pushing the limits and have some sort of spectacular crash. This was a 180 and then I fell over, super lame. I was frantically trying to get my chain back on only it was taking forever because I was retarded and my hands were numb. Anyways I lost my position and went back to 30th or more, not sure. I was pretty pissed, so I rode as hard as I could to get back as much as I could before the end of the race. Thats cyclocross, you could have the best legs out there, have crazy technical skill and you make one major mistake and the race is over. I managed to get up to 18th by the end. I guess I can't be too bummed I did everything else I said I would this season. Having that happen at Nationals only motivated me more for next year.

It's cold....

2009-12-07T12:21:00.000-08:00

It was an awesome morning. I got 7.5 hours of sleep, slightly off my goal of 8 but I'm not sure that extra half hour makes a difference. I found out Macrina bakery downstairs opens at like 6:30 and the coolest part about getting there right when they open is everything is still hot! I pretty much always get a Rolly Polly thing which is like a cinnamon roll only way better with approximately twice the calories. It's really frustrating though because they always try to give me the little runt ones without lots of frosting. I'm probably one of their best Rolly Polly customers and I haven't quite figured out why they'd want to screw me out of a big one. This morning I pointed to the one I wanted (very clearly) and was met with a blatant disregard for my request as he started to pull out basically the smallest one. I stopped him though and directed him to the largest one. This made me happy. Today is super cold, basically arctic weather where to go outside I need one of those safety suits like in Alaska. I once watched the TV show Ice Road Truckers, thats how cold it is. I performed a test to see if it was as cold as it is in Alaska when they film the show and I have confirmed that is is indeed that cold right now. I parked the Backhoe on a puddle and the puddle didn't crack. This confirms that we probably could have an ice road worthy of holding a truck if need be.

Lucky to be alive...

My commute on I-5 this morning was perilous...

Pick Up Alison Day

2009-12-06T22:42:00.000-08:00

Not much happened today. I woke up late, my dad had already picked up breakfast stuff by the time I got up. We sat around and watched Myth Busters for the good part of the day and then decided to go for a ride. I was so cold I had a booger freeze to my lip. We cruised around on our cross bikes and went off some sick jumps. I worked on my bikes a bunch so they would stop breaking, I should be good to go. I checked all my tires and re-glued any that looked questionable and checked all my bolts. I headed back home today to make sure Floyd Landis Jr. didn't burn the place down (he's very spiteful). He was very very angry when I arrived and wouldn't stop growling. I'm pretty sure he has multiple personality syndrome or something because he'd be all nice and rub against my leg then all of the sudden yowl and book over to something and knock it over then yowl some more. He also defied physics again by shitting more than he can possibly consume. I picked up Alison a few hours ago from her trip to New Jersey. I wish I could have gone but I have a warrant out for me there caused mostly by my buddy Gian, a Hanna Montana sticker and a lack of spare change. Plus the water tastes funny. Anyways it's bed time now and I have vowed to get 8 hours of sleep a night.

This is Floyds Physics Defiance Lab...

Blizzard ride

2009-12-06T22:33:00.000-08:00

Went for a ride Friday with my dad. 2 minutes in a blizzard (slightly exaggerated) started, 2 minutes after we finished it stopped. Strange.

Portland GP

2009-12-05T19:50:00.000-08:00

I'm pretending I never raced the Portland GP. Its worked well so far as I'm not even sure why I'm heading North on I-5 right now. If I had raced Portland I probably would have had my bars slip, got brake arm stuck in a front wheel and rolled a tubular. Also, if I'd gone down south I'm not sure if I'd have been on my A game. Thanks to my team and Tim who I'm sure would have done an awesome job in the pits with any and all mechanicals I would have experienced if I'd raced in Portland Saturday.

Motor Pacing

2009-12-04T09:44:00.000-08:00

My Dad spent two day's getting his old Honda Trail 90 going so we could add motor pacing into our Repertoire of cross workouts. I left early and my dad was going to meet me out on the country roads but he never showed up. Turns out the old girl was having some carburator trouble. Finally we got going as the sun was going down. I got a good hard workout in, about perferct for getting the legs going again before this weekends racing. My dad headed home before me but I ran into him again outside of town at an intersection. Turns out the old girl was having problems again. It wouldn't start so he had to start pushing it back. I decided it would be faster if I could push him on my bike which took about 380 watts. I'm sure it looked as if I had crapped out and had to get pulled back to town by a motorcycle. A cop passed us when my dad started walking again but surprisingly didn't stop him even, which is good because it isn't registered and my dad isn't licensed to ride it. My dad was also wearing a regular bike helmet so I'm pretty sure the cop thought he was "special" and left him alone.

Jingle Cross Day 3

2009-11-30T22:11:00.000-08:00

Jingle Cross Day 3 was going to be brutal. Two weekend races in a row is tough, three is beyond words. Saturday night was my worst night of sickness. I really just wanted to go home and skip the race, I felt completely awful. I stayed in bed not moving and couldn't eat anything. Alison bought me a can of chicken soup which I was able to keep down, only barely. Towards midnight I started to feel better and ate a liter of yogurt, 1300 calories in one sitting. I guess it helped because I woke up without a stomach ache. I knew it was going to be a tough day as the wind had picked up and brought with it some cool temperatures. Anyways, I got of to a good start, made it to the front of the race by riding the run up. I was going to try staying glued to Todd's wheel along with Troy but it turned into a battle for position. Todd ended up pulling away, Troy ended up pulling out and I was stuck in no mans land alone, only 3 laps into a race with a strong 5 man chase 20 seconds off my wheel. I gave it everything to keep my gap, worst case I'd blow up and they'd catch me but could be satisfied in knowing I gave it my all. I was hurting so incredibly bad, especially in the head winds. With two laps to go they got to within 12 seconds of me after I bobbled, which only fueled there motivation. I knew that if I could get my gap up to at least 20 seconds going into the last lap the groups tactics would change and the group would slow as each would be looking to score the final podium spot. Apparently my plan worked because I somehow held them off the entire race and ended up for the second time this weekend on the podium and bettered Friday's performance. Not sure how that happened....
Cyclocross Magazine Coverage

Jingle Cross Day 2

2009-11-30T18:02:00.000-08:00

Jingle Cross Day 2 I was less than enthused about. I had been up most the night with cross gut and was feeling weak. Once I was warming up I started to feel a little better but I knew it would be a rough day. I figured if I could just get a top ten and a UCI point the day would be worth it. I started out not so well but worked my way up to the front. Todd and I got a decent sized gap in the first two laps but I knew I wouldn't be able to hold his wheel. I started to get a stomach ache going into the fourth lap and just tried to keep the pedals turning. A chase group caught me with 4 or 5 laps to go and I hung on and attacked the downhills since my body was shot. I ended up getting a decent gap on the last half of the last lap and thought I may have second if I could hold it. I slid out on a turn and lost my advantage, I hung on for a top 5 though.
Cyclocross Magazine Coverage

Jingle Cross: Friday Night

2009-11-30T17:31:00.001-08:00

Jingle Cross day 1 was a night race which I am usually not a fan of because the courses are wussy. Not this once. This was a legit cross course with a super tough run up to the top of Mt. Krumpet, peanut butter mud and a super sketchy 100% off camber downhill. I didn't get off to a great start, I was second row with my 4 UCI points, which wasn't bad but I slipped back a ways when the gun went off. I had to work pretty hard to get towards the front with Todd and Troy Wells setting a fairly brutal pace. I managed to get past them on the run up to take the lead and got to the downhill first. For whatever reason I was able to put a good 15 seconds or so on everyone each time down the descent. I think the only trick was to put it all out there and hope for the best, which is basically what I did. I crashed a few times but it didn't matter much. A few laps into the race Troy and I were going back and forth with Todd out front a ways, I hit the front brakes and the pad went down into the spokes, damn. Troy rode away from me and I couldn't get it out. Instead of messing with it I just grabbed my bike and started booking towards the pits as fast as I could run. My pit man Nate did a nice hand off but not before another group caught me. It then turned into a battle for the final podium spot. I tried to ride conservatively and not let anyone get away the rest of the race. Everyone was very motivated for that final spot and I knew it would be last lap tactics, very stressful! I ran the run up the last time as hard as I could, got tunnel vision, almost died and made it to the descent first which I took my time on so I wouldn't crash. Somehow I made it to the line and held them off for my first podium at a UCI race. That night as a reward for my performance I got horrible cross gut and could not keep anything down including the Mexican food I paid $12 for, what a waste and the bonus was I couldn't sleep. Totally worth it though.