Hey folks….

I’m pretty crunched for time, so this is seriously just a half-assed placeholder post.  I did a couple of races this past week - the one that I posted about last time around where Ian dominated, and then I followed that up with another couple where I did slightly better….hence races 8 and 9.

If I didn’t have a shit-ton of packing and preparing left to do for my rapidly approaching 2 week long departure for Ukraine (I leave for Amsterdam tomorrow), then I’d go into all kinds of detail about my recent races.  I might have even shot the shit about the TdF a bit.  Seems everyone else in the cycling blogosphere can’t get enough of the Lance/AC thing…

[this is where I mention that I'm currently half in the bag]

Anyway…I’ll tell you what sucks.  It sucks that the Mont Ventoux stage just so happens to coincide with my wedding day.  I guess I just wonder what Oksana will think when I disappear for a few hours in search of a broad band connection or a tv.  I wonder how you say: “Lance just threw a stick in Contador’s wheel” in Ukrainian….

I promise to post up a bunch of race pics as soon as I get back.  I’m well aware that this setup has been a little text heavy for awhile now.  For those of you old codgers out there who don’t use Facebook, there were some pretty decent shots of the last few races posted up by some of my teammates.

Anyway…check back the first week of August.  By that time, Lance will be an 8 time winner and I’ll no longer be single…

Lots to catch up on, so I’ll probably have to push a few topics off until tomorrow’s post. The one thing I don’t want to forget to soapbox about is the value of Dura Ace 7700. I’m spec’ing out a drivetrain refresh on the Merckx and getting really psyched at the notion of having some NOS (new-old-stock) DA on there….but more on that tomorrow.  I’ll also finally post up some pics of the Merckx and a full recap of my initial ride impression and race performance.

Meanwhile, here’s a pic I found on my camera of my blogging workspace circa last week. I was gonna post it before but forgot. Note that the monitor was replaced yesterday with a pimp ass 23” widescreen setup.  The beer bottles remain.  (don’t click on it, the file is huge)

In terms of getting in rides, I’ve pretty much been banging out 1 and 1.5hr rides intermittently the past couple of weeks…but only as much as my schedule will allow. With the wedding fast approaching, the evenings in which I can just disappear for a long training ride are in short supply. In fact, ride #129 was a pretty cool little loop around Ocean City, Maryland after having decided to drag my bike along for a 4^th of July beach weekend with some other couples. Normally, the beach is a sacred drinking and loafing place, but being sapped for saddle time lately I had to bring the bike and get out….loafing would not suffice. The other rides? Well, there were the Hains point loops, and a Rosslyn loop in there, and a bunch of other boring stuff that I default to when uninspired.

Today however, was race number 7 and really only my second time racing in a “crit” context, since most of the other courses I’ve raced were considered “road races” with much longer laps and fewer turns. This crit was some kind of Maryland state championship, but quite honestly….I have no idea what significance it held for us in Cat 5. Nonetheless, there were 30+ guys in the Cat 5 group and the course was really nice. It’s a great change not to have to worry about the centerline rule. Today’s race was also different, in that it was my first time racing on the road with my friend Ian. Ian and I had the chance to kick around possible race scenarios via email the past week, and knowing how aggressive of a rider Ian tends to be (there is not much pacing going on in Ian’s world), I figured if we were gonna work together, and since the race was a super twisty crit….that the best strategy would be to organize a break and take advantage of the fast turns. Well, it turns out that’s exactly what happened.

The only twist at this part of the story is that I was not there with him on the break. Ian pulled a super gutsy move about 2 laps into a 12-15? lap crit by shooting off the front and going for it all. My thinking at that point was that he was nuts and that the field would drag him in after a few laps. Needless to say, I didn’t feel compelled to bridge up to him. We had talked about pulling a move like that toward the end, but in the first 5 minutes?

Well, 2 laps soon became 6 and 6 soon became 9. At that point, I started to think that he might be able to pull it off. I found myself up at the front of the pack on several laps and made it a point to throw old Ian a bone and do a little blocking for him. I figured that it would come down to me sprinting against the main field anyway, and there was no use in wearing myself out to reel in a friend….and on the other hand, if he did get caught, he’d be burned up but would probably just finish with the field anyway. So to help him out a little, I got up in front and slowly dialed the pace from mid 20s down to 20ish and once we’d hit the final straightaway people would buzz around me frustrated at my lollygagging. I did this on a couple of laps mid-way through the race and then just drifted back. I’m still not sure if I bought Ian much time or if it was all in my head.

As we came around for the last couple laps, I heard the announcer call out that the gap was 20 something seconds, and at that point, figured Ian would probably hold off the field going into the last lap. Like usual, the pace heated up after the bell rang for the final lap, and people started getting antsy. I moved all the way up from mid-pack to 3^rd wheel or so in the first couple turns (the mtb background really helps a person nail turns where others are shaving speed). There was a snake-like right to left to right turn before the straight away and knowing that folks would look to lay down the sprint right after that….I put my guard up and watched for a sprinting wheel to jump on as we were coming out of that turn. Sure enough, there was a dude form a local team coming around on my outside as the sprint materialized. I popped into his draft and sat there basking in my brilliance in timing a good leadout. With less than 100 meters remaining I looked to scoot out around him and go for the glory, but there were 2 other guys creeping past on both sides. Then all three were in front of me as I squirmed out around them laying down maximum effort. No dice. I had waited too long and was stymied. I finished 4^th in that sprint effort, and proceeded out for my cool-down lap. Lesson learned: the mooched leadout is only as good as the sprinter timing his final attack. I had simply waited too long to lay it on. So instead, I came across the line wishing there was another 100 meters to sprint. Oops.

After circling back to the finish area, I met up with Ian and came to find out that another dude had slipped away with him. Nonetheless, he was able to take the win, which is pretty cool considering he did it with hairy legs and full finger mtb gloves on ;-0 So that put me in at 6^th on the day….which I don’t feel too bad about.

Race number 8 is bright and early tomorrow morning, so hopefully I’ll have some fresh legs after refueling them with lots of Pizza and Amstel tonight.

I had thought about posting rides 128-131, but since I don’t have access to my photos, I’m just gonna ramble about the Tour de France for a few minutes.

I can honestly say that this week is the very first time that I’ve missed the cable package that I dropped 4 months ago. Luckily for me, NBC universal sports (a broadcast channel) carried the Giro, and I was able to catch the Paris-Roubaix live online via a pirated Dutch television feed. But right now, being cable-less, I’m relegated to the online tickers and animated widgets that the different cycling sites (including the official TdF site) offer to help me follow the tour. This is compounded by the fact that our home desktop just crapped out on us last night….so all my TdF updates have to be enjoyed at work. That being said, I’m doing my best to follow the tour, especially on account of the potential for an Astana mini-drama.

I followed today’s tour on the BBC comment feed. Like with other commentaries in the past few days and weeks, they seem to be hinting that Lance Armstrong is looking to jump into the leadership role if Contador flounders in the coming stages. Its clearly a popular angle to play up, simply because it’s the controversial, gossipy thing to talk about. I think I personally rank the probability of this happening a lot higher than most people, and not because of its newsworthiness, but simply because I tend to think Armstrong is way more egotistical than he would let on. This isn’t to say that I doubt Lance’s sincerity in returning to cycling to raise awareness for cancer. Then again, wouldn’t winning an 8^th tour after 3 years of lounging around on the beach with Matthew Mcaughnahey and banging Olsens (ok, so he did run a marathon and do some mtb racing) raise the most awareness possible? It’s not just cancer research that could use a boost from Lance’s success. You figure the sport of cycling took a massive hit the moment he retired. Lance provided a huge boost to the visibility of the sport, especially here in the states. Not having passed the torch to anyone as a “viable” replacement in terms of star power (Landis, Contador and Sastre are all pretty vanilla when you think about it), I think even having this discussion, and having Lance back on Sportscenter – is great for everyone.

Getting back to Lance’s ego. I just don’t buy the fact that he’ll ride shotgun to Contador if he thinks he’s the stronger rider. Lance is too accustomed at getting inside other rider’s heads to be 100% honest in saying that he’s riding in purely a support role for Contador. I’m inclined to believe that this is all one big mind game for him. We’ve seen it before with the way Lance dominated Ulrich, but pretended that it was always way closer than it really was.

Most of the signs immediately prior to the tour pointed to Contador as the undisputed leader. They dropped Horner who was an unabashed Lance supporter and they made sure to fund Contador’s contract as opposed to resigning with a Lance-favoring, possibly U.S. based company – and risk losing Contador. That being said, what if Contador is simply an expensive distraction to downplay Lance’s chances of winning an 8th?

My prediction: if Lance continues to crank out strong races, and if Contador falters one or twice more (just look at all the chatter about him being responsible for the peleton split), then we’ll start to see Lance emerge as the de facto leader and Contador will mysteriously come down with an illness. He might continue to ride, but I bet we hear that he’s riding through an injury or that he’s somehow not himself. There will be some kind of face-saving going on… When you think about it, I’m not really going out on a limb here….this is just a few stages away from becoming the reality of the 2009 tour.

http://www.fedex.com/Tracking?tracknumbers=572205010000244&cntry_code=us&language=english&clienttype=ivother&

She’s en route!

So far the guesses have included:

• Trek 5200
• Something Bianchi Aluminum (in the celeste)
• Ridley Noah (c’mon guys….I’m broke remember?)
• Lobejko Team SL (worst bike ever made)

Clues thus far:

Frame was made in a northern European country with great beer…not far from the city where Oksana and I had our first date…

Monday night should have been a rest day, but I couldn’t help myself.  I just had to get out and spin around.  The evening weather was just too nice.

The ride itself was nothing special just more or less a really mellow (i.e. 15mph) recovery tour on the DC surface streets.  What it did do was give me time to take in the scenery and think about the procurement of a race frame.

As hinted at in the prior couple of posts, the lust for a race frame started this past weekend and has been dominating my thoughts for the past few days.

The Zurich, for all its comfort and simple elegance, is not a race machine.  I found this out during last Saturday’s race finish after having sprinted the bejesus out of bike and body, taking special note of the major weaknesses in both.  The body…..well, I just need to ride more and ride a little harder.  The bike?   There’s not much you can do to milk more performance out of a steel frame.  If this were the 1980s and everyone was sprinting and climbing on a 19lb bike with boat loads of bottom bracket flex (I can hear chainring rub when I sprint), then I’d fit right in.  Since this is 2009, I can’t help but feel as though I “need” a stiffer, lighter and racier frame.  That being said, I still don’t regret parting with the Seven.  It seems a little strange, since the Seven fits the criteria just mentioned, but the bike just wasn’t me.  I don’t know if it was the aero downtube, the compact geometry, or the obnoxious paint job.  It just wasn’t really me.  I tried to really like it on account of how nice of a bike it was (the parts were certainly top shelf), but it just didn’t click.  I guess you have to be a pretty obsessive cyclist to get to this level of bike ownership analysis, but I’m just rolling with it.

Ok, so where am I going with all this?  What’s the point?

Well, I scored a new frame.  It’s another eBay transaction and I’m putting it in the “good deal” column.

I had been leaning toward going mainstream, getting a bike that most common folk would recognize…..maybe a mid-level Cannondale or a Giant.  I spent several hours on Saturday and Sunday, scouring auctions and classifieds, looking for something for a few hundred bucks.  Something that I could just migrate my tired, worn out and trusty Ultegra onto.  With our wedding approaching later this month, and thus knowing that cash is flowing out the door faster than in any prior point in my life….I know I can’t go all out building something up like I did with the Seven.  I can’t be out buying carbon anything.  So there was never really too much consideration for buying a bunch of high end parts.  As such, I didn’t want to target a frame that had too much of a trendy, techy 2009 look.  I needed something a bit more classic, with plenty of cachet, but something that wouldn’t look too underdressed in 2002-3 Ultegra.  I also wanted something that could jive well with some modern accoutrements once the wedding is behind us and the cash flow situation improves.  So what did I go with?

Well, I’m gonna leave it as a mystery until I can take some proper pictures and get going on the build.

Stay tuned for the full story, and frame pedigree will be revealed next week upon arrival.

You’re welcome to email me your guess in the meantime….

Wow, so after all my whining about my back on Friday….I had a great Friday, Saturday, Sunday’s worth of riding and racing.

As mysteriously as the back pain came, it just as mysteriously went away.

Friday night, sometime after I had composed the previous post, I slipped out for a ride with Jon S and CJ over at Hains Point, just to loosen up the legs for Saturday’s race.  It was the perfect pace, just toodling around chatting, nothing extraordinary about the ride until the very end.  For most of the ride, the sky was unusually dark and ominously cloudy, but sometimes a dark cloudy sky is just a dark cloudy sky and passes by harmlessly….so until it starts sprinkling, I don’t even think too much of it (except to always have a little ziploc baggie to stash my iphone in).  Anyway, after peeling off from the other two guys and heading home, I noticed the wind started to pick up and I ended up with the craziest little tailwind heading from the 395 bridge along the Mt Vernon trail up toward the airport.  As I was riding along effortlessly at 23-4mph, I looked over my shoulder and saw black and brown tornado-like clouds.  I was clearly on the leading edge of the storm.  It was just as though I was trying to outrun it.  As I neared the airport, a jet slowly descended in to land (the bike path comes within 50 feet of the runway with only a little chain link fence in between, so the jets literally fly less than 100ft above your head when they land)….but, just he passed over my head, maybe 80-100ft up, his wings started rocking back and forth like crazy and seconds later, the pilot gunned the engines full on and pulled back hard up into the sky.  It was actually pretty cool to see.  Probably not for the passengers who probably felt like they were on a roller coaster ride…but it was cool for me.  So after seeing this pilot respond to the storm that was pushing me home, I figured it’d be a matter of just a few minutes before I’d get blasted by hail and driving rain.  I crossed my fingers and started hammering as much as I could….watching the dust blow around the bike path and the brown clouds bear down on Crystal City.  I kept waiting for that first little pitter patter of drops before the merciless wind and sideways rain…..hoping I’d have just a minute more.  I got within 100 meters of my building and felt those first few drops…..and after really gassing it to get in under the awning of my building…..the rain started to pour, and sure enough…an absolutely brutal maelstrom raged for the next 30 minutes.  I looked out my apartment window at the tree limbs snapping and the crazy wind howling….so grateful I didn’t have s soaked bike to prep for the next day’s race.

So besides escaping Mom nature’s fury, I was also very very happy with the way my back felt on Friday.  After being achy all day at work and feeling 90, I went for that ride and felt more like the [slightly less than] 30 year old I am.  That gave me a lot of confidence for the following day’s race…..not so much in terms of fitness, but at least in terms of pain-free competition.  I still found a reason to self medicate with a few Belgian ales before bedtime however….

….which of course meant that I woke up at 5am on Saturday extremely dehydrated and not all that enthused about the 2.5hr drive I had ahead of me.  Its always those first 10 minutes out of bed that are the hardest.  I can’t help but ask myself: why am I about to spend my Saturday morning in the car?  Oh that’s right, I’m driving 200 miles each way so I can pay to ride my bike 25 miles…..that’s why.  So I got in the car and made the tired drive up to Lancaster county.  I have to say, I really dig the Lancaster area.  Its basically like a mini-Belgium.  Its got the same kind of rolling topography, epic farm field vistas (not the boring flat Indiana corn field vistas, but more the Belgian kind that rationalize my pilgrimages).  To top it off, the sky was a perfect blue mixed with cumulonimbus clouds….the kind that would make for a great generic desktop wallpaper landscape.  I also got the timing down. I wasn’t there 2 hours early and sitting around on my hands (like previous races), instead I was a perfect 1 hour early, just enough time to get my registration packet, chug some more water and coffee, and do my 30 minutes of warm-up on the trainer.  I lined up at the start and realized that the field was unusually large for a Cat 5-Only race - there were nearly 50 of us.  So right from the start, I knew it’d be a challenge to stay in a good position for the finish.  With a strict center line rule, the entire race was a fight to stay mid-pack or better.  There were 4, 6 mile laps with lots of twists and turns and a finish that opened up into 2 lanes for the last 1km.

The first two laps were pretty mellow and I tried as hard as possible to stay really really conservative.  I saved as much energy as possible and tucked in behind people with the least sketchy bike handling.  Mid-way through the 3rd lap, I started to work toward the front.  I jumped on the outside and launched myself up to the top 5-6 guys and started to ride pretty aggressively to secure a spot in the top 10.  Toward the end of the 3rd lap, 3 riders on a local team made a coordinated break and I jumped in with them.  Being without any teammates, I figured if I just mooched off them and refused to do any work, it’d maybe get us caught earlier than if I pitched in, but I’d at least be toward the front of the peleton on the final lap when we’d most likely get caught.  Well, we got caught pretty quickly going into the last lap, and so I was left fighting pretty hard for position in the last 3-4 miles of that lap.  Just before the finish, about 1.5km out, there was a little hill that spread out the field on every lap…..every lap except the last one that is.  I was really hoping that the hill would enable me (sitting somewhere around 15-20th wheel at that point) to jump on a strong rider’s wheel and leech myself a lead-out.  On every other lap, it looked like that would be a perfectly viable strategy.  Unfortunately, the field remained much too clustered for me shoot into a good position and instead, the top 20-25 riders (top half of the field) just went nuts into a totally chaotic and extended sprint about 1km out.   Keep in mind that 1km is where folks like Cavendish and Pettachi start sprinting for the line….NOT Cat 5 racers.  It was a really weird finish because nobody appeared to have coordinated anything with anyone else, on behalf of themselves or otherwise.  It was just this long drawn out sprint with everyone for themselves from whatever position they were in after the hill about 1km out.  So I sprinted my balls off and managed to move up to 11th place, totally fighting the wind, with presumably horrible form.  If there were 2 or 3 riders working together well, they probably could have delivered the world’s worst Cat 5 sprinter to the line for the win.  95% of my team was busy running a Maryland race that our club sponsors and so wanted to race, this was my only last minute option - hence the lack of any team to coordinate with.  So anyway, I can live with 11th out of 47-8 riders.  Not my best day, but not my worst either.  One thing is clear though.  I really “need” to get a race bike if I’m to make this a regular thing.  The Lemond, as money as it is on nice long training rides (i.e. super cushy and compliant), it felt like a wet noodle in the sprint on Saturday.  It was the first time that I ran the bike through a 110% effort at peak power and it wasn’t pretty.  Since Saturday, I have been poking around on eBay for a cheap used carbon or aluminum frame - something really basic, not a long term frame by any stretch…..I’m thinking a Fuji Team or something on that order.  Just something to race the rest of 09 and maybe the spring of 2010.  I’ll post up some possible frames this week, maybe tomorrow’s post

oh and yesterday was indeed Ride 126, and was pretty much just a recovery spin around D.C.  Ok, enough blogging for now….more on the pending frame swap soon!

I might as well re-name the blog again….to something about perpetual aches, pains and injury.  After splending plenty of time dwelling on my knee issues, I told myself I would limit bitching to intermittent posts….  Well, thats easier said than done, especially when you are sitting in your office chair with a back that feels about 100 years old.

Remember the villain in that cheesy Bruce Willis movie about superheroes “Unbreakable“….Samuel L Jackson’s character, the guy that is as fragile as glass (or something like that)….thats how I feel lately.  Just when I thought I was heading down a path of moderation and balance, splitting my time between sessions at the climbing gym (upper body and core strength) and moderate road rides (aerobic fitness and lower body strength)…..I end up feeling like a cripple.  This is the first time in my life that I’ve ever had “back pain,” and I now see what all the fuss is about.  Its pretty much the most debilitating kind of pain you could have.

The good news here is that I think the source of my pain is muscular in nature, which means that I should feel better within a week or so.  The weirdest thing is how it just randomly assaulted me almost a full 24 hours after my climbing session.  After a pretty mellow night at the climbing gym on Tuesday, I found myself getting stiff in my office chair late Wednesday afternoon and by that night I was having trouble sleeping, struggling to find a pain-free posture in bed.  Yesterday morning I was feeling even more pain left wondering what in the hell I had actually done to myself.

The timing of this is a bit ironic.  After my great ride on Monday night, I got all stoked to do a few races before my Ukraine trip in late July.  Then, not being able to contain my resurgent enthusiasm for competition, I registered for the Brownstown Road Race up in PA this coming Saturday.  That was probably about 4 hours before I started to feel the stiffness…and the downhill spiral of pain that ensued.

So now I’m registered to race in what will probably be an accomplishment for me to even participate in.  Last night, I got out on ride #123 to see exactly how bad my back would feel come Saturday.  Interesting enough…..my body position on the bike is one of the few positions I’ve found where my back doesn’t feel like hell….more of a purgatory-like discomfort.  Of course when I stand and pull back on the bars (i.e. to climb or sprint)…then I feel it.  So the question is whether I can limit myself to as much mellow pack riding as possible, while still having a shot at a decent finish.  We shall see.

In other news, the rider that inspired me to turn up my intensity on Monday’s ride….was rewarded by having his bike stolen that very night.  What a disturbing coincidence it was for me to get an email on Tuesday morning from my team’s listserv, on behalf of some guy’s friend who it seems….was the very rider that I was trading pulls with on Monday night.  The only reason I can be sure that its the same guy is on account of the detailed description below that matches my mental catalog of his setup….

Here’s the email:

Hey NCVC,

I’m forwarding this on behalf of a friend at GW who just had his Ridley
stolen. Please be on the lookout for the bike described below.

-Eric

—– Forwarded Message —-
*Sent:* Wednesday, June 24, 2009 12:49:07 AM
*Subject:* [gwcycling] Stolen Bike - Ridley Excalibur

Tonight my car was broken into and my bike stolen. This happened around
11:00pm on Tuesday June 23 in Crystal City.

Please be on the look out for the following bike description:

2008 Ridley Exaclibur Black and Gray Size Medium
Sram Red shifters (custom painted with blue accents)
EA70X tubular wheelset w/Green Vittoria Pave Tires 25mm
Sram Force derailleurs, Sram 1070 Cassette 11-26, Shimano Ultegra Chain
Campagnolo Chorus Carbon Compact Crankset Ultra-Torque, 175mm, 50-34t
White Fizik handlebar tape (left hand side dirtier than right)
White Fizik Aliante saddle carbon rails
EC90 Zero seatpost 29.4 w/shim to fit 31.6

Can you imagine having that setup disappear from your car?  I’d be sick.  I can only hope that he has homeowner’s insurance to cover the cost of a replacement.

Lastly, I’ll bring this post full circle and touch on the “lost rides” that didn’t get posted, and how the remainder of the season looks from my point of view.

Most of you realized pretty quickly after my Race #5 (the Baker’s Dozen) meltdown, that I had devolved into a (gasp) recreational rider and lost a lot of my mojo for posting about bikes or getting all hopped up on gear - hence the “lost rides”.  Being far to vain to descend head long into a beer gut-double chin destiny, I got in the occasional ride, and joined a climbing gym to keep from getting too bummed out (somewhere in there was the sale of my Seven….more on that in the next post).  I saw myself lose a lot of threshold fitness pretty quickly (and the science supports these personal observations….if you don’t train/race near/above threshold, your threshold naturally lowers).  On the other hand, I still felt pretty good aerobically speaking, going out for 1-2 hour 18-22mph rides without much of a problem.  The climbing gym was another story.  The years of upper body neglect were shamefully evident (at least to me), when I found myself burning out after an hour or so and struggling to stay focused on progressing to more respectably challenging routes.  So even as I contemplate a bigger mix of cycling and some increased focus on competition (I still want to get up to Cat 3 within the near future), I don’t see myself neglecting my upper body/core like I have in the past.  Interesting enough, I think one of the reasons that my lower body is so often out of whack after lots of riding….is on account of horribly weak core muscles that provide my lower half minimal stabilization.  This is something that a sports doctor mentioned years ago, and something that I plan to pay a lot more attention to.  With normal core workouts being pretty boring, I’m hoping that climbing will be a far more interesting way to help balance out my body.

OK, so why the interest in riding more and getting back into [some] racing?  What was wrong with the 1-2 rides a week?  One contributing factor, and a funny one at that, is the “Presidential Fitness Challenge” program that some folks at work have setup.  Beginning on June 15, some colleagues signed the company up for the Presidential Fitness Challenge, gave us all login IDs and formed a management team and a technology team, pitting us against each other over a 6 week period.  Each team has the same number of employees (about 20) and we each earn points based on our activity level.  If you’re not familiar with the Presidential Fitness Challenge, its the offspring of the high school testing that everyone remembers from their teen years (the mile, the pull ups, etc.).  In our challenge, we log our activity and each employee accumulates points based on what type of activity they did, how intense it was, and how long they took part.  So there’s no mile or pull ups, but rather a big long list of different sports and outdoor activities.  Me being me, I got pretty fired up about this and took it upon myself to log 4-5 multi-hour rides in the first week to see where I’d stand within the company.  The result?  After the first week, I ended up with 6-7x the point total of the average participant, and scored more points than most of the technology group combined.  Pretty hilarious.  I consider the whole thing to be kinda silly and unscientific, but its nonetheless stoked a tiny competitive flame deep inside me, left smoldering after the Baker’s Dozen.  This contest at work is obviously designed to promote health and well-being, to get people walking during lunch, etc.  Its not intended to increase amateur athletes’ average training time from 8 hours to 12, but I’m just rolling with it anyway. The top three participants get a prize and being a greedy bastard, I’m going to dominate the contest and take the prize…..even if the prize is a $25 Applebee’s gift certificate, I can probably buy a few beers with it…..or stand in the Applebee’s parking lot and trade it for $20 cash.
Anyway, the most significant realization behind my refocusing on cycling, is that I’ll never (in absolute terms) enjoy, or be as good at any other sport as much as cycling (both road and mountain).  The rock climbing scene has really taught me a lot about how hard it is to learn the skills and physical fitness that I quite often take for granted when it comes to bikes.  I look around at other climbers and I feel ridiculously humbled at how novice I am and I get excited about the smallest little bit of progress I make, with very little of it coming naturally.  On the bike however, everything feels extremely natural…..like a conversation with an old friend.  Even though I’ve spent plenty of time in my teens and early 20s screwing around with different climbing disciplines, I never broke through the culture/skill barrier and became a “climber”.  So even though I’ll never be pro, or even Cat 2 for that matter….the saddle is home.

Looking back on this prolific post makes me feel really f#$%ing neurotic……holy smokes.

Anyway, I said there’ll be pictures and there will be…..soon.

Upcoming topics:
Selling the Seven (no regrets!)
Bikes that I’m targeting for late 09 or early 2010 purchase
some random reviews

Ok, so I’m gonna skip all the explanations as to why I haven’t been blogging and cut right to tonight’s ride summary.  I’ll do a longer post tomorrow when I’m more motivated.  Right now, I just wanted to get back in the swing of things while I’m still stoked from the ride I just finished.

Soooooo, Tonight was supposed to be a chill 60 minute “recovery” ride….

didn’t happen.

A guy in a GWU kit flew past me on my second lap at Hains Point and I couldn’t stomach it.

I reeled him back in, and then found myself cranking out another 3 laps around Hains Point trading pulls with the guy (who was obviously really fit…maybe a Cat 2-3 rider).  We were upper 20s the entire time, including about 25-26mph into the headwind on the exposed side.  I almost barfed up the 1000kc meal I wolfed down immediately after getting home from work.  It turns out that pork goyzas, dark chocolate, and milk do not mix well prior to a high intensity ride.

ok, tomorrow I promise to try and provide a recap of where the hell I’ve been for rides 106-121, discuss the bikes I’m scoping out as I plan my “comeback”, touch on some upcoming races and the silly President’s challenge competition at work.

So in lieu of the manifesto I had planned for this long overdue blog post, I figured I’d just wing it and crank out this less ambitious update instead.

My how quickly things change….

One month ago, I was shaving my legs and shopping for carbon tubular race wheels. As of Tuesday morning, I found myself shipping my pimped out Seven race bike to its new owner in Tulsa, OK. I’d like to say that the proceeds will go toward something equally glamorous, but I’m afraid the cash will probably just get lost in the wedding spending spree we’ve been on.

So how did all this come to pass?

Well, in a nutshell I’m simply burnt out on battling chronic injury. I’ll be the first to admit that I absolutely did not do everything (i.e. physical therapy type sh*t, stretching, etc.) I should have over this past winter off-season to prevent the types of overuse injuries I’m prone too, yet I did more than I’ve ever done in the past, and it still wasn’t enough. Everyone that knows me as a cyclist or runner knows that I’ve been bitching about my knees off and on for years now. The strange thing about my knees is that they feel great under 99% of the conditions I subject them to. If you read some of the posts where I’m complaining about knee problems, you’d think I was an arthritic 55 yr old. Yet, that’s exactly the issue that confounds me….I’m only experiencing issues after a certain threshold of use. Unfortunately in cycling terms, that threshold is actually pretty low. Even though I went out and fought pretty hard in a few races this spring, I did so with a mere handful of base mile rides lasting more than 2 hours during the preceding months. Did I end up with an IT band (not even convinced that’s 100% the issue) because I didn’t log more long rides? Or did riding those longer 2, or 2.5 hour rides over the winter aggravate an underlying condition in the first place? The bottom line is that I’m just sick of troubleshooting the situation, and sick of dwelling on it. Its very frustrating as a cyclist to be worried about injuring yourself when riding for more than 2 hours a pop…

The final straw came almost a month ago at the Baker’s Dozen race in Leesburg. I would have written up a race review several weeks ago, but the fact of the matter is that it was a pretty demoralizing race for me. The weather was absolutely beautiful, and a bunch of friends were congregating among bikes, piles of junk food, and countless beers for the entire day. So what could tarnish that? Well, when big chubby guys with beer bellies resting on their top tubes are cranking out night laps while yours truly, (on account of the knee situation described above) is really only capable of drinking beers and trying to feel good about riding 4 laps…that’s what. Thankfully, having a bunch of good friends sitting around drinking beers pretty much makes 95% of life’s problems disappear, so the race was ultimately worth every penny of the $80 fee just to spend a Saturday immersed in that scene.

Following the race, my wimpy little knee felt like a$$ for a solid week. Had the pain dissipated after some NSAIDs, icing, and a few days’ rest, then my mindset might have taken a different trajectory. Yet, here I am today, having joined a climbing gym last week, having sold the Seven, and currently staring down a boat load of wedding planning tasks. Suffice it to say that my road “season” is over. I still have the Lemond with a fresh set of Conti 25s that I plan to log some miles on. I also really want to max out the Walt and give her the attention she deserves. That being said, I managed to get out on my first post Baker’s Dozen ride at Rosaryville on Sunday and it felt great. I logged a nice mellow 2 laps (~18 miles) with CJ to keep me company and it reminded me of how much I miss the casual mountain bike ride. So it’s back to the basics across the board and hopefully quite a few chill mountain bike rides to break-in the Walt Works.

I’ve got a few additional mountain rides to post up in the coming days…still trying to get back into the swing of things here…stay tuned.

So here I am waiting for my race to start (I got here early, just after 8am…too early to start my warm up so I’m giving the iphone blogging experience a try). I can tell you that the weather is a bitch. It’s probably in the upper 40s and a steady rain is coming down hard. I’m ultra thankful that there aren’t any dirt or gravel sections this week, that’s for damn sure…. Really hoping there aren’t too many bike-handling deficient bozos in the field today, the last thing I need is a bad crash.

I’ll update again, post-race.

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Post-Race update here we go:

The good news is that there were no crashes and really not even any noticeable close-calls within a large field of riders competing in horrible conditions.

Here’s how it went down.

Just like the “Millport Road Race” (Race #2) located just a few miles away (also in Lancaster county PA) the “Mount Joy Road Race” was a scenic Amish country route.  A relatively short race of 24 miles, we had 4 laps of the 6 mile course. The course was actually pretty solid.  Definitely a “power” course where you had some “climbs” but nothing that a strong all-arounder, or even a decently fit sprinter couldn’t power up without risk of being dropped by the small guys.  So for me being somewhere in the middle between a beefy sprinter and a spindly climber…..it worked out well.

The start was pretty brutal, not the start itself even, but the waiting for the start.  I was sitting in my car as long as possible to avoid the rain until about 30 minutes prior to the scheduled start, at which point I did a mini-warm up and then lined up.  Just like 2 weeks ago (same race organizers) the start was massively delayed and everyone who had warmed up, quickly cooled down standing in the 40 degree rain waiting an extra 20 minutes beyond the scheduled push-off.  So there I am with everyone else absolutely miserably cold, soaking wet before the race even began.  Once we finally got going I settled into a bit of a groove, and managed to stay up near the front of the 47 rider peleton.  The usual comfort of the peleton was offset by some nasty road spray coming up off the fertilizer-horse dung-salt encrusted farm roads……pretty much straight into my face and mouth.  Yum.  The more you hugged the wheel of the guy in front of you the more you tasted Lancaster.

So at the start, I had been pretty chatty with some other guys, one in particular on a large team from norther MD (Kelly Benefits) [random segway: I joined a team 2 weeks ago, National Capitol Velo Club and don't recall blogging about that....so more on that later].  Not having seen any other teammates at that point, I chatted with this dude (who I determined was a strong rider) and hashed out a theoretical plan based on his knowledge of the course.  He suggested forming a breakaway toward the end of the 2nd to last lap on one of the climbs that would typically bog down the field a bit.

So there we were, midway through the race with nobody really challenging the field.  Then “Levi” (good cycling name to have I guess) pulled out ahead on the very climb he mentioned at the start.  I was probably 4th back at that point and saw him going for it….and just didn’t have the motivation to jump in with him (bad move Dan).  So Levi peeled off the front and established about a 20-30 second gap.  Then going into the last lap I decided to help reel him in and lead a chase group, which would ultimately be my “lesson of the day”.

I launched to the front on a long downhill stretch and really dropped the hammer.  I was powering along in the low-mid 30s down in the drops with a handful of other guys right with me.  We traded places a few times and I rested a bit before taking my turn on a long false flat section.  In retrospect I was working with riders that were not pulling their weight and I suffered for it.  I think part of the problem was the relative inexperience of us all, in that we never really had an organized approach and never really established a rhythm.  I allowed myself to hang out front way too long, blew up and had to fall back 5-6 spots and rest up.  I knew that going into the last lap I wouldn’t have much time to recover before the finish….which would suck given it was looking more and more like a field sprint where I’d need all juice I could get.

So midway through the last lap, Levi seemed to be maintaining somewhat of a gap, but people at the front of the peleton (including myself) started getting antsy about catching him and picked up the pace.  The last kilometer or so was devoid of any hard turns and was a long flowing approach to the finish.  By the time we closed in below ~1.5k out, about 10 of us were cranking pretty hard up front.  Then with <1000m to go Levi was well within reach and was clearly fading a bit.  With <400m to go, the sprint ramped up and I pulled out along the outside and moved up as hard as possible, but my legs were definitely not 100%.  I felt like I should have been sprinting past some of the guys that were hanging right with me - but I just didn’t have it.  We swallowed Levi at the line where I came in right behind him at 6th.

Now when I think back to the way things panned out… I absolutely should have jumped up with him on the initial breakaway.  Assuming everything else being equal, we would have almost certainly gone 1-2.  Instead, we went 5-6.  I can’t complain too much about a 6th place finish out of nearly 50 riders…so chalking up another one to “lessons learned” (I guess that’s what Cat 5 is for anyway)

Now apart from the usual, “next time I’ll do x, y, z” I realize how physically vulnerable I am to cold rain.  By the end of the race I could barely speak.  My facial muscles were essentially numb.  My shoes covers were sopping wet, having collected the rain from my ankles on down.  My entire kit was functioning as the worst wet-suit in the world….wet indeed, but lacking the warmth part.  I was miserable.  Rolling back to the car, I couldn’t stop violently shivering and my head started to pound.  I jumped into the backseat of my car, pounded some water and some ibuprofen and did everything I could to get warm.  I don’t think I was functional for almost an hour later (with the car’s heat blasting).

I look back to all the ballsy backwoods winter solo adventures I’ve had over the years, where I’ve gone out and done things foolishly unprepared and ultimately suffering extreme cold and discomfort….and today tops them all.  Its hard to wrap my head around how cold 40 degree rain can be.

Anyway, I’m dead tired (having got up at 5am to make the drive up to PA) so more on the NCVC team thing later.

Next week is a mountain race where I’ll have plenty of photos to post up after wards and the week after that I have confirmation that my photographer (aka Oksana) will be in attendance.  So the next couple of races will be illustrated….hooray.

Random: I never remember to update the “150lb contest” results from early January, but I officially lost the contest (between me and my buddy Nick L to drop below 150) back in February.  That being said, I’m now down around 149 each morning.  Thats with a terrible diet right now….including beer and sausage on a semi-nightly basis.  Sweet.