Domesticated Carbon

Maglia 2011

2011-01-07T20:31:00.000-08:00

I love this time of year, only PRO cycling has the added excitement of new kits for every team every single year. Let it be known I have simply compiled the information that others have posted in the Cycling News forums; I wanted to be able to see it all in one place, and though others might too. I think my favorites are the Omega Pharma - Lotto and the Leopard - Trek (I know I am alone in this) kits. What do you like?

Movistar:

Team Type 1:

De Rosa - Flaminia:

HTC:

Christina Watches:

Garmin-Cervelo:

Androni Giocattoli:

RWcycling-team:

Avia:

Aisan Racing Team:

Orbea:

Hitec Products:

Sky:

Joker - Merida:

Louletano - CC Loulé - Apolónia:

Cofidis:

Team NetApp:

Team Katusha:

Sunweb-Revor:

Saxobank - Sunguard:

Francaise des Jeux:

BKCP - Powerplus:

Colnago-CSF:

Saur-Sojasun:

Liquigas - Cannondale:

Geumsan Ginseng Asia:

Donckers Koffie-Jelly Belly:

Price:

Lapre - ISD:

Omega Pharma - Lotto:

Bretagne-Schuller & KTM-Murcia:

Vaconsoleil:

Team Exergy:

BMC - BROGIO U23 Team:

Rijke-TVM:

Leopard-Trek:

Quick Step:

Geox - Fuji Test Team:

Diadora-Pasta-Zara:

Astana:

Avanti - Pure Black Racing:

KONYA TORKU SEKER SPOR - VIVELO:

Euskaltel-Euskadi:

Rabobank:

ONDA-boavista:

Wallonie-Bruxelles:

United Healthcare:

Subway - Giant:

Nutrixxion - Corratec - Sparkasse:

KENDA Pro Cycling p/b GEARGRINDER:

Radioshack:

Farnese Vini - Neri Sottoli Trivia:

Miche - Guerciotti:

AG2R La Mondiale:

Kelly Benefit Strategies-OptumHealthcare"

AA Drink-Leontien.nl:

Dukla Trenčín - Merida - Dream team:

Skil - Shimano:

Colombia es Pasión-Café de Colombia:

Endura Racing:

Wonderful Pistachios:

NSP - Ghost:

July 5th, 2010

2010-07-05T12:55:00.000-07:00

Its been a trying few weeks to say the least. Before I forget the things I want to talk about I think I will itemize them here.

1.Denver
2.Seattle
3.New Bike/Seigler
4.Floyd Landis
5.Upgrade
6.Sacramento
7.Bend
8.Tour de France
9.Cyclocross

OK I think thats it.

First Denver:
I recently flew to Denver with my bike in tow to work the Pride Festival and Parade in downtown Denver, CO. I was excited for a few reasons: I like traveling and staying in nice hotel rooms, I like riding my bike in new places and exploring, I like gays and lesbians (especially when they are having a good time), and I like having money in the bank.

The first day of travel was laughable, and I tried to stay sane after a 14 hour trip to Denver from Orange County, CA. I first had to wake up at 4:30 because I had the first flight out of John Wayne Airport. Once Dane dropped me off I realized I had left my wallet in my pants, in my car, at the mechanics. I was forced to take a 60 dollar taxi ride back to my car after changing my flight to a later one leaving out of Long Beach Airport. The good thing was I had time to watch the world cup game at least. When I finally made it to Denver around 4:30 I was not able to check into my hotel because of a credit card snafu. Without being able to check into my room, I couldn't reassemble my bicycle, so I had to walk several miles to the corporate office to pick up the key for the truck I would need for Saturday. upon returning some 4 hours later I still couldn't get into my room and had to wait another hour.

Had everything gone according to plan I would have gotten to Denver around 11:30, checked into my room after lunch and gone on a 4 hour bike ride into the Rockies. Sounds great now.

The first day of the event was really long with 4 hours of set up and 10 hours of standing, but I still managed to get a 2 hour ride in AND go on a date with these two guys who asked me out to the bars. I had nothing else to do at 11 pm, so what the hell right? Besides the huge bar brawl it was completely harmless and entertaining. Its good to make friends, even if they keep asking to see your underwear, ESPECIALLY if they keep asking to see your underwear.

Each day of the even I used my bike as transportation and placed it inside my booth while I was working. With 5 employees and a fully enclosed booth it seemed pretty safe, and there was no incident on Saturday. Sunday I had a bad feeling for some reason, but placed my bike in the same spot, but covered it this time.

Sunday was the actual Pride Parade with floats and all, so there was a lot of down time since people were all pretty occupied by the entertainment and didn't want free product. I allowed my team to enjoy the parade as well, rather than be bored. Well during the parade I happened to glance back at the tent and, like Pee Wee, I flew into a rage and ran about 4 miles around the entire downtown are of Denver where the event was located. I couldn't find my bike anywhere, she was gone!

This is a truly devastating feeling, I don't encourage it.

Once my bike was stolen I really stopped caring about being in Denver, it was a bad trip and I wanted to go home. I would only get one day at home, before I had to head right back out to Seattle though.

2. Seattle
The next work trip followed Denver immediately. I had intended on bringing my road bike with me to ride with Eric, but I brought a cross bike instead. The cross bike is race ready with no bottle cage holes, so I have a tri rack on the saddle SWEET. These bikes are not meant for hours of riding in the saddle I don't think, because I was super uncomfortable after 2 hours.

Seattle was a completely different trip, I had friends to hang out and ride with, and I had plenty of time to ride and a rental car, so my bike stayed safe in my hotel room with a do not disturb sign on the door.

I really love Seattle, its an extremely interesting city, and riding in and out of it is no different. Truly great scenic rides, plus Eric has been logging many miles, so he is a great riding partner. Seattle also has great vegan eats.

To show how much my fortune had drastically changed in a few days, I got a flat out on a long ride with Eric. That's usually a bad thing, but I was riding my deep dish Mavics and had JUST purchased a new 80mm tube not 10 minutes before. I ran over a huge nail that once again pierced my rim and needed to be pried out. Why can't I run over simple glass ever?

I could say more about Seattle, but it went as planned and was pretty excellent. Got paid, rode my bike, ate food, and made my flight.

3. New Bike/Seigler
Well when I returned home I still had to deal with my bike being stolen. I had a lot to do. I had to make sure my insurance claim looked complete and would get accepted (still waiting on that), and I also didn't want to end my season so I needed a new bike straight away. I already had races planned for the next 2 weeks so I was getting very concerned. I knew worst case scenario, I could just take the Seigler back from Josh and race my old bike. I didn't want to, but it was an option, or so I thought.

As if I needed to be reminded about pissing off the universe, the Seigler was quickly stolen from Josh's garage not a week after the BMC was taken. This really frustrated me. I try to stay positive or at least calm and logical all the time, it was hard to do that. Luckily I have wonderful friends.

Ashley still had a beautiful Cannondale Supersix Hi Mod which was brand new and Brad had a 10 speed record groupo at Ashley's house. They both offered to sell them to me and after a short shopping spree for the missing items at Bannings Bikes with E Dubb, I was back on 2 wheels! Actually this bike is fucking brilliant, I am very happy and often find myself forgetting about June all together.

Seriously I can't say how much my family, friends, team, and the cycling community have enriched my life, I think that's why I try to get everyone into cycling.

4.Floyd Landis
I've stated before, I was a Landis supporter during his tour win, during his court battle, during his comeback, and I still am now. It's too easy to judge Floyd on his admission of doping during his time in the pro peleton and much harder to understand and respect the kind of person he is. I don't look up to Floyd Landis as a pillar of morality and I don't strive to be like Floyd (actually I don't think I could drink that much). I do get inspired by choices he has made, whether they be on the bike or off. I hope to one day have a stage 16-stage 17 moment on the bicycle, I don't think any amount of prohibited substances can create that kind of character. That is where my support was validated, but like a family member who makes their own choices, you have to expect to be let down. I can't really describe how I felt that night in May when I read at 1 am that Floyd had admitted to everything and more, I hoped I didn't know everything. I couldn't accept that he lied to me and everyone else for no reason. Later that morning I was given a more vivid picture as to what this all meant for Floyd.

The main thing I personally took away from the countless emails was that he lied because there was no way for him to be honest without implicating many of his closest friends. If you are going to tell a half truth, is that not the same as a lie, so you might as well lie completely. I have lots of opinions on this and can go on for a while if you care to listen.

The second thing I took away was that Lance Armstrong was as bad as I feared. I have to admit that I never really liked Lance, mostly because he was like Lady Gaga (everyone liked him). So I would not give him support, but I would give him credit, he won the worlds hardest race 7 times and should be treated like the champion he is. I still didn't LIKE him though. I would make excuses about his personal life and how they way he acted made him seem like a true asshole, but I never really KNEW.

The biggest problem with talking about Lance Armstrong is that he is a religion. There are believers, cheasters, and non-believers. Just like any other religion the argument goes the same way, two sides shouting at each other with their ears closed while the chesters show up when its convenient. I would be classified as a non-believer, one who does not drink the yellow cool aid. Anyone who has been on either side and had a discussion about Lance with someone else who feels differently knows all too well how the conversation goes.

With Floyd's admission he had also implicated most of the American pro peleton, including his ex team mate Lance Armstrong. Lance had been accused before, but this seemed all too believable. The only thing Lance has going for him is that Floyd is not credible now, but neither was Canseco right?

Having spent that moment laying in bed wondering about why Floyd lied to me, I can imagine what the believers must be going through right now. The conversation has gotten louder and more violent. The public relations storm has gotten unbearable and I think a lot of people are hoping they too do not have to cope with the fact that their favorite cyclist cheated and lied. I hope that Lance gets a chance to feel the relief that Floyd does now, but I wonder, honestly, if Lance is a psychopath and not a messiah.

5. Upgrade
I earned an upgrade with California Bicycle Racing earlier this year to category 3, but it wasn't until this past week that I was able to make it official with USA Cycling. Getting my upgrade and a new bike really helped me get through the mid season lows. I am truly excited to finish the season strong and enjoy myself. On to Cat 2!

6. Sacramento
Instead of going to the Midwest for Superweek, Ashley stayed local and I traveled up north to visit Pat, Jenny, and Baby D. I hadn't been up here in months so, its nice to see my fake family again. Pat is becoming my opposite with his happy wife and kid and house and shit. Plus he weighs 35 pounds less than me!

Yesterday was the Davis 4th of July Crit. I had an OK race here last year. I missed the winning break of 12 riders but won the field sprint for 13th, so I wasn't too mad. This course is pretty fun when you are strung out or attacking, otherwise it is very dangerous. Since I got my upgrade already I devoted myself to helping Pat and Ben try and get a top 10 finish. Pat has really been working on his Crit racing and it showed, Ben is always strong. I also had a chance to meet and race with our team mate Ryan, he was an excellent domestique, both of us neutralized all chases when either Ben or Pat were in solo breaks. They probably could have won from a break had anyone else joined them. Still it was awesome to control a race start to (almost) finish. In the end crashes held up our guys and while none of them went down, their race was over. I managed to stay near the front and got 14th, but I didn't sprint.

The rest of the week will include awesome training with Becher+ dudes and getting ready for the High Desert Omnium in Bend, OR.

7. Bend
I'm really excited for this omnium next weekend. There is a TT, a crit and a road race. The profile shows it to be a course that could suit me, but you never know. More on this later I suppose.

8. Tour de France
This really is a special time of year for pro cycling. Nothing comes close to the Tour, and nothing will. I'm still backing Cervelo Test Team like usual, so a great tour for me would include 2 jerseys and 3 stage wins. I think this course could really suit Sastre if they can keep him out of trouble like they did today and Cav has been making mistakes left and right which I think Thor can capitalize on. It would be fitting for Cav to go winless after taking fan favorite Tom Boonen and my favorite Heinrich Haussler out of the Tour before it started. I don't want Cav to get hurt though! There's been enough carnage through 3 days as it is. I hope Thor takes his anger from today and gets his "Paris-Roubaix" win tomorrow.

9. Cyclocross
I can't wait for it to begin and I want to take it seriously this year.

I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS! I HOPE IT RAINS!

Now go back to watching your LeBron watch. <3

June 21st, 2010

2010-07-04T17:08:00.001-07:00

The longest day of the year (in the northern hemisphere that is). Actually daylight savings is literally the longest day of the year, but whatever. I always look forward to this day, but this one is wasted on traveling.
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June 18, 2010

2010-06-18T13:03:00.000-07:00

I'm stuck on an airplane with thousands of bored children. I don't hate the children, just the plane for being old. I have a helmet in my carry on, should I wear it just in case we crash. I'd feel pretty stupid if a helmet could've protected me and I died instead. Sweet incredibly crazy turbulence as I typed that.

I'm going to Denver for work this weekend. I'm looking forward to riding my bike around town and out of town.

My season has paused a bit this week with no racing on the weekend, I took an extended stay off my bike for the first time since January. It was nice not having to get up at 430 for group rides, but also boring. When you ride bikes anytime spent off the bike feels wasted, I got very little done this week. At least I don't have to shave.

My plan is to ride around Denver until Monday, then I fly home Monday afternoon. Tuesday I'll try and do ElDo and lots of laundry. Wednesday I fly out to Seattle for work again.

I was able to bring my bike to Seattle earlier this year, so I'm excited to be there again. Also I'll get to ride with Eric again (he's a newly minted member of Becher+ now). I come back from Seattle on Saturday night (with just enough time to watch the Fedor fight!). That doesn't end my summer travels, though.

Sunday morning after I get back from Seattle is the Manhattan Beach Grand Prix; a race I love and have always targeted. I feel like George Hincapie this year with my record in the "classics" of Southern California. A crash on the last lap of Redlands caused me to go off course. At Dana Point I spent the whole race working for a team mate and he wasn't able to get the result he wanted. In Long Beach, a race I never enjoy, I was working for a team mate again but he flatted out of the race. I would really like to turn that all around at MBGP next weekend.

Following Manhattan Beach, Ashley and I will be traveling to Chicago for Superweek. We will be doing only the first week, but we're both pretty excited. For me its an opportunity to see how I stack up against top cat 3 racers and hopefully get some points to take home (money too!). For Ashley its more about getting the pro teams to see him and try and get him a spot on a pro team next year. If we could get him in talks with a few teams I'd be happy.

We have to come back from Superweek early because I'm working again on the 17th of July in Santa Barbara. This money will be very welcome and I will enjoy spending it.

Landing in 20 minutes, time to go.
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May 29, 2010

2010-05-29T20:07:00.001-07:00

Been feeling over trained lately, so it was good to take this week really easy. I feel refreshed now. That could mean good things. Listening to Muse, because Ashley likes them and he is probably going to win a jersey tomorrow so it should work for me too. Early to bed, so I'm fresh when I point at my chest tomorrow.

May 25, 2010

2010-05-25T11:40:00.000-07:00

Since I'm stuck in jury duty, I thought I'd hash out an update for this little website here.

This past weekend was pretty amazing. Wednesday night Dave and I drove up to Big Bear for the Tour of California. Thursday morning we drove out to the last sprint spot on the stage 6 course and went for a ride. There must have been a tailwind or something because the climbing to the last KOM spot was really easy and fun. Dave was able to hold my pace and I think we both had an amazing day enjoying the scenery. Dave kept marveling about the fact that we were essentially playing a softball game at Angels stadium. Its true there is no other sport where you can play the sport on the field the day before the pros do. This idea made the day very special for Dave. He is new to the sport and even newer to the professional part of the sport. When we were done with our ride we headed back to the house in time to watch a thrilling finish to stage 5 on tv. I love attacks and breakaways, I want them all to survive.

My parents and Ashley soon joined us in town and we had a mexican dinner filled with discussion of the day's true news story. I think I should get into Floyd after the story of our trip is done.

Friday morning we left the house around 830 and headed down the mountain on bike to the KOM spot. There are lots of rollers on the route to the KOM, but for the most part it is allllll downhill. Ash and I flew down the mountain, enjoying every banked turn that came our way. Dave has never really liked descending, but I think our enthusiasm rubbed off on him as he is taking more chances now and was not too far behind us.

My mom drove out to the KOM to meet us so we didn't have to carry the chalk and walking shoes. I have to say that I was very disappointed with the turn out on the course this year compared to Palomar last year. Also the crowd was much less enthusiastic. We covered the KOM with euro style writings but no one else had written an messages of support, that was sad to me. I wrote an ode to Jens Voigt (which was also a nod to the great blog http://www.cyclingtipsblog.com/) "shut up legs." While Ashley channeled his hatred for Lance Armstrong into a positive message for Dave Zabriskie, "get some dz!"

There was an interesting moment when the break finally made their way to us. The break included big hitters Hincapie, Schleck, McCartney as well as KOM competition leader Rabou and Jakob Fuglsong (a man who neither phil or paul can get the name right for). I decided to cheer on Jakob, because he's awesome and because no one seemed to know that. As I did my euro sprint with the riders I screamed for him and then I pulled off. As I did, the Radioshack team car squirted me with a water bottle. I yelled "Fuck you Radioshack!" into their window and they turned around as they drove away perplexed. I guess I was mad about Lance and if it was any other team I would have laughed, but there was no need for that, I was not in their way, nor was I in the way of their rider.

When the whole group had passed the KOM we hustled to the car and put the bikes away in an attempt to make it to the finish line. We made it just in time to See Cav's group roll by, partially because we were stuck behind Cav's group going up the hill. I joked about it then, but now I feel bad for him. He gave it all he had to finish that difficult stage, which had too much climbing for any sprinter, and they still time cut him. If he didn't want to finish the race he would have pulled out like Boonen.

We were able to see a screening of Cav's new movie later that night at the performing arts center. Chasing Legends is an excellent doc which give great insight into the HTC team during the Tour. I had heard good things about the movie before I saw, and I can say I was not let down. I knew what was coming and I still felt emotion for the events of last year's race. Heinrich's solo win, Jen's fall, they had excellent interviews that really completed the story. Of course, because it was about HTC at the Tour, there was a lot left out, but that's ok we don't need to see who actually won the race at any point...

Saturday I went to LA and watched the Time Trial stage of the Tour of California. The course was very flat, but very windy, so it was going to be hard for any GC contender to really stand out. I found some excellent viewing spots along the course because there was very few people actually out on course. The start and the finish were packed, but other than that the course was a ghost town. I think this was due to the Lance effect in reverse. Once he was no longer in the race, the crowds seemed smaller, sadly. I was able to flirt my way into getting one of the stickers that went on Fabian's motorcycle during his TT for my mom. She swears he's related to her family. TTs are strange though, watching them live is difficult without constant updates, so I headed home and re-watched it all on TV.

Sunday I decided to do the Brea Old Criterium. This course is literally right next Roger Millikan so it was very familiar. I wasn't sure how my form would be after all the riding in Big Bear, especially on Friday, but I gave it a go anyway.

I started first lap with a strong pull and then let Brad and this Swami's guy alternate through. We pulled like that for 6 laps and then I decided we had hurt them enough this was and tried something else. As soon as Brad took the front I sat up and let a gap open up to him. Quickly 3 guys joined him, and they had the makings for a breakaway. This break didn't last long though, unfortunately, so when we pulled them back in, the Swami's guy and myself counter-attacked. 3 other guys joined us and we had the makings of a strong break. We gained 8 or 9 seconds on the field and just seemed to be getting stronger when I noticed my bike felt weird. I looked down and my saddle was completely nose down. My seatpost clamp had come loose and the USCF official sad I wasn't eligible for a free lap so my day was done. The Swami's guy ended up taking the race, he is the reigning TT champ.

This week I will take it easy and prepare for Barry Wolf State Criterium Championships, I want a Bear! Now go ride.

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May 7th, 2010

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

I haven't been following the pro peleton as closely as I normally do this year. I have had my eye on the domestic scene because its close to me. So I am a little caught off guard by how close the Giro di' Italia actually is. Luckily my resident pink sweater wearing cyclist, Eric Popiel made a few predictions for us.

For the upcoming Domesticated special Giro edition....Cunego, Evans, Scarponi, Bruzeghin, Vino, and Basso as my predictions for top 6...Garzelli as the guaranteed 7th and KOM title....Simoni with one final stage win....AleJet taking all the critical sprint stages with Friere taking a couple too.

Obviously the pink sweater is actually a turtle neck and is much too tight. What other excuse can there be for only one non-Italian in his predictions? I don't count Friere because he isn't even starting the race due to illness.

While I love Eric's enthusiasm, I must say he forgot the quiet Spaniard with a chip on his shoulder, Carlos Sastre. He also forgot the German Magilla Gorilla Andre Greipel. Greg Henderson is good for a few stages as well. Lastly I don't think Bruzeghin is on any Giro rosters, but I could be wrong.

Domesticated Carbon's official predictions:
Podium -
1. Evans
2. Sastre
3. Vino

Sprinters -
Greipel

KOM -
Garzelli
Although a podium contender who falls off course is always game for this.

Today is rest day so no news about me. I plan on kicking Long Beach City's ass tomorrow though. Tour of Cali predictions coming soon.

May 5th, 2010

2010-05-05T22:12:00.000-07:00

Song of the day: Godspeed You! Black Emperor - East Hastings

	Godspeed You! Black Emperor - East Hastings .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

Tuesday I did Coffee Crew plus 2 more hours with Kyle, Ashley and James Yang. It ended up being about 70 miles, but I didn't even realize that until later. Not that it was a problem, I was just surprised.

Lately the wind has been hectic around here. it always seems to be hitting you in the face, no matter which way you look. I don't mind wind so much when I am racing because I feel pretty good in it, but there is nothing that will sap your legs faster on a training ride than wind.

I was going to do the secret coffee crew today through the canyon, but 5 AM didn't agree with me today, so I rolled over and tried again; I didn't roll out of the house until after noon. I rode out to Fashion Island and met up with Ashley for an hour (an hour which fucking FLEW by, he's good people) and then we both headed home. Only about 45 miles today, I decided to keep it light because tomorrow will end up being about 70 miles again when I include the Great Park race in Irvine in the late hours of the day.

I haven't done this race yet, so I am pretty excited about it. I am also worried because it has been drawing a pretty talented field and I will be a REALLY small fish in a REALLY big pond. That doesn't mean I won't try and win, just means I have an excuse already for my next post :)

Ashley put the thought in my head about doing Superweek (well he didn't even intend too, he was just talking about going himself) and now I am pretty close to making the decision to head out there. It will mean I will be requesting my upgrade much sooner, like after Long Beach Grand Prix, but Wes is on a recovery month and Sean is already set to upgrade so it'll be alright I think. The chance to race up to 5 or 6 times in just over a week long trip is too good to miss.

This past Sunday I did the San Luis Rey Road Race. It was advertised as being a much friendlier course for my body type, so I was pretty excited about it. Turns out it is a perfect course for me, I just need to train on some climbs once in a while. Here is my race report I submitted to my team:

Mark Reynolds San Luis Rey Road Race

4 laps of a moderately hilly 14.7 miles circuit on well paved roads.

Wes, myself, and one of Wes’ friends Derek embarked on this course together. I surprisingly felt no effects from my crash while on the bike so I was pretty excited to try my hand at another road race. I felt like I had dead legs again before the race, but we put in pretty hard warm up which I think helped wake them up. I was feeling pretty good, and so was Wes, we were both in the front 5 for the first lap.

This course is actually really fun to race, I can’t wait to focus more on my climbing next year to try my hand again. The course is an out and back with 2 180 turns on either ends of the snake. Once we made the turn to come back towards the climb I made sure I was on the outside to be active if I something caught my fancy. one lone guy attacked pretty quickly after the turn and I jumped to join him (hoping maybe 1 or 2 more would join us, but no one did). We actually managed to get out of site of the peleton and get a nice gap. He had the Orange guys and I had Wes and his friend Derek to disrupt things while we tried to build a lead. Everything was going well and it looked like we would reach the base of the climb alone, which was my goal. I figured if we could get on the hill maybe I could find something inside to help me make it up the climb and then we would have a whole bunch of downhill to recover (the peleton went very slowly on the downhill as a group because of two pretty tight left hand turns. Just before we reached the base the catch was made, but I was able to tuck in with the front of the pack.

I thought, “this is great I attacked with one other rider for about 5 miles and I’m still fresh enough to follow the leaders up the climb.” Well there are 2 parts to the climb, the part I like which was faaaaast and the part I didn’t like which was steep. Luckily I had Wes there to pace me up so I didn’t lose too much ground as I got dropped on the climb. I guess I burned more candles than I thought. I TTed solo back to the pack for about 3 miles and finally caught on and Wes let me tuck in next to him out of the wind. There we rested. The second lap was pretty uneventful as we reached the climb together. This time Wes wasn’t feeling so well so I waited for him to make sure we both got back on. He recovers fairly quickly, so I knew we would have a good shot and getting back to the peleton. We caught onto a group of 3 riders and quickly forced them to paceline, this one SC Velo guy made some amazing pulls. And we were safe and sound again. This lap was exactly like lap 2 except for some reason the entire race stopped dead because of a palm from in the shoulder, where no one was even racing. I think Wes touched wheels with someone and almost went down. I leaned into the guy and stayed but, the people behind him were not so lucky.

This made the peleton realize we had been going entirely too slowly and they took the climb very aggressively. Wes and I both hung on for as long as we could, but we were dropped again, this time with even more work to do. As we descended we caught 2 riders and quickly passed them, but they sucked our wheel pretty badly, so we made it evident that it was their turn to pull. Things were said and Wes looked at me and we nonverbally decided to teach them a lesson. We promptly dropped them and I think we saw them roll in about 15 mins after us. We never did catch on the main group on that last lap, but we were too close not to keep going full out. Fuck Wes is strong. We would catch a group of riders try to get them to paceline with us and then destroy them. Obviously we were gapped out because we can’t climb not because we were tired. well I did get REALLY tired on the last time up the climb. Wes tried keep me with him, but at this point there was no point for him to go slow if he could catch a few guys just because I was toast, our day was almost done. I really worked on eating during this race, but I still could have eaten more I think. I showed on the last climb.

All in all I was pretty happy with how we raced, I mean it sucks to not be with the main group, but both of us have not been working on our climbing admittedly. Looking forward to having a few guys to work with next weekend in Long Beach.

Thanks for all of our help Wes.

That's all I got for today, Its time for bed I am getting up early for coffee crew. I should mention that my wounds fro my crash are healing quite well, so I should make it!

Selected images...

April 29th, 2010

2010-04-29T21:48:00.001-07:00

There has been some criticism from people I really like about my lack of updates on Domesticated Carbon, so I give in and here I am.

The whole tone of DC began to focus solely around my training as I prepared for the coming season, and I guess I never made the transition to race reports. I'll do that now.

My season is now in full swing, gone are the jitters of my first time banging bars in a criterium race for the season and in come the comforts of my three millimeters of personal space at 25 mph.

I have had some trying times already; I did not make the cut in the Road Race at San Dimas and took it pretty hard that I couldn't support my team mates in the Crit, so I was acting like a jerk I'm sure. My team mate Sean took Becher Plus' biggest victory this year in that last stage at San Dimas, I'm still very excited for him about that.

I also have not gotten the results I expect from myself, after the off season I had, but its not for lack of trying. I will say that racing with a team that is dedicated to serving only the team and not the individuals is an amazing experience, and I pity those who do not get this opportunity. Racing alone is one thing, but racing with team mates who don't really know you or aren't their to achieve the same goal as you is just not acceptable anymore.

Our teamwork during races has become incredible.

I have also had some good times; besides the whole team experience, I will say working on our criterium racing squad for So Cal crits has been a blast. We haven't worked it into a win yet, other than Sean's brilliant victory, but it is coming. We had an amazing Dana Point Grand Prix earlier this month. I really feel for Wes though, the pressure he puts on himself to preform is immense, and sometimes its not going to work to tell him that sometimes you just don't have the legs in the end. I know he really wanted that race after crashing out last year, next time I will have to work my ass off harder to keep him safe. Also we learned a valuable lesson about staged at Dana Point, show up early, because if you don't...some jerk may forget how to clip into his pedals and force you to start the race in 120th position. Moving up from there on such a fast course was enough to suck your legs dry, so we will not let that happen again.

In each of my crits since then I have made sure I was on the Start line with my wheel touching the tape, ready to go.

Lately the races I have done have been smaller on the schedule and closer to home, so I am racing alone many times. I am used to this and it doesn't bother me, but I can tell you I am sure pining for my team when I'm getting swarmed by sketchy new teams that will remain nameless while trying to keep the best kit in the peleton clean.

This past weekend I raced 1 lap of the Devil Punchbowl road race, it was fucking hard so I quit. Actually I quit because it was too hard for me to really contend, I fell off the lead group pretty early, so I decided to save my legs for the crit the next day. I wasn't going to be able to help John or Sean from way off the back anyway. They both finished really strong, which I liked seeing. Lee also showed up for the Cat 5 race and enjoyed destroying himself for several miles. I can tell he is happy with his effort so far, I know I am excited to see he will be joining us soon in the next level.

I will post my race report for Chuck Pontius, but edited, here now:
What is the story behind every 4 race going off at 4 pm lately? Anyway, I got the hole shot again and took the first lap, this time I did so because I saw a few sketchy guys on the start line and I wanted to get them to the back as quickly as possible.

I stayed pretty much in perfect position all race. When it was fast I stayed top 5 and when it slowed down (which was often) I stayed near the outside around top 15 so I could be attached to any surges.

For some reason the peleton kept taking the worst lines into each corner, like we were in a car and had to stay in the right lane the whole time even though the entire road was open. It made for many sketchy turns.

I had 4 near misses with the pavement, one time I was nailed as a guy couldn’t hold his line in a sketchy turn and I had to lean on him with all of my weight to stay up. I also had the fortune of being at the front of the pack going into turn 1 next to one sketchy rider who must have completely forgotten I was there and decided to take his line into the gutter, leaving me 3 inches of space. He had the balls to yell at me. A few other riders quickly called him on his actions so I was happy to know I was in fact racing safely. Another time a rider smacked into my friend Jason (from Friends Cycling last year) so hard that Jason’s own knee cracked his own top tube. We both stayed up even though I was on his wheel and he had just broken his bike (he actually finished). The last time I almost ruined the best kit in the peleton was on the last lap in turn 3 of a 4 turn race. I was on Jason’s team mate’s wheel and this guy came around me on the outside trying to take the wheel I was on. He never came close to passing me, but he made his turn as if he had passed me and I had to grab a handful of break. Obviously I lost my position and was lost in the swarm. Jason’s team mate won :( well he is a nice guy, but it could have been me.

End report. Expect more of that, and if not I'm sure Eric will get on me for being lazy.

Now onto the juicy bits, more accurately the juicy bits I left littered on the pavement of Carbon Canyon Rd. Wednesday I went for an easy ride with Ashley and some guy I can't remember for the life of me (I think its because he went to Fullerton, go Dirtbags!). The rain spared us and we actually had pleasant riding conditions, although it was quite humid out. I had not done the Carbon canyon loop before, but I instantly liked it! The shoulder could be a bit bigger, but I was never one to be scared about asserting myself in traffic. That is actually a trait that may have saved me from getting run over. Towards the end of the climb I stepped on the pedals a little bit to gap Ash and the Titan so I could stop for a nature break. There is nowhere to pee on this road though, so I just began my decent. I took the entire lane and stupidly acted like I always do and I took one risk too many. As I entered the 180 banked turn going down hill my wheels completely dropped out from under me. There was never a chance for an "OH SHIT I"M CRASHING!" It just happened. The road was extremely slippery from the previous night's rain and I didn't have my Kenda tires on (shameless sponsor plug). I pulled myself together and noticed very little damage to the BMC. We actually rode for 2 more hours and I felt alright, but not great.

The BMC had an appointment with Bannings Bikes anyway, so it was somewhat convenient timing. this crash did put my weekend's racing in jeopardy. I had begun making plans with Brad to race in Bakersfield and had to wave that off when I woke up this morning with what felt like whiplash. I'm going to go for a 2 hour spin with Ashley tomorrow (he got a brand new Colnago he's pretty excited about) and afterwards I will decide about the San Luis Rey Road Cycling Classic which is on Sunday.

this doesn't really flow with the general discussion I have going here, but I thought I should mention that I have earned my category 3 upgrade in the California Bicycle Racing series. this gives me the opportunity to cut my teeth on some Cat 3 races which CBR puts on as well as race with the 1/2/3s at El Dorado and the new Great Park race in Irvine. Those 1/2/3 races are actually really great experiences for me, because I get to races with some word class individuals.

That is all I have for now. Enjoy a plethora of disorganized pictographs from the past month that was.

Song of the Day: Underworld - Sola Sistim

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March 15th, 2010

2010-03-14T23:17:00.001-07:00

I am sitting in my hotel room in Seattle resting from a long weekend of work and a bit of riding. When I do get the chance to work this job, it is a great opportunity. I was a bit worried this morning when I woke up because I felt a little sick again after riding at night last night with no ear covers. I had a runny nose for part of the day and a little scratch in my throat, but nothing seemed to materialize. Not like last week at least. I did destroy my hotel room on my own...

I had the misfortune of being hit not only twice in one year, but twice in one month with sickness. For the second time I was unable to ride my bike for a week and I was running out of tissues. I don't know what I had/have still, but it sucks and it is not something I have dealt with before. Its ironic how poor my health care coverage is and yet I could take my rental car to Canada right now probably and got this taken care of. It wouldn't be a long drive at all. That as much as politics will enter this space.

Back to the training bits...

March 2nd, 2010:
I rode to Irvine to meet Ashley to do the Coffee Crew ride. The ride starts at 6:15 AM and I had to ride there (my poor car died) so I left my house at about 5:15 and hustled there. I was actually early, but now I was quite warm, which is always nice.

It was a beautiful day when the sun eventually showed itself. This ride starts off at a nice 18 mph pace for about 30 minutes and then picks up quickly to a 90% race speed. I felt really good on the flats and was with the front group for the whole ride, sitting on Ashley's wheel, until we went up the backside of Newport and my time off the bike showed some as I was dropped from the group. I made time up as the steep pitch gave way to a power climb which I always enjoys racing up, but Couldn't grab the main group, which included a few Stetina's I'm told.

All was excellent when I got home and I went back to painting my house.

March 7th, 2010:
I planned on joining Wes at the Dominguez Hills CBR crit, but I wasn't able to ride my bike all week because I was sick, so I had to miss it. I feel bad because according to Wes' race report, it sounded like he could have used my help making it fast for him.

I didn't plan on going to the race at all because it was a rainy day and the Cat 4 race was early in the morning, but then a little birdie told me that Floyd Landis would be at the race. So I decided to go watch Ash and see Floyd race, which I always really enjoy. Here is a crappy vid of Floyd trying to break away with a small group and Ashley trying to bridge the gap with another small group. It was all for nothing in the end though, Ashley ended up being too boxed in and Floyd is not a sprinter.

Jonathan Cantwell from Fly V Australia won. Jordan busted a spoke and I got to be a neutral support guy, so at least there was some excitement.

March 9th, 2010:
Inspired by the news of Floyd racing for Bahati's team and watching the boys race on Sunday I went for a ride with Ashley around 10 in the morning. We had originally planned to do Coffee Crew again, but the wind was horrible and it was cold, so why bother?

We rode through the canyon and up Santiago Canyon. Ashley had some intervals to do so it was kind of funny having him pass me then me bring him back like a rubber band snapping as he recovered. I was in no condition to be going hard coming off my cold and all. I felt really good though and tested the legs on the way home. We kept the pace really high through some of the best power climbs and descents Orange County has to offer.

More to come tomorrow, I need sleep and to finish my third day of riding in beautiful Seattle. Goodnight.

Song of the day: The Smiths - Big Mouth Strikes Again

	The Smiths - Big Mouth Strikes Again

March 1st, 2010

2010-03-01T13:00:00.000-08:00

This year is moving along so quickly I don't even remember Smarch.

Today I did some hill repeats. I am in full San Dimas Stage Race prep mode. Hill Repeats are fun because 50% of the time you are flying down hill, but the other 50% of the time you are just counting the seconds until you can go back down hill.

If you have never considered hill repeats before, let me enlighten you. Basically, you find a hill and go up it and back down several times. Pretty boring right? There are different ways you can approach each attempt. If you stay seated you can spin up the hill and this will help you with your climbing for much longer gradual grades. Your body becomes comfortable with spinning up hill. You can also do the whole thing out of the saddle. The benefit for this is that you are working different muscle groups in different ways. Also this helps with all of your out of the saddle efforts, including sprinting.

There is another technique which is great for climbs like Newport Coast (less than 2 miles, but more than 1 mile). Alternate in and out of the saddle efforts every 30 seconds to a minute. I find this helps with my recovery for longer climbs. So that's about all I know about hill repeats.

I also got my first flat this year today, I made it about 3 months since my last one. So that was fun.

Song of the day: Kashmir - Kalifornia

February 26th, 2009 this is a long one...

2010-02-25T23:28:00.000-08:00

I am pretty much over my cold completely. I feel I am at 90% health. I can say that racing when you are sick is very difficult and I don't recommend it. I am certainly happy that I did not prepay for Valley of the Sun or Callville Bay. I would be wrecked and stuck in AZ and NV feeling like a half eaten gingerbread cookie.

This past weekend I hitched a ride with my team mate John up to Sacramento to visit my favorite little guy and his parents. Dresden suprised me by becoming a walking person. It was such a great thing to experience. I hope I get to be there for as many of his milestones as possible, especially when he gets dumped by an older woman (maybe she'll be my age?).

Here is a little video I snagged to enjoy his first steps over and over again.

I also made the trip to get some riding in with Ben and Dresden's father Pat, as well as race the Brisbane Criterium on Sunday. (This is off subject, but I really hope criterium is added to the English dictionary soon). Saturday John, Ben, Patrick and I rode the river ride, which is a very fast paced group ride which usually garners some attention from Northern California pros. Chad Gerlach showed up, as well as come local Cat 1s. It was a pretty fast ride, and I still felt pretty bad at this point. Team Becher+ was able to mix it up still.

I will say, besides the tattoos, our team is going to be known for its peleton poise. (Peleton needs to be added to the dictionary too). I never worry when I am on the wheel of one of my team mates in a fast group ride or in a race. We manage to work our way up to the front intact, its really comforting. Especially since I hope to win some bunch sprints this year.

I spent a lot of the ride up front with Ben, until my cold got the better of me and I needed to drift back. luckily when I wanted to get back to the front I just had to hitch a ride onto Pat's wheel and we were back in business.

I am fairly new to this sport compared to most of my peers, but one thing I have learned is that respect will earn you a lot of rope. I also learned that you get respect by riding fast, hard, and on the front. I don't think Team Becher+ will have a hard time earning our respect.

My computer wasn't working properly so I don't have exact numbers, but I know we averaged about 20 mph for 50 miles. The weather was a little chilly compared to my Southern California standards, but it was otherwise uneventful and nice. The same could not be said for Sunday.

Sunday was the Brisbane Criterium in the marina of Brisbane, CA (just south of San Francisco). Sunday was cold and wet. There was discussion before we even left the house about whether or not we should even go. I think because it involved 6 people making a decision in unison, we opted to head out to the city for the race anyway. I personally hate racing in the rain, I do like riding in the rain and racing cross in the rain however.

Once we finally made it to the course I think the conditions started to get the better of everyone and we wanted to go back home. I had just come up from So Cal, so there was no way I was going to have driven all the way to Brisbane to waste a day by not even trying. I don't think the boys were happy with that.

My new Kenda tires actually made me pretty comfortable when cornering during my warm up, but I don't think anyone of us wanted to be there bad enough to get a proper warm up in. I mean we did waste 20 minutes coming up with excuses.

We actually were able to secure spots on the start line when staging started so I began to feel better about our chances. I looked at the boys and told them our game plan would never work on a day like this, so let's be safe and see what happens. (If you are wondering our plan was to have... wait the enemy may read this).

As you exited turn 2 on course there was a 10 foot wide puddle of water, in turn3 you crossed 2 yellow painted lines at an angle, and there was a hairpin turn. All of these things made the inevitable happen early and often; there was a crash before the first lap finished and that wasn't the last. Our boys stayed rubber side down, but one by one we dropped out. I think fear was the motivator. I was the best placed of the team, but as I kept getting gapped by scared riders I found it harder to maintain contact with the lead 10 riders. So much so that it became futile and when I saw Ben on the side of the road I knew it was time to go home.

I can take with me the fact that, despite the cold and the rain, I actually felt quite good. It was quite a moral boost after the effort I put up the weekend before. I actually don't think I have ever finished a race in February now that I think of it.

One thing I would like to point out, so that I remember for next time, is that I wasn't wearing my lucky cross necklace my grandmother gave me. I am not a religious person at all, I only believe in science and logic, but I do also enjoy symbols of love. I have never had back luck wearing that thing, so i need to remember to continue to wear it.

That was a very long day as evidenced by this lovely picture, I will get my revenge.

Here is a Team Becher+ video to really quantify the experience.

We're not done yet. Yesterday I did some recon for the new time trial that has been added to the Dana Point Grand Prix. The DPGP has always been one of my favorite races. Last year a crash by one of my future Team Mates, Wes, took me out of position for a podium into 13th place. This year we hope to work together and get Wes the big W. The TT that has been added is extremely interesting. It is not a very ordinary way to expand a criterium event. Usually there is a road race and a crit and they are paired together. In this case, the TT and the crit are mutually exclusive, but create an entire weekend of racing. I hope this leads to an even longer stage race in the near future.

The race is less than an hour from my house, so I rode down there and tried the course out. It is going to be hard! The race starts on the same straightaway as the crit, but going the other way and makes a quick right onto PCH then another quick right onto a pretty hairy decent for a TT bike.

From there you ride into a headwind on a nice flat that follows the harbor.

Then you make a sharp right turn into a s turn. Then you face a wall.

Do not let anyone tell you otherwise, this climb is going to be difficult and there will be big time gains made here. It is a steep punchy climb that goes for what feels like a kilometer and only gets steeper once you see the stop sign.

Once you finish the climb, you get a short period to recover before you have another right turn.

After this turn you have a downhill straight away that will be a ton of fun and extremely fast. this section takes you back to the backside of the criterium course which will finish out the TT at the Start/finish line.

I don't care if its fun or not, I will be doing it and I will enjoy myself. The climb definitely sucks though. Here is a video from the Dana Point Grand Prix website which covers every foot of the course, if you need more.

While all of this was going on Wes was up in Portland having fun, he starts his season off this Sunday. Follow Wes here: http://wesleyknielsonracing.blogspot.com/

Your song for the day is La Roux & Skream - In For The Kill (Let's Get Ravey Remix)

	01 In For The Kill - Skream's Let's Get Ravey Remix .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

February 14th, 2010

2010-02-14T22:18:00.000-08:00

First off, Happy Valentine's Day.

February 13th, 2010:
I went out to Palm Springs with Dan Levine to meet up with a bunch of "old" guys and John G. from Team Becher+ and his friend Lee. Old is in quotes because they as fit as any 20 year old you'll meet. The plan was to do the entire century (100 miles) and make a day of it, so we knew we had a lot of riding ahead of us.

Its not often you get to ride with thousands of other cyclists all at once, it was really quite impressive. There were people of all skill levels there, some having more fun than others. This made for some sketchy situations, but nothing too dangerous. In fact I think the most dangerous things that happened we brought on ourselves. For example we pace lined down a heavy populated decent, which was almost like playing a video game. There are few things i like more than going downhill on a bike at a high rate of speed, I think I have said that before.

The ride is actually a paid event with support throughout the course; we didn't pay because I don't have that kind of money to spend on riding my bike. On course were free bananas, oranges, water and brass bands playing the Bee Gees. Having Dancing Queen stuck in your head for 3 hours is not the best way to spend a morning, but I guess its not the worst.

John's friend Lee is newer to riding, but has been spending a lot of time on the bike with John in Redlands, so much so that We convinced him to race the Cat 5's. This still made the ride tough for him, and with me racing the next day (and having a cold, unbeknownst to me) we made the decision to do the metric century(100 km as opposed to 100 miles).

The 65 mile ride was a lot of fun, new rodes and new riding buddies will do that though. We made pretty good time actually, averaging 19.9 miles an hour for the entire day. As we started to make our way back into Palm Springs, John and I decided to animate the group that latched onto us. Similar to when Wes and I were at Food Park, we alternated pulls and made for a very fast very fun end of the ride. John even through in some attacks, but I wouldn't let him get away (or he wasn't trying very hard).

I didn't care too much about my race the next day, so it didn't bother me that this ride was a lot harder than the day before a race should have been. What I didn't realize was that this ride took a toll on my immune system. When I got home I fell asleep, for what I thought was going to be a short nap, and woke up 7 hours later at midnight with an ear ache. I made some oatmeal and did the dishes until I felt I could sleep again around 3:00 am.

Here is a short video we took during the ride, I will make more of these. The rest will be better.
February 14th, 2010:
I woke up today feeling sore, but not anymore sore than usual. I slept in my compression tights, so my legs felt fresh. This meant I could race and everything would be fine.

Wes and Sean were making fun of me for sweating while I was fixing something on my bike, and I thought it was just because it was hot. Turns out I had a fever and didn't realize it, it was REALLY sunny out so it wouldn't be hard to believe it was 90 degrees out.

Sean is still carrying great form from his win last week and took a place behind me in the front of the field once the race started. I figured with the uphill before the sprint the course better suited him. Everything was fine and then I started finding it hard to breathe. I took a break towards the back of the field, but this made me extremely tired because the course created an accordion effect of stopping and sprinting every 30 seconds.

Long story long, I had to pull out of the race with cold symptoms, which was really disappointing because my legs felt fine. Sean continued on and ended up taking 6th place in the field sprint behind the loan winner, for 7th overall.

I flip-flopped over whether or not to do the second race, and ended up starting. This race was so much slower that I felt completely fine. It was only after 5 near accidents in the first 10 minutes that I decided to pack up and call it a day.

I will spend this week getting over this pesky cold and preparing for the Brisbane crit up north. I am really looking forward to racing with Ben and Pat. They plan on working for me, so I need to get my head straight now!

Ashley being pissed leaving the wheel pit:

Music for the day: Phoenix - Fences

	Phoenix - Fences .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

February 11th, 2010

2010-02-11T21:11:00.000-08:00

I've had a lapse in motivation this past week. the combination of things I mentioned before created a storm of in activity. Well that isn't entirely true, just less bike riding. I still went to the gym and played hockey and walked 10 miles. I still feel as strong as ever and I have months before my peak month of April, but it still happens. You lose your riding partner to work, you catch a cold that makes you sleep until 10 and you have a job that starts at 3:30, but in Fullerton. I'm better now if you were wondering.

Went for a 2 hour 35 mile spin today through lovely Irvine. There was a lot of wind, which leads me to believe there will be a lot of wind on Sunday. Sunday is important because it marks the beginning of my career with Team Becher+ as well as the beginning of my 2010 racing season.

Also, this marks my first masters race ever. I am 29, which means I have a racing age of 30 and can race in the 30+ races. It will be nice to race more than once a day when I can.

Tomorrow I will probably do a similar ride, its been so beautiful out lately. Actually Erik owes me a ride...

Saturday I am crashing the Tour de Palm Springs with Dan. It'll be a nice way to get 100 miles in. whether or not this is a good idea the day before a race is still up in the air, but I don't really care how I fair in this race; its a "level 3".

Your musical entry comes from The Faint, a cover of Sonic Youth's Mote.

	skr3amy.free.fr/Playlist/The Faint - Mote .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

February 1st, 2010

2010-02-01T21:15:00.000-08:00

I have neglected my responsibilities here and have left this page dormant for almost a month. Thats what 2 weeks of vacation will do. I didn't end up bringing my bike back east due to logistics, money, and weather. It was really cold there.

Last Sunday I rode GMR with Jordan and Wes. GMR is Glendora Mountain Road and goes up towards Mt. Baldy. This was my first ride in a while because it was really cold out and I wimped out. I felt great that day, even though I had on a base layer, a long sleeve jersey, a long sleeve thermal jersey, a knit cap, knee warmers, embrocation, winter gloves, and booties. We went up the back side, through East Fork, which turned out to be a good idea because there was no way we could have gone down it with all of the ice patches. The road up the mountain was closed, but we hopped the barricade and continued on our way.

The best part about GMR is going down, and even though it there was a lot of debris on the road from rain and flooding, it was extremely fast and fun. This was mostly due to the fact that there was no car or motorcycle traffic at all. I better get used to GMR, our team is getting ready for the San Dimas Stage Race in March and the first day is a time trial up the front side. Oh Joy. The ride was 3 and a half hours and 53 miles.

On Tuesday I did an easy 2 and a half hour ride with Ashley and Scott. Scott is a junior who I have helped before and is a pleasure to ride with. Its good to see kids really excited about bikes, but not turning into jerks at the same time.

We started in the Back Bay and went east to Tustin/ Orange. There are some great little climbs in the hills of Tustin and I am only now getting acquainted with them all. Scott, being the 16 year old that he is, didn't understand what easy meant and kept jumping on up the hill while Ashley and I had a conversation. This wasn't rude, just funny. The ride was 2 and a half hours and 35 miles.

Saturday, Wes and I decided to test our legs out in a local fast paced group ride called Food Park. We only recently got our new kits and some product from our sponsors, Kenda Tires and Enverit supplements, so we took longer to get on the rode than we had expected and had to go at "oh sh!t I'm late" speed. This 10 mile warm up actually only made us stronger and when we met up with the group our plan to stay in the back and just see if we could hang on switched to "let's alternate pulls at the front and contest all of the sprints." Man was it fun to get the blood moving in my legs again at that speed with other people around me. It feels like its been a year since my last race.

The ride goes up Church Hill in Laguna Woods through the Canyon to PCH and back to the Back Bay on its way to Irvine. This ride turned out to be a big confidence builder for Wes and I. We both plan on mixing it up in sprints this years with the others help, so it was great for the both of us to not only see that we were capable of a good kick, but that our team mate was right there too. It was a great day to be on the bike. The ride was 3 hours and 58 miles, with an average speed of 19 mph.

Sunday I headed back out to Pomona to meet Wes and his friend Aaron for an "easy" ride, or so it was advertised haha. We ended up doing the same ride we had done a week earlier with Jordan, up the back side of GMR. I went decidedly slower this time up the hill, because I didn't feel like blowing my legs up after the ride the day before. Going down is always full on though, its my reward for going up right? The ride was 3 and a half hours and 53 miles.

Today was a day off the bike, but I did hit the gym with Dane. We did squats, dead lift, and bench press. Since I am no longer in the building phase of my weight training (that has been replaced by more intense road work outs) I do not hit the same peaks I used to. This means my body isn't in much pain at all after go home and shower. I think I will keep the gym as long as I can, it has worked so far.

Team Becher+ received our new kits from Champion Systems this past week. I am extremely excited to now be an "official" member of the team. I am also excited to have my first skin suit for the track, the LA velodrome has almost 2 races a month it seems!

Song of the day: Alaska in Winter - Close Your Eyes We Are Blind

	Alaska In Winter - Close Your Eyes - We Are Blind .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

January 7th, 2010

2010-01-07T10:38:00.001-08:00

This week is an off week for me. I will spin the wheels a little, but that is about it. It wasn't so much planned as it was forced with traveling this week back east and starting a new job (the job and the trip are mutually exclusive, the job is in Fullerton, CA)

January 6th, 2010:
Dane and I went to the pool and did an hour work out. Swimming is extremely hard for me. The more body fat I lose the more I sink. Also I have girly arms and big legs, swimmers have big manly arms and less big but not girly legs. It sure helped to stretch my back out. I will love/hate including it more in my weekly training for January.

I did notice that I was EXTREMELY tired after we were done. Its amazing to me that i can ride for 6 hours and come home and be a little drained but still able to do things and after a shower I'm fine. After swimming I fell right back asleep for more than an hour. Perhaps its because there is no eating during swimming.

Dane and I figured out a "great" way to work on strength in the pool. We run half the distance of the pool with the other person doing a "dead man's float" on their back. No less than 4 attractive women walked into the pool area while we were doing this exercise, and none of them stayed very long.

After work I had a hockey game in Anaheim at 9:10. For some reason this league has become a lot for physical lately. I'm sure its because our team is a lot faster and more skilled than the other teams, but I really don't play hockey anymore to knock people around. I did at one time, but now I don't need to blow off steam. I just really enjoy skating, so its a shame that this has happened. I'm sure it means we will become more physical again; at one time our team was kicked out of the league for being too dirty, so we cleaned up. I feel like Sean Avery. I will be gone from hockey for a few game so maybe I'm the problem and they will prosper.

January 5th, 2010:
Went on a 2 and a half hour ride with Dane just to keep blood in the legs. We found a great new climb in Tustin that I will being doing repeats on in the near future. I did the whole thing in my big ring.

There are actually a lot of roads around me that need to be explored and I am knocking them off one by one. It is not uncommon for me to say "lets take this road" on a ride now; know ahead of time that I don't know where I am going. Whats the worst that can happen?

Like I mentioned earlier, I will be away for a few weeks. I am worried about how cold it will be. I should have been riding early in the AM to get used to the cold, but 70 degrees feels so nice. I am excited either way though because I will get a chance to explore 3 states I have never ridden a bike before (well Washington DC is not a state, but its new). I will take lots of pictures and hopefully make new friends.

One thing I am sad about, is that I will be missing my team's first camp of the new season. I still have not met everyone on my team, so this would have been a great opportunity for me. We are going to have a second camp in February though, and I hope we do it around the Boulevard course in San Diego. I have never done that race and would like to see it first, as would Dave.

Song: INXS - Mystify

	INXS - Mystify .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

January 4th, 2010; Supplemental Post

2010-01-04T22:03:00.000-08:00

Dave's bike for Lisa is complete. I think I want to keep it. It is so much fun to ride. Check out the gear ratio!
First bike I've built like this, Dave painted it. pretty cool for our first from scratch effort.

January 4th, 2010

2010-01-04T10:45:00.000-08:00

We'll go backwards...

Monday January 4th, 2010:
Went to the gym with Dane. We are winding down our strength training this month. This week and next we are hitting the weights Monday and Friday while swimming Wednesdays. Swimming is being brought in to help stretch out my back and to strengthen my core, my biggest weakness. Do not think for a second I have decided to try a triathlon. I will wait until peer pressure gets deafening when I am in my 50's.

The last 2 weeks we cut weights back to just Mondays, with swimming on Wednesdays and now yoga on Fridays. If I am uncomfortable on my bike then the weight training is useless, so this is the time to work on stretching and my core.

January is also the month I start my weight loss program. Being that I am not overweight at all I feel like an asshole saying I need to lose weight, but there is a difference between being at a healthy weight and being at a performance weight. I would like to be at the latter.

Another reason to tone down the weights is because I am starting to up my intensity on the road. My miles will come down as I do more intervals. One of my favorite things to do is hill repeats. It hurts a lot for a non-climber like me, but you can actually see your results. Find a short 1 kilometer hill that is fairly steep and do it as many times as you can. then do it out of the saddle as many times as you can then only do it out of the saddle. It helps your sprint, well it helped mine.

Sunday January 3rd, 2010:
Short easy day on the bike. just did a loop through Shady Canyon and then stopped at Marcel's bike shop in Laguna Niguel (Celo Europa). Riding alone is one of the most cathartic things I know of. I feel like Henry Fonda and the 11 other "Angry Men" are in my head debating my life's most insignificant topics.

Saturday January 2nd, 2010:
Wes Nielson, my new team mate on Team Becher +, came out my way for a ride for once. Normally I go east to Pomona, but the riding is so much nicer here, its not even fair. He liked the opportunity to ride along the coast for once.

I took Wes through Shady Canyon then up Ridgeline to University. From there to the Back Bay and on to the coast. With it being the first Saturday after New Years the day was pretty quiet surprisingly. there were very few people out and about in cars of on bikes/running. There were also few females to make the ride more attractive, our high pressure system made up for it again.

We took PCH down to Dana Point and just rolled over the worst kept secret in Southern California. PCH needs to be refinished in Laguna beach though, it hurts like hell right now.

Through those rollers in South Laguna I like to keep my bike in a very easy gear and spin almost I'm spinning out.

I feel bad though, because I misrepresented the ride to Wes; he was expecting no hills and it was non-stop rollers. I had a lot more I wanted to say, but I started this entry 7 hours ago, so its all been forgotten by now.

Monday January 4th, 2010 Supplemental entry:
Dave and I spent quite a bit of time, with help later from Dane, building a bike for his fiance. We painted a road frame grey and slime green then put flat handle bars on it and the easiest gear ration you have ever seen. I am jealous of this bike. I will post pictures once I finish putting the grips on and cleaning it off.

Song for today:
The Rolling Stones - Under My Tumb

	The Rolling Stones - Under My Thumb .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

January 1st, 2010

2010-01-01T17:29:00.000-08:00

Yea January 2 0 0 backspace 1 0 is here.

I did not do much of anything today. Friday is a leg workout day, but the gym is closed for National hangover day.

I can think of 20 better holidays to close for, but whatever enjoy the day off right?

Wednesday night I drove up to Los Angeles and stayed with an old friend Sandra. I had a birthday gift card for Real Food Daily and I didn't want to have to drive straight to Thousand Oaks in the morning from Orange County. Besides picking a fight with 2 drunks guys while I was half asleep, the night was uneventful and delicious. There is a cute dog that lives there, although I'm not sure she likes me.

Thursday morning I drove to Thousand Oaks to meet up with a fellow vegan cyclist I met through twitter. Its still very strange to me how things like this happen, but social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook have become immensely helpful to the cycling community. I am unaware of any other communities who use these two forums in the same way cyclists do.

When you receive a pleasant invite from a person who guys by the name @profsmitty you know that the hardest part of the day is going to be getting to the group before the person that invited you gets there. Crisis averted, we arrived at the same time.

The Platinum Performance cycling team guys and gals are all extremely nice. It was a pleasure to ride with completely new people who were excited about cycling and were not assholes (ed. REAL assholes, not the kind I am).

The ride of the day was schedules to be an 80 mile route which passed over two tough climbs and would take about 5 and a half hours. There was support after the first climb, one of the Platinum guys', Bob, wife drove to the middle of nowhere and gave us banana slices water an peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (no I'm still not eating bread).

After the group reached the support destination, many of the riders decided they were not prepared to complete the route for the day and decided to take a flatter, shorter route home. For some reason I kept going with the original plan. Our group of 30 was now 7, myself and @profsmitty (Steve Smith) included.

I have to say that the next 5 miles of road may be the greatest I have ever ridden. My legs were warm from the long slow climb and so I made short work of the short rollers and had an amazing time traversing the smooth switchbacks that presented themselves on the other side. I love when you can beat a car down hill.

I always loved the stretch of PCH that goes south to Malibu, ever since the day Pat and I made our way down the coast and we knew this was the beautiful gateway home. Even with the wind you can really get your speed up and still take in the coast line that is trimming the bike lane. I just wish it was closer to my house. The length of ocean lined road near me is unparalleled, but the beauty is not.

Our group of 7 deviated from the original plan and made our own way through the Santa Monica Mountains spending at least 2 and a half hours climbing during out 5 and half hour long ride time. When we were close to the end, another 10 miles was added on simply for the visual enhancement of the ride. I was told it was for the new guy. I'm not sure if that means that I really needed to see this specific area or if it meant I was being hazed. I wouldn't be suprised if it was both.

90 miles in the legs are a great way to end the year. I put my compression tights to great use, spending the next 15 hours in them. now I feel like a million bucks.

It is legitimately getting close to the race season, in fact there is a track race this month. I don't know if I feel excited or underprepared. Last year I felt confident and fell on my face.

Song for your dreams:
Jimmy Eat World - Kill

December 29, 2009; Supplemental Post

2009-12-29T22:27:00.000-08:00

Went for a reeeeal easy ride with Dave. Turnout just be be an errands run through Irvine actually. Dave finally got his new Fizik saddle he's been wanting, and he is very happy with his purchase.

He had to ride home with his old saddle in his jersey :).
Our ride was really nice actually. Rode through Shady Canyon then up Ridge line to Turtle Rock. I love those little climbs in there. Dave seemed to like them a lot too. I've spent hours in there before just going up and down people's streets, great way to spend an afternoon.

Ended up with 2.5 hours and 35 miles and 5 DVDs on sale from Blockbuster to watch tomorrow while I put my legs up.

There really isn't a lot more I can say, I'll let the pictures tell the story.

Today's song is Virtue by Harvest, back to 2002 for this one. Great times, a lot like these times.

Lyrics:

Dedication to discipline. Endurance of self separation. Sustain the sense to remain. Give of the feeling, control your life. Empower. Slave, suffer. Never will I ignore. No more ingestion of submission to this world. Dedicate some time to that which brings you to life. Empty without substance. You're just a slave to the hand that pulls the strings. Ignite the will. Self acceptance the first discipline. Obligation to fulfill your endeavors. You control your actions. You may free yourself. Suffer, slave.

December 29, 2009

2009-12-29T11:34:00.001-08:00

I feel bad when I flake on the boys, I really like riding with them. I did predict that it would happen though. Its just too cold for something I don't need to do. turns out it was a good thing I didn't go on the ride, my week is already packed so I need the rest day now. I am going to do a New Years Eve ride with a new friend, and fellow vegan, Steve Smith on Thursday, which is 80 miles with lots climbing. followed by the New years Day ride out of Long Beach the next morning which is also 80 miles. My tally actually takes me to 335 miles projected for the week.

Strike that, this just in, Tuesday is being switched for Wednesday. I guess I'm putting chamois cream on today after all, because Dave is getting off work early. To be continued...

December 28th, 2009

2009-12-28T22:39:00.000-08:00

Weights this morning with Dane hurt. I was actually going strong on the squat rack, but every time I stepped out to reset the bar, I felt a pinch in my hip flexor. I didn't push it too much even though I felt really strong, because I was worried about an injury. I tried a few dead lifts and called it a day. Something was just not right. I spent 20 minutes talking to Dane while he continued his routine while I stretched out my leg. It was just really tight I guess.

I took a nap after the gym because I had time to kill before I had to meet Kyle in Newport Beach. My nap went a little long though and I had to drive there.

I ended up taking Sunday off as well, because i was enjoying the time with my family and because the Jets were on. They won, so it was a great choice.

I showed up to the bathrooms a little late, as per my usual. It really must be hard to be my friend. Our friend Jake's girl friend, Eva was with Kyle. We rode down PCH towards Laguna and enjoyed some of Southern California's greatest miles on our way to Bluebird Canyon. Bluebird is a shirt steep climb in south Laguna which makes for a nice effort to throw into an easy ride. The decent on the backside is short but sweet too. We took the Canyon back north through Irvine. Then took a left up San Jauquin and did the alternate Newport Coast climb. I love coming down that road, its straight as an arrow and if you catch the light in the middle you can get your speed up pretty high. 45.6 mph today.

Stats for the day 45 miles/ 2 hours and 45 minutes. Tomorrow I'm riding with Dane and Josh of Becher Jr. fame. I have flaked on the last 4 rides that have started before 10:00 am, so we'll see if I can wake up and get out of my warm bed.

I listen to music all day long, so I think I am going to start including a song with every post from now on. I picked Decades by Joy Division, because of the Tom Zirbel situation. I feel for him, his life is going to change drastically and his character is going to take a big hit. How ever it ends up, I hope he still finds happiness in his life. i love racing my bike, but if I couldn't do it anymore, I know I could find different ways to spend my time. Its still a sad story, I really admired him for making the pro tour at 31. Good luck with this tough time Tom.

Anyway, enjoy...

December 26th, 2009

2009-12-26T11:39:00.000-08:00

Sometimes when you wake up its hard to convince yourself to throw a leg over your top tube. Marcel told me this happens to him sometimes too. I know most of the time I'm just tired and need to eat some cereal and get dressed and I'll be fine. Today I felt different, just drained. I though sleeping in to avoid the cold would help it, but I still wasn't ready to go anywhere. My heel feels the worst in the morning. And at 9:00 it felt like a broken bone, now at 11:30 I'm ready to do hill repeats on it. I mean I'm not going to, but it feels better. Its just a stupid bruise, but its in a bad place.

So I take some advice from Marcel this morning, and I didn't ride. I always take Marcel's advice, he has done everything I could hope to do.

The problem with off days, is I worry that I will over eat. When I get bored I eat, its pretty normal I think. So now I am waiting until 12:00 pm so I can eat lunch, then I'll go brave the stores and make some returns.

I promise to kick Sunday's ass though, because I want to. Sunday's been acting like a punk.

/lunch.

December 25, 2009

2009-12-25T23:14:00.001-08:00

It should come as no surprise to the people who know me, that I am not big on tradition and am not a fan of religion. I do, however, enjoy good friends and family and xmas is a great excuse to get these people together, so I don't hate xmas. I really like it.

Did the presents thing in the morning (got some new compression tights), then met up with Dane around 11:00 to go for a short ride.

I planned to do about 2 hours, but that isn't really possible anymore. There are no good 2 hour rides. We rode through Laguna Canyon via Irvine and spent some time enjoying the beautiful day along the PCH. I still can't believe I get to live here, there is a long series of events that brought me here today... I'm glad that all happened.

Our ride was still pretty short, 3 hours and 40 miles. We went at a pretty slow pace because its xmas. I have a feeling that the law of action and reaction does not apply to headwinds. I never feel like I get the benefit of a strong headwind when I turn around. We decided that the wind must follow the rules of the road and go with the flow of traffic.

No gym today, I'm not even sure they would be open. It was a good day to skip anyway, gives my heel a full weekend to heal before squats again on Monday.

Riding tomorrow up the coast to Seal Beach or maybe shorter, depends on Becher Jr. I think Ashley is going to meet up with us, which is always welcome. I don't think its vain to say that I like the way the 2 inches of my arm in this photo look...

/goodnight

December 24th, 2009

2009-12-24T11:52:00.000-08:00

Turns out my heel hurts a lot more than I thought. I was able to keep playing last night so I thought it was just a stinger. I should be able to ride tomorrow, but I didn't want to chance getting stuck 50 miles from home today with Ashley and have him be stuck listening to me cry like a little girl who got the wrong my little pony toy.

I know that with all of the stuff I do a real injury is bound to happen, but I have to admit there was some irony here. When I was getting ready last night, I realized I left my new mouth piece at home. I play without a face shield, so I figured I should start wearing a mouth piece. I went through all of the trouble of molding it to my mouth and scratching the TapouT logo off the front, and then left it on the counter. I joked with one of my teammates that tonight would be the night that I get hit in the mouth. He said not to jinx myself, but I think that unjinxed me by saying it would happed. After all my body took all of the punishment. My ass is fine by the way, I just flexed and deflected the puck into the net <3 /enjoy your tomorrow.

December 23, 2009; Supplemental Post

2009-12-24T00:43:00.000-08:00

Got hit in the ass and the heel with slapshots tonight during my hockey game. I had a lot of fun though, riding has sure made it easier to play. I had to play half the game tonight because we were short players and then lost another player due to injury. I feel great, now some sleep and then a 6:00 am wake up call. I'm just glad my sister likes to sleep in xmas morning now. Here's a song to go to sleep with, because I will be doing so.

December 23rd, 2009

2009-12-23T19:53:00.000-08:00

Gym workout in the morning with Dane. My hip flexor was acting up, but it was an upper body day, so it got to rest. Standing press and standing rows, both of which make me feel like a weakling. Dane was pretty cooked today, so he took our ride off. Instead I met up with Ashley in Irvine.

Ashley wanted to do 45 minutes of tempo in the canyon again, so away we went. I really like the canyon ride, its one of the best things about living where I do. You can ride for almost two hours without worry about a traffic signal, and you can always continue into Live Oak canyon by O'Neil park for another hour of uninterrupted riding. Turns out though, that I don't know every inch of the canyon just yet. today Ashley took me on a new climb into the Santiago community. It was awesome, nothing too hard, but just a long interesting climb with nice people on the side of the road.

The lack of a bike lane makes things interesting, but the cars were not jerks to us (they did fly by though).

I am starting to enjoy riding a lot more now that I can o fast every once in a while. I love going fast. There is a decent into the canyon when you go the back way, right after the toll road, and as we both started down the hill i looked at Ashley and said "This is my favorite thing to do, go fast." As hard as it is sometimes to go faster, I still want to keep going; this sounds like something Ricky Bobby would say I guess.

All I can think about now is the next race season: group rides, hill repeats, track work outs, and of course the races them selves. Ashley and I were discussing Pro Tour gossip, as per usual, and realized our own peleton has its own share of gossip. I think we all enjoy this part of it secretly.

When all was said and done I ended up doing about 50 miles in 2 hours and 45 minutes, pretty fast because of the tempo work (and we booked it home, which was my fault).

Hockey game at 10:30, which means little sleep tonight. Its worth it though, hopefully I can get Wes out there skating soon.

One of Marcel's "Bubbas" (he calls everyone Bubba), Steve, called me out on missing the Celo Europa group ride all the time, so I told him I'd be there tomorrow. Now I have to wake up at 6:00 am.

December 22, 2009; Supplemental Post

2009-12-22T23:03:00.000-08:00

Today marks our decent into summer, although it has been summer for quite a while now.

Did about 2 hours of boxing with Ryan tonight. Its really difficult to teach your body to move in all of these new ways, but when you get it right and you feel the power in the pads its nice. Every time I messed up it hurt, so I need to learn to get the technique down first them move onto speed. I feel very lucky to have so many people willing to teach me different things. With Ryan now teaching me how to box, Dane teaching me in the weight room, and Ashley teaching me on the bike (among many others) I can only be thankful. There is no way I could afford to purchase this type of support and information on my own right now.

The reason I decided to start boxing has a few parts to it. I want to further tighten up my core. I want to increase my reaction time. I want to learn so I can understand what's going on in the fights I watch. I want an opportunity to spend time with another friend in his element. I want to feel strong for once. I secretly want to learn just in case I have to fight in hockey. I don't have any plans to fight anyone, other than sparring with Dane and Ryan. Just keep it fun and safe. Already enjoy the entire process, so this will be part of the rotation. With swimming replacing one of my weight training days in January, I will be a true renaissance man.

Gym in the morning, upper body only, then maybe a century (more likely just 70 miles). /goodnight.

December 22nd, 2009

2009-12-22T10:13:00.000-08:00

Full rest day. I had planned to ride, but it looked windy and I have all week to ride. I will go buy presents instead. I have to do errands, but since I only buy presents for my family I'm not complaining. Time for a shower and compression tights.

December 21, 2009; Supplemental Post

2009-12-21T21:38:00.000-08:00

This song has come in to my head frequently this month. I'm not sure why. I feel like a wrecking ball, or want to feel like a wrecking ball. Right now I am more like a wrecking ball on the ground full of potential energy. Its the feeling I have when I am sitting on my top tube before a race and my right calf starts twitching. Its the feeling I have before I finally make a choice. OK, it seems I might be sure why the song has been in my head. I don't think having potential energy is the same as having potential though, I could still be full of shit.

December 21, 2009

2009-12-21T21:23:00.000-08:00

Spent the morning in the weight room today. Squatted 165 and Dead lifted (?) 265, then Dips. I hate Dips. The Dead lift has really help my body fill into the shape of a cyclist. Well sort of. I mean my core is getting stronger and more tone, I look like a different person to a certain extent. Being stronger can only help me next year, that and having talented teammates.

This week starts the holiday for my school districts, so there is no work (unless I find something temporary). This means I don't have much to do during the day, except to train. I don't like riding on Mondays because I put in a lot of miles on Saturday and Sunday, so I usually just go to the gym. Today i decided recovery was key, or my body decided that (or Dakota decided that) ,and I slept for 3 more hours after my protein shake. The 3 hour weekly nap is now in the rotation, not everyday, just one day.

I have had a new problem with my training program, that I never had before. I have started to trim body fat (except in my belly, because i am a Roecklein) and now I cant cross my legs with out bone resting on bone. This hurts like hell after 2 minutes. So sad. /goodnight.

December 20th, 2009

2009-12-20T22:58:00.000-08:00

It was a little colder today, low 70s I think. I had at least four sets of plans fall through and I slept in until 8:00am so I decided to go ride by myself ands see who I might run into on PCH; its Sunday everyone is on PCH. I figured that I would get at least 50 miles in and at most get 80 miles in. Felt good enough either way, but ended up with 60 miles of riding in 3 1/2 hours.

As I was about to enter Bolsa Chica I saw the California Pools and Spas team going south, so I turned around and chased up to them. It took me almost to Beach Blvd to catch them. Dan Reback was there like I suspected. One of the best guys I know. As we cruised south bound we passed a tattooed cyclist with a miss-matched kit, and I had an elitist thought. That is until Ashley came up next to me and scared the shit out of me. We tagged on the back of the Cal Pools group until Newport so we could meet up with Erik and 2 lady friends.

These four took me all the way home, giving my ride a yin and yang; 30 miles north all alone, and 30 miles home among good friends. Weights tomorrow.

/end

December 19th, 2009

2009-12-19T23:36:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, Friday December 18th, 2009, I had a tough gym work out with Dane. The legs don't recover as quickly after 70 miles as they do after 40 miles. We were still able to do a full work out and we felt fine, just wasn't breaking any records. We are careful not to lift more than our bodies can. I liken it to riding in a headwind versus a tailwind. You can be traveling 10 miles faster in a tailwind but exerting yourself the same amount in both scenarios. Therefore, in the gym, my body should see the same results from slightly less or the same amount of weight as it would if I were fully recovered. I don't know if this correlates or not, but I know on Monday I always feel like a champ so something is working.

Program on Friday was, and is always, Squats, Bench, and Pull-ups. I hate Pull-ups.

Today, December 19th, 2009, I took Dane on his first group ride. Rock and Road cycler y in Irvine sponsored a large group ride to raise canned goods for the needy. Sounded like a good time so we tagged along.

I had an appointment at 12:00 PM, so we couldn't do the whole canyon ride, which was disapointing, but we still salvaged the day. 30 miles in 2 hours of riding. We rode around Mission Viejo Lake and scouted talent, my favorite pastime on the bike. /godnight.

December 17, 2009

2009-12-17T21:10:00.000-08:00

This weather has been outstanding this week. I can't believe I get to live here sometimes. Most Californians I know have never lived in the snow. I can't imagine finding the motivation to go train in the dead of winter back on Long Island. I'll stick to my ocean front riding. It was 70 degrees today and I was wearing no base layer, arm warmers, knee warmers or embrocation. I'm worried we may have to pay the universe back for this good fortune soon. I just hope its after my winter training is completed. I'd rather skip a day in March than December.

Today I rode 70 miles in just under 5 hours with Dave and Dane. Dave and Dane make up one half of what I have dubbed Becher Jr. I got tired of trying to explain who I was riding with when none of my cycling friends knew them. They are new to cycling this year (along with Josh and Jake) and they sure make these winter miles more fun. Also its nice to have some of my friends do something with me since I rarely have time to hang out anymore.

This would be the longest ride in Becher Jr.'s short history. I think 45 was the previous high, so I knew this was a stretch. I sweetened the pot for them by promising them food, even though I don't normally allow for long stopages. How can we pass up Creme Cafe? I got potatoes.

Once we got onto PCH we met up with Ashley, and he joined us for a good two hours. I think the guys were happy to see someone of his caliber in our little group. At least with Ashley him and I alternate who is late; usually I am always late. Its nice to have someone who can dish it out too.

The ride took its toll on Becher Jr. and we crawled the last 10 miles home, but they'll both have new saddles soon and enjoy riding 70 miles again soon enough.

After the ride Dave and I got down to business on his fiance's bike frame. Its going to be silver and neon green, I'm jealous. Good day.

December 16th, 2009

2009-12-16T19:08:00.000-08:00

I rode with Ashley again today, 50 miles in all for about 3 hours. We did 45 minutes of tempo work, which was the first real work I've done all year. Whenever I try to gauge my heart-rate during hard efforts I do one of my favorite things, talk. Depending on how easy it is for me to talk, I can tell how hard an effort is for me. We both got really quiet during the beginning of our tempo, but it was more of a cautious silence. In the end I emerged with continued confidence for next season based on our conversation throughout the canyon ride.

I love riding in the canyon, but its almost a tease to ride the canyon from Jamboree to cooks corner. Every cyclist who has ever ridden the canyon knows how much fun it is to go north through the canyon, if you don't know this try both and get back to me.

I have been struggling with plan vs action lately. I know what's wrong. I have a mix of seasonal effectiveness, as well as a crunch from limited work. It didn't help that the rain last week made it very easy for me to just pull the covers back over my head and sleep through the week. I am surprised how long my dedication lasted; I am now two and a half months into my off season. So I know that this won't last, especially now that Ashley is back on the bike.

I have two weeks coming up where there will be no jobs available, so, until then, I will try to work as much as possible. I often work short days, but after five hours in a cold classroom with nothing to do I find it hard to get anything done. I like waking up and dragging my feet until I am awake and then going for a ride when I'm good and ready, knowing that when i get home I can have my recovery shake. Its the little things right?

December 14th, 2009

2009-12-14T09:23:00.000-08:00

Tough day at the gym with Dane. Squat went up 10 pounds to 165 pounds, Dead stayed the say though. I could lift more, but my back felt tender and I didn't want to risk injury.It takes us about an hour and a half to 2 2-3 exercises.

When I was in high school I used to squat hundreds of pounds and compete with the numbers of the offensive linemen on the wall, but my technique was horrible. Now that I have a much better technique I can't lift as much, but I'm much stronger so its ok.

No work today, so I have time to shower, have a recovery shake, and put my legs up. I think I'll watch Blade Runner.

December 13th, 2009

2009-12-13T23:29:00.000-08:00

I rode with Ashley, Brad and Greg today for about 3.5 hours. It was nice to see Ashley on the bike again, although I had never actually ridden with him before. Our friendship grew so quickly it feels like we should be used to riding together by now.

My life.

2009-12-13T23:05:00.000-08:00

The goal is always to be like the Daft Punk song, "Better Faster Stronger." I finished the 2009 racing season with a whimper by crashing three times in successive weeks. In fact I crashed in three different cycling disciplines (road, track, and cyclocross) which has got to be some kind of record. I currently find myself in the position to live a partially employed (see underemployed) lifestyle which grants me the freedom to treat this off-season with the respect and dedication it deserves.

In the past two months I have become a recluse living by a schedule written on expired days of a page-a-day calendar about the 1,000 places to see before you die; in the interests of full disclosure, I often forget there is anything on the other side of these pages, I treat my calendar like a post it pad I am only allowed to use once a day.

On these pages I scribble my weekly weight room work out schedule, my weekly on road training schedule and the names of absent teacher I will replace at some point during the week for a few hours. There may also be a business plan on a few of them, but don't you worry about that.

Along with the structured allotment of my time during the week, I have also redesigned my diet. I have been vegan for over 10 years, so this is nothing new, but one thing I realized this year is that I am addicted to dessert. Dessert is what all vegans crave, I don't know one who can pass it up. That's gone. I also have a problem with making sandwiches too often and relying on burritos for sustenance, they're so delicious! Bread (and tortillas) is gone too. The idea was to kick bread, not ALL wheat, for the month of November to help me keep my weight down while I started training. That has since changed to I will not eat bread again until I win a race, and that whole pizza that I do devour that day will be much better than any trophy.

What's it all for? I enjoy racing my bike, I don't ride my bike just to get around, I ride it because I like going fast. I like the power you have when you step out of the saddle. I like the competition. I race to win, just like I play hockey to win. If it was all for fun I would never join adult leagues with refs and organized playoffs, there would be no need. I had a really fun year this past year. I got to ride and race with one of my favorite people while living in Sacramento watching my "nephew" figure out how to use his body for the first time, but I never won a race on the road.

Enter Dane's return from Korea and an organized weight lifting program designed with my bottom heavy interests in mind.

What I mean to say, in my natural long winded way, is that I want to do this right. I have the time and the support (friends, not money) to make my bicycle go faster. I am in a good place now where I have a team who is willing to work with me, unlike last year where I spent most of my time alone. The support is always what's been missing, not the desire. Jordan and I spent 2 hours talking about how the community of cyclists in southern California has created a lot of friendships for us both, as well as symbiotic relationships with people who have more experience and are willing to share that with us. I feel so lucky.

Now I just need to make it all work for me like my confidence tells me I can.

You are being served.

2009-12-13T22:54:00.001-08:00

This area of the internet has had many different personalities. It was a vague look at my daily life. It was a place for pictures and race reports from the California pro cycling domestic scene. It was a place for me to allow music to personify my mood. Most recently it has been a place for me to rant and discuss the European professional cycling peloton. Seeing as how I think my personal life and my opinions os professional cycling are best discovered through twitter now (@assholemike) and the domestic cycling scene is best covered by Podium in Sight, I'll just keep to my own cycling exploits and adventures. Enjoy, or don't.

Two thirds of the way through the tour...

2009-07-21T15:51:00.000-07:00

After stage 16 this tour has finally gotten a couple of exciting days in and we have a real good idea of who is looking good and who is not.

Who's looking strong:
Alberto Contador: his attack on stage 14 was breath taking. He has been protected by at least 2 teammates the entire time and has managed to mark every other attack from the challengers.

Andreas Kloden: Watch for him to podium again this year with a good time trial effort. He has had to do the least amount of work of any of the top ten riders and still looks strong. I'd argue he's the second strongest person in the tour this year, but we can't prove that because he's never had to attack.

Lance Armstrong: as much as it pains me, I have to admit his reeling in of the yellow jersey group today was classic Lance. He doesn't look strong enough to match the Schlecks or Contador when they attack, but he looks a lot like Sastre when he slowly pulls in the leaders. He also blew right by Frank, which is no easy task. He won't win, because even if all bets are off he can't climb better than AC and AC is just as strong in the time trial, but he's a lock for the podium.

Bradley Wiggins: everyday he makes me proud to be a trackie. I would love for him to win this whole thing and Cav to miss out on the green jersey after Cavendish bashed Wiggo when they missed out on a medal at the Olympics. Wiggens won't win, but he was there all day with AC and a podium is looking pretty attainable.

Who's looking flat:
Andy Schleck: his attacks lack the punch of AC and he looks like the week in the flats really messed with his climbing rhythm. He can't time trial at all, so if he can't put any time into the top 5 guys then he will miss the podium. He is still a great climber and can sneak into the third spot, but Iam not sold yet. He is a lock for the white jersey, because Nibali is not going to gain much time on him. Too bad, I like Nibali.

Carlos Satre: my pick to win overall is suffering from the Astana bludgeoning. Its starting to look like you need a solid two headed GC team to be strong enough to win the tour. Astana, Garmin, and Saxo all have 2 guys who can compete for GC and so they can attack to weaken the field, while Sastre has to wait for the field to sleep on him. He hasn't shown an ability to attack yet, but I think he's saving that for a stage win to come.

Christian Vandevelde: for what he's been through this year, he can be proud of his tour, a top ten would be an excellent result. He was able to get back in with the leaders today, but that was after the yellow jersey group slowed down. I worry that Wiggo's success will hurt VDV emotionally, he seems to lack confidence when he shouldn't.

Who's falling back:
Cadel Evans: can't wait to see his youtube videos this year.

Frank Schleck: he is riding (reluctantly?) for his brother. He only has one attack in him each day it seems, or one big effort. We won't know how strong he could have been because he has been supporting Andy, but he won't have a top ten this year.

Sad to see Jens Voight crash like he did. It looked extremely painful and he is one of my favorite riders. The tour will not be as exciting without him that's for sure.

Favorite rides from the tour so far:
Brice Feillu - Maybe France has a future after all? I would be excited for this kid to move up in the GC, but his weak team and lack of experience have left him out of many of the important selections.
Heinrich Haussler - If anyone deserves to win a stage, its HH. Look at all of the emotion.
Franco Pellizotti: glad to see an Italian working his way into the polka dot jersey, there is such a big lead now, but I don't think he will stop earning points.

This will be a great off season, by the way.

2009 Tour de France Preview

2009-06-26T09:59:00.000-07:00

Twitter has rendered most blogs pointless lately, but with the Tour starting I thought 140 characters couldn't do it justice.
First the predictions:
It wouldn't be Tour season without doping; I've almost become immune to this nonsense. This is mostly because baseball doesn't seem to care, so why should cycling? I don't think Contador is a doper, after all Garmin was courting him, however, I feel like the French have it in for him. He could meet the same fate Floyd Landis did in 2006. Since I can't put my finger on anyone who looks doped up right now (every rider has had a bad day it seems), I will have to go with the conspiracy theory.

Best Team: This one seems easy, because Astana is a hellish Cerberus of cycling powerhouses, however, I have little faith in Lance bettering his Giro performance. Also, Levi is the best in American stage races, but he is not going to be able to take advantage of a depleted tour field like he did in 2007, when he podiumed. That said, I'm going with the Schlecks and Saxo Bank - Playitas for team classification.

Green Jersey: I don't want to pick Cavendish, so I won't. I appreciate his track heritage, but I race bikes for the spirit of competition. I hate to think that now we have no competition in bunch sprints. I'm going to go out on a limb and pick Tyler Farrar for the green jersey. Garmin is feeling the heat for their lack of success, as evidenced by their talks with Contador, and Farrar has shown he has the kick to beat Cav in field sprints. Garmin will have to support Farrar instead of Christian Vandevelde because CVV is still not 100% after recovering from breaking vertebrae in his back at the giro. Garmin will have to make a a strong effort to salvage their Tour with stage wins and hopes of snatching the Green Jersey from Cavendish (who can be beat).

White Jersey: With Rabobank working for Dennis Menchov, you have to wonder if Robert Gesink's chances at white will be slim. He will have his hands full helping Menchov tackle the stronger teams. Liquigas could benefit from the GC tussle and have one of their two guys get away with the white jersey, its hard to say which one. I'll pick Vincenzo Nibali, only because he looks stronger than Roman Kreizinger this year (from what I've seen at least).

Polka Dot Jersey: as a natural non climber, I should be more excited about the Green Jersey, but there is nothing more impressive than winning the Polka Dot Jersey. Bernard Kohl had to dope to keep it from his peers. I will always be more impressed with Jaun Maricio Soler taking the Polka Dot Jersey in 2007 than I will be with Alberto Contador being gifted the Yellow Jersey. My pick for this jersey this year foreshadows another pick coming up. I see Carlos Sastre being the man at the top more often than not. He is just as strong as last year, as shown by his two stage victories in the Giro (a training ride?). He is out to prove that he can out climb the Schlecks just to make his old boss Bjarne Riis look bad.

Yellow Jersey: Alberto Co... I mean Carlos Sastre. Contador will never win again on a Johan Bruyneel led team. He needs to be with his countrymen and will win many more grand tours, just not this one. Carlos Sastre must have been involved with the course design of this years race; there are going to be few chances to take time on Sastre in the time trials this year, and there are plenty of climbs for him to eat into the likes of Cadel Evans and Lance Armstrong.

Final Podium: 1st Sastre, 2nd Contador, 3rd Evans

Other Story Lines: Fabian Cancellara cane be in yellow for almost a week if he wins the prologue and the field doesn't let breaks get away. Looking at the course profile we could see Fabian living in yellow again, just like in 2007 (when he surprised the sprinters and Fabianed the whole field, to Fabian a race is to attack in the last 1000 meters and hold on for the win).

Sylvain Chavanel will have a break out Tour with Boonen on the sidelines.

Lance Armstrong will not make the top 10. I will admit he is strong enough to warrant a professional cycling contract, he is not, however, strong enough to win the tour. I don't think he will ever be able to win the Tour again. Perhaps he should have swallowed his pride and fought Ivan Basso for the Vuelta a España

I'm always excited for the Tour. Last year Vino broke my heart, who will do it this year?

Round up 5/6/09

2009-05-06T10:19:00.000-07:00

Vino's bwwwwaaaaaccckkk! I swear this guy is stuck at the developmental state of a 4th grader. He has no idea why people don't want him around.
You make me feel sorry for you and your shitty luck. Have us jump up in support of your resiliency as you managed to salvage your tour and grab some stage wins in flagrant fashion, only to get caught in the stone age of doping.

Now he is ready to return from his suspension and compete in Spain and the World Championships, and for Astana obviously. Thing is he can't figure out why anyone would not want him:

The difficulty, he admitted, is that the Tour de France doesn't want him. The race organisers "dictate their terms" and "for no apparent reason may prohibit me from participating. So it is better not to make plans for the Tour."

(from Bike Radar)

The Tour of California, my home race, is moving to May next year and will now compete with the Giro (which starts Saturday). The hope is that all of the riders who are skipping the Giro for the Tour will use the ToC as a prep race.

"I think being a lead-up to the Tour is the strongest place for us to be and we will have many of the Tour de France riders participating. The teams can do the Classics, the Tour de Romandie, take a break and still have enough time to get over to California for our race. They can even go back to Europe and do the Dauphiné [Libéré].

This is a great step towards make this race a viable grand tour, it just bums me out that there will be no Italians what-so-ever at California now. Well the Italian National Champion will be there haha.

Ted King will be writing for VeloNews during the Giro, be sure to head over there and check them out, he is a pretty entertaining character. Also how can you not support domestic pros who make the leap (Rollin isn't on the Giro team, maybe the Tour?)

Tweet of the day from Burke Swindlehurst:

@flahute I was more than happy to have them there..woulda been bummed if they were prevented from racing. I love to race against champions.about 16 hours ago from web in reply to flahute

Talking about his recent 4th place in GC in the Tour of the Gila where Levi and LA took 1st and 2nd respectively.

Tweet of the Day

2009-05-05T11:30:00.000-07:00

Neil Road:

@neilroad Is it just me or is Simeoni acting like a douche? http://bit.ly/F02rF about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck

If we only knew...

2009-05-05T10:25:00.000-07:00

that it only takes a broken collar bone and a second place finish in a nrc race to break LA's confidence, Ullrich should've Tonya Harding'd LA a decade ago. Just days after taking second overall in the Tour of the Gila in New Mexico to his buddy Levi Leipheimer, ESPN (via AP) is telling us that Lance has given up on his hopes of winning the Giro.

The seven-time Tour de France champion is competing in his first Giro, which begins Saturday in Venice. Armstrong says he is behind schedule after breaking his collarbone in a crash in March and is not in a position to contend for victory in Italy while riding for Astana.

No word in the article about how Lance felt after being set up for the win by Levi on the Gila Monster and not coming through, losing to Phil Zajicek in the races last stage. Granted LA looked good enough to take second overall, but it has to crush his confidence to lose to someone who is not on a pro or pro continental team in the place where he usually leaves people in the dust. No offence to Phil, he had a great race and I'm excited he was able to beat both of them, but the fact that he calls that victory as his greatest ever because of who he beat shows that this is not a seasoned European pro, not someone who is likely to line up for the Giro at the end of the week.

Levi is the man for Astana right now, with Lance broken, Conti's confidence in question, and Kloden...um...no he's not suspended yet (that should happen any day now right?).

Meanwhile, I will be looking for Cervelo and Barloworld to ruin everyone's fun. If Soler or Sastre get on the podium, I'll be happy. Throw an American in there...who doesn't ride for Astana...and I'll be ecstatic. Petacchi for the sprints jersey, Soler for the climbers, the first doper will be... nah that's not fair. I have my guesses though.

This was my make shift giro preview, the world doesn't need more of them so I'll keep it short.

The worst part about the Giro last year is that all of the great memories I have from the race didn't officially happen.
The almost triple on the Dolemites.
The creepy old man taking the win over his younger teammate.
The one who lacks confidence attacking his way to second overall. Lucky for him, this means his primadona freak out post race didn't happen either.

I can't wait to see what isn't going to happen this year!

Tweet of the day

2009-05-01T23:33:00.000-07:00

From BissellCycling:

Zirbel second to Levi in the Tour of the Gila TT! He absolutely muscled a 58x11 to put time into all the other favourites.about 9 hours ago from Tweetie

A 58 x 11, damn.

It's all happening

2009-05-01T22:05:00.000-07:00

Thoughts from my month in flux. I moved from Orange County to Sacramento recently and am not all settled, so I don't have the time, but I like having an opinion and I'll make you read it (when I get around to it).

-Just like every bike ride or race has that moment where you say to yourself, "fuck it I'd rather walk home or flag a bus" this cycling season has turned to the point for me as of late. I hate adding to the cluttered lancerotic interspace with another diatribe about his affects on the sport, but seriously its getting ridiculous.

VS. made promises to all of us that they would air live coverage of the Giro, and now there is word from the twitterati that they have reneged on this promise due to Armstrong's recent setback in Castille y Leon. (Those of you who have paid any attention to Gila know that Lance is doing fine and looks to continue to ride at his dominant level for the rest of the year). Luckily we all have high speed internet access will be able to watch RAI's amazing coverage from multiple feeds which are located at Cyclingfams.com.

Lance has had the same impact on the Gila. In a much documented (er twittered) turn of events, the faltering New Mexico stage race was about to place "the closed til next season" sign on their front yard, this was until someone at SRAM had a great idea. If you fund it HE will come.

Yadda Yadda Yadda... the will they or won't they saga ran on. Which was honestly the biggest PR stunt ever pulled on a non UCI race since I'vebeen paying attention to Pro Cycling. And its great for the Tour of the Gila. The bigger these stage races get, the closer we get to a unified multi-week tour, and the more room there is for Domestic teams to compete and raise excellent American cyclists to compete at the highest level. The problem with all of this, is that there is something about the way the public responds to Lance that is destroying cycling for Americans. Its not the fault of the media, even though they love his Magnum PI style, and its not the fault of SRAM, Trek, Nike, Oakley... for making a dime off of him. I hate to say it, but its the fair weather fan that has destroyed this for us.

Just like the undecided voter has made certain issues hot items every four years,even though we never talk about those issues during the terms, undecided cycling fans have created an impossible scenario. How can a forth tear sport survive with such a weak business model. "OK so as long as Lance wins we will give you $500,000, however if he doesn't win we are pulling our sponsorship."

Its sad, but true. The fair weather fan is responsible for the success of this model. The only hope is that they pay attention to the other names they hear, or just walk up to Tom Zirbel and Rory Sutherland and see what entertaining characters are stateside.

-I'm not sure I ever finished my thought, but moving on...
The word twiterati has been used a lot recently, for good reason, in 140 characters you can get a lot of information quickly (I have become quite fond of the advantages of following cycling through twitter myself). I never thought much about this word when Lance sent his minions out to find his "stolen" TT bike in February, but I have noticed an irritating trend in investigative journalism. Cyclists are now being qupted in response to everything that goes on during a normal race season from their twitter accounts, VeloNews being the heaviest hitter. If all you need to do is read twitters to get paid to write articles for a news site, then where's my W2?

-on a positive note, I would like to congratulate Bissell grad Ted King on his nod for the Cervelo Test Team's Giro squad. Not only is Ted a stand up guy (he did play hockey), but this is something I'd like to turn into a trend. American's in the peloton have been GC contenders or team leaders for the most part, except when riding for an all American team ( 7-Eleven, Postal, Disco, Garmin...). While I love rooting for my favorite Americans to win the biggest races in Europe, in my mind its actually better for the sport stateside if Americans can fill more of the Domestique ranks for European teams. So I'm looking for Teddy King to make us proud by being one of the nameless guys doing all of the hard work for 90% of the race this month.

-The Giro, haven't thought enough to make my picks yet. Obviously I like Cervelo for personal reasons, but I'd like to see DZ surprise us all in the first week. Too bad the Conti and Lance show has to wait until July, I'm not sure I can wait that long.

Who do you think will get popped first? Its just so hard to believe any super performances lately, so much so that its just so hard to care if they are even clean. If Levi is clean, I see him winning the Giro. He is just THAT good right now.

And then there's this guy...

Ronde van Vlaanderen 2009

2009-04-05T23:07:00.000-07:00

Flanders is one of the 2 races on the pro calendar that I am most excited to watch, but would not like to start ever in my life; Paris-Roubaix being the other (and oh, that's next week!). I guess if I were a pro I'd be racing in Spain or Italy, but I digress. All I have to say is that an average of 12% grade for 600 meters with a max of 22% grade just sounds utterly ridiculous for a 200 man peleton to race over, let put them on cobbled roads as well.

A recap of the 2008 podium:
1st - Stijn Devolder

2nd - Nick Nuyens
3rd - Juan Antonio Flecha

I was hoping for one of the Cervelo boys to step up, but that are not a team built specifically for the classics like Quickstep is. If you looked at the men who were strong today, Pippo, Hincapie, Flecha, Haussler...none of them had their teams there in the end when it mattered. Quickstep just owned them all by playing three cards, and any pro team would love to have Devolder, Tom Boonan and Sylvain Chavanel at their disposal. In the end it was another phenomenal solo effort from Devolder that won the day. Heinrich Haussler pulled a similar move to the one he tried in Milan-San Remo, by soloing away form the charging pack. Both times the move was good enough for second, but this second probably didn't leave him in tears. Although when you watch the video he sure sat up early, I would have liked to have asked him about that. I know you are no longer going for a win, but a podium spot in your first try is something to be proud of. Maybe he is saving himself for Paris-Roubaix?
With the one two punch of Cervelo I wonder if they had decided to give this race to Haussler and let Thor Husvod try for Paris-Roubaix, just like Quickstep will try to do again. They were able to pull off the double last year.

I was excited to hear the Saxo Bank had switched from Shimano to Sram components before Flanders (actually before Criterium International), I'm not sure why though. I think the old Shimano hoods are so ugly that I have grown to hate this brand. I could start a whole thread about the shape of hoods and compare the 2009 models to the 2008 models, but that's not why I brought this up. The image of Classics rider and Time Trial specialist Fabian Cancellara walking up the Koppenberg today due to a snapped chain had me wondering if the switch was rushed. Saxo Bank is a team that prides itself on only using the best equipment, but I guess there are coincidences and people have bad days. Perhaps he is well rested now for next Sunday.

With Belgium's "superbowl" finished, I'm looking for Haussler to hop up one podium spot from today for Roubaix. He has the hair to do it.

Great news for those concerned about quality bicycles

2009-04-02T18:56:00.000-07:00

Cannondale Bikes was purchased a year ago by the company who took the tanking brands Schwinn, Mongoose, and GT and moved their production to Asia to create cheaper bicycles to flood Wallmart with. Many people were concerned when the "Hand made in the United States" brand was sold off to Dorel Industries, because it was assumed that the brand would meet the same fate as its predecessors and would soon be made in Asia. Shop owners and consumers were told that this was not the plan for the Cannondale brand. When Schwinn and the others were purchased by Dorel, those brands were bankrupt and what was being sold off was the dwindling notoriety of the names of those companies. Schwinn has been making a sub par product since the bankruptcy. Meanwhile Cannondale was purchased while the company was doing quite well. Dorel has now decided to move production of Cannondale bikes to Asia along with their other brands. I call bullshit, they were planning this all along.

Final Stage of Redlands Classic

2009-03-29T21:58:00.000-07:00

Jeff Louder enjoyed the help of a very strong BMC team to hold on for the overall victory. Louder is penned to make the start at Paris-Roubaix, so its good to see the American in excellent form. Hopefully he can keep it up.

Jacques and I found that the Mall in Redlands is stuck in the 80s which made for amazing memories, so I included those pictures in the slide show for the final stage.

Tweet of the day...

2009-03-29T19:49:00.000-07:00

From Rory Sutherland, again:

Happy @louderjeff my old team mate won Redlands, not so happy with teams "protecting" their overall and riding in muppet like fashion28 minutes ago from TwitterFon

Interesting day in Cycling.

2009-03-29T19:13:00.001-07:00

I spent my day in Redlands and will update that soon, but there are some great photos from Europe on VeloNews.

Click the photos for the stories.

Tweet(s) of the day

2009-03-28T21:05:00.000-07:00

From Eddy Merckx

you may discover what impossible due to circumstance of birth is made possible due to circumstance of how you choose live life12:00 PM Mar 27th from web

spend less time worry about natural gifts or VO2 max can you ride a bit longer? push harder? go up once more? do more than the others11:59 AM Mar 27th from web

Broken English aside, how can this not motivate you? I know I am sure feeling differently about tomorrow.

Floyd dropped out of stage 2 in Redlands yesterday due to illness, he was at the Voler booth though during the Crit today and I asked him about badlands...

Me: So was it annoying when I ran next to you playing badlands?

I asked because of the flood of anti AToC "superfan" emails sent to VeloNews. His Response...

FL: No, that was awesome!

I know I'm a big nerd when it comes to pro cycling, but with such genuine personalities like Floyd and Bahati to root for, how can you not be?

Redland Bicycle Classic Stage 3 Criterium Pictures

2009-03-28T21:04:00.000-07:00

Redland Bicycle Classic Stage 1 TT Pictures

2009-03-26T21:53:00.000-07:00

Tweet of the day...

2009-03-26T21:45:00.000-07:00

From Rory Sutherland

@bengay78 your gay....about 8 hours ago from web

After Ben Day clobbered the field of 196 riders in the uphill Redlands Time Trial. Pictures to come in next post. (I should point out that Ben Day's Twitter is actually benday78)

Race Junkie for the win

2009-03-23T16:22:00.000-07:00

And I won't even point out, because I'm not a wholly callous smirking troll, how perfectly ironic it is that Armstrong was the only rider really taken out in this multi-cyclist accident just days after he blasted Contador for being an inexperienced error-prone twit.

Tyler Hamilton? ...Sike!

2009-03-23T13:06:00.000-07:00

Tyler Hamilton Rumored Doping Positive at Tour of CA

No word yet...

All Tweets are gone. This rumor will die the death it deserves, a forgotten one.

The Astana Files

2009-03-23T12:22:00.000-07:00

I have not hidden my apathetic feelings towards Lance's return to cycling this season. It is a double edged sword for me. First, the good:

Lance brings the media back to cycling.
Cycling has made it back onto the bottom line ticker of ESPNews and other programs.
We now have access to more live television coverage of races, because Versus wants to make a bunch of money on the people who live for the yellow bracelet.
There is a flood of internet live coverage as well for lesser known races (lesser known in the US), like Milan San Remo.
Lance brings the competition level up in the major stage races.
The Tour will always be considered the Super Bowl of cycling, even though 90% of cyclists will disagree.
The tour is always more exciting when there is a high level of competition met with an even higher level of uncertainty, and no one wants to loose to a 39 year old, especially not the Italians or the Spaniards (Contador included).
All of this makes cycling, arguably the worst spectator sport, more marketable.
Anyone who has ever raced a bicycle knows the entire sport lives and dies through sponsorship, and Lance is the only cyclist who has this power in the US.

Now the bad:

Lance is not the only cyclist who pins a number on, nor is he the only one Americans are allowed to root for.
He is not even the only American.
Lance has taken away most of the intelligent conversation about cycling due to the common assertion that he will win any race he enters, when in fact he rarely wins races shorter than 2000 miles held outside of France.
Riders like Christian Vandevelde and David Zabriskie are missing out on being the poster children for a new generation of American cycling by having to compete with LA.
All media coverage of cycling is led with how well LA faired.
It is ludicrous to read an article and have to get two paragraphs in to figure out who won the race, because you have to sift through why LA finished 30th.
Cycling coverage on Versus has gotten dumber, Craig Hummer included.
With the return of LA Versus has realized they can once again attract the fringe cycling fan who knows very little about bicycle racing, this should be a good thing, after all cyclign is a hard sport to approach and start up on your own.
Its very intimidating.
The coverage on TV, has suffered far worse than neccesary, however.
When you compare the NHL's NBC broadcast (which is intended to attract fringe fans as well) to Versus covering the Tour of California this year, you cannot help but assume that all viewers of Versus are in fact duck hunters and cage fighters waiting for this agonizing point to point pedaling motion to finally end.
Now there is also the effect LA has on the printed media.
For the past four months now the print media has been building up a battle royal between Alberto Contador and Lance Armstrong in the 2009 Tour de France.

Contador is the greatest stage racer on the current generation, he has proven ready to supplant LA for the future.
Problem is that LA thinks Contador is not ready, he is still too young.
So we have the situation in February at the Amgen Tour of California, where Astana sent their TdF team (sans Contador) to support Levi Leiphiemer in his quest for his 3rd victory in a 4 year old race. A month later Astana sent a B team and a B director Sportif to support Alberto Contador in his attempt to regain the crown in Paris Nice, an extremely prestigious spring stage race which often follows many of the same roads as the TdF. If you follow cycling, you no doubt know that Leiphiemer won the AToC and Contador lost P-N. Twitterstrong called Contador imexperienced and blamed his loss on Contador's eagerness and impatientence.

Yadda yadda Yadda... Contador and Lance Strong are still trying to prove to the world and thier team that they are better equipped to lead the team, which brings us to today (finally).When Lance Crashed in the Vuelta Castilla y Leon, it was as if Spain was makign LA eat his negative twits about their favorite son, Alberto Contador. Contador lived to race another day, and most likely repeat his 2008 Vuelta Castilla y Leon victory. While LA is stuck with 4 to 6 weeks of rehab. There is a big race in 6 weeks, Giro d' Something...

The real Astana File should actually be called: "How we managed to get the world to love Alberto Contador"

Catching up with March (the first half)

2009-03-22T22:35:00.000-07:00

This will be shorter, because March is not over. See how it works? Then I can go back to commentating on the commentating of cycling and PRO cycling.

Catching up with February

2009-03-22T22:25:00.000-07:00

This will look a lot like Jordan's blog, but its the easiest way to get this done (look at his blog btw http://theblueandred.blogspot.com/)

I kept blurry out of focus images, because, for instance with Mancebo, that is what I saw.

No New updates

2009-03-02T20:29:00.003-08:00

I will post tomorrow about the great week that ended a pretty damn good month of FEB.

Off to Sacramento

2009-02-12T11:26:00.000-08:00

I'm off to Sacramento, I should be updating this daily. On Monday I will be in Fresno for the Dinuba Criterium, here's to getting back on the saddle.

2009 Challenge de Mallorca - Stage 5 Gerald Ciolek breaks through for the win

2009-02-12T09:21:00.000-08:00

Yesterday's winner, Spaniard Antonio Colom, retains the over all on the last day of the race for the win.

2009 Challenge de Mallorca - Stage 4 solo win for Team Katusha (sorry for the music)

2009-02-12T09:12:00.000-08:00

Its a poor video compared to the others, here is Antonio Colom saluting the crowd

(from Cyclingnews.com)

2009 Challenge de Mallorca - Stage 3 Bennati takes the day and the lead

2009-02-12T01:25:00.000-08:00

2009 Challenge de Mallorca - Stage 2 More from Team Katusha

2009-02-12T01:24:00.000-08:00

2009 Challenge de Mallorca - Stage 1 Team Katusha flexes their muscles

2009-02-12T01:20:00.000-08:00

2009 Tour de Langkawi - Stage 3

2009-02-12T01:17:00.003-08:00

2009 Tour de Langkawi - Stage 2

2009-02-12T01:17:00.001-08:00

2009 Tour de Langkawi - Stage 1

2009-02-12T01:16:00.001-08:00

Lance on Floyd

2009-02-12T01:06:00.000-08:00

From Velo News

Velo News: What are you thoughts on racing with Floyd Landis again?
Lance Armstrong: I haven’t given it much thought outside of the things I’ve said: His suspension is up, and you have to welcome people back. He’s done his time. Just like we all get a speeding ticket and we pay our fine, or you do something worse and you serve time or whatever and you’re back into society. We have to be that way. People were critical of (what I said), because they feel like Floyd should confess. But that’s not a discussion that’s ever worth having because Floyd believes he’s innocent. And furthermore, a lot of people believe he’s innocent. And so Floyd Landis can’t confess just to appease the people that want a confession and a clearance. Life doesn’t work that way. In his heart of hearts, he believes he didn’t do anything. And in the reality of our times, he served his penalty.

This has been my biggest problem with people critical of Floyd. You cannot give a confession for something you believe you did not do. I would never call my self a huge fan of Armstrong's, but he has the best response to this question I have seen so far.

Ins and Outs

2009-02-12T00:24:00.001-08:00

Podium cafe has an in depth round up of the three non UCI domestic teams in the Tour of California, Ouch, Bissell, and Colavita/Sutter Home. I have made it pretty clear that I am pulling for Floyd in GC and at least on the last stage over Palomar. I have a hard time not rooting for Bissell, it seems like this is one team who will always be at the front or off the front. How can you not admire a team like that. As far as Colavita, I will be watching for baby Haedo to show up his brother. This is a good read over all.

There is an entertaining trailer for what looks to be a great documentary on Team Type 1 and their goal to place a rider with Type 1 diabetes in the Tour de France by 2012. I highly encourage checking out the trailer. One Shot Documentary by Vox Pop Films.

I will end this post with an entertaining short interview with Brad Huff of Jelly Belly Cycling.

Red Trolley Criterium wrap up

2009-02-11T23:26:00.000-08:00

The crit race in San Diego which came a day after the cold and wet Boulevard Road Race was also expected to be quite wet, but luckily remained dry. Making for a fast and safe race (well as safe as any race can be). This crit boasted a power packed field. According to Rahsaan Bahati, Rock started four guys (including two US criterium champions)

Justin, Iggy, Danny and I started the 80min crit out numbered, out powered but not out smarted.

The field was composed of Jelly-Belly (10guys) Virgin Blue (10guys) Team Type One (10guys) and a bunch of trigger happy local guys putting the smack down.

Bahati gives a great first hand account of how he saw the race unfold during the last laps.

3 to go jelly belly is on the front setting up x-uspro crit champ Brad Huff and with Type 1 and V-blue around it was very important for us to set up right behind the first lead-out which we did and with 1 to go I hit hard with Justin on my wheel and passed the jelly belly guys going as hard as I could taking Justin into the last corner waaaaaaaaay to hot...that [put] him in 3rd position with about 150 to go. As I pulled off I watched Justin go from a all out sprint to sitting down (I got really nervous) but soon after he stood back up to sprint again. I later learned he had to sit down to switch to a bigger gear.

Justin passes Huff and Cantwell to takes win #2 of the year and I have to say he beat some fast guys.

Its interesting to note that he (the US Pro Criterium Champion) is working lead out for the Junior US Criterium Champion. These guys must be pretty close, which can't be good for other teams if they are both willing to race unselfishly.

The Swami's Developmental Elite team made a good showing of their first run as a team with the big boys by placing a rider in the top 20. The Swami's have a different perspective of how the race finished.

Alex and Daggs rode attentively in the closing laps staying near the front and actively covering each and every attack. A dangerous move with Brad Huff and Justin Williams as well as two Fly V Australia riders slipped off the front going into 3 to go, and the selection seemed to have been made. In a last ditch effort to keep Swami's in the race I bridged across bringing the field with me and keeping Alex and myself in the mix. I made a mistake as we started the bell lap, finding myself on the outside and getting swarmed up the inside. By the time I was able to slot back into the forward moving group Alex and I were twenty riders back and, at those speeds, were unable to move up anymore.

One thing I know from racing against guys in the lower ranks of this team, is that they know race tactics and use numbers to their advantage. I will be looking for this new elite amateur squad to steal some victories from the pros before the year is done. Be sure to click the links and read the full posts. Bahati has been nice enough to include a video of Justin crossing the finish line, which can be found here.

The final podium went as so:
1 Justin Williams Rock Racing
2 Brad Huff Jelly Belly Cycling Team
3 Jonathan Cantwell Jittery Joes Pro Cycling Team

Akward blog response from Fly V Australia to Ouch's account of the Boulevard Road Race

2009-02-11T16:39:00.000-08:00

Evans earns first podium for OUCH Presented by Maxxis at Boulevard Road Race

His group also contained three riders from the V Australia/Successful Living squad, including eventual race winner Ben Day. When they caught the front duo, which included another V Australia rider, it put the numbers in their favor.

“The guys from Fly V were very aggressive on the last lap,” Evans said. “With four of them up there, I knew they would attack, and I figured one of them had a good chance of winning the race.

“First, I wanted to make sure I was at least on the podium,” he continued. “After all the attacking, it was down to me, Ben and David (Kemp; V Australia). With about 1 km to go, Ben rolled off the front and got a gap. At that point, I didn’t want to chase and drag his teammate up there, so I made sure I could at least secure second place in the sprint.”

This sounds exactly like what tattoo face did at Sea Otter last year, and is a basic cycling tactic. If a team has numbers they can attack fr the win, if the team without numbers decides to try to pull the break back, he ends up pulling the guy who attacked's teammate(s) with him. Now he is outnumbered in a sprint and might get 3rd or worse. Ironically Successful Living was the victorious team that day as well.

Team OUCH spin on Fly V Australia's Win at Boulevard

So was this just tactics or does Cameron Evans from Team OUCH know he is out classed by Ben Day....

Why was this post even necessary? Ouch did not make their report look like Ouch could have won that day but decided not to or anything like that. Evans admitted Ben was strong. To say someone was outclassed by another rider who had a teammate with them is just bush league. If Ben Day had pulled away from Evans when the two were alonein a break and Evans couldn't match him, then you say he was outclassed.

Planning on watching the tour of California Part II - Forcast is not good

2009-02-09T16:55:00.000-08:00

European Peloton is reporting cold wet conditions throughout at least the first four stages of the race.

Uh oh, here we go again. According to many weather related Web sites, the weather for this year's Amgen Tour of California is looking very similar to the 2008 edition. Rain is in the forecast for much of the first week, and it is looking like the peloton will be drenched at least through the fourth stage.

This is bad news for the riders of course, but it also is not welcome news for the fans planning on attending the event. With rain usually comes wind, and with lows projected in the high 30's, the blustery conditions will have many fans running for shelter instead of hugging the sides of the roads to cheer their heroes.

This should make for an interesting Prologue that's for sure. I hope it dries up by the time the riders make their way to Solvang, but who knows. Last year it rained hardest on the last day, I remember because I was there... and I was cold.

According tho Ouch's Bradley White, Palomar looks quite interesting...

That was from yesterday apparently, I guess I'll need to remember the snow Shoes that day.

Great pictures from Superprestige #7 Hoogstraten- C1, Hoogstraten, Belgium, February 8, 2009 at cyclingnews.com

2009-02-09T13:39:00.001-08:00

(Link to the story)
(Link to the photo stream)

Lance Testing for the Hour Record at ADT.

2009-02-09T09:20:00.000-08:00

I don't understand why he is even bothering worrying about the record right now, his season is already going to be extremely tough on him. The original rumors were for him to try to beat the record after he retired again in a year or two. That makes sense to me. I suppose he is taking the opportunity while he is in California to get acclimated to the track? Velo News seems to think that because he tried out two bikes he is looking to break both Hour records.

Given that he tried not one, but two different bikes, Armstrong may have set his sights on both Ondrej Sosenka’s old-tech hour record of 49.7 km as well as Chris Boardman’s 56.375km “Best Hour Performance.”

It couldn't be that he was riding a TT bike to adjust his position for the Tour of California on a closed setting could it? I think Velo News got this wrong, there is no way Lance is thinking about breaking both records in a reasonably close time frame. In case the trackies were wondering...

Armstrong’s early lap times on the 250-meter track were in the sub-19-second range, good for better than 29 mph. He looked relaxed and smooth. When he switched to the TTX time trial machine he quickly shaved a second off his lap times — with no appreciable increase in effort — bringing his time to 17.7 seconds per lap, and a speed of 31.6 mph.

Planning on watching Floyd Thrash Palomar?

2009-02-08T22:18:00.001-08:00

Get there early, possibly even the night before?

As a preamble to all of this, just remember that this is just friendly advice from a fan who scoped out the course. I don’t know exactly what the authorities have planned in regards to access to the mountain or what other fans are planning. From my experience riding the climbs in the Alps during the Tour de France back in 2000, many camp out on the mountain sides to reserve their spots. Will US fans do the same? The CHP seems to think so.

Read the entire article for information on where to park and what the CHP is saying. This looks to be really helpful, but 4000 people? Really? That would be amazing!

Watching the Tour of California on Palomar & Meeting Floyd

Awesome behind the scenes video from Cervelo Test Team's trainging camp.

2009-02-08T22:11:00.000-08:00

2009 Boulevard road race

2009-02-08T11:36:00.000-08:00

Floyd started his first race of the year, which turned out to be quite eventful for a race in San Diego. Snow marred the start of the race, and was only followed by cold and wet conditions for most of the rest of the day.

(from VeloNews)

Ben Day ended up taking the race at the end of the day, a race which only had 32 riders finish.

Out of the four Team Type 1 riders who started the race, only one finished. TT1's lonely survivor leaned on his experience gained during the US Open of cycling a few years ago:

Hanson, who competed in that epic edition of the U.S. Cycling Open two years ago, said he took a few lessons away from that race. Most notably, to be prepared for even the worst of conditions. (Link)

Ken Hanson finished 13th for Team Type 1.

Ouch p/b Maxxis had a good showing with a second for Cam Evans. Also, Floyd Landis and Rory Sutherland managed to finish the race, both showing good form with 16th and 17th place respectively.

Team Jelly Belly rider Matt Crane suffered a very short day.

Sitting on the start line in 40 degree sleet, I still couldn’t help relishing an opportunity to test out the legs and get back to the world of clicking gears and whirring wheels that I love so much. However, the aforementioned weather conditions made for treacherous pavement, and I lost control of my front end when I tried to flick the bike over a crack in the road...

(from Matt Crane)

Team Fly V Australia p/b Successful Living was extremely excited with their result after only having 4 of their riders stateside for a few days.

After all was said an done the podium looked like this: Ben day (Team Fly V Australia p/b Successful Living)in first, Cameron Evans (Ouch p/b Maxxis) in second, and David Kemp, Charles Dionne, and Bernard Sulzberger (all Team Fly V Australia p/b Successful Living) took 3rd through 5th

(from Velo News)

Five From Sisters of Mercy

2009-02-07T00:49:00.000-08:00

Temple of Love

Black Planet

Marian

More

Comfortably Numb/Some Kind of Stranger

February 6th, 2009 - Musings pre-Tour of California

2009-02-06T23:35:00.000-08:00

I am looking for a few things from my Tour of California this year.

1. I would like Ted King to win a stage, even more so after reading this tidbit from his blog on missing saddle.

I played on an intermural hockey team in college that was comprised entirely of ex-high school-hockey-all-stars-but-not-quite-good-enough-for-Middlebury-College-hockey, that bore the name “Team Rick Halvorson.”

2. I would like to see Fabian take a TT, which would have to be Solvang. I was let down last year, and the only way I will accept the now former world champion's defeat is if DZ or Floyd beat him. I don't know if he is going to be fast enough for the prologue. Plus I would like to save that for...

3. I would like to see Thor take the Prologue like he did in le Tour in 2006. I am really excited for the God of Thunder to be racing for a new team, I hope he can throw a wrench in Cav and Boon's self proclaimed two horse race.

4. I would like Rahsaan Bahati to fill the extra roster spot left vacant by Kemps surgery plans in Australia. I do not fully understand the situation rock is in right now, and I do not know if Bahati is on the "club" team or not (which would mean he couldn't race in this UCI race no matter what). Either way he deserves to be on the team representing California and contesting the sprints with the worlds best. I don't think he is ready to win out right yet, but he is still fucking fast and needs more road race experience anyway. This will give him that, and the added confidence of racing at home, not off in London or Australia.

5. I would like CVV and Basso to beat Levi and Lance in the GC, and up Palomar. I would love nothing more for CVV to become a billy goat this year.

6. I would like the Aggressive rider and KOM jerseys to be worn and hopefully kept by Bissel or BMC. A top 10 from either one would be icing, I'm looking in Zirbel's direction.

7. I would like Floyd to take the overall by crushing the top GC riders on his home course, I really expect him to surprise a lot of people. We are going to be lucky this year in that he will be racing in Redlands and Dana Point instead of Nice and Paris.

I suppose this list is a stretch, I mean one look at the starting field will show anyone that, but its a wish list of sorts. Plus this is a warm up race for many of these riders, but for the local domestic pros, this is it.

I don't know if I have made it clear, but I am 100% behind Ouch Pro Cycling this season, not only for Floyd either. I have enjoyed following Tim Johnson during the domestic cross season and was excited to see he would be working for Floyd and the other great domestic stage race threat, Rory Sutherland. I will be paying close attention to see how this small, but potent team handles their modest schedule. there will be constant speculation if Floyd does well that he will be drawn back to Europe, would that make this one and done? Or would Ouch up the anti to Pro Domestic status? One thing is certain, le Tour will not invite any team with Floyd on it back to race for them again.

Lastly, I'm not quite sure how to react to the banner on the Amgen website:

More on the sudden death of Frederiek Nolf from Science of Sportt

2009-02-06T23:23:00.000-08:00

Link

Cause of death speculation

Sadly, for cycling, the speculation has already begun that this is drug-related death, partly because of the reputation of the sport and the historical precedent for this type of event among cyclists. At this early stage, the ASO (the Tour's organizers) couldn't even confirm the death, and so discussing a cause is very, very premature.

However, a few people emailed me the story this morning with the very obvious implication that this was yet another in a long series of sudden deaths in fit and healthy athletes. In the 1990s, there was a spate of sudden deaths, at least a dozen, where fit amateur and professional cyclists died in their sleep. That negative publicity was at least part of the reason for the clamping down on EPO use, which was rampant at the time.

It brings to mind one of the most fascinating quotes I've ever come across in a cycling book - it was in the book "The death of Marco Pantani" by Matt Rendell, in which a story is recounted of how in the 1990's, with EPO use rampant, the cyclists would set their heart rate monitors to sound an alarm if their heart rate dropped below a certain level. On hearing the alarm, the cyclists would have to wake up, get the bike out and spend 10 minutes on the rollers, in their hotel rooms, just to jump start the circulation.

In the words of one cyclist: "During the day we live to ride, and at night, we ride to stay alive". Quite chilling, and I must confess that these were the first thoughts that went through my head upon reading of the death of Nolf.

2009 Tour of Qatar Stage 6 - Cav is going to be fast this year

2009-02-06T07:09:00.000-08:00

Five From Songs: Ohia/ Jason Molina/ Magnolia Electric Company

2009-02-05T22:49:00.000-08:00

I've Been Riding with the Ghost

Farewell Transmission

Hold on Magnolia

Being In Love

Lioness

February 5th, 2009 - I'm starting to get biceps

2009-02-05T19:54:00.000-08:00

I decided to sleep in today, it was not a very hard decision to make. After being up til 12 because my soccer game ended at 11, I was beat. I had thought that maybe, just MAYBE I could get up at 5 and do some Portola Hills repeats. I decided the extra 2 hours would do me well and I could just ride after work. well that didn't happen, when I got out of school the sky took a shit on the ground.

Its amazing to see how the kids react to the rain, it is purely a site to see for people from the north east. Granted my schools in New York and New Jersey were completely indoors, so there was no walking outside from class to class to get wet during, but I still don't remember it creating such havoc.

Girls should wear heels more.

Listening to: Nine Inch Nails - 34 Ghosts IV

Tour of Qatar 2009 Stage 5 - after the tragic death of Frederiek Nolf, this stage was neutralized.

2009-02-05T19:34:00.000-08:00

Five From Philip Glass

2009-02-04T18:47:00.000-08:00

Glassworks

Metamorphasis I

Prophecies

ESCAPE!

Nosferatu (this one is haunting)

February 4th, 2009 - Where Do We Go From Here or am i responsible for self defense?

2009-02-04T18:36:00.000-08:00

I was told today that a student at my high school told a teacher he was going to shoot the teacher, I do not know if there was a gun involved or not. I would beat the shit out of that kid. No fucking teenage kid from the burbs is gonna pull that shit in my class, although, I would also surmise that it will be a while before I am the kind of teacher which merits such a response from a student.

I did hill repeats in Portola Hills today followed by an out an back on the canyon road. There was a head wind one way and a tail wind the other way. Unfortunately I ended with the tail wind. My mph dropped by 10 going home. I love riding with a tailwind, nothing makes you feel stronger, but its fake. Riding into a headwind just reminded me of how much fun attacking is in races, why the fuck do I ever do that? I'm too big to hide in the wind, I should be letting the little guys go off on flyers, but I guess there's not always glory in that.

Listening to: Bauhaus - The Sanity Assassin

Tour of Qatar 2009 Stage 4 - Fuck that looks windy, sorry Boons, Cav is fucking fast

2009-02-04T09:52:00.000-08:00

Five From New Order

2009-02-03T20:47:00.000-08:00

Someone Like You

Dream Attack

Procession

Guilt is a Useless Emotion

Crystal

February 3rd, 2009 - If That's Movin' Up Then I'm Movin' Out

2009-02-03T20:27:00.000-08:00

The goal is to get two good days of riding in this week before Saturday, because I want to contest the next race on Sunday. I feel motivated, with Amgen coming up and my new issue of Road in the bathroom, how could I not be? I just hope Dresden is cool and waits until after the race to be born. I know its not right to be mad or jealous of a new born, but be cool man.

The line up for Amgen is just stunning this year (see Podium in Sight). I am curious to see if Rock Racing will ride that funky Kestrel Time Trial frame in the Prologue and Solvang TT.

Enough about bikes, I think I may finally be getting a tattoo. Its been a decade now that I have had friends with tattoos, and I just never cared to get one. Now I do I guess? I even have toyed with the idea of a SXE tattoo eventually, which is weird. I used to say I could only see gettign a tattoo if it served a purpose, like tattooing Xs on your hands to save on markers (I don't mark my hands anymore so thats not really neccesary anymore) or tattooing flip-flops on the tops of your feet so that you don't have to wear shoes (I hate when my feet are dry and cracked though, so that's out too). If I follow through with it I will post pics, but there is no point sharing the idea or reason if its only a pipe dream. I can't wait until next weekend.

Listening to: Bruce Springsteen - Iceman

2009 Tour of Qatar Stage 3 - Boonen is such a sloppy celebrator.

2009-02-03T20:25:00.000-08:00

2009 Tour of Qatar Stage 2 - Soloing is the most painful way to win

2009-02-03T20:23:00.000-08:00

Video and Audio and Live

2009-02-02T23:22:00.000-08:00

Nine inch Nails - The Great Destroyer

Neurosis - Aeon

Joy Division - Shadowplay

Kashmir - Kalifornia

MGMT - Electric Feel

Tour of Qatar 2009 Stage 1 - TTT I wish BMC could have made a better showing, but they beat themselves up about it already so I'll let it go

2009-02-02T19:38:00.000-08:00

January 29th, 2009 - The Chain Reaction Always Changes the Elements

2009-01-29T19:25:00.000-08:00

Chemistry means a lot of things, but the basic idea of stripping everything down to its elements and observing how they react with one another remains in each definition. I often feel like sodium standing on a lily pad in the middle of a pool of water. Lily pads can't hold my weight. This creates an inevitable reaction, the addition of something like myself always reacts differently. Good thing there is always no care ever.

I saw the wrestler last night, good movie. I wonder how much Bruce Springsteen's label paid for the 2 minutes of silence at the end while his song played? Or was that a move by the director to help you question the ambiguity of the ending? I was expecting something after the blank screen but I was ok that there wasn't, he plays a dame fine wrestler.

FYI, more people need to sign up for free Disneyland on their birthdays so I can get in half price. I mean I figure who wants to go alone?

Listening to: Rooney - When did your heart go missing?

Nate Robinson

2009-01-29T19:23:00.001-08:00

Into you like a train...

2009-01-28T14:31:00.001-08:00

January 28th, 2009 - I'm waiting, waiting for nothing

2009-01-28T14:15:00.000-08:00

I subbed today, was weird after having my own class for so long. It was so boring. Plus I didn't know any of the kids, just very strange. The nice thing was that it was a short day, so I just went home at lunch. I had to stop by El Toro to see about why my student teaching evaluations had not yet been received by Long Beach, an din doing so I procured myself a subbing job for tomorrow with my old class. I'm excited about that! I guess this is how moms feel.

The shitty thing about subing is that I get paid more than a month later, fucking government. I have been talking a lot in my sleep lately, I bet I sound cute when I do that. Dane is in town, he gets me. Its nice to have an outsider to talk to about everything I need to vent about, I am pretty sure he feels the same way.

Listening to: Santogold - Lights Out

PS that pic was staged obviously.