Le road less traveled

Time for another update

2011-07-29T12:12:00.000-07:00

I'm struggling keeping the blog up to date... I don't really have much time at the moment and probably won't till after I finish up school next summer. I'm in the midst of an internship at Carmichael training systems (www.trainright.com). This week I got back from a week and a half long training camp for the Leadville 100. I was pretty busy working the camp all day every day, but still got in some good riding at altitude and in some pretty cool scenery. I got to hang out with some pretty accomplished individuals in the business world at these camps. I always enjoy getting some insight into other peoples stories and their successes and failures. After spending that much time up there and seeing much of the Leadville 100 course, I kind of got the itch to race Leadville. I'm tempted to squeeze in this year and suffer through it, but I've got a few logistical issues to work out first... like finding a mountain bike... We'll see what happens...

Sunny King crit report

2011-04-10T18:20:00.000-07:00

Sunny King was a smash and grab trip in an attempt to get a little NRC racing in the legs. This was my first go at an NRC race this year. I figured I knew what to expect since I've done enough comparable races in the past. Turned out I was a little too complacent... I intended on using some basic aluminum wheels so I wouldn't be worried about crashing and destroying a several thousand dollar wheelset. Turned out one of my teammates talked me into using his carbon deep dish wheels. I threw those bad boys on and while they looked cool, they squeeled like a stuck pig anytime I touched the brakes since I wasn't running carbon brake pads. I figured I would be fine, the race would be fast and I wouldn't have to brake much... The race was blistering fast, but I should've known that you gotta have good braking to maintain position in these races...

I know I've done races with that guy in the race whose brakes squeel so loud, it can be heard on the other side of the course and nobody ever wants to be behind that guy. There is always jockying for position in these races, but that guy probably always gets it the worst. Well... I was that guy... So, despite my 2nd row start, I was quickly getting elbowed and pushed backwards till I took my place of shame at the back of the pack. I stayed there till it looked like things were gonna hit the fan, then I would move up just enough to get in front of the splits happening on the back till I was once again in my "spot of shame"... So... this is kind of how my race was defined... Did get to bridge up ater getting caught behind a crash and it wasn't too tough to do so... But, the 40 guys who did not go down in the crash getting a free lap and getting let in at the front took another blow to the pride... Making my "spot of shame" all the more painful. With 50 laps behind me and 10 to go, I made a push up towards the front and focused on holding my position squeeling brakes and all. I was doing all kinds of cuddling at 30 mph through 90 degree corners. Still didn't get away with it, I kept inching backwards just at a slower pace than before. That was about it for me on a mental level... I like racing my bike, when I can't do that and I get stuck just riding in circles, I stop having fun... I was hurting from that final push, wasn't having fun, and since I was the only guy from my squad I had no one to work for to keep me pushing... So, I pulled out popped open a beer and watched the finish...

Hopefully I got the stupidity out of the way early and can put it all together for collegiate nationals in May and the NRC calender to follow... Big thanks to Wichita Falls Bike Club, Rouse Bicycles, and Hotter n Hell for getting us to these races. Another thanks to Francis' Soap for keeping my skin smooth and smelling fresh and clean!

2010-09-26T08:21:00.001-07:00

This past week was my first collegiate track nationals (and real set of track racing for that matter). We left early Tuesday morning to make the 12hr drive to St. Louis where we would stay the night. The next day we finished up the 4 more hours of driving to Indianapolis. We checked in and threw together some quick lunch before heading to the track for some practice runs. I was also anxious to try out my newly rigged up track bike that used my road TT frame. My events were mainly focused on my time trialing ability. My confidence in my current TT ability was in the dumps as I hadn't ridden the TT bike in several months and had done a TT the weekend before we left only to have it be the worst TT I had all year. My first event was the 4 kilometer pursuit on Friday morning. Teammate Danny "team sprinter" Robertson, was the first from MSU to go and posted the fastest time until a CSU rider beat him by about 6 seconds. I was up shortly after to do my first 4k pursuit in competition and second one ever. Somewhere around the halfway point I was leading but I dropped off a little at the end to put me in 2nd behind the CSU rider by about half a second. By the time the pursuits were over, enough fast times had been posted to bump me down to 7th. In the coed team sprint, the team consisted of Claire, Natalie, Danny, Matt, Josh, and myself. The point was for each rider to go as hard as they could for one lap before pulling off and letting the next rider repeat till the last rider would come in for the finish. Josh was the last rider, being he is the fastest sprinter out of all of us. I would be the last guy to pull Josh into his final lap. The girls took the first pulls and once they pulled off, Danny hit the front and hit it hard with Matt and myself to follow. I pulled as hard as I could and pulled off for Josh to launch his final sprint. When he crossed the line, we had posted the fastest time thus far. Marian ended up beating us by 3 seconds, knocking us down to 2nd. Still wasn't bad considering Marian is across the street from the track and practices regularly while we live 2.5hrs away from a track and had one practice session. What was most impressive was the girls rode to a 2nd place in the team pursuit against Marian with the little practice and very minimal aero equipment as well. The mens pursuit didn't go as well. We thought we for sure had 2nd at least, but I think our confidence turned out to be our demise... I had the slowest start out of the pursuit team mainly comprised of guys that go fast for short distances. So, I got to start at the front... It was a tough start for me as I'm used to going fast once I get up to speed, not from a stop, and in the same gear I need to go fast once up to speed. Once I pulled off, Danny hit the front and did all he knows how to do... Go as hard as he can. This made my swing up track too high since they came by much faster than I anticipated. By the time I dropped back down to try to tag on the back, I had a bike and half lengths gap between me and Josh who was sitting last in the paceline. I managed to get on as Danny slowed down a bit from his initial surge and just as he was getting ready to pull off. I had about a lap to try to regain some composure before my next pull, which didn't turn out to be near enough. After my pull, I made sure I didn't go as high on the track when I pulled off. I was able to make contact with Josh's draft but lost it as Danny's surge persisted again... I started to inch back on as Danny did his token slow down from the initial surge, but couldn't get back in the draft before Danny pulled off and Matt took his pull to pick the pace back up. The guys slowed down considerably as that fast start caught up with them, landing us a 6th or 7th place in the mens team pursuit. I wasn't completely sure what happened until after the pursuits were done and found that our first kilometer was over 5 seconds faster than anyone else... Hopefully next year we can learn a little self control & discipline coupled with a bit more practice so we can ride a smart, efficient, and fast team pursuit... The other events went well though with Jen winning the match sprints and individual womans omnium, giving her 2 stars and stripes jerseys to take home. The team ended up finishing 2nd in the team omnium. All in all a good weekend and it certainly got me excited about track racing...

2010-09-26T06:40:00.001-07:00

Collegiate track nationals update coming soon...

2010-08-27T07:19:00.001-07:00

Got to go for a nice little spin this morning in porsche's new 4 door sedan... Very nice! 0-60 in 4 seconds...

5:30 am ride...

2010-08-25T17:22:00.000-07:00

yup, getting out early tomorrow before my 8am class. Got class till 12:30 then back home to grab a quick bite and of to the HHH convention show to work Richardson's Bikemart booth. Then MSU team dinner/semester greet & meet... Think a good way to start the day would be with a sweet roll and a good cup of coffee... yea, I'm already planning my breakfast....

2010-08-25T12:29:00.003-07:00

Bag of Mexican sweet rolls for a buck at the little panderia attached to my apartments... These things destroyed me for a bit back in spring... Gotta be careful about how many I eat...

2010-08-25T12:29:00.001-07:00

First art assignment in years... The first go around was a fail, had the perspective all off... This is a bit better... My big weakness is doing contour lines... Found that out today... If I can shade, I can patch things up a bit, but if I do just a contour drawing it looks pretty rough...

Man cave...

2010-08-24T13:26:00.000-07:00

It's in the works... pictures to come... Lalla is working on a man shanty, but I've got the man cave... well not yet, a man cave is not a man cave with the absence of a television... and beer...

2010-08-22T13:19:00.001-07:00

So, I'm back in Wichita Falls and gearing up for school to start tomorrow. I moved out of the cycling team dorm and have my own little man cave. It's a little studio with a few big closets and a simple kitchen and bathroom. I'm digging it... Just need to work on getting some more counter space in the kitchen. That's important to me, because I like to cook. The next big space saver idea is to find a TV with a VGA hookup so I can hook up a computer to it... I already have a wireless keyboard and mouse and a sound system. I have to look at what TV's are available with the VGA port then find a good computer to use on it... Anyone familiar with this setup? I've seen people with a similar setup before...

This is Great!

2010-07-18T20:47:00.001-07:00

Todays near boxing match...

2010-07-18T13:24:00.001-07:00

So this was an interesting one... Those that know me, know I put more emphasis on wit than braun... So to be close to a boxing match is a little out of character...

Decided to cruise three canyons again today... The third canyon has a nice little switchback descent that takes you into Green Valley which is a great place to refill bottles and get a little ice... I'm coming off the steep downhill and cruising into town, the roads are still somewhat winding but no more switchbacks... I'm coming down the road at about 40 mph and see this little Toyota pickup pull up to a cross road... He looks left then right (right at me) then proceeds to turn left right in front of me... Well, he was actually pulling into the oncoming traffic lane despite the fact that there was a blind corner 100 meters down the road... I noticed he had his windows down, so I gave a quick "HEY" to let him know I was there... Well, I forgot I was in California and apparently that "HEY" insulted his intelligence... He pulls up along side me pissed as a hornet after I barely squeezed by him. We're rolling up to the gas station where I usually refill bottles and this is how the conversation went:

Dude: *Pulls up along side me yelling:* "Why you getting on my s@#t, I saw you coming."

Me: "What? You saw me coming? That makes it even worse dude!"

Dude: "I was in the oncoming lane you little s@#t, I knew what I was doing"

Me: "Well, seeing as there was a blind corner 100 meters in front of you, obviously you didn't" "Where were you gonna go if a car came around the corner? right into me right?"

Dude: "Why you getting on my s@#t? You little s@#t, I'm gonna kick your a$#!"

At this point we're rolling into the gas station where there is a group of cyclists just sitting there watching the show come down the road and roll into the gas station...

Dude: *Swerves his truck into the gas station, blocking any cars at the gas pump. He jumps out of his truck as I roll up to the entrance to the gas station and casually dismount my bike. I lean it up against the window and turn around expecting to see this guy charging me... Instead, he is in the process of flipping around to go chase his truck down as it starts rolling down the hill... He clumsily jumps in the window of his truck and grabs the E Brake...*

Me: *Standing there holding my bottle taking it all in with amusement*

Dude: *Stomps up towards me*

Me: *I'm bracing myself for this guy to try something, making sure I had a good footing in case I had to defend myself* (all those who have walked in bike cleats know how difficult that is)

Dude: "What's your problem? Why you jumping my s@#t? "

Me: "Dude, I have more to lose than you do... You'll end up with a dent in your truck, I can end up dead... I would rather yell HEY instead of counting on the fact that you may know what you're doing"

Dude: *Proceeds to walk towards me the whole time like he's going to charge, but walks right past me into the store yelling obscenities the whole time...*

Me: *Walk in the store and refill my bottles, trying the whole time not to burst into laughter...*
*Give my normal greeting to the girl at the cash register, who is also trying not to laugh and get back on my merry way*

What a day...

Back in the saddle again...

2010-07-02T15:50:00.000-07:00

Last two days have been good... Neck doesn't hurt too bad after a short ride. Every day it gets a little better. I hope to be able to actually get back to training by next week. My big obstacle now is getting a new road bike frame... May be out of racing for a bit till I can get that sorted out...

Healing up ever so slowly...

2010-07-01T09:01:00.000-07:00

Tried doing a little riding, didn't work real well... It's tough to tilt the head up for long periods of time to look up the road, I'm good as long as I stare at my handlebars for the whole ride... It gets a little better every day though, so hopefully in a few days I'll be back on the bike for some steady training...

This picture about sums up my season so far... Was completely beat at the end of collegiate nationals for a mediocre result due to not being able to train for the months leading up to it due to medical junk...

Was completely drained mentally and physically... Was happy to be in the lead group at the base of the final climb, but frustrated that I didn't have the form to do anything about it... I was finally getting some good form back underneath me following recovering from all the medical stuff and was ready to try to salvage some of the season and try for a good result at elite nationals. I knew I had it in me for a good result in the road race last year (but was again put out due to some bad luck) and figured I could rectify that this year... Didn't even get a chance and now I am back in the same boat I was in prior to collegiate nationals and can't even train and expand on the form I struggled to get back... I've been telling myself it the darkest before the dawn for the last two years now, so I'm wondering when comes the dawn? I'll always be racing, I love it too much... It's just frustrating sometimes... as is life...

2010-06-26T11:38:00.001-07:00

Broke the frame in the same place as the last one... Kind of ironic... Time for a new saddle...

Nationals Flop...

2010-06-26T09:23:00.000-07:00

Had the Elite Nationals crit last night and went out in pretty awesome fashion... Not the kind of awesome I was hoping for though.

The race was probably the sketchiest race I have ever done... Not sure if I will ever do it again, there is just enough experience by some of the riders that they think they know what they are doing but not enough to know when certain risks shouldn't be taken... I would get chopped by about 5 guys EVERY corner EVERY lap from lap 1 on... Then one guy gets the gaul to yell at me as I am sinking back into the single file field behind Strange when I came to the side of him coming out of corner because I had a little more speed through the corner but I didn't want to chop him so I sank back to my spot... Well, this guy had chopped me muiltiple times and as I'm sinking back he tries to come around me and take Strange's wheel and asks me why I;m fighting so hard for the wheel. My reply was "Why are you fighting so hard for the wheel? I'm just sinking back to where I was..." I don't feel like I should need to get into some big diatribe in the middle of a race when some nimrod wants to tell me how to race my bike when clearly the dude doesn't know how to race his when he's chopping 1 lap into the race... Anyways, stepping off my soap box...

This brings me to my first crash... On the top part of the 4 corner course there was a slight uphill before turn 3 causing things to bunch up and allowing people to carry speed through the inside to chop the corner. Then a slight downhill on a short straightaway and narrow road into turn 4. Well, I got chopped by some dude in turn 3 and he clipped his pedal right in front of me in turn 4. I had nowhere to go but right into him, flipping me over the handle bars, breaking my frame, destroying my saddle, and putting a nice gaping hole in the butt of my shorts... Shimano put me on one of their Orbeas and sent me back on my way. Two laps after re-entering the race, Accelerating out of one of the corners the pedal came off the spindle on the spare bike and nearly sent me back to the ground. Made it back to the pit and they took my pedal off my bike and sent me back on my way again. At that point I was seriously considering packing it in and saving it for the road race with all the sketchiness going on, but seemed like a long way to travel to pack it in so quickly... With about 6 laps to go there was a massive pile up on the back stretch that brought down a bunch of guys in front of me. The crash happened at the front and rippled back bringing a bunch of guys to the ground. I was too close to stop in time and aimed right at the center of it so I couldn't maneuver around it. Went over the handle bars again and this time landed on my head and started to roll over onto my back when someone landed on top of me hyper extending my neck. I jumped up to get out of the road but quickly dropped back down to the road when I realized I couldn't hold my head up. After a few seconds I managed to crawl to the side of the road while dragging my bike behind me. Turned out I broke the neutral bike too... There were a lot of guys that would move into you before they had passed you, it seemed like they were basically giving you the option of crashing or slamming on your brakes to let them in which is dangerous for anyone behind you... After talking to some of the guys who went down it sounds like that is probably what happened. After spending some time at the first aid tent, they decided I wasn't stable enough to make my own way to the hospital and called and ambulance... I hung out in the ER till about 1am waiting for some news that I hadn't done any damage to any vertabrae... Everything looked good and it looks like I just hyperextended my neck straining all the muscles in the back of my neck. Basically, I have little use of the muscles in the back of my neck and will probably be in a neck brace for the next week... The good news is I should be able to race again in a few weeks, just not getting my chance at the nationals road race...

Been a rough season with obstacle after obstacle, each one getting a little harder than the last... Hopefully I can keep this up and continue racing long enough to get through this bad patch... I really need a little silver lining about now...

J signing off...

Some vids from Tulsa...

2010-06-18T20:58:00.000-07:00

Day 1 of Tulsa Tough... race started at 9:30pm featuring a cool fireworks show... This is what this whole series is all about for those who have never been...

Day 3 of Tulsa Tough featuring "Cry Baby Hill"... Got a little T.V. time in the break with Cody... Pretty painful air time at that...

2010-06-11T22:25:00.001-07:00

Tonights race = epic fail for me... was a little too cavalier about lining up at the front even though I got there 15 minutes before the race started. started at the back and got caught behind a crash in the first corner... Stayed tagged on the very back and slowly moved up but not nearly soon enough as my teammate, Pat, was on the front shredding the race apart before I could get in front of the gaps. Managed to claw my way into the second split, soon to be the third when Pat would go off the front with another group. My group got pulled 30 minutes in which stunk as I didn't really even get to race my bike or get any training in during that half hour... So... epic fail...

2010-06-11T15:38:00.001-07:00

A few more shots from riding around white rock lake... I though I got these the other day but apparently they didn't get saved. At 9:30 tonight we start our race in McKinney on a mix of brick and asphalt road. I have to say I am glad just to be healthy enough to race my bike and train. My health was one thing I took for granted before this season... After months of not being able to ride due to poor health beyond my control and the scare of hearing the doctor mutter the word Lymphoma and finally breaking through it, I have a new lease on life and racing. Through the whole struggle, I was trying to be a good teammate and continue racing for the collegiate conference title which all the guys on the MSU team worked tirelessly to make sure I maintained. Those races during that time were the least fun and hardest I had ever done. There was too much going on in my head about what was wrong with me and how it might change or end my life. I am not one to panic, but that stuff still enters the mind especially when you have a month to sit on it before hearing any results. Now I appear to be able to train properly and while I am not real strong in the races yet, hopefully that will come back soon. No matter though now, like I said, I am happy just to be out there racing my bike and enjoying every minute of it...

Rainy Day Ride'n...

2010-06-09T17:01:00.000-07:00

The Iphone stayed at home today... Definitely got my parade rained on today... Five minutes in, the heavens opened up and unleashed twenty minutes of a hanus downpour with lightening and thunder. I kept riding between the tall trees and by the other riders hiding for shelter under the bridges (probably wondering if this idiot thought he was immune to a lightning strike)... I began to get a little worried when I passed my third group of hiding cyclists and started to wonder if I got hit how bad it would be... After all, the only thing touching the ground was the rubber on my tires and I don't think rubber is conductive... right? So... After giving that a couple hours of thought, I pretty much decided I was screwed if I got hit by the billion volts in a bolt of lightning... By that time, the worst of the storm had passed and I just had a steady rain to deal with, my soggy sandwiches in my back pocket, and the crunching and grinding of my overtightened and dried up bearings in my powertap wheel... Three hours later I rolled into my teammates luxury apartment complex soggy and muddy... Jumped in the shower and no sooner than when I got out the rain stopped... Go figure!

Now, looking forward to this weekend... Got some more good crit racing this weekend with Bike the Bricks in McKinney on Friday night which is kind of a hometown race for Richardson's Bike Mart (our BIG sponsor if you haven't gathered that). Then we're off to Oklahoma City Saturday for some more big money crit racing Saturday and Sunday. Last weekends racing in Tulsa was more for training for me. I've been off form since mid March and only able to start training consistently for the past 3 weeks. Tulsa was a good kick in the butt for me to help me get some racing legs back under me. Hopefully, this weekend things will go better than last weekend for me and the team. We should have some of our top riders there as well, from the sounds of it. Pat just came off a stage win at Mt. Hood last weekend, so he's definitely on his A game (even his B game is pretty dang impressive, guess that's the difference between real pros and us mere mortals). I think that about wraps it up... I may have time for a recap of the weekend, but probably not since I get back in the car on Monday to start my drive back to California...

J signing off...

2010-06-08T13:48:00.001-07:00

A few shots from my ride around white rock lake in Dallas.

2010-06-05T22:41:00.001-07:00

Had fun racing these last few nights twilight crits in Tulsa despite still getting my form back on track. Didn't have much fun listening to arrogant idiots talk excessive crap during the races. It's funny how you don't hear the pros yelling at the ameatures about how much better they are, but there seems to be a lot of arrogant ameatures that like to yell at everyone and tell them how much of a better racer they are... I say let the legs do the talking, not the mouth... Then there's no chance of sounding stupid... And I don't have to listen to that crap...

2010-06-04T12:55:00.000-07:00

Jim Hoyt already has 2 of these speed concepts in stock...

He's back...

2010-05-30T07:32:00.000-07:00

http://www.eriksaunders.net/

Back, sort of...

2010-05-27T08:19:00.000-07:00

Done with school stuff for now and back in California working at my favorite local Lancaster bike shop. Not much else to post for now...

J signing off

Another fun weekend in the rear view mirror...

2010-04-12T05:45:00.000-07:00

Yep, another collegiate weekend behind us... I really did have fun, I was actually able to race my bike... well sort of... Maybe I wasn't as strong as I would've liked to be, but after a month and a half of being layed out from that stomach bug, I'll take what I can get. I think the whole weekend came to a good closing when Alexi won the crit in honor of his good friend that he lost this last week.

Now, I have to go back to the doctors and have some more stuff checked out... Feeling much better, but apparently there is a small possibility some real bad stuff may be going on inside me... Need to do some testing to be sure all's normal and well...

Also looking at apartments in Wichita Falls... can't believe how cheap they are compared to California... I think it is my time to bow out of the complex, it's been a good run...

J signing off...

Why do we do what we do?

2010-03-22T16:31:00.000-07:00

Been asking myself that a lot as of late...

I've been racing my bike for about 8 years and relatively recently began going to school...
Now, more than ever, I'm stuck in this limbo where I can answer why I'm going to school but not so much still pretty serious about racing my bike...

Of course we all want to graduate from school, get a good job, get benefits, be able to buy your dream house someday, and when things get stale be able to afford to go on some sort of vacation...

Lets look at bike racing, my situation in particular... Been sick for the past several weeks, granted I'm getting better and can function at a normal level, but still not in a difficult race situation... Frankly, I'm tired of waiting for my body to get back into gear and I really could use some sort of getaway... But I'm a poor bike racer and I spent any money or time I could've put towards a getaway on doctors visits and tests during my spring break last week... To top off these last few magnificent weeks, one of the better paying races of the season was last weekend and of course I was sick and sucked royally... Couldn't even tough out the first stage and had to sit on the sidelines for the rest of the weekend.

So, this brings me to the point that has been weighing heavily on my mind... I have had countless weeks like this every season and have only really had one weekend where I won a race and felt the glory that hides beneath all that suffering. So... Why do I do this? I have countless opportunities if I shift some of my focus to something more rewarding like a reserve unit, national guard, or just a job... I can make money and go on an actual vacation, save a little money for a rainy day, and still enjoy racing as a hobby. I mean shoot, I race like a decent hobbyist anyways, may as well be real about it and live like a hobbyist... I'm turning 26 next month and am always too old for whatever team I apply for, nothings gonna change... I'm not ever gonna make a living racing my bike, just not that good... So, why keep suffering through these tough times when the payout for said suffering is maybe .5% of what I put into cycling? I mean, a company couldn't last a day off those numbers? I've been doing that for 8 years...

Doesn't make sense does it?

I'm back...

2010-03-16T07:21:00.000-07:00

well, sort of... Spring break started yesterday, which I spent the majority of at the docs undergoing every test known to man... Gotta love it when you have to discuss intestinal issues with a female doctor... Had a pretty lackluster weekend this last weekend, couldn't get myself to finish a collegiate race. After dealing with some intestinal issues the last week and a half, everything kind of caved in this last weekend. This coming weekend is the Fayetville stage race and was hoping to be riding well for it, but unfortunatley am going to have to slowly get back into things this week and hope I can pull a hat trick this weekend...

that's all for now... J signing off...

Ever have one of those days?

2009-12-28T18:36:00.000-08:00

Man... I did...

Hood rattin it tonight...

2009-11-02T16:21:00.000-08:00

any ideas?

2009-10-25T17:58:00.000-07:00

So... gonna hang on to the pup for a little while and think it's only fair to give her a name... Any ideas? It may be kind of corny, but I like Aura as a name...

She's coming along very well. She's just barely opening her eyes and we've already got her trained to pee and poop on a pad. So far, she's turning out to be a pretty good dog... I may eat my words in a few months though...

Needs a good home!

2009-10-18T06:34:00.000-07:00

One of my roomates found this litte stray, apparently abandoned by mom, near our house. Her eyes aren't open yet, so she's pretty young. We're going to make sure she gets her shots this coming week.... Once her eyes have been open for a little bit, we would like to try to find a home for her. We saw the mom scavenging around a couple days ago and know she was a lab, we kind of think the dad may have been a rot though...

Not lov'n life right now...

2009-10-13T17:34:00.000-07:00

Got sick on Sunday and struggling to kick it... Did a little more riding this weekend and wouldn't you know it, got sick. Weather here is depressing, was supposed to go to the athletic training room this morning, have 3 mid-terms this week (which I can barely study for because my head hurts so much that my eyes hurt)... and... I'm sick and losing about 3lb's a day... To top it off, one of those mid-terms is anatomy and physiology lab and one of the hardest tests all semester and kind of an important class given my major... and it's tomorrow...

"it only gets worse..." Time to eat my own words...

Did talk to an Air Force recruiter about becoming a pilot though... gonna be a tough road if I decide to go that route... Basically have 2 opportunities at being approved by the board to be a pilot before I would be too old... Suggestions are to get a pilots license and upgrade to a dual engine license if possible... and maintain a GPA of 3.5 or higher... a pilots license would be a pretty expensive investment if I don't get in though...

Multimedia message

2009-10-09T13:46:00.000-07:00

Had a nice little ride today and got to watch an F-18 practice it's routine for tomorrows air show... It was pretty tough to get a shot of him most of the time, he was doing what looked like a very low speed nose stall when I nabbed this one... pretty cool... A couple times it looked like he was getting kind of close to the sound barrier, started to see what looked like part of a vapor cone forming on his nose... Pretty awesome...

I gave in...

2009-10-07T16:43:00.000-07:00

and bought an MSU parking pass... After having to walk in pouring rain and water up to my shins to get to class, then sit through 5 hours of class drenched down to my boxers in unheated classrooms, I decided the 30 bucks was worth avoiding another unpleasent situation like that...

What a shame!

2009-10-06T14:49:00.000-07:00

Houston-based amateur accepts doping suspension

It sounds like a lot of guys feel sorry for him, don't really think I do right now... I think it says something that he understands the mistake and is willing to accept the consequences, and deserves some respect as a result...but... a couple things:

1) knowingly taking a "natural testosterone enhancer" while knowingly being part of the USADA testing pool... really? First off, haven't enough dudes been busted for trying to enhance testosterone to know that those are some dangerous waters to go swimming in? and, again, doing it when in the USADA testing pool?

2) His team won the state TTT this year and now there is a cloud hanging over that. I feel bad for those guys on his team that worked hard for that title only to have it stripped away by a teammates poor judgement.

He's got a tough road ahead of him and I hope he stays strong and sticks with it. It will be tough to rejoin the peleton once the suspension is up with that cloud hanging over his head. I may not feel bad for him, but I do wish him the best of luck and hope he can get back to the kind of rider he was this year without the help of prohibited substances.

How about:

2009-10-05T16:15:00.000-07:00

Where the wild things are? Remember the book?

Animoto.com

2009-10-01T17:02:00.000-07:00

makes your own video out of whatever you give it...

Gotta know this stuff for tomorrows test...

2009-09-30T10:52:00.000-07:00

Plus transcription and translation of DNA in protein synthesis... How all the amino acids link up to the disacharides on a mRNA strand... How tRNA knows when to start and stop linking up amino acids to mRNA... What role polymerase 1 & 3 play in DNA replication and protein synthesis... How the lagging strand is built upon versus the leading strand of DNA... etc...

Anyone willing to trade places for a day or so? I just want to go spend a day doing some autocross instead of studying...

This looks interesting...

2009-09-27T15:03:00.000-07:00

Metrigear

Interesting & very practical new powermeter... need to do a little more reading on it to see if it's really as accurate as they say...

Here she is

2009-09-25T19:02:00.001-07:00

Isn't she cute?

Don't let her fool you, she's pretty quick...

The car accelerates phenomenally and sticks to the ground like glue. Super fun to drive, especially after throwing on the cold air intake yesterday.

Pics...

2009-09-24T20:08:00.000-07:00

of the new addition to the family coming soon... She's a little shy...

gotta go...

2009-09-22T05:20:00.000-07:00

to rehab... of sorts...

Out my front door...

2009-09-18T19:30:00.000-07:00

is a pretty cool MTB trail with some nice single track. Went and checked a little bit of it out today on foot...

Been doing some car hunting...

2009-09-18T04:53:00.000-07:00

It's had me on the computer doing research like crazy... Found a 2003 GTI in Dallas that was priced insanely low. I figured there had to be something majorly wrong with it outside of the high mileage, so I cruised down there and checked it out on Wednesday when I took Tiff to the airport.

The car drove like new but has a few broken trim items inside that need fixing which is no big deal to me, I like having some projects. Gonna cruise back down there and hopefully get it when I go pick up Tiff on Sunday... Already got some mods in mind for it! Maybe a cold air intake to make up for that little gap between starting to accelerate and when the turbo kicks in and some suspension eventually.

The gears won't stop turning in my head, even having a tough time sleeping thinking about all the possibilities... Basically, this little 4 banger can be brought close to the 250hp mark for well under a grand! The only caveat is you would want to throw in a sport clutch to be able to handle the added torque and definitely beef up the suspension to keep her on the road... and all that can get pricey, so I don't really think I would beef it up that much...

I should be studying for my test in 2hrs... back to the books...

A 4 day weekend and some time off the bike, brought a new coffee bar to the complex!

2009-09-06T16:40:00.000-07:00

The coffee bar idea all started last semester when we snagged some old furniture from this old hotel that was being cleared out. The furniture was in pretty bad shape with water damage, what looked like bullet holes in the chairs, and pieces of wood and paint missing. We never found the time last semester to fix any of this stuff, so it sat in the storage room for almost a year waiting to be resurrected. With my season grinding to an unexpected halt (well, it was coming... just was kind of ignoring the signs for a while) on Thursday and a 4 day weekend ahead of us, Tiff and I got busy...

We moved all the bikes into an over sized closet and the bike room to make some extra space for our lounge. Tiff reupholstered the scrappy chairs with some pleather we got on sale...

I took a bunch of old race numbers and stuck them on a table and lacquered over them. This one proved to be trickier than anticipated due to the home depot guy giving me some bad advice on polyurethane... no matter what anyone tells you, it is not sticky and will not hold down things such as racing numbers... plus it turns them yellow... It didn't turn out to be what I had in mind, but it's close enough...

and here's the bar with much more room to add newspaper articles and such...

HHH Report...

2009-08-29T11:14:00.000-07:00

As you may or may not know, it's the Hotter n Hell Hundred time of year again. Before I get started on a race report thus far, scope out this video from the local news station... did a little bit of a piece on hydration...

so... for the race report, last night was the first crit which saw some break aways which all seemed to come back. I soloed up to a break with Josh in it in the last 20 minutes of the race and immediately after tagging on had to go with another move that came from that break. I didn't think I could do it, but it helps when someone tells you to go... you just don't think about it, you just go and don't think about exploding. I eventually got up to the next group, when the games began and people started looking at each other to pull, creating a situation where no one was pulling. Luckily, Colt was up there from RBM (I wasn't racing for RBM for the HHH races, gotta race MSU), so I had a friend up there... We just wanted to stay away, so we just kept riding and before we knew it, it was just the two of us. We got a pretty good gap and I think we were pretty convinced that we stood a good chance of staying away. Four laps to go, the pack was out of sight until we hit the long straightaways. Three to go, a little closer. Two to go, a little bit closer (the gap seemed to close exponentially) but still a good gap and the crowd was going crazy! One to go, the crowd died down, letting me know that our efforts were pretty much futile... we tried to gas a bit more, but we were both dieing, We got swallowed up with a half a lap to go. Josh tried to get the sprint but pulled 5th, the last 2 corners mad the finish real tricky... to get primes, throughout the race I realized I couldn't be any further back than 2nd wheel going into that 2nd to last corner if I wanted to stand a chance at winning the prime...

Now for the road race this morning: Dude! We won! I don't really know what to say other than that... The team rode excellent, with snatching up hotspot sprint points where possible to get Josh the omnium lead and getting Josh to the hotspots first, allowing him to win two of the four. The rest of the time, we virtually always had a guy up the road keeping things easier for the rest of us. Lalla buried himself so deep in his barrage of attacks that he ended up in the first aid tent after the race hooked up to an IV... I gotta say, the team was awesome... and we got the right guy in the decisive move that went in the last 10 miles. Josh took the win and it was a very meaningful win for us. After yesterday's near miss, it was important to us to try to pull something off. Not to mention, no current MSU rider had won the hotter n hell road race before today. It wasn't just a win for the MSU cycling team, it was a win for the community that keeps us afloat! That became clear to me in the crit last night, the energy coming off the crowd was amazing and I felt like I let them down a little, so today was excellent!

oh yea.... we finished 100 miles in 3hrs 45 minutes...

on to tomorrow's final crit and hopefully an overall omnium win...

And the rat race begins... again...

2009-08-24T06:29:00.000-07:00

off to class to learn how to build facilities that encourage exercise and a healthy lifestyle...

Those cell phone companies...

2009-08-21T15:04:00.000-07:00

sure are a sheisty lot... I love how they slip in a completely different contract when they send you a new phone...

Why do I not feel like riding?

2009-08-16T07:36:00.000-07:00

Feeling lathargic, tired, and spent all day yesterday feeling so hungry I could eat my arm... I think I should just bite the bullet and get on my bike... The season's not quite over yet...

Nature valley vid...

2009-08-14T12:19:00.000-07:00

Found this Nature Valley GP video... This is the crit I broke my frame in.

A few shots from Castroville, Texas

2009-08-12T08:00:00.000-07:00

Castroville is kind of a cool place. They have a lot of these old houses from the 1800's, this is the one we stayed in. There is even a town square that is where the original settlers camped out at when they first arrived.

This is a shot of the backyard that drops down into the river for some awesome fishing... or not so awesome considering all that was caught by me was a piece of wood that took Max's lure...

and the dock where the lure eating piece of wood was caught...

This was a cool shot of the river just a little up stream from the house...

Back in the falls and back to real life...

2009-08-11T08:04:00.000-07:00

Wrapped up my big summer of racing anywhere and everywhere in the U.S with the Texas state time trial championships this last weekend. The best I could muster up was a 7th place, which wasn't too bad for me with a time of 54:something or other for my first 40k... But, I still got blown out of the water by the top guys, especially Stefan who even blew 2nd place out of the water with putting over a minute into 2nd with a time of a little over 51 minutes! Maybe some day I can ride a time like that, but the whole TT thing just doesn't come to me despite how hard I work at it... Of course, it didn't help that a massive tractor pulled out in front of me with around 5k to go... I don't think that wouldn't have made a huge difference in my time anyways though...

For the TTT, our team pulled a disappointing 6th and were quite a bit off the pace... We were all a little bummed about that, but we had never practiced together and were constantly having to make adjustments to our rotation along the way... So, we really didn't do too bad with that considered...

Now, I'm back in the falls and already have a paper to write... Library time following today's ride, then cleaning all the dead bugs out of the cycling complex tomorrow... As weird as it may sound, I'm kind of glad to be back and get back to my routine after spending the whole summer in the car or on a plane and in and out hotels and host houses. Never thought I would say that I'm looking forward to school...

Crashed the dominguez hills party today...

2009-08-02T19:32:00.000-07:00

took a little of their money and had my fill of negative racing... seriously guys, when someone closes a gap to a break within 25 meters, all you have to do is pedal through when one pulls off to close it... sitting up looking around and inserting ones thumb in the derrier is not the way to race a bike and I can't imagine is as much fun... and... putting ones whole team on the front just to chase one guy down from some out of state team you've probably never heard of yet let 6 guys roll off the front? beyond my understanding...

well...

2009-07-30T15:26:00.000-07:00

ended my big summer racing stint on a not so positive note at nationals... It was pretty hot, so it was important to get 2 bottles per lap and maybe an ice filled sock. So, we opted to use mussette bags. After 2 laps, had a good feed but things went south after that with missing the next feed due to a misunderstanding then another the following lap... Prior to that, I was hurting on the hills but always able to recover enough to get up the next one. The group was whittling down every lap till all we had was about 30 or 40 guys. With 3 laps to go, I didn't have water and took a few sips from my buddy Bryan's bottles to get me through the lap. Going into the feed zone, I was looking for the mussete and was releived to see it hanging out there. I went to grab it and my dad gave it a little thrust out to me which I wasn't anticipating, sending the bag into my handlebars. I lost the mussette and almost went down, unfortunatley Bryan was behind me and hit the bag sending him to the ground. I turned around to see if he was ok, my day was done anyways without any bottles for 2 laps. Apparently he ended up with nothing more than road rash, and maybe some bruised bones. Kind of a rough day and a frustrating way to end the summer racing for both Bryan and I, but definitley Bryan! Sorry man!

Lalla, there was a dude from your MBK team racing... apparently he knew me from racing Bermuda GP with me a few years back. It took me a little while to figure out where I had seen that kit before, but then it hit me...

Rigged up this oldy but goody...

2009-07-27T19:21:00.000-07:00

After pulling a spoke through my DT Swiss at superweek, I needed to figure out another rim option for the powertap.... so... I was back home and dug around the garage a bit and found an old set of Mavic wheels set up for 7 speed from one of my first road bikes. I got rid of the 7 speed hub and built the powertap up on the old mavic rim. These things are tanks, this wheel and the front will make for an awesome set of training wheels...

Back in California....

2009-07-26T21:11:00.000-07:00

getting cooked from the outside in... over 100 at 9am... It's crazy to see how the body responds to that, I couldn't do intervals I should have no problem doing... especially after doing superweek... Long rides in 100+ temps really screw you up, not so good seeing as nationals is in the cross hairs...

Jason...

2009-07-23T10:08:00.000-07:00

is glad to be back in Colorado for a couple days after a costly superweek stint... broke a powertap harness, lost the CPU, pulled a spoke through the rim of my powertap wheel, broke a spoke on my Bontragers, and lost a peice of my car somewhere on the road... when it rains it pours...

Riding round in circles...

2009-07-20T07:39:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lag in posting despite some solid racing with plenty to blog about going on... Just had some more important stuff to take care of when I was off the bike.

My first block of superweek racing was a 3 day block where I was able to get the legs back underneath me after a long block of no racing or any sort of group rides from being restricted to the TT bike. I was able to pull a 14th place at Elgin (where I made the big newspaper here in chicago http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/couriernews/sports/1663154,3_2_EL13_CYCLING_S1-090713.article) and mainly tried to stay out of the crashes the other two races, keeping in mind that these races are mainly tune ups for nationals and not worth crashing in.

My second block started on Friday and is a 5 day racing block. I struggled with a mental block on Friday and pulled out for no real good reason and did the same saturday but just because I was going as hard as I could every time we hit the climb and had less than a minute to recover from the climb before we started it again... It wasn't long before I blew up...

Last night was the Evanston Grand Prix and I went into it with the goal of staying at the front. I did that, but about halfway through the race I hit a hole and my seat went nose down... so, went into the pit and got let in near the rear of the pack and had to work my way back up to the front. It was pretty hard getting there and once I did, the break that had been away got brought back and the winning break went. I was hurting the most I had the whole race at that point and couldn't go with it. It was kind of some bum luck that would continue with breaking a spoke 10 laps to go. I was worried that I would get let back in at the back and at that point wouldn't be able to move back up at that point in the race. Luckily they let me back in where they had seen me in the peleton and I quickly got back in the top ten and hung there with Josh till we both got completely swarmed on the last lap. I sprinted for 18th place, just because I really needed the cash... Got some good training in and was glad things went better than the last 2 days.

One observation though... apparently, if your not pro and you bring back a pro in a break... that's bad juju... to some guys anyways... I guess if you're not pro, you're not allowed to really race your bike?

Nice way to end a ride...

2009-07-03T18:48:00.000-07:00

Tiff and I did about an hour and half of climbing then I finished off the rest of my ride and met her in Boulder at this cool coffee shop we like to frequent. The barista saw me come in in my bike garb and made me a special latte... Pretty cool...

They start doing Tour de France showings tomorrow while enjoying all their good stuff... May have to swing by and watch some of the Tour...

5 hrs today... again...

2009-06-27T08:51:00.000-07:00

Wouldn't be so bad, except that I'm riding my TT bike... after a 5hr ride yesterday and some long rides leading up to these ones (all on the TT bike), the nether regions are not doing so well... the chamois creme companies are making a killing off me...

Tomorrow off to Vegas!

Flour Mill Lofts...

2009-06-23T09:04:00.000-07:00

I rode by here a few times on the bike path that goes into Denver and thought, can't they do this in Wichita Falls? There are plenty of old mills they could convert if they could give some developer some incentive to convert an old mill... This thing was built in the 1920's and converted in the 1990's

The floor plan looks pretty cool too, with a view overlooking the platte river on one side and downtown Denver on the other side setting it off. Just across the river, you can cruise over to REI and Kayak a section of the Platte river they set up as an obstacle course or go rock climbing on their 3 story indoor rock or just hang out at the starbucks overlooking the river... Pretty cool!

Stage 6 of Nature Valley

2009-06-19T15:37:00.000-07:00

I know... I'm a little late, but I've been battling some sort of bug that I think started taking hold of me before stage 5. Things didn't go so well on Sunday, I fell off the back pretty soon after clearing the time cut. I continued to ride till about the half way point, when they pulled me. I was glad at that point, to jump in my car and start the drive back to Colorado... I was feeling more hammered than normal, which was surprising since I usually get better as stage races go on. Friday night was a rough night with not getting much sleep and starting to feel like allergies were taking a hold of me, things pretty much snowballed downhill from that point on... Ended up 80th in G.C. which wasn't too bad all things considered.

To top off my marvelous week, I got in a car accident on the way back. Some lady pulled out in front of me from the left hand side of the road, then dived into a driveway on the right hand side of the road, right in front of me. I slammed on the brakes as soon as I saw what she was going to attempt and skidded until I hit her rear quarterpanel... I think she's trying to pin the blame on me, which may be easy as I was rocking california plates and we all know how much everyone loves californians... The car's still driveable but moved even one more step into the ghetto direction with the left hand blinker being held together with duct tape...

Also got some of the Lemond cleat wedges that I used to use to put on my new shoes. I hope that solves the vastus lateralis problems I've been having all season. First ride on them was today and I felt much better, the watts were back up to where they were before I got the new shoes, and I'm not getting the tendonitis type of hurt as much... good sign...

Stage 5 of Nature Valley

2009-06-13T20:08:00.000-07:00

Was pretty chill once the break got away, till we hit the finishing circuit... That hill was killer and I was too far back going into it and got caught behind too many gaps and lost touch with not only the leaders, but all the groups in between... I had been struggling with trying to get neutral water at the feed zones much of the race after losing a bottle early into the race. I was already getting goose bumps going into the circuit... Kind of a rough day... Got pulled with a lap to go after getting gapped to far off the back... Pretty sure I wasn't 9 minutes back though... those laps didn't take 9 minutes to complete and only missing the last one... well... you do the math... what's even more interesting is Pipp (from Bissel) crashed before hitting the circuit and hooked up with Colt (who flatted), while they were told to retire, Pipp kept going and was given a time of 6 minutes back... curious... he never passed me... The poor guy had a pretty rough crash though and shoot what the heck does it matter to me, I'm not in contention for squat... Just makes me question the officials...

The Damage...

Think some duct tape will get me through the rest of the race?

I got to try out the Orbea and Dura Ace 10 speed, which is always nice...
Shimano did an awesome job of setting up my position and rigging up my power tap cpu in a pinch... lost bottles, but didn't lose my cpu...

Stage 4 Nature Valley Grand Prix

2009-06-12T21:21:00.001-07:00

little dark blue blur in the top left corner... yea, cute kid too... thanks for cheering buddy!

Felt a lot better today, I think it was a little slower though... Spent most of the race near the front and contemplated taking a flyer, just to get the .0009 seconds of fame, but decided that probably wasn't the smartest idea seeing that tomorrow's going to be a real tough 90+ miles... All was good though, till about 10 laps to go when a guy clipped a pedal in the corner and went down right in front of me... yes... again... that's two for two in the crits... I thought I had the guy dodged and was in the clear, but got nailed from behind by a grand performance dude who somehow managed to get his handlebar and brake lever wedged between my seatstay and rear wheel, snapping my seatstay in half... I got on a spare bike for the last few laps and was struggling in the corners with the awkward position till about the last lap or so... I tried to limit my losses and come in with the rear of the main peleton, but just missed where the officials decided they would cut the field and say that these guys were 20 seconds back from the finishers... lost more time...

About sums up how I feel this morning...

2009-06-12T08:01:00.001-07:00

Woke up feeling congested and lungs are still sore... not a great sign, seeing as the hardest days are still ahead of us...

Not to mention, Colt's out getting an x-ray for a possibly fractured knee cap from a crash he had at Tulsa...

Hopefully the other kids play nice today and don't throw us off the jungle gymn, we may not survive it...

Stage 3 of Nature Valley

2009-06-11T10:57:00.000-07:00

Got to race and even got in a few short lived moves off the front, but dang that finishing circuit kicked my butt... I struggled to move up into the top 30 by the last lap, but once I got there the gas was put on even more sending me off the back and rolling across the line 40 some odd seconds behind the main field... I dropped down to 96th place between yesterday and today. I'm feeling it too... achey, tired, and my lungs hurt... I feel way out of shape next to the guys we're racing against...

Stage 2 of Nature Valley...

2009-06-11T07:49:00.000-07:00

This was how things looked for the whole hour of racing...

It was super fast and riddled with potholes and manhole covers, of course they were strategically placed in the corners. The race was virtually single file the whole time, leaving you finishing where you started. I was sitting mid-pack the whole race and despite my efforts trying to move up into the top 20, I always ended up back where I started. Eventually, I resigned myself to just finishing and limiting my losses and not getting caught behind any gaps. With 4 laps to go a waste management dude clipped his pedal and hit the deck hard going into the first corner. I had to go to the outside to dodge him, nailing a pothole and hopping a curb narrowly missing spectators. I got back on the bike and tried to get back on the group, but realized my seat got knocked down and I could barely keep from sliding forward onto the top tube... I pulled off in the pit to see if they could straighten it, which they did, but it was too late for me to jump back in. The official took down my number and I would end up with a pro- rated time, probably at the very back of the finishers for the day, causing me to lose more time... Well... I woke up this morning and they have me as not finishing! Meaning I can't start today... Meanwhile, the guys who dropped out way earlier in the race got a pro-rated time and get to start today... Something's not right, I'm waiting to hear back from the officials... After forking out the cash to come here, I certainly hope they let me continue to race... I'll be deeply disappointed if it happens like that...

Nature Valley TT...

2009-06-10T13:41:00.000-07:00

Went as about expected... I rode into a mid pack placing (78th) just behind teammate Colt (77th) and a little in front of our other teammate Bryan (84th)... We are all about a minute and a half down on first, which is alright if we can make sure we stay near the front and not get caught in any splits or crashes. The fastest time for the day was by Zirbel which was a 12:36, as compared to my measly 14:09...

Tonight we have a crit in downtown Saint Paul. From here on out should be fun, I'm not much of a fanatic for TT's... It just hurts too much for a mediocre placing...

Hugo Road Race... 3 words...

2009-06-02T11:55:00.000-07:00

Dead Pan boring... Long straight roads with gradual climbs that last 5+ miles for 80 miles... Got in a break about halfway through... those 3 dudes in red are Rio Grande and they made the cake and ate it all... all 3 got in the top 5 spots for money, while the rest of us (outside of Donald from slipstream and the excel guy) went home 50 dollars closer to broke... Ended up missing the attack at the end after taking my pull and was the only one willing to work to get us to the line in front of the chasing main field... oh well, good training for Nature Valley...

Did a local crit the following day which was fielded by 2 slipstream guys, Zajicek, Moniger, Schmatz, Bajadelli, Colby Pearce, and the Rio Grande squad again... it was pretty fast and I ended up 11th, same as last year and out of the money again... bummer... with a few solo bridges to the breaks driven by the big guys, it was another good day of training though... Now it's about time to jump on the trainer, since it's raining like crazy today... Woke up with my window open and all my clothes next to the window soaking wet this morning...

Life is Good...

2009-05-27T10:22:00.000-07:00

Except the racing scene in Boulder doesn't seem to be that great... I have only found races locally for this coming weekend and not much else for the weekends I'll be around through the end of July... Even found a race that has every category except for Cat.1... weird...

and my fishing skills have lapsed big time... With one of my fly poles falling apart while casting and losing peices of it in a lake in my first fishing trip, and a regular pole falling apart while shooting out some lures the very next fishing trip... then throwing my lure in a local lake last night and snagging a beautiful large mouth bass in my first cast only to lose it to my line breaking 2 feet from the shore... It was the big one that got away...

Nature Valley GP...

2009-05-11T14:48:00.000-07:00

I'm in! Gonna be fun!

As for Collegiate Nationals... I'm gonna be honest and say I was dissapointed... I was riding strong, in fact it was the only time in my whole life I have ever felt stronger than roughly 90% of the field... I didn't expect that seeing as I have been struggling the last few weeks... Pulled a hat trick and still didn't come out with a result... 20th in the road race and first in my group, but didn't go with the break since Todd was up there. Had I been up there, I dream of what may have happened... Climbing the best I ever have and sprinting the best I ever have and never getting out of my comfort zone staying with the lead groups on the climbs... ah man... oh well, I hope I can have another few days like that during some big races over the summer... Nature Valley? Elite Nationals? Hope so...

Big Time!

2009-04-30T11:28:00.000-07:00

Well maybe a notch below... I created a link ------------> on the side bar to watch collegiate nationals live online during the event starting a week from Friday (5/1). Pretty cool that there's going to be some coverage on the internet for all those who can't make it to the race... and honestly, those watching will probably see more than many of the spectators...

Oh yea.... We won conference overall and individually in the mens A's & B's, and womens A's... Pretty sweet and good job to all who made it happen!

Awesome B-Day...

2009-04-23T19:34:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone for making this birthday an awesome one! and constantly reminding me I'm a 1/4 of a century old... not so sure I like the way that sounds....

another flat...

2009-04-22T09:59:00.000-07:00

and a missed class due to sitting at express tire for two hours this morning waiting for them to change another valve stem... then trying to convince me that I needed to replace a tire, that unbeknownst to them they had replaced about a month and a half ago... Ironic that the dude trying to rip me off was from Palmdale California... and missing a few teeth... I was amazed he was able to pull a similar stunt on the two people in front of me and get away with it...

What was Bos thinking?

2009-04-20T06:31:00.000-07:00

Not only did he take the yellow jersey (Impey) down in a dis-tasteful display of sportsmanship, he also took himself out... One would think one would respect the laws of physics when grabbing someone and throwing them in front of oneself (in the midst of a sprint) and fully expect to go down with that person... Judging by how quicly Bos jumped up and showed frustration, I'm not so sure he realized that little detail. Back to physics for Bos...

I think Bos should be suspended from the sport for a substantial amount of time. Throwing someone into the barriers in the midst of a sprint (no matter how frustrated one is) has no excuse... Impey could have been killed...

That's all I've got... time to go to class...

man, I miss socal racing...

2009-04-17T10:01:00.000-07:00

The Dana Point GP made it's debut the year before I left for college and is a super cool race. It's a little more of a technical course than most of the socal crits, which really met my appeal. I hope to get out there to do it again one of these days...

3 flats in 2 days...

2009-04-17T06:33:00.000-07:00

what the heck?

wait a minute... that's actually 4 in the scope of a week if I count my car...

so... what's the minority situation again?

2009-04-15T21:10:00.000-07:00

I cruised down to our local grocery store, which lets face it, is kind of in the hood. I was walking around with my basket scoping out sales and all the nonfat, lowfat, and sugar free good stuff when, while passing by a family, I feel the palm of a hand slap my back... I was certain it came from the kid sitting in the basket I had just walked by with his family circled close by... I brushed it off as no big deal... until... I heard the kid say:

"Hey! Mama... I just hit a white man!" !!! (yes, it was said with as much enthusiasm as the exclamation marks imply and sounded like something he was proud of)

The kid was quickly hushed by his sister and I walked off with a rather disturbed feeling about the whole thing. I had thoughts about the civil rights movement and the many hardships endured by the African Americans including situations such as those among others that were far worse... Today, I had the thought that things may have come full circle and the very things that were endured during the civil rights movement by African Americans seems to be making their way back around to everyone else... funny how that works... does that make it right? Is there a reason to bore down a grudge that may be felt from a time before you or any one the grudge is against was born? Don't get it... there is so much out there to support "minorities", yet the animosity and lack of responsibility appears to be through the roof among many of the "minorities"...

What needs to get done today but probably won't...

2009-04-10T08:12:00.000-07:00

-Study some more key terms from History pertaining to WWI and WWII...

-Get started on a paper explaining how two men in seperate renaisance era novels lose their lives as they lose their sense of self and reality and are brought back to everyone else's reality...

-Maybe get started on some accounting homework...

-Meet with CASA to go over their 5k fundraiser run course... (gotta do it)

-2hr ride with intervals... (gotta do it... blah...)

-Try to work on getting some prize money for some cash primes for the MSU stage race crit...

-Be lazy??? I think I should move this to the top of the list, I feel like poo and haven't gotten to take a lazy day probably since christmas break...

Kicking off the Easter break...

2009-04-09T14:25:00.000-07:00

with a little wednesday night racing in Fort Worth with the TBI criterium that benefits juniors. After class got out, Lalla, Josh, Mclane, John, and myself loaded up the car and jammed down there making one pee stop on the side of the freeway during rush hour. After cruising around the course and taking note of the wind, we all started looking for reasons to pack it in but none of us did (except for Lalla about halfway through??? what's up with that dude???)... John pulled 9th in his race, which was cool seeing as he is kind of a newcomer to the racing scene. Our race started off with quite a few attacks and after following several, I finally ended up in one that would stick to the finish with 3 other guys. I was on the ragged edge for a bit doing anywhere from 500-600 watts pulling through into the headwind. Finally after a little sitting on, once we appeared to have a good gap, I got the heart rate back under control. I kind of sandbagged a bit, hoping to do something in the sprint, but when that came around I got beat by everyone and pulled 4th... Not sure what happened, but there's no reason I shouldn't have at least beat the two guys that appeared to be working more than me... made me wish I worked a little harder just for the workout if anything... We had a pretty big gap on the field towards the end, which was surprising given the wind. Word was the pace slowed when a rider decided to sucker punch Josh during a prime, when this guy thought Josh was cheating by crossing the double yellow for the sprint which was actually announced as being allowed for the primes and final sprint before the race... It sounded like everyone sat up to watch Josh set this dude straight. I dug the race (outside of whatever ego thing would cause someone to think they could punch someone), it's cool that this crit is a revenue for juniors and from what I've heard TBI takes good care of the younger racers.

Fort Davis and then some

2009-04-07T11:46:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the delay in posts, I've had soooo many other things I feel I should be doing before I get to blogging. Still the case, but I can't leave everyone in the dark.

This last weekend was Fort Davis and it was up to me and my teammates Colt and Todd to defend the win from last year. I had a pretty dismal day on saturday, not sure what was up, just felt the worst I've ever felt on a bike. Didn't help that after the hill climb we had a 16 mile TT with super windy conditions that saw gusts up to 50mph and to top it off, most of it was into a headwind. I ended the day in 11th after the TT and having a not so great hill climb. Colt was sitting around 8th and was our G.C. man. We couldn't get any sort of break going in the road race to make up any time on anybody with the G.C. leader Vargas from San Jose having Wherry and Blackgrove controlling the race for him. The field would slowly wittle down over each climb, but we would finish with everyone in front of me on G.C. in the same group. I stayed in 11th and took 2nd in the final stage, Colt dropped down to 10th due to a mechanical in the last few miles of the road race. Vargas put in an awesome ride to win the final stage and the overall in a hilly stage race, not bad for someone usually classified as a sprinter!

Big thanks to Alex "Gunshow" Boyd for letting me borrow the wheels! These things were amazing after the turn around... Pretty sure this was the only time I've ever spun out a 54x11...

Oh yea... Despite not feeling to great on the bike, last week was an awesome week with getting 100% on both my geology and accounting tests... Pretty awesome considering I totally bombed the first geology test... Those late night into early morning studying sessions last week paid off... But not so much on the bike...

A Dedication

2009-03-25T19:46:00.000-07:00

I lost a good friend today in a tragic accident when piloting a test flight in an F-22. I'm not real sure things have really sunk in yet, but what comes to mind first is all those evenings after Tour de Tucson every year where we would sit and drink a beer and talk about the epic ride... Then go find some coffee and recount all the bits that we had missed in our previous discussions. Dave Cooley was a mentor, friend, and family all rolled into one. When things were tense, he could come in and crack a joke and lighten the atmosphere. Dave, I will miss you and something will be missing from Tour de Tucson from here on out along with all the training rides when I come home. I was just talking to my dad yesterday and listening to him tell me how you dropped him this last weekend, this hit too close to home. Cool's, you will live on in my heart and I dedicate this season to you! You are an awesome inspiration and will always be in my thoughts.
The article touches on what happened.

Tiff and my prayers are with the Cooley family.

Pictures worth a thousand words...

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

Ended up finishing 5th in the road race with Ryan right next to me yelling at me to push it for the line to snatch up as many points as possible. Thanks dude!

and rolling across the line feeling VERY human at the end of the day!

Managed to crawl up to 3rd in G.C. with Ryan 6th in G.C. Colt & Collin both pulled top 20's, with 4 of us in the money we were pretty stoked with how things went.

Well, back to real life with catching up on homework and studying....

Another weekend in South Texas...

2009-02-08T05:50:00.000-08:00

Right now I am in Castroville Texas doing the Alsation Cycling Classic. Yesterday we started with the TT which I was originally written down as a DNS for the results due to rolling up 10 seconds before my start. They later would give me a time that put me in 10th behind my teammates Collin and Colt and just ahead of Ryan. We were going into the crit that evening with a pretty threatening group of guys all in the top 15. We all managed to stay up towards the front and switch off going with moves for the majority of the race. Towards the end I took a flyer with Pat Mccarty from OUCH (previously Healthnet) but we got caught with about 2 laps to go. I managed to still stay towards the front after and recover enough to try to sprint. I ended up coming in 3rd and scoring a few points on everyone who beat me in the TT. Ryan came in 6th which still leaves us with a lot of guys who can go up the road and possibly podium in the GC. Today we have a 75 mile road race and I'm sitting 5th overall and going to have to try to claw my way on to the podium.

We're staying at this cool house that was built in the mid 1800's and has been restored. All the wood and is the original stuff from 150 years ago, it's just been stripped and refinished.

Fun times at our team training camp...

2009-01-28T17:11:00.000-08:00

Had our Team training camp this last weekend in Kerrville Texas (the hill country of Texas). I got there a day later than everyone due to some classes I couldn't miss. Still got to ride with everyone and duke it out for the city limit sprints. The first day I was there was beautiful with weather good enough to start the ride in shorts and a short sleeve jersey, while the next two where back down in the 30's.
Saturday was our long 100 plus mile day which started with a blustery ride along one of the many crystal clear rivers. We cruised over the many rolling climbs till about the last 30 miles when Max, Collin, and I decided to gun it for the final city limit sprint by ourselves. We mozied back down the road that paralleled the river, constantly watching for landmarks as to when we're getting close to the sprint sign. I kind of dogged on my pulls, I didn't recognize anything and kind of wanted to win that sprint. On this one stretch of road I started to see Max and Collin looking at eachother than noticed that coveted green sign up the road. We all went at the same time and I edged out Collin for the line. We had some awesome fun and everyone is super strong, I look forward to the season

In other news... Thanks to Jim Hoyt from Richardson's Bike Mart, I got the hook up on this Specialized Transition TT frame. Finally got a sweet TT frame that should give that little extra umpf in the TT's. That combined with theRetul, I'll get in the coming weeks will be awesome!

first race report of the season

2009-01-18T16:14:00.000-08:00

and my race started with a laps in attention from the peleton within the first mile of the race. I simply rolled off the front with another guy. We would quickly join up to Veggie and my teammate James who attacked a minute or two before I rolled off the front. Unfortunately James would break his seat and have to drop back before the break really got rolling. Going into the first lap, the break was three strong and we were opening a pretty respectable gap. At the beginning of the last lap we started to see a group of 12 or so coming up behind us. There were some of the bigger guys in Texas in the group so we decided to sit up and not waste our energy trying to stay out front. When they caught us, I was pleased to see I had two teammates (collin and colt) but pretty disappointed to see Josh Carter in there. Carter's living up here in Wichita Falls and is the Husband of the New director for the MSU cycling team. He's pro... and one of the better sprinters in the country. So, basically if one was to finish in the same group as him, one would be racing for the position after him... Now, the only option was to get up the road or drop Josh (which frankly wasn't gonna happen). Our best option was to stay on top of the attacks and make sure if anything went up the road, we had someone in there. Well, we missed a few of those and one big one that got way up the road. Only in the last 8 miles or so did we get organized enough to bring it back close enough to send me across the gap. I made it about halfway across before the rest of the group was on my wheel. When everyone sat up, I went for it again but it was too close to the finish for anyone to get off the front. With a couple miles to go we were all back together and no longer racing for 3rd... I really tried pushing the pace over any of the climbs I could to try to gap Josh.... Don't know if it actually put him in any difficulty but it was worth a shot. Over the final climb into the long downhill finish, I was sitting 3rd wheel and right on Josh. I got a little to antsy and started my sprint too early. I started coming around Josh and the guy in front of Josh started his sprint when he saw me. I started sinking back, but was able to jump back on Josh's wheel and kept my momentum to snake past the guy who started the sprint in first a little before the line, putting me in second place. It was a tough day, but great training and was super stoked with how the legs seemed to do in this early season stuff.

The close of a productive week...

2009-01-11T20:05:00.000-08:00

a little perspective:

-25 hours on the bike

-about 480 miles (roughly the distance from Los Angeles California to Tucson Arizona)

-a total of 41,759 Calories burned on and off the bike (roughly 75 Big Macs)

-The wicked bowl of ice cream I just consumed.... priceless!

first race of the season next weekend then team training camp... life is good...

gettin rollin...

2009-01-09T10:01:00.000-08:00

Here we go... about a week till the first race of the season. An 83 mile road race... Honestly, I look forward to it. I think racing will be easier than my current training... I could use a little break... especially after this week...

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2008-12-27T09:42:00.000-08:00

My grandma pulled this persimon off her tree... She's debating selling it on ebay as a dolly parton persimon... I'm thinking it looks like madona...

Why Santa Why?

2008-12-25T19:56:00.000-08:00

This stuff is sooo dangerous! Why would Santa leave this in my stocking? I was hoping I would leave this addiction in Belgium, but Santa has reopened pandoras box of nutritional destruction...

Joyeux Noël...

2008-12-24T08:33:00.000-08:00

et Bonne Année...

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2008-12-22T09:13:00.000-08:00

Check out my brothers gnarly pimple... He won't even go outside because he's worried the ladies may see it...

so...

2008-12-21T21:30:00.000-08:00

last week, I was really looking forward to coming out to beautiful California for a couple weeks of solid training. well... I get home and there's 10 inches of snow on the ground... and it's supposed to rain (or snow) much of the rest of the week!?... don't get it...

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2008-12-12T22:07:00.000-08:00

Check this place out! I have this place to myself the next 2 nights...

You never learn anything by doing it right...

2008-12-11T21:01:00.000-08:00

I learned a lot this semester then... Now, I am done doing things wrong for a little while. I'm celebrating with a bottle of Spaten Munich Oktoberfest, a can of bike shine, a dirty bike, and surfing the web for some cool contemporary designs...

I think this was by far the hardest semester I've had thus far... I said that last semester too though, I'm hoping it doesn't get worse next semester...

You Know...

2008-12-04T20:41:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I wish my teachers would actually test me on the material they teach me... especially seeing as it's cram time for finals and I don't have any confidence that reveiwing my books or notes will do me any good... Yet, I'm a good little student and stay up till 3 a.m. for the majority of the nights over the next week to do it... Is the real focus to teach a subject or to prepare us for life in the workforce???

I think I like bike racing better... for now anyways... when it comes time to start thinking about retirement money, the workforce may be the better bet...

Happy Thanksgiving!

2008-11-27T17:12:00.000-08:00

Hope everyone has a good Thanksgiving!

To be honest... I rode a whole lot the last several days and still haven't eaten as much as I wanted to or should. There's still pie though, I can catch up...

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2008-11-26T15:26:00.000-08:00

Found the remnants of some animal in my front brake caliper on my car... That whiteish stuff looked like intestines... guessing it was some sort of snake that curled up in there... pretty rude awakening...

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2008-11-26T13:13:00.000-08:00

So much for training in the beautiful socal weather... Gonna retreat back to Texas for warmer and dryer weather...