The Manley Report

Morgan Territory

2011-07-04T13:00:00.000-07:00

It's been over a year since I was able to string together a really hard long weekend of riding. Today I decided to explore from base camp (Discovery Bay, home to the in-laws) and try Morgan Territory Road (http://app.strava.com/rides/869484).

The advice received last week suggested I climb it from the north and descend on the Livermore side. I couldn't agree more. The northside climb is well shaded and provided some great relief from the heat. It was a cool 60* back in the canyon; the heat by the end of the ride was 93* back in Disco Bay. The view from the top of the climb is pretty amazing. I didn't realize I was at ~2,000 foot elevation, but you are rewarded with some pretty cool views of the entire area. The plunge down to Livermore; maybe next time I'll turn right at the end of the road and go climb Diablo...still haven't done that climb.

Back on the Hockey Skates

2011-05-13T10:44:00.000-07:00

14 weeks ago I ran into a small problem while playing. I had a burning pain on the outside of my right ankle. For some reason this only hurt when I laced up the skates, no pain in any other activities. I even went as far as sending the Graf skates back to George's Hockey Repair to have the ankle padding redone (excellent job by the way, a significant improvement of the stock padding). Come to find out the pain never went away and I had to visit the doctor.

I had a suspicion that my pain was somehow related to how the Graf's were a lower-cut boot. I tried on my old CCM's and the pain was a bit less, but not completely gone. On a whim, I tried on some Easton S17's and they just happened to be cut much higher and that got rid of the pain. Later that week the xray confirmed what I thought...something on the ankle was causing pain because of excess inward pronation. This was a result of some old basketball ankle injuries over the past 38 years of my life.

The Easton's restricted the inward movement and thus the pain relief. If you look closely at the photo you'll see what the doctor labeled as "kissing legions"; not sure it's a true bone spur, but it's two small growths that cause the pain when the ankle pronates inward while the boot is applying pressure. Since the Easton's seemed to fix the problem, off I went to buy a pair.

Tonight was the first night with the late night drop-in crew. I'm pretty new to the game (going on playing for just over a year) so I didn't know what to expect. I spent quite a bit of the 14 weeks just doing stick handling drills in the garage until my forearms were burning. That was probably one of the few things that kept me sane while my friends kept playing. So stepping on the ice I had no idea what the evening would hold. Come to find out I was pleasantly surprised.

Skating skills came back after a few minutes and it felt like I hadn't really missed much time off the ice. It was nice to know that I wouldn't have to re-learn everything about skating. After doing nothing but stick drills in the garage having the puck on the blade seemed way more comfortable than ever before. But what really surprised me was some unknown burst of goals that I scored!

I've had a lucky shot here or there to get on the scoreboard before, but tonight I was in the zone. Ended up with five goals: 1) a redirect of a slapshot which the goalie didn't see coming as I have never done that before, 2) snap shot from the right wing to the top shelf on the blocker side, 3) one-timer from the left wing, 4) a greasy goal while battling in a scrum in front of the goal, and most satisfying, 5) a heavy slapshot from the point (this was the most satisfying...I got all of my 6'9" body behind this and beat the goalie at the bottom left post).

No way, no how would I ever predict something like this happening to me after my layoff. Having a breakout evening like this was exactly what I needed to fall in love again with the game as it was a tough time being away for so long.

Time does change a few things

2011-04-26T14:44:00.000-07:00

You know it's been a long time since coming back to your roots when people you run into ask how long you've been away and you can't honestly remember the last time you were in town. Without having Lisa with me on this trip I didn't have my trusted calendar partner to try and figure out when and where we last made it up to the Northwest. If I remember correctly the last time was two years ago when we spent a few days in Portland and then headed over to Bend to enjoy Eagle Crest with the Petersen's.

This time back I was all by myself and in town for my 20th high school reunion. To be honest, as much as I was looking forward to seeing old friends, I probably was just as excited to have a full day of hanging out with my sister on Friday. I think it's probably been fifteen years since either of us had the opportunity to do this. As the day transpired it was great to catch up on a more personal level than just over the phone and email.

Our Friday was pretty unscripted. The week leading up to the trip I had this overwhelming sense that there was a lot that I wanted to do, but I couldn't really pinpoint specifically what I wanted to do. It wasn't until Friday morning after I woke up that I figured out my plans for the day. It had been way too long since I had driven out to Boring and visited the old house where I grew up; so that was at least a start to the day. Once my writers-esque block on itinerary planning was broken by this decision, the rest of the day fell into place.

When you've been gone for a long time sometimes things don't change, yet other things just seem to be juiced up and out of proportion like Barry Bond's steroidal growth'd head. On the drive out to Boring things didn't really seem that different until I turned down Bartell Road. Most alarming was the last half mile of the road before my old house. Trees that were tall had grown another fifty feet and cast all sorts of different shadows upon the surroundings. As we progressed closer and closer to the house my memories from fifteen years plus of living on the road were slowly be re-written. Upon coming around a few corners in the road the sights were different and made me pause; it really had been a long time and things were definitely different. I stopped the car to soak it in and to take a few pictures. I'm still feel like these changes haven't settled in my brain and I feel some sense of internal struggle in my head between my old memories which were so engrained and what is not the reality of change. Strange indeed...

I know I was more overwhelmed than my sister as she's been in the area ever since coming back from college in California. We continued our journey over to the old Hoodview grade school and then out towards Estacada to try and find one of the homes of a boyhood friend (John Neufeld). I always loved his house for several reasons. First, back in the late 70's/early 80's the architecture of the home to me just seemed "cool". The floorplan was long with several floors and lofts, with a ton of wood and very angular architecture. I'm sure there's some style that sums it up, but I wouldn't know what term to apply. Second, I spent a ton of time over at his house because of the number of sleepovers. Which leads to the last point, a deeply ingrained affection for eating nachos while watching Dr. Who. I'm not so much eating Nachos anymore while watching Dr. Who, but I'm still a super-freak fan of the current Dr. Who series; so glad the BBC decided to bring it back!

From here we meandered through the outskirts of town, did a quick stop at River City Cycles and found our way through downtown to Northwest 23rd. The yellow VW convertible we were driving brought us good luck and we were able to quickly find a prime 2-hour parking spot. That gave us enough time to hit up the street and take in the sights before nabbing sushi for lunch. With the day half shot I needed a good sugar hit; on the way back to the car with swung into Papa Hyden to indulge. I remember as a kid going there with the Neufeld's after going to symphony events as a kid (yes, I somehow didn't get too annoyed at going to the symphony as a kid knowing that we'd hit up places like this afterwards).

Fully jacked up on espresso and carrot cake and our day over halfway gone, we headed down to the Pearl District. Again, luck struck with parking and we made our way into Powell's. Now there's a place that hasn't changed! It still has the largest selection of books I've ever seen. OK, maybe not as much as the Green Library at Stanford, but by far the most of any store out there. While in the area we came across a piano store and dropped in to see how much these actually cost. Yeah, I have our family's Yamaha baby grand piano at my house, but I have no idea what it's worth. Well now I know, and they aren't cheap! I definitely feel some self-induced guilt knowing that the piano is in need of a good tuning and some TLC. I sat down and played a bit of Rachmaninoff's Prelude in C#minor on a concert Steinway. The price tag on that piano made my Yamaha seem like chump change. Thinking back to the lessons I took from the teacher who had one of these in his living room makes me have a greater appreciation for something I've previously discounted. In retrospect, very cool to have learned how to play on such a beautiful sounding piece of art.

We wrapped up our day by getting lost in the west hills of Portland while trying to find some vista points. We did manage to find a few but too quickly the day was drawing to a close and I had my first reunion event coming up quickly. Thinking back it was nice to just hang out and spend some quality family with my sis.

20 Years Later - The Pending High School Reunion

2011-04-07T22:22:00.000-07:00

Something called Facebook has seemed to diminish what I used to think was a monumental milestone of reunions. I think it's been nearly ten years since I made the last reunion and I recently thought, "Wow, I'll definitely have to make the twenty year reunion." With Facebook I feel like time really hasn't passed much and I still know quite a few of the "unique" idiosyncrasies of my classmates. In fact, I probably know more than I really wanted to learn.

A little background might be helpful to set the context of the pending activities. I went to a small christian grade school (SDA, Seventh Day Adventist) and stuck with that religious education all the way through high school. My class was never large and I think there were around forty-five kids in my graduating class, many which I had known since an early age. To say I grew up in an education-related cocoon would not be an understatement. In fact it smacks of so many interesting perspectives that I won't dive into them now; more interesting is the fact that many of my classmates went all-in and decided to continue their education at the same college (Walla Walla College). It's a double edge sword with this class population. Everybody knows you and you know everybody. And that's not always a good thing...

In earnest I haven't been around the Portland area much since graduating. Sure, my parents still spend about two-thirds of the year up there and the rest of their time at the Joshua Tree cabin and my sister has a sweet little tattoo business. Outside of my immediate two to three close friends I haven't kept in touch with anybody (...you can argue the merit Facebook brings to your friendships if you like...I'm on the fence). This seems to be the norm with me when it comes to my social circles. I know a lot of people, but I float from one circle of broad friends to another over time. Let's see, how many people do I keep close to from high school, college, raving, those first early career jobs, the startups, graduate school, teaching, golf, basketball and cycling? It's less than you would think; probably around ten to fifteen people in total. Diving into that function/dysfunction is newsworthy enough to blog about later.

So running into this small population of past classmates will be interesting. I'm diving into it solo; no wife or kids this weekend (they're getting ready for Disneyland while I'm away). So armed with a few recent photos and some old crazy high school stories that might dig up some interesting memories (yes wife, I'll do my best to use fake names to protect the innocence of the guilty and hide shame from their spouses) I'll see if I can make it through the weekend without missing a beat.

On a side note, I'm probably most excited to hang out tomorrow with my sister for the entire day. Just me, her, the convertible and plenty of coffee to keep us warm while we drive around the town dodging the rain with the top down!

A Different Approach

2011-03-31T14:05:00.000-07:00

Over the past several years this time of the racing season has usually seen me in pretty good form and getting ready for the District TT up in Sattley. But over the past nine months a lot of things have changed and it's a different Spring for me this time around. Not that different is bad, more often than not doing something different has a pretty positive experience which I tend to believe this will be the case going forward.

Something called work absolutely crushed me leading into Sattley last year. Starting back in May I took over a pretty overwhelming integration program (Tandberg) that had just kicked off and the timing couldn't have been worse...for training and trying to peak. On the other hand, it was a shot of confidence from leadership that they gave me the "keys to the car" to drive this integration forward; for this I've been really happy. Anyway, Sattley was only a smidge better than the previous year, probably due to the new pavement and not my ability to peak and taper for the event.

The winds of change knocked me sideways. For the rest of June, July and August I believe I only was able to get on the bike around ten times. And to make matters worse, I lost a really close friend: My fitness! Gone was the motivation to ride just for the joy of riding. Work had crushed everything, except the nagging ability to put on a few extra pounds. The low point was in December when I stepped on the scale and saw that I put on thirty pounds. Of course that much weight spread over a 6'9" frame doesn't really seem like any cause for concern to my friends, but that's like carrying Chris Phipps' and Greg McQuaid's bikes on my back while climbing Mt. Hamilton.

Align all this up with the family stuff and I figured it makes sense to approach things a bit differently this season. Gone is the early fitness for the Spring, but I have a new appreciation of watching my kids enjoy their soccer and volleyball events, and seeing my soon to be 3-year old daughter blossom immediately in front of my eyes. Spring brings change and being around to see more Single A baseball is pretty fun.

On the flipside I've got my motivation back and yes things will hurt. Shedding a few pounds is not fun, but at least there's the motivation to get it accomplished. Most importantly, I'm excited to actually not burn out after Sattley and to experience the races in June/July/August/September that I've neglected from TT-itis (that's the medical term for post-TT letdowns). Only time will tell...

Negligence

2011-03-18T13:46:00.000-07:00

On one hand I can understand why I haven't posted for a long time, on the other hand it's been way, way too much time between posts. I thought this post was amusing, but it smacked of reality...the reality that I have been slacking on this site and it's time to start posting again.

San Ardo RR

2010-08-23T09:45:00.000-07:00

I hadn't raced since Sattley, and to think of it, hadn't raced in a RR since that fateful day at Petaluma where I cam in second, secured the cat 2 upgrade, and left the race shivering from the cold and eventually getting a sinus infection. Obvious to say, I hadn't done a RR in quite some time.

Due to life, my fitness was only around 60% of where my peaks had been earlier in the season, but I had the itch to get out and race. Ramon and I were in the same boat, so we figured we'd do all we could to help Dennis be in the right spot coming into the final lap. To sum it up, hold on as long as possible, then help until you blow.

The first two laps weren't too difficult, but due to a lack of fitness my HR averaged 156. There was plenty of attrition due to the goatheads (Dennis can speak to what happened at the start line); 13 guys were DNP in the race, including some of the favorites. Somewhere during the second lap a break of 7 got up the road, with no SJBC presence. Guess it would be time to help do some chasing.

As the third lap started I found myself in a position I hadn't experienced before. I was cramping in both quads, but it was "interesting". If I went hard, the legs felt better, but when I eased up I would cramp. But by going hard it exposed my lack of fitness, thus, I couldn't go hard for too long. To help Dennis out I got to the front on the rollers heading north on the course. I popped and thankfully was able to hide in the back to recover (...and cramp).

After recovering better than I would have thought (my quads, and now my hip flexors, were both cramping), I made one last attempt to help at the front. With about 8 miles to go I put in a good hard 5 minutes of time at or near the front (HR avg 178bpm). I popped and fell off the back. I rolled up the final climb and through the finish line. Man, it's hard to race when you don't have the fitness, but it was rewarding to help my teammate with his top 10 result.

Where did May go?

2010-06-14T23:24:00.000-07:00

Wow, just noticed that the entire month of May went by and no posts from yours truly. Since I don't get paid by the number of words on this blog, it goes without saying that it was neglected due to some crushing waves of work from the job that does pay the bills. Thankfully I'm having a blast at work so it's all good.

District TT Race Report

2010-06-14T23:21:00.000-07:00

Place: 9th, 54:11
Category: 35+ Masters Open
Field Size: 14
Conditions: Perfect

After a fabulous spring of racing and getting my cat 2 upgrade, it was time to focus on the TT events. However, life decided to intervene and throw a few hurdles. Between being sick in late-April and a motivational letdown after the upgrade, I had a sneaking suspicion that I might not hit this event at my peak. To make matters worse, things at worked ramped up mid-May and had me doing 12-14 hour days.

So with all this going on I decided to just shed any preconceived notions of success and just focus on enjoying the experience. One point of feedback I took away from last year was the fact I felt unprepared for the longer TT efforts. So to get ready I did several 40+ minute threshold intervals leading up to Dunlap/Sattley. This definitely helped in getting my mind wrapped around how it felt to go hard for so long.

Come race day I decided to stay at home the night before and make the drive in the morning. Out the door at 3:45am and zooming on the highway. It only took 3 hours and 50 minutes to get up to Sattley. Plenty of time for a nice warm-up and confirmation of the newly paved section of road.

With a slight tailwind on the way out I found a comfortable pace knowing the return leg was really going to hurt. About 10k into the race I was passed by my 30 second man behind me. At 18k I was passed by the guy a minute behind me. I didn't panic and just kept to my game plan.

After the turnaround I was passed by one last rider with around 12k to go. The only redeeming thing at this point was the new pavement, which was a welcome change from last year's event. With a kilometer to go I thought I was going to break 54 minutes, but it didn't happen.

Overall the field was stacked this year, but I'm pretty happy to know I was 25 seconds faster this year than last. Sure it would have been nice to be higher up on the final standings, but hey, I can't argue with the blessed season I've had so far. The best part of the day was the drive home via Hwy 49. Some amazing scenery...way better than the 54+ minutes I spent in the pain cave.

A Bad Apple

2010-04-28T15:10:00.000-07:00

For all the whiz-bang stuff that comes out of the Cupertino workshop, the folks at Apple need to get a better grasp on a few things. Oh where shall I begin...

How about the nifty little hand warmer they've had on the market. Oh yeah, it's an iPhone. Over the past nine months this device, which I have a love/hate relationship with, twice has decided that it doesn't play well with the apps. I'm no product engineer, but something in me says that there are a few apps that don't play nice when you shut them down, and they leave open processes running on the chip. These unresolved process spin out of control and cause the battery to heat up and drain over the course of an hour. This might be a nice feature if I'm an eskimo, but I'm not. I just want my phone's battery to last more than a day without having to recharge.

As long as I'm bitching about Apple, let's continue. Stand behind your product people. I'm not a fan of shelling out my hard-earned money for you to tell me that the device is out of warranty. Geez, there's enough cell phone service providers (AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, MetroPCS) that will throw you a free device and not think twice. I'm so tired of the warranty dance from Apple that I'm tempted to start a campaign to relabel their "Genius" bar, or whatever they think that is where they provide customer service, and just call it what it is. Oh I don't know, how about "I've drank too much Apple kool-aid...we can do no wrong" bar.

In the end I'm left with a kool-aid drinking shaggy beard twenty-something telling me to restore my phone and start from scratch. How 'bout you go back to your employer and suggest they do a better job testing apps and alerting users to potential conflicts that render iPhone's into hand warmers. Really!

Spring Hill RR - 35+ 3/4 Race Report

2010-04-11T22:11:00.000-07:00

The last couple of days has been a siesta off the bike. Nothing like a little tickle in the throat that turns itself into a head cold. It was bad enough that I was fighting off crud developing in my lungs. So after a few days off, I woke up and thought, "Hey, it's a really stupid idea since I'm not healthy, but let's go race in the wind, cold and rain." Watching Paris-Roubaix at 5am will do that to a fool (i.e. me).

Let's get to the action. A good size 35+ 3/4 field ready for 2 laps around the hills and rollers west of Petaluma. The spectators were brave, but there were more cows taking in the action than people. With no warm-up the opening climb right from the start line hurt myself and probably a few others. By the time we hit the second climb a few miles later I made sure to get to the front for the descent into a tight right-hand turn. Made it down the hill with a local on my wheel passing up instructions to me on the safest route to take down the bumpy road. It felt good to get the HR up since it was absolutely raining hard and cold. By this point I was already soaked. One a side note I did learn some neat tricks by watching what a few other competitors did to stave off the rain.

Not much happened on the rollers but a single Wells Fargo (WF) rider got off the front. With the largest team in the field (at least from pre-reg), I was content to let somebody else bring him back. Nothing was happening so Ramon took a flyer to bridge up but nobody wanted to join him. Eventually Ramon was brought back into the fold.

The gap up to the solo WF rider was shrinking but not very fast. After passing through the start line (the finish is midway up the hill past the start line) and getting over the first hill I found myself with a dropped chain on one of the rollers leading up to the second climb. Calmly I dismounted and fixed the issue, and caught back up with the pack at the base of the climb. However, there were some guys hammering at the front so I had to pick my way through the pack to make it to the leading group.

I hit the top and saw the lead pack was about ten meters in front of me and a lot of guys were falling off behind me. I buried my head and got back up to the pack and found Ramon's wheel. Down the descent again and on to the rollers. On the slowest roller two guys near the front probably crossed wheels and went down. The WF rider was still off the front and not much was being done to bring him back.

The first time around the loop I took note of how many times I had to hit the brakes while descending these rollers. On the second lap I used my momentum to push the pace as we came flying down on the water-covered roads. With fifteen miles to go we hit another roller with a fair bit of head/crosswind. I hit the gas and quickly found myself with two WF riders and a lone Victory Velo guy. Not the mix I was hoping for, but I was committed. I dropped the Victory and one WF rider. The remaining WF guy sat on my wheel and did the smart thing and stayed put. I knew he wouldn't pull through to help me bridge and I wasn't expecting it to happen. But as we got closer I could sense we'd eventually be working together to keep the three of us away.

With the bridge effort complete and now in a break of myself and two WF guys, it was game on! Just like Warnerville RR, but the numbers were reversed. We rode hard to get out of site and then began passing groups and dropped riders from previous groups. It felt good to go hard and stay warm because I know that if I was just sitting in the pack I'd probably shiver myself off the bike.

We made our way around the loop to the final climb. The WF guy who I bridged up to led us up the hill and then I came around. With about two hundred meters to go I pushed the pace and then tried to find an opportunity to shift into the big ring. Due to my shifting issues (I had dropped the chain to the outside a few times on lap one), I had to back off just a tad to make sure I had a good shift. I was completely cooked and with about forty meters to go the WF guy I dragged across came around and sprinted for the win.

As soon as I crossed the line I went straight back to the car and took off all the wet gear and got dry. I think I shivered for the next thirty minutes. Though only forty-four miles of racing, the combination of wind/rain/cold made it one of the hardest days on the bike. No way could I have done another lap.

Another 15 Minutes of Fame: TrainingPeaks Profiled Athlete

2010-03-31T16:37:00.000-07:00

A while back I was asked to help provide some content about myself to the TrainingPeaks blog. I totally forgot to get around to the questions, but finally did so this week. So without further adieu head over to the TrainingPeaks blog to learn a bit more about myself.

Warnerville RR - E3 Race Report

2010-03-28T22:57:00.000-07:00

Leading up to this race there were indications from teammates and friends around how this race could easily turn into one long death march if the conditions were "normal". You know, that typical central valley breeze that likes to blow hard and steady and push people over into the gutter. Today wasn't normal...nor should I forget to mention the gravel.

The start was delayed due to some tragic happenings out on the course (http://www.modbee.com/2010/03/28/1105993/man-electrocuted-another-injured.html). Sad to hear the news and hopefully they'll be something to memorialize the memory of the young man.

With the delayed start it allowed all of us to warm up just a bit. No wind and the sun soon warmed us up and cause the embrocation on my legs to fire up real quick. At the start the refs informed us we'd be racing with the P/1/2 field; this was going to change the dynamics just a bit (or so we thought...). Having the largest team in the pack was a nice as it's not too often to have this luxury.

Off we rolled and about 3 miles into the race Odi takes off with one of the Webcor P/1/2 guys and gets a good gap. They were off the front for next 10 miles or so and were swallowed up right before the gravel section (1.4 miles long).

I coasted into the gravel near the rear of the pack and soon realized the gravel wasn't too hard and there were some pretty soft spots. After catching a rock on the bridge of my nose and finding the bottom of some potholes, I found a line and got through the trauma. Whew, survived without losing any bottles or busted cranks.

After a quick regroup by the pack another attack of around 5 guys went up the road. We had Ramon in this break and it allowed us to sit in and let some of the other teams manage the distance between the hunted and the hunter. Ramon's break was caught on lap 2 immediately after going through the gravel section a second time.

Like clockwork another break went up the road. This time Kenny managed to get into the mix. Meanwhile, Johannes, Ryan and I sat in again while others shut down the break. About a mile from the gravel the break was about to be caught and I turned to Johannes and said we should lead the chasers through this rough stretch of road and keep the pace real high. The last of the break was caught just before we finished the gravel section.

With fifty miles in and just over a lap to go guys were starting to feel the fatigue. Funny how you pick up on the little things while racing: the pounding of fists on their quad to shake them loose from the eventual cramp, the need to get more water when they're already carrying two full bottles in your back pocket. Little stuff like that...

Heading into the final lap we had myself, Kenny and Johannes keeping things high on the front. We came through the mini-hill of a feed zone and a few folks picked up bottles. After cresting and passing through the zone there's a gradual descent. Combined with an ever increasing breeze from behind I decided to roll the dice. Our tactic was to keep Johannes and I around for some last lap antics.

I hit the gas on the descent and soon found Johannes on my wheel and us catching a bunch of water-drinking racers at a decision point. Do we chase again and let SJBC do nothing but pack surf? That's probably not what people were thinking, at least the one brave soul that decided to bridge across. I gotta hand it to the Wells Fargo rider who came across; Johannes and I were pulling nearly 30mph.

A bridge effort like that puts years on a rider. Our WF friend had to sit in quite a few rotations before he was able to help, and even then it wasn't much. But given his stature he was able to give me a pretty good draft. With about seven miles to go he threw in the towel and relegated himself coming in third. We passed a few fields yelling "On your left..." with much vigor.

Meanwhile, we decided to take it pretty easy heading into our final pass over the gravel. Apparently that message didn't reach from my brain to my body. Coming into the first 90* right turn I had too much speed and found my front wheel angled at 45* and my bike going straight without turning I was able to unclip and stay up until my foot slipped. I fell doing about 3~4mph and quickly remounted. In the commotion of all of this I found that my chain wouldn't get back onto the big ring.

While looking down I lost attention and realized I was going into the ditch. Uh-oh, I didn't want to pull a "Zamora" where a few 35+ 4's went flying over their bars while ditch riding to miss a nasty crash. I put my weight back and just coasted to a stop. Amazing how weeds and natural grasses work as a brake. I scrambled back up to the road, remounted and looked back. In hot pursuit was a strung out pack of riders. In my adrenalized state I thought it was our field, but only after looking back a few minutes later after getting away from them I realized it was the 45+ field we had recently passed.

Soon back on the pavement we kept the pace high with the WF in tow. With all the effort my legs were starting to feel the pain. On a punchy big-ring climb about 1.5 miles from the finish I stood to get over the top and found both quads on the verge of cramping. It didn't help that when I fell the right pedal caught the back of my calf and brought on a cramp there too.

With 500 meters to go the WF rider slipped off our break. Johannes and I took in the pleasure of executing our tactics to perfection and getting to the line together. I cross the line in first with Johannes producing a big grin in second. I can't say enough about the team effort that was put forth by everybody. Minutes later Ryan came across and cleaned up by taking the field sprint with a nice leadout from Kenny.

All in all it was a pretty great day and one that ranks up there with some other epic racing experiences.

Post race thoughts from Madera SR

2010-03-25T08:36:00.000-07:00

Readers familiar with my love/hate relationship with the Madera Stage Race know why it was marked as a priority race for this spring (if you don't know, go search my blog posting archives from 12 months ago). I'm happy to say this year I survived Madera and finished without the cranks falling off the bike. So on to the recap...

Crit:
Typically this is a tame race given that the TT is later in the afternoon. Guys usually will sandbag a bit to save the legs, but then again, with the field we had this year you just didn't know. Specialized had split up their 35+ team and had some of them (Lyman, Roemer) riding with their juniors in the P12 field. However, Safeway looked strong with Dan Martin.

And speaking of Dan, he attacked pretty much on queue after the first lap. He stayed away long enough to take the first prime, but he was caught soon thereafter. After a short break, Dan attacked again. This time he got some help and stayed away to almost snag a second prime. We caught him with probably 10 minutes to go before the finish.

The wind was pretty strong coming across the course and it made the west and north legs of the course pretty hard. In retrospect it could have been harder if a team was motivated to gutter everybody, but thankfully that didn't happen.

By the way, did I mention Dan attacked again?!? Off he goes, and as I roll up to Ramon I said, "We need our guys on the front". Calmly Ramon looks at me and says, "GO!". I hit the gas from about 20 places back and caught a ton of people by surprise. I bridged up to Dan and a few other guys were on my wheel. We had about a 10 second gap with 4 laps to go, but it was caught with around 2 laps to go.

Coming into the last lap I worked to get near the front when we hit the crosswind section. I had to work hard to get up there and was rewarded with being around the 5th wheel coming through the final corner. The Rocknasium train came flying through the apex just behind me and had a pretty good jump on the field. I looked around and realized it was going to be a pack finish so no need to sprint this one out...save the legs for the TT. I rolled across feeling pretty good about not burning too many matches for the TT a few hours later.

TT:
The wind was so strong that everybody knew to throw out any potential time target you'd shoot for. Last year I did the TT in 22:36, good enough for 9th place on the GC. This year I came into this TT with better fitness and stronger legs. My target was sub-22. But with the wind I knew that was unrealistic.

After a good warmup I proceeded to go out pretty hard and hold almost 31+mph on the downwind section. What proved to be beneficial was the pacing I forced on myself to leave just a bit in the tank for the returning headwind section. I was able to average 24+mph into the wind. I didn't pass many guys so I wasn't able to gauge how well I did by that criteria, but I had completely emptied the tank and knew there wasn't any left to give when I crossed the line. I was happy with my time of 22:43.

Later that night when the results were published I was in 4th. However, there was a missing rider (Innes from Specialized); come to find out he showed up on the results the next day after the stage race was over. He had clocked in at 22:39 so I was actually sitting in 5th coming into the RR. Vitamin/Bike Plus had 3 guys in the top 7 so it was going to be an interesting RR.

RR:
After a bit of strategy/tactics discussion at the start, we rolled out with a neutral start up in ~40* weather! Clear as a bell and cold. On the first lap somebody attack. Oh yeah, Dan Martin attacked. From what I could see it looked like Dave had found his way into the break, so for us it was an opportunity to relax just a bit.

The demons from last year loomed large as we hit the bumpy ~4 mile stretch of road. I got through there without breaking the crank, so that was a minor victory. And I didn't have any of my water bottles eject, so another small win. As we came up through the rollers and past the finish line I saw Dave sliding back through the pack. Come to find out he just flatted, so we had lost a teammate.

Ramon was doing an excellent job of being our road captain. He was making sure we had people up front when it was necessary and he made sure I stayed out of the fray to protect my GC position. If I remember correctly the pack stayed together for the second lap and then Dan Martin attacked again, this time drawing out Dan Bryant. This duo hooked up and stayed away all the way through halfway of the final lap.

By this point there were some tired legs all around. Chad had fallen off the back with a double snake bite flat. Ramon had done the work of 3 men up front and popped off (immediately after Ramon popped Ron Anderson from Specialized popped, so you know it was pretty brutal up front).

We hit the bumpy section and the Vitamin/Bike Plus guys find there way to the front and slow ramp up the pace. I was in death mode and found myself getting caught behind riders who were getting gapped by the high pace. I continually had to hop around folks and close down the gap to the next wheel. At this point there were no teammates to help, I was on my own. Coming out of the bumpy section I was in the lead pack of ~25 guys with the rollers coming next.

Somewhere another gear was found by the pack and not by me. There was a hard acceleration and I could not keep contact. I looked around and the only person near me was Dan Martin. We hit the first roller as hard as both of us could; we probably were only 10-12 seconds behind the lead pack when we crested. We held that gap but the lead group accelerated again as they wound up their sprint. I had no relief from the wind and found myself riding as hard as I could with my head down watching the yellow line as my guide.

I crossed the line not aware of who might have been in the lead pack and whether or not I could have lost any GC places. Come to find out Innes had flatted so that moved me up a spot, but 3 other riders behind me on GC were in the pack that finish ~25 seconds ahead of me. That bumped me down to 7th on GC.

Overall I'm really pleased with the effort the team put in during the weekend to support my "A" race goal. I learned a ton during the RR and hope to put this to use during the Chico SR. Many thanks to my teammates who worked so hard, I'll be more than happy to pay you back during your "A" races.

Memorial Day Weekend - Sponsorship Opportunities

2010-03-09T05:44:00.000-08:00

In this economy it's tough to secure money for events. I've seen it with other clubs in the local area and across other sporting activities where I'm engaged as a parent. However, it won't stop me from using this communication medium as a way to make a plug for a cause that's near and dear to lot of local cyclists.

It's less than two months away and SJBC has a great opportunity for potential sponsors. The Mt. Hamilton Road Race is the only point-to-point race in the area and tackles the infamous climb up the slopes to the observatory on the peak of Mt. Hamilton. The Memorial Day Crit competes around a fast and safe circuit in Morgan Hill and with plenty of racing categories for all participants.

The cherry on top of this opportunity is fantastic. For racers, this race weekend is the final opportunity for qualification into the Nature Valley Grand Prix. Details can be found here about the specifics for qualification. For sponsors, Nature Valley is providing a huge conduit for communications of these qualification races. Sponsors will be able to leverage the targeted marketing communication efforts provided by Nature Valley to the greater cycling community through TV and press.

If you're interested, read through the sponsorship documentation and contact us.

Berkeley 2TT Race Report

2010-02-21T07:47:00.000-08:00

There's nothing I like about Berkeley, but that's probably because I'm a Stanford guy and I have a fond dislike for those Cal Bears. However, I'll chalk up this event as one redeeming quality for Berkeley...

Last year Clark and I rode in the 70+ Masters category with our TT bikes, but this year we wanted to try something different. We signed up for the Merckx category. For those not familiar with this category you cannot use any aero equipment (wheels, bars, frame, etc.), not even a skinsuit! We found out prior to the event that our arch-nemesis from Morgan Stanley (Chris Phipps, Paul Dyrwal) were going to ride in the same category. Last year they took 4th place from us by 1.5 seconds.

Luckily we arrived with plenty of time because the registration lines were moving very slow. I think we wasted 30+ minutes at the reg desk because they were so disorganized. On the plus side both Clark and I learned that we can get a very effective warm-up in less than 25 minutes.

At the start line there were quite a few teams around us that were late. Thankfully we were on time (yes, it's the experience you bring to the table as a Master's racer) and ready to rock the course. Our plan was simple: ramp up the intensity and leave the tanks empty.

Off we went and Clark got us up to speed. The first couple miles along San Pablo Road had a not-too-friendly headwind. We probably passed at least four teams along this part of the road which was a nice confidence boost, but no luck in seeing the Morgan Stanley guys up ahead of us (they started three minutes ahead). In my effort to maximize my recovery behind Clark's draft I was riding dangerously close to his rear wheel. At one point I came about an inch from rubbing wheels, but I kept my mouth shut because I didn't want to distract my teammate.

As we rolled through the backside of the course and navigated the gradual climbing/rollers we kept the pace high. I forgot to ask Clark about this afterwards, but I got the sense that we tempered our efforts back just a little bit on this stretch of road so we'd be a tad more fresh for the upcoming hills.

The wind was enough of a factor that I actually could get a some protection behind Clark as we hit the first big climb. I was feeling pretty good so I yelled up to him to ramp it up just a bit. Around mid-hill I could sense Clark fading so I came around to hammer up the last half of the climb.

Up and over a few smaller climbs and we were still picking off teams left and right. Coming into the final hill we found a good tempo and got comfortable in the pain closet. Like the previous major climb I came around and led us over the last 3+ minutes. I didn't ride with my power meter, but I can probably estimate that I was pulling 450+ watts (5+ w/kg) on the final portion of that climb.

We flew down the small descent to the uphill finish line and emptied our tanks. We crossed the line at 43:15 and were pleased with the effort. Chris and Paul were waiting past the finish line and we swapped stories; come to find out Chris pulled Paul all the way from the start to the base of the first climb (12+ miles)! They won, but at least this year it wasn't by 1.5 seconds. Next year we'll probably go back to the TT bikes to see what happens.

Historical Trends - Cantua

2010-02-12T09:14:00.000-08:00

Playing around with Google Analytics is a fun way to see what's happening with this blog and site traffic. To my surprise I was caught off guard to see that my old race report from Cantua nearly two years ago was the second most hit posting on the blog. I guess folks are searching the interwebs to find any additional info they can around this upcoming road race before they make the drive past the cows at Harris Ranch and pin on the race number.

Funny to also note who reads my random musings. I was riding on Sand Hill Road yesterday and saw a guy with a Metrigear Vector water bottle. The conversation went like this:

Me: Nice bottle.
Rider: Huh? Me: Nice bottle.
Rider: Oh, thanks. Got it at the low-key event.
Me: Cool
[some random chatter happens, then this...]
Rider: Hey, you look familiar...
Me: I'm Todd, nice to meet you
Rider: I think I read your Cantua race report last night. You're that manley man guy...

One joke here is that the only product released by Metrigear so far has been their water bottles. Second, I find it pretty cool that a cat 5 beginner who has a passion for racing is searching out race reports to get an edge...that's inspiring.

Continuing the Crank Saga

2010-02-12T09:06:00.000-08:00

The bottom bracket fix seemed to do the trick on the Zipp cranks, but check out this latest problem:

If you look closely you'll see the threaded sleeve moves back and forth as I try to tighten/loosen the pedal. It only takes about 0.5Nm of force to make this happen. I'll be having an interesting conversation with Zipp on this problem.

I've since gone back to the old aluminum SRAM Rival cranks. Today will be the first ride with the old crankset and I'm hoping it will be enlightening particularly around the stiffness and lack of chainring flex. I did notice a bunch of flex with the Zipps and recently confirmed that their new chainring design due out in March would fix this problem. Too bad I won't be running your cranks Zipp to let you know if the problem was fixed.

Cranky BB Bearings

2010-02-08T21:20:00.000-08:00

After last season's mishap at the Madera Stage Race I decided to play around with a set of Zipp cranks. Shaving off nearly a pound from the SRAM Rival cranks was a nice bonus, but other interesting surprises have popped up.

In the past seven months I've burned through two sets of ceramic bottom brackets. I'm not sure if I'm getting sloppy seconds from Zipp, but this hasn't been much fun. Each time the BB decides to bite the dust it makes the loudest click-click sound you could imagine. I'm sure a few guys riding near me at Cherry Pie yesterday were wondering what was happening to my bike. Trust me, as annoying as it is to you my fellow competitor, it's ten times worse for me. I get a bit OCD when it comes to having a quiet bike.

I'll let Zipp know about this failure and see if their steel bearings might be a better fit for me. Each breakdown of the ceramic bearings has had the same result. It feels like grit and sand has worked its way into the ball bearings; definitely not rotating smooth, but very rough. Thankfully I've got a spare set of BB's on the shelf that will keep me on the bike. If these break down again I might just have to find another crank alternative.

SJBC Training Camp

2010-02-02T09:20:00.001-08:00

This past weekend marked the second year SJBC has done a winter training camp. Last year was our initial trek down to the ultra-secret central coast location. Ok, it's no secret, but Solvang is still a nice quaint small town. Again we were treated to perfect weather and plenty of sun.

Friday's mid-trip stop in Paso Robles was an excellent way to break up the drive and get a quality ride into our legs. Peachy Canyon, Vineyard and some other back roads were excellent. Caution had to be given in most corners due to the debris in the road from the recent rains, but for the most part people were safe and had a blast. I can probably throw this blanket statement out there for most everybody when I say that our pace was probably a little too brisk for the first day of camp. We must have been itching to throw down because my power file showed some pretty high numbers for extended amounts of time for a January ride. Ok, I was one of the instigators...

The next morning brought on Figueroa. Riders had the option of doing a shorter ~50 mile loop or toughing up and doing the ~95 mile route. For some reason climbing up the backside of Figueroa this year didn't seem as hard as last year. It was a few degrees cooler this past weekend, but I think what made it easier was knowing the climb. I was expecting much worse for myself because I had my own personal challenge that I set for myself; I wanted to stay with the lead group all the way up the climb. I accomplished that which was nice. Also, the elevation profile wasn't completely truthful. After completing the 95 miles we had put in nearly 8,000 feet of climbing.

After our team meeting Saturday night, some excellent food and a good night of sleep, my dead legs were put to the test on Sunday. Thankfully there wasn't any significant cramping all weekend, but it was still hard to roll out of bed and know I had another 75+ miles waiting. The plan was to ride out to Jalama and back. I did map out a longer route, but there weren't any takers and I needed to be back to Solvang by 3pm. To make up for the shorter distance, I made sure I put in some pretty serious digs to get out of the ride what I wanted. For those that had to peel off early and head back to Solvang before reaching the coast, I advise you make the effort to stay later and ride Jalama Road all the way to the beach. One of the best rides I've had!

It goes without saying that all of this couldn't have been possible without the tremendous support of our SAG folks. They did a great job keeping everybody hydrated and well-fed, safe and took some pictures too (I'm trying to track all of them down...). And I'm glad the wives who came along had a great time too. I know my wallet is a little lighter from wine club memberships and shopping, but that's an insignificant expense when you consider the compromises our families make to allow us to ride and race.

A Few Noteworthing Things

2010-01-08T05:22:00.001-08:00

2009 came and went so fast I didn't have time over the holidays to publish any thoughts about the passing year. I might get to that, but don't count on it. Looking forward there are a lot of balls being juggled. New SJBC president role, expanded club race team, busy-ness with family stuff and general chaos.

On a tangent, it's been fun over the past month to watch my kids take up the sport of basketball. I'm not one of those parents that dictates what their child's sporting interests will be. I see lots of parents getting their kids involved in things based on the past history of success (or lack thereof) of the parent. I'm not expecting my kids to be Division I Pac-10 athletes (like their dad), but just seeing the joy in them taking up the game of basketball has brought back a lot of heartfelt memories of my own.

Last night a fellow parent asked if I would ever get into coaching basketball. Hmm, something to ponder, but at the moment I'm having too much fun watching. Besides, I can't give away all my secrets on how to play the game.

Need Route Advice for Solvang/Santa Barbara

2009-12-15T21:07:00.000-08:00

I'm putting together some routes for myself and want to learn more from local riders in the Solvang/Santa Barbara area.

The first loop takes us out of Solvang and out to Jamala. The return back I've got us going through Lompoc, then Los Alamos: http://www.mapmyride.com/ride/united-states/ca/santa-ynez-valley/838126093664516876

The second loop goes up the dirt side of Refugio Road out of Solvang (not sure how good of a road this is, but I'm not afraid of taking the road bike on some dirt), then on to Santa Barbara and returning via the Gibralter climb: http://www.mapmyride.com/ride/united-states/ca/solvang/177126093828350408

Any feedback would be great.

Blogging Low Point

2009-12-09T09:35:00.001-08:00

Wow, November was a dismal month for postings on this blog. I guess that coincides with a few things happening with other priorities in life. Work has picked up significantly with a little known acquisition that's been proving to be more worth than initially scoped, and the onset of the holidays has its usual bevy of activities between Thanksgiving and Christmas (...or Festivus if that's your holiday of choice).

In the midst of all of this, I'm proud to say that November broke some new ground for things bike-related. I explored a lot of unexplored routes that I previously had dismissed. Many of them were dead end roads, but several gems were found (Weaver Road) among the duds (Aldercroft Heights Road). I found out how versatile a road bike can be on local fire roads where most traffic tends to be mountain bikes and hikers. I even explored the possibility of buying an old bike from one well-known CX racer who just happens to be very tall and a national champ (BTW, thanks to those that helped me get in touch with the individual).

To top it off, I did accomplish something of interest on the bike. For you Trainingpeaks WKO+ geeks like me, I had a five day block of serious volume right around Thanksgiving. Hit a new high for my ATL while driving my TSB down to -51! But what about the CTL? It came close to a high, but not near what I had back in July. That's fine, because I'm not really looking to put a peak together this off-season for our local weekend club races.

And speaking of those (SJBC Winter Series), I had a blast testing out my new Edge tubulars at the last crit. First time out on this wheelset and an absolute joy. I'd forgotten how much trust one can develop with a set of tubulars while your railing through a corner and laying down some power.

Thinking more about this, it's the first time in probably 2+ years that I haven't raced with a power meter. All my previous iterations of race wheelsets had been built around PowerTap hubs. With my intent to use Metrigear's future product (yes, I did order a Garmin Edge 500 on Cyber Monday...sweet discount too), I've decided to move away from the PT hubs. It was interesting in the crit on Sunday that I never found myself feeling the need to have the power numbers in front of me. Sure, when I hit the gas and cause the split and subsequent break to form, it might have been nice to see the data after the fact, but in retrospect I found it somewhat of a relief to just not have the power number in front of me being a distraction. I felt myself focusing more on the race, which was the object, and placing less focus on whether or not I'd blow up since these power numbers on the head unit were showing that I was going ballistic. This somewhat supports the idea I've thrown around in my head about riding/racing with the power readout display covered up with some electrical tape.

When time permits I hope to throw together a post highlighting some fun stuff from my own past year and give some 2010 predictions.

Exploring in the Back Yard - Soda Springs Road

2009-11-23T16:35:00.000-08:00

Our local area is very blessed with the vast amount of terrain for on- and off-road biking. Over the past couple of months with the intensity low on my training radar I've done a few rides that normally I wouldn't have tried previously. Not sure as to the specific reason why I wouldn't have done these rides as part of my normal training, but it's probably because I've felt less in a rut around riding and more carefree about where my bike ends up taking me. That's a good thing and something I need to do more to counterbalance the demands of training and the impending slew of interval work I see on the horizon.

I recently decided to explore Soda Springs Road. The low-key'ers did this climb a few weeks ago and though I missed it, I felt I should at least make the effort to give the climb a go. What really prompted me to get my rear up to this climb was the announcement that the Los Gatos Creek Trail had reopened the upper part of the trail across the front of the dam. No more nasty climbing on the gravel road (I actually never did it, but it was a deterrence). I came down it plenty, but never found a reason to be joyous about climbing it. With the change in the trail in place, I figured it was worth heading up to Soda Springs.

The sign at the bottom is harmless and gives no real indication of what was in store. As the climb began I was surprised at how this road meandered up through the canyon. For some reason I thought I'd end up with a nice few of the back side of Mt. Umunhum as I climbed but that wasn't the case. I did keep getting views of the trails in the Sierra Azul area where folks typically mountain bike.

I'm not going to go into too much detail, but I captured some interesting things along the climb that caught my interest. The autumn colors in the leaves on the vines aren't done justice by the iPhone camera, but they were ablaze in vibrant fall hues.

As you climb higher the road narrows and leaves just enough room for a cyclist and a single vehicle. This is probably one of my favorite pictures on the climb because it gives you a real sense of what the climb entails. Pretty steady 8% grade the whole way up. You just have to find that happy gear and mash out your feel-good cadence. Mine happened to be at at nice tempo pace on the day I took these pictures. I came back a week later and went a bit faster (sub-threshold) and shaved off three plus minutes from my previous time up the climb.

Higher up on the hill you come across less people and more outstanding views. There was some local valley haze in the area and it wasn't completely clear; the following week at the top it was much cooler and clear. I could see all the way to Mt. Tam, SF, Oakland and the foothills up near Sonoma and Napa Valleys.

I'm still surprised at myself for not making the effort to get up to this excellent climb sooner. From my house it's roughly a 1.5 hour ride to the top. Not bad considering that I'm only having to really deal with cars for the first twenty minutes of this ride from the house over to the LG trail head. Once you get up around Lexington and the climb the volume of cars is very low.

On the way home I decided to hop over and give Montevina a climb. I've cut across the dirt trail numerous times to descend Bohlman, but given my adventurous bent, I decided to stick to the dirt trail (on the road bike...25mm tires mind you) and descend into Los Gatos. Of course I took it easy on the descent because coming home in several pieces is not an option. Overall it was fun to explore some new parts of the hills and open myself to new adventures in the dirt descent.

Hello off season & low-tensity

2009-10-30T18:54:00.000-07:00

The last month and a half since my last race has been nice. Mellow rides, great scenery (thanks Granfondo!) and plenty of time to not ride hard. In fact, it's been nice to ride the same roads I hammer on during intervals and have time to view the surroundings. Amazing the amount of things you take for granted when all the blood goes to your legs and lungs and not your eyes and brain.

So if I come across you on a ride this fall/winter I'm not likely to try and follow. I'm liking this pace and so is my waistline (down 9 pounds...watch out climbers).

Interbike, Part III - Pictures

2009-10-08T20:46:00.000-07:00

Been busy lately and totally forgot to get these posted. So here are some highlights of mine from Interbike:

I don't know who the Garmin rider is on the left, but Christian Vande Velde is pretty recognizable. These guys, plus Dave Zabriskie, just happened to be signing autographs at the Vittoria/3T booth.

Dave didn't want to emphasize the height difference so he decided to stand on his chair for the picture. You can't tell from this picture but DZ's shoulders are probably narrower than his waist; no wonder he's fast on his TT bike.

Lunch courtesy of Clif Bar...espresso from this guy.

The Ouch guys were hanging out at the Kuota booth. John Murphy (US Crit Champ), Rory Sutherland and Floyd Landis were all interested in the Metrigear product.

Hung out with Bob Parlee for a few minutes. He actually remembered when the order for my frame came through his shop almost two years ago. Bob was kind enough to spend time listening to my feedback on his frame and what I'd do differently with my next Parlee frame.

Levi's Granfondo Carbon Clincher Failure on Meyers Grade

2009-10-05T07:41:00.001-07:00

This past weekend I participated in Levi's Granfondo and had a wonderful time. Amazing roads, people, support and weather for a terrific ride that took me through parts of California that I would otherwise not have ever seen.

One of the sights I thought I'd never see was my beloved Edge Composite 68 carbon clinchers fail under me while riding. These have been a bomb-proof wheel set since day one. 20/24 spokes, WI hub up front, Powertap in the rear with CX-Ray spokes. An absolute dream. My 88kg's have had nothing but great times on these wheels.

I've learned with these wheels that under heaving braking on steep descents you must exhibit caution. You can't ride the brakes and just think you'll be fine when you get to the bottom. I learned this on a very short and steep 20% descent last fall when I had a latex tube blow out. Yes, I was on the brakes the whole way down and should have known better, but thankfully no harm was done to the wheel or myself. Lesson learned, at least I thought...

Some of the descents of the Granfondo were pretty steep and around blind corners. With being unfamiliar with the roads, I made sure I was cautious. Cautious, but also considerate of the fact that I didn't want to overheat the brakes. I didn't experience any problems over the first 60 miles. The rims weren't squealing nor were the rims overheating.

This all changed as I descended down Meyers Grade Road (photo from http://www.steephill.tv's route preview). The day of the 'fondo was just as perfect as this picture.

The descent was made a bit more technical from the 20+mph wind blowing from off the ocean to the right. The signs at the top warn riders that you're about to descend an 18% grade and caution is required. As had been the norm for the descents up until this point, I made sure I descended safely and with the goal of keeping all equipment in tact. To put this is relation to other riders, I was descending just as fast as others with the exception of a former MTB pro who kept bombing past me on descents (I would then pass him on climbs).

Toward the bottom third of this descent I felt a very bad pulsation in the front brake lever. I looked down at the front wheel to see if there was something wrong but there wasn't anything visibly bad. But it was scary to see the fork flexing back and forth under braking; it probably was oscillating at least an inch when I had the front brake applied heavily.

I got to the bottom of the descent and my teammate pulled over a few seconds later to see how I was doing. I spun the front wheel and it got stuck. It wasn't clear to me what happened. I opened the brakes up to let the wheel spin more freely. At this point I saw the issue. Initially it looked like the sidewall of my Rubino Pro had bulged out and was rubbing the break pads (yellow Swiss Stop). But to my surprise it actually was a deformity of the braking area of the rim! I had somehow managed to melt the carbon.

I was able to limp back through the rest of the ride, but took it very slow on corners and was only able to use about 10% of the braking power from the front. When I got home I took the tire off the wheel and noticed the damage was much worse. I thought only one side of the rim had melted. Come to find out it was on both sides. In the picture you'll see how each side of the clincher flares out.

Thankfully I kept the rubber down, but I'll be on the phone with Edge to discuss the details around the failure and what we can do going forward.

Interbike, Part II

2009-09-25T16:29:00.000-07:00

Now fully armed with Metrigear stuff, I had to figure out how to tackle the convention floor layout. Pretty simple to just walk the aisles so that's what I just did. First up was the Euro area of the show. Strained conversations were the norm here. I got the sense that a few of the interested people at some of the booths were having a hard time trying to get through the language barrier of the foreigners.

For me this happened at the Acros booth. This is a German company that has some pretty light weight gear. Yup, a homegrown competitor to the other weight-weenie company Tune. They displayed a sub-700g wheelset made from their hubs and some new prototype AX Lightness rims. I asked about the hub weight, but this was lost in translation. I never got the answer. Most of the other Euro stuff were things I had already seen from the interweb postings from Eurobike.

Continuing my assault on the aisles, I soon found myself approaching the Vittoria/3T/Selle San Marco booth. And to my surprise there were some Garmin riders signing autographs. I'm typically not an autograph/rider groupie, but I couldn't pass up see these guys in person. First up was Christian Vande Velde, then some other random Garmin guy who I couldn't identify, and then Dave Z. All of them were cool, but I was most interested in DZ partly from my own twisted fascination with TT's and his complete domestic dominance of this discipline. I had a photo taken with him, but he didn't want to look short, so he stood up on his chair to even things out a little bit.

And here's DZ's secret weapon to being fast. His shoulders are so narrow that he probably could have been birthed from his mother at his current side and she probably wouldn't have needed an epidural at all. This dude is narrow, plain and simple.

Along the way I'd get folks asking me what Metrigear was all about, so I'd hand them the literature, show them my Speedplay pedal and direct them to the booth. I started to hit the wall and came across the Fizik booth. Some neat stuff there, but best of all was the espresso vendor. I downed a double and kept on working.

I eventually came across some other regionally focused vendors. First up where the Asian companies. These all felt cheap and inexpensive. I felt like I was walking through rows and rows of copy-cat designs and rip offs. I was happy to move on and find I was soon halfway across the world and surrounded by the Italians. All the Italian vendors had a certain air about them...like they were the holders of cycling's holy grail (not sure what that may be, but the Italians probably have it...maybe it's called the World Champion rainbow jersey). Besides the class of the Italians, I really appreciated their attention to detail; very refreshing and a nice change from some of the in-your-face displays from other parts of the floor. I was surprised by the number of clothing vendors from Italy. A ton of vendors showing fabrics and clothing components. Neat stuff if you're a chamios geek.

On the way out of the Italion stallions, I passed through the Kuota booth. Go figure, more pros! John Murphy (US Crit champ), Rory Sutherland and Floyd Landis were just chilling at a table with nobody around. I saddled up and asked for a poster, and given the lack of action, and probably because there weren't any pretty girls around, they decided to strike up a conversation with me and ask what brought me to Interbike. We probably talked for five minutes and there were all pretty excited about a pedal-based powermeter. Nice guys.

A quick check of the clock revealed it was 1:30pm. The espresso was wearing off and I needed nutrition. I headed back to the Metrigear booth and met up with Alan. We headed over to grab lunch. Since he had been on the floor the day before he gave me the rundown of what transpired the day before and some booths I had missed that I needed to head back to and look at in more detail.

On the way back I wanted to hit up Pearl Izumi and find out what was new with some of the aero shoe covers. We had to cut through Shimano. Yes, I know. A Campy guy like me walking through the Shimano booth. It was damn tough. To make it worse, George Hincapie was signing autographs. I pushed aside the Campy voices in my head and had George sign a poster for me. However, the picture Alan took with my iPhone didn't turn out at all. Oh well. And if George is "big", then I'd hate to see the rest of the peloton. He's not that big, just normal size.

Wow, so who else did I bump into? Well, Lennard Zinn (VeloNews technical editor and tall guy frame builder) asked me where the Metrigear booth was located. And yes, he's not as tall as he claims too. It's like high school again when you hear about athletes from opposing teams (or frame-building editors) seeming to be larger than life, and then when you see them in person there's a different perspective you walk away with. Trust me, I played against a lot of 6'7" guys in high school who were barely pushing 6'4".

By this time the day was winding down. I hit up the espresso guy again and swung by the Bell/Easton booth. An old Stanford teammate of mine is the business manager for their helmet business. He was in the middle of a conversation with some former US mountain bike pro champ, but when he saw me he quickly excused himself. We caught up and later I told this story to the rep at the Prologo saddles booth. He said that my buddy was probably all too eager to get out of the conversation with the bike rider because the rider was most likely only talking about themself.

With sore legs I went back to the booth and meandered through Rotor and Selle San Marco. Rotor is coming out with their Q-rings for the Zipp cranks (which will suit my road bike just nicely thank you). Selle San Marco just came out and updated the Regal saddle at Eurobike. They've shaved 150 grams off the saddle and have retained the shape. Finally, a nice big saddle without a significant weight penalty. I asked the rep if I could buy one, but he had to keep it around until the show ended.

This led to a moment of enlightenment. Some of these vendors are willing to wheel and deal with their goods on Friday. As the show closes down, they're looking for ways to reduce the amount of product they need to ship out. So with that in mind I took Mandi over from the Metrigear booth, made introductions between her and the San Marco guy, and gave them both instructions on the saddle make/model/color I wanted. Mandi, I owe you!

Wow, is reading this exhausting? Yeah, probably. Just like being on your feet all day at the show. More reads to come in Part III and pictures.

Interbike, Part I

2009-09-25T09:15:00.000-07:00

Over the past year I've been covertly planning to make it down to the 2010 Interbike show. For years I've scoured the web to see photos of what was coming out from different vendors. So now with some careful planning and deft product development of some friends I executed my plans. So what's so covert about going to Interbike? Nothing really except I was going in support of a friend who's bringing out the equivalent of sliced bread to the power meter crowd. More on that later...

Day trips to Vegas aren't a regular occurrence for me. Heck, prior to heading to Vegas for my ten year wedding anniversary back in April, I hadn't been back to Sin City since spring break 1994. Lots can change in a fifteen year absence, but now I'm heading back only a few months and it actually will seem more "normal" of a city than when I was overwhelmed during the spring.

No major hiccups on the flight, except I learned a valuable lesson at the Vegas airport. I tried to be sly and pick up a taxi on the wrong side of the airport. The airport officials quickly guided me to the right "line" on the other side of the building. After getting into my cab, I asked why none of the taxi's weren't even giving me the time of day on the other side of the airport. Apparently it's a $100 fine for them to pick up people on that side of the terminal. Ok, my bad...I forgot that I needed to queue up with two hundred other people and wait in line (I think some Brit might be running the airport since their love of queue's is high).

Upon arrival to the Sands Convention Center I found the reg desk and promptly was greeted by Velopromo people. Not really, but when I think "reg", I think Velopromo. However, the man helping me could have fit in just perfectly with the Velopromo folks.

I'm going to turn the clock back here about eight years and tell you a little side story that will help you understand what I was about to face. Before Lisa and I decided to have kids, we made sure to take a nice trip to Europe. Since I had spent some time around London and knew the town well enough, I wanted to expose her to Harrod's. We spent about five hours there (including lunch) and at one point Lisa had one of the paralysis moments of shopping. Just too much overload of what to buy. We fondly refer to this as our "Harrod's" moment.

So back to Interbike. I see the open door to the convention floor and briskly walk through. WHAM! I'm being hit from all sides with "Harrod's" moments! I am so utterly completely overwhelmed by everything that I found myself standing still for about a minute. Soaking in all the biking goodness was such a nice feeling. With that over I quickly got oriented and found my way over to the Metrigear booth.

A quick change of shirts soon found me in the black Metrigear t-shirt. Armed with a handful of marketing literature, I decided to walk up and down the aisle to get the word out for Metrigear. Of course along the way I saw some pretty cool things...but we'll get to those in the next blog posting.

More to come...

Chico Crit Race Report

2009-09-22T16:00:00.000-07:00

Place High-teens
Category: 35+ Masters 3/4
Race: Chico Downtown Criterium
Team Mates: Steven, Jonathan, Bruce
Field Size: 40+
Conditions: Hot and windy

After racing in the Henleyville RR the day before, it was nice to hang out in Chico the rest of Saturday and enjoy the town. After a fun dinner with Steven and Jonathan at a local Thai restaurant and a good night of sleep, I was ready for a hot day of racing. My racing didn't start until 2pm. Nothing like a lazy morning in Chico to get things started (and a plug for Cafe Coda...best breakfast spot in town).

I set the family up under the shade in the plaza near the start/finish line. Lots of other racers were doing the same thing and it was a great atmosphere for racing. After some brief time on the trainer, I did a few laps on the course. One corner had the nastiest rain drain I had ever seen. It must have sunk a good two feet! If you cut that corner you\'d be launched off your bike into the exit of the corner from the apex. Definitely a line that nobody tried to take willingly in the race.

The race started off fast and stayed that way. A couple of laps into the race the first prime was called (two deep). I was in the top 5 coming into the next to last corner and so I put in a hard dig to get to the last corner first. With that successfully accomplished I was able to nab the prime. A quick glance back and I had a gap, so we all know what that means ;)

I kept the gas on and probably did about 3 laps out by my lonesome self. I know was hurting and I was hoping my teammates were helping me back with the pack (Steven must have been hurting because in his oxygen-depleted race report he completely forgot I had rolled off the front solo). As I started to eventually slow, a Chico Corsa rider bridged across. He was pushing a big gear and I was having trouble sticking on his wheel.

A few laps later another guy made it across. I was cross-eyed at this point due to the heat of the afternoon, the solo effort and the dead legs from the road race the day before. I held on for a few more laps, but I ended up popping off the back. In retrospect I should have sat out a few pulls, but logic is defied when the door of the pain cave is closed and everything around you turns dark.

I slowly drifted back to the pack and saw that the rest of the SJBC crew had been shelled. There were some Chico guys on the front keeping the pace reasonable. Every now and then guys would try to push the pace, but there wasn't any great amount of teamwork between teams to pull the break back.

With about three laps to go I put in another hard dig to bridge up to three guys off the front of the pack. However, they pretty much gave up their effort as I rolled past them. So once again here I am in no-man's land. This lasted only another lap and a half before I was tracked back down. I surfed the back of the pack as the final two laps were ridden at a fast pace. I was happy to cross the line and be done.

In retrospect I probably could have, and should have ridden a bit differently in the break. As noted by Steven in our post-race chat, it's sometimes not until you\'re in the pressure of the moment that these opportunities of learning present themselves on the bike. This is not something you learn on a training ride or at our Tuesday night rides. It's what you do the next time this happens that defines whether or not you've learned from your past experiences.

As my final race of 2009 I can say I've learned a ton this season and can't wait to see how 2010 plays out.

Henleyville Race Report

2009-09-22T15:54:00.000-07:00

Place 7th
Category: 35+ Masters 123
Race: Henleyville Road Race
Team Mates: None
Field Size: 10
Conditions: Sunny with wind picking up throughout the day

I had targeted this weekend not so much for the racing, but to take the family up to Chico to visit a niece of ours starting her first year of college at CSU-Chico. Just my luck, OK I planned it out just a bit, that there would be two races over the weekend.

This was the first time I actually was able to wake up past 6am and make it to a Velopromo race on time. Nice to be staying close in Chico for the weekend. Our field was real small! Two Morgan Stanley's, three Zenn's, two Sierra Nevada/Bike Plus and then myself, Winder from Lombardi and a random Davis guy.

At the start the Davis rider decides to go up to the front and set the pace. Nothing too hard, but he kept pulling off and then rotating back into the front three. I stuck my nose out in the front a bit on the first lap, but not much. The Davis guy was just too ready and willing to pull us around. The feed zone was on a small pimple of a hill (maybe only a 3% grade at most).

Coming into the last few miles of the first lap the attacks started. This caused the Davis rider and one of the Zenn's to fall off the pace. Winder and I looked at each other and figured we'd sit in and watch the teams just punch/counter-punch each other. A first for me happened rather soon too...a pee break on the side of the road. Such gentlemen us junior geezers can be when the need arises.

Soon after we got back on the road and there was way too much talking between the represented teams. I had a feeling something was up. The attacks started again and finally there was one that stuck; it had one guy from each team. The remaining teammates looked at Winder and I with that pitiful look of "Hey, go chase them down...we're not!".

The break got up the road by about a minute, but Winder and I thought perhaps we could gutter the other teammates and bridge across in the crosswind section. We hit the corner and Winder launched me from the back of the pack. I put in a pretty hard dig, but the 3 chasers didn't want to let me go and reeled me back in within the next two minutes. Then Winder attacked. Rinse and repeat, it was the same thing for the next eight miles as we tried to make something happen/stick. We didn't have the numbers and the remaining teammates were more than willing to chase us down.

I resigned to the fact that we now were racing for 4th place. But my moral victory was that I had beat the Davis rider, so I was doing my part to help close the BAR gap. The winds picked up more on the final lap and we all eventually played nice and rotated through the pace line. Coming into the final kilometer the Morgan Stanley guy launches and I slowly bring him back. Just as we're about to catch him the remaining three guys launch their sprint. I rolled through 7th and learned what it feels like to miss the winning break and ride without teammates.

Lady Gaga, Your Dad's Proud of You!

2009-09-13T23:23:00.000-07:00

Watched the VMA's tonight on MTV. Just a short word to Lady Gaga...your dad called and said he likes what you did with your hair (the Eskimos like it too). If you saw her last outfit during Jay-Z's performance you'll see know what I'm talking about.

La Palabra de Vuelta del Día

2009-09-11T09:03:00.000-07:00

Universal Sports is doing a great job with their live coverage of the Vuelta on their website, but let's not overlook the other great contribution they're making.

I don't have a large vocabulary of smart-guy words I like to throw around to impress people, but I can usually ascertain a word or two that's out of my league when I at least know the context. The announcers on Universal Sports today threw a new word into the mix:

Bonification

Ponder that for a minute...Ok, now there are a few things that make sense about this word and why you might have never used it in your normal day to day communications.

First, are there any bonifications on the line if you finish your coffee first? Probably not. People on this side of the pond don't throw this word around (at least in the company of my friends). Second, do you notice where that above link takes you? Yup, to a UK dictionary website. Maybe this is a more common word in the Queen's commonwealth. I'm sure the UK version of Beavis & Butthead would go nuts using the word "bonification" in a skit or two.

.

District TTT Race Report

2009-09-06T13:16:00.000-07:00

The District TTT was a late addition to the Norcal racing calendar. This was going to be run on the same course as the Altamont TTT back in April with some additional kilometers thrown on to make it a full 40km. The newer section of road wasn't a surprise to me as in-laws live out near the course and I've ridden these roads quite a bit.

There's a reason there are windmills dotting all these hills. It's typically windy and this morning was no different. In fact, it was probably one of the strongest winds this early in the morning that I've ever felt in this area. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

As with the District TT in Sattley, I had the same early morning problem. You'd think I'd learn to set my alarm when I'm not tired, but I neglected to pay attention to the AM/PM distinction. Thankfully for me I woke up at 6am otherwise I probably would have missed the race. I quickly checked my iPhone alarm and realized I made the same mistake I did for Sattley. Gotta work this out eventually...

So with my adrenaline was pumping and after slamming a yogurt and banana down for breakfast, I was on the road. Thankfully for me I was staying at my in-laws, the car was pre-packed and it was only 20 minutes to team's meeting spot. I texted Clark to let him know I was going to be a few minutes late.

Upon arriving at our meeting spot, Mike and Dave were waiting for me and it was pretty cool out. Definitely a long-sleeve skinsuit morning. However, no Clark to be seen. Ten minutes pass and still no Clark. I gave Clark's cell phone a ring and no response. Not good, but this race only requires you to have three riders crossing the line. Yeah, I'm already thinking worse case scenario and we haven't even hit the registration table.

We finally make the call to drive over to registration after we waited for twenty minutes. I left a message for Clark and we rolled. We parked and rode up to the registration table to pick up our numbers. Come to find out Clark had picked up his number and was already warming up. I found Clark on the way back to the car and I was very relieved. With almost an hour to warm up I felt much better knowing the entire team was ready.

I brought my tiny arsenal of wheels, but in reality I knew it definitely wasn't necessary. Running a 1080 would have been fun for maybe the first quarter of the course, but with the strong winds it would be too much to handle this deep of a front wheel. In fact, having the disc on the rear was even something I was questioning.

Our team rolled up to the start and just in the nick of time. I quickly heard the starter tell us we only had thirty seconds before starting. Just around the same time the Rocknasium team in front of us had a logistics snafu and missed their start time. Needless to say they were pretty steamed about it, but the rolled on and out of site.

At the start we all clicked in but Dave had a problem. We had to wait and he eventually caught back on. Once all together we ramped it up and were flying. The tailwind had to have been 20+mph and I've never gone up this gradual hill so fast (~36mph). We hit the peak of the climb and then descended at terminal velocity. How fast is terminal velocity on a TT bike? About 54mph! It was probably the scariest moment I've ever had on a bike. That fast, and being whipped from side to side by the wind (every rider after the race I spoke with was just as scared too).

As we hit the crosswind section on Mountain House Road, we quickened up our rotations and echeloned. It was hard to find any calm wind behind the wheel in front of you since the winds were so strong and we were all getting blown all over the place. At the turnaround we lost a bit of time with Dave not being in the right gear.

It was fast on the way out, but it was a death march on the return. The crosswind was now coming a bit more from the front of us and it was really slowing us down. It hurt just to do ~21mph! Poor Clark was starting to feel the effects of the wind the most. Not surprising given he was the lightest guy in our group. We were able to rotate smoothly and let him sit out a couple of pulls to recover.

Turning onto Altamont Road I was thankful I was running my 11-25t cassette. I dropped into my small front chainring and explored all my rear gears to find a suitable cadence. With the straight-on headwind, the 39-23t combo proved to be where I spent a ton of time riding. And it wasn't any better sitting up to climb. The wind would just slam into me and cause me to lose momentum. I spent all my climbing in the aerobars.

Halfway up the rollers to the peak of Altamont Road we lost Clark. I don't like losing teammates in TTT's, but it's part of the strategy to know when to push on and when to wait. With how Clark was feeling it was time to plug on. We pushed through the last rollers and up to the summit.

With just two miles to go it was time to empty the tank! Dave was starting to get gassed so it turned out to be the Todd and Mike show taking longer pulls as we gradually descended down to the line. The last two minutes of the TT seemed to take forever. I think lactic acid probably makes your brain loopy, since I was producing it in spades!

The three of us stayed together and we passed the Rio Strada team (they started 4 minutes ahead of us) right before the finish line. With my vision crossed and my face covered in a mix of sweat'n'snot, I looked over at Mike and we both had the same thought. This was the hardest conditions, and perhaps, the hardest TT we've ever done. Period.

Finishing this race in one piece with all your teammates safe was reward enough. Taking third and being on the podium was just icing on the cake after dealing with these conditions.

So what are some key takeaways with these conditions? First, it might have made sense to use a road bike with aerobars. The handling of the TT bike was pretty scary. Second, running a wheelset like a 404 and not having a disc might have been just as fast. This morning I went out on a ride from my in-laws with my low profile training wheels and the wind was just as strong. It was amazing how much more stable I was on this wheelset compared to the Edge 68 front/disc rear.

Hopefully they'll keep this event on the calendar as it's one of the few TTT's out there and a blast to ride with a strong coordinated team.

First Endurance Giveaway

2009-08-31T16:07:00.001-07:00

I'm a big fan of First Endurance products, so I decided to enter their most recent product giveaway. Thankfully all that was necessary was a blog posting that happened back at the Madera Stage Race.

http://themanleyreport.blogspot.com/2009/03/im-cranky-payback-is-comingmadera-style.html

http://themanleyreport.blogspot.com/2009/03/busted-crank-photo.html

Winters Road Race

2009-08-30T23:25:00.000-07:00

It hit me the night before this race that I hadn't done a road race since Panoche back in May. Wow, how time flies! I was pretty excited about riding this loop as we had a pretty strong team put together for this field.

I was really concerned about the heat, so I packed two additional water bottles in my back pocket. I even went as far as freezing them the night before and kept them frozen up until we started. Between what I had on me and the water at the feed zone I made sure hydration wasn't going to be a concern.

We rolled out and our pace was pretty tame, tame enough that a few guys rolled off the front, but this didn't cause any chases. We came around the loop and hit the gradual slopes on Cantelow Road. Things were pretty steady and hard enough to make me happy to hang out at the back of the main pack.

The descent was a blast and those off the back were able to catch on relatively easy. On the second lap we got a time split and the break, which at this point had grown by a few riders, was 1:20 up the road. Once we heard this Ramon, Dave and Jim rolled to the front and sped up the pace. Ramon spent a considerable amount of time staying near the front.

We hit the climb again and for some reason I found myself near the back leading into the feed zone (on the first steep pitch of the climb). Not the place I needed to be! Next thing I know a Touchstone rider is putting on his brakes and stopping in front of me. He caused myself and Matt to both ease up and lose contact with the pack. I grabbed a water, looked back and Matt. He said we probably could catch them after the descent, so I put down a hard tempo (at least for me) to pace both of us up the climb.

After bombing down the hill, we caught up with Jim who had slipped off the back and we did a three man TT over the course of the next three minutes to catch the pack. At this point I wasn't sure whether I had it in me to stay with the leaders if they decided to climb hard. I figured I could at least get to the front on the flats and put the hurt on a few people and hopefully a stronger/better teammate who could climb would make the selection at the front.

Nice idea, but my rear wheel had another plan...like going flat. I had a slow leak and it eventually put me on the side of the road. Andrew Lanier Sr. was driving our follow car. He jumped out and asked, "Hey, you want to use Junior's wheel?". Sure, why not. We swapped the wheel and I decided to try and TT back to the group.

I could see the group about 3 minutes up the road and thought, "If I make it around the next corner where I can see them, and they look closer, I'll keep truckin'...". Well, it just happened that I wasn't able to see the group due to some of the turns along Putah Creek Road.

Finally, I turned south on Winters Road and saw the pack. One nice thing about having my eyesight over-corrected by Lasik nine years aog is that I have 10/20 eyesight (my eye doctor thinks I could be a sniper). The bad thing was somebody was hitting the gas in the pack and they were stretched out and pulling away. I told myself to keep going until the next turn a few miles down, but I knew it was a lost hope.

Ten minutes later I reached the next turn and shut it down. Sad to say I was bummed, but some days lady luck just isn't on your side. Needless to say this race is a definite on the racing calendar next year.

Death by Salad - Part II

2009-08-27T09:03:00.000-07:00

Back in April I was taken back by the cost of eating a salad at lunch. Since then things have changed by 25%. How so? The cost per ounce was lowered from $0.40 to $0.30. Doesn't sound significant, but when your salad weighs over a pound, it does make a difference. Making this change and being more strategic in my selection of lighter veggies (I'm taken my weight weenie mindset from the bike to the salad bar) I can now walk out of the cafeteria with a salad that costs less than $6. Much better than giving away my firstborn for a piece of green nutrition.

Fire Season

2009-08-20T10:41:00.000-07:00

This is a week or so behind the times, but it was just a bit ironic given what has transpired over the past week around the Bay Area with local forest fires. Growing up in Oregon I find forest fires troubling to me on several levels. At the core I truly cherish the forest and all it encompasses. Many days of my youth were spent in the back acres of our property playing among the trees and streams of the forest. Seeing land like this go up in smoke just bothers me to no end.

I took this first photo as I was meandering through the east foothills of San Jose on an easy spin. I hadn't heard about the fire north of Davenport yet, but Smokey sure knew something was ominous. I don't know if this sign's fire danger level ever gets changed; the sign is located on a closed road section of Alum Rock park.

As I rode back to work I saw in the distance the smoke from over the Santa Cruz mountains. My gut just sank as I knew this was a pretty big fire just given the size of the plume. This photo was taken near the south end of the bay near Milpitas. Only for a brief moment did I think this might have been the fog bank rolling in, but upon looking further north where Highway 92 crosses over to Half Moon Bay my initial suspicions were confirmed. No fog up north certainly meant this was a fire in the hills.

Last year soon after the Pine Martin fire near Bonny Doon I rode through that area as part of the Santa Cruz Mountain Challenge ride. That was eerie! Not something I particularly liked doing. Hopefully we're through with serious fires in the local area and things are kept safe around the state. However, that will be tough; a few weeks ago our family went up to Oregon for a week and on the flight I spotted several fires east of Mt. Shasta. Fires look different from the sky, but it still makes my heart sink.

Performance - It's the Name of the Game

2009-08-12T14:24:00.000-07:00

You may have already seen this, but I like it for so many reasons. One of the not so obvious reasons...the shots within the video from the Mt. Tabor park area. I grew up playing as a small kid in that area.

Backstage with Cervelo Test Team

2009-08-11T22:47:00.000-07:00

I've been transfixed lately by a series of videos following the Cervelo Test Team. Head over to Bartape.net and make up a pot of coffee (or break open a bottle of wine). Each video is roughly ten minutes in length and give you a very good idea of what happens behind the scenes with the riders.

Contrary to the postings Lance and company have put up from the first two Grand Tours, these videos have a realism that to me portrays the day in/day out grind of being a professional rider. Watching the transformation of Heinrich Haussler over the first couple of episodes had me transfixed.

The "Look" - Part Duex

2009-07-28T14:28:00.000-07:00

Lance and the "looks". Sounds like a bad name for a wanna-be cover band. First there was this:

New and improved '09 style:

Oh, please, please, please stay healthy the both of you. I want to see a clean fight, no thumbs to the eyes, and all the Texan piss and Spanish vinegar you can hurl at each other come next July!

Boy, and what's going to happen with the supporting casts of Team RadioShack and the future home of Al-pistolero Contedor? An all out smackdown of American toughies (Levi, Horner, George...maybe a Garmin defect or two) against who the heck knows. And just for kicks let's get the new terminator faceplate of Jens Voigt added to that team. I can't wait!!!

Best new Bay Area climb - Mt. Umunhum

2009-07-24T08:46:00.000-07:00

One of the best stories I've read lately in the San Jose Mercury News. Mount Umunhum clean-up gets congressional approval! The article notes that the road will also need to be repaved. This will turn out to be one of the best climbs in the Bay Area.

Watsonville E3 Race Report

2009-07-20T13:56:00.000-07:00

After doing the M35+/45+ race, the legs were pretty toasted. I quickly put on the number for this race and lined up. I was just hoping to hang and see what would transpire.

With the longer distance compared to the 35+/45+ race it seemed like we didn't really start to ramp things up until a few laps into the race. The legs were feeling pretty tired, but at least siting in the pack felt pretty good. And there were some tall/big guys in the pack that could at least provide some relief.

About ten minutes into the race I was thinking, "Heck, I got the upgrade points I was seeking...why not just shut it down and find a nice burrito to eat?" Just then Matt rolls up to me and says, "You can win this." Matt, apparently you can't read my mind because it's not what you were thinking. Talk about a little peer pressure from a teammate.

Around this time a break goes up the road and dangles out there for the next 35 minutes. Thankfully I didn't have to do too much work to reel them in, but I will say there were some low horsepower'd riders that were having a hard time contributing to the paceline. At least I knew they wouldn't be a problem if things came down to a sprint.

With three laps to go the break was caught and I knew it would come down to a sprint finish. We had about 10 guys in our pack and coming into the last lap everybody was looking around to see what was going to happen. I found myself on the front with two corners remaining and a slight headwind. Not ideal, but better than being at the back.

Coming out of the last corner I sprinted as hard as I could. I wasn't able to get any separation from those behind and pretty much just gave a few other riders an awesome leadout. Three guys came around me, but getting back to back fourth places was very gratifying.

Watsonville 35+/45+ Race Report

2009-07-20T13:45:00.000-07:00

Clark threw out the idea to me that a team TT effort off the front might be fun to try, but alas, Clark wasn't able to make it to Watsonville. The general strategy was to use our numbers to our advantage. Attack where possible, cover when necessary and disrupt any chase attempts to teammates up the road.

The race started off fast and furious. It took a couple of laps of intensity to get used to the turns and the best lines through them. Imagine trying to figure that out while redlining?!? Not much fun. I stayed mid-pack and could see most of the action at the front.

Soon I found myself coming up the hill to the start/finish with a lot of momentum. I carried this momentum and attacked down the right as people caught their breath from the hill. Nobody went with me, so I shut it down after a minute or so. Back to the pack for a bit of recovery.

With about 7 laps to go (can't fully remember), the same situation happened, so I attacked again. This time Tracey Colwell (Webcor) decided to bridge across. It took him a bit to latch on, but once on my wheel we worked well together. Then Eric Easterling (Sierra Pacific) crossed the gap. On his heels was our own Chris Wire.

We were a pretty cohesive break as we continued to hammer. I think we all understood that if we didn't work well together, we'd be doomed and our break would fail. We grew the gap to probably around 15-20 seconds, but it felt much closer; I didn't look back at all, just kept my focus on going forward.

Coming into the last lap I knew Chris had the best opportunity to get the team a win. Our break slowed a little coming out of turn #2 and I got to the front and drove us hard through the next three turns. Chris rolled the dice and jumped hard right before the last corner. I was completely gassed and couldn't do anything but watch Chris and the others go at it for the line.

I crossed the line fourth and pretty elated with my finish. This result confirmed a few things and definitely is a building block in the large scheme of things.

Big & Bigger: The demise of tall clothing

2009-07-17T23:13:00.000-07:00

On the recommendation of my wife who was walking through Macy's a few days ago on the way to her car, she pointed me in this direction. Apparently Macy's has a new Big & Tall section. Obviously, this narrows the clientele browsing the isles to pretty much nobody. Well at least there was nobody when I stopped by to check in and see what they had.

And oh did they have some stuff. Big picnic table clothes that apparently were supposed to be Ralph Lauren Polo shirts (6XB as in eXtra Big), sailing spinnakers masquerading as dress shirts and enough denim to outfit a small Eskimo village and their sled dogs. My point, it was all a bunch of clothes made for big (let's be honest) fat people.

Obesity isn't something to laugh at given how it's soon to be an American pandemic, but man'o'man, when I can't find anything that actually fits me at a big and tall section of a store I know I've gone outside the norms of society's bell shaped fit curve and I'm a statistical outlier. Even BMI (body mass index) graphs aren't produced to show where I stand from that standpoint. I'm off the charts in a healthy way (those charts in my opinion are skewed toward the obese).

I take a lot of pride in staying in shape. I take even greater pride when my father who battles with his own weight tells me how proud he is of my active lifestyle (Macy's department is suited to guys like him...6'5", 270 lbs). I'm not sure where I'm going with all these words except to say it's hard to find anything that fits at Macy's own department that supposedly is catered to my demographic...

...and that people need to take obesity seriously and change their diet & exercise, which in my opinion are the root causes for many ills.

Musings from the Livestrong Ride

2009-07-13T10:38:00.000-07:00

This past weekend San Jose hosted the Livestrong Challenge ride. I'm not typically a fundraiser type of guy, but for some reason I felt motivated to join in and do my part. Here are some interesting things I took note of during the 100 mile ride.

Kudos to those raising money for Susan over at Fat Cyclist. They did a great job at raising a ton of money for the cause and they were duly rewarded with being up front for the neutralized rollout from downtown. Thankfully for them the day didn't get too hot since those black kits looked like they could have been pretty warm.

Now here's where things get interesting. While I support and respect everybody who was fundraising, I do have to question whether or not everybody was on board with Fat Cyclist. In my heart I hope they are on board for the right reasons. But here's where I deviate and let the skeptic in me take over.

I saw quite a few overweight cyclists sporting the Fat Cyclist jersey. I really should have approached some of these people at the rest stops, but didn't. I should have asked if they were supporting Susan's cause, and if they weren't, then I'd educate them and let them know the wonderful story behind the Fat Cyclist work. However, part of me thinks these riders realized that they were overweight, and found a jersey that mockingly made fun of their physical condition, so they decided to buy the jersey. Heck, I could be wrong, and I hope that I am, but it would be like me buying a jersey that said Tall Cyclist when I didn't know that the proceeds of the sale of the jersey went to help research for people who had lost their legs from amputations.

Hmm, what else caught my eye. Oh yeah, these rides are more dangerous than a Cat 5 crit at the early birds when everybody thinks they can corner like a pro. About three miles into the ride we're making a nice mellow right hand turn and I'm holding my line through the corner. Out of nowhere a guy on a hybrid bike comes sweeping across my front wheel and almost takes me out. I pedaled up next to him, looked over to see if he would at least acknowledge the fact that he nearly took me out, but his face was as stoic as an executioner. No reaction. None. He was completely oblivious to what he had done. From then on I made sure to be more aware of these kind of riders.

Soon after this incident we crossed the Hamilton Avenue/Leigh Avenue intersection. Somebody about 10 meters in front of me had a Powertap. Or at least they used to have a Powertap. The head unit on their stem came flying off and was ping-pong'ing between riders. The owner probably didn't know what happened because I didn't see anybody slowing down and turning around. Poor cyclist, they probably didn't realize they lost it until they were halfway through their ride.

Incidentally, having a full road closure and escort through San Jose, Saratoga, Los Gatos is nice, but it's a bit of a new experience for us who routinely ride these roads on our bikes. I for one know where all the potholes and hazards are on these roads...when I'm in the bike lane! Being out in the middle of the road was a bit nerve racking because I wasn't familiar with when and where I'd encounter a hole large enough to send me flying. I made it through safely, but I did hear some people hit some of these hazards head on.

Safety needs to be a given when riding in events like these, but please, and this goes out to the other riders, don't put yourself in a position of being unsafe when you think you're being "safe". What do I mean? I mean if we're coming up on a section of road that's bad, you don't need to call it to half the world by taking your hand off the handlebars and making obvious pointing gestures. On more than one occasion I saw a few riders to this, and then with only one hand on the bars they'd hit some road hazard and about lose it. I made sure not to follow these people as they were more of a harm to themselves.

When I showed my wife the route, her first reaction was how were all these people going to handle Metcalf. Well, it was ugly, just ugly. I don't know if the casual weekend rider is prepared for Metcalf, but somebody could have made a killing if they had a van and a bike rack. Probably 75% of the riders I saw on the hill were doing the following:

Walking their bikes up the hill
Searching for the lung they just coughed up on the side of the road
Realizing that the pain cave is really does hurt
Zig-zagging back and forth across the road
Wishing they were like the smart lady who had a triple crank and a MTB cassette

The highlight of the hill was the guy in the devil suit. He first made his presence know on the climb up Shannon, and then motored over to Metcalf. He was gracious enough to cheer people on and pour cold water on our heads as we passed by. Now on the my favorite Metcalf story...

We're pacelining up Santa Teresa into the headwind. We probably snagged up 5-7 riders and I was on the front putting down a nice hard tempo. I wasn't expecting people to pull through and I didn't care. I wanted to get in some solid training. We turn onto Bailey and start to make our way towards Metcalf. At this point the crosswinds caused people to get gapped. As we came over the Hwy 101/Bailey intersection, one of the guys behind me comes ups next to me. He notices the climb immediately in front of us and asks, "Hey, is that Metcalf?". Oh, young Jedi, you have much to learn. I told him he'd know Metcalf well in about 2 miles and he'd know it when he saw it.

I let him get a gap going up the hill and decide to suck his wheel for a while as we approach Metcalf. At the base of the climb as I unzip my jersey getting ready for the hard effort (average watts was 370), I let him go up the road. About 3 minutes into the climb I come by him. He glances over with pain written all over his face, and I say, "This is Metcalf. Pretty fun, huh?!?". He was having no fun. Sorry bud.

Help me raise donations for the San Jose Livestrong ride

2009-07-02T10:38:00.000-07:00

I'm not typically the fundraising type, but this year I decided to give it a shot. I'm doing the 100 mile loop of the San Jose Livestrong Challenge fundraising ride. Ok, I'll admit to the fact that riding a 100 mile loop with supported food stops is a pretty cush way of getting in a nice hard training ride, but at least the funds raised will go toward furthering cancer research.

If you're interested in donating $5 or $50 (friendship won't be based on how much you give), go here to donate:

http://bit.ly/KmL1W

District TT Race Report

2009-06-15T10:26:00.000-07:00

As many of you know, my season has been geared toward TT's and specifically this past weekend of the District race. It's only been since October that I've had a dedicated TT bike and though I've come a long way, you'll find that I've still got a ways to go. Sattley proved to be an enormous learning experience on several fronts.

It's the little things that make race reports interesting to me. That being said, I took the advice of many as I prepped for the race. I spoke earlier in the week with Dave Stockwell and drew upon his 17 previous years of knowledge around District TT events to get a feel for how this race would go down. Dave's knowledge of the route was spot on!

I also worked with my coach and discussed how my body didn't react well to the taper we had been doing. Leading up to Dunlap last week I felt good, but the power numbers were way down. My belief was that it was due to be "too fresh"; I need a bit more fatigue in the legs to perform well. Being too fresh killed me a few years ago when I was a cat 5 and took a few days off leading up to the Mt. Hamilton RR. That was a bad day. But the decision was to stick with the taper plan and to see how my body responded. At worse my coach and I would walk away with a much better understanding of how I react to tapering.

One point of advice that Dave mentioned was how necessary it was to tighten every bolt on your bike before the race. The expansion cracks in the road will take a toll on equipment. More on this later...

I drove up Saturday to my brother-in-law's place in Granite Bay (near Roseville). Upon arriving I realized I forgot my water bottle. I thought about snagging a bottle cage from one of the bikes in the garage, but after a bit more thinking I realized that having the bottle probably didn't matter too much. Plus, with all the potential jarring on the bike, the bottle might fly off like it did to me on one of the Winter Series TT's.

I checked, and re-checked everything on the bike. Tightened down bolts, re-taped some loose bar tape and made sure there was no brake rub. Everything was good to go. The plan was to wake up at 4:45am, grab a bite to eat and hit the road with plenty of time to spare. I checked my alarm on the iPhone to make sure it was working properly, then set it for the early wake up. Ah, sleep...

Rolling over in the morning I realized it was getting light out. Sometimes my internal alarm clock wakes me up a few minutes before I need to get up. Today, I was very lucky. The night before after testing the alarm I had forgot to switch the alarm setting from "PM" to "AM". I woke up at 5:05AM!

Yikes, late already! Well, my HR was spiked and I probably could have ridden a pretty good 40k TT right then and there given how amped I was. Luckily the night before I had pre-packed everything and it only took me 15 minutes to get out the door and on the road.

While driving I saw that Clark had texted me 2:53AM letting me know he had just left Los Gatos. I figured he had to be in the area so I gave him a ring as I was coming up toward Auburn. Come to find out he was just about to hit the road after getting his coffee IV hit at Starbucks. No coffee necessary for me...I was doing 80+mph and already in TT mode. Clark made mention that I'd probably catch him on the road a few minutes past Auburn. Chase on!

There have been two times in my life where I've absolutely flown up Hwy 80 toward Tahoe. The first was about 8 years ago when I cut out of work early and jetted up there for a bachelor party. I had the radar detector on and was amazed how much fun the BMW V-8 could boggie up the hill. This morning was the second time.

I was flying by cars left and right. Not much traffic on the road except for a few random vehicles. Even a small red Prius that decided to flash it's lights at me while I smoked it. I was on the hunt for Clark and his Land Rover. About twenty minutes up the road I thought to myself that Clark must really be pushing that Land Rover hard. But then again, Clark wouldn't do that as he's got a different car in the garage for just that purpose. Then I remembered that Prius that flashed me. It was Clark! Later in the day we got a good laugh out of the situation...

Making it to Sattley in record time, I realized I had almost two hours before my start time. Just what I like. In prepping for the race I had changed my PT CPU to read out KM's instead of miles. I wanted to easily break out the race into quarters. The strategy was to go out in the first 5k and just get up to speed, then ramp it up from there.

The sun had come out and there was only a slight hint of wind. Perfect conditions! As I warmed up on the trainer I could feel the effects of the altitude. My HR didn't want to get above 170 without a huge anaerobic effort and my power was down about 30 watts. I knew this was going to be the case going into the race so it wasn't a surprise.

The last bike adjustment I made was to take off the water bottle holder and tape down the PT wires. With the lack of wind the 1080 front wheel was the perfect choice. I ran about 120psi in both wheels to lessen the effects of the poor pavement (rumor has it that the course will be repaved soon...that will make it even faster). With Clark's help to get my number on I was ready to go.

Jonathan Sinclair was my 30 second rabbit. I told him my strategy for not starting too hard; he was going to give me a thorough yelling if I passed him too soon on the course. With my watts being impacted from the altitude, I figured I'd start out at 300 watts for the first 5k, then ramp it up to 315 there after and try for more in the last 10k.

I start out and the cracks in the road weren't that bad. Sure, they were annoying, but I had mentally prepared myself for much worse. Things were going to plan until about 7k into the race I realize that my CPU on the aerobars seemed a little too far away from my face. Then I noticed that the aerobars had slowly dropped down toward the front tire as I had been jarred over all the cracks in the road. Not the position you want to be in, so I did the only thing I could think of in that situation. I gave a nice hard yank on the aerobars to bring them back up into position. That worked, but over the course of the race I'd have to do this about every 5k due to the slippage.

I passed Jonathan around the 9k mark and felt good. As I entered the short little forested area and hit the slight rise in the road my power went up and I thought it might be sustainable as the road hit the false flat. However, this wasn't to be the case. For some reason my body didn't want to do any more than 315 watts. I kept on the gas. During this time my legs would alternate between feeling good and bad. Weird, but it was like somebody was turning them on and off like a light bulb.

At the 19k mark Michael Buckley of Morgan Stanley passed me. He's a super strong TT and I was able to up the power a bit and stick 30 yards behind him for a while. I made the turn and Michael put down some serious power and slowly pulled away.

Nothing spectacular happened between the 20k and 30k mark. The wind didn't seem to be of any specific assistance or hindrance, so I just tucked my head down as low as I could and tried to find speed.

With 10k to go I ramped things up to around 325 watts and my world really began to hurt. This was uncommon territory for me as Dunlap was 10k shorter and this was a new area of the pain cave for me. And to make it more painful, the cracks in the road were back (they're most prominent in the first 10k and last 10k of this course). At this point it felt like I was a WWII pilot trying to land a battered P-51 Mustang onto an aircraft carrier (imagine flying at high speed and parts of the plane coming off or getting loose...). The aerobars were acting up and now it felt like my saddle was starting to get loose (post-race inspection showed that it wasn't loose, it was just that my hamstrings and glutes had gone to gel).

Over the last 5k I put down around 335 watts and crossed the line completely gassed. I finished at 54:36.7! I felt much better about my pacing compared to Dunlap. I viewed that as a small personal victory. I kept riding and spent the next 25 minutes cooling down and actually taking in the spectacular scenery.

After reviewing the results I came in 6th. 1.8 seconds out of 5th place which was my goal. I was a bit disappointed that I didn't get a top five placing, but I came away from the race with a ton of personal knowledge on what I need to improve going forward. Innes won with a time of 51:32.3; pretty impressive as he won by over thirty seconds.

On the way home I treated myself to In'n'Out burgers and a milkshake. Gotta love that!

Wife vs. Coach

2009-06-09T17:12:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was supposed to be a rest day according to the training plan, but then the wife spoke up and said, "Wouldn't your legs feel better if you just went out for an easy spin?".

Wife - 1
Coach - 0

And yes, my legs felt much better after the ride.

Falling Apart at Dunlap

2009-06-08T10:33:00.000-07:00

This was my first time doing this TT and I was looking forward to it, but perhaps not too much since it was 30k and I haven't done any TT effort that long since our last Winter Series race. Arrived with plenty of time to scope out a good parking spot with shade, chat with friends and generally be able to take my time and not feel rushed.

While on the trainer I felt great. I've been tapering for this and Districts next week, and while tapering is something new for me (it makes me feel like a caged beast), I felt like I could conquer the course when I was warming up. My back had been bothering me for the past day after I pulled a small muscle on Saturday from bending down to pump up my tires, but with the heat of the day everything felt fine. The wind was up, but I decided to run the 1080 front anyways (more on that later).

My goal was to hit between 350-360 watts for the entire ride. I started out into the headwind and found myself having to throttle back my effort just a bit as it was easy to go too hard. Through the first left hand turn and now a long crosswind slog. I was finding that holding 350 was really starting to hurt.

After that stretch and the subsequent right turn, I knew it wasn't going to be my day. I glanced down at the powermeter and saw 290. Pretty disappointing! There was nothing I could do about it. I guess that's why they call it the race of truth.

At this point the 1-minute man behind me (Craig Roemer) passes me and we've got the tailwind section left. My power was able to come up into the 320 range for the last 10k, but my day was over by that time.

Overall it was a tough day. The wind was stronger than I thought and I should have gone with a less deep front wheel. I was fine with my pacing strategy, but in retrospect the middle 10k was were I fell apart and cracked. The first and last 10k were ok, but the power just wasn't there.

I have some theories about how my body is reacting during the taper period, and we'll see how they play out again next week at Districts. I have a hunch that I don't perform well when I'm so "fresh" and that I need more fatigue in my legs (perhaps a bit more volume and intensity than what I'm currently going through). I'm sticking with the current plan leading into Districts this year. Learning more about how I react to a taper is hopefully going to help me out more next year which is my real goal (2010 Districts TT).

Crazy Dream

2009-06-05T16:28:00.001-07:00

I don't have all the details, but here's a summary:

Clint Eastwood is a bad man. Being his sidekick was awesome.
Living large in a penthouse high in a San Francisco skyscraper is pretty cool, especially on the 120th floor where you can see the fog roll into the city beneath your feet.
Tyra Banks in my dream looks the same as she does on America's Next Top Model
I have no idea why Prince decided to be there too. He's still pretty damn short

I wonder what tonight will hold?

Guardian Angel on the Bike

2009-05-20T16:17:00.001-07:00

I've been meaning to write about this for some time, but it's been one of those topics that has escaped when I've sat down to type. Not this time...

My upbringing was Christian, and I consider myself to be a Christian (ok, I'm not going to be an advocate and try to force anything religious down your throat, so bear with me and keep reading). As I've aged, my view of organized religion has changed. I view it more as a "system" of beliefs, and depending on where you were born or who your parents were, your system might be different. And to me, different is good and what makes us unique.

The concept of a guardian angel is unique to Christianity (I think...haven't really researched if this concept applies to Islam or Hindu's). You grow up being taught that there's an angel looking after you, making sure not too much harm comes your way. Some harm will come, but enough to help shape your live. I mean, come on, as a kid, your guardian angel isn't going to stop you from touching the hot stove, let's be real about it.

How does this apply to biking? It's a stretch, but this has happened to me on several occasions. Typically it occurs at least once every two to three months. It always happens under nearly the same circumstances, albeit on different roads. I'll be riding solo out in the country with no one around. No cars, no distractions. Just me and my bike and my thoughts. Sounds like a lot of us who routinely put in the long training miles.

And then, out of the corner of my eye, I get a very brief glimpse of a cyclist going the other way in my peripheral vision. I look back over my shoulder and realize that there wasn't any cyclist there at all. But I swear my mind saw a cyclist going the other way. As this has happened more and more, the idea has formed in my mind that perhaps this is my guardian angel.

Apparently my guardian angel like to cycle too! He usually is wearing a darker color kit, probably to soak in the rays of light to keep him warm during the ride because he's so fast. And he's always in the drops. And he's hammering hard. Funny to think that I know so much by just catching glimpses of him (or it could be a her...don't know yet) out of the corner of my eye. The bike has low profile wheels and the frame as a classic flat top tube. No sloping stuff for this angel.

I don't know when I'll see my guardian angel next, but I'll try to see if he trains with a power meter. I'm sure he's got some insane capabilities!

Photo credit goes to Ken Conley at kwc.org. His pics are top quality and amazing.

Panoche RR Race Report - M35+ 1/2/3

2009-05-17T22:44:00.000-07:00

Race Report: A year ago I rode this course on the Monday after Cat\'s Hill and re-aggravated my old L4/L5 disc injury. That put me out for a month and left a sour taste in my mouth. Today I was excited to get back on the course and actually race. At the start it was already scorching hot and about to get hotter. After a few quick instructions from Chris and Nick we headed to the start.

The pace was pretty relaxed as everybody was getting used to the heat and trying to get a sweat going. Actually, it was too hot to sweat; any fluid on your body would evaporate immediately. On the rollers it was myself, Greg and Nick setting pace near the front. At one point I think Ramon rolled up to Greg and instructed him to get his butt back in the pack and stay protected for the upcoming climbs.

As we descended one of the rollers I found myself about 50 meters off the front of the pack. I wasn't planning to do this, but gravity has a positive effect when I descend. Looking back I saw a Specialized rider coming up; it was Kevin Metcalfe. He pulled through and then asked, "Is this a stupid thing for us to do?!?". I said that it probably wasn't the smartest, but that we should just keep our tempo and see what would happen. Looking down at my powermeter I saw that I was going about 85% of max; a pace I felt I could keep for quite some time.

At this point the heat started to kick in and really affect my heart rate. My HR kicked up to over 175bpm and I wasn't even pushing the pedals that hard. It seemed like Kevin and I were off the front for about twenty minutes, and my HR kept creeping higher. We hit the first hill and were caught about halfway up. A few minutes later Chris rode up to me to see how I was feeling. I wasn't able to get my HR back down and I knew it was going to be a long day. For the record, it took me over thirty minutes of just sitting in before my HR got down below 150bpm. Absolutely nuts!

The wind wasn't really a factor at this point and we soon descended and made our way to the notorious left hand turn onto Little Panoche Road. Usually the crosswind hits you on this section, but today it wasn't a factor. Halfway across Metcalfe attacks and Nick follows. Then a few other random riders bridge. Just as the gap is getting bigger, Chris zooms up the left and Billy Innes latches on. The acceleration from Chris was fast and quick enough to catch most off guard, so our chase group didn't put in much effort. I was happy to see two teammates get up the road, which was far more than I could have done at that moment.

Our group started our next significant climb and halfway up Tracy Colwell drops his hammer and the group splinters. At this point I had been racing for over an hour and a half, and my HR was averaging 167bpm. To put this into perspective from my VO2max test, my body\'s functional HR threshold is 163. Anything over this and I'm dumping more lactic acid into the muscles quicker than I can clear it out.

This acceleration, combined with the heat and my racing HR, broke me. I crested the climb and descended to the turnaround point. I stopped to top off all three of my bottles and poured a few more over my body. Jonathan Sinclair was out there manning the water station and I\'m sure he saw a lot of ugliness from riders being impacted by the heat. Another rider teamed up with me and we started our long haul back to the start.

As I was climbing I saw Ramon coming down the hill. I didn't know when he was dropped, but he was very optimistic when he yelled, "I'll catch up to you...". Well, Ramon caught us back on the flat crosswind section of road. He and a few other guys he was dragging caught up to myself and we worked together for a few miles. I didn't feel strong enough to stick with Ramon and he slowly rode off.

The bottom of the final climb wasn't bad, but the wind was starting to pick up. No, please don't bring the headwind! Into the last water station I roll, get off the bike, fill up the bottles and drench myself all over again. I was looking forward to the mostly downhill ride into the finish, but the winds were picking up.

With about fifteen miles to go I get caught by a Webcor, Specialized and CVC rider. We worked together until one of the rollers broke us apart with seven miles to go. I didn't realize it until I crested, but I rode the other guys off my wheel. I put my head down and counted the miles until I crossed the finish.

Hands down this was the toughest race I've done. My body did things from the exposure to heat that I've never experienced. Elevated HR, really low power output, and a pair of hot feet that were pretty much in pain over the last ten miles. Hopefully this is just a heat acclimation thing that will subside as we enter our hotter summer racing. Thankfully I didn't get sunburned or experience any nasty post-race headaches from being dehydrated.

Dealing with the heat

2009-05-16T11:38:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow's Panoche RR will be interesting. The first true race of the season where the temperatures will be high and the riding fierce. For me, at least, I've lucked out with most of my races being earlier enough in the day that it's not too hot and heat isn't a significant factor.

However, tomorrow's going to be different. I was thinking that hauling one of these along might serve some good for teammates. No worries about going without a bottle. But I will give the Panoche organizers their due. There's going to be several water stations for racers and since it's an out'n'back route, we'll get several opportunities to hit these up.

I doubt this will help me (...but then again I wouldn't mind myself being proved wrong by some ill-thought actions leading up to the race). I decided after hitting the steam room at The Brown Palace while in Denver that there might be some application of sorts to endurance sports. I dug around with a few Google searches to see if saunas or steam rooms provided any perks. It wasn't easy to find any serious evidence.

Anyway, over the past 3 weeks I've been hitting up both the sauna and steam room after my weight workouts at the company gym. Not both after each workout, but just one or the other depending on the mood (yes, my mood dictates which door I open). If there's a benefit, that's great. If not, at least I know going into the race tomorrow that my pores are working really well.

Saddle Update

2009-05-08T10:18:00.000-07:00

Just received the replacement for the Team Toupe saddle. The problem with the tighter rail/saddle tolerances of 4mm have been fixed with the regular Toupe saddle. I'm a little bummed that the white/blue combo of the Team saddle won't be on the bike because it looked pretty darn good, but the undercarriage will be much happier knowing that it won't be bottoming out and hitting the seatpost hardware. The new saddle is white with some faux carbon bits on the front and back. Still pretty good looking.

I tore apart the old Gel Toupe that had the busted rails. The kids and I ripped off the cover as we wanted to find out where and what the gel looked like. Once the black cover was gone we exposed the guts. The gel isn't so much a "gel", but more like a softer black padding that has gel-like properties. There's gel under each sitbone area; what I wasn't expecting was the patch of gel right near the tip of the nose. It makes sense that they put a bit there, but I had no idea it would be there.

In the end, I'm glad to say that the regular Toupe is doing its job. Plenty of clearance between the saddle and seatpost. Now it just needs some ride time to break in and get comfy.

Mile High Work & Play

2009-05-04T21:05:00.000-07:00

Hitting the road for work happens every so often in the world of acquisition integration. I've been in Denver the last couple of days doing a major network cutover for a recent acquisition. However, my bike has been at home and I've been pretty darn focused on the work tasks as hand. There have been some pretty cool things in Denver that I've done and experienced...

Let's get the work stuff out of the way. When an acquired is operating on a couple of T1 circuits, things can be pretty slow. When you bring in a DS3 circuit it's like drinking water from the fire hose. More than enough bandwidth to do everything you need.

Getting these up and running requires a bit of change to hardware and cabling. Network cables have to be organized and laid out for patching. All sorts of hardware gets racked and stacked into the data center. Routers, gateways, switches and probably a few other things I'm forgetting. And don't forget about the power that's needed too...these things suck up power and produce a ton of heat. Air conditioning gets added to the mix to keep things in check.

Where the rubber hits the road for this network stuff is behind walls where nobody sees the 'magic' happen. Ok, maybe not behind the walls, but in the hole in the walls where the network connections make it to the desktop. I have a new appreciation for guys who have the finger dexterity to do this kind of work for a living. Basically, you've got to break down the cat5 network cable into the eight strands and rewire them to the appropriate junctions in the jack (there's probably a technical name for this, but I don't know it). I think the only redeeming quality I brought into this task was that I'm pretty good with my hands on fine stuff like this; but then it backfires when I think I can meat out and over-power the mere plastic bits and pieces. My thumb took a beating and got all cut up. To get to the point, we got the network up and it was time for some play.

A full agenda was in the plans for the next day. Staying at the Hampton Inn isn't so bad. Free breakfast, nice large rooms, two 32" flat screens in my room...works for me. Plus, it brings back the fond memories of hanging at the Hampton in Madera (except for the crank). But I needed to upgrade my coffee fix. I found a nice place in uptown and along the way I ran into Logan Street. My daughter would be proud that there's a street in this town named after her (I emailed her the picture after taking it...7 year-olds are so Internet savvy already).

I walk into the coffee joint and immediately the barista asks, "Hey, how come you aren't out cycling today?". Man, this guy must have a psychic connection with me! Nah, he's probably just observant as I was wearing my Capo cycling cap. I was thinking the same thing, but taking my road bike to Denver was not in the cards on this visit. I was just lucky enough to have a free day due to getting the technical work done ahead of schedule. I guess effective planning does have some merits.

Soon my friend showed up and whisked us over to the Pepsi Center. It's been several years since I've seen a NBA game, and almost twenty years since I saw a playoff game in person (I think the '90 playoffs in Portland was the last time). I can't recall how old this arena is, but it's got everything...and plenty of people who gawk. I probably had at least five people inquire about my height. Luckily for them I was in a good mood and didn't give them a jerk response (yeah, catch me on a bad day and I'm bound to be a smartass at times when asked questions about my height).

We ended up having seats about fifteen rows up from the Dallas bench. Everybody in our section was giving Mark Cuban a pretty hard time. Afterward a friend told me that Cuban tweeted about how brutal the fans were to him...it probably will only get worse. By the end of the series, if this goes the distance and Dallas has to come back to town, Cuban might just want to stay in his hotel room. Denver won the game and I became a fan, at least for the rest of the playoffs. Chris Andersen (aka Birdman) is a pretty high-energy athletic big guy who comes off their bench and gets the crowd into the game. My sister would be his #1 fan due to all of his colorful tattoos.

After the game I decided a little pampering was required. I visited the spa at The Brown Palace. The name itself just makes me chuckle; it sounds like something out of South Park. But this place is no laughing matter. The architecture inside the building is top-notch and the spa is pretty good too. I opted for the cheap twentyfive minute focus massage. My left shoulder has been pretty tight since the Wente RR when driving to the race I turned my head to change lanes and felt my muscles seize up a tad. The 'suse beat me up and I'm still sore (three days later).

Lastly, the food in Denver was really, really good. Between the tap room with its 100+ options (I got a Belgium brew, St. Bernardus or something like that), the Spanish tapas, Indian, Italian and a nice steak, the meals were superb. It helps that most of the reviews on Yelp! are pretty accurate. Here's the dessert from Sullivan's Steakhouse. It's a creme brulee, but sized for two people. I disagree...it's the right size for me. Rumors abound that sharing something like this can lead to marital difficulties. Thankfully it was all mine.

Bald Spot

2009-04-29T11:59:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the genes in the family, going bald is probably a long shot for me. If I were to head down that path, you'd quickly see me going to the local Long's and buying a heavy duty Wahl to keep thing high and tight

It's been about a year since I decided to go all Grizzly Adams and let the old beard grow. The current growth is just a sign of laziness on my part since shaving while I've had this cold is not something I really feel like doing. However, I did notice something unusual this morning in the mirror when I looked at my mug.

Apparently my bicycle helmet snap had created a bald spot under my chin. I don't have any issue with being "Manley" and growing a beard, but these spots look weird. Yeah, spots...plural. Just checked again and there are two distinct areas. Apparently the bike helmet industry hasn't caught on to this adjacent benefit from their gear. Too bad it can't work for my entire face. Shaving is just a hassle.

Why 4mm matters - Specialized, read this and let me know your thoughts

2009-04-22T22:44:00.000-07:00

This evening I received a box from my FedEx friends with some new bits for the road bike. Over the past year I've dabbled a bit with some lightweight parts. These have been fun given the light weight, but after riding some of our rougher venues I want to make sure I've got some solid components under me that will not fail.

Gone are the old stem (3T) and seatpost (KCNC). The 3T stem isn't a weight-weenie part in the truest sense, but you'll see my logic soon. The seatpost is definitely uber-light, but the clamping mechanism destroyed my rails on the old Toupe saddle (see last blog post for details). I went with a new Thomson stem and seatpost. Why both? Because I think it just looks better when you've got matching components. I'm just a bit OCD about this at times.

Why does 4mm matter? It matters when your underside is concerned! With my old Toupe there's a ~15mm gap between the rails and the edge of the saddle. The new Toupe I got last week (team edition in blue/white) only has ~11mm gap. This matters because the Thomson clamping mechanism has a part that protrudes up a bit. When the saddle bottoms out and flexes it now hits the top of this clamp.

I'm hoping it won't hurt me, but Specialized, why did you change the specs? Sure, one model is the gel version and the other is the team version, but wouldn't the distance between the rails and saddle be the same? If I've got a defective saddle, let me know and I'll personally drive down to Morgan Hill to get it replaced.

But then again, I do have three kids and we're not planning for any more. Maybe this is just a cheaper solution than taking a visit to the doctor for the snip-snip.

Saddle Showdown - Fizik vs. Specialized

2009-04-09T20:43:00.000-07:00

You've probably heard it from everybody, more so than you know. Those wise words of advice around saddles where some wise experienced rider waxes about how it took them years to find the right saddle. And now that they have the right saddle, they continue to preach the mantra that "...everybody's different...".

I'll agree w/ the "different" argument. My first saddle was a Fizik Arione. It looked fast, cool and aggressive. Yeah, it was aggressive. Aggressive in how fast it caused me to go numb! Not to walk completely away from the Fizik's, I tried the Aliante next. Boy was that a comfortable saddle. But I could never get that dialed in; I still went numb.

I finally found bliss with the Specialized Toupe. Initial scorn of the big box "S" from Morgan Hill was soon turned to passionate zeal for their butt-friendly product. Once I got it dialed in, I knew I had found "my" saddle. Over the years I've tried a few different variations on the Toupe. The gel version was ok, but not as good as the original. Plus it weighs a bit more and that's a no-no. I've got enough padding on my rear end (but reasonable when you look at some of those larger behinds at our local crits...you know who you are).

The past two years I've been using the same black Toupe. It was with me pre-back injury and was a friend during my recovery and subsequent category upgrades. But I got a seven year itch this past week and wanted to try something different. I took the saddle off and realized that the rails were pretty beat up. The picture below might not do justice to just how bad they had bent. So much that the saddle could no longer rest flat on its' rails. Some of our local roads and races left a permanent mark on the ole' Toupe.

The silver paint on the plastic front had worn off. If you look close enough you can see just a bit of daylight underneath the bent rails. I hated to have this thought go through my mind, but this old horse needed to be put down. So what was I going to try instead? Another Toupe? Nah, let's see what new saddles might work...

A quick call to Bicycle Outfitters and I found out they had just received the latest Fizik saddle. The Antares hit the market a few months ago after being introduced at Interbike. The bright orange saddle stuck out like a sore thumb. Hopefully it would feel better than sitting on your own thumb.

The nose of the saddle is a tiny bit wider than the Toupe, but not too noticeable. I did notice, however, that when I would climb out of the saddle and then sit back down, the width of the saddle was a tad startling at first. Apparently my taint wasn't prepared to meet so much saddle when sitting down, but I soon got over this and it didn't bother me. And speaking of climbing, this saddle was very nice on the climbs. Very firm, with no noticeable flex. The flare of the saddle toward the rear makes it very comfortable to sit and spin up our longer climbs. No issues with going up.

However, things just didn't feel right when on the flats and in the drops. Maybe it was me being so used to the cutout of the Toupe that having a normal saddle just felt wrong. I could never really get comfortable, and knowing how much I like to just bite the bit and hammer in the drops, this was a non-negotiable for me. No way did I want a squased underside to hinder the hammering.

I ended up riding about 150 miles on the Antares. I probably could have ridden the saddle more and seen more positive changes to both my adaptation and that of the saddle from breaking in a bit more. But my old love the Toupe was calling. Not the busted friend that had been with me all these years, but a new Toupe to match the colors of the bike. Might I right the Antares? Sure, but it's in second place. My "boys" are sticking with the product made by the boys down at the big "S" shop.

Death by Salad

2009-04-02T13:09:00.000-07:00

At my place of employment, cafeteria services have been outsourced for a long time. So much so that people have been receiving on hell of a deal for their meals at the various cafeterias on our campus. One staple of my infrequent visits to the cafeteria has been the salad bar.

I work from home the majority of the week, so when I have the option to build out a fantastic salad, I jump at the opportunity. My two "go to" ingredients are the blue cheese crumbles and the fresh-off-the-grill bacon bits. Last week the bacon bits were still warm and glistening! Not technically veggies, they do serve their purpose in the whole scheme of my salad.

What you see in this picture is a large salad bowl. Not completely heaped up with veggies to the max, but a nice full bowl. This normally would have cost around $5.

Last week the prices changed and the salad bar would be charged at $0.40/ounce. I don't know much about ounces; besides all my bike components are weighed in grams. But I did receive one cautionary note from a peer earlier in the week. He gave me fair warning that the salad bar was THE most impacted cafeteria item from the price increases. Sure, it might be a bit more, but probably something reasonable.

What you see in this picture, besides a nice salad, is a meal that just cost me $9.93! Yes, almost ten dollars for a salad. I was blown away. In fact I was so enraged (but not so overly enraged that I didn't pay for it and walk away...) that I raised my voice at the checkout counter to let others know how much of a ripoff this meal had just become.

The cafeteria vendor has just taken a probably high margin item where they make a ton of money on anyways, and just jacked it up astronomically. What's even more sad is that this is the most healthy thing left in the cafeteria. They took away the fresh fruit, yogurt and cottage cheese...now they are charging an arm and a leg for the most healthy items remaining on the menu.

If people continue to eat there and realize that they have to change their eating habits due to the cost of food, you'll see the general population become unhealthy because the $4.25 cheeseburger and fries are the only reasonably priced option left on the menu.

This could be the last salad I eat at my employer for a very, very long time. Sad.

Snap, Crackle...Implode!

2009-04-01T15:28:00.000-07:00

A talking head on the local TV news broadcast mentioned how great the weather was going to be today. Nothing better than knowing that Mother Nature was going to cooperate and provide me with a great morning of riding. Unfortunately things didn't transpire as I had hoped.

Not often can I say that I've hit the wall when riding. Sure, there have been times when I have bonked, but that was over three years ago. I've got a pretty good handle on my nutritional needs when I get on the bike for long training rides. Today was different, it was all about the legs...or lack thereof.

Let's go back to yesterday. It was a long day of work and one heck of a workout on the training plan to do. Eight minute sets of thirty seconds at anaerobic pace (450+ watts) followed by thirty seconds of tempo (~250 watts); like washing your hair and rinsing'n'repeating, you continue this on/off sequence over the course of the eight minutes.

I did this three times on the slopes of Sierra Road. Don't ask me why I felt so inclined to do these on a hard climb, but it had been a few months since I last climbed that beast. The only saving grace was the ten minutes of rest between the sets. To make it just a little harder I decided that every other 450+ watt effort would be done out of the saddle.

On the slate early this morning (7am) was a long ride up OLH and West Alpine. Halfway up OLH I knew that the legs were pretty dead, but soldiered on with an OK effort. But the HR wouldn't get up and I knew things just weren't right. At the base of West Alpine things just felt wrong. I can usually fight through this when training, but today was different. The legs had imploded and there was nothing I could do. Just put the chain in the 25t and spin up the hill. Anything over 300 watts was out of the question.

I'd rather have this happen to me during a training ride than a race. Wishful thinking...

7 Years Ago

2009-03-27T15:50:00.001-07:00

Today is my oldest daughter's birthday. Her growth in all aspects of life has amazed me over the past year. Maybe it's the fact that she's in 1st grade and consistently surrounded by an environment of learning, but see that kind of enthusiasm for new things is contagious. Not contagious enough to make me take up triathlons, but fun to experience nonetheless.

Her biggest surprise of the day was a hand-me-down mountain bike. I lucked out that a fellow SJBC member had a daughter that had outgrown her old mountain bike. The bike was in great condition and I knew it would be something special for my own girl. After the shock and awe wore off we donned our helmets and hit the streets. 21-speeds are a bit daunting for a newly minted seven year-old, but she's getting the hang of it.

I know she's my daughter when I showed her the easy gears and she promptly replied, "Why would I want these? They're too easy." Perfect, my daughter wants to drop the hammer on the other kids in the neighborhood. Forget those knobby tires, this girl is getting slicks and latex tubes for Easter to reduce rolling resistance and to smoke her friends as they ride to school.

Busted Crank Photo

2009-03-19T15:00:00.000-07:00

Sometimes all you can do is smile when your hopes are squashed by a mechanical problem:

For more great photos from the Madera RR check out Veronika's website.

I'm cranky; payback is coming...Madera style!

2009-03-16T11:41:00.000-07:00

This was my first time racing in the Madera SR. I was looking forward to the TT as it would be a good test against some of the solid TT'ers in the district. On to the details:

Crit:
First race of the day and pretty uneventful. I was expecting a 50 minute race, but at the line the officials said 40 minutes. Works for me...more energy saved for the TT later in the day. Pre-race strategy for us was to just conserve and let things play out. I rode in the back half of the pack most of the time and watched as several attacks would go from time to time. The only thing of interest was how I got pushed wide in turn #3 and had to navigate the orange cones to get back on course (afterwards I was irritated that the guy next to me didn't hold his line through the corner and drifted wide). No attacks stuck and we all picked up the pace a bit with one lap remaining. Coming out of the last turn Chris was 3rd wheel and I knew he'd have a great result for the team.

TT:
My goal was to go sub-23 on this course. The head wind was pretty significant on the last half of the course. My 30" man was Chris Lyman (who ended up winning the TT with a mid-21 time); he was so fast that I didn't see him until later in the evening at the hotel.

I focused real hard on not going out too hard during the first 4 mile stretch of road before the first turn; this was my downfall at BtC and I didn't want to repeat that mistake. This goal was accomplished, but the road was bumpy enough that it was difficult to get into a solid rhythm.

With the wind at my back on the second leg I ramped it up a bit and averaged 31.5mph. By this time my HR was settling in around 175bpm and things were starting to hurt. Turning into the wind and onto the 3rd leg proved to be hard. In retrospect, having a little bit of headwind made it easier for me to put in a more constant effort, but the legs were dying a slow death. Watts were slowly creeping down...

Through the last turn and on to the finish. With 1km to go I buried myself and check the watch. I knew I'd break 23 minutes, but didn't know so by how much. I came across the line at 22:36, good for 8th on the GC.

RR:
At dinner Saturday night the rest of the team gave me some very sound advice given I was our top GC guy. Stay near the front, let Morgan Stanley and Specialized do all the hard work, and just try to maintain your GC position. This figured to be interesting...

We rolled out and I was in the top 10 for the first 10 miles. I noticed that those around me in the GC placings were riding either in front or immediately behind me. I figured it would be like this for the entire 68 miles.

As we made our first turn onto the bumpy section of road one of my large water bottles ejected from the seat tube cage. Luckily I had a spare bottle in my back jersey pocket for just this type of problem (again, another point of sage advice from the experienced teammates). The road was bad, then it got worse.

I have a new appreciation for those European classic one-day events. There is so much truth when you realize the fight for the front before the cobbles (or bad road in our case) is so important. Important in the sense that you can actually see what's coming in front of you and be prepared. I found myself slipping back a bit when we hit the bad road (which is fully closed, so you can use the entire road). I had to trust the wheels in front of me and that was not ideal. At least I could look over people and see what was coming.

About a third of the way through this nasty section a small group of 4-5 riders got a gap of 50 yards. Hernandez comes motoring by me on my left and for some reason I was really fascinated by his rear tire. Probably because it looked to be 30mm+ wide and under-inflated. Man, that would have been a comfortable tire to be on given the condition of the road.

Immediately after he goes by I put down a bit of power to get a free ride from him to the front. As I'm doing this I notice a little play in my left cleat. Uh-oh! It's the same feeling I had in the cleat when I was climbing Mt. Figueroa at training camp. At camp I had to dismount and tighten the cleat. It didn't feel as bad, so I thought maybe I'd get lucky and make it around the course without having to stop.

No sooner had I finished that thought and something else went wrong! My chain suddenly shifted from the big to small front chainring. I tried to slam it back into the big ring and it wouldn't go. This wouldn't be good if I had to small ring it the rest of the day.

At this point I have a loose cleat, a bike that can't shift into the big ring. I'll survive.

I went to double check on the loose cleat just to see if I could unclip. This is where disaster struck. As I'm twisting my foot out of the pedal, the entire left crank arm disengages from the bottom bracket and comes off the bike! Now I have a broken crank, I've just lost contact with the pack, and my 8th place on the GC just went up in smoke. Oh how I rue you Madera RR.

Standing at the side of the road with my crank arm in my hands was not the site I imagined earlier in the morning. I was completely at a loss for what had just happened. I've never heard of something like this happening to anybody...ever! I'll admit it was pretty amusing, yet frustrating.

To make matters worse, here come the E4's down the road. Some unattached guy in a black kit leading the pack yells to me, "Hey, go pick up the bottle back in the road." Really?!? Do you not see the crank arm in my hand? I felt like hucking it like a boomerang up against his head. That was not what I wanted to hear from him.

So after that group passed I got back on the broken steed and pedaled one-legged all the way back to the finish line, through the feed zone (got applause from the crowd) and back to the car.

Madera will have a big target on its' back next year. I will go sub-22 at the TT and be prepared to get top 5. You can count on it!

Menlo Park Crit Race Report

2009-03-11T10:41:00.000-07:00

The legs were pretty tired from doing the TT yesterday, but I wanted to get in this crit before next weekend's fun at Madera. Being my first crit of the year I was expecting this to be a really fast race. I line up and behind me are BJM and Holloway. Nothing like doing my first 1/2/3 crit and having these guys on my heels.

Things started out fast and pretty smooth. However, the new left/right corner sequence on the back kept being taken too slow. From my position in the back it looked like those in the front were able to take it faster since they were strung out, but towards the back we constantly were slowing down and then re-accelerating. That got old real quick.

My lungs felt fine, but the legs were pretty dead. I hung out at the back and wondered just how long I could hang at these speeds (we averaged around 28+mph for the race). I forced myself to get real low and aero to get any draft benefit available from the wheel in front of me.

With 5 laps to go and heading across the start/finish, I feel the rear wheel getting a little loose. I had to slow down and take corner #1 slow and by the time I hit corner #2 the rear was completely flat. I found a spot on the course where I could cut across a parking lot and get back to the start/finish area and the neutral wheel support. I hopped over the barriers and ran the next 50 yards across the start/finish line down to the wheel support area. I wasn't expecting to work on my CX skills, but I was running like a gazelle with my bike over my shoulder.

Thankfully my sprint to the pits gave me plenty of time to get a new rear. I wasn't able to get in the gear I wanted when I hopped back onto the tail of the group, but I quickly latched back on. With only a few laps to go and nothing really left in the tank, I found an opportunity to get to the front with 3 laps to go.

Coming out of the last turn there was a brief lull and I shot up the right side and slotted in 3rd wheel behind Joel Robertson (I think) and a Team Oakland rider. Both pulled off and I went into TT mode. Down through the start/finish, around turns #1 & #2, and still going on the back straight. I pulled off halfway down the straight and knew that the end was near. As the group begins to pass I hear Nevitt yell over to me, "You went too early". I didn't say anything, but knew that I had to do something w/ only fumes in the tank.

After that it was a slow death march off the back with a couple of other riders. We ended up being pulled with 1 lap to go and I promptly found a spot to watch the finish in the wheel pit. Holloway laid down a nasty sprint to easily take the win by a few bike lengths.

I have to say the speed of this race was a wake up call to me. I knew it would be fast, but had no idea that it would be this fast! Boy that was fun; completely different than any 35+ cat 4 crit I did last year. The faster speed definitely felt safer. Hopefully the body will be better prepped after this weekend of racing for the upcoming Madera stage race.

Berkeley 2-man TT

2009-03-08T15:44:00.000-07:00

Place: 5th
Category: 70+
Field Size: 32 teams
Conditions: Cool, Sunny & No Wind
Team Mates: Clark Foy

Photos:
Team
Clark
Me

Race Report:
Clark and I were really looking forward to this year's 2-man time trial. Leading up to the event we had ventured up to the course to scout it out and see it first hand. Clark knew it well from doing this event before (and the Berkeley RR which runs on the same loop), but I was a rookie. It helped to see it before the race and get somewhat familiar with the climbs, descents and corners. We also teamed up at BtC last weekend to get some 2-man TT practice.

We arrived early with plenty of time to get in a nice hour warm-up. Almost too early as we definitely didn't feel rushed. However, as we were pinning on our numbers we quickly realized that our start time was approaching faster than either of us had thought and if we didn't hustle we'd miss our start time. The parking lot is about a mile away from the start line. We hopped on the bikes and booked! We came to the line with only a minute to spare; the benefit being we were plenty warmed up for the TT effort.

Our strategy was to take 30 second pulls and adjust accordingly if one of us was feeling too spent. It also made sense to maximize my gravity-friendly abilities on the descents and have Clark pace us up the climbs. Darn gravity, it works both ways.

Off we start and settle into a nice pace. We quickly pass two teams in front of us and make it through the minimal rollers without much trouble. At this point my HR is pegged right around 171 and the legs were getting over the initial shock to the system. We hit our first downhill and Clark pulls over to let me through. I made sure not to hit the gas too hard until I knew he was safely tucked on my wheel. Over the next two minutes we bombed down the hill at peaking at 46mph and averaging 38.4mph. Through the first right hand turn on to Castro Ranch and up next is our first climb.

A punchy climb sees Clark lead us up and over. We soon realized that it made the most sense for Clark to pull us over the top and through the initial portions of the following descents to allow me a bit more of recovery. Then I'd swing around and pull the rest of the way down the hill. We did this on the next descent and continued to do so over the rest of the course.

With a third of the course behind us and a screaming descent down to Alhambra, we sweep through the next turn doing 30mph. This is where things really started to hurt. The pavement is not great and the gradually ascending rollers make it very hard to find the right pace. Other than the upcoming Mama and Papa Bear climbs, this to me was the hardest part of the TT. It was difficult to keep consistent power to the pedals and some of the jarring potholes in the road weren't kind to the undercarriage.

Mama Bear was up next. I soon started to utter my new "favorite" word to Clark..."off". I didn't want to blow on this climb and I had to call up to him to ramp it back just a bit. Even still I was climbing these about 8% above threshold (this should give you an idea of what it's like to stick on Clark's wheel going uphill). Both Mama and Papa Bear are climbs where you can see the summit from the bottom of the hill, and these summits just never seem to come soon enough.

Down the backside of Mama, over another little hill and on to the descent to Papa Bear. We come bombing down and carry ourselves a fair ways up the hill due to our speed. Clark gets to his usual position in front of me with myself chattering "off" every once in a while. I do have to say Clark's positive vocal encouragement was a great help as we climbed this last hill.

We crest and bomb down the last short descent to the finish line. No rest for the tired as we gave all we had to cross together. My data shows that my HR averaged 175 for the last 5 minutes of the course. We clocked through at 40:52.5. The goal was sub-40, but we were pretty happy with the effort.

At the results table we found out that our Morgan Stanley friends of Phipps/Dyrwal had beat us out for 4th by 1.5 seconds. A sting of agony, but our tanks were empty and the clock doesn't lie. Overall the strength displayed in the category was something to behold and those finishing above us read like a who's who of big TT guns. Next time we'll make sure we have more weapons on our belt.

Rest Day Observations

2009-03-02T13:55:00.001-08:00

The cycling season is kicking off in grand fashion and with that a new meaning has arrived for my normal Monday rest day. The wife has learned, and I totally support this as I know how much time I spend on the bike throughout the rest of the week and how it can be impacting on the family, that Monday's are a great time for me to take advantage of getting all those little things around the house done (I'll let her take advantage of me too...).

For example, between conference calls today the needs of the master bathroom toilet needed to be addressed. A small leak which I likened to a babbling stream had developed from the toilet. This lulled me to sleep at night, but it wasn't the case for the wife. In the pursuit of a peaceful home, I did a little googling on the subject and was quickly armed with fix-it information. In a matter of ten minutes I was a plumbing god and back in the good graces of the family. Thank you Denver Water for the help.

Over the course of the next several Monday's I'm sure my to-do list will blossom like a spring almond tree on the Merco RR course. Not a bad idea to brush up on the handyman skills in this economy too.

Bow Down to the God of Watts

2009-02-21T07:08:00.000-08:00

For you TT geeks and powermeter freaks (I'm both), I was amazed at reading this:

http://www.velonews.com/article/88344/gustav-larsson-s-third-place-power-data-from-the-solvang

The ability of this guy to hold this amount of power in the TT position is amazing. I checked my power file from the last SJBC WS ITT and for the same duration of the race I was only able to hold 411 watts. Larssen was 70+ watts stronger (486 avg watts) and 30 pounds lighter (170 pounds). Scary!

More details here:

http://www.trainingpeaks.com/sw/R2NO7JUZSERODM4RZYGX2Z4YRE

Me & Ballard Canyon

2009-02-20T11:01:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago our race team spent a great weekend down in Solvang. On one of our rides we came down from Los Olivos to Solvang via the last half of the ToC TT course on Ballard Canyon Road. For me this part of the ride came after doing repeats up Mt. Figueroa so I was able to enjoy the scenery of the canyon and the various vines in the fields.

Riding down this road I couldn't help and think what it would be like on a TT bike. I'm really interested to see how the riders take the short descent after the small hill at the northern most part of the road. When I came down the descent on the road bike I had to shave off a bit of speed on the sweeping left hander since there was plenty of gravel in the roade. If the pros can take this corner at speed and in the drops then I'll be amazed.

The rest of Ballard is like a TT'ers dream. Slightly downhill with plenty of opportunity to get some serious speed built up. The pavement is ok, but if they put down fresh tarmac it would be unreal! Something like a 55x11 combo would be perfect if there's no headwind. Anyway, coverage on cycling.tv starts here in the next hour so let the fun begin.

Cantua Creek RR M35+ 1/2/3 Report

2009-02-15T07:53:00.000-08:00

I was really looking forward to this race as I had a win here last year (different category) and was stoked to race with my teammates. We had a small group, but it got more interesting at the start line as the officials decided to add the four P/1/2 guys (their results picked separately) into our group since their numbers were so low.

Initially I thought about attacking on the beginning descents from the start/finish line, but I waited until we crossed over the first I-5 overpass. I took off and got a nice little gap. No one was attempting to come across so I decided to back off the pace. A few minutes later I was back in the pack chatting with teammates. No other riders/teams were attacking, so I just sat in and noticed how strong one particular P/1/2 guy was (Kevin Klein). If you don't know Kevin, he raced last year with Rock Racing. More on his antics later...

After the first turnaround there was a slight slowing of the group and I attacked again. This time a couple of guys jumped on my wheel. We ended up having 5 guys (including Klein) in the group. But for some reason these other guys couldn't figure out that we needed to paceline to stay away. I guess they had forgotten this skill over the winter. Klein was real pissed at a few of them for not getting their act together...nothing like having a pro berate you!

As we got caught Matt took a flyer. I stayed at the front and kept the pace reasonable so it would give him a chance to get away. As folks came around me to pick up the pace I stayed in the top 10 to keep an eye on things. Matt was able to extend his break and was up the road for a long time.

We hit the hill pretty hard and got mixed up with the 3's. Matt was caught too as we sped up the hill. On the descent things were pushed because we wanted to get separated from the 3's. Some AV/Webcor guy was riding next to me from the 3's so I told him to get his butt to the back. I'm sure he didn't like me telling him this because he sure was enjoying his free ride with our group.

Back on the flats I attack again. My other attacks were at 90%, but this was 100%. I figured it was going to be guts or glory. I knew somebody was on my wheel, but not sure who or how many. After about a minute of pain I feel a tap on my hip and it's Klein! I'm gassed, so I can't tell how many people are in our break. Klein rotates through, then a few others, then Daryl and Matt. Damn, we've got 3 guys in the break of 9. Sweet! We pushed it real hard for the next 30 minutes to make the break stick. When you have a pro in your group you gain a new appreciation for their strength and speed. On several occasions Klein would give menacing looks to people who weren't pulling hard enough. Thankfully I didn't receive any of those glances.

With about 3 miles to go Klein attacks the field, and Matt jumps on his wheel. I was at the front of the pack hoping nobody was going to chase. Knowing how strong Klein was riding I wanted him to drag Matt to the finish line for the win. Matt looked back at me and I mouthed, "GO, GO!!!". I don't know if he could interpret what I was saying, but a few seconds later our pack decided to shut it down.

At this point Klein was feeling frisky so we just let him roll off the front and get his P/1/2 win. I had to laugh because one of our breakmates didn't realize who he was and he was killing himself to stick with him. Back in our pack it worked out that Matt and I were on the front as we hit the hill. I was feeling pretty fried but knew that I had enough to put some hurt on the pack for some part of the climb. I hit the first hill hard and the second hill harder. On the short descent people slowed so I hit them again.

As we hit the final hill I blew, and so did my chain! Poetic justice having my chain drop as I physically blew up. I got things fixed and noticed that Matt was dropped. We rode together up the final hill hoping that things had gone well for Daryl up the road. We crossed the line together.

I was more gassed than I thought I'd be for the race. Our break stuck, I attacked enough to probably be labeled "crazy" or "stupid" by some (not that I care), got a top 10 result and I had a great time with my teammates. For you powermeter geeks, my normalized power for 2 hours of racing was 334 watts.

Adrenaline Rush

2009-02-09T17:07:00.001-08:00

As a kid and throughout college when it was game time, my palms would get damp and I knew it was game time. With cycling I don't get that same reaction, but something that I would rate as more powerful. ADRENALINE!!!

This usually happens on the start line, but it's become more of a frequent thing when I start looking at upcoming races and registered athletes on Sportsbaseonline.com. I'll begin by looking through the different categories and the come to my own. Browsing through the riders gives me a sense of what's to come, how different tactics might play out and whether or not the race is going to hurt...or REALLY hurt.

My mind gets wrapped up with all these details and triggers off a massive does of adrenaline into my system. I feel like I've just ingested ten espresso shots via an IV! My mind starts to race, fingers want to freak out on the keyboard, and the butterflies start a mass migration through my veins. Pretty cool if you ask me but it freaked me out the first time it happened a couple of years ago. Good to know it still happens even when I'm just browsing around at my non-priority races for the spring.

Valentine's Love, aka Cantua

2009-02-09T09:59:00.000-08:00

I don't know how I scored on this, but I actually will be racing at Cantua on Valentine's Day. I'm sure it helped in the discussions with the home social coordinator that I won my category last year and I had to at least see how I would fare this year. Nothing like kicking off the racing season with other 35+ 1/2/3's who want to kick your teeth in while your nose is catching the savory fragrances of Harris Ranch.

It is true that the SJ crit is going on locally, but don't get me started on that whole thread. Others have said enough around the promotor jacking up the reg fees and such. I actually won't be around SJ next weekend and the trip down to Cantua from my in-laws is actually just as close. And, I have more affection for Cantua than I do for a downtown crit at this moment.

So what's in store for the RR? Well, it currently looks like a relatively small field made up of SJBC, Morgan Stanley and AIAGE (not sure who they are...). Some friends from other teams are in the field as well so at least there will be some nice pleasantries over coffee and crumpets as we roll down the starting descent.

Now for the weather, last year was perfect. Sunny and chilly at the start but it soon warmed up and became a perfect day. I've got a feeling in my gut Saturday will be quite a bit different. Anybody showing up with a new kit that has white on it will probably want to bring along some Spray'n'Wash just in case they want to keep that jersey looking minty clean for the rest of the season. As for me, I don't mind my race kits getting a little dirty and grimy as the season progresses. It reminds me of the races and good times (or bad depending on the situation).

Comcast, You're Killing Me!

2009-02-04T10:27:00.000-08:00

All I want to do is cancel my cable service and keep my business-class internet service. I've been transferred four times and then I was told I would have to call a different number because they couldn't help me. I call the number and find out that the person I'm dealing with is only taking my info down to create the initial "request" and that somebody will call me back to continue with the request.

C'mon Comcast, how hard is it to turn off my cable?!? Really!

Conchords

2009-01-30T05:50:00.000-08:00

You've probably seen Flight of the Conchords at some point singing about business time.

Not sure if you've even seen the socks, but they're legit.

I knew these guys were funny, but only recently have I discovered their show on HBO. Move over YouTube, I've got some episodes that need watching.

SJBC Winter Series Final ITT Race Report

2009-01-18T20:17:00.000-08:00

Got in a moderate warmup and would have like something longer. I didn't have any significant expectations coming into this event as the last ITT back in late October my powertap was on the fritz. I didn't know if my power would be anything close to what I did at San Bruno or if it might be compromised due to the aero position.

Out of the blocks I wanted to slowly get up to my target watts, but not too fast. I thought hitting 370 would be a good target, so I tried to throttle it back to around 350 for the first couple of minutes. For some reason I just wanted to go faster. The data supports this as I ended up averaging 382 watts down Santa Teresa.

When I turned onto Willow Springs my 30 second man (Daryl) in front of me was only about 12 seconds ahead. He's a lightweight climber so I figured I wouldn't catch him on the hill. Counter to when I did this race last and stayed at my threshold on the climb, today I decided to hit the climb harder. I averaged 446 watts on the climb and almost caught Daryl. I sped past him on the technical descent and motored away.

Once on Oak Glen/McKean I kicked it up a gear and decided to see what was in the tank. I went flying by John Christensen with such speed and so close to him that I actually apologized after the race for the potential scare. 402 watts leading up to the last climb.

Somehow I was able to hold 402 up the climb and then flew down the hill past the Cinnibar Golf Club entrance. Thankfully the truck at the entrance decided to let me pass first as I was doing around 43mph!!!

Crazy yet I was still averaging around 402 on the rest of McKean and then onto the slight rise on Bailey just before the downhill section. I had to scrub off about 5mph coming into the first corner, but quickly got that back upon a smooth exit from the apex.

Through the last downhill corner and back up to 43mph! The final two minutes hurt like hell. Tunnel vision was kicking in and I was finding it hard to concentrate on anything past 20 feet in front of me. Luckily I had ridden this stretch of road yesterday so I knew there wasn't any obstructions in the road.

Holding 528 watts for the last two minutes hurt oh so good. Why? Because I had just squeaked in at 37:57! My goal for 2009 was to crack the 38 minute mark and I had done it. It also puts me in some cool company with other strong TT guys who have done sub-38 times on the same ITT course over the past eleven years (35:29 is the record by Clint Graver in 2002).

All told I was really surprised I was able to hold this kind of power in the aero position. Sub-38 minutes of work at a normalized power of 406 (average was 397) feels pretty satisfying.

Yeah for Brooke

2009-01-16T10:25:00.000-08:00

I tried to leave a comment for Brooke on her latest post, but no luck. I just wanted to say that I too had Lasik almost 9 years ago with the same doctor and my vision has been outstanding ever since! You'll do great and the outcome is amazing.

Sweet Sweat

2009-01-15T15:57:00.001-08:00

During these winter months...

Ok, who am I trying to kid with this intro. Norcal is having a great warm spell and the summer cycling gear is in full effect. However, suspend your beliefs in reality and allow me to some freedom of written expression.

During these winter months there comes a time when I realize that one of my key feedback mechanisms decides to hibernate like a groundhog. I'm talking about sweat. The salty stuff that tastes oh so refreshing when you lick your upper lip after spending three hours in the saddle tackling climbs up and down the Santa Cruz mountains. It's a welcome reminder of all the hard work you just.

But during the winter I find that sweating is one of the first things to go (along with helmet hair since I almost always wear some sort of cap). With this recent warm spell of weather it was nice to see how my body hadn't forgotten to sweat. While in the middle of an eight minute threshold interval on the TT bike I somehow was distracted enough to glance down at my right wrist and notice a small pool of liquid work. With the position of my forearms and hands, this part of my wrist was just basking in the sun and creating a nice little pool of sweat. Ok, this is a bit extreme in describing what I saw, but it was mesmorizing, really.

In a week or so I'm sure the weather will change and sweat will be a thing of the past. It's cherising those little things that get you through those hard intervals that make you want to hurl.

2009 Beat the Clock TT Schedule

2009-01-10T07:27:00.000-08:00

I was excited to see that the 2009 Beat the Clock TT series now has their schedule published for the year. I've been wanting to do this for a while but haven't made the effort. Now I'm motivated and might actually do the race solo and as part of a 2-man group for some additional practice.

If you have a passion for doing TT's head on up and do these as they support a great cause (Lance Armstrong Foundation).

A very troubling dream about a missed TT start

2009-01-08T07:13:00.000-08:00

I just awoke from a dream that was real enough that it caused me to wake up at 6:57am this morning and be very thankful it was just a dream and nothing more. Here it is...

It's a nice warm spring morning in Northern California as I'm heading to a small town somewhere in the Central Valley for a Velopromo individual time trial (ITT) event. Having never done this ITT in the past I didn't know what I was in for, but I was excited nonetheless.

Upon getting closer to the town it became evident that a rather large new office park was receiving its finishing touches a few miles down the road. This office park was the jewel of the community. So much so it was easy to see as you got closer to the outskirts of town. As I got closer my directions to the start led me into this office park.

Hmm, not your typical location for a Velopromo event, but hey, I'm always game for something new. However, something didn't feel right about this event. I pulled up to the registration tent and the normal hustle and bustle that I normally see at races was absent. In fact the only people around were a few of the guys setting up barriers and tables.

I asked what was going on, but I never got an explanation. Was I here on the wrong day? Did I miss the start? Were they tearing down the course because the race was over? I was puzzled at the lack of information they shared with me. But they did point me to a dirt parking lot about a quarter mile away where I could park.

It seemed bizarre that nobody was there to race, but they didn't say that I wouldn't get to race, so I continued to unload the bike. I realized that I hadn't picked up my number from registration so I casually rolled over to the start in my street clothes and flip-flops. Upon getting back to registration I see two other riders at the start receiving their countdowns and rolling out on the course.

The race officials and Velopromo people see me and immediately begin telling me, ok, yelling at me, that I have 15 seconds before I have to start. WTF?!? When did my start time move up two hours? All alarms in my head went off and I immediately went into panic mode. No shoes, no skinsuit, no warm up...nothing!

My panic led to some crazy behavior. I started to yell at all the people near the start as I stripped down my clothing. Yes, I was going to race this ITT in my boxers and flip-flops, but only after turning the air blue with my immense displeasure of all things leading up to this situation. Rarely do I ever get this enraged and pissed off, but I was in fine form. I even began talking about myself and how irate I was in the third person ("Don't piss off this big guy any more or he'll....").

Right before starting the race I woke up.

I don't think having a cup of coffee will wake me up any more than I already am at this point. Getting jacked up in the morning off crazy dreams is not my idea of fun, but at least it reinforced one fear of mine. Show up on the right day for an ITT and give yourself plenty of time to warm up.

This looks interesting

2009-01-07T06:32:00.001-08:00

I woke up and saw this article sitting in front of me as I scanned the headlines. Interesting to see how Satyam is owning up to cooking their own books. If this goes down as the Indian version of Enron, I could see some big changes in how major corporations look at outsourcing IT tasks to foreign companies. Sure, optimization and cost efficiencies are welcomed by anybody in the corporate world, but on the moral side I can't see the justification in giving business to a company like this.

WebEx & the iPhone

2009-01-06T15:56:00.000-08:00

I just found out about this and am going to give it a shot since I'm a heavy WebEx user.

I tried to get the video to be embedded here, but the link didn't work...oh well.

San Bruno Hill Climb Race Report

2009-01-01T15:10:00.000-08:00

Category: Elite 3
Field Size: 20
Conditions: Cold, some winds, and a fog that got worse as you climbed higher

What better than a hill climb to kick off the new year?!? Ok, there probably are better things to do, but doing this the past two years how could I not do it again this year. My strategy was to race in the 3's to see if I could gain any BAT points for placing in the top 10 and to follow moves until I blew up.

Today wasn't a day for pacing. The goal was to go hard, find some strong wheels to follow and forget about going over my threshold. I was able to get a good warm-up in and things were going fine until I started to get ready for the start. A weird rattle was coming from my right shoe. I checked all the screws on the cleats and no luck. I got back on the bike to see if the cleat was loose, but it was solid. I double checked the cleat again and found that the rattle was coming from the end of the toe area. After playing around with my bootie I had an interesting surprise; a shiny new quarter fell out of my shoe! Whew, finding the source of the rattle was a relief, but losing 0.25 grams was a joy...no need to take change for the park entrance with me.

At the start the 3's were immediately in front of the M35+ 1/2/3's. Seeing those fast guys on my tail was actually a good thing. I knew they were planning to make a big effort to work themselves around the pack and get to the front. They'd be my ticket to get up there too. The whistle blew and we were off. Sure enough the leaders in the 35's came around (Chris Phipps, Tim Clark, Kevin Metcalfe, Michael Hernandez) and I latched on. Soon we were a lead group of around 30 riders and going strong, real strong. There was some draft available at the back of the pack, but not much. I was able to hang with this lead group for about the first 40% of the race (definitely a mental victory). There were some surges at the front and that caused me to fall off the back. Plenty of others fell off too.

I felt pretty good and clicked into the big ring as the road flattened out. Past the park ranger station and into the trees. I went to downshift and dropped my chain. I lost about 15 seconds due to this, but eventually caught back up with those next to me prior to the dropped chain within the next 3 minutes of climbing.

As the road pitched up and the fog got thicker it was difficult to know what was coming up. I knew where the finish line was and anticipated when I needed to turn it on. Kicking up the watts I crossed the line with a very respectable time of 17:27 (unofficial from my computer).

I was happy with my effort. 50+ seconds faster than last year and I was able to hold 415 watts. I won't know if I succeeded in placing in the top 10 for the 3's but just doing better than last year is reward enough. It was also nice to see a great turnout of SJBC racers and the success they had across the other categories.

Year-end Totals

2008-12-30T08:19:00.000-08:00

With no significant bike riding on the calendar for the rest of the year it's time to reflect. I'll keep this short and sweet:

8,754 miles
417,435 kJ burned
532 hours in the saddle

Sitting on my butt and having an extra serving of food seems in order.

Old La Honda...my new friend

2008-12-28T07:46:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was the first of a 3-day training camp. Our ride took us around the Woodside area and north along Canada Road for about 2 hours. Then it was time to do some repeat climbs up Old La Honda (OLH). Those of you in the area know it's pretty much the baseline climb used by folks in this area to test their climbing ability.

The goal yesterday was to ride OLH three times, with each successive climb being faster than the previous attempt. This sounded easy, but it takes focus to restrain yourself at times when climbing. The first time up I stuck it in the 25t and managed to make it up in 25:47 (average HR was 152). After descending on Hwy 84 and toodling back to OLH, I hit it again. This time I did it in the 23t and proceeded to clock in at 23:40. Now on to the real fun...

I don't usually do repeats on the same climb during my training rides, but now I was becoming much more familiar with the climb since I had done it twice in the past hour. I knew that I could easily go faster on my third attempt as I remembered areas where I could downshift and gain some valuable time/speed.

On the third and final attempt I stuck it in the 21t and proceeded to hammer away. After about five minutes the HR settled in around 172 and I was averaging 390 watts. Things were hurting but I figured since I had never climbed OLH for time I might as well trudge on and see what would happen.

As I neared the top my HR was around 181 and the finish line was in sight. One of my goals for 2009 is to break 20 minutes on this climb. I clocked in at 19:17! A victory for all tall and lanky cyclists who can't climb. Scary to think this was with my heavy training wheels, a saddle bag full of stuff and it being my third time up the climb.

With the San Brutal (Bruno) hill climb coming up on New Years Day I'd say I'm ready for this race. Not that I'll be winning because that's probably unrealistic, but I should be able to set a new personal best on that climb which will be a personal win in its' own right for myself.

Getting Twitter-faced

2008-12-24T12:26:00.000-08:00

After a pretty long absence in doing anything on my Twitter page I decided that I needed to put some of my new techno-gadgets to use and see if some better solution was out there. Indeed, there's plenty out there.

A few minutes later after my deep, deep dive into the research articles and materials around Twitter products, I ended up putting Twitterific on my iPhone. Playing around with it is easy and I really like the photo capabilities. Now if I can get my Facebook account to get sync'd up properly I'll be in cyberspace nirvana.

Time Trials on the 2009 NorCal Calendar

2008-12-23T14:06:00.000-08:00

I'm pretty excited to see the upcoming NorCal schedule of races. Last year the time trail bug bit me but it wasn't until the end of the season that I actually did something about it. Looking around the garage it was apparent that enough spare parts were sitting around and gathering dust. Spare parts must live on somehow, so putting them together on a TT frame made the most sense.

Now with the dedicated TT bike in the garage it's time to look forward. I rode the Exeter TT in Visalia last year and really enjoyed that race. However, it's not on the 2009 calendar. I really wanted to see how I would do this year on a TT bike versus the road bike in 2008 with the clip-on aerobars. Hopefully it will come back on the calendar in 2010 (man, that sounds like a long way away...).

Some of the other events on the calendar look interesting. The Altamont team TT should be a blast. Take one part Wente RR and two parts Patterson Pass RR and you've got the makings of a fun day of threshold riding on Altamont Road. It will be an out'n'back on the road, and when I road back from the in-laws in Discovery Bay to San Jose via Altamont Road I was caught off guard. On both the RR's it's so nice because the wind is usually at your back and it makes the climb and descents pretty easy. However, coming from the Tracy side back towards Livermore with the wind in your face will make for a harder death march for the TT teams. After riding the road I think Santa needs to deliver me a 55t large chainring.

Most of the other TT's look to be the same from last year. Hopefully these events continue to stay on the calendar going forward because I want to eventually chart progress from year to year as I continue to do more TT's.

Holiday Party Space Invaders

2008-12-16T09:40:00.001-08:00

'Tis the season of finding your weekend evenings being completely booked with parties. Sure, the economy has put a damper on those corporate parties. But that's fine with me as I never really found them to be too much fun, except for people watching as you see the drunk intern hooking up with the recently divorced Director of Operations. However, I will give credit to a former employer for allowing me to win a Playstation 2 at a holiday party.

With this change in the holiday party landscape, it's still with a sigh of "Ok, I guess I'll come along" that there are still individuals throwing their own parties. Don't get me wrong, some are great and I really look forward to them, but others are dull to the point I'd rather just sit in the corner and play with my iPhone. And to those hosts of the boring parties, trust me, your "interesting" guests don't really get more interesting if you pump more booze into them. I'll still think their boring and bordering on the edge of stupid as they zoom past the 0.08 blood alcohol limit.

Maybe you've encountered this species of people at parties. For some reason they like to come out most during this time of year. They are the Space Invaders. This type of human form of the classic Atari game aren't easily detected when they walk in the room. They look just like any other party-goer; however, you quickly will learn young Jedi. As you engage them in conversation they slowly move closer, closer, and closer into your own personal space. Next thing you know you start to feel uncomfortable for no apparent reason other than this space invader who's now ten inches away from your face.

I don't know about you, but I need my space. Good thing I'm tall and it's usually not an issue, but when you're sitting on a bar stool the playing field gets leveled in a hurry. Those space invaders zoom right in and don't even give me room to stand up.

There has to be some common characteristics for people like this. At least I've got plenty of holiday opportunities at parties to try and find the genetic defect that causes humans to mutate into these space invaders.

Recovery and the Fish Ladder

2008-12-03T15:39:00.000-08:00

There are times when I ride the same route and discover something new. These discoveries are great! The changing color of the leaves, smell of new rain in the air, sounds of birds and darting ground rodents.

Yesterday I discovered something new. I routinely ride Hicks Road and most of the time I'm not paying too much attention to the surroundings. Yesterday was the plan was to do an easy recovery ride up Hicks. Mind you, I turn around before any tough climbing.

I decided to ride really, really slow. Upon doing this I discovered a newly installed fish ladder. I grew up near Portland and would routinely visit Bonneville dam. The fish ladder there is an engineering marvel. I'd post a picture of it, but it probably would crash your browser. Anyway, this new fish ladder was spanking new. No algae or other obstacles yet on the ladder. But where are the fish?

I remember overhearing a conversation a few weeks ago from somebody in the know about the local fish scene. Apparently fish were going to be making a comeback to some of the local streams. Don't know the specifics, but here's my social theory spin on it...since all the 'cougars' are hanging out at bars in Los Gatos and not catching fish in real streams, the fish have a chance to make a roaring comeback. Fish are no longer 'cougar' bait.

That was a stretch, but it made me laugh. And that matters a hell of a lot more than if you laughed or not.

I thought her 15 minute of fame were over...

2008-11-21T23:20:00.000-08:00

Boy, is this interesting:

Bleeding Edge

2008-11-18T14:23:00.001-08:00

Just got the good news that my new Edge fork is at the shop and ready for me. So long you heavy old Alpha Q fork! This should drop almost a quarter pound off the bike and from what I've heard it will improve all handling aspects of the ride. Ride reports to follow...

These don't fit

2008-11-12T16:30:00.000-08:00

Being tall has some advantages, but shopping for clothes is not one of them. In fact, it's become harder over the past several years as I've lost weight. Many folks think that if you produce a line of clothing for "big & tall" clients that these two terms are inter-connected. In fact, these need to be re-examined.

It needs to be understood that "Tall" crosses many waistband boundaries. Some tall people are thin, some are fat. But here's the crux...I apparently needs to have a 36" waist to be sized in many tall cuts of pants. The problem is I have a 34" waist, so I have to hunt around to find what I need.

I recently found that the Gap brands (Gap, Banana Republic, Old Navy) have smaller waist sizes with a 36" inseam on the pant. This length will do, but a 38" would be perfect. So I have to do the next best thing which is to be diligent and not shrink the pants in the dryer. Hanging drying baby, right next to all the cycling gear.

And another interesting thing to note. You can't buy these tall sizes in the store. Online only.

Gap must have waistband amnesia. I received a pair of 34" waist khaki's that fit great. The next pair of pants in the shipment was also a 34", but a different type of pant and cut. These didn't fit; in fact, I think they were sized to fit 32" waist (the tag said 34"). I wear enough tight fitting cycling gear to feel comfortable in my own skin, but these pants were way too tight. They're getting returned the next time I get back to a Gap store.

Prop 8 - What about love?!?

2008-11-11T15:29:00.000-08:00

I don't watch Keith Olbermann much (used to when he was on ESPN's Sportcenter), but a friend of mine sent this my way. Take your opinions, set them aside, and watch with an open mind and soul:

Sierra Road in the Fall

2008-11-06T14:03:00.001-08:00

It has been over six months since I climbed up this hill. The day was so beautiful I thought I'd share some pictures from the ride:

Engine Work

2008-11-02T08:16:00.000-08:00

After enough time around cycling you realized that there's no further purpose to trying to find the latest and greatest to put on your bike. Shaving weight can only go so far...go too far and you're riding around on a fragile death rocket. Luckily I've stayed away from these temptations (mostly) and have a garage of bikes that are durable enough for my size.

I feel like I've reached an almost nirvana-like place. No more do I feel the need to read through the latest catalogs that show up in the mail, looking for the latest and greatest component to purchase. Let's be realistic, will I really get a 30 second improvement riding up Highway 9 if I shave off 30 grams from the stem and seatpost? Probably not, but my checking account would certainly be lighter.

In this state of bliss I find myself thinking long and hard about what's next. The goals for 2009 are done, written and communicated to those who need to know. So where does one go next? Well, I'm going to the garage to work on the engine.

My "garage" are those roads that we commonly travel and train upon. There's a lot of work that's going to be done in the garage over the winter. The engine cylinders will be larger, intake manifolds doubled and perhaps a turbo thrown in for the hell of it. The garage door will be open and the engine will have to battle with whatever storms, wind and rain blows through. But when this engine is done and it's brought out into the late spring/early summer sun, I think it will be purring just like the Ferrari F1 engine pictured above.

Oprah Grills Marion Jones

2008-10-29T16:07:00.000-07:00

Today is the airing of the Oprah show where she sits down with Marion Jones who just got out of jail after serving a six month prison sentence. Here's my play-by-play calls of the interview as they happen. I've got it on Tivo so I can pause it while I spout off...

First off, where's the audience? It looks like they did this on a closed set. Marion, are you too scared to face the questions in front of others?
Geez, ladies, enough of the "You smell good...yes, you smell good too" comments!
Jones, you said you had days in prison where you felt "empowered". Empowered to clean laundry and make license plates? Your explanation of being in prison for "a reason" is interesting...do tell more.
I can tell you why you're in prison...you got caught doping and you lied.
Hmm, interesting to find out she can't vote. McCain, heads up, the corporate felons of America can't rally to save your election.
Marion didn't know what "the clear" was. Apparently it wasn't "introduced" to her as such. How was it introduced to you? Marion, try this new moisturizer, it has a nice fresh scent to it that will also make you run faster.
At the split second she decided to lie, Marion had a million thoughts running through her mind. Apparently none of them were causing her inner voice to say, "Hmm, telling the truth is probably the best option you've got lady."
"Infor-way-tion" - not familiar with this term Marion. Inform me, provide me more information.
You've got to be kidding me. Marion can't remember exactly what her coach called "the clear" when she received it. She knew it was a supplement, but doesn't remember the name of it.
Oh wait, Oprah, thanks for lending a hand and reminding Marion. Apparently it was flaxseed oil.
You take the pill containing "the clear" and put it under your tongue, leave it there, then swallow after a while.

The story of how Victor Conte saw Marion take the drug is different from Marion's version of the happenings
"Knowingly" - interesting to see how Marion hides behind this word to somehow justify her own actions.
31 minutes into the interview and we have it...the first tears
So who are the lucky people who got the bronze medals from those events...those athletes who came in 4th?
Ouch, her teammates had to give up their medals too. I'd be pissed if I were one of them.
...and Marion didn't specifically apologize to those teammates. The least she could have done was to say "I'm sorry" to them.
Ok, Oprah is giving Marion a chance to speak to the camera and apologize. Hmm, I'm not too impressed by Marion's lack of effort.
Lowest points - missing the birthdays of her children. I can sympathize with her on this point...it would be hard.
Apparently her stay at prison wasn't too harsh; she didn't have to watch her back for the lady with the home-made knife.
I'm perplexed. Marion says that when you took away the facade of "Marion Jones the athlete" she was ashamed, not as self-confident. She was having a hard time living up to the persona of who people thought she was.
So Marion, if you're energized by this "next chapter" of your life, I'm interested to see where this takes you. Do you know what it will be?
I actually take Marion's side while she's ready her letter. Pretty heart-felt stuff that brought a tear to my eye. Not as an athlete, but as a parent and knowing that you're missing out on watching your children grow.
Yo MC, Marion's a rapper, "I'm happy with the skin that I'm in." Throw in the human beat box!

So it's done. Interview complete. Interesting enough, but only time will tell what will happen next.

Hard Roller

2008-10-26T12:36:00.000-07:00

While I was rolling up to Henry Coe Park for the SJBC Winter Series hill climb, I missed Taylor rolling over for her first time. And so goes the innocence of her being stuck in one place and not moving. Life is about to get more interesting as her mobility catches up to that of her older sister and brother.

As for the bike ride I shaved 2+ minutes off my previous best. I only do this climb once a year (I really should do it more) and it happens that each year I improve by about the same margin. Like they say, you get faster but it still hurts. I'm sure this will be the case next year too.

Sightings of the Day

2008-10-24T16:55:00.000-07:00

There must have been a convention of domestic pros over in Los Gatos today. On my way over to my weekly flogging up Hwy 9 I came across somebody from the Bissell team (and yes, they did have their Pinarello too) and BMC. Not sure exactly who they were but you could tell they were enjoying the nice day. My best guess to their identity would be Ben Jaques-Maynes and Jackson Stewart. Had we all been riding in the same direction I'm sure they would have liked staying on my wheel in my vortex draft coming off my sweet big-guy rouleur profile.

Being Thin

2008-10-20T10:18:00.000-07:00

Over the past three years my body has gone through a pretty big transformation from being a basketball player to a cyclist. I've lost 40 pounds and most of my muscle from the upper regions of my body has trimmed way down. Plus I lost a bunch of fat and leaned up too. I actually weigh less than my collegiate playing days (better endurance too).

But I thought this picture was interesting to see. Amazing how thin a pro cyclist is when you strip away the jersey. I'm sure not everybody is like this on the pro tour. So to my friends out there who worry that I'm "wasting away", don't fret. I don't look like this.

Acts of Random Happiness

2008-10-20T09:07:00.000-07:00

Taylor is almost four months old and she's crossed over from being a docile infant to the realm of unexplained happiness. It used to take a bit of work to get her to smile, but now she's throwing out smiles like a politician wanting to shake every hand at a rally. It's a nice change as now I don't have to work hard making high-pitched baby sounds to get a reaction.

She also has the kung-fu leg kicks going too. Poor Tate and Logan may get one of these kicks straight to their heads if they're not paying attention. I fully expect this to happen to Tate as his luck with his head has been pretty low of late. First he accidentally closed the car door on his head (how does anybody do this?!? ... don't worry, the door was closing very slowly) then he ran into a chair at my in-laws dinner table. He takes life "head-on" apparently...

Pet Peeve - Earbuds

2008-10-18T08:34:00.001-07:00

I own one and I'm sure you probably do to. They're great to have and make things so, so much more convenient. Yeah, I'm talking about the iPod. Whether you've got the Nano, the iPod or the iPhone I do marvel in how it makes my library of 400+ CD's all come together so seamlessly.

But enough about my man-crush on this device. I'm peeved and here's why. I'm not a fan of these things being used by cyclists.

The other day I was climbing up Hwy 9 out of Saratoga and came passed a cyclist. As usual I gave him some words of encouragement and kept motoring along. Next up was another cyclist about 300 yards ahead.

Upon reaching her I gave her some encouragement as well, but it fell on deaf ears. Ok, not deaf, but ears that were being occupied by the iPod earbuds. So my kind words were not heard, and then when I passed, I get this incredulous look from the rider as if to say, "At least you could have said you were passing me?!?".

Come on! You had your iPod blasting who-knows-what into your cranium and you decide to give me that look and attitude?!?

So that's just my most recent experience. I actually have had teammates tell me of stories where people listening to music have turned into traffic and/or other cyclists passing from behind because they can't hear what's happening around them.

But hey, who am I to tell people what to do. You just go ahead and get that love tap from the Ford F150 next time...just let me know if it "snuck" up on you and pounced unexpectedly from behind.