Mountain bikin'

This past weekend, it was time for some long over-due mountain biking! To celebrate, I dusted off the ol' Dean Colonel, and took it out for 4 consecutive days of thrashing. It was really nice to be out in the woods again, picking my way through rocks and exploring trails. I found a couple new links, to assemble some very nice loops, right from the house. And with all the rain we have been getting up high, the trails are in awesome condition! And super green, even this late in August! A couple of the thicker wooded sections were giving me flashbacks of the ol' trails back east...

All complaints must be held in check, when this beauty is right out your back door!

Sunday, a couple of the guys from the team came up, and I played "tour-guide" as we trolled around some of the local Neder-Nederland trails. It was a great ride, with 6 of us out rippin' it up.

All this mountain biking, and my recent running, can mean only one thing - it's nearly cross season! With that, the cross bike was rebuilt this week also. It took till yesterday to get a real ride on it, but it was SWEET! I was riding home from work, heading up the Flagstaff mountain way. You just have to love a commute that includes 3500 feet of climbing, paved roads, fire roads, and single track. Good times.

This weekend it's out to Dillon for a crit. Maybe Copper Mountain on Sunday, if I can motivate to get back out that way, two days in a row. Should be interesting; a flat, barely 1k course, at 9000 feet.

Racin'

This week I traded my sweet racin' slicks...

For something with a little more meat on 'em...

Hey! There is still a trend line on the old ones. I wanted to get my money's worth out of them, plus, only the front ones were that bad; isn't that why I have 4-wheel drive!? Anyway, it makes Clemmie feel tough! Bring on the crappy weather!

In other news; this weekend was the Federal Center race. I had a decent race, doing a good amount of work. But a break couldn't get away with the right combination of guys... until right at the end. Randy made the group, and then promptly flatted, leaving us out of the mix. Crap.

Sunday was "chore-day" doing stuff around the house. Exciting stuff like caulking windows and installing new weather-stripping. Like I said, "bring on the crappy weather"! Wait a tick, actually, can that. I don't want ANY crappy weather. It's getting to that time of year where certain times while I'm outside doing whatever I can feel it... yes, fall is coming. It's not too far off. We have some warm times left, but if winter didn't come at all, I think I'd be perfectly happy.

Slackin'

Yep... totally slackin' on the posts.

This past weekend was the Salida Omnium. Salida is a surprisingly cool little town, out towards the middle of Colorado. Just ignore the occasional angry redneck, and you'll be fine. Really, it's gorgeous there.

Even the view right from the hotel was really cool.

Typically, Salida is a hot, hot race. Instead, this year it was incredibly wet. The TT went alright for me. I switched from my unlucky shoe covers, to a pair from a couple years ago, and it seemed to do the trick. I had a decent TT - even though I was racin' blind on a brand-new course, my warm-up suffered due to thunderstorms, and the start was delayed 15 minutes. I wish I could have pre-ridden the course, I know I could have shaved a healthy amount of time off the ride, if I knew what to expect going in. It didn't rain much during the actual race, but there was no shortage of dangerous lightning very close by.

Saturday was the road race, and it went okay. I don't know about this race, I never seem to ride well here. I was determined to finish, and was happily plodding along, but I had dropped out of the points for the omnium, and had two laps to go, when some nasty black clouds and lightning rolled in. I decided it wasn't worth it, and my energy would be better served in the crit for Sunday, so I pulled the plug. It basically rained most of the rest of the evening.

Sunday was the crit. Actually, it was mostly waiting around all day for the crit to start. Dan and I got out for a nice ride in the morning, and the weather was perfect. In fact it was nice all day, right up till about 10 minutes before our race when the wind started howling away. I was on the rivet from the word "go" in the crit. 20 minutes in, and the wind got crazy, and this storm just absolutely dropped down on us. It poured, like I haven't seen it pour in quite some time! Salida is pretty flat, and right on the river, so they don't really have sewers - just those gutters running along the curbs of the roads. These quickly turned into 10 inch deep rivers of gushing water, on all 8 turns of the course! It was epic, with zero-visability, cracking lightning overhead, and pouring rain. But damn it, I stuck it out and finished the race. After thirty seconds of riding in that storm, it's not like I was going to get any wetter, so what the hell?

Jessica and Sara were real troopers this weekend, working the feed zone in the rain, traveling with smelly, bike-racin' boys, and working the radios and cheering during the rainstorm that they called a crit.

Yes, it's Wednesday...

This past weekend was both the Mike Horgan hill climb, and the Longmont Crit. Two races that couldn't be more different, other than the extreme heat. It wasn't the plan, it was a possibility, but I ended up driving the pace through the canyon right from the start. I had plenty of help from Seth and one of the Al's guys. We were definitely going quick up the canyon. And the legs responded as you would expect once we hit the climb. I settled in, and just kept the pace steady. Unfortunately I just got gapped at the beginning of the dirt, where having friends to ride with would have been the most help. So it was pretty much a solo TT for the rest of the ride that day.

Saturday evening I went down to Jeff and Craig's house for a little party action. There was fun to be had! Beer-pong, flip cup, the charring of animal flesh, and just plain hanging out. Always a good time. I was designated driver, and was racing the next day, so the drinking was kept to a minimum. But I think it helped my flip-cup technique for sure!

Jeff relaxes;

Craig focuses;

Sunday was the Longmont crit. Not one of my favorite races, since it is bone-flat. And it's quick; I swear I was getting dizzy last year riding this course, going around and around for 90 minutes. The roads are wide though, which makes the corners a breeze - even if lots of guys do tend to slow up too much for them. HART missed the break, and with the high speeds, and temps in the high 90's it was tough to get a consistent group working at the front. I tried to put in as much work as I could. Unfortunately at the end, with about 15 minutes left, I walloped one of the nasty holes on the course, and it shifted my front derailleur out of adjustment. Suddenly it was dragging on my chain and chainring anytime I tried to pedal. I was mostly pack-fodder at that point, so I ended up slipping off the back. Did I mention that it was hot? I think I was over-cooked for the rest of the evening.

How about this tour? It's been a crazy and unpredictable one. I can't help but notice how much closer all the competition is, and the stages are, with (presumably) less doping in the peloton. And just as yesterday's stage was a real beauty, with an inspiring ride by Mauricio Soler. Then followed by the news today, that Patrik Sinkowitz turned up a positive testoterone test back in June. Great. But again, things look back up today, with a stage win from a break by Cedric Vasseur. I've really liked Cedric since his ridiculously long solo break some 10 years ago at the tour. Crazy, I remember watching the long tv coverage, with him out front that entire day, routing for him to hold on, and he did. I think that single ride made me love riding into a break, more than anything else.

No racing this past weekend, but a busy one nonetheless...Saturday I met up with E, McChad and Brent for a little preview of the Mike Horgan course (which we'll be racing this Saturday). I live right on the course, so I was more the tour-guide, rather than learning how the course goes. You ride Magnolia, and it's hard to forget just how stinkin' steep that evil hill is! Though, of course I like riding up it in the summer, way better than driving down it in the winter! It's steep!

We rode up to Eldora, and the weather was great. And climbing is fun and all, but coming back down the mountain is still always where the real buzz is...

After the early morning ride, Jessica and I were off to a bit of a pool party. The rain tried to dapen things, but there was still plenty of swimming, grilling, and beer-drinking to be had!

Sunday morning, Craig, Jeff, Jesse, and Wes came up, for some great paintballing! I was anxious to play, since it's been awhile since we got a game together. It was a good time, and we had a blast as always. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to get any pictures.

After paintballing, we traded Wes for Jessica, and the five of us were off to Hibachi for some dinner, and then, the moment we'd all been waiting for - TRANSFORMERS! The movie was pretty awesome. I was definitely glad it didn't suck, since you know how Hollywood tends to do that... They had the guy that did the original voice for OptimusPrime come back for the movie, and I'm glad they did. It wouldn't have been the same if they didn't. Great too, that the Transformers still had a sense of humor, like they did in the original movie and cartoons. They did a good job with the story, without making it too goofy. And of course it had to have a romantic part to the movie, but they didn't over do it, and I think even embraced the fact that it was goofy, which actually made it more tolerable. There were still plenty of silly things in the story, but it was tolerable. I was hoping they wouldn't make a sequel, but of course word on the street is that they are. Hopefully they won't jack it up, but at the same time, there is talk of bringing in the Dinobots! That could be interesting...

Now we just have to wait for the Simpsons movie to open!

The 4th...

Yep, 4th of July. Pretty much one of my favorite holidays. It's always warm, it's near my birthday, and you get to blow things up. Fireworks, and especially explosions, are good. And now, well, it's also going to be our wedding anniversary. It was also a day off work; always a welcome gift, especially when it comes in the middle of the week. And I believe I needed a break, because it was the first time in a long time, that I actually got to take a nap in the middle of the day. And it easily turned into a two hour nap, before I made myself get out of bed. After my rest, Jessica and went out to find some fireworks!

It was a lovely evening, and the plan was to try to make our way up Flagstaff. The Flatirons looked very inviting in the setting sunlight.

Not surprisingly, Baseline Road was closed going up Flagstaff. Whatever, rules don't apply; Jessica was feeling like a trooper, so we took the hike up to the first parking lot up the hill. It was a nice walk, and it made me wish the road was closed whenever I was going to ride up the hill! We had a great vantage point with very few people nearby. The fireworks were to be at Folsom field, right in the background. Luckily, we were also able to see a couple separate shows up near Longmont, and several in the Lafayette, Broomfield, Supior directions. Easily 6 shows we saw all from one spot, which was great, since the Boulder ones were quite lacking in my opinion.

Today, I was poking around the Formula1 site, getting ready for tomorrow's British Grand Prix, Friday practice, when I noticed their F1 store. Knowing they just had to have something ridiculous in there, I took a peak. Now I can't decide if I want the $520 carbon fibre mouse pad..

...or the $260 F1 baseball cap, complete with the F1 logo, completely in Swarovski crystals...

Warm Mornings and the Bike Path

I love summer. Especially when I can wake up early enough to take the leisurely ride to work. I hopped on the Dean mountain bike today, and spent my extra time cruising down the bike path along the Boulder Creek.If I wasn't so worried about losing my coffee thermos out of my backpack, I might have hit a few more of the jumps along the way. And as usual on warm and sunny bike commutes - it took every ounce of my strength to turn into the parking lot at work, rather than continuing the ride up into the forest.