Cognitive Dissonance Part 2

From a Performance Bike e-mail I just received:

I don't know what kind of work they're biking to, but I know I want a piece of it.

tour de high life

...meanwhile, at the High Country Tour du Life

podium for jay?

Giro d'Italia, stage 7

David MIllar - Giro d'Italia, stage 7
Originally uploaded by Garmin-Transitions Pro Cycling Team

Strada Blanca. Corey, this is for you buddy.

li'l italy

with the tour of italy in full swing, and since this website supports intergalactic peace and understanding, it seems appropriate to counteract the negative stereotypes that americans often use to depict italians by presenting, what else, italians making fun of americans. in particular, the english language. apparently, according to the internet, this video is of an italian comedian singing made-up lyrics composed of sounds that he figured sounded like english. huh? yep. in any event, it is the dopest italian song ever (that's right, fuck you, guiseppi verdi).

so close...

pack-sprinters are suckers. long live the escape artist!

Vintage

My first clipless pedals....resurfaced.

Prize to anyone that knows what they are? When they were hot? And to anyone who has cleats or elastomers for them!!!

Cross Training and Foretaste of the Feast to Come...

Snowshoed up to Monarch Crest/Colorado Trail/Continental Divide Trail Junction on Marshall Pass yesterday.....lots of snow needs to melt before Pirate, SmAli and Wicked join me on this in July.


View Larger Map



Funny how the trail was the only part that was covered in snow.

Live action soul crushing

We are famous

Look for me at about 1:45 of the video. I'm pulled over to the right side trying to clean mud out of my eye. Went through a puddle very early on the climb up Black Mountain and had a big chunk of dirt fly up under my glasses and into my eye. You'll see Ben a few seconds later where he pulled over to wait for me. Thanks teamdicky for including us in your 8minute video that you cut down from 10hours. Makes me feel special.

And here's a post race photo courtesy of Bruce and Innes. We shared some suffering with them near the end of the race:

Man Salt

Today was hot. And North Carolina hot is a special kind of hot. You could crunch the numbers as far as temperature and humidity are concerned but it doesn't seem to really tell the story. Chris, Jay and I headed out in the earlier morning hours to rendezvous with the Chapel Hill P ride and already the mercury was rising. I don't know that it ever got over 85 but between the wind and mugginess it felt like I had concrete in my shoes after just a few miles. I'm sure we're all familiar with what it is like to ride into a head wind (it sucks), but at least it can sometimes provide a cooling sensation (especially when one's jersey is unzipped).

Not today, and the already saturated air made sure that and sweat produced by one's body went nowhere, which brings me to my minor epiphany and bear with my quasi-lame sales pitch.

In our present day awareness of man's impact on the environment it no surprise that responsible consumption is more and more important. Shop at your farmer's market, support you local bike shop and (this is the new part) eat MAN SALT. Seriously, I must have brushed off at least a table spoon or two after three or four hours in the saddle. Where did all that salt end up? Down the drain! Somewhere there's an Indian shedding a single tear while baby seals fist fight.

For real, someone needs to get on this.

My Soul has been crushed!

PMBAR 2010... I should have know by the race slogan, Crushing Souls since 2003, that I was going to be in for a tough day in the saddle. JD and I prepared as best we could, convincing guys to go out on 4-5 hour rides every weekend, heading to Pisgah to do some recon on the trails and generally speaking riding as much as we could to prepare for the devastation.

While I think all those things helped nothing could have prepared me for the mental and physical battle of wills that would ensue.

JD and I hopped in the car Friday morning pumped up and ready to ride. We zipped down the interstate only to hear a loud crash just before Greensboro...we look back and JD's bike is hanging from the roof of my car. My King Cobra roof rack just disintigrated and JD's bike was holding on by the rear tire strap. You can imagine the degree of freak out that was occuring on I-40.

Luckily, JD's bike was fine aside from a slight adjustment to the headset. My car got a couple of battle scars but nothing considering the potential gravity of the mishap. Unscathed, we pressed on to the mountains that were beckoning our souls.

Upon arrival, we quickly set up camp and slipped out for a quick ride, came back to camp, sucked down a couple of cold beers and called it a night.

Race Day:

6:00 AM: Wake Up call
7:00 AM: Sign In
7:59 AM: Receive the map with 5 checkpoints(riders must hit 4 of 5 to finish...5 checkpoints gets a time reduction of 3 hours)
8:00 AM: Start Riding

We decided to head on up Black Mountain to the first major junction before we open the map up and hopefully avoid some of the inherent log jam that was sure to happen. No such luck, we were able to ride most of it but several very ridable sections required dismounting and quick remounting due to the line of riders in front of us...The mental aspect of the race was now on, we were both getting frustrated with the hike a bike on non-hike a bike sections.

We arrived at the first junction, pulled out the map and designed a rough plan on how to hit 4 checkpoints as quickly as possible. While hindsight is 20-20, I think we made some reasonable decisions and for the most part we didn't get turned around too much.

The first checkpoint was brutal, the second and furthest away could have been a potential disaster. We connected with a couple of hammerheads at the first checkpoint. They were going the same way so we tried, in vain, to stay with them. These guys stopped for water before the 2nd checkpoint while we pressed on so we ended up ahead of them...only to be caught on the climb. We stopped to check the map after an hour of climbing and decided to keep climbing, just then a team came down the mountain and said they had climbed to the top and the checkpoint was not there. As luck would have it, the checkpoint was 50 yards from us...HUGE morale boost!

The 3rd and 4th checkpoints were a bit easier but energy was at an all time low. JD and I at some points we just barley turning the pedals over. Honestly, It was the hardest ride that I have ever done!

After the final checkpoint, we straight up gassed it. We passed 2 teams in the last 45 minutes and bombed the descent on Black Mountain. I came into the finish, my soul officially crushed, body in shambles, dreaming of the token burrito promised at the conclusion of the race.

We navigated the finish line and scampered over to the leader board. At the time, there were 6 teams that got all 5 checkpoints and 5 that had 4 checkpoints. I couldn't believe it...I actually put down the crappy veggie burrito that I was shoving down my throat and just stood there in amazement.

100 teams started the race and we were sitting in 12th place, WOW! Of course some other teams arrived with 5 checkpoints and pushed us down the list. Turns out we ended up in 21st place, personally I am going to exclude the 5 checkpoint people based on the fact that they are freaks of nature, insane, and apparantly have no soul to be crushed!

Either way, it was an amazing event and a bunch of fun.

one month countdown

mark your calendars: this year's memorial Ride For Clive is scheduled for June 5th. details (and updates to that website) will follow shortly.

last year, local cyclist Clive Sweeney was struck and killed by a reckless driver while riding on Pleasant Green Road in Orange County. members of Bull City Cycling, as well as Clive's co-workers at McKinney, started this ride as a celebration of Clive's life and as an effort to help make bicycling in the area safer.

the route departs from the American Tobacco Campus and travels south on the American Tobacco Trail. The trail, a former railroad route, is very flat and except for a couple street crossings, is closed to traffic. The route itself is an out-and-back trip, so for people looking for a shorter option, they can turn around at any point. These factors make the ride great for cruiser bikes, kids, and friendly conversation.

back from the slack attack

i've been slacking.

but not JD and Gentle Ben.

ten hours, one minute.

21st overall at PMBAR

Results here.

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