the helping friendly book

wordpressing attempt 2

2006-01-18T21:31:00.000-08:00

so, i've gone done it and put up a new website.

check it out. let me know what you think, if you wish, or not. but, i do like to hear people's opinions.

http://www.helpingfriendlybook.org/

yeah, i'm a dot-org now. don't question it!

john herding

2006-01-16T14:44:00.000-08:00

so today, we went john herding. same cast of characters as yesterday, matt, dave, lindsay, john, and i went out for another nice long slow gravely ride. and on the way back home, on the coralville path, we were playing bike tag. suddenly we got the clever idea to herd john. so we chased him around for a while. good times. i encourage anyone and everyone to give john herding a try sometime. its a pretty awesome passtime.

plus we got the new iowa kits in. and the bib shorts.....oh boy. glorious.

things i've been up to

2006-01-16T08:21:00.000-08:00

saturday i went home for to visit with the fam, as it was older sisters birthday. brought the single for some dirt at scott county park. it was great, but too wet, so i cut my ride short. got in about 45 minutes of dirt play time though which was great. as for the sister's birthday, mom's friend jean joined us for dinner, and the four of us had a most excellent evening.

sunday was to see what i should like to call nothing short of an epic gravel road ride. dave, lindsay, john, matt, and i went out on our singles, mostly. the theme of the ride was to be not so fast, just long time on the bike. starting at noon-thirty, and ending at four thirty....i think we didn't do too poorly. made our way our prairie-du-chein past sugar bottom road, and onto some gravel out there. ended up in solon, and took the trail behind the high school. eventually ended up in the park, made our way to the raptor center, for a nice visit with the birds. and headed back in by way of north liberty and the bike path. all in all it was a great ride.

today not much of anything, perhaps a bit of groceries. take in some recycling. definitely doing some laundry. and yep, that's about it.

can anyone explain to me why it is insisting on being spring in january? where's my snow?

more ouachita prep

2006-01-13T15:56:00.000-08:00

rode matt's trainer today. could only manage just a bit over an hour of it. that's some hard stuff. so, up my base miles total to about 35ish. awesome. now, there's a solid platform to build on...right....

the ups man dropped off my pedals while i was on bike. they are pretty nice. but, one complaint. crank bros. packaged them beautifully. doesn't sound like a complaint? it is. the packaging is made of a hard molded plastic case, with a what looks to be aluminum cover for it. it looks great. but is highly not recycleable like their cheaper, and equally attractively packaged lessor models. i dunno. i guess i'd rather see them in a cardboard box that i could recycle rather than a flashy tin which will probably find its way into a landfill someday. so thus i think i'm going to sell them on ebay. unless anyone who reads this is interested in some double ti egg beaters? and buy a cheaper set, recycle the box, and hopefully have a bit left over for some cranks or other such desperately needed parts. anyway, we'll see.

on a somewhat related note, i bought my books today. all kinds of new edition, non-used goodness. four hundred and ten dollars worth to be exact. ouch. the one history course i'm taking for fun, thought it would be a good joke to make me buy 7 or 8 little books. although, i shouldn't complain too much, as those 7 or 8 didn't total as much as one of my math books. perhaps i should go into the textbook publishing business, it seems they've got quite the racket going on there.

margo seems to be doing well in colorado. i've talked to her a few times now, and she always sounds like she should. like she's in the 'rado, and its a good thing. yeah, i'll say it again. she's officially better at life than me.

ouachita prep

2006-01-12T16:15:00.000-08:00

i figured that since everyone else has been talking about it, it was about time i started "training" and "getting ready" for the undertaking that is to be ouachita. i was going to ride matt's trainer today, but then i walked outside, and then andy rang. and thus the first road ride since november was born. i now officially have about 20 base miles in. sweet. ouachita is probably going to kill me.

friday night fixie ride and such

2006-01-11T19:29:00.000-08:00

....back on its namesake night, wednesday. headed out tonight with michael, david, fritz, and joe. rode almost out to coralville mall. turned around as i didn't wear proper gear and thus couldn't feel either my fingers or my toes. it was chilly. lost joe as he needed to go home. carried on to dabs circle. had a few enthralling rounds. and a couple of nice tumbles. then off to el ranchero for some most excellently appreciated mexican food. ran into roomy and court leaving as we were just arriving. there's some poor timing for us. thats it. no pictures tonight. it was cold enough i wasn't feeling taking the gloves off. nighty night

oh yeah, matt and i are in for ouachita. its going to be brutal. and awesome. i guess i should start getting used to riding bikes again. and perhaps put my mtn bike back together since its semi-demise in early november.

i won some pedals from dirt rag. they should be pretty awesome. and arrive sometime early next week. oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy

back from colorado

2006-01-09T20:46:00.000-08:00

returned from colorado late last night. good times. colorado is a beautiful place during winter. boarding was great. one of the best parts of the trip was a walk i took through the snow on saturday evening. had a scientific experiment, and proved once and for all, birkenstocks are indeed all-weather winter footwear.

the sister is in fort collins. the little lady hauled off and headed west. sunday from what i learn. way to go sis. i passed her on i-80 and didn't even know it. get settled in so i have a place to visit! you guys go right on and rock colorado like 2 the hard way.

going to colorado

2006-01-02T19:05:00.000-08:00

i'm off to colorado for some boarding, we leave tomorrow morn at 5.15 am. i have literally only $21 cash to spend on this trip, i'm going to have to see just much of a workout i can give my credit card. talk about some poor planning on my behalf.

i'm in the midst of packing and was just thinking, up until now i had assumed i'd take the compy along. but, i have since decided it might be nice to escape it for a while, take a short break from this noise... not to mention, its a really expensive, fragile toy to be tossing in an already full car, and a condo full of guys i have yet to meet most of. so, this is to be it until sometime after my return, which, coincidently is to be sunday. until then...

new years eve

2006-01-01T14:13:00.000-08:00

so, for new years i went over to court and angies for a little drinky and some games. quite happily, a fun crowd showed up and we played a few games until q got antsy and wanted to go downtown. rang out the old year at mickey's, and started the new at joe's. quite a nice way to ring in the year. here's hoping this one treats y'all nicely.

the birth of something big (or at least funny)

2005-12-31T07:40:00.000-08:00

friday night fixie ride! good one. cast: mitch, michael, fritz, me
i fixed the ghetto cross, and took it instead of the fix. it was fun, its been a while since i've ridden anything but fix, and it took some getting used to again. not much, just a little. rode out to the cx country fields. plowed through a bit of snow. back to ic. dinner as pizza. stop by dirty john's for to pick up some grain belt. ride home to meet matt and kim. happily as i got home, john's bike was out front too!

matt came down from cr to pick up his gear before his colorado trip, and to introduce his roomates to a creepy concoction called jagnog. that stuff is thick! plus, i don't really care for the eggnog in the first place. so we commenced to crack the gb prem. john left to meet the guys we'd be staying with in colorado downtown, and rang us up to join. and join we did. join in a bit too much if i don't say so myself. long and short of it... i was supposed to be at work at 8.30 friday morn, coincidently that was also the time i woke up. and after much scientific deliberation...driving a bus around for a few hours is NOT a good way to cure a hang over.

yeah buddy! the happiest result of thursday evening was once at martini's; john, matt, and i finally drank enough, and got loopy enough to decide upon a name for our team... DQYDJ, yo! that's right, 'don't quit your day job' racing. now to get to work on the website, and finalise our jersey design. i'll keep y'all posted! yeah, buddy.

....expect big things and much hilarity to ensue....

the holiday and such

2005-12-28T15:45:00.000-08:00

so, christmas has come and gone. i was lucky enough to get mine out of the way last tuesday,; margo, cody, ma, and i had a nice evening of things, and exchanged gifts and whatnot. lots of nice gifts, i think everyone liked what they got. i asked for and got clothes, as during the rest of the year, i haul off and buy myself the toys one would usually ask for as a gift, instead of the clothes i need. so, that works out nicely. i spent the last few days at my ma's instead of driving back and forth all the time. which was nice. there is nothing quite like heading to family's house for a few days of sheer and utter no responsibility (not that i have much to start with...). we played games, had a nice walk with the puppies, and just enjoyed hanging out.

now i'm back in i.c. which is also nice.

i apologize. i haven't much to write about since the weather has turned cold, and i'm riding less and less. on top of that, the weather is warming back up and has destroyed the nice snow we had. mother nature is not on my good list.

a brush with the law.

2005-12-23T09:57:00.000-08:00

looks like q had a bit of time on his hands while at work this morning
----------------------------
multiple violation ticket

plate no. ISUKCOK

-broken mirror
-burnt out headlight
-missing hubcap
-being a d-bag
-totally sucking
-gigleophonoronimonicus

hugs and kisses
the police
----------------------------

looks like tonight is going to call for arts and crafts. its time to be making some holiday cards. if only i had a clever idea....

....wordpress....

2005-12-15T11:45:00.000-08:00

blogger, you've been good to me. but i'm sorry, it looks like things just aren't going to work out. wordpress has gone public, in such a way that an ill-web-knowledgeable twit like me can figure it out.

so, check out my soon to be much more fun-and-functional-than-this:

helping friendly book webhome

i have some funny friends (i think.)

2005-12-11T19:20:00.001-08:00

so, here's what i came home to this morning. it scared the bee-jezus out of me, as i was looking down to avoid slipping on the stairs.jealousy doesn't even begin to express exactly how i feel about this noise. i am sooo mad that i didn't think of anything this clever. looks like the kids at 914 will have to step up their game. just you wait...it will basically be winter break in a few long hours, and then...we're gonna throw down.....maybe. seriously, a job well done mystery pranksters, well done. getting the bike out tomorrow is going to be something tricky.

john, matt and i had a snow day at chestnut friday evening. met john's friend chris there. got in a couple of hours of riding for $9. i'll take it. going to try to make it out again this week between finals. we'll see if its in the cards.

its that day again. don't tell anyone, i tried, relatively successfully, not to.

it was a good weekend

2005-12-05T14:19:00.000-08:00

friday, not much, did however turn out 1/4 of my paper due wednesday, i'll finish it up right quick like once i get some words out on the web.

saturday, again, more paper. up to 3/4 now, closer. come evening time, went to town with paul and michael for some tv shopping and some dinner, which was nice. saturday was awesome, all day as i sat inside, i kept looking out the window and cursing school. happily matt decided we should get out the boards and go play saturday evening. good times. john, matt, andy, and me. 2 skiiers. 2 boarders. 4 shovels. 1 already started jump. the weather was perfect, and the snow was nice. good times.

sunday, in honor of this being jeff's last semester at iowa, before he heads west for warmth, we decided to have us a little bar ride. headed out at just a bit before noon. cast of characters: matt, john, jeff, dave, steve, me. although steve had some obligations so he would miss out on the first half of the ride. sucker. left our place bound for the vine in coralville. then old chicago. then to the dabs circle for a few rounds of snow dabs. these guys schooled me. buildings crumbled in our wake. we got to take a super fun off road snow downhill monstrosity thing that matt came up with, let me tell you, that was fun on the skinny fix. then downtown finally to que for some pool, to be topped off at mickeys for our sunday night pseudo-tradition.
bike pile!

today, long day. cold as all get out. wasn't feeling making breakfast, so stopped at java house on the way to school for a cinnamon roll and a bit of coffee to warm me up, and keep me awake. even the coffee couldn't do the trick, was fighting it all day. thermometer read neg 6 on the way to school. didn't catch it after school on the way to work, or home this evening. didn't feel much warmer. some gals thought my bike "couldn't be safe." can you believe that? yeah, i couldn't either....they obviously don't know for fun. laters.

fun with acronyms

2005-12-02T17:25:00.000-08:00

so, we had us yet another fnfr last night. left the shop at about 5.30ish, and had us some pagliai's. post-pizza we headed to the icpl for the ibc's winter biking seminar. it was a hoot. that's all i've got for acronyms.

then off to the mill to see friend jess rock out. although i was mildly disappointed when she didn't smash her viola in post-show-rage-angst (i thought that's what rock stars did), it was still very nice.

its snowing out and that's nice. if i finish this paper i'm writing i can go boarding tomorrow for $3. that would be really nice.

snow bike

2005-12-01T14:54:00.000-08:00

-first there was snow.

-then came the fixed gear to get around in the snow.

-and it was very good.

my roomates...

2005-11-30T12:54:00.000-08:00

*******MY ROOMATES ARE SWEET-TOOTHED NERDBAGS!*******

i like riding in the cold

2005-11-29T13:36:00.000-08:00

so, as of right now, i'm loving riding in the cold. ask me in a week....maybe not....but until then!! oh boy! its windy and cold and my toes are numb.
i'm loving life.

rode to volunteer at school today. rode over to von maur to pay a bill and change my address. rode downtown to visit the bank. for a change of pace didn't weigh myself on the bank scale. am already regretting it....it is, afterall, my favourite part of going to the bank. rode home again. and will probably ride downtown for the studying later. but first....cars & cold & very little gasoline is not a good idea...so i'm out to fetch some groceries and gasoline.

i know, i know....i'm still not nearly as tough as those of you who are still out riding big long training rides and things like that. but i'll take what i've got.

i'm hating my blog layout....i gneed a gnew one.

looks like the friday night fixie freeze will be conveining on thursday at 5.30 for a ride before the winter riding seminar at 7 pm. be there or be square.

its crummy out.

2005-11-28T15:42:00.000-08:00

since its gotten cold and rather crummy, i haven't been riding for fun as much, actually that makes it sound like i'm riding somewhat...that's a lie. i think i've ridden the road bike once since the end of october, and the mtn bike is still in pieces, likely to remain as such for a long time. still riding the fixie around town more often than not.

thanksgiving break was nice. visiting with the family was good. but as usual the break was too long for me. i've been saying it for a while, but i wish we'd have a fall break sometime earlier in october, while the weather is still nice, rather than a full week for thanksgiving. its too close to the end of the semester and i'm not good at coming back with so little left. oh well. i remember my first year when we only had the last two days off for thanksgiving. no one liked that either.

on the riding front...today i was nearly blown off the bike on the way home. the wind around here is acting up something fierce tonight. plus earlier today, after classes, i had the distinct pleasure of riding to work in the rain. then driving around in circles for the next few hours with a wet bottom. i have GOT to get me some fenders.... it may sound it, but i'm not complaining, the whole time i can't help but smile...wet winter-esque roads = super fun fix riding.

and with that.......hope for snow....

friday night fixie freeze

2005-11-20T17:16:00.000-08:00

we had us a good ol' friday night fixie freeze this past thursday. arguably, well actually in truth, we did more eating than riding, but good times none-the-less. afterall, the bank thermostat registered 24, that's degrees F. which means cold, but nice. we hit up a couple of new joints for the fixie ride. 1st george's, and their infamous hamburgers, which in my humble opinion, lived up to the hype, not to mention spotting the most magical pair of signs in iowa city. 2nd pagliai's, for some pizza. sadly paul flatted his "clinch-u-lar" between the two stops. anyway, that was the fixie ride. nice, cold, and around town. i'll be back in fixie action in two weeks time. no ride for me this upcoming as i'll be out for the txgiving with the family.

break has officially started, and i love it.

psuedo-snow!

2005-11-14T13:51:00.000-08:00

first and foremost...it is amazing just how wet the front of your pants can get while the back stays bone dry. riding bike in the rain is fun. cold, but fun.

it snowed. albeit the snow melted upon contact, but it was snow none-the-less. keep your fingers crossed that snow season has indeed arrived.

i've simply got to get some fenders for the fixie. this ride annihilated me. my shoes are soaked....i can't feel my toes. my pant legs (front only) are soaked up to the mid-thigh level. my bum....well, hence the fenders comment....

anyway, i'm happy. it may be raining, and kind of crummy...but i'm taking it to be a sign that winter is on its way. i'm just hoping its coming fast.

on one last note, have you ever heard anyone say, "people sure drive crazy during the first snow?" i have. it is a totally, undoubtedly, beyond a doubt FACT. those suckers were out to kill me today. all day. and i was all over iowa city to and from work and class and the like. yep, crazy. i think people were so busy watching out for, and being careful in the snow, that they forgot to look out for me on my little bike. several sketchy incidents. grrrr.... but, thats their problem....as for me....

winter!!! yay!

"yesterday's sock becomes today's kleenex"

2005-11-12T15:05:00.000-08:00

--matt while camping in kansas
-------a few weeks ago

....night racing....

2005-11-11T11:26:00.000-08:00

and no, i don't mean this weekends super-fun-ness planned in decorah.
----sadly----
1. no bike assembled, or cleaned for that matter, since nats
2. a decided lack of owning lights (although super nice dennis did offer to lend me some)
3. still recovering from this weeks crummy bug
----will all keep me away, but YOU should go.----

on another note, perhaps uiowa had better get on the ball and plan a campus crit, or some kind of night race. it seems the minn boys (noonan and company) are putting us to shame in this department. looks like they're having fun. we've been batting around this idea for a couple of weeks now, have a location, and even course marking ideas...all we need to do now is get on it!

our top-not-so-secret team mission is well under way. at least we've got the ball rolling in that department. figure out that bit of cryptic-ness my friends...

not much to report, looking forward to a weekend of rest.

ill

2005-11-10T06:20:00.000-08:00

so come tuesday evening past, i got all sorts of ill. let me tell you, not so fun. it also had a detrimental affect on my stat exam wed morning at 8.30. so, as a result, i'm taking a break from my stat class today...as there is a good chance i will have the distinct pleasure of taking the class again...and opting for some chicken noodle soup. feeling better though.

mtn bike still not put back together, or cleaned or anything like that. bummer.

fixie ride is still on tonight. i said i'd go. we'll see, i'm thinking time on the bike in this cold weather just might not be all that bright of an idea.

nats pictures

2005-10-31T19:28:00.000-08:00

it was tough. and a long, tedious process, but i finally managed to get the boatload, in nearly its entirety, of pictures we took this past weekend up for all to see.

CLICK ME!

and yes, it is in backwards order. what can i say, turns out i'm not a web genius, just a web nerd.

nats part 2

2005-10-31T17:06:00.000-08:00

disclaimer: this one is bound to be quite long. and for that, i apologize in advance.

friday night: we went to the hotel to check in and unload after watching the qualifying runs of the 4 cross. at 6 we headed back to the resort for a pre-race meeting where some school spent a long time arguing with the officials, suggesting that the girls only race 2 laps, since the conditions were crummy, but still keep the guys at 4. one of the officials put it well, with a retort involving some witty remark about the ladies only doing half the distance of the men. we decided the arguing guy knew his school's women would do better in a short race and was trying to stack the cards in their favor. thankfully, the race wasn't shortened, for either gender. but the meeting was a good time. we had a few laughs at all the teams there taking it seriously. i don't want to sound like one shouldn't take nationals seriously if one is fast enough. its just that we are in such a different league, to take the race seriously wouldn't have been any fun. we made it to nationals, that was our goal. and we all finished the race, our other goal. standings don't really matter for us. yerke put it well when he compared us racing in nationals to the university of iowa football team taking on a hobbyist team from kirkwood community college. we are just in a different league than those fast riders.

on the way back from the meeting we stopped to get some dinner, and were served by the rudest little twit of a waitress i've ever had the pleasure of dealing with. no harm done, we decided she must have been grounded or something, as she was angry at the world. as we were finished with our meal, matt looked out the window and started laughing. it was snowing. hard. it wouldn't last long, and didn't accumulate to anything, but we all had a nice laugh at that. it looked like condition were to remain wet.

we woke up sunday, got all geared up, and headed back to the resort for our race. on the way we stopped by a local bike shop, where i thought all my problems would be solved as i bought a new bladder for my camelbak. no dice. the mouthpiece was broken, and it leaked badly. we stopped by on the way home and exchanged it for a new one. but i still had to do the race with water bottles. which really wasn't that big of a deal afterall.

we got to the resort, and headed up to the top of the ski hill, where the race was to begin. we found a parking spot right next to the course, so we could watch the women come in from their race, and cheer them on. they had the distinct misfortune of racing in misty / foggy, cold, windy conditions, that would later clear up nicely for us. we tracked down syracuse girl, whom we had met at the pre-race meeting friday night, and congratulated her post-race. she looked like she had a good time. and i wouldn't be surprised if she finished quite well. although i wouldn't know, as the official standings still aren't posted anywhere. but that's another story. you'd think usa cycling would run the collegiate national championships well....but you would be wrong. no signs to tell people where to park in a massive resort complex, no posting results formally (merely taped to a mirror in a hallway), no t-shirts with our registration packet (they would be handed out at the awards banquet saturday evening), no tickets to dinner, rather a super long line with names crossed off a list...it was just poorly run. oh well. enough about that...

a bit later it would be time to race. we headed over and lined up at the rear of the starting group. it wouldn't make sense to have forced our way forward and just ended up getting in people's way up front. the course lap started and finished at the top of the ski hill. immediately after the start it put the whole group of us on a just slightly narrower and shorter than a football field of pure, sticky, brown mud downhill. it was awesome. bikes were sliding all over the place as the mud sucked people this direction and that. my bike in particular was all over the place, it seemed that my front tire grabbed on and tracked a nice line, but the rear, with its very small tread pattern just slid all over. needless to say, i was having quite a fun time. i do like to slid. and i like to ride in crummy conditions. eventually the muddy downhill gave way to some nice muddier singletrack. the downhill section had spread the group out enough that there wasn't too much of a bottleneck at the entrance to the trails. and sure enough, very shortly the bottleneck spread itself out too.

anyway, the entrance to the trails was a foot-deep, winding, crevase-esque little trough of black mud around a little lake, that eventually lead into the woods. where we were met by an increasingly tricky section of rock gardens. read: not too bad at first, but gradually, and continually getting worse until we were in the midst of a meadow of slippery rocks in the midst of the woods without so much as any line to pick through the things. i walked quite a bit. so did many others. yerke had the distinct pleasure of watching the guy who won, ride through this section when he got passed on lap 3. (we were all lapped on the third lap by the leader..except john, who finished his third lap right infront of the winner. he wondered what all the cheering was for, he would later recall...) i guess the guy just plowed through it with no regard for anything, least of all his bike. anyway, the trails were nice. i bet they would have been a riot in dry conditions. heck, i thought they were a riot in wet conditions, and was actually glad we were racing in the muck. i have a feeling, if things were dry, the race would have been much, much faster.

eventually the singletrack ran out and we were thrust back out onto the ski hill. first things first though, they made sure we were at the very bottom before they made us climb back up. thus commenced a series of hairy switchbacks. the worst of which, i rolled up to, looked at the spectators looking on, and said "who's idea was this!?" they got a kick out of it, and i cleaned the turn by some bit of sheer luck. it was the only time i would ride it well, the next 2 times...not so good. but i stayed on the bike, and didn't fall off the side of the hill, which would have been quite the fall at that point. after several switchbacks, we were about 2/3 the way down the hill, and they put us on an access road that cut directly across and downhill two ski slope faces. it was long, fast, and muddy. to top it off, they had a big old pipe running across it at about the point where you were carrying the most speed. once again my bike slid all over the place, and all i was thinking was "if i crash, i'm going to break something, but i'll be damned if i'm going to touch my brakes." so i didn't. and i survived. and it was awesome.

the road ended at the very bottom of the hill, and immediately took one quick turn around the parking lot, and headed right back up the hill. one big long climb with one switchback half way to the psuedo-top. pseudo-top, eh? yeah, this first climb only took us about half the way back up the hill. then a bit more riding across mud fields, and across a couple more ski faces, right over the grass, perpendicular to the face. 3 times i attempted to ride across the slope. 3 times i walked my bike. my rear tire just gave out on the grass. too slick for the conditions. that was the only place i had a problem though. everywhere else i loved my tire combo. big up front, little in the back, matt was right, moto is the way to go. after crossing the slopes we ended up with a bit more climbing, and a bit more trail before finally returning to the start.

well, it looks like i've written a bit much about the trail, and i know i've mixed up sections with other sections and things like that. right now i'm remembering one section i left out that was particularly fun. we rode up a very slight incline, in an open meadow-ish area, once again in a trough-like trail, with a soupy, light-brownish mud substance flowwing down the trail against our direction. now seems a good time to mention that shortly into the race i decided it would be a good idea to deliberately ride through puddles and all the muddy water i could find, as it cleaned the mud off my tires. and it was just plain fun to get a little bit dirty.

the first lap felt good. i rode it and thought i could keep it up for the necessary time to finish the race. and i wasn't even in last place. some rocks hung me up and i lost matt and john for a bit. but eventually caught up to matt. john had taken off and charged ahead. matt was hurting and had to pee pretty badly. so he opted to rectify that situation. and i passed him by while he did so. that would be the order for the rest of the race. i saw john on a couple of the climbs early on in the race, but he lost me quickly. i found out after the race, he did the whole race without his little ring. an impressive feat. and luck was on my side, as somehow i managed to stay ahead of matt.

during the second lap, things still went well, on the big climb i saw ndsu taylor behind me and hollered down at him. he caught up with me and i stuck with him for a short bit before he too left me behind. that kid can ride. i still felt decent going into the third lap. but things deteriorated quickly. once on the trails, the simplest little roots, and rocks were stopping me. i was off the bike a lot. i managed to suffer through it. but then came the climb. by the top i was literally falling apart. although i rode the whole thing. i spent all my time pushing in the singletrack, through the rocks, and over some roots. as i finished up the last section of climbing, i had long since been lapped, and some spectator was telling all of us we were only going to have to do 3 laps. i was elated. you couldn't tell it to look at me, all you could see was a body slumped over, concentrating on one and only one thing, turning over the pedals. but in my head i was happy beyond all belief. because, by that time i had decided i was going to finish the race. if i had to push my bike the entire 4th lap, i was going to finish. happily, i didn't have to.

after the race we headed back to the hotel to clean up and take a quick nap before the awards banquet. the banquet was nice. a nice selection of food, fish, pasta, meat, etc. we shared a table with the kansas boys and ndsu. this being our first nationals experience however, we didn't know costumes were appropriate attire for about 1/3 the house, and bring-your-own-beer was encouraged. if there is a next time, i'm staying on site... anyway, people were getting awards in costume, and much, much yelling was taking place between tables. a ruckus is a good term. a very funny ruckus. one kid had a mega-phone and quick wit to match, and he kept us entertained all evening. then there was the guy in the apron, and little else, who ended up streaking across the awards stage during the mens div 1 cross country awards. it was just silly. and words fail me, but a fun time was had. sadly, since we did not stay at the resort, we missed out on the naked crit to be held at 10.30 after the awards ceremony. so, instead we went over and joined the ndsu boys for a couple of beers, and planned a mutual assault on the upcoming road season, before finally calling it a night.

sunday morn we woke up and were on the road decently early, 7.30 i think. but happily we gained two hours with the time change, and day light savings time too! the trip back was similar to the trip there. silly.

its about time i wrap this up and finally figure out the pictures which are giving me no end of trouble. so, of nationals i have this to say...

it was awesome. and i hope i get a chance to do it again.

nats part 1

2005-10-28T12:38:00.000-07:00

so john, jeff, matt and i rolled out of iowa city last night at about 9.30 pm. both matt and i packed in just under 15 minutes, as we decided a bit of dinner at the vine over-ruled actual preparation for this weekend. as a result, now that we're here, i realize i have left my camelbak bladder at home. that is no good. i would have been needing that tomorrow for keeping hydrated on the bike. now, as it seems i'll be having to use water bottles and cages. it should be alright as it will be stupid cold out...but that's a whole other story. perhaps i should start at the beginning.

it was dark. we picked up john at his house just a bit after nine. he was most upset that no one had called him to tell him it was snowing in pennsylvania (oh yeah, that's where we are, somerset, pa) and that, as such, we had abandoned plans for camping. he got over it, and re-packed accordingly. from john's we picked up jeff, and headed on our merry way. it was about nine thirty, and we were, by some piece of alleged good logic, about to thrust ourselves into anywhere from an 11 - 14 hour drive. needless to say, ridiculousness ensued. i can't really recall anything specificly amusing about our trip out here, but if you can imagine, 4 guys staying up all night in a minivan...well, stupidity and lots of laughing. a good time. we alternated drivers, and arrived at the ski resort, seven springs, where the events are to be held.

we explored a bit of the resort on our way to score our registration packets, and check out the 4 cross course. 4 cross, as i learned today, is a form of (my description) mini-downhill, in which 4 riders are pitted against each other at the same time. and in this case, those 4 riders are pitted against each other on a course entirely too small for even 2 to fight it out. we watched a good portion of the qualifying runs, individual runs to see who would actually compete in the 4 person heats later today. lots of falling, sliding, and pushing of bikes. perhaps that last comment warrants a bit of an explanation.

the rumors were true, it did indeed snow at seven springs, an alleged 6 inches of snowfall, has been rapidly melting to create a messy, muddy terrain. the snow / melt combination virtually destroyed the 4 cross course, rendering it more of a slow paced skid fest rather than a fast jump-worthy-mini-downhill course. tomorrows cross country race, while not quite as bad as the artificially built 4 cross, should be a mess.

q says: "brian's blog is stupid. like his face. after i kick it with my foot, in the face, with a foot."

upon finally tracking down the gal with our reg packets, we found out that we lacked a necessary eligibility form (read: proof that we go to iowa, and are not failing out). that would have been nice to know we needed to have before driving a ridiculous distance. hmm. oh well, we invaded the resort until we found a computer lab, and purchased, yes, purchased, 15 minutes of time to use the aforementioned computers. during which time, we printed off our 3 transcripts informally from the internet. took these papers to the lady. got our packet, by promising to send in an official eligibility form to them, from the university, within a week, upon our return. so, we get to race tomorrow. that should be fun.

anyway, we're in pennsylvania! and its beautiful out here! tree leaves are changing. the roads are cute little, quaint country lane-ish, often times with trees creating an archway over the path. its pretty. and despite the poor weather, it actually hailed on us for a bit on the way to the hotel earlier, this is a fun time. i mean, we're at nationals! and that is kind of exciting.

76th annual fall gala

2005-10-24T17:46:00.000-07:00

our friends courtney and angie threw together one of the finest shindigs to ever grace i.c.'s hallowed streets. it was, a wine and cheese party. complete with formal attire required. bring your own wine approach, they provided the cheese.

so, matt, janie, john, and i got all dolled up, and ready to go. matt and i decided this would be the perfect opportunity to drink up our home brew. so we loaded up a couple of cycling club bottles. threw the rest of our back up wine into our bags, hopped on our bikes, and headed over. we got there, and were happy to see that our attempts at dressing up were not in waste...everyone was in formal attire. one guy even had a full suit on. i was by far the least dressed up. i guess that comes with the territory when you wear cut off army pants...i wasn't about to ride the fixie in dress pants and muck 'em all up with chain grease.

the party was a hit. my compliments to the girls, they know how to throw together a good time. john is a good drunk. he danced and danced and danced and danced. he finally earned that sugartoes nickname that has been on my phone now for quite some time.

we watched the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy movie last night...it's awesome.

i finished housekeeping today. it was quite good, and that is an understatement. although, i feel i missed out on quite a bit by reading it relatively quickly, and in many small bits and pieces, rather than slowly in long, quiet draws. anyway, i liked it, and think i may have to read it again, eventually, when i can dedicate more time to it.

friday night fix & burlingtoners

2005-10-24T15:07:00.000-07:00

so the burlingtoners came up for the last friday night fixie ride. and it was raining! i was looking forward to it all day as a result. here's a quick mathematical proof to explain.

fixie + rain = awesomeness

i opted to not skip the ride as a result, by all logical analysis, i should have...2 assignments suffered as a result. too bad, by my analysis, a bit of fun was more important than a couple of points in class. now, that, is some fine logic.

so, amanda, tracy, and dennis came up for the fixie ride. dennis even rocked a fix. and a fun one at that. the evenings cast of characters would include paul, 2 michael's, fritz, me, and the burlingtoners. we rode out to north liberty for some dinner at iguana's, and had all sorts of good skidding times on the way. nice meal, suzie even said hello, although sadly was not our waitress. returned to iowa city, and commenced with the foot down. several games. dennis faired quite well. tracy and amanda also proved quite adept at our little game. me, on the other hand, just couldn't stay on the bike...so i got a lot of picture / backward circle practice time. proof:post foot down, tracy and amanda, and michael k. headed home. leaving fritz, me, paul, michael, and dennis. the parking lot was empty so we decided to have us a pair of pursuit races. paul vs. me. paul wins. dennis vs. fritz. dennis wins. the oval we used was too tight for fun. or it could be just that i am not that good at cornering at speed. probably the latter. oh well. then we opted to take more advantage of the empty lot with some sprint races. we started at one end of the lot, from trackstand, and sprinted to the opposite end. paul dominated. he took the first two heats, and dennis took the 3rd. i came in right behind those jokers each time, i think. oh well.

we headed off for some DQ to finish up the night down by the river. all in all an excellent fixie ride, as per usual. although sadly i'll be missing this week's ride, as we're leaving for nats on thursday evening. pennsylvania here we come.

collegiate mtn conference championships

2005-10-24T14:24:00.000-07:00

lawrence, kansas
oct. 15-16, 2005

matt, john, and i headed down in a minivan again. arrived on saturday, about 2 hours before the dirt crit started. ndsu, ksu, kansas, isu, nebraska, and us. (i think that was all that showed up) pre-race, and all weekend...everyone was awesome. there was a kind of fun, easy-going atmosphere going on. everyone was more chatty and friendly than we all have been at prior races. anyway, it was a nice improvement. not to say that anyone was unfriendly before, but it just seemed like at this race everyone was real nice-like. carrying on, we got ready, and headed over for the dirt crit. there was some concern about people being able to figure out the course, which in retrospect, was well marked and i thought clear. so after a few attempts to describe it, which ended up just adding more confusion...someone suggested a practice lap...so sure enough, we had us a giant group ride around the ~1/2 mile course. nice course. nicely laid out, fast bits, and a couple of climbs. not too terribly technical, but just nice, a great course for a crit. 30 minutes + 1 lap was the order of the day. we ended up doing 6 (possibly 7) laps. yerke 5th, me 6th, john 7th. a good race.

the xc race was sunday. so after the crit we headed into lawrence to try to find a dinner joint the kansas boys suggested. we failed, so just picked a bar for some burgers and it turned out to be nice. interesting decor...dollars bills used as wallpaper, decorated over the years by patrons. i thought it was a fun idea. we sat at a table which coincidently had an IOWA dollar up near it. downtown lawrence is a lot like i.c. only bigger. all sorts of fun. post dinner we retired to set up camp and get us a good nights sleep.

sunday's race was nice. the weather was good. it was held in a different part of the park, so we packed up and headed over. again, same nice atmosphere...made for pre-race time being real nice. we warmed up a bit, did a very brief bit of trail exploring, got a glimpse of the rocks that would kick my @rse for the remainder of the race. at the start, i got cut off and out gunned by a kid whom i knew to be a bit slower than me, so as a result i got stuck waiting it out with john until we could find a spot to slip by this joker. the course was punishing. at least for me. i'm still new to rock gardens and they do a number on me. (read: darn near stop me) so i lost the boys relatively quick, but happily caught a few glimpses of them up ahead of me in switch-backy sections. pretty quickly the field spread itself out. john and matt quicker than me as usual put a bit of a gap on me, and i in turn put a nice little gap on the rest of the field. not to be passed again until the local experts started racing. those boys were fast... there was a one mile section of the 4 mile course that was dubbed "mad mile" or something like that. and i say, it was an appropriate name. not quite as rocky as tour de lizard, but still pretty tough. stopped me a couple of times on later laps when i was a bit tired. at one point an isu kid showed up from out of no where. don't know if he was an 'a' racer or 'b,' but passed me briefly when i got stopped by some vicious rocks. caught him right quick like on the next climb and left him for the rest of the race. 5 laps. 4 miles. lots of rocks. some real nice quick sections. with a bit of nice climbing mixed in. i liked it. i would have liked it more if i hadn't exploded a gu packet all over my right handle bar at the end of the 2nd lap. oh well. i had a super grip for the rest of the race...that stuff is STICKY!!

john made an impressive showing for himself, taking a solid 4th. matt took 6th. i caught a glimpse of him right toward the fast bit that finished up each lap, he noticed...needless to say, i didn't see him again until the end. he admitted afterward he didn't want me to beat him, fair enough, i would have taken the chance if i could have!

a nice little awards ceremony. they even gave us some medals. and we qualified as 1st team for nationals this coming weekend. 2nd team overall in our conference. i even made 4th in the individual competition for conference....solely because i did all the races and quite a few quicker guys finished below me because they skipped a race or two. (matt and john included!) still, i'd be lying if i didn't say i was a pretty proud of my finishes. good times...looking forward to this weekend!s

friday night fixie mall crit

2005-10-14T10:52:00.000-07:00

last night we had us our weekly friday night fixie ride. we opted to head out to the mall, as michael needed a leash for maggie. whom, i also saw earlier yesterday. puppies...they grow. she was still a bundle of energy and adorableness. anyway, while michael fetched himself a new leash. we opted to have the...

pseudo-first-annual-small-enough-to-still-be-gaining-credibility mall crit

the rules were simple. one lap around the mall. beginning and ending at target. direction toward scheels. "any way you can get around the mall"

i managed to get to the front after scheels, and figured if i turned left and stuck to the pseudo-road that circled the mall, the others would follow. i was wrong. i turned left and the entire pack just blew right by me, straight through the parking lot. i cut my little detour short, and starting trying to bridge back on. i guess they were serious when they said, "any way you can get around the mall." passed some gal on her cell outside of the movie theatre that hollered at me, "is there a race going on?" to wit, i replied "hell yeah." managed to catch the paul and fritz out front right before we turned by best buy, and somehow squeaked past them to take the lap.

right quick like, michael showed up, having been successful on his leash mission. he said it looked like we had fun...thus we opted for lap 2, now that michael could join us. another lap, but this time, i was on to 'em... blew right through the parking lot just like the rest. again, i managed to take the lap, but only by a bit. paul and fritz had their second sprint finish of the night right behind me.

return to i.c. for some mexican at el ranchero. which, was most excellent. and we called it a night.

and now, i HAVE to do a spot of dishes...as the sink is full of dishes...most of which were put there by me!

p.s. we're going to conference this weekend!
oh boy oh boy oh boy

i (heart) fall

2005-10-12T18:13:00.000-07:00

fall is great. i went for a most excellent ride today. 2.5 solo laps at sugar. mostly no black loops. just a nice quick pace. i chased lots of bunnies. i saw jami. i rode with a bottle for the first time since i got the camelbak, it was nice. i made it last for the first two laps. a quick refill, sugar bottom water isn't very good at all.

me+fall+bike+ipod=nice.

calc finished. nice and quick. exam this morning. could have gone either way. studying would have helped. you will have that. volunteering today was good. i have worked with one kid now a few times, he's all sorts of fun.

desperately looking forward to kansas race this weekend. my legs are actually a little sore. that good kind of sore.

volunteering

2005-10-11T13:13:00.000-07:00

that's chloe, and i love her. 1.25 hours until free parking opens up at the bank downtown. i don't feel like riding my bike, namely because i feel like wearing my clogs. and i have learned that riding with any form of sandal is a bad, potentially painful, idea. so, i'll wait it out until free parking, and then commence the studying for tomorrow's exam. stat...eww.

re: subject of this post.
i've started volunteering at an i.c. high school. i get to go in tues and wed weekly, and work in a sort of guided study hall classroom. we get kids who need a bit of guidance, and encouragement to work, and we do just that. so far, i've only done it twice, but its all sorts of good. you have to be on your toes, as you could end up helping (or attempting to) in any subject. so far i've dealt with american studies (why don't they just call it history anymore?!), and english. mostly why i like it is the kids. they're great. i've met about half of them in the class, and will try to get a chance to work with all of them as i continue helping out. its making me busier..but i've decided that i actually do better when i'm busy like this. makes me manage my time a bit better. i was chatting with the teacher who runs the class, and mentioned my being a math major. she encouraged me to contact the math dept too, if i was interested. i decided i was.

thus, she gave me the appropriate names, and i contacted them. now i on tues after i get done in her classroom, i spend time in the math lab, helping students as needed. today was my first day, and i spent it working with 3 guys, doing their calc homework. i was curious to see how i would fair with older subject matter...but i guess taking calc three times paid off, as it came back quite well.

anyway, i'm volunteering quite a bit now. 4 hours a week sometime. and working less. as a result. which is a good thing.

still 1 hour until free parking downtown. snack time? yeah.

namesake...

2005-10-11T13:02:00.000-07:00

isu race

2005-10-09T16:40:00.000-07:00

isu hosted thier mtn race yesterday. dave, ryan, and i drove out for it. we were going to take a van, but the gals in the business office forgot to submit our request in time. so we drove out in our own cars.

a couple of gripes.
1. the course was crummy. flat. no fun. boring.
2. the directions were wrong. flat out. wrong.
3. it wasn't the iorca race.

a bit of elaboration, i am super sad that the isu race didn't team up with the iorca race this weekend. the people running the iorca races are super nice guys, and would likely have been more than happy to have the collegiate riders join in. then we would have had a whole weekend of great racing, instead of just one really bad race. the iorca race had a tt, and dirt crit on saturday, followed by the xc race on sunday. all of which i would have done if i could have...and thus qualified for overall consideration in the iowa series too (i needed 2 more races). instead, we had a race on a saturday (seriously, who hosts races on saturday?!).

so we rolled out of iowa city at about 8. directions in hand. upon reading them, i was concerned... and as it would turn out, my concerns were not unmerited. they were the single worst directions i have ever followed. (matt says i should be cleaning my room. he's right) i had to ask twice.

finally, about the race. worst course ever. 5+ miles. flat. boring. lots of gravel road intermixed with some singletrack. dave and i raced A class, for 6 laps of this punishment. punishment from boredom, from having to pedal the entire time due to the flat, from the fact that the course was no fun. ryan raced B class for 4 laps. i finished 6th, dave 8th. ryan finished, i didn't check his standings. but that alone is a feat, considering he still very new to riding. way to go, pal. on the last lap, the one guy i wanted to beat, who had been behind me the whole way, caught me right as the lap began, and managed to put a 2 minute gap on me. i wasn't really hurting, but i wasn't feeling really good either. bottom line is that he is stronger than i am, but i am still a little disappointed. oh well. that happens.

why i do NOT love des moines

2005-10-03T19:03:00.000-07:00

so, this past sunday yerke, jeff, and i headed to des moines for a cross race. we arrived a little later than we would have liked, but still had plenty of time. the race flyer directions to the park must have assumed that we already knew where the park was and knew how to get around des moines intuitively, because it was a sheer piece of luck that we found the place. but find it we did. with about half an hour to spare before the race was to begin.

so, we got all registered up, into our kits, and decided it just might be a good idea to do a bit of warming up before the race. we rode around the course a couple of times. me, unintentionally being a bit of a twit, didn't realize the race was about to begin, went out for another pre-lap, and ended up holding up the race for a few minutes. but they were nice enough to wait for me.

a bit about the course. they laid out the course in a big oval. downhill, and then back up. gravel downhill, a barrier at the bottom, and three at the top. a long, windy climb inbetween. i'll just say the climb was painful. i was going slow enough that my glasses were fogging up. that = slow. oh yeah, thankfully, it rained on us lightly during the race. i say thankfully, because it kept it from being terribly humid, like it got for the rest of the races after us!

matt was loving his flat bar set up, and he and jeff ended up finishing together. i ended up finishing a bit behind them. i got lapped. i was sooo happy to see the leaders catch me. in my mind, getting passed = one less lap of this murderous climb that i had to do. to inject a bit of perspective, yerke grannied the hill in his 30x27. i was stuck in my 2 to 1 ratio. still, worth mentioning, the rest of the singles won, and finished highly in the race. how these guys do it, i don't know. perhaps i need to gear my monstrosity of a race bike up like these boys.

we elected to stick around and watch the gals race. lindsay put the hurt on the women's field, and took first. way to go!our trip out of des moines went worse than the trip in. we stopped at a pizza buffet and i made a pig out of myself. then we tried, rather unsuccessfully, to find the interstate. we figured the detour signs would lead us to it. 20 minutes later, and at least a few miles in the wrong direction, the detour led us to the interstate finally. we would have been much better off getting on the interstate in the wrong direction, and turning around at the next exit, rather than going through town to do essentially the same thing. stupid des moines. it's sure got nothing on iowa city. but we had fun. then return to iowa city to begin this, what is to be a long and busy, week. not a very good post, i know. that's all i've got.

iowa city...i love you

2005-10-01T09:02:00.000-07:00

i love this town. it's true. yesterday morning my 9.30 class was cancelled, so i had an hour to burn between the others. i was feeling sort of crummy, a bit of a coldish thing coming on i think, combined with a 1am night thurs in a last ditch attempt to finish my stat homework are to blame. so, i headed down to the java house for some soul warming coffee. (that's right, i'm working on developing a taste for coffee. i can see this one happening however, unlike trying to develop a taste for beer..bottom line is that stuff still tastes bad) i pulled up, roped my bike to my tree out front. yeah, i like the attention. the rack out front is always jammed full, and i'll admit, i kind of think the fixie looks neat roped to a tree out front of the shop.

a nice couple got out of their car, and noticed the bike, and i got yet another complement on my bike. which, is always nice. then i noticed that the line for coffee was extending out of the front door just a bit. consider my curiosity piqued. i've got the time...might as well wait this business out and see just why so many people are interested in coffee at 9.30 on a friday morning. don't you people have jobs!?!?

then i saw a flyer up on the wall, it looks like the java house is playing host to an iowa public radio show, something about coffee and conversation, featuring a cowboy author character...forgive me for forgetting his name...and william elliot whitmore! i've been hearing this guy on krui for a while now, and have been meaning to go pick up his album. john has seen him and told me a bit about him, so i've been wanting to see him play as well. lucky me! this shindig was supposed to get underway at 10am and with the looks of this coffee line, i'll be just in time.

so i got my coffee, and headed toward the back room, where they had set up for the show. waited for a few minutes and was pleased with being tall, as i could happily stand behind a crowd of nice, little old ladies and see the whole room.

right quick like they got the show underway, and lucky for me, they started with will playing a song. and john was right, he's fun to watch. a yound, skinny little white guy, playing guitar and singing like a grizzled old man.

i got to listen to a bit of the show, and then had to cut out for my next class. but, iowa city...you made my day...iowa city...i love you.

night riding

2005-10-01T08:57:00.000-07:00

last night andy took me night riding. he let me borrow one of his lights, a helmet mount, 10w bulb. it was awesome. the trails become something completely new. i picked lines, i like to flatter myself into thinking, i wouldn't even consider during the day. trees take on a whole new meaning, shadows dart across the trail. the trail itself appears and disappears at will. we rode one whole lap (minus most blacks) in the standard direction, with the intention of riding another backwards afterwards. sadly my light puttered out at the end of the first. my elbow was hurting a bit, so we called it a night and packed it in.

verdict: i need a light system!

i (heart) cross

2005-09-27T21:46:00.000-07:00

so, i did my first cross race this past sunday. and boy oh boy, do i ever (heart) cross. seriously, it was probably the most difficult race i've ever done. there is just no time for coasting and resting, at least with this course. perhaps the fact that i did this one on a single speed may have had something to do with that too. whenever there could have been room for a bit of coasting i still have to spin to keep the speed just slightly above a snails pace.

about the bike: ghetto speed converted into pseudo-ghetto cross. john says it can't be ghetto anymore because i spent money on it, point duly noted. anyway, big thanks to john for letting me use his basement, and jeff and matt for their bike fixage knowledge helpage extraordinaire. without you jokers the pseudo-cross wouldn't be. so the story goes...saturday i spent running around to the shops and getting the necessary parts for cheap to jimmy together a cheap single. to save you the boring details, the most notable change is drop bars. yep, single speed with drop bars, and non-aero brake levers to top it all off. needless to say, it's pretty hot.

so, lindsay, jeff and i rolled down to the village of east davenport for the race in lindsay park. beautifully laid out course. i don't know any better, but it sure seemed fun to me. ma, margo, sandy, jean, and phil were nice enough to come out and see us in action. i raced the c race, as that was where they put us foolish singles. turns out though, i wasn't the only one who thought it would be fun to rock cross single. i think the field had about 8 singles. i finished 5th, with which i am very happy, as there were some strong riders in the bunch. jeff had a solid race in his first cross jaunt too. he rolled in the b race, and looked like he enjoyed it. my one regret is that i didn't race a second race in the b class with the other mtn bikes. they may have had gears, but technically, my monstrosity is still a mtn bike. and no, matt, it is not "attrocious." and that, my friends, is why...
I (HEART) CROSS.

fixie revitalized! fall is here!

2005-09-24T09:03:00.000-07:00

last weekend, yerke fixed the fixie. he knew someone who had a kind headset for sale, so now i'm rocking a king. a new chrome fork, and a new, old itm stem yerke rummaged up for me at northtowne. bottom line, it looks hot. it is hot. it handles a bit quicker now with the new fork. i love it. i've gone brakeless. so far so good. i had to ditch the cross tires, for lack of clearance in the new fork. so now, the fixie is just about how i want it. happiness ensues.

yesterday, john, yerke, steve, jeff and i rode out to sugar, did the better part of a lap, and rode back in. we were all on our mtn bikes, jeff on his cross. i like riding out to sugar. it beats driving out any day.

last monday, dave and i rode sugar in the evening. the swine dropped me a couple of times. it's only a matter or time and dave is going to be giving us all a run for out money on the dirt too.

it's finally looking like fall might be arriving. yesterday's sugar ride was awesome. i love fall.

minnesota collegiate time trial 9.17-9.18.05

2005-09-24T08:32:00.000-07:00

this past weekend, yerke, john and i headed north to southern minneapolis area for the 2nd installment of the collegiate mtn bike race series.

we left saturday, in a minivan. yerke worked till 1, so john and i packed up here and picked him up in cedar rapids on the way up. we got to northtowne, and met up with matt. but, we are bikers, and we were in a bike shop. you do the math. a half hour or so later, one new wheelset and a few other goodies, and we were on our merry way. i bought a new tubeless wheelset and a rear tire. borrowing a front from yerke. anyway, my bike is significantly nicer now. we got up to eagan, at a park called lebanon hills. i guess some farmer back in the day gave 2000 acres to the city and said it had to be used as a park. so now, in the midst of minneapolis-suburban-sprawl there is this awesome park area. we set up camp, and sadly it was too dark for a pre-ride. so instead we headed into town, got us some dinner and made a night of it.

woke next morning, dressed, rode over to the course. registered, chatted with some of the other racers. headed out for a pre-ride. 4 mile course. most fun course i've ever ridden. yerke and john say about the same thing. when they built this trail, they built it for fun. trial following a nice line, with the land. barely any noticable climbing. tons of fun rollers. extended downhills. banked turns. a jump over a water drainage. fun fun fun. fun enough, post race, we went out for another lap. specifically to ride a double black trail people told us was fun that was left out of the race. a mini teeter-totter, bridges, and all sorts of other goodness. it was simply put, a riot of a place to ride.

the race was fun. time trial. one minute intervals. i put myself in line behind john and matt. and it was appropriate, as i didn't see either of them, but they would have caught me. time trials are different as you constantly have to remind yourself you are racing. i'm pretty sure i could have had a faster first lap, but anyway i look at it, i'm still happy with my time. i came in 9th place with 2 26 minute laps. yerke 6th. john 8th.

i want to go back just to ride those trails again. i can't say enough good things about them.

tour de lizard 9.10-9.11.05

2005-09-24T07:41:00.000-07:00

so, the first collegiate mtn bike race of the season. the slightly infamous (among our crowd) tour de lizard, in arkansas city, ks. read: almost oklahoma.

cast of characters:
me, yerke, john, dave, and scott

the first 4 listed above rolled out of iowa city saturday morning at some ridiculous hour, like 4.45 am or something...
we drove a nice long 9ish hours. on the way we picked up scott in kansas city. he flew into kc to meet us for this race. earlier he had posted his bike to here, so we could load it into the van and take it down with us. he was waiting by a lamp post...
arrive at about 3.30 on saturday. unpacked, set up a bit, and headed off to pre-ride the course. wow. if i had to sum up the course in one word, it would be wow. rocks. rocky downhills. rocky uphills. sandy uphills. a huge climb. and do it all over again. lots of walking for me. riding in the rocks is hard. i took a spectacular fall, no one was around to witness it. on a particularly nasty downhill (in my opinion), i tried it, but got too far off to the right, where the trail curved left. crashed into a pine tree, which ate my bike, and sent me straight up over the bars. i actually did a full front flip in the air, and landed downhill from my bike in the brush, luckily on my back. i got up, and surveyed the damage. my bike was literally wedged in the middle of a small pine tree, looking like some fool had just barreled full speed straight into the thing...oh wait...i am the aforementioned fool. and i tore off a few limbs of said tree, the most notable one being 1.5 inches in diameter. to top it off i left a large flat spot in the brush where i landed further downhill. very little blood, only a few scratches. but i hit my left shin badly. it hurt all sorts. i still have a sizeable bump on it that just won't seem to go down. oddly enough, the thing never bruised, just a nice big bump. oh well. post-crash i got pretty testy and discouraged. leg was hurting annoyingly, and i was questioning whether i'd do the race sunday or not. the camping that night was warm but nice.

noteable on this trip is dave:
that guy had all sorts of firsts this weekend.
1> mtn racing. his 1st race. raced sport. 2nd place. nice.
2> camping. his 1st time camping. kimmy was nice enough to lend him her bag and tent.
let's get down to race business.... sunday rolled around. we woke up and discussed our plans. scott, yerke, john and i decided to race expert. 3 8+_mile laps of, what i would call, sheer punishment. dave, as mentioned, rolled sport.

yerke threw together what would turn out to be a plan of sheer genius. he suggested we all roll together nice and easy on the first lap. have sort of an iowa group ride. let the other racers fight it out for the lead. 8 guys started the A (expert) collegiate race. 4 of us were from iowa. at the line, 4 guys took off like they were starting a race. the other 4 sort of half-arsedly clipped into their pedals, and leisurely rolled out of the line. by the time the first 4 got to the single track, the last 4 were about half way there. very soon, the last 4 couldn't even see the first 4. that was us. we were those slow jokers. we made it about the first 1/2 lap together before we broke up too. there were times where we all got off the bike and let the experts from other age classes (that started at 2 minute intervals after us) go by. it was a riot. we were talking and joking and having all sorts of a nice ride. eventually, john and yerke were keeping a quicker pace than i could handle, so it was scott and i for a bit. sometime i lost scott, and thus we each commenced our own races. the lap finished up with a super long, steep climb...which politely started out as sand, and made it's way to large, loose gravel. dave was up at the top of the hill snapping pictures.
at the end of the first lap i hollered at dave to see if he would tell me how far down i was on john and matt. he said i was pretty close. so i decided i was going to try my hardest to bridge that gap and catch back up to them. somehow, i did manage to catch them. about 1/4 the way into the 2nd lap. there was a brief open section of singletrack through some fields. i turn out of the woods onto this, and who should i see infront of me but john. i made some smart crack about john q being good looking, and it appeared he was surprised and happy to see me. so i hung on with those two for a while. yerke stopped to pick up a pump someone had dropped. i learned that they had stopped for john because he dropped a gu packet. these guys were doing the race right. seriously...you aren't supposed to stop and pick stuff up are you? awesome. that's what it is. simply awesome. eventually we got far enough into the rocks that, me not being very good at rocks, i lost them again. but it was a boost of my moral for a while to catch 'em. the rest of the race went pretty normal for me. it wasn't a race for speed, it was a race of sheer, stubborn obstinance. i just kept going. on the third lap, i caught the 3 of the other collegiate racers, each of them appeared to be hurting all sorts. about 1/3 into lap 3 i broke my chain again. (this is getting old...i need new cranks) so i flipped the bike, fixed the chain and kept going. i managed to ride the downhill which had thrown me the night before all 3 laps. so i am calling that a victory too. i finished up not terribly far behind john and matt, i may have even seen them headed back to the camp on my way to the finish (the course ran through camp on the way to the start/finish).

turns out john finished 2nd. matt cramped up on the last big hill, and ended up 3rd. i came along for 4th. and scott ended up in 5th. 5 finishers. 4 of them from iowa. we are all pretty proud. it was a super fun, if not a bit odd race.

scott's story is worth mentioning too. scott went into this not having ridden as much as he would have liked for preparation. and toughed it out. i guess the guy cramped up something fierce in the same spot yerke did, at the bottom of the last climb. lay in the sand for something like 10 minutes, and decided he had 2 options...stay laying there and be eaten alive by mosquitos, or ignore the pain in his legs and shove his way up the hill. he opted for choice number two. scott had run out of water at the beginning of lap 3, and was thus hurting bad. since the race ran through camp, he stopped, got a cold gatorade, had a few drinks, got back on the bike, and rode to the finish. he had to look pretty awesome, rolling across the finish, surprising the officials who made some crack to him at the end of lap 2 regarding the fact that the sport race was about to start, holding an open bottle in one hand. i wish i could have seen it. way to go scott...you're tougher than me!

dave commandeth at the end of his first lap, at the top of the hill, that we fill up his rapidly waning water supply. john, or matt, i don't remember who, grabbed daves bottle ran over to camp, filled it up, and met dave at the other end of camp. and dave was on his merry way again.

pictures:
<---mine--->
http://www.flickr.com/photos/helpingfriendlybook/tags/tourdelizard/
<---dave's--->
http://www.flickr.com/photos/80942263@N00/

i killed the fixie...

2005-09-04T11:04:00.000-07:00

so we had a cycling club meeting last tuesday. post meeting someone got the nice idea to go get some old chicago cheap pizza and beer. so it was on. 4 of us headed out on bike. yerke, steve, john and me. we were headed down by the river path, when john got the great idea to take off across a nice big park lawn. me, being the clever type i am, immediately entered "pursuit mode." so here we are, two fools sprinting across the lawn. i'm only a few feet from a glorious capture when... john makes a quick decision. he doesn't realize i was so close to him, and thus he decided to slam on the brakes and stop his bike perpendicular to his prior path. seems like a decent idea. except for the -- brian-is-less-than-5-feet-away-in-the-midst-of-a-dead-sprint fact. so, i did what anyone would have done in my shoes. well, maybe not anyone, but safe to say, other fools like me would have done... i t-boned the sucker. naw, i didn't really mean to, but i had no other choice. it all happened so quick there was no alternative. i was going to fast for any evasive manuever, and we were too close for stopping. i didn't even have time to hit the brake. i guess i just leveled him. steve and yerke were up ahead, and heard all sorts of comotion from the lawn, so came back. all i remember is flying through the air, and rolling when i hit the ground. laughing commenced before i even landed. john said he was relieved to hear me laughing. i love falling on the grass. we were both fine, i guess john hit the ground pretty hard, but nothing bad. and i didn't even get sore. i did however kill the fixie. we surveyed the damage. the front wheel was rubbing the fork. the brake was bent to $#*! yerke ghetto-trued the wheel with a few whacks on the ground, and we forced it back into what we suspected was a bent fork. and i commenced riding a very oddly handling fixie to the bar. good times. good times.

evidence:

i already miss the thing something fierce. must fix the fixie and get it back in action. the ghetto speed is no fun to ride around town. not to mention the fixie ride just isn't the same not rocking a fixie. speaking of fixie ride...new pics up.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/helpingfriendlybook/

labor day weekend is nice. rode sugar friday with john. a lap and a half when he broke a spoke and we called it a day. i had a nice crash. full speed @ss-over-teacups endo, whole right side of the body smacked the ground, including a nice head thwap crash. john was very obviously concerned for my apparent lack of concern and desire to continue the ride relatively quickly post fall. we got a kick out of my comment while on the ground as he came rolling up to me... "i know what i'm doing" i meant to try to convey to him that i was fine, just needed a second to lie there, but that's what came out. and funny enough, it makes sense. sadly, i must admit, while i may not "know what i'm doing"...i am getting quite used to crashing. i do it more than anyone i know. anyway, it was a spectacular fall, and miraculously only one small new wound on the elbow. so i called it a good one.

yesterday had a nice morning sugar bottom loop on the road with john. we met jeff for breakfast at the cottage, he had to work, so no ride for him. then later in the evening yerke and john took me 20" riding. which was all sorts of a good time. bmxer's are crazy. i waited till most everyone had left the skate park before i gave it a go. 1st go round, fine. 2nd go round, got too far up on a wall, and stayed vertical on the bike, so it slid out, and so did i, down the wall a bit. opened up the right side of my rump, and my knee gash again. both of those are injuries from back in the day, memorial day to be exact. q.c. crit crash wounds. healed by now, but the skin seems to be weaker there, so they keep opening up. this makes 4 times now i've torn the skin off the exact same spot of my knee. it'll leave a nice scar if the damn thing ever stays healed for more than 2 weeks at a time. anyhow, 20" riding is all sorts of fun.

ran the kayaking club pool session today. couldn't get in though. open wounds all over = not a good idea to get sumberged in the pool. showers hurt enough. so i got to watch a few people have fun. i was jealous. part of me can't wait for winter. a nice long chance to heal up... i did get to check out our new boats. they are pretty nice, and i fit in them, which is a plus. now instead of fitting in just one boat, i get to choose from 4. good good.

waverly installment #2

2005-08-29T18:31:00.000-07:00

this past weekend was one of the bike. you know, like the chinese have the year of the rat and stuff, this was the weekend of the bike. or more appropriately, another weekend of the bike.

saturday swung down to pella for to watch the state crit with lindsay. we got there in time for the master's race. then, much to my dismay, the 5 race... i had thought about bringing my bike, but elected not to. regrets... oh well. i like crits. anyway, i didn't get to ride. and should have. opps. next year. then came the women's race. fun times. followed by the kid's races and finally we stuck around for the 1,2 race. which turned out to be a very fun race to watch. all sorts of fun stuff went down. and even some not so fun.

we got back to ia city at about 3.30, and i packed up the gear and the golf to go get john and head to waverly. we got up there in time to pre-ride saturday night. and the trails were sweet and vicious all at once. explained: trails = sweet and all kinds of fun, they have everything... creek crossings, super fun downhills, very fast rollers, sandy corners, rocky climbs, and lots of freshly cut trail through the woods...that was the vicious part. fresh trail = tush jostling goodness. lots of people on rigids = poor guys. i am still a bit sore and i had a squishy front end. post pre-ride we went down to meet john's friend andy and his lady friend for dinner. dennis was nice enough to join us. he was the only other guy who camped. cory slept inside the lodge. all in all a good night.

sunday: woke up. ate breakfast. went out for another pre-ride with dennis of the rigid, internally geared karate monkey <--he is a bike genius. a nice lap. felt good and strong. burned through all the oatmeal and granola bars i called breakfast. come race time this would = a very hungry brian, which in turn would equal a good, but not great race. i just wasn't feeling as strong as i should have been. i guess i overdid it a bit. but, how could i turn down a chance to ride with dennis on his tank of a surly? i know, i couldn't think of a good reason either. even only a good instead of great race.

race time: lindsay showed up with donny. which was neat. so she got to hang around with us. andy showed up. lots of single speeders on rigids from that irwin's team. good for you boys! sounds like john had a great race. well, apart from shoe trouble had a great race. he was feeling strong, and was up in the front of the pack. way to go pal. sadly his cleat came loose. i still didn't catch the swine. a wrong turn, and a stop to fix his cleat, and he still finished with 2 minutes on me. nice. oh well, i had a very nice endo on the same rocky downhill that i had cleaned twice already this weekend, but had taken me down at waverly installment #1 back in early may. it was a good endo though. and i have yet another gash on my leg to add to the collection. YES! even i am starting to think my legs are getting kinda scary.... but i rode creek crossing number 2 both times! they put up these sketchy bridges, covered with some plywood. some spectator propped up the 2x6 that led to the 2nd bridge, so that the foot climb up the bridge now was a 2x6 mini bridge. anyway, i saw it and made a quick decision that i wasn't close enough to the front to worry about crashing, so i'd give it a go. it was awesome. i found out it was possible the first time around, and not only that, but on the far side if you were lucky (my case) or good (other's cases) you could hop down on to another series of 2x6's which lead over the sandy bit to the other side. this let me put a nice big gap on the guy that had been tailing me for the longest time on lap 2. anyway, i was proud. i'm a nerd. it doesn't take much. i'm sure lots of people rode it. it wasn't exactly hard. just looked a little iffy. other than that, not too much exciting. i finished 9th, right after john, 2 minutes down on him. waverly races rock socks. yeah, i said it, socks.

one week down: i should buy text books. they are not in stock. it's going to be a busy semester.

sugar bottom scramble and other tid-bits

2005-08-22T13:57:00.000-07:00

so, since last wed a few things have happened.

1. we had us a friday night fixie ride

2. bren, andy and i rode some sugar, then were joined by john for more riding.

3. andy was nice enough to take me tree climbing

3. andy built a fixie. it rocks socks.

4. it rained friday night, so sugar race was cancelled postponed saturday morning. sadness ensued.

5. fire pit corn + beer = pre-race carb loading session
read: we salvaged saturday. i even unpacked my room. about time, eh?

6. sugar bottom scramble!!!!

hilarity ensues.

7. yerke and i finish the bike rack.

right. so i might have left something out, if i did, i'm sorry. it's been a busy few days. oh yeah school started. but that isn't terribly exciting. and i certainly don't have any photos of that. but that's only because kim didn't stick around long enough this morning to take our first day of school picture. we'll have to do one tomorrow.

sugar race write up:
here's the quick and dirty... it was a fun, fast, frustrating time.
FUN - it was tons of. i rode out with andy, who was kind enough to pull his b.o.b. containing our post race beer (or what little remained after certain drunkards raided our race beer stash late saturday night!!). but we did rig a radio up too, so that was fun. dave joined us on his road bike, and the three of us headed out just after 9. we got there probably near 10ish. we were there in plenty of time to see the beginners off at 10:30. got registered up, ran around and chatted with folks. bren showed up a bit later than desirable! she slept in accidently...been there done that...as you may well know if you've been reading this for a while. but was in plenty of time to be situated and ready to go for the beginner race. speaking of the beginner race...amanda put in one heck of a showing...2nd place was the rumor i heard. way to go! bren made a nice showing too! nice job on her first even mtn race.
FAST - it's a race isn't it? why wouldn't it be fast? trails were in good shape too.
FRUSTRATING - so, yeah, i think once the race got postponed the race gods were angered and started plotting to make this a bizarre ride for everybody. things were going well for a while. that while being the 1st lap lake side of the trails. then, the north side came out of no where and kicked everybodys arse. andy had a spot of bad luck, when his crank arm bolt came loose a bit before the end of the 1st lap, and ended up with a dnf. sorry buddy. i got to the first black trail, and shortly after the first downhill, i caught a stick and it ate my chain. so i had to stop, get out the tool, remove half a link, and re-attach my chain. all the while watching as people were blowing by me. i'm guessing the change took at least 3 and a half minutes. i was fumbling all over. and i think at least 10 people went by me. lots of them were nice and asked if i had what i needed. which is one of the many reasons i really love mtn racing. finished up, and hopped back on the bike. i had been doing very well for me, and decided it would be a shame to just quit now, so i took off, making it my goal to catch the people who had passed me. so for the next lap and a half i kept making it my goal to get whoever the next one was in front of me. when i caught jami, she was all sorts of great, and kept hollering at me whenever she'd see me on a section of trail. thanks, it helped tons! i didn't make cyclocross the first time, someone was already walking my line of choice to the right, so i gave the left a go, but am not quite that good...so hopped off and finished it with what had to be one of the worst transitions back to the bike ever. but it worked. made it the second time though. which was nice. it was very cool to have a crowd of people hanging around all over the place on that hill. on the second lap, much to my surprise i passed yerke off the bike. poor guy cramped up. him and about 4 other people. everyone was having a hard time of it sunday. there were weird cramp vibes going on all over. (see above comment about angering the race gods) anyway, even with my chain issue, i managed to pull off a 13th place finish. which i am super happy with. but, pompous as this may sound...i can't help but wonder if i could have done a bit better sans chain problem. oh well, we'll find out next year! post race i rode home with andy, we stopped for some ice cream...which hit the spot. and i even scored another pair of glasses for schwag, and a gift certificate too. throughout the race, john played photographer with my camera, and took, what i think, are some super fun pictures. he now knows how to use my camera better than me... along that note, let's hear it for the jokers who came out to watch us suffer: margo, ma, lindsay, kim, john, and scott jr. thanks guys!

steve g. aka "number terror" rocks socks.

i've got the tendonitis!

2005-08-17T14:22:00.000-07:00

in my left wrist. to heal i must take one of two possible routes.

1) deal with it
2) take it mildly easy

i vote option 1.

countdown: friday night fixie ride:: 1.5 hours.

one more week...

2005-08-16T12:19:00.000-07:00

...and the fun that has been this summer will be coming to an end. students are moving back in. traffic downtown has picked up again <--- oh boy! it makes for fun townie riding! still not riding a lot. actually for the last week, riding has mostly been on the fixie around town. had a very nice ride sunday morn with lindsay. the weather was awesome. other than that, last sugar ride was last week sometime.

looks like i never finalized my race against ragbrai. ragbrai won. by a landslide. lucky kids riding around iowa for a week.

sugar race = saturday. can't wait.
andy = in
john = in.
me = in.
yerke = in (hopefully).
brenna = in.
me = excited == understatement.

the last 'night at the oval' race is tonight. it looks like it's going to be nice weather. and there will be pizza after the race. hopefully i'll feel a bit more like eating than i have at every other oval i've done.

since it's been about time i put up a picture:
micheal's new (and most adorable) little puppy maggie (<---maybe. i suggested 'vrodent' and 'black train of death' but neither seemed to have that appropriate ring...)

oh yeah, and i've finally immersed myself in those harry potter books. they really are quite nice.

a brief hiatus explained

2005-08-12T13:29:00.000-07:00

i moved.

but now things are up and running again. i see my last post / whine-fest was all about gears allegedly sucking. they still suck, but now i have a new rear derailleur and shifters and fork, and the mtn bike is fun to ride again.

other than that, i now live with kim, and bomber (for the few of you who may not know, bomber = big blue great dane). yerke moves in this weekend. good stuff. new place is fun.

on the riding front, i've been doing exactly that. although not quite as much as i'd like.

i gots me a cell phone. i joined the ranks. once upon a time i said i didn't like 'em. then i said i was jealous of them, but didn't want a land line and a cell. now i have one...i love it. so, that's settled.

gears are for sissies.

2005-07-28T19:34:00.000-07:00

i just returned from a nice ride out at sugar on the cannondale. it's derailluer hanger is shot. cached. thus, as i rode, it jumped all over the place. on almost the majority of the times i stood, there it would go. skipping invariably to the next highest gear...not a very knee friendly thing to do. and thus my bike and i have had a falling out. at least till i get it fixed...it is starting to seem like i spend more time getting the darn thing fixed than riding a nice working bike. oh well. i dunno, maybe it's not even the hanger...what do i know? very little.

all sketchy shifting, and sketchy it was, aside...i had me a phenominal two laps. continuous. no breaks for me. and therefore i am tired, a bit sore, and happy. i missed out yesterday, so i made up for it today. out at 6:15, was curious as to whether i could get in two before the sun set for the evening. yep. and it made for some awesome riding on that second lap as it got low in the sky, it was all kinds of pretty. noticed today that i ride a lot more poorly on the geared bike. the lines i picked tonight were nothing short of embarrassing. am begining to suspect i may actually be faster on a single... verdict: gears are for sissies. oh yeah, and i got to enjoy the harmonious knocking sounds that come from deep within my fork all evening, combined with some serious creaking of the cranks...i was a regular orchestra. to top things off...i literally lost count of the number of deer that i not only saw, but that cut across my path. the first one of the night startled me, as she was actually within touching distance in front of my bike, and chose to run the path for a way directly ahead of me. it was great.

ragbrai, you fickle broad you, you are beating the pants off me.
me: 82 + 5 + 0 + 15 + 22 = 124
ragbrai: 65.5 + 84.4 + 62 + 83.7 + 78.3 = 373.9
that zero in the middle of my days bothers me. can't remember the last time i pulled a zero day, excluding days off due to injuries (i'm a nancy). zero days suck.

not a very good post. i know.

me = stupid

2005-07-27T14:33:00.000-07:00

i'm getting kind of bummed about moving. it looks like i'm going to be in everyone's way for a day or so. i'm going to completely fill kim's room with my junk, and i don't know that i'll be able to get it out by the time she returns from ragbrai, but i suspect not. i also don't know what to do with / how i am going to move my couches.

so, i decided that...when i gets frustrated...i's needs to go ride me a bit of sugar. so i got all excited for a nice couple of loops in this beautiful weather by myself. loaded the car, drove half way there before i remembered i had forgotten to check if it was open. i have become so used to it being open in this nice hot, dry weather that i forgot all about it raining yesterday. since it would have been silly to turn back, i kept driving out there. and of course it was shut. so, sad and beaten i turned around and headed home, where i took a nice needed nap, which was nice, but as it turns out, i could have ridden sugar instead of...which would have been ideal. namely, to make matters even worse, i just woke up, and checked to see if sugar was open, and they updated the interenet to open at 2:06, which would have been right as i was leaving north liberty from my ill-fated trip out there. so, now no sugar for the remainder of the week. which sucks, because the weather is PERFECT, and it's already been 3 days.
so, me = stupid.

and my ragbrai total continues to sag, 15 today (from the soon to be friday night fixie ride), and not the 15 + 22 which should have included 2 laps at sugar.

me: 82 + 5 + 0 + 15 = 102
ragbrai: 65.5 + 84.4 + 62 + 83.7 = 295.6

so, yah, moving sucks and i've got some serious catching up to do.

me vs. ragbrai pt ii

2005-07-26T20:01:00.000-07:00

me: 82 + 5 + 0 = 87
ragbrai: 65.5 + 84.4 + 62 = 211.9

ragbrai is kicking my arse.

but...i did get quite a bit done today regarding moving and packing up my stuff. i moved several loads over to the new place. kim's room is rapidly filling with my junk.

me vs. ragbrai

2005-07-25T19:18:00.000-07:00

me: 82 + 5 = 87
ragbrai: 65.5 + 84.4 = 149.9

hmmm....
and now i have to start packing my junk...

an almost century...

2005-07-24T18:34:00.000-07:00

i'm feeling good considering my weight is still hovering somewhere dangerously near the 170 mark.

yesterday = ride sugar with steve and bren. good ride was had.

today =
we had had plans to do a "potluck one hundred" so aptly named by yerke and john. anyway, it was to consist of 100 miles today on the road, followed by a nice big potluck grilling fest at john's. our plans changed.

riders:
jeff - had to skip out for work at 1
john, matt, me

we rolled out sometime around nine. and held a very fast pace into a nice strong headwind for most of the first 30-some-odd miles. had several stops for re-water-filling and refueling, including one at a random building which was to host a nice family's reunion. i say nice since they let 4 sweaty guys stop by and fill their water bottles with fresh, cold water. after this stop, it was about 11.30ish and jeff had to bail. the pace slackened a bit with the absence of jeff. much to my relief. jeff is a strong rider. anyway, john, yerke, and i carried on on our tour of johnson county. john and jeff threw the route together a while back, and i must say, a nice one it is. once we three reached north liberty, we agreed it was hot. yerke's temp reading on his computer topped out at 115! and decided to roll back into iowa city at a nice leisurely pace on the bike path. we got to john's, recovered a bit and went out seperate ways.

no one was foolish enough to want to ride some mtn with me. i was still feeling prett good, and wanted to see what i could get in for the day. plus, yerke's ride-the-same-mileage-as-ragbrai-this-week challenge sounds like fun, so i need to kill some miles.

tally:
me = 81
ragbrai = 65.5

we'll see where this tally goes...
anyway, i went out solo and did a lap at sugar. met up with a fella i've raced with at the oval, so joined him on my lap. i had intended to do two, but the rigid bike and sore hands from the road cached me in after one. i endoed nice and big on hell trail on that hairy rooty, curvy, treey gradual downhill. caught a tree with my bars, and over i went. opened up my knee gash again. aww, and it was just starting to heal nicely. oh well. i'm destined to have the most-knicked-up-legs-ever.

steve will be here soon. and some riding will commence to downtown for burgers and beer. make my tally for the day, 82.

...i should be tired...

2005-07-21T22:37:00.000-07:00

ok, so i should be tired. by all calculations i should be in a near-coma-style sleep right now. but i am not. so i'll kill some time till i am tired doing this.

today i went to burlington to ride with the burlingtoners, namely: scott, tracy, and amanda. i got up, worked from 6-8:30. for some reason took my house keys out and left them at work on a table. found my keys on that table after coming home and becoming slightly frustrated. packed my bikes, cooked a couple of bagels for the road, and took off.

arrived about 20 minutes late. fancy that. i met the crew at dane's, some very nice singletrack behind the ymca. dane's = fun. big fun. lots of skinny, and shady bridges over gaps. ridiculous bridges. scary bridges. i like bridges. we rode the 5 and a half mile loop twice, once in each direction. scary downhill bridges become scary uphill bridges. big, sketchy uphills mated with big, sketchy downhills. and all kinds of fast, fast, fast flat inbetween. i crashed. twice. evidence:
from crash number two. good times. both falls happened within the first 20 minutes of riding. both times on sketchy-esque downhills curving to the right at the bottom. rear wheel skidded out. think it might be the new tire. not as much tread on the side of the tire, rather all tread is in the middle. or it could be just that i took it too fast and leaned too much...but i prefer to blame the tire. we even had a nice little sit in the grass between laps...it was good.

off to geode. they then took me out to geode state park. four mcdonald's cheese burgers later, we arrived at geode, and rode a gravel-esque trail that circled the lake. fun times. a shared use trail with hikers, but we didn't see a soul on the trail. some very tricky sections out there too, particularly some climbs involving rocks. but, in my opinion, not as tricky as dane's. but still fun, and quite fast in places. i bet even faster in the opposite direction. we only rode one lap, and then we lay in the grass some more, watching some clouds literally disperse to nothing above us. it was really neat, they were swirling around until nothing was left. never seen anything like that before.

finally we decided it was time to abandon mtn for the day, and get ready for the group road ride at 5:30. scott's girlfriend megan was kind enough to let me shower at her place, twice, but we'll get to that. shower #1 = post mtn riding. she, being quite a nice girl, even fixed us some sandwiches. got all geared up, and rode over to the bike shop, where the group ride starts.

rode about a 35 mile route, just trying to hang on the whole time. i succeeded, so i'm calling it a victory. good riding, nice scenery, good guys (and amanda). much fun was had on this little stint of a road ride.

post road ride, the burlingtoners decided it was necessary to climb snake alley, seeing as i had never had that unique pleasure. and pleasure it was. i did it once and was left questioning..."and you jokers do this 11 more times?" (let alone at race pace...) we also finished out the crit course for fun. it was nice to ride what i got to watch earlier this year. then, off to the cemetery. burlington has a huge cemetery, built into a hilly area. so as a result there is quite a nice maze of hilly, curvy goodness out there in the access roads. literally, we just rode around on the access roads, on scott's crit course he made up, and even a bit of off-road road bike styling involving me getting snagged by a very low downed tree. it was a lot of fun to zip around those roads. finally, after a long day in the saddle, it was time to head back.

got back to megan's place. shower #2. ate some dinner with them (which i owe you for!). chatted for a bit, and headed back to iowa city.

all in all a phenominal day. that crazy burlington crowd, they know how to knock together a day of riding...

danes: 10 miles
geode: 8 miles
road: 45 miles
--------------
total: 63 miles

wors cup weekend

2005-07-19T10:41:00.000-07:00

saturday morning, true to my word, and only slightly late, i showed up at scott's. john d joined me. we moved some stuff. and had a few laughs. and i called it quiting time at noonish, as i had to fix the bike and finish packing before we headed north for yerke.

and by fix the bike, i mean look at it. i looked at it. it looked green and black still, so i called it good. and actually, for a change, was shifting moderately well with only minimal tinkering in wisconsin. <--hey, that's good for me! sadly, i should have given it a nice once over and checked everything. oh well, it wouldn't have occured to me to check the tire sidewalls even if i had performed a nice pre-race check up.

joined john, drove up to pick up yerke. saw yerke's soon to be sweetest-paint-job-on-a-1-x-1-ever. grabbed some lawn chairs and headed off. the drive up: relatively uneventful. highlight: shaved llamas.

we got up to devil's head while it was still daylight. so we set up camp in the open field designated for camping. crummy ground as yerke and his lack of a camp pad can attest for. $10 per tent. can you believe it? outrageous. oh well. john had a nice shade shelter thingy. it was awesome. we cooked us some dinner. courtesy of john being a clever and prepared camper. without him, i would have eaten crackers all weekend.
sunday morning we woke up, ate us some breakfast. lounged around for a good long while. fell in love with john's shade shelter again. eventually got up and dressed, did a bit of a warm up on a nearby road. i flatted in the parking lot shortly before the race. swapped out the tube. noticed the sidewall was worn through in spots on my front tire. cleverness would have prompted me to put a dollar bill in there to try to avoid further flats. sadly, i am not that clever.

anyway, we all raced sport. we started a bit less than half way up the hill, and the gate put us out on a nice big long climb. we were all riding together, and having a good time. i decided that the group was going slower than they could, so i started passing some of the other racers on the right, happily both john and yerke followed me, and we put a nice portion of the pack behind us on that first climb. still, a bunch of racers ahead of us, it bottlenecked quite badly at the first single track, and lots of times thereafter as guys wouldn't manage sections and would hold us up. some jokers behind me were getting a bit impatient, and nicely a fellow infront of me told them all to calm down, afterall it's just a sport race. i chimed in with a race comp if you're that serious guys comment. the trails were great, in and out of singletrack mixed with ski hill climbs and crosses. i thought it was a pretty rocky course. not continually rocky, but lots of little gardens with nice, decent sized rocks to weave your way through. it was a lot of fun. plus the ground was super dry, and thus dusty as all get out, so much so that my eyelids felt gritty. yerke finished an impressive 6th, with john right behind him in 10th. way to go guys. me, on the other hand, i finished with a not-so-impressive DNF. flatted for the 2nd time 3/4 the way through lap one of three. i raced for about 20 some odd minutes. i am pretty bummed about it, as the course was a riot, and i think i was riding well, and still feeling strong. but, the biggest bummer is just missing out on the riding. oh well. yerke and john did great, and i had fun while i was there. all in all, a good weekend.

wednesday goodness

2005-07-14T10:35:00.000-07:00

yesterday was a good day. steve and i went on a road ride in the morning. kim brought me out to steve's on the way to the mall, and i stole a saddle from steve for to put on the road bike. post mall going and returning homing, steve and i headed out and did a nice relatively leisurely sugar bottom loop, heading back in by way of mehaffey rd and the bike path.

i had a quick nap, and ran some errands around town.

then off for the friday night fixie ride.
we saw a turtle.
we named him snappy von snap snap.

then we made it out to north liberty for some iguanas. and our usual waitress finally remembered us. although she did it on the sly. namely just brought us our usually requested pitcher of water without being asked. sneaky. i ate a bit too much. turns out two chimichangas are all that one needs to acheive food-itary happiness. three is one too many. and four, well that's just out of the question. hopefully i'll learn my lesson this time.

the ride back was nice. i wasn't present but chris had a nasty (at least the after effects looked nasty) fall. but he is a tough old bird and rolled right on back with us. upon arrival at our self-proclaimed foot-down circle, i spotted wet sidewalks (*thank you university sprinkler system!*) and thought it might just be the perfect time for to learn to skid. and it was. micheal and i spent a good long while skidding on the wet pavement. and even had us a nice little informal contest, at which i failed miserably. but that's okay. because...I CAN SKID now! and while detrimental to my tires, skidding is fun. chris even hung out and watched us skid around. we met a nice lady with two nice dogs, one being a husky puppy...which loved to play in the sprinklers. <---quite possibly the cutest thing ever. how silly is it that i want to go back again and skid around in the sprinklers? me = nerd.

and to top off an already nice evening, we finished it with some ice cream at the dq. i love kiwi-strawberry slushies. and as a result of our evening i got a solid 4 hours of sleep last night, a bruise on my right thigh where i braced my leg on the bars while skidding, and a sore bottom from a 50+ mile day on my bikes. thankfully bottom soreness has pretty much passed, and i'm about to remedy the short sleep time, but my leg leaves much to be desired. oh well, I CAN SKID! i'm sooo happy.

scott's last ride for a while

2005-07-13T15:37:00.000-07:00

so, scott is moving to utah. that is a bummer. but it's pretty cool too. a good place to settle down, lots of fun to be had. so yeah. thus we had a nice group ride out at sugar last tues evening. i met scott out at 4.30, with the intention of doing a lap, and then meeting the others that would be showing up during the 6 o'clock hour. but when i got there, i learned scott's wife had had a flat. so off we went to mend that situation.

score:
flat tires: 0
me and scott: 1

we packed up a grill scott was gracious enough to give us for next year's apt. then returned to sugar. and met up right quick like with bren and john. shortly after right quick like, matt showed up to join us. and we all made ready, and rolled off into the sunset. i was on the single again. turns out i like single-speeding. we had a nice ride, and headed in to old chicago for an evening of cheap pizza and beer. lots of folks showed up and we were there decently late (by my early-to-bed standards!)

built: one fixie!

2005-07-12T09:08:00.000-07:00

so, sunday rode with matt and john at sugar. 2 laps left me near dead. turns out i inadvertantly lost 15 lbs recently. i suck. i need to eat more.

monday took ryan out in the morning on the new bike. i rode the ghetto single, as i finally got my new pedals for it. it rocks socks. we had a nice half lap. then he got off his evening shift for working, so we rode again in the evening, other half this time.

also, monday threw the new rear wheel in my bag and rode over to the shop. while i looked kinda goofy (i know i did, people gawked at me downtown as i ran a couple of other errands) with a wheel hanging off of my back, it felt pretty fun. trying to use the car less and less. about to ride out to myep and scrounge for a new chainring for the ghetto single. 36 x 16 is kicking my tail. need: 34 or 32, we'll see. anyhow, micheal loctited a track cog on, and i scrounged an old bottom bracket lockring from the scrap bin, and all was well. still rocking 46 x 17, and liking it. fixed = fun. i spent the last hour just riding around trying to trackstand. it'll take some work!

anyway, scott is moving, and that is a bummer. so we're going on a nice big group sugar ride tonight. i'm going to rock the single some more. we'll see how i fair with some fast folk. then off to pizza and beer at old chicago. sounds like a good night, and i'm excited.

house-sitting and breaking stuff. thankfully not the house though.

2005-07-08T13:43:00.000-07:00

i'm still hanging out in cedar rapids. kyra-rodent and i had a nice morning earlier, where we lounged around outside, rather she lounged, and i (relatively successfully) figured out how to tighten my headset (mtn). now at least i am no longer scared of the front end of my bike.

my elbow still hurts all sorts. i don't think i'm going to be able to race sunday, which has me in a very bad mood, as i also turned down a ride today. what is it with me and getting smallish little injuries that are always just big enough to keep me off the bike for weeks at a time? it's starting to get a bit frustrated. grrr.

plus, i just broke my mtn saddle. having bent the rails, it was only a matter of time before they snapped. that time finally came as i was riding around today checking to see if i had done the headset any good. i had. but i broke my saddle. so, it looks like i'll be ghetto-speeding it for a while. i also broke a toe cage on my townie. i wanted new metal ones anyway, but had been smart enought to realise that new cages cost money, of which i have very little. so now i need new cages, and a saddle. biking = expensive. no matter how i try, it seems every week i need to fix some part of some bike. grrr.

it's nice out, so here's hoping everyone else has a chance to have a nice ride, or for those who are not so 2 wheel inclined, a chance to get out in the nice weather. as for me, i'm going to take a nap. the one activity during which i don't think i can hurt myself, or break any of my toys. grrr.

a very, very fast night at the oval

2005-07-05T22:27:00.000-07:00

i am currently executing my charge of caring for one kyra. kyra is my cousin's dog. i get to house / dog / fish / some form of rodent (gerbil maybe?) / plant sit. i'm having a good time up here in cedar rapids.

spent yesterday with grandma and the family in park view. brought the aforementioned rodent-dog down with me. chloe was absolutely baffled by this creature that resembled a dog, yet refused to play with her or even acknowledge her attempts at friendship. it made for an amusing day. chloe was visibly confused. kyra, i couldn't tell. but, to both of their credit, they behaved most excellently. we had us a nice little dinner and some games. a good way to recover from sunday's mud fest.

today i brought the golf down to iowa city for golf-fixage! verdict: no worries. the good people at carousel checked it out and even put in a recalled hazard switch, all for free. quite nice of them. i'm a fan. plus, it's comforting to know that the golf is fine.

post golf-fixage, returned to c.r. and joined ryan in picking up his bike at northetowne, he is now the proud owner of one cannondale in a great paint job of dark grey. sharp bike ryan. soon enough we'll have to have us a sugarbottom ride.

i have turned brent and sharon's house into my personal bike cabinet. i'm keeping the mtn bike in the garage, as it's dirty, but the single and roadie are resting in the hall. my bike clothes have taken over the kitchen counter, and tomorrow i plan to re-space the single for to fit andy's wheels, so i can fix it finally. then off to the oval for to have my arse handed to me repeatedly.

the oval tonight was what i call "stupid-fast." a bunch of fast guys showed up and thus made some semi-fast guys ride with us in the not-so-fast-group. it made for a de-moralizing evening. but, jeff and john joined me, and the burlingtoners showed up, so that was all sorts of fun. and to jeff's credit, he hung out with the fast guys, while john and i put for some seriously half-arsed efforts in the slow group. those jokers can sprint. john threw down a foolhardy challenge, and we both took off way too early on the first lap for a 1 point sprint of a snowball race (ascending points for each lap go to the leader), and had our precious point robbed from us by a sneaky fellow with one heck of a sprint right at the finish line. i hung on for about half of the miss-and-out, john hung on for significantly more. i think i may have gotten a couple of points on one of the 4 sprints during the points race, but i may be in error. we'll find out tomorrow. i missed most of jeff's races as i was busy panting for breathe and questioning why i submit myself to such self-inflicted punishment as road racing.

other notable moral victories:
-john and my astonishing last and second to last place finishes on the so-called "vicious" race which sent both fields into and out of the littlest 1/8 mile oval twice and spat us back out onto the big 1/2 mile oval 3 times.
-john and my super-awesome-way-too-late-we-planned-it-that-way sprint at the end of the little gear race. we actually sat up and let 2 guys roll by us for our plan to roll across the finish holding hands. last minute that plan was scrapped when john observed our sketchy bike handling, and i challenged him to a sprint to the finish. we were neck and neck till the end, but i think i pulled ahead by a millimeter or so at the last second. we got a few laughs from those standing around the finish. i guess it's relatively uncommon to see the last 2 riders sprint for the finish during the little gear race. i think that is a shame. what the bike racing world needs are many, many more little gear sprinters.

yeah. good times were had. oval = good practice. a nice chance to learn how to try (albeit unsuccessfully) to hang on to breaks, (again attempt) to catch back on, sprint, sprint, and did i mention sprinting. plus always a fun crowd. although tonight was more serious and thus a bit less fun that last time. but, i'll be back again in 2 weeks. i'm a sucker for punishment.

uncle sammy's birthday bike-a-thon

2005-07-05T22:08:00.000-07:00

sunday july 3, 2005
way to go andy, andy's parents, and jp for putting on one riot of a good race down in washington. all of my curiosity as to how he would pull a course out of that maze of trails that are down there was answered, and answered well. ie) the course rocked socks. literally. it was a great laid back atmosphere: best part = we got to pick our own race numbers. i chose number "john p" and a picture of a bunny and some flowers and a sun. when i added clouds john was upset. turns out the clouds were appropriate... i still win the "best-race-number-ever" competition.
started from the meadow, were forced to climb the hill of death right away, and twice more...up to the top, where the singletrack began. the singletrack was well thought out and equalled a nice, fast course. 3 laps, at something over 4 miles made for about a 13 mile race. john lost me on the first climb of the hill, and i wouldn't see him again until the end of the race. although i did race his colors. eventually the trails spat us back out smack into the meadow again, we crossed to another corner of said meadow back into the woods. which in turn once again spat us out into yet another corner of the meadow. 4 corners + 3 used in the race = criss crossing race traffic!!! awesome. we don't need no stinkin' safety measures. actually it worked fine. everyone was super nice about it, and people who were farther ahead were declared to have right of way at the pre-race meeting.

i traded places with another nice tall guy (notice shameless plug for self) for the first 2 laps. had a glorious crash on lap 2. on a nice fast gravelish downhill that becomes a nice slow gravely uphill in the middle of a nice off-camber turn = brian sliding out on the aforementioned turn. 2 guys right on my tail, and i somehow managed to snag the top tube, haul my bike out of their way, and stand back up before i was done sliding. hopped right back on the bike, and in no time was right back on their tail. managed to find some energy on the 3rd climb of hill of death, and wouldn't see anyone except singlespeeders dq and lee for the most of the 3rd lap. although, completely unknown to me, some guy rolled into the finish literally seconds after i did. found that out upon looking at the results. how i missed that i'm not so sure. i ended up placing 6th, about 3+ minutes down on john in 5th. really happy with my result. about a third the way through lap 3 the rain commenced. heavenly rain. i was sooooo happy. nice cool rain to cool me off. plus, rain made the trails a whole new ball game, of slippery sliding. rainy mtn bike races are the best. snow isn't too bad either. turns out i kind of like riding in muck.

a soggy post-race john

schwag-wise i made out like a pirate. i couldn't have looted and pilaged for better booty. i walked away with a new, much needed tire to replace the worn rear on the mtn bike, a new set of rims for the soon-to-be re-fixie (i actually paid for those), and 2 t-shirts for me, as well as a couple more for gifts. i did however, forget my cooler. i'll have to drop andy a line about that.
all in all a fantastic race.

as it turns out...i'm a really lazy kid...

2005-07-01T15:31:00.000-07:00

alt titles:
-catching up
-an odd series of events

WED:
fixed the single finally. not the ghetto single, but the townie. i love my townie. i love my townie even better as a fixed gear. went into the broken spoke, got a rear wheel with a fixed/free hub and put the silly thing together. decided to rock the same gear ratio 46x17. it is/was (getting to that) awesome. i love riding fixed. i've got my brake, so my inability to skid yet (i blame my semi-knobby crossish tires) is of relatively little consequence. the plan is to replace the road bike tires, and then use those to learn to skid, then after thouroughly thrashing those on the fixie, getting some nice fat 35cc townie treads.

getting to the aforementioned "was" comment. some lucky fellow decided to come in and build up a very nice frame the shop had. and micheal needed a wheel by saturday. so seeing as i have yet to pay for said wheel, he rang me to see if i would be willing to part with it. i was. turns out the golf needing fixed is going to cost money. that wheel will go a long way toward golf fixage. and sadly, golf fixage is slightly higher on my priority list than riding fixed. so, after a very brief stint as a fixie rider (tear, tear)...i am back to coasting. and for the record...if you're only going to have one gear, coasting is for sissies. and climbing hills is actually harder. i think i was faster on the fixie.

currently: plotting some way to re-fix the townie. coasting is for sissies.

THURS:
-6 am- work
-10 am- meet burlingtoners in washington for some trail recon. good riding. excited for the race. still curious as to how andy is going to wiggle 10 miles out of that course.
-after noonish- back in iowa city for some lunch, and out to sugar. with hopes of the trails reopening. a nice rest in the shade of a tree. a quick turn round sugar bottom loop, and by our return just after 4, the trails had indeed reopened. still a bit damp, but not bad at all. john just rode them today, and says they're now great. both nice rides. sugar bottom access road on a road bike = sheer elation.

thanks to said burlingtoners. i always have a good time riding with you jokers.

FRI:
-the reason i have decided i'm a lazy kid-
what have i done today? i work up at 7.30ish to be ready to work at 8.30 until noon. then i came back here, took my last ride on the fixie down to the shop for un-fixage. un-fixed the townie, which i can no longer address as the fixie. returned here. ate a bit. looked round. decided the apt is in such disrepair that any attempt to remedy the situation before moving day later this month would be futile. i live in self-inflicted filth. settled in on the couch for a much un-needed nap. now i'm just killing time until i work again tonight. this is pretty much what i do everyday, only with an earlier start time, and no working in the evening. bummed about that. i need a new job. one that doesn't require waking at such early morning times. one that allows me to blow around iowa city on my bike all day. one that allows me to deliver fine sub sandwiches. jimmy johns here i come. they are not going to know what hit them. but i need to re-fix the bike then. remember, fixed = fast. not as fast as pink, because pink is fast. now, fixed and pink = stupid fast and...simply to die for. who else thinks velocity deep v's in pink would be the perfect way to dress up the townie? i do.

stupid hobby costs stupid money. damn.

apart from that:
-desperately excited for this weekends mtn race.
-eagerly anticipating a hopefully large iowa turn out at the oval next tuesday.
-ashamed that i still haven't gotten margo a birthday present. (sorry sis. worst.brother.ever.)

a desperately worn old chainring

2005-06-28T07:18:00.000-07:00

old biopace chainrings make good spacers

junk bin salvaged desperately worn old 36t chainring +
sawed off bolt mounts from said old biopace chainring =
one GHETTO single speed

evidence of an afternoon well spent

that's right folks. you heard it right. the ghetto single is up and running. and, for the record, it is awesome. i'd even go as far as to say...it rocks socks. after a nice loop with steve and scott on the cannondale i was still feeling pretty good. so i went out for lap number 2 with mauk, and elected to give this single business a try. verdict: single speeding is fun. platform pedals and converses left much to be desired on climbs, but other than a couple of times, i managed to stay pretty firmly planted on 'em. the 36x16 setup also leaves much to be desired on climbs. but was awesome for flats and downhills. seldom did i find myself spun out. but then, we weren't out to go super fast either. still, i'm currently in the market for another salvaged, less worn, 34 or 32t ring. the old derailleur as a chain tensioner slaps the chainstay, so yes, my single is going to have a chainstay protector as soon as i can russle up an old tube.

i'm going to today replace the taped cable with the end of some old derailleur cable, and so eliminate the need for the whole yes-i-tied-some-very-precariously-loose-knots-in-cable-and-taped-over-it concern. (the stop screws wouldn't go in far enough for nice chainline, so that's how i keep the derailluer lined up properly) speaking of chainline, i'm pretty happy with it. i only dropped the chain twice...and like i said...the chainring is painfully worn.

not too shabby

total cost: $23
....it's dreamy....
(a new paint job is probably in its near future. i'm thinking pink with blue lugs. yeah, that'll be hot. any suggestions, thoughts, comments?)

happy birthday margo!

2005-06-27T07:59:00.000-07:00

i had a nice weekend. despite the cancelled race, it turned out to be all sorts of fun. our plans to salvage the weekend were going good, starting with a with a nice big group ride at sugar: yerke, pemberton, chris, and me...but...it got vetoed by that fickle broad, mother nature. she decided it would be a nice change of pace to dump a stupid heavy rainfall right over sugar, even a bit of hail, and leave the rest of the area bone dry. so, she foiled out sugar plans. saddened but not beaten, we commenced our grilling plans, had us a nice old night. we even learned a thing or two...namely, japanese beer = ridiculously strong cans

someone had a sudden stroke of genius, and proposed we go ride the washington trail on sunday, in case sugar was closed in the morning. and so it was. we argued john out of waking at some ridiculous hour like 6 am, in favor of meeting at the cottage at 9 (a much more sensible hour for a sunday).

sunday morning rolled around, we ate, and were off. the drive went well, until we encountered "rolling-golf-death-hill" as it shall hence forth be known. we saw an access road which looked like it would take us into sockum ridge. the sad part was, as the golf rolled along we came to several speed-bump-esque things of colossal proportions. the first snuck up on me, and immediately after cresting the first monstrous thing...developed the as-of-yet-undeterminded-rhythmic-grinding-metal-on-metal noise from under the left front wheelwell. not good. a few chuckles later at my bum luck, and the golf's inadequate off-roading abilities, a near death incident involving yerke's bike coming partially unattached from my rack (thank goodness for the safety string we applied earlier!), and we were at the top. the road ended. we pulled off the bikes. got geared up, and headed out into the sweltering heat. it was stupid hot there. it seemed like the greenery of the forest was adding to the already blindingly-hot temperatures. there was very little, if any, relief when we rolled into the shade even.

the trails were great. it promises to be a fun race. a real maze in there. we were riding circles the whole time. would like to explore it a bit more sometime, as we didn't even hit it all. the heat got us down, and we elected to head northward once again. first we pulled off the golf tires, just to see if anything was visibly awry...to no avail. the noise got worse after re-attaching the tires, then by the time we were home, was no longer noticeable. (it's got an appointment next tuesday...hang on little buddy...)

had some lunch here at the apt, and decided it was time to hit some sugar. faster trails, and noticeably cooler temps in the shade made sugar great. don't get me wrong...we were sweaty boys...but it was still great riding.

then homeward to join up with margo and mom for some huhot.

happy birthday little sister!

so... edit bummer...

2005-06-25T11:39:00.000-07:00

yesterday went on a road ride. got out there and just wasn't feeling it. it was stupid hot. i was drinking every couple of minutes. and my legs...just didn't feel right. so after about 9 miles. i turned around, and let the wind carry me home.

a quick lap at sugar with micheal this morning. it was still hot, but not nearly as bad as yesterday. plus, once in the shade it was actually a very comfortable temp. hot yes. but not stiffling. plus the trails were in great condition. so, all in all, a nice way to start the morning. i'd be up for more...but am still unsure about plans for tomorrow's race. we might be rolling out of here come 3, or we might not...we'll see. excited for tomorrow's race. i think i'm riding well. i know yerke is riding great. and andy, well, andy = fast. it should be fun.

***edit***
ft. dodge race cancelled. rained a ton up there
next step: salvage weekend with much sugar riding, grilling, trail work day, more sugar riding, and more grilling.

update

2005-06-23T20:45:00.000-07:00

ghetto single coming along nicely.
wheels all worked out.
brakes almost dialed in.
all i need is a chain ring, and it's in business.
although, the small ring on the crank is currently looking like a permanent fixture...it just might be getting the hack saw treatment.

a night at the oval

2005-06-22T13:46:00.000-07:00

riding around in circles is fun.

last night i raced at hawkeye downs in cedar rapids. it was great. the most fun i've had to date at a road race. everyone was real nice, and much more laid back than usual...or so i thought. there were a series of races. my favorite being the points race where we had to sprint for points every other lap. i rode with the B group, and finished quite well, so i am very happy with that. scott seems to think i should ride with the A group next time...he's crazy. we'll see. the only thing about last night i regret was not eating before hand. once again, somehow i managed to forget to eat until it was too late. that, my friends, was a mistake. still, can't wait for next time!

now, for a bit of work on the ghetto single...

soon to be the coolest / fastest snail powered single speed this side of the mason-dixon line

2005-06-20T20:46:00.000-07:00

yeah, those are two front wheels, what of it?

check out those HOT bottle cages. i think they need to go on the road bike you know, for some...flair.

a most excellent way to spend a day

2005-06-17T23:08:00.000-07:00

sleep in.

ride road - 34 miles
ride mtn - 22 miles

eat pizza, have a few beers.

sleep. repeat as necessary.

cell phones...

2005-06-15T20:45:00.000-07:00

seriously. what's the deal? i accidently called some kid's phone this evening, dialed a friend's number wrong. thankfully robbie didn't answer i just got his machine. although later i did have the pleasure of chatting with robbie when he returned my accidental call.

me: hello
robbie: (silence...) hello
me: hello
robbie: hello, who is this, did you call my cell phone?
me: it was a wrong number, sorry
robbie: oh okay
me: bye
robbie: yeah

first off, robbie, i don't know you. had i wanted to talk to you i would have left a message. second, it's late, don't call me. third, just what goes on in someone's head when they return a missed call on their cell phone. i can see doing so if one misses a friend's call...but random numbers...seriously robbie, get a life.

cell phones...sheesh.
on that note, i need one.

seriously...who puts the boot on a railroad track? scene discovered by john on tonight's friday night fixie ride.

burlington kids...

2005-06-15T08:04:00.000-07:00

several jokers, namely tracy, amanda, scott, and nick, from burlington headed up yesterday with hopes of riding sugar, and then joining the group ride in the evening. i joined up with 'em for a very nice lunch at atlas (thanks!), and then some riding. while the rain thwarted our plans of riding sugar, we headed out with a couple more iowa citians, and i learned some new paths. a very nice little ride. finally we joined up with the college green / county building all-rolled-into-one group ride and headed out into the wind. the group set a quick pace considering the headwind we were dealing with. i got a shot to pull twice. two short pulls...and then it happened...right after my 2nd pull, as i was dropping to the rear...some joker pseudo-attacked...and i got shelled off the back like i wasn't moving. i tried my best to catch 'em, but was hurting pretty bad. but, all was not lost, shortly thereafter, the sky opened, and the gods sent me a miracle, in the form of ...the tandem...pulling a small train of about 5 riders. i grabbed on and hung on for dear life, and sure enough we were gaining on the group. caught up with tracy and amanda, then the three of us, decided to pop back around into town, this time with the wind. a smart move. 200 miles this weekend, 50 yesterday...has left me tired. so, i'm off to rest, in the form of a movie-induced-coma-style-power-nap.

thanks to the burlingtoners for letting me tag along, i had me a good day yesterday.

tomrv

2005-06-13T14:49:00.000-07:00

well, my first tomrv has come and gone. good times were had, a sore butt lingers.

over the course of the last 2 days:
-miles: 214.46
-hours: 12.15 (saddle time)

cast:
chad, scott, john, jayce, and me

saturday:
leave scott community college at 6:45 am-ish. once clear of bettendorf, heading north through leclaire, someone had a sudden stroke of genius, and thus began the section of the ride i like to refer to as *death march* i suspect jayce plowed the way for what would become a genuine assault on the first 50 miles. a paceline formed, and we took turns pulling, being joined every so often by other riders. soon enough, john had the good sense to fall off, realizing quite cleverly i might add, that we just might need some of our energy left for the hard part of the ride once the hills up north set in. we skipped the princeton firehouse breakfast stop, as well as the first sag stop, in favor of continuing on to the miles stop, where margo and ma were volunteering. *big thanks to any tomrv volunteers who may stumble upon this write up* it was here in miles that i realized what i liked about tomrv. you can ride with whom you choose, as fast as you please, and you can always meet up at the sags. shortly after we arrived, john pulled up too. meeting up with jean and her crew was nice too. as luck would have it, i would run into those jokers several times throughout the weekend. jayce took off earlier than us from miles, and i didn't see him again for the rest of the trip. rumor has it he reached dubuque at some ridiculous early hour, and slept in the grass for a while. i am jealous only of the nap...

thank goodness for trains!!! a little break before resuming the death march to miles.

on to savanna from miles, i joined john and we rode at a nice sensible pace. this section of the ride was beautiful, river route along the bluffs on the illini-side, and thus prompted all sorts of one-handed camera acrobatics, which would continue for much of the remainder of the ride. the camera even survived a fall at roughly 28 mph onto the pavement. some nice car was kind enough to slow down and let me get it rather than grind it into the pavement...i would exercise more caution with the camera for the rest of the trip. we regrouped at the savanna sag stop...which, as with all the sags on this trip, was awesome. qcbc knows how to throw together a nice bike ride!

riding along the mississippi

we rode together for most of the rest of the way north, but broke up once the hills began. the climb up to chestnut was great. a tough ride, but a really nice climb i thought. again more awesome scenery. i guess, growing up in iowa has rubbed off on me...but i like seeing farms out in the country, on my favorite type of roads to ride....country roads without those crummy yellow lines to mar them all up. a highly (pun!) popular sag at the crest of the hill which plays home to chestnut was enjoyed by all. *popsicles* i even ran into an old high school teacher, which was a nice surprise. the chestnut downhill was hairy, scary, stupid fun. i held back quite a lot... that hill was still scary fast.

thus began the hilly section, a few more miles, galena, and a section affectionately referred to as the wall later, we found ourselves rolling in one at a time to a nice little bar. and CHEESEBALLS. yeah, that's my recovery food. cheese fried in a vat of boiling oil. yum. by this time our group had grown and included several other quad-citians (me thinks) that chad knew. a mere 11 miles left, we figured it was time to relax for a spell. finishing the ride we even teamed up with ryan and his dad.

arrived in dubuque. of course, we had to end with a giant hill. the banquet was great. although, i hit the dead-to-the-world mode after my dinner. once i sat outside in the beer garden for a while, i regained my will to live. happily mom and margo even swung on up to join us for a while. a few drinks, some "lively cowboy tunes," and a rainstorm later and it was time to retire.

sunday:
this is getting long enough as it is...
essentially more of the same, in reverse, at a much more tolerable pace. my rear commanded it. i will say riding the extra loop (20 some odd miles to push the 88 mile ride to over a bit over a century) gave me the chance to see some really nice bluffs and scenery that we had rocketed by saturday. mainly because those 20 some odd miles, regardless of what everyone tells you...are pretty much all uphill. but totally worth it. we stopped at most of the sags, and stayed together more on sunday. john opted to ride the short route with ryan and his dad to preston. i'm sure his lady appreciates it! met up with them all in preston, where ma and margo once again volunteered.

riding through princeton was nice. we took the route out of town that i knew very well from growing up, and it was a treat to ride it. the last time i rode anywhere out there would have been an ill-fated north scott tour with dad, involving me on a 20" and a nice big endo.

a stop, once again with about 10 miles left, at the argo general store, some beers, more cheeseballs, made us fresh to finish the route.

scott won the first-annual-thus-still-gaining-credibility who-can-not-sit-the-longest competition.

...and i slept like a baby sunday night.

a cure for what ails ya

2005-06-08T21:18:00.000-07:00

the friday night fixie ride is the best invention since sliced bread. yeah, it's wednesday, what of it?!

progress.

2005-06-08T12:37:00.000-07:00

i'd say it's coming along rather nicely...

a great bad idea...

2005-06-08T11:36:00.000-07:00

so, yesterday i went on my first ride since my little crash on memorial day. a week and a half off bike. for the record, it was painful.

first things, i went to northetowne to pick up the road bike, all fixed. trued up rear wheel, and derailleur hanger bent back. new hanger on order...hopefully it'll hold for this weekend, tomrv. i'm sporting the torn jersey both days! make do with what you have...

upon my return i recieved a none-to-polite invitation from steve and sr. (mainly just steve..) to ride sugar. i believe the term "nancy" was thrown about... so i made the mistake of taking them up on it. however, i did have a stroke of genius and told them to go ahead and do their first lap, rather than wait for me...that way i could keep up for lap 2! met 'em out there. oggled sr.'s new bike (hot!). steve quit on us, so sr. and i went out for a lap. skipped a bunch as i was riding pretty conservatively...gotta be cautious of my scrapped up self. felt good to be riding again. was overly cautious though...so i was going slow. and on the gravel downhill (lake side) i saw a tree hanging over the trail to the right side, and had the great idea to use my right hand to swat it out of the way...with the intention of protecting my leg from branches ripping it open. that part of the plan worked. although the, stay-upright-on-the-bike portion of the plan failed miserably. up over the front i went, and landed a few feet ahead of the bike, full on frontal. ie) some scraps on my chin, a couple new bruises, and dirt everywhere. i haven't fallen of the mtn bike for a long while now. and, seeing as i didn't do any new damage to my current state...i remembered just how nice a good fall is. all in all, a good ride. i'll wait 'til i heal a bit more, 'til brush whipping my leg is less of an issue, before my next lap though.

verdict: another reason mtn is better than road. a fall at 15 on dirt, and you're usually back on the bike in a matter of seconds ready to go again. a fall at 15 on the road, and you're laying there bleeding and sniveling like a little girl (at least you are if you're like me!)

hopefully the rain will calm down in time for tonight's friday night fixie ride.
i should probably work on getting some form of rain gear for this weekend...

so very, very glad i shaved my legs...

2005-05-31T20:21:00.000-07:00

saturday:
drive home to pick up ma in the morning, and headed to burlington to watch snake alley crit. got there in time to see jeff warming up. scored nice seats in the alley. next year...i'm bringing a bell to ring. seeing the crit made me excited for next year...it's on.

poor jeff crashed. twice now have i seen him bite it, and twice now i have been impressed by how well he takes it. (as i now know just how badly it hurts, but that's coming up later) and then moving around hurts. and it's pretty much continual. but he just takes it without a peep. and even hung out with us to watch the rest of the races. which...were pretty much ridiculous. to watch the 2, 1, pro race climb that hill, and then take those decents....one word: absurd. absurdly fast, absurd bike handling, all around absurdity. they're awesome.

sunday:
snake alley looked like so much fun, i opted to do the melon city crit in muscatine. plus an entry fee of only $10 had me thinking, it's worth it just for some experience. jeff had planned on it too, but being banged up detered him...as it would have anyone. so i headed down solo. happily, scott and megan were there, so i had some people to hang around with. another great crit. people aren't lying when they say this is a great weekend for bike racing. a nice long downhill, with a decent sized speed bump at the bottom makes for a fun way to set up for a nice longish climb at a decent grade to complete the lap. the cat 5 race did 8 laps. and i suffered through it. i finished at 16thish of 25ish. was pretty excited with my finish. i think i hung on to the lead group for the first 4 and a half laps, then lost them at the top of the climb...there are lots of fast guys in the 5 races. so just hung out and let the 2nd group catch me, as i didn't have it in me to catch back on to the leaders. and finished the race out with the second group. i even got to do a neat little sprint at the end. good times.

monday:
q.c. crit. i had so much fun at melon city i decided i better do the q.c. crit too. the cat 5 race was the last race at 4.45, so i showed up just before 2 to catch the 2, 1, pro race. the course was a figure eight, one block square eighted with a 2 block rectangle.
-length: 3/4 of a mile
-turns: 8, 6 right handed turns, 2 left

it's a great crit to watch, with all sorts of a nice atmosphere, since it's in the district. i was only mildly nervous going into it, and by the time i took the first corner, was more excited than concerned. i held on through the first break, and hung out with the lead group for the duration of my portion of the race. we averaged 24 mph. i managed to keep with it for 20 minutes of the 25 minute + 3 lap race. then i bit the pavement on 4th turn, a right hander, on the inside of the curve, with 2 bikes to my outside. i went most of the way around the curve, and thus as i fell i skidded to the inside, and only took out one other rider. was, and still am more sad about not finishing the race than my currently scraped up right side. i was feeling strong, and had just settled in to being warmed up. i think had i finished i would have finished well, for me anyway. oh well. still glad i did it. it was a riot.

i walked to the car to change, as i didn't rip my shorts, and didn't want them to have to cut 'em, as they are less than a week old. got all changed, and the bike put away, headed to the medic tent. saw the guy i took down, apologized all sorts. he was super nice about it though. afterall, it's just a part of crit racing. don't know what happened, if i got bumped, or if i just took the corner poorly (most likely scenario...). could have been any of these. all i know, is i went down. anyway, i got all bandaged up by the great gals at the medic tent. i think they were from the mississippi valley blood center. they were awesome. mom, margo, and sandy managed to find me finally. they had been slightly concerned when i stopped coming by during the race. and had been out looking for me. margo drove me home, and we had a nice memorial day cook out.

bike:
-de-trued rear wheel
-bent the rear derailuer hanger all kinds of bad. but looks fixable.
-ripped some bar tape on the right handlebar drop.
-somehow managed to bend the hoods inwards on both sides.
--so not too shabby, not very expensive to fix

clothes:
-ripped my jersey right shoulder. (i'm going to stitch it up)
-tore a small hole in my right glove.

verdict:
THANK GOODNESS I SHAVED MY LEGS.
now not only do i look super sleek...(translate, nerd), but the healing process will go much nicer.
can't wait for next year. hope to do all 3 crits. and hope not to fall again.

already itching to get back on the bike...

i'm getting great tan...

2005-05-26T20:49:00.000-07:00

...at least on the bits of me that are exposed while cycling. awesome. it's like someone painted the top halves of my arms a nice shade of pink over their already tannish hue, and left everything else flashy white.

anyway, good day today. 50+ miles. 2 rides. a nice, tough, windy 40 mile road ride with jeff this morn, topped off with a fast loop around sugar with steve in the eve. all in all what i call a good day. and as a result...i'm a little tired. time to remedy that.

friday night fixie ride

2005-05-25T21:27:00.000-07:00

went for the usual friday night fixie ride tonight. 7 people showed up, so it was a real nice crowd, and felt all sorts of fun to roll down clinton street as a big ole' pack of bikes. we decided it would be nice to ride out to north liberty and back. and we were right, it was. it was also a lot of hills to climb, and some construction to weave through on the path, and a few raucous rounds of foot down, and some celebratory ice cream back in iowa city, and all in all a good time. result: i NEED a fixed bike. tonight i found myself jealous of everyone on their fixies and their no brakes finesse. so...i need to fix my bike.

you asked for it...or wait, maybe you didn't.

2005-05-24T07:56:00.000-07:00

so, about this sunday's mud-fest...
i.e.) wors #2 - alpine valley

i re-spoked half of the drive side of my wheel with the help of steve's truing stand sat night. now i have a every-other-spoke-black-then-silver-colored-spoke-motifee going on on the rear drive side. it's awesome. then steve and i decided it was a good idea to hop on the bikes to go play some cards and drink some brews with robin and friends. so, beer in our bags, butts on our bikes, we headed out into the big dark night. i returned home in time to sleep just after 1.30. and was up at 7...there was mistake number one...but i had cleverly packed sat night, so i just threw everything in the car and took off. got there at just a couple of minutes after 11 for the 11.30 start...hurried changing...hurried registration packet pick up...hurried number pinning....hurried rush to the start line...hurried filling of the camelbak as the nat anthem played...NARGH!..i forgot my gloves....oh well we'll see how these grips treat me gloveless...

anyway, i got there in time and managed to be all set for the start. it rained the night before...the ground was ugly, sticky, clumpy, clayey, blacky mud. and with a course which i would guess at about 85% climbing up the hill...with the only dry ground being the downhill and the bottom of the hill...both of which were part of the..."you've just climbed for the majority of the lap, now here's a very brief respite to get you back down so you can do the whole dern thing again" section...i had me a fun time. plus...since i arrived nice and early with lots of time to set my bike up properly...i ran tires inflated to 60psi....which really...really didn't help things.

i don't want to sound like i'm complaining. really, i had a blast. 13 out of 22 is a finish i am very happy with. plus as it was my first time dealing with mud of this sort. i got to experience the "hey, i'm pedaling, and the wheel is spinning, but i'm not gaining ground nearly as fast as i should be for as much as the dern thing is turning" feeling as i ground up some of the climbs...i cleaned one hill that most were walking and had all sorts of support from guys telling me just to keep spinning...it made me kinda happy....that being said i did lots of pushing too. so did everyone...except probably the quick ones in the front. several times i saw people in front of me just stop and tip over. and couldn't help but think...clip out dude...it's not really that bad. but i
guess it was. i'm calling it a victory. lots of errors, but no crashes off the bike. no chains dropped. (big, big thanks to yerke, for fixing the bike saturday...shifted like a dream... and to top things off, of course we had to have 3 bog crossings. not creeks. no moving water. but definitely not rideable 4+ inch deep sections of muddy puddles and rocks. so again the shoes are cached. and by the end the bike probably weighed nearly twice normal a la mud attached to everything. luckily the drivetrain stayed clean...passed people cursing and pulling clumps out of theirs...was jealous of the singlers who didn't have these worries. i was mindful of my own. bottom line is wors races are all sorts of fun. lots of people. nice cooperative guys. encouragement all over the place from each other, which i thought was pretty cool. and a huge turn out. i'd like to do some more. we'll see. it is aweful far to go...and an aweful steep entry fee for no shwag...an no chance for payout for me.

as far as the drive was concerned..drive up fine...although...i rolled into the race on less than E as i couldn't stop or i would have missed it...but made it. post race i got gas, and headed home...the long way...i'm not so swift and ended up 1 full hour out of my way in madison. and took the twitish route to get back from there. no one to blame but me...had i woke up earlier i could have stopped at a rest area for a free map instead of the one i bought in madison thus realizing my
error long before ending up actually in that cursed city...and i could have gotten gas...and i could have run decent tire pressure...and i could have sported gloves. although...the grips are great...comfortable the whole time, and no blisters. was shocked.

so...would i do it again...in a heartbeat. i'd just get up a bit earlier next time.

first things first

2005-05-23T22:01:00.000-07:00

welcome to my literary webhome. enjoy your visit.