Skinny #1 Racing

Back on the Bike

2007-10-02T20:34:00.000-07:00

My Mom and Sister arrived last night, so after my class we went to Cafe Mexicali and ate the best burritos in town. Hannah told me that she didn't care to see me, she just wanted to eat a burrito. After that we watched the Patriots game. How good is it to be a New England sports fan? The Patriots are a dynasty, the Red Sox won their division, the Celtics are going to be unstoppable, and nobody cares about hockey so it doesn't matter how the Bruins do.

Today was my first real ride in a while. I decided to climb the Poudre Canyon and then come right back down. It's usually windy in the canyon, and blows in from the East. Today however, the wind was coming from the West so I got to climb with a headwind before turning around and cruising on the way home. Three hours feels like a long time on the bike when you haven't done it in a while, and my legs certainly reminded me that.

After that I just hit up some local places with the family before they headed off for Lake Tahoe. I have another three hour ride to look forward to tomorrow...maybe I'll do the World's loop.

2007-09-30T19:33:00.000-07:00

Well this weekend was the last one before I begin training, so I decided to live it up the way someone like myself would. This involved me eating Cold Stone ice cream Friday night (which had over 30 grams of saturated fat), playing soccer Saturday, and eating a McFlurry today and watching some more soccer before indulging in a little Dr. Pepper. This will be the last time in a while before I eat anything bad. I think I'll have a slice of pie at Thanksgiving and then wait until Christmas before I indulge again.

Looks like I'll be meeting my Mom and Sister on Tuesday, as they are on their way to Lake Tahoe so my Sister can ski bum it for the winter. I think she got the idea last year when we were at Whistler, and then when she went out to Lake Tahoe this Fall, decided that was where she wanted to do it. It will be good to see them, it's been a while since I've seen anyone from back home.

Like I said earlier, I'm going to start training this week for the collegiate road season in the Spring. I realize it's a little early, but I haven't been riding too much, and I don't want to wait too long to start riding again because 1) It's hard not to have cycling dictate my life and 2) I'm afraid I'll have no cycling fitness if I wait any longer. So, I'll have plenty of time to prepare, so hopefully I'll be pretty fast when the races start in March or April. I just downloaded a ton of music so I'll be able to chug along to some new songs without getting bored for a while. During these long days on the bike I'll be able to judge Kanye West, who I refuse to like. This way I can listen to all his music and find out whether or not he really does suck.

The OC

2007-09-25T18:03:00.000-07:00

So lately I have been busy downloading episodes of the OC on Limewire. I think I was looking through someone's favorite TV shows on Facebook, and I saw that they had The OC listed there when I decided it would be a good idea to watch those first few seasons and see why I became hooked on such a good show in the first place. So far, I have all put three of the first season's episodes downloaded, and I have watched the first ten of those. Needless to say, my internet time (checking e-mail and Facebook) has dwindled greatly because of my new found passion.

I've been riding about an hour every morning, just to transition until the beginning of November when I start training for the collegiate road season. Today I did some weight lifting and crunches on a machine before I went to a yoga class, and when I got to yoga class I was already super tired, and then I got super worked during the yoga class because I didn't expect we would be doing core work in it. We had to have our legs in the air (like 90 degrees, perpendicular to the ground) and then draw the alphabet with them...I was hurting. I had to stop at P before I could finish it off. Well, I've got a test and homework due in Financial Accounting tomorrow, so I had better go ahead and do the homework and not study for the test because the class is really easy...

2007-09-20T19:07:00.000-07:00

Check out these new shoes that I picked up at Footlocker the other day. The best part is that they were $40, on sale from $75. I guess I'm quite the bargain shopper.

Lately I've been riding for about an hour in the morning, and in the afternoon I alternate between swimming and lower body weight lifting. I hate lifting, so I treat the swimming as my upper body work out. I feel so ripped when I get out of the pool, even though as my roommate Ben pointed out, the main feature of my body is my skeleton. Oh well, that will be changing a little bit at a time. I picked up some True Mass that I drink three times per day to add an extra 630 calories to my diet, and something like 45 grams (200 calories) come from protein. The guy at GNC told me this stuff was pretty much the best so I decided to roll with it. Well, I think it's about time to finish downloading the rest of the songs from the new 50 cent CD. In case you haven't heard it, you should probably go ahead and listen to Touch the Sky.

Back At It

2007-09-18T10:13:00.001-07:00

Well now that I'm back at school I find myself with more free time than I need. I haven't updated in so long I forgot all my login information, so it took me a while to sort it out. Not too much news, just that I'm going to try and put on some weight. I'm weighing in at about 152-153 pounds right now. I went to cyclingnews and you can see the pros' heights and weights when they profile their bikes. I've decided that I should try to get up between 170 and 175 pounds. According to this website I was at, I'll need to 3800 calories per day to gain 1/2 - 1 pound per week. Looks like I'm going to be eating a lot of Cafe Mexicali burritos in the next few months...

Cycling + Soccer

2007-03-20T17:15:00.000-07:00

Had a big day today. This morning we had team time trial practice. This was by far my hardest ride of the year effort wise, 3.5 hours. I was really pushing, and really spinning a lot of times because I only have a 13 tooth in the back. I remedied that by ordering an 11-23 today. The ttt is on Saturday morning, and then Saturday afternoon we have a 45 mile road race on the same course. By then my legs are going to be pretty toast. On Sunday we have the Oval Crit, which I can't wait for. This afternoon I went and played soccer for 1.5 hours, scoring two goals in the process. It was a lot less organized and there were way too many people playing but I still got my fair share of touches. I developed a pretty fierce blister on my right heel though. I think I'll have to go dubs on the socks next time to fix that. I think I'll be playing again on Thursday because I have Wednesday night worlds tomorrow.

2007-03-19T14:39:00.000-07:00

I often look to see how people came to my site, and I have encountered the funniest so far today. On google, someobdy searched for "hip hop aerobics classes that make you skinny" and ended up reading my blog...way too funny.

Arizona was a lot of fun. I got in a lot of good riding, and I'm really getting a feel for my new 29er. I rode my campus bike around today (which is a rigid 26 inch bike) and it felt tiny. I rode every day in Arizona from Saturday to the next Sunday, with the exception of Friday. I went and visited my cousin in Prescott, and then we drove through Sedona because I had never been there before. I would have rather ridden my bike but oh well, now I've seen Sedona. I forgot how rocky one of the trails in McDowell was. The time trial course from the 2005 Norba. The first and second thirds of the loop are super fast and smooth, but that middle third is just brutal, I wish I would have had a free ride bike for it. I've got some nasty burn lines and sun burns in general, and my arms are peeling like crazy. I wish I would have worn sun screen the first few days!

2007-03-05T18:19:00.000-08:00

I ended up not racing on Sunday. I never got a phone call from anyone wanting to race, and it was a road race so I didn't really care if I went or not. That meant that Saturday I was free to do whatever I wanted, which included me going for a bike ride and messing around in the park for 1.5 hours. After I got back, I hadn't had enough of the park so me and some friends headed back. We swung on the swings for a while, and then had some INTENSE games of tag. Wow...it felt so good to play such a simple game. The only problems were that my shoes were filled with sand by the end, and my shin splints are worsening. I was definitely feeling them Friday night after soccer, and they were even worse Saturday after tag. I played some soccer again today and iced my shins afterward. I guess I just shouldn't run as much.

In a little while we are headed to "hip hop" classes at the student rec center. We've been going to a lot of classes lately, and I'm really looking forward to this one. I'm supposed to get a great aerobic workout while learning some of the newest and hottest dance moves. Maybe this will prepare me to go shred up the club sometime...haha.

2007-03-02T22:19:00.000-08:00

I just got done playing soccer for 3.5 hours. I went last Friday and it was a lot of fun, so I decided to go again before I can't because I'll be racing. My team consists of a whole bunch of white guys, and 90% of the people there are Arab or African, so for the first time in my life I am a minority. It's really funny though, because both times I have ended up being on the best team. That's really good, because when you win you get to keep playing, but when you lose you have to sit for a while. I almost scored a few times today, but I guess it just wasn't meant to happen. I won't be able to play next Friday because I'll be chillin in Fountain Hills, but I guess that's a good thing. I may go play Thursday night with a kid I met tonight.

It's been super windy lately, and I've been super tired from riding my bike and hitting up all the aerobics classes. Wednesday night I did a class called STRONG, followed by a core conditioning class with 2 miles of running somewhere in between the classes. Yesterday I rode 2 hours hard in the wind, and then did lower body strength and step interval. Let's just say my body is definitely taking its toll. After lunch today I went and sat in the hot tub for a while to try to feel a little better. Well, I've got that race coming up on Sunday so I better do some stretching and then head to bed.

Make It Rain

2007-02-28T17:47:00.000-08:00

I just heard the best song ever on MTV2. Before this my favorite song was Make it Rain, with Fat Joe and Lil' Wayne. The only song that could be better would be a Make it Rain REMIX with Fat Joe, Lil' Wayne, R. Kelly, TI, and Rick Ross. Talk about a stacked artist list. Everyone except for Fat Joe is crazy good. Anyways, the song is 7 minutes long, and you should definitely download it and listen to it over and over again.

Yesterday I did a group ride with a couple of girls from the team and got worked pretty good. I rode my 29er on the road with them, and I made it hurt a lot. On the flats I was content with just drafting (if you can even say I get one of those), but on the hills I was OK to open it up a little more. Tomorrow I'm going out with the same group again (hopefully more people), which will mean more hurting for me.

I think Matt and I are heading down to race a crit in Boulder this weekend. First race of the year...

2007-02-25T16:21:00.000-08:00

Phoebe sent me this picture from Florida, looks like she's been really busy lately. If you were wondering, it's a Liger. And I think they are bred for there magic abilities, or something like that.

Tour of California is over. It was great to watch. The past two days I was really hoping for those breaks to stay away because they had Danny Pate in them. Too bad they both got caught, it would have been cool to see someone like Danny go top 10 in a race of that caliber. After watching that, it makes me want to quit mountain biking and just ride my road bike!!!!!

This week I went to aerobics and group fitness classes pretty much each night. They are a lot of fun, and they're a good workout if you don't feel like riding your bike. Last week I didn't really feel like riding my back, so it would make sense that I went to a ton of them. Some of them make you lift weights and stuff, and they're all about making your butt and lower body look nice, and toning your upper body. Haha, I guess I'm going to look like a girl before too long!!!!! The funny part is that it's always me and a bunch of girls, and then the friends that I bring along with me.

The best part about these classes is that they haven't hurt my cycling at all. Today we did Rist Canyon, and I made it my second hard ride of the year. I climbed it in just about 50 minutes, which is a pretty decent time. I guess that time can only go lower the more than I ride. I can't wait to see what it looks like when May comes around. Well, I've still got some work to do before I head out to kickboxing in a little bit...

Staying Alive!

2007-02-20T12:55:00.000-08:00

Last night I got 5 extra credit points in my Techniques of Teaching Aerobics if I went to this Staying Alive event. I went with Kristina and Eric, and together we learned every dance move to the song Staying Alive. I must say that I wasn't expecting to have much fun, and I was really just going for the extra credit, but after I got there I guess I got my groove on. The dance was pretty long and hard to follow sometimes, but it was still a great time.

I think all that dancing (1.5 hours) may have made my legs tired for my ride today. I didn't have a lot of time because of my busy schedule this week, so I substitued my ride with 2 hours and some climbing. On the climbs I bumped the pace up to zone 4...for the first time of the year. I knew it was the first time of the year going hard because I was breathing sooo heavy. At the end of the ride, I had a terrible stomach ache, but nothing that some Tums and good lunch couldn't fix.

I only have two more tests this week. Today I already took my Health and Wellness test, and in about an hour I have to take Drugs and the Human Body, which may prove to be somewhat difficult. Tomorrow I get to do my lifts test in Techniques of Teaching Weight Training. It's a group test, and my buddy John knows everything about all these exercises, so I'm pretty certain that anything he won't know I'll be able to kick in some info. A little more studying and then I'm done...

2007-02-18T16:48:00.000-08:00

The burrito challenge didn't go quite as well as I would have liked. I only rode for 3.25 hours today, so I wasn't in prime condition to attempt the challenge, but I had promised my friends so I didn't want to let them down. I got back from my ride and waited another hour before going to Chipotle. Burritos one and two went down pretty easy, but I was suffering pretty bad on the third one. I swear the person that made the third burrito made it another 2 inches longer than the other two, and that was the only bit that I wasn't able to finish. I met up with Pete at Chipotle and we headed back to the dorms to watch the prologue of the Tour of California. Jason Donald had an awesome ride, I was pretty upset when Levi got him by 1.5 seconds at the end. I have five tests this week so I should probably do a little more studying...after all, I'm going to be distracted by the NBA All-Star game in a little while.

2007-02-17T15:32:00.000-08:00

I put some 700 x 23s on my 29er, because I figure I won't be riding any trails until spring break. I decided that I'd climb Rist Canyon today and then head down through Masonville back into town. The climb wasn't that bad. Because of the snow yesterday, there was about an inch of packed snow that I rode on all the way up, except for sometimes where the shoulder was melted away so I could ride on the pavement. I got to the top, ate a granola bar, zipped up my jacket, and then got really wet and miserable on the way down. I had to stop twice to clean my glasses so I could see, and one time I got something in my eye and it took me a few minutes to dig it out...I still don't know how I did it. When I got to Masonville the roads were nice and dry and I was able to enjoy the rest of my ride. I was planning on 3.5 hours, but it took more like 4.25 because of the bad conditions. Tomorrow I'm going to stick on the flats a little more and try to stay dry!!!!!

29er Time

2007-02-16T11:29:00.000-08:00

I finally got my 29er yesterday, and I am so impressed with it already. The bike itself is enormous, and I am so happy to finally have a bike that doesn't look ridiculously small for me. I rode it for an hour easy yesterday, and I was gonna go out for a good ride today before the temperature dropped, it started snowing, and the wind increased to 40 mph. Put that together and it doesn't make for really good riding conditions.

This weekend, Sunday I think, I am going to attempt to eat three burritos from Chipotle. I think I can do this, but it is going to take some mental strength to get through it. Last Sunday, I ate a foot long BMT, a foot long Meatball Marinara, a medium soda, and a bag of chips. I think that is a good trial run to get me ready for the big time.

I think I'm going to be riding with Pete, so I'll probably be riding a little faster than I'm used to anyways. It should help me burn the extra calories that I'm going to attempt to pack in. Seens how I'm not riding today, I might as well go ballin' at the rec center for a while and do some stretching while I'm there. I couldn't stop doing this blog thing, so expect more updates like the old days!!!!!

Free Time

2007-01-18T13:02:00.001-08:00

School has started once again, meaning two things. I now have more free time and a faster internet connection. With that in mind I've decided to start updating again. Here goes. I ordered my Gary Fisher Paragon 29er this morning from the Cycle Loft. I rode around an X-Caliber the other day and it felt pretty sweet, so I can only imagine how much sweeter the Paragon is going to feel. For those of you that think 29ers are just a bunch of hype, I'm about to prove you wrong this upcoming season. Depending on my monetary situation, I may or may not get a set of Stan's wheels for the bike.

I'm going to start riding again tomorrow. Saturday night I got a bad case of the 24 hour flu and threw up six times. This was followed by a restless sleep in which I got up about five times and headed for the bathroom, or washroom as they call it in Canada, yeah? Anyways, I think all the side effects are gone now, so I'm good to go. I won't have a mountain bike to ride for a while until my Paragon gets here, so looks like I'll just have to brave the cold on my road bike. Collegiate road season starts in only five or so weeks, so I'll have to get in a really good base before I start hitting those races. I plan on attending all of them, just because I know that it will be really good training, and also a great team atmosphere. From what I understand, our men's B team is more organized that many teams. By this I mean that we work together better and have more team unity because after all, in collegiate it doesn't really matter how you do as long as you can put four riders in a good position.

Classes have gone well. I'm glad I changed my major to Health Promotion because I now feel like the classes I'm taking are worthwhile and beneficial to my cause. With that in mind, I've got Drugs and the Human Body in a few minutes so I should probably head out.

Free Time

2007-01-18T13:02:00.000-08:00

Too Long...

2006-12-10T09:23:00.000-08:00

I decided that it's been too long since I last updated, so I am finally getting around to doing so. I've got four finals coming up this week, so I'm going to be pretty busy. Psychology on Monday, Nutrition on Tuesday, Biology on Wednesday, and Chemistry on Thursday. My Psychology final should be pretty easy, because it is all just questions from old tests, word for word. I'm pretty good at memorizing stuff like that so I shouldn't have a hard time of it. I also have another test in that class, which is on the most recent material that we covered. I already read that stuff in the book, and went to every class, so I think I'm pretty much set to roll tomorrow. My Nutrition final is going to be easy because it is just a fourth test, on the latest material that we covered. Biology is the same thing, except that there is some "big" stuff that we previously covered...Basically the stuff that has already been drilled into my head. The only final that I'm really worried about is Chemistry. The tests in that class vary in difficulty quite a bit. Sometimes the test average is a 75, other times it is a 60. I think it's safe for me to say that if I get a 75 on the test I will get a B in the class.

Pete talked me into doing the Colorado State Championships yesterday, even though I haven't ridden my bike in about 3 weeks. I've been lifting weights three days a week and working on my broken toe heeling, so I didn't really know what to expect. I didn't get a chance to preride the course, but I was happy on the first lap when it turned out to be really muddy. I ended up flatting on the first lap and rode my bike to the pit, to find that there were NO campy wheels. Oh well...I guess today wasn't my day. $30 for one lap of suffering...Not my idea of a good value. On the bright side we went to Pete's house in Boulder afterwards and I was able to clean my dirty clothes and hop in a clean hot tub.

On the way back I learned that even though Doritos Munchies look really good nutritionally, with 7 grams of fat (only 1 gram saturated), a ton of complex carbs, and 2 grams of protein, they are, in fact, not. This snack contains monosodium glutomate, which apparently is pretty bad for you. I guess that rules out about 1,000 more things that I won't be eating anytime soon.

On another note, I decided that I'm going to start my base training over Christmas break, rather than waiting until I get back to school. I figure I won't have much to do anyways, so I might as well make the most of the free time that I have. Lucky for me, Christmas falls on a Monday so I won't have to worry about riding. With that in mind, I can't wait to get home for Christmas and enjoy the holidays, without having to worry about school.

2-1

2006-11-10T08:59:00.000-08:00

Last night I went 2-1 in all my competitions. The only loss that I suffered was in my soccer game, where I was pretty much throwing down. We lost the game 9-4, but I managed to score a hat trick, so I was pretty excited. Running around on an indoor soccer gym can really wear you out. I hate how it's intramural soccer and everyone thinks their name is David Beckham. Some of the kids just need to calm down and have some fun. My first win of the night came in hair braiding, where I dominated. Austin kept telling me that he could braid better than me, but when given the opportunity, failed miserably. My last win of the night came in Pokemon Stadium. My friend Jeremy won a Pokemon tournament a while back, so he's pretty much a Pokemon master. I was able to outwit him, and with a little luck, beat him in a really intense game. I still don't know whether or not I'll be racing this weekend...I think I might delay the weight training until next week when I find out how to do everything, and then follow the program.

It's Been A While

2006-11-09T12:53:00.000-08:00

I've been a little busy with tests this week, so I haven't had much time to spend updating my blog. My first test of the week went really well in Psychology. I needed to get a 75 on my last three tests to get a B in the class, and I ended up with an 84. Yeah for me. I just did the math and I can get a 70 on the next two tests and still get a B. This seems much easier now that I know all you need to do is read the book and you'll get a good grade on the test. My second test was in Survey of Human Nutrition. My grade in there is pretty well set so I didn't worry about it too much. I ended up with a 74. That means (assuming I get a 90 on my dietary project), that I can get an 86 on the final, which is not cumulative, and get an A in the class. Or, if I want, I can just not study and get a 36 on the final for a B. My other test today was in Biology, and it certainly proved to be the most difficult of them yet. I didn't get a whole lot of studying done because I wasn't super motivated or anything. There are a lot of opportunities for extra credit in Biology so I'm not too worried about it.

I started lifting last night with Pete, and I'm pretty beat today. My butt is really sore and when I was taking notes in nutrition class today, my abs started to burn from all the core work that I had done. Pete's going to work out again today, but I'm gonna be busy ripping up the 3 on 3 indoor soccer pitch. They make me take my earings out, I think because they're more of a distraction than a hazard...but I'm sure I'll be able to bring my A game tonight. Wish me luck...

Race Prep

2006-11-03T19:08:00.000-08:00

So Colt arrived Thursday afternoon to come race in the USGPs. We went for an easy ride yesterday because we were a little pressed for time, but we hit the cross skills techniques pretty hard today. Colt took this picture, which was the only salvageable one of the day. We ended up taking about ten videos and analyzing our cross skills. Yes, we both know we're nerds. Now it looks like we're resting up for tomorrow and Sunday. Hopefully we can put some good rides together. Speaking of rides...I still need to figure out how we're getting down there...Wish me luck!

Halloween Excitement

2006-11-01T10:36:00.000-08:00

Last night was the first time that I went trick or treating in a while. We started off by hitting a few houses that we knew, and then headed down to the neighborhood where Austin's aunt lives. Apparently they didn't get too many trick or treaters, because we were the first, and last, trick or treaters for most people. Most people were glad to see us and got a good laugh out of it, but there was this one middle aged guy that was really reluctant to give us candy. Andy was wearing a Russian hat (that was it), and the man looked at him and said, "What the hell are you?" I think that was the highlight of my night, I guess you must have had to been there to realize how funny it was...but it was pretty hilarious.

After trick or treating we did what a little kid would: trade candy. It was great, just like I remembered it. I haven't been too keen on eating all the candy lately, so I gave some people some pretty good deals. After this I walked into Christina's room, where her and Jess were watching Halloween. How could I pass this up on such a scary night?!?!? We ended up watching Halloween, Halloween 5, and Halloween Resurrection, which is when Austin joined us after returning from a party. In a desperate attempt to pull an all nighter, we then rented Identity from the front desk. I don't think any of us made it half way through the movie...I think I ended up getting to bed around 4:30, and waking up at 7:45 to write an easy 1 page paper before my class at 10:00. We'll see how it is to function on 3:15 of sleep.

Happy Halloween

2006-10-31T09:18:00.000-08:00

I can't believe that it's almost November, and I've been in school for two months already. I have a Chemistry test tonight, my third one so far. I've got an 80 on the first one and an 85 on the second one...does that mean 90 on this one?!? I hope so. I have class in a few minutes then I'll go to a review session to make sure I really know what I'm doing. That doesn't leave much me any time to ride, so I guess I'll have to get my exercise trick or treating tonight. I still don't have a costume yet, and it's going to be cold, so I'll have to think up something.

We had a not so good game of capture the flag last night. The people who are organizing the games this year aren't doing as good a job as I would like. Last night, they had their flag hid in a ridiculous spot that nobody would be able to find. About halfway through the game, I ran into a group of people that were playing sardines (some sort of flashlight game where people hid and you have to find them) and decided to play with them rather than run around not being able to find the other team's flag.

I think my auctions are going to end on a pretty good note today. I've been getting lots of questions for pictures and shipping costs, so it seems as though people are interested. 10 people have my Rogue on itemwatch, and 15 have my Azure on itemwatch. I guess they don't realize that the Rogue is way sweeter, but that's their own fault. Hopefully I can get those two bikes out of my room before Colt arrives with two more bikes on Thursday..

Wheels

2006-10-27T08:17:00.000-07:00

http://www.fullspeedahead.com/fly.aspx?layout=product&taxid=81&pid=160

Well these are the wheels I'm going to get for next year. They are made by FSA which means they are sweet. I haven't had any big problems with my road wheels so I figure they can't be too bad. I looked on mountain bike review and there are only like two bad reviews, but everyone else gave them full marks. They are lightweight, and the best part is that I can get them for $300 brand new. There is a pair on ebay right now that is only $200. I may have to start bidding pretty soon...

Good News

2006-10-26T20:46:00.000-07:00

I just found out that the U23 race at cross nats is on Saturday, and the Collegiate race is on Sunday. This means that I'll be able to fly in on Friday, and still be able to do both races. The best part is if that my legs are bad on Saturday because of the plane flight, they will be better on Sunday. In two days, I'm pretty sure I can put together one good race. It would be great if I pulled off a top 10 in both races. I've still got another week off before I start racing. I can't wait!!!!!

2006-10-24T17:51:00.000-07:00

This is the National Champion jersey that I was presented at the meeting on Monday night. Last year at cross nationals Brad won the B class, and with it came this jersey. I guess they saw it fitting to present this jersey to me. The only problem is that I really wasn't sandbagging...I really wanted to do the A race. Hopefully next year I can get a real one...

I've been drinking a lot of tea to try and get rid of this cold/sore throat that I developed. I'm to the point where I can fill my Nalgene with hot water and two tea bags and not use any milk or sugar but the tea still tastes good. I guess that's pretty good, because before I used to put 4 packets of sugar in it.

I had a good ride on the cross bike, nice and easy on some of the local mountain bike trails. I need to dial in my brakes a little more before it will be set to race. I think I need to run my tires at a little higher pressure because I was bottoming out on everything today!!!!! I have these next two weeks really easy, so I'm going to concentrate on my techniques. What I need to work on are barriers. The ones that are wide open on the flats aren't too bad...but it's the ones that they place halfway up hills that really give me a hard time. My left hip was hurting today when I was walking...I hope there's nothing wrong with it.

Gilmore Girls is on in an hour, followed by Veronica Mars. I don't really care for the first show, but Veronica Mars is great. After that me and Patches have the "Roomywed Game," which we plan on winning. Wish me luck...

Mountain Bike Nationals

2006-10-23T17:34:00.000-07:00

This picture pretty much sums up my weekend at collegiate mountain bike national championships. This was the B short track, and the photo is compliments of Brad Cole. You can't see from this picture but I actually threw in a kiss before I threw the hands in the air. We ended up fourth as a team. Peter was our only podium of the week, taking 5th in the men's short track. We did really well as a team, hopefully next year we can take it up a notch. I guess this means there will be red, white, and blue stripes on my jersey for next year.

Short Week

2006-10-17T12:50:00.000-07:00

So this is going to be a very short week of school for me, with a lot of work involved. I have decided that I'm going to mountain bike nationals to compete in the B race and cheer on the other riders. We will be leaving Wednesday at 2 pm, and it's about a 6-7 hour drive, so it's really not a whole lot of travelling. Before tomorrow afternoon, I'm going to have to read an article and summarize it for my biology lab, write a paper on a research talk for my biology class, and write an educational biography for my education class. Also, I have a dietary project due Tuesday at 8 am, that I will have to complete Monday night. Sheesh...

You can check out the bike that I'm going to be riding next year by click on this link: http://www.specialized.com/bc/SBCBkModel.jsp?spid=16878. I'm making a few minor changes to the components, which I will list. I have not yet decided if I will run XO twist shifters, or the X-7 triggers that come on the bike. For changes that I'm definitely going to make though: cassette- sram pg 950 11-16, saddel- slr, pedals- eggbeaters, wheels- whatever I end up going with. I'm bidding on some wheels that are XTR hubs laced to 717 rims. Hopefully I'll win them.

If anyone is interested in buying a new bike or two, both of my IronHorses are for sale. I'll be riding the Rogue until Saturday and then retiring it. Both bikes are in great condition and have always been maintained. I'll probably put pictures up on here when I put them on Ebay next week.

Boulder Day 2

2006-10-15T18:27:00.000-07:00

Where should I start? Maybe the 4:45 AM wakeup call would be appropriate. So yeah, the race began at 8:30, so we left Fort Collins at 5:15 this morning. I was able to chug a glass of oatmeal for breakfast. (Seriously though, two packets of oatmeal in luke warm water is not very cool for breakfast.) We arrived at the venue and I got in a good warm up. For the race I decided to go skinsuit with arm warmers, in my best immitation of a long sleeve skinsuit. I don't know if I said this already, but this course wasn't the Tim Halliday, but the "New Tim Halliday" showed up anyways prepared to race. I ended up 14th, if the official counted correctly. Nick came right behind me, putting 4 CSU riders in the top 15. I was happy with my result, especially because this race was suited for me very well.

Looks like I won't be attending Collegiate Mountain Bike Nationals again this year. It's dissapointing after such a great race to hear, "So Tim, would you go to Nationals and do the B race?" Of course I'm too prideful to do that, especially when I've been riding so well the past few weekends. With this shocking piece of information, I'm seriously beginning to weigh my options as far as riding and school goes. I'd love to continue racing mountain bikes at the collegiate level, but I just don't know if I can do it here at CSU...

Boulder Day 1

2006-10-14T17:20:00.000-07:00

The short track was today. We heard that it was going to be at a campground, so I figured I'd bring my cross bike along in case it was super easy/fast. I'm lucky I brought my hardtail too though because this was probably the burliest short track I have ever ridden. It started out going down a big hill, then a technical downhill through the woods, and then a granny ring climb for like 1.5-2 minutes, then the cycle started over. I got a great start, but on the climb on the first couple of laps I was really hurting, like I was even cramping around my stomach area. I decided to back the pace off a bit in an attempt to recover. I guess it worked because in the last 3-4 laps I really turned up the pace and passed a lot of riders, the last being Brady Kappius. I ended up beating some fast people today, and earned some points for our team. Steve had a great ride, and Peter did pretty well, then I came in right behind Nick with Phil and Caley right behind me. We actually got lapped so did not ride the final lap. I had just passed Phil and Caley and was planning on picking off Nick before the end too but I wasn't given the opportunity.

I already cleaned my skinsuit and have it near my fan drying off for tomorrow...anyone on the team will know that "The New Tim Halliday" will race only on a hardtail with tubeless wheels, in a skinsuit. Although these may not seem important, they really are. The hardtail is vital because it keeps the overall weight of the bike down. The tubeless wheels are important because it lets me run my old tire pressure of 30 psi front and 35 psi rear without flatting...ever, and the skinsuit is just necessary because it's well...a skinsuit. When the guys get back from eating dinner I think we're gonna go hot tub it for a little while so I can get a leg massage in and try to recover from my effort today. Tomorrow isn't exactly my type of course so I'm gonna need a little luck to pull this one off. I hope I can keep the rubber side down tomorrow...

All Systems Go

2006-10-13T16:18:00.000-07:00

I've got both my bikes ready for regionals this weekend. The two bikes being my hardtail and cross bike pictured above. Tomorrow is the short track, and I'm going to bring both bikes, just in case the course is super fast and well suited for my cross rig. I just put the brakes on that I got this morning. They are the Empella Froglegs. They aren't working that great right now, so hopefully they just need to be broken in a little bit and then they'll be sweet. I got the silver and black Hutchinson cross tires to match my FSA wheels, too. I think it looks pretty sweet right now. I'm trading Evan my Candy SL pedals for a set of his stainless steel Eggbeaters. I don't use the Candys anymore, and he needs a little bigger platform for cruising around campus so this should work out well for both parties involved. Well looks like I have to take care of some more race preparations before I head off to dinner. I hope this weekend goes well...

Pre Nationals

2006-10-10T19:04:00.000-07:00

I have three tests this week, the first of which I took today. It went really well. It was a hard test in that we have fill in the blanks and we have to pull the words out of our memory, so we have to know the material pretty well. I can say with a fair amount of certainty that I got at least an 80%, which is what my goal was going into the test. All it takes is attending class and studying a couple of hours before the test and I'm usually ready to take it.

AC sent out a "long team" for nationals, and I'm on the list for both the ST and XC. That means that this weekend I really need to throw down. I'm going to do everything possible to be ready for this race, because for me this is almost as important as nationals, because this will determine whether or not I go. It's good that I have two tests because that means I'll just lay down in my bed and read notes and the textbooks, expending little to no energy. Hopefully the tests and the races will go well...

Grand Junction Race Report

2006-10-09T07:52:00.000-07:00

This weekend we traveled to Grand Junction for the last race before Regional Championships, and two weeks before National Championships. We arrived to our host housing at about 8 pm on Friday night. Waiting for us was potato soup and bread...it was unbelievable to eat good home cooked food. It rained all night, and when we arrived at the short track location, it was too muddy to race, so the race was moved to the college campus. I sat out this race, but had a great time watching. Fort Lewis swept the podium as usual...our best rider was Steve who finished around 10th probably. Phil was having a good race but flatted on a stair set, and Gordon would not let me take the wheel off his bike to give to Phil...what a jerk. For the most part it was a pretty uneventful day, but I had fun watching the action.

The XC was what I was waiting for. I knew I had fresh legs and I also knew that it was going to be a little sloppy...perfect conditions for me. I was super aggressive from the start, trying to make my way up to the FLC train. I think I ended up somewhere around 12-13th after the first lap. I ended up just powering down and riding the race so well, working my way up to 8th for my best finish of the year. I beat some good people, like Yuki Saeto, Blake, and Trevor, so I was really happy with how I raced. I got 8th last weekend, but FLC didn't have any riders, so it was good to get that same result with all the fast guys there. Hagman won, I think I was a little over 10 minutes off his pace. The best part about this race is that it really wasn't my type of course. I'm really looking forward to the XC next weekend because my form is coming along really nicely. I have no idea what our team for nationals is looking like right now, but I know Andy has a lot of confidence in me so hopefully that means I'll get to race once or twice in New Mexico. I guess I'll just have to throw down next weekend and see what happens...

After a somewhat scary experience on Thursday, I decided to get some new brakes for my cross bike. I was descending Rist Canyon, and near the top this is this right hand switchback that you come into pretty hot. My brakes weren't really slowing me down too well and I ended up in the wrong lane, and almost in the guard rail. I was lucky another car wasn't coming. I'm gonna get the Empella Froglegs, I hear they are pretty sweet brakes. I still haven't decided whether or not I'm going to run a single on my cross bike or not. If I want to do it the good way, I will have to order a 40 tooth chainring, some Cane Creek hoods, and a 3rd eye chain watcher. If I want to do it the ghetto way I can take the 39 tooth off my road bike, use the same brake hood/lever, and still buy a 3rd eye. Option one will cost probably cost me about $70, whereas option two will only cost me about $8. I just ran the numbers, and the Cane Creek hood is only 37 grams lighter than what I have now...I guess I'll go for option two. I'll end up saving the weight from the cable/housing of the front derailleur, the front derailleur, and the teeth that I'm going to grind off my 48 tooth. I could also bring the lever to the bike shop and ask them to take out all the shifting mechanisms and see what they can do...

Ups and Downs in Wyoming

2006-10-01T13:52:00.000-07:00

Well I think I went from my worst race of the season to my best race of the season in a matter of two days. I'll start off with the bad day in the XC first. I started off slow like I didn't really have the legs, hoping that they would come around and I could pick off lots of people. Well, at the end of the first lap there was this huge ditch, and I attempted to bunny hop it. I bottomed out my fork and got a little disoriented...and took a wrong turn. I rode for about 10 minutes until I came across a barbed wire fence that ended the trail. So, I turned around and continued my expedition back to the start/finish area where I talked to Andy. We decided that I should just ride tempo and treat the race as training because there wasn't any hope left for me at this point. That was all good until I got the climbing done, and on the top of the descent managed to hit my rear tire just right on this rock and pinch it. For all of you know it alls out there I was riding a 2.0 Larsen with 35 psi in the back, so I just got unlucky this time when I flatted. I changed it, but didn't have quite enough CO2 to fill so had to borrow a mini pump from a teammate. I was back on the trail, and soon after that I was lapped. I ended up getting lapped by about the top 5 riders in my race.

Today was by far my best ride of the year, though, I really think I'm pulling it together. I was feeling good before the start and then when there was 3 laps to go in the race before mine I punctured and was forced to ride a teammates heavy wheel (with slime tubes) in my race. Maybe it was the slime tubes, but I was going pretty good. I wasn't able to make the lead group, but I was in no man's land almost the whole race suffering as much as I could. I managed to finish in 8th place, which I was pretty happy with. Next week I'm going to be rolling on my Crossmax SLs with tubeless tires and I can assure you that I am not going to flat. The new Tim Halliday will be showing up from now on.

I also decided today that I'm going to ride a hardtail for next year. I don't know whether it will be a specialized with NERD or my Rogue with IronHorse New England. My rogue is probably the sweetest hardtail I've ever ridden (including my 9.8) and I really like it a lot. I figure if I sell my Azure I can get enough money to make my Rogue pretty tricked out. A little imput on this decision would be appreciated. I came to this conclusion when I realized that all the fast guys almost exlusively ride hartails. Colin Becker won twice this weekend, this kid Brian from CU is super fast, Eric Ransom is a beast, and that's just collegiate dudes who fly. We haven't even got into the Absalon, Hermida, JHK crew that ride hardtails all the time. I figure that if a hardtail is good enough for them then it sure is good enough for me.

2006-09-29T09:03:00.000-07:00

Well I'm coming off a rest week where I got some good mountain biking in and I'm definitely looking forward to the races in Wyoming this weekend. We have the XC on Saturday and the ST on Sunday. Apparently Fort Lewis isn't attending this race so this is a great opportunity for our team to get a lot of points. I decided that I'm going to race my full suspension in the XC. Last year I remember there wasn't a ton of climbing, and there were some downhills were the full suspension would be nice. The Azure is so efficient anyways that it doesn't really matter if I ride it or my hardtail. The only difference is that my hardtail is a lot lighter.

Looks like I don't have much to talk about today, except for how excited I am to be getting my cross bike and all the stuff that comes with it. I'll put up a race report Saturday night and Sunday night after the races. Hopefully I'll be able to throw down this weekend.

Bling Bling

2006-09-27T20:49:00.000-07:00

Here's the long awaited picture of me with my new earings. I think they look pretty good!!!!! My new diet seems to be working out pretty well. I am staying away from simple sugars and saturated fat. I am allowed to eat ice cream after races, along with soda. Basically the point of not having simple sugars is to maintain a constant metabolism. Hopefully it will make me way faster. I'm getting outbid on all the powertap stuff right now, I'll have to see how much the price goes up before I make a decision or not.

I went skateboarding with Pete today and managed to ride off a curb. After tackling that, I attempted a two set, which was actually pretty big. I went for it three times but was never able to land it. I guess the first time I was pretty close. Hopefully I'll be able to do it when my very own skateboard arrives here pretty soon. I can't wait to get my cross bike and all the other stuff in my care package, too.

Power Down

2006-09-26T09:21:00.000-07:00

I went in to Back on Track yesterday to get some testing done. It's a pretty cool facility and now I'm way into training by power rather than heart rate. I did three tests, a 1 minute, a 5 minute, and a 20 minute. For my 1 minute test I averaged 395 watts, for my 5 minute test I average 303 watts, and for my 20 miute test I averaged 236 watts. The numbers weren't as good as I was looking to get. I wanted to do over 300 for the 5 minute test which I accomplished. The 20 minute test I wanted to get 250, so I ended up a little short. The 1 minute test was just ridiculous, I can't say that I liked it too much.

Right now I'm bidding on a PowerTap SL laced to a Mavic Open Pro on ebay. I have the highest bid right now with three days left, so let's hope that it doesn't get too out of hand. If I end up winning the auction it will be unbelievable, I won't be able to wait until I get it. If not, I think I might end up just asking for a PowerTap wheel for Chrismas. Oh yeah, the wheel I'm bidding on retails for like $1,300 and it's the lighter hub with more features, so it's pretty sweet. I can't wait until my cross bike gets here, I guess it's being shipped out tonight.

Durango

2006-09-25T08:41:00.000-07:00

Well this weekend went kind of like all the others. I just didn't have a good one. The short track was on Saturday and I was able to suffer pretty well finishing in the top 15. I think I could have done a little better (finish with the next group) because this kid crashed in front of me in the singletrack and I lost the group that I was riding with early in the race. I think I was only about a minute or so off the pace, so I can definitely live with that. Sunday's race didn't go nearly as well. I was riding OK, top 20 or so and just got my legs going when I flatted. I had just given my tube to a teammate so I had to wait to get some stuff from other people.I got going a few minutes later and then about a mile down the trail I hit a rock just right and flatted again. I decided that I'd throw in the towel because at this point I wasn't going to be earning any points for the team and it would be counterproductive for me to walk 8 miles.

I ended up walking back with Danae York, who apparently was coughing up blood. She decided to pull the plug too so we chit chatted on the way back. What I am about to say is absolutely unbelievable, I have no idea why I did this or how I did this. We were walking up the final climb to the start/finish area when I spotted a huge spider by Danae's foot. I was so amazed that I dumped the rest of the Gatorade out of my bottle, and caught it in the bottle. I couldn't believe it, it was a tarantula. I brought it back and showed it to everyone and it was the most insane thing ever. I was talking to Hagen afterwards though, and he told me I should probably let it go because it would be happier in its natural environment. I guess that it would probably be happier injecting its venom into humans that crawling around in a cage so I decided to let the little bugger go.

Today I get to go do some testing. I have no idea exactly what I'm going to be doing, but I know I have to bring my bike and probably suffer a lot. We decided to do it today because my race was cut short yesterday, and Monday is the only day that Andy and the guy from Back on Track are able to work together. Hopefully I'll be able to put out some good numbers and learn a little about my body, too. In order to get faster, I'm going to start eating differently. I started this morning on the AC diet, and I have to say it was all right. The only problem that I came to was when I started eating my pancakes and realized that I wouldn't be able to put maple syrup on them. Looks like I'll have to find something to put on them that still tastes good.

2006-09-21T08:31:00.001-07:00

So it's been a little while since the last update. I guess it was because I was waiting to put up some good pictures, but I don't have any so looks like there will be none. I guess the most important piece of news is that I got my ears pierced Friday night. We did this with two safety pins, a lighter, and some hand sanitizer. I carefully cleaned the safety pins and before I knew it my ears were pierced.

This weekend was my worst in a while. In the short track on Saturday I crashed really hard, hard enough that I busted my helmet up pretty good and was unable to finish the race. The cross country went pretty much just as bad, except that I pedalled in for the finish. We're heading to Durango this weekend so hopefully I can turn the luck around and get in some good races.

2006-09-21T08:31:00.000-07:00

2006-09-13T20:36:00.000-07:00

Well Wednesday Night Worlds wasn't exactly what I imagined it would be like. Basically it was me hanging on to the back of the pack at 182-187 bpm for 20 minutes before deciding that if I did it any longer I wouldn't be able to race this weekend. I don't understand how people find road rides like that fun. It was on the flattest road with the worst pavement job, and in general it is just a terrible ride. Next week I'm back to my normal training plan, no more of this stuff.

I got an 80 on my Chemistry test, and the class average was a 73, so I'm pretty much the man. My skis also came in sometime while my parents were in Nevada. I think I'll have them bring them to the ski shop with some bindings and have them mounted and sent out here because I'm gonna be ripping the ski slopes in no time. I need to head to REI tomorrow to get a sleeping pad for the race this weekend and also my ski pass. It's hard to imagine that in only 6 more weeks I won't be riding for a while. I think we are going to have a few indoor soccer teams, which should be a lot of fun. Well, I've got to study for a Biology test that I'm going to ace because we already covered like half of the material in high school but apparently a 3 on the AP test is just no good...

2006-09-12T08:57:00.000-07:00

This is the award that I won in my outstanding performance on Sunday. In case you can't read it, it says "MOST TENACIOUS RIDER." If you look closely, you can see that there is no tire on my rear wheel.
In the next week, I have four tests. This evening I have a Chemistry exam, Thursday I have a test in Biology, Monday I have a Psychology test, and finally next Tuesday I have a test in Survery of Human Nutrition. I also have a paper due tomorrow and a quiz on Thursday, so I'm going to be pretty busy. This weekend we are going to a race and I don't even know who is hosting it or where it is. All I know is that we are going to be camping, which means that I get to break in my sleeping bag. In the near future I am going to need to go to REI and pick up a pad, I think a ThermaRest is what AC told me I should get. If time permits I might try to go and do Wednesday night world's tomorrow night. I'm sure that will be interesting...

Beaver Meadows

2006-09-11T11:06:00.000-07:00

Well I could probably sum up the entire weekend by saying that things didn't go the way I wanted them to. The short track was on Saturday, and I was definitely looking for a good result. I didn't get a good start, but I remained calm and worked my way through the field until at the beginning of lap 3 I had positioned myself at the back of the main (fast) field. I had the momentum from bridging and I planned to go around them and try to make contact with the lead group. As I did this, two wheels ahead of my a couple of guys rubbed wheels, and somebody came over into me and I got whiped out. I got back on my bike and took like 15 seconds to get into my pedals because I had my Speedplays with road shoes, and by that time there was no hope of getting back on. I ended up riding in with a teammate for 17th. The cross country was even worse than the short track however. The morning of the cross country I decided to run a Maxxlite 310 on the back with a Larsen TT on the front, BAD DECISION. I was having a good race, feeling better than I had all season when I flatted. I figured I would fix it real quick and get on my way. I did just that and by the end of lap 1 I had worked my way up to 11th place, not too shabby. I moved up a few more positions in the second lap (after my flat I was cruising) before I flatted yet again. One tube and two CO2 cartridges later (from random people) I was back on my way. By this point I was just going to try and pick off as many people as possible. But, as things would go, I flatted less than 1/2 way through the third lap and ended up walking 7 miles to finish the race. It was a long race, and it was really unfortunate because I felt super good, but I guess that's how things go sometimes.

What Have I Done?

2006-09-07T21:23:00.000-07:00

I have become the very person that I swore I would never become. I am currently downloading a 10 day trail version of World of Warcraft. You might say that it's just a trail version, but there is a reason why it's only a trial. I was out the door with Jeremy planning to guy to Best Buy to purcahse my copy of WoW when Jeremy told me that it would be better if I found out for sure that my computer could run it before spending $3o on the game. He would also get a month free if I end up purchasing the game, which I will if my computer decides to run it.

You might ask why I am playing this game. Well it's pretty simple. There are probably about a dozen kids on my floor that play, and I'm friends with all of them. We are planning on playing together quite a bit, and I'm sure it will be a lot of fun. To play this game, it costs $15 per month, but if you play only 1 hour per day then you end up spending only $0.50 per hour of play time, which is pretty cheap. You could also look at it as one month of WoW play is the equivalent to going to about two movies. Two movies last about 6 hours, and WoW can last as long as you can physically and mentally take.

Well now that I'm done admitting my pure nerdiness, I'll try to sound a little cooler by describing my new lunch ritual. Since Tuesday, my lunch crew and I have eaten in front of the TV (nothing new there) and watched the music videos on BET. When we get a TI song or "Walk it Out" we turn the volume up as loud as it goes so it echoes through the entire cafeteria. It's hilarious because we are some of the whitest guys you have ever seen. Our personal favorite right now is "Shoulder Lean" by Young Dro featuring my main man TI. I think I even have the dance down. I also realized that my aviators looks almost exactly like the ones that TI wears. I guess that makes me pretty cool.

I put on my new tires today. The MaxLites are insane, I couldn't beleive how light they are. I can't wait to race them on Saturday. I put the Larsen on the front of my FS for now, and I think it's going to stay there with the skinny Ritchey on the back to prevent clogging. There are a few stream crossings in the XC and if things get wet the last thing I want is for my rear wheel to not be able to spin. Wish me luck this weekend...

2006-09-06T19:18:00.000-07:00

As excited as I am about the collegiate mountain bike season, I think I'm looking forward to the ski season even more. It's wierd because I've never been like this before. I looked for a new pair of skis for a while and two days ago I ordered a set of K2 Seth Vicious in a 189 cm length. They are by far going to be the best skis I have ever had, and I know they are going to be so much fun. This week I'm going to get my Colorado Pass, which lets me access Keystone, Breckenridge, A-Basin, Vail, and Beaver Creek. It's going to be insane ripping the pow once or twice every weekend. Hopefully we end up going to Whister over Christmas break because that would also be a lot of fun and I would probably get the opportunity to ski a lot of big lines.

I'm pretty sure my form is coming along really well. I know that I'm faster than I was last year, but I think my chances of going to nationals this year may be even slimmer. I have decided to not get my expectations up in case I am not selected. Peter Stetina is going to be riding with us this fall, and I'm sure that he is going to be flying. We also have this kid that raced the 100 mile series this summer and finished second overall in the series, so he must be pretty fast. I'm sure Nick (the new President) will be pretty fast, along with Matt. It will be interesting to see how fast Adam and Steve are, because Steve was getting pretty fast at the end of last season. It seems like Adam just doesn't have the build for a mountain biker, he's so big.

I just ordered some new tires that should get me through the collegiate season. I got 2 of the new Maxxis MaxLite 310 and 1 Maxxis Larsen TT. I figure I'll run the MaxLites for the STs, and for some of the XCs I will throw the Larsen TT on the front. I also have a 1.95 Ritchey Zed Race WCS that I'll use on the back for muddy conditions on my full suspension to prevent clogging. All in all I'm sure they will work really well. Tomorrow I need to go get some gels for the races on Saturday and Sunday. In Sundays XC I'm going to make an effort to eat a gel, a packet of gushers, and a whole bottle each lap, along with Coke on the last lap. Hopefully that will get me through the race (2.5 hours I think), and keep me strong the whole time. I'll have to eat tons of bananas to not cramp either. Hopefully I can open up the season big with a podium or two. I'll have race reports (and hopefully pictures) on Sunday night/Monday.

2006-08-31T09:15:00.000-07:00

At the beginning of each year, there is a 3 on 3 soccer tournament. Our hall was lucky enough to have two teams in this tournament; the best team and the worst team. I didn't really sign up for this thing, but when I was asked to play for fun I figured I wouldn't pass up the opportunity. I donned a pair of Jeremy's (new Jeremy that is) soccer cleats and off I was. That day we lost both our games. The first one I guess we were just settling in, and the second game things kind of clicked and we started playing pretty decent, but the other team was just quite a bit better. We were eliminated from the tournament, but our other team was still staying strong. There are two more games tonight, and if they win the first they advance to the finals, and hopefully they will be able to win that. It's a lot of fun watching and cheering them on.

After the game last night we played some hardcore games of knock-out. I think we ended up playing about 8 games from the free throw line, 3 point line, and halfcourt. It goes without saying that I dominated the halfcourt games before I got too tired and didn't play for the win anymore. What else would you expect from the person who sank the half court shot at the Alumni Game a few years ago?!?!?!?

I have a scheduled rest week so I've been taking it pretty easy on the bike. 1 hour easy on Tuesday, and then 3 hours easy yesterday. Today I think I have two hours. Hopefully next week I'll be able to do Wednesday Night Worlds...I'll have to talk to Bill about that one. I'm working on getting my skis for next year. I think I found someone who has the same pair of 1080s that I do that are for sale. Hopefully he'll get back to me pretty soon. I figure I would pick those up pretty cheap and give them to Hannah because she said that she liked mine. I'm also giving her my snowpants so she's gonna be all set to rip this year. I think I'll be getting a pair of Public Enemies, except I'll mount them at at least +3, because my old ones seemed a little too far back. I've got two people on NS right now that are selling some of the 04-05 ones so I'll see how things play out. A ton of people on my hall ski, along with tons of the other people I know, so I won't have any trouble getting to the mountains this year. I hope we win tonight...

King Back

2006-08-27T14:32:00.000-07:00

Well, I thought the king was gonna be back, but looks like he didn't show up quite yet. After my ride I decided that it was time for me to handle the back to back foot long subs from Subway. Up first was the meatball marinara, which I cleaned up pretty easily. What I was about to face I could have never predicted though. The BMT that was on deck was just too much to handle. I ate the first half and then got about halfway through the second half. In other words I ate 3/4 of the BMT, totalling 21 inches of Subway, not too shabby but I've done better in the past.

I felt as good today as I have all year. I was supposed to do 3x6 minutes in zone 4, but I decided that today was the day to see what my time up Rist Canyon would be. I started my clock at the dirt road right before you enter the canyon, which is where I assume most people time from. I rode at about 178 beats per minute for most of the climb, sometimes falling down to the low 170s on the flatter sections and reaching into the high 180s on some of the steeper stuff. I ended up cresting the top at 54 minutes. If I remember correctly Andy said that we should be able to do it in under an hour, but I will verify that at our next meeting. It was a good effort but I think I could go lower. There was one section where I went to hard and had to pay for a while before I could recover and get back up to a good pace. Also, I had 3 water bottles, a cell phone, a seatback with tube and CO2, an ipod, and my keys, so I was weighed down a little bit.

Looks like I should get a rest week this week, and then have one hard week of training before Beaver Meadows and the race season starts. I just watched "A Walk to Remember" and I must admit it was a pretty good movie. Well, looks like it's time for me to do my calculus homework...

2006-08-25T07:19:00.000-07:00

Well I'm getting back into the swing of things back here in Fort Collins. A day in my life looks kind of like this. Eat, class, eat, class, bike ride, video games, homework. In the middle of all this is a whole bunch of internet and more video games, because a lot of times you'll just have about a half hour or so just to kill some time before you have to do something else.

There has been a lot of quality Super Smash Brothers Melee action going on in Newsom already. So far we have three rooms set up with a GameCube and, depending on where we want to play, we just bring in some extra controllers. I must admit that even though I practiced a lot over the summer, there are a couple freshman that are pretty good, making it hard for me to win. One kid is just ridiculously good and none of us can beat him (not even Pat when he's spamming the up B). Hopefully I can take it up a notch and teach this kid a lesson though.

Somebody explain this to me: Tuesday I rode for 3 hours and I got back and had a newly defined tan line. So, I decided that Wednesday was going to be the day to extend my tan lines. I put my shorts about 4 inches above my old line, wore a sleeveless jersey (thanks Mom), and no socks. When I got back though, there was absolutely no new tan. I did the same thing yesterday and got the same result. I guess I'm just going to have to get lucky some time if I'm going to try and accomplish the tan line extension.

This weekend we have our century ride that helps us make a lot of money. There are actually like 4 different lengths. I only have 3 hours scheduled for that day so I think I'll just try and go through as many aid stations as possible so I only have to carry a bottle or two. If you were wondering, I was able to put 3 bikes in my room this year. It's pretty amazing. The whole center of the room is still empty, so there's plenty of room to sit down/pull up chairs/do whatever. Well I think I've written enough for one day...

26 Inches Just To Get My Roll On

2006-08-21T21:04:00.000-07:00

So Sunday was my first ride back in Fort Collins, and I flatted. I had rode to the Dixon Reservoir and done a loop around that before completing some intervals. Then, about an hour and a half into the ride I flatted and had to turn around. It's amazing that I didn't flat at all back home but here I flatted on my first ride. I'm thinking twice about equipping my whips with the new Maxxis MaxLite 310 tires...
I did see this guy riding though. He weas insane. Just out of the picture there is a row of rocks and he was managing to ride over it. I must say I was pretty impressed.

I had my first day of classes today. I pretty much shouldn't even have gone because the teacher would just hand out a syllabus (??) and read from it before letting us leave a few minutes early. My chemistry teacher is French (I think) and she does this annoying "eh" after everything she says. I think it would normally be an "umm" but with her accent it comes out sounding a bit funny. My schedule is pretty nice so it should be a good semester. Tomorrow I go to Attributes of Living Systems for the first time, so it should be another easy day. Tonight I had 16 calculus problems. I can't even believe I had that much due on the first day!!!!!

I Got A Whole Lotta Mo

2006-08-19T20:34:00.000-07:00

I think I put this huge dent in my wheel at Hodges, somewhere around the same time that I snapped a rail on my SLR. I decided to leave them at home becase they have taken such a beating and just aren't performing like they did when they were new.
My little neice. Sometimes it's kinda hard to snap a picture of her with a smile on her face.
The plane ride was spacious...to say the least. I watched Rocky III from Boston to Pitt. and Rocky IV from Pitt. to Denver.
I've got a new set up for the room this year. There is enough space for at least one more bike back there, maybe even two if I move my desk over a little more.

In case you didn't know, that's what Clubber Lang (Mr. T) says to Rocky Balboa in Rocky III in their rematch when Rocky is letting Clubber tire out by just swinging; just a little side note to go with all the pictures and stuff I have to say now that I'm back to the real world of fast internet!!!!!

Hodges Village Dam

2006-08-13T15:42:00.000-07:00

Today was the Hodges Village Dam mountain bike race. Last year, this was my best race, and nothing changed this year. There were a lot of good riders there today, like the Alessio twins from Pennsylvania, Aaron Snyder, and a lot of the regulars. I didn't get off to too good of a start, and I was struggling to hang onto the back. By the end of the first lap I was about 5 minutes off the lead. Then I started coming around and I rode the next 3 laps with Skip Brown, who was on a rigid singlespeed, but still moving along as fast as I could go. So, we were able to maintain our positions (which were last and second to last, haha), and not lose too much time to the leaders. He pulled away from me on the last lap, but I still had my strongest ride of the year so far. I think I would have beat everyone in the expert category so at least I can feel good about racing with the big boys. I just started intensity training so I can only get better from here, too.

I have concluded that I do have the Curse of the Blue Tees. When I played with my uncle on Thursday I shot an 80, with two double bogeys. I rolled in 2 birdies on the front side and shot a 37 (3 over), but fell apart a little on the back with a 43 (7 over). All in all a good round of golf.

Real Training

2006-08-09T17:04:00.000-07:00

I guess I'm back to the world of training in zones 4 and 5, and what a rough world that is. Last night I went on the Gearworks ride, and right before we were about to leave I was somehow placed on the A ride...great. We started out climbing for about the first hour and fifteen minutes, and I was always at the front of the group, hanging in really well. We started out with seven and managed to get rid of two guys on the hills. After that we hit the flats and I hit the wall. Once we got rolling I just had such a hard time pushing that big gear and they completely wore me out. I ended up limping home struggling and hanging on as best I could. That wouldn't have been that bad if I didn't have four hours on the road bike today. The first two were OK but then the thorough whooping that I had recieved the night before began to take affect. From that ride, I have decided that I need to readjust the saddle on my road bike, it's so uncomfortable right now and I don't even want to begin to get into the specifics of why I want to change it.

Tomorrow I have a big golf date set up with my uncle. I haven't played with him in a long time so I'm really excited. I'll have the home course advantage as we'll be playing at Winchendon. He's getting old so we'll probably be playing from the whites, another advantage for me. 1o yards less on each hole doesn't seem like a lot but it certainly makes the difference on some holes. On #5, it's the difference between a good 3 iron and "easy" 3 wood. I don't carry a 5 wood so it makes that shot super hard from the blues. Well I've got water to drink, food to eat, stretching to do, all in hopes of recovering before my pyramid intervals in zone 5 tomorrow. Wish me luck.

2006-08-03T16:31:00.000-07:00

What a day. I got an Ipod Shuffle today, the smaller one that holds 120 songs. Right now that's about 8 hours, so I think I'll wait until I get to school and get some new music before I even bother changing what is one there. I only rode with it for a few minutes today, because of events that I will explain later...

I got the brakes for my hardtail today and put them on my bike. I also brought the disc wheel from my full suspension to the shop so that Andy could see if we could just tighten the hub up. As expected it has cartridge bearings and we're going to order a few of them before it starts working good again. Hopefully the wheel will be all set before I leave for school. I think I'd rather run my hardtail at Hodges rather than my full suspension anyways.

I made plans to ride with my sister, Aggie, today. That was good, we were just cruising and I had some sprints to do so I would do those and then wait up. It turned bad when I tore an Egg Beater off the spindle though. The ironic part is that it was within 1/4 mile of where I did that a few years ago. So, I called my mom and had her pick me up so I could go put on a different set with reliable spindles. Ok I'm good to go this time, along with my new Ipod because I was now going to be riding by myself. 10 minutes down the road I run into the Thursday night road ride (which is the easier one) so I decided to pull a Nick Martin and tag along. Tonight was the sprint night so we had some hardcore sprints for the town lines. I took one sprint and it was just because everyone was regrouping at a corner and I took off and surprised them...haha. All in all a good day, hopefully I'll be able to listen to the new Ipod a little more tomorrow though.

2006-08-02T18:27:00.001-07:00

I wrote a big update yesterday, but when I tried to upload a picture of my little neice my whole post was denied. Amen to dial up. A few more weeks and I'll be back to reality...well I guess that's what one might call college life.

I have never swam so much in my life as I did today. I thought I was going to die at one point. I hitched a ride on the back of a kayak over to a ropeswing that we were sessioning that is a couple houses down on our second villa (this one is on a lake and owned by the family). Anyways, on the way back I decided that I would rather swim because kayaking is so boring and requires so much work. Bad decision! It took me so long to go the distance and I was so tired when I arrived back to the camp. Anyways, to make a long story short, swimming isn't nearly as easy as it seems.

I was right about the rest week, tomorrow I have some sprints and saturday I have 40 minutes in zone 4 and that is the extent of my training for the week. My new brakes should be coming in tomorrow so hopefully I'll be able to go rip around on the hardtail after work or something. I just got done watching the movie Hitch and I have added it to the list of lame movies that I will probably never watch again. Recent additions to this list include: Constantine, Sideways, Match point, or pretty much any movie that my mom gets from NetFlix. I have yet to watch a good movie that she has ordered. I hope it cools down because I don't really want to have to try to sleep in this heat...

2006-08-02T18:27:00.000-07:00

2006-07-31T18:08:00.000-07:00

I think I've got developed something that I just made up: The Curse of the Blue Tees. After my remarkable 79 ten days ago, I decided that I would move back and start playing from the blue tees. Big mistake. Since that epic day I haven't shot good at all. The worst part is that the driver used to be my go to club, and now I'm hitting it so bad. Sometimes I'll hit a big hook, other times a big slice, and sometimes she'll go straight. I just can't figure it out. I've been to the range a lot and think I have it straightened out, and then I get out on the course and she's all over the place. I'm still hitting my mid-short irons real nice and chipping the ball like a champion. I'm getting better with my long irons, too. All I need to do is start putting better and hitting the driver and 3 wood consistently and I'll be unstoppable. I want to break 80 again before I leave to go to school in only 19 days. I can't believe it's going to be that soon.

I finished up a good week of training with quite a few long days. It ended up being 17 hours which is quite a bit for me. I even took a new route that my dad told me was 3 hours (it ended up taking 3 3/4 hours). It was so hilly though, I don't know that I'll be doing it too often. Before I leave for school I need to get both of my mountain bikes in tip top condition. I just put together my FS with the XT hydraulic disc brakes today...I think I'm going to get used to the STI shifters. I also just ordered some Avid SD7 brake calipers for my hardtail so that I can try to keep the weight down. I figure I'll end up racing the HT on most short tracks and cross countries, but that I'll keep the FS in case it's a little burly. Our home race (the one at Beaver Meadows) is pretty nasty so I'll probably unleash the dually for it. I think I have a rest week this week but I haven't got my workouts yet...let's hope.

2006-07-21T17:38:00.000-07:00

I set a new record yesterday by shooting a 79 on the golf course. It was really wierd because I wasn't even hitting my irons that well, but I was chipping great and my putting was so-so. After playing a few holes on the front nine, I started thinking that I could break 80 if I played decent. Flash forward: 16th hole. I need to bogey 16, 17, and 18 to shoot a 79...a task that shouldn't be too challenging considering the fact that I hadn't gotten worse than a bogey all day. The 16th hole is a 150ish yard downhill par 3, so I hit a pitching wedge on the green. OK...I ended up 3 putting, my first 3 put of the day. I had made bogey so it didn't matter. 17 is a 500ish yard par 5, slightly downhill. I can come really close to knocking it on in two with a good driver and 3 wood. Today wasn't a day to be taking risks like that, so I reached into my bag and hit 6 iron off the tee, followed by a 7 iron to 150ish. I hit another PW, this time right of the green. I chipped on so I had about 20 feet (it was a tough chip I had no green to work with). I 3 putted again and made double bogey, my first of the day, meaning that I would need to par 18 to break 80. 18 is another 150ish yard par 3, that goes down, and then back up...so you are actually hitting slightly uphill. It's the 7th hardest hole on the course. A 9 iron can get me there, but I decided to play it safe. I hit an 8 iron pin high and two putted for my par. What an epic day.

I'm a little fed up with road racing. It's pretty much the most ridiculous thing ever. Wednesday night I crashed and I wasn't even doing anything wrong. My right wrist/bicep is still sore, and I'm going to need a new derailleur hanger, cables, housing, and bar wrap for my bike. I couldn't even finish the race because my rear wheel wouldn't spin because the derailleur was in the spokes. That's the first race that I have ever failed to finish, and there was absolutely nothing that I could do about it. In conclusion, I would much rather golf than do road races.

The Usual

2006-07-17T06:37:00.000-07:00

First of all, congratulations to Colt for winning a national championship in the marathon on Thursday. I was on the edge the entire time reading his website. All I know is that the race was 120 km, and my longest ride this year has been 60 miles, which is about 100 km, and it was on a road bike. I couldn't image racing that long on a mountain bike, unless of course it was on a straight up lame course.

Anyways, my predictions were way off, I don't think I got a single one right. The most surprising of them all, Jermiah Bishop finsihing second in the ST. I didn't think he knew how to race a short track, but oh well. I can't believe T O double D went down in the XC after he had dropped JHK.

Well, I signed up for the Working Man's Stage Race yesterday, and it starts tomorrow. Time trial tomorrow, circuit race Wednesday, and a points race on Thursday. I don't really know how everything is going to work, but I think I might go for the KOM if I feel good. I figure I'm pretty fast on my mountain bike, so I should be able to give a bunch of old cat. 4 roadies a run for their money. On my ride yesterday I rode by this guy who was completely covered in sweat. I got to a big climb and had to keep my HR in zone 2, so at the top of the climb the guy caught up to me and we started chatting and he was pretty whipped. Anyways, turns out he's a cat. 4 roadie and I was about a million times faster than him. Hopefully he's not the kind that get dropped really quick. I've got a big day of golf ahead of me, maybe 36 holes. The other day John and I played a 2-man scramble in 1 hour 45 minutes for 18 holes...

Kawa Bunga...

2006-07-13T06:15:00.000-07:00

I rode for 3 hours and 10 minutes in the pouring rain yesterday. It started off overcast and then about 15 minutes into the ride it began to drizzle. I guess the pace slowly picked up and by the end of my ride it was an absolute downpour. The weather said isolated thunderstorms with a 50% chance of precipitation, so for NH I figured my odds were pretty good! Along the way I drank 3 bottles of gatorade/water, two packets of gushers, and a huge banana. However, when I got home the only thing that could satisfy this wild beast was a large cheese pizza from Gabby's. When I got that craving for pizza, a craving for Ninja Turles came along with it. So, I got my pizza and popped in the movie. The movie was excellent, and the box of pizza (yes, I ate the whole thing) was excellent as well. There is a whole lot of stuff from the movie that I didn't remember, like this one part where Michaelangelo acts out Rocky...it's so funny.

Anyways, it looks like rain again today. A couple of hours on the mountain bike probably isn't going to be too pleasant. I can't wait until I get back out to Colorado and I hardly ever have to ride in the rain. Here, I think I ride in the rain just as much as I ride in the sunshine. It's a real bummer. Mountain bike nationals this weekend, these are my picks:

Men's XC: 1) JHK 2) Todd Wells 3) Jeremiah Bishop
Men's ST: 1) Todd Wells 2) JHK 3) Adam Craig
Women's XC: 1) Mary McConneloug 2) Shonny V 3) Heather Irminger
Wonem's ST 1) Katerina Nash 2) Shonny V 3) Willow Koerber

Moody Park

2006-07-10T12:43:00.000-07:00

So my favorite race of the year has already come and gone. The course was in fantastic shape, probably the best that it's ever been in. They cut this new singletrack-ish section in to replace the old one that was kinda burly. It was really nice, the soil was perfect for mountain biking. Unfortunately, I didn't have too great of a race, but what do you expect after back to back rest weeks. I ended up 5th, but Brian had an even worse day than me and took 6th...what a way for us Semi-Pros to represent in the Epert Senior I category!

My dad raced, too. He took 3rd in Novice Clydesdale. There were only 3 racers. HAHA. It was really funny seeing him out there in his baggy shorts and sleeveless white shirt. He had on one of my old helmets and some black half finger gloves with big hiking boots on. He might have been able to compete for second, but he said he was just going for a ride to finish, and that he really wasn't too tired. I told him he would just have to try harder next time.

Well, I need to go work on my golf game today. I haven't played a real round in about a week, so I need to get back into it. I shot 90 one of my first times out this year, but haven't been able to get below 90 yet. Last time I played the same exact ball the entire round until 18, and then the luck turned on me and I just quit. Hopefully today it will all come together and I'll hit my irons accurately. I have no trouble hitting them solid, I can just never hit them where I want to.

Fo Shizzle...

2006-07-06T18:06:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure if that's how you spell fo shizzle. Me, being a white American, am challenged at spelling words of the African descent. Anyways, these past few days have been pretty good, except for the fact that nobody at Gearwork's Cyclery is capable of selling me the right bottom bracket that I need. All I want is a 68 x 113 octalink, that's all I want. First, Andy sold me an e-type, so I had to bring that back. Next, Gene (the owner) was like I'll sell you this XTR for the same price. I'm thinking to myself cool, now I have a lighter bottom bracket. I get home and install it and have to adjust the front derailleur. I go inside and have a message from Gene saying that the BB is XTR specific, and I'm like what's this guy talking about, it's working fine. So I go to leave on my ride and I feel this dead spot on the bottom of each pedal. Back to the barn...I take the crank bolts off and the arms just fall off...ooops. I guess that BB was XTR specific. My old one is still on there now, and it's got so much play. Looks like I'm going to have to race on it this weekend.

BIG NEWS!!!!! I put disc brakes on my hardtail (the only IronHorse that I'm riding). I'm using the wheels off my FS for now, but I think I'm going to get some Stan's and maybe their new tires, too. On their website it said a 150 pound person should start off running them 20 psi front and 23 psi rear...WHOA!!!!! If I can run a tire that low and not flat all the time, then I will run that tire until I die.

I got some massive burns on my back today...I guess that's what I get for mowing the lawn all day with my shirt off. The burn on my back should accompany the one on the front pretty well though. I have to go to the dentist at 8:30 am tomorrow, so I think I'm gonna go eat some dessert and head to bed.

Training Day

2006-07-03T10:19:00.000-07:00

These were my riding partners for the day. I talked my dad into racing Moody Park this weekend, and Ed said he was up for it, too. We rode for two hours, training for them, recovery for me. Not a bad ride though, lots of stops and lots of goofing around.
We started off with what we would do when we were little: ride to the lighthouse. It used to be a huge deal, but not it's only about a 15 minute ride from the villa. If you walk along the beach it would probably take a little less time.
This little guy was running around down by the docks. I wonder what he was up to...
We rode over to this golf course that is pretty fun. We didn't play but this is the major attraction on the way there. It's so big. The rock itself must be about ten feet tall.
This is right in the center of town and I couldn't pass it up. I was laughing as I snapped this one.
This is another major attraction in the town of Mattapoisett. It signified to me when I was a kid that we were almost there. It's only about 5 minutes from the house, but it's pretty cool.
Last but not least, Oxford Creamery. This is one of the best ice cream places around. They also serve fried food and stuff like that, but I'm more into the ice cream aspect. I got a large peanut butter cup two nights ago and I'm wanting some more right now. Hopefully the ice cream truck pulls up here pretty quick because I'm ready for a snack.

The Villa...

2006-07-01T12:05:00.000-07:00

I arrived at the villa around 2 in the morning today. Aggie wasn't done with prior commitments until sometime around 11, so we got kind of a late start. It's not that big of a deal though, I'm used to driving at all sorts of times these days.

Thursday, I woke up at 1 am to drive down to Maryland to pick up some cement mixers. It was supposed to be a six hour drive down, one hour there, and an eight hour drive back. As always, nothing went according to plan. On the way back, the fuel filter in one of the trucks was clogged. This meant that we were going 15 mph uphill on the New York Thruway. Talk about scary!!!!! Most cars were going 65-75 mph and we were only going 15. We ended up getting a new fuel filter for that thing, and then of course more had to go wrong. In the other truck we had a blow out in the front, so we had to leave that one on the side of the road for the towing company to come and pick up. OK, just when we thought it couldn't get any worse it did. In the same truck that we had already replaced the fuel filter, we ran out of gas. This is because the gas gague didn't work...go figure. Luckily, we were only a few minutes away from a gas station so I had to go and buy a can, put some diesel fuel in it, and drive back to the truck. We got it started, drove to the gas station and were finally on our way again. 10:30 pm came around and we finally arrived home, 21.5 hours later. Talk about the longest day ever.

Today me and Ed went in search of some trails that my dad told me were really nice. He said that they were good and he had a fun time or something like that. All we found was mud and dead ends, it was pretty much the worst ride ever. To supplement this lousy ride, I decided that swim out to the raft (which was put in this morning) was the only solution. It looks like it's only about 200 yards away, but it feels like it's way longer when you have to swim that far. Now that I have a good wireless connection right outside my front door and not much to do for the next few days I'll be able to update.

Oops...

2006-06-28T04:30:00.000-07:00

What a great day yesterday. Wake up, eat breakfast, work on my bikes, ride for 1.5 hours easy, eat lunch, go golfing, work for 1 hour. If every day could be like that then I wouldn't be too upset. After dinner, I was feeling a little hungry still, so I went down to Murdock's (the local ice cream joint) to get some dessert. So I placed my order and turned around right as this girl was walking up to get her ice cream and boom, I elbowed her right in the chin. I felt so bad, but she didn't seem to be hurt. She was there with a couple of friends and they all seemed to get a big kick out of it. Once I saw that she was OK I decided it would be fine for me to laugh.

I put my cross bike together yesterday. It looks like it's ready to go, I just want to get some wider handlebars for it. I don't know what the biggest size is, but that is the size that I want. I would go for the OS handlebars, but then that would require me to buy a new stem and new levers for the tops, and I don't feel like spending more money than I need to. I figure I'll just go Salem style and keep the smaller diameter bars because they will "give a little more." I was surprised at how light the bike is though, it seems like it's just as light as my road bike.

My mountain bike is in pieces right now, because for some reason I have three left side brake pads and only one right side. How does that happen? The LX brakes don't seem to stop really well so I think I'm going to purchase the Avid SD 7s. I had the SLs before and they worked real nice. They're only about 15 grams lighter than the 7s, so I figure I'll just save a little money. I should probably call the bike shop today and have them order the brakes because it looks like I'm going to be in Mattapoisett (the villa) over the weekend. It should be a lot of fun, hopefully I can convince Ed to come down because it's not like he'll have anything better to do at home.

Real Job

2006-06-01T06:40:00.000-07:00

Well I went out and got a real job this week. I talked to Tommy, the pro at the Winchendon Country Club, and he told me he can put me to work for the rest of the summer. What a relief. I didn't want to end up making sandwiches or bagging groceries, instead I'll probably be mowing grass and cleaning golf carts. I'm going in today to fill out some paperwork and do all that jazz after I go on a bike ride and mow some of the lawn around the edges and stuff. Hmm...looks like I don't have much to talk about since this week is a rest week and I've been watching the Rocky Anthology and golfing the whole time...

Coyote Hill

2006-05-29T17:47:00.000-07:00

Well, this was pretty much one of the worst races ever. On the start line, a couple of guys thought it would be really cool to change the race from three laps to four. Well, that would be cool if we were planning on it and prepared, but as it was I wasn't ready for it. I was pretty strong after the first two, but it was tough because mud was jammed in my frame (what a surprise) so I couldn't shift into my little ring for some of the climbs. After that I just kind of limped in to finish. A lot of guys dnf'ed so I don't feel too bad. It was a really tough race though, and I'm glad that it is over.

I set up my hardtail yesterday/today, and looks like I'll be racing on that rig the rest of the season. I already have pretty much everything dialed except for the fork and front brake, which is still really squeaky. I even rode today because I couldn't wait to ride my new rig, which is quite sweet if I do say so.

I just got back from the golf course where I got eaten alive. The best part about living in Colorado for nine months was the lack of flies. Today, it was a constant battle; me vs. the flies. The back of my neck is probably covered in blood and I probably killed at least 500 flies today, and that's no exaggeration. I wonder if Colt's actually showering right now...

2006-05-13T07:48:00.000-07:00

I ended up stuck down at the shop my third day home, answering the phone. I guess it's not that bad because I didn't have to do any super hard work the day before a race. I can't way for tomorrow, I know it's going to be so much fun racing in the rain, which I haven't done since August of last year at Brian Head, Utah. I hope it keeps raining, because the worse the conditions the better my chances of doing well are. Last year it would have been the worse the conditions the better my chances of WINNING, but this year it's a whole different story. Tomorrow will be my first race with the big dogs!

I had a great training day on Tuesday. I did four three minute VO2 intervals, followed by a 30 minute threshold ride. I fgured that would be the best thing to help simulate a mountain bike race. I didn't get in a ride Wednesday or Thursday, but got out for two hours in the rain yesterday. It wasn't bad in the woods for the first hour, but being on the road for an hour really gets you soaked. I don't know whether or not I'll ride outside today or just spin on the trainer.

Me and Aggie are going to get her a mountain bike today. I think she's gonna drop about a G, so she should get a pretty good bike for that much. I'm thinking a hardtail with mechnical disc brakes and shimano nine speed. I put some new grips on my mountain bike yesterday. Green Stella Azzura handelbar wrap. It looks cool and it feels even better, even though I still haven't ridden it yet with the new grips. Looks like my mountain bike weighs 27.1 pounds...ouch!!!!! I figured it was around 25, but I guess I was wrong. Of course, this weight is with the old grips, cassette, and chain. I just put on an XT 11-32 cassete and a brand new Sram 971 chain. My bike ran awesome in the mud yesterday, so I hope it is able to do that well tomorrow!

2006-05-07T20:14:00.000-07:00

Well it looked like everyone had a lot of fun in California for the first Norba of the year. I've read all the results and have most of the inside information except for the Expert 19-24 XC and the JuniorX ST. What I do know is that the JuniorX XC was pretty lame. 11 kids started the race. My best finish last year was 14th, and this year they aren't even getting 14 kids that enter the race. Sounds pretty lame if you ask me. I'm glad that I raced with a lot of competition, because I think that will make me stronger in the end.

Last night me, Jeremy, and Cole went and saw Silent Hill. It was a pretty good movie, but it was also pretty messed up. There were some deaths in that movie that made me think to myself, "Oh my God, I can't believe that just happened." In this one part, this thing (yes, that's the only way I can describe him) grabs this woman by the chest, twists, rips her skin off her body, and then throws it at some people. And, if you think that's messed up then there is even a more messed up part. At the end of the movie, this chick is all covered in barbed wire, and she is making her barbed wire go out and kill people. Well anyways, the barbed wire grabs this woman and goes straight up her body, ripping her in half. I wouldn't say that the movie was so much scary, as it was just intense. Now I really want to play the video games so I can understand a little more of the plot.

While I've been doing homework throughout the day, I just finished watching A Time to Kill, which is probably one of my favorite movies. Yesterday, I also watched Rocky IV, which is probably one of the sweetest movies I've ever seen. It's so inspirational. There's this one part where the huge Russian guy is training with all this high tech. stuff, and he's doping. Meanwhile, Rocky is running up snow capped mountains and working his butt off, doing virtually the same stuff as the Russian guy (minus the doping) except in the most ghetto way possible. I just talked to my Madre as told her that for my birthday I wanted the Rocky collection on DVD. I think I'm going to make them my new pre-race movie to get me pumped up. I also just downloaded the song so that I can get pumped up in the same way without having to watch the movie.

This week I took really easy, so hopefully I will be completely recovered to start some intense training this week. Tuesday I'm going to do some VO2 intervals, followed by a good portion of time in Zone 4 at my lactate threshold. I'm going to go for an easy ride on Wednesday, for pretty much as long as time permits. Tuesday I'll get home, and plan on doing some off-road time trialing, as described in my training Bible. Then it'll be easy days on Friday and Saturday before my first mountain bike race of the year, and as a Semi-Pro, on Sunday. I have a final on Tuesday and Wednesday, and my calculus test on teusday shouldn't be too difficult. After all, you can't do one thing without knowing how to do the thing before it. There's no way to know how to integrate functions, without first being able to differentiate them. It's funny, because one of the songs from Tony Hawk's Underground is called King Kong, and one of the lines is, "Don't integrate, differentiate." Now I know exactly what that means.

Well, I've got an essay and a take home test to finish up, and Jeremy should be back anytime with my quesadilla, so I guess I've got to get going. I can't believe how much I just typed. I wonder how Todd's arm is doing...

2006-05-05T17:39:00.000-07:00

Crappy weather again today. It's been about 40 degress and raining off and on pretty much all day. I had my last two classes of the semester, and it definitely feels good to be done...almost. I still have a little work and two tests to take. My calc final shouldn't be too bad, because you can't do one thing without knowing how to do the other first. Chem on the other hand is probably going to suck. I ran the numbers and it looks like I'll have to get a 88% on the final to get a B in the class, and a 62% to get a C in the class. There's pretty much no way that I'll be able to get a B, but I'm going to try for it. That class is so ridiculous.

I've been watching a lot of basketball and playing a lot of Super Smash Brothers lately. I can't believe the Suns came back to tie the series with the Lakers. I really hope they end up winning, because that would be really sweet. Steve Nash has the nastiest handle in the league. The guy is incredible. Well, I've got to get back to the Cleveland vs. Washington game to see what Labron has in store for us viewers...

2006-05-04T07:50:00.000-07:00

I have my road bike all packed up, along with tons of clothes and other crap that I had lieing around my room that I am going to need in New Hampshire. The box weighs a ton. Yesterday me, Josiah, and Jeremy went to the classiest McDonald's ever. This place was clean, had some leather chairs for sitting in, and there was even classical music playing in the background. I was really impressed, especially because they had a bucket full of free cookies that you could take. It goes without saying that Josiah emptied the bucket.

Speaking of Josiah, he just posted this paper on his door that talks about how all these other ethnicites have pride groups, and how they can all call us by racial slurs, but the minute we say something about them, or try to form a white pride group, we are considered racist. It makes a ton of sense and is logical if you read it. The ironic thing is that our RA just put up a sticky on it that says "remove immediately." Our RA is such a douchebag. He's so politically correct and is such a hippie. We are probably the most well behaved hall ever, and he still gets mad at us for using words like gay and fag, because, "as a heterosexual male I find that extremely offensive." Well screw you Skye, you dumb hippie. Nobody likes you.

The worst part about living in the dorms next year is definitely going to be that I have the same RA as I do this year, and of course because Anime Jon is still living on the floor. Anime Jon is this kid whose life revolves around anime and video games, and nothing else. He's majoring in computer sciences and japanese, and he wants to make video games for a living. I hope he fails miserably. The kid has zero social skills and cannot express himself in a manner that doesn't involve him yelling at you.

Happy Birthday Hannah

2006-05-02T17:57:00.000-07:00

Like the title says, Happy Birthday Hannah. She's getting up there, over a quarter century if my mind serves me right...

Anyways, went for my easiest ride of the year today. Average heart rate of 127, with a max of 147. It felt good to just chill for a while on the bike. I think I'm gonna ride like that the rest of the week. I start my build 2 phase next week, and then have my first mountain bike race of the season the Sunday that I get back. I can't wait, I know it's going to be so much fun. I also can't wait until I do those XTerra races near the end of the summer. I'm actually gonna do some swim and run training this summer so I don't get beat too bad in those portions. Colt told me I'd probably be the fastest on the bike, unless of course if Matt Boobar shows up.

Mountain Bike Stuff

2006-05-01T20:04:00.000-07:00

So I really wanted some tubeless disc wheels for my Azure. Crossmax SLs were at the top of the list, followed by the Stans Olympic ZTRs. The Crossmax are so expensive, so I figured I couldn't afford them. The Stans are a pretty good deal, but I haven't heard too much about them, so I was still a little skeptical. Well, I ended up taking the easy way out by just getting some Stans rim strips with valve stems. Turns out Evan had a set under his bed, so I didn't even have to order them or even pay a lot for them. I already have my wheels set up. I didn't even use sealant, just some tubeless tires I had lieing around the room. I didn't bother getting the tires perfect, cause I think I have some Kendas waiting for me when I get home...

I also decided that I'm going to build a hardtail, because I don't think I'll be racing cross next season. Our conference win yesterday inspired me to want to dominate on the mountain bike next collegiate season. This domination would help if I had both a hardtail and a full suspension. The hardtail is gonna be an Ironhorse Rogue, aluminum frame with carbon seatstays. I'm going to run v-brakes on it, so that I can use my Crossmax SLs. I pretty much have everything I need to build it, except for saddle, stem, and handlebars, which I put an order in for today. I'm getting the new Ritchey WCS 4-Axis stem, which looks really sweet!!!!! I'm also going with the new WCS saddle and some WCS aluminum risers. I still don't trust carbon handlebars, I don't know that I ever will.

My first mountain race of the season is less than two weeks away!!!!! I can't wait. Hopefully I'll have my hardtail built by then so I can have the ever challenging pre race decision.

Conference Champions

2006-04-30T14:16:00.000-07:00

Yup, you read it right. We beat both CU and FLC to win the RMCCC. It's pretty sweet, considering the fact that we are racing in the toughest collegiate conference.

I didn't do too well this weekend. I was off the back so early in both races and it was just torturous. Yesterday we had a 20 mile out and back (40 miles total) that was just ridiculous. The first 20 were downhill with a tailwind and took 45 minutes, and the last 20 were uphill with a headwind and took 2 hours!!!!! It was probably the worst race ever. Today we had a crit and it was pretty fast, way too fast for me right now. Hopefully all it will take is a little anaerobic training and I'll be racing strong on the mountain bike.

Besides mountain bike racing when I get home, I have another goal, well kind of. If I want to race Fitchburg then I'm going to have to get my Cat. 3 upgrade because Cat. 4s are already full. The only problem with accomplishing this is that I really only have one weekend of racing to do so. The two races will be Lake Sunapee Bike Race and the North Stonington Cycling Classic. I guess I have an outside chance of getting my upgrade if I do really well in both of those races. Who knows, maybe the upgrade person will feel sympathy for me and just let me race anyways. It would be a shame not to race because I should be in really good form at that point in the season.

Tough Luck

2006-04-27T17:50:00.000-07:00

So there are these two black guys that work in the cafeteria in Newsom, and I must say that they are both pretty cool. Well one of them Marcus let me in on this secret of his called the Sushi Roll, and pretty much every time I eat there and he's working, I have him hook me up. Just to show the level of commitment this kid has I posted a picture of the finished product. It's great because he even put the dressing on top of like the pros do. Evan liked it so much that he took a picture and sent it to me which meant that I was obligated to put it up on here.
So here's the stupid peice of metal that I got in my tire that made me cut my ride short. I was just riding along when I heard this noise. I thought I picked up something that was in my spokes, but when I stopped to check it out I heard the pssssss that is idicative of a flat. My first one on the road this year. So I pulled into a gas station and fixed it, and was quite surprised when I found this in there.

Looks like this weekend I'll be doing three races. Saturday will be a 62 km road race, followed by a 20 km team time trial. Then Sunday will be the 45 minute criterium. I'm looking forward to it because I haven't raced in so long. I'm sure my form won't be as good as most people's but that's no big deal this time of year. Just wait until those two East coast NORBAs and we'll see who's in good form and who isn't.

I changed my flight today so I get back May 11th at 2:00 pm. I'm pretty excited because I'll be able to race the Belltwon Classic, which kicked my butt last year. I think the real problem was that I was on my old 9.8, and that's the best full suspension course of the year. I aslo missed a turn so this year I'm definitely gonna learn where I'm supposed to go so nothing crazy happens during the race. It looks like Ethan and the other fast junior were only a little slower than the Pros/Semi Pros at Farmington, and I'm sure that this year I'll be a lot faster than I was last year so I shouldn't do too bad racing Semi Pro.

Java = Done

2006-04-24T21:15:00.000-07:00

So I finished my Java yesterday. I was trying to post it here, but that wouldn't work, so I set up geocities account so that you can all view it there. Here's the URL: http://www.geocities.com/bigdoubler125805y/bigdoubler125805y.html. It is ridiculous, all of the login names that I wanted were taken, including: timmyh, timmyh87, psychobiker04. psychobiker04 is the most surprising because that's a pretty unique name. Anyways, check out the final project!

Wal-Mart Games

2006-04-23T16:21:00.000-07:00

The name of this game is Roll Back. Basically we change the prices on misc items. Today was the first day that we actually got evidence of this. The chips were really funny because they were pretty much in the main aisle. It's so funny. Some time we are gonna wait around until somebody is like, "Wow. Can you beleive the deal on those chips?"

My favorite part about the last one is that we even changed the little sign. I can't remember what it said before but it definitely said "Husky Sizes $4 More" when we were done.

This other game is called the Movie Drop. I haven't done this one yet, because it's way too risky. But what you do is you take a completely random movie (it's funnier if it is a terrible movie to begin with), and you place it in somebody's carriage without them knowing it. That one is really funny.

I also created a game the other night that we haven't tried yet, it's called the Item Count. It only works when you are in the express aisle. All you have to do is look over the person's shoulder in front of you and count (out loud, so they can hear you) the number of items in their basket or carriage. I have a feeling that one will be really funny too!

2006-04-23T14:27:00.001-07:00

Well, while I was working on my Java I also found time to check the live coverage of the Tour de Georgia every 15-20 minutes. It was pretty cool doing it like that. Looks like JJ Haedo got a stage win, Landis won another stage race, Tommy D took second this year, and my main man Todd Wells had an unbeleivable week of racing. I'm guessing nothing changed today which means he'll finish 19th on GC. Not bad for a mountain biker competing in the most hardcore domestic stage race.

I finally finished my java project. As much as I hate that class I must say that the project I made is pretty cool. We have to post it on the internet (that's part of our grade) so I'm gonna see if I can get it up on here so you can all take a gander at it. I felt like crap yesterday so I took today off in an attempt to fully recover before starting some intense training this week. We have regionals this weekend and UW, so hopefully (homework permitting) I will finally be able to race again. I have another play tomorrow, and then I'm done. Can't wait!

2006-04-23T14:27:00.000-07:00

2006-04-21T20:30:00.000-07:00

Well the weekend has arrived and once again I will not be racing. I really wanted to race in Grand Junction this weekend, but because of my stupid Java project that is due on Tuesday I won't be able to attend. Java really does suck, you know that? I guess I lucked out though because we dont' have a final in that class, we just have to complete a take home test. I also don't have a final in my honors seminar, I just have a long paper that I need to write. Looks like my only finals will be Chemistry and Calculus. I'm not too worried about the Calc final, it shouldn't be too difficult. The Chemistry one on the other hand is probably going to suck because after all, Chemistry sucks.

Right now I'm watching the movie Swordfish. It seems like they play that movie every weekend about 10 times, because every time I flip through the channels, it's on. I watched the last 1/2 hour or so a few weeks ago, so when I saw that it was on today I figured I would watch it. I'm really tired after my ride today, and I really need to stretch because my left calf cramps on occasion. Last night I woke up and moved it wrong, and it cramped up on me and it sucked a lot. Hopefully I can get rid of that. I would have gone and done some yoga with Evan, but I was busy riding. I bet that would have helped out, because last time I did yoga I felt really good the next day on the bike.

2006-04-19T20:13:00.000-07:00

Looks like this week and weekend are going to suck quite a bit. I was planning on going to the race in Grand Junction this weekend, but turns out my final project for Java is due on Tuesday, so that probably wouldn't be a good idea. I have a calculus exam tomorrow, so I still need to do a little reviewing for that. The great thing about calculus (or just math in general) is that if you know it you don't really have to study, you just have to do a little reviewing. However, I guess I'm pretty fortunate that math comes easy to me because some people suffer with it like I do with Chemistry. I have a test in that class on Tuesday...but I'm not too worried about it. I want to get a B on this one, maybe even an A if I do enough studying and reviewing.

Yesterday I rode the trainer because it was so cold and windy outside. I was gonna do VO2 intervals followed by some lactate threshold riding, but by the time the second VO2 interval came around I was already toast. I rode the trainer again today because it was windy out, for about 1.5 hours pretty easy. It was funny because I played Super Smash Brother Melee with three other people the entire time. I couldn't decide if I was lazy for playing video games, or motivated because I was riding while playing video games. I guess it could go either way.

The play yesterday went really well. Anne Marie (that's my teacher and that's what she has us call her) thought that it went pretty good. She even took us out for ice cream afterwards. We have another performance on Monday, and afterwards we are having a cast party at her house which translates into me eating regular food. YUMMM!!!!! I can't even wait for that, even if I have to go hang out at my teacher's house. At the beginning of the play, the principle of the school was reading some thing, and apparently he wanted me to come out on stage early, but I didn't realize it. I guess he like prompted me about five times before somebody pushed me out on stage. It was pretty funny, especially because I had no idea what was going on. I had a whole bunch of those elementary schoolers that were diggin my sweet mohawk.

I gave myself a haircut yesterday and let Eric touch it up once I was done. It's at 1/2 inch now, but that was as long as I could go because that was the length on the sides of my mohawk and it didn't grow enough in the week I had it to cut it at a longer length. Thanks to Hannah for sending me the new TI cd. It's really good. So far my favorites are Headbank, Ride Wit Me, What You Know, King Back, and I'm Talkin to You. Those are pretty much the first few songs on the cd, but I still haven't listened to the last tracks that many times. So far it is about as good as Urban Legend, maybe even a little better.

2006-04-17T22:20:00.000-07:00

The record hits are continueing, so keep on reading everyone. I haven't been doing anything too exciting lately. Mainly just homework and riding. We're preparing for a play that my honors seminar class is putting on tomorrow and next Monday. I actually have the lead role and am playing Terra the Terrasaur. It's pretty funny. Basically it's me being a complete idiot and hurting the environment, and then these dolphins (or big horned sheep) tell me that I'm being stupid and what I should do to fix it. It's made for elementary schoolers so it's pretty easy to follow it. I don't think I'll be able to race this weekend because I have my final Java project due on Tuesday of next week. Wish me luck with that one. I'll give a good update about how the play goes.

2006-04-14T21:32:00.000-07:00

I'm having record hits on my blog lately and I think it's due to the crazy haircut. If I had known earlier that all I needed to do was cut my hair then I would have done it a long long time ago. I went to Wal-Mart the other night and picked up a hat so that I could rock the mohawk without looking like a complete idiot when it wasn't spiked. I went with white Red Sox hat, I'm pretty sure Phoebe would be proud of me for making the right choice.

The past few days I didn't feel really good while riding. Last night, we did some yoga, and today I felt great. I did my first VO2 intervals of the year. I had 4 by 3 minutes at 182-187 bpm. I could only get my heart rate up to 182. By the time the last one came around, I was beat, but still had another hour and a half to ride. It was good, I feel a whole lot better on the bike this year than I did last year. Looks like this weekend I get to put in back to back 4 hour days. I'll probably do a good road ride tomorrow, and then a hard mountain bike ride on Sunday. I need to get my mountain bike skills up before the first race, which should be on May 14...the good old Cow Bell Classic (Belltown Classic). Last year I missed a turn and had argueably my worst race of the year, it was terrible. Hopefully this year will be a little different.

Happy Birthday Aggie!

2006-04-13T16:14:00.000-07:00

Well, I have been in the process of creating a good mohawk for a while, and I didn't want to post until it was complete and in good shape. Yesterday was my first full day of wearing it. I did it myself, and it held up pretty well. I used Elmer's Glue and a blow drier from some random girl (I still haven't given it back). The first time it was OK, but most of the hair was positioned way at the top of my head. After seeing that it wasn't done properly, Taylor volunteered to do my hair this morning. He spent 40 minutes creating this masterpiece that you are seeing right now. The thing about mohawks is that people either love them or hate them, there really isn't an in between. I like, so I'm going to try to keep it for a couple of weeks. The only bad part about it is that it will take forever to set up in the morning. Also, when I don't have it up, it looks terrible. It looks like I have a dead squirrel lieing on my head. I guess it's pretty funny actually.

I like this shot. It really shows how evenly spread out the hair is. I think it's about six inches high almost at the highest point.

Anyways, Happy Birthday Aggie. I hope you have a great day. I hope you enjoy this surprise and get a good laugh out of it.

The Weekend

2006-04-08T12:07:00.000-07:00

Well this weekend started off pretty well. We had our second night of capture the flag on Friday. Pretty much everyone on our team had walkie talkies. It was a lot of fun just communicating on them. We split up into three attack group: delta, bravo, and red team. Me, Cole, and Marcos were on red team. Cole oversuses the walkie talkies so much it's just ridiculous. So we played two games last night, the first of which we won. The second game, however, we couldn't find their flag. We had all three of our attack teams on offense looking for the flag for two straight hours and we still couldn't find it. After the game they wouldn't reveal the location of the flag, so we are really suspicious now that it was 1) not hidden or 2) hidden illegally.

I have a new song now, it's "Soul Survivor" by Young Jeezy. It's a pretty good one. I've listened to it about 40 times in the past three days. My rest week is almost over. Me and Eric are going mountain biking today, so that should be a lot of fun. I like being able to ride with people that I normally couldn't ride with because I'd be going too hard. I went with Josiah on Thursday, and that was a lot of fun. Well, I have to go check my mail before the Masters comes on. Hopefully my man Phil can get a little higher up on the leader board today and win a second green jacket tomorrow.

What a Great Day!

2006-04-06T22:02:00.000-07:00

I got this picture in an e-mail today, and I still don't know who it's from. Either way it's a good one. I'm pretty sure Sager would be proud.

Today was probably one of my best days of the year. I woke up late, knowing that I didn't have close until 12 so there was nothing that I really had to do. I usually have a 3 hour lab, but today Kaitlyn and I got it done in under an hour, so I was back to my room by 3. When I got back, Josiah decided that he would come for a mountain bike ride with me. It was a lot of fun, I rode down the stairs in Newsom and out the door. He kept up pretty well, we were going pretty slow, but he still hung in there. We got back from the ride, and then me, Josiah, and Robbie went to the driving range and hit a large bucket of balls. The bucket was huge and took me forever. I was hitting some great 3 irons though. It's great that I can finally play them off the fairway now. After that we got back and Josiah and I skated for a while. I came up with this new trick called the Halliday Trio (that's the name Josiah gave it, it's really nothing spectacular). After that we went some acting thing for class which lasted a few minutes and then I watched the OC. I think I got Coop hooked on that show now. He seemed to be around my room a lot when it was on.

I heard Todd got 6th today. I wonder if he found some time to watch the OC tonight after a hard day of racing. Maybe cyclingnews or usacycling will get some preliminary results up or something pretty soon because I can't really live without knowing how people did.

Rest Week

2006-04-04T19:45:00.000-07:00

The best thing about rest weeks is that I can do pretty much whatever I want and not have to worry about it. Today I went and played tennis with Evan for an hour and a half. It was a lot of fun. I wanted to play a real game but Evan didn't want to. The hardest part about tennis is deciding when to charge the net. It seemed like every time I did I ended up having the ball lobbed over my head and I couldn't get to it. I figured that If I dressed like a tennis player, I would play way better. I ended up wearing blue mesh shorts, a white polo with blue stripes, a headband and an armband, and my running shoes. I looked so funny with the headband on because my hair is so ridiculously long right now. I think I'm gonna try to play again on Thursday.

In other news, we are having another capture the flag game on friday night. I decided that I am not going to race this weekend in Golden so that I can play capture the flag. I also decided that this time around I am going to play D most of the time. Playing D is better because you can't get put in jail, you can stop chasing people whenever you want, and there isn't any pressure on you to try and get the flag. Offense is fun, don't get me wrong, but I think defense will be a little better.

2006-04-04T09:26:00.000-07:00

So we went to Wal-Mart the other night, nothing new there. I saw this headband which I just had to have. However, Josiah decided that he wanted it, too. I told him that if I let him get it, then he would have to get the matching double wristband to go with it, and wear it to chemistry the next day. He agreed. Unfortunately, Josiah decided not to attend chemistry, so I told him that he also had to wear that get-up to our honors seminar. It was hilarious, when the teacher walked in she laughed at him. It was probably one of the funniest moments all year. In case you can't tell from the picture, that's a mini hot dogs Lunchables that he's eating. It's probably the most disgusting Lunchables available and I somehow talked him into buying it.

I registered for my classes yesterday and I got everything I wanted thanks to priority registration. It's pretty impressive that I get to register at the same time as D1 athletes. It works out well though because all the athletes take the super easy classes, while I mostly take the harder ones. Next semester I'm signed up for physics I, calc II, matrices and linear equations, schooling in the united states, and golf. I am looking forward to golf so much! With the addition of my sports medicine major I actually have a legitimate reason for taking that class, and that's because an ex100 is required. I'll definitely be bringing my clubs out here with me next semester. I have that class from 12-2 mwf, so on mondays I'm going to stay after class and play another round. If I get a season pass there (I have no idea how much they cost), then I'm sure I will play a lot. Robbie signed up for the 8 am session, so hopefully he'll get a pass too and we'll be able to play in the afternoon sometimes.

I get a rest week before jumping into the build stages next week. I need to get a strap for my heart rate monitor before I am ready to train though. Maybe Lee's will have one in stock or something, or I guess I'll just have to order one. I think I have decided that I am going to run v-brakes on my new hardtail. After all, I already have a sweet set of Crossmax SLs that are rim brakes wheels, so I mine as well use them. And in case you didn't notice, guys like Julien Absalon ran a hardtail with v-brakes at a lot of the world cups last year, and at the opener this year. The only disadvantage to this is that I won't be able to get a set of 700c disc wheels. This wasn't even that necessary so it's not too bad. Either way, it is going to feel great to have a hardtail and a full suspension. Both of the bikes are going to be really nice, so come race day, the only decision I will have is which bike I should race. There are definitely some Root 66 races where a hardtail would be faster (like the Farmington races), and there are definitely some where a full suspesion would be better (like almost all the other races).

2006-04-02T13:02:00.000-07:00

I put my Jamis for sale on ebay yesterday, so if you want to bid on it here's the url: http://cgi.ebay.com/2004-Jamis-Dakar-XC-Pro-21-FS-Mountain-Bike-Frame_W0QQitemZ7231562713QQcategoryZ98083QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem. So far it's up to like $50, but I have my reserve so it should be all right. I think it should reach my reserve because that frame is like $1300 new, and it's still in pretty good shape.

I was gonna go for a 4 hour mountain bike ride today, but that ended up gettting shortened to 1 hour because the wind was so bad. I rode up the A Trail to the Horsetooth Reservoir and the wind was so bad that I was forced to get off my bike and wait for it to let up. Unfortunately, it didn't let up so I decided to just turn around. Descending the A Trail was pretty scary, the wind was practically blowing me into rocks and stuff...it was really intense. We're going to play basketball tonight so I won't have any problems worrying about not getting in a workout today.

Watching Off Road to Athens this morning before my ride, I found the quote that I want to live by. Mary said it in one of the interviews, "Who cares if we're not making any money? We're living a dream here." I think that's really cool, especially because she is argueably the best domestic female racer. She just took 5th in the world cup and Broderick took top American rider, a few spots ahead of Adam Craig. By the way, I can't decide whether or not I like Adam Craig, and I'm leaning more towards no. I just don't get the same vibe from him that I get from other riders...

2006-04-01T20:22:00.000-08:00

Me, Evan, and Daniel just got back from Wal-Mart. First of all, I feel like that place is my new home. I have been there 3 times in the past week. Every time I go in there I am forced to buy something, and most of the time it is food. Today, I bought Lunchables and ate it right away. It was so good. I got the pizza one, and it came with Starbursts and a Capri Sun. Believe it or not, it was pretty nutritious. It has a lot of good stuff in it. I also had to buy some Cow Tails, which helped remind me that my Mom's birthday is tomorrow. Happy birthday, Mom! I had to wait in the checkout line so long that I was also forced to buy some Soft Batch cookies, sooo good.

2006-04-01T15:27:00.000-08:00

I did my favorite ride today. Climb up Poudre Canyon and desend Stove Prarie. I like it a lot because Poudre Canyon is a lot of fun to climb (and it sucks to descend) and Stove Prarie is a lot of fun to descend (and it sucks to climb). Descending Stove Prarie is so much fun, you are going so fast for so long, it's such a great section of road. There's one section that's probably 5 minutes long where I break the speed limit the entire time. To be honest, it makes me feel cool when I'm speeding on my bike, haha.

I'm pretty tired from the past few days, so I just got up from a nap. I wish I could have slept longer than 45 minutes but oh well. Tomorrow is my final day of base, then I get a rest week and then begin to build. I can't wait to start doing some harder rides. I'll probably go skate again tonight with Evan because he just got a new set of rollerblades. I still have to get comfortable enough on the skateboard so I can skate to class without making a fool out of myself.

2006-03-31T19:05:00.000-08:00

I had some pretty fun rides the past few days. Yesterday was the windiest ride that I have ever done. Me and Eric rode up Poudre yesterday. On the way up, we reached speeds as low as 11 kph, and that was working hard. The wind was just ridiculous. He ended up turning around 2 miles before the top, so I made it my goal to climb to the top and get back Newsom before he could make it back. I was really close, apparently I got to the top of the stairs only a few moments after he did.

Today I climbed up Rist and then descended Poudre. Rist is always a good climb, it's a lot of fun, too. It took about an hour today, and I was in my second and third largest cogs most of the time. I saved the 26 tooth for the steeps at the top. Descending Rist I hit 76 kph, which was pretty fast. I also took some cattle grates at 70 kph which I definitely would not recommend doing, it was pretty sketchy.

I should be going out to do some skating tonight. I think Evan's gonna use some rollerblades while me and Josiah skate so it should be pretty fun. I'm working on my ollie. I can do it pretty decent in my room, but it's totally different when you're moving on cement or pavement.

Oh yeah, I am also going to be building an IronHorse hardtail, too. It's the frame with the carbon seat stays. I'm gonna use my Sid Race, some BB7s that Andy is going to sell me, some Ritchey products that I need to buy, and a complete drivetrain that I have sitting at my workstation in New Hampshire. I'll be able to just switch my disc wheels between bikes, so that should work out pretty well. I think I'm gonna try to build (more like have somebody build me) a 700c disc wheelset. I'd like to use them at some short tracks and maybe even some cross country races this season. Also, that would allow me to not even have to bring my road bike out here next fall, so it would save me a ton of room.

Skateboarding

2006-03-29T21:50:00.000-08:00

So me and Josiah went to this skateshop tonight so I could finally get a skateboard. The guy working there was super cool, except for that every other word was dude. He was really helpful and hooked me up with a nice set up. I ended up with their cheapest deck, an upgraded set of trucks, some abec 5 bearings (apparently they are pretty good), and some sweet camo wheels that you'll be able to see in the pictures (or will you?). So far I can ollie on the grass and ride all right. We went skating all over tonight...to the chem building, to the student center, out to the oval, and back to newsom. It was a lot of fun. I even tried some boardslides tonight, which is why I am already looking cooler because my deck is scratched. I ended up dropping $96 on this beast.

2006-03-27T20:10:00.000-08:00

Like I said earlier, I got my semi pro upgrade this morning so it made my entire day extremely enjoyable. It's good to know that I won't have to ever do another expert race. I can't wait to be racing with the real fast guys, it should help me improve a lot. It will be good for our team too because now I'll be able to race with Justin Finn, and Nick Leigh and Eric Carlson will be able to race together in the expert 19-29.

In other news, I had my first race of the season yesterday: the oval crit. It was a lot of fun, the course was great and everything was very well organized. I raced Bs and was off the front working and attacking and trying to get something going for the first 30 minutes of the race before my legs decided to start hurting. I ended up getting dropped and soloing the last 15-2o minutes before finishing right ahead of the field, but still on the lead lap. It was a really fun race. I think I'll sit in a little more next time, because right now I don't have the capacity to be throwing down like I was trying to yesterday.

I got some of my stuff from our mountain bike team today like my new helmet and computer. The helmet is a Bell Sweep and it's probably one of the sweetest helmets I have ever seen. It's so comfy and it fits my head like a glove (a glove that was made for a head of course). The computer is also really tight because I was able to mount it on my stem. Not only does it looks cooler, but it allows me to throw my aero bars on way easier.

I should go to a skateshop to get a skateboard this week. I want to get a Zero because they have, by far, the best promo videos. I would know this because I played Tony Hawk's Underground so much that the PS2 won't even read my disc anymore. I should also be getting my new skate shoes this week too. The new shoes, along with a new skateboard should allow me to start throwing down on that. I can skate fairly good now, but I still need to learn how to ollie and do some basic flip tricks.

Who's the Man?

2006-03-27T11:44:00.000-08:00

I got my semi pro upgade!!!!!

Good Stuff

2006-03-23T21:00:00.000-08:00

I just got done watching the latest episode of the OC. It was truly a great one, it reminds me why I continue to watch that show. It wasn't on for a month, so I got used to not watching it. Then when it came back on I wasn't ready because I had forgot, and then last week I couldn't watch because I was in Arizona. So this was my first time watching in about 2 months and it was a great way to get back into the swing of things.

Tuesday I couldn't ride outside, well I could have, but it would have been crazy, so I rode the trainer for 2:20:00. It was pretty long and I had my most intense workout of the year. I simulated 7 2 minute big gear climbs with my heart rate at about 180-182 beats per minute, followed by 4 7 minute cruise intervals where I maintained my heart rate in the high 160s to low 170s. It was pretty intense for this early, but it was on the schedule for this week and I have a race coming up so I knew I had to do it.

Yesterday I rode the trainer for an hour easy. Today I rode up Poudre Canyon with a 60 minute zone 3 tempo. It was great, I love riding up the Poudre. The only downfall is coming back down it. The wind is always blowing right into your face and it sucks so much. I almost always get disillusional while descending. My eyes always go all blurry and I can't even open them all the way. On the way back into town though I had to stop at CVS to get some chapstick. My lips got so chapped in the past few days and they hurt real bad. I'm not even joking, my lips were starting to kill me on my ride, it really wasn't cool. And of course, I couldn't go into a store without buying a king size Nutrageous and eating it right away.

Like I said before, my first race is this weekend: The Oval Crit. I'm gonna do a little training on the course on Saturday morning and scope out how everything might play out. This is my first collegiate road race and I really don't know what to expect so I'm going to race Bs. I hope I'm strong enough to throw down attacks and use all the tactical stuff that I've been learning from watching so much road racing lately. I really want to do well and not just sit in the whole time, but we'll see how everything goes on race day.

Arizona Trip

2006-03-19T17:58:00.000-08:00

I knew that riding here for a eight days straight would be a lot of fun. I just didn't know how much I was going to be in for.

I guess it was enough fun to give me some pretty sweet tan lines. I also have the ankle one going on, that's not quite as good, as well as the upper arm tan line. Not to mention the fact that I didn't use any sunscreen so my arms are starting to peel pretty good now.
My bike definitely likes the trails here a lot more than the ones in New England and Fort Collins. If only I could get my brake rotors trued then it would have loved those trails even more cause I would have been going a little faster. Actually, I must have blown through about three corners that I was just carrying too much speed into and went flying out into the desert...
I was definitely testing my speed on some days, mainly those days when I blew through the corners and ran into bushes and stuff. If there's one thing I learned, it's that nothing in Arizona is soft. Even the bushes that look soft are hard...my arms and legs are pretty scratched up.
Lucky enough, I didn't fly into anything that looked like this.
Look at this cute little guy I ran into. I never thought that there were turtles in the middle of the desert, but I guess there are such things. I don't know how they stay hydrated, because there was no water around at all.
For St. Patty's Day they dyed the fountain green. It's pretty cool looking when you're there in person. It's really weird because there's all these natural colors and then this bright green that seems so out of place.
You can't see that well from this picture, but those peaks are actually covered in snow. It was pretty cool, who ever would have thought that it would snow in Phoenix.

Almost Time

2006-03-09T09:45:00.000-08:00

I got Off Road to Athens in the mail yesterday and watched it immediately. It was a great movie, and I loved seeing all the coverage from the World Cups. I cannot believe Felipe Meirhage (whatever his last name is) and the stuff he said. The part about people cutting the course and how they are cheaters, while he's hitting the EPO at that same moment. I was so mad at that guy by the end of the movie. I loved watching the parts with T-O-Double D though, they were great. I had read about the race in Calgary, but I didn't know it was that bad.

Last night I was trying to get people to let me jump them on my scooter. I finally proved to them that I could when I jumped over a skateboard deck with 3 obstacles after it spaced apart. So, Eric decided that I could clear him. The moment of truth came and I crashed so hard going down the hall trying to get my speed up. It was pretty embarassing and it hurt quite a bit, my thigh is still a little bit sore. Anyways, I turned that around and jumped him twice perfectly.

I only have my chemsitry lab and then my calculus test and I am done with school! I just booked my reservation for a ride to the airport, so I'm all set to go. I've got my bike vouchers, Evan's bike box, and I'm ready to roll. All I have to do is do some laundry and pack my bags and wait around all day Friday and then I'm out of here!

Rest Week

2006-03-07T21:21:00.000-08:00

After a demanding three week block, I now get my second rest week of the year. That means I will be well rested going into spring break and I'll be ready to put in some serious time at McDowell. I decided that I'd bring my mountain bike so I can ride the sweet trails in McDowell all day long. They say that there are about 55 miles of trails, and I've only ridden about 20ish of them, so I'll be pretty busy while I'm there. I got a call today on my ride from Aunt Becky and it looks like Maddie will be my chofeur from the airport to the pad in Fountain Hills. I can't wait to be riding in shorts and a jersey for 9 days straight, it's going to be wonderful.

I've been riding the scooter the past few nights, and I think I'm at my peak right now. The other day I stalled the stairs, and tailwhipped off. I can land tailwhips like you wouldn't even believe. I was also throwing down some 180s and 360s. I have this sweet stall where I go up to the curb and pop my back wheel up onto the curb. I can't tailwhip out of that yet, it's way too hard, maybe I'll perfect it tonight is Josiah gets back from Navs anytime soon.

I've only got one test this week and it's in Calculus. I'm pretty decent at that subject and I just did the review homework that I was assigned so it shouldn't be too bad...

Horses Suck...

2006-03-05T21:40:00.000-08:00

Yes. Horses really do suck. My favorite trail out here is in Laurie State Park, and it's just this nice cruiser of a trail that runs side by side to the main dirt road. Well, remember a little while back when it was snowing out here? Well, the trails turned to mud, and the mountain bikers weren't allowed to use them. Horses, however, were allowed to. So, the horses walked all over our trails and now there are giant hoof marks everywhere, that are now hard as cement. When I first got on the trail I thought I had flatted because it was so bumpy, so I stopped to check my tires. The pressure was fine in both of them. Not to mention the fact that the trails are also covered in horse crap. It really is ridiculous. Mountain bikers have to fight for their rights to use the trails but horse people just get to do whatever the heck they want. I really don't think that's fair!

Other than that, my mountain bike ride was pretty good today. I rode up the Maxwell Trail, and then the trails along Horsetooth, and then the small road section to get to Laurie State Park, then the crappy (pun intended) trails there, then a monster climb up to Horsetooth State Park and some trails in that vicinity, before taking the road back to town and finishing the ride with a lap around the Dixon Reservoir. It was good to get out on the mountain bike, I forgot how nice my new rig is.

In other news, Josiah's been working on solving the Rubik's Cube. He got his time down to one minute and 15 seconds today. It's absolutely ridiculous to watch the kid at work. I can't even get one side of the stupid thing, and he can do the entire thing so quick. He keeps telling me that he's gonna go for a four hour bike ride so that he can say he can do anything that I can do.

Earlier tonight, we started with a dunk contest in the stairwell, before we switched to a scooter contest. (For a side note, I took a volleyball to the side of the head from some chick that was trying to serve the ball, right as somebody opened the door and I came flying out from the hall.) Anyways, that got too boring so Matt brought out his skateboard. So, to make things simple, Josiah and I are going to take up skateboarding. I think I was the only kid that didn't have one when he was little. I don't even know how to ollie so I have a lot of catching up to do. Micah is going to bring his skateboard here after Spring break, so that we'll have a few of them to play with. Only 5 more days till I leave to the bright skies and warm weather of Arizona...

1,000 Views

2006-03-04T20:52:00.000-08:00

So this site hit 1,000 views. Thanks to all of you who actually take the time to read this site. I really appreciate it. I now know that all my typing isn't ignored.

Last night we had a huge game of capture the flag on campus. We played North side versus South side, and about 60 kids showed up to play. I cancelled my ride earlier that day so I would be in prime shape for the running that I was about to be doing. The course that we played on was huge. It basically went the length of campus North to South, and from the library to the railroad tracks in the West-East Direction. It was a really fun game, and the South side (my team) ended up winning in about 2 hours. I played really aggressive on offense, but next time I want to play a little D and see how that goes.

Today I went on a ride where somehow I had a headwind for 90% of my ride. It was absolutely ridiculous. I had a headwind up Poudre Canyon, up Rist Canyon, down Stove Prarie, and then I finally got out of that headwind periodically when I hit Masonville. Descending down Stove Prarie was pretty scary with all that wind. Cruising down those hills at 40+ mph with wind that seemed even faster than that made for a sketchy ride. I'm gonna go out on the mountain bike tomorrow, so that should be a lot of fun. That will be my last ride before I get a rest week before I head off to Arizona for some good riding.