Alo vs. Curb. Point Curb.

Let me be honest, this was not initially what I had hoped to have wrote about today. Instead it was going to be a nice little play by play of my ride around GR on my day off [which will still be part of this but not until later]. But only 4 or so blocks away from my house, I take a little bit of a short cut which involves crossing traffic, jumping a curb, taking a side walk to a dead end street which then leads me home. If the title of todays entry didn't already give it away, it wasn't the traffic that was the problem, it was: being in such a hurry that I lifted up my front wheel early on the fixie, going too fast which then lead to me putting down the front wheel too soon. This of course then caused me to hit the curb at probably around 13 mph, throwing me over the handlebars onto my left side, giving me a small but deep gash on the elbow, a scuffed up lower leg and a bruise that I'm just now noticing on my hip.

All of which I would be totally ok if it wasn't that quite possibly have totally jacked up the front wheel. It's hard to see from the picture [taken moments afterwards, I'll pat myself on the back for that one, Thank You Very Much!] but there is pretty extreme wobble and I haven't mustered up the courage yet to see how much up and down there is, but I'm willing to bet pretty good.

Deep breath.

Now for the rest of my ride... I headed out today and headed over to a near by shop to say hello to a friend and see about lending hand in a little 'impromptu' urban mtb 'gathering' going on this Sunday. Sounds pretty sweet, there will definitely be pictures.

Then headed to help figure out a commuting route for a friend who wants to maybe ride in a day or two to work. In doing so I stumble onto a very new trail that seems to be a ticket...
This was taken after I went around it... If given the 'safer' and 'dryer' choice, which would you choose? Yes, you're correct the right side. Unfortunately, although some thing might look dry it might not actually be...
Yep, the right foot took a dive. Can't tell much from the picture but it's pretty muddy and half of my foot was then wet. A shame. I continued to cruise along and ended up deciding on going over to the cheap theater in town and hit a movie. Went to the Other Boleyn Girl. Sounded mildly interesting, has my favorite actress Natalie Portman in it so that definitely didn't hurt and for $3.50 worth the risk. I ended up cruising around the mall for a bit before hand and must say if you want to get fun looks from people, show up on your bike to a mall, then proceed to walk around your shoes and whatever cycling appropriate garb. I was definitely in the 'urban/hippister' garb today. Lots of double takes. Good times.

After the movie I came out and just sat in the sun for a bit next to the bike... Took a shot of the fixie [pre-curb terror]...
And as I sat there and just soaked it in, I noticed some thing. I had a waterbottle cage but no bottle. I had left the house with one, left it on the bike when I went into the movie/mall. SOMEONE STOLE MY WATERBOTTLE???? WTF? I'm sorry, I'm not really upset about losing it but out of all the things that I left on the bike a person, of high intelligence no doubt, decides to take the USED water bottle? Ok? Let's go through the items which could have been taken without any tools: the head of my Cateye computer and my newly purchased yancopad. Things easily taken with a wretch or alley key: Inform staddle, front wheel, bottle cage.

So if anyone is in the Grand Rapids area and sees someone with a Europa Cycle and Ski water bottle that isn't me, please go up to certain individual and pat them on the back for such a stellar choice.

My last few days.

Now, unfortunately there hasn't been much for me to write about lately from my commutes. On Wednesday I had started to get a little bit of a sniffle, which then progressed just to an annoyance on Thursday, to a Barry White phase Friday in which I ended up going home early from work, to Saturday calling in sick and getting that ever so sweet feeling like ones brain is actually becoming mush as I lay stuck on my bed for the day. It's been a beautiful last few days and I'm not fully recovered. Hopefully, I'll feel good enough to ride in tomorrow.

But never the less, if you're like me words are mildly boring. Leading me to respond best to colors and/or pictures. So that's what I have for you this evening. a picture or two from one of Geoff and myself ride home last week...

Then a picture of the Orbit... This is my next fixie build, I got this frame from Carl. I wish I would have taken a picture of what it looked like before it was sand-blasted and powder coated, lets just say Wham! and Boy George would have loved it. From what I'm told, this bike although old, might not have yet to see the road as a complete bike. Going from the old Advantage shop to owner to owner until finding it's way to me. We'll see when it will for me but let's just say, it's smooth...
That's right folks, I'm going with the Inform again for this build. It has won me over...

And now for a teaser... the Ferrous. She's not done yet but she's still a sexy machine... The wheels are on loan from Geoff until I can build up mine. Outside of saving up for the King hubs, I'm waiting for one more item...
Yep. That's my phone and my background is from my first ride on it...

"Make your eyes bleed" hard

"They're going pretty fast", "They are just showing off because they are riding past Nate's", "This is still pretty fast", "Oh crap we're sprinting now". That was my first 2 minutes of the Tuesdays Founders Ales Racing Team road ride, a ride that was billed as being so hard it will make your eyes bleed. Needless to say this was a fast ride. I had been out for a long ride Sunday and had come back pretty cooked, but my legs felt completely recovered by time Joe K. started talking crap about the Founders ride. I figured why not see if I could throw down with a couple elite mountain bikers. I loved it, I haven't ridden that hard outside of a race ever, Dan Jansen made sure that every stop ahead sign was a sprint and even with a small group 2nd or 3rd place was a tough snag. Once I settled in and realized that this was going to be the pace it was time to match pulls, keep the pace high, and keep my eyes peeled for stop ahead signs so I wasn't leading out a sprint. The eye popping moment for me came about 30 miles in when a gap started opening to the rider leading up a decent "Michigan climb", sitting 3rd wheel I felt it was my duty to come around and close the gap. I realized to late that I had given it too much gas and had committed myself to the attack and decided to just go with it until the top. I managed to gap everyone except Dan, who wanted to keep them chasing, so we traded pulls until the next stop ahead sign where he blew me out of the water in a not so hotly contested sprint. The ride ended at Founders for some of their excellent recovery beverages. Hopefully I can attend this ride on a regular basis as its a great group of guys and super fast. With the countdown almost to an end and the number of fast rides under my belt rising I don't know whether to be exhausted or exuberant at the progress I have made.....and A.Lo I don't train I just sometimes take long rides without any destination, no heart rate monitors, intervals, or power meters here.

GBK

SRAMano

Look closely... very closely. It may look kosher but the reality is that some thing just a little off... Cyclingnews.com posted these photos a few days ago, for a closer look go there. Not that this is anything unusual for pro teams to be sponsored by one company and then actually ride a competitor just 'altered', but come on... I really want to like the new SRAM stuff, but lately there has been to many reasons not too, but that's another story for another day.

UPDATED 11:24PM EST 04.09.2008: GEOFF IN HIS INFINITE WISDOM AND SPARE TIME... ORIGINALLY POINTED THIS PICTURE OUT TO ME. So on the rare occasion I do give credit where it is due.

Week 4 Update

Sorry for the lack of post the past week. No excuses but let's just say I needed a break of sorts but I'm back and hopefully this will mark my return to the top of the podium. We'll see, Geoff is well... riding a lot, maybe I shouldn't have allowed training miles.

Geoff is still leading with 945.74 miles on the bike and 248.1 miles in the car.

I have 207.13 miles on the bike and 136.23 miles in the car.

Brian has 309.24 miles on bike and 308.57 miles in the car.

Yesterday, I ordered up the ultra sweet 'Til Death poster and so far none of us have driven for trips under 2 miles!

Anticipation

It looks like spring is finally arriving. Yesterday was warm enough for leg warmers and a wind vest, I still wore heavy tights and a light jacket which resulted in a 3.5 hour sweat session that left me feeling like I had ridden on a sweltering summer day. Despite being overdressed it felt good to get out to the short steep hills of the Ada/Lowell area to test the legs a bit. With the miles piling up and the first race looming I am growing impatient. I am impatient to get my wheels into the dirt and impatient to pin on a number, but most of all I am impatient to feel the exhilaration that comes from competition whether I podium or end up as pack fodder I love the oxygen deprived feeling of a hard race, although a good finish does help. This year is definitely different as I have more motivation to show up ready to go later this month and I crossing my fingers and toes that I will find my legs by time I line up for Yankee. In addition to the MMBA CPS series and a fair amount of road races I hope to get out to the Milk Jug Racing series. Raymond puts on a good low key race series that is casual and nice primer for bigger races. One of my favorites was when Raymond started us straight up the ski hill at Cannonsburg and I turned what I thought was to big of a gear into a big gap at the top. After the climb I sat up to recover and was joined by Tommy Hahn, a teammate and all around swell guy, we ended up finish one, two for a good day. I'll leave you with a pic from the top of the ski hill.(A.Lo claims to need pictures to understand my posts) 17 days until racing begins until then lots of miles and hopefully this years first century are on tap and hopefully we get more of the sunshine and I can break out my knee warmers and start on my super sweet bike tan.

GBK

April Challenge.

In the spirit of a little thing called 1 World 2 Wheels comes Aprils challenge for the three of us. We have all agreed to forsake our cars for ALL trips 2 miles long and under. This means no quick trips to the gas station, grocery store or ATM if they are such a short distance away. And just to give a little incentive, although I'd hope that we wouldn't need more, I will be purchasing another sweet product from Twin Six to serve as a carrot, that being the Til Death poster for the rider who does not drive their car for the entire month for these short trips.

It is really alarming when you look at what really happens in those short trips, here are two facts from the 1w2w website for 2 miles or less:

_60% of the pollution created by automobile emissions happens in the first few minutes of operation, before pollution control devices can work effectively.

_24% of all trips are made within a mile of the home, 40% of all trips are made within two miles of the home, and 50% of the working population commutes five miles or less to work.

Although I am speaking for myself on this but there is a quote from a great movie Shawshank Redemption from Brooks when he's writing after he gets out of jail that seems very appropriate and mildly profound... 'Dear Fellows, I can't believe how fast things move on the outside. I saw an automobile when I was a kid, but now... they're everywhere. The world went and got itself in a big damn hurry...' We've gone and gotten ourselves in a big damn hurry haven't we? But maybe the real question is, what are we in such a hurry to get around to doing?

So for this month, Geoff, Brian and myself are slowing down a bit. Although this might be a naive dream but maybe we might see a little bit more of life that we so often fast forward over.