I went riding on Staten Island yesterday. Yep, now that I’m living in Manhattan almost 100%, I figured I’d tie the bike to the back of the girlfriend’s car and join the Staten Island club for the round-the-island-dodge-the-potholes-and-bicycle-friendly-drivers ride.
Rather than provide a play-by-play, there are a few things about riding on Staten Island that I’ve missed the past ten months and there are a few things about riding on Staten Island that I will never miss.
THINGS I WILL NEVER MISS ABOUT STATEN ISLAND:
1. Goddam effing drivers, commonly referred to Joey Macaroni, Joey Goombah, Fat Joey, Fat Danny, etc.
2. Goddam effing road quality
3. Goddam effing beautiful scenery
4. Goddam effing bike lanes in the most useless areas
4. Goddam effing dump
5. Goddam effing drivers . . . wait, I mentioned that one already, but I guess they’re worth mentioning again
THINGS I MISS ABOUT STATEN ISLAND:
I don’t technically miss anything about Staten Island with the exception of the club rides. As per my notes above, I could do without the potholes and whatnot, but the characters and conversation are second-to-none and since I simply can’t seem to find such colorful exchanges in any of the other cycling groups, I occasionally return for a ride on Staten Island. Sure, I probably did more damage to my bike yesterday in three hours than I did all summer, but isn’t it worth it to listen to Dr. Rob go off once in a while? Isn’t it worth it to listen to Ed and Vito calmly telling each other to go f#ck one another?
I think it is.
Monday, December 31
Tuesday, December 25
The Sunshine State
So I’m down here in Florida on vacation. I’m in Wellington, Florida, to be exact and, rather than ship my bike down or invest in a piece of bike luggage, I rented a bike from a place in Palm Beach. To be exact, my girlfriend rented it for me. Rented it for three days, to be even more exact. When a girl doesn’t ride but she rents a bike for you to ride, is that true love? As Kenny Picco said, “Dude, she TOTALLY hooked you up.”
That she did.
Anyway, like I was saying, it’s now December 23rd and I’m in Florida. Been here since Thursday and I’ve been out riding two hours every morning in the lovely Florida weather. No tights. No long-finger gloves. No sweat-wicking caps. Not frosty breath. No constantly dripping nose. No booties. No feet warmers. Every morning I’ve hit the road with my Camelbak, my pump stuffed in the Pump Port, a few granola bars, a few gels, my cell phone, driver’s license, and a couple of bucks. I throw a leg over my rented Trek 2.1 wearing a short-sleeved jersey, a pair of shorts, gloves, a helmet, and that’s it.
And I’m doing all this in the end of December. Who’s better than me?
Apart from riding in eighty-degree weather a few days before Christmas (and as all us northeasterners know, that’s just wrong on so many different levels), the roads down here are not only pristine, but they’re flat as boards and straight as rails. For instance, I’ve been riding from Point A to Point B along Route 441:
As I said, flat as a board and straight as a rail, although 441 does come complete with a bike lane, at least until you hit Boca.
My starting point every morning has been here, this community where the Katzman family (my girlfriend’s family, obviously) lives . . .
. . . which is this far from the beach.
When we first rented the bike, I started from Palm Beach and followed the following route:
Nice ride along the water, but A1A is only a two-lane road, so I had a fair amount of traffic bearing down on me from behind.
But then I made a right there on 802 and started heading west when (a) a few drops of rain began falling from the sky, (b) the neighborhood demographics changed from over-the-top mansions along A1A to considerably smaller haciendas and plenty of Dos Amigos convenient stores, and (c) I began to encounter a sweltering headwind, but hey, if you don’t have hills, the least you can do is ride into a headwind, right?
And that was it. That was the trip. Sure, I probably could have been a bit more adventurous and made a few more left and rights, but when all the streets are straight and flat, what’s the point? I would basically leave the Katzman compound, head south on 441 for an hour or so and then turn around and return to the Katzman compound to find my girlfriend lounging by the pool. After a quick shower, I’d join, wait for happy hour, have a few drinks, have dinner, maybe do a bit of swimming, and then repeated the following day.
I’m assuming this is how debutantes live. They have their own activity on the side but most of the free time is spent drinking and lounging. Not sure how I feel about that. Put a gun to my head for saying this, but maybe there is something to be said for working.
Jesus, did I really just say that?
That she did.
Anyway, like I was saying, it’s now December 23rd and I’m in Florida. Been here since Thursday and I’ve been out riding two hours every morning in the lovely Florida weather. No tights. No long-finger gloves. No sweat-wicking caps. Not frosty breath. No constantly dripping nose. No booties. No feet warmers. Every morning I’ve hit the road with my Camelbak, my pump stuffed in the Pump Port, a few granola bars, a few gels, my cell phone, driver’s license, and a couple of bucks. I throw a leg over my rented Trek 2.1 wearing a short-sleeved jersey, a pair of shorts, gloves, a helmet, and that’s it.
And I’m doing all this in the end of December. Who’s better than me?
Apart from riding in eighty-degree weather a few days before Christmas (and as all us northeasterners know, that’s just wrong on so many different levels), the roads down here are not only pristine, but they’re flat as boards and straight as rails. For instance, I’ve been riding from Point A to Point B along Route 441:
As I said, flat as a board and straight as a rail, although 441 does come complete with a bike lane, at least until you hit Boca.
My starting point every morning has been here, this community where the Katzman family (my girlfriend’s family, obviously) lives . . .
. . . which is this far from the beach.
When we first rented the bike, I started from Palm Beach and followed the following route:
Nice ride along the water, but A1A is only a two-lane road, so I had a fair amount of traffic bearing down on me from behind.
But then I made a right there on 802 and started heading west when (a) a few drops of rain began falling from the sky, (b) the neighborhood demographics changed from over-the-top mansions along A1A to considerably smaller haciendas and plenty of Dos Amigos convenient stores, and (c) I began to encounter a sweltering headwind, but hey, if you don’t have hills, the least you can do is ride into a headwind, right?
And that was it. That was the trip. Sure, I probably could have been a bit more adventurous and made a few more left and rights, but when all the streets are straight and flat, what’s the point? I would basically leave the Katzman compound, head south on 441 for an hour or so and then turn around and return to the Katzman compound to find my girlfriend lounging by the pool. After a quick shower, I’d join, wait for happy hour, have a few drinks, have dinner, maybe do a bit of swimming, and then repeated the following day.
I’m assuming this is how debutantes live. They have their own activity on the side but most of the free time is spent drinking and lounging. Not sure how I feel about that. Put a gun to my head for saying this, but maybe there is something to be said for working.
Jesus, did I really just say that?
Sunday, December 16
Cordial? Manners? Couth?
Can we all agree that time trial helmets are one of the more ridiculous cycling products ever invented? Granted, I realize there are aerodynamic benefits to be had from wearing such an awkward-looking device one one’s head while one is in the midst of a time trial, but let’s be honest. While cyclist and cycling fans the world over may have glazed over their initial impressions of time trial helmets (which we can abbreviate as TTH for the remainder of this update) once the aerodynamic function of the elven-shaped helmet have been explained, they’re still ridiculous.
Are we all on the same page? I know they might look cool (“might” being the operative word there) while watching one of the pros blast along at 30 MPH hunched over their aerobars, but you really should admit to yourself that whenever you’ve seen a cyclist not hunched over their bike and wearing the TTH while standing around, it looks like a fashion gone horribly, horribly wrong.
With all that said, from this day forward, I’m taking an anti-TTH stance. Even in the unlikely event I turn into a time-trialing freak and spend 98% of my disposable income on time trial bikes and time trial equipment I will never, EVER, lay a TTH upon my head. I’m sure you’re as okay with that as I am, but I wanted to toss it out there anyway.
Shifting gears, I went for a ride this morning. As I’m all but living in the Upper West Side now, I rolled out of the apartment, hooked a left on 71st Street, a right on West End Avenue, a left on 72nd Street, and a right on Riverside Drive which took me all the way to 165th Street where I made another right and climbed the short yet relatively steep hill that leads to . . . you know, I really should pay better attention. I made a left at the next traffic light--whatever that street is--and then made my glorious yet freezing way to the GWB.
On my way over the bridge, I was sitting behind a pair of girl (cyclists) waiting for bridge path to widen so I could pass safely when some douchebag wearing a local team kit began yelling at me to hold my line (which I was holding just fine, thank you very much) so he could squeeze by on the left.
My initial instinct, of course, was to unclip my left shoe and kick the little douchebag in the head, but I’m something of a rational and well-adjust human being so I let it go. It’s nice to let things go (when you can, although some people really do need a kick in the head once in a while), so just like that, I let it go, but I thought to myself, Let’s check something out.
For the remainder of the ride, I waved at every cyclist passing on the opposite side of the street and said, “How’s it going?” to every person I passed on my side of the street.
Survey says? Sorry, but most road cyclists are douchebags. Correction: most roadies act like douchebags.
Of all the cyclists to whom I either waved or said hello, NONE of those wearing team kits acknowledged me whatsoever. Of those riders not wearing team kits, I would say only 10% to 20% acknowledged me with a wave or a nod of the head.
What the hell is it about a matching jersey and tights that causes roadies to act the way they do? It absolutely bewilders me. Regardless, my new policy, along with never, EVER wearing a TTH, will now include waving and saying hello to every cyclist I see on the road, acknowledgement or not. I’m not going to let incessant douchebag behavior turn me into a douchebag. Nuh-uh. Not me.
Are we all on the same page? I know they might look cool (“might” being the operative word there) while watching one of the pros blast along at 30 MPH hunched over their aerobars, but you really should admit to yourself that whenever you’ve seen a cyclist not hunched over their bike and wearing the TTH while standing around, it looks like a fashion gone horribly, horribly wrong.
With all that said, from this day forward, I’m taking an anti-TTH stance. Even in the unlikely event I turn into a time-trialing freak and spend 98% of my disposable income on time trial bikes and time trial equipment I will never, EVER, lay a TTH upon my head. I’m sure you’re as okay with that as I am, but I wanted to toss it out there anyway.
Shifting gears, I went for a ride this morning. As I’m all but living in the Upper West Side now, I rolled out of the apartment, hooked a left on 71st Street, a right on West End Avenue, a left on 72nd Street, and a right on Riverside Drive which took me all the way to 165th Street where I made another right and climbed the short yet relatively steep hill that leads to . . . you know, I really should pay better attention. I made a left at the next traffic light--whatever that street is--and then made my glorious yet freezing way to the GWB.
On my way over the bridge, I was sitting behind a pair of girl (cyclists) waiting for bridge path to widen so I could pass safely when some douchebag wearing a local team kit began yelling at me to hold my line (which I was holding just fine, thank you very much) so he could squeeze by on the left.
My initial instinct, of course, was to unclip my left shoe and kick the little douchebag in the head, but I’m something of a rational and well-adjust human being so I let it go. It’s nice to let things go (when you can, although some people really do need a kick in the head once in a while), so just like that, I let it go, but I thought to myself, Let’s check something out.
For the remainder of the ride, I waved at every cyclist passing on the opposite side of the street and said, “How’s it going?” to every person I passed on my side of the street.
Survey says? Sorry, but most road cyclists are douchebags. Correction: most roadies act like douchebags.
Of all the cyclists to whom I either waved or said hello, NONE of those wearing team kits acknowledged me whatsoever. Of those riders not wearing team kits, I would say only 10% to 20% acknowledged me with a wave or a nod of the head.
What the hell is it about a matching jersey and tights that causes roadies to act the way they do? It absolutely bewilders me. Regardless, my new policy, along with never, EVER wearing a TTH, will now include waving and saying hello to every cyclist I see on the road, acknowledgement or not. I’m not going to let incessant douchebag behavior turn me into a douchebag. Nuh-uh. Not me.
Thursday, December 6
Warm Feet Delivered Straight To Your Home
So the new Pearl Izumi AmFib MTB booties? They FREAKING rock! Highly recommended.
I’ve been spending the week here in the city and last night I went for a ride in Central Park last night. Snow? Yes, it was snowing, but hardly enough to stick. On Park Drive, the snow was only sticking on those parts of the street where an underpass existed (sort of like a bridge?) and even in those spots it was only a thin covering.
Regardless, the temperatures were way down in the thirties and my feet were comfy. Granted, I now stick those air-activated toe warmers to the top of my thick wool socks before slipping my feet into my size 50 Sidis before slipping those into the new booties, but I don’t think my feet could have been any more comfortable than they were last night.
Also, if you suffer from big feet the way I do (meaning you probably also suffer from another uncommon condition, but it’s not the kind of condition anyone would ever complain of), the XXL Pearl Izumi booties are a pleasure to get on. Last winter, I was wearing Craft booties but they were so damn tight the zipper eventually gave out. The AmFib booties fit like a snug glove--no hassles.
And that’s that. If you don’t use the toe warmers, I highly recommend those as well. Sure, they’re going to cost a couple of bucks--about $1.50 a pair--but isn’t it worth it for warm toes? It damn well is to me and they supposedly stay warm for 6 hours. Supposedly . . .
I’ve been spending the week here in the city and last night I went for a ride in Central Park last night. Snow? Yes, it was snowing, but hardly enough to stick. On Park Drive, the snow was only sticking on those parts of the street where an underpass existed (sort of like a bridge?) and even in those spots it was only a thin covering.
Regardless, the temperatures were way down in the thirties and my feet were comfy. Granted, I now stick those air-activated toe warmers to the top of my thick wool socks before slipping my feet into my size 50 Sidis before slipping those into the new booties, but I don’t think my feet could have been any more comfortable than they were last night.
Also, if you suffer from big feet the way I do (meaning you probably also suffer from another uncommon condition, but it’s not the kind of condition anyone would ever complain of), the XXL Pearl Izumi booties are a pleasure to get on. Last winter, I was wearing Craft booties but they were so damn tight the zipper eventually gave out. The AmFib booties fit like a snug glove--no hassles.
And that’s that. If you don’t use the toe warmers, I highly recommend those as well. Sure, they’re going to cost a couple of bucks--about $1.50 a pair--but isn’t it worth it for warm toes? It damn well is to me and they supposedly stay warm for 6 hours. Supposedly . . .
Sunday, December 2
Heading South Again
It’s starting to look like my days in Westchester may be numbered. For those of you who know me well enough, you may be assuming I’ve gone and punched out another high school kid and the authorities of the pleasant village of Pleasantville have finally asked that I pack my bags and leave for the sake of their obnoxious high school students. (As usual, that’s a whole other story.) I’m happy to say that I’ll be leaving Pleasantville of my own free will (as it should be with a name like Pleasantville). As I said, it’s looking as though I may be moving back into Manhattan not long after the New Year passes.
Of course, I don’t want to jinx myself by talking about it too much before it actually happens, but come on. It’s important to plan accordingly based on where you think your life is heading and I definitely think this is where my life is heading--living not far from Central Park (once again).
So what does that mean? In other words, who gives a shit if I’m moving from Westchester to Manhattan? Well, for starters, it means I can be one of the cool kids again. Go ahead and say it: Donaldson, you never really were one of the cool kids and it’s hard to imagine you ever will be one of the cool kids. Maybe there’s something to that and maybe there isn’t, but I figured I’d toss it out there anyway. When I say I’ll be one of the cool kids again, I mean I won’t have to spend almost three hours a day commuting to and from work (because really, that does suck the big donkey). I won’t have to schedule myself around the Metronorth train schedule. I won’t have to drive two miles to the Shoprite in Thornwood. Instead, I can walk two blocks to an over-crowded and over-priced Food Emporium on the corner of 68th and Broadway. (Who’s better than me?) I won’t have to do a lot of the thing suburbanites have to do (although I can’t seem to think of any one of them right now), which is nice.
Sort of. While it also means I’ll have the convenience of riding in Central Park during the week--wide road, no traffic, etc.--I’m losing the long weekend rides through the back roads. Sure, I can ride over the GWB and up 9W every Saturday and Sunday, but honestly, 9W really isn’t that nice. I see myself occasionally hopping back on Metronorth to catch a ride with the Westchester club, maybe something that starts in lower half of the country around Hartsdale or Scarsdale.
You know, I almost forgot one other major consequence of possibly moving back into the city. I’m thinking that perhaps I’ll join CRCA, but again, I don’t want to be one of those guys who talks about what he wants to do and then never actually does it. While joining CRCA is not that big of a deal in and of itself, it means I could try to join one of their sponsored racing teams. The question is, though, do I want to do that? Do I want to spend weekends traveling to races in the Northeast? I mean, I enjoy racing locally in Prospect Park, but I don’t want to make a career out of racing. I don’t need to deal with teammates who spend every waking moment poring over the strategy for next weekend’s race. In other words, I want to have fun, ride hard, and hop in a few races, but I don’t want to go so far that riding my bike is no longer enjoyable.
That make sense? Maybe I’ll just join CRCA as a racing member, not join a specific team, race a few club races in Central Park, show up for a few of their coaching sessions (free for members, I believe), enjoy wearing the CRCA jersey, and leave it at that. I think that may work. I want to have fun and take it semi-seriously, but I don’t need to find myself surrounded by a bunch of wanna-be ProTour racers.
And that’s it, I think. That’s how I see my cycling changing if . . . I mean when I move back into the city. Any thoughts? Comments? Suggestions? And I mean suggestions other than throwing myself out a window, so don’t even think about it.
Of course, I don’t want to jinx myself by talking about it too much before it actually happens, but come on. It’s important to plan accordingly based on where you think your life is heading and I definitely think this is where my life is heading--living not far from Central Park (once again).
So what does that mean? In other words, who gives a shit if I’m moving from Westchester to Manhattan? Well, for starters, it means I can be one of the cool kids again. Go ahead and say it: Donaldson, you never really were one of the cool kids and it’s hard to imagine you ever will be one of the cool kids. Maybe there’s something to that and maybe there isn’t, but I figured I’d toss it out there anyway. When I say I’ll be one of the cool kids again, I mean I won’t have to spend almost three hours a day commuting to and from work (because really, that does suck the big donkey). I won’t have to schedule myself around the Metronorth train schedule. I won’t have to drive two miles to the Shoprite in Thornwood. Instead, I can walk two blocks to an over-crowded and over-priced Food Emporium on the corner of 68th and Broadway. (Who’s better than me?) I won’t have to do a lot of the thing suburbanites have to do (although I can’t seem to think of any one of them right now), which is nice.
Sort of. While it also means I’ll have the convenience of riding in Central Park during the week--wide road, no traffic, etc.--I’m losing the long weekend rides through the back roads. Sure, I can ride over the GWB and up 9W every Saturday and Sunday, but honestly, 9W really isn’t that nice. I see myself occasionally hopping back on Metronorth to catch a ride with the Westchester club, maybe something that starts in lower half of the country around Hartsdale or Scarsdale.
You know, I almost forgot one other major consequence of possibly moving back into the city. I’m thinking that perhaps I’ll join CRCA, but again, I don’t want to be one of those guys who talks about what he wants to do and then never actually does it. While joining CRCA is not that big of a deal in and of itself, it means I could try to join one of their sponsored racing teams. The question is, though, do I want to do that? Do I want to spend weekends traveling to races in the Northeast? I mean, I enjoy racing locally in Prospect Park, but I don’t want to make a career out of racing. I don’t need to deal with teammates who spend every waking moment poring over the strategy for next weekend’s race. In other words, I want to have fun, ride hard, and hop in a few races, but I don’t want to go so far that riding my bike is no longer enjoyable.
That make sense? Maybe I’ll just join CRCA as a racing member, not join a specific team, race a few club races in Central Park, show up for a few of their coaching sessions (free for members, I believe), enjoy wearing the CRCA jersey, and leave it at that. I think that may work. I want to have fun and take it semi-seriously, but I don’t need to find myself surrounded by a bunch of wanna-be ProTour racers.
And that’s it, I think. That’s how I see my cycling changing if . . . I mean when I move back into the city. Any thoughts? Comments? Suggestions? And I mean suggestions other than throwing myself out a window, so don’t even think about it.
Winter Training Begins
All right, all right, all right. So it’s been a long while since my last post. Go ahead and sue me, but these things happen.
Actually, I don’t mean to sound like a whiney douchebag, although I do have two excuses in that (a) it has been ridiculously busy at work, and (b) it’s cold outside and when it’s cold outside, it’s not as much fun to ride as it is when it’s warm outside. Am I right or am I right?
Speaking of the cold, it wasn’t long ago that I arrived home on a weeknight, suited up for temperatures in the high-forties, strapped the blinking headlight to the handlebars and the blinking taillight to the seat post, and hit the road for my usual 18-mile weekday training ride. Honestly, it was the first time since last spring that I had to wear full-fingered gloves, a baselayer, a long-sleeved jersey, leg warmers, my Woolie Boolie socks, and my riding cap under my helmet. I mention all this as, once my ride was over and I climbed the stairs to the front door of my house and stepped inside, I had one of those flashbacks, but not the drug-induced kind of flashback. The moment I stepped inside out of the cold, an entire winter’s worth of riding came back to me all at once. Know what I mean? The season’s change and you spend so long riding on warm mornings with just a jersey and a pair of shorts that you forget how long it takes to gear up when the temperature drops below fifty. You almost forget how good it feels to get home, blow your nose with a tissue (as opposed to umpteen snot-shots while on the road), peel off all the layers, and hop in a hot shower. It’s the shower that always does it for me. Spending a few minutes under the warm water as the mirror and windows begin to fog and then getting dressed in fresh clothes and then sitting down for a satisfying meal? Putting up with the wind-chill almost seems worth it when you think of it like that, doesn’t it?
Speaking of the cold, though, I pulled myself out of bed a little after seven this past Sunday morning (and leaving your girlfriend/wife in bed under the covers to go for a ride in twenty-eight degree weather is never too easy of a thing to do) and geared up for a brisk, two-hour blast. And you know me and my size 14 cycling shoes--finding booties that fit is close to impossible, especially considering I have shoes of the mountain biking variety (that’s a whole other story, so let’s not even bother), so I tend to simply roll with the Woolie Boolie socks, a second pair of thick neoprene socks over the Woolie Boolies, and a regular pair of Pearl Izumi toe warmers.
Needless to say, an hour into the ride, I found myself desperately searching for either a convenient store or a grocery store or any sort of public establishment where I might sit down for ten minutes in order to regain the feeling in my toes. Of course, this is not new news. This has happened to every person reading this page, although I’m happy to report that over the weekend I came to realize that Pearl Izumi (one of my favorite apparel manufacturers, fyi) does indeed make an AmFib bootie specifically of the mountain biking variety and they also happen to make this bootie up to size XXL for those cyclists with shoes size 49+.
I don’t know about you, but I’m excited. Really excited. As soon as I found out about the MTB booties in just my size, I quickly hopped online and promptly spent $49.95 of my hard-earned money on a pair of new Pearl Izumi AmFib Mountain Biking booties. Will my feet soon be thanking me? You’re damn right they will be. Especially when I also invest in a few pairs of those air-activated heated insoles. The heated insoles combined with the booties? Cold weather? Freezing temperatures? I’ve got your freezing temperatures right here, tough guy!
Actually, I don’t mean to sound like a whiney douchebag, although I do have two excuses in that (a) it has been ridiculously busy at work, and (b) it’s cold outside and when it’s cold outside, it’s not as much fun to ride as it is when it’s warm outside. Am I right or am I right?
Speaking of the cold, it wasn’t long ago that I arrived home on a weeknight, suited up for temperatures in the high-forties, strapped the blinking headlight to the handlebars and the blinking taillight to the seat post, and hit the road for my usual 18-mile weekday training ride. Honestly, it was the first time since last spring that I had to wear full-fingered gloves, a baselayer, a long-sleeved jersey, leg warmers, my Woolie Boolie socks, and my riding cap under my helmet. I mention all this as, once my ride was over and I climbed the stairs to the front door of my house and stepped inside, I had one of those flashbacks, but not the drug-induced kind of flashback. The moment I stepped inside out of the cold, an entire winter’s worth of riding came back to me all at once. Know what I mean? The season’s change and you spend so long riding on warm mornings with just a jersey and a pair of shorts that you forget how long it takes to gear up when the temperature drops below fifty. You almost forget how good it feels to get home, blow your nose with a tissue (as opposed to umpteen snot-shots while on the road), peel off all the layers, and hop in a hot shower. It’s the shower that always does it for me. Spending a few minutes under the warm water as the mirror and windows begin to fog and then getting dressed in fresh clothes and then sitting down for a satisfying meal? Putting up with the wind-chill almost seems worth it when you think of it like that, doesn’t it?
Speaking of the cold, though, I pulled myself out of bed a little after seven this past Sunday morning (and leaving your girlfriend/wife in bed under the covers to go for a ride in twenty-eight degree weather is never too easy of a thing to do) and geared up for a brisk, two-hour blast. And you know me and my size 14 cycling shoes--finding booties that fit is close to impossible, especially considering I have shoes of the mountain biking variety (that’s a whole other story, so let’s not even bother), so I tend to simply roll with the Woolie Boolie socks, a second pair of thick neoprene socks over the Woolie Boolies, and a regular pair of Pearl Izumi toe warmers.
Needless to say, an hour into the ride, I found myself desperately searching for either a convenient store or a grocery store or any sort of public establishment where I might sit down for ten minutes in order to regain the feeling in my toes. Of course, this is not new news. This has happened to every person reading this page, although I’m happy to report that over the weekend I came to realize that Pearl Izumi (one of my favorite apparel manufacturers, fyi) does indeed make an AmFib bootie specifically of the mountain biking variety and they also happen to make this bootie up to size XXL for those cyclists with shoes size 49+.
I don’t know about you, but I’m excited. Really excited. As soon as I found out about the MTB booties in just my size, I quickly hopped online and promptly spent $49.95 of my hard-earned money on a pair of new Pearl Izumi AmFib Mountain Biking booties. Will my feet soon be thanking me? You’re damn right they will be. Especially when I also invest in a few pairs of those air-activated heated insoles. The heated insoles combined with the booties? Cold weather? Freezing temperatures? I’ve got your freezing temperatures right here, tough guy!
Wednesday, November 7
Swing Batter, Swing
So I’m on the road last night with about five minutes left in my usual weekday training ride. You know how it is: you’re not far from home and the road is relatively quiet so why not stand up and blast out a few sprints before you pull the throttle down to idle and cool down the engines? That’s exactly what I started doing and in the middle of the second sprint while approaching a wide-open intersection, I spotted a mid-sized SUV nearing the STOP sign to my right. No need to push my luck, I thought, taking my foot off the gas.
Thank god I did. If not, I would have ended up as road kill last night. The driver happened to reach the STOP sign on the right—I had neither a STOP sign nor any type of signal—a moment before I did and apparently, she missed the blinking headlight on my handlebars. Apparently, even while under the street lights, she missed every piece of reflective clothing on my body and decided to go for it, meaning she came within 2-3 feet of broad siding me straight into oblivion.
Now I know that every person laying eyes on this blog page has most likely spent a fair amount of time riding a bicycle and, if you haven’t, I’m sure you can relate. If you don’t ride, you’ve either seen cyclists get hit or snake through close calls, or you’ve almost hit a cyclist yourself, probably both. The reason I put the energy into describing the above, though, is not because almost getting murdered by a middle-aged woman behind the wheel of an SUV (most likely rushing to some parent-teacher conference . . . go ahead and call me sexist, I’m fine with that) is anything unique to me and my ride last night. The reason I mention what happened last night has to do with how such a close-call invariably causes one to fly into an uncontrollable rage.
When you’re driving along in your own SUV and someone almost blows through a STOP sign, it’s annoying, but with a few tons of metal surrounding your fragile personal frame, it never really seems like that big of a deal. Chances are you’ve got air bags to keep your pretty / handsome face from smashing into the steering wheel in the event of a head-on collision. You have disc brakes to stop all four wheels and more than enough rubber-to-asphalt surface area to get you stopped that much faster.
When you’re doing 35 MPH on tires less than an inch wide with wire-pull brakes and someone blows a STOP sign and your heart rate jumps to 210, we’re talking about a whole other ball game. Without that sturdy steel frame and air bags to keep you safe, some jackass in a SUV failing to take half a second to actually look for oncoming traffic no longer means a simple inconvenience settled with a finger poised in the air. When you’re on your bike, a sloppy driver could mean a nasty spill. It could mean road rash. It could mean a broken bone or a few broken bones. It could mean finding yourself without the ability to move your toes or your legs. It could mean a coma from which you never recover, or if the driver is really that much of an asshole, it could mean not only your last ride, but your last thought, your last day, your last minute, your last breath. It could mean never seeing you wife/husband/girlfriend/husband again. It could mean never seeing your kids again. It could mean that some irresponsible dipshit takes away every fucking thing you were looking forward to for the rest of your life whether you’re twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, or seventy-years-old.
And considering it only takes three-tenths of a second to realize how close you just came to losing everything, you get mad. You get madder than mad. Pardon the cliché, but you fly into something closely resembling an uncontrollable rage and, if you don’t, then you damn well should. And while I’m not advocating violence—only if you’re with a riding group you can trust—it never hurts to toss the offending driver a gratuitous verbal ass-beating just so he or she is aware of how much of a moron he or she actually is. It’s sort of like George Carlin says when discussing survival of the fittest: “The kid who swallows too many marbles deserves to die,” meaning the people who drive as bad as they do, they deserve a gratuitous verbal ass-beating at the very least.
Know what I’m saying?
Thank god I did. If not, I would have ended up as road kill last night. The driver happened to reach the STOP sign on the right—I had neither a STOP sign nor any type of signal—a moment before I did and apparently, she missed the blinking headlight on my handlebars. Apparently, even while under the street lights, she missed every piece of reflective clothing on my body and decided to go for it, meaning she came within 2-3 feet of broad siding me straight into oblivion.
Now I know that every person laying eyes on this blog page has most likely spent a fair amount of time riding a bicycle and, if you haven’t, I’m sure you can relate. If you don’t ride, you’ve either seen cyclists get hit or snake through close calls, or you’ve almost hit a cyclist yourself, probably both. The reason I put the energy into describing the above, though, is not because almost getting murdered by a middle-aged woman behind the wheel of an SUV (most likely rushing to some parent-teacher conference . . . go ahead and call me sexist, I’m fine with that) is anything unique to me and my ride last night. The reason I mention what happened last night has to do with how such a close-call invariably causes one to fly into an uncontrollable rage.
When you’re driving along in your own SUV and someone almost blows through a STOP sign, it’s annoying, but with a few tons of metal surrounding your fragile personal frame, it never really seems like that big of a deal. Chances are you’ve got air bags to keep your pretty / handsome face from smashing into the steering wheel in the event of a head-on collision. You have disc brakes to stop all four wheels and more than enough rubber-to-asphalt surface area to get you stopped that much faster.
When you’re doing 35 MPH on tires less than an inch wide with wire-pull brakes and someone blows a STOP sign and your heart rate jumps to 210, we’re talking about a whole other ball game. Without that sturdy steel frame and air bags to keep you safe, some jackass in a SUV failing to take half a second to actually look for oncoming traffic no longer means a simple inconvenience settled with a finger poised in the air. When you’re on your bike, a sloppy driver could mean a nasty spill. It could mean road rash. It could mean a broken bone or a few broken bones. It could mean finding yourself without the ability to move your toes or your legs. It could mean a coma from which you never recover, or if the driver is really that much of an asshole, it could mean not only your last ride, but your last thought, your last day, your last minute, your last breath. It could mean never seeing you wife/husband/girlfriend/husband again. It could mean never seeing your kids again. It could mean that some irresponsible dipshit takes away every fucking thing you were looking forward to for the rest of your life whether you’re twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, or seventy-years-old.
And considering it only takes three-tenths of a second to realize how close you just came to losing everything, you get mad. You get madder than mad. Pardon the cliché, but you fly into something closely resembling an uncontrollable rage and, if you don’t, then you damn well should. And while I’m not advocating violence—only if you’re with a riding group you can trust—it never hurts to toss the offending driver a gratuitous verbal ass-beating just so he or she is aware of how much of a moron he or she actually is. It’s sort of like George Carlin says when discussing survival of the fittest: “The kid who swallows too many marbles deserves to die,” meaning the people who drive as bad as they do, they deserve a gratuitous verbal ass-beating at the very least.
Know what I’m saying?
Tuesday, October 30
Deep Breath
Like all of us, I battle with things. Every freaking day, I battle with both things we can all see and touch and some things we can’t see and touch. I mention this as I have zero intention on delving into a diatribe around my “feelings,” but rather, I felt like making mention of the constant battle of cycling and the need to improve.
Now, let me start by saying there is absolutely nothing wrong with striving to improve. Maybe it’s just a part of us as Americans that we constantly feel the need to do everything progressively better and better, but what’s wrong with that? Nothing, I say, but one can definitely take it too far. What do I mean by that? I mean that I believe the desire for improvement may often overshadow the enjoyment that comes with particular endeavors—endeavors like cycling.
It’s important, REALLY important, to keep in mind how much enjoyment can be had from tossing a leg over a bike and pedaling through five, ten, fifteen, twenty, thirty, fifty, or even eighty miles (as insane as that may sound). It’s important—to me, at least, which is my usual disclaimer—to occasionally hop on the bike and just go for a ride without a pre-set agenda, without the heartrate monitor, and (god forbid), without the computer. I believe this is part of the reason why people own fixed-gear and/or single-speed bikes.
Now I’m not going out for a quick leisure ride tonight as tonight’s a night for improvement overall via intervals on the freaking trainer. Sounds like fun, doesn’t it? Jealous, aren’t you?
Now, let me start by saying there is absolutely nothing wrong with striving to improve. Maybe it’s just a part of us as Americans that we constantly feel the need to do everything progressively better and better, but what’s wrong with that? Nothing, I say, but one can definitely take it too far. What do I mean by that? I mean that I believe the desire for improvement may often overshadow the enjoyment that comes with particular endeavors—endeavors like cycling.
It’s important, REALLY important, to keep in mind how much enjoyment can be had from tossing a leg over a bike and pedaling through five, ten, fifteen, twenty, thirty, fifty, or even eighty miles (as insane as that may sound). It’s important—to me, at least, which is my usual disclaimer—to occasionally hop on the bike and just go for a ride without a pre-set agenda, without the heartrate monitor, and (god forbid), without the computer. I believe this is part of the reason why people own fixed-gear and/or single-speed bikes.
Now I’m not going out for a quick leisure ride tonight as tonight’s a night for improvement overall via intervals on the freaking trainer. Sounds like fun, doesn’t it? Jealous, aren’t you?
Sunday, October 28
Me and the GWB
I went riding today and while I realize that a ride in and of itself is not exactly exciting news, it’s a matter of where I went riding that makes it mildly entertaining. After spending the night in the city--in the Upper West Side, specifically--I hit the road at seven-thirty this morning and made my way along Riverside Drive to the George Washington Bridge, into Jersey, and eventually back into New York just south of Nyack.
And that was it. That was my ride. Fifty-one miles later and three hours later, I returned to 72nd Street and Broadway.
(Another quick thanks to Benny for the bag of Clif products. After an hour-and-a-half of riding, I pulled over to chow down on a bag of lemon-lime Clif Shot Bloks to keep the energy up on the way back into the city. LOVE those things!)
A bit chilly this morning, no? Windy as well? During the approach to the GWB, I found myself a bit worried the wind might carry me over the railings and into the Hudson River, although oddly, the wind was the worst on Riverside Drive and not as brutal while crossing the bridge.
Apart from the rather uneventful yet entertaining ride this morning, my gearing seems to be a bit messy once again. I would have to imagine I need to fine-tune the rear derailleur with the barrel adjuster considering I’m getting a bit of chatter in the crank arms when they’re under stress, meaning when I’m pushing the pedals harder rather than pushing them lighter. My first thought is that the chain may be jumping the tiniest bit while toward the top end of the cassette, but the derailleur is shifting fine when I was working on it Saturday night. Again, it’s only when I’m on the road and actually pedaling that I can both hear and feel the chatter, but it was really breaking my concentration this morning, enough to make it that much less of an enjoyable ride.
Over the past year, I haven’t had the best of luck with Shimano gear. The next bike--assuming there is a next bike--may be Campagnolo. Give that stuff a shot. Dr. Rob seems to swear by it, so maybe there’s something in that.
And FYI, I realize I’ve been a bit lacking in my blog update responsibilities, although I promise to work on that and get these things up with some more regularity. And I also promise to try and make them a bit more interesting as well.
And that was it. That was my ride. Fifty-one miles later and three hours later, I returned to 72nd Street and Broadway.
(Another quick thanks to Benny for the bag of Clif products. After an hour-and-a-half of riding, I pulled over to chow down on a bag of lemon-lime Clif Shot Bloks to keep the energy up on the way back into the city. LOVE those things!)
A bit chilly this morning, no? Windy as well? During the approach to the GWB, I found myself a bit worried the wind might carry me over the railings and into the Hudson River, although oddly, the wind was the worst on Riverside Drive and not as brutal while crossing the bridge.
Apart from the rather uneventful yet entertaining ride this morning, my gearing seems to be a bit messy once again. I would have to imagine I need to fine-tune the rear derailleur with the barrel adjuster considering I’m getting a bit of chatter in the crank arms when they’re under stress, meaning when I’m pushing the pedals harder rather than pushing them lighter. My first thought is that the chain may be jumping the tiniest bit while toward the top end of the cassette, but the derailleur is shifting fine when I was working on it Saturday night. Again, it’s only when I’m on the road and actually pedaling that I can both hear and feel the chatter, but it was really breaking my concentration this morning, enough to make it that much less of an enjoyable ride.
Over the past year, I haven’t had the best of luck with Shimano gear. The next bike--assuming there is a next bike--may be Campagnolo. Give that stuff a shot. Dr. Rob seems to swear by it, so maybe there’s something in that.
And FYI, I realize I’ve been a bit lacking in my blog update responsibilities, although I promise to work on that and get these things up with some more regularity. And I also promise to try and make them a bit more interesting as well.
Monday, October 15
Changing Colors
It was maybe two weeks ago that I happened to take a good look at my mountain bike leaning against the wall in the basement--the same bike I’ve ridden maybe three times since buying it earlier this year--when I thought to myself, You know, I really should carve out some time to get on that thing again before it gets too cold.
Sure enough the opportunity arose. Yesterday morning my lady friend Stephanie and I hit the road and headed north (actually, we first had to drive south until we made a right onto 287 West and then another right onto 87 North) up to the New Paltz area to do some off-road riding with a crew composed of Dr. Rob, his wife Cecilia (apologies if I misspell any names), Anne D., Benny and his wife May. Were we all riding? Nope. The girls, with the exception of Anne, went out for some hiking around Lake Minnewaska and then shopping through town while Dr. Rob led the rest of us through the trails, but before I even get started on that, Benny and May presented us with a mussette all but stuffed with Clif bars, Clif gel shots, and Clif shot blocks while we were getting ready.
“Mother of God,” I mumbled under my breath, my eyes feasting on the horde of nutritional goodies. Grabbing some orange Shot blocks and a vanilla gel, we were ready to roll.
We hit the road and got the legs warmed up with a ten-minute climb up to the trail. It’s never easy to start a ride with that much climbing, but sometimes you just do what you have to do, especially when the air’s as cool as it is and you know you’re in for a hell of a day.
(Honestly, my only concern starting the ride yesterday was that terrible duo, Dr. Rob and Anne. If those two nut jobs decided at any point to put the hammer down, I knew I’d be in for a painful morning. Thankfully, neither of the two decided they were in the mood to try and kill me, so it all worked out for the best and I can actually walk today.)
Overall, we had an unbelievable day, at least in my opinion. The weather cooperated, none of us had any mechanicals, no one crashed (except Anne, and I wouldn’t exactly call her tip-over a crash considering we were doing all of 3 MPH heading up one of the steepest parts of the trail and she was laughing as she went down), and everybody made it to lunch. Is that a good day in the mountains? I would say it is. I would say it was a terrific day.
Wait. I forgot about the traffic on the way home. Ah well. Sometimes you have to take the bad with the good. Know what I mean?
After roughly three-and-a-half hours on the bikes and a much-needed lunch at the Gilded Otter--where we met up with the ladies after their excursions--we were done for the day when that fabulous mussette that Benny and May had so graciously offered earlier in the day came back out of Dr. Rob’s trunk.
“Take the whole thing,” Benny offered. “I’m swimming in that stuff.”
“Are you sure?” The man had might as well just presented me with a check for a million dollars.
Anne didn’t want any and neither did Dr. Rob. “Are you sure?” I asked everybody again. I should’ve asked Stephanie to pinch me just to make sure I was awake. In the bag were at least half a dozen Clif bars, just as many gels, and a lot of Shot blocks.
“Take it,” Benny said.
That man now has a friend for life.
Below are some pics . . . oh, wait. I almost forgot the donuts. The girls picked up a box of apple cinnamon donuts in town before lunch. Polishing one off, Stephanie and I hopped in my truck. On the way out of the parking lot, I rolled down my window when Dr. Rob offered me another donut.
“Man, this was the best day EVER!” I said, grinning from ear to ear and stuffing my face with yet another donut.
Anyway, below are the pics from our excursion. Looking forward to the next round, amigos!
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You know what? I probably should've taken a picture of all that stuff Benny and May brought, not to mention those donuts.
Sure enough the opportunity arose. Yesterday morning my lady friend Stephanie and I hit the road and headed north (actually, we first had to drive south until we made a right onto 287 West and then another right onto 87 North) up to the New Paltz area to do some off-road riding with a crew composed of Dr. Rob, his wife Cecilia (apologies if I misspell any names), Anne D., Benny and his wife May. Were we all riding? Nope. The girls, with the exception of Anne, went out for some hiking around Lake Minnewaska and then shopping through town while Dr. Rob led the rest of us through the trails, but before I even get started on that, Benny and May presented us with a mussette all but stuffed with Clif bars, Clif gel shots, and Clif shot blocks while we were getting ready.
“Mother of God,” I mumbled under my breath, my eyes feasting on the horde of nutritional goodies. Grabbing some orange Shot blocks and a vanilla gel, we were ready to roll.
We hit the road and got the legs warmed up with a ten-minute climb up to the trail. It’s never easy to start a ride with that much climbing, but sometimes you just do what you have to do, especially when the air’s as cool as it is and you know you’re in for a hell of a day.
(Honestly, my only concern starting the ride yesterday was that terrible duo, Dr. Rob and Anne. If those two nut jobs decided at any point to put the hammer down, I knew I’d be in for a painful morning. Thankfully, neither of the two decided they were in the mood to try and kill me, so it all worked out for the best and I can actually walk today.)
Overall, we had an unbelievable day, at least in my opinion. The weather cooperated, none of us had any mechanicals, no one crashed (except Anne, and I wouldn’t exactly call her tip-over a crash considering we were doing all of 3 MPH heading up one of the steepest parts of the trail and she was laughing as she went down), and everybody made it to lunch. Is that a good day in the mountains? I would say it is. I would say it was a terrific day.
Wait. I forgot about the traffic on the way home. Ah well. Sometimes you have to take the bad with the good. Know what I mean?
After roughly three-and-a-half hours on the bikes and a much-needed lunch at the Gilded Otter--where we met up with the ladies after their excursions--we were done for the day when that fabulous mussette that Benny and May had so graciously offered earlier in the day came back out of Dr. Rob’s trunk.
“Take the whole thing,” Benny offered. “I’m swimming in that stuff.”
“Are you sure?” The man had might as well just presented me with a check for a million dollars.
Anne didn’t want any and neither did Dr. Rob. “Are you sure?” I asked everybody again. I should’ve asked Stephanie to pinch me just to make sure I was awake. In the bag were at least half a dozen Clif bars, just as many gels, and a lot of Shot blocks.
“Take it,” Benny said.
That man now has a friend for life.
Below are some pics . . . oh, wait. I almost forgot the donuts. The girls picked up a box of apple cinnamon donuts in town before lunch. Polishing one off, Stephanie and I hopped in my truck. On the way out of the parking lot, I rolled down my window when Dr. Rob offered me another donut.
“Man, this was the best day EVER!” I said, grinning from ear to ear and stuffing my face with yet another donut.
Anyway, below are the pics from our excursion. Looking forward to the next round, amigos!
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You know what? I probably should've taken a picture of all that stuff Benny and May brought, not to mention those donuts.
Monday, October 8
Down South
Saturday morning, I found myself back on Staten Island with my gear and my bike, ready to ride from New Dorp to St. George to whatever that industrial / junkyard area near the Bayonne Bridge is called to the Outerbridge past the mall down Arthur Kill Road up those godforsaken hills to the bagel shop and down Hylan Boulevard back to New Dorp.
Riding in Staten Island is always something of an adventure. If the gas-guzzling SUVs illegally hopping across the double-yellow line to speed head-on into bicycle traffic (meaning us) and blast through steady red lights don’t provide enough entertainment, all that’s required is a keen ear to absorb all the conversation one would never hear during a group ride with the Westchester Cycling Club. For example, after coming to a stop, Kelly realized a screw had embedded itself into her rear tire.
“I got screwed and I didn’t even realize it,” she said, to which someone else responded, “You going to try and pull it out or are you just going to leave it in?”
Apart from that, what I definitely don’t miss are the potholes. That’s not to say upper Westchester is pothole free, because it’s certainly not that, but after two-and-a-half hours on the road in Staten Island, I was amazed my bike was still in one piece.
So that happened. And other things happened, but nowhere near as exciting. I read on VeloNews.com that Johan Bruyneel may lead the Astana team and he may take Levi Leipheimer and Alberto Contador with him.
A quick word about Contador. I may be repeating myself here, but does anyone really believe that a twenty-four-year-old kid was in a position to beat a guy like Michael Rasmussen (who was probably swimming in EPO and other doping drugs) on natural ability alone? I think not.
And if Leipheimer’s going with Johan, does that mean Mr. Leipheimer’s comfortable and confident in Bruyneel’s ability to get his riders doped up as efficiently as possible without getting caught? I think so.
More on that. Take a guy like Basso who tells everyone, “Fuentes had my blood but I never doped. I only intended to dope.” Do Basso and his lawyers and the media actually expect us to believe a bunch of crap like that? They expect us to swallow a line like that after Basso absolutely destroyed everyone in the Giro? Are you kidding me?
I think I’ve been reading too much on professional cycling racing. I really need to tone it down, or better yet, just tune it out. While I enjoy watching some cycling on TV every now and again—and I admit to owning the 2006 Tour de France 12-hour DVD set—it really doesn’t do much for me when it comes to my own cycling, so why bother?
Riding in Staten Island is always something of an adventure. If the gas-guzzling SUVs illegally hopping across the double-yellow line to speed head-on into bicycle traffic (meaning us) and blast through steady red lights don’t provide enough entertainment, all that’s required is a keen ear to absorb all the conversation one would never hear during a group ride with the Westchester Cycling Club. For example, after coming to a stop, Kelly realized a screw had embedded itself into her rear tire.
“I got screwed and I didn’t even realize it,” she said, to which someone else responded, “You going to try and pull it out or are you just going to leave it in?”
Apart from that, what I definitely don’t miss are the potholes. That’s not to say upper Westchester is pothole free, because it’s certainly not that, but after two-and-a-half hours on the road in Staten Island, I was amazed my bike was still in one piece.
So that happened. And other things happened, but nowhere near as exciting. I read on VeloNews.com that Johan Bruyneel may lead the Astana team and he may take Levi Leipheimer and Alberto Contador with him.
A quick word about Contador. I may be repeating myself here, but does anyone really believe that a twenty-four-year-old kid was in a position to beat a guy like Michael Rasmussen (who was probably swimming in EPO and other doping drugs) on natural ability alone? I think not.
And if Leipheimer’s going with Johan, does that mean Mr. Leipheimer’s comfortable and confident in Bruyneel’s ability to get his riders doped up as efficiently as possible without getting caught? I think so.
More on that. Take a guy like Basso who tells everyone, “Fuentes had my blood but I never doped. I only intended to dope.” Do Basso and his lawyers and the media actually expect us to believe a bunch of crap like that? They expect us to swallow a line like that after Basso absolutely destroyed everyone in the Giro? Are you kidding me?
I think I’ve been reading too much on professional cycling racing. I really need to tone it down, or better yet, just tune it out. While I enjoy watching some cycling on TV every now and again—and I admit to owning the 2006 Tour de France 12-hour DVD set—it really doesn’t do much for me when it comes to my own cycling, so why bother?
Tuesday, September 25
Done and Done
So the bike’s fixed now. Two-hundred dollars later, my shift lever now shifts nine times, the rear derailleur hanger has been straightened, I’ve got a new rear tire (apparently the Hutchinsons that came with the bike are softer than a meter maid’s backside and not exactly suitable for use on a trainer), a headset / head tube that no longer clanks every time I stand up, and I also splurged on the Deluxe Tune-Up for $59.99.
I know, that’s absolutely thrilling news, although for a total of $197, I was kind of hoping they might clean the bike up a bit but when I brought it home this past Saturday, it actually seemed dirtier than it had been when I dropped it off the previous week. I was also under the impression that $197 would include a few drops of lube for the chain, but thirty minutes after hitting the road, I realized that expectation must have been a tad bit too high considering the squealing coming from the drive train.
Regardless, after a two-week layoff, I’m now back on the bike getting the legs back into shape for . . . the end of the season. Not that I raced enough to say I had an actual “season,” but it’s only a matter of weeks before it’s dark by 5 PM and the only time you get outside to ride is Saturdays and Sundays--granted it’s not raining or snowing--and you do so bundled in a few swaddling layers of polypropylene, neoprene, polyester, nylon, cotton, and wool to keep from freezing to death. Christ, I can’t believe the summer is over already. My brain just isn’t ready for hours upon hours spent on the trainer in the basement. Maybe I’ll buy a power meter for Christmas (notice it’s Christmas and not the holidays) to make myself feel better.
Just maybe.
I know, that’s absolutely thrilling news, although for a total of $197, I was kind of hoping they might clean the bike up a bit but when I brought it home this past Saturday, it actually seemed dirtier than it had been when I dropped it off the previous week. I was also under the impression that $197 would include a few drops of lube for the chain, but thirty minutes after hitting the road, I realized that expectation must have been a tad bit too high considering the squealing coming from the drive train.
Regardless, after a two-week layoff, I’m now back on the bike getting the legs back into shape for . . . the end of the season. Not that I raced enough to say I had an actual “season,” but it’s only a matter of weeks before it’s dark by 5 PM and the only time you get outside to ride is Saturdays and Sundays--granted it’s not raining or snowing--and you do so bundled in a few swaddling layers of polypropylene, neoprene, polyester, nylon, cotton, and wool to keep from freezing to death. Christ, I can’t believe the summer is over already. My brain just isn’t ready for hours upon hours spent on the trainer in the basement. Maybe I’ll buy a power meter for Christmas (notice it’s Christmas and not the holidays) to make myself feel better.
Just maybe.
Thursday, September 20
It's in the shop . . . really
I finally brought my bike to the shop. When I explained the head tube / headset was making a clanking noise, the mechanic grabbed the bars, lifted the front wheel about a foot off the ground, and let go.
“Oh yeah,” he said. “Big time.”
Locking the seat tube into a bike stand, he began picking apart my bike. “Come on over here,” he said, inviting me behind the counter. “You’re derailleur hanger is bent. Your brake calipers are loose and aren’t set correctly. Your rear tire is worn down to the threading.” (Apparently, the Hutchinsons that came with the bike don’t do so well with the heat from my trainer.) When he loosened the shift cable and toyed with the shift lever, he added, “You’re right. It’s only shifting eight times. The ball-end of the cable that broke is probably stuck in there.”
That was last Saturday and they’re still working on it. I agreed to the $60 tune-up while we were at it, but the good news is that they were able to fix the shift lever without replacing it.
And since I decided to take a few days off from riding beginning last Monday, I haven’t ridden since September 9th. Today’s the 20th. Man, do I feel all out of sorts or what? Regardless, if I can get the bike back by Saturday (I can only imagine what the financial damage is going to be), I’ll hit the road for the first time in almost two weeks. Thinking about it, the idea of riding again after two weeks off the bike is almost scary. I get the feeling I’ve lost every ounce of fitness I’ve gained over the past year and I’m going to cough up a long on the first serious climb. Rationally, I know that won’t happen, but it’s surprising what the imagination will come up with knowing a particular routine has been broken as long as I’ve broken it this past week-and-a-half.
That's it. That's all I've got right now.
“Oh yeah,” he said. “Big time.”
Locking the seat tube into a bike stand, he began picking apart my bike. “Come on over here,” he said, inviting me behind the counter. “You’re derailleur hanger is bent. Your brake calipers are loose and aren’t set correctly. Your rear tire is worn down to the threading.” (Apparently, the Hutchinsons that came with the bike don’t do so well with the heat from my trainer.) When he loosened the shift cable and toyed with the shift lever, he added, “You’re right. It’s only shifting eight times. The ball-end of the cable that broke is probably stuck in there.”
That was last Saturday and they’re still working on it. I agreed to the $60 tune-up while we were at it, but the good news is that they were able to fix the shift lever without replacing it.
And since I decided to take a few days off from riding beginning last Monday, I haven’t ridden since September 9th. Today’s the 20th. Man, do I feel all out of sorts or what? Regardless, if I can get the bike back by Saturday (I can only imagine what the financial damage is going to be), I’ll hit the road for the first time in almost two weeks. Thinking about it, the idea of riding again after two weeks off the bike is almost scary. I get the feeling I’ve lost every ounce of fitness I’ve gained over the past year and I’m going to cough up a long on the first serious climb. Rationally, I know that won’t happen, but it’s surprising what the imagination will come up with knowing a particular routine has been broken as long as I’ve broken it this past week-and-a-half.
That's it. That's all I've got right now.
Saturday, September 8
Mechanical Failures
Been a while since I last updated this page, although I’m unsure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. Either way, I’ve been busy in the office and haven’t spent all that much time thinking about cycling, although I was thinking about it a lot the past hour as I was down in the basement working on my Jamis.
You know, a few weeks ago if you had asked me how I liked the bike, I would have said, “Love it.” Today, I’m not so sure and I say that as I’ve had mechanical issues the past few weeks including a Shimano 105 shift lever that only seems to want to shift eight times as opposed to the nine times (10-speed) it should be shifting.
When my shifting started acting funny a few weeks ago, I brought the bike home and started tooling with the barrel adjuster on the rear derailleur to try and get the gearing spot-on when the shift cable busted--at the end inside the shift lever. I changed the cable and got it working, but I’m convinced the metal end of the old cable is stuck in the lever and not allowing the shifter to shift nine times the way it should.
Oh well. That just means I can’t hit top gear and how often am I in top gear? Eventually I’ll get around to replacing the shifter, but no rush on that as those things are pricey.
(And I tried adjusting the H-screw on the derailleur but that didn’t help me at all.)
On top of that, I keep getting this loud clicking noise every time I stand up to sprint and I’m convinced it’s coming from the stem/fork. Everything’s tight when I do a check-up and I doubt it’s the crank considering I only hear the noise when I stand up and throw the bike side-to-side when I’m pedaling hard. I also hear a similar click when I hit a big enough hole, so I’m pretty sure it’s coming from the front end, but am I confident enough to take apart the stem and dismantle the fork from the frame? Not exactly.
Eventually, I’ll get that fixed.
And apparently, after having ridden the trainer a few times the past few weeks, the threading in my rear tire is now showing. I only noticed it today while doing climbing repeats at Bear Mountain and at first I thought it normal wear and tear, but after only 2,500 miles? It wasn’t until I had the bike mounted on the trainer tonight while I attempted to adjust the rear derailleur once more that I put the two together. This means I’m going to have to take apart the trainer and make sure that thing’s working the way it’s supposed to considering this never happened on my old bike (and the same trainer).
You know what I’d like? I’d like things to work the way they’re supposed to work. Is that too much to ask? Sheesh.
You know, a few weeks ago if you had asked me how I liked the bike, I would have said, “Love it.” Today, I’m not so sure and I say that as I’ve had mechanical issues the past few weeks including a Shimano 105 shift lever that only seems to want to shift eight times as opposed to the nine times (10-speed) it should be shifting.
When my shifting started acting funny a few weeks ago, I brought the bike home and started tooling with the barrel adjuster on the rear derailleur to try and get the gearing spot-on when the shift cable busted--at the end inside the shift lever. I changed the cable and got it working, but I’m convinced the metal end of the old cable is stuck in the lever and not allowing the shifter to shift nine times the way it should.
Oh well. That just means I can’t hit top gear and how often am I in top gear? Eventually I’ll get around to replacing the shifter, but no rush on that as those things are pricey.
(And I tried adjusting the H-screw on the derailleur but that didn’t help me at all.)
On top of that, I keep getting this loud clicking noise every time I stand up to sprint and I’m convinced it’s coming from the stem/fork. Everything’s tight when I do a check-up and I doubt it’s the crank considering I only hear the noise when I stand up and throw the bike side-to-side when I’m pedaling hard. I also hear a similar click when I hit a big enough hole, so I’m pretty sure it’s coming from the front end, but am I confident enough to take apart the stem and dismantle the fork from the frame? Not exactly.
Eventually, I’ll get that fixed.
And apparently, after having ridden the trainer a few times the past few weeks, the threading in my rear tire is now showing. I only noticed it today while doing climbing repeats at Bear Mountain and at first I thought it normal wear and tear, but after only 2,500 miles? It wasn’t until I had the bike mounted on the trainer tonight while I attempted to adjust the rear derailleur once more that I put the two together. This means I’m going to have to take apart the trainer and make sure that thing’s working the way it’s supposed to considering this never happened on my old bike (and the same trainer).
You know what I’d like? I’d like things to work the way they’re supposed to work. Is that too much to ask? Sheesh.
Saturday, August 25
They Go Really Fast Downhill
I know I’ve said this before and while I don’t want to sound like a broken record, there are a lot of guys up here in Westchester who show up for group rides who I simply don’t understand.
This morning, I drove down to SUNY Purchase for a 44-mile B ride. You know what a B ride means? It means an average speed between 14.0 and 15.5 MPH so when the ride starts and almost half of the guys begin gunning it less than ten minutes later (and I know they’re gunning it because (a) I’ve been on more B+ rides than B rides and (b) I know what a B pace is supposed to do to my heart rate), I have to ask myself, Do these guys know how to read?
Maybe it’s just me. Maybe the guys I began riding with a year ago had it all wrong when they slowed down to let the group re-group after short to medium bursts of speed. Maybe waiting for people when they suffer a mechanical is bad etiquette. And maybe waiting for a guy or girl when they’re suffering from leg cramps is what you’re not supposed to do when out for a group spin.
But I don’t think so. I think a group ride is supposed to be exactly that: a GROUP ride, meaning everyone shows up to ride as a group. Sure, you put a few seconds between some people and that’s fine, but a few minutes? Are you kidding? I’ve led two rides up here with the WCC and I can tell you that it is one thankless job and one that I really don’t look forward to doing again.
I really shouldn’t bitch, but it is my blog and I get to bitch as much as what I want. (If you want to bitch, you’re welcome to start your own blogger, which is rather simple, actually.) My point is, though, if you show up for a B ride and can ride a B+ or A- pace, why ride with the B group? Why not go out with a B+ or A- ride? And if there isn’t a B+ thing scheduled the day you want to go out and do a B+ ride, why not set up your own ride and lead a bit yourself to see what it’s like? Go out and see just how much fun it is when a dozen other riders are your responsibility.
So again, maybe it’s just me, but when I think about my riding, I’m always thinking about how I’m going to train harder and ride faster. I think about what I have to do so I can start hanging with the A riders and what I have to do to sit at the front of an A group and set the pace. (That day is probably a long way off, but let me at least have my thoughts.) What I don’t do is show up for C rides as a B+ rider so I can feel good about myself by kicking off the front of the group.
Like I said, though, that’s just me.
This morning, I drove down to SUNY Purchase for a 44-mile B ride. You know what a B ride means? It means an average speed between 14.0 and 15.5 MPH so when the ride starts and almost half of the guys begin gunning it less than ten minutes later (and I know they’re gunning it because (a) I’ve been on more B+ rides than B rides and (b) I know what a B pace is supposed to do to my heart rate), I have to ask myself, Do these guys know how to read?
Maybe it’s just me. Maybe the guys I began riding with a year ago had it all wrong when they slowed down to let the group re-group after short to medium bursts of speed. Maybe waiting for people when they suffer a mechanical is bad etiquette. And maybe waiting for a guy or girl when they’re suffering from leg cramps is what you’re not supposed to do when out for a group spin.
But I don’t think so. I think a group ride is supposed to be exactly that: a GROUP ride, meaning everyone shows up to ride as a group. Sure, you put a few seconds between some people and that’s fine, but a few minutes? Are you kidding? I’ve led two rides up here with the WCC and I can tell you that it is one thankless job and one that I really don’t look forward to doing again.
I really shouldn’t bitch, but it is my blog and I get to bitch as much as what I want. (If you want to bitch, you’re welcome to start your own blogger, which is rather simple, actually.) My point is, though, if you show up for a B ride and can ride a B+ or A- pace, why ride with the B group? Why not go out with a B+ or A- ride? And if there isn’t a B+ thing scheduled the day you want to go out and do a B+ ride, why not set up your own ride and lead a bit yourself to see what it’s like? Go out and see just how much fun it is when a dozen other riders are your responsibility.
So again, maybe it’s just me, but when I think about my riding, I’m always thinking about how I’m going to train harder and ride faster. I think about what I have to do so I can start hanging with the A riders and what I have to do to sit at the front of an A group and set the pace. (That day is probably a long way off, but let me at least have my thoughts.) What I don’t do is show up for C rides as a B+ rider so I can feel good about myself by kicking off the front of the group.
Like I said, though, that’s just me.
Sunday, August 19
What's a Century?
Yesterday was Saturday and on Saturday I rode with the Staten Island group in New Jersey for just under 62 miles. (This particular ride is usually a hair over 63 miles, but without the initial detour to the rest rooms, the full ride came in at just under 62 miles.)
Today, I went out and did 105 miles up here in Westchester with one other member of the Westchester Cycling Club, all of which means I have to finish this update as quickly as humanly possible so I can spend the rest of the day relaxing in bed.
Oy. I spent so much time leaning on my hands today that as I type this, my left pinky finger is refusing to cooperate. And around 2:30, after a shower and a meal that could have fed at least two or three hundred Ethiopian children, I was laying in bed for a power nap when a charley horse sprang up along the inside of my thigh, causing me to scream like a bitch as I jumped out of bed and hobbled from one side of my room to the other. Then, after thirty seconds or so of excruciating pain (I would liken the experience to giving birth, but my frame of reference for such an analogy would cause me to lose all credibility), the cramp simply disappeared, yet it left a little leave-behind. Two hours later, I can still feel something along the inside of my thigh, like a charley horse calling card, constantly reminding me that if Mr. Charley Horse so pleases, he can easily cripple me with little to no warning.
Goddam that guy.
Anyway, the Cheesequake ride yesterday. Dr. Rob called the previous night with an invite. “Can’t do it, buddy,” I explained. “Already have riding plans for tomorrow,” but then, after pressing END on my phone, my pea-sized brain began to churn. You’re spending the night in the city, jackhole, so why not drive in with your bike and your gear and head down to Jersey the following morning?
Not a bad idea, said one of the other voices in my head. Not a bad idea at all, Mr. Donaldson.
At 7:45 Saturday morning, I rolled into the commuter lot and waited. It wasn’t until 7:52 that Anne D. pulled in. Thank god. I was thinking that maybe the guys cancelled the ride and never called me because I had said I wasn’t going to be there in the first place but when I spotted that red VW Beetle, all my fears were put to rest.
Ah.
Once Anne arrived, I started to gear up and strapped on my heart rate monitor, quickly checking my watch to see my heart taking it easy at roughly 70 beats per minute. A second later, Dr. Rob drove by followed by Lester, the crazy Pole. As soon I laid eyes on Lester, my heart rate immediately shot up to 110 or so. For whatever reason, I was sort of hoping for a ride not too nuts, but as soon as I spotted Lester’s face, all that hope vanished.
Damn.
Remarkably, though, the ride wasn’t all that nuts despite Lester’s presence. Don’t get me wrong--there are others in the group who can make my life and my heart rate miserable if they so choose, people such as Dr. Rob, Anne, Lester’s nutjob brother Robert, Mr. E. Dalton, and a host of others--but Lester tends to be the one to do . . . how should I say this?
Crazy shit. Does crazy shit work? I think it does, because that’s exactly what Lester does--crazy shit. Like sprinting down route 35 . . . in the right hand lane . . . in summer beach traffic.
Two other worthy mentions as per the attendees. Dr. Rob brought Canada Jeff. Apologies if that’s spelled G-e-o-f-f, but since I don’t know the correct spelling and considering my currently gimped-out pinky finger, let’s stick with J-e-f-f, okay? I call him Canada Jeff for the simple reason Canada Jeff hails from Canada. He’s Canadian, born and raised in Canada which, as we all know, is the correct country to blame whenever anything goes wrong here in the States, including regional blackouts and local riots in Harlem as well as Washington Heights. Other than his Canadian-ness, all I can say about Canada Jeff is that (a) he seemed like a nice guy, (b) had come to know Dr. Rob via former mountain biking excursions, and (c) he was wearing a Francaise des Jeux cycling team kit.
My apologies, Canada Jeff, but I really can’t let this slide. Myself, as an American, I severely doubt I’d be able to bring myself to wear a French team kit. Granted, at this point in my cycling career, I can’t bring myself to wear any professional team kit considering I’m about as fast as a three-legged sea turtle (and the fact that team kits tend to be a bit pricey also keeps me from investing in an actual kit, but if I did, it probably wouldn’t be a Francaise des Jeux outfit). While I do enjoy the clean simplicity of the predominantly white and blue Francaise des Jeux design, the bottom line is . . . it’s French. Most Americans, including New Yorkers, would just not go there.
Yet, Canada Jeff, you yourself explained that you live somewhere near Toronto. My understanding is that there’s a significant French population up there in the Yukon, I mean Canada. Perhaps you have French roots. Perhaps some of your immediate family if from France. If that’s the case, or if you found the kit at a disgusting, rock bottom price, then all is good. All was good to begin with, but I only raise the point as it’s not every day we see someone wearing a French racing team kit.
Okay, let’s move on.
Dr. Rob’s friend Greg was there too. I don’t know Greg’s last name but then again, I don’t know most of the guys and girls last names, so what does it matter? Greg, like Canada Jeff, is a nice guy, but he yells a lot. Myself, I’m not much of a yeller unless a car comes dangerously close (see previous post for my thoughts on that).
(Hold on a second. I’m gonna go munch on a few potato chips in the kitchen but I’ll be right back. If you want to take a break for a quick bite, I would suggest doing so now.)
All right, I’m back.
So that was the crew. With the exception of a ungodly wind blowing as we chugged our way through Sandy Hook, the ride went off, excuse the cliché, without a hitch.
And then I stopped by my parents’ place and rotated the tires on my truck. Sheer excitement.
As for today, I had the genius idea to try and ride my first century the day after the 62-mile Cheesequake ride. If you put a gun to my head and asked, “Why’d you do that?” I’d probably tell you to pull the trigger. Why’d I do it? Because sometimes smart people do dumb things. Actually, that wouldn’t apply to me, so mark it up to dumb people doing really dumb things.
Thinking it’d be more interesting to have some others along, I posted the ride last minute on the WCC site that turned out to be a great idea because a guy showed up. One guy. Just one.
No biggie. I wanted to do the ride and, at the end of the day, it wouldn’t matter if I did it alone or with others. Regardless, I did a 105 miles with Rupert, a man who has a heavy passion for both history and architecture. Until this morning, I never realized how many stone walls there are in Westchester. Once Rupert started pointing them out, well, he started pointing them out. I, my usual self, felt little need to comment. Instead, I tossed out plenty of “Oh yeahs?” and “Reallys?” as I learned that the British were never able to advance beyond Washington’s colonial forces near a certain point close to route 100.
(Despite my lack of conversation, my sarcastic, cynical nature--I know, hard to believe--was incredibly tempted to pull up next to Rupert between architectural point-outs and ask, “So. You get laid last night, buddy?”)
After two hours, we reached Pleasantville and the end of the first loop when I said, “We need to stop, Rupert, and we need to stop right now.” I was running on fumes (having forgotten to buy milk the night before so I only started out with half a bowl of Raisin Bran), so I helped myself to a bagel with butter and jelly and we hit the road again for lap number two out of three.
With 80 miles under our belts and another 35 to go, I asked Rupert, “What would you think about turning around once we reach route 22? That way we avoid all those frigging hills.”
Rupert was cool with that, but I know, I’m a loser for knocking the ride down from 115 to 100 miles, although I was beginning to reach a point where I’d glance down at my legs to see what was up, to see why they were acting the way they were, and my legs would simply frown up at me and tell me to get the damn ride over with. And when your legs reach that point, you really have to listen to what they say, otherwise they’re capable of shutting down the entire operation. If the legs go on strike, there isn’t much else you can do other than walk or call a taxi, so I slashed those last 15 miles from the ride in order to appease my sorry excuse for legs.
And it worked. I survived, albeit barely. By the time we reached the end, my legs didn’t seem much interesting in turning out a cadence much higher than 60, which is about 30-40 RPM lower than I normally pedal.
That was it. A hair over 105 miles in total. Nothing exciting happened with the exception of sighting a few deer, but that happens a lot up here. Rupert actually complained about the deer population and the deer ruining his garden until he finally installed a fence. Myself, I don’t have a garden, so the deer can munch as much corn and carrots as they please as far as I’m concerned.
As for these century rides, I don’t see myself doing a lot of these. Much too taxing. I’ll leave the long excursions to the psycho professional riders who seem to enjoy stage racing. Let them kill themselves.
[Author’s note: I know the length of this post got out of hand, as they normally do, but I can’t help myself. With that said, I would suggest printing the post and reading it on the printed page, which is infinitely easier than reading off the screen.]
Oh. Hey. If you want to watch something really, really funny, CLICK HERE.
Today, I went out and did 105 miles up here in Westchester with one other member of the Westchester Cycling Club, all of which means I have to finish this update as quickly as humanly possible so I can spend the rest of the day relaxing in bed.
Oy. I spent so much time leaning on my hands today that as I type this, my left pinky finger is refusing to cooperate. And around 2:30, after a shower and a meal that could have fed at least two or three hundred Ethiopian children, I was laying in bed for a power nap when a charley horse sprang up along the inside of my thigh, causing me to scream like a bitch as I jumped out of bed and hobbled from one side of my room to the other. Then, after thirty seconds or so of excruciating pain (I would liken the experience to giving birth, but my frame of reference for such an analogy would cause me to lose all credibility), the cramp simply disappeared, yet it left a little leave-behind. Two hours later, I can still feel something along the inside of my thigh, like a charley horse calling card, constantly reminding me that if Mr. Charley Horse so pleases, he can easily cripple me with little to no warning.
Goddam that guy.
Anyway, the Cheesequake ride yesterday. Dr. Rob called the previous night with an invite. “Can’t do it, buddy,” I explained. “Already have riding plans for tomorrow,” but then, after pressing END on my phone, my pea-sized brain began to churn. You’re spending the night in the city, jackhole, so why not drive in with your bike and your gear and head down to Jersey the following morning?
Not a bad idea, said one of the other voices in my head. Not a bad idea at all, Mr. Donaldson.
At 7:45 Saturday morning, I rolled into the commuter lot and waited. It wasn’t until 7:52 that Anne D. pulled in. Thank god. I was thinking that maybe the guys cancelled the ride and never called me because I had said I wasn’t going to be there in the first place but when I spotted that red VW Beetle, all my fears were put to rest.
Ah.
Once Anne arrived, I started to gear up and strapped on my heart rate monitor, quickly checking my watch to see my heart taking it easy at roughly 70 beats per minute. A second later, Dr. Rob drove by followed by Lester, the crazy Pole. As soon I laid eyes on Lester, my heart rate immediately shot up to 110 or so. For whatever reason, I was sort of hoping for a ride not too nuts, but as soon as I spotted Lester’s face, all that hope vanished.
Damn.
Remarkably, though, the ride wasn’t all that nuts despite Lester’s presence. Don’t get me wrong--there are others in the group who can make my life and my heart rate miserable if they so choose, people such as Dr. Rob, Anne, Lester’s nutjob brother Robert, Mr. E. Dalton, and a host of others--but Lester tends to be the one to do . . . how should I say this?
Crazy shit. Does crazy shit work? I think it does, because that’s exactly what Lester does--crazy shit. Like sprinting down route 35 . . . in the right hand lane . . . in summer beach traffic.
Two other worthy mentions as per the attendees. Dr. Rob brought Canada Jeff. Apologies if that’s spelled G-e-o-f-f, but since I don’t know the correct spelling and considering my currently gimped-out pinky finger, let’s stick with J-e-f-f, okay? I call him Canada Jeff for the simple reason Canada Jeff hails from Canada. He’s Canadian, born and raised in Canada which, as we all know, is the correct country to blame whenever anything goes wrong here in the States, including regional blackouts and local riots in Harlem as well as Washington Heights. Other than his Canadian-ness, all I can say about Canada Jeff is that (a) he seemed like a nice guy, (b) had come to know Dr. Rob via former mountain biking excursions, and (c) he was wearing a Francaise des Jeux cycling team kit.
My apologies, Canada Jeff, but I really can’t let this slide. Myself, as an American, I severely doubt I’d be able to bring myself to wear a French team kit. Granted, at this point in my cycling career, I can’t bring myself to wear any professional team kit considering I’m about as fast as a three-legged sea turtle (and the fact that team kits tend to be a bit pricey also keeps me from investing in an actual kit, but if I did, it probably wouldn’t be a Francaise des Jeux outfit). While I do enjoy the clean simplicity of the predominantly white and blue Francaise des Jeux design, the bottom line is . . . it’s French. Most Americans, including New Yorkers, would just not go there.
Yet, Canada Jeff, you yourself explained that you live somewhere near Toronto. My understanding is that there’s a significant French population up there in the Yukon, I mean Canada. Perhaps you have French roots. Perhaps some of your immediate family if from France. If that’s the case, or if you found the kit at a disgusting, rock bottom price, then all is good. All was good to begin with, but I only raise the point as it’s not every day we see someone wearing a French racing team kit.
Okay, let’s move on.
Dr. Rob’s friend Greg was there too. I don’t know Greg’s last name but then again, I don’t know most of the guys and girls last names, so what does it matter? Greg, like Canada Jeff, is a nice guy, but he yells a lot. Myself, I’m not much of a yeller unless a car comes dangerously close (see previous post for my thoughts on that).
(Hold on a second. I’m gonna go munch on a few potato chips in the kitchen but I’ll be right back. If you want to take a break for a quick bite, I would suggest doing so now.)
All right, I’m back.
So that was the crew. With the exception of a ungodly wind blowing as we chugged our way through Sandy Hook, the ride went off, excuse the cliché, without a hitch.
And then I stopped by my parents’ place and rotated the tires on my truck. Sheer excitement.
As for today, I had the genius idea to try and ride my first century the day after the 62-mile Cheesequake ride. If you put a gun to my head and asked, “Why’d you do that?” I’d probably tell you to pull the trigger. Why’d I do it? Because sometimes smart people do dumb things. Actually, that wouldn’t apply to me, so mark it up to dumb people doing really dumb things.
Thinking it’d be more interesting to have some others along, I posted the ride last minute on the WCC site that turned out to be a great idea because a guy showed up. One guy. Just one.
No biggie. I wanted to do the ride and, at the end of the day, it wouldn’t matter if I did it alone or with others. Regardless, I did a 105 miles with Rupert, a man who has a heavy passion for both history and architecture. Until this morning, I never realized how many stone walls there are in Westchester. Once Rupert started pointing them out, well, he started pointing them out. I, my usual self, felt little need to comment. Instead, I tossed out plenty of “Oh yeahs?” and “Reallys?” as I learned that the British were never able to advance beyond Washington’s colonial forces near a certain point close to route 100.
(Despite my lack of conversation, my sarcastic, cynical nature--I know, hard to believe--was incredibly tempted to pull up next to Rupert between architectural point-outs and ask, “So. You get laid last night, buddy?”)
After two hours, we reached Pleasantville and the end of the first loop when I said, “We need to stop, Rupert, and we need to stop right now.” I was running on fumes (having forgotten to buy milk the night before so I only started out with half a bowl of Raisin Bran), so I helped myself to a bagel with butter and jelly and we hit the road again for lap number two out of three.
With 80 miles under our belts and another 35 to go, I asked Rupert, “What would you think about turning around once we reach route 22? That way we avoid all those frigging hills.”
Rupert was cool with that, but I know, I’m a loser for knocking the ride down from 115 to 100 miles, although I was beginning to reach a point where I’d glance down at my legs to see what was up, to see why they were acting the way they were, and my legs would simply frown up at me and tell me to get the damn ride over with. And when your legs reach that point, you really have to listen to what they say, otherwise they’re capable of shutting down the entire operation. If the legs go on strike, there isn’t much else you can do other than walk or call a taxi, so I slashed those last 15 miles from the ride in order to appease my sorry excuse for legs.
And it worked. I survived, albeit barely. By the time we reached the end, my legs didn’t seem much interesting in turning out a cadence much higher than 60, which is about 30-40 RPM lower than I normally pedal.
That was it. A hair over 105 miles in total. Nothing exciting happened with the exception of sighting a few deer, but that happens a lot up here. Rupert actually complained about the deer population and the deer ruining his garden until he finally installed a fence. Myself, I don’t have a garden, so the deer can munch as much corn and carrots as they please as far as I’m concerned.
As for these century rides, I don’t see myself doing a lot of these. Much too taxing. I’ll leave the long excursions to the psycho professional riders who seem to enjoy stage racing. Let them kill themselves.
[Author’s note: I know the length of this post got out of hand, as they normally do, but I can’t help myself. With that said, I would suggest printing the post and reading it on the printed page, which is infinitely easier than reading off the screen.]
Oh. Hey. If you want to watch something really, really funny, CLICK HERE.
Friday, August 17
To All of THEM
I went for a ride last night and some punk yelled something at me from the backseat of a shitty car with tinted windows. The kid didn’t even have the cojones to open the window and show his face while he was yelling at me. I didn’t catch the first part of what he said, but I definitely caught the end which include the word assh*le.
At the time, it aggravated me to no end. I yelled back, of course, inviting this particular punk, as well as his three friends, to step out of the car and say it again, but you know how these things work. Everybody, and I mean everybody, is so tough when they’re sitting in a ton of metal yelling at someone twice their size on a bicycle. I’ve only been riding a little over a year, although I’m yet to find myself in a situation in which one of my invites to stop the car is actually heeded and the driver actually steps out. Says a lot, doesn’t it?
Regardless, I want to take a moment to address all the teenage jackasses who have cute things to say from behind tinted windows. I want to address all the middle-aged and elderly drivers out there (women, mostly, but who wants to be labeled sexist?) who don’t even realize they’ve just come about three inches from killing me as they whiz by at fifty miles-per-hour. (And it’s the fact that they don’t even realize what they’ve done that gets my goose.) I want to say something to all those people who race a few feet ahead of me so they don’t have to slow down as they make that right-hand turn without a blinker, cutting three feet in front of me. I also have a few words for those people who feel it’s necessary to honk when they’re behind me, as if leaning on the horn is going to scare me into the curb just so they can pass and get to the shopping mall nine seconds faster than they would if they had waited for me. What are these choice words I have for all these morons?
Fuck you! Fuck you very much!
At the time, it aggravated me to no end. I yelled back, of course, inviting this particular punk, as well as his three friends, to step out of the car and say it again, but you know how these things work. Everybody, and I mean everybody, is so tough when they’re sitting in a ton of metal yelling at someone twice their size on a bicycle. I’ve only been riding a little over a year, although I’m yet to find myself in a situation in which one of my invites to stop the car is actually heeded and the driver actually steps out. Says a lot, doesn’t it?
Regardless, I want to take a moment to address all the teenage jackasses who have cute things to say from behind tinted windows. I want to address all the middle-aged and elderly drivers out there (women, mostly, but who wants to be labeled sexist?) who don’t even realize they’ve just come about three inches from killing me as they whiz by at fifty miles-per-hour. (And it’s the fact that they don’t even realize what they’ve done that gets my goose.) I want to say something to all those people who race a few feet ahead of me so they don’t have to slow down as they make that right-hand turn without a blinker, cutting three feet in front of me. I also have a few words for those people who feel it’s necessary to honk when they’re behind me, as if leaning on the horn is going to scare me into the curb just so they can pass and get to the shopping mall nine seconds faster than they would if they had waited for me. What are these choice words I have for all these morons?
Fuck you! Fuck you very much!
Monday, August 6
Did You See That?
This past Saturday evening, I set my alarm for 6 AM. The original plan was to get out of bed early on Sunday, hit the road for a few hours, and then get back home before the day began in earnest. All that would have worked if, around eleven Saturday night, I hadn’t decided to turn off the alarm and sleep to my heart’s content.
So rather than take a group ride up here in the woods of Westchester, I loaded the bike into the truck and drove up to Bear Mountain for more climbing repeats as riding up and down a 4.5 mile hill never fails to serve as terrific entertainment. Am I right or am I right?
After spending thirty minutes climbing to the top, I took a few slugs from my water bottle, spent another ten minutes cruising to the bottom, and when I reached 9W, I turned around to begin the process all over again. Less than five minutes into the second ascent, I glanced up to see a shiny black bear on the side of the road staring straight at me.
Now hold on! First thing first. I’m proud to say I did not lose control of my bladder. This wasn’t a full-grown bear. The black bear that stood no more than twenty-five feet ahead of me looked more like a teenager and I say teenager as it was definitely not a cub and it was definitely not as big as I would imagine a full-grown bear to be. If I had to compare it to something, I’d say it was about the size of a big dog, like a big Labrador with meaty legs. Does that help paint a clear picture? I hope it does because that’s about as much effort as I’m putting into that description.
So there I am on my bike pedaling up Bear Mountain when a bear walks into the road. In hindsight, I probably should have glanced at my heart rate monitor to see how my cardiovascular system reacted to such a situation, although my brain placed a higher priority on avoiding a potential When Animals Attack situation, so rather than check and see how a bear sighting might have been messing with my heart rate, I stopped pedaling, hit the brakes, and was halfway through cutting a U-turn when the bear turned and ran back through the bushes.
And that was it. That’s all that happened. After waiting half a minute, I started back up the hill again. Just as I reached the spot where the bear had been standing, a car came around the bend heading in the opposite direction.
“Did you see that?” I asked the driver as we both slowed. I had to make sure it wasn’t my imagination because, you know, my imagination had a tendency to just flare up like that at times.
The rest of the ride, I’m happy to report, was uneventful, unless you want to include a lot of heavy breathing and sweating on my behalf as I labored my way to the top of the mountain again and again, yet the lesson to be learned from this experience is simple. Whenever you take a ride outside the suburbs into the mountains, bring plenty of water, food, and a gun.
So rather than take a group ride up here in the woods of Westchester, I loaded the bike into the truck and drove up to Bear Mountain for more climbing repeats as riding up and down a 4.5 mile hill never fails to serve as terrific entertainment. Am I right or am I right?
After spending thirty minutes climbing to the top, I took a few slugs from my water bottle, spent another ten minutes cruising to the bottom, and when I reached 9W, I turned around to begin the process all over again. Less than five minutes into the second ascent, I glanced up to see a shiny black bear on the side of the road staring straight at me.
Now hold on! First thing first. I’m proud to say I did not lose control of my bladder. This wasn’t a full-grown bear. The black bear that stood no more than twenty-five feet ahead of me looked more like a teenager and I say teenager as it was definitely not a cub and it was definitely not as big as I would imagine a full-grown bear to be. If I had to compare it to something, I’d say it was about the size of a big dog, like a big Labrador with meaty legs. Does that help paint a clear picture? I hope it does because that’s about as much effort as I’m putting into that description.
So there I am on my bike pedaling up Bear Mountain when a bear walks into the road. In hindsight, I probably should have glanced at my heart rate monitor to see how my cardiovascular system reacted to such a situation, although my brain placed a higher priority on avoiding a potential When Animals Attack situation, so rather than check and see how a bear sighting might have been messing with my heart rate, I stopped pedaling, hit the brakes, and was halfway through cutting a U-turn when the bear turned and ran back through the bushes.
And that was it. That’s all that happened. After waiting half a minute, I started back up the hill again. Just as I reached the spot where the bear had been standing, a car came around the bend heading in the opposite direction.
“Did you see that?” I asked the driver as we both slowed. I had to make sure it wasn’t my imagination because, you know, my imagination had a tendency to just flare up like that at times.
The rest of the ride, I’m happy to report, was uneventful, unless you want to include a lot of heavy breathing and sweating on my behalf as I labored my way to the top of the mountain again and again, yet the lesson to be learned from this experience is simple. Whenever you take a ride outside the suburbs into the mountains, bring plenty of water, food, and a gun.
Tuesday, July 31
Tagged
So they tagged Iban Mayo for EPO. Yeah, it’s true. I saw it on the front page of Velonews.com yesterday afternoon so it has to be true.
That’s too bad. I remember writing about Iban Mayo not too long ago and, honestly, I get this odd sense of satisfaction every time I log online and see another headline for another top riding testing positive for either testosterone, EPO, or anything else they’re not supposed to be taking. In other words, I enjoy reading about the cheats getting busted for cheating and I would have to imagine a fair amount of other people probably feel the same way.
Strange, though, how much of the media keeps their heads in the sand. Also in Velonews.com yesterday (I’m not the biggest fan of the pub, but they do keep their news up to date faster than most other sites and you can’t really beat their video footage) were a few rumblings as to how Alberto Contador had originally been implicated in the Operacion Puerto bust but then had been cleared by Spanish authorities, yet most of the media chose to hail Contador as a new hero, a great, young, clean rider to pave a new path in the future of cycling.
Give me a frigging break. Contador was one of the few people who were able to challenge Rasmussen in the mountains and Rasmussen was kicked out for lying about his whereabouts which most likely means he was doping. I mean, let’s put two and two together here:
Rasmussen = Yellow jersey / KOM jersey
Rasmussen = kicked out for lying and/or alleged doping
Contador = contesting Rasmussen--an alleged doper--in the mountains on the hardest climbs
Contador = Discovery rider
Discovery rider = Johan Bruyneel
Johan Bruyneel = his riders always seem to win yet never test positive
Do you think it’s Johan’s secret training program? Or do you think it might have something to do with the fact that the former US Postal and current Discovery riders tend to take about thirty needles in their asses every night during a stage race? How in the world any journalist could consider Contador the hero for clean racing is beyond me.
Speaking of which, I wonder if Lance takes the occasional syringe of EPO just for laughs? I wonder if the guy draws and then transfuses the occasional pint of his own blood just to make him feel like he did in the old days? Talk about drug addiction. Can you imagine retired racers handing around Blood Drive trailer units, twitching and scratching their necks, begging for a few cc’s of Type A or Type B?
That’s too bad. I remember writing about Iban Mayo not too long ago and, honestly, I get this odd sense of satisfaction every time I log online and see another headline for another top riding testing positive for either testosterone, EPO, or anything else they’re not supposed to be taking. In other words, I enjoy reading about the cheats getting busted for cheating and I would have to imagine a fair amount of other people probably feel the same way.
Strange, though, how much of the media keeps their heads in the sand. Also in Velonews.com yesterday (I’m not the biggest fan of the pub, but they do keep their news up to date faster than most other sites and you can’t really beat their video footage) were a few rumblings as to how Alberto Contador had originally been implicated in the Operacion Puerto bust but then had been cleared by Spanish authorities, yet most of the media chose to hail Contador as a new hero, a great, young, clean rider to pave a new path in the future of cycling.
Give me a frigging break. Contador was one of the few people who were able to challenge Rasmussen in the mountains and Rasmussen was kicked out for lying about his whereabouts which most likely means he was doping. I mean, let’s put two and two together here:
Rasmussen = Yellow jersey / KOM jersey
Rasmussen = kicked out for lying and/or alleged doping
Contador = contesting Rasmussen--an alleged doper--in the mountains on the hardest climbs
Contador = Discovery rider
Discovery rider = Johan Bruyneel
Johan Bruyneel = his riders always seem to win yet never test positive
Do you think it’s Johan’s secret training program? Or do you think it might have something to do with the fact that the former US Postal and current Discovery riders tend to take about thirty needles in their asses every night during a stage race? How in the world any journalist could consider Contador the hero for clean racing is beyond me.
Speaking of which, I wonder if Lance takes the occasional syringe of EPO just for laughs? I wonder if the guy draws and then transfuses the occasional pint of his own blood just to make him feel like he did in the old days? Talk about drug addiction. Can you imagine retired racers handing around Blood Drive trailer units, twitching and scratching their necks, begging for a few cc’s of Type A or Type B?
Monday, July 30
Hill Repeats
Yesterday, I drove to Bear Mountain to do hill repeats. Hill repeats suck, of course, but like they say, you have to do what you have to do.
So I did what I had to do and I did it four times. That was all I could manage. From 9W to the top of Bear Mountain is a 4.5-mile climb at an average gradient of 4.5% (according to Bicycling magazine). 4.5 miles may not seem like much, but when you can barely manage more than 10 MPH or so on the way up, 4.5 miles feels like a long, long time to be heading uphill.
For any of you who have ridden your bike up Bear Mountain, I’m sure you’ll agree that the first half of the climb really isn’t bad, or at least it’s not that bad compared to the second half of the climb. It’s when you make that right turn to continue heading toward the top that the road begins to kick up. It’s at that part of the mountain that the heart rate begins to climb and it does so damn fast. It’s that part of the road that causes your mouth to drop open and your breathing to go into labor. It’s then that you might try to stand on the pedals to let some of your bodyweight do some of the work, all the while the sweat dripping from your chin and landing on your front tire.
For me, that’s the part of the road that gets me the most. It’s then that I glance down at the crank and witness my feet turning, wondering if they can manage the entire climb. And if the road turns steep enough, I’ll begin talking to my legs and, eventually, once I can hear my heartbeat in my ears, I’ll even talk to God. As religious as I’m not, I’ll ask Him for a hand in getting to the top.
So I did what I had to do and I did it four times. That was all I could manage. From 9W to the top of Bear Mountain is a 4.5-mile climb at an average gradient of 4.5% (according to Bicycling magazine). 4.5 miles may not seem like much, but when you can barely manage more than 10 MPH or so on the way up, 4.5 miles feels like a long, long time to be heading uphill.
For any of you who have ridden your bike up Bear Mountain, I’m sure you’ll agree that the first half of the climb really isn’t bad, or at least it’s not that bad compared to the second half of the climb. It’s when you make that right turn to continue heading toward the top that the road begins to kick up. It’s at that part of the mountain that the heart rate begins to climb and it does so damn fast. It’s that part of the road that causes your mouth to drop open and your breathing to go into labor. It’s then that you might try to stand on the pedals to let some of your bodyweight do some of the work, all the while the sweat dripping from your chin and landing on your front tire.
For me, that’s the part of the road that gets me the most. It’s then that I glance down at the crank and witness my feet turning, wondering if they can manage the entire climb. And if the road turns steep enough, I’ll begin talking to my legs and, eventually, once I can hear my heartbeat in my ears, I’ll even talk to God. As religious as I’m not, I’ll ask Him for a hand in getting to the top.
Thursday, July 26
More Of The Same BS
Is it just me, or is professional cycling not getting any better whatsoever? And it’s not that I expected all the top riders to just stop what they were doing--meaning the drugs--because I realize there’s a ton of money on the line, but come on. Reading through the stories on Velonews.com, the scenario is simply growing bleaker and bleaker with every passing stage.
First, Vinokourov tests positive for blood doping. People still do that? Wasn’t blood doping the big thing in the Olympics in the 80s? Then again, the guy’s Russian. Yes, I realize he’s technically from Kazakhstan (and I know I didn’t spell that right, but so what?), yet when you really think about it, they all sound Russian when they talk, so what’s the difference? My point is, Russians are crazy, so why would Vinokourov give a rat’s ass about infusing blood that isn’t his into his vein in the middle of the race? He wouldn’t. Wasn’t there another crazy professional racer from Russia who, after winning a few races, took his money and opened up a Mercedes dealership as selling Mercedes had always been his dream? See what I mean about crazy?
(Then again, selling top-shelf cars compared to racing bicycles with a needle hanging out of your ass? Maybe that guy wasn’t so crazy after all.)
Anyway, too bad for Andreas Kloden. Dude was in fifth place when Astana pulled from the Tour.
Then Cristian Moreni of the Cofidis team tested positive for testosterone, so Cofidis has pulled from the Tour. So much for that.
And Sinkewitz from T-Mobile also tested positive for testosterone. Didn’t T-Mobile force their riders to sign the UCI anti-doping agreement? Does this mean Sinkewitz is going to have to pay UCI a year’s worth of his salary? If he does, that sucks for him. Big time. Then again, if you cheat . . .
Finally, there’s Rasmussen. When I logged online last night to check the latest Tour news, there was the headline staring me in the face: Rasmussen Pulled Out of Tour, Fired by Rabobank.
That’s even more big time than Sinkewitz. Here’s a guy who’s a few days away from most likely winning one of the biggest sporting events in the world and Rabobank tosses his skinny ass not because he actually tested positive, but because they learned he had lied about his whereabouts to allegedly dodge off-season blood and urine tests.
Regardless of whether Rasmussen is innocent or guilty, put yourself in that chump’s shoes. Can you even begin to imagine how utterly enraged he must feel at being canned after more than a week in the yellow jersey and only a few days away from the finale in Paris?
Not that I blame Rabobank, either. They must have been rather convinced that Rasmussen had done something wrong considering how close they were to winning the Tour. If not, if there was even a shred of evidence pointing to Rasmussen being clean, they never in a million years would have done what they did: too much to lose in terms of sponsorship and media exposure.
In my opinion, the best part is the response from the other riders, specifically David Millar. There’s a great interview clip with him on Velonews.com where you definitely get a good sense of the guy’s frustration via his candid comments. You can check it out by CLICKING HERE.
First, Vinokourov tests positive for blood doping. People still do that? Wasn’t blood doping the big thing in the Olympics in the 80s? Then again, the guy’s Russian. Yes, I realize he’s technically from Kazakhstan (and I know I didn’t spell that right, but so what?), yet when you really think about it, they all sound Russian when they talk, so what’s the difference? My point is, Russians are crazy, so why would Vinokourov give a rat’s ass about infusing blood that isn’t his into his vein in the middle of the race? He wouldn’t. Wasn’t there another crazy professional racer from Russia who, after winning a few races, took his money and opened up a Mercedes dealership as selling Mercedes had always been his dream? See what I mean about crazy?
(Then again, selling top-shelf cars compared to racing bicycles with a needle hanging out of your ass? Maybe that guy wasn’t so crazy after all.)
Anyway, too bad for Andreas Kloden. Dude was in fifth place when Astana pulled from the Tour.
Then Cristian Moreni of the Cofidis team tested positive for testosterone, so Cofidis has pulled from the Tour. So much for that.
And Sinkewitz from T-Mobile also tested positive for testosterone. Didn’t T-Mobile force their riders to sign the UCI anti-doping agreement? Does this mean Sinkewitz is going to have to pay UCI a year’s worth of his salary? If he does, that sucks for him. Big time. Then again, if you cheat . . .
Finally, there’s Rasmussen. When I logged online last night to check the latest Tour news, there was the headline staring me in the face: Rasmussen Pulled Out of Tour, Fired by Rabobank.
That’s even more big time than Sinkewitz. Here’s a guy who’s a few days away from most likely winning one of the biggest sporting events in the world and Rabobank tosses his skinny ass not because he actually tested positive, but because they learned he had lied about his whereabouts to allegedly dodge off-season blood and urine tests.
Regardless of whether Rasmussen is innocent or guilty, put yourself in that chump’s shoes. Can you even begin to imagine how utterly enraged he must feel at being canned after more than a week in the yellow jersey and only a few days away from the finale in Paris?
Not that I blame Rabobank, either. They must have been rather convinced that Rasmussen had done something wrong considering how close they were to winning the Tour. If not, if there was even a shred of evidence pointing to Rasmussen being clean, they never in a million years would have done what they did: too much to lose in terms of sponsorship and media exposure.
In my opinion, the best part is the response from the other riders, specifically David Millar. There’s a great interview clip with him on Velonews.com where you definitely get a good sense of the guy’s frustration via his candid comments. You can check it out by CLICKING HERE.
Saturday, July 21
Poughkeepsie Critierium
Another big race this morning, or big for me, at least. I had a choice between racing in Prospect Park for the second time this season or trying something different in Poughkeepsie. For those of you who live south of Westchester (which is probably all three people who read this page once every few months), Poughkeepsie probably sounds like a long haul for a bicycle race, but it’s only fifty miles from Pleasantville, so I figured I’d give it a shot.
Big mistake. Huge. Gross tactical error, although I’ll take my beating like a man. At nine this morning, roughly twenty Category 5 riders handed me my ass in a 20-lap criterium in downtown Poughkeepsie.
About a month ago, I raced Category 5 in Prospect Park and did well enough to stay with the main / lead group for the entire seventeen miles. After a year or riding and training, I was happy with that, so I felt good about doing well again today up in Poughkeepsie. I trained hard all week and expected things to go well this morning, yet as I stood on the line waiting for the race organizer to finish his speech, I noticed almost all of the other riders around me not only sporting team kits, but shaved legs as well. Maybe that’s how they roll up here in Putnam County, I thought, eyeballing the Sasquatch-thick fur covering my own legs. Maybe that’s just how these guys roll.
Clearly, I was kidding myself. The race in Poughkeepsie turned out to be a far cry from your standard Prospect Park criterium where the organizers (whoever they are) set up a table on the side of the road and use a bullhorn that needed new batteries in 1985. I’m joking, but apparently in Poughkeepsie, when these Putnam Country organizers roll, they roll big. (If I use the term roll one more time in the course of this update, feel free to slap me right across the face.) Take a look at the Start / Finish line below:
The organizers had an open-sided trailer upon which they sat during the course of the race. They had set up bleachers across the street for spectators. They had porta-a-pottys. They had a hospitality table set up under a tent. Around the mile-long course, they had not only piled hay bales around the poles in each corner, but they zip-tied squares of plywood over all the sewer grates to ensure no one’s wheel got caught up. And you know that orange plastic fencing they use at construction sites? They wrapped the outside of each corner with that stuff to ensure none of us went slamming through any storefronts if we overshot a turn.
I mean, these guys were taking their shit seriously. While warming up, I had to swerve around more than a few street cleaners as they went over every inch of pavement on the course.
As I said, the organization behind this criterium was rather serious, so the team kits, the shaved legs, and the expensive aero rims really should not have surprised me. I shouldn’t have been surprised one bit, but what was I going to do? Myself, I don’t see much point in going to line and thinking anything other than, I’m the baddest motherf*cker out here. If you can get yourself in that mind frame (or something similar), at least you’re going out there with confidence and based on what I saw in my first true criterium, you’re going to need some confidence when negotiating 45-degree corners at 22 MPH surrounded on all sides.
When the whistle blew, the sprinting began. In the space of two laps, I quickly learned how important it is to stay near the front as the pack approaches each turn considering once the first few riders cut through the corner, everyone hammers on the pedals to get the speed up again. With that said, I used the tailwind on the back stretch to jump out of the draft and position myself within the top ten and sat there for the next two or three laps. The accelerations out of the corners were taking their toll on my lungs, as was the headwind on the finish line stretch, although the group seemed to take a breather for a few seconds each time we had the wind behind us so I figured we’d settle in until the last lap or two.
Another gross tactical error. It was around lap six or seven that the pace shot up a few miles-per-hour. Someone must have took the lead and decided to shake things up a bit because until that point, things were tough yet manageable. With my heart rate already up to 185 - 190, the pack just spit me out the back and left me for dead.
How embarrassing.
Actually, a big guy (wearing a team kit, of course) who must have dropped back initially came barreling by a few seconds later. Hopping on his wheel, I proposed we work together to see what we could do, but after two laps of sitting behind He-Man, I told him I was doing everything I could just to stay with him and let him go off on his own.
And that was it. I sat in no-man’s land all by myself for a few laps and the worst part about the rest of the race wasn’t getting lapped. Rather, the worst part about going out and getting dropped on that kind of a course is when people clap and cheer as you’re passing the bleachers. I know they mean well, and encouragement should always be considered a good thing, but I knew that they knew that I had been dropped, and when I get dropped, I’d prefer invisibility. It’s surprising more bikes don’t come equipped with reliable cloaking devices for such situations.
With one lap to go, I rolled up next to a guy who had been dropped before I had been dropped. I was a lap down and he was two laps down, so rather than bust our asses to get over the line, we put the pace on cruise control and chatted for a minute. He had driven up with a friend from Virginia Beach, which struck me as a long-ass ride for a 20-lap race, but he did mention a night out in Manhattan tonight, so who can blame a few southern boys for wanting to hit the Big Apple for an evening?
Changing out of my riding gear, I rode back to the Start / Finish line to (a) check my placing, which was 14th out of 17, and (b) snap off some more pics as the Category 4 riders were getting started.
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P.S. I witnessed another crash this morning, this one fifty feet ahead of me in the middle of a corner. Both of the guys who went down seemed all right as I rode by, but golly, for such light machines, bikes make a hell of a lot of noise when they hit pavement.
P.S.S. And if it wasn’t for those two guys who crashed, I would have finished 16th out of 17.
Again, how embarrassing.
Big mistake. Huge. Gross tactical error, although I’ll take my beating like a man. At nine this morning, roughly twenty Category 5 riders handed me my ass in a 20-lap criterium in downtown Poughkeepsie.
About a month ago, I raced Category 5 in Prospect Park and did well enough to stay with the main / lead group for the entire seventeen miles. After a year or riding and training, I was happy with that, so I felt good about doing well again today up in Poughkeepsie. I trained hard all week and expected things to go well this morning, yet as I stood on the line waiting for the race organizer to finish his speech, I noticed almost all of the other riders around me not only sporting team kits, but shaved legs as well. Maybe that’s how they roll up here in Putnam County, I thought, eyeballing the Sasquatch-thick fur covering my own legs. Maybe that’s just how these guys roll.
Clearly, I was kidding myself. The race in Poughkeepsie turned out to be a far cry from your standard Prospect Park criterium where the organizers (whoever they are) set up a table on the side of the road and use a bullhorn that needed new batteries in 1985. I’m joking, but apparently in Poughkeepsie, when these Putnam Country organizers roll, they roll big. (If I use the term roll one more time in the course of this update, feel free to slap me right across the face.) Take a look at the Start / Finish line below:
The organizers had an open-sided trailer upon which they sat during the course of the race. They had set up bleachers across the street for spectators. They had porta-a-pottys. They had a hospitality table set up under a tent. Around the mile-long course, they had not only piled hay bales around the poles in each corner, but they zip-tied squares of plywood over all the sewer grates to ensure no one’s wheel got caught up. And you know that orange plastic fencing they use at construction sites? They wrapped the outside of each corner with that stuff to ensure none of us went slamming through any storefronts if we overshot a turn.
I mean, these guys were taking their shit seriously. While warming up, I had to swerve around more than a few street cleaners as they went over every inch of pavement on the course.
As I said, the organization behind this criterium was rather serious, so the team kits, the shaved legs, and the expensive aero rims really should not have surprised me. I shouldn’t have been surprised one bit, but what was I going to do? Myself, I don’t see much point in going to line and thinking anything other than, I’m the baddest motherf*cker out here. If you can get yourself in that mind frame (or something similar), at least you’re going out there with confidence and based on what I saw in my first true criterium, you’re going to need some confidence when negotiating 45-degree corners at 22 MPH surrounded on all sides.
When the whistle blew, the sprinting began. In the space of two laps, I quickly learned how important it is to stay near the front as the pack approaches each turn considering once the first few riders cut through the corner, everyone hammers on the pedals to get the speed up again. With that said, I used the tailwind on the back stretch to jump out of the draft and position myself within the top ten and sat there for the next two or three laps. The accelerations out of the corners were taking their toll on my lungs, as was the headwind on the finish line stretch, although the group seemed to take a breather for a few seconds each time we had the wind behind us so I figured we’d settle in until the last lap or two.
Another gross tactical error. It was around lap six or seven that the pace shot up a few miles-per-hour. Someone must have took the lead and decided to shake things up a bit because until that point, things were tough yet manageable. With my heart rate already up to 185 - 190, the pack just spit me out the back and left me for dead.
How embarrassing.
Actually, a big guy (wearing a team kit, of course) who must have dropped back initially came barreling by a few seconds later. Hopping on his wheel, I proposed we work together to see what we could do, but after two laps of sitting behind He-Man, I told him I was doing everything I could just to stay with him and let him go off on his own.
And that was it. I sat in no-man’s land all by myself for a few laps and the worst part about the rest of the race wasn’t getting lapped. Rather, the worst part about going out and getting dropped on that kind of a course is when people clap and cheer as you’re passing the bleachers. I know they mean well, and encouragement should always be considered a good thing, but I knew that they knew that I had been dropped, and when I get dropped, I’d prefer invisibility. It’s surprising more bikes don’t come equipped with reliable cloaking devices for such situations.
With one lap to go, I rolled up next to a guy who had been dropped before I had been dropped. I was a lap down and he was two laps down, so rather than bust our asses to get over the line, we put the pace on cruise control and chatted for a minute. He had driven up with a friend from Virginia Beach, which struck me as a long-ass ride for a 20-lap race, but he did mention a night out in Manhattan tonight, so who can blame a few southern boys for wanting to hit the Big Apple for an evening?
Changing out of my riding gear, I rode back to the Start / Finish line to (a) check my placing, which was 14th out of 17, and (b) snap off some more pics as the Category 4 riders were getting started.
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P.S. I witnessed another crash this morning, this one fifty feet ahead of me in the middle of a corner. Both of the guys who went down seemed all right as I rode by, but golly, for such light machines, bikes make a hell of a lot of noise when they hit pavement.
P.S.S. And if it wasn’t for those two guys who crashed, I would have finished 16th out of 17.
Again, how embarrassing.
Monday, July 16
From Lance to Landis
About a week after Floyd Landis’s book hit the shelves, the Irish sports journalist David Walsh released From Lance to Landis: Inside the American Doping Controversy at the Tour de France. A day or two after it came out, I took another trip down to the Strand in Union Square and picked up a copy of the hardcover for the low, low bargain price of $12.97.
Understandably, I realize my previous book reviews tend to be a bit long-winded (because I feel it’s important that if you’re going to review a book, you might as well support the review with actual information), so I’m going to attempt to spare everyone from dozing off while I do this.
When it comes to this read, my humble opinion is, if you’re at all interested in the professional side to cycling, go out and buy the book. It’s almost long at 334 pages, but those 334 pages are interesting pages. Will the book convince you that both Lance Armstrong and Floyd Landis have doped (meaning they cheated) during their professional careers? I believe it will. It sheds a lot of light on their individual careers, although most of the book is dedicated to investigating Armstrong.
For example, the book starts out by highlighting the early career of a teen cyclist by the name of Greg Strock. The kid had talent, rode for the national team, and then was doing amateur stuff overseas while working with a Belgian trainer and his buddy soigneur who gave the kid lots of injections along the way. Eventually, Strock became way too sick and stayed that way long enough so that he returned to the States. When his doctors here in the US figured out what it was, they realized it was something that almost everyone gets at one point in his or her life (think of it as something like a cold), but it affected Strock so much worse than usual--exhausted all the time, constantly sleeping, joint and hip pain, etc--that it basically ended his cycling career.
So why does David Walsh open with a chapter about a guy you’ve never heard of? Because while Greg Strock was a year younger than Lance Armstrong, they were both riding for Chris Carmichael on the national team at the same time. Armstrong was on the A team and Strock was on the B team. They rode under similar supervision for years and later, once Strock was sick and decided against a future in cycling, it’s noted that his condition, as serious as i was, typically produces a high incidence to testicular cancer in other men who have suffered the same condition.
It’s not hard to put two and two together.
Then, while it’s circumstantial, there is evidence that is quiet damning. Frankie Andreu, Armstrong’s former teammate on the Motorola and US Postal teams, makes this statement: “God knows what happened during that winter, but Lance came back the spring of ’96 and he was frickin’ huge. He looked like a linebacker. It was ‘Holy sh*t, man, he is big.’ Obviously, we all noticed it and he knew we did. He said something about [Dr. Michele] Ferrari not realizing the effect the weight room was going to have . . . but with Lance it was more than just seeing him big. I mean, he was big, but he could now rip the cranks off the bike like never before.”
Dr. Michele Ferrari is the Italian sports doctor who I believe is now in jail for helping athletes dope. Maybe he’s not in jail, although I do know an Italian court found him guilty of unethical practices in his dealings with athletes. And this is the doctor Lance chose to hire after a few seasons in the early ‘90s after EPO hit the peloton. Walsh explains that it was mostly the Italian teams doing it and they were destroying everyone, including Armstrong and his teammates. The rest of the riders knew what was going on, but most of the team doctors, especially on Motorola, weren’t advocating that kind of “medical program” for their riders. But then Lance hooks up with Ferrari and he starts trouncing everyone . . . convincingly.
The list goes on and on. In the end, the evidence is circumstantial and based mostly on depositions during civil lawsuits, testimony provided by Lance’s former teammates, his former soigneur, and others who have contact with him within the realm of professional cycling.
It’s also interesting to note that during a deposition, an instant message conversation between Frankie Andreu and Jonathan Vaughters was entered as evidence. During the conversation between the two former teammates, Vaughters explains to Andreu that Landis told him that on the second rest day of the 2004 Tour de France, both Armstrong and the team’s director, Johan Bruyneel, called Landis to the bathroom so he could watch as the two men flushed his blood refill down the toilet.
By that point in the race, Landis had already signed with the Phonak team for 2005 and if anyone isn’t aware, Armstrong never handled defections from his team in a very professional manner. So if Armstrong was confident he could win the Tour that year without a ton of help from Landis, why not mess with him a bit?
If you ask me, it’s all rather f*cked up, yet somehow believable at the same time.
Again, it’s a good book. Well worth the time to read it.
And apparently it’s impossible for me to write a review under 850 words. That’s my bad.
Understandably, I realize my previous book reviews tend to be a bit long-winded (because I feel it’s important that if you’re going to review a book, you might as well support the review with actual information), so I’m going to attempt to spare everyone from dozing off while I do this.
When it comes to this read, my humble opinion is, if you’re at all interested in the professional side to cycling, go out and buy the book. It’s almost long at 334 pages, but those 334 pages are interesting pages. Will the book convince you that both Lance Armstrong and Floyd Landis have doped (meaning they cheated) during their professional careers? I believe it will. It sheds a lot of light on their individual careers, although most of the book is dedicated to investigating Armstrong.
For example, the book starts out by highlighting the early career of a teen cyclist by the name of Greg Strock. The kid had talent, rode for the national team, and then was doing amateur stuff overseas while working with a Belgian trainer and his buddy soigneur who gave the kid lots of injections along the way. Eventually, Strock became way too sick and stayed that way long enough so that he returned to the States. When his doctors here in the US figured out what it was, they realized it was something that almost everyone gets at one point in his or her life (think of it as something like a cold), but it affected Strock so much worse than usual--exhausted all the time, constantly sleeping, joint and hip pain, etc--that it basically ended his cycling career.
So why does David Walsh open with a chapter about a guy you’ve never heard of? Because while Greg Strock was a year younger than Lance Armstrong, they were both riding for Chris Carmichael on the national team at the same time. Armstrong was on the A team and Strock was on the B team. They rode under similar supervision for years and later, once Strock was sick and decided against a future in cycling, it’s noted that his condition, as serious as i was, typically produces a high incidence to testicular cancer in other men who have suffered the same condition.
It’s not hard to put two and two together.
Then, while it’s circumstantial, there is evidence that is quiet damning. Frankie Andreu, Armstrong’s former teammate on the Motorola and US Postal teams, makes this statement: “God knows what happened during that winter, but Lance came back the spring of ’96 and he was frickin’ huge. He looked like a linebacker. It was ‘Holy sh*t, man, he is big.’ Obviously, we all noticed it and he knew we did. He said something about [Dr. Michele] Ferrari not realizing the effect the weight room was going to have . . . but with Lance it was more than just seeing him big. I mean, he was big, but he could now rip the cranks off the bike like never before.”
Dr. Michele Ferrari is the Italian sports doctor who I believe is now in jail for helping athletes dope. Maybe he’s not in jail, although I do know an Italian court found him guilty of unethical practices in his dealings with athletes. And this is the doctor Lance chose to hire after a few seasons in the early ‘90s after EPO hit the peloton. Walsh explains that it was mostly the Italian teams doing it and they were destroying everyone, including Armstrong and his teammates. The rest of the riders knew what was going on, but most of the team doctors, especially on Motorola, weren’t advocating that kind of “medical program” for their riders. But then Lance hooks up with Ferrari and he starts trouncing everyone . . . convincingly.
The list goes on and on. In the end, the evidence is circumstantial and based mostly on depositions during civil lawsuits, testimony provided by Lance’s former teammates, his former soigneur, and others who have contact with him within the realm of professional cycling.
It’s also interesting to note that during a deposition, an instant message conversation between Frankie Andreu and Jonathan Vaughters was entered as evidence. During the conversation between the two former teammates, Vaughters explains to Andreu that Landis told him that on the second rest day of the 2004 Tour de France, both Armstrong and the team’s director, Johan Bruyneel, called Landis to the bathroom so he could watch as the two men flushed his blood refill down the toilet.
By that point in the race, Landis had already signed with the Phonak team for 2005 and if anyone isn’t aware, Armstrong never handled defections from his team in a very professional manner. So if Armstrong was confident he could win the Tour that year without a ton of help from Landis, why not mess with him a bit?
If you ask me, it’s all rather f*cked up, yet somehow believable at the same time.
Again, it’s a good book. Well worth the time to read it.
And apparently it’s impossible for me to write a review under 850 words. That’s my bad.
Sunday, July 8
Group Riding Basics
Get this. We’re all of five or ten miles into a B ride in Westchester this morning and already the group of twenty-something riders has split. I’ve noticed this tends to happen on B rides on those mornings when no one’s scheduled a B+ ride. What happens is, all these people show up for a B ride and within minutes, those guys who you know can hold a B+/A- pace just go off the front, and that’s exactly what happened not long after we left the parking lot at 8:30 this morning.
Then, not long after the group split, this one guy decides to hit the gas on a long downhill, so most of us grab his wheel once the downhill turns into a flat. We reach a short hill and still we stay behind the same guy who went nuts going down the last hill, but on the next hill, that same guy seems to be running out of steam, so most of us go right around him. Reaching the top of the hill, I didn’t see much point in slowing down to wait for anybody and neither did the other guys behind me, yet a few minutes later, I hear a voice behind me and this particular voice--it’s a woman’s voice, mind you--is all but yelling at me for dropping so-and-so after he so graciously pulled us all along.
I turn around and there’s this woman behind a pair of mirrored sunglasses and she’s pointing her chin straight at me.
“You mean the guy with the red bike?” I ask. I know what she’s saying and I know who she’s talking about because there’s only one guy in the group who’s gone way so far off the front.
Rather than answer my question, she says, “Now I’m going to sit on your wheel and let you pull me around the next thirty miles.”
I guess this is supposed to be something of a threat, but it’s Sunday morning and I left my anger management toolbox at home. I’ve got half a mind to stop, fish my cell phone from my bag, and give Dr. Rob a call and ask him what “Martha” looks like (I’ve never met Martha, although I’ve heard the name on various SIBA rides).
Considering I don’t really know this woman from a hole in the wall (and I would have been content if she remained in anonymous status), getting on my case because I don’t wait for some guy who likes to blast down hills but can’t hold the pace when we’re going up the same hills sort of brings out the motocrosser / asshole in me, meaning I’ve got half a mind to toss in a brake check just to f*ck with her. I won’t, of course, but one of the things I’ve learned from the Staten Island crew is that if you’re going to go screeching downhill, you might as well have the balls to keep your speed up when you start heading the other way. Otherwise, you kind of look like a jackass (as I certainly have in the past), so glancing back, I extend an invitation. “You want to sit on my wheel, lady, you be my guest.”
“Don’t hit too many holes.”
Now she’s pushing buttons. “I don’t hit the holes--just follow my f*cking line.” And shut the hell up, I wanted to add, but what good does it do to get angry?
A few miles go by, I’m on the front and as soon as we reach the next downhill, guess who goes blowing by? And I don’t mean he charges to the front and gives me a break. If I was in the front doing 20 MPH, this guy goes by at 25 MPH and just keeps going . . . until we get to the next hill.
Eventually the pack slows down as we’re making a turn and I let the little lady go by. A few seconds later, just as we start going uphill again, I pull up next to her.
“What were you complaining about?” Before she can answer, I follow that up with, “What?”
She tried explaining that if Mr. Downhill is going to have the decency to pull us along for a while, we should at least have the common courtesy to wait for Mr. Downhill when we reach the top of an uphill.
“Well, for starters, I wouldn’t call what he does pulling considering no one’s on his wheel,” I say. Mr. Downhill is only a few feet ahead of us, so I’m hoping he’s getting an earful. “Second, no one asked him to go charging to the front. No one told him to put his nose in the wind. He can sit in the draft as long as he likes, but if he’s going to go nuts on every downhill while the rest of us save a bit for the hills and he gets dropped, that’s not my problem.”
Then, just to be a dick, I stayed right on her wheel as she stayed on Mr. Downhill’s wheel. Halfway up the next hill, me and everybody else pulled around them and just kept going, yet sure enough, once we reached the top and started drifting downhill and I sat up to let the rest of the group catch, guess who went barreling past me until the next hill?
From now on, I’m leading my own rides. If I get lucky, all of three or four guys will show up, so I won’t have to deal with the kind of stuff I had to put up with this morning. I looked at one of the guys next to me, this guy Glen I had met a few weeks earlier, and asked, “Why am I getting yelled at because someone else can’t keep up?”
Later, to cap off an obviously perfect afternoon, I drove to the other side of Pleasantville to attend my first-ever session with a mental health professional. I know, it’s hard to believe I’m as angry as I am, but it’s true. Figured it was high time to talk to a professional to figure out what the problem is, so I make the appointment, show up a few minutes early, and when I ring the doorbell, I hear a window slide open and someone say, “What time is your appointment?”
“3:30,” I answer.
“You’re ten minutes early. Wait outside.”
“No problem,” I said. Walking back to my truck, I got in, turned around, and flipped the doctor the bird when he opened the door and waved to me.
I need attitude from some jackhole psychiatrist when there are a million of them out there I can go see? I think not.
Then, not long after the group split, this one guy decides to hit the gas on a long downhill, so most of us grab his wheel once the downhill turns into a flat. We reach a short hill and still we stay behind the same guy who went nuts going down the last hill, but on the next hill, that same guy seems to be running out of steam, so most of us go right around him. Reaching the top of the hill, I didn’t see much point in slowing down to wait for anybody and neither did the other guys behind me, yet a few minutes later, I hear a voice behind me and this particular voice--it’s a woman’s voice, mind you--is all but yelling at me for dropping so-and-so after he so graciously pulled us all along.
I turn around and there’s this woman behind a pair of mirrored sunglasses and she’s pointing her chin straight at me.
“You mean the guy with the red bike?” I ask. I know what she’s saying and I know who she’s talking about because there’s only one guy in the group who’s gone way so far off the front.
Rather than answer my question, she says, “Now I’m going to sit on your wheel and let you pull me around the next thirty miles.”
I guess this is supposed to be something of a threat, but it’s Sunday morning and I left my anger management toolbox at home. I’ve got half a mind to stop, fish my cell phone from my bag, and give Dr. Rob a call and ask him what “Martha” looks like (I’ve never met Martha, although I’ve heard the name on various SIBA rides).
Considering I don’t really know this woman from a hole in the wall (and I would have been content if she remained in anonymous status), getting on my case because I don’t wait for some guy who likes to blast down hills but can’t hold the pace when we’re going up the same hills sort of brings out the motocrosser / asshole in me, meaning I’ve got half a mind to toss in a brake check just to f*ck with her. I won’t, of course, but one of the things I’ve learned from the Staten Island crew is that if you’re going to go screeching downhill, you might as well have the balls to keep your speed up when you start heading the other way. Otherwise, you kind of look like a jackass (as I certainly have in the past), so glancing back, I extend an invitation. “You want to sit on my wheel, lady, you be my guest.”
“Don’t hit too many holes.”
Now she’s pushing buttons. “I don’t hit the holes--just follow my f*cking line.” And shut the hell up, I wanted to add, but what good does it do to get angry?
A few miles go by, I’m on the front and as soon as we reach the next downhill, guess who goes blowing by? And I don’t mean he charges to the front and gives me a break. If I was in the front doing 20 MPH, this guy goes by at 25 MPH and just keeps going . . . until we get to the next hill.
Eventually the pack slows down as we’re making a turn and I let the little lady go by. A few seconds later, just as we start going uphill again, I pull up next to her.
“What were you complaining about?” Before she can answer, I follow that up with, “What?”
She tried explaining that if Mr. Downhill is going to have the decency to pull us along for a while, we should at least have the common courtesy to wait for Mr. Downhill when we reach the top of an uphill.
“Well, for starters, I wouldn’t call what he does pulling considering no one’s on his wheel,” I say. Mr. Downhill is only a few feet ahead of us, so I’m hoping he’s getting an earful. “Second, no one asked him to go charging to the front. No one told him to put his nose in the wind. He can sit in the draft as long as he likes, but if he’s going to go nuts on every downhill while the rest of us save a bit for the hills and he gets dropped, that’s not my problem.”
Then, just to be a dick, I stayed right on her wheel as she stayed on Mr. Downhill’s wheel. Halfway up the next hill, me and everybody else pulled around them and just kept going, yet sure enough, once we reached the top and started drifting downhill and I sat up to let the rest of the group catch, guess who went barreling past me until the next hill?
From now on, I’m leading my own rides. If I get lucky, all of three or four guys will show up, so I won’t have to deal with the kind of stuff I had to put up with this morning. I looked at one of the guys next to me, this guy Glen I had met a few weeks earlier, and asked, “Why am I getting yelled at because someone else can’t keep up?”
Later, to cap off an obviously perfect afternoon, I drove to the other side of Pleasantville to attend my first-ever session with a mental health professional. I know, it’s hard to believe I’m as angry as I am, but it’s true. Figured it was high time to talk to a professional to figure out what the problem is, so I make the appointment, show up a few minutes early, and when I ring the doorbell, I hear a window slide open and someone say, “What time is your appointment?”
“3:30,” I answer.
“You’re ten minutes early. Wait outside.”
“No problem,” I said. Walking back to my truck, I got in, turned around, and flipped the doctor the bird when he opened the door and waved to me.
I need attitude from some jackhole psychiatrist when there are a million of them out there I can go see? I think not.
Wednesday, July 4
1-Year Anniversary
It was exactly a year ago today that I walked into R&A in Brooklyn with Mr. Picco and bought my very first bicycle (not counting the BMX stuff when I was a teenager), the blue Giant OCR2 sports touring bike, for $600, water bottle cage included. From there, Mr. Picco and I drove the few blocks to Prospect Park for a few laps, spinning through the tons of foot traffic carrying coolers and beach chairs on their way to Independence Day cook-outs. Little did I know at the time that in the space of another two months, I would move to Brooklyn Heights and spend almost every day riding in Prospect Park, enough so that I’m now intimately familiar with every inch of that damn 3.4 mile loop.
A lot happens over the course of a year. I had been riding barely a month when I was dense enough to try and race in Prospect Park. In hindsight, it might have been one of the best things I could have done so early in my riding career. Those seventeen miles were quick to prove just how far I still had to go on the bike and, rather than demoralize me, rather than turn me off from the sport, the experience only served as motivation.
Not long afterward, the fall arrived and weather began to turn, meaning it was time to begin investing in things long-sleeve jerseys, tights, wool socks, booties, and a garish neon yellow windbreaker that would eventually fail me on a chilly day all the way out near JFK airport, although it turned out as a good thing as its failure (failure as in the zipper on the removable sleeve came undone) forced me to buy my first piece of Pearl Izumi apparel, a much more aesthetically pleasing black and silver winter jacket. Pleased with its quality, I now invest almost exclusively in Pearl Izumi apparel.
It was probably not long before that afternoon that I ordered a copy of Chris Carmichael’s training book, The Ultimate Ride. At the same time, I bought a heart rate monitor, did my first set of field tests (3-mile time trials), and began training within a specific heart rate zone while incorporating sprints and fast-pedal exercises.
That was when I still lived in Brooklyn. At the end of October (I realize the chronological order here is somewhat screwed up, but I just returned from mountain biking and I’m struggling to fend off a nap as I write this, so please, reader, bear with me), Mr. Picco hosted a terrific Oktoberfest party in his yard and it was then that I met Mr. Dr. Rob. Toward the end of the night, he mentioned a 100K training ride he had planned in Cheesequake the following day. I should have realized I was getting in way over my head by the way Dr. Rob sort of paused and smiled when I asked if I could tag along. A smarter man would have immediately picked up on the signal and took a rain check for another day, maybe after putting some more miles in his legs, but you know Dr. Rob, he’s a nice guy, so I got the invite regardless. I showed up, met Dr. Rob, Anne, Brent, and Joe C. and by the time we hit those three consecutive hills, I fell right out the back, thinking to myself, You are WAY out of your league here, kiddo.
Maybe two or three months later, after Dr. Rob introduced me to Ed Dalton and the SIBA group, Mr. Dalton invited me on the Cheesequake ride, to which I replied, “Honestly, I’m kind of scared of that ride.” And I was scared of the ride, the hills, the lactic acid that I knew would build up and stay in my legs as everyone just blasted away up every hill we encountered.
And instead of packing it in and taking off for a few months, we rode through the winter--long yet somewhat manageable training rides in Staten Island. Rides that started off with freezing fingers then ended up with okay fingers but freezing feet. And the hill climb ride on a Thursday morning, just Ed and I, avoiding patches of ice as we crossed over Rockland Avenue and worked our way up Manor Road to Ocean Terrace.
In mid-winter came a move to Pleasantville in Westchester yet instead of hitting the roads, I hit the trainer in the basement until the snow began to clear. Soon I bought a new bike, the Jamis I ride now and the switch from aluminum to carbon fiber was definitely a switch for the better considering the number of spokes I broke on the Giant’s rear wheel.
As soon as the temperature began to lift somewhat, I put the trainer away in favor of the roads yet riding through unfamiliar territory proved a major pain in the ass. Reaching the bottom of a hill, I had no idea how long the incline might continue, so I struggled and swore under my breath every time I came around a corner to see the hill heading up another quarter of a mile. Soon, though, the roads became more familiar, as did the sights, so now I know when to push and when to settle in to a friendly, seven mile-per-hour pace.
A month ago, my first time trial. Nothing too long, only eleven miles, but enough test myself. Averaging just under twenty miles-per-hour, I again realize how far I still need to go until my legs can handle more of a beating and get the bike going faster.
Two weeks after that, the second race of the year, a return to Prospect Park and since that experience has already been dissected and discussed, not much need to go there again.
And now here I sit, a year come and gone.
A lot happens over the course of a year. I had been riding barely a month when I was dense enough to try and race in Prospect Park. In hindsight, it might have been one of the best things I could have done so early in my riding career. Those seventeen miles were quick to prove just how far I still had to go on the bike and, rather than demoralize me, rather than turn me off from the sport, the experience only served as motivation.
Not long afterward, the fall arrived and weather began to turn, meaning it was time to begin investing in things long-sleeve jerseys, tights, wool socks, booties, and a garish neon yellow windbreaker that would eventually fail me on a chilly day all the way out near JFK airport, although it turned out as a good thing as its failure (failure as in the zipper on the removable sleeve came undone) forced me to buy my first piece of Pearl Izumi apparel, a much more aesthetically pleasing black and silver winter jacket. Pleased with its quality, I now invest almost exclusively in Pearl Izumi apparel.
It was probably not long before that afternoon that I ordered a copy of Chris Carmichael’s training book, The Ultimate Ride. At the same time, I bought a heart rate monitor, did my first set of field tests (3-mile time trials), and began training within a specific heart rate zone while incorporating sprints and fast-pedal exercises.
That was when I still lived in Brooklyn. At the end of October (I realize the chronological order here is somewhat screwed up, but I just returned from mountain biking and I’m struggling to fend off a nap as I write this, so please, reader, bear with me), Mr. Picco hosted a terrific Oktoberfest party in his yard and it was then that I met Mr. Dr. Rob. Toward the end of the night, he mentioned a 100K training ride he had planned in Cheesequake the following day. I should have realized I was getting in way over my head by the way Dr. Rob sort of paused and smiled when I asked if I could tag along. A smarter man would have immediately picked up on the signal and took a rain check for another day, maybe after putting some more miles in his legs, but you know Dr. Rob, he’s a nice guy, so I got the invite regardless. I showed up, met Dr. Rob, Anne, Brent, and Joe C. and by the time we hit those three consecutive hills, I fell right out the back, thinking to myself, You are WAY out of your league here, kiddo.
Maybe two or three months later, after Dr. Rob introduced me to Ed Dalton and the SIBA group, Mr. Dalton invited me on the Cheesequake ride, to which I replied, “Honestly, I’m kind of scared of that ride.” And I was scared of the ride, the hills, the lactic acid that I knew would build up and stay in my legs as everyone just blasted away up every hill we encountered.
And instead of packing it in and taking off for a few months, we rode through the winter--long yet somewhat manageable training rides in Staten Island. Rides that started off with freezing fingers then ended up with okay fingers but freezing feet. And the hill climb ride on a Thursday morning, just Ed and I, avoiding patches of ice as we crossed over Rockland Avenue and worked our way up Manor Road to Ocean Terrace.
In mid-winter came a move to Pleasantville in Westchester yet instead of hitting the roads, I hit the trainer in the basement until the snow began to clear. Soon I bought a new bike, the Jamis I ride now and the switch from aluminum to carbon fiber was definitely a switch for the better considering the number of spokes I broke on the Giant’s rear wheel.
As soon as the temperature began to lift somewhat, I put the trainer away in favor of the roads yet riding through unfamiliar territory proved a major pain in the ass. Reaching the bottom of a hill, I had no idea how long the incline might continue, so I struggled and swore under my breath every time I came around a corner to see the hill heading up another quarter of a mile. Soon, though, the roads became more familiar, as did the sights, so now I know when to push and when to settle in to a friendly, seven mile-per-hour pace.
A month ago, my first time trial. Nothing too long, only eleven miles, but enough test myself. Averaging just under twenty miles-per-hour, I again realize how far I still need to go until my legs can handle more of a beating and get the bike going faster.
Two weeks after that, the second race of the year, a return to Prospect Park and since that experience has already been dissected and discussed, not much need to go there again.
And now here I sit, a year come and gone.
Sunday, July 1
Name That Quote
Let’s play Name That Quote, meaning take a guess who said the following:
“God forbid anything happened to my wife, I think I’d get myself a little [derogatory term used in reference to a homosexual man]: someone to cook and clean around the house and, if he ever left, what the f*ck would I care?”
Do I even have to put a name to the quote? I think for most of you, the answer to that question is obvious, yet I titled this updated Name That Quote not just for that single quote, but to shed some light into what it’s like riding with some of the crew from the Staten Island Bicycling Association. And I’m not talking about the guys who show up every once in a while who aren’t really associated with the club. I’m talking about the guys who are there week after week and have been there week after week for years upon years.
Anyway, Name That Quote is a fun game to play, especially after a long yet terrific four-hour ride that both started and ended in Cheesequake on this beautiful morning (the kind of morning that reminds you just how sweet life can be when you’re with friends doing something you want to be doing under a perfect blue sky) with a small, select group. While the wind did pick up at certain times, I was only privy to snatches of conversation here and there, but I got enough to develop a sense of the overall tone. For example, here’s another one that references a wife:
“. . . it’s the psychological torture that drives me crazy. I’d actually prefer it if she just punched me in the face.”
Someone replied, “It’d be quicker.”
Ten minutes later I heard this one:
“So last night I’m sitting on the couch watching TV when my wife says, ‘We never go on dates any more.’ I’m sitting there thinking, ‘We’ve been married thirty-four years--why the hell would we go on a date?’ so I said to her, ‘Where we going with this?’”
And then there are the references to marriage as it relates to cycling.
“Every Saturday night my wife asks me, ‘You’re going riding tomorrow?’ as if it’s some sort of surprise. We’ve been living together for X-number of years and I’ve got the bike in the living room, the bike stand in the basement, the bike magazines on the coffee table, the jerseys in the closet, and I’m sitting there watching a bike race on TV. What the hell am I hiding?”
This is why I never spend money on comedy clubs. Sure, it cost me a couple bucks in gas to get from Pleasantville to Staten Island (or Cheesequake), but that’s not just gas money. It’s not even the comic value. At the end of the day, it’s terrific material for this, the blog in addition to comic value. I mean, who wouldn’t want to ride with these guys? I can tell you it’s not like that up here in Westchester. Speaking of which, what I should do is invite the SIBA crew to join one of the Westchester Cycling Club group rides so the guys up here can see just how interesting a 50-mile ride can be, hills and all.
“God forbid anything happened to my wife, I think I’d get myself a little [derogatory term used in reference to a homosexual man]: someone to cook and clean around the house and, if he ever left, what the f*ck would I care?”
Do I even have to put a name to the quote? I think for most of you, the answer to that question is obvious, yet I titled this updated Name That Quote not just for that single quote, but to shed some light into what it’s like riding with some of the crew from the Staten Island Bicycling Association. And I’m not talking about the guys who show up every once in a while who aren’t really associated with the club. I’m talking about the guys who are there week after week and have been there week after week for years upon years.
Anyway, Name That Quote is a fun game to play, especially after a long yet terrific four-hour ride that both started and ended in Cheesequake on this beautiful morning (the kind of morning that reminds you just how sweet life can be when you’re with friends doing something you want to be doing under a perfect blue sky) with a small, select group. While the wind did pick up at certain times, I was only privy to snatches of conversation here and there, but I got enough to develop a sense of the overall tone. For example, here’s another one that references a wife:
“. . . it’s the psychological torture that drives me crazy. I’d actually prefer it if she just punched me in the face.”
Someone replied, “It’d be quicker.”
Ten minutes later I heard this one:
“So last night I’m sitting on the couch watching TV when my wife says, ‘We never go on dates any more.’ I’m sitting there thinking, ‘We’ve been married thirty-four years--why the hell would we go on a date?’ so I said to her, ‘Where we going with this?’”
And then there are the references to marriage as it relates to cycling.
“Every Saturday night my wife asks me, ‘You’re going riding tomorrow?’ as if it’s some sort of surprise. We’ve been living together for X-number of years and I’ve got the bike in the living room, the bike stand in the basement, the bike magazines on the coffee table, the jerseys in the closet, and I’m sitting there watching a bike race on TV. What the hell am I hiding?”
This is why I never spend money on comedy clubs. Sure, it cost me a couple bucks in gas to get from Pleasantville to Staten Island (or Cheesequake), but that’s not just gas money. It’s not even the comic value. At the end of the day, it’s terrific material for this, the blog in addition to comic value. I mean, who wouldn’t want to ride with these guys? I can tell you it’s not like that up here in Westchester. Speaking of which, what I should do is invite the SIBA crew to join one of the Westchester Cycling Club group rides so the guys up here can see just how interesting a 50-mile ride can be, hills and all.
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