How Very Trusting

So I'm right now in St. George, Utah staying at the Ambassador Inn for the evening before the bike tour begins tomorrow morning. The book I brought with me is turning out to be quite dull, so I found the nearest Barnes & Noble in the phonebook and figured I'd grab a taxi rather than burn myself to death by trying to walk the few miles from the inn.

On a whim, when the young lady behind the front desk picked up the phone to call a taxi, on I blurted out, "Or you could simply lend me your car."

Can you believe she did? Does that not sound like something straight out of On The Road by Kerouac? After writing down the directions, she handed me the keys to her Honda Civic. Make a short story long, I got a book for the rest of the trip and she got a full tank of gas.

Sweet.

Getting Closer

Getting Closer to Utah

Getting Closer

I haven't been to Vegas in years. Holy freaking god, it's hot out here.

Destination: Utah

T-minus 24 hours . . .

Bryce to Zion Coming Up

Honestly, I really don't think I'm one to boast, but I'm completely pumped to do this trip starting on Sunday. Was able to pull it off last minute, so I'm flying to Vegas on Saturday, spending the night in St. George, Utah, and then hitting the trails for a full six days.

Magnificent photos to follow.

Harlem Criterium

I had high hopes of racing up in Harlem last weekend, yet alas, I decided to get married recently and, as this race always falls on Father's Day, my desire to race my bicycle rather than attend a BBQ with the in-laws became a sore subject with the wee-fay.

In the end, I relented and attended the BBQ, yet the video looks pretty good.

Next year . . .

Trailer for Hincapie Movie

Well this certainly looks interesting.

The Lead-Out

Lots of exciting and utterly thrilling updates to follow shortly, including a 240-mile 2-day Montauk ride, quitting the CRCA Board of Directors, leaving NYVelocity, the cocaine in Tom Boonen's hair, etc., but for now, let's have another look at Lester, the man who is plastered across the cycling-related Internet.

Here he is, doing what he does, which is ride hard. Extremely hard.

(Photos from the June 13th CRCA club race.)


Unfortunately for Lester, there's something to be said for a long, strong lead-out train. That guy who's about to pip him at the line (who the hell do I think I am using a word like "pip," Paul Sherwen?), that's Mitch from NYVelocity. How did he manage to get to the line first? Apart from training, dieting, and stuff like that, I've got two words for you: lead-out train.


Still, Lester is a strong mofo. You had to be strong to survive that race. I know as I was the first man in the lead-out train (that started back at Tavern on the Green) and I barely lasted three out of seven laps, yet here he is, contesting the final of a total of twelve sprints that race.

And his reward? Third place when all was said and done.

Priceless Post

Just came across this on Bicycling.com:

Questionable Decisions

-Speaking of Kohl again, one of his claims in the l’Equipe interview was that his manager, Stefan Matschiner, handled his blood transfusions at the Tour. Matschiner would apparently fly to France while the blood bag thawed out in the hold. At the hotel, Kohl would steal away to Stefan’s hotel room for 20 minutes for the transfusion. All of this begs the question:

Are you f__king nuts?

Relying on Easyjet’s cargo hold to manage a temperature-controlled thaw of a living bodily tissue that you will reinject and which could KILL you if it goes bad is not my idea of sound decision-making. Although the whole process does speak highly of Matschiner’s phlebotomy skills should he be in need of a second career, post-prison.

Fog and LCAs

Despite the shitty weather, which you might think would keep more people off the streets and indoors on the trainer (I know this godforsaken weather stymied my desires to race round three of the Rockleigh Crit last night), it’s been an odd, odd week cycling-wise.

First, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, this total piece of white trash struck and killed two cyclists while injuring a third.



How? Apparently, the LCA (that’s acronym for Low Class Asshole) was drinking and driving behind the wheel of her big, bad SUV (that’s LCA for Sport Utility Vehicle) . . . at four in the afternoon. If drinking while driving at four in the afternoon is not a total indication of actually being an LCA then I don’t know what is.

You can read more about it HERE, although apparently, this ugly bitch swerved off the road onto the shoulder, struck the three cyclists, and then continued driving. When another driver tried to stop her, she attempted to keep driving. It wasn’t until other drivers forced her to stop did she actually stop.

Yet she claims she doesn’t remember hitting anyone or anything. If that’s true, Ms. LCA, then why not just pull over? Why try to get away?

Here’s to hoping she does some time and gets raped in prison by several overwhelmingly large African-American women on a frequent basis. (And I only mention the women as African-Americans for one reason: since this women is a LCA, there’s no doubt she’s racist, so it’ll hurt that much more when a group of taunting, laughing black women shove a broomstick up her ass.)

Apart from the LCA in Tulsa, did everybody hear about this Brian Dooda character? I found this on NYVelocity.com. This douche was riding in Central Park around 5 PM a few days ago, holding up vehicular traffic in the left-hand lane when he should have been riding in the bike lane and, when a driver cut him off, he caught up to the driver at the next light and stood in front of the driver’s car to lecture him about his unsafe driving habits.

Before I go any further, here’s a pic of Dooda:



As the story goes, without waiting for Dooda to move out of the way, the driver then started driving again at 5 - 10 MPH with Dooda clinging to the hood while he begged the driver to stop.

Now upon first reading Dooda’s account, my immediate reaction was that the driver was another LCA psycho. Yet upon reading more of the story, thinking it through, and actually seeing that pic of Dooda and that ridiculous hair on his lip, I’m almost siding with the driver. Granted, Dooda probably deserved a few harsh words, perhaps a slap in the face for acting like an uppity bitch, but nobody should be carried along on a hood while some nut job drives down Park Drive.

That’s me, though. You decide.

Then there’s this professional, Bert Grabsch. I’m sure I’ve heard the name before, yet until the other day, I had never seen the guy. Earlier this week, though, while watching the opening prologue for the Dauphine Libere, I actually saw the rolling mass of muscle that is Bert Grabsch.

Could this guy be any bigger? This guy makes Lester look like . . . me.

You can watch a video of Grabsch winning the World Time Trial championship HERE (because, apparently, Universal Sports doesn't like anyone embedding their video coverage outside of YouTube).



Next up? CRCA club race tomorrow. At 5:45 in the AM. You know, I love riding my bike, but dragging myself out of bed at 4:45 AM to race?

Put a gun to my head and paint the wall with my frigging brains.

Bernhard Kohl Comes Clean

Last year's winner of the Tour de France's polka-dot jersey who was recently banned for EPO use, has been talking about what he did and how he did it. It's an interesting read and you can check it out by clicking HERE as it's hosted on VeloNews.

Taylor Phinney and His Loving Mother

Anybody pick up the July copy of VeloNews? Anybody read the piece around Taylor Phinney? You know who I’m talking about? (Or to be grammatically correct, do you know to whom I refer?)



Apparently, this kid is the next big thing, the great American hope, and the great white hope of professional cycling all rolled into one even though he’s only eighteen-years-old. Apparently, he’s got incredible talent when it comes to riding a bike, although considering his father was a successful professional cyclist and his mother an Olympic athlete, I’m not so sure if I’d call what this kid has talent.

(As a useless aside, I guess I’ve always been challenged by labeling a person’s ability to pedal a bike as talent. To me, it’s a simple motor function and the size of each person’s motor is first determined by (a) genetics, followed by (b) repetition. In my opinion, talent is not just an innate genetic trait, but the result of hours upon hours of practice, such as having a head for race tactics, or archery, or brain surgery. If I handed Kenny Picco a scalpel and asked him to perform a vasectomy on Ron Jeremy, he just couldn’t do it. Flip side of the coin, if I handed a bike to a kid with Olympian parents and asked him to ride as hard as he could, I’m sure he’d beat the rest of the neighborhood kids in a race. Is that talent? I’m not so sure.)

Apart from that, the young Mr. Phinney strikes me as an arrogant bastard based on his comments from the interview. This is the first, one in which he references the national kilo record which, as we all know, is the epitome of cycling achievements:

“People have been trying to beat that record all their lives, and I blasted it out pretty easily,” Phinney said matter-of-factly.

So this douche bag (if interested in reading about other cycling douche bags, feel free to click here) is only eighteen and his first order of business is to belittle other cyclists’ attempts? Granted, I would imagine his world consists of a cycling bubble from which he never really has to step and that means the time he spends off the bike is probably time spent listening to other people in his camp showering him with incessant praise--especially the brat’s mother, Connie Carpenter. Get a load of this:

Connie Carpenter was so thrilled by her son’s success in Mexico that she put together a shrine to Taylor in the dining room of their two-story home, which sits quietly on one of Boulder’s leafy streets near the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.

A shrine? Is this kid supposed to be enlightened?



Not much of a resemblance. This chubby guy’s a lot better looking.

Shrine’s aside, here’s another of Phinney’s ripe quotes as he refers to playing soccer during his childhood spent in Italy:

“I was one of those under-10 kids who was the best player on the team and scored all the goals,” Phinney said.

Is this douche the picture of modesty or is it just me? This is the kid who will no doubt grow up into that guy, the guy who’ll no doubt try to steal your girlfriend/wife after you just finished shaking his hand and congratulating him on breaking the national kilo record for the sixth time. I can practically hear it in my head, exactly what this douche would say to a friend who just returned from the men’s room during a black-tie banquet for Phinney hosted by Phinney’s mom.

“Josh, listen, your girl Crystal wanted to go down on me while you were taking a leak so I figured why not? I know you’ve been trying to seal that deal for weeks but I blasted it out pretty easily, huh? I think my mom took some pics when she was under the table, so I would get on Facebook in a few days if you want to check those out.”

Eighteen-years-old and already an egomaniac. I guess that’s what happens when your mommy calls you on your cell six times a day to tell you how totally awesome you are and you spend as much free time as you can with Lance Armstrong. This kid should go on a few rides with Pozzato. I get the feeling he wouldn’t be as impressed as everybody else in Phinney’s camp. Maybe the Italian would do us all a favor and shove a few canolis up his ass.

Back to Rockleigh

Went back to Rockleigh, NJ last night for the criterium. Thankfully, last night went much, much, MUCH better than it did last week. While I wasn't close enough to the front to know exactly where I finished, I think it might've been somewhere in the top 20 out of 50+ riders, so that was satisfying (as opposed to getting lapped by the same riders last week . . . god, that EPO really works).

And I checked the results that are listed online here, but they're wildly inaccurate. How do I know theyr'e inaccurate? The rider who's listed as having placed two spots ahead of me? Reginald Rasch? He's a terrific racer but I know for a fact that he finished behind me as he was pushed wide and off the road into the grass by some jackass in the second-to-last corner and, as a result, finished way behind me. So I don't know who the hell is doing the scoring on these things, but they might want to think about wiping the dirt from the video camera lens they have set up at the finish line.

As usual, though, I arrived much to early, so I grabbed this extremely exciting, utterly thrilling video clip of the 1/2/3 field whipping along the start/finish straight.



I mean, come on. Have you ever seen a more entertaining cycling video online?

To add to the overall excitement, I was reviewing the power meter file from last night's race. Typical criterium with the wattage all over the goddam place. You're either going full gas or soft-pedaling or braking into a corner. Un-freaking-believable.

(FYI, the yellow line represents watts.)

The Man of the Hour, the Tower of Power . . . Jens Voigt

It's no secret I'm a big fan of Jens Voigt. I mean, how can you not be a fan of a bike racer like this?

Lester Is Everywhere!

Despite all the talk, despite all the rumors, despite what you may have already heard, I am now the proud owner of a Powertap power meter.



As I usually say, how utterly exciting.

And now that I’m gauging my rides via watts rather than heart rate, the first thing I learned extremely quickly is just how inconsistent my (and yours, probably) pedal strokes actually are. What may seem like a steady effort is most likely far from an actual steady effort. What exactly do I mean by that?

My first time out, riding down 70th Street, which is flat, toward Central Park, this is what my wattage was looking like, all in the space of less than five or six seconds:

168
192
201
141
151
158
198
212
166
179

So on and so forth.

At first, I figured, “Something’s wrong with this thing,” although upon speaking with Saris, the customer service rep quickly informed me that nothing was wrong.

“That’s just the way people ride,” she politely informed me.

“It’s hard to imagine my output is going up and down by 40 watts on a flat road,” I said.

“Try decreasing the sampling,” she suggested, which basically means I had to decrease the frequency with which the CPU provides readings. So I moved it up from 1 to 10. Now my readings, on a flat road while trying to hold it steady, look more like this:

168
177
162
178
180
175
166
170

That’s the kind of variance I can live with as, after having ridden with this thing for a week now, I’ve learned that a 10 or 20 watt difference in perceived effort is extremely negligible and I say all that to say, this thing is INCREDIBLY ACCURATE.

You know how every person you meet who has a power meter never fails to say, “It’s SO much more accurate than heart rate?” Well, we all say that because it’s so goddam true, so I’m here to tell you, “Power meters are SO much more accurate than heart rate monitors.”

Yet all that accuracy comes at a price. Granted, the Powertap was a gift and it came with the complete gift, but this bad-boy, the Comp wired model, cost almost $700, which, in this economy, is a pretty hefty price tag.

Apart from all that boring bullshit, take a look at some of these pics from last Saturday’s race in Central Park. Is it me or does Lester somehow manage to get into every goddam picture from every goddam race? Is his wife the woman behind the camera? I mean, this guy is all over the Internet!







Finally, is this guy spitting or is that a snotshot?

Thomas Voeckler = Stupid Douchebag

Is it me, or is this guy the biggest douchebag in the sport of professional cycling?



It’s not just me. I’ve been watching the Giro almost every day since the race started a few weeks ago and based on the calls I’ve made, the emails I’ve sent, and the people with whom I’ve conferred on a daily basis all agree that Thomas Voeckler is, indeed, the biggest douchebag in all of professional cycling.

For starters, he looks like a pre-pubescent adolescent still trying to determine the direction of his sexuality. I’d be willing to bet Voeckler doesn’t spend all that much time holding a shaving razor to his face although I would be willing to bet that French son-of-a-bitch spends an inordinate amount of time in front of the mirror working on his “I’m going on the attack with 3K to go” grimace. And if you’re unsure which grimace I’m referring to, this is the one:



Looks a bit rehearsed, doesn’t it? If you’re going to grimace when you ride, you might as well make sure it’s authentic, like this guy:



That’s what brings me to this post. As stated, I’ve been watching the Giro pretty much every day and guess who jumps from the front of the peloton with a few kilometers left in most of the flat stages?

Douchebag Thomas Voeckler.

Imagine you’re part of Mark Cavendish’s lead-out train. You’re at the front with 5K to go, you’ve got your hands in the drops, your SRM is reading somewhere in the range of 400 - 600 watts, and you’re thinking, “We’ve got this,” when you see a little douchebag of a rider in a bland aqua kit sprinting down the road all on his own. No doubt you’ve seen this before. As a matter of fact, the same little douchebag tried the same thing yesterday and the day before and while he’s been caught EVERY SINGLE TIME he tries this, he’s apparently not the sharpest tool in the shed because, lo and behold, here his is trying it again.

Now I don’t know about you, but if I were pulling along the entire peloton near the end of a race and some little dickhead like Voeckler went off and tried to attack, I’d be pretty pissed off. To me, Voeckler seems like that annoying gnat that just keeps circling your head no matter how many times you try to swat it away. I have to imagine he realizes there’s no way they’re going to let him get away every time he tries one of his inside-10K-dumbass-moves, so perhaps he just does it for the TV exposure back home in France. I can imagine the cycling fan conversation . . .

“Voulez-vous des poo-poo, monseiur. Did you see petit Voeckler ahier--”

“Oui, oui, that petit douchebag. So very stoo-peede, no? Je pense--”

“In-cruh-dee-bla that douchebag still has a job with a team like--”

Lester and An Upgrade to Category 4

So last week, my coach emails me: "You've been on the bike plenty the past few weeks. You should think about upgrading to Category 4."

My immediate response was (in my head), "Are you nuts?" So I wrote back, "I don't know, but if you think it's a good idea, I can request the upgrade from USA Cycling."

My coach responds with, "There isn't much of a fitness difference from Cat 5 to Cat 4," which, to me, is a total bunch of bullsh*t. This guy wants me to upgrade simply so that have a big, heavy-duty guy who can make a hell of a draft to start their lead-out train in the Category 4 races.

Apparently, I'm going to be that guy. How utterly thrilling, but honestly, it is kind of fun to be a part of a strategy to help a team win.

With that said, I applied for the upgrade so I'm now racing the Category 4 field and my first race in Cat 4 was going to happen this morning at the NY Criterium at Floyd Bennett Field. When the alarm went off at 6 AM this morning and I could barely see the building across the street through the window due to all the fog, I immediately got back under the covers. As much as I love riding my bike and as much as I often enjoy racing, I don't get paid to do this stuff. If it's raining and I don't race today, I'll simply race another day. No big deal, so I wasn't about to drag myself out of the apartment and drive all the way to FBF for a potentially wet race.

I bring all this up as, after dinner this evening, I was on Facebook and spotted a friends picture uploads from the foggy race this morning. Take a look at this pic. That's Lester on the left, right? Here--have a look.



That's him, right? Now that I'm in his field (category 4, I'll probably have some fun and see if he wants to try and get into a break with me), I'm looking forward to racing with the guy, or at least sitting in his aftershave-filled draft for as long as possible.

And unfortunately, I don't think Lester won. Here's a picture of the finish, but my friend posted this under the pic:



"Adam Duncan leading the field sprint. I think that Organic rider was lapped and not in it."

Kloden, Coke, Boonen, and the Giro

So how about that Tom Boonen, huh? Busted for using cocaine a second time in a single year? This “hot on the heels” of his third Paris-Roubaix win a few weeks ago.



You know, I’m tempted to say, “Sucker,” although that would be easy, wouldn’t it? It would be easy to just pass judgment on the totally badass dude and say something to he effect of, “God, all that talent and he’s doing coke?”

Like I said, it would be easy to say that, but how many of us actually know the guy? How many of us can say they understand the nuances, pressure, etc., of being a world-class cyclist? The fact of the matter is, the guy gives us what we want. Sure, he’s a cyclist, but he’s also a performer. Did anyone see the 2009 Paris-Roubaix on Versus? Granted, some of Boonen’s main rivals crashed in the last twenty kilometers, but in my opinion (and, as we all know, it’s all about my opinion around here, isn’t it?), that argument doesn’t hold water. Why not? Because Boonen could’ve crashed himself, but he didn’t? The rest of his competitors, who should be just as skilled in bike handling as any professional, hit the deck and not through the fault of any other riders. Thor Hushovd was right there at the end but he slid and crashed, leaving Boonen to solo away to the finish line.

My point? That kid put his head down, went balls-to-the-wall, and gave us the show every single fan wanted to see that day. He obliterated his competition. Every single person reading this page can’t even begin to conceive of riding that hard, for that long, over that kind of terrain, matched up against the best cyclists in the world, and I say all that to say: if the kid wants to blow off a few rails of coke now and again, that’s his freaking business.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem the rest of the world sees it that way. According to the UCI, they don’t give a rat’s ass (as they shouldn’t), but apparently, everybody else does, including Christian Prudhomme (who’s last name I can’t help but hear in my head with this ridiculous French accent, as in PROO-DOHM). The Tour de France director has stated that Boonen will not be invited to the 2009 Tour which, to me, is people just passing judgment.

(I get that there’s the whole “we’ve an image to protect” argument when it comes to something like the Tour and then you get the kids involved, as in, “Well, we need to project the right image to the young cycling fans,” and all that crap, but if you wiped away most of the “image” in this world and everyone and everything showed their true colors, what you’d be left with is something like a 63 / 37 hypocrisy to bullshit ratio.)

Then there’s the Kraut, Andreas Kloden, who has apparently just been named in a doping report, something I found on Velonews last night.



Does this come as a surprise to anyone? This is the guy who’s been a front-runner in the Tour de France almost every year and has ridden for teams that have been doping their riders for freaking years. Like everyone else (except Lance . . . did I say that?), it’s only a matter of time before you get busted if you do shit like that.

Speaking of which, I remember years ago, I put up a post on a recreational cycling message board online, something to the effect of: “Think of it this way. All the guys Lance beat were doping. Is it possible Lance wasn’t doping himself? Sure. Is it likely? NOT REALLY!”

The Lance fans attacked hot and heavy and the one line I remember most clearly was from some yucca out in the middle of nowhere who said, “Obviously, you have no idea what you’re talking about.”

I love how, when threatened, some people drop the idea of debate all together and simply choose to rabidly discredit the other side with insults which, I believe, is kind of how Democrats go about their business . . . D’OH! Just kidding. Well, I’m not really kidding, but that conversation is neither here nor there.

Anyway, Universal Sports has been covering the Giro d’Italia. Two whole hours of coverage every single day. Has everybody been keeping up with this? Has everyone been watching the two former dopers, Ivan Basso and Danilo DiLuca, tearing things up on the first two mountain stages? I wonder if they’re still doping. Hmm, I wonder just how they go so fast uphill for so long, especially when you see powerhouses like Jens Voigt getting dropped on those same hills. If anything, I guess it should tell us that one can be competitive in professional cycling without having to stick a needle in your ass, just not in the mountains.

Is That Lester? The Crazy Polish Guy?

The other day, I was updating the Jim Boyd points page on CRCA.net when I spotted this name on the bottom of the list for the B Field. Check it out. (If you can't see the name on the bottom of the list clearly, just click on the picture and it'll expand.)



I think it was last summer that I bumped into Lester in Central Park. I even wrote a quick post about it and you can read about that here. So again, when I saw that Polish-looking name on the bottom of the list, I thought, "You know, that might be crazy Lester from Staten Island."

With that tucked away in the back of my head, I was online last night checking results and pics from the recent Jiminy Peak road race and, sure enough, I find this which, to me, looks a lot like Lester, doesn't it?



Am I right or am I wrong? I was sitting here thinking, "That's gotta be him."

A little further down the page, I see another pic, but the guy's not riding Lester's usual yellow Trek. Anyone know if Lester upgraded to this blue machine?



Further, it's hard for me to tell if it actually is Lester from this photo considering (a) I usually only see him from behind (which means I smell him more than I see him with all that aftershave), and (b) this guy's in the small chainring. When was the last time you saw Lester in the small chainring?

Finally, on the bottom of the page, I found a final picture that might be Lester yet considering the paragraph immediately above this one, I just can't tell if it's actually him.



I mean, that's him, right? Can someone let me know?