Where is Spring?

I have no idea who's ass this is but all I can say is "ow," and "wow..."

All joking aside, seems a bunch of male readers/browsers/phantom blog lurkers had a lot of funny comments about the "big cock" picture on my previous post. It's a chicken, boys. Friggin' gutterbrains :).

What have I been listening to lately? Here's a brief smattering....so much music, so little time...

Life on a Chain - Peter Yorn
Drop Dead Legs - Van Halen
Punkrocker - The Teddybears (feat. Iggy Pop) - thanks to Kristin for that one...
This is a Call - Foo Fighters
Don't Change - INXS
Top Floor, Bottom Buzzer - Morphine
Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is - Jet
Where are We Runnin'? - Lenny Kravitz
Mrs. Robinson - The Lemonheads
Jerk it Out - Caesars
Sunshine of Your Love - Cream
When the Levee Breaks - Led Zeppelin
Cult of Personality - Living Color
Fire Woman - The Cult
The Only One I Know - Charlatans UK
London Calling - The Clash
The Healer - John Lee Hooker
They're Blind - The Replacements
It Can Happen - Yes
Take Me to the River - Talking Heads
Out in the Cold - Tom Petty
Given to Fly - PJ
Set Me Free - Velvet Revolver
Found Out About You - Gin Blossoms
Rush - Big Audio Dynamite
Last Night - The Strokes
Highwire Days - Psychedelic Furs
Someone's Calling - Modern English
Seven Nation Army - The White Stripes
MFC - PJ
The Rascal King - Mighty Mighty Bosstones
....finished with Warning Sign by Coldplay. Another one of those I love but can't explain.


I'm racing this weekend - will it ever stop raining?? I was hoping to avoid having to apply embrocation - I don't like getting it all over my hands and stuff. Is anyone out there game to come along and do the application for me? Gutterbrains, you gettin' this? It's definitely a guy's job. Let me know.

Pictures!!

Mary, me and the Robbinsville Chicken

You can find Jessi's spring break pictures by clicking here

Spring Break Observations and Other Things

Winter unicycle training...the new way to develop a monstrous sprint

Now that I've re-entered my pre-spring break life and routine I've had a chance to sort of review my experiences and come up with a list of observations made with regard to the trip, coming home and various other things. Some are funny, some not so much but they're all things that have occurred to me, just the same.

* Drivers in Chicago are still malicious assholes. I was so hoping that wouldn't be the case but I've been disappointed yet again!
* It's still not spring in the Midwest. It might never be.
* My nearly 10 year old Jeep Wrangler can still go above 90mph without incident though I will say that's not something I care to investigate on a regular basis.
* Elite male bike racers can eat ASTOUNDING quantities of food.
* Southwestern North Carolina is an amazing place that demands a return visit at some point.
* Competitive kayakers are freakishly strong and skilled.
* You should try to finish an entire GU before returning the wrapper to your jersey pocket unless you enjoy having annoying stickiness all over your stuff.
* It appears that adult bookstores and ultra-mega super born-again Christian churches can peaceably co-exist as neighbors.
* Fierce melon Gatorade needs to be introduced to southwestern North Carolina.
* There remains a place in this day and age where radio stations are devoted entirely to the broadcast of bluegrass music. I am indeed a music junkie but I can't handle that.
* Descending a mountainside at nearly 50mph provides an intoxicating rush that I cannot duplicate at home. That might be a cool thing to try on a tandem or fixed gear sometime.
* There are still enormous potholes all over the place in Chicago.
* "Oil" by Upton Sinclair is a really fantastic read (yes, I know the title of a book should be underlined but blogger doesn't provide that option).
* If I ingest a massive quantity of Bonine (meclizine) beforehand I can conquer the Tail of the Dragon without feeling like I'm gonna hurl.
* My teammate Kat Clark missed her calling and should be a comedian. She's hysterical.
* A confederate flag can be an appropriate house/trailer warming gift in some instances (like, in North Carolina).
* Did I mention that Chicago drivers are still malicious assholes? They are, just in case you missed that one.

Not much more to share at the moment. I'm taking it easy on the bike for a few days then it's back to work preparing to race. Thanks for reading - it's good to be home even though the weather still sucks.

Last Day, Best Day

Check out the Flag over my bike...oh yeah....
(thanks to Kristin for the photo)

This was our last day of riding here in southwestern North Carolina before heading back to the cold, snowy Midwest. After a long, slow get-up we loaded up the bikes and drove over to Nantahala Outdoor Center (NOC) to spectate at the kayak races before rolling out on a 4+hr ride through the mountains. It was sort of cold in the morning but things warmed up nicely by ride time - enough in fact that I was able to go out with only armwarmers and removed them within 10min. I do indeed have tan lines, thank you very much.

Jessi, Kristin, Kat, Rachel and I rode along the river for a while before heading inland to do the 45ish minute Junaluska climb then back toward NOC on Wayah, up Winding Stairs and back down on 19 to our departure point. Everyone pretty much agreed that this was a most excellent ride - weather was perfect, scenery was fantastic and our route was just long enough. I didn't hit anything close to 50mph but that's okay - I had a good day on the bike and felt like I climbed pretty well, for a 'sprinter,' or whatever I am.

We stopped for an early dinner (I won't divulge what I ate because it was just plain bad and wrong in every way) and headed back to the cabin for showers, a final load of laundry and some relaxation before we leave early tomorrow morning.

Day 6 - Tail of the Dragon

We rolled out a little later this morning to allow time for the air temp to rise. Jessi, Kristin, Kat, Justin and I headed out on a 70mi loop that took us into Fontana Village then down along the Cheoa and Little Tennessee rivers before heading back up into Robbinsville and over Stecoah Gap. It was an amazing route today - we spent a lot of time riding along the river bank just taking in some pretty incredible scenery and enjoying the warm sun on our backs. Not quite a perfect ride but it sure was good.

At one point we rolled into a service station at the base of the Tail of the Dragon, a super tight curvy stretch of Highway 129 that has 318 curves in 11mi. We didn't actually ride on it - that probably would've ranked right up there with the morning commute on Milwaukee Avenue in terms of carnage potential. Given my proclivity for motion sickness it was a wise choice to forego the dragon today, or for that matter, any day.

Tomorrow we'll be heading out to ride after checking out the kayak races on the Nantahala River in the morning. Only one more day of riding to go before we head back to the snowy Midwest on Sunday morning. I hear it's pretty nasty back home - looks to be a week for riding the Frankenbike.

No Sleep = No Legs

After a night of epic insomnia I was feeling puny - we rolled out into (literally) freezing temps with the UW guys who were drilling it from the gun. When I realized what was going on I rolled off the back, content to head over to Cherohala Skyway and up the 10+mi climb to the top by myself. I wasn't feeling the love and it was probably better for me to be alone anyway.

Not too much later I picked up Kristin and Jessi - they'd seen the writing on the wall and knew it was best to take things down a notch and do our own ride. We headed into Robbinsville with a bitter cross/head wind to go along with the cold temps. Had the sun not been shining things would've been just like home!!

We covered a significant amount (10+mi) of rolling terrain before starting the sustained climb up the Cherohala Skyway. Somewhere around 3500ft all the trees began to display a sparkling coat of frost. The wind was vicious around some of the switchbacks and the temps were definitely below freezing. I'd been experiencing some problems with regulating my body temp and was alternately too warm then too cold - just not comfortable. I wasn't able to feel my hands or feet but for the burning sensation of frozen-ness. I looked down at my top tube and noticed something frozen on it then realized it was my own snot and spit. Nasty.

I had a lot of interesting conversations with myself (and the lizard) on that climb and had a good amount of time to think about lots of stuff. Though I did suffer a bit on the way, I certainly paused to look around at the amazing Smoky Mountain landscape that surrounded me. We didn't stay long at the summit - it was really cold up there at approximately 5600ft (give or take 1000ft). I put on another baselayer and headed back down the mountainside. The descent got a little tricky a couple of times with gravel and surface changes but I didn't need to touch the brakes much - the wind made things difficult and I was only able to get up to 46mph for any length of time. At one point we were chased by a dog which made things interesting for a brief moment.

By the time we reached the ranger station just outside Robbinsville I'd been on the bike for about 4.5hr. I'd had quite enough at that point so I put my bike in the ISCorp car and got a ride back to the cabin. We still have 2 more days of riding and I really didn't want to be totally smoked for it.

While I didn't feel super today, it wasn't an entirely bad day on the bike. I've decided that I might dislike climbing as much as I dislike cooking. Dunno - that's a close call. In a sense they're both necessary evils and really - doing stuff that pushes you to explore the limits of your comfort zone is a good thing, right?

Day 4 - Embrocation Anyone?

The plan for today was an easy recovery ride of about 2 hours. The forecast was calling for rain starting at mid-day so we rolled a little early in order to escape the impending precip. Temps were decent - low 60s at ride time but I rode out wearing warmers as I was confident that even a small amount of descending would leave me shivering.

We headed toward Stecoah under cloudy skies and after about 15min of riding it was clear that most of us were overdressed. I started unzipping and peeling off warmers in effort to regulate my body temp to no avail. We got to the base of Stecoah Gap and the rain starting coming DOWN. My gloves, arm and legwarmers were soaked and already in my pockets so I pulled on the rain jacket and we headed back. I would've given anything to have some minty warm embrocation on my legs for the ride back!

So it's more bike cleaning and laundry for today. We've entertained the idea heading into Bryson City later on for some coffee and relaxation but the rain keeps falling and the likelihood of that keeps diminishing. The plan for tomorrow is about 100mi - my legs feel good and I've been climbing well all week so I'm definitely looking forward to it. We'll have a bigger group tomorrow as the Cincinnati contingent will be joining us for at least some of the ride, the UW Madison team will be along, Mary's husband Jay is arriving tonight from Loveland and Kat Clark is coming in for the rest of the week.

Thanks for reading - I think I'll just go put my feet up, read and relax for a while...

Day 3 - Front Side of Wayah Bald

Jessi, Me, Mary and Kristin at the top - before the freezing descent.
Thanks for taking the pic, John.

I could've used my bike cleaning dude after today's ride....We rolled out from Nantahala Outdoor Center under cloudy skies with temps in the upper 40s planning to climb the more gradual side of Wayah Bald. I was feeling good and the ascent went well - I got to the top with Kristin and Mary, two very strong climbers. We waited at the top for the rest of our group and by that point we'd been getting rained on for a good 20min or so. We were soaked, underdressed and getting colder the longer we waited.

We regrouped and started what proved to be a pretty dicey descent. I headed down first and had a few nervous moments through some slick, gravel-filled hairpin turns but got down in one piece and waited at the bottom for everyone. Fortunately there wasn't a lot of traffic on the mountain today - only a few cars and trucks passed me on the way down. This was certainly not a day to attempt a 50mph descent - getting to the bottom without incident was definitely the priority.

We ducked into a gas station at the corner of Wayah and Old Murphy Roads to warm up and made the decision to call for a ride back to Nantahala. Everyone was thoroughly soaked, shivering and really not prepared to ride the remaining 35mi back to our starting point - we didn't bring dry gloves or rain jackets along as the forecast said the rain would hold off until much later in the afternoon. We were retrieved about an hour later at which time I was still wet, shivering and numb - it was actually painful and I was extremely uncomfortable.

It wasn't a bad day on the bike - rather quite a good one for me while we were actually riding. Tomorrow looks to be an easy day and we hope to get out before the rain starts around mid-day. I have photos to post from today's ride but Blogger is still moving slow on photo uploads so I'll get them up at some point later on.

As always, thanks for reading. Now I have to go clean my very dirty bike....

Day 2 - Stecoah Gap

Kristin and I before rolling out

After a long, slow get up this morning, we rolled out from our secluded mountain retreat for an approximately 50mi loop that took us to the top of Stecoah Gap which stands at about 3200ft of elevation. Weather was nearly perfect - upper 50s and sunny with a little wind but nothing too bad. Mary, Kristin, Jessi, Rachel and I shared the work and had a really good day in the saddle. We were sort of tired from yesterday so things stayed pretty mellow except for the descending....I just missed hitting 50mph on the ride down to Robbinsville.

I got sucked into cooking duty this evening so I downed a bottle of Guinness not just to celebrate St. Patrick's Day but also to help me tolerate the abuse that was thrown at me by my teammates. I don't like to cook - I do it rarely and only under duress. Jessi was kind enough to photograph me hard at work in the kitchen, half intoxicated. I am a serious lightweight when it comes to alcohol consumption - so much in fact that I truly am a non-drinker but for the occasional hit. I'll post the pic once Jessi sends it over.

The plan for tomorrow is to climb the front side of Wayah Bald. Mary informed me that we'll have some company on the ride tomorrow - John and Scott from Cincinnati are here!! This is both good and bad - the opportunity to watch man-butt on the ride is always good. The fact that the last time I saw John (back in September) he kept feeding me shots isn't necessarily good...

Thanks for reading - I have to post pictures from today's ride retrospectively as blogger's upload function is painfully slow at the moment.

Day 1 - Wayah Bald - The Steep Way

Heading back to Nantahala Outdoor Center at the end of today's ride

Our loop today departed from the Nantahala Outdoor Center and took us up and down the mountains for a total of 70 miles. When Kristin, Jessi, Rachel, Yvonne and I rolled out a little after 10:30 this morning the sun was shining and the temp was in the mid-50s. I have to admit that I was a little nervous - as we all well know, climbing is not my forte so suffering up the mountains isn't always my favorite thing to do. We ended up spending about 4hr in the saddle and had a really fabulous ride - the scenery isn't breathtaking at this time of year but it's certainly cool to descend at speed on mountain roads that run parallel to rolling rapids and through secluded valleys. I don't miss the buses, cabs and potholes of Chicago at the moment.

I have to extend congrats to Ansgar and Mike for representing in Kenosha today - Ansgar won and Mike finished 5th in the 40+ race. I don't recall how they finished in the 30+ race at the moment but I'll update this post when I get that info. Nice job guys!!

Spring Break - I am SO Outta Here

It's a good thing racing season is right around the corner - these photo-less blog posts are boring!! The temp around here finally broke 50 yesterday, just in time for me to leave town for some training in the Asheville, NC area. I've not ever been to Asheville so I'm excited at the opportunity to get in some good miles, chill with my teammates and (ugh) do some climbing. Climbing - not my forte. I have a complex relationship with climbing - I don't dislike it, but I'm not very good at it so it pains and annoys me. Longer, sustained climbing isn't all that bad - I just hang there at functional threshold power and grind. It's the short, steep stuff that kills me - Chicago is flatter than flat so finding places to work on kicker hills is challenging, to understate the obvious.

I'm always amused by my teammates gear selection for climbing:

Debbie: "So Jessi, what are you running for the hills today?"
Jessi: "Oh, I have an 11/23. I really only need an 11/21 but the 23 was all I had laying around."
Debbie (feeling ill): "Yeah, I have the 12/27 just in case I need the bail-out gear."
Jessi: "Really? I was thinking we could just big-ring the whole thing."
Debbie: "God - I wish this bike had the compact crank on it."
Jessi: "Aw, you'll be fine. It'll just hurt a lot and at some point you'll wish you were dead. Don't worry - we'll wait for you at the top, maybe."

Ah yes - lots of love right there.

I have to actually drive to the thriving central Illinois metropolis of Champaign-Urbana so I made a special playlist to make the Jeep time tolerable. I do not particularly enjoy driving (at all) so having decent music is about the only thing that makes it survivable. You'll notice that this one is decidedly dominated by classic rock - definitely my favorite genre.

Fortune Teller - Robert Plant
Psycho Killer - Talking Heads
Hang Fire - Rolling Stones
Sweet Emotion - Aerosmith
Four Sticks - Led Zeppelin
Stranglehold - Ted Nugent
Cold Shot - Stevie Ray Vaughn
Little Wing - Jimi Hendrix
Crosstown Traffic - Jimi Hendrix
Sunshine of Your Love - Cream
Rebel Rebel - David Bowie
Free Bird - Lynyrd Skynyrd
Invisible Sun - The Police
Mary Jane's Last Dance - Tom Petty
Do You Feel Like We Do - Peter Frampton (live, of course)
I Feel Free - Cream
Blues Before and After - The Smithereens
Black Dog - Led Zeppelin
Comfortably Numb - Pink Floyd
Eminence Front - The Who
No Quarter - Led Zeppelin
Should I Stay or Should I Go? - The Clash
Jeremy - PJ
Run for the Hills - Iron Maiden
It Can Happen - Yes
Working Man - Rush
Life During Wartime - Talking Heads
Don't Fear the Reaper - Blue Oyster Cult
Don't Look Back - Boston
Riders on the Storm - The Doors
Pump it Up -Elvis Costello
Cocaine - Eric Clapton
Rocky Mountain Way - Joe Walsh
Let My Love Open the Door - Pete Townshend

There's more but I think you get the idea.

Anyway, I'll try to check in from Asheville and post pictures and commentary as I am able. It's my understanding that while we do have wi-fi in our mountain retreat the signal isn't consistently good.

Thanks for reading - try to get outside and do something illegal while the weather is nice at home (it can be very liberating to blow a stop sign and not be caught or crashed...). I'll see you in a week or so.

And So It Begins.....

The 2008 season 'officially' began for me this morning in Kenosha, WI - I did the Masters 40/49 (yes, with the men) criterium held courtesy of Kenosha Velosport in an industrial park off Hwy 158. I'd have to say that air temp at race time (10am) was maybe 20 degrees. Maybe. But that's just a sidenote to an otherwise truly Midwest too-early season race. There wasn't much wind, just a little bit coming off the lake and right in your face between turns 3 and 4 which made for a nice cross/head wind on the back stretch. It wasn't a hateful wind but I made sure to keep my nose out of it.

Let me tell you a little about the course....pretty much flat 1 mile loop with various "hazards" to negotiate - I have to give credit to the American Bicycle Racing crew and Kenosha Velosport for doing what they could to make the course race-able. Some of the snow had melted so what water had found it's way to the pavement was frozen in a few areas that were nicely marked with some orange traffic cones. Then there were a few other icy patches that were large enough that there was just no need for traffic cones... There were lots of bumpy stretches with dicey pavment seams and most of the smaller potholes had been filled. Gravel and debris were out in force in all the corners and the larger potholes were covered with cut-to-fit pieces of plywood and held in place with duct tape. I'm not kidding. You better believe there were guys running those things over every lap.

Things got off to a reasonable start and after a few laps some hard attacks starting happening, though nothing that really hurt me much. Right after closing down a gap on the right side of the road a hard attack went up the left side. I saw that MetLifeGuy was on it so I sat in and let it go. With a hard effort I probably could've gotten over too but staying with those guys would've been supremely difficult - they're a bunch of friggin' beasts and I'd have likely gotten spit out sooner or later. Turned out the break held and MetLifeGuy ended up 3rd in the 40+. Ansgar took the field sprint for 4th and I was close behind taking 5th. In retrospect I should have registered and also done the 30+ race that followed. In that race the guys did a fine job of representing again with MetLifeGuy getting into a late break good enough for 4th and Ansgar again taking the field sprint.

It ultimately turned out to be a good day, even with the freezing coldness and course "features." Next time I'll be sure to do two races - I'm not remotely tired today and I can surely use the work.

Thanks for reading. 4 more days to NC....

Could it Be??

I leave for NC in 7 days and yep - the weather here still sucks something terrible so my departure can't arrive soon enough. It's a downright balmy 15 degrees at post time and the wind chill has got to be in the single digits. So it's another day for the rollers - could it be the last day of dedicated indoor training for the winter of 2007-08? I sure hope so - based on some of the long term weather forecasts (abc7chicago.com) it appears that things might be turning the corner and I daresay that spring may actually arrive sometime before June. Then again, this is Chicago....

Today's indoor session ended up to be in the 2-2.5 hour range and involved a fair amount of time spent at threshold. "What's threshold?" you ask...well, it's that place where the work is hard enough that you feel somewhat nauseous (so very pleasant) and you suffer a great deal but not so horribly that you'd rather be dead. I like to think of it as "uncomfortably difficult, but not un-doably so." Pre and post ride doppio - a given. Fortunately I had some fierce melon Gatorade on hand today so at least that critical part was covered. I needed some good, hard, angst-driven tunes broken up with more mellow stuff....here's a random sample - I was in an odd mood this morning so if it seems like a weird combination well, it is.

Kashmir - Led Zeppelin

Paint It, Black - Rolling Stones

Walk All Over You - AC/DC

Once - PJ

Hey Man Nice Shot - Filter

Welcome to Paradise - Green Day

You Could Be Mine - Guns 'n Roses

Stop - Jane's Addiction

Pain - Jimmy Eat World

Little Things - Bush

Watch the Tapes - LCD Soundsystem

WMA - PJ

Wrong Way - Sublime

She Sells Sanctuary - The Cult

What Matters - Matthew Sweet

All I Want is You - U2

Fade - Staind

Natural One - Folk Implosion

All Day and All of the Night (Live version) - The Kinks

Breakerfall - PJ

Fall to Pieces - Velvet Revolver

Best of Both Worlds - Van Halen

MIA - Foo Fighters

Wherever I May Roam - Metallica

PDA - Interpol

Girlfriend - Matthew Sweet

Tall Cool One - Robert Plant

Time Bomb - Rancid

Cherub Rock - Smashing Pumpkins

Better Man - PJ

Fool in the Rain - Led Zeppelin

Stay (Far Away So Close) - U2

Truly a weird assortment but it did the job for me this morning. I was feeling mellow so the low key stuff was perfect. What? Me - mellow? Yep. Probably more often than you might think. So begins the mental preparation for tomorrow's training criterium in Kenosha, WI...it's gonna be COLD.

The Morning SpinHeads...A Highly Cerebral Group

Keith, Me, Lindsey, Chad and Marianne - after 30min @ Threshold.

See? I really do teach Spinning on the rollers.

The south end of the room - mind over matter...
Lookin' good McMahon!!

The north end of the room - the legs follow what the mind tells them to do...

Above are a few pics from this morning's 6:30am Spinning class at the Loop gym where I teach and maintain a personal training clientele. The morning group is full of super strong, fit, focused athletes who always work very hard in class - no small task at that hour of the day. I've threatened for a while that that one day I would bring my camera to class - it happened today and I'm sorry to say that poor Bill missed his chance to be a star. Bummer. On the playlist:

Piss it all Away - Puddle of Mudd

Shine it all Around - Robert Plant and the New Sensations

Demolition Man - The Police

Flagpole Sitta - Harvey Danger

Smells Like Teen Spirit - Nirvana
Walk Idiot Walk - The Hives

Kryptonite - 3 Doors Down

World Wide Suicide - PJ

Teen Angst - Cracker

Panama - Van Halen

Blow Up the Outside World - Soundgarden

My intervals will be completed later - I'm not a morning person. I like to say that I can function in the morning but I can't perform. Not sure if it'll be indoors or out - the temp will be agreeable (woo-hoo!! almost 35 degrees!!) but logistics might be difficult given the type of work I need to do today - longer intervals are very difficult to do when you're constantly stopping for traffic signals and other related hazards.

Ugly Bike Love

The Winter Beater - Sporting the Fenders, 28-hole 404s and a Power Meter. Fat.

So I've decided to post a blog entry dedicated entirely to the beast we call the winter beater - but I need your help to make the post a reality. I know that lots of you have a frankenbike - the bike with a mix of mismatched parts that you vaguely remember was pretty high-end back in the day which now sits in storage wishing that you'd ride it (Bill, the LeMond, need I say more?). Is your winter beater a carbon Colnago cross bike with reflective tires, full chrome fenders, 15 lights and an SRM? Or, do you maybe reserve a bike specifically for winter commuting with studded tires that weighs about 40 pounds? Or a single speed Surly Steamroller wrapped with electrical tape and bling'd with a carbon fork? I'm looking for photos to include in the post (to start with anyway) so if you have something cool to share, please send it along.