"Operation Gothic Serpent"

"Irene, I say again Irene........Fucking Irene!"

Sorry......that was all me.....inside information.

But that phrase was the first thing that came to mind as the 20 Guy's riders rolled thru our first lap at Fair Hill this morning. Total different reason then 15 years ago...but still......that was my first thought then I looked ahead/back and saw this green mass snaking it's way thru the trail.

The "pre" ride today was great. We did three laps of the course total (just under 20 miles) and it was beyond sweetness. The first two laps we were smoking it (me being the only "Sport" rider in the lead group of six "Elite" riders) and I was redlining it most the time. The third lap was a nice cool down/regroup.

After the ride was a cool post ride beer/meal/beer at a local watering hole where a few "war stories" were told......all in all a kick ass day in the saddle with the new Team.

Can't wait till we all hook back up next weekend for the MASS team relay.

Procrastination will kill you...

Well it'll kill your ability to do races you REALLY want to do that is.

Even after being forewarned by Jason (from here on out to be known as the Ruler of All things large and small) I keep dragging my feet on signing up for the Leesburg Bakers Dozen.....a race I was REALLY looking forward to. So what happens when you really want something and don't act on it........somebody else takes her home for the night and teaches her new tricks.

Race was capped at 375 riders...and if you can't tell I was not one on them. F*CK!!!!! So hearing that first thing this morning there was only one thing I wanted to do......beat the Hell out of my pedals, so that's just what I did. Went out on the road bike and booked 45 hilly miles at a nice clip....so I'm a little less pist.....but only a little.

Meeting the wife for a Mexican throw down in a few so that should help the blow to the junk some too.

Rumor has it a group from the Guy's team is heading down to Fair Hill to pre ride the race course on Sunday. Sounds like the 29er is gonna get it's first true run thru.

Gear and gears..

Trying to get back in the grove after Easter....Something about eating poorly makes me want to just keep on eating poorly, same thing goes for eating clean. I guess I'm kind of like a Fluff girl, once I start something I do it till I get my fill.....(if you don't get that last comment...good) let's just move on now.

I met up with GirlWonder on Monday for "her last day of Spring Break road ride." It's about time, the kids not been in school this month......really. But she brought me a muffin from my fav bakery...so no matter what it was gonna be a good ride knowing what was waiting for me.

Lastnight Bikewrench and I did a road ride from Perkasie, where we headed over to Green Lane for a great two hour hilly ride that ended up being right at 30 miles. This is the same area that the Cyclosportif runs later this year....looking forward to making up for my "mechanical" I had last year. Nothing like throwing a chain while being in a 20 person break (Landis being one of them)....."goodbye everybody." Ended up finishing seven f*cking minutes back.....can you tell I'm still a little pist?

But today was the first ride of the "chunky girl"....that's what I'm calling the still over weight 29er. All the parts are pimped out.....just waiting on the wheel set......STILL. Just hope they get here by the first MASS race. But the girl was SWEET, even thou the rider was a bit rusty. I need to start changing from the road to the dirt before it's to late. Training on the road is great for endurance/speed/power, but it's not mountain biking.

So that's the "gears" part, now on to the "gear."

Thermal jacket

Team Kit

Sorry, I did not feel like modeling today......I need to shave first (and shave is an under statement) it'd be like a Ewok in spandex.

Now go ride your bike...

Happy Easter....

Other then family (which wifey and I have none within 1500 miles----luckily) and church (which if either wifey or I walked in you'd see a little spontaneous combustion happening) Easter makes me think of one thing....

But my little candy coated pieces of joy had to wait till after a ride. So with that joy in mind I headed over to BikeWrench's house for a road ride. We headed out of Doylestown and down to the river where we meet up with Girlwonder. The three of us rolled up north for an hour, hit up a coffee shop for a bit then turned towards the casa. In all we knocked down 35 miles at a pretty casual pace. Probably the last non recovery tame ride for a while, time to start kicking the speed up.

So the Team meeting/party was a blast lastnight. Meet my new MTB team coordinator and talked over a couple different plans for the year....so I think I have my plan for the year.....I think. Also picked up my kits......pretty sweet looking. I'll take some pictures tonight and get them up tomorrow.

Now since it's Easter and all, I'll do a little confession. The whole "coleslaw wrestling' thing yesterday came to mind very easy for a reason.....yes, I've been to one.....

ok, more then one. What can I say, I grew up in Daytona Beach......it's a Bike Week thing.

For give me Father for I have sinned........ALOT......now give me the mini eggs and nobody gets hurt.

Riding and ridin

Been a couple good days "riding."

Yesterday I meet up with Girlwonder (aka KarateMonkey--long story)


for a nice little ride over into Jersey. We tried the best we could to stay out of the 20-25 mph wind and we knocked out 35 miles at a nice tempo.

We had a cold front roll thru lastnight and they were calling for snow/rain this morning. But we lucked out and only had a dusting that cleared out early. So I meet up with Gary at 10 for nice loop with lots of climbing, in all we threw down another 35 miles. Rollin back into Doylestown we cut thru a little group of houses, and what did we see? (now for the ridin) About 100 meters up I see two guys just hanging out on the sidewalk drinking beer (not a problem) till I look over at what they're watching. About ten yards away (guessing in dudes A's front yard) two dogs are going to town.....and by going to town I mean GOING TO TOWN.

Just seamed very odd to us, I mean it took us 30-45 seconds to ride up and by......and dudes were just having a good old time watching the show. Not sure if they were looking for pointers or what, but they were glued to it like it was a Monster truck pull or if it was there sister coleslaw wrestling.

Welcome to Pennsyltucky.

The wife and I are getting ready to head out for my team party.....pretty pumped up about it. Time for some beers, race/training planning, beers and in general hanging out and meeting the new team. Oh yeah, the gear too....Team John Deer here I come.

Nuun for you, none for me....

The none for "me" is on the ride front.....let's just say this boy is not gonna go outside and play with winds of 30 plus mph. No, no, no..............NO!

But now to the "you" part of the Nuun....yeah, what can I say....I'm a people person (nothing could be further from the truth by the way....I like doing 12 hour endurance races, SOLO...you figure it out) but we'll move on.

My stash of Nuun tab's came in the mail the other day:
I got a eight tube box of the Tri-Berry and a single tube of the Kona Cola (should last me till mid year.) I've been using the Tri-Berry the past two weeks on rides and I really like it. I've found it's gonna be the perfect thing for shorter training rides/road crits and hopefully anything falling into that 60-90 minute riding/training window.

I've spent a good part of this past winter working on my nutrition on the bike, and I think I'm pretty much got it pegged....knock on wood. I've known that I never really need any nutrition for these shorter (60-90 minutes....afterwards yes, during no) but I also know that I still needed to drink (and I hate hydration....can't count the times I've gone out and never taken drink one.)

But this is where the Nuun came/comes in. The favor is light but refreshing and I truly enjoy drinking it. Not to mention all the electrolytes it has packed in it, that are perfect for these shorter rides where you don't need all the carb's you'd get with other carb based electrolyte replacement drinks.

On a side note:

When I was doing the search for Nuun images on Google this came up...

.....not complaining, just not sure why.

Shades of Pink

Wifey got a much need boost yesterday (been a pretty busy girl) when she came home to see she got a little UPS delivery love herself.

Her Twin Six "School Girl" jersey came in the mail yesterday........

I'm not sure which one of us like it more....granted, it was for different reasons.

So also got her new Giro Atmos yesterday too......

Was a pretty good day for the little lady......and yeah, she has a pink thing kicking this year.

And on the riding front. I got out with GirlWonder yesterday (she's back from her two weeks down in the Virgin Islands) so needless to say she wanted to take it easy. But we still put in a good 40 mile spin. Today I want to get outside before the weather turned south (we've got rain coming for the next 2-3 days) so I went out solo and knocked out a nice little 35 mile loop.

This Saturday night I get to meet my new race team. We're having a little get together at a bar/pub here in the Philly area. It's part meet/greet and part planning out the race year, but we also get our new kits (so I can stop being the man in black.)

Either way I'm pretty pumped about meeting everybody......let's get the puppy started.

Let the Pimpin begin.

So with the rain rollin thru this morning the phone was beeping with text messages on people bailing on the AM road ride.....thank God. For some reason I was not in the mood to ride today...... so with that being said I sent my BikeWrench a message if he was free to "rebuild" the 29er (aka Fatgirl.) Less then an hour later I was at his place unloading said Fatgirl and her new upgrades.

After shooting the shit for an hour we planned a road ride for tomorrow and I headed home to meet the wife for lunch and more importantly BEER! I met said wife and we have said beer.....and nachos........then I get a text. It's BikeWrench asking if I'd be home in an hour...."f*ck yeah."

An hour later he shows up with this..
and the 29er was sitting just under two pounds lighter. Damn I can't wait till those wheels get here. I've got the XTR cassette and tires just waiting for those girls to show up.

I feel like a 13 year old boy waiting on his first date.

Ridin and lovin...

Don't worry, I'll keep this PG-13.....well, unless pimpin bike parts do it for ya. If that's the case you may want to clear everyone out of the room.

But first a little ridin..........what!.....I had to tease first......that's how I roll, just ask the wife.

So Wednesday's long ride was cut a little short (something to do with the 25 mph winds) but Gary and I still knocked out a little over 50 miles. I think 45 of those were both uphill and into the wind. That would explain why my legs felt like complete crap yesterday....so yesterday was a day out of the saddle....thank God.

But with the weather being in question this weekend I wanted to get out today for some miles. I went out solo and put in 30 miles on road.....and as I came rolling back into the driveway Miss UPS was doing a little drop off.

Well.....knowing what was in the box itself that's how she looked anyway. Now on to the lovin...

In the box of love we had the following:

XTR cranks, front derailleur and rear cassette

SRAM XO trigger shifters and rear derailleur

Avid Juicy Ultimate front/rear brakes

Ergon GX1 grips

Throw all that with the carbon handlebar/seatpost and Maxxis Ignitors that came over the past couple of days.........I think I need to be left alone for a minute.

Ok..........that did not take long......again, ask the wife. But one thing I'm really pumped on trying out is the grips.

I've rode a buddies bike that had the GP1's and really liked them. They were just a little to big for my hands, so these being a little smaller....we could have hand happiness.

Now go ride....I need to be left alone again.

Gettin my Goth on

That's what today felt like....or maybe the Man in Black ride? But no, it had nothing to do with Johnny....

But for some reason I sported out the door this afternoon wearing all black. It was the first time in the past four years that I was not pimping somebodies kit, and I have to say it did feel a little strange. But I get my new Guys kits next weekend and the TwinSix stuff should not be to far behind.

But for the boy in black ride I pulled the geared CR-1 out of winter hibernation. After rollin on the fixed gear for the past four months it took me half the ride to realize I could stop pedaling and change gears if need be. Was a good quick 30 miles that felt great, but I wanted to keep it short. Tomorrow is going to be a long day in the saddle....more on that if I live thru it.

But after the quickie I got home to find Mr UPS came to visit, looks like the pimpin (weight loss/diet) for the 29er is starting.

The rest of the stuff should be rollin in over the next 3-4 days....big thing now is just waiting on the I9 wheels....then she's off the Kirk for Fat Camp/rebuild.

Now it's time for a little NIN to keep my Goth going on.....

"A little windy"...WTF!

"A little windy"........that's what the weather girl said lastnight and today would be....so I guess her idea of "windy" is not the same as mine. Lastnight we had steady winds of 30-40 mph with gusts over 50, and today it backed down to 20-30 mph with gusts to 40.

So even thou the heavy rains yesterday keep this boy inside, I was not gonna head outside and risk something like this.....

or this happening.....yeah, bad hair.

Ok, fine.....to tell the truth I was more worried about my skirt being blown up then anything else.

Either way this weekend was a outdoor wash. So getting out tomorrow is a MUST...plus a scored a tube of Nuun yesterday that I want to try out. Heard some good things about it....I'll throw in my two cents once I try a bottle.

Other then that the 29er's weight loss is in the works....parts are on the way and hoping to gets her "rebuilt" next weekend. Damn I can't wait.

Should have parts "porn" photos on Wednesday.

The calm before the storm

That's things this week, just chilling and doing a lot of this....

....sitting on my ass, not jumping out of planes (sorry I was scanning in old military pic's and thought it was fitting.) Next week I start to ramp things up for the year, both on miles and speed. I did get out both Monday and Tuesday for a couple easy 25-30 miles spins on the fix gear just to keep things moving and feeling good, but nothing to much to speak of.

I've been looking at parts to put the 29er on a diet too, the I9 wheels should be here in the next week or two so I need to get my butt in gear and find what I want. I need to give Kirk time to "update/rebuild" the girl plus give myself a couple good weeks in the saddle with it before the first dance in April.

With that in mind I've got blue skies, no wind and a temp of 50......off to the fix gear I go.

Short Track practice?

So what do you get when you mix a new bike and WAY to many beers?

Yep, indoor short track racing.........against the dogs.

Luckily I caught my competition off guard at the start and I got the hole shot......

But by lap two the pursuit began.....and I knew I was in trouble.....

Here's where things started to go wrong.....

Over shot the turn.......

Man down! Man down...............
And yeah, it freaking hurt.........side of the island right to the knee cap.

So that was lastnight....but this morning came VERY early......not sure why. Before the beer started I had a fix gear ride planned....so I met up with Kirk and Gary in the AM for ride. Luckily the plan changed from a 40 plus (working ride) to a easy 30 mile roll down to the river for a muffin. And thank God for that, after putting in 100 miles over the last two days on the fixie (and a HEAVY hangover) my body needed just this.

So after all that the wife and I met up for a late lunch/early dinner and yes....beer was apart of the menu again. Just glad tomorrow is the start of the week again....therefore no beer for a few days. But rumor has it the wife may be playing hookie from work tomorrow......sounds like the week may start out very well......

Happy Valentines Day

Yeah, I know it's the first of March....but look at what the wife got me for Valentines Day, just got it built up today......

Sorry for the crappy ass pictures (the cases of beer in the photo are why......well) but here's the new "pig" for next year. Yes, I calling her/it a pig right now.....I know she's sweet as is but she needs to go on a diet. Already have a pair of kick ass Industrynine wheels on order (should be here in a week or two) but she can also drop a few pounds here and there. Already talking to my "parts guy" (Gary) on that one.....it's great to know people in the business.

But other then my new "lady"......(what.....I plan on spending lots of hours on this baby this year) today was a good fix gear ride. I meet up with Gary for a three hour spin (that turned into a four and a half hour epic) ride. But that's what a couple flats, two wrong turns and a 25 plus mph head wind will give you. But we put 50 miles in the books.....not to mention pulling, dragging....and begging Gary home the last ten miles home from the river......uphill.

Tomorrow will make it all worth it.....a nice easy 40ish mile spin up to New Milford for a muffin....oh, I can already taste it. Wait, sorry that's the beer.

Leap Day riding....

Yep, I'm proud to say that today was my best "Leap Day" ride ever......ok fine, it was also my first one too....but does that really matter?
Met up with Gary for a nice hilly three hour tour of the Doylestown/New Hope area on the fix gears. That set things up just right for the wife and I to do the Friday night Mexican throw down.....mmmmmm.

We've got some snow/rain coming thru tonight but I'm hoping to get back outside in the AM after the weather clears out.....then in the afternoon......can't tell you yet, it's a secret.

But I'll have pictures tomorrow night.