Velochallenge

Like most cyclist I’ve moved into my winter training phase of my cycling. My team have begun their normal winter routine training on the rollers, down at the BINGO hall. And for all of you whiners out there not feeling up to snuff, here’s a PepTalk from our favorite Quarterback Peyton Manning.

Happy Gobble Day! Don’t eat too much of those pumpkin and peacan pies. Wait if your a Cat B please do, eat as much as you can stuff down your throat. That way I have a chance of a decent placing at the USGP in Portland next week.

I’m down in San Francisco, visiting family and will hopefully be going out for a nice ride tomorrow. Did a little research to map out a ride and of course bike shops. And I think I hit a mother load, found American Cyclery which not only has one shop but two and their right across from each other. Looks like the are dedicated to the fixie/trackoholic. I simply can not wait to go there. Hmmm….fixie!

We found out on friday that we’re having a baby boy. I’ts our first child and we are both so excited. This weekend we decided to forgo the cross racing and began going out and purchasing lots of boy clothes and looking at all the baby stuff. I thought there were alot of gadgets and stuff for cycling, baby shopping is a whole other beast. From the strollers to the high tech monitoring devices there is a multitude of stuff to purchase.

So as any good father the first things I asked the store clerk was if those strollers come with carbon wheels? I’m sure that will knock off 1-2lbs and I’m already scoping out those tri-cycles as well!

I can’t believe it, road racing season’s only three months away. What better way to start it off then the “Tour of California.” This years tour looks to add some additional climbing pain to the mix with a couple of new 4000 ft climbs.

The 2008 Tour of California will highlight 12 cities during its eight-day, 650-mile race. Slated to start on Feb. 17 with the prologue at Stanford University, in Palo Alto, and ending a week later in Pasadena.

My favorite will be Stages 1 and 2 of the race, which are the same as last years. Both are again likely to end in mass sprints. Wow, mass sprints! You don’t get that in cyclocross.

Today’s crosscrusade race was at Estacada Timber Park, and what a wham packed day of racing. If you didn’t know this was the “unofficial singlespeed world championship.” For me, however, it was a pretty anti-climatic day of racing; I finished a little below mid-pack today but I’m satisfied with my result. A crash and a broken shifting cable-housing sent me borrowing a team mates bike from the pits and scrambling to regain any ground on my competition. Thats cross racing
Well it’s been a rather rough cyclocross season so far for me. That isn’t to say I haven’t done well I’ve managed to do well for myself with a few mid place finishes. Not bad for a roadie/trackie trying cyclocross for the first time this season. It hasn’t been easy, I’ve had to battle my way back from mid-pack/back-of-the-pack almost every race so far. Why? Mechanicals mostly. Dropped chains, flat tires, crashes…it’s been one of those seasons. Slowly, learning how to setup my bike specific for cross. Interestingly, I’m beginning to understand this suffering concept in cyclocross. As the season’s progressed I’ve found that I’ve been able to either slowly fight my way back up through the pack or fight where I’m currently positioned rather than call it a day. But this is what cyclocross racing is all about - suffering. If you can suffer more than the others, you have a very good chance of winning. Unlike mountain bike racing or road racing, cyclocross definitely requires (if you want to do well that is) that you leave EVERYTHING at the finish. Though it is my first season and I am learning there’s always that part of me that can’t stop thinking how I could have, should have, may have been able to go that much faster, push it that much harder. Oh well, there is always next year, right?