Monday, November 26, 2007

 

The One That Got Away

Friday - The Fast Friday ride, like Crit training. A bit more structured than the old days around Tuskawilla, but still edge of your saddle fun. That is until TurboTodd went down. A skilled landing saved a bunch of skin.


It's a dangerous game we play out there people, respect it - your riding partners will thank you.


Saturday - the 42 mile Lakemont Road Race. Time didn't permit me to go with the longer group. Have to do it next time. Florida Road is still a drag race, and the speed didn't end there.




Sunday - Planned on broadening my horizons by heading up to Lake Mary for the Seminole Cyclists ride. Printed up some maps. Left in the dark. That Blackburn Quadrant headlight looks a bit like an old Flash Gordon ray gun, but works nice. 4 LEDS, and you can set it to have 2 blinking and 2 on steady.





Somehow got the info wrong as to the start location. Was at Lake Mary Cycles, but no one else was. Oh well.




Went on to ride the loop anyway, then saw the correct start locale at the Coffee Shop. I'll know for next time. The loop is around a big Lake, so no place to shortcut and catch anyone, but I tried anyway. Real loop in blue, my wanderings in red.











Saw some orange road hickies that seemed to keep me on track.



Wrong way? or WAY wrong? Either way, better turn around.






Beautiful day to ride, and a real nice loop - long wide open roads with big shoulders.








Took a short off road detour 2 miles from the end and paid the price with a flat.








Was another great trip down here, the weather was ideal, but I missed the Einstein's Bagels. I'll get some at Christmas .....

RideOn,

JB

Thursday, November 22, 2007

 

ThanksGiving

Happy Thanksgiving to all.

A day to sit back, ponder the year gone by, and look forward to the year ahead.

A few of the things I'm thankful for :
Speaking of which .......

I got out at 0-dark hundred to meet the Lakemont groups.








Saw a nice sunrise








Had a nice 4+hour ride with 30-40 cycling buddies, including one national champ (WTG Cori)










Dave has a new bike, and don't think for a minute you can drop him on it. It's not often you see a seat post longer than a top tube, or a wheel diameter that is 25% of the riders inseam.







Of course one "funny" bike seems to attract others



Well, the bird is almost done, and it smells

goooooooooooooood




Hope you made some room for lots of turkey by getting a nice



RideOn



JB



Monday, November 19, 2007

 

The 18 hrs of Boy Scout's Honor 2007

Once again the overall feel and vibe of the race was incredible. Huge props to CEd, Jodi, and the whole Cobblestone crew for keeping a good thing going, and making it better and better every year. If you enjoy MTBing, and haven't done this event, you're really missing out.





The conditions were dark and cold at the 6PM start. Ed led us around the prologue on the sweet 69er he'd just built and we were off. All endurance MTBraces should take a cue from this race and eliminate the dreaded LeMans start. Sure there were minor log jams here and there, but it gets the fastest cyclists (not the fastest runners) into the single track first.






Shawn Tevendale (Trek/VW) led the solo division for much of the race with Charles Clarkson (Ellsworth) close behind. Clarkson took the lead in the wee hours of the morning only to succomb to numb fingers and toes and a brief bout of blurred vision. The temps just before dawn were in the VERY low 30's.









While Clarkson (-->) was resting and recovering he was passed by Kevin Cox (Natures Path/3Sports) who held on for second place.







Clarkson went back out to solidify his 3rd place while Eric Alger (EVMA) (<--) finished 12 laps just before the cut off time for 4th place solo.


Check Dave Swager's site for some nice photos



Jared Nieters was there with a strong Haymarket Bike (-->) team to win the 4 man Expert/Pro division, but not without a strong fight by local favorites Yoda/Lama (<--) ....














Team Arsenal did what they do, and set a strong consistant pace that wasn't to be matched in the Dou Expert division. Fernando and Robert (NCVC) (--->) were close enough to keep them looking back and took second.





Of course these results are what I saw and totally unofficial!...

As far as my race - It can be summed up by this and this. More details later.

RideOn

JB

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

 

Whooped

OK, I'll be the first to admit that Monday night's Velocity training session kicked my butttttttox.


The "Dirty Thirty" they called it.




30 of this

30 of that

30 of the other.

Can't even remember them all, but I'll try :

30 situps
30 chinups
30 pushups
30 dips
30 squat weighted ball throws
30 burpeys <----- tough things they are
30 wall to wall runs (woops only ten of those)
30 sweepers
30 squat weight swingy thingy's
30 or more of me thinkin' "Man this is tough, why am I breathing so hard and sweating so much?"

and a partridge in a pear tree.




Then on the bike 9 hours later for the Tuesday AMers. The first few Tuesday's after Velocity it was a goal to suck wheels and hang on. This Tuesday I thought I'd be feelin' a bit stronger - Until about #15 of the the squat weighted ball throws. My quads were burnin'. I said to the Crazy one thrusting his ball next to me - "So much for a strong ride tomorrow morning."

But the morning came, and I figured may as well give it a go. Took one good tug, then back in the pace line. tRoy took a good hard last pull into the headwind sprintzone, and no one made an effort to get around him. Fine by me.


Up the bridge I really felt the dead legs. AtD (astride leadfork) went up strong w/JDiesel, and gapped the rest of us. I wasn't going to chase up the hill and hoped everyone (or anyone) would come around me . No one did. Eff. Tried hard to reel those 2 in on the downhill side and further down the road. Got the group within 15 feet or so and popped like a cheap balloon. Pulled out just before COX HS. Enough work for the day, I'm supposed to be taperin' anyway.
ed. - been lookin' at that picture since I had it up - Does AtD have 2 big handfulls of brake or WHAT? Heck, without that brake action he'd of come in better than the 3rd he got.



The word is that pre-reg for the (rescheduled) 18 hr is ahead of last year. WoooooHooooo!!!! Almost 30 solos, sure to be some last minute folks too. Temp forecast is for 34-54 degrees. That'll be comfortable (unless you stop!)
RideOn
JB

Saturday, November 10, 2007

 

I've done some pretty silly things before ...

but today's group rides weren't one of them,

I don't think ...............

Temps in the 40's, 10-20 mph north wind,
oh yeah, and RAIN.

Sally and MkMc fix a gashed tire w/cold hard cash.












Austin and I circle back to find the group,












K-Dog pulls a "I'll attack at the regroup" break, and fuels up w/ a moonpie.












Dag tries to direct traffic at the "longest redlight ever"












While a smiling crowd ignores the ominous clouds behind them.











Then the rain came, again, and hard. Couldn't see squadoush. Thanks to Crazy for being sure I got (more than) enough time at the front. Wheel-suckin' took on a whole new meaning. Road spray for hydration.

And to all those that stayed out to finish the loop(s) - I applaude you, but my momma taught me to get in out of the rain ........ The weather probably got better, 'cause it couldn't of gotten much worse.

Even a week long growth of hair couldn't keep the legs warm today.

At least, after a nice hot shower, I can almost feel my toes now.



RideOn

JB





and happy B-Day to JLaw, hope you got your hundy in.

Monday, November 05, 2007

 

The Chill is On

MTB weekend.
Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Yummmmmmm, yum, yum
Hit the 18 hr. course for a pre-ride Saturday. Parking lot was full. Lots of folks enjoying the Sunny cool day. Saw a bunch of the Richmond crew, Phil, Scott, BigD, Susan, AC and more.










Gotta say that when I heard CyclesEd was reversing the course direction for this year's race I was a bit leary. I'm an old, scared rider, and really had grown accustomed to it the original direction. One pre-ride in the mire and muck early this year didn't show me a lot.


After a few day laps, and some more at night, I've gotta say I'm a believer. Really thought this was one of the best layouts anywhere before the direction change. Now after riding it the new way I say it's even better! It's so much fun you can forget how hard you're working.

Props to Ed and crew for even more new (since the postponement) trail work. The new sections eliminate just about all of the gravel road around the start/finish, and really have some flow. One section has the feel of a pump track. A nice little climb into the scoring area lets you know the lap is done, unless of course you have to keep on going .............


Makes me ?!really!??? look forward to 18 hours of pain, agony and delerium ........... I think.



The sun went down and the temps dropped into the 40's FAST. After the day laps on the Epic, I saddled up the Caffiene 29er for the night. Got lights dialed in and such. Still think the Epic will be the bike of choice for the race. The squishy rear end is much kinder to my old back than that non-compliant ALuMinium.


Forgot how much fun night riding is. Not a cloud in the sky. Furry little critters with glowing eyeballs scurrying about. Eiree noises coming out of the Pirate Ship at night. What are those Boy Scouts doin' in there? The loops seemed to go by faster than before. The last 1.5-2 miles will lay a hurtin' to ya after awhile for sure.

Gonna keep the NiteRider MOAB on the bike and the NiteRider Flight on the brain bucket. Try to milk as many minutes out of them as I can. The race will start at 6PM (in the dark), so there will be close to 12 hours of darkness, then 6 hours of daylight.
LED vs. HID --->
Nice to have the LED's as backup.
RideOn
JB

Thursday, November 01, 2007

 

BackBlog

Last weekend - A few cross races, then some spectating/photoging at the TidewaterMTBChallenge. It made for a fun, busy weekend.



The second sweat session at Velocity on Monday night made the group ride on Tuesday (9 hours later) even more of a struggle to get up for. But ya gotta do what ya gotta do. The ride was the first ride of the year started in ~50 degree temps. And it didn't even seem to warm up much as the sun rose. That'll wake ya up in the marning boy!


The Velocity session was fun(ny), hard, and interesting. I mean, it had to be funny watching an old man (me) trying to learn to jump rope. Glad there's no video on that. I'm learnin' and and am looking forward to doing it again next week. Not quite ready to buy my own rope yet. (Do they come in carbon fiber?) Then some Burpy (sp?) intervals. Another new trick. Not really any post workout soreness to speak of, especially compared to last week. But definitely no snap on the ride Tuesday.





TideWater Mountain Bike Challenge

The TMBC is, imho, one of the premier MB events around. The whole vibe is as laid back as it gets. Lots of spectators on lawn chairs with coolers. Nice tent set up by the Casey folks with a loud cheering section including fans doing the wave. It was the first real MTB race I ever did 3 years ago. I won't miss it next year. I mean cross is fun, but not quite like this. Sure the pros are serious, it's what they do. But the vast majority of folks are out there to have a good time, get some big air, then yell and scream for everyone else. KUDOS to Steve Nevins and crew for keepin' the dream alive.

Some highlights :

The incredible HULK.











Big Daddy - lookin' good and, in his own words, "feelin' pretty". 4Sure







His wife - in her first TMBC - lookin' good AND pretty. Have to say I told ya so ........










The TriPower crew.











Also props to the only guy I saw that did the double - Bryan Park Cross AND the TMBC.



More cross reports later, tater

RideOn

JB

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