Cowbell

Really cool race. They didn't make us run therefore earning my eternal gratitude. The day was super hot. I think the high was around 94. I actually felt really good before the race. Peppy even.

The race got started at 10 and everything was going well. I was holding back a little. I didn't wanna blow up in the heat. About halfway through the lap I heard a banging noise. I looked down and noticed that my bottle cage was flopping around and that there was a nice big hole where part of it used to be connected to my frame. Uh-Oh. I pulled the bottle out and stuck it in my jersey then tried to reposistion the cage. Thats when the other bolt ripped out. Now I had 2 rather large holes in my frame. Both water bottle mounts had come completely out. I stuck the cage in my camel back and rode the rest of the lap. I'm not any kind of expert on frame integrity whatsoever. All I could think of was all the stories I'd heard of people's frames breaking after they'd drilled holes in them to save weight. I kept thinking I could feel the frame flex while I rode. I got back to my pit madder than hell. I was convinced that my racing and riding where done for a few months at least. I packed up and headed home. Went to the bike shop and asked the mechanic about it. He then informed me that I could just put some electrical tape over the wholes to keep the water out and it would be fine. WHAT????? I then spent the next few days kicking myself in the ass. I'm an idiot. later.

Obligatory " more cowbell" refernce here

Off to Charlotte. Good luck to TD, Danielle, Jason the soiled chammy, and everybody else who is racing this weekend.

zzzzzzz

After much heated internal debate I decided against another long monster ride this close to Cowbell. I went out for a 2 hour spin this mornin with a few hard intervals thrown in just to wake the legs up a little. I'll do a few more easy rides this week and then Friday it's off to Charlotte for pre-ride and all that fun stuff. I'm thinking about turning the AC off and the heat up just to get used to the heat. J/K..the girlfriend would kill me.

Later yall.

Trashed and scattered...

..but not in a bad day. Legs are full of that good tired feeling that means yesterdays ride was a good one. Got in a little over 7 hours. Only 8 more days until Cowbell so I should probably start resting a little. Problem is...I'm off Monday also. I'm going to honestly try not to go out and ride all day but no promises. BAH!!!! Who am I kidding? I will and I know it. Oh well.....tis the season. :-)

Checklist

Bike-check
6 bottles of carbo plus/gator ade mix-check
Camelback-check
Helmet,shoes and sweet glasses-check
Tools and other needed items-check
ipod fully charged-check
rain jacket-check
assorted clif bars and clif shots-check
Day off-check
Off the charts level of giddyness about spending the next 6-8 hours riding my bike in the woods-CHECK!!!!!

later folks

Approaching liftoff....

..for the next race of the year. All signs are pointing towards it being really,really hot. I honestly don't mind the heat. When I lived in florida I used to actually enjoy riding in the midday heat. Of course, since moving here I've become a bit more of a hot weather wimp. As long as I stay hydrated and take my freaking electrolyte pills I should be ok though. I'm looking forward to this race for a few different reasons.

1. It's for a really good cause. It benefits The Lance Armstrong Foundation. Anything that helps raise money to cure cancer needs to be supported big time.

2. Lets me put some hard race miles in my legs before ORAMM.

3. I've never ridden the trails at the National Whitewater Center before. Any chance to ride new trails is a good thing to me

4. A chance to put the "lessons" learned from Burn to use.

Good luck to Bonnie and Danielle at Lumberjack this weekend. Also good luck to everybody else who is racing this weekend. Later yall.

P.S. Anybody who feels the urge to give me some hints about what the trails are like for Cowbell feel free.

I need to win the lottery

Work is killing me. We've had 3 people quit over the last week and the workload has almost doubled for everybody. I try not to let this kind of stuff get to me and just accept it as part of life but every now and then I want to scream. OK...maybe not scream but at least throw stuff and curse.

Anyway. Only 12 more days to Cowbell and only 41 more days to ORAMM. ORAMM is my "big race" every year. It's the race that got me on this endurance biking kick and well..it's just a blast. Todd(the promoter) makes it super fun and really,really hard. It's about 65 miles long with around 11,000 feet of vertical gain. If any of you guys and gals happen to be in the WNC area on July 22nd I highly reccomend you sign up and go for it.

Well, time to get to the grind. Hope everybody has a great day.

Still here

Sorry. It's been awhile since the last post. I haven't been feeling well and have been dealing with some bike issues. It's an older bike and it seems that whenever I get one thing fixed something else goes. Ah well. I've still been able to get some good rides in getting ready for Cowbell. I've been focusing on doing tempo intervals. Trying to up my sustainable power.

Other than that it's been work,work,work. Thank God for long summer days.

Hope everybody is having a great week and doing well. Later folks.