Miscellaneous Mexlerwerks

Enjoy the Silence

2011-06-26T20:12:00.000-07:00

What started out as a brief hiatus turned into full-blown blog writer's block. Try as a I did I couldn't get a creative idea substantial enough to be a post to pop in to my noggin. I suppose one could "blame" Twitter, what with it's 140 character forced brevity, but realistically I just was at a loss. The way I look at it Twitter is a Tourette's-like media that in rare instances can be not humorous, and blogs allow for a more long form narrative.
While I don't have the desire, nor you likely the time, for a full blown run down of the goings-on of the last year, I'll try to hit the highlights:
I 'got lost' and got lost on some decent Arizona single track:

Photo cred: me

Pressed for time I zigged when I should have zagged and ended up on the wrong side of the canyon with no daylight and a foggy-at-best memory of where I wanted to be. Given there was no cell coverage (and thus no Google Maps on my phone) I forged ahead where I thought I should go and survived. It was fun.

I raced my MTB:

Photo cred: Jeffrey Jakucyk

I won a few races, didn't win a few races, won the Short Track title in Indiana for the 3rd time in a row, had an all around solid MTB year.

I raced my CX bike:

Photo cred: mountaingoat_99 (flickr)

A semi-nationwide tour saw me in Cincinnati, Louisville, Madison, Chicago, Portland and Bend. Had a really good season for the smaller races but sucked hind tit in the USGPs. That blew.

I put on a CX race: Along with Ryan and Don, I put on BloomingCross 2010. Thanks in no small part to Barry Wicks from Kona Factory Racing, we had about 30% more people attend this year's race. I have to say he is quite simply one of the coolest cats out there. At the USGP following my race, he almost rolled past me when I was warming up but stopped and talked to me for a solid 5 minutes. He easily could have just said "hey" but no, not the coolest cat out there!

I sold my house: I finally sold my house in Columbus which could not have happened any later - you see, after looking at about 15 - 20 less than 'ideal' houses over several weeks I found myself bumping up against current rental house lease expiration. Alas, I found a great house that suits my needs and have signed agreements in place. All that's left is an inspection and signing my life away for the next 30 years. For what it's worth, by 'suits my needs' I mean 'has a 40 foot deep garage'.

With any luck I've got more words percolating in my noodle, so I hope you got to Enjoy the Silence while it lasted.

wait, I mean I hope you were waiting with baited breath while this block passed.

anyway, later.

-the Mexler

World In My Eyes

2010-05-18T20:04:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to post a bunch of pics I've taken over the last few months for some time now, so enjoy.

This is a picture from a ride we did in January where we ended up on Lake Monroe. An by on, I mean ON. The posts you see used to be a 'road' that appeared to be reclaimed by the lake. The thin ice I was standing on tipped me off to that. I turned around.

I've had a long term plan to put a small subwoofer in my car to tighten up the bottom end since, for all their virtues, BMW cannot engineer a car stereo. I think the best attempts were some Harmon/Kardon iterations but they still sounded like muffled garbage.
The challenge here was to install the sub and not lose any storage space since prime directive of the car is to haul bikes and other miscellaneous things that require, uh, space. Putting a big fat cube in the cargo bay is quite antithetic to that whole notion.
Of course, a small sub requires a small amp, which helps with packaging but still takes up space. Being mostly virtuous, it turns out my car has some space where some optional electronic modules would mount. Since said optional modules were not there I opted to install my own. Once the load floor is installed you can't even tell there's an amp in there.

This brings me to the project I started while watching the Super Bowl. As I said, space is at a premium so I decided to mock up a box to check for sizing and installation ease. It worked like a champ because the sub box fit the first time without fuss. Naturally I didn't take any pictures of it after this stage, but I promise I will. The last year or two, any project I work on tends to get 90% done to where it's functional then it sits long enough until I get tired of looking at it not finished. Once I have some spare time I 'll finish upholstering the box and take a few pics so you can see it. Again, I promise.

Bridal Veil Falls - Dupont Forest, NC. If you follow my Twitter feed you saw a pic from here. As I'm sure many (including myself I'm sure) have said, this is where the chase scene from The Last of the Mohicans was filmed. Not ashamed to say that's a good movie. Makes it all the better to see first hand the place where it was filmed.
Oh yeah, this and the next few are from our spring training camp. It was 80 degrees and awesome.

John Rock. Kinda funny because it's not only a rock, but I'm pretty sure I saw a plaque saying the guy's name for which the rock was named was John Rock, like "hey, that's John Rock's rock"
Unfortunately my camera was my phone and autofocus picked the trees on which to focus. Eh, you get the gist.

Beautiful waterfall on the descent down Butter Gap.

"Now it's a ride!" Not sure when, but somewhere on the descent down Black, I did that. As I see it, this is the best kind of cut to have; it doesn't hurt but there's blood so you can say it was a good ride.

Another car project more born out of necessity. The rear windscreen wiper seized on my car, which illustrated to me exactly how much I need a rear windscreen wiper.
I ordered everything to replace except the one part that was really rusted solid so I got to drive around for a week with duct tape on my car to cover the hole it left in case of rain. The edges were cut with scissors, not ragged tears so it looked like it was supposed to be there.

I'm also not ashamed to admit that.

That big ring of rust is not supposed to be there. After 30 minutes of wailing on the spindle with a BFH, I decided to count my lucky starts for not having missed the spindle only to connect with the rear glass, so I had to cut away at the metal bracket from underneath. I guess you could say I'm getting wise in my old age.

I just think this is a neat picture. I suppose its like most pictures from vacations and such in that they remind you of your time spent wherever the pic was taken. In this case, when I left my house to commute from Bloomington to Columbus at 5:30a it was 38 freaking degrees. If my car had been in the garage I would have without a doubt driven in to work, but I drove in to work the day before and ridden home after work, so my car was 45 miles away. Instead, the only option was to man up and ride, so I did. Did a few intervals, too. Parenthetically I don't recommend threshold intervals 60 minutes after waking up.
Anyhoo, along the way, there was much fog and temps were up to around 40, so the leading edges were pelted with water vapor, but not enough to form drops and drip down. The result was that my brake and head tube, along with shins were perfect magnets to collect road dust. On the last 20 min of the ride, once the sun came up, the dust dried to what you see here. Pretty cool, but it didn't matter that night - I still washed my bike.

In other news, as much as I may like the house we're renting, I'm really getting tired of not owning it. The house has a nice layout but there's so much I look at and want to fix/change that it has me longing for another house I can call my own.
Of course, before this happens I need to sell my house in Columbus. This is proving more difficult that I thought. Yeah yeah, economy and housing market blah blah blah, I'm not buying that excuse - there are plenty of houses that are on the market for a freaking week. If they're going that fast people still want houses. From the discussions I've had with my real estate agent I've decided people are just plain stupid. Not dumb - S T U P I D. To decide to buy a house based on the color of the wall, not the brand new furnace that will last the next 20 years completely blows my mind.
Anyway, I need to stop thinking about it. I'm pretty sure this situation has given me the headache I've had for the last 3 days.

So with that, I'm out.

-the Mexler

Sweetest Perfection

2010-05-04T08:05:00.000-07:00

For many years now I've structured my season around July so that I could have a good race at MTB Nats. This worked out well, especially in 2008 when I took second at Mt Snow in Vermont. Even before that race I somehow bonded with that course and it has become one of my favorites - some really good climbs along with some insane rocky rooted out descents.
Anyway, the down side to this is that I've never had really great spring races. Sure I've had pretty good results but never great results. Top 10s, top 5s but never really having the chutzpah to make the podium and feel content with how I did my race. This has meant there have been plenty of time spent towards the end of the race when I was racing by myself, with waning motivation only to beat myself up later because I would lose a bit of time from lap to lap and end up with positive splits. At least for me, when I don't get the positional finish I want I look for ways to make myself feel better. Positive splits do not make me feel better about a race effort.
For this year I decided to put more emphasis on early season form since racing into July kinda peeters out with only a few MTB races on into August. Of course now with cyclocross taking more emphasis and starting in mid-September, it's a little hard to wind down from a peak then quickly wind back up for a solid cross season while still having the motivation to race (and more importantly train) when the late fall hits and the weather turns to shit. Since I have really never had a great race at the DINO series opener at Winona Lake, I set my sights on it as really wanting to podium, perhaps even take the W. Signs were pointing to a good execution of plan when I had a good showing at the PRO race wave of the SERC series at Tsali trails in Bryson City, NC a few weeks back plus good sensations at the DRT Brown County State Park Hesitation Point time trial (minus the mechanical mishap...), but one never knows until the finish line is crossed.
After a week of great weather the trail reports were that they were blazing fast and ultra dry, but reports were calling for some pretty nasty storms the night before. Usually at Winona the magic mud sheds water well, but the pre-ride showed otherwise. I decided to switch to the mud tires to avoid potential issues then headed off to toe the line.
Throughout the first lap the lead group of 4, including, and being pulled by my teammate/coach/friend/business partner/all-around good guy Don put some serious time into the rest of the pack. About 2/3 of the way into lap 1 a crash whittled us down to 3. Starting into lap 2 another crash left Don and me 20 seconds up on 3rd place so we tried to hold a steady high pace. Alas it was not to be since Matt Battin was in 3rd and he was, as he generally can, able to close the gap. With Matt now leading into the third and final lap, Don caught a root and yard sale'd, forcing me to stop for a second while Matt rolled up the trail. Once I got going again I was pleased with how quickly I calmed down and set about closing the gap. It took some time but I brought it back, then went to the front to set the pace. Matt and I were pretty even except on the climbs where I seemed to have just a bit more, so I rode to stay in front as well as ride my own race. Towards the end I sprinted hard out of a sharp corner and got a few seconds, then kept attacking up the series of short hills that ended up getting about a 10 second gap. There was only one minor panic moment with lapped riders, through no fault of theirs, where there was no room to pass so I had to wait what seemed like an eternity for an opportunity to get around. It all worked out and Matt was far enough back that my small lead was preserved. I carried this through the remaining bit of trail to post up for the win.
So I feel pretty good to have achieved the first of my season goals and I guess this is where I have to resist adding too many new goals trying to cash in on my good form. While I can't say it was a perfect day for the team result we wanted it was pretty damned close since Don was able to recover from his crash to hold on to 3rd place and consolation prize of fairly deep gash on his leg. I can say, however, it felt pretty close to perfection to be able to ride a strong race in its entirety then seal the deal in the waning minutes to grab a victory at a target race, and that is pretty sweet.

-later

the Mexler

Race and recover

2010-04-12T14:06:00.000-07:00

Its funny how no matter how long you've been racing you still get nervous before a race. I find myself constantly checking my watch to make sure I get to the start on time, and from that constant checking comes constant verification of my pre-race schedule of warm-up, nutrition, clothing and bike prep.
Anyway, the Knobscorcher always has a good turnout and the PRO field ended up with about 25 guys all intent on being first into the single track after a short gravel road climb. I got a reasonable start and pulled a bit of a maneuver to get into said single track in a respectable position but paid for it on the first longer grinding climb. Knowing that there were still 2 hours of racing to do I eased off a bit and rode within myself and was not too proud to use my 27t front ring instead of grinding away in the 40t. This paid off towards the end of the race because I could stay on the skinny climbers' wheels then dig deep towards the top and use my size and technical skills to drop said climbers on the rooted out descents. After all was said and done, I ended up 8th which, if I'm not mistaken, is my best result in a regional PRO race. Nice!

Today's plan was to get up, clean bikes then take a recovery ride out to Caesar's Head just across the border into South Carolina. I say recovery ride, but even if the hills are longer and not as steep they're still hills. Regardless, it was an easier day, unlike what we have planned for the rest of the week so it was welcome. I can already see the color returning to my legs after a long winter of leg warmers and tights, so this week of 80s and sun will be very much appreciated. Oh yeah, and there is no shortage of sweet riding around. The pic is about half way up the SC side of the climb to Caesar's. At least I'm not the only one with pasty white legs.

So anyway, I probably ought to get ready to eat or something.

later.

-the Mexler

....and Resume

2010-04-10T20:39:00.000-07:00

I uncharacteristically started my 2010 racing season on the road, but since I bailed on the Chickasaw Classic (100% glad I did, BTW) such is life. I'd never done a proper cat 1/2 road race, just a couple of crits here and there, until I picked up an Ohio Valley Spring Series race last weekend. I was a little disappointed with my result only because I have to relearn this whole nutrition thing when it comes to a 3 hour road race and having less of a calorie deficit is key. Alas, I failed at my attempt and got dropped on the climb on the 5th of 7 laps due to, uh, upset stomach. Anyway, I still finished the race and almost bridged back up on L6 but just couldn't close. Regardless, I got in a great 3 hour race effort at a much higher effort that I would have been able to do otherwise, and then I did some hard MTB efforts on Sunday to test my efforts after recovery.
As a result of some no-go planning that fell through for work trips out to Arizona (and the resulting mini-training camp that would have followed), I was able to plan on attending my team's full on training camp in North Carolina. So here I am. To start things off, we're all racing the Knobscorcher at Tsali so I'll kick off my MTB racing season against some heavy hitters on a climb heavy course, so I should definitely get a good result. I do have to say I feel like this year I've been able to ride better technically and push myself more into corners so who knows, maybe I will actually get a good result. In any event, I'll give it the ole college try regardless.

OK, I'm out.

-the Mexler

Pause

2010-03-28T11:38:00.000-07:00

I decided to hit pause on my race season start... call me smart, call me a sissy - either way I'm NOT racing my MTB today in 50 degree pissing rain and mud. I usually open my racing season with the Chickasaw Classic an hour south of Nashville, TN but the weather forecast for race day was a consistent 70% chance of rain throughout the week. Don't get me wrong, I'm not opposed to a sloppy and/or cold race; anybody who races cyclocross in the late fall will at some point have a nasty race. I raced cyclocross last November in North Carolina in 40 and rain, which ended up taking about 2 hours in the car with the heat cranked and 4 layers of clothes to stop shivering. Hell, I even did Chickasaw a few years back in sub-par conditions. The day before saw torrential rain, and race day was overcast and maybe 45 degrees. The course was a non-stop peanut butter mess, but I had already made the 5 hour trek so I toed the line. It worked out well for me since I ended up with the win.

Still eager to race this weekend, I even looked into driving 6 hours North to hit up Barry-Roubaix, but I would have been severely time crunched to work a mostly full day, come home to pack, and leave early enough not to make it another post-midnight bedtime. That, and it was supposed to be about 30 degrees at the start of the race. Again, somewhat sissy-ish but at this point in my racing career I think I benefit more from not beating myself down early in the season for a training race. This will pay dividends in spades come November when I am driving to New Jersey for the USGP, and still have the motivation to do so. It's always way better to want to race but not than to force yourself to look for motivation and half-ass your effort.

Soooooo, I'm sitting at my desk, enjoying my second pot of coffee on the day getting a laundry list of things done that would have otherwise put yet another time crunch on me - boxing up eBay sales, paying bills, watching Ghent-Wevelgem, downloading training data. OH, and blogging. Can't forget about that.

later.

-the Mexler

A pain that I'm used to

2010-03-13T06:25:00.000-08:00

As cyclists, we tend to have a high threshold for pain. It always ends up the same - "What will it take to get me back on the bike?" or better still, we just push through the pain and deal with it. That second part really encompasses a wide range of pains; from the mundane dull pain from a hard effort, to the more acute pains associated with crashes and missing chunks of skin and flesh.

Most of us have a number of stories of pushing ourselves to our body's limits to give up and suffer a far worse pain: the pain of regret. This typically manifests itself in any number of ways such as self-loathing, doubt, questions and maybe even resignation. Happily I haven't come close to resignation, but have definitely danced with questions, doubt and self-loathing many times over the years. My typical pattern is a period of self-disgust, then after stewing about the events for some time I doubt myself and the work that I put in to get where I am (this passes quickly), then questions of motivation arise. Most of the time, if after a race I'm back to normal around half way home. Of course, it could be because at this point I've stuffed my face with some type of comfort food but I try not to pay attention to those things because they bring on a whole other subset of regret.

Anybody who has turned a pedal in anger for any length of time has almost certainly had some incident happen to cause some type of physical pain. I've had a few road rash incidents that have resulted in a few weeks of pants stained from wound seepage around the knee. Not trying to sound too modest, but those are injuries where you just double wrap the gauze, walk slowly and with a limp, then carry on about your way.
It's said that, on average, we'll have a bad crash once every 7 years or so. Since I had two crashes happen one month (31 days exactly) apart I figure I'm good for at least 14, maybe even 21 if I play my cards right.

The first is, to date, my worst crash ever. Not really in terms of bandages and tape, but out-and-out pain. It was the first mountain bike race of the year and I was on a completely new bike and didn't have my position on the bike quite right (grossly wrong, as it turns out!). Long story short, my long-time friend and teammate, who was directly behind me summed it up best "Well, once your face hit the ground, your body just kinda went limp." I have to rely on his account since I really don't remember anything from about 10 seconds prior to 30 minutes after when I woke up in the ambulance.

So the end result was a few scrapes and scratches, a bent rim, a concussion and a good story. I wouldn't really find out the worst of the damage, though, until about a month later which dovetails nicely with my road crash a month later.

That one resulted from me decelerating from 30 mph to about zero by way of a 90 pound dog in the road. I tried everything short of riding into the ditch to avoid the dog, but the dipshit kept running towards where I was going to be. With 5 other guys directly behind me not able to see the dog, standing on the brakes was not an option so I hit the dog, went ass over elbows and landed in the ditch.

Again, scrapes and bruises, but I also got 25 stitches in my shin from where my cassette scraped my shin. Believe me, I've tried to work out the physics of how that could happen but there is no other thing on a bike that can provide 7 equally spaced slices. Not surprisingly, stitching skin that doesn't really have any meat underneath it is pretty hard to do. Painful, too. In line with pushing through the pain, I remounted my bike and rode the 10 miles home, but did have a friend drop me off at the ER. Thanks, Terry.

Throughout the previous month I had shrugged off a lingering back pain that I figured would just go away. Alas, no. After being head over heels for all the wrong reasons twice in a month, I decided to push through the pain no more. X-ray film at the chiropractor showed the signs of a hyper-extended back that I can only guess was the result of feet touching ground over my head when my face stopped forward progress in my mountain bike crash the month prior (think situp except bend the opposite way). Fast forward a few years and I still get knots in my back that usually take a few days of deep stretching to remedy.

So anyway, that's the long way around of saying I've had some pains in my day, but I've gotten used to because I love it. As I type I'm still dealing with a nagging pain from about a month ago that feels like it could be a pinched sciatic nerve resulting from a forgot-to-account-for-suspension-sag incorrect saddle position. I guess the only thing to say is don't crash, always stretch and don't ever get old. The wisdom you gain from living and growing older does not fully compensate for the pains you gain. Trust me.

later-

the ATM

A sign the Apocalypse is nigh

2010-01-20T19:57:00.000-08:00

You'd have to know me to understand the gravity of the above picture. When I first started riding a road bike I chose Campagnolo components not only because they had a great reputation, but also because service parts are readily available. This appealed to my 'do it myself' approach that had served me so well in the past (and still serves me well to this day). For about $15 in parts, you can have a functionally brand new set of shifters. Sign me up. In fact, I still have that entire gruppo I bought almost 10 years ago. The last few years the parts have served well on various iterations of cyclocross bikes to good effect.

In addition, once I find something I really like I stick with it with a passion - not unlike what most people know Italians to have. In line with my do it myself strategy, staying with one brand longer allows me to 'get to know' a company and their design and product philosophy in the same way one gets to know a person. This is a huge time saver because one doesn't have to invest scads of time to re-learn subtle nuances for any given thing.

Anyway, back to Shimano. People I ride with regularly know me as a Shimano hater. In part that still holds true; I really don't like the Shimano mountain bike gruppos. To me they feel mushy and generally not positive. Ever since I switched to SRAM 4 or 5 years ago, I've become ever more used to the flat out solid gear engagement and not only audible, but tactile clicks for each gear change. Don't get me wrong - Shimano make good mountain components or they would not be as well known as they are. I even have a Shimano front derailleur on my mountain rigs.

All that being said, there are a few annoyances with Campy gear that got me to thinking it wouldn't be bad to try something else. They're really not that big of a deal but they stayed in the back of my mind over the years. For example, freehub bodies. Of course Campy has to have a different style than Shimano because they believe it to be better, but this makes it difficult to test out a change if you've got a good number of wheels. Since I'm a wheel whore, I fall into that difficult-to-change category. This leads into cassettes. Shimano (and SRAM) cassettes are generally 1/2 to 1/3 what Campy cassettes cost. This makes outfitting wheels with cassettes an expensive proposition when you're the aforementioned wheel whore. There are a few other things but they're really not important enough to merit attention, but they do add up to plant a seed of doubt.

On to the actual riding. I've had the gruppo on my road bike for just over a week and I finally was able to log some solid miles on the road (trainer miles don't count in this case). As expected, it took about half the ride to purge my Campy shifting habits. I expected no less, but the shifting is quality. The ergonomics are good, as well. Different, naturally, but just fine. The different hand positions I've come to use with Campy ergonomics will mostly not work on the Shimano so I'll have to come up with new ones. Such is life.

So a week in I'm not in love, or even smitten for that matter, but I'm confident it will always do the task required without fuss. Since I'm ever increasingly looking for ways to have free time, that alone may mean the gruppo finds favor with me.

But let's be honest: What Italian man hasn't had a mistress at some point in his life? Maybe this is mine. They are a passionate people, you know.

Later.

-the ATM

...and with that, I'm out!

2009-12-12T20:38:00.000-08:00

Another season in the books. I didn't have near the season ending race that I wanted to have, but as they say, it is what it is.
After nearly wishing for more work emails to arrive just so I could have something to do, race day finally came. The course had thawed nicely, so it was a sloppy, muddy mess, not the frozen mess of the past few days. The soil around Bend is all volcanic ash, so everything was gritty. Traction wasn't really an issue, but there were still plenty of ruts to avoid, and there were also a few sections of loose mud that were somewhat treacherous.
Because of the atrocious sign-up protocol from USA Cycling, I drew a 7th row starting position. As per my typical shitty starting position protocol, I had to aggressively force my position without taking people out. After 3/4 of a lap I was in about 25th, so that worked out. Over the next few laps I picked a few more people off, and was just about ready to make contact with a group for 18th when my front wheel washed out in one of the aforementioned ruts. It wasn't really a bad crash, but I lost a bit of mojo and it took a bit to get it back. In the mean time we were still picking off some guys that had gone out too hard. I think the highest I got was up to 14th but then with 1/4 of a lap to go I had a blow out and had to run/creep to the finish without letting too many people pass me. All told, I ended up 20th. Not nearly where I wanted to be but unless I would have made it up to 8th or better (callups for next year) it didn't really matter.
So now I'm getting all my stuff packed for the trip back to Portland tomorrow after Ryan's race, then jump on a plane Monday morning and back to the real world. Ugh.

A few parting thoughts on my week here:
-Oregonians, or at least those from Portland and Bend pretty much all stop for bikes and pedestrians. All the time. Crazy.
-Once you get past the tragically hip-ness, everybody is pretty cool. Alas, an occasional shower wouldn't hurt though.
-As I pretty much already knew, Jeremy Powers is quite possibly the nicest guy out there. At the number party for the USGP, I flagged him down just to say hey, and he ended up talking with us for about 10 minutes and was engaged in the conversation the entire time. Class... Pure class.

So anyway, yeah. I'm out.

-the ATM

Wrapping up in Oregon

2009-12-09T18:43:00.000-08:00

As silly as it sounds, I haven't had time to post a new entry even though I'm smack dab in the middle of a ten day vacation. To catch you all up, day 2 of the NCGP was, as it turns out, an introduction to Nats - but more on that in a sec. After day 1's not stellar result I moved up one spot to 15th. The real story was the weather though, in that it was 40 and rain. It took me two hours to stop shivering even with the heat cranked in the toasty warm car!
Fast forward through a week of work and I was on a plane heading out to Portland to finish out the USGP series, then a week of chillaxin between Portland and Bend, where the 2009 Nats are being held.
First, I'll hit on last weekend's racing at the final stop of the USGP that had me galavanting across the country in search of glory and race schwag. After a mixup with numbers I found myself with #107 and no callup. Calling on some modified J-Pow ninja skills, I finagled my rightful spot on the front row and knocked out the hole shot,
and after clawing back from a flat tire back up to the lead, I lost the sprint for the win. Dummy.
Day two was a little less hectic at the start only because I asked anybody and everybody how to make sure I was on the front row. I was a little off and ended up third on the day, but that was good enough to lock up third for the series, which is nice.
So after hitting a few local bike shops, we headed back to our host housing to get in a day-after-race ride and stumbled onto an awesome twisty couple mile climb. Can't find that in Indiana.
Now I find myself holed up in a hotel room in Bend, dodging the 20 degree weather waiting for Saturday to come so I can put the wraps on my season. Not that I'm wishing it away - I'm not - but I am anxious to see how the good form I'm on stacks up against others' good form. I'm sure the course will be interesting - it's frozen now but after a few degrees higher tomorrow, coupled with a shit-pile of racers to mangle it up means it's gonna be sloppy. This means I've got my work cut out for me since I'll line up in the 7th row. Eh well, it wouldn't be a race otherwise.

Game on.

-the ATM

It's all a blur

2009-11-21T14:54:00.000-08:00

The tranquil weekends off between the 3rd and 4th rounds of the USGP were pretty tame, if seemingly a bit too short. This is in stark contrast to the past two weeks. As you may have read in the previous post, I headed out to New Jersey for the 4th round and had some pretty good results; I took 6th on the muddy Saturday and ended up just missing the podium for 4th on the not as muddy Sunday. As I'd hoped, I was able to be on the road within 45 minutes of finishing my race, and ended up getting home at about 12:30.
1400 miles in the bank.
Monday and Tuesday flew by since I had to prep for a semi-planned trip to Peoria on Wednesday, but the trip came and went with little fanfare.
500 miles in the bank.
I got back around 6 - about the same time Ryan got home. It was about 45 and rain, and I was going to get my rain gear on when Ryan brought up the trainer. It didn't take much to convince me that wasn't a bad idea, but I one-upped him with me not riding at all so I could overhaul his hubs since the bearings were not really spinning. at all. Anyway, this worked out well since I knew I still had plenty of other things to do in preparation for this weekend's trip to North Carolina that would more than take the place of riding the trainer for an hour. After getting everything ready to go, I called it a day. Friday found us making great time so we were able to smash a few pre-ride laps before the sun went down. After dinner, we got some interwebbing and TVing done and I was cashed out by 10:30.
Now for the race. Eh, Even though I felt ok, my legs did not respond well to all the travel I've been doing. At least that's what I'm telling myself anyway. The course was refreshingly tacky, with only a few tight corners to speak of, but it had close to a half-mile of pavement and a longish run-up (my favorite!) plus a single track climb with a few hidden roots. It's definitely a course for big legs but as I searched through my travel bag, I apparently forgot to pack them. I fared well in the corners but floundered elsewhere. I rolled in for 16th, fairly disappointed but at least I have another day to make up for it. We shall see.
After this weekend? Another 1000 miles in the bank.

Alright, time for some bike maintenance.

the ATM

Sometimes I trick myself into thinking I'm smart

2009-11-14T17:24:00.000-08:00

My weekend started a day early so I could spend the day driving from Indiana to New Jersey. I was pretty torn as to whether I would leave at 5a so I could make it in time to pre-ride the course, but the thought of sleeping in overrode any other thoughts. Turns out this was a good thing since I got an email around 11a saying pre-riding was canceled due to 40+ mph winds. Score.
On top of that, I was surprised that I was was not mentally blown after 12 hours in the car heading to the New Jersey rounds of the USGP. It really felt like just another car trip to a race. I suppose this is where the smarts of taking a few races off pays off. The real test, though, is in how I feel tomorrow on the way home when I'll be getting home around 1a, without having showered or had the leisurely afternoon that I had today.
Anyway, race report: The race today was brutal. The worst peanut butter mud in which I think I've had to race. There was even a pan flat section of course that was so loaded with mud that it was faster to run it - that was my least favorite 200 meters of course. I think the announcer, Richard Fries, said it best when he compared it to adobe since the mud had loads of grass in it to keep it all stuck together. I took a bike change half way through the race just so I could shed the seemingly 20 pounds of mud that had accumulated around the cranks and BB. Ugh.
Anyway, I decided not to spectate the woman's or men's pro race so that I could get back to the hotel and begin the deconstruction/reconstruction of both bikes' drivetrains, etc. It only ended up taking around 90 minutes so I was able to get cleaned up, stretched, and head off to a semi- early dinner. This of course laid the ground work for time to lay down this sweet blog post.
So I'm quite content, not nervous for tomorrow. Pretty much gonna take what I can get and leave it all on the course, then pseudo-wash my bikes, repack my car and make like a tree and get out of there.

and with that, I'm out.

-the ATM

Funny stuff

2009-11-11T08:36:00.000-08:00

So I've been making the most of my two weekends off from racing; I cleaned out most of my house in Columbus so I can rent it out in the coming weeks (10+ years of shit accumulation takes time to sift through) with only about 2 hours worth of finish work left, worked on Project Bike Rack v3.0, cleaned my car, built a few bikes, slept in and actually did some proper training not otherwise possible with weekend racing.
Of course, now that I'm back racing it's starting to hit full-force - drive to New Jersey for the 3rd round of the USGP, then back to work on Monday, then drive to Peoria, IL on Wednesday, then return on Thursday, then pack and get ready to leave for North Carolina on Friday, then get back to be at work again on Monday.

Last weekend when I wasn't racing I ran into some friends, so we stopped to chew the fat for a bit. Shortly before we parted ways, I saw an ex-girlfriend drive past us. Now I'm not one to wax ecstatic about past relationships but I had to chuckle upon seeing her because she would always want to go out every night, and couldn't understand why I didn't want to drink like a fish night after night. She even equated having a drink to having fun - as in, no drink = no fun. Leave the bar before midnight?? Are you nuts?? I think my favorite was when she asked what I wanted to do that particular night. After I offered up an evening of Low Quality Time (couch, dinner, conversation, etc), she responded with already-purchased comedy club tickets. Great... thanks for asking!
Anyway, this clearly was doomed and we eventually broke up. Her break up platform was based on me wanting to spend more time riding bikes than spending time with her. Now I know I spend a fair bit of time training, but in the grand scheme not that much, and when time spent with her is buying dinner and drinks at $50-$100 per night times 2-3 per week, which would you chose?

Why is all of this funny? Because when I saw her last weekend, I was on my bike.

later.

-the ATM

A murder of one

2009-10-31T08:14:00.000-07:00

I finished round 4 of the USGP with another 8th place. Not bad, but not what I was looking for either. As I was reflecting after the 3rd race of the series, it really hit home that I have done a lot of shit in the last 5 weeks - not the least of which was 11 races. I guess you could say I'm cooked. I've not really done any focused training which I think is a big part of why I've not done better than what I've done so far. Funny how one's mind wanders during a race, and at some point I thought about taking a week off from racing. Also funny is how much in sync Don and I are since he suggested taking a week off before I could say I was thinking about it. So after some pondering, I decided it best to take a few weeks off from racing so my next go at a race will be the USGP in New Jersey. I thought when I first set my cross schedule my lighter road racing load in the summer would carry me through from late September through Nats in mid December. Alas, as it turns out, I'm getting old and can't sustain that.
Hmmpf. That sucks.
Anyway, it's actually been really good this past week once I committed to not racing. I finally got my new bikes built in both road and mountain form. For the mountain, an Epic Marathon carbon tames the bumps and for the road I got a Tarmac Pro in matte carbon. I was originally planning on sweeting it out with white tape and a white saddle but both Zach and Ryan talked me into murdering it out.
Now of course the white saddle doesn't exactly make it murdered out, but that's only temporary until the new black saddle can get here. Regardless, it's pretty sick. I've also ordered a set of FSA's black 11 speed specific chainrings so they'll make it all the better.
I can't really post any pics of the MTB since I'm going to be swapping out the brakes and gruppo, which would essentially mean you'd get to look at a sweet frame and fork setup. Eh, just wait a week or so...I'll get there.
In the mean time, here's some digital media from day 1 of the Louisville USGP:

photo cred Tobi Herron

download

2009-10-24T19:34:00.000-07:00

Whew, glad that's over. Last weekend was the culmination of a huge chunk of time I've been spending in order to get the inaugural BloomingCross race dialed. By all accounts, it was a cracking success even if attendance was down more than we expected being a non-Cincinnati-local race. No matter, we learned a lot and will make next year's BloomingCross even better!

As a result of all that, tho, I've got a laundry list of things to get caught up on. Meh, such is my life.
Most alarmingly, I've got two new bikes in the basement that have been there for a week yet remain in the shipping boxes.
Sweet bikes, for sure... now I just need to make time to build them.
In my spare time I've been burning up the highway miles to and from races and pulling down reasonable results. I netted a 15th place in the Friday UCI in Cincy, but faded a bit for Saturday's race to get 23rd. For Sunday's race, my legs were just not there so I rolled in for 26th.
I really had zero expectations for BloomingCross, since my day started at 5am to brew coffee for the race. Add in about only a bowl of oatmeal and a Clif Bar from 5a to 3p to eat, and I ended up in 7th place. So now I'm in the hotel room, getting some interwebbing done, and reflecting on my 7th place in the Masters 35+ category in the third race of the USGP of cyclocross series. I've been playing a bit with my preparation to see if I can get rid of the typical mid-race funk that I seem to have and it seems to be working. I'll try a few more things for Sunday's race - perhaps I can pull up a few extra spots and crack the top 5.

and with that, I'm out.

later.

-the ATM

Cross updates

2009-10-10T05:15:00.000-07:00

As seems typical much has happened since last I posted, and while there has been alot of racing, there's also been some me-not-on-the-bike stuff going on, too.
So first and foremost, things are rapidly approaching with the first annual BloomingCross, my first crack at promoting a race (along with Ryan's first time, too). It's been pretty hectic the last few weeks but the light is at the end of the tunnel. I know there'll be a few more sleepless nights in the coming week but it'll be worth it. Can't wait to show my adopted home of Bloomington the awesomeness of cyclocross. So if you're in town on the 18th, come on out to Twin Lakes Sports Complex. I'll buy you a cup of Two Johns Podcast coffee!
OK, so race reports...
Zach, Ryan and I piled 3 dudes, 6 bikes, 18 wheels and all our gear into Zach's Subaru and headed up to Madison for the first round of the USGP. I did the Master's 35+ races and got some solid results of 8th and 10th. I could have gotten better on Sunday, but I flatted on the last lap and had to ride slowly back to the pit for the B bike and lost 3 spots in the process. Still pretty pleased with my first showing on the national level... Round 2 is in Louisville in 2 weeks - can't wait!
Last weekend was round 2 of the OVCX series, and the long straight plus a front row start gave me the hole shot through the first sector. Flyin' Ryan Knapp came around me shortly after and just slaughtered the field. Hitting my usual mid-race lull, I hammered home for a not bad 5th spot.

Photo cred to Tom Moran and Lauren Half

It's a little weird - I love race weekends that keep me two days away because there ends up being downtime for things like blog posts and general interwebbing that I don't normally get loads of time to do. At the same time though, because I'm away I don't have the time to do things that have been getting pushed out like finish bike rack v3.0, wash car, organize sock drawer, etc.
Eh, I'll take the racing... the other stuff will be there tomorrow!

Oh yeah, work has been kicking me square in the pants lately too. That's about all I have to say about that.

2009-09-25T09:11:00.000-07:00

I seem to have this affliction that requires I have way more to do than time in the day. Unfortunately this makes some things fall of the edge of my plate like Grandma's gravy on Turkey Day. Such as this blog...

Anyhoo, I had this awesome outline for a post in my head after a cracking good Labor Day weekend of riding, but the time came and went and with it, the justification for column-inches on a recap. To summarize, however, Don came up with a new word to describe our first day's ride: Epiticity, which is a scale from 1 - 10 that ranks the epic-ness of a ride. Factors include awesomeness of the parcours, conditions, flats, and general bonking. Our ride was about 8 since we hit about 15 miles of deep gravel, had two flats (3 minutes apart), it was fairly hot, and we only expected about 2 hours that turned into 4.5 hours. This allowed me to tap into the "Just in Case" $10 bill in my saddle bag. The result was a Belgian PowerBar (ie, ham sandwich). Epic.

So for the last month or so, I've been 90% moved in to the new digs in Bloomington. All I can say is it is awesome. Wish I moved years ago. The rental house we're in is a little worse for the wear, being built in the 60s and all, but the world's largest man cave for bikes makes up for it. We've finally got it mostly dialed so pics are forthcoming.

So the biggest time sink I have going on now (aside from the job that pays my bills) is that I am promoting one stop on the OVCX calendar in Bloomington with Rad Racer Ryan Knapp. The race is on the 18th of October, so mark your calendar! Of course, in the mean time I'm usualy up until at least midnight, and sometimes past 1. I can push thru the fsatigue mostly but sometimes my body just shuts down.
No matter, it's definitely worth the effort.
In racing news, my 'cross seson is officially underway starting off at the King's CX weekend just outside of Cincy. Typical early season cross racing means dry, dusty and hot, which was Saturday's race but that gave way to 60 and rain on Sunday. I ended up with a 6th on saturday anda 4th on Sunday, which is a nice kickstart to the season since I usually start of slower during early season and get faster as the weeks progress.
So this weekend is the first installment of the USGP series in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin. Conditions look to be similar to Sunday's race, so it should have about a 7 on the Epiticity scale. Can't wait.

later
-the ATM

Apparently...

2009-08-12T16:24:00.000-07:00

...They have not been dealt a good hand in life.

It's scenes like these that always make for great rides.

P - I - M - P

2009-08-07T18:45:00.001-07:00

um, yeah, so the Dugast order showed up, and Kyle had a great idea for a photo op...

The front derailleurs of my discontent

2009-08-05T05:00:00.000-07:00

That's twice - in two weeks, no less.
I lined up at the start of the Brown County State Park off road TT only to hear a crazy crack at the start, and the accompanying grinding noise. At first I thought it was a crack in the frame given the loud noise I heard, but after some on-bike diagnostics it turned out to be the chain rubbing on the front derailleur cage. You see, somehow the chain grabbed the cage at the start and twisted the entire derailleur assembly on the seat tube. Perhaps the recommended torque is not enough???
In any event, I ended up second by 23 seconds. Bummer for sure, but I'm starting to think all things 'cross, and wrapping up my MTB season so I can start training for cross is sounding more and more appealing, for several reasons.
First off, fall is a great time of year... crisp mornings with some reasonable temps during the day, just low enough that either arm warmers or a long sleeve jersey are appropriate for when the sun dips down. We've still got plenty of warm days left; This is clear, but it won't be too long!
Second, new bikes. How sweet is it to get a new bike and tear in to the build up. It's even better for 'cross when you get to build two bikes! Man, I can't wait.
Third, and probably more important for now is that I'll be moved over to Bloomington. Note I said 'moved' as in, already done. I'm not really looking forward to the act of moving but once done, I'm totally in. Moving my crap from 10 years of the same address is going to be a challenge...
Alas, all will be good since the house we'll be in will have what should be heralded as the man cave of all man caves. Now keep in mind, 3 dudes living in a house generally means that the entire house is a man cave, but 3 guys that each have at least 4 bikes a piece, along with 5 - 6 sets of wheels per dude means there is going to be an entire wall devoted to storage of said equipment.
I'm going to have to stop talking about it so I don't wet my pants.

anyway, enough for now.

later.

-the ATM

Moving right along

2009-07-28T20:48:00.001-07:00

Aside from a rain-induced hiccup, my racing season marches on. The DRT stop at Wapehani was a good one, with a more World Cup style lap count – 6 laps of about 6km each (yeah, with World Cup counts comes World Cup units). A nice small hill to sort out the pecking order into the woods saw me in P1. I must have subconsciously channeled Todd Wells because I was railing that trail like I never have before. I had a small gap that I was just trying to maintain (not extend) since I was feeling good and wanted it to stay that way. Unfortunately my first semi-mechanical of the season dropped in to see what condition my condition was in, in the form of a slipped front derailleur cable. This left me with a tiny 29t front ring with which to ride. Not ideal since I’m more of a big dog guy, but I wasn’t going to take a technical break to fix it.

Photo courtesy Matt Link

I still rode well, and the 29t really probably helped in a few small punch climb sections. I rode yet another consistent race which makes me think I’m a little better at pacing than I have been in years past. In any event, my last lap (actually the last 3k probably) wasn’t so awesome. On the last steep climb I noticed my HR was about 30 bpm below my normal race average. Clearly this is not good. I ended up hemorrhaging several minutes to first, but held on for second. Of course I can’t download my data because Vista 64 doesn’t have IrDA drivers, but that’s beside the point.

Anyway, last weekend’s race was ~~postponed~~ canceled due to rain, which left me with a Sunday to make up for no race effort. I wanted to get in a good hard road ride with some climbs so that I could beat myself down. All told, I got 4 hours in and just under 70 miles in with two hard 5 minute efforts plus a few county line sprint dubbyas so I guess I get the virtual Green jersey.

Speaking of Le Tour, I was disappointed at the end that it was over… it seemed to fly by, with excitement every day. I guess I expected Contador to win but it seemed like he was always looking for approval and acceptance as a force to be reckoned with. Was it me or did his eyes seem like he was looking for someone, anyone, to give him a thumbs up? I guess he would have been looking for a pistolero from somebody, or whatever the hell stupid logo is on his hat. Anyway, he was most definitely the strongest guy, even on TT day, with taking 30 freaking seconds out of Mr TT himself… I pity the fool, Fabian Cancellara.

I do have to say thanks to DVRs… there is no way I would have been able to watch coverage as efficiently as with 2x and 3x speed fast forward.

Finally, this weekend should be a cracker (learned that from David Millar and Bradley Wiggins!) of a good time… Revolution Bike and Bean is hosting the midway point SAG of the HMBA century with burgers, dogs, PBJs and various other goodies. Of course there will also be coffee and espresso, so come on out to 10th and Grant in Bloomington for some sweet fun. I’ll even buy you a shot of espresso if you mention this post. If you cough up $5(with proceeds going to HMBA) , you can eat grilled goodness, too! While you’re there you can register for the DRT off road Time Trial at Brown County State Park on Sunday. It’s a point to point from the North Gate to Hesitation Point. It’ll be awesome, mainly because there will be hotdogs at the finish line.

later.

-the ATM

yes, no and yes

2009-07-10T05:02:00.000-07:00

I've had a bit of time to reflect on my performance in the cross country race over the July 4th weekend, and while one can always want more/better/faster I can't really complain about a 3rd place finish.
Things were moving along really well starting at about 12:15p on Saturday with me having just won the short track race then finding out I'm the the state champion as a result, but about 12:30 things started turning pear shaped. You see, that's when the rain started and didn't really stop until about 11p that night. It was no gully washer - just a steady light rain that kept going. This sucked big time because Muscatatuck does not really do well with rain. There is a lot of tree cover that makes even the smallest amount of water sit for days waiting to dry out. While the local trail crew had done a great job of changing things to mitigate that, the simple fact is that the trail is mostly a dense clay that turns into peanut butter when wet.
There was a sparkle of hope when a race day report from a friend who had already ridden a lap came back the trail wasn't THAT BAD and his bike wasn't loaded with mud to back it up. Unfortunately, my pre-race recon did not give me warm fuzzies and I was on the limits of safe low tire pressure. Anyhoo, I had a great start and took second into the woods. I felt like I was cornering like a sissy but had good climbing legs so I pushed when I could. After superstar Slowinsky passed me (he apparently felt bad early on) Gentle Ben and I settled in to a good battle for 3rd/4th with him cornering better than me but I seemed to be climbing better. I took my opportunity to push it on a climb and created a gap to Ben. I was able to hold it to the line for third behind untouchables Matt Battin and Slowinsky.
After about 3 hours worth of cleaning, the talley was one spent chain, two rebuilt (but semi-worn out anyway) jockey pulleys, one likely destroyed crank arm, and perhaps the worst is what appears to be blown BB bearings. I'll dig into that this week.
Fast forward a week and I was finally able to toe the line on my road bike for the first time this year. Alas, a flat tire only 15 minutes in and no spare wheels meant my day was done. At least I was able to keep upright when the rear went flat leading into a corner. Even better was that nobody went down getting around me as I had to straight line the corner.
On to Sunday's MTB race in Warsaw at the great Winona Lake trail, I took third into the woods after Dave McComb lit up the start. Matt Light was setting a mean pace and him being a local to the trail I was not in any hurry to take a pull. It didn't take long for Matt's two teammates to bridge up so I was, um, outnumbered. 1 vs 3? Sweet. I probably rode a little too hard trying to stay 2nd wheel in front of Isaac Neff and Chad Salla, which was remedied when my front wheel washed out in a sandy corner and they came around. This turned out to be good since I settled into my own pace and got bits of micro-recovery. By the end of lap 1 I had bridged back up to Isaac and Matt but Chad had already checked out. I was able to get around them to start lap 2 and eventually brought it down to 25 seconds, but Chad was able to drill a section or two and stretch it back out to a minute.
If I hadn't had a set of BB bearings seized, I would have won. Totally. I swear.

Later.

-the ATM

Muscatatuck STXC report

2009-07-04T12:12:00.001-07:00

As it turns out, the short track event was the state championship. So now I'm the short track state champ. I wonder if I should get a jersey made for that...
Anyway, the start chute was rather short and my thought of lining up to the outside didn't net the position I was looking for. Alas, I had to settle for 5th wheel. After two or three laps, tho I had moved up to 3rd wheel after a few bobbles from the guys ahead of me. With first and second content to pull me around for the duration, I was content to let them. At the end of 2 to go I launched an attack that was apparently pretty good since it stuck and I was able to post up across the line.
So now I guess I like short track races. Much better result than the first (and last) STXC race I did back in 06, anyway.
So now I'm chillin out for tomorrow's XC race watching Le Tour. Sweet.

Later.

-the ATM

'Bout that time, eh?

2009-07-03T10:55:00.000-07:00

You know it's getting to 'cross season when goodie boxes start showing up.Fresh bar tape, a few new Campy freehubs and a pile of sweet Grifo XS tubulars. With any luck, I'll be able to start rebuilding the Record hubs and Mavic Reflex hoops next week, but that will require removing 2 years of glue which is no too terribly appealing. In any event, I look forward to building another set of wheels.

In racing news, I started my sizeable racing block last weekend at the OMBC event at East Fork. I was a little disappointed with the start since we weren't going balls out up the opening climb (where I set my 1 min max power last yea), but then again we weren't going balls out. I took 5th into the woods after the ~2 mile road section and was riding comfortably. Unfortunately, I got slowed by a few bobbles in front of me and didn't want to/couldn't bridge the 20 second gap. With a coupla PROs like Anthony Slowinsky and Brad Wilhelm ahead of me, I didn't figure it wise to try to bridge only to hemorrhage time later.
As expected, I started feeling better as the race progressed. This was bolstered when I passed the guy in 3rd who had flatted and asked if I had a pump. I did not, so I could not oblige. Let me say that I would have dropped a CO2 cartridge had he asked for one, but I'm not going to potentially strand myself by giving up my CO2 gun so a competitor can continue. If he did not prepare well enough then this is not my concern. Carrying on, I was solidly in third going into the final lap and was just about to throw in the 'chase' towel when I saw P2 about 30 seconds in front of me. I'm assuming he had shut down until he saw me because that's what the gap stayed and I definitely gave it the ole' college try to close said gap, so any efforts by me were matched by him.
At the end of the day, I ended up 3rd behind Slowinsky and Wilhelm, and I was only 2:30m behind Anthony and 30sec behind Brad. Sure, Slowinsky flatted and ran the last half mile in but I wasn't 6 minutes behind, either.
So the next race is the AMBC event @ North Vernon's awesome Muscatatuck Park, and starts Saturday with a Short Track race followed on Sunday with the XC race. Fingers crossed, I have a good weekend.

later.

-the ATM

Death to peppermint

2009-06-21T11:30:00.000-07:00

I had been thinking of changing the bar and hood position on my road bike for some time but as with any relocation such as that, the bar tape needs to be rewrapped and the white tape I've had for some time would not lend itself well to reuse. Being a fan of Fizik I decided to try some of their new dual tape with a color accent. Being me, I had to go with the white with red stripe figuring it would tie in well with my white and red saddle. As it turns out, they only make the Dual tape with soft touch which is pretty much like velvet. Looks sweet out of the box and the double stitched piping adds a nice subtle layer of grip/comfort to the feel. Universally, the first comment from everyone that saw it was "well, it looks like a candy cane but it looks kinda sweet." This helped a bit but looks take a back seat if it doesn't perform (reference any mid 70s Corvette: 150HP from a V8? criminal!) As I feared with the soft touch it was filthy after one ride. After about 5 minutes per side of cleaning I gave up, and resigned the tape to be a 3 week test.
On the good side, I really dig the new bar and hood position that I rotated to a more traditional position for the classic bend bars. This integrates nicely with the new 11 speed shifters I've been rocking this year. Maybe now I will push myself to jump into a road race or two, since I have not done one yet this year. The horror!
Speaking of racing, I am getting ready to start a huge block of racing starting next weekend... pretty much every weekend through August. This is crazy because then I'll start to taper for cross season. This is cool, and as much as I am looking forward to cross races, I'm not sure I'm ready for cross weather just yet. Yes, of course there will be 4-5 races of miserable hot weather but chilly mornings are just around the corner after that. Unlike most other people, I really don't mind the abysmally hot/humid weather. Sure, it's not great and 75 with no humidity is awesome but it's not THAT bad.

Anyhoo, I finally got my wheel project done. I hit a stumbling block two days before I threw down the paint thinking it may look good to murder out the wheels. Alas, dark car with black wheels was nixed. Too trendy and I don't think I'd like them in a year, so silver it is... Surprisingly, the snow tires I ran until this past week did not shred to pieces in this heat. In fact, the tread wore rather well. The rim finish is pretty good, although it's not my best work. Not sure if that's a result of the paint I used or operator error. Either way, they look ok and I expect 97% of the people that see them will not even notice. Except for you, of course, my loyal readers that hang on my every word and will notice now that I've pointed them out.

As a final tidbit, I've somehow managed to wind up with a sweet quiver of MTB bikes that makes me feel like a PRO, even tho I may not ride like one. Pretty much the only difference between the two is the brakes, and I'm about a week away from making that happen since the new Magura SL brakes are pretty much that good. As a testament to the design, the Epic has been the hands down favorite to ride this year since it realistically rides like a hard tail until the brain lets the suspension do it's thing. It also helps that with the Epic I have power data which is all the more motivating to ride that. Too bad it's not wireless and thus easily swapable, because the HT is an awesome ride. Plus, at 20 lbs, it would floss the trails like my hygentist flosses my teef.

And with that, I'm out.

-the ATM

Do work, son!

2009-05-09T05:36:00.000-07:00

I have been universally getting my ass kicked in pretty much every facet of my life as late. I recently decided that my brain is generally vibrating, just enough to be uncomfortable. My normal day-to-day work of supporting a mining haul truck manufacturer has been somewhat oddly extremely busy. This is more realated to process improvements and new hardware development but the simple fact is there's plenty of work to be done. As part of some recent corporate restructuring, I've also had to pick up some smaller (well, 30 liter is smaller compared to the 60 and 78 liters I deal with for OEM support. Your car probably has around 3 liters of engine displacement, for reference) global mechanical engine support, which means any question anyone has anywhere in the world comes to me. "You see, I have people skills. I work with the GD customer!" (Office Space, BTW). So ramping up that knowledge base has been a semi-time consuming pain. On top of that, I've been burning the midnight oil with garage projects such as the s-l-o-w-l-y progressing wheel refinish project, which has been temporarily suspended so that I can finish a woodworking project:
Naturally, I've been training my keister off and pulled out an MTB TT win along with a 5th place in the season opener Indiana MTB race series, against some baller regional PROs... which is OK given my level of accumulating fatigue from burning said midnight oil.
This is in support of the biggest source of my lack of posting of late. You see, I went in with my friend and all around good guy Don to buy a bike shop. So for the last 6 months or so, we've been doing alot of research, writing of proposals, texting and talking to get things ironed out. As of Monday, though, all the ducks have been placed in a row and we are open for bidniss, which is to say the industry. One of the cooler things that every cyclist should appreciate is the commercial espresso machine:
Soooo, if you find yourself in need of a bike or bike accessories, a tune up from PRO mechanic Zach, or just want a great shot of espresso or cup of coffee, feel free to stop by Revolution Bike and Bean in Bloomington.
Unfortunately, we couldn't do pre-development of the new website so the current one will have to do for the time being. Sorry.

Anyway, hopefully I still have a few readers since it's been about 6 weeks since my last post, which has been wearing on me. I feel better now.

later.

-the ATM

Incontrovertible proof...

2009-03-30T19:31:00.001-07:00

...that I have readers.
The title of my blog stems from my early professional years, when I was a Product/Facilities Engineer at a manufacturing plant. There was a good group of 20-something peeps that all got along well. So well, in fact we still hang out together from time to time as schedules, babies, and lives permit. There's a pile of good stories that can be told, but this is not the purpose of this post.
Since we all pretty much hated our jobs and felt like the man was beating us down on a daily basis, we called the company 'The Sweatshop,' and the good group of peeps was 'The Sweatshop Crew.' Generally speaking, Fridays were group lunch days, and since I was in Plant Engineering I was always stuck in the shit and had to get paged over the P.A. system that everyone else was waiting for me. This wouldn't have been a big deal except the P.A. was used for all support requests, which meant that everyone heard every page. Like a really bad game of telephone, whatever was heard was relayed over and again. At some point somebody from the factory floor paged me as "Andy Messner" so the name stuck. It became somewhat of a game to me to correct people and since I can be that harsh, I would walk up and tell the offending pager that the N in my name was silent. My humor was lost on them, based on the blank stares I regularly got.
In any event, other variations were also paged so my Crew decided it was funny to page me in the same fashion. Mesner, Mefner, Muffler, Mexner - any concoction of letters, they said it. One of my friends took a liking to Mexler so that anytime we had to put our name in for a restaurant Mexler was given. And so it stuck.
The werks part of it is from my German heritage, and the fact that I dig Bavarian Motor Works, which is long for BMW. As I've previously posted, I'm somewhat handy, and tend to do things myself. Coincidentally, same friend that coined Mexler also began saying I had a shop for cars based on the work I did to my cars, etc. The German word for shop can loosely be translated into Works, or spelled with an 'e' in German parlance soooooo..... 1 + 2 = 3... Mexlerwerks is born.
There's more to that story but again, that is not the purpose of this post.

No, the purpose of the post to prove that this viral marketing on the interweb is a real phenomenon.
For several years now, I have been sponsored by Crank Brothers for my cycling endeavors and every order I place, my name is written by me correctly spelling my last name. Never once have I hinted at an alternative spelling. To my enjoyment, I laughed out loud when I saw the address from a recent package from Crank Brothers:

Now either people have a hard time reading the letters I typed in the computerized form I filled out (ie, did not hand write anything) or this blog actually has readership. For ego's sake I'll take the latter.
So for those readers out in Cali - Laguna Beach in particular - You make sweet pedals. And alot of other sweet bike parts. And sweet apres' ride gear. Keep it up. Thanks.

later.

-the ATM

...In my spare time

2009-03-23T18:27:00.000-07:00

I never cease to amaze myself how I'm able to cram so much crap in my life. Specifically, How much crap I try to (and generally do) get accomplished - not the least of which is this blog.
I realize it's at the expense of sleep, but that's why God created coffee.
Which is nice.
Several years ago, I at least figured out the root of my predilection in that I pretty much can't stand having something done by someone else when I can do it myself, and in my head I can do it better, for cheaper. Plus I generally feel better knowing that I know how to do something.
Rebuild a Ford V8 from my brother's boat?
Check.
Rebuild Toyota Landcruiser engine?
Yep.
Design and build trailer hitch for my last two cars?
Si.
Work on bikes?
But of course.
The list goes on, so at the risk of sounding too arrogant I'll stop there. I like to say I'm a jack of all trades, master of none. Aside from being a cool dude. Pretty much got that one dialed.

So my latest project involves my car, and in particular the summer wheels. As a long term plan when I bought the car, I knew I would need to refinish the wheels after the original tires wore out since the wheels had been poorly repainted and that paint was flaking off. I like to keep my whips tight, so flaking wheel paint is a no-no.
I've repainted wheels before but a light scuffing with sandpaper was all that was needed for those. Having flaking paint would require much more effort, and rather than have a not-so-smooth finish from hand sanding (not to mention probably 20-30 hours of hand sanding) I had a local blast shop media blast the wheels (cheaper to have them do it then buy a sand blast cabinet. I looked.). As expected, they got a little hot with the media in a few spots so some filler touch up was required.(Note red marks to indicate where to fill).

After looking around at options, I decided on Glazing Putty and got to it.Glazed, but not sanded.

Center rough sanded, outer ring not sanded.

It's been a two day (well, an hour each night) process so far, but I'm encouraged with the progress and how smooth the test areas are turning out. With any luck, I'll have some freshly painted wheels in a week or so, thus allowing me to get back to some normalcy so I'm not rocking the 15" squishy snow tires when spring fully hits.

Stay tuned for more progress pics.

later.

-the ATM

Whips and chains

2009-02-24T12:09:00.000-08:00

Spring is just around the corner, so it's about time I got my whips built and dialed in. Semi-famously I haven't been on an MTB since November, mostly due to trail conditions, which has pushed MTB building to the back burner. I Finally got the one-ride-so-far Epic ass end rebuild with all the proper bearings, bushings, etc so it's good to go. Just need a good trail day to let 'er eat. Also got a new fork, and since I liked the Magura Durin Race from last year I decided to add another to the stable.
The trusty HT is a little worse for the wear since I still haven't pulled the cranks off my CX bike, but at least I finally got another saddle so that I could finish dialing my position in. It'll be interesting to see, but I'm guessing it'll be around 21.5 lbs which is not bad for a 19" bike!

As mentioned, the CX bike has some cobbled-together cranks/rings, but having power data is key, so a non-pinned (and thus SHITTY shifting) Salsa 46T outer with a generic 34t inner 94mm BCD is my compact CX gearing to match up with the ISIS Ergomo I have. The Q factor is noticeably wider but hey - the bike still moves forward when I pedal!

I have to do this because I had to send my SRM back to have a new battery installed (great time to die, BTW), which left me powerless (oh the humanity!) on my road bike. It's working out OK since I just ride my CX bike when I need power data and ride the road bike for endurance rides, like the 5 hour team ride last Sunday in steady 20 mph headwinds. awesome.
All that stuff was just a bunch of shuffling to pass the time until my newest whip arrived - an 09 Tarmac PRO SL. I thought it would be a little bunk using the C'dale SRM that I've had for 2 years, but my search for a sucker, er, sponsor to trade me a Specialized SRM for a Hollowgram SRM has thus far proved fruitless.I was actually a bit surprised to see it doesn't look too bad. It will make a bit more sense once I actually get the SRM back and install it, but there are no interference issues and even though they're fairly easily spotted as Cannondale (and we all know how much Cannondale and Specialized like each other!), I'll swear to my grave the cranks are prototype Campagnolo BB30.Being a new whip, and being a Campyphile, I decided it was time to see what asll the fuss over the new 11 speed was about. When I first heard they were going to 11 speeds, I said I wouldn't do it because I didn't want to deal with the incompatibility between cross and road equipment.
but then I went to InterBike.

Kee-ripes that stuff is awesome. I didn't think they could improve on the 10 speed Record I've been rolling the last several years but they sure did. Starting with the front derailleur shifting action is swift. I can cross chain both 39x11 and 53x25 without any chain rub. Not that I would, but I could... The rear derailleur shifting is ever so subtly different than the outgoing 10 speed action. Surprisingly lighter, but at the same time a bit more swift and crisp, and no where near Shimano mush.
Gripes? VERY cumbersome installation of the ergo levers as a result of another effing torx screw, which precludes the use of a ball end hex key for easy adjusting of lever position. Also, while the lack of cable housing bulge is appreciated, the installation is a bit silly - you can't slide the housing into the lever body without uninstalling the shifter - negating any position you just sweetly found.
Anyway, minor annoyances for some righteous gear. I dig.

I also got some sweet other gear, but it doesn't quite fall into the 'whips' category so you get to check back again later. I'd offer an apology but I wouldn't mean it, and - admit it - you like my prose and check daily for blog updates.

ahem.

Now for the chains part of the post - I bought a KMC Gold 10 speed chain for my CX bike since the Ti-N coating is supposedly more durable. We'll see but the 9 speed chain sure looks sweet on my HT.
As luck would have it, the chain doubles as an old school grill, not like the platinum grills all the kids are getting these days.

The mean mug comes with the teef. You can't not cop a 'tude with fangs like those!

later.

-the ATM

AZ Trip and some soul riding, part 3

2009-02-22T20:06:00.001-08:00

My final day in Arizona found me getting up at 6:30 for a brisk hour-ish ride to spin out the legs before I paid my keep for Thursday through Saturday. After a quick shot of oatmeal before I headed out, I went to my real breakfast:
Ahhh, the breakfast of champions!
It was convenient the coffee joint I visited on Friday was 45 minutes away so I made that my Saturday destination. After a quick chat with my dad and finishing the coffee, I headed back with a swift tail wind to end the riding weekend on a good note. After I showered, I reported for duty.
In trade for room and board, I agreed to help install a utility sink and some lighting in Todd's garage of his newly built house.Please note I am quite jealous of the two wide, two deep three car garage.
After a trip to Lowe's, we got to work. New construction is nice since everything has not had time to bond to everything else. We made quick work of the sink and moved on to lighting.
Once we figured out the wiring, installation wasn't too bad on that either - the biggest problem was making sure we hit joists so the lights wouldn't fall after I left. Three lights up, job done.Piggy aproved of the installation! Note Heather's very pregger belly - she was posting ads on Craigslist while we did our bidniss then she delivered the baby 5 days later. Talk about a trooper!
Long story short, good flight home but I arrived to 35 degrees. Starting with Monday and carrying all the way through to Friday, I had a a candidate for worst week ever.
That brings me to the soul riding portion of this epic trilogy. I don't generally like to give excuses as to why I haven't been blogging - you probably don't care - but after a solid week of getting shelled at work, I needed something positive. Even though I still had to drive 3 hours up to hang with my family, after work on Friday I busted out a SWEET F A ride that made the stars line back up for me, which is nice.
Even though I did log power data, and the Two Johns generally hold that a soul ride has no data attached, I had a fantastic soul ride, bar none. This played into my good Saturday, where I laid down a threshhold test pretty damned close to my max ever - this in February. My weekend ended with a long-overdue long breakfast with my brother then a drive home and subsequent decompression.

Ahhhhh.....

later.

-the ATM

AZ Trip and some soul riding, part 2

2009-02-22T20:05:00.000-08:00

The ride almost didn't start out so well since I got a block away before I realized I didn't put my freshly filled water bottles on my bike. Problem solved, I headed out. With my home base in Gilbert, AZ I decided to head south a bit then North towards the Superstition Mountains. Since it was friday, I figured traffic would be reasonable and scenery awesome.

I was right. The roughly 90 minutes to get to Apache Junction was a great warm-up and I even found a coffee shop 45 minutes into the ride to top off my caffeine stores for the long day ahead. The beauty of caffeine is also one of headache medicine. With as much coffee as I pretend to drink, many of you think I could pound a cup before bed and fall fast asleep in 5 minutes but the truth of the matter is I usually have no more than 3 cups in a day. Factor in no pop (or soda as you from Da Region say) and that's not THAT much caffeine.
Anyway, back to my headache. It was holding fast and not letting go. After about 2 hours, I hit a point in the road where it started to have a consistent grade up so I pried off my helmet. Chap my ass if you want for removing said helmet but I noticed when I removed it at an earlier stop that my headache went away. Eureka! no helmet = no headache. Given the helmet was brand new to my noggin (and let's face it, I have a big head) I just wasn't used to the pressure points.
Along the way, I passed Canyon Lake and snapped a few pics that don't come close to doing it justice.

The last two are on the road past Tortilla Flats - simply amazing. Best part? February 6th, and I was wearing a short sleeve jersey, wind vest and bib shorts...No arm or knee warmers.
Only after about 3 or so hours did my legs start to feel the effort which puts me much farther along in my training than I've been in years past in February. Even better was that I didn't crack, just had the same sensations for the last two hours of the ride. All said and done, I got 90 miles in in just under 5 hours. Just the ride I wanted.

That evening Todd, Heather and I went to dinner at an 'old town Gilbert' establishment, the Liberty Market, that is owned by some cat named Joe. I say cat because even though he looked to be in his 50s he looked like a guy who wished to be referred to as a cool cat - Tommy Bahama type button down silk shirt (that was not gaudy) and a straw fedora that oozed cool. It didn't hurt that he had imported a Faema espresso machine from Italy that was rumored to be from the mid-1950s.Regardless, it pulled a tasty shot!
It was also a nice treat to have an Espresso Stout from Japan during dinner.
It's a Kiuchi Brewery beer, more info here

yet another novel-like post, so part 3 will wrap it all up

-the ATM

AZ Trip and some soul riding, part 1

2009-02-19T10:07:00.000-08:00

I found myself in the semi-fortunate position of having 4 days worth of work in central Arizona a few weeks back, so I took the free flight opportunity to ship my road bike out to some friends in Phoenix for an end-of-week ride or two.
Monday’s flight out of Indy’s new airport was a very early 6a, which meant leaving Mexlerwerks corporate HQ at 4a, which meant a VERY early 3:30a wake time. I did get an hour of sleep in on the plane plus about 90 minutes worth of laptop time, so things worked out OK. Once my plane landed in Phoenix I got the rental and made my way out to Globe, AZ to some stunning scenery along the way.

Upon arrival at the mine site I opened my suitcase to retrieve hard hat and steel toed boots inside only to find the gorillas in baggage had not only broken my plastic container of miscellaneous in-room eating supplies, but also broken open my tub of oatmeal, spilling about 4 cups worth all over my clothes. Sweet.
Anyway, work got done around 6p (8 body time) then we headed out for local Mexican (of course!) cuisine. After getting back to the hotel room at 10p (again, 12a body time) my computer finally decided to connect to the interweb so I felt obligated to catch up on email - being days behind email is not fun. I think I finally passed out around 11:30p for a grand total of 21 hours of wake including the hour kipper on the plane. Crash indeed.
Day two at the mine was more of the same, and when we got done at 7p I jumped in the car and headed south to Tucson since 7a start times are better when you wake at 6a, not 3a. A quick stop somewhere for Subway and gas I was back on the road, enjoying the 75mph speed limits Arizona has to offer. The last 15 minutes of the trip were rough, so loud music and rolled down windows had to be used. Another day, another crash.
Wednesday and Thursday had me at my customer’s testing Proving Grounds south of Tucson, but we managed to get done at a reasonable hour on Thursday, so I was able to start my vacation proper a little early. A quick stop at Fairwheel Bikes at the suggestion of my friend Todd Wells (if he only knew we were friends, it would probably work out better) for a water bottle and drool over two Wilier Triestinas and a couple Parlees, plus scads of S Works and Addicts racked up... very nice.
Coping with the idiot drivers of Arizona, I made my way up to Phoenix to stay with my friends on Thursday night. The first task for Friday was to retrieve my bike from FedEx since the 15 minutes Heather stepped out for errands on Thursday was when FedEx showed up. Of course FedEx was all the way across town which meant 45 minutes each way. A key piece of info that would have been nice to know before hand (and was not told on the phone when I called them) was that they would not allow me to pick up a package sent by me because I didn’t put myself as a ‘in care of’ in the Recipient box. Thanks FedEx phone support! I again used my gift of gab, or maybe my disheveled look, to convince the gal I was not trying to steal my bike from myself and I was on my way.
After I assembled my bike, I was on my way!

stay tuned for part 2

-the ATM

Fat, Dumb and Happy

2009-01-31T06:43:00.000-08:00

Figuratively speaking, of course.

I'm finding myself with plenty o' time on the weekends to do things like clean my house, enjoy coffee breaks (lots of those!), sleeping in and the occasional blog post. Even if I've not actually posted much, rest assured I've got lots of good ideas.
Take, for example, today; My big task is to make it to FedEx on time so that I can get my bike shipped off to Arizona for a few days of working on my badges of honor, er, tan lines.(Please note I'm not wearing an arm warmer to match the kit... that's the previous day's ride tan)
Two downsides to this trip are that I have to work for four days out of a week long trip, and once I've gotten used to 75 degree weather I have to come back to 20 degree weather. On the plus side, I've got two days to just ride my bike. I do have a few tasks to do for my buddy who is hosting me - a few small garage projects, nothing fancy. As he pays my mythical salary as CSO of DUM (that's Chief Sanitation Officer for Double Up Motorsports), I am more than happy to oblige.
In my own private cycling news, I got the new fork for my MTB and the build-up is slowly coming along. I'm in a bit of a holding pattern since the cranks I have slotted for my MTB are currently posted up on my CX bike while my road bike is boxed up for the AZ trip. Once that gets back, the full on build will finish and I can sleep well once again. That may also play well with the weather so that when the bike is complete I can throw a leg over ye olde rig and get in a sweet MTB ride, which has not happened since November 16th. This is too long.

Anyway, I'm off.

Later.

-the ATM

Classic

2009-01-14T18:54:00.000-08:00

I asked for and got the Red Zinger/Coors Classic highlight video for christmas. I was pretty excited because I figured it would be a great way to see racing from yesteryear. It's a 3 disc set with 8 hours worth of footage, so I figured it would be really good trainer fodder.
It's pretty good, but unfortunately footage was not plentiful so the first several years (maybe 1977 - 1982) were struggling to get 10 and 12 minute segments. Then came 1983, a time when broadcasting companies got a new toy in the form of overlaid graphics and titles, plus noticeably better recording equipment (or they coughed up more cash). Plus, this is 1983 we're talking about when popular music also found a new toy in synthesizers. As with everything else, more is better so they overdubbed some really classic early 80s tunes with heavy synthesizers.
Now you may laugh when I say classic in the context of good songs from the 80s, but unless you were born in the mid/late 80s I guarantee you have some songs from the 80s that you have on your iPod, whether you admit it or not. And you listen to them. The Outfield, Softcell, Erasure, Journey, Toto, all of them. But I digress.
I couldn't find any videos from 83, so 1986 will have to do:

Then during one of the climbing stages up the Rockies, where a Colombian mountain goat is drilling it in his 42x18 A crazy familiar [classic] over-synthed tune comes on:

(Asia - Only Time Will Tell, by the way)
Forgive the video... the music video business was in a time that was as awkward as a 13 year old with braces and pimples at the school dance.

One of the more surprising things I saw was a young, pre-whatever the hell genre music he does John Tesh rocking a blue CBS Sports blazer asking the tough questions. I'm very proud to know that I didn't know John's career highlights included sportscaster.

Anyway, it's a cool video and neat to see from whence modern cycling came. From playing billiards between stages to unabashed, non-polished quotes afterwards. No media coaching going on there! Make sure you put it on your list o' vids to get.

later

-the ATM

Euro Mudflap

2009-01-01T18:53:00.000-08:00

Vladimir Karpets has the most fierce mudflap in modern cycling. I think he had frosted tips last year so that's a bit of a loss, but it wasn't as long. He painfully looks alot like Billy Ray Cyrus back in the Achy Breaky Heart days. Somebody needs to tell him to go for a bit less party in the back. And by party, I mean par-tay.

yikes.

later

-the ATM

The best New Year's ever

2008-12-31T20:43:00.000-08:00

...or at least in the last few months. Recall last NYE was the "sorry for partying" year that saw me donate to the Good Times Gods. Ah, good times. Good times.
Anyway, this holiday season I've felt fairly poopy-pants-ish and not really festive. I turned down a few Thanksgiving dinner invites, then drove up on Christmas day for the family bidniss. In keeping with my poopy-pants-ed-ness, I was explaining to my dad a few days ago that I didn't have any plans this year for New Year's and was quite fine with that. After running some errands today I spent much of the evening in the garage getting things cleaned up and organized. I've got 4 bikes and only one is built - This grates on me. In the continued eBay efforts I got a few cassettes cleaned that will get photo'd tomorrow and thrown out on the 'bay.
All in all, I timed it perfectly and turned on the tube with 30 seconds to go, watched the ball drop, turned off the tube and now sign off so that I can go to bed.

Gotta ride my bike tomorrow, you know.

later

-the ATM

Really, it's just a small pain in the neck.

2008-12-24T18:04:00.000-08:00

Seriously. Day two of the pain in my neck was a little worse than day one. Occasionally I get these near-debilitating pains in my neck from what I think is somehow ending up sleeping with my neck all twisted up. Two days ago I awoke with said pain. I generally deal with it for a day, trying not to look over my shoulder, etc then lay on some ice that night.
Did that, no help. This became a much bigger deal because I was headed out for a bike ride, and 40+ degree weather without rain in December was not going to see me skip it. The big problem this presented was that unless I nearly turned my entire body around on my bike, there was no way in hell I would be able to look behind me. I think I stopped maybe 4 times to stretch my neck in every direction possible. The last time finally made some progress so I could at least lift my head up high enough not to continually have to 'look up' just to see what was in front of me. Nothing a quick trip to the chiro won't fix. Too bad that's Monday.
Apart from my pain in the neck, every time I headed West during the ride I was maybe doing 11 mph in order to keep my HR where it should be for a recovery ride. The beauty was that heading east to come home meant I was pushing 25mph at that same HR. Score!

I'm heading up to Fort Fun tomorrow (yes on Christmas day) since Christmas is not what it once was in the Mexler household. I think we'll get together in the afternoon, then sleep, then wake up and eat more then go to bed. Friday is brunch at my Dad's then hopefully a ride with coach extraordinaire Don. Saturday will find me in our team meeting then Sunday is the return trip to continue with getting lots of stuff done around the house that is possible with a week off of work and no travel.

Anyhoo, no pics of anything exciting lately. I pretty much lead a boring life without bikes. I hope you stick around until racing starts up in the spring.

later.

-the ATM

Masters Nats and Convenience

2008-12-19T04:32:00.000-08:00

I've been struggling to find the motivation to post about my last race of the year since I've pretty much decoupled over the last week. I've gotten a few things done around the house but I guess I've taken this week of from everything except the bare essentials.
I wasn't getting great feelings about my legs for the start, but I was going to give it a shot anyway. At the gun, I passed several rows on the inside again but a pile up blocked me in to a solid 4th from the back at the first corner. According to the official at the start, that would put me at 98th.
As expected, it was more difficult to move up but I was still giving it my all. I wasn't feeling the flow and was extremely slow at the run-up as a result. I was ready to pull the plug a few times but cheers from Mike, Isaac, Ryan and Zach kept me rolling. I settled in to a group of a few that, on the whole, were matched up but had strengths in different sections - climbs, corners, etc.
I ended up 29th, which I feel good about. I had already kinda checked out and I knew it would be one of the harder races of the year so to pull out 67 places from the ashes is pretty ok.

SO, moving on... I tend to be a little slow on the blog updates which has been a bit troubling. I guess it gets built up in my head and devoting the necessary time to write a good post ends up dragging on, which I think ends up hurting my readership - which I don't like. I suppose I look at it as the more hits on my blog, the more people enjoy my ramblings and schtick - which is nice. As a whole, cyclists have fragile egos so any encouragement is good.
All this boils down to the great American progression of things. As in, we quickly accept the new as standard and look for the next new thing to provide some form of new/better/easier convenience. Take cars, for example. Keyless entry was barely used on ultra premium cars in the early 90s. A few years later even the $10k cars have it. Now we see convenience packages that don't require you to remove the key from your pocket. Are you really that lazy? No, but it's way more convenient to just reach up and press a button to start the engine. Silly if you ask me, but too many people HAVE to have it. egad.
So what does this have to do with blogs? Well, it's proven to be difficult for me to regularly post to a blog, even though I have lots of ideas pop into my head throughout the day. This is where I build it up too much and don't end up posting. After 'the moment' has passed, interest wanes and the chances of a post, much less a good one diminish quickly.
Enter the next new thing... Twitter. I've known about it for awhile but wanted to avoid it because it seemed silly. Of course, after I put some (okay, lots of) thought into it, it actually makes sense. The logic of it is such that you have to keep it short, so more frequent posts are essentially encouraged. It also helps for when random subjects that are pseudo-blog worthy, since one can send a random tweet and let 'er eat. You can see them at right or get really nutty and have them sent to your mobile. Because, you know, I feel like so many of your lives revolve around my randomness.
or something like that.

So that's a long-winded explanation of why I'm not jumping on the band wagon so much as improving my readership. Buy it?

later.

-the ATM

Pics from round one

2008-12-12T18:03:00.000-08:00

Zach was kind enough to snap a few pics from the race so I figured I'd post a few, since several of my last posts have been pic-less:

The first several painful run-ups:Sherer's probably online now looking for the neon pit coveralls

The frozen ground offered way more grip than mud:
Amazing how much a 32 spoke 3 cross rim rides like butter:

So we're sitting here in the hotel room, watching the first season of Californication, getting ready to head out directly after the races tomorrow. I'm in weird state of mind now, in that I want to do well and will give it my all, but I have no expectations for results since I'll be literally 12 numbers from the back of the grid of 152 dudes. Maybe I'll pretend I'm at the back of a MTB World Cup race where there are 250 guys toeing the proverbial line.

Anyway, all for now. Later.

-the ATM

Two for two

2008-12-11T11:44:00.001-08:00

For those keeping score, that's two 2nd places in two National Championships - sort of. I guess the 2/3 CX Nats isn't really a jersey paying race so it's not really a National Championship, but it was marketed under the guise of National Championship so it's close enough.
I waited too long to register so I ended up getting the #88 grid spot. With no-shows taken out I counted an 8th row start. Luckily enough people were asleep at the wheel at the whistle and I quickly shot up to maybe 30th by the first corner. At the highest elevation on the course roughly a third of the way through the lap I muscled into 4th then moved into 2nd by the 3rd lap. I apparently dug too deep to get there because I just couldn't close it. Well, that and I'm fighting off a cold.
So there it is. Two Nats races and two 2nd places. Perhaps I'll make it 3 for 3 on Sat in the old man's race, starting from 140th place. That should be fun.

Later

-the ATM

the magic of silence

2008-12-06T17:16:00.001-08:00

It's been a really long year, and I'm starting to have to scrape the bottom of the barrel to pull strong rides together. Mentally, I'm good but it's still hard when my legs aren't putting up numbers I could do in the summer. I'm in somewhat uncharted territory since I've never done as many races in previous years as I did this year.
All of this adds up to what I would have thought would make me not want to ride my bike. Alas, even when it's 20 degrees out I can still take motivation from certain things surrounding me: the rhythmic whoosh of tires on the pavement, the silence of a country road interrupted only by the faint mechanical whir of a properly tuned drivetrain and, when I look behind me - my tire tracks in fresh snow:

Yep, I love to ride my bike.

-the ATM

Those crazy Germans

2008-12-03T13:02:00.000-08:00

I bought a belt tensioner for my car since the pulley bearings are shot, and there is no option to buy just a replacement pulley. When I opened the box, I saw one of the universal diagrams and laughed out loud after I decoded it:Apparently you have to have a set of overalls to work on cars. Mere mortals need not apply.
This presents a distinct problem because overalls go against every fashion-forward concept in the world today. Secondarily, I'd have to buy said overalls, and even if purchased at WalMart they'll be at least $20, which brings the overall price of the job up that much more. This is unacceptable.
I think I'll just close my garage door when I'm installing it so that nobody can see that I'm not wearing overalls. I will be wearing khakis since there are no rivets to scratch paint, but no overalls. Just don't tell anybody. Thanks.

-the ATM

Storm the Green

2008-12-01T18:13:00.000-08:00

A somewhat fitting title since it did rain, but only in the hours before our race. This actually sucked because all the mud turned to peanut butter and made for a dirty, dirty bike. I'm fairly certain that chain is done. At least I didn't shred any other drivetrain parts from crashes and such.
During the pre-ride laps I took a few spills so I experimented with dropping the tire pressures until I was regularly bottoming out on the ground. I was feeling good before the start and got a good jump from the gun, but about mid-cassette the chain dropped down to the little ring and I got passed by about 5 people. Big dog restored, I settled in a good pace in about 6th. At the insane low pressures I was running, my Grifos were hooking up like college kids on Saturday night. Not that I ever did, Mom. I studied and got good grades. Really, I did. Anyway, I can only imagine what a set of Fangos would do in the mud.
I rode the race technically clean, and only screwed up a nasty corner-into-run-up section once which only cost me a few seconds. The head wind sections were pretty brutal, but not to the point that I was questioning my sanity.
King Ryan crushed it again and all but clinched the OVCX title, and I was able to jump another step up the ladder to hit 4th which puts me in 5th on season points. I just have to not have a bad race to get 4th since Mike Purvis got collected by a car while training on his road bike last week and now has a limp. Man, that sucks. He's definitely a guy that doesn't deserve anything close to that. I hope he recovers well for sure. I really need to have a stellar result this weekend to crack the season podium, but with the way the other Barbasol guys are riding that is a tall, tall order. No matter - I'll give it a good ol' college try, similar to my efforts on Saturday nights in college. Studying. Because that's what I did, Mom. I promise.

-the ATM

Oh yeah, Is it just me, or does the description "FSA compact 50/34 rings" not tell you the BCD is 5x110mm? After 3 questions from bidders I figured I should edit the post. If nothing else, go to their website and look it up, or better look at the picture I posted where it says '110mm BCD' Sheesh.
/end rant

Cap City cross

2008-11-26T05:03:00.000-08:00

I'd been feeling a little off the last few weeks and not riding tip-top as a result, so I ended up taking a weekend off from racing to let my noggin reconnect with itself. The cure was the maiden voyage on my new Epic, and it was exactly what I needed.
I got a fairly good start considering I was gridded in the 3rd row. I was maybe 4th or 5th wheel after the first few corners, then played pseudo-teammate for Ryan and went to the front for a piece.After he attacked I settled into a group of three for 3rd-5th. Of course, before he launched I did have to show Ryan how to hop the barrier/run up:I hopped it for the first several laps but I noticed my rear wheel clipping the leading edge so rather than bomb out on it I started running it, which really wasn't that much slower anyway. I was working the technical sections well, but I still didn't feel like I had my top end back so I ended up getting gapped over the last two sections and ended up 5th. It's still my best result in the Elite field of the OVCX series this year so I'll take it. Perhaps this is me racing myself into form. I guess we'll see how this weekend's Kentucky state championship goes.

later

-the ATM

Fitting

2008-11-16T19:08:00.000-08:00

For those of you that add up the posts on the right side navigation page this is nothing new, but I'm guessing I'm probably the only one that knows this is my 100th post, so it seems fitting that it's a post about a new bike.

As part of my Grand Plan hatched in early 08, I'd get a hard tail and race that for a season then keep it and buy a full suspension rig to have two race day rigs in my quiver. Well, that kinda happened a little sooner than planned but as they say, I got a great deal!
I was really happy with the build of my HT and want to wait for 09 gruppo bits, so I figured I'd start The Great Component Swap from the HT to the dually after the Iceman. As you read below, it's after the Iceman so here I go:What better place for MTB pics than on a trail? Granted, it's not the full race build, but imagine about 5 less pounds in the wheels and you get the picture. It was a good build if a bit slow, but being a used rig I had to go through the bushings/bearings in the back and I only remembered that I have two bike stands after I swapped the frames out for the last time I needed to pull parts. Plus, for reasons unclear to me other than perhaps marketing, the headset for the HT uses 45x45 bearings ala Campy's Hiddenset while the Epic uses a 45x36 bearing more typical of MTBs HOWEVER they extended the head tube while keeping bearing position the same, so the bearing is recessed in the head tube which prevents proper stackup of the parts. To get around this I used a 5mm stem spacer under the cap until such time as I can procure the Specialized Mindset headset they list in the manual. It rode great today, so it must not be THAT bad.
Speaking of rides, the bike is pretty damned sweet. I'm still dialing in the suspension, but it seems reasonably close to where it should be, and I like it. Alot. I can only imagine how the 09 Epic rides. I wish I was good friends with Todd Wells so he could loan me one of his 09 race rigs. I guess he could do that any way, but I expect being friends with him would grease the skids a bit.

I hope PRO mechanic Zach is reading, since I have to pay tribute to his top tube routing of the rear derailleur. He implemented on Don's Epic and I was smitten with the full cable housing routing passing through the seat stay. I also hope he appreciates my front derailleur:OK, it's not baller Record but I had the Centaur with the right clamp diameter in stock. It shifts pretty good, and I expect it will get even better once I put my 108mm BB in (again, had a 113mm in stock) to tighten the chainline and allow a bit more fine tuning of the cage placement. All in all, 23.5 lbs with maybe another half pound to come off closer to race season next year. I'll take it.
Anyhoo, I'll leave you with a few parting shots since it's pretty rad.
the sun shone down on me, and it was good

it even knows which way to the trail

Later.

-the ATM

The Iceman Cometh...

2008-11-10T20:00:00.000-08:00

...the Iceman goeth.
The last few years I've managed to score an invite to the Iceman as a result of winning my age group for Indiana, but I've always been low on motivation to drive almost 9 hours for a sandy double track race. Having reasonable form and more of a desire to finally do the race, I committed to it. A mini bonus was that I got bumped up to the PRO race. Sweet.
I really started to get nervous about it the day before, once I arrived in Kalkaska. Since I had nothing but time on my hands I stewed about it, going over timelines for pre-race and general race day plans. Once it was close to go time, I headed over to the start line and wound up 3rd row. I figured the start would be critical and that turned out to be true. Only I wasn't nearly as aggressive as I should have been. I ended up in a decent group of 5 guys, and we generally worked well together until the end. At the line I took 34th, which was disappointing but a mere 30 seconds up was 25th place, so I did my normal brooding for a day then got over it on the VERY long drive home. I have to say I felt very Euro when there was a crowd of people a few peeps deep on each side of one climb screaming their brains out - good for a few extra dubbyas of motivation.
In the mean time to help that pain, I figured I head to the Bell's after-awards party and drown my sorrow in booze. I've long been a fan of Bell's brewing efforts, and especially like their Porter so at $3 a pint I was in. A few beers in, I noticed the Best Brown I was quaffing wasn't exactly transparent, which isn't un-normal for Bell's since one motto they have is 'Live life unfiltered' but I've never had it that thick before. Mmm, mmm, good!

Indeed.

Anyway, I've finally given myself some time to post an update as I sit here in a hotel room in wonderful Peoria, Il. Life is pretty crazy for me these days, and I have what seems like zero time to do it all so I flounder a bit on everything. This, too, shall pass but in the mean time I'm pretty wrecked. Good thing is I am still motivated to ride and race my bike, which helps for this last stretch of racing before settling in to a long few months of endurance rides. This is bolstered by a new addition to the family, but details and pics are forthcoming.

On another positive note, I got a belated birthday gift tonight from one of my counterparts at my customer.
Quite possibly one of the best lines of all time. Period.
"which one is your wallet?"
"It's the one that says..."

Until then, later.

-the ATM

One of these days

2008-10-27T20:36:00.000-07:00

...I'll be a bit more diligent about posting only one day post-race. Until then, you just can't rush greatness, I say.

ahem.

Anyway, The Louisville GP weekend was damned near perfect for both me and my team. I love unexpected surprises, such as the #1 bib for the 2/3 races of the weekend.
This gave me pick of the litter on grid position both days. It helped that PRO mechanic and teammate Zach got #2 and second teammate Ryan M got #11 to grid right behind me. Coach extraordinaire Don got shafted by his own silliness (ie, not registering before the week of) so he was #55, in about 8th row.
At the team meeting, we kinda joked that Ryan, Zach and I would slow things down so Don could use his mad pack skills to slice through the field, never thinking it could actually happen. But happen it did. I was in the lead, soft pedaling and coasting through the first two laps yet nobody wanted to come around. Far be it for me to complain. The best part was that a gap was forming to the rest of the field.
True to form, Don bridged so we just started working the lead group over. It was fantastic to hear the announcer over the loudspeaker (Richard Fries, BTW) talk about the tactics we were displaying. In the end I broke away with about two laps to go and held it to the line. I must say it was an awesome feeling to look back and not see anyone in sight so I could get my salute on.
It was even better to see when Don came across the line in second, and Ryan M take 4th with Zach a close 6th. Teamwork fo' sho'.

Day two had the same grid with a slightly altered course including a smallish ditch. I saw potential for somebody to stack it up so I wanted to make sure I was first through it. Having an open road ahead at the start makes getting the hole shot fairly easy. I wanted to push the pace a bit more so we didn't have 11 guys in the lead group as was the case Saturday. I think that was the cause of at least two crashes that slowed my teammates down a few times. Anyway, Don again bridged after a few laps and the smaller lead group again contained four DRT teammates. I had to laugh because Richard Fries was hamming it up on the PA, calling my boys "my henchmen" and me Mr. Mexler. Funny stuff.
Four out of five? you do the math!
With maybe three to go, it was down to three; me, Don and some other guy. I was a bit peeved when said guy did zero work throughout the entire day, but that just gave extra fuel to the fire for when Don and I attacked and countered several times.
Naturally he was forced to chase down and got tired in the process. We never dropped him but it sure seemed like he didn't have much left for the sprint. Don was leading us out and I was third wheel coming onto the pavement the final time. A self-proclaimed slow twitch man without a sprinting muscle in his body, Don was pulling away from the front of the 3-up sprint. Once I dispatched of what's-his-name, I wasn't really sure if I could close the gap to Don and figured it asshole-ish to punk a teammate on the line so Don took the win and I took second, a flip flop from Day 1. Ryan again took 4th - just shy of the podium. Zach had back problems but came in a respectable 14th.

After the post-race interviews, it was great to have Richard Fries off-mike say how that was probably the best display of teamwork he'd seen in a cross race. I'm guessing probably not ever but I'll take it.

So it was a good weekend all around. Another teammate of mine, Nicole B had strong showings both days for her first adventure into Elite level CX racing, netting two top 25s. Especially considering her back-of-grid starting position, she moved up well and represented!
Mike had shit luck on Saturday, which needed no less than 3 bike changes, and not-good luck on Sunday needing just one bike change. Ryan got a top 30 on Saturday then showed determination on Sunday by keeping at it to recover after hitting the wall good for a top 25. Isaac raced clean all day Sunday to get just outside the top 20. Awesome work boys!

the 'nati

2008-10-15T19:31:00.000-07:00

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

Friday started off pretty well. The course was super bumpy and I actively chose NOT to run my 32 spoke box section Reflex hoops laced to Record hubs. Why? I'm lazy. I simply did not want to swap brake pads. Plus deep section hoops look sweet.

Problem is they are crazy stiff. Alas, I'm lazy and therefore took a pounding.
The race itself was pretty cool, I yet again managed to avoid about 3 crashes, one of which was when Rad Skills Ryan took a digger in a corner. I dropped a few dudes towards the end mainly from me unexpectedly riding away from them. Once I had a gap I was just trying to hold it. With about 3 turns to go, a guy bridged to me then passed me going into the final corner. A little odd since he effectively put himself in position to give me a leadout. Regardless, my misinterpretation of the start line as the finish line (super PRO, BTW) and resulting bike throw had him shut down in time for me to realize the real line was about 30 meters later. I won that bike throw, good for 21st in a C2 UCI race. Not awesome, but not DFL either.
Friday night was not so good for recovery... delays and a fancy restaurant that took 45 minutes to serve a plate of freaking bread (honestly?) had me eating at 9p, well beyond the replenish window.
I started Saturday's race a little behind on food but my position in the OVCX series netted me a 3rd row start, behind Troy Wells and Marko Lalonde. Troy missed his pedal at the start and steered into the starting bunch, and I yet again missed the 30-man pile up. I hope my crash avoidance luck never ends.
Anyway, the two way sand pit was interesting... A nice downhill led to one side of the pit with a 180 turn back into it. I typically ride on the flats for sandpits so I don't drive the bike too much, but the immediate 180 required brakes, and didn't give much time to shift down for the return.

I rode it both directions all but once and no matter how hard it felt to ride, running was worse. I finished in 26th, probably from poor recovery on Friday night. Otherwise, top 15 totally.

Sunday's C1 race at Harbin Park had a killer course with a little of everything. And by everything, I mean a rising sand pit, hairpin corner on a descent, a crash, a rolled tubular, and my fast-becoming favorite - course tape in cassette.
To hit the highlights - my front wheel washed out when I thought I was anchored --> dropped chain and scraped right knee. Broke too late into said hairpin --> rolled tire, nice gouge on inside of left knee from canti brake, time lost remounting tire on wheel plus swapping front wheel in pit. All of the above led to me set to be lapped by the big boys, which leads me to my favorite - course tape in cassette.
I wanted to not be a dick so as the leaders were passing me, I pulled over to the right (wind coming from right and blowing the tape into the course) so the PROs could have the clean, un-taped line. Nice... after stopping to remove the tape, I rolled back to the finish line to get pulled and take my sweet 39th place.
So that race sucked, which sucks because I at least felt like I was able to hold a good pace when a lot of guys were cracking and hemorrhaging time. Eh well, there's always next time.

Later

-the ATM

"Oh, excuse me Russell,

2008-10-01T08:25:00.000-07:00

...but I believe I requested the hand job."
-Wayne Cambell, Wayne's World

I can't say that I ever thought that quote would ever fit in another conversation. I remember in my cycling youth hearing tales from my brother of cool names from Ibis. Names like SilkTi, BowTi, Moron and Hakkalugi. Quite clever when you consider the both the SilkTi and BowTi used used the material properties of Ti to flex without a pivot for rear wheel travel (ala C'dale's Scalpel), Moron - which is their version of double butted tubing because there's, uh, More On the ends, plus the Hakkalugi cross bike. My personal favorite, however, is the Hand Job:

Quite possibly THE best detail any bike could ever have.

Sweet pain

2008-09-25T09:56:00.000-07:00

Man, that was crazy. 100 guys lined up for a cross race and off goes the gun. I got shafted on the call up since I thought they would line up by reg number but when the mass of people surged forward I knew I was screwed. It actually helped tho since there was a pile up of about 20 guys and I was able to avoid it. The next 10 minutes were a blur of sprinting, pain and more pain.
The course was wide open but alot of sections were in deep grass that absolutely sucked any momentum I had. I was working the corners pretty well, even if the owner of Challenge tires told me after the race I had way too much pressure in my tires. No matter, I still got paid from dollar-hand ups. I grabbed $6 but lost one as I was just in front of two barriers on a run up.

Since I knew I was going to get lapped, I decided to gain whatever time I was losing by adding style points whenever possible. There was one section that was a perfect spot to air out a bit, so for the last 4 or so laps I was crossing up to the delight of the crowd. I sure hope I can find a few of those pics because that would be a hella-sweet blog pic.
So the final result is that I ended up getting pulled just over 50 minutes into the race, which is about 10-15 minutes longer than I expected to be in there. This was evident when at the start I saw no less that Thomas Frischknecht, Christoph Sauser - you know - current World MTB champ, Mud and Cowbells, plus the usual murderers such as Barry Wicks, Todd Wells, Ryan Trebon, J-Pow, current CX US National champ Tim Johnson. Oh, and Lance Armstrong showed up to boo's at the call up. Funny stuff.

With out a doubt, that was THE hardest race I've ever done. Period.

So Interbike is awesome so far, and I can only imagine it's going to get better!

-the ATM

And so it begins

2008-09-24T11:26:00.000-07:00

I've been destroying my legs since Sunday with walking around here in Vegas plus standing around during booth duty for work. As with any convention when you work a booth, you get to stand around alot then answer questions when people ask. Mainly they end up being semi-fluff questions that are easy to concoct answers, but there is the occasional know-it-all so it ends up being a time sink. This is both good and bad since that person is generally annoying but talking for longer periods of time tends to make the time go by faster. This is key.
I was set to work Tuesday morning then have the afternoon off. My intention was to grab some lunch then go talk to a few customers for max 1 hour, then come back to the hotel for a quick nap but things didn't go to plan so I didn't nap. This is unfortunate since I seem to be going to sleep on Pacific Time then waking on Eastern Time, which means I'm up at 6a. Sweet. It is what it is, and I'll deal with it.
Anyway, after the show I hooked up with some co-workers to head out to dinner in any number of highly over-priced restaurants here in dirty Vegas. After blowing about $100 each on dinner, we headed to some fancy 'bistro' for some cocktails. About 3 minutes before we were set to leave, I thought I recognized a guy coming down the stairs. As it turns out, I was right:

Perhaps he was a bit cheesed at having to be bothered for a photo and thus posed as such, but I like to think he thinks of me as a good buddy just hamming it up for a photo. Yeah, that's it.
Whatever, he was super cordial and talked to me a few minutes without seeming like he needed to be somewhere else. So JV is A-OK in my book.
Sidebar, that dude is always wearing a sport coat of some kind. Tres' stylish.

And so beings my 3 days of starry-eyed geekiness that is Interbike.

all for now-

the ATM

For to make Russian headache

2008-09-19T13:26:00.000-07:00

My previous job was to support our mining engines for all world wide customers, which includes alot of mines in Russia. As part of that, the local engineers would ask questions and I would answer. Over the course of a few years I worked up a rapport with one engineer who, on occasion, makes it to the states for training.
Well, this week happened to be training and he was in town. He shot me an instant message earlier in the week asking if I was going to be in any of the classes. Since my group was presenting several modules on Friday, I was planning to attend and told him so. He responded that I needed to touch base with him as he had a Russian souvenir for me. I like presents, and since it was my birthday earlier in the week it was sure to be a wonderful addition to the birthday wishes I've already received. Sure enough, it was:
Now I can't read Russian, but I can guess as to the contents based on size.

I was right. Please note the lack of english letters on the label. I was most impressed by the felt-like texture on the bottle. This goes well with my souvenir from last year:
Now the reason I haven't tapped into the first was because I promised to drink the vodka in traditional Russian fashion: Do not replace the cap once opened. It is apparently bad luck to open a bottle then not finish it and I'm not a huge vodka drinker. Besides, let's be honest; if I could polish off a fifth of vodka I would have to admit I have a drinking problem. However, in the perfect timing department, I'll bring them out to Vegas so I can honor the other typical Russian method for consuming a fifth of vodka of one bottle for every three guys. That's more of a guideline but it'll be way easier to finish them off in Vegas.

Anyhoo, I'll be leaving in a few minutes to start my week+ adventure starting with a UCI race on Saturday in Davisburg, MI then beating feet back to Indy on Sunday to catch my flight to Vegas. From there I'll spend a few days taking care of bidniss, which is to say, the industry, then start my vacation with a few laps around the Desert Breeze Complex. I can't say I'm as excited as my boy Knapp, but I'm not far off.

So with that, I'm off for now

-the ATM

I am Specialized...

2008-09-15T18:54:00.000-07:00

but come 2009, so is Todd Wells, which is awesome.
Two things:
Specialized better reuse the 'I am Specialized' campaign with Todd Wells:

I can only hope like hell he is able to use his powers of persuasion to have them make a white bike for him:

Anyway, back to me... I am diggin' my Tricross a bunch. Even though I got some course tape wrapped around my cassette (from 40+ mph wind gusts) that shot me to the back of the pack, I was able to claw back to a reasonable finish for my first cross race of the year. More importantly, I felt super awesome with 100% confidence in my rig so assuming I can put together a race without issue I should see some good results in the first part of CX season.
This is good because CrossVegas is a mere 10 days away. I know I'm going to get shelled but I don't care. This race is pure fun for me so even if I have a shit race it will still be awesome. Seriously, how many of you can say you lined up next to Thomas Frischknecht? Given his looooong career, probably alot. But I don't know any of you. Not that I'll really line up against him, but we'll at least be in the same 300 meters for at least 10 seconds. Whatever. It's still cool. Mr Colorado Cyclocross himself, Mud and Cowbells will be there, too. I hope he will appreciate my collection of white sex. No Sidi's for me, tho. I have wide feet and I think they only make Mega in black. Ack! No matter, Specialized is getting righteous for 09.

Enough giddy babbling for now.

-the ATM

Cankle: A photo essay

2008-09-02T17:29:00.000-07:00

As an addendum to my post yesterday about getting stung on my ankle, I now have a cankle.

It feels (and looks) like I have about a gallon of water in my ankle, so bending it is not what I would call comfortable. Sitting all day with my foot as the lowest part of my body does not help things, either.

This is awesome.

-the ATM

Much to Blog about nothing

2008-09-01T15:27:00.000-07:00

Yikes, it's been a while since I posted. Like I always say, though, you can't force a blog post.
Anyhoo, I wrapped up my summer campaign on the road with a 2nd at the Warsaw crit. Always a bridesmaid, never a bride. Er, well, groomsman anyway. I'd like to think I played it smart since a teammate of mine was off the front, then when the group brought him back I countered. From that, a two man break formed and we worked well together. Of course, hindsight is 20/20 but I figured if I kept attacking from maybe three laps out, he was strong enough to hold on such that he'd either just sit on or we'd slow our pace and the peleton would catch us. I continued my error in judgment by letting him come around before turn three, thinking I could come around after turn four. Wrong answer... there was just not enough road. That and he was pretty strong. So I punked myself into second. Idiot. Good thing is the cash was still green so I'll take it.
Did the 1/2/3s race after that and managed to be at the front a few times, then mid-pack the rest of the time. I was really only interested in finishing in the group anyway, so job done there. On the way out of town I think I kinda hit the wall of both sleep and energy depletion. Conveniently, there was a Mexican restaurant on the way home which was crucial in providing much needed instant gratification.
The reason for my lack of sleep was that I got my new cross frame the week before and finally got to build it up on Thursday. I finally stopped at what turned out to be 3am, which is funny since it felt like about 1. ugh. No matter - the bike is sweet!
At the time of the pic, I still had my road tires on so you'll just have to imagine knobbies on the wheels. Also, I have since cut off the steer tube, just needed to get a shakedown run to make sure the cockpit would be positioned correctly. Once I finish with the gluing of tires, expect a new pic.
I was smart enough to snap a pic of my road bike with the sick wheels since I had yet to do that.Looks pretty PRO to me.
Let's see... just finished about 10 hours on the bike in the last 3 days, so that's pretty sweet. Probably went too hard a few times, but it's all good.
Sunday found me on an exploratory CX ride over hill and dale. I had taken a few different turns on my road bike about a month back and stumbled onto a gravel climb, so I decided to revisit it.Turns out it was a good thing. It maybe went up for about a half mile but at the next intersection (still gravel) it kicked up again. I went right and climbed again then started to descend. It was naturally sketchy since 25-30 mph on loose gravel with turns at the bottom were the order of the day, but I managed not to take a digger. I think all told, there was about 5 miles of gravel. Pretty damned cool.
Towards the end of the ride, I stopped at a friend's house since he was outside. Naturally the talk turned to beer and how he didn't like a porter in the summer. When I said I liked them anytime of the year he handed me a few. Being a little slim on capacity, I did what anyone would do in my position - enter Super domestique mode.
What the pic doesn't show is that I still had a few Clif bars left plus a water bottle (and no cages on the bike) so I shoved everything non-beer related down my back under the bib strap. I made the last 20 minutes home without so much as a hoot from any rednecks, which almost makes me think they weren't paying attention. Surely a redneck would appreciate a long neck or two sticking out of a jersey pocket, no?
To wrap things up, I finished my long weekend with an MTB ride. Just as I was ready to roll out, a few cats from Louisville pulled up and we started chatting. It became quickly apparent they were not slow, so we set out together. Not 10 minutes into the ride, I got stung by a bee. This mostly sucks since I'm allergic to them, but also because it was on my ankle where there is no meat so it really flipping hurt. There was not a whole lot I could do, so we rolled on. Ended up with just over 2.5 hours of ultra dusty trails that capped off a fantastic weekend. We even tried to eat Mexican but the place I was headed was closed. WTF?!? Terribly pissed, I pulled into a Wendy's since the guys had to head south sooner than later and driving across town to find another Mexican place was just not in the cards.

So there it is, I'm all up to date. Later.

-the ATM

Bookends

2008-08-20T19:37:00.000-07:00

I decided about a month ago to make the Logansport Dino race my last MTB race for the year so I can squeeze out some good results from the insane form I seem to be brandishing these days. I love the course and aside from last year, I generally have good results there.
A few Dent Wizard guys from St Louis (Ryan Pirtle and Craig Wohlschlaeger) showed up and, given Craig had a carbon C'dale hardtail with the 110SL fork AND Reynolds tubular wheels with Tufo MTB tires, I figured they were not slow. Turns out a good assessment - They took 1-2 into the woods and rolled a pretty good pace. It oddly didn't take too long to whittle it down to us three. Only problem was that they didn't seem too keen on pulling through and I was not going to be the designated tow boat for the day. After some prodding, we were all taking pulls and continued to stretch the lead.
Heading into the last lap, it was down to Ryan P and and me. Earlier he said he wasn't sure about his legs, having done an adventure race the day before, so I started surging to see if he had anything left. He brought me back each time, and we were nearing the final K so I sat up, waiting for the final sprint. He started to come around in what I thought was a final pull, so I stabbed it one more time. Sounded like he cramped up, but I didn't wait for the confirmation so I stomped it in for the win.
I like the fattening of my wallet from the winning purse. I need to do that more often.
As I was driving back, I realized I started my MTB season off with a W at the Chickasaw Trace Classic back in late March, giving me victory bookends. This is in stark contrast to what most would call a Victory sandwich, which is wrong. It would be a pretty good season on Victory bread. Rather than try to explain this to people and come off sounding like an arrogant jerk, I just say I had bookended my season with victories. Explaining this on my blog is much less abrasive.
Anyway, I'm hoping for some sweet victory pics but I think my dad brought his non-digital camera so I have to wait a bit. So do you.

One more weekend of road crits then it's game off for a few weeks then the start of cross. Sweetness!

Later

-the ATM

Coming soon to an interweb near you

2008-08-17T04:23:00.000-07:00

I really dig these productive weekends where I can do some work on Saturday, then do work, er race, on Sunday.
After a quick trip to the recycling center, I came back to Mexlerwerks corporate HQ to do some business. Since it's only been about 8 months since I started, I figured it was time to finish the hitch on my car so I can utilize previous iterations of bike racks I've made for the upcoming CX season. Granted, I've not finished since I've been racing weekends, but management has been pushing for the completion of the project.
I actually got the bulk of the work done last week but a few details needed addressed. So now it's 100% done, and after the shakedown run to my MTB race, I can now be confident it's ready for powder coat. Like Colonel Hannibal Smith from the A Team used to say, "I love it when a plan comes together." Sweet.
I'll post a few pics once I get it back from p-coat. That and I forgot to take pics before I mounted the bumper.
Another piece of work that I finished was the Hydrolator, which is basically a water bottle tree.This prevents knocked over or stolen bottles on picnic tables, with the added convenience of being able to grab bottles at speed without worry. Plus, it breaks in two for trunk transportability. That's cuz I'm smart.

So, I need to make myself do what I've talked about for a while and hang my shingle out for custom fabrication. You want it? We can make it.

Anyway, that's all for now-

the ATM

I'll admit it

2008-08-10T08:50:00.001-07:00

I'm a wheel whore. I can't have enough wheels. Six wheelsets, plus a trainer-specific wheel is not too many wheels for two bikes... It's all about having the right tool for the job.
Through some wheeling and dealing, I just picked up a set of Campy Record/Mavic Reflex tubulars 32h laced 3x. The main reason I got them is for ultra nasty CX race conditions (more to not destroy my carbon hoops than to have a more conditions-appropriate wheelset). Side benefit to the wheels was that they came into my possession with road tubies already glued to them. Sweet. Rather than just rip off the tires, I decided to get at least one ride on them.
Holy smokes...those babies roll ultra smooth. I was amazed at how instantly I noticed the difference between theses and my regular training wheels (32h Veloce hubs/Mavic Open Sport hoops). I'm sure the biggest reason for that is the tubulars, followed closely by the box section rim without stiffening benefits of the clincher hooks. Having Campy's tried-and-true cup & cone bearings does not hurt, either. It also doesn't hurt that I rebuilt these wheels back in December 07, while playing mechanic to the stars when they were still in the possession of Superstar RDK.
Add in the 2.5 wheelsets for my MTB and you can understand why I'm a wheel whore.

Hell, I even have 2 sets of wheels for my car; one for summer, one for winter.

A productive weekend

2008-08-04T19:10:00.000-07:00

This past weekend, I was originally going to just race the DRT Series finale MTB race in Fort Wayne on Sunday but once I realized there was a circuit race in Cincy on Saturday, I threw caution to the wind and decided to do both.
Since I've done well in the Huntington 140the past two years (it's a two day stage race with about 40 miles of cyclocross and single track) I wasn't too worried about overextending but I was still curious how my legs would respond on day 2.
The circuit race started much like every other Cat 3 race where everybody wanted everybody else to put their nose in the wind. Ugh, here we go again... The finishing straight was about 2% with a headwind so we'd end up barely going 15 mph many of the laps. I was surprised to see that the small break was not coming back - you know - because the 2% climb was too much work for the peleton, but towards the top it would usually end up at about 15 seconds. With about 5 to go, I decided to punch it about 100m from the apex. Since there was about the same grade downhill, I only really had a few hard seconds then another 15 at just slightly above threshold before I bridged.
With about 1km to go, one guy launched at a short, not steep climb but since nobody wanted to chase he took the W. I suppose I could/should have tried to bridge to him but I think everyone else was ready for any accels so it would have come down to a bunch kick and me half-gassed from bringing it back. As it ended up, I took second from the breakaway group sprint, third on the day. Not too shabby. I just need to get a bit more positioning experience to capitalize on my power.

Anyway, on to the MTB race. I really just wanted to have a good race without any stupid crashes resulting in me chasing for 2 hours, as has been the case lately.
Job Done. I didn't even sweat that I didn't get the hole shot (I was 2nd into the woods). The guy who took the lead laid it out in a corner about 3 minutes into the race so I took the lead from there. SuperMechanic Zach and I stretched it out to about 45 seconds after the first lap, then he dropped his pace to make sure he finished strong. I was feeling super good so I was gassing it as much as possible. I didn't realize how much time I pulled out until after I burped air, stopped, reinflated and got back on the bike without anyone in sight. In a wide open field, I still had about 30 seconds, which was nice.
After all was said and done, I clicked off 4 laps within 30 seconds of each other at just over 25 minutes, plus a silly-fast first lap at 24:38. I even got to bust out the Robbie McEwen running man victory salute.
I wasn't surprised afterwards, tho, that for about 45 minutes I was cashed out. After sitting around for a little while and getting topped back up on fluids I started to come back around. Capped the weekend off by having dinner with the family at a typically nice Italian joint. This time the food was molto salty. Should have had Mexican.

All in all, a good weekend!

Sorry for the lack of pics... Blogger is having upload issues tonight.

-the ATM

And so it begins

2008-08-02T07:05:00.001-07:00

I tried to delay it as much as possible, but I guess this is as far as it goes. When asked to play mechanic to the stars on his 'cross bikes I naturally agreed. This was a basic start with only a roughing in of parts - chain, cables, derailleurs, brakes, etc. Most notably, tho, was fixing the star nut clamp in the steer tube in one of the bikes.
Specifically, a star nut in a carbon steer tube is a bad idea, and a star nut that is cocked in the bore is worse. On top of this, the nut appeared to have been driven in by an aluminum sleeve that was essentially pressed-in in the process. After trying first to file a groove in the aluminum by hand (to collapse it for easy removal), and stabbing my thumb in the process, I decided to go for the Dremel. Job done, I moved on.
Of course, after roughing them in I had to do some visual payback, so I threw on my ultra sick tubies. In a mental lapse for proper blogging, I just snapped a pic with my camera so forgive the graininess:

So now it begins. I've assembled all the parts for my 'cross bike except one. Um, the frame... but that's in the works.

I even watched Transitions 2: Cross the Pond last night to get more in the 'cross mood. It worked.

All for now

-the ATM

Instant Gratification

2008-07-28T19:23:00.000-07:00

I know how to ride a bike - I swear. Yet another crash in yet another race led to yet another chase. I really need to learn how to make these hole shots I keep getting Todd Wells stylie count.
This crash ranks pretty high on the dipshit scale. I somehow managed to clip my 23" wide handlebars on a tree that was 36" away from the tree on the other side of the trail. It sure was a doosey... I flew over the bars and assumed the fetal position lest I get clipped by the chasing pack of 6 fast guys. After I felt safe, I jumped back to my bike to survey the damage and remove my bars from Don's wheel. You see, Don was right behind me and assumed I would be able to ride my bike. Silly boy.
Reinstall chain and commence chase. I must have been pretty close to making the bride but dug pretty deep to get there and had to recover a bit. Never quite made it and started to slow a bit on lap 3 to make sure I could have a strong finish. I ended just over 3 minutes off wining pace, set by none other than Semi-Pro Don. If I hadn't dropped my chain, I totally would have been there. I think.
I was pleased with my effort and wished I had the data. You see, the bar mount for the head unit worked it's way loose in the crash and did a number on the connector, rendering the unit worthless for race data. At least it still works.

So after a faster than usual ceremony, I talked the crew into a post race dinner. What else? Mexican. Two important things were discussed:
(1)You can't really consider yourself a mountain biker if you don't at least want Mexican after a race or even ride.
(2)Tortilla chips and salsa. You're generally hungry after a race, and chips are a great form of Instant Gratification.

-the ATM

So close…. Ever so close

2008-07-20T21:14:00.000-07:00

may be 'just another race' but it was still big enough to bust out white, white, white
After my call up for being #2 Expert in the country, Dave B (whom I had met a few weeks earlier at the AMBC on the July 4th weekend) took his #3 call up and we exchanged good lucks before the gun. Based on how he rode at the AMBC race and his better-at-updating-people-than-me blogging he’d done, I wanted to make sure I kept my eye on him. He reeked of top notch form for sure. That didn’t change the fact that I wanted the hole shot.

Dave B #3 and me #2, 35 sec before Work
So I took it. I simply wanted to put some sting in everybody’s legs. After a quick descent the first big climb came up and I settled into my own pace. Not wanting to blow after a lap or two, I watched the two leaders of my group climb away.
There was almost 10 solid minutes of descending, east coast style - all kinds of roots and rocks that snake down the mountain. For some reason, I seem to have a retard switch on this trail that allows me to descend like a stone. My older brother’s sage advice kept playing in my head throughout the day – brakes only slow you down. I was picking off lots of back markers so I kept pushing the downhill pace. This turned out to not be a good idea for the entire descent because I took a pretty sharp digger into some roots that gave my knee/shin/hip some witness marks.
the straight lines mask the actual squiggly trail

I’ll spare you the picture of my outer hip
After remounting, I rode fairly stupid for a little bit while I regained my composure and got my leg back working at full strength.
Starting into the meat of L3 climbing I saw P2 ahead of me and he was suffering. What was a 30 second gap at the start line had come down to 10 seconds pretty quickly. Once I passed him I never looked back. I was motoring whenever possible in the hopes that P1 would come into my sight – Nope. I crossed the line 2nd, nearly 4 minutes back. Dammit.

While it burns my ass that I didn’t quite reach my goal, I still had a fantastic race. And I still got some hardware even if it is the wrong color.

Big up to Dave B for showing that the Midwest knows how to ride a bike.

So now it’s one or two more MTB races, then heavy on the crits as training for ‘cross. Because, um, my new wheels are sweet, and Cross Vegas will be here in no time.

-the ATM

Goals

2008-07-20T19:56:00.000-07:00

I've determined that I can't come up with a short post, so I'll have to break it up. Race report to follow.

I started training this January with a little something to prove since I didn’t have a good showing at 2007 Nats. Much as last year, the jersey was my season goal. Sure, I wanted to have some good results along the way but nothing really mattered except Nats. After two crashes sent my race Tango Uniform last year, I was quite wrecked mentally for the next 6 weeks...So much work for 23rd place -->one spot away from DFL.
As the time drew nearer to ‘the day,’ I was trying to understand how I felt. On Thursday I was able to pull it all together: There was really nothing more that I could do. I’d give everything I could give and take whatever I’d get. A few months back I committed to myself that I’d take my Semi-Pro upgrade after Nats and this, without even realizing it, took a huge burden off my mind. This was further reinforced when I went to sleep the night before the race and didn’t have my typical hour of nervous tossing and turning before a big race.
Anyway, back on task. As I pulled into staging, my dad and asked if I was nervous or worried. Nope. It was just another race - A very big ‘just another race’ but just another, nonetheless. Time to, as Big Black says, do work.

-the ATM

Welcome to Vermont

2008-07-18T08:39:00.000-07:00

Damn, New York is a long state. Really long. It took about 8 hours to drive through, and it dragged on and on.
Anyway, once we settled into our lodging it was a bit of interweb surfing then lights out. Woke up this am to get a little preride in on the 90% different course than what I've ridden the last two years. I like the new course - could do without the fresh cut opening section, tho. I like last year's separator/opening climb better. More of a powerman's climb then small single track section. No matter, good stuff all around. The descents are S-A-H-W-E-E-T. Ultra gnar-gnar with lots of rocks and roots. There are even a few rocky punch climbs that have 'big ring' stamped all over them.
So now I'm in the room, just chillaxin'. The legs are trained, the bike is dialed, and on Wednesday just before I left even got a sweet Oakley hook-up in the form of red ear socks to compliment my white chrome Radar frames. Getting ready to head out for lunch, then come back for a nap and a movie.

I kinda like being lazy.

-the ATM

Not too shabby

2008-07-08T16:10:00.000-07:00

Even though I probably didn't really get hoops custom made for me, I'm going to pretend like I did. I mean, how many of you have your names on your wheels?

I'm still waiting for the correct length spokes to show this weekend for the rear wheels, but that didn't stop me from building up the fronts.
That, among other things were done this weekend, making me hella productive for the extendo weekend. First off was a wash/clay bar/polish/wax job on my car that was woefully overdue. I'd been putting it off since it generally takes 2 days to finish since you have to tape the trim so as not to require a day to removed extra polish, etc.
For whatever reason, I was on it and only took a day. The paint is now smooth like buttah!
That gave me plenty of time on Saturday to wake up sans alarm, make some pancakes, get in the rough lacing of one wheel, open up the legs with a ride for an hour, then come back and finish building both wheels. They were surprisingly easy to true and didn't require much in the way of adjustment after relieving spoke tension. Can't wait to ride 'em!
I even got to watch The Prestige, which, if you've not seen, you should. Not so much a magic show as a psychological thriller with some crazy twists.
Sunday was my last MTB race before Nats in two weeks, so I wanted to have a strong ride. Good thing I have a power meter to record data because I wasn't feeling so awesome about my result (7th). Went out a little too hard and thought I paid for it, but looking at the data I probably had my best race of the season. Fancy that.
Finished my weekend with a cookout at a friend's place.

all for now.

-the ATM

Sweet, sassy!

2008-07-01T04:41:00.000-07:00

Whew! I needed that. My last several races have not exactly shown the form I felt I have, and as it turns out put me into a bit of a funk. It was a little deceiving because it wasn't any one thing - just little bits and pieces that kept innocently piling up.
Anyhoo, with the planned MTB stage race postponed due to rain, I decided to do an OMBC race outside of Cincy. This was good because I was not spending the entire weekend away. This allowed me to spend an afternoon with my newest time distraction. More on that in a minute.
I was able to bridge to the two who launched uphill from the gun, and pip them for the hole shot into the single track after a lengthy road section. This was key since I had maybe 15 minutes of trail time, and the trail was definitely challenging - lots of sections that started to flow but then turned right. It took me two laps to get the flow, so my first two laps were not smooth at all. So unsmooth that I washed out of corners 2 times and clipped my pedal twice. End result was 3 spills and one dropped chain.
The road section was a blessing in disguise, even with a stiff headwind because I could flat drill it and make up some time. Heading into the third lap, I caught the 2nd place guy and let him make pace until I sensed we were getting reeled in by 4-7th. Naturally after I took over it was game over, and we cruised away. A long grinder proved to be my unintended launch pad, as I gapped the guy. Darn the luck, anyway. I ended up 90 sec down from 1st and 30 sec up on 3rd, so job done. I definitely had to earn it and felt good about my performance. A nice motivational shot in the arm heading into a few mui importante' races. OH, and all 3 laps were within 20 seconds of each other. That's 1% for those keeping track.

So back to my Saturday distraction...

I even got them laced up, only to find I got some bad info and the spokes I had were about 2mm too long. So I got to break them back down. Sweet. Anyway, I'm working on the correct length so I should be able to have them built up by next week. Seeing as they are tre' pimp, I will be ever-so-unPRO and rock a set of tubulars on the very first ride they are glued up. Poseur status be damned. They're too sweet to leave bottled up... 1400g for an aero wheelset? Yep, thank you very much.
Two sets, you may ask? Why cyclocross, silly. But having that sweetness hang in my garage for two months without using a set for road borders on sacrilege. Besides, I did have to sell my wonderfully awesome Shamals to cover these wheels, so it's only right that I get to use them.

That's all for now.

-the ATM

maybe it's just me...

2008-06-24T08:26:00.000-07:00

...but does Christophe Sauser not look like he's working on a 70s vintage mustache,
possibly somewhat porn-ish?
Then again when you have World Champion stripes, you don't necessarily need to justify your mustache tendencies.

While on the subject of making fun of World Champions, did Sven not get the memo that the 80s called and want their helmet back? At least put it on as a helmet should be, not how rookies do trying to protect their cerebellum...
Even if he didn't have WC stripes, having a sweet rig such as he does with tubular MTB tires and all would aptly compensate for the silly helmet.

-the ATM

Can't buy a break

2008-06-23T17:46:00.000-07:00

...but a flat? No problem. Actually, more like a cut. As in my brand spankin' new rear Specialized Roll-X mud tire was sliced open 3 minutes into the race yesterday.
Rolling through the opening flowing single track and I must have hit the only sharp object on the trail. BOOM! was the familiar sound, followed by the painfully familiar feeling of no rear traction. The tire had completely blown off the rim. I tried to boot it back up but the remaining sealant fizzle revealed the gaping hole and no hope for repair.
My day done, I walked backwards on the trail relishing in the fact that I was not 5 miles away, but a mere 1/2 mile away. After a casual chat with Don, I went to go mount my dry condition wheel so I could ride to a faucet to wash off the nasty Stan's sealant off my bike before it turned to dried epoxy. About the same time, Don and I both had a thought... Don could look away while I went back on course.
Now this is highly illegal (As is taking a teammate's wheel which was offered by Superstar Dave Coar) as it is considered outside assistance by USA Cycling, as if to say the 15 minutes lost walking back to the car wasn't penalty enough.
Anyway, I decided I was going to chase hard for one lap to see what I could do (that and I had some calories to burn off from my pre-race big breakfast!) I set off like a scalded dog. I did some skills work, focusing on less braking through corners and generally trying to maintain momentum. It must have worked because my average power for the lap was within 30w of my thresh hold power, and for twice as long as the power test to boot!

Anyway, looking for a good set of results in the MTB stage race coming up this weekend. Perhaps no flat this race...

-the ATM

She is sweet, no?

2008-06-18T06:28:00.000-07:00

My MTB rig developed a creak that I thought was related to the aging pedal spindles that have done their job for the last two years. Frequent greasings did nothing to quell the creak. The last time I was reinstalling the pedals I noticed a thin line around the bottom bracket shell that would not rub off. Yikes... the BB shell had delaminated from the carbon.
Since it happened, I've struggled with mentioning it because the bike flat out rocked and I'm in no way wary of a Specialized bike... making a light bike requires pushing the envelope and this is not the first carbon bike to have a delamination. I know one guy who's on his third frame for the same problem. I don't want to mention the brand but it rhymes with Trek.
Anyhoo, hopes of sliding under the radar were dashed on the rocks below when I got the new frame:
Um, yeah, so they didn't have the Stumpjumper HT Comp in stock so they bumped me up to the S-Works HT. By the way, it's red. Flo Red to be exact. It's dead sexy. Have I mentioned red is my favorite bike color behind white?
Props to Don for swaying me to white bottle cages from the bunk black ones I had. Once I recover a bit from some other purchases, a white saddle is in the cards. Perhaps for Nats because kicking people's ass is all the better when you look good doing it.

short-ish post.

later

-the ATM

Everything goes better with oil

2008-06-08T06:49:00.000-07:00

I expect I'm not alone on this one; everything is better with oil. To start, there is the obvious engine oil. No oil is bad in this case:
This was the rod bearing on my 88 Toyota LandCruiser after the previous owner ran it out of oil and I bought it as a project. Amazingly, the other 5 bearings look fine for 200k miles.

Anyway, back on task. There's also bread.

A little olive oil and perhaps crushed pepper to dress up and make delicious:
Bonus feature is the good fatty acids you get from olive oil. Just don't overdo it!

Then, of course, there is this:
Before

after

But the point of my post is legs:
This was after a spill in a Crash 4 race so pardon the damage. Note lack of definition.
This was after a ride in about 50 degree weather with considerable rain. Note how the oil highlights the muscle tone and enhances definition. Goodness knows my legs have terrible
definition otherwise.

So there you have it. Things just go better with oil.

-the ATM

Priorities need adjusted

2008-06-02T18:17:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted in a while, you all know this. For that, I apologize. Much has gone on in the world of Mexlerwerks. To avoid a War And Peace-like novel, I'll quickly summarize.
Day two of car suspension wiped me out; I finished the fronts around 2:30a. Took a little longer than expected. It took me about 4 days to recover from that. The end result was totally worth it - my car is tight. Like slot car tight. Really need to finish the hitch so I can really rail the corners and not slam bikes around in the trunk.
The late night wiped me out so much I was too tired to post about the mini training camp to Chattanooga. Damn, that was very much needed. Ride, eat, sleep, coffee, eat, ride, repeat. ~13 hours in 3 days and my riding belly was full. A few pics:
Turns out it IS available in stores!

Our rolling residence and support rig for 4 days. Ultra sweet.

We were antsy to ride so we park the RV in a Dollar General store parking lot and pointed wheels to the Cherahola Skyway. Many of you might remember this as a destination ride back in March when spring camp was based out of Fontana, NC. We didn’t ride it, and I left wanting. Lucky for me, it has two sides so we were conveniently afforded the opportunity to ride it from the TN side.
Early on at the start of the climb

Total climb time was about 1:20 h and the distance was just under 17 miles. I’d guess the first 3 or so miles were barely elevating, but still that was a damn long climb! I even took a quick video of me once I was riding solo (Don and Zach were not digging the heat so much) but it was quite Mud and Cowbells-esque and I didn’t want to blatantly copy so you don’t get to see it.
Days 2 and 3 found us in a Walmart parking lot since there were no camp sites available. Fortunately, said Walmart was at the base of Racoon Mountain XC trail. Even better, a 30 minute road climb (and descent when finished... more on that in a minute). Damn sweet trail. Gonna be a SERC race there later this year, to boot. May have to do that one.

Ok, so back to the descent. On the 2nd trip (we did a 2-a-day) down, I just clocked in at about 40 mph (yes, knobbie 2.3 tires at roughly 20psi. no, it wasn't scary. I ride better than that) when out of the corner of my eye I see a small blob, then hear a "ping!" Looking down, I saw blood on my knee and and some giblets on my fork.

I looked over at Don and said "I just hit a bird." Upon arrival at the RV, feathers on my rim confirmed I Ginsu-ed a bird. Sorry buddy. I felt bad as I was cleaning my fork ofthe guts.
The last day we hit the Chilhowee and Tnasi trails. We were all ready to head out so no stopping for blog pics. Chilhowee was pretty sweet - a 45 minute ascent with some gnar gnar single track, followed by the 45 minute descent in reverse. It only took us 7 minutes to get down. A bit slow on the way up, not slow on the way down.
Tnasi was neat, too. It started across the stream from the 96 Olympic venue for kayaking. Surprise, surprise... climb, single track, descent.

Upon arrival back in Columbus, I spent a day cleaning bikes, etc then headed for the airport for an 8p flight to Montana. Not super stoked to travel for work for a host of reasons, but it needed done so I did it. Got back Thursday night after a full day of travel. Three days of taking it easy helped with good recovery, which bode well for me for Sunday's XC race in my back yard.
I took 2nd into the woods and was feeling great. About 5 minutes into the race, my stupid low tire pressure conspired against me, and I rolled my tire. Watching the race go by in front of me I opted to just inflate rather than throw in a tube. 30 seconds past and I was chasing. For the next 90 minutes. With a slowly deflating tire. I really didn't have too much trouble with lap traffic but I could not bridge to the winning move. I ended up 6 minutes off the pace. dammit.

So that's it. I would liked to have gone into more details for each event, but I doubt many of you are still reading along. This post is quite epic.
As justification for those who are still with me, I'll leave you with a pic of my domination of the start sprint at the Morsches Park XC race where I disintegrated late in the race. Obviously, the start is not as important as the finish, but staying in front of crashes is a much better way to race.
about 2 hours before meltdown

So with that, I offer an half-empty promise to place a higher priority on posting more regularly. Actually, I'll be optimistic; the promise is half-full.

I'm out

-the ATM

Just like Ice Cube

2008-05-20T07:38:00.000-07:00

I gotta say it was a good day.

While I didn't mess around and get a triple double, I did pick up the cash flow.
But that's not what this is about.

During the day Monday, I started plotting the suspension overhaul on my car and it looked like my best opportunity (short of taking a day off) was to split my efforts over two days. Looking at the repair destructions, I figured the rear shock replacement wouldn't take too long so I tackled that first. It was pretty straightforward and I was done in about 2 hours.
I then shifted focus to my front wheel, since it had been gnawing at me for about a week. I dove in and replaced the previously mentioned alu nips with brass. Truing it was straightforward and I was done with everything by 10:30p. Plenty of time to stretch and hit the sack on time. Monday was for sure a good day.

OK, so back to the race. I actually didn't feel so hot during the race since I tried a new concoction of nutrition. Apparently Gatorade and Accel Gel give my GI tract fits. So bad, in fact, that I hemorrhaged about 5 minutes on the last lap. Not terrible though since Brad and I were able to build up a pretty good lead, so I still took second. It took me the rest of the day to feel better, so I won't be trying that again.

So I hope tonight is more of the same as yesterday. The front proves to be more difficult and time consuming so I'll need some good juju.

later.

-the ATM

bummin'

2008-05-13T20:31:00.000-07:00

I'm actually pretty pissed. I've popped 3 nipples on my training wheels in the span of 4 days.
The first two happened at the same time and were non-braking spokes on the front wheel. WTF? front wheels are supposed to have lower tension (and even) to prevent this problem, plus non-braking spokes are even less cyclically loaded than braking spokes so they should be the ultra durables ones. Oy gevalt.

It's pretty funny because I actually had a draft post almost ready to publish yesterday (before nip #3 broke) where I said the following:
"Now call me crazy but if I were a betting man, I'd wager the drive side rear would blow a spoke or nip waaaay before two on the front. There is considerably more tension in the rear, afterall."
So which nipple popped tonight? yessir, driveside rear, thank you.

Now I've not exactly been kind to these wheels. They've pretty much been my bitch for the last two years, and they get ridden every where in every condition. Lately I've been logging lots of miles in the rain, but I routinely wash after a rain ride. Granted I don't relube the nip/eyelet joint but I didn't think that was needed. silly boy.

I went through the front wheel on Monday, checking tension and found several on the high side of acceptable, so I went to take a full turn out of each one. Problem is, that whole no-lube of eyelet joint thing kinda bit me, as I rounded a few more nips in the process. Oy gevalt!
Another bit I had ready to post yesterday:
"Makes me think about relacing using brass nips, which isn't a big deal I guess but I've had ZERO problems with Aluminum nips in the 5+ years I've been using them for both road and mountain."
On the way home after the breakage tonight I almost justified keeping the alu nips but decided I'm probably on the verge of blowing out all the nips on the rear so I'll just start over with brass.

I'm fairly certain the pummeling they've taken as of late with all the wet rides is a major contributor. Any triflo that was between the nipple and eyelet has long been gone, and the SpokePrep has pretty much taken ahold. Mix in continuous cyclic loading and something's bound to give.

On the good side of things, the auction ended for my Shamals and I got paid tonight, so I get to make way for the new hotness.
later

-the ATM

Happy weekend, indeed!

2008-05-09T12:22:00.000-07:00

This weekend was already planned to be quite busy with much to do on my mom's car. We traded cars last weekend so I could do some routine maintenance over a two week period, instead of trying to shove it all in a day's time. I already changed the transmission and final drive fluid earlier in the week, and tonight I had planned on starting some minor engine work to replace some seals in the upper valve train area. Not a hard job, just time consuming. Next week is oil change and a wax job.
So I was working my way through the work day when I started having odd glitches with my computer trying to open up Excel. OK, so a reboot is in order...
...only problem is it kept shutting down during reboot, then start the process over. Ugh. not a good sign. I called the IT help desk and the prognosis was not good. He figured he may be able to have a functioning computer back to me by 5 but no promises. Note I said a functioning computer. He did not say my computer. Basically, the hard drive is dead and all my files with it. We have this fancy backup program that takes 30 minutes to run every week, and slow the computer down in the process but when a hard drive fails it's pretty much worthless. So that is a waste of time. Awesome.
Result? Screw it... I made a few calls then bagged it for the day. Nice, because I can get started on the project earlier than expected. Sucks because all the work I don't do today will be there on Monday.
This weekend was further bolstered with the package that was on my doorstep when I got home...

Ah yes, the shocks that have been on back order for about 5 weeks now.
This is awesome because I've been dealing with the blown original shocks for about 6 months now. First order of business once I get my car back is to tear into the suspension. To say I can't wait is an understatement.

Anyway, I had a good ride last night. Made some good power and didn't have the shit feeling in my legs like I did last weekend. I also figured out that I screwed up the transfer of measurements from MTB to road bike, so my saddle was 5mm farther back than desired. I kinda noticed this on Wednesday, with some shooting knee pain so figured I would revert back to the old position on my road bike since I felt awesome with that setup. Upon baseline measuring, I discovered the error. Sweet baby Jesus, that was troubling. I bumped it forward then set out on my ride last night and felt particularly awesome.
Looking forward to this weekend's lack of travel, plus a few days of chill riding.

ah, the good life.

-the ATM

Don't ever get old

2008-05-08T10:18:00.000-07:00

A few nights ago, I had to laugh out loud as a I walked to my bed. I put 3 therapeutic devices on my bed on which to fall asleep. There were two ice packs on my bed as well as a heating pad. Ice pack # 1 is for my SI joint (spine/hip) since I seem to have inflamed some soft tissue that tends to pinch blood flow to my lower extremities, most noticeably my legs. As I generally like to ride my bike, and legs are pretty much needed to ride said bike, I kinda need blood flow to 'em. So I sleep on an ice pack.
Ice pack #2 is for my on-again, off-again aching back. Any generalized abuse including but not limited to hours spent standing, working in the garage, etc tends to bring a certain level of discomfort. Trips to my chiropractor, plus icing my back helps. So I sleep on an ice pack.
The heating pad is currently in use to help increase blood flow to my shoulder, as I decided to squarely clock a tree this past weekend during the MTB race. As one could infer, I did not perform as I expected, tree notwithstanding. Get it? standing?
ahem.
Moral of the story is take care of your body, and don't get old.
My race didn't exactly go as well as I had hoped. I got a good start, taking second into the woods, but as it turned out I threw it in reverse from there. I ended up 9th and lap times were about a minute slower each lap - not so good. The pisser of it all was that I lost two spots in the last half mile of the race. I'm not saying I wouldn't have lost those spots otherwise, but I did come up on lap traffic 4 or 5 times where passing was not an option. Such is racing.

Anyway, a benefit to having limited mobility in my shoulder is that it's generally painful to reach behind me, so I get to say "Man, I'd totally buy lunch for you, but I can't reach my wallet. Sorry."
I'd post a pic of my shoulder, but it really doesn't do the damage justice. it looks like a small abrasion, maybe 2 inches in diameter. Promlem is hitting a tree at 15 mph does more impact damage than scraping damage.

In wheel news, as much as it pained me I reverted back to my Ksyriums for crit duty on Sunday since I didn't want to risk damage to my Shamals as they have gone on the auction block. They are hella sweet, but I'm awaiting delivery of the next newest sweetness, and something had to give. Feel free to search eBay for Shamals and buy them. Super awesome wheels with less than 500 miles on them. You won't be disappointed.

later

-the ATM

living

2008-04-30T12:14:00.001-07:00

I'm rather happy to have BKW as a reference. Time and again he(they) is able to put succinctly into words what I'd like to say:

"There is no mistaking the way form satisfies. But the best lessons we learn come in those moments when the outcome isn’t certain. They come in the day’s great challenge when we muster, moments that may have occurred kilometers before the ending. Sitting up in triumph isn’t the victory. Living the PROgram is the victory."

Full article here: The PROgram

Two for two

2008-04-28T07:00:00.000-07:00

I could really get used to this winning thing. This was a double good weekend because not only did I win, but also got several laps of pre-riding on the course which will be the same as the season opener for the Indiana MTB race series next weekend. I hope the trail stays the same because it was absolutely dialed in.
This was also the first time of riding my complete race setup, wheels and all. Um, yeah, it's nice.

The weekend started a little early as I had to leave work at noon so as to make a scheduled bike fit up in Fort Fun. Results were good, not many changes save for a saddle swap. You see, this hombre has child bearing hips and a wider saddle is supposed to help better support and cure the hip roll I have. This also meant ponying up a saddle for my road bike to achieve the same result, so it started out to be an expensive weekend. Not so nice. Also not so nice is that the shop only had a black saddle for the MTB so I lose a bit of the white hotness.
Performance increase as a result? That, however, is nice.

Friday night found me in a hometown local restaurant for my brother's birthday. Good times as we flipped through family photos of my brother, sister and I growing up. Blizard of '82? Every kid's snow day dream! Power Mullet from high school? You know it! I don't have a digipic of my mullet then, but I do have one from 2002, when I rocked one for old times' sake for 24 hours:
I got a pretty funny look when I asked the hairdresser to cut from my ears forward. She asked if I lost a bet. I didn't. Anyway a deal was struck that I wouldn't tell anyone who cut my hair so long as she would cut the rest off the next day. Hence a 24 hour mullet.

Anyhoo, Saturday morning was spent helping my dad lay some paver stones in his back yard. Now I'm no Roger Cook (landscaper on This Old House) but I can lay pavers square and level just fine. After lunch and hanging out with the other half of the fam for a while, I headed out to the race course to help set up and get in a lap or two. Job done, we retired to the RV and watched part of "Into the Wild" until we all cashed out.

Woke up on race day, finished the setup at the start line then got in a pre-ride lap. Retreated back to the RV to hide for the next few hours to get some food and throw my legs up.
Parenthetically, I'll take this opportunity to extol the virtues of having a mobile living room. A nice couch to lay on and prop up your legs, plenty of room in the fridge, and a nice break room to take care of pre-race business. To quote Ferris Bueller, "It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up." Well said, Ferris. Well said.
OK, so about 45 minutes before race time I kitted up, got a quick warm up in, then headed to the start line.
Earlier in the day, Don (race promoter) rode a lap in 37:44 then proceeded to offer up a $50 prieme if anyone could better his time. I took that challenge on my way to victory with a 36:59.

I did have to laugh. In a typical race, spectators cheer you on regardless of who you are. Occasionally, however, you run into fans who have a clear favorite, which does not include you. I came up on a group of people towards the end of the lap at a small punch climb that had a large fell tree 2/3 of the way up it. Provided you maintain momentum, it's not super difficult but it can catch you if you're not careful. As I cleaned it, I saw at least 3 people's faces with a look of spite for me. Not one cheer. I even noticed one person who looked to have a rather expensive SLR camera who I assumed to be an event photographer put the camera down! I was crushed.
Not really.

The weekend was capped off by what else? Mexican.

Life is good.

-the ATM

I REALLY must rate

2008-04-20T19:51:00.000-07:00

First, On Wednesday I got to hit the trails on one of the best days of the year so far:
The trail is here...

and then later you take a left...
Ah, yes, I'm on a sweet trail

So the ride was great and I felt great, plus we ate Mexican afterwards. Good times.

On top of that, I got to feel like a baller on Thursday. A quick 50 minute flight on the company Jet is much better than a 4 hour drive.

Way better. The crapper had more expensive fixtures than my house did. Note the padded toilet seat. On top of that, the Blue Angels were at the airport practicing for an upcoming air show, so we got to watch them for an hour while they did their aerial maneuvers. Again, pretty sweet.

Completely unrelated to rating well with the Make Andy Feel Like He Rates Gods, I did a few circuit races on Saturday and got a pretty good result. Took 5th in the 3s after throwing down a few flyers and otherwise contributing the race. This is in sharp contrast to several guys in the race that did not show their face at the front of the race until about a lap to go. I suppose if you wanted to get a cheap result it's a reasonable tactic, but fuck sake, it's a 3s race. At some point you're going to have to pay the piper by working at the front. I'll take working my ass off all day over that shit any day. Pussies. I still beat 'em. Maybe a solid training plan is a better approach to getting good results...
For the 1/2/3s race, I wasn't figuring on finishing based on my previous paragraph's diatribe. Silly me. Not that I had anything left in the tank when I was done, but I did finish both races, and I contributed in both so I walk away content with my efforts. Plus I got to rock my sweet gold Campy Shamals. Always a plus.
Of course I paid for it today, and my 2:30h ride on the MTB was not in the top 5 for all time best feeling rides, but a not-good day on the bike is better than a good day at work, no?

Lastly, I framed and hung the last of my posters on my living room wall.

This completes the remodel of my house, and I have to say I quite like it. A bit more of a classy art flavor while not having the "what does this piece of art say to you?" feel.

with that, I'm out.

-the ATM

Um, yeah.

2008-04-16T05:05:00.000-07:00

Who has two thumbs and gets to ride his mountain bike on the trails?
This guy.

I'm like a kid on Christmas eve... can't wait! 3 days of no rain should make my favorite trail, Gnaw Bone Camp, awesome.

Good luck

2008-04-12T07:50:00.000-07:00

Forgot to include in my last post....

Good luck to Isaac and Mike at Little 500.

Also saw that Ryan's DG women's team won the Ladies' Little 500. He got quite a bit of face time on cyclingnews.com as a result. Kudos to the DG team!

Later-

Why I drive a wagon and other niceties...

2008-04-11T15:25:00.000-07:00

Why do I drive a wagon?
So that when I'm not hauling ass on my bike, I can haul stuff in my car. The above is most of the parts of my [former] Rush. I'd have to say it was worth the effort to part it out instead of selling it as a complete bike.

It was also recently discovered that I have made an impression on certain good-to-know people...
Look at those beautiful socks in all their high cuff glory. I suppose I'm making a bigger deal of it than it is but it's my blog, and I can brag if I want.
And yeah, I like SRAM.

Tonight was sweet. I got to rewrap my road bike with some new bar tape, and put the old tape on my MTB rig. The Fizik chalk tape is much easier to keep clean than the Deda, and I think gives a better tactile feel with the bike. Plus it's white.
If only we could have 3 days of no rain so that the trails would avail themselves to me, I might actually get to ride my bike offroad.

I'm out.

-the ATM

BFI

2008-04-08T19:58:00.000-07:00

So I found myself needing to be in Peoria, IL for work for a few days so I decided to schedule it around a local group ride. Yeah, work revolves around my personal life. That's right.
Anyway, I pulled up the weather and it was a 90% chance of rain. I'm getting used to this riding in the rain thing. It no longer affects me. I swung by the LBS to patronize them as they are both a C'dale and a Specialized dealer, but also to see if the local ride was still on given the rain. Consensus? No ride.
Well, I'm not one to back out so I kitted up and took along my cape. It threatened a bit with a little bit of spitting, but then with around 30 minutes left on the ride, it flat let go. I could barely keep my eyes open from the pelting of the rain. On top of that, the wonderful headwind on the way out turned in to a wonderful headwind on the way back, too. Awesome. I'm convinced there is a universal headwind with my name on it.

The ride itself was pretty good for being in the middle of nowhere. Straight roads for miles and miles. And this is coming from a brotha who normally rides in Central Southern Indiana. Unfortunately, no pics because I didn't want to frag my new camera. So all in all, 38 miles in just over 2:15. Ah, good ride..

-the ATM

A week of funk

2008-04-07T07:24:00.000-07:00

Last week sucked. Work was doing it's best to break my spirit. Good thing it only partially succeeded, which was easily remedied by two awesome days of rides/races and generally getting crap done around the house.

Come to think of it, riding cures most everything.

On the home front, I took off the Proletariat/snow wheels off my car and put the summer tires.

Man, it looks so much better that way.
I say Proletariat because, as my friend Matt said, they look like most of the euro government cars... Alas, I'll be getting hubcaps next year so no fender flags for me, unless they were Belgian - then it'd be cool.
Maybe some spinner hubcaps...

Saturday was pretty cool. Sunny and maybe 50 so I did some yard work to act like I want a green lawn this year. We'll see how that turns out, but I'm not holding my breath.
I also got most of my Rush parts listed on eBay so as to fund my CX bikes, which is nice.

Sunday rocked. Did a spring series road race outside of Cincy. As Chris C pointed out, we got Roadhouse'd. Not that they even have a B team, but their A team was in full effect. With no other strong teams, Roadhouse just kept drilling it until a group of about 4 plus one other guy got up the road. It seemed like there were several motivated guys mid-race so we mounted a chase for a few laps. We couldn't get anything really put together so that was a busted effort.
On the positive side, I had a great time in the race, result notwithstanding. And I got my first burn lines to mark my short level for the rest of the year. Sweet.

Speaking of Belgium, did anyone see Angel Gomez remove the fork from his bike? Yikes... totally missed the flagger warning of danger I guess.

Life is good. And with that, I'm out.

-the ATM

Race report

2008-03-30T21:53:00.000-07:00

Chickasaw Trace Classic. Won that shit.

why nobody else threw up their hands is beyond me

I tried in vain to use my race wheels, preride testing with lower and lower pressure to get traction in the corners just wasn't working. Sliding through corners in what turned out to be with 10 psi? No thanks.
So I threw on my mud/training tires and rolled to the start line. I took third into a quick chute before an open field, then jumped into the lead into the single track. This turned out to be critical since I was apparently the only guy to clear a rocky climb shortly after the single track. I figured I'd take it a little easy but still make 'em ride hard to chase.
Ended up whittling it down to me and two others by the end of lap one, at the end of lap two it was me and one other. Over the course of the race I found out my adversary was a track racer and decided I did not want to pull him to the line so he could sprint around me. About 2/3 through the last lap on a muddy run up, I sprinted. He didn't. Enter off road TT mode. Turns out my tire selection was top notch because I was railing every corner. If I wasn't hooking up it could not be done.
Over the last 2-1/2 miles I ended up putting just over 30 seconds into him for the solo across the line. Alas, no pics yet but I'm sure it looked good.
My time ended up being good enough for a top 5 in the Semi Pro/Pro race. Not too shabby for my first race of the year.

The trip home makes 2 for 2 on stopped traffic, this time only about 30 minutes. I ended up getting in about 12:30 last night, so I'm beat and going to go take a quick 20 minute kipper so I can finish out my day.

later.

-the ATM

Well, that was fun.

2008-03-29T22:07:00.001-07:00

Drove to the race today... about 4-1/2 hours of sunshine and 55F. What happens when I get 10 minutes from the trailhead for a preride?
Yep. Thunderstorm. What the fish?? Soooo.... no pre-ride today. That sucks. Eh well, drive back up to Nashvegas for my temporary domicile, grub up, get sleep.

Racing in the rain is not my favorite, but I'd say I do way better at it than many. I embrace it and hit it, regardless. Alot of people bitch about it. That's fine with me, tho. If they want to mess up their head before the start - have at it!

later.

-the ATM

This week brought to you by...

2008-03-27T17:20:00.001-07:00

...No Chain

This whole week has been a string of great rides. It started off on Saturday, when I threw down my best threshold power test ever, so I got that goin' for me... which is nice (name that movie). Did a chill ride on Sunday for a few hours.

I got snowed on. It was pretty rad. Had Monday off. Got in a good flatland ride on Tuesday. Nothing special but felt awesome. Last night, I did some threshold intervals and started out with the ol' gams feeling a little flat but they bounced back right proper towards the end. Everything was capped off by today's ride.
Holy crap, it was awesome. With temps in the mid 50s and a 70% chance of rain, I rolled out. Maybe it was the killer playlist, the light rain or the gently rolling hills I picked as a route, but I could not stop smiling and [quietly] singing along. The rain did not bother me in the least. I even think it enhanced the ride a bit. Call me crazy. Anyway, I ended up with just under 2-1/2 hours of awesomeness.

In other non-riding news, it's nice to be needed. Maybe I have a career in the thankless world of wrenching. Well, maybe just bike washing. I'm just happy to help a brotha out with a huge opportunity in his first dance on the National Stage because we all know, to be PRO you have to have a clean rig, no exceptions. I figured it couldn't hurt so I waxed his bike too, make him extree fast.
I also got my shit totally dialed on the new MTB rig. She's 100% race-ready and looking quite svelte.

Including the portly 300+ gram Ergomo BB and computer, it weighs in at exactly 21 lbs and looks good enough to eat. This is all good timing because my first race of the year is this weekend. Fear me.

The only negative to the whole week is my insanely silly lack of sleep. It's always something, but welcome when a buddy stays at my place whom I've not talked to in probably 6-9 months. It started with a quick free hub swap on his Ksyriums (switching to the goodness known as Campy, no less!), morphed to discussing my race bike, then progressed to general bike stuff.
I'm hitting the sack early tonight, but first a quick wash of the rig then download ride data.

Lastly, as sweet as they are, I really hope pink is not the new white:

Master Chavanel has a seriously white (and big) grill, plus he's rockin' some great form right now. Could a Frog get a Beligian Classic W??

later.

-the ATM

Pulp...

2008-03-24T17:10:00.000-07:00

Fiction??

I had visions of this picture looking a whole lot more like the scene in Pulp Fiction where Jules breaks bad on Brad, quoting scripture and what not. Problem is, my briefcase is aluminum and I don't have a goatee.

Other than that, totally nailed it.

Anyway, my super sweet bottom bracket I mentioned earlier is contained in that case. Since SRM is rather slow in delivering their MTB cranks, I decided to get the Ergomo BB that measures power instead. I'm going to do the install tonight, but playing around with the interface still reeks of German engineering not unlike the SRM. Since my lineage is German, I'm an engineer and I have an SRM on my road bike, I figure I should be able to pick this up pretty easily. One nice thing is that is has a backlight, which is something the SRM lacks. Well, yours does. I bought some LEDs and wired up a few batteries to give my SRM display lighting for the long winter rides I do.
I'll probably post a few pics, but it's just a BB with wires coming out of it. Naturally you'll see my trick/stealth wire runs, but other than that there's not much to see.
For the times I'd rather have a DEEEE-sgusting light bike with no power I'm going to roll a Crank Brothers Ti Cobalt BB at a silly 180g tare.

I really do have a sickness.

-the ATM

Rain ride

2008-03-20T12:54:00.000-07:00

Since I was prepared, but didn't get, to ride at camp in the rain I felt obligated to give it another go back in the real world. The past few days have offered plenty of opportunity to do said rain ride so I capitalized on that yesterday.
On tap was a basic endurance ride, and I could not bring myself to plunk my bike in the trainer in my cozy garage and throw down 90 minutes. Call me crazy, but all the beautiful riding I did last week reminded me of the good times...
Anyway, I tested out my new rain cape but made the mistake of only going for a medium embrocation and knickers instead of donning leg warmers. Turns out that was the only error in clothing. While the embrocation offered a PRO-like sheen, it did not offer a warm cocoon like leg warmers would have. After the ride, my exposed shins were more red than white. Yikes! A post-ride shower only helped a little in removing the redness. Eh well, lesson learned. No more 40F rain rides without all skin covered.

Also, sorry about the huge photo up top, but that's from MTB Nats last year and wanted to share the sweet spectacle toss caught on film. BTW, it was a muddy race. Give me a few more days of appreication and I'll take it down.

all for now.

-the ATM

Strong + Light = Stronglight

2008-03-17T19:42:00.000-07:00

So my retro Cannondale cranks pretty much gave up the ghost 5 minutes into the maiden voyage last week at camp. The crank fixing bolts kept backing out as the rides progressed. Upon teardown, I could see how worn the Octalink splines were. Oh well, anyone want to buy a barely used 112.5mm XTR bottom bracket? 1 week old...

As luck would have it, I got a hookup on a set of Stronglight Oxale Two cranks. In fact, I got THE last set of Oxale Two cranks in the US. So you can't have 'em.

As the name suggests they are, indeed, light. Since my coach loves these cranks and he's been known to put out a few dubbyas, I'm going to assume they are, uh, strong.

"But Andy," you ask "with cranks as sick as those, what bottom bracket are you going to use?" Well, my friend, I'll tell you...

But those are words for another post.

later.

-the ATM

Please excuse the mess

2008-03-14T19:36:00.001-07:00

As I skimmed through my camp week posts, I was pretty appalled at the lack of quality. Sorry about that. I'm going to attribute most of the substandard quality to the building fatigue throughout the week. The rest of the crap was probably me hurrying to get done since we had to drive to get interweb time and we could only stand about an hour of dropped connections before throwing in the towel. Plus we had to watch the season of Californication in 4 nights.
Anyway, I was going to write a long diatribe about how I sat on the interstate for over 90 minutes (stood, actually - as in feet on the ground) before moving but I decided against. I got home safe, car is unpacked, laundry is done, yada yada.

Might take a few days to recollect and come up with a meaningful post.

-the ATM

Camp report #4: Welcome to 711

2008-03-13T17:34:00.000-07:00

As we were looking at the weather and taking stock of our legs, common sense prevailed. As much as I wanted to and was mentally prepared to ride 711 tomorrow in the rain, I started to remember how much I don't enjoy riding in 40 degrees and rain. Since the plan was to ride around 120 miles, we'd have to leave no later than 9a which is where that whole 40 degrees comes from.
The group took a vote and decided it was best to cut the ride to 70 miles, which meant driving to a nearby town and leaving from there. While it was not the epic day we all wanted, we still got in around 7000ft of climbing and just over 72 miles. The two big payoffs were the Fire Service road 711 and the 5% false flat down to finish the ride which provided for 12 miles of 25 mph at a measly 175W.

The ride to 711 provided some great views, including a great lodge

several crossings of a breathtaking stream,

and a random roadside grazing meadow

Especially since there were about a dozen fly fishers, I could not get the
movie "A River Runs Through It" out of my head. That movie has some seriously powerful scenes (thinking only of the river, not the city stuff).

After we finished up the ride, we headed to what every ride should end with: Mexican. This time it was El Pacifico Restraunte. Mmmmm, enchiladas. They started out with some really sweet chips and, when asked, brought some killer spicy salsa. It was perfect for me - not too spicy but still had kick and had a nice smokey flavor to finish it off. An enchilada and a burrito, plus some spanish rice topped of my belly for the drive home.

All is not lost, though. The weather is supposed to be in the 40s at 7a so we'll get in a nice hour and a half MTB ride before we head out. It may be a little wuss-like but we still got in about 24 hours of seat time. Not too shabby to jump start the season. If nothing less, I got to put my new MTB rig to the test. It passed.

Camp report #3: Another one bites the dust

2008-03-12T17:19:00.000-07:00

Today started out pretty good; left @ 9a for another MTB ride. It was rather chilly to start out, maybe 40F. I decided to run full leg warmers and several layers up top to fight off the cold. Good choice. I never got too hot as long as I was diligent with unzipping layers when we started to climb.
Sad to report we had another derailleur hanger issue today. Zach did a better job of snapping off his derailleur hanger completely off.

Good thing he's a top notch mechanic. That makes two days of making a makeshift single speed. Today was an advanced challenged since he was riding his Giant Anthem with 3.5" of rear wheel travel. As we were really close to a sweet fire road climb (and thus descent) that Zach wanted to do, we snapped a group photo in the missing man formation to honor him:

The afternoon's road ride was a shorter one where we were targeting around 60 miles. It peaked out on Stecoah Gap at 3165 ft.
The gradient you see is what we climbed, but the descent was just about the same. The road ride seemed to have a universal head wind. This was ok on the descent but I still had to pull around 350W to stay above 40 mph. This was necessary because I had to chase back on the group since I was slow to roll out. You see, mobile phone coverage is non-existent at the village and this was the first time in days we were able to get any signal.
Back to the ride... the road out of Robbinsville had a few rollers but most of it was a false flat down, at least until the climb up to Deal's Gap. I threw down on the climb and won, naturally. I took a "little nature break" at the gas station on the top and came out to an empty parking lot. Apparently they thought I said move on but I didn't. Eh well, I figured a nice solo ride back to the cabin wouldn't be that bad... it's only 11 miles, right?
Wrong. Add in what seemed like a universal headwind and some tired gams to pretty much stink up my chase. I just decided to roll in to save whatever strength I had left for the 1 mile climb back to the village.
I really hope this is my bad day on the bike. It sure felt like it. I think tomorrow will be a semi-easy spin (with this many hills, tho, that may be hard) for a few hours to recover for Friday's epic 7-11 ride with an unpaved service road at the 50 mile mark. Did I mention it will rain? Yeah, that is going to be epic for sure.

I'm beat.

Later-

Camp report #2: "I'll put my vagina away"

2008-03-11T15:32:00.000-07:00

Or so says Dave Strole:

He said that after we suggested he stay with the group rather than turn around. He was glad he did; we hit some great trails shortly after we changed his mind.

Today was a bit easier than yesterday, mostly in preparation for the upcoming epic Cherahola Skyway with around 10000ft of climbing on tap. We got in 3:30h of MTB ride time, but that was including the one mechanical we had on the day:

The unfortunate thing was that a stick shoved Don's rear derailleur into the spokes so bad it took about 30 minutes to get everything back to almost normal, minus the upper and lower 2 gears. That mechanical came back when the chain didn't like things and twisted the cage into spaghetti. Single speed it is!

Along the way we had some sweet views, punctuated by some killer views:

Basically, the trails were in awesome shape with just a little leaf cover and not too many wet sections. We will definitely have to hit it up at least one more time because we didn't get a chance to climb and thus descend a winding fire road. Can't wait.

Later.

-the ATM

Camp report #1

2008-03-10T06:12:00.000-07:00

Sunday's drive was super uneventful. The weather conditions at home were quite motivating to get rolling...

I made the drive in just at 6 hours when I expected it to take over 7. I had to do a double take when I was rolling down the road and saw a semi carrying a bit more cargo than expected...

The drive was capped off by a jaunt on the curviest road this side of the Mississippi, Hwy 128. Also known as the Tail of the Dragon. 318 turns in 11 short miles. Sweet.
So we started out today with a nice little 90 minute MTB ride around the camp. It was super chill and a great way to break in the new MTB, which is sweet by the way. A few pics is all I could take, and those were a bit silly, given the terrain.

After that ride we loaded up on some lunch and coffee, then headed out for a 60 mile road ride. Total tally was 64 miles and 5500ft of climbing in just under 4 hours. The out point was the Foothills Parkway which was damned near a perfect steady pitch of around 7% for 6 miles. I was told by coach to drill it on the parkway, so I did. Before we got to the parkway, there was a hella-sweet vista overlooking a dam.

A nice little respite before a 10 minute curvy descent that lead to a few kms of flat. Hang a right and enjoy the climb. As with any out and back (taking the Parkway would have added another 3+ hours to the ride) involving a climb, you pay in to the sweetness bank to have an almost immediate return. After taking a quick pic of the payoff,

we had close to 5 steady minutes of zero cadence at 35 - 40 miles!

Ugh, another monster post and my guys are sweating me to get done, so I'm off.

later

-the ATM

My new favorite superhero

2008-03-07T08:43:00.001-08:00

I previously talked about the Bialetti Moka Express espresso maker I ordered. I got it in the mail on Wednesday so I tried it out for the first time on Thursday, and again this morning.
First impression? Nice little machine that performs very well. The 4 or so shots it makes are fantasmalactic. A side benefit is that I can have a shot of espresso then use the rest to make a killer americano.

To summarize, my new favorite superhero is L'Omino:

-the ATM

Safe blogging

2008-03-04T12:30:00.000-08:00

Occasionally, as part of my job I have to take online training courses. Today's training course covered Careful Internet Communication. As you might guess, the subject matter discusses how best to and how not to communicate via the internet.
The first part of the training talks about an employee who exaggerates some findings of hers in an email. The training module then presents multiple choice of what she should have done.

The correct answer is not (A). I guess that means I can't write about any potential product issues. So don't expect to hear about them here.

This sucks because I find it therapeutic to tell at least one person (or blog) about the bigger things happening in my life.

-the ATM

words

2008-03-02T04:47:00.000-08:00

Words don't begin to describe my excitement at the prospect of riding today in 50+ degree weather. This means I can expose my lower legs without fear of losing them. The other good news is that it's new kit day.
All of these combined with my team coming down to get in a long road ride with some hills should produce one of the best days for me of the year. I'm sure it won't last on the list very long because camp is only a week away and the weather looks to be headed for the mid-60s

Can't wait!

-the ATM

Hemorrhage in my wallet

2008-02-27T11:38:00.000-08:00

I love training camps. They provide the clarity of a singular purpose; ride your bike. It also provides necessary relaxation (for the most part) and lots of coffee and internet browsing. I definitely run out of cycling sites to hit when on camp. Then again, I wasn't hooked on blogging at the last few camps.
Realistically, tho, it's not like you get to sit around for hours. There is always something to do - clean bikes, make breakfast, make dinner, clean bikes, etc so sleep rest is not a guaranteed 10 hours per night. I think only Todd Wells does that. In any event, I do enjoy all that is camp because I get to enjoy some simple pleasures I don't normally get to enjoy.
Take, for example, coffee. I've somehow associated sipping coffee from a true mug (ceramic, not paper/plastic tumbler) while sitting down as one of life's little joys. It's ever so much more enjoyable when an espresso is close by said mug. I've thus far been pretty limited in my espresso experience because I don't yet have an espresso maker, and there aren't any local coffee houses that serve their espressos in a ceramic mug. I can get the folks at Starbucks to serve me one in a small, er, tall mug, but it's not the same thing, and as BKW wrote, taking your espresso in a paper cup is just not the same thing. Besides, Starbucks espresso is not THAT good. It's merely good enough.
Anyway, back to camp. We're under two weeks out and I'm looking forward to it. Alot. As I look at the route plans, I note there's about 35 hours of riding on tap. Thirty five hours. Three-Five. That's alot. Like I said, I'm looking forward to it, but I know it is going to take a huge toll on my body. As such, I feel it necessary (mainly because I can) to indulge in a few niceties to help, mentally if nothing else.
A quick check on my stores and I note that I am out of embrocation, and low on recovery oil. Some may balk at using such products, but I know embrocations work and the self-massage on the ol' gams one gets from applying recovery oils is worth it alone, but it helps to have a bit of lubrication to make the mini-massage that much better. On both counts, this means I need to stock back up so there is cash outlay #1.
Touching back on espresso, I check the various retailers for espresso machines from time to time just to see what's out there. I know an $80 machine is not going to be that good, so I've held off. That and it seems like $400 is about the minimum to get a good European model. $400 is too damned much money for this tight wad.
Imagine my surprise when I was ordering Peet's coffee (Arabian Mocha Java, thank you)for the upcoming trip that I stumbled across the Bialetti stovetop espresso maker. At $25, I can test the waters and not feel bad if it doesn't work out. Since it's pretty much the same design from the 1920s, and is the most copied design out there it can't be that bad. Add in a set of espresso cups , and you have cash outlay #2. Ugh.
As I'm sure you've noticed and probably silently complained, I've been lacking on the pictures, especially on-ride pics. Feeling this pressure, I decided it was time to break down and get a good/ride friendly camera. Cash outlay #3. I guess I could argue that the camera will be used for alot more than just rides, so it's a worthy expense (as is the espresso maker, duh!).
You can sleep well at night knowing that I'm NOT going to be that guy that tries to get group shots at every stop, directing people to move here/there, smile, etc. That's bunk. However, from time to time, I catch myself saying "Hey, that would be a sweet picture."

And so it is.

-the ATM

The New Hotness

2008-02-23T18:21:00.001-08:00

After an excruciatingly long time, I finally got it built up. I'm still debating on whether I should fire my mechanic. Man, that dude is slow. I got the bike Wed night around 9 and was quite tired so I postponed any activity until Thursday. I had lady-friend plans at 7 so it would have so wait until after. I jumped right in after I got home and threw in the towel around 1a. Everything was roughed in so I was OK with that. Detail work is best done when fresh.

The list of work to do was extensive; I basically started from scratch, but had to strip it to the frame to started. Fork, cockpit, cranks, seatpost/saddle, etc all had to go. In order to maximize resale on the stock XT cranks, I installed an old favorite 2x9 C'dale crankset. A bit non-PRO, but just wait til I get the real cranks. Trust me. At least the white fork/saddle/grip tape helps to offset that.

SRAM X.0/X.9 is installed for the go; I'm trying the X.0 Grip Shift on the front derailleur to see if I can get used to it. All previous attempts at running a Grip Shift always resulted in a dumped chain when manualing over logs and such, so this is a test. My mistress, Marta, provides the slow. The added bonus is they are anno red. A fiery redhead, indeed!
As per standard operating procedure, I'm leaving the steer tube as-is until I feel safe to cut it to the proper length. I'm also hopeful the front end is stiff enough with the spacer stack because it looks so much better to have the stem horizontal.
As built, it tares out at a svelte 21.2lb, which will easily fall when I replace the portly cranks and backup skewers. I've also got a set of Schwalbe Fast Freds that, at 380g per, are about a half pound lighter than the Fast Trak LK/SLK I'm running now. Hard to give up the solid feeling I have for those tires, but we shall see. So the end result may be a solid mid-20lb bike, Not too shabby considering it's a 19 inch frame (Thanks Isaac for having a 19" bike in your living room for me to try!)

So I'm excited to ride it, this being the first post-Cannondale Lefty era bike, and all. A full week at team camp in NC is coming up in two weeks so I will assuredly shake it down.

In other news, I decided the SRAM TT ring I was undecided on is cool. They look damned sweet when rolling over at around 100rpm.
What's not cool, tho, is the bunk-ass approach to leaders jerseys/skinsuits at the AToC. Straight black bottom with no team sponsor mention up top?? If you want to be the biggest stage race in the US, lean on Voler to man up. Seriously.

With that, I'm out.

-the ATM

Well, that only took a year

2008-02-18T20:11:00.000-08:00

Wow, I should fire my mechanic. I mean, really. A year? I've been chasing a ghost shifting issue on my road bike for it's entire built up life. I first thought it was all the wheel swapping I was doing, then thought it was a bad cable so a new cable was installed (well, 3 new cables were installed over said year, actually).
The weird thing that clouded my troubleshooting was that it shifted fine for about a week or two after retensioning the cables. It got to be annoying to have to shift once then half shift again to trim the chain position so that it wasn't trying to go up or down one gear.
After having racked my brain for way too long, I realized I had neglected to eliminate one semi-obvious part as a suspect. In retrospect, it was fairly obvious but I had convinced myself I needed an inline barrel adjuster to dial out the ghost shifting. Whenever I replaced cables I noticed the housing ends into the adjuster tended to be bent a bit and thus replaced. Dumbass.
After putting the removal off for a few days, I finally decided to take jump in. This meant new housing, which meant re-wrapping bars. This provided a nice little benefit of extra motivation to swap out the Ritchey Classic Italian bend bars for a gifted set of Deda Newton Deep bend bars. My burly man-hands were just a little cramped on the Italian bend and the Belgian bend feels awesome. Sweetness.
I do realize it's not uber-PRO to have bars and stems from different manufacturers but I'll deal with it for now. But swapping parts like I want to do would get really expensive really fast and I have yet to get my new MTB rig to start that onslaught...

In other news, I'm a big fan of billboard-type decals yet at the same time a fan of the understated. Funny that. Anyway, I like billboards, like the Easton Tempest II carbon deep dish hoops. That should make me like the SRAM Red TT rings, but the jury is still out on that one. Big labels are definitely cool, but I kinda think SRAM overdid it on the cranks.

I'm still noodling on them, but in the mean time that is one damned big ring. I bet that's Cancellara's little ring on his TT bike.

Speaking of unloading bikes, anybody want a barely used Ridley X-fire, hella sweet all carbon frame/fork in size 58? I'll throw in a Ridley skinsuit and way cool Limar helmet.

That's all for now
-the ATM