I renewed my racing license for 2009 today.

I'm getting old.  I've had a USCF license since 1993.

Looking forward to camp - hoping that it won't dump buckets on us this year.

J.

        

All hail the Sun and it's triumph over the darkness!  At 12:04UT on December 21, 2008 the sun began the long march back to summer.  I can tell there's a little more light every day - I know I can.

To celebrate I drank a bottle of wine, braised a lamb shank and banged on a pot in the moonlight in the backyard.  No virgin sacrifice this year - none could be found.  Oh, yeah, there were some Judeo-Christian festivals in there too.

My training has been sketchy.  CTL still plummets after slight stagnation/upticks.  Camp is going to be brutal for me...oh well.

Mark Tokar, the newest Privateer, has sent some pictures from his new rider training day at the Encino Velodrome.




I hear he may now be going to ADT for their new rider training...evidence of the addictive nature of track racing. 

During the holidays we went to the store for groceries for the famn damily during their stay.  Biggest load on the Xtracycle yet.  I'm thinking this was somewhere in the range of 500lbs considering load+bike+meat pie for a pilot.





We even rode up on three guys out for a group ride and the comment was - "Now that's how you go to the store." 
Right on.  Power to the Xtracycle!!

Now to go find my motivation to go train....where DID I put that?

J.

        

It's often been said that the great tragedy of Southern cooking is that we haven't figured out how to deep fat fry salad - yet.  Turkeys we got covered though! 

Well, as is always the case, the Turkey Day shutdown didn't produce the mega-mileage it could have.

I did go 5 of 7 days though this week, with some solid efforts, so it could have been worse. (Even did two days on the CT due to the rain.)

My brother came down from Berkeley and brought a buddy, and the guy's dad, to Thanksgiving dinner.  I am always embarrassed to say this but deep fried turkey is the best turkey I've ever eaten.  Moist, juicy, tender and delicious.  Besides, nothing says redneck fun like the ability to deep fry a Snickers bar when the turkey is done - not that I'm saying we did - but you could....

Tomorrow it's back to the work grind.  Time to get another monthly train ticket, and return to the rails after the week off.  It's been nice.  I'm fully sure I'm never getting up on time in the A. M. this week.  I slip into the vampire circadian rhythm astonishingly fast. 

I'm also set to try the new gym in town this week.  I know weight lifting is counter productive to being an endurance cyclist.  I don't care anymore.  I like to pick things up and put them down.  It has a simple finality that few things can provide.  Besides, have you seen how bad sunken chest chicken boy cyclists look with their shirts off?  It's not a pretty sight. 

J.

        

Slowly getting back at training.  Inertia not as bad now.

Starting to remember why I like hurting myself riding a bike.

I have a week long shutdown at work coming up for Thanksgiving.  I hate to over commit and under deliver so I'm not making training camp like plans but., I do hope to take advantage of the week off as much as possible and get some good long high volume rides in over the break.  We'll see.

Coaching Chester again this season.  Hope to help him earn his 2 upgrade before the end of the season. 

Speaking of training camp...dates for the G.S. Tenzing training camp have been finalized.  The Texas Mafia returns Jan 16-23, 2009.  Time to start racking up the miles!! (or they'll rip my legs off. )

Commuting has been tough.  Lots of weirdness at work = long days, late meetings.  In addition I've somehow developed a 45min cutoff on train lateness.  Any more than 45min out and I bail and drive home.  Really tweaks me that they can't seem to figure out how to make that whole "single track" thing workout.

J.

        

Need volume. 

It's been six weeks since I've done any structured training.  Inertia is a bitch.  Can't seem to get moving again.

Last week was tough on commuter man.  3/5 days early in the office for work.  The office lost flexibility last week.  This week is better, although, I'll only ride the train for the next two weeks due to the office shut down over Turkey Day.

Need to hit the rack to start early tomorrow.

J.

        

Normally this blog is about bikes, or racing, or racing bikes.  I try to keep politics out of here as it sort of represents a the activities of the Team and not just me.  Today is an exception, today my country needed me.

"Rosa sat,
So Martin could walk,
So Barack could run,
So our children can fly."

So to keep it on topic - I rode my bike to the polling place this morning.  This is significant, and interesting, because I met up cycling friend in town that also rode his bike to the polling station.  Now, I can't say with 100% certainty but, I'm pretty sure our votes canceled each other out today.  That's cool, this is America, I'm allowed to be an asshole and so are you. 

What's even more cool, to me at least, is that we both showed up and left to got to work - on our bikes.  Hmmm, now I'm worried he didn't vote for Measure A.

J.

        

This weekend was the SCNCA race schedule meeting and picnic.  Normally this wouldn't be news except that I was invited to attend and be recognized as the Second place Overall Endurance Track racer in Cat 3/4 for the SCNCA SoCal Cup.  Whew, that's a mouth full. 

Anyhow, it was cool to see that I had finished second in the Endurance series, and sixth overall - not too bad for not doing a single "sprint" event in the cup.

We didn't go to the picnic however because Jenelle found a bike she wanted!!  We went Saturday AM and bought her an Electra Amsterdam.  It's the "Tulip" model.  Bright yellow paint, red tulip accents, full wrap chain guard, generator lights, fenders w/mudflaps, rear rack and skirt guard.   It's the bomb of a city bike.  Except for it's price, it's everything that Copehagen Cycle Chic would approve of - "Style over speed," indeed.

This is all part of my "Commuter Man" plan.  Here I am formulating the beginning of my plan while at Interbike in Las Vegas this year, while coming back from the Crit finals.  Photo courtesy of Dave Lettieri.



In trying to reach full Commuter Man Nirvana, in addition to riding my bike to the train station and then bi-modaling it to the office, I did some research on how to carry as much stuff on a bike as is safely possible.  Racks, panniers, BOB trailers....

The answer: Xtracycle Free Radical.  Here's the Free Radical with the Free Loader kit filled after a run to the grocery store with a full week of food.  Both side panniers are chocked full.  It's a fairly stable operation - about like riding a tandem with a well behaved stoker.

Here's an unsolicited product endorsement: if you want to try and live and do more on your bicycle in your daily life, buy an Xtracycle Free Radical.  It will breathe new life back into that old hard tail mountain bike you've got taking up space in the stable not being ridden.



Later in the day I went to Home Depot for some 4x4's for a project.  I never thought I'd haul lumber home on my bike, but today I did.  I got some crazy looks from people on the way home.  Other hardware was loaded in the pannier opposite.



Yes, that's right, those are three full length 8', 4"x4"s lashed to the side of my bike using the Long Loader kit.  This was MUCH less stable than having the panniers fully loaded with the grocery run earlier.  Frankly, this is not something I'd necessarily advise an inexperienced cyclist to attempt.  Handling was squirrely, especially in right hand turns.

Both loaded runs today pointed out something very important to a good Xtracycle set up - bomber wheels.  As soon as I can I'm getting a set of 36h high flange hubs with the gnarliest free-ride/DH rims I can find to put on the bike.  The corollary to this is the Xtracycle performs better with 26" wheels.  If you want to carry big loads don't waste your time with the 700c kit.  In addition, tires that are symmetric (read: round with very little, if any, run out) will improve handling stability. 

Tomorrow starts the fourth week of the bike/train Great Transportation Experiement.  Let's just say I like it enough that come Friday, I'll need to go back to the SB station to get another mothly ride pass.

J.

        

The 'Cross bike is built.  The celebratory Duvel is poured., and to steal a phrase or two - it's time for mud, cowbells, barriers, crashing, and rub on "knee warmer."

Not sure if I like the SRAM double tap shifters yet.  I can see how it's really easy to forget the operation direction and grab a wrong gear.

Now I just have to remember how to jump off the damn thing at speed into a full run....

On to news from the commute -

Photo from the commute Thursday:


Not a bad way to start the day. 

The train this week was less than stellar, so I'll chalk this week up to "Learn to keep your mouth shut when it's going well."

For those that may be reading this and are not from SoCal, most of Simi Valley, some of LA, and Camp Pendelton in San Diego were(are) on fire last week.  As a result train service was slightly "disrupted." 

I didn't notice Monday, as it was the last Monday night TT and I drove to SB both ways.  Turns out, the Monday P.M. train was cancelled and I had no idea.  So, I ride out to the station Tuesday AM, change into my work clothes, and sitdown to wait for the train.  The automated lady voice in the scrolling timer sign then announced that my train for that morning was "annulled."  My first thought was, "How the hell do you 'annull' a train?  I can understand that a train is cancelled, but 'annulled'?"  Then I realized that I needed to get back to the house, and drive in again.  Jenelle was able to pick me up and I was only ~5min late to work when all said and done.

Catch the train home Tuesday night, it's ~35min late.  AM Wednesday on time, Wednesday PM ~40min late.  AM Thursday train was OK again, Thursday PM ~35min late again.  AM Friday on time.,  P.M. ~40min late AGAIN!!  Hitched a ride home with friends instead - pissed. 

The commute is really frustrated by freight trains.  Apparently Amtrak owns no track between San Diego and San Luis Obispo.  This means Union-Pacific pushes Amtrak to the siding rails, as somehow freight has priority.  This isn't supposed to work this way but, UP make their trains so long they can't fit on the siding rails and force us out of the way.  Bummer. 

Hopefully week three is better?!

Other signs you know it's Fall?  BEERFEST!!  And beerfest means Lederhosen.  YEAH!!

This pic was from the Firestone-Walker Oaktoberfest in Paso Robles a couple of weeks ago:


My frauline tolerates so much bullshit from me sometimes. 

She's a relatively good sport about it usually too!!

J.

        

Tonight was the final Monday Night Time Trial of the season.  I had another solid, but not winning, performance.  Was 2nd again to Gary D'Velo.  24:49 @ 40kph average.

In other news, I have become "COMMUTER MAN."  I'm trying my "Great Transportation Experiment," this month.  I bought a month long rail pass on Amtrak and am trying to commute to work on the train.  The schedule is good, and it allows me to put in an extra half hour a day on the bike each way to the train station and my house.  As the weather, time, and my motivation change, I'll be able to ride the hamster wheel for about an hour in the AM before the commute and still get a solid two hours in per day.  I am really enjoying the train ride.

The only problem is I have very little motivation to ride the hamster wheel before 6AM right now.

Orders for 2009 Privateer kits are being accepted.  TjK has posted an email schedule to all those interested. 

J.

        

Interbike 08.  This year was even better than last. 

First though, a little editorializing: I understand that Vegas has abundant hotel rooms and a large, very large, convention center to host a show of this size.  I get it, really I do.  But, I'm always left wondering if the organizers of Interbike intentionally chose Vegas just for the irony.  I would venture that most cyclists, even ones shaped like meat pies, think of themselves as fitness enthusiasts.  And, I would also venture that due to the "cult of the bike," the retailers and suppliers to the bike industry are probably some of the most fit retailers in sports or any industry for that matter.  So why is it that we have the annual industry convention in Vegas?  I'll stop now, if you've ever been to Vegas you'd understand why I'm confused.

So on to the show.....

This year Interbike was not just about the $10,000 plastic race bikes. Although they did feature prominently.   There was a lot of attention given to commuter/city bikes this year too.  Maybe it's gas prices, hopefully it's a changing view of bikes as transportation not recreation, who knows? 

Just about every company had a cruiser, or a "Dutch bike," or even the super offerings from Surly (the Big Dummy) - http://www.surlybikes.com/bigdummy.html and Kona (the Ute) - http://www.konaworld.com/09_ute_u.cfm.

Cervelo unveiled the new P4 on Tuesday.  I'm sure most of you have seen these shots already but here are mine.






The coolest part about this release was being able to talk directly with Gerard and Peter and ask as many questions as I could think of about how they came to this design.  Really great guys, more than tolerant of my badgering.

Not to downplay Cervelo's work but it's funny that except for the water bottle fairing, they've incorporated all the design cues from the DA into this new ride.  Hidden rear brake, smooth head tube fork junction, wishbone rear stays, and top tube internal cable routing.  The claim is 30s faster than a P3C over 40km TT.  That's huge.

Speaking of Felt, here's hopefully my next bike purchase:








Not that it will make me any faster but damn, it's so sexy I don't care!!

Greg and I spent a great, really probably the best, thirty minutes of the show talking with Steve Hed.  Greg poked him in the eye about some data that has been posted on the Interweb about Zipp wheels, taken by Hed.  Turns out that the reason that so many people go to Steve Hed and ask him about how to go fast is he knows his shit.  I really have tremendous respect for him, his company and the work they've done.

In the back of the new Hed catalog there is a great chart showing the reduction in drag at various yaw angles for just about every "fast" wheel out there, baselined against a box section wire spoked wheel.  The take away? On average, the only wheel faster over all yaw conditions than a Hed Tri spoke is a disc.  Not the Zipp 404, the 808, or even the 1080.  Simply amazing.  I can think of only a handful of designs that have ever been so "nailed" by any company.  Kudos to the my fellow propeller heads at DuPont, and too bad Specialized didn't stick with it and instead went with those Roval abominations.  Bet they kick themselves in the ass everyday - if they don;t they should.  Note to self: Order rear tri spoke before next road season.

BTW, all of Zipp's toroidal rim shape designs are based off of Steve Hed's patents.  They are loathe to admit it but they are...

And just when you think Steve is out of magic he gives the Jet Disc Power Tap - faster than a Sub9, you can true it, and about $600 cheaper....



Tacx showed a VR trainer that is so far ahead of the CompuTrainer, CompuTrainer should just quit.  The Tacx VR trainer has "live" hi-def videos that are linked to the wheel speed.  I can't afford one right now but think it's worth saving the pennies for.

In the power meter world nothing shocking happened.  I guess I spend to much time on the wattage list to gain anything from the show.  OK, three things, 1) the updater is ready for PTap to go ANT+ Sport.  2) PTap is all wireless now.  3)SRM have released a SRAM crank version.  The team from Quarq was there also.  Looks like the Qranium is still about six months away but with Jim and his crew I have no doubt that it will show up as soon as they can get the manufacturing issues sorted.  I really like the Quarq guys.  Smart, good product and when the SRM dies I'll seriously consider replacing it with a Quarq. 

The new Fuji TT bike was on hand.  As my friend works for Fuji, I don't want to bash it publicly.  But, I will say that for them to even peak my interest in that bike they had better come with great data 'cause compared to the other thoroughbreds out there, they've got a way to go....

Lance was at Interbike.  He did the cross race Wednesday night and got in an argument with LeMond Thursday. 

The race announcers for both the cross race and the crit were so bad that they made me pine for Phil and Paul.  There wasn't any Six Day racing at Mandalay Bay casino like they promised last year.  I was bummed.

My personal favorite moment of the show was when I got to ride the new electronic DuraAce - not because I liked it, but because I was able to break it!  >:}  Short story - from years of playing video games I can tap the shift levers faster than DA can shift the gears.  Annoying as that may be that didn't break it.  Down shifting off the big ring while simultaneously shifting to a smaller cog - that breaks it - it dumped the chain.  Hehehehe.  The Shimano rep was not amused.

I was able to meet our clothing rep from LG in person.  She was very friendly and was surprised that I didn't demand anything from here right there.  She told me that pricing was just finalized this week at the show and we should expect to hear from her next week with quotes.  Also, the chamois for next year is "new and improved over this year - yeah!  The "see through," side panels will still be see through.  The do not offer a solid black short in the custom line no matter how much I whined - booo!

Capo Forma still makes the best custom clothes period.  I would really like to see if we have enough to meet their minimums.

Tired now.  Work tomorrow.  Fun over till Christmas.

J.