Too Late

This morning because I had other commitments later in the day I wasn't able to do my typical commute so, instead, I decided to bust out the Dos and hit the trails I rode past the other day. Boy am I glad that I did, it turns out that there is a pretty decent network of singletrack practically out our current front door. Four minutes on the road and I was into singletrack bliss. It's pretty amazing, what probably would have been a sub-par commute on the road (because of how tired I was feeling) turned into 1:20 of exhilarating trail riding. I could tell it was a good ride because when I got home I couldn't stop yammering on and on about the trails to Marcy. I was almost giddy.

The one unfortunate thing about the discovery is that I made it when we only have four more days in that particular locale and once we move it's pretty unlikely I'd make the drive down for it specifically (and it would be 40 minutes on the road with a mountain bike ICK!). Oh well, I'll try to enjoy it one more time before we move. That reminds me, starting next week I'll be able to start putting my new commute together and that IS something to be excited about since it will probably be 2/3 singletrack. Giggidy, giggidy.

I swear there is singletrack in this pick. Also, if you look really closely for 15 second (and turn your volume way up) the fog in the center of the pic will do an awesome John Fogerty impersonation.

The new "from home" loop.

All Coming Together

Things are finally feeling like they're all coming together. We're (way?) behind on the house build but we're finally approaching a time that we'll be able to move in as we complete all of the final details (something we swore we would not do before construction started). In the push to get everything set for drywall, the last few weeks have been hell. I figure we have one more hell week and then things will ease up a bit.

Probably a good part of my positive vibes is thanks to me getting out for a couple of decent rides recently. Friday night I was once again able to hit up the Rage ride in Bath. It was a smaller group this time (5 instead of 12) so it meant for a quicker pace and less regrouping. I continue to be amazed at the amount of trails in that area. We rode for 2 1/4 hours and barely touched the trails I rode there two weeks ago. I'm thinking that I may need to incorporate that trail system into the GRRRRR.

Sorry, no time for more today.

Parts are IN!

You'd think that I'd be more excited to know that all of the parts for my Selma build are in at the fantabulous Bikeman.com. But I'm not. Why? You ask. Well, maybe it's because Selma in a caniving beyoutch and is taking her sweet ass time on that slow boat from China. Sight seeing probably. If I were actually doing next week's race I'd be more keyed up but I just found out that my company is organizing a little get together at my place next week and will be helping us side the house, on the same day as the first race of the season. So, I could do one of two things, I could say "thank for the generous offer to help BUILD OUR HOUSE but I've got a race to do" or I could bag a race in which I'll suck more than anyone has ever sucked before. Hmmm, tough decision.

Speaking of the house (like you haven't heard enough about it recently) I found out the other day that it will be featured in a sweet new mag called Maine Home and Design in their Drawing Board section. Pretty cool since it's THE design mag for Maine. Yeah, it's only Maine but they still have some pretty cool shit. Hopefully this means that once construction is done (ever???) they'll feature it in a full article. Fingers crossed. Until then, I'll be eagerly awaiting the July issue.

Two Days, Two Rides

It doesn't happen often these days but between Monday and Tuesday I somehow managed two rides. Monday's was a short, one hour mountain bike jaunt in my new local stomping grounds and today was commuting action. Nothing too exciting but it was nice to be out and finally feeling good again. That frickin bug I had last monday totally screwed me up for the whole week and weekend. On monday's ride I finally felt human again. A slow as snot, out of shape donkey of a human but human none-the-less.

The following pics aren't from my most recent rides but actually from an ill conceived ride last week (on a day I thought I was feeling better). It turned out I was still sick and ended up suffering mightily for 1:30. If I'd had an out, I would have taken it. During the ride I was tasked with retrieving Marcy's coat which we had stashed on a ride two week prior (woopsie!). Thankfully, it was still there and not suffering from a case of mildewdies.

notice anything wrong with this picture?

Ok, how 'bout now?

the ride was sucking so much donkey d*ck that I decided to walk the final stretch to marcy's jacket to avoid a very short hill. Tail between legs, check.

No mildew, check.

Not Much to Report

There is precious little to report these days. The closer our move-out date approaches, the less I get to ride or even think about riding so that I can focus all of my energy on finishing the house. In two weeks I have my first race of the year and it makes me wonder how effective my 3 hour/week, low intensity "training" will be. I'm not a betting man but if I were I'd be laying money down on extreme cramping and trailside pizza. Who knows, maybe I'll find that I thrive on no training.

To add to the drama, the Selma still isn't in the hizouse and I'm not sure when it will be AND the earliest my crank will be ready (it's on back-order) is 5 days before the race. Yeah, this is gonna be fun.

No riding pics for today so here are a couple from the house showing the master bedroom curved ceiling and insulation in progress. Enjoy.

Big Tough Guy

You know what the problem with being a big tough guy is? Most of you probably don't know since I've met a bunch of you and know for a fact that you're not big tough guys. MAYBE, you're little emaciated biker boy tough guys but definitely not a big tough guy like me. If you (and if when I say "you" you think that I'm talking about you, I probably am) need a metaphor to help you understand, let's just say you're a 90 lb weakling and I'm a 100 lb weakling. Ok, now that we're all on the same page, the problem with being such a manly, leg waxing tough guy is that when you get sick, your true weenieness shows through. Over the weekend, Marcy was VERY sick, throwing up close to 20 times on Friday alone and was down for the count for a couple of days. Sunday, though still being sick, she hoisted herself up and watched B so that I could work on the house. Holy crap, I'm rambling on about nothing here. Time to get to the point me-thinks. So anyway, Monday I start feeling like crap and before you know it I'm down and spend the entire day sleeping on the couch. Super tough guy huh? At least I did throw up a total of 0 (that zero, Z-E-R-O) times. What a wus. Throw a 12 hour race my way and I'm your man, throw a seriously minor flu bug my way and I'll scury away with my tail between my legs.

The good news is that because I was feeling sick for a couple of days I had essentially no caffeine during that time and it has allowed me to ween myself off the bean. I'll never give up coffee entirely but I was drinking so much that I'm surprised my penis didn't whistle while I peed (not whistle while you work whistle but old timey teapot whistle). Now that I'm cut way back on caffeine I feel surprisingly good.

Now, if I can find some time to ride.

Mental Health Day

Marcy took pity on me on Friday and cut me loose so that I could get in a proper mountain bike group ride. The Rage on Portland group was hitting up some unknown to me trails just a half hour away from the soon to be new digs so there was no way I was going to miss it. To top it off, the ride was being led by my Winter XC compatriot Steve K. so I knew I'd have a good challenge trying to keep up with him and his top notch tech skills on his Santa Cruz Blur Lt. Steve and the trails didn't disappoint. For a fairly in-town park, there was a surprisingly vast network of trails from buff double track to scary as hell, off camber rocky/rooty, slip and you go for a swim singletrack. It was a hell of a good time and a chance for me to hone my tech skills and ride with actual human people for a change. Thanks for the ride guys.

GRRRRR Revealed

So what exactly was this GRRRRR I talking about the other day? Details are still a bit fuzzy but here is what I know so far. First off, GRRRRR stands for Ginormous Racin Rick Righteous Riding Rendezvous. Pretty clever don't you think? I think so and I'm an amazingly smart and creative guy, so I should know. Essentially, it's a weekend filled with debauchery, riding, more debauchery and even more debauchery and possibly a hangover or two.

Things will start out with a Friday afternoon/evening ride on the frickin sweet Camden Snow Bowl trails. Many people have ridden the snow bowl's race course (which is sweet b.t.w.) but very few people know the true wonders of the spot. Friday night if you have 2-3 hours to kill, you will too. Afterwards, we'll head to our new (hopefully finished) place for an evening of beer, ping pong, Wii, PS3 and whatever else comes to mind.

Saturday morning, after a hearty breakfast, we'll head out for a multi-hour (4+ hopefully) mountain bike ride directly from the house. Saturday night we'll repeat Friday nights festivities.

Sunday, we'll hit up another of Maine's primo riding destinations, Bradbury Park. If you've done a race there, you know it's probably the best place in Maine to ride and with the addition of the Tryon mountain area, we should be able to put together a sweet ending to a killer weekend.

Sound good to you? Let me know because I suspect I need to make some more friends to pad the numbers.

More info to come.

Fenders and Idiocy

Today's ride is powered by fenders and idiocy. Or, maybe it's fenders and optimism? I'm not sure which yet but when I awoke to walk the dog this a.m. the skies were overcast and there was a steady, light rain. I would have loved to not ride this morning but, unfortunately, my belly the waist band of my pants has been getting in the way of my belly recently so a slack day was definitely not in order. Thankfully, I haven't taken the recalled stem off my El Mariachi yet so I still had my fender shod warrior at my disposal. The El plus just the right amount of ignorance and a touch of optimism was the recipe for a salvaged commute. It turned out the ride wasn't nearly as nasty as it could have been given all the festive colors on the weather map during the morning news. In fact, my clothes may even be dry for this afternoon's ride home. Of course, they're calling for a deluge in the p.m. so even if my clothes have dried, they'll immediately be soaking wet in short order. Good times, very good times indeed.

Speaking of good times, in the past seven days I managed to ride on dirt four times. I think that's pretty dam good considering I'd ridden on dirt a total of zero times in the six months prior. Basically, after Thursday's ride with the boys when I discovered just how sweet the riding conditions are right now I've been sneaking in a ride every chance I could get. Over the weekend it involved getting up extra early so I could get my ride in before heading to the house. As a bonus, Sunday morning I was even able to get Marcy to come out with me for an hour.

GRRRRR

It felt so good to be riding on dirt again that while in one of my ride induced euphoric states I hatched a plan for a late summer social/ride event. I'm not sure of the details yet but you should go ahead right now and block off all weekends in September so that you don't do something silly like schedule your wedding or child's birth on what could be the greatest weekend of you life. More to come.

First Dirt 2

As I alluded to the other day, I finally got a chance to ride dirt. For the first freakin time in 2009. I had to go well out of my way to do it but it figured it was worth it. I'd get to ride a trail that I rarely get to ride (the Portland River Trail), get to ride with guys I only see a few times a year, and my tires would kiss dirt for the first time in a very long time. Win, win, win.

The ride to P-town.

The ride started out pretty uneventfully except of course for the frickin-a sweet single track. About 10 minutes in I kinda forgot that I was riding a geared bike (first time since mid-summer 2008) and tried to sneak past a mighty pointy stick on my right side. Sure enough I heard the tell tale KA-CHUNK! of a derailleur being sheared in half. Pokey stick meet derailleur, derailleur, meet pokey stick. There now, we're all acquainted.

Thankfully, the boys were more than happy to stick around while I fiddled and faddled for 10 minutes single-speeding the dos and gave me some kind advice on how to get it to work (thanks Scott and Bill). It kind of got me thinking that maybe, just maybe this was a sign from the man upstairs that I shouldn't be dabbling in gears. Message received.

the dos all single speedy

the posse

All photos (except for the one of my mug) were provided by JeffScher.com

First Dirt

I went for my first dirt ride of the year last night (thursday). Wanna guess how it went? Well, here's a itty bitty hint:

More to come...

Setting the Bar

Last weekend, in order to fit a ride into my busy (and amazingly important) schedule I decided to ride to the property on Sunday morning. In order to ride (and still keep the house shit rolling) I had to stop at the office to pick up one of my finish nailers. I strapped it to the exterior of my already fully loaded BD1 thusly:

Not exactly the most secure load for ripping up singletrack but since I was only taking it for a 6 mile road ride I figured things would be A-OK. And it was. Once to the property I did the whole layout the pile of shit I carried thing that I so enjoy to do and you are left with this:

Lemme see, we have the already mentioned finish nailer, a box of finish nails, pair of work pants and long underwear, two long sleeve shirts, boxers, wallet, belt, wallet, redsox hat, tool hook and most importantly 1 dozen easter eggs to hide before B showed up to do her easter egg hunt.

Good Ride

Yesterday after many thwarted attempts, I finally made it out for a LONG ride. Seriously long, mega long. Over two whole hours long. Two whole hours and one whole minute to be precise. It seems kind of silly to be excited about a 2 hour ride this time of the season but it was easily my longest ride so far in 2009. Usually I'd have countless 2hr rides and a handful of 4+ hour rides by this time of year but not this year. Oh no, not this year.

The ride started out well, it was sunny and warm-ish at 45 degrees, as I cruised along coastal roads trying for once to do a proper warm-up before jumping into the real workout. I started my sprint interval routine shortly before crossing the Wiscasset bridge. Similar to my Augusta ride a couple of weeks ago, I love to do hard efforts while in town in Wiscasset. It's a small town but the bridge always proves to be a good launching pad for an all out effort. Plus, immediately after leaving the bridge you head uphill through town with cars continuously passing, going just slightly faster than a bulging from the eyes, vomiting in mouth cyclist can maintain. In short, it's my ideal environment to get in a solid 1-2 minute all out effort. There is something inside of my (probably vanity) that just loves to hammer in those kinds of situations. In fact, if it wouldn't make me look like an escaped metal patient in a leotard, I'd circle back multiple times to do it over again.

Anyway, I finished my intervals just shy of the 1 hour mark which mean that I'd have some time to enjoy just being outside. That didn't last long. Apparently my body has become accustomed to the short rides I've been getting recently and anything over 1:15 becomes a real question of survival. As an endurance cyclist this makes me sad, very, very sad. By about 1:30 I was hitting a serious wall (maybe I should have been carrying more than a bottle of water perhaps?) and was forced to stop and get a can of pepsi for my final SLOWWWWWWW 8 mile crawl back to the house.

Once back to the house I immediately popped open a Dog Fish Head 60 min IPA, ate a couple handfuls of jelly beans (thanks easter bunny!) and made up some lazy man's burritos. Nothing has ever tasted so good.

Angering the Cycling Gods

I'm not sure what I've done, but somehow I seem to have pissed off the mighty mountain biking gods. How do I know this? Well, today all bikeman.com team members received an e-mail from team manager Big "you've already used the Big Gay Al joke about a thousand times" Al saying that all of our tasty SRAM bits are in. Except for my stuff and one other teammates'. Just so we're clear, everything showed up for a team of roughly 70 riders except for me and Matt. Apparently I've been a bad boy and Matt's obviously been snorting Dumonde while lubing some other bike's rear end. Now that I'm thinking about it, it could be the fact that I did naughty things to on jack hammer this weekend. Observe:

ttttt-eeeeeee-lllllllllll-llllllllll mmmmm-ee wwww-hhhhhhh-eeeeeen yoooooo-uuuuuu wwwwwaaaaaa-nnnnnnn-ttttttt ttttttt-ooooo gggggooooo!

We also heard the other day that all of the team Salsa nuggets (hey, what do you want, I already used "bits" and I couldn't think of anything else) are on the slow boat from China and should be here sometime in the next millennium. When my beloved Selma finally lands on American soil I'll be sitting pretty with a sweet pair of Ergon grips, some, but not all, of my SRAM bits and nothing else. I guess it might be time to finger out the rest of my build. Who am I kidding? I'm still trying to figure out the rest of our HOUSE build. Selma, my little hussy, you'll be half dressed for quite some time. Hmmmmm, me likey what me thinky.

Separated at Birth?

Is it just me or do blog headers for Laps in the N'east and Bikes Beer and Bacon look strangely similar? To be honest, I knew of Pete's blog (BB&B) first but then he sort of went off-line for a bit. During that time, Laps showed up with a similar blog header and format. Not to mention they were both Bikeman.com team members so for quite some time I was convinced that they were one and the same. Pete messing with my head. But, as it turns out, they actually are two very different people who just happen to be the same person in my pea size brain. I think they only way for me to get over this is to see both of them at once. Kinda like seeing superman and clark kent at once or like the Patty Duke show. Here's a little off topic RacinRick trivia nugget for you. When I was a kid my mom watched a lot of Nick at Nite which had re-runs of 50's & 60's sitcoms. One of those sitcoms was the Patty Duke show. Basically a show about identical cousins which, as you can imagine, led to all sorts of hilarity. Anyway, I watched that show many, many times before my mother broke the news that both Patty and Cathy were the same person in real life. It totally blew my mind and I've never been able to trust women since. Conniving little vixens. Laps and Pete may be vixens (conniving ones at that) too for all I know so meet-up is in order. Hey you two, get yer asses to Maine!

Micro Blog, Twitter Style

No time for prose. Worked til 10:15 last night and back up at 4:45 this morning for a meeting in Boston. Prepped El Mariachi for ride in rain the morning with slicks mounted, fenders and a new 34 tooth chainring so as not to hamster wheel of fury as much while on the flats. Worked well. Got in with just enough time for this. Aren't you glad???

Doooood!

Another week down and we're one week closer to being homeless. It's becoming apparent that we won't have our house finished by the time we have to vacate our care taking gig so it's been full steam ahead on the house and not so much on the bike. Last week I did complete my first kinda-sorta week of structured training. I didn't get all of the LW prescribed workouts in but a couple did happen and I'm sure that's better than nothing. The week started out well with two good training rides mid week but the house stuff always keeps weekend rides to a minimum so I didn't get the "big" weekend rides. Those will come.

Sunday, I did manage to sneak out early enough for B and I to get a quick ride in. For the first time this year it was warm enough for just a sleeveless base and one long sleeve jersey. It was N-I-C-E. I just wish I had had the time and energy to get out longer. It was nice to roll with the B-monster though so I was happy and the short ride helped erase the weekend's stress from my melon.

Let Me Paint a Picture

Let's say that there is this guy named Rick (not me) who rode his bike to the house he's building (not mine) to do some work before meeting his wife (not Marcy) to head to her father's birthday dinner. Now, let's assume that Rick's (still not me) clothes to change into are in his wife's car so he'll have to change when she gets there. Unfortunately, Marcy (woops, I meant not Marcy) was running late so Rick would need to change uber fast. Not Marcy jokes about Rick stripping naked for when she gets there so he'll be ready for said uber quick change. Now, lets assume Rick (pretty sure he's not me) is a shameless twit who will do anything for a laugh (and even more for blog fodder) and decides to do her one better and proceeds to strip down to work boots (untied of course), a heart rate monitor strap and a bikeman.com hat (with brim turned up) and nothing else and then waits in the bushes for not Marcy's arrival. Upon her arrival I (I mean, Rick who could very well be me), runs from around the corner in said outfit, pale flesh, knees pumping high, limbs akimbo and junk all kadywampus in perfect comedic timing.

Try to erase that picture from your head today. Good luck

Ring it up

I have my first structured training ride of the season under my belt. It took some doing and was accomplished in less than ideal circumstances but it happened. Yay for me. On top of that, this morning while waiting for B to wake up I did some cyclo-core work and some push-ups in anticipation of not riding today but when B got up she requested a trailer ride to school. Being the model dad that I am, I quickly agreed, got everything together and we hit the road. After dropping her off (less than a five minute ride), unhooked the trailer and TT'd it into the office. I have to admit, the route from her school to my office is awesome for a quick hard effort. It has a significant (for coastal maine) amount of uphill with just enough down and flat to allow a few quick breathers. Add to that a good shoulder and constant traffic and it makes for an ideal hard tempo effort for me. I've found that I usually do my best hard training on busy roads because I find myself going a bit harder for an audience. Turning it up to 11, if you will. For example, on Saturday, on my way to my parents I had to ride through downtown Augusta. It's not most people's ideal riding locale but I loved it because the traffic traveled just slightly faster than I could thus allowing me to try to keep up with traffic, add in a few rolling hills and a couple of high speed (on a bike) traffic circles and the result was me having my hr pinned in upper zone 5 for 10 minutes straight. Good stuff.

Those of you who have been racin rick fans for long (not likely) may remember that a couple of years ago I had a sweet Van Dessel single speed that I had used for commuting. The story behind it is that my brother bought it used and then I traded him a road bike that I wasn't using for it. Eventually, he began to miss it so I gave it back to him as a Christmas/birthday/christmas/birthday present. I now, of course, miss having it too. To rub things in a bit, Rus sent me this pic the other day of the shiny new red wheels he got. They're nothing fancy but for a meat and potatoes commuter bike, they are perfect. I miss my VanD. It's weird that such an inexpensive bike could stir such feelings.

Look What the Brown Santa Brought

Yesterday, the brown santa made a much anticipated delivery courtesy of the Green Santa and Ergon-Bike. The box contained two sets of Ergon's GX2 magnesium barend grips. Frickin-a sweet! Too bad I don't have a bike to put them on yet. All Bikeman.com team members were given explicit orders not to pester team manager Big "don't call me gay" Al about when the team orders from SRAM and Salsa would be in because just imagine the time Al would spend answering daily e-mails and phone calls from neurotic, emaciated Adam Craig wanna-bes about when their precious bits would be in. I've got to admit though, that I've come precariously close to calling a time or two and even went so far as to try an end around with another bikeman.com employee figuring that if I asked Taber, I might find out what I needed and technically still be playing by the rules. Unfortunately, Taber knew shit (as if I didn't already know that) and he probably narc'ed me out to Al. Stupid Taber. Anyway, I guess until some Salsa goodness and some SRAM-tastic bits show up I'll just have to get kitted up, hold the grips in my hands and get all Monty Python with my imagination.

What's in a Picture

The other day, while out for a trailer ride with B, I took a few pics of a giant fisherman statue that sits at the entrance of a coastal hotel just down the road from our current residence.

At first glance, everything seems pretty normal but as you drive/ride past things get a bit more interesting...

Didn't see it? Well, how 'bout now?

cleverly positioned thumb!

Now, before you start saying that I'm just a dirty perv (I am) and that no one other than me would see this, you should know that this was pointed out to me by a friend of ours, Jen (another dirty perv by the way). I've got to say, that was totally a ballsy (pun totally intended) move by the artist responsible for the statue.

First Trailer Ride of the Season

That's the tip of my saddle sticking out there, if you were wondering.

This afternoon I decided to leave work early (after only 10 1/2 hours) and pic B up from school in her trailer. Thankfully, she was excited to see me in my riding kit. The other parents may not have been quite as excited.

Do you have any idea how many tries it took to get this picture? You try to get your ass, your kid and the water beyond all while riding.

From there we proceeded to hit every road and hill within close vicinity of the house (I've learned that there are two keys to taking your kid for a successful trailer ride, 1. always bring a snack and some water and 2. never get too far from home because when it gets ugly, it gets ugly and nobody wants to ride for an hour with a screaming kid in the back. what would the neighbors think?). Some of the climbs were serious nut droppers including several that were over 15% and one that touched 20%. Try doing that sometime with a 39/23 gear combo and a 40 lb kid tagging along in a trailer. PAINFUL! On the 20%'er I was forced to do the dreaded sawing back and forth in the road to keep any speed (and knee cartilage).

After meandering around for about an hour we rolled into the driveway while B still had a smile on her face. Mission accomplished. (morning edit: she asked for, and got, a ride to school this morning too)

While Visions of Radiant Tubing Dance in His Head

A sure fire way to tell that I'm stressed is when the day's trials creep in and disrupt my sleep. I've always been a sleepwalker of sorts. I don't usually wander around the house at night but I do occasionally do weird shit (usually in the bedroom) in the middle of the night while I slowly come out of my dream state. Sometimes I figure it out on my own, sometimes Marcy snarls at me through gritted teeth to get back in bed. On a side note, never, ever wake your wife in the middle of the night. Not for anything. I don't care if the house is on fire, if you want to survive the ordeal, I suggest you carefully wrap her in a blanket and carry her out Fabio style.

Anyway, I used to have my sleepwalking episodes much more often, like the time when I was a kid that my mother awoke one night to me peeing right next to her head. Or about 10 years ago when Marcy awoke to me crawling around on the floor, from window to window, searching for the person who was shooting at us.

Anyway, back to the story. Super stress seems to make me sleepwalk and yesterday was one of those days. I was frantically preparing for a client meeting to happen today and that, in and of itself, would typically be enough but I had the added "fun" of needing to prep the first floor radiant tubing for today's concrete pour. Before encasing radiant tubing it's important to pressure test it for leaks because no-one wants to cut into a concrete slab to find a pinhole leak. I had borrowed the fittings and tools that I needed to do the job. Unfortunately, once to the house I realized that the crimper that I had been given was the wrong size. Several frantic phone calls later I was able to find another to borrow from another mechanical contractor (it pays to run in those circles I guess) and was able to get the job done just as it was getting to dark to work.

Apparently, I took that stress with me to bed because on several occasions last night I awoke to find myself checking the tubing. Another side note here, how great of a pick up line would that be? "Hey baby, how would you like to come back to my place and pressure test my tubing?" That's a double slap, guaranteed. I may try it this weekend and find out.

Getting My Act Together

If you've been reading the blog for long (and judging by the numbers, if you have been, you won't be here much longer!) you know that this has been a tough winter for me. Work is super busy (which is awesome) and we're currently building our dream house (which is even more awesome-er, maybe even the awesomest) so it's left little time for keeping my other shit together. Ride time has been slack but by being creative and not bailing on any rides, I've been able to keep some reasonable weekly hours for the off season (4-8). Where I've really fallen off is in my diet. When time is tight, it can be hard to eat the right thing and when you're stressed (at least when I'm stressed) I tend to eat crap and drink much. I've slowly been weening myself off the sauce and trying to make small changes in the diet to get back on track.

One sure fire way for me to control my eating is to eat lots of bean based foods. The above "soup" is an example of what I enjoy. Yesterday morning, while waiting for B to wake up, I literally threw this together (basically three types of beans, spinach, peas, canned tomatoes, couple cloves of garlic, some beef broth and some various seasonings ). It's healthy, tasty and most importantly, keep my ravenous gut satiated. By my calculations there is roughly 10g protein, 20g carbs, 15mg sodium and about 15000 grams of fiber per serving. Lets just say, this soup keeps things REGULAR. Nuff said.

Speaking of keeping things regular and getting my shit together (pun alert!) I've started carrying this calendar around with me everywhere in the hopes that I'll finally get my season training planned out.

It hasn't happened yet but with the help of LW Coaching and Road Bike Rider . com, I'll soon be getting my workouts together (loosely at least) for the season. LW's "Time Crunched Expert" plan worked pretty well for me last year so I'm hoping to build on that this year.

Get the Funk Out

maybe I should change my blog name to "The Sandy Chamois"

my taint trembles looking at this.

Another week gone and I'm still trying to find some balance in my life. I have been able to squeeze in some respectable hours (for me) recently, cramming in rides ranging from :30 - 1:30 whenever I can and trying to up the tempo a bit so that the legs know whats what when I start doing "real" training rides instead of the "junk" miles I've been working on so far. To be honest, while my riding has been junk as far as training goes, they have been serving a real purpose; keeping me sane. With our house move-in date quickly approaching, I find myself with precious few moments to myself to unwind and as the week progress' I get closer and closer to climbing up the nearest bell tower with a high powered rifle. Quick jaunts on the road bike (that's right, I've transitioned from the el mariachi on the road) are all that's keeping me from ascending those stairs.

The Ergon pack carries baby toys too.

Last week, I finally took a look at this years' Maine Mountain Bike race schedule. Unfortunately, it looks like several races have dropped off the calendar. I'm bummed but not surprised to see it happen considering the dwindling numbers in recent years. The one bright side, for me at least, is that there is only one spring race in the schedule and then the rest picking up in July. That should give me time to get my arse in gear for a late season comeback.

Spring is near

Not much to blog about today. I had hoped to do the wednesday morning spin class today to squeeze a quality workout in since no other ride is in the works for today but after the whole fam felt like ka-ka last night, I figured it was best to get an extra half hour of sleep and get in to work early instead. Bummer. The above photo was from less than two weeks ago. I can't frickin believe it, there was so much snow that hiking without snowshoes was impossible (or at least miserable) and now, here we are with barely any snow left on the ground. Usually, I'd be psyched to see the snow go in the spring but given the current house situation, I was actually kinda hoping for a few more weeks of snow and crap so that it would keep people around here off their bikes thus allowing me to catch up quicker when I'm riding proper again. Oh well, just another way ma nature has me over a barrel.

Because it could get sticky

Overheard at my place of employ:

Me: "yada, yada, yada, I'm the best cyclist ever and I'm super studly because I ride in winter and did I mention yet today that I WAX my legs?(or something of that nature)"

Bora (name changed to protect the annoying): "yada, yada, yada, and while you were riding around in your latex..."

Me: " Bora, I guarantee you, I'm on a totally different kind of ride when I'm wearing latex."

Spring must be approaching

because there are two bikes on the car.

Yay!

Work

Ugh, work has taken the front seat, the back seat and the luggage and glove compartments so far this week so I've barely had time to think let alone blog. Thankfully, I was still able to squeeze in a few quality rides last week. They're still short rides in duration but I've slowly added intensity so hopefully come race season I'll have some top end speed, sure I might implode at the :45 minute mark but I'll look good up til then.

Over the weekend we kicked some serious house butt and installed all 18 window assemblies (somewhere around 25 windows total) and have moved one giant step closer to having a habitable house come summer. With that in mind, I'd better get crackin!

Orange movement

What happens when you have two bowls of squash soup for first breakfast (we had lots of leftovers and I didn't want it to go to waste) followed by a bagel with cream cheese and salmon (not lox, that's gross) and then a salmon steak for lunch (our salmon tends to be a bit more orange than pink)? You have an orange movement, that's what. At least that's what I'm guessing because I'd never look when I'm finished. Nope, not me. Never.

ThomP (see pic above) has totally got me thinking about getting the DT Swiss RWS quick release.

Last year I had a bit of trouble with quick releases loosening up on my El Mariachi unless I torqued them so hard I thought I'd break something (my fingers trying to release them). Anyway, the RWS essentially lets you tighten it by spinning the lever thus allowing the application of plenty of torque. This allows both a more secure connection PLUS (at least it is said) a noticeably stiffer assembly. Hmm, sounds pretty good. My only question is, how long does it take to loosen and secure the RWS in comparison to a typical quick release. If anybody knows, please let me know.

Commuting is great, commuting sucks

As all of you know (all two of you) because I whine about it constantly, the only riding I get these days is my twice weekly commute and maybe a ride to and from the property on the weekend. Thank god for the saddle time during the commute because otherwise I'd become such a grumpy prick that even fewer people would be able to stand being around me. BUT, I am so frickin getting tired of this commute. I've done just about every conceivable route that doesn't take me way out of the way and I still find myself bored as sin recently. The one good thing is that we finally have some bare pavement on the roads so I might be able to finally take the studded tires off the bike. Most winters the studded tires are only needed the day or two after a storm but this year we've had so much snow so frequently that there has been ice on the roads EVERY-SINGLE-DAY. The March sun is finally on my side though and clearing the roads nicely during the day. Maybe, just maybe I'll be able to throw the schwalbe big apple shod wheelset on the El Mariachi for this weekend.

That's all I have for now. Originally I had a marginally more interesting post up about orange poop (now we're talking!) but stupid blogger won't upload the photo. Maybe tomorrow.