From the night of the Merco Criterium, at our wonderful host family's house--thanks so much Michelle and John!
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Dinner with Lexi
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Alexi, you're back!
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Las Vegas training Day One
After a great weeklong Salt Lake City Boo video shoot with new friend Tom Inskeep and old friend Tyler Wren, I've ventured south for the winter--er, at least the next week or so!
I'm staying with my good buddy Jim Robbins, a rider on the elite Paul Tracy master's squad, and putting in some good warm-weather (high 50s and sun!) training before heading down to race the Vuelta Chile.
Check out the incredible view of The Strip from about 4500 feet, near the top of Potosi Canyon. It was a touch colder up there!!
Potosi Canyon looking ENE |
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Friday, October 29, 2010
Ups and Downs at Tour do Brasil
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
World Tripping: 4/10 of Tour do Brasil
My updates about this crazy Brazil trip have thus far been fragmented and largely limited to 140 characters. But TdB deserves so much more, and we have a nice little transfer ahead of us so here's nuthin'!
Let me begin by saying: "Dad, you are right. I should leave an extra hour on top of whatever I think will be required for travel." I am lucky enough to have a great friend (and Boo customer!) in Denver, Dori Biester, whom I pick up and drive with to the airport so she can keep my car while I'm gone and I can avoid the $6/day at the Pikes Peak Lot.
Well let's just say I pay for that convenience in part because I must travel straight through Denver to her house...and Colorado folks know how to balance life, so rush hour starts at 3PM!
Long story short: I missed my flight by about 15 minutes after leaving my house over three hours before departure. So right after the 45 minute security line (which passed as I would imagine time passes when one's hand is inserted into lukewarm water on the stove and the burner is turned on), I got on the phone with Delta to see what's what.
I was flying DIA-SLC-JFK-Sao Paulo, and my first layover was five hours, but I heard the next (and last) Delta flight DIA-SLC was fully booked, and I was facing the prospect of missing my entire itinerary (as well as sleeping in DIA). Delta passed me to TAM Brazilian Airlines when the found out my whole trip might change. TAM passed me to Expedia when they found out our director Seba booked with them. Then Expedia told me I just needed to get to SLC somehow to get my bike, which would be waiting on a carousel somewhere, before they could redo the rest of the flights.
MAN I AM F*CKED!
Well, one foot in front of the other...so I get to the counter of my 5:15 flight, now 5:40, and I succinctly described the horrible security line and gave her my useless ticket. After a short bout of pecking at her keyboard, the printer started humming to life. Of course this standby ticket is worth less than the paper it's printed on, and I was about to hop onto Southwest.com the see if they had a one-way I could get on that night and still make things work.
Then she started to hand the standby ticket to me and said, with affirmation, "this is your only flight, right?" now here's the subtle note about my flights: the DIA-SLC leg IS a single flight, disconnected from the rest of the itinerary, because teammate Tyler Wren is in SLC and Seba simply booked two identical trips from SLC so we would fly and arrive together.
"Yeeeaaaaah..." and she now fully extends her arm, waiving what I now see is not only a real TICKET for the last over-sold 7:20PM flight to SLC, but it's seat 1C Premium. I'm flying First on the last flight to SLC after it was oversold!!!!!!!!!
So yeah Dad, it worked out great, this time :)
Anyway, Wren and I met up at 11PM in SLC for the epic redeye to JFK right before a 10hr flight to Sao Paulo. I think Tyler is the only reason I made it through the trip!
I did meet an awesome couple from Spain spending the next eight months between SLC and Ogden (i.e. The Middle of Nowhere) so she could teach Math and Chemistry to middle school kids. We had an incredible four hour conversation about Mormonism, US Healthcare policy and geo-societal quirks and stereotypes, as well as cycling/Boo/schooling. Although I should have been sleeping, this was worth it!!
After arriving at our hotel in Sao Paulo at 10PM (I left my house at 2PM the day before) we learn that the bus transfer departs at 5:30AM. And it is a 600k transfer. On a bus that goes 90kph and stops every two hours for a thirty minute rest. We didn't get to wherever we got until 4PM. That means a total of FORTY EIGHT HOURS door-to-door.
OK, enough travel, there is a bike race to do, and it's nine days and 10 stages, so let's get to it!
Saturday, Sunday, and Monday were basically the exact same terrain. Maybe even the same 50ft wide freeway. I don't know. What I do know is there is not a flat piece of ground for thousands of kilometers, nor is there a hill longer than four minutes, nor a solitary tree to protect the Peloton from wind.
The races start at 6:50AM at the crack of dawn, proceed neutral straight out of town and onto a freeway entrance ramp, before the checkered flag is waved. Then either a small break immediately goes or lots of small breaks go and each grows too large before being reabsorbed, just to start the process over again.
In the end of each stage, all notions of safety are thrown out of the window as the field takes an off-ramp and goes on/through/around at least two of the following: 1) roundabouts, 2) man-eating potholes, 3) parallel cracks of death, 4) stray dogs, 5) Bot's Dots the size of squirrels, or 6) oil-soaked paint lines (with Bot's Dots).
After the sprint, life somehow returns to normal as everyone changes and goes to lunch (provided by the race, as are all meals/hotels/transportation) since by now it's between 10 o'clock and noon!
The first day I came in 13th in a ripping "field" sprint that looked more like a final kilometer blown-apart mess. Anibal came in 5th after Ale got boxed while in perfect position for the win, avoided a huge pileup, and came in 18th. The other two Gringos, Tyler and Andy Guptill, came in with the same time and all was well.
The second day finished with a 90kph descent in a U-TURN 300M before the finish!! Again Ale narrowly avoided a crash and the Borrajo Bros (BBros) rolled in 5th and 18th, while Los Tres Gringos came in way back, at the same GC time.
But the third day...Stage Three...uh, that was a beast. Yes, there are usually a couple days each season where I wish the extent of my bicycle riding was limited to cruising on a townie to Whole Foods. And Stage Three was such a day.
Start a 178k stage in pitch darkness with pouring rain and cold after sitting on the start line for 10 minutes. 140 Popsicles rolled out, and 119 rolled in, some over 30 minutes down, others battered and bruised with broken wheels and frames and bones. I came in fifth in the uphill sprint with two (somehow) still a minute up.
We orchestrated the finish to perfection, with Wrenegade super-tucked at 2k to go to pull back a late break of three, and Ani, Ale and me sitting around 20th ready to rip the 300m uphill to the line. Then a rider crashed in front of Ani on the Bot's Dots of Death, Ani crashed at about 60kph, and Ali didn't sprint after fearing for his brother. I closed my eyes and displaced the vision of Ani rolling over the other guy, and focused on timing the tricky sprint, almost a replica of the Univest Grand Prix.
The timing was just a couple seconds too late, as I had a good 5kph on the guys in front of me but the line came to early to grab the last podium spot on the stage.
We regrouped after the finish and watched in amazement as Ani rolled across the line on the same bike and wheels, unscathed! We were all completely exhausted and mentally shattered after a brutal, nervous day in the wind/rain and endless 100m rollers of Brazil, ready to roll to the hotel and shower/eat/sleep.
This race is excellent training and a strange experience for most of us at this point in the year. But a nine day stage race is two more days than I've ever raced before, and I know the team will come out stronger and more connected than before, finally ready for a nice off-season vacation.
Tuesday AM was a brutal TT which I'll include in the next race report, and this afternoon we have a 120k road stage about which I currently know nothing.
I plan to do shorter and more frequent iPhone blog posts over the next seven days as we continue on this crazy Tour do Brasil!
Monday, October 11, 2010
Orglamic plugs Boo Fixie for Manly Monday
Sandra Sanchez, creator of the wonderfully hip Orglamic site for "sustainable luxury living", just gave the Boo Fixie a nice plug in her latest post, a series called Manly Mondays. Check it out: http://orglamic.com/2010/10/boo-bicycles-2/
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Tyler Wren top-20 on Boo at Cross Vegas!
Looking over the start list for last week's Cross Vegas cyclocross season opener, I was second-guessing the intelligence of my participation. I would be starting in 40th position, on the fifth row of riders, and some of the biggest names in the cyclocross world were present. Bikes, parts and clothing for the season was trickling in literally just hours before the start, so I only had two short opportunities to ride my beautiful new Boo CX before the race.
When the gun went off, I was able to find my pedals quickly, and start sprinting towards the front of the group. I feel confident using my road positioning skills in these crazy CX starts, and I was able to tag onto the back of what was becoming the front group by the end of the prologue lap. My Boo CX was responsive when I stood up to sprint, and tracked very well over the bumpy grass course.
I yo-yo'd off the back of that front group of fifteen riders for the first third of the race. The Boo was duking it out with Tim Johnson's Cannondale and Ryan Trebon's Kona. It was where it belonged. Part of the goal of this Boo CX sponsorship this fall is to show the bike's legitimacy. For a cyclocross bike, the bamboo is actually an ideal material, with amazing power transfer during sprints or low speed grinds, stability on high-speed descents, and minimal fatigue to my lower back over the course of the entire race.
Eventually I came off that front group, but held off the chase group behind me that included Barry Wicks, and some other big CX names to finish 18th on the day. 22 spots ahead of my starting position, and proof that the Boo CX can handle the toughest international CX competition with ease.
Tyler
Credit to the wonderful Lyne (aka Podium Insight) for her incredible first image, then Jonathan Devich, DMunson, and VeloDramatic for their photos, respectively.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Memorial Weekend Races: a homecoming in Iowa
It was about a hundred degrees at Snake Alley on Saturday, and I was totally unprepared. It's been a *long* time since I've raced in heat like that, especially with the notorious Midwest humidity, and I went from riding with Volodymyr Starchyk (badass Ukrainian national champion on Amore & Vita and eventual winner of the race) and Paul Martin (another storied strongman of domestic racing) to getting bogged down in "the field" halfway through and then pulling myself out with just five laps to go after some serious side cramps. It was frustrating to have good legs and just not prepare well (ice sock, cold water, two bottles, etc.) but having my one bottle of ice water eject on the second of twenty laps is just plain bad luck!
All that said, I know every other non-winner of The Snake has similar war stories--that's why that race is just insane and I want to win it at some point in the near future!
The rest of the weekend went very well, no breakout wins but just solid performances across the board with 6th in the road race (3rd in the 80kph downhill field sprint), 7th in the Melon City Criterium (in no-man's-land trying to bridge to the break a little too late) and 10th in the crazy Cage Match field sprint in Rock Island. I made sure to stay crash-free first and foremost since Nature Valley is just two weeks away, but I also wanted to get some great training in and rode a couple hours before each race. I love these races, they're like a homecoming for me, and it's awesome to reconnect with a bunch of racers I've grown up with through the juniors and espoirs. The racing is extremely fast and the Snake always makes Sunday and Monday a lot harder.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Been a LONG time!
I might start doing some blog entries, as much as I love Twitter there's just not enough content.
I just made a (not super pro) video about Boo Bicycles for the Bike Expo in Munich this July. It's a huge trade show with some big awards up for grabs, and Boo is grabbing!
Please PLEASE click here and vote for us, it takes less time than reading this sentence.
If you want, watch the video as well, enjoy!