Singlespeed slugfest

Saturday I did a 60 mile singlespeed ride to Fulshear. There were 3 ss cross bikes, 1 geared cross bike that never shifted, and me on my rigid 29er ss mtb with cross tires. I was geared the lowest, so I was spinning the whole time. It was a good workout though. We rode along the bayous and backroads the whole time, so it was a neat route. The pic shows my normally big looking bike dwarfed next to the huge yetti bike in Fulshear. All the rhoadies got a kick out of seeing our ragtag group on our ragtag bikes with knobby tires all the way out in Fulshear. The best part was seeing this dude with a high zoot TT bike getting sagged back home from the station after barely making it out there.

Japanese grills

The last two fridays we have gone to japanese grills for dinner. Last weekend was JT's birthday dinner with the small group, this week Raine's family is in town and they wanted sushi. Both times the food was good, but what is it with these japanese places and their live entertainment? The first place wasn't so bad, a full band playing decent music, but a bit loud in a small restaurant. The second place though, was not good at all. It was a guitar player who could groove ok with a dude banging on the bongos and couldn't keep a good rhythm for his life. Worse though was the fact that they were playing along with canned music and all of it was blaring over huge speakers like 15 feet from our table. You can see the setup complete with the little music box in the picture. It was so loud we were yelling at each other to talk. Finally they took a break and played the canned music much quieter than they had been. That was the best part of our dinner.

Crit race

Last night was crit race #4 at Memorial Park. I've done all of them so far but this has definitely been the best one yet. I was able to stay in the pack the whole time and finish with them on the lead lap. I even found myself on the front a couple of times taking pulls. I expected big attacks when I got to the front, as I thought I would be slowing the pack up, but that didn't happen so I guess I did alright. I thought about going for a prime, but it wasn't as easy to move to the front as I thought it would be and I was afraid of blowing myself up and getting dropped so I decided to stay in the group. I got some new wheels last week, I don't know if they really helped or not, but they definitely should help as they are much more aero and I think lighter than my old wheels. They do look really good, that's worth some speed right there.

My HR numbers were pretty good from last night, I was able to hold a high effort level the whole race and not get blown like I've been doing. My avg. was 184bpm, my max was 196. I spent 32 minutes above 90% of max HR. These races are shorter than my mtb races but much more intense, so I'm hoping this will help me up the intensity level in mtb races. I know that I need to be doing long rides to go along with these races, though, 50 minutes on the bike at a time isn't going to cut it when the race is 2-2.5 hours long.

I don't know if anybody else regularly reads this except me, but I should be updating much more frequently now that I have a new phone and I can blog(with pics) from it. Whether it's a good story like this one or just a short blurb about something interesting I saw I'm gonna try to write something every day.

Dat's a big crawdad

Tonight was a going away party for David and Rachel at Ragin' Cajun. I had a crawfish poboy, it was really good but it sadly wasn't as big as this giant mudbug on the roof. David and Rachel are moving to Florida, we will miss them. They're going to meet us when we go on vacation later this year so that should be lots of fun, i'm really looking forward to it. 4th crit is tomorrow, there's a good chance of rain so we'll see how that turns out.

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I have surpassed my Wii Tennis plateau, i'm ready to give Patrick another attempt. This is also a test of blogging from my phone.

Hill Country Challenge at Comfort

Well Comfort is a good race and a bad race for me. There is a lot of climbing, which is not so good for me, but the course is technical and has lots of downhills where you really can make up time, which is good for me. This technical aspect of the course is largely attributable to the vast amount of rocks present. Rocks and I don't seem to get along too well, having resulted in a pair of flats at the very rocky Reimer's Ranch course. Unfortunately, we continued our bad relationship this weekend when I flatted again. Yep, you heard right. I flatted 7 minutes and 30 seconds in this time. So immediately I was back to dead last. I fixed the flat and tried to get rolling again but I just couldn't get a good groove going on the first half of the course. When we hit the second half it started with a long climb to the tune of about 20 minutes, and interestingly this is where I hit my stride. I started making up some ground and passing riders in my class as well as others that had previously passed me. I kept rocking along on this second half of the course, I passed a few riders from my class and then caught another one a few miles from the finish with one solid climb left to go. I locked onto him as my last target and plotted the rest of the race to cross the line ahead of him. I knew I was going faster than him since I'd caught him, but I didn't want to pass him too early and expend too much energy, giving him a chance to lock on my wheel and pass me back. So I sat behind him until just before the last climb was over and then I made my move. I punched it to the top and flew down to the finish line. I wound up putting over a minute on him in that last mile or two, and I crossed the finish line with plenty of energy left over. Unfortunately, I finished only about 20 seconds behind the 10th place finisher, and 9th was less than a minute ahead of me. Had I continued my strong pace and passed that rider earlier, I would surely have caught 10th and maybe even 9th for a much more satisfying finish. But I didn't, so I have to settle for 11th.

I think maybe I need to work on my mental game a little? At Warda when I got dropped on that last climb I let myself explode when I may could have pushed harder to the finish alone to retain 4th place, or would have continued at the same pace if I just could have held onto that wheel and had a shot at 3rd. But once I got dropped and was by myself I couldn't push anymore. Was that mental or had I just hit my physical limit? I don't know. At this race I let the flat hang over my head too long which prevented me from getting back up to race pace. The flat should have only taken 4~5 minutes to change and I should have been back underway, but the impact on my race was much larger than that.

Well hopefully Double Lake will be a good race for me, I would like to get one more solid finish this series as a Sport racer before making the big jump this fall. I still also have X-Bar to race as well, but I'm banking on Double Lake right now as it is a local race that I did reasonably well at last year.

Oh I almost forgot to mention that just a few days before the race I woke up at 6AM Wednesday morning and didn't go to sleep until 8:30PM Thursday night. Yes that is 38.5 hours of straight being awake. I got called back into work Wednesday night to finish a test that took until 9AM Thursday morning, and then I chose to just keep on working the rest of the day Thursday. I did get Friday off, but I didn't get much sleep past 7:30AM or so. Only having a few days to recover from this episode may have had an impact on my racing, as I was sure feeling the tiredness Saturday during the preride. But I did what I had to do for work and then did what I could at the race so there's not much else to do about it.

The Warda Race and Reimer's Ranch

Well the last two races have been so good and so bad. First was Warda, a semi local course that suits me well: not much climbing and a lot of twisty stuff. And things went my way that day. My parents came out to watch the race, and brought the RV so we stayed there that night. My birthday was the next weekend so we also had a pseudo birthday party complete with cake and ice cream. Sunday morning I was on the line at 9:00AM, following a last minute tire change due to a cut sidewall the day before. I got a good start and grabbed a strong racer's wheel and we hoofed it for two and a half laps. We made a few passes here and there to move up to third and fourth place. About halfway through the last lap we hit the biggest climb on the course and Geoff got out of the saddle going up and I just couldn't match it. I tried to get back on his wheel but I couldn't do it, I was done. I was riding by myself in 4th at this point trying to hold onto it to the line. I lost one spot in a big open field right before hitting the singletrack again. I finished 5th, which was my best result ever and I was really happy with it. It was cool that my parents got to be there to watch it. This was a great race for me, and I thought my season was finally coming together and I was establishing myself as a top racer in my class. It was also an awesome race as Raine finished third in her third race, getting the first piece of podium pie between the two of us.

The next race up was Reimer's Ranch west of Austin. Reimer's is another course that suited me well. A bit more climbing but not too much, a lot of technical rocky stuff, and some fast swoopy stuff on the backside of the course. Off the line a racer went down right in front of me, and I had no choice but to run right over his bike. I was having flashbacks to my road race crash and I just knew my life was over, but I managed to roll right over his back wheel with a nice crunch and keep rolling. I lost several spots so I had to work extra hard to get back to a decent spot before hitting the singletrack. I hit the trail in sixth place or so and everything was going well. Over a rough rocky patch the guy in front of me lost his bottle when it ejected from his cage. I thought he would be easy to pick off in about 20 minutes when he had been without fluid so I got a little positive. Then we came over a sharp hump in the trail and somehow down the backside of it I found myself careening out of control and into a stand of trees. Luckily my front wheel missed the trees but my front brake lever was not so fortunate, taking the brunt of the impact. This resulted in a loose brake lever and a bent bolt, but nothing was broken so the bike was still good to go. Unfortunately, I was not so much good. In the deceleration that occurred when my bike and the tree came to know each other, one of Newton's laws(don't ask which one please) told me that I had to stay in motion until an outside force acted upon me. So stay in motion I did until the steer tube on my bike acted upon my ribcage, knocking the breath out of me and leaving me a nasty fleshwound. But I got back on the bike and just tried to keep moving forward, meanwhile I was moving backwards relative to the majority of the riders in my class. A bit after the crash when I was just starting to get my breath and my groove back, I dropped into a rock garden and heard the dreaded pshhhhh, that is an "all the air coming out of my back tire" sound. So this would be a nice little break to get my breath and my wits back and say hello as all the old guys passed me as I changed my flat, and soon I was back underway.

The rest of this first lap was ok, I got stuck behind some guys for too long but eventually got past them and assaulted the swoopy stuff on the back side of the course to pick back up a few spots. Starting the second lap I was motoring along in overdrive feeling ok and looking to make up some time in the technical stuff. Then not too far along I started feeling my rear tire getting a little squirmy, sure enough another flat. So I rode it as long as I could and then gave it my last shot of air. I nursed it from there on, but only got another few miles out of it at best until it was unridable again. So at this point I'm faced with at least 6 more miles of trail, no more tubes, and no more air. So what do I do? I start walking. I walked the rest of the course, sometimes thinking I just had to keep going to finish and sometimes thinking how stupid I was. While I was loathing in my self pity and approaching the finish line less than a mile away, the last rider from my class came by me. So I got dead freaking last by three and a half minutes after pushing my bike for over a quarter of the race. So that was my race. Not at all what I planned, but I guess it could have been worse. Don't ask me how, but that's what they always say so why not?

Next up is Comfort, a rocky course with lots of climbing(not good for me) but does have some fast downhills(good for me) where I can hopefully gain a little advantage. We will see how it turns out and report back. Until then, keep the greasy side down(if you're in airplane) or the rubber side down(if you're on a bike). I plan to do both Wednesday night when I fly to College Station to ride at Lake Bryan with Patrick. Sounds like fun.

Ridiculously Awesome™ Day

I had one of the best days ever yesterday. It was preceeded the night before with a slab of Texas Roadhouse ribs when my brother James came over from Baytown for my week late birthday dinner. So that wasn't really in the Ridiculously Awesome™ Day but it should be noted.
So my day started off with fresh homemade waffles. I love waffles. My birthday was last weekend, and Raine got me a waffle maker. I love my waffle maker. I got out of bed and made waffles for breakfast for Raine and I before going to church.
We headed off for "early"(9:30, not really so early) service at church which was good, we haven't been to church in three weeks because of bike races. Then we headed back home and got dressed for a bike ride.
We rolled out on the road bikes and met Clare and Adam for a ride at George Bush Park. We got in 30 miles or so for the day before arriving back home. I pulled the girls along for a couple of intervals, I was sitting straight up to get the most for my money and give them a good draft to sit in. They held on up to 28mph or so on one, they really liked that. And I was really proud of Raine.
After I got home, I ate some leftover steak I had grilled Friday night. It was still good.
I then headed out to the airport on my bike. I had planned on going flying, but I had forgotten to call ahead to get the plane pulled out early enough. The Commemorative Air Force was having their plane show and fly-in that day, which happened right in front of our hangar. They couldn't get the plane out in time, so I just hung around and took pictures of the cool WWII aircraft and watched a few fly. I took some pictures and videos, they're posted here. I didn't know Picasa supported videos, that's cool.
So next up was my small group meeting. I love my small group. I have Ridiculously Awesome™ people like Patrick and JT in my small group. We had a great time and some great discussion, and we also all agreed to read through the bible in 90 days. What a challenge this will be, and I expect it to be life changing as well.
After small group and to finish off my Ridiculously Awesome™ Day, I went up for a late evening flight. I cruised around the West part of town with the power pulled back and at about 1000'AGL(above ground level) seeing what I could see and watching the sunset fade. I flew a loop around George Bush Park, then I went and flew a few circles around JT and Abby's house and then the Flick's. I flew out to Brookshire and watched the sun paint the clouds their last shades of pink and purple, I wish Patrick had been with me, I know he could have gotten some awesome pictures. Then it was back home for a night landing to end the day.

What a Ridiculously Awesome™ Day.

Ridiculously Awesome™ is copyrighted, any use without the express written consent of the originator and copyright holder is strictly forbidden, punishable by penalty of law and a good noogie.

Bicycles & Burritos, Airplanes & Pain, Flowerbeds & Friends

Interestingly enough, none of the above pairs are actually pairs. They're all just things that have been going on in the last week. In fact, there are triplets, a pair, and a loner.

We'll start with the loner: flowerbeds. Since we bought our house, we haven't done much improvements to the exterior. We still haven't put down grass on the sides and backyard, and we didn't have much of a flower bed. Raine and her mom and grandma had done some work to the flowerbed last year, but it never really took. The soil was just not good for plants, and they planted at the wrong time of the year. So we decided to redo it this spring in the hope that it would take this time. So we started by mixing some organic matter into the soil to better support the plants. Then we planted three roses, some Salvia(?), and a few small flowers. We also put in a soaker hose to keep the bed nice and moist. We topped it all with some mulch, and it actually looks pretty good. I really hope it will stay looking good, as Raine really likes it and it also really improves the looks of the house: curb appeal, that is. Maybe a pretty flowerbed will make it easier to sell when we decide to evacuate this flat swampland, who knows?(pic to come)

Next up, the dynamic duo: bicycles and pain. After all the setbacks I've come across this season(road race wreck, grandfather sick and passing, etc.) it has been less than ideal. I am just now starting my high intensity training stuff, where you envelope yourself in pain to acclimate yourself to the pace required in a race. I was talking about this with Raine the other day, and she said "I don't get you people. Pain is not gain." This was my response:

"Pain is gain. How do you figure it's not? Ok, well you're actually right it's not the pain that's the gain, it's the recovery part that's where the gain comes from. But you have to have the pain first. But there is a certain enjoyment(to me) of going out and pushing yourself to the limits if for no other reason than to get back to the house in time to see a stupid TV show. It's euphoric. You just have to get into it to feel it. It can't be explained."

It's true that sometimes I don't feel like getting on my bike and pushing to my limits, but I know that I have to. But once I get out there and get started, I don't want to stop. In this case, hurting is good. The pain truly is euphoric. That's what those doods who hang themselves by meat hooks in their backs say, too, but I really think this is different.

And finally, the trifecta: airplanes, burritos, and friends. Towards the end of March I still had some hours to use from my plane "lease" so I took a few mid-week evening flights. Monday night I flew from home over to Eagle Lake, then up to Brenham, then back home. Had a good flight, beautiful day with smooth air and good landings. Then Wednesday night, I flew to College Station with Brandon as my copilot for dinner. Patrick picked us up and they took me for a tour of the A&M campus, then we dropped into Freebird's where Jon met us for dinner. All these guys are Aggies who are in my church small group. We are all either newly(relatively) or nearly married. It's a great group and we all get along great and have a great time. We ate our burritos and told war stories, then we went to Jon's place and watched a "The Office" episode. Namely, Conflict Resolution. Then it was back to the airport for the flight back to Houston. We were bucking a headwind down low, but the ceilings were only about 2800 feet, so we just had to ride it out. Still only took about 45 minutes, though.

So that completes the list. It's now April, which means I'm almost another year older(April 12th if you didn't know, hint hint). It also means the heaviest period of racing is upon us, with three weekends of this month occupied, and two sets of back to back races with only one weekend between the sets. Hopefully I'll have good stories to tell about those races that do not include vomit. And as always, I'll have good pictures of myself. SEE YA!!

Spring Series Intro

Well, I'm two races into my planned seven race run at the TMBRA Spring State Championship Series. Unfortunately, things haven't gotten off to the start I was hoping for. I have lots of excuses I could make for why I'm outta shape, but none of them can cover the fact that I just didn't work hard enough. So I'll take what I get and try to keep improving each race, that's positive thinking.

The first race for me was the Bar-H bash in St. Joe, TX, which is up north of Dallas almost to the OK line. This was actually the second race of the series, but I didn't make it to the first one due to the 12+ hour drive and the fact that it coincided with our annual attendance at the Houston Supercross. This was also to be Raine's first ever MTB race!! Raine and Claire(new team member) and I departed Houston Sat. morning in the new Subaru. We got there that afternoon and did a preride lap of the course. I tried to help the girls learn some stuff about climbing technical hills and riding drops while we were out. We were camping out that night and unfortunately, the wind blew hard and gusty all night long, flapping the tent incessantly, resulting in me getting pretty much no sleep. My race was at 9AM, so I had to pop out of bed and get in race mode early, ready or not.

During my warm up I could tell this wasn't going to go well, as my heart rate was sky high and any power I normally possess was non-existant. I tried to get off the line slowly and down the long start hill as gingerly as I could to hopefully warm up a little bit before hitting the singletrack and turning uphill and into the wind. But the day was not my day. I hit the singletrack in sixth I think and went all backwards from there. I had zero power and zero energy. I pulled over about 20 minutes into the race and stood on the side of the trail puking for 5 minutes. This dropped me to dead last in my class, back to 26th place. After this I did feel a little bit better and was able to move my way back up to 17th position by the end. This was definitely not the start I was looking for, and felt like my season was ruined. I sulked home and tried to put in some good effort over the next two weeks leading up to the next race at Cameron Park in Waco.

Waco was a little better to me, although I did puke again. I took a slow start off the line again and resolved to stay steady throughout the race and work my way forward. I battled through the first lap with a couple of guys who had smoked me two weeks before, so I knew this was going better. As I came around to start the second lap, that familiar feeling in the pit of my stomach reared its ugly head and I started puking again. I tried to keep moving and puked twice off the side of my bike on the roll, and then finally had to pull over and get rid of the rest of it. This only cost me a minute or two sitting still, but I know it cost me more than that in the big picture. After you puke and there's nothing left in your stomach you're just not the same. It actually feels a little better afterwards, but there's just nothing there to pull from. I rode as hard as I could for the second lap with whatever strength and willpower I had left to a 9th/28 finish.


I now sit 13th in the overall standings for the series, and hopefully with the work I've been doing I can keep posting top-ten results and move myself further up for a decent overall finish. I have my heart and mind set on upgrading to Expert starting in the Fall, so this is my shot to achieve a good overall result in the state championship series. I had set my goal as winning the overall title, but that came crashing down pretty early. I'm just gonna keep my head up and try to do as well as I can the rest of the way. I still have to earn my Expert upgrade with two top-five finishes, which is a good goal in itself.

John Neilson, 1921-2008

My grandfather passed away today. He made it to his 87th birthday last Friday before losing his battle with cancer. I don't know how to feel, I don't know what to say or what to do. I can only hope that being there for my dad will be enough comfort for him. I will be a pallbearer in his funeral Thursday, that will be a first for me. We will have to go through Easter without him, only made worse by the fact that we have just begun to spend holidays with him over the last few years. I hardly knew him, but I will miss him dearly. I wish we'd spent more time together. I guess it hasn't really sunk in yet, even though I knew it was coming I still picture him lying there in his bed sleeping or maybe talking to me a little. The best memories I will keep were when he came to my parents house at Christmas less than three months ago. He drove himself there, opened gifts with us, and he was totally capable and able to stand outside and visit and take pictures with us. But now he's gone. Miss you Gran'daddy.

Catching up.

It's been a month since I posted last, sorry about that. It happens, though. I have been busy, and I have a lot to write about, so here goes. The weekend after my last post was the supercross race in Houston. My parents and little brother came down, and went with Raine, James, and me to the race. We had a great time, got to see Kevin Windham take the win for the first time. The next day, I finally got a chance to take John flying. We flew across town through the I-10 corridor, then down towards Galveston and around the Hobby class-B airspace and back up to IWS. That was his first flight in several years that I know of, he really enjoyed it and it was real special for me.
The next weekend, I got some good riding in with a trip to Rocky Hill Ranch and 3 hrs on the mtb on Sat. and an intense solo road ride on Sunday.
The next weekend was my first race of the season, Bar-H, which I'll write about in a different post.
Sorry this post is kinda sparse, I had to get it down as I have other things to write about by now.

Time Machine

That's what my airplane is to me. It gives me extra time in a day to get places and get things done. I flew my brother and I to LA this weekend to see our grandfather. What is normally a four hour drive one-way took us less than an hour and a half in the plane. After we got to the airport, the parents picked us up and we all went to lunch. After lunch we went to see Granddaddy. He was doing well, in good spirits and pretty talkative. We had a good visit, then went down to his house to look through some of his things. He loved woodworking, and he had a lot of cool stuff around his house he had made. He wanted us to have something, so I picked out a cool biplane wall hanger.

We went back to visit with him for just a little while, but soon we had to head back. The parents drove us back to the airport and off we went into the wild blue yonder. We buzzed Granddaddy's house because I told him we would, even though I doubt he heard us, then we climbed to 6500 feet and cruised back over East TX at 150mph on a beautiful afternoon.We went up and came back and did all that stuff in about 7.5 hours. That's less than the amount of time it would have taken to drive there, walk in the front door and say hello, and then immediately get back in the car and drive home. That's why it's a time machine.

I also got some miles in this weekend on the road bike, I did the Sugar Cycles Shop Ride Sat. morning. I wound up going on the long route all the way to Angleton with three other guys, we did 64 miles in three hours flat. It was a good fast ride and a great workout. I am feeling good about my fitness with my first MTB race three weeks away.

Roadie Racing

After being a hard-core, hairy-legged, roadie-bashing mt. biker for my first few years of calling myself a cyclist, I have undergone a transition over the last couple of years. It all started when James Ramsaur at Lincoln Parish Park where I worked through part of my college career loaned me an old road bike somebody had dumped on him a few years before. It was probably an early '80s model, and it was too small, but it rolled. I began to enjoy the occasional road ride, going out for hours at a time covering the beautiful countryside around Ruston.

After moving to Houston and realizing the mt. bike riding here was not as convenient as it was in Ruston, and Raine getting interested in road riding and us getting the bug to ride in the Hotter 'n Hell Hundred, we bought our first road bikes. A Trek 1500 for me and a Trek 1000 for Raine. We rode around the paved bayou trails here in Houston for a while and then drove to Wichita Falls for the '06 HHH. I set off to do my first century(100mi ride) and Raine went on her first real solo ride looking for 25 miles. Raine made her full distance and I was so proud of her. My 100 mile attempt was foiled, however, when they shut down the "Hell's Gate" cut off an hour and a half early and I got there only an hour before the published cut-off! Missed it by 30 minutes. So I was forced to take the shortcut back along with a lot of other riders and finished with 75 miles for the day.

After the HHH we continued riding our road bikes together and I used mine for my primary training tool for MTB racing. Throughout all the '07 series most of my miles came on my road bike. As I had started racing for a Specialized dealer the Trek had to go. I swapped the components off my bike onto a Specialized frame and had a sort of new bike! It has continued to evolve from that point as I get more miles on it and get more comfortable on it. I also began to join the Sugar Cycles shop rides on Sat. mornings, getting comfortable riding with others in pace lines and packs. I was a fast guy on these rides but definitely not nearly the fastest. This was the extent of my roadieness for a while, just solo training rides, rides with Raine, and shop rides. I was still a hard-core, hairy-legged, mt. biker just without so much of the roadie bashing part.

Then came the Tour of New Braunfels. My shop's cat 5 team was down a man, so they asked me to pitch in and help out. I had no idea what to expect, and whether or not I would even be able to stay with the pack. My mt. bike season didn't start for another month so I wasn't getting into race shape yet, but I figured I would give it a try. We were all hyped up about the race, making big plans and talking strategy. The Thursday before the race I even gave in to the pressure and shaved my legs! We arrived in New Braunfels and hit the road on the neutral roll out, and all our planning and strategizing was out the window. We weren't all riding together, we were separated from the start, some of us jumped on the front when they weren't supposed to, etc. Eventually our field of 50 starters was whittled down to around 25 still in the lead pack, and true to statistics 3 of our 6 team members were off the back. But surprisingly, I wasn't one of those 3!! I had managed to ride smart the whole time, and didn't have much trouble staying with the pack. I did chase down a couple of breaks, and even attacked once on my own half way through the last lap, so it wasn't like I was sucking wheel the whole time.

As the pack approached the finish I was sitting somewhere about midpack, not as far forward as I should have been and definitely not organized with my remaining two teammates for a lead out. A couple hundred yards away from the line some guy a couple riders ahead of me made a bonehead move and went down, taking a few other riders with him: one of which was me. I hit a downed rider at 25+ mph and to the tarmac I went. I got the breath severely knocked out of me after impacting the stem and a pretty good road rash all the way down my right side. My front wheel was broken and my chain was wrapped all up in my back wheel. Once I got my breath back I fixed my bike enough so I could pedal to the line and I rode in. Everybody who responded to the wreck expected me to want a sag vehicle to carry me back but I told them "I don't quit." Other than the wreck, I really enjoyed the race. It was a good fitness test/indicator and I felt good afterwards. I can see myself doing more road races in the future, but MTB will still be my #1.

So now roadie-bashing and hairy-legged are out the window, but I still plan on being a hard-core mt. biker. And as they say, but it's never been more important to me: keep the rubber side down.

LA Trip

We drove up to LA this weekend to spend some time with the family. Grandaddy wasn't doing well, and Raine had an aunt coming in from NC, so the weekend was to see them. We left Friday about noon and drove to Logansport to see Granddaddy. He was having a bad day, but we still got to visit with him for a while. Afterwards, we had dinner with John, Velda and James. Then we drove on to Ruston to Raine's parents house.

Saturday morning we got up early and got on the road bikes in the 35 deg. temps and damp roads. We rode around our old college campus for a bit, brought back the memories. Luke(little bro) met us in town and then we headed out for some hills. We rode a loop North of town and then back to the house to drop Raine off at the end of an hour and 13 miles or so. Luke and I rode to the other side of town and he headed back home as he had to work, and I took off alone. I rode a loop down to the South side of town and then back to the house. I finished up with 30 miles and 2 hours. Raine rode well on the hills, she's still getting her lungs back after being sick for a while and is learning how to deal with her asthma, too. See the whole ride here.











Saturday night I got drug to the Monroe Mardi Gras Parade, what fun that was. We visited with Raine's grandpa and his wife for a while, it was good to see them. Then off to suffer at the parade standing around in the cold. The highlight of my night was getting in a shouting match and almost coming to fists with a drunk kid who tripped over my feet. That was great. Unfortunately a policeman stepped in before I got to do the world a favor and ruin his night. Had a binge on some fried catfish at Scott's restaurant and then headed back to the house.

Sunday morning I woke up and headed out to Lincoln Parish Park for some mountain bike riding. It was 35 deg. and foggy. I did a pretty easy lap the first go round and finished in an hour. I headed out for my second lap and got almost four miles in when my chain exploded. :( Oh well, so much for my 20-mile day(and glad I didn't ride to the park like I'd planned). I hiked out and drove back to the house. I absolutely chowed down on some Johnny's Pizza then we packed up and hit the road back towards Houston.

We stopped to see Grandaddy again on the way back through. He's staying at my aunt Amy's house now, and when I first walked in I saw Amy in her recliner and I looked over at Granddaddy's hospital bed and it was empty. Gave me quite a shock, I feared the worst after seeing him Friday. Fortunately, he was asleep in the recliner right in front of me buried under the blankets and I just hadn't seen him! We had a good visit, he was much more talkative and I even got him laughing a few times, telling him we'd gone out and rode bicycles in the 35 deg. morning. It was good to get a good visit and see him in a little better spirits. James stopped in and visited for a while, then we all hit the road back to Houston. We stopped at Chili's in Lufkin for dinner, and then went our separate ways.

It was a good weekend with some riding and family visiting. And as an added bonus, even loaded down and with bikes hanging off the back, our new car got 26.67 mpg on the way home Sunday!! That's almost double what we would have gotten in the Xterra. It's already proving itself as the right way to go.

A different kind of hurting than I usually write about.

I don't really know what I'm saying here, I just needed to write about this.

As I sit here "working", my grandfather lay dying in LA. I never really knew my dad's dad. I remember my mom taking us to visit him occasionally when I was young, but I never really got to know him. Him and my dad never got along, so we weren't that close to him. In the past several years, they have made an effort to mend their relationship, and I've gotten to visit with Granddaddy a few times and see him at Christmas and Thanksgiving. But I don't really know him. What will I tell my kids about their great-grandfather? I know he liked to fish, he liked houseboats, he liked woodworking, and he drove Dodge trucks like their grandfather. But I don't really know any stories about him. Was he in the Army? I think so, that would be a good story to share, if I knew it to share.

My dad and I will do better. My children will know their grandparents and their family's history.

He will be my last grandparent to go. I'll soon be "one generation's length away from fighting life out on my own."-John Mayer

New Car

Raine and I decided to get a new vehicle to replace the Xterra. I loved that truck, but it was just killing us on the gas mileage. 90% of the time it was being driven back and forth to work getting about 13.5 mpg. Also, doing all the traveling back and forth to the races getting 14.5 mpg was totally unacceptable. Taking Raine's car to get the good mpg wasn't really an option as I didn't want to put it through all that, it's too nice a car for that. So we started shopping for cars/SUVs with comparable interior room to the Xterra, that were also capable of doing a bit of light off-roading when needed to reach those remote race sites. Emphasis on light, I can't remember the last time I really needed the full off-road capability of the Xterra(did I ever?). Just dirt roads, grassy field parking areas, etc. After searching we settled on a Subaru Forester. The Forester has a 2.5L four-cylinder engine, and claims to get 20city/27hwy mpg. It has interior room comparable to a Rav4 or CR-V, but sits lower to the ground and edges them out in gas mileage. It still has 8+ inches of ground clearance, however, and the symmetrical all-wheel drive enables it to be pretty formidable in low traction situations like snow, mud, and wet roads or grass. I like the way it drives, it's actually a sporty handling vehicle that still has tons of interior room(big enough to put a 29er inside). I have heard that the gas mileage claims are accurate, the folks at www.subaruforester.org were pretty helpful in providing info and helping me decide on the car.

So the day after we got it we were already putting it to work with a bike trip to Huntsville State Park. We met Lisa H. there and we all rode a lap together. Afterwards Lisa and I turned out a semi fast fun lap. She was riding well, I know why she's an Expert!!! It was so nice knowing while we were buzzing down the interstate on the way home, we were getting 25+ mpg(allowance for the bikes and rack on the back). Here's a picture from after we got home.

Excruciating? You bet.

A few weekends ago, I rode the Talon Trails Excruciation Exam. I'm just now finding the energy to write about it. Sorry about that. The race was an 85 mile trail/road/dirt road odyssey through the beginnings of the TX hill country. Raine(the Wife) and I drove over to Bluff Creek Ranch, Warda, TX, the night before the race and set up camp. To bed we went, and I had trouble sleeping knowing what was staring me in the face the coming morning.

We were up before sunrise, getting registered was the first priority. With that taken care of(not without a hang-up or two) I hustled back to camp to get ready. Put the bike together, air in the tires, get food and drink together for the ride, get my jersey pockets filled up, Raine's cooking me breakfast, and before I know it and before I'm ready they're calling for the pre-race meeting. I hustled up to finish, ran to the meeting, and threw some food down as fast as I could, but not enough I know. The meeting was over, and we headed over to the start area.

I had no intentions or illusions of making this a race, I was just there for the miles. The start was Le Mans style, maybe 40 yards to a tree and then around it and back to the bike. I jogged pretty slowly, wanting to make sure that everyone who would be riding seriously would be in front of me. On the first Warda lap I rode with a few other friends for a bit, then passed up to Shaun Taylor. I finished the lap with him and then hit the road. I took it pretty slow on the road, as I was gonna wait on team Acci-Dent to catch up. A couple of friends I worked with on the South TX Death Ride last year caught up and I pacelined with them for a while, then decided to hang back and wait some more. Hit the first checkpoint where Raine was volunteering, and boy it would have been easy to quit there. I was soaking wet from riding through thick fog for an hour and a half, she was there with the truck, dry clothes, and my dog. But I kept going on down the road. I got to Rocky Hill and Dent still hadn't caught up so I decided to go on out to keep moving. The lap at Rocky Hill was neat, I'd never ridden some of that back stuff, it was pretty cool. Then of course we had to ride Y-kNot, all I could think was "why, why, why?" Back to the bottom and I headed out on the road back to Warda. I left with another rider who had dropped me pretty good on the road from BCR to RHR, but I had caught and passed him towards the end of RHR and put a few minutes on him before the end of the trail. He was in my class, and it was at this point that I started thinking, hey, I could at least beat somebody. We chit-chatted out on the road a good bit, I figured out he was a roadie and could probably drop me if he wanted on the road. But I also knew judging by the way I passed him at RHR if we got back to BCR together I could take him. We got to the last checkpoint where Raine was waiting on me again and she told me that Dent's bike had exploded on him before he even finished the first lap at BCR. So off we went to BCR, and the other rider never tried anything. He let me go into the singletrack first, and I wasn't really feeling like trying anything either. I just held a steady pace, but it turned out I dropped him pretty quickly. Once I figured out he was gone, I ramped it up a bit to make sure he stayed back there. I wound up putting five minutes on him in that three mile section.

I finished in 7:11, probably could have been a fair bit faster if I hadn't spent so much time waiting for Dent to catch up. But the time didn't matter to me really, I enjoyed the all day ride. On the way back to BCR, my arms were just totally toast. I could barely sit normal on the bike. Once I hit the singletrack back at BCR, every bump I hit felt like the fork was locked out. My wrist was the worst, still very, very tender for a couple days. That washboard road really did a number on it. Thank goodness I had the bigwheels to smooth it out some.

So that caps off my third mt. bike endurance event: Ouachita Challenge '06, South Texas Death Ride '07, and Excruciation Exam '08. They're all miserable, long, and challenging; but in the end extremely satisfying.

Weekend of riding and flying

So this weekend I had a lot of fun! Saturday, I had to go into work for a while, as it was my duty week to be at the plant. Once that was over, the fun began. I hung around the house with Raine through the middle of the day, wanting to go riding but never could get away from the TV. TBS was playing a 24 marathon, and the back to back to back episodes wouldn't release me! I finally got away early afternoon to go finish my high-performance endorsement and checkout in the plane I'm flying now. We flew down to Eagle Lake and did a few touch and goes, then came back to West Houston for a few more, and Pat called it good. After that, I went up for a sight-seeing flight with a friend who is a partner in Pat's plane. Their plane is in the shop, but his brother was down from South Dakota for the holidays and he wanted to take him up to see the city and the coast. So we flew the I-10 corridor to the other side of town, then down along the coast for a little bit and then back up to West Houston. So I logged a couple hours time for the day. :) It was nice to fly the plane for a while without being worried about doing repeated touch and goes. Back at IWS I did my first night landing in a LOOONG time, but it was a pretty good one.

After church Sunday, Raine, Cotton and I drove up to Hunstville State Park for some riding. We met Dent, Kyle, and Lisa there. Raine had been sick all week and only lasted about 30 minutes before feeling bad enough to call it a day, so I took her back to the truck then took off around the trail backwards to find the others. I met them and finished the lap with them, and then we did another one. I was on my new 29er, and definitely enjoyed it. I'm liking that bike more and more everytime I ride it. It was much smoother through the roots than the rigid singlespeed was at the race!! Hopefully I'll get in another ride tomorrow on New Years Day, or maybe I'll do some more flying. Who knows, I've got the day off and I intend to make the most of it.

Raine Rides again!

I got a pretty good bit of riding in this weekend, really had a good time. It started Sat. morning at the Sugar Cycles shop ride, wheels rolling at 0735. After a flat(Shaun), a wreck(Dent), and riding at the back of the B group taking care of a rider, we finally made it back to the shop 31 miles later. I had to swap the stuff off Kyle's C29ssmaxes I'd been riding back onto my wheels, grab the demo bike for Raine, and then we were supposed to be up and outta there to head to the house for our MTB ride. Well that devolved into taking forever after Kyle offered up a bike that Dent was thinking of buying for him to take out and demo. We had to swap some components, which took forever, so we were over an hour late getting where we needed to be to meet up for the ride. But it all worked out, and we hit the road for Warda, TX to ride at Bluff Creek Ranch.
We all rode a lap together, with Raine back on the dirt for the first time in quite a while. I was really proud of her, she rode very well and impressed the heck outta Dent and I. She really liked the Safire FSR Expert Demo that Kyle let her borrow, she'd never ridden a full-suspension before and said it was way better than her hardtail. After we finished, Dent and I rode a fast lap and really had a blast. They have added a new little section to the trail that involves a new climb and reverses some old stuff, really spices it up a bit. I continue to love my new FSR 29er more and more. The ride is super smooth and the handling and traction are sweet!
Sunday we went out to Memorial Park to do a trail/urban ride. Raine and I met Dent, Katie, and Lisa. The trails were in much better shape than we expected, and we wound up riding just trails. Again, Raine had a great time and did great. Hopefully we can keep her riding regularly and she'll keep improving. She's been pretty focused lately on getting in shape to ride, and has even been sitting on the trainer at night! Hoping to take her to Huntsville this weekend for some more dirt.
Here you can see my bike and Raine's demo side by side. Kinda his and hers. Mine is obviously much larger and rolls on the bigger wheels, but their design and component spec is very similar. It's cool that Specialized puts good effort into their women specific bikes to match the caliber of the rest of their models.