Ride More, Talk Less

Down Time

2009-07-22T16:46:00.003-06:00

I've got a gap in between races right now, so there's not much to report. However, I did receive this photo from Ryan Amirault from our day at the Firecracker 50.

It reminds me that you can check out more up-to-date Golden Race stuff at their Facebook page.

Super D-licious

2009-07-12T21:32:00.007-06:00

Today was the first of two Super D races at Winter Park. The second one is part of Crankworx in early August, and today's race already has me totally pumped for it.

But (take a deep breath, Marty) one thing at a time.

For starters, leave it to Winter Park to design the climb-iest Super D around. The start goes up the resort access road for just over a quarter of a mile, which, I know, I know! isn't that long, but it takes an agonizing eternity when you're going balls out. And then, just to uppercut you when you're already hanging on the ropes, the course hits you with another substantial (for Super D) climb about halfway through. Naturally I fixate on the pedally bits, since that's not my strong suit right now, but of course there was plenty of downhill goodness to be had.

At any rate, I lined up with a surprising number of other women. Apparently the word has gotten out that Super D is pretty fun, because it was a huge improvement from last year, where FIVE women, total, showed up -- of all the categories. Now there were probably 15 women in my overall category. Sweet.

So I lay the Marathon on the ground and walked away. No, not bowing out...lining up for the goofy Le Mans start. Standing on a ski hill, staring uphill at your bike, which is lying on the ground like a dead horse, is one of the stranger sensations of bike racing. But anyway, the gun went off (finally, huh?) and I started to sprint. It's funny -- sprinting is my only natural ability, but it's pretty worthless when you can't capitalize on it. So I make a great start, passing people on the run and leaping on my bike with aplomb, only to have girls cruising by me like it never happened. Sigh.

But I refused to back down, cranking as hard as I could to limit my losses. But in spite of bleeding out my eyes, I still found myself at the back of a five-woman train, all held up by one slow chick ahead. With no place to pass for some time. We were tailgating each other for all we were worth, buzzing each other's tires and grabbing the brakes hard when the slow girl got scared by anything. Finally, the two women behind her got around, but there wasn't time for number three and I to shoot the gap. Arrrgh.

After more tailgating and internal steaming, #3 and I dash past. Liberation! But as luck would have it, we reached a fire-road section and another girl behind me made a pass before I could react. And lo and behold, the second climb arrived (cue soundtrack slowing into distorted, drawn-out guttural noise) and the damn slow chick made her way by me. Nooooo!

I gamely pushed as hard as I could make my hollowed-out legs go, and was definitely on the verge of hyperventilation. I was glad I was riding alone just then, because I was literally gasping and squeaking when I breathed. But that's what you gotta do to make Super D success happen, and I knew that.

Descending again, I charged down the remaining portion of that singletrack, desperately aware that there was only one more passing spot before the finishing section. I hit the fireroad below and forced myself to downshift, even though I already felt like I was at my limit. I cranked past two women right there -- how, I have no idea. And as I dropped into the final section, I hauled through the rubble to re-pass Slow Chick. Hooray!! I can't believe I made A Significant Move in the last few minutes of a race. Kick ass.

I hurtled down the final switchbacks and water bars, almost at the edge of control, trying to make up time. It wasn't pretty. But it felt good, and I was super stoked.

Turned out, in spite of my terrible climbing, that I pulled out a fifth place, less than a minute off the podium. Awesome.

After learning that Rob hauled down a bunch of people after a similarly crappy start to place 2nd, my day was complete.

We wrapped up the afternoon by taking a run down the Crankworx course, and it should prove to be a lot more fun. Probably more hotly contested by real gravity types, but blessed by less climbing. Giggity! What could possibly go wrong?

Firecracker's Last Spark

2009-07-08T09:56:00.004-06:00

A friend sent me a couple of photos from the race.... I'm laughing through the pain because he was yelling at me so loudly that it could be heard from the bottom of the climb. Drill sergeants everywhere should take note.

Thanks, Tom! And while I'm giving credit where credit is due, I should mention that a lot of the photos taken in my recent posts are by Rob Love, who manages to squeeze them in while wrenching on my bike, wrenching on everyone else's bike, wrenching on his own bike, setting up gear, reminding me of how much time remains until my start, etc. etc. He rules.

Firecracker 50

2009-07-06T08:42:00.015-06:00

This race rocked the free world on a day to celebrate our fine country...what could be better?

Not much, but the day was certainly enhanced by the fact that the start/finish was officially GT Central. Rob, Ryan and I set up the Dirt Coalition Compound right next to the Demo Program, and the Golden Race Series folks were right next to that, rocking some tunes and polishing the Golden Bike for four-time winner Vincent Lombardi. This resulted in a six-tent city that attracted all kinds of people.

There were GT fans of all shapes and sizes:

Then Mick Hannah made his appearance. What a nice, laid back guy. I felt like he deserved just as much attention, if not more, than Vincent Lombardi, but he didn't seem to mind flying under the radar. These cross-country weenies don't know who he is, anyway.

Here, he checks out GT's new 5" travel bike, the Sensor, with Rob and Louis, the GT Demo Program go-to guy. Louis was super nice to us, helping us set up our tents, loaning us stuff, and going over my bike after the race. All I had to offer was chocolate chip cookies to go with his beer, but let's hope that was sufficient thanks.

Here's a close-up of the new rig. The suspension's been tweaked a bit; I wish I'd been able to test ride it after the race, but it was raining intermittently by then, and I was pretty cooked.

So after getting our setup dialed, Ryan and I started pressing the flesh.
The staging area at Carter Park was full of people, from runners who had just finished their race prior to our event, to families and friends of bike racers. It was great. Everyone had to scope out the Golden Bike and the Gold Digger cheerleaders, who could be spotted practicing their routines behind the tents.

But eventually, Ryan and I had to pose for one last photo before warming up for the big event. Ryan was doing the whole enchilada; Rob and I were each having a taco. Ha. :)

Rob was kind enough to give me the first lap, which means I got to start as part of Breckenridge's Fourth of July Parade. It was a madhouse down there.

Rob had intended to be my umbrella boy, but there was barely room in the crush of people to maneuver your bike, much less put up an umbrella. I found my wave, the co-ed Maverick Teams, and got in place. One last fun photo and we were off.

It was such a good time to ride through the walls of people and be part of the parade. Little kids stand out in the street in long lines, holding out their hands for high-fives. I made contact with as many little hands as I could, taking care to do so lightly. :) I even got a few tiny little dudes, hanging out in dad's arms. It was cute, and made for the mellowest race start I have ever experienced.

As I made the turn out of town, I heard a holler from a friend of mine, and it was great to begin the race with a friendly cheer. I started up the road and found that I felt pretty good. I was climbing well for me, which was a pleasant surprise. I took care to conserve some energy, though, since I knew it was going to be a long 25 miles.

Just as Rob described it, though, it was actually less taxing than last weekend's Winter Park race. Decent-sized stretches of this course went quickly, especially the descents, where I roosted off rocks and tree roots and got a grin on my face before the next climb. I also took my iPod for the first time ever in a race, which was the best idea I'd had all week. I only ran the right-side ear bud, so I could hear other racers and still enjoy the sounds of nature. But a steep descent with Tool's "Vicarious" as a soundtrack was one of the highlights of the race. Hell yeah! And by the next descent, a male racer I hadn't even been paying attention to said,"I definitely don't want to be in front of you on this downhill!" I had to take some small pleasure from that, since I knew I was climbing like a snail on quaaludes.

I pushed hard, for being recently injured and out of shape, and only stopped once. I was trying my damndest to make it in three hours, but just couldn't go any faster. I got some friendly cheers on one of the final climbs from a couple more friends, which was a welcome boost, and then finally started the twisty, switchbacked descent into Carter Park. It was a great finish to a really fun course, and I still felt reasonably human.

Rob snapped a quick pic of me crossing the finish line:

I tried to pass on some good energy to him, especially since it was starting to rain. But he looked amped and ready to go, rocking the pirate kit given to him by a buddy who used to work for GT's new relative, Cannondale. He told me to look for him in 2:30, and took off like he was shot out of a cannon. I got some lunch, washed the Marathon, put my feet up for a few minutes, and then at two hours I had a feeling. I bet Rob's feeling great, too, and will be faster than he thinks. I grabbed the Dirt Coalition umbrella, the camera, and hiked up the switchbacks. Sure enough, in about ten more minutes, Il Pirata made his appearance, rocking the pants off everyone else in the turns.

While we didn't have the world's best finish, seeing as how neither of us have been able to train effectively, we still had a fantastic time. It was great to actually feel good and work the course, rather than having it work us. I couldn't have asked for a better weekend.

Meanwhile, the Golden Bike has found a new engine. Vincent Lombardi suffered at altitude (plus he couldn't go to the next race anyway), so now the series lies in the hands of a Coloradoan. I'm supremely embarrassed to say I'm not entirely sure of this guy's name right now. I think it's Ryan Dorsey of Woodland Park. It's too soon for the Golden Race folks to have updated the GT site, and the Firecracker results are a maze of amateur categories that I can't wade through just now. But here he is getting the bling:

But with a graphic like this on the back of your jersey, the pressure is definitely on.

As for me, I will be making my next race appearance at the Winter Park Super D this coming weekend. I will be rested and ready to sprint up that damn hill for the holeshot!

Winter Park Series is a Go!

2009-06-29T10:36:00.004-06:00

I skipped the hill climb two weeks ago in favor of training, so I began my yearly Winter Park campaign with the first mountain circuit. Here I am rocking the old-school t-shirt from my early days with GT:

You can see from the mud all over the bike that it was a good race. I always enjoy a race that has technical challenges, and that includes adverse conditions. It's my only hope against women that are faster than me but more tentative. :)

But first, we had to overcome a tent setup problem. When DC rider Ryan Amirault contacted the Winter Park people, an underling told him he couldn't set up in the start/finish because the tent would "compete with the current sponsors." Considering that we're a race team, not expo workers, we were frustrated by this. Yes, we're promoting GT, but we're doing that in the course of trying to race and being athletes. Being barred from the start/finish when every other race team was setting up there was definitely not cool.

So when we arrived, my man Rob and I went to seek out the race organizer, Jon, who has always been a very nice person and a patient, enthusiastic promoter. We explained that the tents are for a race team, and he said it was no problem for us to set up with the other teams. We just couldn't be next to the sponsor tents, which was fine.

On to the tent setup...me on the left, Ryan putting up his on the far end.

After talking to people and handing out a bunch of our blue Sport Beans (always makes the tent a popular spot!) we had to settle down to racing.

The course was a long-feeling 18 miles, with plenty of rocky, muddy, rooty singletrack. You had to push for every pedal stroke, for sure. In spite of that, the downhills were a blast, as always, and the Marathon felt like a million bucks. I made some girls that were younger than me nervous (finally I broke down and told them that I wasn't in competition with them) but that's about all I can brag about. My lack of fitness is still apparent, and Colorado is a tough place to be not-quite-in-shape. :)

But I had a great time, and got to talk to some more people about the bike afterward, so I consider the race a success.

I spent the next day doing lift-assisted downhill runs, working on my speed and skills for the upcoming Super D race in two weeks. FUN!! I hope to make a decent showing there, but since the Winter Park people can't resist starting their Super D up a steep access road, that puts me at a bit of a disadvantage.

Heck, maybe I should just switch to downhill racing. Especially with this beauty available:

Now I have a week to pull myself together for the Firecracker 50. It's going to be a crazy scene, with the GT Golden Bike Series there as well as the Demo Program. Sweet!

Buffalo Creek Radness

2009-06-08T10:53:00.003-06:00

There's nothing quite like it for swoopy, pump-track goodness. I was definitely braaap-ing the flow state out there. Everyone in Colorado should go there at least once, if not constantly. :)

And thank god, a tiny hint of fitness was gotten by chasing some friends that had started a half-hour earlier. Not that my competitors should start shaking in their Sidis or anything, but it's a start.

Lyons Fat Tire Festival

2009-05-30T18:58:00.003-06:00

After hearing about how cool it is for a couple of years now, I finally made it to the Lyons Fat Tire Festival. It helped that the organizer, Redstone Cyclery, is my local GT dealer, so I was able to set up the tent there and turn some people on to the GT Comeback.

It was a record turnout for this little festival, which started nine years ago as a housewarming party for Redstone's owner, Dave Chase. This year, 90 people showed up to ride, party and hang out. I was able to meet a bunch of them, not only at the tent, but on the ride I did, which had 27 people in attendance. Nice!

Like many rides in Colorado, it started up a steep-ass forest service road, that led to yet more steep-ass forest service road.

But like pretty much every ride in Colorado, some sweet, sweet singletrack awaited.

It eventually turns steeply downhill, following a little creek, and gets fabulously rocky and technical. I love that stuff! Naturally, I was having too much fun to stop and shoot any photos during that section, but I got in one last one before the little climb back to the car.

The great thing about representing GT at a little festival like this one is that people are chill and there to have a good time. They're ready to chat and get to know each other and talk shop. They're not all bound up about their preparation and performance like they are at races. I think a number of people had a good impression of the bike and the brand, and that's what I'm here to do. Success!

Battle the Bear

2009-05-11T13:08:00.004-06:00

Well, the first race for GT went without a hitch, I am happy to report. The tent went up without any problem and we got in right next to Dan Porter from Fort Collins.

The rad blue artificial turf for our cosy floor looks great, but I'm a bit chafed that the guy put in charge of getting the GT logo on it completely dropped the ball, even though he had almost a month to pull it together. I have to start all over in finding someone to make me a stencil so I can get the logo on there.

The carbon Marathon, dubbed Leonidas (I can't help naming my bikes) got quite a bit of attention. People came by the tent to scope it out, and people talked to me about it while I was warming up. It's a great bike; I'm very pleased with it.

I'm less pleased with my fitness. But I can't help the fact that I have not been training as much as I'd like. My back injury is just not resolving in the manner I had hoped. Seven months in, and I'm still having pain pretty much every day. It's a buzzkill, for sure.

I haven't ridden my mountain bike for 30 miles yet this year, much less raced for that long, so I didn't really expect to do well. Sure enough, I was 4th out of four.

I don't really understand what's going wrong with the women's fields in Colorado lately; it's strange that there's only a handful of women racing in a state where everyone rides a lot.

But regardless of that, I got through my three ten-mile laps with minimal pain and totally dug the course. The bike performed beautifully and I was very happy to be out there.

I hope that by my next race on June 13th that I will have some resolution to my injury.

On a side note, I wish you could see an actual bear at this race. It would certainly make everyone ride faster.

I did, however, see a snake. It was sunning itself on the trail, and since I have a strange attraction to snakes and frogs, I had to stop for a quick second to check it out and shoo it off the trail. It was huge; I think it had no idea its tail end was still hanging out there in the line of fire.

I could have bunny-hopped it, but I'd have felt really bad if I missed.

Just because I was getting slaughtered myself didn't mean I needed to take out another innocent creature. :)

However, I must say that I'm in an insanely fast category right now. The 40+ women were the fastest ones out there. I got some work to do!

At Last!

2009-05-04T16:19:00.007-06:00

I apologize for the internet silence here, but Mother Nature has been perversely uncooperative with my need to ride my new bike.

I still can't believe that some people have won races on their bikes and I've just barely now ridden mine. But that's what spring in Colorado is like.

And to be fully honest, I was also waiting on these rad frickin' wheels. It's a match made in heaven!

And then it was time to hit the trail.

The bike feels good, but I'm considering taking it to Push Industries to have the suspension customized. Seeing as I'm only 120 pounds, those components were not set up with me in mind. The ride's a little harsh right now, but I know with the right tweaking it can be perfection.

The first race of the season is in Denver this weekend. I'm stoked to get GT Central set up with fellow Dirt Coalition riders Joe (Durango) and Dan (Fort Collins). I'm just training through this race, since my back injury is still causing problems, and the fitness I'd hoped to have at this point has yet to materialize. But an MRI later this week will hopefully provide some answers.

In the meantime, come by the GT tent to scope out the bikes, chat us up, and grab some free Sport Beans!

The Golden Bike Race Series

2009-04-17T16:59:00.002-06:00

It starts tomorrow at Sea Otter...keep your eyes peeled here for the results of this first hardcore smackdown involving all things gold.

Finally, The Tent

2009-04-15T09:35:00.003-06:00

I'm probably the last of the DC riders to get my tent up and running, but mine was damaged in shipping, so I had to wait for a replacement. It goes up quick and looks good! I'm already busy planning my race setup...wait until you see my "floor!" (Details to come...)

One More Addition

2009-04-04T18:01:00.006-06:00

Anything to keep me interested while I'm stuck doing this:

(Homer Simpson voice: "Bor-rriiiingg!!")

But it's certainly better than nothing, I'll tell you that. And we'll have some warm, dry weather back here soon.

And for anyone who's interested, the name stickers can be had by contacting Victory Circle Graphics in Golden, Colorado.

New Bling

2009-04-02T17:42:00.003-06:00

The latest addition to my sweet ride. If this doesn't shame me into riding faster, I don't know what will.

I've got five weeks until my first race, and Jim Thomas of Texas already has a podium under his belt. Those folks at sea level have got it made for early season racing. Congrats, Jim!!!

The Go-Fast Machine Has Arrived

2009-03-27T17:06:00.006-06:00

Damn. This thing is RAD. Can't wait to rumble in the jungle with this beast. Thanks, GT!

It figures that a foot of snow arrived at the same time as the bike, so I can't even ride around the block, much less on the trails. Sigh.

Well, it gives me ample time to swap out the tires. I'm sold on Maxxis Ignitor 2.1 for Colorado riding.I love the Maxxis website description of these:

"The Ignitor tread pattern was designed for the most discerning professional racers and already has laid claim to multiple World Cup victories."

Well, ALL RIGHT. Giggity!

I'm one of those racers who knows I'm light-years away from any World Cup victories. I just prefer the whole racing experience to be fun. No matter where I end up in the results, I want to savor every piece of trail. I want to pump every roller, manual off every root and ledge, rail every loose corner, and get the proverbial bugs stuck in my teeth at the bottom of every descent. And for that reason, I choose to race the longest-travel bike I can manage, and run big fat (by cross-country standards) juicy tires. I do my best to get enough fitness to offset the weight difference, but if that fails, so be it. You will never find me getting jackhammered around on a hardtail with skinny tires out here in the Rockies. Not that there's anything wrong with running a hardtail here, but it just doesn't trip my personal trigger.

Besides, I will always be a better descender than a climber, and it makes sense to capitalize on my strengths. The race wins I've had so far have been in Super D, so I gotta stick with what works. :)
Anyway, besides trying to carpe-diem the heck out of local races, I'm doing this to make the world recognize the radness of GT. Word.

As soon as the snow melts, I will get this rig out there and actually Ride More, Talk Less. :)

First Lance's Bike, Now This

2009-03-22T11:39:00.007-06:00

(From Bike Radar...written by my pal James:)

Stealing this bike seems like a waste of time. I mean, seriously. Steal something you could actually ride or sell. This thing is more noticeable than Rush Limbaugh at a gay pride parade.

And of course, it's just a crappy thing to do. Come on, punk...give it back so a hardworking amateur racer can earn it the real way.

Clothing

2009-03-21T14:23:00.007-06:00

While Boulder is known for its Naked Bike Ride, you will not see me on it. Sorry. The chafing really detracts from the experience. And anyway, I have rad clothes to wear now:

Unfortunately, I got sent guy-size/style T-shirts (my name probably threw them off, just like it does with the folks at Playboy Magazine - stop bugging me! I'm not subscribing!), so I won't show off the casual wear until my girl-style shirts show up.

To add to the delays, my rad tent was damaged in shipping, so I have to wait for parts to arrive before I can get it going. The tent folks were super cool to deal with, though, so no worries.

At least my umbrella's here. This thing is pro! Hey, where's my half-dressed, Euro-trash umbrella boy?

Oh. You have to pay extra (a LOT extra) for that perk. Plus you end up with spray tan and cologne all over your umbrella. Well, I guess I'll just sucker some nice American racer dude to hold this over me at the Super D start lines. :)

FedEx on Overdrive

2009-03-13T17:41:00.007-06:00

Well, the GT Dirt Coalition team has been finalized. Huge congrats to everyone. To see the whole list of racers, visit the DC blog.

I'm stoked to see that there's a good group of us from Colorado, and I hope to meet the others at some events. Come to the Firecracker 50! The Golden Bike Race Series will be there at the same time, so this could be GT Central.

And I just got an email saying that the bike, tent and welcome kit are on their way. When I think about all this stuff going out to all these riders, I am kind of blown away by the effort GT is making to bring themselves back. It's a mission I'm proud to be part of, since I spent several years racing and logging the epic miles on an old-school I-Drive Pro that I loved.

I tried to tell everyone what a great bike it was, and I was always surprised at how fickle people were. They were often down on the bikes just because GT was owned by a company they didn't like. Or maybe they "heard" that the I-Drive suspension was full of problems and you could never get parts, yada yada yada. Granted, GT definitely was underground at the time, and I was forced to buy a bike on the internet because the closest dealer was in Vail. But I never had a single problem with my bike in three years of hard riding and racing.

And now, I get to fly the GT flag again, this time on a carbon Marathon. Sweet! I gotta say, I was hard-pressed to not choose the carbon Force. Six inches of travel at 26 pounds??

Hell yeah! But I restrained myself. The suspension's so plush that even the 4" Marathon will feel great for Super D racing.

I race a mix of cross-country and Super D, and I'm really excited about the growing trend in longer, more enduro-style Super D racing that's emerging. Ashland's got a popular one, and of course there's Downieville. As for Colorado, Keystone's old Super D was like that, but since they've done away with it, I hope some other promoters get on the bandwagon. We'll see. Maybe by next year, if I can convince GT to take me on again, that Force will have a place in the garage.

Fun Vids

2009-03-09T14:14:00.001-06:00

If you need some worktime diversion: Just don't cackle so loud that you get busted by your boss.

In Other GT News

2009-02-15T23:21:00.000-07:00

The GT-sponsored Jelly Belly team is getting busy at the Tour of California. I am there shooting photos for Mavic, but I took the time to scope out the GT guys during the Prologue.

Candy and bikes. Not a bad combo at all, in my book. We'll see how it all shakes out when this race is over on the 22nd.

I'm Back!

2009-01-27T13:24:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the internet silence; I've been busy maintaining a community mountain bike blog for the Daily Camera here.

But now it's time to resume here too, because I am now officially a part of the GT Dirt Coalition, and that means something seriously cool to blog about. Sweet!
I get to race a carbon Marathon, set up a GT tent at events, and scheme up cool ways to show people that GT has still got it going on. I'll be blogging about my experiences, and since I'm doing some new races this year in addition to my old haunts, it should be rockin'.

Here's some starting fodder:

My ride:

And last but not least, GT's Golden Bike promotion is pretty rad. I'll be seeing that drama unfold right in my own backyard, at the Firecracker 50. Giggity!

I'm a Winner!!

2007-09-05T09:32:00.000-06:00

Holy crap, I won my first-ever mountain bike race!

Amazing, I know. :) I spent the weekend in Keystone, hanging out with my downhilling friend Zach White, alternatively working on my handcycling story (more on that later) and just chilling. I wasn't even taking the racing that seriously.

Sunday morning I lined up for the cross-country race with only three other girls. (In case you can't tell, I'm the one on the far right.)

Jesus. What is UP with the old chick category?? It used to be the fastest, toughest group, and now it's dwindled to nothing. Granted, it's the last race of the year, so...I guess I'll quit bitching. But come on. Four people?? Anyway, I actually felt good -- the legs were strong and I had gas in the tank, so I thought I could race like a normal person. I was climbing hard and keeping the leaders in sight, which made me really happy. But then about 45 minutes into the hour-plus climb, my back seized and cramped so bad that I thought I would vomit. Then the whole rest of the race was just limping along, trying to survive.
I'm so tired of this situation; paying good money to just hurt like crazy and not even be able to race at full effort. I think I need to get several really good massages in a row and maybe some acupuncture.

So after that lame start to the day, I had no expectations of the Super D. It was so late in the day that the afternoon clouds had gathered, and it was freezing at the top of the mountain. We all lined up, jumping up and down to stay warm. The race style is primarily downhill, with a few short pedaling sections. The Keystone version was exceptionally long, about 25 minutes for my group, so a lot could happen. And the start was the usual wackiness: run with your bike uphill, then jump on just before the singletrack.
I watched the men go, and saw that Zach jumped on his bike halfway up the hill in a slightly flat spot. He surged hard and got the hole shot. Shazaaam!
So I tried the same thing. I didn't get clipped in right away, which cost me a little, and I was second into the singletrack. The girl in front of me wasn't very fast, either; I tailgated her for 2/3 of the race, trying to find a place to get by, but there were no options on the narrow, techy trail.
Finally we made it to the dirt road, and I sprinted past her. The girl behind me passed her as well, and I barely held that girl off going into the next section of singletrack. Then suddenly it hit me: I'm in the lead of a mountain bike race!! Holy shit! That's never, ever happened to me. I couldn't get the grin off my face. I kept pushing hard, not wanting that girl behind me to find a way to pass.
Near the bottom, I encountered several junior boys, who were dropping off the back of their class. They were very professional and got out of my way immediately, which was impressive. How do these 16-year-olds understand that and 30-year-olds don't? Then on the last stretch, where I wanted to sprint hard and keep #2 girl at bay, some older dude was blocking the way. I couldn't tell if a non-racer had gotten on the course, or if it was actually a guy from the 30+ men's class, which had started 10 minutes prior. Spectators started yelling at him. "Move it! Leader up!" and it took him way too long to understand what they were saying. I finally had to call out, more aggressively than I'm used to, "On your left! ON YOUR LEFT!" When he finally moved out of my way, I called out, "Thank you!" and began hauling the mail as fast as I could. When I charged under the finish banner, I just about fell over from amazement. I won a bike race!!
The girl behind me was super cool, praising my riding; so did the girl who was originally in the lead. I was impressed to see this, since I had found that when I raced Sport class last year, the women were too uptight to even talk to each other a lot of the time. I returned the props, and went to find Zach. He had won his race with no problem, which put him 2nd in the overall series results. Sweet!
We are winners, dude. :)

Here's me on the podium...I'm a total dork. :)

Steamboat Springs

2007-08-27T15:05:00.000-06:00

It rules! I can't believe I waited so long to go ride there. And since I wrote my current column about it, I'll paste it here with some photos.

____________________________________________________________________ Have you noticed that special sort of optimism that only mountain bikers possess?
It can never be underestimated, no matter how enhanced it may be by visions of sun-dappled trails lined with aspen and air-inducing water bars.
I witnessed the power of this Fat-Tire Thinking over three days in Steamboat Springs last weekend.
Day one was supposed to be an easy ride to warm up the legs, with a two-hour cruise to Long Lake and back.

But you know how it is. At the intersection to Long Lake, we decided instead to create a loop by riding the Lake PercyTrail and connecting it to a singletrack called Pleasant Rabbit. We were clearly deluded by the Alice-in-Wonderland name, as well as a by our map, which wasn’t entirely accurate in its depiction.
We ended up bushwhacking and backtracking, struggling to follow the faintest of trails. It lured us along hillsides, only to coyly disappear right when we got our groove on.
Quite some time passed as we rolled back and forth, eyed the map, pointed at landmarks, and rode some more.
Rob, my friend and guide, had never tried this loop. He began debating the merits of just riding/hiking cross-country until we hit a road we saw on the map.
“Should we be trusting this map?” I asked. It not only showed Pleasant Rabbit as an established singletrack, it idealistically called it a “sylvan lane.” Someone’s been hitting the hookah, I thought.
“Good point,” Rob replied. We stared around in silence. In the distance, we could see cars cruising along U.S. 40, but a huge chunk of land lay between.
Then Rob’s keen eyes spotted a light-colored smear on the hillside below. While I marked our current location, he rolled down the hill and found traces of the abandoned logging road that Pleasant Rabbit had sprung from.
Excitedly we cruised down it, hopping the endless fallen logs, and collapsed at the car six hours after leaving it. The legs were warmed up, all right.
Day two started on the South Fork trail, north of Steamboat. Again, optimism ruled as we ignored the storm clouds building overhead.
The rain hit us at about five miles in, as we huddled under trees at a trailhead. Mutely, we watched soaking wet hikers dash out of the woods and jump into their cars. The rain pulsed on and off, soaking us through.
Shivering, I began to have visions of the famed Strawberry Park Hot Springs. “Mmmmm....hot springs,” I said, hopefully.
Rob wasn’t buying it. “It’ll let up pretty soon,” he said.
Not only was he right, I was never so glad to be talked out of something. After making our way to Diamond Park, the return route along Scotts Run trail unfolded like a Steamboat Springs promotional video.
The sun came blazing out of the clouds, illuminated the drops of water hanging on the aspens, and made me wonder if that’s how Diamond Park got its name. The narrow trail twisted through the trees, and for another day, we didn’t see a single other person. Gotta love it.

Day three was slated for The Epic. We planned a huge, 30-mile jaunt over Buffalo Pass, along the Wyoming Trail, up the Mountain View trail, then down into the ski resort and back to town.
Even through this required an 11-mile slog up a dirt road to Buffalo Pass, Rob and I blithely figured it couldn’t be that bad.
It won’t surprise you to hear that it was only slightly more pleasant than being poked with a sharp stick. It was hot, steep and -- because of me -- slow. We were on target to spend two hours on the dirt road alone. And guess what? More storm clouds were building.
But we really wanted to do the whole ride. So we put our optimism to work again, willing the arrival of a pickup truck headed to the pass. And I kid you not, one showed up. Rob stuck out his thumb, but it passed us by.
Groaning, we bent over the handlebars again. Suddenly, the truck stopped just ahead, and a woman leaned out the passenger window. “Are you serious?” she called.
“Heck yeah!” Rob replied, and we practically sprinted up to the truck. She and her husband, also a mountain biker, welcomed us into the bed, where we gleefully watched the remaining eight miles roll by.
“I’ll be talking about this truck ride all week,” Rob said.
Although we got rained on yet again, the sun was shining by the time we stood atop the ski resort, huge grins on our faces.
I am now a firm believer in mountain-bike optimism: when you want something, you’ll make it happen.
Hmmm.... maybe we should write a self-help book. We could call it “Ride and You Shall Receive.”

How's Your Aspen?

2007-08-14T11:43:00.000-06:00

I just spent a whirlwind weekend in the hills, trying to combine a clinic and a race. It was fun, but I'm not sure I'll try doing that again.

Here's my buddy Zach White, after winning the expert level Super D race. We teased him mercilessly beforehand about his superhero skinsuit, but once someone wins wearing that, you shut up. :)

The weekend was fun in that weird way that running from one thing to another and not really sleeping can be kind of fun. I drove to Breck on Friday, and my car broke down two miles shy of the Eisenhower Tunnel. Lovely! So I called AAA and got towed to Silverthorne, where the tow truck driver actually helped me out, and then I limped on to Breck. (Got there four hours after leaving Boulder.) Rob joined me (in his own car) and we hit the town, but it took us forever to get any dinner. We went to bed late and then I got up at the ass-crack of dawn to teach my clinic. It went very well and the women were all cool, but one of them was light-years ahead of the others. When we get a skill-split like that, we usually call in another instructor, and previously my coworker Dave had said he was available. But come Saturday afternoon, when I realized I had a problem, he was suddenly too busy to help me out. So I spent a stressful afternoon trying to keep that one woman challenged while not scaring the pants off the other girls. Luckily it mostly worked, because their feedback forms gave me “stunning reviews,” my boss said. But that one woman did complain a bit that she felt she warranted some more advanced coaching -- and she really did. I felt bad.
So anyway. When the clinic finally wrapped up, I dragged my dehydrated, exhausted self into Dave’s loaner car and drove 2 1/2 hours to Snowmass. Found Rob (who had driven out that morning) and our friend Zach at the hotel, scarfed some pasta, and fell asleep while watching Saturday Night Fever. Had weird dreams with a soundtrack of “I’m gonna put on... My my my my my boogie shoes.”
Got up at the ass crack again, feeling like I’d been hit by a truck, and I hadn’t even done the freakin’ race yet. Dragging ass, I went to the venue and tried to warm up. I was astounded to find myself on the start line at a NORBA National Championship race with only FIVE other women. Lame!! What the hell?? I paid $50 to race five other girls? Well, regardless of the number of competitors, I certainly got my money’s worth anyway. That has to be the hardest race I’ve ever done. We experts rode the same distance as the pros: 19 miles with 7000 feet of climbing. OUCH!! My legs came actually around, but the aerobic system was just too blown out. It took everything I had just to finish. But I kept plugging away, partly because I had no idea where the hell I WAS out there, and partly because the trails were so gorgeous and fun and technical that I felt compelled to ride them. But sadly, I got passed by lots of really old chicks, and came in last. SIGH. It’s a good thing my ego isn’t hung up on this stuff. It’s hilarious that this situation still put me in 5th place (one women quit), and at a NORBA, that puts you on the podium. I took home this huge tacky medal for being marginally faster than the melting of the polar ice cap.
Then, I STILL had the Super D race to do. I changed into some clean clothes and we three got on the lift. The course was quite challenging, and I found in my second practice run that I was already checking out mentally and making stupid mistakes. My second sense was buzzing, telling me this was a dumb idea. I wisely went back to the car, got out of my chamois and settled at the finish line with a Gatorade. (Ding! There went another 40 bucks – ugh! Why do these race promoters put these races on the SAME DAY?? What about MY needs? But hey, it’s better than a broken collarbone.) Zach ripped in a win, and Rob took 6th. After taking Zach’s picture on the podium, I loaded up the car and dragged ass all the way back to Breck. Slept on Dave’s couch, then drove to Boulder with an hour to spare before work Monday morning.

Velomoto

2007-07-31T08:49:00.000-06:00

Just when you think everything's been done, someone comes up with something cool. My friends Rob and Tim of Blue Sky Cycles took their love of supermoto motorcycle racing, and applied it to cruiser bikes...and Velomoto is born.

Each course is part pavement, part dirt, with jumps, sharp turns, and other obstacles. You can run your own bike, or use one of these sweet, stock cruisers. You get four laps to hammer your competitors....game on!

I tried to shoot video for the very first time at this event. Since the races didn't really end up happening the way they were planned, I had little opportunity to shoot. We'll see how much the video sucks. :)

For the Love of Crested Butte

2007-07-25T14:47:00.001-06:00

I've been so busy that I haven't had a free second to talk about the Crested Butte trip this year. It was spectacular. Even better than the previous four years, which is incredible to me. How does something keep getting better when it's already freaking amazing??

I won't do a big play-by-play, but the trip started on a fantastic high note: My dear friend Scott Gurst proposed to his girlfriend Miki while we were riding the Snodgrass trail, and he whispered to me to shoot a photo of them right before he did it:

They are so stinkin' cute! And I've never been part of anyone's proposal plan before, which was really cool.

We also had t-shirts made this year, the 10th anniversary, and surprised Scott and Scott with them.

They were floored. They loved it! It was awesome. The back reads: "What could possibly go wrong?" -- which is Scott's famous phrase.

The riding was amazing as always, and so was the company. And then there was our annual party, with the theme of Saturday Night Live. My friend Sunny and I went as the "Wild and Crazy Guys":

We drew on chest hair with an eyeliner pencil and stuffed socks in our pants and generally had a good time. Chad, who shot video of our "swinging," threatened to put us on You Tube. Dear god, I hope not! :)

The Tour: A Rolling Spectacle

2007-07-25T14:37:00.000-06:00

With all the doping scandals, the Tour de France has become a joke, in a lot of ways. I'm so tired of all the busting, dropping out, and denials. And now that scrawny, needle-loving weirdo Michael Rasmussen is going to win, when Cadel Evans, our hardworking, "no-worries-mate," former mountain biker deserves to be the first Aussie on the podium.
Mountain bike racing rules, my friends. People might be doping, but at least it's not ruining the whole sport.
However, you are unlikely to see this at a mtb race:

I guess you gotta enjoy what you can of this crazy scene.

Trying to Keep the Ego Afloat

2007-07-23T10:08:00.000-06:00

It's been taking a beating lately. I guess I may have to write off my mountain bike season this year. The racing is...shall we say...shitty. :) First of all, I've only managed to do two races so far, due to conflicts with clinics, vacations, and lack of fitness. And then both times I suffered substantial back pain. Not from my injuries, but just from my back muscles. During the first race, a long, technical Winter Park jaunt with lots of climbing, my back pretty much shut down, taking my legs with it. It hurt so bad I could barely pedal after a while, and it took everything I had not to just quit. But I limped along to the finish and was amazed to not finish last. But there's no denying that it was really demoralizing, especially since I upgraded to Expert and everyone around me is so fit and fast.

Then this past weekend I raced Winter Park again. I started out feeling pretty good; I was on the Maverick instead of the Yeti this time, and to my total astonishment, I managed to stay with the group on the first nasty climb up the resort access road. I am usually dropped immediately (if not sooner) right there. And I stayed in a bigger gear than usual, too, which made me really happy. I kept on trucking, riding well and pushing hard, and then about a third of the way through, the back started screaming again. I managed to keep my legs moving, but it was another ten or so miles of agony. I don't mind being out of shape and I don't mind coming in last, and I don't even mind the pain that comes with riding really hard. But this kind of pain just ruins the whole endeavor. The whole time I was desperately wanting the race to end, which is not the kind of experience I was looking for. I placed second from last once more.

This is curious, because I did a six-hour ride in Crested Butte two weeks ago with no pain whatsoever. So there's something about the intense effort of racing that my back can't handle. I was wondering if the fact that I'm breathing so hard means I can't keep my abs held in tight the way I do when I'm just riding for fun. Or if it's the fact that I'm pushing so much harder in every regard, putting bigger demand on my core to stabilize me as I negotiate obstacles at higher speeds. It's strange, because my core is much stronger this year than last, from all the Pilates and physical therapy and all that stuff. But I recall that my PT said something about my muscles being "pain sensitive" now, from six months of constant aggravation and spasm.

So....I guess I'll do some research and try to figure out some options. Maybe acupuncture or frequent massage would help. Or maybe I need to wear a back brace of some kind while racing.

The silver lining, I guess, is that in spite of my back aggravation, I am still putting up faster times than some of the folks I used to race in Sport last year. Although I am not really competitive in the Expert class and posting some pretty sorry results, I think I'm actually finding some fitness. As I keep saying, I'm hoping to have an enjoyable cyclocross season. The races are short and don't involve climbing, really, so I think my back could survive. Time to work on that remount!

Hanging in the Aspen

2007-06-21T15:41:00.001-06:00

Last night's assignment was cool, but it took forever for people to come along the trail. I guess it makes me happy, really, that these trails are still so empty.

This photo will probably be the lead picture in tomorrow's paper:

Here was an alternative, but it's more about the rider than the trees, which isn't what we're going for with this story. This lucky dude lives in neighboring Rollinsville.

And for whatever reason, Josh (who's playing editor this week) didn't like this photo, and chose a different one. But since this is MY blog, I can love this photo all I want. :)

I didn't really get to ride much afterward, but that was okay. It's a rest week, anyway. I should be back at the long, slow rides this weekend.

Buzz Off, Man

2007-06-19T16:16:00.000-06:00

Interesting day at the office today...had to visit a beekeeper. I've photographed him before, but it was in the winter when the bees were mostly dormant. This time, they were buzzing around like the proverbial busy bees, and the beekeeper got dressed up his full veil.

I didn't wear any head covering, because he warned me that it's extremely hard to shoot through the veil. Luckily I'm not really afraid of bees, because then he did this:

I considered myself lucky that only one bee bothered me. Apparently they are attracted to contrast, and the dark blue strap on my camera against the white of the bee suit I was wearing was more than one could resist. It landed on my shoulder, buzzing loudly in my ear. I tried not to panic, but walked quickly away from the hives and tried to shoo it away. I couldn't figure out where it was, though, and Tom the beekeeper had to come over to help me. He was poking around in my hair, saying, "Hmmm...I can hear it; where is it?" Meanwhile I was trying to stay calm and not imagine getting stung on the neck. Ouch!!!! He discovered it, pinned under my camera strap, and flung it away. Wheeeeeew.

Here's me, in my contrasty outfit, having survived 20 minutes of standing around beehives with no headcovering:

Then on my drive home, I found a Native American artist working on a carving out of an enormous tree stump:

Still can't decide if I like it better in black and white:

Tomorrow I get to ride in Nederland and get paid for it -- sweet! We're going a story about organisms that are threatening aspen trees, and what better way to find people near aspen trees? I'll just camp out in Aspen Alley up there, and hopefully find tons of people cruising through, hiking, riding, and even on horseback, probably. And tomorrow morning I get to photograph real estate agents that provide their clients with cruiser bikes to use to go look at properties. I'll get to put my sweet Bianchi Milano bike to work, with my panniers full of camera gear. It should be a decent day of work...I wish I got paid more, so I don't have to eventually leave this job. Or maybe I should get busy looking for that Sugar Daddy.... :)

Life on the High Plains

2007-06-11T08:38:00.001-06:00

Sheesh, life's getting busy! I'm falling behind a little. It doesn't help that work has gotten a lot busier. We're required to work on the website now, making all of our own photo galleries. And since our prepress person left and won't be replaced, we're required to do all the preparation work to our images to get them ready for the press. It's not an enormous amount of extra steps, but just enough to be seriously time consuming when you have eight pictures to work up. Well, at least I have a job. ;)

Last week I followed a crew of friends (in my car, unfortunately) out to the High Plains trail to shoot it for my column. Mother nature came through for me with some astoundingly beautiful light and storm clouds:

Here's them riding:

Then a colossal windstorm kicked up, making me really glad I wasn't riding. It was hell-acious! It went on all night, taking out people's power into the next day. Damn. Here's the wind getting started:

This trail is actually pretty cool, in that it's right between Boulder and Superior, but it sits down in this little valley, and when you're on it, you can't see anything man-made except the occasional power line. No roads, no buildings, no parking lots...it's quite an accomplishment. I think it's going to be a struggle to figure out a way to write anything truly interesting about this trail, but it's new, and every time I mention it to people, they say, "the what Plains trail?" So it's clear that people don't really know it's been added to the Marshall Mesa area. I need to round up a pal or two and ride it myself sometime this week.

With no pictures needed. There's no way I'll get that kind of light again!

Yay! Nederland rules.

2007-05-31T15:25:00.000-06:00

I really, really wanted to head up there on Saturday, but I wasn't sure of the state of the trails. A phone call to my buddy Randy at Happy Trails confirmed that things were tacky and perfect (at least at the lower elevations), so I nearly fell over myself getting ready to ride.

I headed up there on the bus, since my car was in the shop. I stashed the Maverick underneath rather than risk the sketchy rack. Luckily there was no Vinny this time; in fact, the driver was very friendly and asked me about where I was going to ride.

I was joined by only two other people, which surprised me, but I think most folks don't know the trails are rideable yet.

I tooled along by myself for a while, enjoying the silence and views. Here's a lovely singletrack with a backdrop of newly-leafed aspen trees and Eldora Mountain Resort.

What's not to love? This is one of my favorite places.

Here's the view the other way:

I made my way deeper into the woods, and as I emerged from singletrack into an open area, I found my friends Matt Alford and Rich Marchbanks hanging out eating snacks, "working" as mountain bike patrol ambassadors. We were psyched to see each other, and I spent the rest of the ride trying to hang with them as they cruised around, looking for people to assist with maps or mechanical help, but the trails were beautifully devoid of crowds.

Here they are catching their breath after a short, steep climb. Matt, right, is on a singlespeed, which means he has to charge up hills at full steam before the one gear gets the better of him.

We headed out onto the Hobbit Trails, and on Hobbit 3 we found a big downed tree that had already been turned into a rideable obstacle with the addition of some more material. Rich pulled out his digital SLR, upping the quality of our ride photos significantly. :)

Here's me, photographed by Rich:

Here's Matt, shot by me (and he survived; it must be the bulletproof bike patrol jersey):

Here's Rich, also shot by me:

And then a last photo of me:

It's hard to see here, but I'm riding toward the edge of a hill, and so the aspen trees behind me are weirdly twisted from the constant wind. I always want to take some kind of arty farty black and white photo of them, but I'm always too busy riding.

After exploring most of the lower trails, I finally made my way to Magnolia road and headed back to Boulder. I arrived at my door six hours after leaving, and it was the best Saturday I've had since Fruita. Viva la Nederland!!

High Country Dreaming

2007-05-15T09:42:00.000-06:00

Last night I dreamed I was here:

It was probably because Scott Gurst sent out the email, getting us all pumped for the yearly trip to Crested Butte. It's the trip's ten-year anniversary, which is amazing. I think it's my fifth time, and I cannot wait!! It's going to be outstanding, I'm sure. We get an extra day there this time, since the 4th of July falls on a Wednesday. Sweet! In the meantime, I'm working hard to get back in shape. I'd like to ride in the "B Group" rides again. But no matter if the rides are slower or shorter -- it's an experience like no other.

More New Horizons

2007-05-07T18:37:00.000-06:00

I spent another great day exploring new trails... this time in the snow! Von and I headed up to Coulson Gulch, between Lyons and Estes Park, on the advice of his friend Dave.

Little flakes starting falling as we got out of the car, and we had to just laugh. That's Colorado for you. And I was still in the hot desert mindset, so I had barely enough clothes to stay warm. I ended up wearing the casual pants I'd brought over my bike shorts; Von had to put on his dressy wool sweater. But hey, we had fun and that's what matters.

Snow gathering in the trees:

Von digging around for more clothes:

A break in the weather:

Then back in Boulder, after years of seeing the tulips blooming on the Pearl Street Mall, I actually stopped and did the tourist thing:

I couldn't help it; I'd never seen tulips like these before. Sometimes, ya gotta stop and smell (or shoot) the flowers, har de har har.

Ahhh...Life is Good Again

2007-04-30T11:57:00.000-06:00

Fruita was paradise. The weather was perfect, the trails were in great shape, and the company was fantastic. Best of all, my back didn't hurt even slightly. I couldn't have been happier!!

Here's Chad making coffee at our lovely campsite at the Bookcliffs:

We rode the Bookcliffs trails on Friday, then Kokopelli Trails on Saturday. They were both fabulous as always, with the warm sun baking the chalky whiteness off my legs and arms. Then on Sunday we went into Grand Junction and rode the Lunch Loop trails for the first time. A checker at the City Market in Fruita told us about a trail there called Pet-e-Kes (of all weird-ass names), so we went to check it out. It was great: super narrow and twisty, with funky rocks jutting into the trail both at ground level and head level, which really challenges your balance and slow-radius turning abilities. Then we got to Holy Cross, which turned out to be fantastic -- really technical and interesting.

Here's Chad in a little "slot canyon:"

Here's me on a little rock ledge:

Here's Tanya and then Ivy on some of the brief swoopy sections:

I gotta go back to GJ and ride there some more...we were too tapped out to check out all the other trails there. But unfortunately, it's going to be way too hot there very soon. It was already mid 80s while we were there, and of course all the trails are totally exposed to the sun. No trees taller than me in the high desert, which means there's very little shade to be had. Oh well, there's time for many more desert trips in the fall. Soon it will be time for the high-alpine trips! Look out Crested Butte, Vail and Steamboat Springs...here we come!

Frooooootaaaa!!

2007-04-26T08:15:00.000-06:00

It's a banner day: I'm finally getting out of Boulder after almost five months of being cooped up. Hooray!

It's the Fat Tire Festival out there this weekend, which I usually avoid because it's such a cluster, but I think it will be fun to see it this time. I know I'm going to see tons of Boulder people....I've already run into three other folks who are going to be there. I can't wait to ride real desert singletrack! Yes, I'm going to be very careful of my back, but it's time to branch out a little.

In other news, the Maverick website is up, with my goofy picture. And if you go under "What Makes a Maverick?" you can watch my cheesy video. If you like motorcycles, be sure to watch Don Atchison's piece. His bikes are stunning.

I have started writing my columns again. If you care to read them, you can go here and type "caivanom" into the search field. It will take you to all of my columns, including some from last year. Also, you can view my first-ever attempt at an audio slideshow of the Koppenberg Circuit race, if you have the time. ;) It was really fun to make, and I'm hoping to do a bunch more this summer...not just of bike stuff, either.

Work has been good. We redesigned the paper in a big way, and people have finally stopped freaking out. I had the front page that day, with an interesting story about grasshopper research that reveals things about climate change. I had no idea grasshoppers could be this beautiful:

Here's the researcher, left, with one of his graduate students, trying to catch grasshoppers, which is pretty funny to watch.

Well, I'm out...hopefully I'll come back with a tan and some nice Fruita photos!

No Moab For You!

2007-03-27T08:28:00.000-06:00

Bummer... I was unable to go to my team's training camp in Moab this past weekend. I couldn't work out a carpool with anyone, and I really didn't want to take my car on a long road trip, what with the whole exhaust ready to fall off and whatnot.

So... I stayed home and tried to have my own training camp. I put in a good two hours on Friday, which was great. I tried to ride the singletracks north of the Rez, but they were so freakin' bumpy from everyone riding them when they were wet -- I thought I was going to lose some fillings. So I abandoned ship and went back to the dirt roads, but first I snagged this photo at the picnic shelter:

It poured rain all day on Saturday, so I used that day for recovery. Instead, I held an umbrella over the heads of some of my friends at the start line of the CatEye Road Race. Boy, this separated the boys from the men. Yuck!

Sunday I tried to ride again, and was feeling full of energy, but was cursed with sciatic pain. Apparently, I need my own personal traction machine. So I hiked instead, but was pretty disgusted with the lack of "training" at my training camp. Oh well. If this whole business isn't a lesson in patience (that I'm getting tired of learning, ha ha) I don't know what is.

It's supposed to be a nice week, so I should be able to get some more rides in. I see the PT tomorrow, so I can get on the rack and feel a lot better. ;)

Oh Baby...

2007-03-22T16:48:00.000-06:00

I would probably make this choice, too, were the roles reversed. I'm not ashamed to admit it. :)

The Weekend

2007-03-20T15:46:00.000-06:00

I feel weird writing about my superficial experiences after going to Robert's funeral.

Sigh. I know, nothing brings him back. Life goes on. It's a cruel reality that any of us could kick the bucket tomorrow and only an infinitesimal slice of humanity would even notice.

That's why you have to milk life for all it's worth... this is all we get!

At least riding a bike gives you some meditative time.

I rode alone on Saturday, cruising the dirt roads north of the Reservoir. My back was feeling good and the weather was fabulous. Then I saw these two girls off the side of the road with a flat tire, and as I approached, they both looked at me expectantly. So I knew they needed help, and I pulled over.
They were seriously an odd couple. The girl with the flat had a nice Trek road bike and some basic cycling clothing, and the other girl, in a tank top and ancient helmet, had a totally strange bike that I think was just an old ten-speed from the 1980s. She was also sporting enormous, 70s-era sunglasses with the gradient lenses. I almost got the feeling that were a real couple, if you know what I mean. Not that there's anything wrong with that. ;)
They couldn't get their mini-pump to work, so I took out my CO2 canister and inflated their tire. They both freaked out at how awesome that was, which was totally funny. Gotta love technology.
I finally stood up and at looked the sunglasses girl in the face, and mentally recoiled in shock. This girl, who looked no older than 20, maybe, had a BEARD. I am dead serious. She had many, many VERY dark hairs growing out of her face, that actually curled under the edge of her chin. I sure hope I didn't l let my feelings show, but I was a little taken aback. She was a pretty girl, and it just shocked me because it must have been a conscious decision on her part to leave the hair like that. I mean, she could pluck, shave, bleach, wax, depilate, or use any number of other methods to make those hairs disappear.
Yes, I wondered if she was actually a he, but she was well-endowed enough in both chest and hips to make that seem unlikely. Plus the hair was pretty sporadic, and at the same time, she had strangely pretty skin.
Weird.
She must have people staring at them CONSTANTLY, you know? It's like the "mole" in the last Austin Powers movie. "Guaca- MO-LE!!!"
Maybe she's a student and it's a social experiment. She just goes out into the world and watches people freak out. That would be hilarious.

Then on Sunday I rode with my friend Catherine, who luckily chose not to break me, and we rode near the Rez again.

It was a really pleasant morning, and I actually got two hours in without any pain. You can see from the strange lump on my ass that I'm still having to wear my SI belt while riding. I bet when I rode away from the bearded girl , she said, "What the hell is wrong with that chick's butt?"

On another note, Akira and I have got a solid billiards addiction going. We've been playing every Monday night at the Foundry, which has free pool. The game reminds me of golf in that some days you're magically in The Zone, sinking balls left and right, and then other days you can't make the most dumb, obvious shot. It keeps you coming back, trying to redeem yourself.

My game has improved a great deal under Akira's coaching. He in turn was coached by a former professional pool player, who is now a mountain biking friend of ours. She instructed him to hold the cue loosely in your hand, "not like you're gripping your dick." Unfortunately, that instruction only made me want to hold the cue more tightly, ha ha.

A Tribute, However Small

2007-03-18T18:06:00.000-06:00

Robert Hicken

1968 -2007

I first saw Robert in the cardio area of the gym, on a snowy day back in 1998 or so when I joined the club. He was riding an old-school stationary bike harder than I’d ever seen anyone ride, period. He was pedaling like the devil was at his heels, bent low over the handlebars, sweating heavily and oblivious to anything around him. He was the only person in the room until I walked in and got on the other stationary bike. His eyes were squeezed closed, his jaw clenched, and the whirr of his bike’s flywheel was the only sound.
I looked closer and saw his motivation – headphones. I still wonder what song was driving him.
I settled onto my bike and began trying to warm up gradually, but the presence of Robert, riding like the Tour de France title was at stake, was in turn making me ride harder. I surreptitiously watched him. Wearing a ratty sleeveless t-shirt over his bike shorts, he was surprisingly muscular in the arms and chest for a cyclist, but the fluid circles of his pedal stroke revealed that he was no gym rat. His upper body was nearly motionless while his legs kept an astonishing cadence.
This was also in the days before indoor cycling classes became popular, if I recall. These two stationary bikes were the only two in the club that resembled actual bicycles…the rest were the upright-style exercise machines burdened with huge, squashy seats and computer screens. No one rode the stripped-down stationary bikes except people who rode bikes in the outside world as well. It was clear that Robert was no stranger to this kind of workout.
As I watched, he ramped up his effort even more, and within 20 seconds or so his interval reached its maximum intensity. Now I could hear him gasping hard, his hands clenching the bars, and he appeared to find a kind of endorphin high for a brief moment as a radiant smile crossed his face. Then his legs slowed drastically, and as he recovered, eyes still closed, he looked as though he were miles away, hearing a cheering crowd as he crossed the finish line. I’m still not sure to this day if he even knew I was in the room until he sat up and wiped the sweat out of his eyes. But by then I had averted my gaze to my own feet, and busied myself with my Walkman.
I don’t remember when I finally met him, officially. He was a personal trainer at the club, and hung around there a great deal, training clients, teaching classes, and doing his own workouts. He was very generous with his attention. He treated his clients with warmth and professionalism, and reached out to everyone at the gym.
Eventually we somehow got to know each other a bit and chatted in the weight room. I asked him for some advice, and he happily gave it, along with tons of diet information and cycling training plans.
As indoor cycling classes became the vogue, Robert taught them, as well as headed up the cycling program at the gym. In the winters I took these classes with frequency, and learned Robert’s nickname: King of Pain.
He had gotten the moniker from his ski conditioning classes that left people staggering out of the group fitness room, sweaty, noodle-y versions of their former selves. But boy, were they motivated to come back and get as strong as he was. He could do plyometric jumps onto a box as high as his chest from a dead standstill.
And he never let people think badly of themselves. His relentless encouragement during those classes got people excited to work out, to watch their bodies get firmer and fitter. And he made them laugh with his easy humor; he got their hearts pumping with his music collection, which his friends say he maintained fanatically, making new mixes for cycling classes every week. He didn’t want his students to get bored.
I curse my terrible memory, for most of our interactions have long been lost. But two events stand out to me now: one time we rode together outdoors – in December, of all strange times. I had gotten a crazy idea to ride “Super Hall” – from Boulder along U.S. 36 to Hall Ranch in Lyons, ride the trail, and then return on the road – on a mountain bike, in the snow. I was in good enough shape to do it, although I wasn’t fast, and I knew one person who would take on that kind of weird adventure: The King of Pain.
He and I saddled up on our hardtails and headed out. He was very solicitous, not seeming bothered by the slow pace or the fact that we were getting frequently passed by roadies, some of whom knew who he was. We talked about music, cycling, living in Colorado, and any number of things I can’t recall now.
We got to the trailhead and that’s where things got snowy. I was a relatively new mountain biker then, but the packed-down surface blunted a lot of the technical aspects of the trail. Perhaps this memory is wishful thinking, but I recall walking very little, and feeling happy with my accomplishment. Robert was encouraging and complimentary, as he knew how to be. He mostly rode behind me, a gentlemanly thing to do for a guy who was probably dying to haul the mail.
We stopped at the park bench at the top of the rock garden to survey our snowy domain. We didn’t plan to ride the top loop, since our ride was so long already and the day was getting on. We took a few photos there; I still have the snapshot he took of me standing on the bench, flexing my arms in Swartzenegger-style toughness. I wish I could find the photo of him, but in my endless moves around Boulder, it seems to be gone. Or I hope I gave it to him at some point.

The other thing I remember is running into him in the Daily Camera parking lot a few years ago, as I was headed to my car.
“Marty, you gotta hear this!” he called, waving a CD. “This is awesome.”
We got into my car and fired up the stereo. He couldn’t get the grin off his face as he slid the disc into the player and turned up the volume. Within seconds, the thumping groove of Sir Mix-A-Lot’s “Baby Got Back” filled the car, and we both started cracking up.
“No way,” I said. “Are you using this in a spin class?”
“You know it!” he replied, and started rapping along to the song until I had tears in my eyes from laughing so hard. That song, which I never fully appreciated back in the day, became a favorite after that, and yes, I can rap the whole thing, too.
In 2002 Robert moved to Hawaii and we lost touch.
He passed back through Boulder at times, worked a stint at University Bicycles, and then went back to Hawaii, then back to Boulder. But our paths had rarely crossed recently, and I was never sure if he was still around.
Then two weeks ago I saw him at my new gym, where he was once again teaching indoor cycling classes. We chatted quickly, and he seemed his usual self, looking me right in the eyes in that way that always made me feel like he really saw me. I peeked into his class a few minutes later, and saw that on the studio’s television, he was playing a video he’d shot at Walker Ranch. Through his microphone, he called out, “Come on in, Marty!”
So I took a seat on the floor and stretched, watching the video and listening to the boundless energy of Robert’s teaching style. It was good to see him again, and I noticed, as always, the relentless powerful spin of his legs. After a few minutes I took my leave and gave him a quick wave goodbye, not wanting to disrupt the class. I had no way of knowing that I would never see him again.
I wonder if he knew that.
I hate hindsight. It only exists because some circumstance forces you to look back – usually with regret.
I wish I’d hugged him. I wish I’d invited him out for coffee. I wish I’d looked him in the eyes with the same attention he always offered me. I wish…but it changes nothing now.
I attended his funeral in a state of numbness. How is this possible? I just SAW him. How on earth can he be lying in that casket?
I listened to stories from his friends, as well as from his brothers, who I met for the first time. (I learned that he'd raced on the velodrome at the Olympic Training Center as a teenager. I learned that he was more than just brawn: He had a bachelor's degree in biochemistry and a master's degree in kinesiology.)
The regret that I did not reach out to Robert, just five days before, burned itself deeper into my heart.
Not that I had the arrogance to think I could have changed his mind. But at least he would have known someone cared.
Another cyclist and spin instructor got up and went to the microphone in the little church. She looked hollow-eyed. She encouraged all of us to take Robert’s death as an opportunity to make more time for the people in our lives. No matter how busy we think we are, she said, does any of that stuff matter more than our friends?
I sat with my teeth clenched, blinded by tears. I knew by now that I wasn’t alone in my feelings, but it didn’t matter.
I just couldn't stop thinking about what was going on in Robert's mind. How much pain do you have feel to want to put a gun in your mouth?
There’s a tendency, after people have passed away, to glorify them a little. Thank god. I’d much rather remember the good things about people, and I sure hope it’s the same for me when I’m gone. I admired Robert for his passionate approach to life and to the things he cared about. He was not one of those people who just plodded through each day, and I loved that about him. I think life let him down a lot, because he expected other people to give as much energy and attention as he did. He gave so freely of himself.
I put the one photograph I have of him – at the Stazio Criterium, in an old-school, East Coast bike shop jersey that he’d brought to Colorado when he was 17 – on my refrigerator, to remind me. Not only of him, but of my commitment to the friends I still have.
Goodbye, Robert. Thank you for the inspiration.

At Last!

2007-03-15T11:16:00.000-06:00

I actually got out on a "real" ride yesterday with a teammate and another friend. Sadly, their recovery pace was a good workout for me. But I was just happy that my back didn't hurt - hooray! I didn't even mind that the whole ride was on asphalt, which I usually avoid like the plague. I was cruising along on my mud-encrusted 'cross bike (with road tires), sporting the mountain bike shoes and helmet visor, happy as a clam. I'm really sorry I forgot my camera, because there was some fabulous sunset light happening as we rode back. At any rate, I'm looking forward to a warm weekend so I can get some more base miles in!

Here's some recent work images:

Ray Rovey, a Nederland man who welds iron into gates, chairs, wine racks, and more -- all while being legally blind. He wears the goggles to keep out debris. He calls his little business "Out of Sight Art and Wrought Iron."

The CU radio station shut off their CD players for a day and pulled out all their old vinyl. It's amazing the eclectic taste in really old music, like '40s, '50s and '60s-era stuff, that these kids were into.

And finally, more yummy food. Seared ahi salad with citrus from Sunflower, one of my top three favorite restaurants in Boulder.

A Unique Form of Torture

2007-03-12T09:06:00.000-06:00

Is watching yourself on video. UGH!! But I promised (especially to my mom) that I'd post this.

http://homepage.mac.com/brianhawkins/filechute/marty258.mov

If you laugh your ass off at me, please keep that to yourself. ;)

Good Lord

2007-03-06T08:16:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe that road racing has already started. I mean, I know the Tour of California happened last month already, but hell, that's California. Out here, there's still piles of snow sitting around. But that didn't stop folks from showing up for the Stazio Criteriums on Sunday. I went out to watch the Cat. 1/2/3 race and ran into my teammate Rob:

Even though he's actually been training, we both agreed that this looked like WAY too much work.

I'm hoping to race in late May, even though the fitness will be pretty marginal. I suspect I'll truly peak for cyclocross season -- which isn't a bad thing. I really missed racing 'cross last fall. The scene here in Colorado is getting really good... lots of spectators ringing cowbells, people grilling and drinking beer, racers in the Cat. 4s wearing funny clothes -- it's a great time. I'm looking forward to all of it!

Cats and Dogs Living Together!

2007-03-05T14:03:00.000-07:00

I'm glad I'm not petsitting for these folks!

Future Magazine Star

2007-03-02T10:17:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I spent the morning in Denver at b. hawkins advertising studio, doing my photo and video shoot for the Maverick ads.

I know, I'm such a cheeseball. But it was really fun! I'm not sure what's up with the background color, which they called "Baby Puke," but I think that somehow the color can be changed easily in Photoshop, allowing them to drop in whatever color they want. They said the end result will probably be gray, like the sample ad I showed in my previous post, but they're not 100% sure just yet.

Check out their sweet studio:

They use a Hasselblad medium format camera with a digital back, which is an amazing setup. It seriously made me want to do commercial photography. But I lack the $50,000 needed to buy all the cameras, lights and studio space to get started, so... maybe in my next lifetime.

The photographer and the art director, both named Brian, were really cool guys. They actually work with several other bike companies, like Giant, for instance, so they know the whole mtn bike scene. And I got to see my buddy Rob from Blue Sky Cycles for a few minutes, since he was getting his picture taken before me.

The video part was fun, too. Brian the art director shot it and coached me, and I think I did okay. I'll probably think otherwise when I see it! I just hope I don't look fat. It IS the Year of the Pig, you know. ;)

I'm Now a Yeti Betty

2007-02-24T14:42:00.000-07:00

The new bike arrived today! It's sick light and covered in bling, courtesy of Sports Garage:

I guess this means I am now a member of "The Tribe," as Yeti owners like to refer to themselves. :) I haven't named this bike yet; I need to ride it a few times and see what its personality is like.

Yeti the company is based in Golden, which is cool. That means that both of my mountain bikes are from Colorado companies (even if the actual frames are made in Taiwan). Here's the Yeti headbadge:

And here's a peek at the lovely new XTR derailleur and wheels:

I would like to publicly thank my sponsor, the Joseph R. Caivano Foundation, for his immense generosity and his patience in listening to me freak out about my financial situation. I dedicate this racing season to him!

Another great thing about today is the weather. The snow that was predicted never showed, so I got to ride outside -- yahoo! I didn't even care that it was windy. I can't even describe how great it feels to be on the bike and outdoors again. Being injured and trapped inside for so long made me feel half dead.

A lot of what I love about riding outside is just noticing things. A lake I passed had ducks out exploring the half-melted surface:

There was also a guy standing by the bike path with an SLR camera and an enormous lens, probably a 600mm, photographing prairie dogs, of all things. I almost stopped and said, "Wow, that's a really big lens," like dumb people always say to me, just to irritate the hell out of him, but decided to spare him at the last minute. It's bad enough he was taking pictures of rodents in really bad light.

More good news: the Maverick folks have decided to use me for their ads! I'm very excited. I go in for a photo and video shoot next week, so I need to get a haircut and run through some possible things to say besides "My Maverick is, like, way cool, dude." Actually, they're wanting me to paint a picture of myself as a maverick, too, and then explain why the Maverick bike and I are a perfect marriage. I need to put some more thought into this and try to make it really compelling. They already liked what I wrote, but I want to show up with several options in my head, ready to say in a compact "sound bite" kind of way. They sent me a sample of the print ad:

Thank god I'm too broke to get into motorcycling, because this would probably tempt me.

I don't get the comment about how the bike would piss some people off. That doesn't make any sense. Unless he's referring to other bike makers, who might get mad they didn't think of such a beautiful way to solve the problems inherent in suspension design.

Update on the Karen Rodarte story: We're in a substantial dilemma about her family's status in this country. They're illegals, as you might have guessed, but they've begged us not to print that, obviously. But the trouble is, if we do that, we're leaving out an important fact, and we ARE journalists, after all. Now, we could just let readers figure that tidbit out for themselves (it's pretty obvious, since the family has no access to medical care), but then so could the INS or anyone else in a position to deport them. They MUST be aware of the risk in talking to us, I would hope...but maybe they're not clear on how public this story will really be. So, I've taken a break from shooting any more photos, because this story could very well get axed altogether if we can't figure out a way to deal with this. Obviously, I would feel tremendous guilt if they got kicked out of this country because of us, when they desperately need to be here for Karen's treatment. I mean, I have my own conflicing feelings about illegal immigration, but this family is already here, and Karen is highly unlikely to get what she needs in Mexico.

In the meantime, I really need to get on the ball with doing an audio slideshow about SOMETHING. Folks in the newsroom have definitely noticed that Mark and Josh are the only shooters tinkering with multimedia so far.

Speaking of work, I won second place in the Colorado Associated Press Editors and Reporters contest for Portrait/Personality with this picture:

I've just started entering contests again this year. I've always found them kind of meaningless, especially in Colorado, where there just aren't a lot of newspapers. There's only about four papers in our circulation category. The next category up is even more lame: The Denver Post, the Rocky Mountain News, and the Colorado Springs Gazette. And I'd be willing to put money on the fact that the Gazette's circulation has fallen below 100,000 Sundays, which would actually put them in our category. And then the Rocky and the Post are owned by the same people anyway, so....what's the point? ;)

But one thing that was cool is that CAPER made a Best in Show category this year, and Todd Heisler from the Rocky won with this amazing photo:

(Sorry it's so small; I nabbed it from their website.) It's from a story about the soldiers whose job it is to deliver the bad news to families. Go here to see the whole package, which is an incredible example of great journalism and use of multimedia. http://denver.rockymountainnews.com/news/finalSalute/

Karen's Story

2007-02-16T14:34:00.000-07:00

I'm working on a new project about Karen Rodarte, an 11-year-old who survived a rare, aggressive brain tumor. Research tells me that:

"Brain Tumor: Atypical Teratoid / Rhabdoid Tumor
This rare, high-grade tumor occurs most commonly in children younger than 2. It is generally found in the cerebellum, which is the lower, back part of the brain that controls balance. These tumors tend to be aggressive and frequently spread through the central nervous system.
Even after surgery and chemotherapy treatment, the survival rate for children younger than 3 at diagnosis is less than 10 percent. It appears that older children, when treated with chemotherapy and radiation therapy after surgery, do somewhat better long-term, nearing 70 percent.
Treatment generally involves surgical removal of the tumor followed by chemotherapy. Radiation therapy may be considered depending on the age of the child and whether the tumor has recurred."

It's wonderful that the survival rate is better in older kids like Karen, but what this doesn't tell you is the impact on their daily life. At 11, Karen's memory is heavily affected, making it difficult for her to remember even simple things like basic addition; it took her a very long time to memorize the alphabet.

Here, her teacher admonishes her to pay attention to her math work, in spite of having onlookers:

Each day she gets the challenge of having to remember her lunch code, a surprisingly long string of numbers she'll have to produce while feeling the pressure of standing in the lunch line. Here, she gets a high-five from her para-educator after she practiced the number correctly:

Karen has grown up speaking Spanish at home, and prefers it, but understands English very well and has no trouble making herself understood. She does struggle with writing in either language, though. Here, she laughs with one of her teachers, after finishing an assignment with the translation help of friend, left:

Her Spanish-speaking parents, however, are having a hard time with the medical system, especially as they continue her treatment without the benefit of health insurance. Perhaps this story will bring some Good Samaritans out of the woodwork.

In the meantime, Karen enjoys recess with her friends:

The tumor has stunted her growth, and part of her treatment includes doses of human growth hormone, an expensive substance also prized by endurance athletes. Who knows... maybe she'll grow up and become an Olympic marathon runner or something...her balance doesn't actually seem that impaired.

I have about six weeks more to devote to this story -- an eternity in newspaper time -- so I plan to record audio and create an audio slide show, which will be my first (and long overdue) foray into the multimedia trend that is rapidly becoming the future of newspapers.
I just hope I can capture Karen's hilarious giggle, which was cracking up everyone in earshot.

I've Been "Modeling" More Than I've Been Riding Lately.

2007-02-13T14:17:00.000-07:00

Dammit. But hell, when I'm 70 years old I can look back on these and reminisce about being able to stay upright on a bike.

Josh came through for me again, this time for the folks at Maverick American Bicycles, who plan to use real Maverick owners in their advertising, and wanted to see pictures of their potential people.

I don't know if they'll choose me, but it's nice to have the photo either way.

Mmmmm....food.

2007-02-08T13:26:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I think I should quit the news biz and become a food photographer. I seem to be decent at it and it's fun.

From a story on Valentine's Day food:

Oysters with champagne "caviar," from Q's Restaurant.

Spinach mousse with Meyer lemon. I got to taste both of these, and they were delicious. The concept was food that you could feed your sweetheart, which is why they're bite-size portions. (I think I would probably throw up if I had to watch another couple feed each other in public, though. I mean, come ON. Gross.)

I just like to analyze the dish and figure out how to light it in a pretty way, and make it look tasty. I usually use just a combination of window light and one flash... I'm always amazed that it looks pretty tolerable. I mean, it's no fancy studio light like the food pros would do, but what the hell. I work for a small-town newspaper.

A few weeks ago we did a story on liquor for winter sipping, and I got this good layout with my photo:

But honestly, I don't think I could do this kind of thing full-time. I'd really miss being outside, for one thing. Plus, I really do like to shoot things that move and talk. :)

Nothing But Crickets

2007-02-06T17:22:00.000-07:00

I know it's been way too long since I've posted here. I'm probably just talking to myself. Wait, what else is new? :)

But I gotta get this rolling again for summer, when I'll actually have a life.

In the meantime, I've had two consecutive back injuries that have kept me off the bike since my ruined trip to Fruita in October. I won't even try to describe how frustrating and depressing this has been , since nobody likes a whiner. But I will say that I've been spending WAY too much time here:

The lovely Boulder Center for Sports Medicine, where I have been contemplating life's meaning while strapped into this medieval device:

Traction is strangely relaxing. You get a harness strapped around your chest (woe to the girls with the big boobs) and another around your hips, and then the machine pulls the two apart. Ahhhhh.

Also slowing down my life (for what -- eight weeks??) was this:

So let's just hope that the rest of the mountain bikers around here have screwed up their training as much as I have. ;)

Since I've been down for the count, I've been trying to write that book on photojournalism. I've spent many hours looking at this:

The writing process has been really enjoyable, actually. It's made me reconnect to some of the deep-seated reasons that I became a photojournalist -- just in time to attend "the sky is falling" meetings about the dire straits of the journalism industry. Yay. You kids in journalism school make a run for the business school while you still can.

So my life has felt like a kind of "Groundhog Day": Get up. Go to work. Try not to fall on ass in Daily Camera parking lot. Go to physical therapy. Form a close and personal relationship with Advil and the floor of my apartment. Abuse caffeine while working on book. Go to bed, get up, start over. Drag friends out whenever possible, but discover that people are seriously hunkered down with NetFlix. Ponder subscribing to NexFlix. Remember the torture of watching "Failure to Launch" (which has a hilarious "mountain biking" scene that made me almost regurgitate my popcorn) and go back to working on book. Space out in endless fantasies of travel, mountain biking, and good-looking men. Realize I'm still here and sigh in disgust. Repeat.

I did take some time for fun, though, most recently by going to the Boulder Mountainbike Alliance black tie fundraiser. Some local celebs showed up: Jeremy Horgan-Kobelski and his wife Heather Irmiger:

Giro d'Italia winner Andy Hampsten and University Bicycles owner Doug Emerson:

And as for me, I pulled out my 1940s-era dress and accessorized with the usual hardware:

It was also an opportunity to wear the necklace my mom gave me and actually buy cute hair gadgets, something this tomboy hasn't done since middle school.

The other freakin' fabulous thing is that the cold weather finally headed out to the East Coast for a change. Today my coworker Josh and I did assignments on foot to bare our bumpy white flesh to the sun:

We wandered around together for a few minutes, since we're usually never able to do that; Josh oogled the co-eds out on their afternoon run while I got jealous watching people ride by on their bikes. Everyone looked ecstatically happy to be out in the warmth.

But I heard it's going to snow again this weekend. Sigh..... and repeat.

Proof That I Can Laugh at Myself

2006-12-10T15:39:00.000-07:00

The Daily Camera marketing department has reached new heights of desperation: they have decided to use US (the humble, badly-dressed, behind-the-scenes journalists) as marketing tools. They seem to think that if readers know who we are, they'll feel more of a connection to the newspaper. (I personally think that if we simply write good stories with the facts straight and everything spelled correctly, and shoot compelling photographs, that's probably good enough, but hell, who am I?)

So we all had to suffer through having "marketing" photos taken of ourselves. I managed to get out of it for a long time, by going on vacation the week the marketing photographer was here to shoot them. I mean, come on, most photographers can't stand being in FRONT of the camera.

But last week the proverbial gun was held to my head, and the result is, as I expected, cheesy. Yes, folks, it's very clear that I'm the "Cycling Columnist!" Now I'M on my way to the gun store, because if this photo ends up on the side of a bus, I'm going to shoot myself.

Marty who?

2006-11-30T14:32:00.000-07:00

I know, I've neglected this thing so long that I probably haven't a reader left! But this time of year, with a back injury keeping me from doing much of anything, I had nothing to say; I was too busy taking rides in the Whaaambulance.

Before hurting myself, however, I did some great fall rides. Here's the view from a wonderful solo jaunt in Nederland:

Then the next day I did Kenosha Pass with a group of friends. I had never ridden that trail before, and I gotta say, it rocks!! Fun, challenging riding with incredible views.

The big news is that I changed race teams in a last-minute, nerve-wracking decision. I'm leaving Blue Sky Velo, in spite of the fact that I LOVE the shop and its fantastic owners, because I really, really, want to be on a true mountain bike team. So I will be joining the black-white-and-teal camoflage clan on the Sports Garage Team.

Not pictured are the 15 women on the team -- sweet! It sounds like a great group of people, very close-knit. They all train together, travel to the races together, etc. And every member is required to host a meeting or social event throughout the year. It sounds awesome! Plus it's a Boulder team, so it will be easier to ride with these folks than the Longmont crowd.

I did have a few cool assignments recently, as well...In anticipation of the Dalai Lama's visit, I drove to the Great Stupa, deep in the mountains above Fort Collins, and took pictures of the workers getting ready. The Stupa is a Buddhist shrine, usually a place that contains the ashes of a revered figure in the religion.

Here's the Stupa:

Here's one of the founders of the place, preparing the two-story Buddha for its coating of paint, which is traditionally a vibrant gold:

This was really an enjoyable assignment. It was tremendously peaceful there, and everyone was so friendly and mellow. When I had filled all my digital media, I took a walk in the trees, and accepted an offer for lunch. I like it when I can settle in and really immerse myself in what I'm shooting. Unfortunately, I didn't get to photograph the great man himself (I had the pleasure of photographing him some years ago, though), which bummed me out. Here's Cliff's photo of him arriving to consecrate the Stupa:

I worked on a story about an old part of Louisville that the city council almost designated a blighted area so they could bulldoze everything and bring in a bunch of crappy retail. I had to find people in the neighborhood...

Not only does this guy sport the sexy mullet, he had on - no joke - these skin-tight short-shorts. Yes, WITH the leather jacket. I had to spare the readers that extra detail.

There's also this photo from a parade in Louisville:

So I haven't been a complete slacker...even though I lost a couple weeks of my life in the black hole known as "Shogun." What a great book!! I loved it. It was such a vivid portrayal of medieval Japan that I felt like my real life was a dull dream. I was even hearing Japanese spoken in my head. "Wakarimasu ka?" (Do you understand?)

I was so psyched with it that I bought "Tai-Pan," the writer's next novel, but mentally, I'm not ready to leave those characters just yet. And of course, all this is distracting me from my own writing. But, I've got plenty of dark winter nights at the coffee shop ahead, right?

Hubba Hubba

2006-08-21T15:45:00.000-06:00

The Maverick climbs so well, I keep looking around to see who is secretly pushing me. I was still pretty tired today from Saturday's race, but still felt like riding the backside of Hall Ranch. And it felt way better than I would have imagined. Love that!

I like these isolated trees you see at Hall Ranch sometimes. The land there is an interesting combination of forest and open grassy meadows. I changed this to black and white because the light was so crappy this morning.

Then I got to enjoy the twisty, rocky descent all the way down without being stopped by a single person. Sweet!!

The New Ride

2006-08-20T18:11:00.000-06:00

I got my new bike on Friday evening! It is really, really beautiful:

Here's the fancy Maverick fork. It makes the bike look like a miniature motorcycle. And if you squint, you can see on the head badge, where my friend Frank hand-engraves the frame's creation date and it's individual name. My frame, Basilisk, was born on June 8, 2006.

My very first ride with this bike turned out to be the huge King of the Rockies final race in the Winter Park series. It's 26 miles, with a lot of climbing and technical singletrack. I love it. This race turns you into quivering mush in the best of circumstances; riding a bike that you have not had any opportunity to dial in or have fitted can be a recipe for even more pain.

Here's Cindy getting ready:

Here's me and Basilisk:

I was very happy to feel good and have strong legs. Most of my summer has been lost in a weird bog of fatigue, low heart rates, and subsequent lack of motivation. So I was psyched, for sure. I was climbing well (for me, that is... climbing is not my thing), but the bike was really helping in that regard. It goes uphill so well, with little excess movement in the suspension. And when you stand up, it feels even better. Bubba's one drawback was that standing up tended to feel worse and frequently cause rear-wheel spinout. I always thought that was just pilot error, something I could never figure out how to do right, but with Basilisk it's a cinch. Sweet.
But then on the downhill, the Maverick's suspension was surprisingly harsh compared to the GT. I'm not making any judgement on that yet, though, since I've had zero chance to tweak the suspension. The idea behind the GT and Maverick suspensions are very nearly the same, so I should think that with some knowledgeable help, I can get Basilisk to feel just as good going downhill.

At about the halfway mark in the race, my back started to hurt. This race is so long that it always hurt, even on Bubba, so I wasn't surprised, but I could tell it was going to get a lot worse, since I haven't had a bike fit on the Maverick yet. Sure enough, several miles later I was in some major pain. I had to keep standing up and trying to stretch in every direction. When I got to the final climb, I was so buckled from the pain that I could barely pedal. Luckily, the final, twisty, rocky descent was a total blast, and I cruised to the finish line in 7th place out of 15, a very good result for me, considering how crappy I felt for most of this summer.

I had to strip the final parts off of Bubba today, which was sad. But there's no denying that Basilisk is cool! I'm psyched! I've got one more race in Keystone, but most of my weekends now will be filled with fun rides with friends, my favorite part of mountain biking.

Outta Sight I'm So Behind

2006-08-18T11:39:00.000-06:00

Hey there folks, I'm sure you thought I abandoned this blog. But life just got a bit ovewhelming there for a while! But I'm back, and thanks to my awesome brother, I now have a laptop, so I can work on the blog anytime. Sweet.

So, to catch up:

1. I had another KILLER trip to Crested Butte. This might have been the best one yet. I got put in a condo with really fun people, the trails were in great shape from daily late-afternoon thunderstorms, and I finally got to do the last descent on Reno/Flag/Bear/Deadmans.

If you're really bored or trying to avoid work, you can surf on over to Mike O's website and look at a bunch of goofy photos of the trip. It's not too dialup friendly, unfortunately. http://www.whirledmedia.com/cb06/cb06.html

2.My teammate Cindy and I went to the Blast the Mass race at Snowmass Mountain. Neither of us had ever been there, and damn, it's beautiful. Snowmass is steep as hell, and the cross-country race was brutal. It was gorgeous, and a real mountain biker's course, with tons of technical singletrack. I loved it, even though it put me in the hurt locker from the get-go. Cindy and I were both pretty hammered by it, but we managed to squeeze in a practice run for the next day's Super D race, and also scope out the Mountain Cross event:

You will be amazed to know that I actually camped at Snowmass. I know, it's a shock. Truly, I love to sleep outdoors. What I can't stand about camping, though, is the claustrophobic feeling of sleeping bags and tents. If I could just sleep on a queen-size bed under the stars, I'd camp all the time. ;) But to my surprise, I managed the camping thing just fine. In fact, the view of the night sky through my tent roof was so amazing that it was the most memorable part of the trip. I'm the background tent:

We dragged our tired asses out of bed the next morning, got stuck on the lift for the obligatory few minutes, and finally made it to the Super D start. For those of you who don't know what that is, I'll explain: It's a race that runs down a ski resort, but also includes a few short climbs. It's usually longer and not as technical as a true downhill race, which these days is extremely rocky and difficult.
I tried to go through a proper warmup, but it was a bit hard to do at the top of a ski resort, plus I was too distracted by watching other waves start. I had never done a Super D, and it's pretty funny to watch if the venue uses the Le Mans style start. This means that everyone lays their bike on the ground, and then from some distance away, when the gun goes off, everyone runs to their bikes, jumps on, and starts riding. You can just imagine the comedy that ensues. And because Super D is still finding its legs in the racing scene, all kinds of people show up. Downhillers in full-face helmets and pads; skinny cross-counry geeks in tight lycra, and everything in between. Watching all these folks awkwardly stampeding in helmets and cycling shoes is truly an amusing sight.

When our turn came, I was actually worried about being dropped during the running portion, since I run as well as a pregnant hippo, but I managed to hang okay. Our cyclocross experiences helped Cindy and I mount our bikes swiftly, but there were some wicked fast downhillers in our group, so they got way ahead right off the bat. And sadly for me, my derailleur, which had flawlesly survived the previous day's five creek crossings and other abuse, decided to blow up during the brief climbs of the Super D. I was further dropped, but still loved hauling the mail downhill, and I finished tolerably well. Conclusion: I think Super D rules!! What a fun event! I'm going to do the last one in Keystone next month.

3. After much stress and unneccessary freaking out, I finally got moved in to my own one-bedroom, for the first time ever in my 16 years in Boulder. What a blessing!!! I love it. It's tiny but perfect. I have a porch where I can see the Flatirons while I eat breakfast, or work on my bikes; a little creek passes nearby, and so far the neighborhood has been very pleasant. (We'll see if that changes when the students arrive in the next week or so!)

The porch:

And the living room:

4. The very bad news is that I lost Bubba. My GT I-Drive, always so dependably fun and nimble, suffered a frame crack, right near the seatpost weld. I'm crushed!! I wanted at least a few more years with that bike, both because I loved it, and because I wanted to actually save up for a new bike, which I was starting to do.
Here's my honey:

I really and truly was saddened by this, for reasons that had little to do with financial issues. That bike was with me through a lot; riding it was my way to escape stress and bring light into gloomy days. I will really miss it, no matter how cool my next bike may be.

I wrote an essay (that became my cycling column for the week) about the loss of Bubba and how it echoed the loss of Z.V.
On a side note, I will probably have to quit my job after it runs, either out of fear that Z.V. or his friends will hunt me down, or because a bunch of weirdos will start hitting on me. That will make life interesting, won't it? At any rate, I'll post a link when it runs.

Well, I've been camped out in the coffee shop for a while now, and the feeling that I'm a pretentious nerd has become overwhelming. I promise to be back very soon with an update on my new bike, which I should be picking up from Blue Sky Cycles later today.

May Bubba go on to Mountain Bike Heaven, which is a perpetual descent down the 401 Trail in Crested Butte.

Off the Back

2006-06-15T16:58:00.001-06:00

Geez, I'm way behind with my blog... I've just been overwhelmed with freelance work, househunting, training, the day job, and all kinds of stuff.

So, to catch up a little:

A bunch of us from both Blue Sky the shop and Blue Sky the team went up to Ned a few weekends ago. I only shot photos during the snack break, because I was having too much fun riding. :)

The Shop Guys and Friends on one hand, the Racers on the other:

Rob's a racer, too, actually, but he was just too cool to sit with us.

All's fair in mountain bike racing:

Another crappy view of the Continental Divide:

We sure live in a purty place, all right.

Then, I managed to score second place on the paper's web-hits-of-the-day list with my column on marijuana:

Last, and far from least, was the trip I took to Durango with my brother Joe. We stayed at the Tamarron resort where he played golf all by himself both days. Here's the view from our room above the 5th hole:

The trails were equally empty:

Although I did find a guy to photograph for a future column about Durango:

This area of Durango riding, on the Colorado Trail, seemed like Crested Butte, and then the Horse Gulch area (which I didn't photograph) seemed like Fruita.

I could move to Durango and never need to leave! :)

Another Ned Adventure

2006-05-22T19:49:00.000-06:00

I wanted to do another epic Nederland adventure, and I decided to spare my car, taking the bus up instead. It was a very... interesting experience.

It was early on a Sunday morning, 8am to be exact, and I was standing at the bus station waiting for the 8:10 to Ned. A bus pulled up, and the driver got off in a huff, catching my attention right away. He was built like a beer barrel, round in every regard. He oozed "East Coast" out of every pore. I can't tell East Coast accents apart, but my best guess was New Joisey. He was obviously deeply irritated, and with a noise of annoyance, began operating the exterior wheelchair lift. At the top of the lift was a guy I've seen around Boulder and Denver almost as long as I can remember. He's basically a "professional homeless person." He scoots around in a battered wheelchair, with all these hand-lettered signs about how he was injured in "the war," and was burned over large portions of his body, etc. His face, indeed, does look pretty scarred. I don't want to cast doubt on the fact that he's not exactly cut out for holding a job, so he's doing the best he can. But I've heard rumors that he actually has a home in Denver, along with a wife and kids. His panhandling on the 16th Street Mall and the Pearl Street Mall is so lucrative that he seems to be making a decent living. He's definitely been around Boulder for at least 16 years in this exact state, virtually unchanged, because he was one of the first people I noticed when I moved here.

Anyway. He was being let down the wheelchair lift, but he was actually standing up next to his chair. I could tell that "Vinny" the bus driver thought he was a total fraud. I spent a few minutes pondering how Americans have an ingrained disrespect for people who don't work for a living. And lots of homeless folks I've talked to (while trying to photograph them for stories) have no interest in working. For them, panhandling in wealthy places like Boulder and downtown Denver is good enough to sustain them.

So the bus driver let the homeless guy out, grunted at me to load my bike, then stomped off to the station to announce the Nederland bus. So I loaded Bubba up:

There were now two hippies waiting to get on, as well... a man and a woman who didn't seem to know each other. And here I thought everyone in Nederland knew each other. Hmmm. The driver got on, changed the readout on the bus from Boulder Local to Nederland, rolled his roundness into the driver's seat, and then finally looked at us like we were bugs to incinerate with the magnifying glasses of his eyes. Whoa. Bad vibes, dude. And it's only 8am on a Sunday, for pete's sake. I made one last check on Bubba while the hippies get on. Vinny yelled at the female hippie for not having her student ID. He made no comment to me as I got on. Since I'm prone to carsickness, I sat in the front seat across from Vinny. We pulled away from the station, and this is fascinating: as we entered Boulder Canyon, Vinny actually crossed himself. No shit!! Spectacles, testicles, wallet, and watch. Then kissed his fingers. I stared at him in amazement.

Turns out he's a shitty driver. One of those supremely annoying people who can't just smoothly turn the steering wheel when going around corners. He would overcorrect, then jerk it back, over and over in the turns. And since the canyon has about nine hundred turns, this was pretty irritating. I kept peering over the dash to make sure Bubba didn't get jerked out of the rack and flung under the bus.

A while later we encountered a road cyclist riding up the canyon. I have no idea why roadies ride this canyon. Weekend traffic is hellacious, the road has little shoulder, and drivers can be pretty aggressive. And since there are about three other prettier, quieter canyons that will get you up to the higher country, I really don't get it. Well, Vinny of course found himself trying to pass this cyclist just as another car was coming the other way. He jerked the bus around the cyclist at the very last minute, scaring the crap out of me and the oncoming driver. I could see that guy's astonished face for a split second as he whipped past. I started wanting to cross myself, too.

At a stop just outside of Nederland, the male hippie got off. As he went down the stairs, he looked right at me with a big smile, very flirtatious. For some reason, nothing is funnier looking than a scrawny white guy with crappy dreadlocks and frumpy clothes trying to look sexy. Hippies actually remind me faintly of Puritans in their asexual-seeming, devout kind of commitment to wearing natural fibers, eating vegetarian, and being "pure" in their rejection of bathing. I gave him a huge grin because I just couldn't stop myself. He looked so comical.

Here's Barker Reservoir -- Nederland, next stop:

When we finally made it to Ned and Vinny's turning skills had not improved, I was thinking to myself: Wow. Now I really understand my friend who used to say that RTD stands for Reason To Drive.

But then my sense of compassion kicked in. I thought of my dad, who drove for Trailways and then Greyhound for years. He probably spent a lot of time just as irritated as this guy, for good reason. I don't know what came over me, but when I got off the bus, I smiled at Vinny and said, "I bet your day's going to get better." He shot back, "Nah it won't." Classic!! Yo, Vinny, have ya thawt about goin' back to Joisey? It seems like ya belong beaack theah. I stifled a giggle while getting the bike out of the rack. I was barely setting it down on the pavement, and Vinny actually honked at me, gesturing for me to put the rack back into its upright position. Nodding calmly, I complied. I stepped out of the way and Vinny immediately began to pull away. Then suddenly he stomped on the brakes. The door hissed open. He looked right at me. Like a person this time, not an insect. "Thanks," he said. "Really. Thank you." And then the bus swept away, leaving me in the peaceful silence of a mountain morning.

I looked around. Crystal clear sky, without a speck of pollution. Faint breeze in the trees. The sweet smell of pine. I took a deep breath and swung a leg over the bike. The sound of my cleats clipping into the pedals rang out into the quiet. There's no question... mountain biking is a gateway to so many interesting experiences. So is getting out of your car. For good or bad, this day's start was something very different from the usual.

Since it was early on a Sunday, I was hoping to not see too many other people. After a few brief encounters, I climbed out of the low-lying areas and was truly alone, and it was so peaceful and perfect. In the week since I had last been here, the aspens had gained some tiny leaves. Soon this trail will be inside a shady tunnel of flickering, spinning round leaves.

I returned to a place where I'd been doing some exploring before, and found some more fabulous singletrack.

Then I engaged in some self-photographic decapitation:

I explored on and on, not seeing a soul, enjoying the alternating mountain views and dense trees. After about three hours, I got extremely hungry and an energy bar was not going to cut it. So I retired to the Mountain People's Co-op in downtown Ned, for an Asian Cowboy sandwich (BBQ tofu... I like meat, but just wasn't in the mood) and some side dishes.
Ugly day for a picnic:

After some idle conversation with a family of locals, I finally roused myself for the ride down to Boulder, on Magnolia Road to avoid the aforementioned scary-ass Boulder Canyon. Boy, was I in for a surprise. I had only ridden Magnolia to Boulder once before, and it wasn't after three hours of nonstop riding. I had completely forgotten that you have to CLIMB out of Nederland, dragging your full belly, and continue climbing, for quite some time before the road becomes asphalt and then FINALLY, blessedly, goes downhill. Ugh, what a grind. I couldn't even stop to take a picture. I was too busy groaning at every false summit and getting sunburned.

But as always, when the ride was over, I couldn't get the smile off my face. And Vinny, even though your driving sucks and your religious behavior is disturbing, I will still continue to take the bus to Nederland.

Amazing Stuff

2006-05-18T21:15:00.000-06:00

Sometimes I am just floored by what people can accomplish. Check this out: this guy is blind, but he competes in downhill races. He follows a guide, and learns what's coming in the terrain by listening to that person's tires on the dirt. He can distinguish the type of soil, if it's rocky, if it's loose, dry, etc. He can hear that person turning, braking, etc. Totally cool!! I don't know if the guide calls out things to him or not... I kinda doubt he could hear the guide with the noise of riding, cheering, etc.

This guy is impressive as well. I don't know anything about him, except that he gets my admiration:

And on another note, here's another funky freaky from the sidelines. How do we get some of these folks at the Colorado races?

First Ned Ride of the Season

2006-05-11T18:21:00.000-06:00

No, it's not a man named Ned, you perverts!! I'm talking about the fabulous trails in Nederland, at 8,000 feet, which are just now getting dry enough to ride.

I headed up there on Sunday, and of course, even though I was looking for a nice steady ride by myself, I ended up running into a group of folks from BMA, the local trail advocacy group. I rode with them for a bit, not wanting to seem rude:

One of the guys wanted to shoot a group shot:

It's Jason, Botsie, John, Gary, Erin, me, and Mike. Several of these guys are board members of BMA. Gary recently got married, I learned, and I wanted to ask,"Does this mean you'll stop staring at my tits?" Because this guy was the worst I have ever seen. I really have to appreciate how young men have learned to leer more invisibly. Guys of Gary's age are just hopeless. But Gary does great work for mountain biking, so I used to always suffer in silence for the cause. Geez.

But eventually I realized I just wanted to ride alone. I usually love group rides, and these are all nice folks, but that day I really wanted to pedal in silence, and not stop so much. So with apologies, I took off on my own. I started climbing and climbing, and found my way up to some snowdrifts:

The weather was wacky! It would be sunny for a while, then cloud over and start snowing in this weird, mini-hailing kind of way, and then get sunny again. Meanwhile, the temperature held steady, so I never really had to put arm warmers on.

The trails were in great shape:

Ahhh, I love Ned. Now I'll be up there constantly!!

This Saturday is my next race, down in Lakewood. I'm going to hang with Joey afterwards. Maybe he'll shoot some photos for me to post!

Drool-Worthy

2006-04-27T16:02:00.000-06:00

I don't usually geek out about the equipment side of mountain biking; I'm usually a lot more concerned with the experience itself, but this time has got to be an exception.

My pal Andy introduced me to Scot Nichol of Ibis Bicycles, who bought back the company after selling it some years ago, and he's busy making some incredible carbon fiber mountain bikes.

Here's the Mojo, which is pretty damn eye-popping:

Here's the suspension link, which to my untrained eye, looks quite similar to the Maverick/I-Drive concept. I gotta go to the website and do my research, since I plan to write a column about all this.

Here's Scot, left, and Andy, holding one of the carbon road frames.

The only bummer about a mountain bike that beautiful is that I'd be WAY too nervous to ever crash it, so it would make me ride like a weenie.

Early Season Racing, Baby

2006-04-25T09:12:00.000-06:00

I did my first race of the season down in Nathrop this past weekend. Nathrop is a tiny little joint near Buena Vista (pronounced "Byoona Vista" of course) in central Colorado, with outstanding views of the Collegiate Peaks. My teammates Cindy and Noah and I drove down Friday night and stayed at the Byoona Vista Super 8. Here's the view from our room:

After laughing our asses off at a Jennifer Lopez-themed episode of South Park, we crashed out, and I had the most spectacularly terrible night's sleep I've had in a long time. It was a combination of caffeine abuse, songs stuck in my head, obsessive thoughts, and finding the bed too hard. I don't think Cindy and Noah slept that well, either. We sat at the breakfast table, hunched over more caffeine, staring at each other like extras from a backyard zombie movie. But after we drove to the venue and started checking things out, I began to feel really good.

We met two more teammates there, Steve and Ron, which gave us a great turnout from Blue Sky Velo. Steve knew the course, too, and was able to warn us about problem spots. Steve and Noah getting ready:

Me and Steve:

After warming up, we went to the staging area, and found that these training races (meaning they're supposed to be low-key and not super aggro) are so small that all the classes could be started in TWO waves. Cindy and I comprised the entire Sport women's class. :) We lined up with the Beginner and Sport men, which was awesome, because we were able to start as a team; plus I found the men a lot more fun to talk to in the start chute than the women. The men are less pent-up.

Soon enough, our wave started, and we all started hauling ass toward the first climb. Left to right, in the matching clothes, are Cindy, Steve, and me.

I got past as many people as I could, feeling surprisingly confident that I could hold them off. I was even more amazed when this turned out to be true! Only a couple of guys passed me on the climb, and then I found myself in perfect position for my fitness level... fast guys ahead, slow ones behind. I ended up racing the entire thing all alone, totally isolated, but it was good that way. It gave me a lot of leeway to work on the really difficult aspects of the course without feeling pressure.

And let me tell you, the course had some tough spots. Several really steep climbs, covered in a lethal combination of sand, soft soil, gravel, and larger loose rock. Traction was scarce. And then the downhills were even softer, like riding through cake mix and sand, while also being very narrow, exposed on one side, and at times slightly off-camber. Yikes. For whatever reason, though, I was psyched about all this. Conditions like that are a weakness for me, and I found myself very motivated to practice every technique I could think of. I had nothing but positive thoughts in my head, even after several minor slide-out style crashes on the downhills. I was learning that you have to just surf your bike down this stuff. Forget actually having any traction... it's just a barely-controlled slide.

My dedication to the yucky stuff was rewarded with an awesome section of singletrack by a creek, blessed with hardpacked soil, fast swooping turns, and logs to bunnyhop. I couldn't get the grin off my face in this section, and even whooped out loud, I was having such a good time. There was no answering holler, though... either the racers behind me couldn't breathe, or I had a substantial gap on anyone behind me.

I came through the start/finish area even more psyched for lap number two, because my lungs had finally stopped hurting. :) I've been off the bike for two weeks, so my lungs weren't quite up for that kind of intensity. I attacked the climbs again, trying to relax and pedal smoothly so I wouldn't spin out. On the second climb, I made it through a really steep, nasty part, and a guy who was hanging out there called out, "Nice job! No one else has ridden that!" I figured he meant out of my group of slower folks, NOT the pros, but it was gratifying nonetheless. Then I managed to hit the downhills even faster than lap one, but my overconfidence took me down twice more. And still I found that I coudn't view this negatively... I was having too much fun. Each time I just jumped back on and resumed my mental coaching.

I keep remarking on this, because it was such an unusual mind state for me. Not that I'm a ball of negativity or anything, but I'm frequently very self-critical about my riding ability. To be so mentally aggressive and non-judgemental was a fabulous way to race, and I realized that in another frame of mind, I probably would have hated that course. It was pretty eye-opening to see how much my own mind affected my experience.

I finished strong, passing two more men on the long fire road to the end. I was amazed to see how much the past two weeks of hiking, running and weight lifting have strengthened my legs. They had energy to burn.

I found the rest of my teammates, except for Cindy, who was still on the course. Noah and Steve had top-ten finishes, while poor Ron had broken his derailleur hanger and had to drop out. That sucks to drive for hours only to get half an hour of racing in. Bummer. When Cindy arrived, we had a great team "debriefing," comparing notes on the crappy sections and how much we loved the trail by the creek.

So I won my first race ever, but it's pretty meaningless with Cindy and I being the only ones there. Cindy was upset with the way she rode, which was a bummer, but she's even more self-critical than I am, I think. Cindy is one tough cookie who has endurance for DAYS from all her years of competing in triathlons. She needs to be patient with the transition to the much higher-intensity style of racing that is mountain biking. It takes your body time to adapt. I mean, let's face it -- if I tried to do a triathlon right now, I'd fall down twitching and crying by the time the run started. :)

Here's my girl:

At any rate, I'm so excited to have the season started, and that trip was exactly the sort of thing I've been dying to do -- road trips with the team to gorgeous locations and fun riding/racing. Yahoooo!!

Speaking of Spectating...

2006-04-19T16:08:00.000-06:00

This is hilarious!

My dear friend Sarah, the fabulous mountain biker shown on the right side of the picture, sent me this. Awesome. Maybe I need to move to Boise??

Yo, Check it Out!

2006-04-17T17:29:00.000-06:00

This week's column is up! You can find it here.

All Blue Skies

2006-04-13T17:36:00.000-06:00

Not much going on in my neck of the woods, but my team is ramping up on the road racing side of things.

Here are a few photos (not taken by me) at last weekend's Boulder Roubaix race.

Here are the Cat.4 guys getting their game faces on:

Here's my girl Cindy getting her 2nd place medal in the 35+ category. She also won a six pack of beer:

Here's Katie, our Cat. 4 roadie who has already won several races. I think it's time for an upgrade. Plus she has her arm warmers on the wrong arms :) But who can argue with her -- she took home the medal!

I may bring back some photos from this weekend's road race, as well.

I'm a Dork

2006-04-06T11:45:00.000-06:00

but I wanted to show off our new team kit. Pretty cool. Some folks think the two different colored arm warmers, shorts legs and socks are lame, but I think it's fine. For a self-portrait, this came out decently composed, I think.

Riding the Desert's Edge

2006-04-04T16:30:00.000-06:00

I should have posted this yesterday, but my cycling column ran, and it actually ranked #7 out of the top ten stories read on our website that day. Crazy! Considering that there's a lot going on in the news right now - not least of which is the RTD bus drivers' strike, leaving many commuters stranded - that's a pretty impressive ranking.

If you're not totally sick of hearing about Fruita, go here to check it out.

Thanks for reading!

One More Photo

2006-03-30T10:24:00.000-07:00

Jason persuaded another cyclist to shoot this for us at the end of our great ride on Saturday:

Now I'm just struggling with the decision about whether or not to head back there this weekend. I'm feeling better, but I can imagine that strenuous mountain biking would just break me down again. Rats. I'll talk to Brad and get some outside perspective.

How Often Does Perfection Happen?

2006-03-28T15:33:00.000-07:00

Not too often, but this weekend embodied it! Everything about the weekend was ideal. We left Boulder early Thursday, Jules and T.J. in their car with little Lilliana, and Amanda and I in my car. We stopped in Glenwood as planned. It's obviously a very commercialized hot springs, but it's still very enjoyable. The pool is huge, and is hottest (like 108 degrees) near the source, and then coolest (probably about 78) at the farthest end, giving you many options for hangout spots. We explored the full length of the pool, noticing how hot water seeped out of the cracks. The water smelled faintly of sulfur and other minerals, and seemed smooth as silk. The surrounding hillsides had snow and it was about 40 degrees out, with the sun on our shoulders. Perfect weather for a hot springs. I didn't shoot any photos there, but Amanda did, so maybe later I can add one to this post.

We continued on the road, reaching Fruita at about 4pm. We unloaded our stuff into Casa Fruita, a fabulous house owned by a Longmont couple who rent it out to mountain bikers and wine afficianados. The house is beautiful, filled with cycling art, and blessed with a huge kitchen, space for eight to sleep, wireless internet, DVD player, stereo, and a garage with bike workstand. Needless to say, the place kicks ass. I was SO glad we stayed there! It made the trip that much more pleasant, with home-cooked meals, music, and safe storage for the bikes.

I jumped on my bike and decided that since I couldn't take any more of the car, I'd ride out 18 Road. I had forgotten how long that road is! It took me 50 minutes at an aerobic pace to make it to the singletrack of Prime Cut.

Love that sunset light. I got totally sucked in by the sinuous trail and could not force myself to leave until the sun was already dipping below the horizon. I zoomed back down Prime Cut and hauled ass as fast as I could back to La Casa, making it there just as total darkness was setting in. It was a really pleasant solo ride.

The next day, I got up and found Jules getting ready to ride -- with a passenger:

Jules and Amanda and I rode while T.J. looked after the baby. We did some trails on the Kokopelli side... Rustler's Loop, part of Mary's Loop, and Horsethief Bench, one of my favorites. Jules, who used to ride constantly until she got pregnant and then broke her ankle, was overjoyed to finally be riding again. Amanda has done some mountain biking in her hometown of Annapolis, but totally impressed us with her fearlessness of the technical aspects. Sadly, though, she's a smoker in addition to being from sea level, so I watched her with some trepidation as she bent over her handlebars, gasping for air, at the tops of hills. She complained of her airways closing up, and I was terrified I'd be forced to test out my never-used CPR certification on her. Thankfully, nothing happened, and she seemed to suffer her breathlessness with good humor.

That night, two more folks arrived, Jules' former roommate Shelly, and her husband Jason. They're very fun people as well, and since they live in Westminster, I may get to ride with them again in the future. Jules had brought an entire turkey, of all things, so we enjoyed Thanksgiving in March.

The next day, everyone but T.J. and I headed out to ride the Bookcliffs. I really wanted to ride with T.J., and he had baby duty for the morning while Jules rode, so we planned our ride for the afternoon. He and I went to the coffee shop for a little while, where I saw two Boulderites. I swear I am absolutely not exaggerating when I say that I never see these people in Boulder, but I see them in Fruita almost every time I go there. It's like they read my mind or something.

When the group returned and had lunch, T.J. and I got ready to go. Jason decided to take on an entire day of riding and came with us. We were psyched to ride Troy Built, a trail none of us had ever ridden. It's built, obviously, by Troy Rarick, the man who owns the bike shop and singlehandedly turned Fruita into a mountain bike destination.

We rocked some Pantera on the way there, and I was just itching to get on the bike. We started hauling ass right from the car, and I felt incredible, like there was no chain on my bike. I love that feeling!! It seemed so effortless, which is a rare reward in a sport that usually feels like very hard work. I was charging the hills, railing the turns, and flying over the technical stuff. I could not pry the grin off my face. I couldn't dream of a better day -- the weather was warm, the trails were in perfect condition, the company was wonderful, and Troy Built was a fantastic joyride.

Artsy fartsy shot of Jason:

T.J. and Jason on Lion's Loop:

Then T.J. wanted to shoot the same photo with me in it, which I could hardly refuse:

We finished not long before sunset, and after three hours of zooming around, I still had energy left. I couldn't believe it. It's a testament to the consistent training I've been doing, that's for sure. I've never ended a ride in Fruita without feeling completely blown out! It was a refreshing end to a killer day of riding. We made it even sweeter by grilling steaks and salmon with baked potatoes and salad on the side. Yum!!

Sunday morning was the last quickie ride for us, since all of us except Jules and T.J. were driving home that afternoon. It was windy and chilly, a far cry from the previous day's balmy warmth, so we layered on all our clothes and headed up to the Bookcliffs, where there was some possibility for dropping down out of the wind.

Jason on Chutes and Ladders: (I was always shooting him because he was always right behind me!)

After a hot shower and lunch, we made our goodbyes and headed out. We decided to forego the hot springs on the way back, because we heard there was bad weather over the mountains. But the driving home was just as easy as the drive out! What more could you ask for from a weekend road trip???

The only thing that would make that even better would be... you guessed it -- another trip back THIS weekend! My teammate Cindy and I are planning on it, because her brother-in-law, who lives in Grand Junction, invited us to stay at his house. The only stipulation is that I need to be feeling better... I woke up yesterday morning with a raging sore throat. We'll see what happens, but another chance at Troy Built, as well as stuff we didn't ride, like Moore Fun and Mack Ridge, would be fantastic!

And this time, I better not see either of those two Boulder folks stalking me. :)

Fruita, Here I Come!

2006-03-22T09:28:00.000-07:00

Here's what the weather looks like here, as I take the mountain bike to the shop for cleaning because I don't want to wash it out in the snow:

Here's what it looks like in Fruita:

Plus we're stopping in Glenwood Springs for a soak in the water. Niiiice.

I am sooo ready to rip up the trails!

Happy St. Paddy's Day!

2006-03-17T13:46:00.001-07:00

I'm only a tiny bit Irish, if any, nor do I drink, but I made sure to wear green today so I wouldn't get pinched by all the "adopted" Irish people out there in the world. It's a good thing, too, because I had to go to the local Irish pub and shoot pictures of people who were already completely blitzed at noon. Wow, once you're that pissed, how do you manage to keep it up for another twelve hours??

For me, St. Patrick's Day is my anniversary at the newspaper. Today, if fact, marks ten years at this job. Here's my press pass photo from five years ago:

This is an interesting profession... I've had experiences that I could never replicate. I've flown over wildfires in small planes. I've been tear gassed at riot scenes. I've watched a man take his last breath as I sat next to him. I see my community from the inside; I see its highs and lows, I meet the people who accomplish incredible things as well as the people who screw up. I get to spend chunks of time inside the lives of others. Even on a scale as small as Boulder County, this is fascinating stuff.
But at the same time, I've spent more mindless hours in my car, driving around this county, than anyone I know (maybe I should meet a UPS driver so I'll feel better about myself). I've spent far too much time that I'll never get back photographing at meetings, people at computers, and pictures of the weather. I can't go into a coffee shop and try to read a book without being interrupted by five people that know me and want to chat. I can't afford to buy a new car, take a vacation any farther away than I can drive, or purchase furniture for my apartment (my desk is a door, straddling two filing cabinets). I see the struggles of the newspaper industry and wonder where my career is headed. And most of all, I can't figure out if my work actually has meaning for me on a deep level anymore -- and what I would do instead. This is something I hope to answer before St. Paddy's Day, 2007.

But I gotta add something that so far has made it all worthwhile.... SIX WEEKS OF VACATION A YEAR!! Yeah, baby!! This job has enabled me to do a lot of other things that I love: bike racing, Dirt Camps, tons of bike trips, and interesting freelance opportunities. And it's simple work. Once the next day's paper is on the presses, I go home and sleep like a baby. Ahhhhh.

The Wheelie Master

2006-03-16T09:04:00.000-07:00

I finished my next cycling column yesterday, complete with story, still photos, and video, about Matt Fisher, the Wheelie Master.

This guy can wheelie for blocks at a time, up stairs, down stairs, on road bikes, on kids' bikes, you name it, he can wheelie it. And then there's my friend Nick Martin, who has long wanted to be able to wheelie. After a few minutes' coaching from Matt, Nick made significant improvement -- I think he's on his way of reaching his dream: to wheelie across the finish line when winning a NORBA pro mountain bike race.

Nick took this of me at work:

I'm hoping the column works out okay... there's a lot less space available this time. And I had to shoot the videos on my crappy little point-and-shoot camera, so they are going to be tiny on the web. People will have to glue their faces to the screen to see anything. But I'm hoping we can run the vids in slow motion so people can really see what Matt's doing with his body to make the wheelie happen.

Now I gotta learn it!!

Reminiscing

2006-03-15T09:07:00.000-07:00

I was going through some more photos, searching for bike-related stuff to send to a prospective freelance employer, and I found this:

Instructors Dave Nash and Akira Yasuda and me, standing at Gemini Bridges during a Moab Dirt Camp a few years ago. Ahhh, the memories! I really, really miss Dirt Camps. I can't even express how much. Those days were the most fun and most fulfilling experiences of my life (along with a few special assignments for the paper). It's hard to explain to people why teaching mountain biking is so gratifying. Adults often don't make a point of learning new things, especially athletic things, and it is just SO cool to watch them ride things that they were convinced they could never do. They get these huge grins on their faces, and the cameraderie of the group makes the accomplishment even more rich. It gives these people, who are normally very busy with jobs, families, and other demands, a bit of time for themselves; and they take the renewed confidence back to other areas of their lives. Dirt Camp clients were always such cool people, so diverse, so interesting and funny.

I just have to work hard to help Akira and Dave bring RipStoke up to speed, so we can have camps like that again.

Doing Time

2006-03-15T08:57:00.000-07:00

is bad enough, but when you have another person sleeping on the floor of your cell, watching you take a leak, etc., it's gotta really suck.

Austin Fisk mops his cell in the Special Management Module at the Boulder County Jail on Friday. He shares his room, meant as a single, with another inmate, who sleeps in the plastic bed on the floor. This module, which houses inmates with special needs, was built to contain 16 people. As of Friday morning, 25 men were housed there.

Or how about this dorm:

Albert Luna Jr. reads a magazine in his top bunk in Dormitory D at the Boulder County Jail on Friday. The dorm was built for 40 people, but as of Friday morning it held 50. Some single bunks had to be built into doubles to accommodate more people.

And get this... our jail just had an addition built last year. Doesn't make you feel too good about the state of the world, does it? Luckily, this assignment isn't as bad as it looks. The inmates are usually happy to have any attention, and since I was escorted around by the jail commander, no one even so much as looked at me funny. Although Austin called me "sweetheart," ha ha. Actually, for whatever reason, I've always had an interest in the correctional system. And maybe because I'm such a restless person, who can barely stand to stay at home when I'm sick, I'm morbidly fascinated with the horror of being locked up. I know I couldn't stand it. I'd be driving people nuts by constantly pacing and doing pushups or something.

Swingin'

2006-03-10T13:08:00.000-07:00

I went swing dancing last night, with Phil, Juliet and Kerry. What a blast!! We went to the Mercury Cafe in Denver, where we had a lesson, and then an hour or so of putting together everything we learned. Those guys had been before, but I wasn't too lost, since Zack and I had learned the basic steps as part of a teaching program he did for work. But I had to learn to do turns and keep it together while all sorts of new things were added. Juliet was kind enough to find other partners while Phil brought me up to speed, and he was very good-natured as I stumbled around adding about sixteen steps to turns that should have been two. At least I didn't step on his feet!

The people-watching was great -- lots of folks of every age, size, color and shape out there having fun, some learning like us, others competitive dancers who were mind-bogglingly good. And the music was great. I love swing music. I know this will come as a shock to those who know what a metal head I am these days, but you know, it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing. Frank Sinatra doing "Mack the Knife" and that song that always makes me think of my mom, "The Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy From Company B." Totally cool. I was always watching the older folks, imagining what it was like to be a young person when the swing craze first hit.

After learning way too many turns and variations to possibly contain in my feeble mind, and experiencing a competely deflated hairdo, I managed to peel the grin off my face and be persuaded to leave. I might have to go again next week! Cindy and her husband Matt swing dance, too, so maybe I can drag them along next time.

The Face In the Mirror

2006-03-09T12:07:00.000-07:00

Heh heh, this is funny. I found it while digging around in my personal archives. This is from when they tore down Crossroads Mall, and we were doing a story on Resource 2000's efforts to recycle a lot of the building materials.

I had some long-ass hair then -- for me, anyway.

Here's what guys look like on the job; I call this picture Gear Envy:

Because men LOVE to talk about gear. My buddy Patrick Kramer, right, left the business and is now a Longmont firefighter. Only working ten days a month, heck yeah! And Esdrass Suarez went from the Rocky Mountain News to the Boston Globe, I think. I'm sure no one there can roll the R in his first name, that's for sure. :)

Consumer Equipment Sucks

2006-03-07T14:32:00.000-07:00

I thought I was shooting a nice picture of Cindy against Long's Peak during our groovy mountain bike ride on Sunday, but it wasn't until I downloaded the photo that I realized how outstandingly awful the digital zoom is on my point-and-shoot camera.

Wow. Even if I wasn't a professional snob about camera equipment, I would think that sucks. There's absolutely nothing sharp about that!

For comparison, the wide shots are fine:

Dang, to think that camera, worth probably $150 today, cost me $400 three or four years ago. Oh well. Such is the nature of electronics. I'll make sure to only shoot wide stuff from now on...

Red tea at Amante:

The fantastic Christmas cactus given to me by Zack:

I gave my two weeks' notice at the gym on Saturday. I really need to earn some more money still, but I think I've only got about two weeks of this left in me. I've decided to lay off the two jobs while I can still be relatively cheerful about it... I'll deal with my financial situation as best I can. Maybe the universe will help me out by sending some freelance work my way.

However, I actually will miss that job. It was fun in many ways. Very social, easy, and mostly mellow. I got to meet a lot of cool people and got in several really interesting conversations with the late-night crowd. Plus, I will miss the access to the gym, since I'm too broke to actually be a member there. :) But it's okay, I'll buy an exercise ball and some dumbbells for my house (don't go there with the dumbbell jokes, folks!).

A Bike With an F-Bomb

2006-03-02T21:14:00.000-07:00

I saw this bike outside Amante the other day, right near a funky old Vespa. I blasted off this messy shot with the point and shoot:

Here's the aforementioned bomb:

This doesn't help you make friends, does it?

Then I had to go full force into the cliched shadow shot, but hey, it's cause they're fun to shoot.

I need to post some REAL photos from work... this stuff makes me feel like a slack-ass, but it's keeping my interest in photography alive, so it's worth its weight in gold. :-)

Finally

2006-02-27T16:50:00.000-07:00

My first cycling column ran in the paper this past weekend. It's nothing special, but feel free to check 'er out... I pasted it at the bottom of this post because logging onto the paper's website sucks. You have to waste all this time registering. If you want to see how it looked on the website, feel free to go there and search for "North Rim Trail."
I should be cranking out another column soon!

I'm a bit off the back with my blog because my home computer crapped out and spent some time being futzed with by the kind folks at the Mac Shack, who have a shop cat, of all cool things. Just about every local business in Boulder has some dog lying around, but leave it to the Mac folks to break the mold.

I'll be back in business here shortly.

Cindy Vanover of Longmont rides the North Rim Trail.
_______________________________________________________________________
North Rim Trail can ease those Arizona blues
By Marty Caivano, Camera Staff Writer
February 25, 2006

This time of year, I get the itch. I ogle magazine spreads, troll Web sites and get lost in lurid fantasies. If I don't get my fix soon, I will do something unsavory to satisfy myself ... like spend a lot of money traveling to Arizona.

If you, too, are yearning for a taste of singletrack this winter, you can stave off the itch by riding a new-to-you bit of dirt in your own backyard.

The good, old Boulder Reservoir provides a place to start. Now, before you roll your eyes and tell me you've ridden that area more times than you've watched Simpsons reruns, I must encourage you to check out the North Rim Trail. Affectionately known among mountain bikers as The Trophy Home Singletrack, it sneaks behind a row of prairie mansions near the Lake Valley golf course and adds a fresh section of slender fun to the dirt highways of the reservoir. It connects the Sage Trail to Niwot Road, allowing you to ride west on Niwot Road for about a mile and catch the Lefthand Trail, where it terminates near the trailhead of the same name, creating a killer loop that is frequently free of other users.

If you think the trails at the Rez are boring on your mountain bike, try a cyclocross bike, or you can even ride your road bike with some heavy-duty tires if you feel like it. Just be sure to bring extra supplies in case you get a flat.

To find the trail, turn north off the Sage Trail on a gravelly connector that looks as if it merely dead-ends into some large homes. Go through the gate and follow the trail as it winds northeast; soon you'll find yourself on the North Rim.

Judging by the condition of the trail, it doesn't see a lot of riding. When I rode it last fall, I had to bushwhack through an overgrowth of weeds, grasses and thistles, emerging with legs that looked like they'd been attacked by territorial prairie dogs. I'm happy to report that last weekend the situation was much more pleasant. A few more knobbies had come through to clear the trail, and Mother Nature's herbal bounty has hunkered down for the winter. The February sun slanted between the golden thistles, and the gradual upslope revealed, upon looking back, a wide-open view of the reservoir, the mountains and Boulder, domed by a cobalt sky. As a friend and I cruised along the narrow strip of dirt, there was not another person in sight.

I won't lie to you, though. Riding around the reservoir does expose cyclists to the elements. And you all know what element I mean — the one that's been challenging your sanity on a regular basis this winter. We listed sideways in the howling wind, like drunks angling toward the doorway to the bathroom.
"Wow, this is some wind," my cohort yelled.

"WHAT?" I shouted.

As we approached the section of trail directly behind the homes — and I do mean directly, so be prepared for dogs charging their fences — we got out of the wind with an abruptness that made us catch our breath. That's the kind of wind that pulls the saliva out of your mouth if you're breathing hard. God, I hate that. Note to self: Start saving money for trip to Sedona.

The trail goes up the slope, turns a corner around a house, marches over a wooden bridge, and pops you out onto Golf Club Drive for a brief stretch before hitting Niwot Road. While we were tempted to turn around and haul the mail back down, we decided to expose ourselves to more wind in exchange for the swoopy bliss of the Lefthand Trail, where I have twice seen bald eagles gliding overhead. This section is frequently devoid of people as well, with a few fun climbs, descents, bridges and carve-ready turns to keep things interesting.

If you're really looking for a long ride, turn off the Lefthand Trail just north of the picnic shelter on a gravel road that will put you out onto Neva Road. Take it up to U.S. 36 to Lefthand Canyon and ride Heil Valley Ranch. Don't freak out about the asphalt — it's only two measly miles to the dirt road of Geer Canyon. This epic ride will only get more gonzo and fabulous when the Heil-to-Hall Ranch connector is built. Think of the possibilities! Note to self: scrap Sedona. Save money for new bike.

Contact Camera photographer Marty Caivano at caivanom@dailycamera.com.

The New Team

2006-02-21T09:24:00.000-07:00

After much redesign, discussion and rumor, my new team, Blue Sky Velo, has finally completed our new kits.

I'm really happy with the final design. I think it looks clean and stylish, with good colors. No raging orange or aerodynamic, flying boobs.

The additional bonus is that my bike is blue. I've never had a kit match my bike before... that will be cool! Too bad we have to wait another month for the actual clothing. We're going to have matching socks this year, too, so I can look even more professional while going slower than a tortoise on quaaludes.

Chomping at the Bit

2006-02-16T15:02:00.000-07:00

There's a free publication here called Rocky Mountain Sports, and every year at this time they put out an issue called "The Keeper," which is basically an enormous calendar of every event happening in every sport. I started reading the mountain bike section and totally got my knickers in a twist over all the fun stuff happening this summer. Races, clinics, festivals, presentations -- it fairly boggles the mind. I can't wait! I'm really hoping to stay injury free and have my best-ever fitness this year, which should make this stuff even more fun. And as always, there's my yearly trip to Crested Butte. It's truly the highlight of my season.

And then there are trips to Fruita:

And skills sessions with Akira:

And hanging out with my team:

This year I really want to travel to a few more races that are farther away. I'm envisioning some great road trips with my teammates and other pals, laughing our asses off, hollering for each other at finish lines, and embellishing/exaggerating our race stories at the end of the day. ("Dude, I just KILLED everybody on that steep downhill," etc.)

And hopefully ripping a few legs off at the Winter Park races! Booyah!!

Spartacus the Specialized

2006-02-10T12:28:00.000-07:00

"One bike's epic story of overnight weight loss!"

Last night I watched (and helped a tiny bit) while Cindy's bike got some major upgrades. You can see a new fork, Avid mechanical disk brakes, cassette, XTR rear derailleur and chain, and (not shown) Mavic CrossMax wheels. This bike is going be super sweet.

The work happened at Blue Sky Cycles, the fabulous new shop that is sponsoring our race team. Here is Commander In Chief Rob Love, with Cindy looking on, as Spartacus' starting weight is recorded as 29.7 lbs. Definitely heavy by race standards. Rob estimates the bike will lose about a pound a half. (Equivalent, perhaps, of me losing 15 pounds?)

Cindy meets our good friend Stan. Bye bye, flats!

And the makeover is almost complete....

This ride has most certainly been pimped. As Rob would say, "Word."

Unfortunately, the night ran long, so the bike has not yet been fully completed, nor it's weight re-checked. I will update this post when the bike is ready for its closeup.

Now Cindy will become invinceable on the race circuit, ripping legs off in all directions. Look out!!

Here's What I See Most Mornings

2006-02-09T08:25:00.000-07:00

Every weekday, like a lot of other schmucks, I have to get up in the dark. But after a few minutes, if I look out the window, I see something like this, and it makes it more worthwhile:

And I thought I'd throw in another photo from my ride with Cindy:

I need a helmet cam!

Note to Self: Don't Paraglide Into the Wind

2006-02-08T15:34:00.000-07:00

Some poor soul had a paragliding accident on Monday. I've never seen this before, and felt really, really bad for the guy. He was screaming and hollering obscenities the whole way down the hillside while being carried by rescuers. He apparently had a pretty bad head injury, but it certainly didn't affect his ability to remember foul language. But he was in a lot of pain, obviously, so I won't pass any judgement.

Members of the city of Boulder fire department, Rocky Mountain Rescue, and Pridemark Paramedics carry Matthew Hecker, 21, whose paraglider collapsed on Monday morning, down the hillside near Wonderland Lake. Hecker is in critical condition with head injuries at Denver Health Medical Center.

I thought I was going to break my own leg and need rescuing from RUNNING down this rocky-ass slope while photographing. I was very impressed with how fast these people could hustle while carrying the injured guy. They didn't waste a single second getting him down to the ambulance.

Another interesting thing was that some friend of his chased me and the television guy up the slope, begging us not to shoot the injured guy's picture. As kindly as I could, I replied that he really didn't get a choice. Someone doing something to require this kind of response is going to get in the newspaper and on TV. End of story. I added, "You know, paragliding here is perfectly legal. He's not going to get in trouble or anything." The kid responded, "Yeah, but it looks bad for the sport." HUH?? Here this guy's friend is battling some serious injuries, and THAT's what this dude is worried about?? I responded, "Every sport has accidents. It's not the end of the world," and ignored him thereafter. Sheesh.

Yeah, Now I'm a "Writer"

2006-02-08T15:27:00.000-07:00

I've started writing a cycling column for the paper again. I don't get paid any extra to do it, of course, but it will be fun, because the guy newly in charge of the outdoor section wants to make the stories more whimsical, or edgy, or whatever you want to call it. Plus then I'll have some writing samples, however weird they may be, for future use.

The first column will be not that exciting; just a Bike of the Week, but the following one should be more interesting. I won't give away my topic just yet, but I'll keep you all posted when it runs.

The Bike of the Week will feature my friend Cindy:

I'll post a link when it runs in the paper.

The Other Side of Erie

2006-02-08T15:00:00.000-07:00

Yes, the town I wanted to call Eerie has an older, less yuppie side, and weirdly enough, it's the neighborhood next to the airport. I know, that sounds like the start of a comedy skit, but there really is a substantial group of homes around the airport, and some of them have been there a long time.

And don't worry, Beth -- I remember your place in Erie, and it's nowhere near the section that's practically in Nebraska. :-)

Anyhow, we did a story on dome homes, and this couple in Erie loves flying, so they bought this double-dome home --which everyone calls the Dolly Parton House -- right off the runway. And you guessed it: one of the domes holds their plane.

The house side:

The hangar:

It will come as no surprise to you that the house was built in 1978 (gee, what gave it away?) by another fly-happy pilot who wanted to taxi right out of his house and take off. I wonder if you just radio the air traffic controller from your driveway?

I thought the house was pretty ugly, to be honest, but I loved the concept. I want a house with a garage that leads right onto a zillion miles of singletrack. And it should have a power-wash chamber that you step into after riding that washes you AND the bike with zero effort. Sweet! Frank Lloyd Wright, eat your heart out.

Living In Paradise

2006-02-01T09:18:00.000-07:00

So this is funny. The whole concept is warped, in my humble opinion. Sunset Magazine named Erie, Colorado as one of the West's best suburbs. Ha ha ha!! Now, if you've ever been to Erie, it's one of those creepy Stepford-Wives kind of nasty-ass subdivisions just sitting in a big pile of mud out on the prairie. If what's important to you is a grossly oversized yet sadly unoriginal tract home painted one of three approved shades of taupe, slapped up as quickly as possible with 300 others, because you don't want to spend an equal amount of money on a smaller, maybe older home in an established town -- you'll love it! I bet you'll also love your 45-minute commute each way to work that robs you of not only hard-earned money in gasoline, but valuable time you could be spending sleeping, with your children, learning something new, or any number of other more useful things. I'm always amazed at the way people choose to live that seems so ass-backwards to me. I mean, not that I think everyone has to think like me... thank god they don't! But I just can't relate to some folks' priorities. When I'm on my death bed, am I really going to be happy that I spent 85% of my adult life working and driving to work because I felt the shallow compunction to own a cardboard box out in the boonies -- and to basically destroy a beautiful piece of prairie or farmland -- rather than a more modest house in a town close to my job? What the hell.

Anyway, what good is a blog if you can't rant like a pretentious know-it-all? :-)

But the flip side of this assignment is that I actually made a couple of nice photos of an Erie family:

Tyler Hahn, 8, left, runs ahead of his brother, Nathan, 6, his sister Trinity, 3, and mother Kim as the family walks to a nearby park in Erie's Vista Ridge subdivision, where they moved two years ago. Sunset Magazine recently named Erie one of the West's best suburbs for quality of life.

Nathan Hahn, 6, center, laughs as his mother, Kim, spins him around in a swing at a park in Erie's Vista Ridge subdivision.

I especially liked the top photo because it showed good reaction skills on my part. I didn't even look through the camera. As soon as I saw the boy start to run, I just whipped up my hand and shot from the hip.
Aspiring photographers always freak out when I advise them to do a whole series of photos without looking through the viewfinder, because they're so attached to the idea that their "lofty thought process" is what makes them photographers. While this may be true in other photographic disciplines, photojounalism is all about reacting to what's actually happening in the world, and trying to communicate the feeling of a place or event. I feel like I got that across here, at least on some level.

Okay, I'll shut my pie hole now!! :-)

Searching for a Clue

2006-01-27T15:45:00.000-07:00

Ever have one of those days where you can't figure out where the hell you're going? In life, I mean? (Yes, look out, this Existential Crisis is brought to you by the Institute for Shambling Through Life Without a Plan, also known as, The Marty School of Follow Your Bliss, Then Get Your Ass Lost.) I mean, seriously. It's like that funny sign I saw somewhere: "This life is only a test. If this were a real life, you'd be told where to go and what to do."

My friend Beth and I were talking about this the other night. Both of us have come a certain distance in our lives and now the progress seems to have ground to a halt. What's next? Beth has no love for her job, although she's very good at it and makes more money than I do in my so-called "fun, cool" job. I don't hate my job by any means, but I'm teetering on the crumbling cliffside of financial instability -- mainly because my salary, for all intents and purposes, is not increasing. I'm the dodo bird of journalism (pun not exactly intended, but I guess it's apt enough) because I actually prefer small-town reporting, and so I've never moved on to that big metro newspaper that would pay me a living wage. But by the same token, things in Boulder have gotten a bit stale for me, and I've lost the idealism that fueled my passion for visual reportage, back in the day. (That's a whole separate topic, there!) And now I've reached a level of stagnation, where I have no money to take any risks in my career without the specter of debt, and anyway, now the whole destination's gotten obscured.

I've always been a person who had strong ideas of what I wanted and went after them-- even if they were dumb ideas-- so this state of not-knowing is foreign and oppressive to me. I fumble about, thinking that moving elsewhere is the answer, or that wholesale career change is the answer, but I can't any concrete ideas about either one. So I periodically annoy whatever friends or boyfriends who are handy with my mental/emotional navel-gazing and tail-chasing. Then I give up and pursue other passions, while I wait for the light bulb to come on. Time passes, I finally notice it's still dark in here. Crap, what's up with that? I grope around for the light switch or something else as quick-fix, and discover that I still haven't the vaguest idea of how to solve my problem.

I've been doing some field research on other careers lately, but none of them really sound appealing either. Can't I just jump on my high-wheeler and ride off into the sunset??

I have to say in defense of my life, though,that none of it truly sucks. I have a really good time with the vast majority of it -- living simply, riding my bike, enjoying my friends and the great outdoors, with little pressure or stress. My job meets my basic needs and allows me six glorious weeks of vacation to immerse myself in the things I enjoy. But the lack of deeper meaning is an insidious beast, sneaking up on me in moments of weakness. Are our lives even SUPPOSED to have a so-called "higher meaning?" Sometimes I think that's a cruel joke to make ordinary people living ordinary lives feel shitty about themselves. Perhaps in reality, meaning is in the details of life; how you interact with the people you care about, how you perform small duties each day, whether you help or hurt the situations in your immediate influence, etc. Perhaps all this big-picture fixating just distracts us from the real stuff we should be doing on the small scale.

Hell if I know, huh?? Now I've just dragged you all into my philosophical spin cycle. There's no shame in using the sick bag. :-)

Sorry About Your Penis

2006-01-26T09:49:00.000-07:00

I can't take credit for that great quote... it comes from the unrivaled humor of my friend Akira Yasuda, trials and mountain biker extraordinaire.

But here's my contribution to the FUH2 movement of disgust and loathing of ostentatious consumerism and wastefulness:

Now, I know, this is the height of laziness, to shoot this without even getting out of my car, but to wax photo-jargony for a minute, I like the framing device of my own car window; plus, it gives the viewer the feeling of the H2 blotting out the very universe, as I felt when it pulled up next to me.

Dude. I REALLY am sorry about your little problem.

ASS - fault

2006-01-23T10:51:00.000-07:00

Stop the presses! -- I actually did a road ride yesterday. Yeah, yeah, I know, it's snowing in Hell right now. Recent moisture and cold weather have rendered the trails unrideable, so I figured I'd succomb to my teammate Cindy's peer pressure to go on a road ride with her and some friends.

I rode out to Longmont to join them, since I was supposed to be doing a pretty long day, and on the way I encountered a guy changing a flat tire. I slowed down to make sure that he had everything he needed, and he totally recognized me. "Marty! How are you? What's up?" etc. True to form for me, I had NO IDEA who this guy was! He was in Louisville Cyclery clothes, but that didn't clue me in... and he was bundled up against the cold, which made it worse. I made the best small talk I could, then escaped as quickly as possible. He could probably tell with no trouble that I was totally clueless. God, I hate that!

When I got to Longmont, surviving the expected close encounters with penis-compensating rednecks in jacked-up pickups, I found the girls at the Dyslexia Cafe. (This coffee shop used to be called Gizzi's, and was a sponsor of our bike team. Now they're still a sponsor, but out of the blue they changed their name to Ziggi's. HUH??? I'm still waiting for an explanation on that one.)

After consuming some fabulous banana bread, we took some back roads north toward Mead, passing Cindy's Scenic Lake.

We made a detour to find some outdoor johns, but they were locked, which was annoying. After running out of ideas on how to write "These bathrooms should be open" in pee, we took a leak nearby. I recently learned that public urination is considered a sex crime... can you believe that?? That basically means that every runner, cyclist, triathlete, adventure racer, etc etc. in this town in a "pervert." Hmmm... okay, wait a minute... where is this line of thought going, again?

Anyway, I pulled out the camera again and got this response:

Nice. We made our way back to Longmont, and I persuaded Cindy to ride with me part of the way back to Boulder. I was pretty tapped by this point, entering hour number four on the bike, and she was kind enough to tow me all the way back, practically to my doorstep. And the gods must have truly been smiling on us, because a largish group of other riders passed us and were surprisingly friendly. I usually find many dedicated roadies to be snooty; they usually pass without deigning to even say "On your left." Maybe my name is written in large letters on my ass, because one of these riders recognized me, too... my acquaintence Chuck Coyle of the Vitamin Cottage team. He gave me a big wave as they passed.

I was very happy to get in nearly four hours of saddle time yesterday, and it was great to have some social miles with pals, but I still maintain that road riding is not for me. I feel that it has all the physical work with none of the mental/emotional rejuvenation that I get from mountain biking. I love to be in the woods, away from the noise and pollution of cars, where I can stop and hear nothing but the wind in the trees, and see wildlife, etc. etc. And of course I need the mental challenge of rocks and other terrain. Sitting on a bike on the road, pedaling like a robot with nothing else to do just leaves me feeling flat. But the beauty of cycling is that there's something for everyone. From road riding and it's various forms -- track racing, crit racing, road racing -- to mountain biking... trail riding, freeriding, downhilling... and all the more unusual things, like trials, dirt jumping, -- even mountain unicycling -- you just plain can't go wrong. That's what I love about this sport. There's always something new to try if you want to.

One Speed is All You Need

2006-01-19T08:46:00.000-07:00

I took a ride on my newly re-converted singlespeed yesterday.

The one gear makes the bike very light, quiet, and simple.

There are many mountain bikers out there, like Zack, who make riding tough terrain with one gear look ridiculously easy. After just cruising around some dirt paths yesterday on this, I really have to give them props. My trigger finger was twitching all over the place, looking for that nonexistent shift level to find another gear. A lot of the time I was either spinning out or bogging down, and my legs were always yearning for their optimal cadence, which I could rarely find. In the world of true mountain biking, singlespeeding really teaches you to refine your pedal stroke, preserve your momentum, and plan ahead. (You also need a very strong core and healthy knees!)

While I love how cool this bike is, I have come to the conclusion that I am not a skilled enough mountain biker to appreciate the extra challenges of the singlespeed. What I really love about my geared bike is it's Swiss Army Knife versatility. I can blaze along the road in my big ring to get to a trailhead, then creep up steep hills and technical sections in my granny gear. And for now, I definitely need all those options!! Perhaps when my skills have improved and I'm finding that things are feeling too easy, I'll revisit the unique experience of taking on every trail, whether smooth or rocky, with one gear. In the meantime, in the world of just getting around town, it's a fun toy to have!

However. In my current situation of two-job debt fighting, I'm pondering selling this bike, most likely by parting it out. I could definitely shorten the time I spend working two jobs, or else pad my savings account, by doing so. While I hate to part from any bicycle I own, especially since this one has an interesting history (it belonged to Allison Sydor, a professional Trek racer who was extremely successful), I rarely ride it. It's mostly a showpiece. And since it's a pretty high-end bike, although a bit older now, it really should belong to someone who will ride it, race it, love it the way I love my other mountain bike.

But you know me... I might give it a few more rides before I make up my mind. :-)

And They Say Money Can't Buy Happiness

2006-01-18T08:39:00.000-07:00

Well, folks, I'm going to do the best I can to keep up with my blog, but I've taken on a second job. I have some bills that need to be paid, and the Daily Camera isn't cutting it (surprise, surprise). I've had to start working the desk at my gym. It isn't hard work or anything, but I have to stand the entire time, and that's exhausting. Right now I'm having to work three 14-hour days in a row, and let me tell you, that's not working! My legs are about ready to seize up and fall off, and that's not even counting my actual cycling training. So I'm going to lose one of the gym shifts... that should help.

This gym is a rebirth of the place where I've been working out since 1998, Boulder's Pulse Fitness Center. It was always a low-key place with a lot of endurance athletes and downtown professionals. Very few bodybuilders or poseurs. But then the owner of the Pulse decided to buy out another local gym, Body Balance, and combine the two into this completely new club, just built in December. It's a very nice facility, but it's hardly bigger than the old place, with nearly 500 more members added. Needless to say, it's annoyingly crowded, and more people are joining every day. I'm a bit worried. Plus, Body Balance was the place all the steroid-using, flex-in-front-of-the-mirror, "Oh my god, don't do any cardio exercise -- your muscles will shrink!", overbuilt and egotistical wanna-be bodybuilders worked out. They love to prance and grunt their way around the weight room in half-shirts and lycra shorts, a truly horrifying combination by most anyone's standards. And then the former Pulse members are a lot of lean, skinny runners and cyclists, calmly walking around doing low weights/high reps (oh, the horror!) in a t-shirt and shorts. So I think it's safe to say that these two groups of people are not sharing this small space very willingly. But, everyone hates change, and I think it will all work out in the end. In the meantime, it's fun to watch!

Oy vey!!

2006-01-11T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today is a good day! First of all, I made a cool picture before 9am, which sets a good tone for the rest of the day:

Naomi Steinberg, a rabbi from Carlotta, Calif., performs her morning prayers on Wednesday at the Hotel Boulderado. Steinberg was one of about 180 rabbis, rabbinic pastors, and cantors who gathered in Boulder for the 8th Annual Ohalah Conference, a six-day event organized by Aleph: The Alliance for Jewish Renewal. Attendees came from all over the U.S., as well as Israel and Germany, and from all denominations of the Jewish faith. This is the 7th year the conference has been held in Boulder.

And then I got a call from my buddy Troy at the gym where I work out and teach spinning. He desperately needs someone to work the front desk, so voila! I have my part-time job. It doesn't pay that great for the first month, but it will get better after that; plus I can make commissions by selling things out of the "pro shop." This is great, because I was finding that right after Christmas is a tough time to find work. AND it ends the dilemma I was in about my gym membership. I had been warned that as only a substitute spin instructor (the gym bought another one and is under new management) I would have to start paying for my gym membership. Apparently, only the people who teach a class every week get a free membership. But now I've got all that worked out, and some dough coming in as well! I hope to have my moving/car/medical bills paid off by April or May. Come on universe, send some more freelance jobs my way so I can get out of debt even faster!

Quote of the Day

2006-01-09T10:14:00.000-07:00

"If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough."

-- Mario Andretti

What Is UP With The Weekends???

2006-01-09T09:05:00.000-07:00

Why do they go by so fast? It ain't right, I tell you.

I got up on Saturday and headed out on a long ride, looping around the Reservoir and headed up toward Heil Valley Ranch.

I had to stop to shoot a picture of the funky thistle-thingies out there:

It's just amazing how freakin' warm it was. Check out the short sleeves:

When I got up to Heil Valley Ranch, I ran into my teammate, Steve Held, and I gotta tell you, this makes the FOURTH time I've run into him on a trail in the past few weeks. This is either eerie coincidence, or Boulder County is in desperate need of some more trails. It's probably the latter. He thought it was pretty amazing, too, especially since the last time we bumped into each other, we saw no one else.

On the way back, the wind really started to kick up. It has been unrelentingly windy lately. Global warming is upon us!

Then on Sunday, Zack and I suited up to ride again, but some scary weather loomed over the Foothills, and we both lost interest. Plus we were sick of the damned wind. Zack is one of the few people who can make the old-school cycling cap look hot:

Tattooing Has Always Been Fashionable...

2006-01-06T15:17:00.000-07:00

....for cattle, anyway.

This was my assignment this morning, and I got the urge to see this in black and white:

This ranch belongs to the Hogan brothers, one of whom was born right behind the spot where this photo was taken.

Living Vicariously

2006-01-06T14:11:00.000-07:00

This time of year I tend to spend a lot of my down time at the computer, staring slack-jawed at other people's mountain biking photos. Most of them are from the "Passion" forum at www.mtbr.com. This time of year, everyone does their "photo recap" of the previous year, and there were some nice ones. Some of them aren't great photographers, but I just get jazzed looking at all the cool locations.

I've been to Moab, of course, but check out this sweet-ass collage my friend Rich made:

I've been here, too... Commando Run in Vail, so this gives me a warm fuzzy:

This is Tsali, in the Smoky Mountains... I really want to go here, among a ton of other places:

This is in Idaho, where I've also been, but not to this spot... gorgeous!!

Arizona somewhere:

California somewhere... wish this shot had a cyclist in it:

No idea where this is, but I still wanna be there:

It's a beautiful day in January, but I always manage to still be wishing it's June. ;-)

Money, Tools and the Mysterious Heat

2006-01-06T08:31:00.000-07:00

Serendipity strikes again! After I made it a goal to get out of debt, I got a call yesterday morning from Polaris Images in New York. They had a job that needed to be shot in Westminster (yes, I mean in Colorado) for the London Sunday Times. It was for a story about Tomboy Tools, a company out of Denver that makes tools for women... you know, like power drills that are smaller and lighter and ergonomically designed for smaller hands, etc. They sell them through "tool parties," like the old Tupperware parties, at people's homes. This company is expanding into the U.K., so this London paper wanted pictures from a tool party that was happening last night. Luckily I was free to do it, but it sure made for a long day, since I had to transmit the photos immediately afterward. I ended up working from 8am to 11pm... ugh! But I'll make about $400 once Polaris takes its cut, which is way better pay than I'm going to get at my second job.

Anyhow, here's one of the women from the party:

This girl was really funny. When she was told that the drill could be used on masonry, concrete, etc., she asked, "Will it go through bone?"

So after busting my ass all day, I got home and found that my tempermental thermostat was on the blink again, and my house was 80 degrees. I threw open all the windows, but the heat kept cranking, and I could barely sleep from being too warm. But I have no idea how to make the heat shut off!! I turned the thermostat all the way down, but that does nothing at all. Thank god I don't pay for the heat, but it's wasteful nonetheless. Plus it's totally annoying to have a down comforter on your bed when your house is 80 degrees. Grrrr. I always get pissy after a bad night's sleep.

The good news is that the weather is supposed to be great this weekend! I'm long overdue to put in some long slow miles on the bike (as opposed to the long, high-intensity miles I put in during the Moab trip last week), so that's my goal for the weekend.

Zack and I weren't feeling the photo vibe in Moab, so the few pictures we shot are pretty lame. I'll try to get one or two up here soon, though.

Hyperspace Exits

2006-01-05T08:21:00.000-07:00

I think I just flew through it. It's called "the Holidays." Damn!

Zack and I hung out in Denver with my family for Christmas, which was fun -- we played Trivial Pursuit and had dinner at The Fort, where all the waiters wear Western clothes and serve you big slabs of meat. The best part of the day, though, was this:

"Luke... I am your father." Yes, my brother and I are Star Wars geeks. We're of that generation, you know.

And after we finally got over all the cool buzzy/whooshy noises it makes, we had to mess around:

Sweet!! (Zack's a good sport.)

I hate New Year's Eve, mostly because I don't drink, and I have fairly low tolerance for drunk people. So I just spent a couple of hours at a mellow party, and went home long before midnight. I had to work New Year's Day, anyway, shooting the stupid Polar Bear Plunge, where a bunch of people jump into the frigid water of the Boulder Reservoir. I guess they think they're staring the new year by doing something "really daring!" Wow!! I sure hope the rest of your year is a hell of a lot more exciting than this, folks. You'll have to forgive my sarcasm... this is one of those events I can't stand to see anymore after 10 years at the Daily Camera.

Four students from Longmont High School, from left, Alex Zuelke, Dan Moulton, Joe Diefenbach, and Mike Best, leap into the Boulder Reservoir on Sunday as part of the Polar Bear Plunge, a benefit for the Longmont Humane Society.

Thankfully, the next assignment was cooler -- the Japanese New Year.

Hiroki Miyake, left, uses a big wooden mallet to pound sticky rice into a smooth paste as part of the Mochitsuki ceremony Sunday at the Japanese New Year celebration on the Pearl Street Mall. The rice ceremony is a tradition in Japan, where its stretchy consistency symbolizes long life and brings good luck to those who eat it. At right is Tak Nagatani.

Yumi Sueyoshi, right, and her husband, Taka, left, play Taiko drums as part of the Japanese New Year celebration Sunday on the Pearl Street Mall.

This was much more fun to watch, and since I wasn't hung over, I thought the drums sounded pretty damn cool.

Anyhow, 2006 is upon us, and since I'm notorious for just living in the moment, I figured I had better make some goals for the year:

1. Have a fantastic year of mtn bike riding and racing. Stay uninjured!!
2. Get out of debt and put more money in savings.
3. Buy a condo or find housing I want to stay in more than one year at a time.
4. Make some real progress toward solving my career dilemma.
5. Work on making more meaningful friendships.

I know, you're aren't supposed to have more than about three goals at a time, but I've got a whole year to work on these things, right? ;-)

Here are some things I learned last year:

1. Nothing matters more than your health. Coming back after a horrible back injury to place 4th in the local mtb race series felt really, really good.
2. Getting abruptly dumped by the love of your life really hurts. But as long as you can ride, it's truly okay.
3. Grab life by the handlebars, and be sure that you're the one steering it.
4. Ride somewhere new as often as possible.
5. Let your legs do the talking, not your mouth.
6. Trust that you can ride obstacles that scare you.
7. A life without regular riding partners is a bummer.

In '06 I'm sure I'll learn a bunch of things I'm not even aware of yet, but I'm hoping to:

1. Clean a local tough trail all in one go
2. Travel to awesome riding destinations
3. Win a race in my category and upgrade
4. Create that group of rock-solid riding peeps that I've been looking for
5. Regain my faith in the world of relationships -- cheeseball, but true!

I hope the new year is a banner one of all of you as well!

No Whining

2005-12-21T13:22:00.000-07:00

Just when you think your life is sucky or annoying, you see this:

Cliff shot this last Sunday. Four families were made homeless by the fire, and no one knows yet what started it.

I followed up with the family whose apartment contained the fire a few nights ago:

Anjie Bull, right, checks out the boarded-up entrance to her family's apartment Monday night at 11th Street and Portland Place, which caught fire on Sunday afternoon. Left to right are Isaiah Danaher, 14, Matt Roper, and Oaklie Bull, 10. Danaher was seeing the damage for the first time, since he had been out of town when the fire happened.

They're holding up surprisingly well, but still, that is a huge drag. Luckily tons of people from the community are stepping up, offering them a place to stay, replacing their Christmas presents, etc.

This of course gave me memories back to my own house fire, in 2001. Thank god for renter's insurance! Too bad this family didn't have any.

On a happier note, the weather here is getting fabulous and warm! I'm hoping to have a fun weekend of riding around Boulder, seeing the family in Denver, and then perhaps taking off for Moab on Monday. Yahoo! Then I'll finally have some fun pix for the blog. ;-)

Yo, Word.

2005-12-15T15:44:00.000-07:00

Dig this white-boy 'fro:

I know, I know. You all want my job.

Random Oddities

2005-12-13T22:26:00.000-07:00

I know I've been slacking on my blog, but there just hasn't been much of interest going on. I'm on a later shift at work, which usually results in mind-numbing assignments like meetings and high school sports. Nobody wants to see that stuff.

There IS one picture from tonight's girls basketball game that's amusing, however:

For my friends that don't know about this, my brother nicknamed me "Biz" when we were really little. No one knows what it means. But dammit, I'm one of the team!!

In other corny but entertaining news, I have another wonderful commemorative item to add to my collection. This beauty came to me from our race team party after the State Championships, where I was awarded the "Best Teammate/Best Supporter" award (you know, the "jock strap" award). I probably got this award for all my hollering, hooting, cat-calling, and other annoying vocalizations at the summer short-track races. I also received a pound of coffee and a "growler" of beer from two of our team sponsors (nice sponsors, huh?). I gave the coffee to my roommate, who actually chokes down Folgers every morning, and the beer went to my friend, teammate, and coworker at the Daily Camera, Jeremy. But of course I kept this nugget for myself:

My teammate Cindy won a gorgeous engraved-Lucite golfer for "Most Improved Rider." It's pretty safe to guess that one of the team directors scored these things that morning at a thrift shop. The best part is that we have to hang onto them, to pass on to next year's winners.

Lastly, I've been reading the blog written by my friend Nick Martin, who runs the Trek Rocky Mountain racing team, and quite frankly, it's depressing. I want to be 24 years old, a sponsored mountain bike pro who has no other job but to ride all day, dammit!! (If you have time, check out his blog; naturally it's a lot more interesting than mine.)

So in a desperate attempt to imitate his fun-filled winter training rides, I cast around for someone to ride with this morning. Luckily I found "someone" -- Andy Hampsten. (The fat slacker who was the only American to win the Giro d'Italia... no big deal.) We did the coffee-shop meeting and then headed out on our 'cross bikes. While Andy's custom "Mud Pig" (so called because his bike-touring company is named after Italy's famed wild boar, the Cinghiale) has water bottle bosses, he doesn't have any cages on the bike. So he asked me to be his domestique and carry his water. As you might know, domestiques are the "helpers" in road racing, the underappreciated, ass-busting no-names who ferry water and food to the important guys as well as block the wind for them, wipe their butts, do their taxes, change their kids' diapers, etc. etc. But I digress. So I put Andy's bottle in my second cage and we set off, heading toward the dirt roads north of town. (I'm allergic to asphalt, as many of you know.)

The wind turned out to be HELL-acious, due to a cold front heading in. (Or is it just that Boulder is windy every god-forsaken day in the wintertime??) We had to literally yell at each other to be heard. We still managed to talk about movies, flying in small aircraft, Andy's plans to remake wool cycling jerseys as well as retro 40's and 50's clothing, and any number of other things. Of course, I talked in strategically small sentences to hide the fact that I was getting totally gasping from fighting into the wind.

And suddenly Andy's arm shoots into the air and he turns to look behind him while he's riding. It takes me a second, in this setting, to recognize the classic body language of a pro rider waiting for help from the team car -- needing water, a spare wheel, a pat on the ass, etc. I start cracking up, but let him hang there. Finally he bellows, "CAIVANO! Where's my water??"

This picture is after he was properly hydrated, of course. He went on to tell me a story about his days on the Motorola squad, when a cyclist named Raul Alcala was the big shot. Raul kept insisting that Andy and another domestique stay with him, even though they were at a good strategic point in the race (a flat spot) for one of them to go back to the team car for liquids. Of course, Raul waited until the road went steeply uphill to demand a Coke. (The riders drink them for the caffeine boost.) So Andy went back for the Coke and ferried it to Raul, without complaining about having to slog up the steep section of road twice. But Raul went postal, threw the Coke off the side of the road and screamed, "I wanted a COLD one!!!"

And you thought basketball players were prima donnas.

And dammit, that pesky Nick Martin doesn't have this story!