Spinning

From approximately the beginning of November through February, I go to a Spinning class every Tuesday evening. While the class is technically a team event for my former team, quite a few Average Joe's seem to show up and take adavantage of the cheaper classes. I can't blame them. And, the more people that show up, the more money for the local company. That is a good thing.

The interesting thing about Spinning classes are the bikes. Particularly among those that do not race. I was looking at the others in class last night and was befuddled. Here, I was, an average sized male with my saddle raised about as close as I could get to my road bike's saddle height and the handlebars about the same height. The setup is not ideal but not bad.

On the other hand, average to smallish women were there with saddles that were MUCH lower than mine but the handlebars were jacked up about a foot higher than the saddle. I was fascinated. Even the bland hybrid type of bikes are not set up in this radical fashion. What would possibly make someone want to ride this way?

Just for the hell of it I did a Google search for "spinning" and it didn't take long to find a photo showing what I am talking about. Who would ride an actual bike like this?

Beast

Greipel might cause me to wet my chamois if I saw this chasing me.


Photo: © Mark Gunter

Revelations

Life is a terribly confusing thing. You can spend years trying to figure out a situation. Many brain cells are spent thinking, pondering and postulating. Then one day, in a sudden burst, the answers come as a revelation. Or, so you think. Maybe you are not as smart as you thought or you walked down the wrong path to enlightenment and you stand in dark again... wondering. Back on the bike to figure things out.

Sunday

Giuseppe, Patrice and I met in Columbia for a shortish ride yesterday. We did our frequent Waterloo loop. I was short on time so this worked well since it typically lasts about 1:45. The length of the ride means that we usually keep the pace fairly brisk.

The wind was out of the south which meant much of the first half of the ride was into the wind. Of course, being the procrastinator I am, my bike continues to have shifting problems which leaves me with two gears... big ring... small ring. And, let's face it, when faced with big ring vs small ring I will be in the big ring.

I felt pretty good but not spectacular. You rarely feel great when you are grinding up hills in too big of a gear. Giuseppe was laying on the praise pretty thick and acting like I was Jens Voigt driving the peloton for miles on end at 28mph. The wind and gearing issued left me satisfied with looking at the ride as a solid strength workout.

Greipel and the TDU

Based on his shoe choices, I am thinking that Andre Greipel might be wanting to kick some ass at the Tour Down Under.

Sweet nothing

This has been a sweet week of doing virtually nothing on the bike.

Yet, my mind has been fully occupied with what lies in the future. I'm tempted to thrash myself on the trainer for three plus hours. To fully break myself down physically and be left with pure, filtered mental clarity.

I doubt it works that way but it's worth a shot... Isn't it?

Seams

Champion Systems had their team presentation today. What is up with the seam on their shorts. Some shorts use the exposed stitching but I don't think I have ever seen shorts use white stitching on the center seam. Bizarre looking.

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A couple rules...

After going to yet another Tuesday Spinning class I feel it is necessary to relate a couple rules for the wearing of shorts/bibshorts. These rules will brief because they are so obvious that they should not need further explanation.

1) The bottom of the shorts should not reach the top of your knees.

2) The bottom of the shorts should not be loose

Why do some people find the these rules hard to grasp?

Sunday at Nationals

After my short race on Saturday, Sunday at Nationals was going to be all about watching the Elite Men and Women. Cory had brought her bike along on the trip to do some riding. But, somewhere along the way she built up the nerve to enter the Elite Women's race.

We ate lunch Saturday and made our way over to registration, thirty minutes before they closed. She had to be one of the last, if not THE last, women to enter since there was no "day of" registration. Cory seemed seemed a tiny bit nervous about jumping into a race where the big fish swim. How could she not be a little nervous lining up with Katie Compton. Sure, they were separated by about 10 rows of cyclists, but still. Regardless, Cory was taking a great attitude and just hoping to beat one person and not get pulled after one lap. Talk about realistic goals.

After everyone was lined up, the referees started the countdown. Two minutes... One minute... One fan began chanting "Katherine, Julie(?), Katherine, Julie..." Fans began to bang the sideboards and cheering. You couldn't help but feel the excitement build. I looked over at Cory and saw her say "Shit!" and a few seconds later they were on the way.

I ran to the pits with Cory's spare wheels as best I could, through the crowds of people and trudged through the mud bog that was the pit area, looking for a spot where I wouldn't be getting in the way of others. Katie came by, the Cannondale ladies went by and lots of others came streaming past as well. I had that brief moment of concern, hoping there were no incidents but eventually Cory came into view as they circled the soccer field. And... she was not last and was plugging away just fine ahead of three others. I got a little emotional. Up the hill she went and out of view until the next pit passthrough.

Photo credit © Dave McElwaine/trailwatch.net


She came by, still holding her place although one rider slipped by after a slight bobble in the twisty, rutted muddy section and then back out of sight she went.

Katie Compton was flying and now my concern was that the officials not have too much of a trigger finger about pulling riders and that Cory get to ride another lap.

Several minutes passed but eventually here she came, and the tears welled up a little in my eyes knowing Cory was loving this. No one was behind her anymore but, as she came by, she said she had crashed a little which explained her position. Up the hill she went as I waited nervously for her to come through a second time. I kept looking up to the top of the hill for the long descent. There she appeared, still ahead of Katie. Cory dropped out of view for a minute or so as she negotiated the barriers, then came Katie at the top of the hill. Cory came over a little rise high-fiveing the fans and having a blast with a big smile on her face. Past the pits she rode with Katie gaining fast. A couple turns later, the inevitable happened as Compton roared past and the race would be over at the end of the lap with Compton having 2 laps to go.

We found each other after the race and Cory was flying high and over the top happy. What a great thing to see. We still had the Elite Men to watch, which turned to be a great race. But, for me, nothing topped seeing Cory so happy about just being out there and having a great time on the bike.

Nationals

The alarm clock woke me up Saturday morning at 5:30. After reevaluating preparation time, I didn't actually get up until 6:15 and out the door not much after 7am.

Temperatures dropped to the upper 20s overnight but the winds were calm and the sun was out, so things did not feel so bad. I went out for a couple practice laps to learn the course and did not like what I found. The first couple hundred feet of grass/mud was fine before making a right-hander into a long section of deep ruts of frozen mud from Friday's racing. These ruts went from tape to tape and left no room for escape. Riding in a straight was hard enough for me and going through the turns was even tougher. Hit a rut wrong and it would grab your wheel and toss you across the course as you tried to correct, hoping another rut wouldn't toss you in another direction.

I literally had some fear for what the actual race would bring. People struggled enough in the relative isolation of warmups. Put 80 or so riders trying to win a race and charging into these sections of frozen mayhem and it could be ugly. While there were portions of the course that were not bad, there were about ten others very treacherous.

I was more than happy to be starting near the very back and not feeling the pressure to mix it up in the midst of a packed field. As expected, lots of folks were having trouble on the first section of frozen ruts. The field bottled up but I managed to ride a short distance before having to dismount. Rode a short distance. Then had to run again around the hairpin turn by the pits. Back on the bike for a long, gradual uphill that kicked up at the top.

I was cruising along and not pushing TOO hard. My goal was to get one lap under my belt, let things sort out and take my chances from there. After reaching the top of the hill, it was down a paved road with a right hander back onto a softer mud section and up the stair runup.


I got up the stairs pretty well. I hopped back on the bike for a downhill S-turn back onto another paved section. The first part of the S-turn felt awkward but I figured it was the soft ground of this section. The second half of the turn felt even more awkward and I had a bad feeling about what was going on. Once I turned onto the pavement I was greeted with the unmistakable rough ride of a flat tire.

My race was over. I was not close to the pit. And, even if I had been closer, I had decided to not put the borrowed Zipp 404s in the pit for fear than if I had needed a wheel that the course conditions might damage the wheels. I was not prepared to risk damaging another person's wheels

My race was far too short. I was done before I even got into the flow of the race. Next year, maybe it will be different.

1 day to Nationals

Im safely ensconced in the hotel room, laying on the bed as I type. The highs today in Madison were 50-51, depending on the electronic signs that you would see on the roadside.

We drove by the race course and doing packet pickup. Not much of the course was visible but all reports are it is rather muddy. But, the forecast is low temps of about 29 so my hunch is that I will be racing on a rather frozen course with a lot of ruts from today's racing. It should be interesting.

I am racing a bit out of my league, up here. My goal, if any, is to beat USA Cycling's predicted finish for me. USAC predicts that I will finish 66th of the 73 pre-registered riders. Anything better than that and I will be satisfied. 65th place wont make necessarily make me happy but I can live with beating the prediction. Ideally, I would like to crack the top half of the field. Even Top 50 will be okay.

Until tomorrow...

Two days to Nationals

When registration for Nationals opened, the USA Cycling website, originally, only let me register for the "B" Non-Championship race. I reluctantly did so, even though the race was on Wednesday.

I went back to the website an hour later and it then let me register for the Masters Championship race on Saturday. I don't like wasting an entry fee for a race I did not participate in, but traveling tomorrow (Friday) and staying the weekend is much better than being in Madison from Tuesday night through Sunday afternoon/evening.

All that is simply background information. Yesterday, I looked at the starting grid for what would have been my race. Unbelievably, they had given me a front row (number 5) starting position. How did that happen?

Seeing that starting spot almost makes me wish I had gone up. However, I have a talent for screwing up even front row starting spots. One this is almost certain. I will NOT have a front row spot on Saturday morning. Put $10 on it. Or as Mitt Romney might say, "I bet you $10,000"

Three days to Nationals

I chose to take today as a day off the bike. I hope to ride tomorrow and then again Friday with a couple practice laps on the race course, after all the races have completed for the day.

RadioShack Nissan kit

RadioShack has their big team presentation Friday. I am terribly excited to see Johan Bruyneel prattle on about the Schlecks and how they wont lose 5 minutes with 100km of TT's in next year's Tour.

I am more curious what the team kit will be. My best guess is that it will be a combination of last year's big RadioShack "R" and Leopard's basic design. This will most likely be wrong but it seems a logical compromise for the merging of two teams.

Four days to Nationals

Went to the usual Spinning class tonight. I planned to keep my efforts subdued but I worked pretty hard the last half of the class. After coming home, it feels like I tweaked a muscle in my lower, left part of my back. Just what I needed.

I'm pretty confident the muscle pull will be fine if I do not stress it for a few days but it is another thing on my mind. For the last few weeks, every little sniffle of the nose or minor soreness of the throat has had me paranoid of getting sick prior to Nationals. With any luck, those symptoms will stay at bay and this back thing will clear up and all will be good on Saturday.

I would like to be a few pounds lighter but I am not freaking out about my weight. It is acceptable. Until tomorrow...

Five days to Nationals

The legs were slightly tired today. The bottoms of my feet were sore, too. Not sure what is going on there. Maybe it is a result of the winter boots I wore Sunday.

Today was rather cold and very windy. Between the weather outside and the tired legs, I chose to do an easy spin on the trainer instead of taking out the CX bike. I could better control the amount of effort than if I had ridden the CX bike. I wanted this to be recovery day.

I've been on the bike 10 of the past 11 days, with varying levels of effort.

Countdown to Nationals

Six days to CX Nationals. I followed up yesterday's 53 miles with another road ride of about 52 miles. It was a terribly windy day.

Giuseppe and I chose to head into the wind for the first half of the ride. It was a grind. Particularly with my right shifter not working properly in cold weather. Rather than risking getting stuck in a gear I did not want I did the whole ride in the 17t cog. It was a reasonable gear except for long, steeper hills.

The turnaround point at Clayton and 109 was more than welcome. The rest of the ride was considerably easier but the legs were growing weary in the last few miles

This evening, after putting my feet up and wearing compression tights, the legs are feeling pretty good right now. I'm undecided what to do tomorrow. Maybe a light spin on the cross bike with a few efforts