somebody had a birthday...yesterday,

and her name rhymes with colnago..







happy happy birthday...and, I am still older than you!

halftime

Arguably, this was the best part of the Mt. Hamilton race this last weekend. We spotted these porta potties and decided we would hit them and beat the rush at reg. Reg didn't have porta potties, they had full on bathrooms.


I was still squeezing out the last little drops of the Bella high from Kern and thought maybe I ought to try another hilly road race. The Bella high coupled with taking a complete rest day after Friday night track made for a guilty but energetic feeling. The rest day consisted of watching the giro, consuming lots of food, and taking many naps. At 9pm Saturday night, we felt unusually peppy so we traded our nighties for regular clothes. We got in the trucks and headed to Livermore to tackle the first part of Mt. Hamilton's point to point logistical nightmare.

Cutting to the race day chase, someone from another team was told by their coach to make the race a time trial effort. No reason why anyone would pay to do a time trial effort in a hilly 63 mile race from the very start? But, they did. The race started from the gun, and I was dropped before the right turn to road 130. A full on eight measley fricking minutes. I checked the heart rate monitor, and it was falling to 194. Ok, so that really was a fast start, and I wasn't just lame and wimpy. Later on, I had lovely company as Marscat and Marian decided to turn back and find me. We all rode the rest of the way together.

We had a follow vehicle that we kept trying to get rid of, but he told us that he could not go around "because this is sort of my job". He finally stopped at the top of the Lick Observaory. Whew...I felt bad for him. Burning all that $4+/gallon gas.

In the valley around mile 43, we caught a woman from our group and thought she might want to ride to the finish with us. For some reason, she wanted no part of our little group and scurried on ahead. Oh well...her loss. At mile 62, we saw the unfriendly again. Marscat said "lets pip her". We tried, rather Marian and Marscat tried, but I was out of gas and just exhausted. Anyway, this was one race that I had never attempted from the San Jose side, and I will never ever do again.

But the good thing is now I feel like imposing a mini halftme rest period on my racing season before the big gear up for nats. So for now, just a few Fridays and Tuesdays and maybe a crit now and then, but no more hilly road races. And, some card games and some camping thrown in for good luck. Yay!

man, am I in touble for this

bogarted from marscat...and, I know that sneezing feeling, but not so fond of the laughing(turn volume way down)...all the laughing seems mean

# 12 all done

# 12 all done
Originally uploaded by Ippoc Amic

and I'm on a Bella high!

It's offical

It's offical
Originally uploaded by Ippoc Amic

We are legal, again!

just looking

Funny thing, we went in looking for water, but we found ourselves in the lazy section of bevmo. We didn't buy anything there, but we looked for beer and found some cool Belgium beer to bring to the guys who help us at Kern.

Oh and another thing, those drink mixes have lactic acid in them. Now isn't lactic acid a bad thing that causes your muscles to conk out? Something about buffering and overloading? Oh well, a very good thing we didn't but that stuff.

tap tap

Maybe, this is better than the humira and chemo shots that eat up my WBCs and RBCs. Maybe, it's good for negative thoughts too. Gonna try.

popped

kern taper tip #2:
For dessert, we often go to the local video store with little plastic baggies. We go the the m&m machine and get 1 to 2 $0.25 little things of m&ms and then try to sneak out before the video workers eye us. In honor of our kern taper, we opted for a different more healthy kern like dessert: either watermelon for hydration purposes or cherries. We opted for the cherries which unfortuantely came to a grand total of $11.00. The kern taper is expensive. But, if you count the $9.00 x 2 mojito that we did not have, I guess we are ahead of the game by $7.00.

Kern recycled

Sad to report that Berkeley Hills was not a confidence builder for me. But, it was helpful prep for the days to come: ass handed back to me over and over again. Berkeley Hills is just a small appetizer, and Kern is the whole enchilada. Yeah...I can't wait!

The 12th Annual Kern, video not edited, so it still reads 11th.

more music

I'm jumping on the band wagon. One of my favorites: Silvio Rodiguez.


Try Dias y Flores and Rodriguez. Oldies too.

trophy wife

or I should say, my wife has trophies...these are some from kern.(p.s. I hate that term trophy wife. The first time I heard it used was by Jonathon Vaughters. I stopped liking him then. But currently, he's one of the only current pro team owners to actually invest energy, time, and money in women's cycling. Slipstream has some junior women riders and their 5280 TIAA Cref younger junior team has a few girls. Maybe, I will reconsider my feelings towards JV.)

these are mine


Kern taper tip:
If you make old fashioned tomato rice soup with non fat milk, you can use the calories saved from the milk to eat all the ruffles you feel like eating. Did you know calorie counting works that way?

We went riding on Sunday and attempted to ride the Grizzly Peak Century. We have ridden this century ride many times, and the reason I like it is because I can usually pass LOTS of people on the hills. For a flatlander sprinter racer, centuries are cool because the majority of the people riding the century are not racers. And racers riding centuries can go pretty fast. This fastness includes me. On hills in centuries, I don't mind saying it, but I look like a climbing stud, and I love it. It's the only time when I can feel pretty good about my climbing. But this year, I was foiled. We started out early and ran into a lot of riders. I was passing people left and right and feeling pretty darn good about it. It was great prep for Kern. A truly great confidence builder before the real climbers hand me my ass over and over again. Unfortunately, there were too many riders and my two riding partners were not having fun. By the way, these two unnamed riders are ones who don't need centuries to pass people on hills. So after 1.5 hours, we bagged the ride, turned right at SP Dam Road and rode up to Mt. Diablo. Then afer 5 hours, we caught bart and rode back to berkeley with some bunnies. All in all it was a good training day: same amount of climbing, same amount of ride hours, but 1000 times more peaceful and quiet.

frack love

looks like the frack bed is not going to get used by anyone but us...but that's ok...we still need to do a lot of fixing up around the house.

My upcoming kern taper schedule:
1. No heavy cream in my morning coffee
2. No scone for breakkie just a banana
3. less mojitos
4. small glass of wine rather than a "good pour" glass of wine
5. Sunday - grizzly peak century
6. Tuesday track racing
7. Friday Norcalcycling track night
8. Sunday - Berkeley Hills road race
rest rest rest
9. Friday Kern ITT = more rest...
10. Saturday Kern really starts!