Down the...

Down the drain, more like, down the outhouse hole.

Todays commute didn't start out well. I was out the door at 4:50am which is 10 minutes earlier than usual. Almost 15 minutes down the road I went to grab a drink and guess what, no bottles. I turned around and went back home to get the bottles. It's a two hour commute to work and none of the water spickets in the metroparks are open yet, I had to go back. Now I'm rushing and since it's warmer I'm drinking more Hammer Heed and it makes me go. The second time I stopped I took my winter gloves off and dropped one down the *&%$#@ outhose hole at one of the metroparks outhouses. I got so mad I threw the other one in the hole and rode out of there as fast as I could. It was almost like "fire in the hole"

The infamous outhouse.

Made it to work with plenty of time to spare. Cleaned up changed got ready to eat breakast and spilled coffee all over my desk and papers. This time I was cool and collected, cleaned it up got another cup and sat down to eat and answer e-mails. The rest of the day went well, had plenty to do. The ride home was uneventful and warm. I didn't bring my short sleeve jersey and the arm warmers and had to wear my long sleeve winter jersey. I was surprised It had to be at least mid 60's and most riders I saw were wearing tights and jackets. You get a couple of days in the 80's and the slighest cool weather brings out the coats again.

On another note my back has not been doing well lately and when I ride my hard tail off road I spend a couple of days in pain. I've been debating whether I should get a full suspension bike or not. I received an e-mail from Orbea advertising a blowout frame sale of up to 50% off. I usually just delete the e-mails they send, this time I opened it and found a sweet deal on a full suspension frame at almost 50% off. Called Dan at the store and the rest is history. Now I just need to keep on doing spin classes to buy all the parts I need and pay the frame. Home equity lines are good.

Isn't it a beauty, 3 inches of travel which is what I like not the 5 or 6 most full suspension bikes have these days. I'll try to buy the lightest parts I can afford and my back will be taken care off.

Ended up with 63 hilly miles and 3:45 hrs.

Yesterday and today

Yesterday got up at 5:30 to set-up the goals at the soccer fields, 10 fields in total.

Then headed to Mohican to do a lap on my mountain bike. The trail was perfect, very dry and only a couple of spots had a little mud. There was quite a few riders enjoying the day yeterday.

The first 9 miles went perfect and I was holding back because I felt too good. Then around the 10th mile it hit me, I had to slow down and take a couple of gels for instant energy. Made it to the covered bridge and instead of taking the trail I decided it was best to rest and climb the road to the top which is about a mile and change. Got to the top and met up with Mike Colonna, Cochran, Jason and a couple other riders who were coming out of the trail. tried to ride with them but had to slow down. I did catch up to Jason and this other dude which I forgot his name and I just kept on riding, they were hurting worse than I was. The heat didn't help, it was hot and I started to cramp up on the inside of my legs, but my solution to cramps is to beat them up with my nuckles without stoping and it worked. Once fatigue sets in you get a little careless and that's when accidents happen. I rounded a corner and came up to a rock garden that I have rode right through it before without any problems, didn't lift my front wheel and over the handlebars I went. Scrapped both elbows and hit my left hand hard on the rock. Funny, my knees didn't even get scratch on them. I managed to finish strong and i can say even as tired as I was I rode everything but the section I fell on.

Today up at 6:30 out the door by 7:30 and headed to Hinckley to watch the biathlon. Ken, Henry and Steve were doing it. Ken did very good in spite of not being able to run much because of his accident at Rays. Henry had a super race and waon his division as did Steve who also won his division, the big boys division, Clysdales.

I ended up with 3 hours and 50 miles for the day.

The fields

The trailer

The road up

Tired rider

The covered bridge

The mohican river

Ken

Steve, Stop waving and focus this is a race no a walk in the park.

Henry

Jim O from Camba getting his training in for the Leadville 100 Mountain bike race.

The Show

The show was excellent in terms of visitors to our booth. I talked to a lot of our Latin American customers. Our booth is new and it looks very nice and open. Other booths in the show had to much clutter in them. The show uses all the halls at the convention center and you need one full day to walk all of it without stopping too long anywhere. I took a walk to the Central Hall and got lost looking for the entrance to the South Hall. I wanted to go check out the Microsoft booth, never made it. The Panasonic booth even had two HD theaters that you needed tickets to get in.
I took a few pictures of the show but didn't take pictures of the hotels on the strip, maybe next year if I make it back. Nancy (my co-worker) and I walked from the show to our hotel the MGM hotel casino, almost 4 miles everyday but Thursday. I can ride a hundred miles easier than I can walk 4. My sheens and ankles were swollen from all the walking and don't even mention my back from standing all the time. That was about all the exercise I did. The show hours ended at 6pm. dinner at 7:30 back to the room at 9:00, not much time to do anything else. I'm really going to be hurting today when I go out for a couple of hours to start my last month of training before the Mohican 100k mtb race. Tuesday night we ate dinner together in Dawns suite watched the Mall Cop movie and we all had a great time laughing and joking.

Part of the crew, Bill, Lynn, Nancy, Don, Dawn, Augusto and myself, great people to work with. Nancy is holding and award we received at the show for one of our new products.

I love to have one of this with my own satellite on top

Were they really working?????????????

Our booth

Part of the Central Hall.

I took more pictures but most of them came out blurry. I need a better camera.

Vegas

Nothing much to report. I've been walking between 6-8 miles a day to and from the show. Plus standing for 8 hours makes for very sore sheens. There's over 100,000 people in town just for the show. This city was made for people watching.

Good day

I took the day off and what a day, busy from the moment I got up to the moment I started writing here. Got up early, went grocery shopping with my wife which she wasn't thrilled about it. She's a school teacher and sleeps late every day, must be nice to sleep late, I don't know how that feels like. Went to work to pick up a few things for the show I'm going next week (more on that later) stopped at the bike shop, came back home and tried to install the wire harness in my car but I purchased the wrong one and it only took me an hour to figure it out %*&%$#@. Went to the soccer fields to pick up the goals for the Smurfs 4-6 year old program. Helped Bob finish painting the lines on the fields. Came home changed got ready and went out for a 37 mile ride with the "HO" in 2:10. Tomorrow is going to be another busy day. Sunday I'm leaving for a week to go to Las Vegas for a Broadcast show. This is my eleventh year going and to tell you the truth I don't even go out anymore. I don't gamble I only drink an ocasional beer here and there I've seen almost everything there's to see. It's a week I'll spend exercising in my room, I'm not paying 20 bucks to go to the gym, yes the hotels charge you 20 dollars to use their small exercise facility. That's 20 a day OK.
Yesterday I had a good ride back from work in the afternoon Almost 40 for a total of 70 and 4 plus hours. Big ring 50-70 rpm afternoon working on strength all the way home. My knees were hurting today when I got up because I didn't ice them last night. Nothing a 600 miligram ibuprofen can't take care off. Later.

April 16th morning commute

I love riding early in the morning. Out by 5am, met Tom near my house and we rode together for about 45 minutes. He was getting his ride in early. There was a lot of criters out doing their thing this morning. The skunks were blooming and the silly wabbits are starting to come out as well. A couple of birds swoop down I guess to see what was going by. I've had a few encounters with birds lately. Last week I was almost finished with my ride and I heard a noise right next to me and it was two geese coming in for a landing their wings weren't any farther that 2 feet away from me. It was great I was mesmerized seeing them so close to me. Didn't even think about trying to pull the camera out.
That's another issue I have when I write in this blog, it doesn't feel right to just write and not post pictures. I don't have any and I left the camera at home so no pictures on my way home either.
Overall a good ride in today, no "close encounters of the car kind". Early in the morning drivers are a little more polite than later in the day. 30 miles 1 hour and 50 minutes. I'm taking the longer route this afternoon. Talk to you later.

Todays commute

Last night before I went to bed I checked the weather one last time, it still said partly sunny for today. Get up at 4am get ready head downstairs turned the weather on and everything changed overnight. Dry in the morning showers in the afternoon. It was decision time, my backpack was ready since I get everything ready the night before and all I needed to do was throw my breakfast and lunch in and take off which by the way it's exactly what I did. I left later than usual, I went downstairs and tried to install my road fenders real quick but since I had them on my other road bike I had to do to many adjustments and I just left. I did throw in my rain pants and heavier rain coat in the backpack which brought the weight total to 14.2 pounds, ouch. The temp. was better that other days 34 when I left but a very stiff breeze blowing in my face all the way to work. I hit the bike and hike and I didn't need the head light anymore which was good because I was able to sneak up on a coyote that was just sitting there on the middle of the trail. I tried to pull the camera out real quick but he heard me and ran into the woods. I'll be ready next time. Left work at 10 after 4 and my legs felt really heavy but I was happy because the wind direction didn't change, the temp was 47. I had a tail wind most of the way home. Did 4 intervals of 2-3 minutes each at almost max effort and felt good. The rain finally came as I was going up 130th and had to stop to put my raincoat on. Overall a good day 64 miles and over 4 hours to start the week.

Happy Easter

HAPPY EASTER EVERYONE. ENJOY THE DAY WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS.
DON'T FORGET TO THANK THE LORD.

Just tempo

Went out at 1pm today on the mountain bike under a light drizzle. Waited to long to go out spent the morning putting together a small trailer I bought online to pull with the Vibe. Soccer season is here and 16 goals at 35 lbs each would be a little to much for the vibe. As soon as I started putting it together am telling myself what pc of crap did I wasted my money on. But once I finished it does look like a nice trailer. Pics later.
Anyway I headed to the boat docks on the bike path and met up with Brett who was on his way home from the office putting in the miles on his Specialized hard tail getting ready for Cohutta. I turned around and kept him company until we reached the bottom of the hill before Ridge road, he was on his own from there on. Before I turned around I was just trying to stay at or close to zone 3. He tells me I'm just doing about 40 minutes of tempo riding and then slow down. Well Brett, your tempo riding had me at the top of zone 4 creeping into zone 5. After a while we slowed down and I was able to snap a couple of pictures after I shoved my heart down from my throat to were is supposed to be. Thanks for the workout Brett you are an animal. Keep it up for Cohutta.

The latest book I'm reading. You'll never think the same about sugar after you read it. The author makes it intersting and funny, worth reading, buy it.

What I don't like

If there's one thing that I really hate when I ride is the stupid drivers that have the whole road to themselves and still pass you real close. Twice today during my 1 1/2 hour loop that I do by Valley City. All I can do is shake my head what else is there to do? You have to be really careful what you do or say. You are basically at their mercy, you are riding a 16lbs bike and they are driving a car or truck. They can drive back give you a hard time and even try to hit you and if you get hit by a car way back there you may not be found or seen for hours. All we are trying is to ride a bike but they don't want to take the lead foot of the gas pedal for 1 second. They are nothing but a bunch of (%^(&* morons. I feel much better now, I needed to vent.

Race Down Under

This race report is from the Land Down Under. I work in International Sales and often e-mail back and forth with my counterparts on the other side of the world. Riley is my counterpart and friend from one of my accounts in Australia. He took on running recently and asked me for some tips. I gave him some tips and the rest was up to him. This was to be his first running race ever.
It was a 13km race. He trained hard and did great even pushing the pace during the last 3 km's.
Now he's hooked and even plans to train for a half marathon. It happens to all of us.
The race had over 30,000 runners as you can see below. Riley is in the green with his two running mates below. And he even used Hammer gels on my advise and says they worked. That Hammer stuff is great.
Great job my friend and cheers, have a Foster on me or whatever beer you like, you earned it.
What can I say, I'm an International coach now, highly recognized in the Land Down Under.

Guys you are supposed to have a nice sun tan. It's summer there you know.

Indoors???????????

April 6th and I just finished and hour on the trainer watching The Tour Of Flanders that my wife taped for me yesterday. I didn't even finish it, the *&*%$# vcr ate the tape with 20 kilometers to go.Why the trainer, see the pictures below. Low 30's and snow expected for the next couple of days. The good thing about this time of the year is that the snow melts fast. Another thing is that after you spend part of the fall, winter and early spring riding outside, this time of the year the last thing you want to do is ride outside in this type of weather. That's Ohio weather for you. Hopefully this is the last of it.

Windy but sunny

Went out yesterday and put in a good 3 1/2 hours with the HO. Wind was blowing at 20-30 miles an hour. Two hands on the handlebar kind of day. There were some streches of road I didn't even want to drink unless I wanted to end up on the side of the road. On a strech of road about 3-4 miles long we had a tail wind and we were hardly working. It was a good day for a small ring spin workout. Today I decided to take the day off and do some overdue yard work.
Back to the grind tomorrow. Although the week looks ugly with snow expected tomorrow night and Tuesday. Next decent day to ride to work looks like Wednesday.

April 2nd.

Yesterday's commute to work was a lot better that last Friday's. It was in the mid 40's in the morning and no wind. This time of the year I'm very paranoid about cars but so far is been very good. If they can't see me they have no business driving. I've been told I loook like a Christmas tree, most mornings if I'm using my winter booties with lights I have 7 blinking lights. Hey, I want to be seen out there. My backpack was 13.5 lbs yesterday morning. It may not sound like much but try riding 32 hilly miles with an extra 13.5lbs on your back. The afternoon ride was great. I had a tail wind most of the ride home and there was some streches of road I was pushing 25 effortlesly. Waited for the "Scatante Man" at 21 and the parkway went back down did the meadows loop, back up and headed for home. 130th was a bit of a struggle, going up and a 20

mile an hour wind in your face. Overall, a good day 4 plus hours for the day.

The Scatante man.

Look Ma, no hands.