What a way to start the day and 36 inch wheels

With maybe my last race (thinking about a 6hr race next weekend) tomorrow, I haven't been riding to hard or long this week. This week went like this:
Sunday: off
Monday: AM weights, core work. PM 45 mins on the trainer
Tuesday: spinning class, core work
Wednesday: 1.5 hrs on the SS in the park
Thursday: Spinning class, weights, core work
Friday:
Not much training going on for a 40 mile race.
the plan was for 45 mins on the trainer in the early am. got up at 4:45, headed downstairs, read the daily word, put a pot of coffee on. Got a cup of java and headed to the other downstairs, set up my little table with the remote, glasses, coffee. I start pulling the thick mat that my trainer is on and hit the table, coffee spills on the carpet, run upstairs to get cleaner, grab a rag from my bike stuff workbench. Clean it all up, now is only 30 mins of fast spinning, adrenalin is going. Feel good I didn't say a cuss word, took it all in stride and was very calm. Then...I look at the spot I spilled the coffee and it looks kind of dark, I finished the 30 min. spin and grab the rag to rub the spot some more and then...It was the rag I used the last time I cleaned the chain, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, run upstairs again for the cleaner and a clean rag, spot clean again and it looks better. Can't wait until I get home and see what it looks like dry. I'm sure my wife will let me know as soon as she goes downstairs to workout tonight and sees the spot.
Hope your day started better.

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To other things now, like 36 inch wheels.
check this video courtesy of Sir bikes a lot blog.

36 in wheeled bike! from Sir Bikes on Vimeo.

What is is going to be

Last race of the year for me coming Saturday and feel sickness coming in. I've only done 2 rides over 2 hrs the last two weeks, I should be well rested right? Rode in the rain a couple of times because i didn't want to sit on the trainer for an hr when there's still light out there.
It's been raining all week up there too, should be fun.
I came up to this a couple of weeks ago and tok a pic from the car.

This tree really wants fall to come in fast.
Lots of colors popping up now all over the place. Fall is my favorite season of the year until it starts to get into the 30's in the morning.
Trails are muddy with all the rain we've had in the last few days, who knows if I'll be able to ride any of the local trails again this year. I don't ride trails when they are muddy, one because it ruins the trails, two, I don't enjoy spending money for parts ruined by mud.
Enjoy the day, rain in the horizon again.

Oh oh

Fall has made an early appearance and with it it has brought rain. Seems like just a few weeks ago we were dealing with early to late spring rain and muddy trails. This morning I saw leaves turning a different color other than green.
Got up at 4:46 am this morning for my commute in to work and what was on the radar, "rain". It was dry in Strongsville but the local radar showed rain in BH, Brecksville Sagamore, Solon, etc, you get the point. All dressed (yes, came downstairs all ready to go) an nowhere to go I thought about heading out and riding the neighborhood streets but instead I went downstairs and spun on the trainer for a half hour, what a drag. I guess I'll head to Bonnie park tonight and do a few intervals up the closed section of Albion rd. on my SS. Anyway, I made a good decision, the roads were soaked all the way from BH to Solon.
Had a good week of riding last week and made it to Mohican for the first time in a month. The trails were perfect as I rode the SS just for fun. Thinking about going again either Friday or Saturday afternoon if the rain holds.
I have a few more days of hard riding and then easy until my last race of the year in Michigan next week.
I started my spinning classes again on Tuesday and had a good crowd, hopefully a good sign for the rest of the fall/winter session.
Have a great day.

Thought of the day

"A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams"

B-day

Birthday tomorrow, my co-workers celebrate today and caught me by surprise. I got paged to go to the lobby, grabbed a couple of business cards just in case it was somebody I had not met, they jump out from behind the counter and...

It says Happy Birthday Flat Head, but it really looked like like they wanted to tell me something else...
They really are a great group to work with...seriously.

All downhill

CWC

Traveled to Maryland and DC this past weekend to meet my family in DC since my niece was participating in the nations triathlon. 6,000 athletes were scheduled to compete but "only" a few over 5,000 showed up. The swim portion was cancelled because of the heavy rain the area received the week prior to the race. After I dropped my wife off at the hotel and drove over the Potomac river and saw how high, fast and dirty it was running I thought they would be cancelling the swim. I headed back to Frederik to meet the guys and go get our "packets" for the Civil War Century on Saturday. By ride packet I mean a bag with your number or wrist band a map and a few other goodies you get used to getting when you do a century. Well the "packet" turned out to be a wrist band and choose your map from the table. Can't complain much, the rest stations were full of all kind of fooods and they had a good spread at the end. It rained hard on Friday and we thought here we go again, another rainy century. But it turned out to be a great day with temps most of the day in the high 70's to low 80's. The next day we parked at a farm field where I thought they were going to need a tow truck to pul cars out after the ride but the ground was hard and the cars stayed "above ground".
The ride started with 30 minutes of climbing right up the mountains. The pace was mellow since we wanted to enjoy the ride. Any other time it would have been a 25 minute climb. Great views, beautiful farms and homes the rest of the day. Mid-way through the ride we hit what the locals called the "grinder", a 7 mile climb that started on a wide country highway with a wider that average berm at 3-4%, then at 3 miles in it turned left into a narrow road that quickly went to 5-8% the rest of the way with a few pitches at 10%. I felt good and let it all hang out there and went hard. I waited at the bottom for Joe and we rode together the rest of the way enjoying the ride. In all we ened up with close to 8,000 feet of climbing for the day and 105 miles.
After the ride it was back to DC. Sunday the city had many streets closed because the tri, a running race and 911 celebrations and we couldn't make it to the race. We headed home and of course we had to stop at the Premium Outlets for my wife to check out the "purse" store.

New commuting pack

I'm always looking for the perfect commuting pack and when you think you've found it, you have to go for it. I like small commuting packs that I can shove a lot of stuff in them. For the time being I think I found the perfect one.

Notice I already clipped one of my blinking lights on it. This pack expands has a big enough main compartment plus a small zippered pocket to put an extra tube, tool kit and your valuables. It sits away from your back letting air between the pack and your back flow through. You can wear it high or low and it doesn't swing too much like some of the other packs I have.

 It expands and has two large side pockets for extra bottles, phone,food, gun, knife.

 Meshed back that sitsaway from your back and lets the air flow and a confortable waist belt.

 One nice feature is the built in rain cover, not that I'm planning on commuting in the rain but it is nice to have. I don't know if it'll be big enough for cold weather commuting with all the crap I wear and carry with me so I'll have to keep my eye out for a bigger one.
Tried it out yesterday on my commute to work and fit me perfect, didn't move much and was able to stick my hands in my jersey pockets without having to unclip the waistbelt, which is a must for me.

Fall is almost here, is in the air. Have a great day.

Manatoc weekend

As usual we had a very dry hot Saturday and rain came overnight and got the course wet and muddy. The races went on without any problems and everyone seem to be satisfied.

Saturday was the cross and kids races and the people involved in putting them on did a fantastic job. Both the cross and kids courses were new this year and everybody I talked to loved the design. Demo bikes were on hand from Specialized, Felt, Raleigh, Kona, Planet Bike, Jamis, Yeti and a few other vendors. Saturday we had close to a thousand people come to participate in the events and ride the trails that are open only once a year for this event. I only have a few pics, I had no time to take many as I was working the gate.
Next is the Westbranch Enduro, come on out and try it. Next for me is the Grampian Challenge. Hoping to do well in my age group. This is where my road skills as a wheel sucker are going to come in handy with 30 miles of double track/gravel roads and the last six miles of single track. I'm thinking about putting cross tires on my mtb but with the single track coming at the end I'm not sure that would be a good idea since I haven't ridden the course before. 1.95's front and back is probably going to be my set up for this race. 3 more weeks of hard training and then easy until race day.
Friday is traveling day, heading to DC to watch my niece compete in the DC TRI on Sunday. Saturday is going to be the most relaxed century I have ever done. I say relaxed because most centuries i have done are at almost race pace or something similar where there's a lot of hurting. I'm taking my time to enjoy this one, the Civil War Centuty
This century goes through all 3 Civil War Battle fields in and around Gettysburg, Md. I've never had the chnace to visit any of them and I'm looking forward to this.
Hope you had a great holiday.

The weekend is here, the weekend is here

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Got up yesterday morning and somebody was moving furniture in heaven. Took a look at the weather channel and opted to go downstairs and do a light weight workout with heavy core work included. My back has been really killing me lately. This summer since I was carrying a real good core base from fall/winter I decided to only do 1 core wokout a week and I'm paying for it now. With my back condition I need to do it 3-5 times a week year round.
Got home in the evening and got all the yardwork out of the way so I can spend Saturday and Sunday at the Manatoc festival.
Rode in to work today under heavy fog. So heavy in some parts down in the valley I could feel the moisture hitting my face. Very muggy, should be a hot ride in the afternoon. Today I didn't chase any blinking lights...because I didn't see any with the fog as thick as it was. Luckily not too many cars on park roads during my ride in the AM. Although if they don't see me with 6 blinking lights...
Looking forward to the weekend. Hope to see you at Manatoc.