Where you need to go?

It is still a 29er

I call my bike a 29er even when I have narrow tires on it, so I figure my Madone is a 29er as well. I got in three hours of riding and then went and did the Tuesday night crit on my day off. Sweet day of riding for sure, I rode into downtown and then flew down Main Street towards the Plaza with a big tailwind at my back keeping pace with traffic the whole way. Then I played around back in the neighborhoods looking for cool routes. I felt pretty good when the crit started but I hurt bad after a handful of hard efforts on the front and quickly dropped off the back. Oh well, I figure I will get a better workout punishing myself when I got the goods rather than sitting in. This morning I left our apartment with the sun coming up to get a little pedal play on the trails before a long day of work. Shawnee Mission Park was tacky and ripping fast. I rode for nearly 2 hours before working for nearly 12. Our Super Sale started at the shop today and we killed it all day long. It is so much fun when things are popping. Except for my legs popping in crits.

Pedicabs are Awesome

Right now I do not have any pics to post, although one girl is supposed to be emailing me some she took. But pedicab driving if pretty much the coolest thing ever. The Power and Light District is straight insane. Not being much of a party'er I had not ventured down their except early morning rides when it is not the Zoo it is at night. I cannot even imagine all the crazy stories I am going to gather from this venture, all I know is I will be the camp fire master. I drove for four hours, pretty good money, nothing outrageous, but it was so much fun in all, I cannot wait for next go around. Happy Easter Y'all

Today

6:30 AM- Out the door with Mr. Dirty Kanza
7:00 AM-On the bike leaving Bonner Springs on gravel
10:00AM- Roll into the bike shop to build my new newest bike (HiFi) before my 12:00 shift starts
10:01 AM- Begin helping customers
10:01AM-8:05PM- Work like a one armed paper hanger
8:05PM-8:30-Built the HiFi
8:30PM-Rode the HiFi Downtown to hook up with pedicab Jim
11:30PM- Back at home

That was cool

Tomorrow I should have photos of my inaugural pedicab adventures

Madone

"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww!"

On The Road
Jack Kerouac

Today I got a new Madone 5.2. Or a Mad One as I like to call it. Wow what an amazing bike. My Dad had it at his shop and he made me a heck of a deal on it. I will get you that money real soon Dad. KC is a pretty awesome town for road riding and it is going to be fun to have a sweet machine to enjoy it on. I road for a bit this morning on it and was floored at how fast it was. It is just simple fun to bomb down hill at over 30 MPH and sprint uphill and do it over again. So speaking of Mad Ones...
gotta love her. At least I do.

climbing

Alright I think I am getting on top of this. I am not hacking quite as bad as days past and slept pretty good the last few nights. I made the stupid decision to go try and race at Clinton, I just am a sucker for a start line. I must have been dehydrated pretty bad from being sick because after only 15 minutes or so of racing both my calves cramped up. For a couple of minutes it looked like mice were running around inside my calves. So I left and went back to building bikes at the shop.

Yesterday Scooter and I rode on the road for close to 3 hours and although I did not feel good I could tell my legs are coming around. The weather is warming up and we are climbing up and out of Winter...hopefully.

My schedule is fixing on getting a lot busier in the coming weeks. Not only are things at the shop starting top pick up, I picked up a couple of side jobs that will keep me moving. For one I am going to be teaching a few spin classes a week at the Health Club next door to where we live. I have helped with a few already and I enjoy it quite a bit. I have to go through the Spinning certification program which wonderfully enough is the day before Ouachita, but then I will be ready to teach away. The second thing is, hopefully, driving the new pedi-cabs downtown zipping people around during big events, back and forth. I am totally stoked about doing that, and Jason Gakowski was kind enough to put in a good word for me with the people he knew starting the company and apparently they had several names of interested riders and they called me first yesterday. It might be a little unorthodox but it still getting paid to ride.

Down and Out

Oh Dear God. I have not been sick like this for...well nothing comes to mind. I felt it coming on Sunday and Monday but just chalked it up to a ton of training and winter blues. Then after a unsuccessful ride with scooter on Tuesday morning I came home and looked for a place to curl up and die. I could not open my eyes and was randomly moaning. Amber came home from work early and babied me around. I hit the night time thera-flu and was able to sleep but kept waking up totally drenched in sweat. Today is better, things hurt and I came home from work after a morning meeting. I have put racing this weekend out of my mind. I am disappointed but honestly hurt to bad to care much.

After posting a picture of the Maa Daa Hey trail on my last post I received a very nice email from Wade Westin who is the marketing director for Medora, ND (the home base for the epic trail) He told me that the trail is extending another 50 miles to make it around 150 miles of continuous singletrack. If you have the chance go ride this trail, it is stunning. Wade also asked me to post the dates of a couple of events that they hold in the area. The Bully Run is on May 31st and the Badlands Trail Run is on September 6th. Maybe just enough incentive to get you there.

My second Rainbow picture. Apparently the double is pretty rare, and the arched bridge is making a triple, rarer yet.

Wet Earth

No race this weekend at Landahl. That is such a bummer, but I did not see how we could have raced, the ground is totally saturated. But this weekend still holds some promising fun. There are Swope Park workdays on the new trails that are being developed, both Saturday and Sunday. Check out http://www.swopetrails.blogspot.com/ for the info and to stay up on the happenings. I rode my bike to Swope for the first time a couple of days ago and was blown away at how beautiful the park was. I was already excited about the new trails, but after spending some time in the park I was giddy. It took me right at an hour to casually ride my singlespeed to Swope. And you pass a million good coffee shops and restaurants in route. So I better get out there and pitch in on the work and help make this happen. It feels good to be excited.


Looking out over the badlands in North Dakota towards the Maa Daa Hey trail.