Albion Night Ride

Awesome night ride with D-Rock. Did Albion frontwards, backwards, daylight and nighttime. All tired out. My kind of Saturday night.

Bicycle Repairman

Thanks to Sweet Pete's Bicycle Repairmen, for tackling my brake problems, once again. See you soon!!

Right now, facebook is a pretty happy place. It's just full of pictures of my family and friends' beautiful growing families.

The world most recently welcomed twins Aurélie Laila and Félix Gabriel Biloski! Congratulations Ron and Geneviève!

And congrats to all the other new moms and dads: Athena + Ryan = Ronin, Sarah + Derek = Jeremy, and Dawn + John = Ashton.

Keep the photos coming :) xoxo

Bike For Sale!

I never like to do this, but one of my babies needs a new, better home.

I bought my STP SS to help me improve my skills for XC riding, but since I am now a perfect rider and awe-inspiring technician, I don't need it anymore and it's just collecting dust.

Okay, that's not quite accurate ... but the part about it collecting dust is, and it ought to be ridden.

Since it's a single speed, it's taught me about momentum. Since it's a jumper, with flat pedals, I've learned a lot about skills like bunny hopping, cornering and even some jumping. Imagine what it could do for your riding! How much fun could you have this winter at Joyride!?

The bike is practically new, since I only really played with it in the fall of 2008 -- since then it's mostly been transporting me on the odd errand if it happens to be the bike closest to the door. Or if I just want to look cool.

Seems a shame to reduce this beauty to "commuter" or "fashion accessory" so it needs a better home.

Asking 600 or best offer. One small nick in the top tube (cosmetic only). Parts completely stock. Test rides welcome. Happy Trails.

Race Report: Ocup #5, Buckwallow

We arrive at Buckwallow ... and yes, I painted my nails to match my race kit (for you Thorsten!)

Another Ocup, come and gone. But this wasn't just ANY Ocup! This was Bucky, my favourite course, and to make it an even sweeter deal, I had a cheerleader and personal photographer accompany me for his first ever race-of-any-kind experience. Chike kept the day super positive from my perspective, on what was otherwise a pretty tough race for me. David, from the sport-class was along as well and we had a great relaxed drive up in the minivan for his 11:30 race.

David, all class in sport class

I like to go early because I get a chance to say hello to folks, watch some racing, and with Chike there it was fun to show him around as well. He even learned how to feed!

The weather was great. The sun beat down as it has been for the past week, but thankfully, not quite as intense as the heatwave a few days prior. Still, it became apparent that the heat would be a problem pretty much as soon as I spun out for my warm up on the Muskoka Parkway.

I ride Shimano components, and since my brakes run on mineral oil instead of automotive braking fluid, i was dealing with a common side affect: expanding fluid pushing my pads into my rotors making a very disheartening sh-ch-sh-ch-sh-ch sound as my rotors went round and round. with conventional brake fluid, i think there's a little more resilience when it comese to environmental factors. Oh well, no time to do a thing about it, not that i'd know what to do anyway. So, I had to line up with a little piano tied to my ass.

On top of that, my warm-up left me feeling a little TOO hot out there on the pavement. I went through almost two bottles of water (one with eload) before the race began and still had dry-mouth and nausea. "oh boy" i thought, but i still felt like I had a good day in me. Especially with aforementioned cheerleader standing by!!

The start was crazy -- Mike (the property owner) had warned me about a rock that comes up fast on the left side of the opening double track. Apparently he'd seen his fair share of endos as people launched themselves into unexpected "big air" during the local thursday-night series. I remembered his words, but only as we came around the corner and a Cycle-solutions kit went flying in front of me at eye level. Somehow I managed to stay out of her way, but heard a kafuffle behind me indicating others hadn't been so lucky. At the end I found out it as Mandy, and her day had been cut too short by the bad news bears. I wondered where she was all race, and her "ghost" kept me honest (i.e. hammer now or Mandy's gonna get ya!). So thank you Mandy for a good race anyways -- I hope it's just a little irritation and nothing serious.

The line

After that, my first two laps went fairly well. I was happy with my position, convinced that I'd be catching up to the lead group momentarily. But then it just seemed like all systems began to fade ...

It all went wrong on the third lap. I started making mistakes ... and really awkward ones at that too. Ones that left me precariously perched atop rocks while I prayed my cleat would stick to it's foothold while I regained my balance with one foot still clipped into the bike. Then I got passed. Then I got passed again, and the only thing more unpleasant than being passed is when the passer is extra pleasant to the passee. Strategy? Or is she just a really nice girl? I'll never know. Thus undone, I just focused on riding clean, however despite accomplishing that for the most part in my last lap, speed was not a by-product. in fact, I rode every lap slower than the last, starting out with a sub-thirty lap and finishing with one that can only be described as "sub forty". ouch. and may I also add, "wtf".

Anyway, the one thing that saved me from a total pit of despair moment was a Hub rider who passed me and instead of the customary "have a good race" one usually hears as the male fields work their way through, he said "have fun!"

"Thanks for the reminder!" i said. Because, really, that's what it's all about. Sometimes I forget as I get ready for the Ontairo-World-Cups.

Having fun.

Happy to see the finish, I rejoined my trio, got some hard-earned watermelon and we went off to jump in the lake. Then we hit up webers. And I even ordered TWO orders of fries. It was an awesome day because I got to ride bikes, i did it safely, the company was excellent, the weather perfect, and ... it was fun.

Crash Course: TdF

Excellent collection of gasps and ohs on the Star's sports page today. See the carnage here. The first four stages have all featured race-changing pile-ups with most notable disappointment being Saxo-Bank's Frank Schleck's tour-ending broken collar bone (in three places, requiring immediate surgery ... owww). Schleck was considered a GC contender, but looks like he'll be on an extended rest.

If you want to follow the tour, but don't have OLN, follow the live blogs on http://www.letour.fr/ or http://www.velonews.com/. Not the same as seeing it on screen, but better than nothing! Racing begins at 8:30am and goes until approximately 11:30. OLN usually does an evening show of race highlights, but this year it is notably absent.

Finally, check out this photo ... what's the caption? (Left: Alberto Contador. Right: Lance Armstrong. They get along like oil and vinegar.)

Royal Heat Wave!

When it's this hot I'm more inclined to just rely on existing fitness rather than go out and try to collect more. However, Gerhard and I still managed to sweat out a great preride at Buckwallow on Sunday evening. Man, it's going to be a hot one there. We rode in the evening in an attempt to wait out the traffic, and it was still brutal. Course is super fun though, and I'm looking forwad to a decent race on Sunday. Although touring around my usual blog reading list, it seems like the usual suspects are more often than not opting out! Hope there's a good turnout. If not, oh well, less of you to clog up the 400 on the way home I guess ;)

The weekend was a great trip ... guess I'll get around to posting about it now. We decided to hit up Hardwood (instead of battling the traffic all the way to Buck) on Thursday and enjoyed an awesome Canada Day Ride on favourites like "Serious" and "Radical". Gerhard and I think we need to get some friends up there for a day of fun riding (Nancy, Jules, Birke ... we're looking at you).

A quick beer in the parking lot and then it was off to Bruce County. We arrived in time for a BBQ at my sister's before heading down to the fireworks at the flagpole in Southampton. The rest of the weekend was a wonderful rainbow of outdoor eating, beers, bonfires and "testical toss" (otherwise known as "horse nuts", "scroats and ropes" or just "ladder ball").

Thought I would do more riding than I did, but changed it up instead with a smaller-than-planned hike up at the National Park on the Bruce Penninsula. It was full, so we had to wait our turn before finally opting for a lesser known trail-head further down the Bruce Trail. Not the Grotto, but still fun (and still full). Something rubs me the wrong way about waiting in line for nature, but we had a great day nonetheless. Although I think the boys were all K'd* out by the end.

Ever since getting back to Toronto it's been tough to find the will to train ... maybe that will change tonight ... maybe not. It feels like interval work just to walk between Whitney Block and Main Building so maybe I'll just call it done.

Hope everyone's staying cool!

PS - I saw the Queen today!!

*K'd out: refers to the fatigue incurred after spending the day with me and Kim in top gear.