Attention ladies!! Men. . . you can ignore this one. . . .

I've finally found the secret formula to lose those unwanted extra pounds.

1) Triple your work load so you're working around the clock.
2) Run a 12 hour race taking the majority of the work on your shoulders.
3) Sprinkle in some additional personal issues (family, friends, etc).
4) Try to keep riding on top of it all.

Wha-la. 5-10 pounds lost instantly.

Saturday

Wow did 4am come fast Saturday. Off to the course to set things up. Check out all the cool raffle stuff I managed to solicit. Not as cool as the stuff "some people" get, but hey, it's my first year.



A little pre-race meeting and they're off.

Scoring. . . . .yeah, they look like they were working REALLY hard. . . .

Over all the day went smooth. We had cool trophies and everything. Of course I didn't take a picture of the trophy. . . .duh. I'm still learning. The weather held out, the trail was great - and FAST, and a good time was had by all. . . .I believe.

Off to Cedar Grove

What a day. We did a nice easy ride to Cedar Grove on the "inter-urban" trail leaving from SS Amy's house. 3 hours in the saddle. Kuddos to Kerri, who came along on her VERY first road ride (on a road bike). Even with platform pedals she kept up to that crazy SS Amy girl. Unbelievable. Might as well make your first ride a 3 hour tour! I was tired when we were done. . . . .I don't know how Kerri remained so chipper!

The best part of the ride (besides being with good friends & beautiful people) was when SS Amy and I did intervals and sprinted some guys who thought they could pass us. We flew by them like they weren't even moving. I think I even heard one of them moaning. Boys suck. Sweet. Of course they were just recreational. . . .but hey, we left them in our dust none-the-less.

More on the New Fane festivities & clean up tomorrow. Gotta rest the completely cramping hamstring caused by the pinched nerve in the back now. I think someone should take me out to pasture and shoot me. Nice. Hope it's better for Wausau.

The 12 Hour at New Fane

Well, for those who didn't know, I was the official "race director" for the 12 hour race at New Fane this past weekend. It's been a stressful couple weeks dealing with that on top of my increased work load but I made it through. Let's recap the last few days for those who weren't able to join us for the fun filled festivities.

Tuesday was the kick off for trail work. We had some very devoted team players who showed up to help rake the course and get things set. A big thanks to Ben, Ross & Bill for that.

Thursday was day 2 of trail work. Setting up the trail head and buzzing the grass down so people didn't bitch at us for having to work too hard. Thanks go out that day to Rich (who ran the 12 hour race in years prior), Steve, Mark and of course Bill. After a long few hours we headed home to rest.

Is Rich flipping me off?!?

Friday was the big day. Finishing the trail prep, trail marking & EVERYTHING else so Saturday we could get up and just BE there. Friday Bill and I got out to the course around 10:15 (after my chiropractor appointment) and we got right into it. Like my tan lines? Ooops forgot the sunscreen.

We dragged our butts home Friday after everything was "set". Then we had all the stuff at home to contend with. . . . . packing the truck, getting the money set, the night was a blur we did so much. . . .I can't even remember it all.

And then of course SATURDAY. . . .the big day. Drag my butt out of bed at 4am to get to the course to finish final set up and get everything set by 6:30. More on "Race Day" tomorrow, this camper's heading to bed for the night.

Thank GOD

Thank god it's done. That's all I have to say. Maybe I can regain some "normalcy" in my life now. Details to follow. . . . .whenever I "recover".

Alpine

Tuesday is just TOO long to wait for an update to my blog. Sorry to keep you all in suspense!

Well, let me just say that was a hard race. I think if I had actually had FULL USE of my legs & back, I may have performed just a tad bit better. . . . .who knows.

But here's me off the start.

I of course lined up in the second row (since Don seems to call the youngin's up first). And when he said gooooooooo, I found myself NOT where I wanted to be. So out of the saddle I got and I pounded that hill to slip into 5th going into the single track. Of course I wanted to throw up when I got there. . . .but that's how it goes.

Two laps holding that place, give or take a position, then my "lack of fitness" caught up with me and I started to poop out. I couldn't believe the number of guys we passed even on lap 1 in the woods. . . .that's hard stuff. Trying to find a place to squeeze by those men, and then having them set aside their egos and LET you squeeze by. . . . .that takes it's toll. I can only imagine what the expert guys have to go through meeting up with comp traffic. Takes some practice.

This race put me even further down on the totem pole of pain. Afterwards I didn't feel too bad. . .but that night it crept in. I cannot believe how much worse this pinch or whatever it is has gotten. Today I'm off to the chiropractor. If that doesn't do it, it's back to the doc to be poked, prodded, x-rayed, scanned and whatever else he needs to do so I can return to "normal". Captain and CK almost laugh at me now when I've been sitting for a while and get up. It's a slow process. . . .slowly start to stand up, double over again from the shooting pain, work myself up slowly. . . .then after about 2 minutes of this, I'm good to go. Nice. Maybe people should send flowers. I could be on my death bed. . . . . .

Pre-ride

Tomorrow's the big day. Alpine Valley. Last year I got a sweet start and had a very good finish, despite the fact I had a cold. This year I'm not in as good of shape, my quads were faking cramps on pre-ride and my pinched whatever-the-hell hurts a lot. Should be a fun time. Hopefully a combination of drugs and adrenalin will take me "to the top".

Here's the HILL TRAINING I've been lacking lately. SS Amy and I even did 2 laps to make sure we were ready. The trail was in great shape. . . . .the creek crossings were sweet. . . . .everything is good. Now if the rain would just wait ONE MORE DAY that would be sweet.

Let's try massage. . . . . . .

I broke down and called my "massage therapist" (Becky Rands) and went this morning for some "therapy". She's actually really good, and has quite a bit of training in sports medicine, neuromuscular stuff, etc. Her preference is to work with athletes (but she took me anyway). So I called her up and told her the story of my "pinched nerve" and that it just doesn't seem to be going away. I also told her I had a race Sunday and couldn't be "hurting" for that. . . .as I know sometimes she goes pretty deep in the tissue and I'm sore for a couple days. She said come on in, she'd be gentle and she'd check it out.

She worked a bunch of stretches with me and when she started on my "glutes" she felt exactly what I was talking about. A "very thick band" in her words. . . . .that she worked from a TON of different angles. Then she went to my right leg to balance things out (this is the "good" leg) and I winced when she touched my quads which were just riddled with knots. She laughed at the fact that my LEFT side was the one hurting but my right side seemed to be in worse shape (at least my quads were, why I do not know, it's not like I USE them lately).

So I hope that does some good. When I got up from the table I actually felt a bit of relief. Now 7 hours later it's hurting. I knew it would. . .it always does. Hopefully I'll get done with my appointments quick enough tonight to come home and hit the hot tub, then ice it down again. No work out today. . .maybe a light recovery spin tomorrow. . . .test it out Saturday. . . I should be in good shape Sunday. Or so I hope.

Britney Spears in trouble again

I think the press needs something more constructive to do with their time. I mean who really cares if Britney Spears put her car seat in her car "the wrong way". Please. Like anyone thought she would be a model parent anyway.

Finally. . . . .THE SUN!

Finally there was a break in the gloomy weather today and the sun poked out for a little while. It almost blinded me, I'm so unaccustomed to it. But I took full advantage of the couple hours I had between appointments this afternoon to hop on my bike and get a ride OUTSIDE in. Sweet. Of course it seemed to hurt more than I expected. . . maybe it's because I've just been stuffing my face with bon bons since Iola. . . . . . . . .or at least that's what everyone THINKS I do. . . . .

Frustration

Every morning I wake up, roll over and hesitate before I roll out of bed, because I KNOW it's going to hurt when my feet hit the floor. A couple weeks ago I started experiencing what felt like a pinched nerve or something in my back. I have back problems to begin with (a "moderate" case of scoliosis has left some of the "facets" in my back rubbing on each other and as time goes by the bone degeneration has left me with what's pretty much been termed as "arthritis" in my lower back). Somehow the muscles around my spine must have once again been aggravated and now every day I feel the stabbing pain in my butt & lower back, with a pain that shoots down my leg.

I went to see the doctor earlier in the week and he confirmed that I've got a case of sciatica. He gave me a stronger anti-inflammatory than I usually take, and a mild muscle relaxer to ease the spasms. He also said it's likely it will just go away, as most of the issues that I've experienced in my back go away over time. Well, I keep waiting for that day I'll wake up and it's gone. That day hasn't come yet.

Thankfully riding my bike doesn't seem to have an effect on it. . . .if anything it almost makes it feel better. But I can sure respect what mountaingoat is going through, and I have a simple "pinched nerve". It begins to make you just a little annoyed when the body hurts all the time.

Well, as they say, getting older sucks. I guess I have many more years to look forward to of aches and pains. Great. I can't wait.

Emotional roller coaster

Games were just an emotional roller coaster tonight. Bill had a rough go at it and after Squirt kicked him to the ground she stood triumphantly on his chest. Unfortunately CK knocked her off to claim second place. . . . . .and of course. . . the only one left. . . ."Girl". . . .came from the basement and rocked the house. I think Squirt was the only one who didn't get bucky all night. Sweet. Now I'm drained. I think that was harder than a WORS race in some respects.

It's "on"

So I don't even know my "girls" anymore. . . .or is it my "homies"? SS Amy takes a dive on the pavement and doesn't even tell me. What's up with that? At least Squirt told me she made "loser of the week". . . . . . .

Looked outside today and said "YUCK, no racing for me". Bill spent the day removing the tree off our duplex from the "storm". Thankfully it was just resting on the house. Unfortunately it took him like all day to remove it. That's ok though. I was out makin' the dough. . . . . . .

And "it's on". Games tonight. I hope Squirt and Captain don't rip each other's hair out. . .although that would be interesting. . . . .

Is it time to race again yet?!?

I think I'm finally recovered from Iola. I sat on the trainer yesterday (yuck) to get my ride in and watched "In the Mix", the movie with "Usher". I don't recommend it. I thought there may be some good tunes, but I was disappointed. At least it kept me involved while I was suffering through a trainer ride in MAY.

I picked up 3 new listings this week. Sweet. Now I just need someone to buy them. If you know of anyone looking to sell or buy. . . .have them call me!

We were hoping we'd catch a break in the rain to do the RACE this weekend. Perhaps it's better if it stays raining. Maybe we'll actually have time to catch up on household chores (and work stuff).

I'll leave you with a little humor on this gloomy day.

What a beautiful morning

What a great day to wake up. I wish I could cancel all my appointments and stay curled up on the couch watching TV. Riding my trainer in the basement will be a real treat today. How exciting. I know we need the rain. . . .but do we need the high winds that are accompanying the rain today? And the cooler temperatures? Just knowing I won't see the sun all day has me depressed.

At least we were graced by the presence of a turkey strutting through our yard this morning. It was enjoying breakfast from our garden. We tried to snap a picture of it, but it didn't like the flash (since it's so freakin' dark outside). And of course the picture turned out to be of the window. . . . . .

I hope today only gets better. If it gets worse, I'm in BIG trouble.

Finally. . . .a race update!

Finally I caught a break in the action to reflect on the race and give my "viewers" an update.

I was very surprised at how I performed Sunday. I expected my finish would be sub-par, and while I hoped for the best, I prepared myself to accept whatever the outcome was. And I must say I was pleasantly surprised.

Off the start line Don called up the "series" gals. . . .except being that my number is 3080, he called up the "numbers under 3051". So that left me in the back. . . .where I am no longer accustomed to starting. I knew I was going to have to blow some of those gals away off the start line, because climbing is my strong suit and if I got stuck behind girls that had to get off and walk, I was screwed. So off we went. . . .and I pounded as hard as I could to work my way up from the back. By the time I came around the "bowl" I was in about 13th (so I'm told) and Bill said there was quite a gap between the #1 gal and myself. . . . a good part of which I would close slowly as the race continued.

Despite the fact that I literally felt like I was going to puke when I got done with the first set of hills, I seemed to be hanging in there and not doing a lot of "stupid" stuff. A few technical mistakes. . . .but nothing like I THOUGHT would happen. Somehow I remembered how to "ride my bike". Thank GOD.

It was either the second or third lap that I shook two single speeders free. . . . .I pounded up those hills and just didn't let up (thanks to SS Amy for reminding me of the basics on our warm-up). I then had Tammi in my sights. I remember her beating me consistently last year. . .she's FAST! And I was hoping I had enough endurance to stay with her. I could see her here and there and then I didn't see her for a while. While I wanted to just recover and scale back a bit, I knew I REALLY wanted to finish in the top 10 and the only way I was going to do that, was to catch Tammi.

It all came down to the last lap between the two of us. I saw she was suffering more than I was on the hills, so I hammered them with everything I had left to make a gap of any kind. Then I hit the new twisty single track and pulled a complete rookie move. I grabbed a HANDFUL of front break and over my bars I flew. Of course she was right behind me and that's all she needed to pop around me. As I got back up I gave the sport boys around us a little lesson as I called out "well boys and girls, that's what happens when you grab a handful of front break". Luckily I recovered quickly and thanks to the routing of the sport boys I hammered again to get on her tail.

Then we hit the second to last stretch of single track. She made some type of rookie move and fell across the trail in front of me. JUST the break I needed. I rode over top of her (ok, not really) and I took off. I didn't see her again until she crossed the finish line and took out one of the stakes. I think I just plain wore her out. Excellent.

8th out of 37 women that finished. . . .9th once results were posted to the web (a single speeder took 4th). While I'm happy with those results, I can't help but wonder how I would have done had I had a DECENT start. . . .guess we'll see at Alpine.

Fun filled camping weekend

Well, I'm just too tired to give an accurate recount of the race tonight, but I will leave you with some of our camping pics from the weekend.

This was Saturday's breakfast. French toast w/yogurt, granola & fresh fruit.

Camping with Boys for the weekend, I of course had to add a "girls" touch to our camper.

Lori will be happy to know that I "stomped" Bill for her when we played games Saturday night.

And what is there really to say about this picture?!?

Great job to everyone at today's race. I hope you are all feeling more "peppy" than I am right now! Off to snack and hit the hay.

Kansas is setting a minimum age for marriage

Did you see this? Kansas is setting a minimum age for marriage now. Now you have to be at LEAST 15 before you can get married in that state. Way to go! Apparently last month Georgia set their minimum age at 16, after a 37 year-old woman married at 15 year-old boy (a friend of her son's).

I'm all for being "happy", and I think age differences are up to the individuals. . . .but come on, a 37 year old marrying at 15 year old? That's just icky.

No wonder there's so much divorce in the world today. People just do whatever the hell they want. . . .many times without thinking it through. I mean geeze, what if she runs out of something while making dinner? He'd have to hop on his bicycle. . . . . .

We dominated

SS Amy, squirt, Captain (aka "science guy") and myself dominated the trails at Glacial Blue last night. We commented on what nice condition they were in as we were exploring the new single track someone is building. Captain said he felt like a rock star, and squirt commented on the fact that she was feeling pretty good too. SS Amy and I reminded them that they felt so good because they were riding with US. . . .just a little speed difference there. Of course we both felt like crap and were getting the heart rates up there. . . .I was dripping sweat as usual. . . . .we were both thinking Sunday is going to hurt.

While I still seem to have forgotten how to ride technical stuff, SS Amy was dominating the largest of hills, which looked pretty cool (especially that time she was at a complete stand still on her bike). The COOLEST part of the ride was when SS Amy ever-so-gracefully climbed over a fallen tree on the trail. She looked just like a deer. Yeah, that's what she looked like. A graceful deer.

On the ride back up the BIG hill home SS Amy took off like a bat out of hell to sprint past us all. . . .trying to show Captain who's boss. Maybe it was because she still had her number on from the race last weekend. . . . or maybe it was because dinner was waiting for us. . . . .or it might have been the bottle of wine waiting. . . . .whatever the case squirt tried to pull me back, but they ended up dusting me and I decided the last 5 minutes of the ride home were supposed to be EASY paced. . . .not a heart rate of 174. I think I got home as they were eating desert. . . . .Iola should be great.

I'll all set to take "the jacket" this weekend. . . .the question is, is "he" cool enough to bring it?!?

Can you identify this guy?

This is some "slow guy" we saw on vacation. Poor guy. He didn't even know how to operate his headphones.

And obviously this guy was having a great time at the tour of the Biltmore. . . . . .

Tomorrow's departure time. . . . .it will be a crazy day of packing and preparation, including last minute business so we can go have a blast this weekend.

Good news and bad news

Well, the good news is that I felt pretty strong at Blue today. The bad news is I felt strong only if I could keep my heart rate under 160. As those who ride with me know. . . .I can almost get my heart rate up to 160 running up the steps in my house. So if Iola is FLAT this year. . . .and I ride alone. . . .I think I'll feel strong.

Crap.

And who would have thought one could "forget" so much over the winter months? At the end of the year last year I felt SOOO strong and MUCH BETTER technically. Today I felt like I just got my bike. Maybe when thrown in the race situation those "skills" will come back. At least that's what I'm hoping for.

Bill's new bike is FINALLY one step closer to being ready to be picked up (but we've heard that before). Gee, we've only been waiting since January?!? Or was it December yet? I'm more than a little disappointed with Trek as of lately. He had to order NEW stuff for the old bike in order to be able to race Iola. Nice. Apparently they're TOO BIG to care about the "little guy" anymore.

Mt Mitchell

I already wish I was back in North Carolina. I think the day we did this "mountain climb" was the day that put me over the edge. Several weeks later I'm still recovering from it, but it sure was fun.

Anytime you ride your bike for 4 hours, and almost 3 hours of it is straight climbing, you KNOW you're "mental". Thankfully Ben's wife Kerri was our sag vehicle. She checked in on us, brought us beverages and encouraged us to keep going. Talk about riding in style.

The ride DOWN Mt Mitchell was MOST excellent. Ben & I rode together and navigated around all the pot holes in the road. Going 40+ down twisty corners can be a little unnerving. Me being a better "desender" than many "girls" (or so I'm told) found great fun in whipping around the bends as fast as my wheels would take me. . . . .hoping to GOD I didn't encounter a hole, or an on-coming vehicle. Thankfully we all made it down safe and sound. Ben needed a little help. . . . .the "big boys" popped him on the ride UP the mountain. . . .but I took him under my wing and brought him home safely.

When I'm kicking it in gear up those short little climbs at Iola, I'll think back to that day. How much fun I had climbing a mountain on my road bike. I must be growing as an athlete. . . .because I wouldn't have been able to do that last year, at least not if I wanted to ride again within the week.

What doesn't kill us makes us stronger. . . . .and wind is my training partner. Two sayings to train by I guess.