What am I thinking?

I’m leaving this afternoon, with pro license in hand, for Colorado Springs and the Carmichael Training Systems Sand Creek International Classic.  This will be my first race on the PRO XCT Tour so I only have two aspirations:

1)    Not finish last
2)    Be asked to pee in a cup

Cross your fingers. 

A horse is a horse

One morning when I arrived at my office with my fourth different bike in as many days, I was greeted by a co-worker saying “Jeez Chad, how many bikes do you need?” 

This co-worker is probably the closest thing to a real cowboy you’ll find in this day and age.  He competes as a calf roper in regional rodeos, he wears skin-tight Wranglers, and is fluent in the local dialect of Mountain English.   And in case you still had any doubt about his authenticity, he wears a big bushy handlebar moustache.  Incidentally, he is also my supplier of free range, grass fed buffalo meat, which he raises for practicing his calf ropin’.  [There are no –ing words in Mountain English]. 

So anyway, when my cowboy co-worker asked how many bikes I needed I replied in a way I knew he would understand.  “Different horses for different courses” I said.  He was satisfied.  After all, how could he not be?   He owns something like a dozen horses.  He has not mentioned my numerous bikes since. 

This has got me thinking.  What is the real meaning of that phrase?  Is it ‘different horses for different courses’?  Or is it ‘different courses for different horses’?  They’re not the same thing. 

One implies that, given a certain course, you need to select the right horse for it.  The other implies that if you’ve only got one horse, you’ve got to find a course he’s well-suited for.  Either way you’ve got your work cut out for you. 

If it’s the former, you’re going to have a lot of horses to feed.   If it’s the latter you’ll spend a lot of time seeking out the right course for your horse.  And how will you ever know you’ve found the right course?  You won’t, of course, so you’ll just have to keep searching.  

I hear there are good courses in Driggs and Durango, and of course I have ridden horses in Moab, Fruita and San Jorge, and found pretty good courses at all of them.  Also Hood River, Hilo, Hanover, Friday Harbor, Bar Harbor, Santa Cruz, Santaquin, Maah Daah Hey, Monterey, North Bend, Bend, Boise, Trapper Creek, Talkeetna, Black Hills, Fountain Hills, Fountain Green, Green River Utah, Green River Washington, but not Green River Wyoming,  Anchorage, Austin, Smithville, Millville, Harrisville, Harrisburg, Alton, Elko and Ely.  All have good courses, but I’m not sure if any of those is the right course for my horse. 

So naturally I’ve turned to filling my stable with different horses.  I won’t list all of my horses; suffice it to say they comprise a small herd.  I will warn you however, that owning multiple horses is not enough.  You are also going to need Wranglers for cold weather and others for warm weather.  Baggy chaps for dusty trails and the tightest Wranglers you can find for days you pretend to be a jockey.  You might need some balm for long days in the saddle, but I don’t recommend it.  Different horses also call for different sorts of cowboy boots, but whether or not to use spurs is completely up to you.  Keep your horses well fed.  Oats and hops will keep horse and rider healthy and happy.  Finally, every horse will need shoes that match perfectly the course you intend to ride him on. You wouldn't ride roughshod over a smooth road would you? 

As you can see, owning lots of horses is every bit as complicated as owning just one horse.  So whether you decide to keep just one horse and cart him everywhere in search of the ideal course for him, or keep a herd of horses so you’re ready for all kinds of courses, I hope this discourse on horses and courses provides you with a little horse sense on the matter.  

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to see a man about a horse. 

It's official

It’s been a while, I admit it.  I’d apologize but what good would it do?  I just haven’t been feeling any blogging mojo.  And it’s not like you can’t find narcissistic ramblings anywhere else on the interweb.  Quite frankly, I’m very surprised you’re still hanging around.  Haven’t you got anything else to do?  Well, I don’t feel any remorse for leaving you without your weekly dose of circular logic and nonsensical observations.   Besides, I’ve got a couple of lame, but nonetheless official, excuses…

It all started last autumn when USA Cycling announced it was going to dissolve the semi-pro category.  For 2009, all semi-pros would have the choice of moving up to pro or going back to the expert category (renamed Cat 1).   In other words, USAC told us to choose between being USAC-Sanctioned Sandbaggers or perpetually losing to guys that don’t have real jobs, get paid to ride, have team mechanics and don’t know the value of their equipment because they never buy it for themselves.  Easy choice, right?

For me it was less a decision to turn pro and more of a decision to not go back to Cat 1.  Remember how I worked extra hard last season to upgrade to semi-pro?   OK, it wasn’t that much work, but it did require a trip to Phoenix and lots of riding in circles.  This time around my upgrade came not from my own effort, discipline, hard work, sacrifice, training, sweat, etc.  This upgrade came my way via the action of a faceless bureaucracy. 

To make it official, this arrived in the mail earlier this spring:

The best part is that it says while I may be good enough to ride pro in the dirt, at least according to USA Cycling, I’m still a beginner (Cat 5) on a road bike.  Yeah, that seems about right, although others might argue with that statement. 

So with a bona fide professional license in hand and in need of a healthy dose of reality, I set out for San Diego in early April for race number 3 of the Kenda Cup West Series where I finished a respectable 19th in the Sage Brush Safari.  Respectable yes, but there were only 34 starters. This pro racing game, I realized, is going to take a bit more effort.  

So that’s what I set out to do—try harder.  Maybe I’d even learn to ride downhill.  But that’s when my academic life reared its ugly head, in the form of a macroeconomics class.  I’d been cruising along in an MBA program for over 3 years, and now, suddenly, I was expected to put forth a lot more effort.   It was like riding in the foothills all day then, when you think you’re almost done, the road turns up a canyon and you have 3,000 more feet to climb.   

Anyway, several thousand IS/LM curves later, I finished, and a couple of weeks ago I made it official:

So now I have two masters degrees but not enough work experience, a pro license but no winnings to speak of, and I still can’t ride downhill. 

I officially need to come up some new excuses. 

Sasquatch. Yeti. Red Beard. Cro-Magnon.

Sasquatch. Yeti. Red Beard. Cro-Magnon.  These were all names I was called at the
Desert Rampage in St. George two Saturdays ago. 
It seems I had forgotten to shave my face while shaving my legs in preparation for the first race of the 2009 season. 

I did finally get around to shaving, but I seem to have
missed a few spots. 

There’s not much more to say about my race.   I prepared the way I usually do,  (by going bowling on the Thursday before),
warmed up on the morning of the race, then relaxed until just before the start.  I raced well and finished 12th out
of 27 pros and quasi-pros like me.  I was
happy that I finished strong, my lap time on the fourth lap was only about a 90
seconds slower than my first lap time. 

There are, however, a few things that need to be said about
Mags’ race on the same day.  There were
18 sport women racing against her, and she beat every one of them.  She was nervous at the start, but she has recently renewed her commitment to
the hooptedoodle training plan: ride your bike to work.  She takes the commuter train to O-town every
day, then pedals her very heavy commuter bike from the train station three
miles up to the University where she works. 

So when she gets on her lightweight mountain bike with
hand-me-down, gently worn in, and race proven parts she climbs like gas prices climb
in the summertime.  I like to pretend
that I taught her how to climb, but unfortunately, that would also mean I’ve
taught her how to descend, and that’s like taking ethics lessons from an
Illinois politician. 

Oh, there’s one more thing she’s been doing that helped her climb to the top of the podium.  Remember how I tried to convince
people that you can in fact shop at Costco on your bicycle?   Well, apparently I have at least one
follower. 

Dog days of winter

People have accused me of being a dog hater.  It’s not true, but much of the time perception is stronger than reality .  Truthfully, I’m not a dog hater, but I’m not a dog lover either.  I will admit that I hate interacting with unleashed dogs that I don’t know, especially when I’m approaching them rapidly on my bike or skis.  I think I’m pretty justified in this hatred.  Ryan is too.  

To prove I’m not a dog hater, or maybe because my therapist says I’ve got to make peace with the canine species, I did something Saturday morning that I never thought I’d do. 

I went Skijoring.  

More specifically, I participated in a Skijoring race.  The race was put on by Racer and his wife, Maren.  They told me I could borrow a dog and all the equipment I’d need.  Maren also promised to give me a dog that knew what he was doing, to make up for my not having a clue. 

So Mags and I waxed up our skis and made the drive to Park City Saturday morning.  We quickly met Amy and her two Malamute puppies, Wilson and Brutus.  Here’s a picture of Mags with eight-month-old Wilson.  I think Wilson outweighs Mags.

Mags and I spent about an hour trying to get Wilson and Brutus to pull us around, and had the most success when Amy ran in front of them.  Maren said I could use a second dog during the race that should work well with Brutus. 

Meanwhile, Aaron and I got interviewed by a reporter from Park City TV.  I think he was a bit disappointed when we told him this was our first experience skijoring.  I also doubt that clip will ever make it over to YouTube. 

One minute before the race started I was introduced to Zilla, my second and supposedly well trained dog.  We hitched her up alongside Brutus and they immediately started to wrestle.  They were more interested in playing than in pulling me around the two mile course. 

After about five minutes of trying to cajole them into working, I finally gave up on Brutus and sent him back to Amy.  Zilla and I then took off up the hill.  Zilla was a good worker as long as she didn’t get distracted, which initially was every 30 seconds. 

Eventually Zilla got the message and we started passing people.  She pulled us all the way into fourth place—good enough to win me a pair of socks. 

After the race, Zilla and I went out for another lap, just the two of us.  You might say we bonded. 

Bicycle transit center open house

This short article inviting public comment on a proposed bicycle transit center was in the Salt Lake Tribune today:

I will be at the open house tomorrow night, not because I support the idea of a bicycle transit center, but because I want to find out just what a bicycle transit center is.  The article mentions a facility for rental and storage of bicycles at the downtown transit hub, but I’ve also heard talk of showers, a bike shop and an information center. 

Those all seem like reasonable ideas, but I can assure you this bicycle commuter is not going to reroute his commute just to pass through the transit center.  And who’s going to want to take a shower at what is essentially Salt Lake City’s Grand Central Station [which is just around the corner from the Salt Lake City Mission]?  I think the money would be better spent retrofitting TRAX cars to accommodate bikes, putting more bike racks on buses and making more room for bikes on FrontRunner.   

I really want to know what kind of commuter the proposed transit center would serve. 

A first time for everything

I've been called lots of things, from Hippie to Elitist, and almost everything in between, but nobody has ever accused me of being a roadie...