rollin the cross rig

i decided to break out the cross rig today. Its a bit early for it by looking at the weather, but we have already had 2 cross races in the chicagoland area. Not that i intend to race much cross, but its always a fun ride. I traded up this year to a new Cannondale TJ cross rig, all aluminum. Now my last cross bike had a great nickname of the pumpkin, and the cross hog. This rig is not hog at all! Its super light, nimble, quick and stable all at the same time. It just plain feel fast. Perhaps my old Kona was wore out or old geometry, but this bike is night and day. I set out for my old standby triangle route, west on the Prairie Path to Wheaton, north through Winfield, catch the Great Western Trail, and head southeast for a while until it hits the Prairie Path again for the return trip home. Great ride, the bike impressed me the whole way.

60km, 2.25 hrs, 1234kj

I guess i need to start working on a new nickname for the cross rig

Hit by a WHAT???

So i am rolling in today, no one to talk to so i have one ear bud dangling for entertainment. No need for tunes, the local villagers are all i need for excitement. Just east of Pulaski this morning, i narrowly avoid colliding and being assaulted by - Yup a dude in a motorized wheelchair!!!
Now maybe it was because he had his head cocked all crazy looking at his buddy over his shoulder, or perhaps he was operating a wheelchair under the influence like the crazy guy above. Now i could be wrong, he could have had coffee in the brown paper bag he was holding, but i'm going to go out on a limb and say it was a fine variety of malt liquor, nothing better at 7:30am, breakfast of champions.

For those of you that don't commute in Chicago that read this, if you ever want to experience some of the most bizarre and amusing riding ever, feel free to hook up with me for the commute ride and experience some of the REAL sights of the city.

Keep your eyes on the handicapped, you never know when they might be gunning for you!

Bike Pool-ing

I mentioned in one of my prior posts this year how enjoyable it is to spend some time on a commuting ride with someone else, chatting. I have ridden slower and faster just to spend a few minutes chatting with someone i have not met before, find out where they are headed, where they are going, what they do, etc, and share in the camaraderie of bike commuting.
Today i saw a rider in front of me as i was heading towards Austin, he was pedalling at a pretty good cadence, and was moving pretty well. I shifted up a notch to see if i could close the gap. Fortunately he got caught at the light at Central, and i realized it was MTB Matt Silvia. Its even nicer to share some commute time with a friend. We talked about the morning, cyclocross, traffic and such. He turned north at Ogden and i continued my roll east into the Loop. It was a solid 15minutes of time that passed quickly both in time and speed, as MTB Matt doesn't ride slow too often.
Per the season, I'm leaving the house with the sun barely breaking the morning sky, arm warmers pulled up and gloves on the hands today. This week has been a certainty for lights. Up till now i could squeek by. With the combination of me working til 6 this week, and the evening getting shorter, i need the big lights for a good 20 -30 minutes at the end of the ride. I can tell it wont be too long before i leave the bank with the lights blaring full.

Ride Fast - Jump Logs

Guilty... and Chequamegon narritive.

Indeed i was almost guilty of the "haven't posted in an month" offense, but just like every good bike racer, i have my excuses ALL LINED UP!
see my posts referring to the dirty chickens held over the first few weeks of september leading up to the Fat Tire Festival.
Fat Tire weekend is always a highlight of the year. It was the 2nd Annual Lenny Parisi Northwoods Open, it was a beautiful day and well attended. Many beers were drank in honor of Lenny, and a good time was had by all.
This year we had 2 Texas Cadillac's in the caravan to the Northwoods. Gatto had the big black Chevy, with Tawse, Bos, Gatto, picked up a Balmer en route.
The SS Valdeez was my big white Ford, with Smooooott, Ritzler, MTB matt, picking up a Dixon en route at Balmers place. Feltz and JP were rocking out the Volvo, and met us up north. The walkie talkie came in handy for some great heckling, and police alerts.
The race was a good one this year for me. It was a warm morning, so there was not much need for extra planning of layers to be removed. I started with armwarmers, and had them rolled down by mile 6. Of course the SRAM crew got rocking early, and i learned from last year to keep my pace on the road roll out, and start picking off people after Rosie's field has settled the nerves and increased the HR. It misted off and on during my ride, the course was wet, but near as muddy as i had thought it would have been. The new wheels i got from Alberto's Sport were handling the conditions excellently, and the suspension tuning from SRAM was spot on for me.
I was eating and drinking on schedule to avoid getting to the last 10 miles with nothing in the tank. I latched onto every wheel i could get on the fire roads, and found one guy with about 6 to go that pulled me along nicely until we got to about 3 to go and i decided i was close enough to gamble on an effort. I finished up the ride in 3:27, taking about 20 minutes off my time from last year. Just as i was finishing, it started to lightly rain, which turned into a downpour after i got out of the shower and cleaned up. Unfortunately we loaded our gear in the rain, and started our journey home back to the Chicago Suburbs. Thanx again to SRAM for hooking me up with a sweet place to crash, not more than 300m from the finish line. I love hanging out with the SRAM crew on Fat Tire Weekend, always good for some laughs!!