A sunday ride

Late march and early april is always a crapshoot for weather and fitness, Milan SanRemo, E3 Prijs Vlaanderen, or the sunday starbucks ride, its all good. Tawse, Matt C, Matt S, Ritzler and I headed out west with a nice tailwind under threatening skies. It was a nice stroll out to the theaters, then between us, we managed to navigate back in a King route that provided some shelter in the neighborhoods from the breeze. Nice ride indeed, but apparently we stayed a bit long at Starbucks, because there was a nice misty drizzle to greet us as we mounted up to roll home. Not that it wasnt chilly and damp enough, but the extra mist in the air really made the last few minutes reary. I rode back with Matt S and Ron, and put an extra few minutes on the zoo path to round my ride out to an even 3 hrs.

in good company

Chicagoland had mild temps and sunny skies. I have heard rumors that Chicago warms up in the spring, but i'm pretty sure i forgot about it. We had a good group roll out from WS. It was good to have a tanned and tires Tawse back in the mix. Feltz also graced us with his presence, but Ritzler and Wassman went soft on us and bailed after riding out from the city. Nothing too eventful, we did have Apache go ripping past us on the reurn trip on frontage, only to see them crawling on Cass when we turned the corner. Guess its all gas only in tailwinds for them right now. Our rotation got rolling pretty good, and i got gapped going up Joliet hill. I had to put in a big effort to get back to Tawse, who dragged me through thr right hander on Plainfield Rd for the final. I came past him and gave him a tow past the Feltz, but there was no closing on the 2 escapees up the road. Tawse took 3rd, with me trailing for 4th. Good ride, good coffee at the Bucks, and the first road ride of RED was AWESOME!!

RED

about this time last year i posted some sweet pics of FORCE. It was a Fantastic new group and over that past year has exceeded all expectation on performance and reliability. I am completely beside myself with excitement about the latest and greatest from SRAM. Not only did i upgrade to RED across the board on parts, but i also plunged into late 2004 with a new outboard BB and new SRAM SRM! With only 2 rides on the new parts so far, i can confidently say there is another change for leaps and bounds. The shifting is crisper and the trim is much appreciated.

I will follow up on the overall feel in the next week or two as i really get used to the shifting and really appreciate the change.

cluck cluck

another day of decent temps and sunshine. we had a bit bigger group than last week roll out of WS, but relaxed about 10 min out that a few held back to wait for C-Ramo.. we all got it together after a spirited chase. The roll out was good, we flipped it at lemont road, then rolled 91st up to wolf. We had a nice rotation going after shaking out the cobwebs of a rotating line (nice save Alex W) the it really got whipped up on wolf rolling in. All enjoyed a nice chat at the 'Bucks and headed home to play another day. Good to see Brian and Francine Haas back out to grace us with their presence.

chickenride!

A great time was had by all on the Chickenride.
Great to be back on the bike after a long lousy winter in Chicagoland.
Lots of old country roads, but lots of great conversation, which is a lot more than I'm used to riding alone all winter
See more snaps of the ride at: http://chickenride.blogspot.com/

a boys dream..

being able to play with big jugs! I couldn't pass up the opportunity to post that one.

chicken recon / secret training

so it was my day off, it was sunny and above freezing. Not nearly as nice as sunday, but being able to get outside 2x in a week with the weather we have had is priceless. Not only that, but it allows me to have 2 posts in the same day.... yeah buddy, livin the dream. Could it be secret training? nah.. i wouldn't exactly say i had a banner winter. Most winters the crew expects me to log the hours indoors and do what it takes. Lets just say that this winter i fell way short of my own expectations.
I wandered out the chicken route to see the damage winter took out on the roads. The neighborhoods have a stark resemblance to Old Country / Muncie training roads. The new pavement on the frontage road is in good shape, but they must have a pretty rough drainage issue, as there is a huge glacier of ice in one section. The wind was from the west, so it was very enjoyable to tag up at the theatre and start heading back east.
An enjoyable ride, seeing that i was on the bike and not at work.
check back soon, the fat kid needs to start riding more if I'm gonna survive fat kids bike camp.

Rumors.....

There is a rumor circulating that the Enmark is back on the bike.
no new updates on the blog yet, but perhaps we will see the man re-emerge just like his hero Mario C. If i were a betting man, if the Enmark does re-appear, look for him to be dusting field sprints again by late summer.

pot holes and road spray

It was too good to pass up here today. 37 degrees at 7:30 am, almost 40 by ride time. we rolled out of WS starbucks and headed west. It was beautiful. All except for the fact that work has some computer upgrade over the weekend, and we had TO GO IN today for a few hours to make sure they didn't start speaking Taiwanese or something. Seriously? Sunday? and 11 am at that?? Couldn't we do 8 am or 4 pm or something besides the middle of the freaking day?
figures, the only day above freezing here in 3 months and i gotta freakin work. Someday Chase will be bought by a BIG bank and we will have an IT department to do that crap. oh well.
I did manage to get just over an hour and a half in, which was fantastic. I realize finally after 20 years + of riding a bike why spring rides are so tiring. true - it may be my lack of conditioning, but i have determined its more the fact that i lack the necessary attention span to not ride myself into one of the craters that have developed across Chicagoland over the winter. I use more energy paying attention that actually turning the pedals i think. Its my story and I'm telling it how i want to.
Hopefully we can get out once more beforre the Chickenride starts up shortly.

catching up

so i am now 12 days into quitting drinking pepsi cold turkey. i can say the headaches have been brutal, and im glad i was never addicted to meth or something crazy like that, because im ready to tear my head off; and all i quit was drinking pepsi.
it also seems i quit riding, between illnes throughout the family and crappy weather that requires me to clear snow instead of riding, its been fairly bleek for feb so far.

thats all for now, time to go drink some lemon water and not think about pepsi

later

RIP Sheldon Brown

Anyone who ever tinkered with a bicycle, made a living in the back room of a shop, or needed to find an answer to a unique question; knows the name Sheldon Brown. Master of problem solving and cycling’s' own 'google' for information; has passed away from a heart attack Feb. 3 2008. The world of bicycles has lost a guru, and I wish his family well.

better than a bike ride....

my friend Bill finally bought a house and moved in. Im really glad he is a bachelor, because Super Chexx hockey now takes over the room most people would use to eat dinner in. Bill rocks!

Livin Large

So i know Hilly Hundred is a LOOOONG way away - but i wanted to announce that THIS year - i was on the ball and hit the easy button EARLY. We will be staying at the Hampton Inn for Hilly 2008. That means breakfast at the hotel -AND - no paying $189 a night for super 8.

its about the same price for the Hampton, with better pillows for Trent to bite after the saturday outing.

STC indoor ride

Mountain Bike Matt showed up around 8 and we kited up for some indoor action. With the AM temp at -5, it was chilly just holding the door open for him.
We choose to do a spinervals workout, and it has been a while since i have done one, but it didn't take long to remember they are butt kickers.
2 separate 5min efforts and 2 separate sections of sprint efforts were enough to get the lung butter churning for sure.
In the end, we got 1:15 on the bike and about 30k
dork data includes 687kj, the 2 - 5min intervals were over 230w, and saw a nice 10 sec number of 737W

Mid month roll call

Ok - just got off the bike and downloaded the dork-data.
I'm not exactly on par to be ready for Amgen, but im ahead of last year
10 workouts
11 Hrs
265km
5474kj
190.0 lbs (down 1.0)

just gotta keep it rollin

2 am - 2pm

no - i wish that was significant of sitting on the couch, watching football - or our riding my bike on a marathon outing. but it IS 2 days of Am and PM rides.
The am rides are 45 minute efforts -with 2 x 10 min at or around 200-210W. I know i suck, wait - it gets better ( or worse)
the PM rides are 45min to an hour with 5 x 3min efforts between 280 and 290W - did i mention i suck?
well at least its a start, and the ones last night and today seem easier than the ones the day before.

Saturday at STC

I had to work today - so it was an early call to head down for the STC session today. Watched some sports center and know all the odds for todays games. I got in an even hour of riding with a few intervals thrown in to pass the time.
Geek Stats:
1 hr
2 x 10 min @ 220w
3 x 3 min @ 275W
604 kj

RDO

i was fortunate enough to get out and enjoy the warm temps on sunday. I was off work today, but the temperature was not as nice. I layered up and got out for a nice ride. A bit of a headwind heading out, but i got a nice push home. All things considered for Chicago in January, ill take it.

geek stuff:

2 hrs 15 min

61 km

189w ave

1307kj

Sloppy Sunday

We all agreed that usually there are about 3 good days in January in Chicago to get out on your bike. Today was one of them. It was 50 degree when i left the house at 8:30am. pretty wet from all the melting snow and drizzle, but pretty warm as well. We met up at the usual WS 'Bucks, and headed out southeast toward the theaters. It was a brisk wind from the south, so the roll out was tougher than the roll in. Tawse, Kind, Ritzler, Mountain bike Matt, Mike Herr, and i made an even 6. The SRAM boys had their fenders in place, King had an old Zefal fender for the rear, but we decided it was more of a water re-applicator and kept only a portion of him dry and no courtesy for the riders behind. I was fender-less, so i caught lots of crap when it was my turn at the front. Pretty good day to be out all things considered. Looking forward to another day soon to enjoy it.
I ended up with an even 3 hrs wheels turning and 70km for the day. NICE.

Holy January!

well - like the most of us, i turned the calendar to 2008 and like most of us - realized i am behind the ball; then again that's not too unusual in the Smott camp.
December numbers -
7.5 hrs - fooey
191.0lbs - im slipping the wrong way
0 outdoor rides - well ok, it was december anyway.

The Bad - im about 2 seasons short of having a good base coming into this year - hers a tip for you youngsters at home - don't take essentially 2 years off and think that a big january push will get you back to form.
The Good - i am in day 2 of the new lunch protocol partnered with a buddy at work. we are only allowed to go out on fridays now for lunch, and part of the friday outing is to go shopping for lean cuisines and lunch meat to make lunch. so far so good ( and the parts fund is now growing instead of my waistline - lol)

The Plan - looks to be a nice sunday for an outside pedal - WS bucks at 8am anyone?????