I want to write about anything else, I really do! But the only thing swirling through my head is Floyd telling the truth and tossing everyone else under the bus and by everyone, I mean Lance Armstrong.
I've always said, and I believe I said it earlier this week, that it's easy for all us who have never had to make the choice to dope and compete in Europe or be "moral" and race crits back in America, to wag our fingers and take a holier-than-thou stance against athletes who confess or are caught doping. I've often argued that if everyone else is doping and cycling is your best prospect for increasing your quality of life, it's a poor economic decision not to dope. I've never argued that it makes it morally better because everyone else is doing it, but, in a case like this, the morality of doping is a gray area.
For issues like this I often like to turn to the opinions of pros. What do they think about Floyd and if Lance doped, etc, etc? Yesterday I posted on twitter a link to a blog entry by Adam Myerson who I think has an insightful take on the entire issue. You can find it here. Maybe I like his take because it matches pretty well with what I already think, but, I still think a pros opinion should carry a bit more weight than the guy who beats up on you at your local Tuesday night ride who's been a Cat 3 for the last 10 years and refuses to upgrade because he knows he can't compete at the next level. Man, that's a tangent.
Back to the issue at hand. There is now a full on federal investigation into whether Lance Armstrong used performance enhancing drugs during his career. First off, let's just all take a moment to reflect on what's going on in the world today, this instant:
(In no order of importance)
1) Oil Spill with little to nothing being done about it.
2) Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that cost ga-billions a day and don't need to be fought.
3) Schools all over the country and firing teachers and closing doors because of budget short falls.
4) Economy still in the shitter.
Now, I realize that a federal investigation of Lance Armstrong doesn't cost so much that it would have any affect on the issues listed if the money were spent in those areas instead. But, one can't help but wonder why the hell the US Gov't gives a shit if Lance Armstrong used drugs or not. I had the same argument about their investigations into baseball and football and I think the same reigns true now. If they want federal investigations, fine, but do it on some topic that actually makes a difference. In reality, whether Lance was doped up or not doesn't change anything about the world in a positive way. If you're going to take away his tour titles, a lot of years you're going to rolling that title down to the 4th placed rider before you get to someone not busted for doping. Is Lance going to write a check to Andre Kivilev (Finished 4th behind Ulrich and Beloki) for the 2001 Tour de France if he's found guilty? If so, that same investigation better go find out if Kivilev was doping because chances are high he was and so on down the line. It may change the outcomes on paper of who won 7 straight bike races in France. Big F'in Deal!
For the longest time I've had the internal debate over whether Lance used drugs because I feel like he did but I want to believe he didn't. While some people don't think that Floyd's statements are credible because he lied for so long, I'm not sure I agree. Floyd's got nothing to gain by naming names. Nobody's paying him to do so. Maybe he gets a reduced punishment for lying under oath or some shit but I'm not sure that's reason enough name all these names. If he had just kept his mouth shut he wouldn't have to face that charge to begin with. I think Floyd was simply tired of being the guy taking the fall for everyone else. This sentiment is backed up by Myerson's comments.
Do I think Lance Armstrong used drugs? Yes. There I said it. I know I have no evidence that could prove anything in court. I'm just a guy who rides a bike and writes an opinionated blog about various crap. I have a ton of reasons to believe he was and I think he's just smarter than everybody else. I think Lance's inner circle is better paid and more loyal than any of the guys he beat in the Tours that got busted. Lance didn't work with a doctor who was going to put his name in some easily deciphered code in his balance sheet. You know why king pins of drug rings hardly ever get busted? Because they're so far removed from the product the guys at the ground level don't even know who they're working for. Lance isn't stupid. I'm sure he and Johan set up their circle the same way. Whoever was supplying the dope probably thought it was for some junior in Bulgaria trying to get to the next level. Everybody's got a price and if there's one person in cycling who can afford to meet someone's price, well, that answer's obvious.
Do I think Lance Armstrong should get busted? No. I know, that's a contradiction, but remember, I don't personally get into the whole morality issue of doping. Some people don't like Lance Armstrong. Those some people are a tiny tiny minority of the people who travel across the globe to stand in a crowd 20 deep to take a picture of the guy at an event they had never heard of before. You know why? Because they've got/beat cancer and this guy is their inspiration. Is that a reason to not get busted for doping? Maybe not to some people, but to me it is. Worlds will literally crumble for people fighting that disease if their hero is exposed as a fraud. I'm not making this up. It's not hard to find accounts of people battling cancer who say they'd never had made if it weren't for such an inspiring figure as Lance Armstrong. There is plenty of science that backs up the claims of having a positive outlook or a reason to live as a helpful factor in beating deadly cancers. If Lance doped his way to 7 Tour de France victories and millions of millions of dollars, does that infraction negate the insane amount of money he's able to raise for cancer research? You think if Lance Armstrong didn't win 7 Tours de France he'd be able to sit down with Senators, Congressmen and other leaders to talk about legislation and funding for cancer? Absolutely not. I obviously can't prove this but my assumption would be donations, funding, meetings and support that is currently driven by the Lance Armstrong Foundation would all but dry up upon a conviction or confession of using drugs.
When Floyd confessed nobody's life was altered. The people who donated to his fund certainly had every right to be outraged but if you had the excess cash to donate to that anyway I imagine you're still doing alright. I doubt anybody would even call it a setback once discovered you donated to a scam. If Lance confesses, critical money being used to fund cancer research could go away. In the grand scheme of things that could definitely mean a set back in someone's life battling the disease. It could mean they die.
I don't care if Lance Armstrong used drugs. But I like cycling and the history of the sport in a totally different way than most fans. Most people that are Lance fans aren't cycling fans. They don't care or haven't even heard of Paris-Roubaix, the Tour of Flanders or any other race that Lance didn't win 7 times. Most of them don't even understand how the Tour de France works. But they love Lance Armstrong and that's all they need to know. Maybe Lance built a really elaborate house of cards. And for no reasons besides those I mentioned, I hope beyond hope that he used super glue.
Friday, May 28, 2010
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Chris Horner Vs. Michael from Biggest Loser
The managing editor here at TeamLandall is sometimes known to be a bit indecisive. Especially when it comes to topics to write about. Well, maybe not especially since it's well known we basically write about cycling, but, mostly when there are multiple topics of interest and one or so happen to be about something other than bikes. When this happens we generally decide to cover both. Or, however many there may be.
First up, cycling.
The Tour of California wrapped up on Sunday and much like I predicted Levi wasn't standing on the top step this year. My favorite quote came from Dave Zabriskie, "I'm sick of finishing second in this race." Yeah, no kidding. But, I think there are much more important things to be taken away from the Tour of California than just the overall GC.
First off, the biggest DNF of the race, Lance Armstrong. I know he crashed and got stitches in his face and I'm not about to question a guy's toughness. But regardless of the fact that Lance didn't finish there is one thing that's pretty clear, Lance Armstrong is not going to be anywhere near the top step of this year's Tour de France. For all my Contador-hating-Lance-loving friends out there, it's time that everybody just prepare themselves for a good old fashioned whipping in the both the high mountains and the TTs and probably behind a wood shed if available. Will Lance embarrass himself at the Tour de France? Absolutely not. Will he even be a factor? Only if you measure factor in media attention and crowd clapping.
So, if I'm right, and I think I am, this brings a whole new question to the table for the higher ups at Team RadioShack. Who should be the team leader at the Tour de France? For me, this answer is easy and obvious, Chris Horner. Take a look at the RadioShack team and tell me who was won a stage race that drew real talent? Let me help before you start googling, it's Chris Horner. Levi's only win is at the Gila and while I think it's a great race and great that bigger squads are sending guys; while Levi was beating up on Fly V Australia, Chris Horner was beating up on Alejandro Valverde. No disrespect to Fly V, but I would be surprised if Alejandro Valverdo has heard of them. Can Chris Horner beat Alberto Contador? I don't know, probably not. But he's certainly got a better shot and can be on much better form in July than Lance has shown all year. I think Horner has proved himself to be worthy of the leader role on that team. He worked his butt off for Levi in California because he's a great teammate, but as a domestique and finishing only 1:09 off the lead, one has to wonder what might have been had the reigns been turned loose. I think Lance and Levi should do the same for him in France. He's easily their best shot at being on the podium.
Also, from a racing tactics stand point, the only way anybody is going to beat Contador is to isolate him and make him chase down on his own early and often into the climbs. If RadioShack has three guys who can continually counter attack when Contador covers the move, I think eventually they can whittle him down. That is unless Contador just gets sick of that game goes on the attack himself and buries everyone. I sort of feel like my strategy is the equivalent of poking a bear with a stick, but maybe they can get a big stick?
Up next, not cycling. The Biggest Loser.
I watch this show every Tuesday night and cry like a baby. It's ridiculous. I think it's actually embarrassing for Jill. Something about people who have finally hit that bottom and are willing to do whatever it takes to make themselves better is awesome to me. People working hard to make themselves better is just inspiring, period. Being that I'm 6'3" and weigh 153lbs I don't really have a lot in common with the people on this show. At the beginning of every season I sit there and wonder how they've let themselves get that way. The funny thing is, in their interviews, they all ask themselves the same question. They never have an answer, they just know that now, they're sick of it, and they're ready to do what it takes to change their lives. And you know what? They do.
Last night was the results show and the winner, Mike, lost over 50% of his original body weight in less than 6 months. He didn't have surgery, he worked his tail off, quite literally. When he was sore, he worked out. When he was hungry, he ate correctly. I know being in an environment like they have on the ranch would really help to jump start anybody's weight loss and not everybody has access to those facilities or super star personal trainers. But what everybody does have access to is the outdoors. You don't need a gym to get healthy. You just need will power.
The obesity rates in this country are ridiculous. Just take a look around you on any given street and see how many people you'd categorize as healthy. Not fit. Not about to run a marathon, but just healthy. Not that many. I wish it was absolutely mandatory for obese people to watch this show. To see that it can be done. The show does a great job of showing how hard the contestants are working out, but also how hard their journey is outside of a gym as well. Like I said, I can't really relate, but I bet most people could, and they could be inspired even more than I am. But, the one thing I think I take away from every season is that the decision to work that hard comes from within. You see the people that get to the ranch and then don't make it very long because it's too hard. But you also see the people who are serious about changing their lives.
For a visual, here's the before and after picture of this season's winner.
After seeing these kinds of transformations it's tough for me to listen to people make excuses about how it hurts when they work out because of this or because of that. This guy, O'Neal, could barely walk his knees were so bad. Not too bad for a guy who wanted something bad enough to deal with the pain. After more time than anyone should spend searching for a before after picture that would load I have given up, go here to see what I mean.
First up, cycling.
The Tour of California wrapped up on Sunday and much like I predicted Levi wasn't standing on the top step this year. My favorite quote came from Dave Zabriskie, "I'm sick of finishing second in this race." Yeah, no kidding. But, I think there are much more important things to be taken away from the Tour of California than just the overall GC.
First off, the biggest DNF of the race, Lance Armstrong. I know he crashed and got stitches in his face and I'm not about to question a guy's toughness. But regardless of the fact that Lance didn't finish there is one thing that's pretty clear, Lance Armstrong is not going to be anywhere near the top step of this year's Tour de France. For all my Contador-hating-Lance-loving friends out there, it's time that everybody just prepare themselves for a good old fashioned whipping in the both the high mountains and the TTs and probably behind a wood shed if available. Will Lance embarrass himself at the Tour de France? Absolutely not. Will he even be a factor? Only if you measure factor in media attention and crowd clapping.
So, if I'm right, and I think I am, this brings a whole new question to the table for the higher ups at Team RadioShack. Who should be the team leader at the Tour de France? For me, this answer is easy and obvious, Chris Horner. Take a look at the RadioShack team and tell me who was won a stage race that drew real talent? Let me help before you start googling, it's Chris Horner. Levi's only win is at the Gila and while I think it's a great race and great that bigger squads are sending guys; while Levi was beating up on Fly V Australia, Chris Horner was beating up on Alejandro Valverde. No disrespect to Fly V, but I would be surprised if Alejandro Valverdo has heard of them. Can Chris Horner beat Alberto Contador? I don't know, probably not. But he's certainly got a better shot and can be on much better form in July than Lance has shown all year. I think Horner has proved himself to be worthy of the leader role on that team. He worked his butt off for Levi in California because he's a great teammate, but as a domestique and finishing only 1:09 off the lead, one has to wonder what might have been had the reigns been turned loose. I think Lance and Levi should do the same for him in France. He's easily their best shot at being on the podium.
Also, from a racing tactics stand point, the only way anybody is going to beat Contador is to isolate him and make him chase down on his own early and often into the climbs. If RadioShack has three guys who can continually counter attack when Contador covers the move, I think eventually they can whittle him down. That is unless Contador just gets sick of that game goes on the attack himself and buries everyone. I sort of feel like my strategy is the equivalent of poking a bear with a stick, but maybe they can get a big stick?
Up next, not cycling. The Biggest Loser.
I watch this show every Tuesday night and cry like a baby. It's ridiculous. I think it's actually embarrassing for Jill. Something about people who have finally hit that bottom and are willing to do whatever it takes to make themselves better is awesome to me. People working hard to make themselves better is just inspiring, period. Being that I'm 6'3" and weigh 153lbs I don't really have a lot in common with the people on this show. At the beginning of every season I sit there and wonder how they've let themselves get that way. The funny thing is, in their interviews, they all ask themselves the same question. They never have an answer, they just know that now, they're sick of it, and they're ready to do what it takes to change their lives. And you know what? They do.
Last night was the results show and the winner, Mike, lost over 50% of his original body weight in less than 6 months. He didn't have surgery, he worked his tail off, quite literally. When he was sore, he worked out. When he was hungry, he ate correctly. I know being in an environment like they have on the ranch would really help to jump start anybody's weight loss and not everybody has access to those facilities or super star personal trainers. But what everybody does have access to is the outdoors. You don't need a gym to get healthy. You just need will power.
The obesity rates in this country are ridiculous. Just take a look around you on any given street and see how many people you'd categorize as healthy. Not fit. Not about to run a marathon, but just healthy. Not that many. I wish it was absolutely mandatory for obese people to watch this show. To see that it can be done. The show does a great job of showing how hard the contestants are working out, but also how hard their journey is outside of a gym as well. Like I said, I can't really relate, but I bet most people could, and they could be inspired even more than I am. But, the one thing I think I take away from every season is that the decision to work that hard comes from within. You see the people that get to the ranch and then don't make it very long because it's too hard. But you also see the people who are serious about changing their lives.
For a visual, here's the before and after picture of this season's winner.
After seeing these kinds of transformations it's tough for me to listen to people make excuses about how it hurts when they work out because of this or because of that. This guy, O'Neal, could barely walk his knees were so bad. Not too bad for a guy who wanted something bad enough to deal with the pain. After more time than anyone should spend searching for a before after picture that would load I have given up, go here to see what I mean.
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Floyd Doped. Get Over It.
If you're a fan of cycling and didn't crawl into a cave sometime between Wednesday night and today you are well aware that my boy, Floyd Landis, confessed to doping. If you're a fan of cycling you probably go to all the same websites that I do and so you've read about a hump-teen-ga-jillion articles on the topic. Being that this blog talks mostly about cycling I guess I feel (even though that's weird) some sort of obligation to at least express my thoughts on the ordeal.
I read the story Wednesday night from VeloNews on my iPhone. When I woke up the next morning there were about 15 emails that had already started circulating on the cycling team's list serve. Everyone was calling Floyd Landis an asshole. A friend who I used to ride with in San Francisco sent out an email to his riding buddies calling Floyd a huge asshole. Everyone but me, it seemed, had this knee jerk reaction to this news to the point that they thought they needed to share it. I found this odd. Just weeks ago there was a story on the news where a teacher beat a student and they have it on video. Nobody sent me an email calling this teacher an asshole. But Floyd Landis' drug confession warrants outrage...
I get why people are upset. Floyd put on a charade since the positive result came back. In actuality I think he did everything he should have done to try and over turn the case. He's not the first cyclist to question the validity of the test used or the ethical practice of the lab doing the testing. There's another pretty famous cyclist who has done this on several occasions and seems to walk away from it each time with his star power tripled. The one thing I do think that Floyd did absolutely wrong was establishing the Fairness Fund or whatever he called it. Basically Floyd went bankrupt and couldn't afford to pay his legal bills. So, he set up a fund where people who believed him could pitch in. It was all very "for the good of cycling." What it turned out to be was a sham and it's a shame he took his fan's money and squandered it away when he knew the truth all along. That aspect of this entire case I think justifies calling Floyd an asshole. But the doping? I'm not sure.
As a cyclist with a lot of non cycling friends, I always get asked the question, "Do you think Lance doped?" That is probably the single hardest question to answer in all of cycling. Legally, the answer is no. He's never been busted, he didn't do it. Logically, it seems almost impossible that he didn't. I was asked that very question this weekend and again I had to dance around the topic so that I don't crush the image of someone's favorite cyclist but I feel like there's a truth that people, especially Americans, just need to realize about that era, and more importantly, the history of cycling. It was, and maybe still is, a culture of cheating.
Lance is one of those guys who loves the science of what he does. I think that's one reason he's been so successful. When other guys thought TT bikes looked funny he was investing in wind tunnel testing to get as aerodynamic as possible. When other guys were eating chocolate in the off season (Jan Ulrich) he was taking advantage of testing things like his VO2Max and using a power meter to establish baselines for measurable results and projections of fitness. Because of this, it was often thought that Lance Armstrong was a freak of a human being recording numbers so high and off the charts that nobody else had anything of this level. Truth be told, everybody who rides in the professional peloton has V02Max numbers at least in the range of Lance, and he's certainly not the owner of the highest (That's some cross country skier from one of the Scandinavian countries). I remember reading a few years ago that our boy Floyd Landis had higher numbers than Lance and it's long been known that Tom Danielson (or Jan Ulrich) is the most "gifted" cyclist from a pure scientific stance. But, as they say, that's why they don't play the games on paper.
What's this have to do with Floyd doping and accusing Lance of doing the same? Bill Strickland pointed out on his blog, Sitting In, that of the 7 tours that Lance won 14 other podium spots up for grabs. 8 of those 14 podium spots were held by the same riders and 5 of those 8 have admitted to doping or were suspended for it. If Lance was surrounded by guys that were doping (not to mention the domestiques that left US Postal or Discovery to be busted later, ie., Roberto Heras, Tyler Hamilton and Floyd), and they're all pretty equal on paper, how'd he beat them so consistently? I know that question looks like I'm throwing Lance under the bus and I really don't mean to. Again, legally, Lance is clean and innocent because he's never tested positive. Maybe he beat them because he was willing to hurt more than they were. Maybe he beat them because he's just flat out better at racing his bike. Maybe he beat them because it meant more to him than it did to them. Maybe he beat them because instead of eating chocolate in the winter he was training. Those are all factors that would certainly make a difference in a 3 week bike race.
I have a tough time, except for the Fairness Fund, of telling all my friends how much of an asshole I think Floyd is. I defended him to just about every person who I've rode a bike with because I like/d Floyd and I really wanted to believe he won the Tour de France. I made up all sorts of excuses and debate points based on science I didn't and don't understand all in the name of trying to convince one more person to side with Floyd. Still, knowing now that it was all a waste of time, I can't say that I blame him. I've said it over and over again that it's easy to point the finger at these guys when they get busted and scold them and say "how could you?" But until you've had someone come to you and say "If this is how you want to make your living, this is what you have to do," I'm not sure you're in any place to be upset that Floyd chose to dope. If Floyd is telling the truth and all those other guys were on the juice as well, he has to feel betrayed that he got busted and nobody else did. At this point, I'm sure he looks at himself in the mirror and says something like, "Fine. I did it. But I'm not going down a lone." Isn't that what happens to drug dealers and the mafia? Eventually one person can't take it anymore and simply isn't willing to be the only one doing time for doing what everybody else was doing?
Floyd doped. Get over it. Did Lance and the other's named? Who knows. Maybe they did, maybe they didn't. But, in my humble opinion a cyclist doping isn't nearly a big enough deal for everyone to send out mass emails as if they've been personally assaulted by the guy.
Just for fun I responded to my friend's email using "reply all," which I generally despise. I wrote, "He's no Richard Virenque, but he's doing ok for himself." I'm not sure if a single person on that email list even knows who Richard Virenque is, but if not, hopefully they looked it up and found a story of a guy who somehow managed to dope his entire career and seemingly by ignoring the charges, won more polka dot jersey's than anyone in the history of the Tour. Mr. Virenque is French and to the French dopings not a serious crime. It's just part of the sport. It creates drama and that's what the French love about cycling, the drama. How's the saying go, "If you ain't cheating, you ain't trying?" Maybe that's just how it goes in cycling.
I read the story Wednesday night from VeloNews on my iPhone. When I woke up the next morning there were about 15 emails that had already started circulating on the cycling team's list serve. Everyone was calling Floyd Landis an asshole. A friend who I used to ride with in San Francisco sent out an email to his riding buddies calling Floyd a huge asshole. Everyone but me, it seemed, had this knee jerk reaction to this news to the point that they thought they needed to share it. I found this odd. Just weeks ago there was a story on the news where a teacher beat a student and they have it on video. Nobody sent me an email calling this teacher an asshole. But Floyd Landis' drug confession warrants outrage...
I get why people are upset. Floyd put on a charade since the positive result came back. In actuality I think he did everything he should have done to try and over turn the case. He's not the first cyclist to question the validity of the test used or the ethical practice of the lab doing the testing. There's another pretty famous cyclist who has done this on several occasions and seems to walk away from it each time with his star power tripled. The one thing I do think that Floyd did absolutely wrong was establishing the Fairness Fund or whatever he called it. Basically Floyd went bankrupt and couldn't afford to pay his legal bills. So, he set up a fund where people who believed him could pitch in. It was all very "for the good of cycling." What it turned out to be was a sham and it's a shame he took his fan's money and squandered it away when he knew the truth all along. That aspect of this entire case I think justifies calling Floyd an asshole. But the doping? I'm not sure.
As a cyclist with a lot of non cycling friends, I always get asked the question, "Do you think Lance doped?" That is probably the single hardest question to answer in all of cycling. Legally, the answer is no. He's never been busted, he didn't do it. Logically, it seems almost impossible that he didn't. I was asked that very question this weekend and again I had to dance around the topic so that I don't crush the image of someone's favorite cyclist but I feel like there's a truth that people, especially Americans, just need to realize about that era, and more importantly, the history of cycling. It was, and maybe still is, a culture of cheating.
Lance is one of those guys who loves the science of what he does. I think that's one reason he's been so successful. When other guys thought TT bikes looked funny he was investing in wind tunnel testing to get as aerodynamic as possible. When other guys were eating chocolate in the off season (Jan Ulrich) he was taking advantage of testing things like his VO2Max and using a power meter to establish baselines for measurable results and projections of fitness. Because of this, it was often thought that Lance Armstrong was a freak of a human being recording numbers so high and off the charts that nobody else had anything of this level. Truth be told, everybody who rides in the professional peloton has V02Max numbers at least in the range of Lance, and he's certainly not the owner of the highest (That's some cross country skier from one of the Scandinavian countries). I remember reading a few years ago that our boy Floyd Landis had higher numbers than Lance and it's long been known that Tom Danielson (or Jan Ulrich) is the most "gifted" cyclist from a pure scientific stance. But, as they say, that's why they don't play the games on paper.
What's this have to do with Floyd doping and accusing Lance of doing the same? Bill Strickland pointed out on his blog, Sitting In, that of the 7 tours that Lance won 14 other podium spots up for grabs. 8 of those 14 podium spots were held by the same riders and 5 of those 8 have admitted to doping or were suspended for it. If Lance was surrounded by guys that were doping (not to mention the domestiques that left US Postal or Discovery to be busted later, ie., Roberto Heras, Tyler Hamilton and Floyd), and they're all pretty equal on paper, how'd he beat them so consistently? I know that question looks like I'm throwing Lance under the bus and I really don't mean to. Again, legally, Lance is clean and innocent because he's never tested positive. Maybe he beat them because he was willing to hurt more than they were. Maybe he beat them because he's just flat out better at racing his bike. Maybe he beat them because it meant more to him than it did to them. Maybe he beat them because instead of eating chocolate in the winter he was training. Those are all factors that would certainly make a difference in a 3 week bike race.
I have a tough time, except for the Fairness Fund, of telling all my friends how much of an asshole I think Floyd is. I defended him to just about every person who I've rode a bike with because I like/d Floyd and I really wanted to believe he won the Tour de France. I made up all sorts of excuses and debate points based on science I didn't and don't understand all in the name of trying to convince one more person to side with Floyd. Still, knowing now that it was all a waste of time, I can't say that I blame him. I've said it over and over again that it's easy to point the finger at these guys when they get busted and scold them and say "how could you?" But until you've had someone come to you and say "If this is how you want to make your living, this is what you have to do," I'm not sure you're in any place to be upset that Floyd chose to dope. If Floyd is telling the truth and all those other guys were on the juice as well, he has to feel betrayed that he got busted and nobody else did. At this point, I'm sure he looks at himself in the mirror and says something like, "Fine. I did it. But I'm not going down a lone." Isn't that what happens to drug dealers and the mafia? Eventually one person can't take it anymore and simply isn't willing to be the only one doing time for doing what everybody else was doing?
Floyd doped. Get over it. Did Lance and the other's named? Who knows. Maybe they did, maybe they didn't. But, in my humble opinion a cyclist doping isn't nearly a big enough deal for everyone to send out mass emails as if they've been personally assaulted by the guy.
Just for fun I responded to my friend's email using "reply all," which I generally despise. I wrote, "He's no Richard Virenque, but he's doing ok for himself." I'm not sure if a single person on that email list even knows who Richard Virenque is, but if not, hopefully they looked it up and found a story of a guy who somehow managed to dope his entire career and seemingly by ignoring the charges, won more polka dot jersey's than anyone in the history of the Tour. Mr. Virenque is French and to the French dopings not a serious crime. It's just part of the sport. It creates drama and that's what the French love about cycling, the drama. How's the saying go, "If you ain't cheating, you ain't trying?" Maybe that's just how it goes in cycling.
Monday, May 24, 2010
A Trip To Detroit
I've been lucky enough to convince a great girl from Michigan to love me. For any of you that know me, you know my undying love for the great state of Texas. Well, take my love of Texas and multiply that by some coefficient that represents actual knowledge of why they love something and you get how much Jill loves Michigan. This past weekend we drove to Michigan for a few family festivities and decided to turn it into a little mini-vacation since we haven't been on one in a quite a while. A vacation to Detroit you might ask? That's right, and here's roughly how we spent one of the most fun Saturday evening/nights I've had in a long time!
Detroit has three casinos, the MGM Grand, Greek Town and Motor City. The MGM Grand could easily be in Vegas. It's that nice! Greek Town and Motor City are both really nice as well, but not laid out in your typical giant gaming floor casino style. Both are in renovated buildings. Motor City is in the old Wonder Bread plant which is really cool and Greek Town is in something old as well. Brian, like Jill, loves Michigan, but especially Detroit so he gladly took on the role of tour guide and took us all over Detroit Saturday night once our casino hoping was done.
Detroit is an awesome city. I know that most people will read that and laugh because all you hear about Detroit is how dangerous it is, how there are no jobs and a plethora of other things you wouldn't necessarily associate with a city being described as "awesome." But, I've been to the city twice now, the other time was in the winter, and my opinion was only confirmed more on this trip. I like cities that have character. Cities that when they were built took the time to make their buildings beautiful. Most people when they think of the buildings of Detroit they think of abandoned factories and burned out neighborhoods. But there is some seriously amazing architectural details in Detroit. And not just the biggest buildings that make up the skyline as you're coming in. Pretty much 1 out of 3 buildings, regardless of size or stature in downtown Detroit has really extensive and beautiful details. They didn't just build a bunch of rectangles that shoot to the sky. They built character and that character, whether people chose to look past it or not, is still there today.
We ate dinner at this little place called Small Plates. It was like a tapas restaurant but not Spanish. We all ordered a bunch of stuff and shared. It wasn't the best meal I've ever had in my life but it was good. And, like every meal you buy in downtown Detroit, you're helping a place that obviously needs it. It was nice to support local Detroit business owners instead of eating at a Friday's out in the suburbs.
After dinner we went to Astoria in Greektown for assorted pasties of awesomeness. The place was so packed it took at least 10 minutes just to get your order taken. Not only were the deserts some of the best I've ever had, Astoria is full of character and charm. When people think Detroit, they certainly don't think places like this exist and that's a shame, because it's awesome. The Baklava I ate literally caused an "oh my god" verbal reaction while my mouth was still full from the bite.
Did you know that Detroit is the home to the only urban state park in all of Michigan? Yeah, neither does anybody else because the place was deserted. When we parked I was a bit nervous because it was already dark and we were on the riverside of an abandoned factory or warehouse. But, we were troopers and found a picnic table to eat our treats. I know I keep going on and on about how great it is, but this park was really pretty. It's waterfront location, the Renaissance Center and the rest of the skyline was right there. The Windsor skyline was just across the river. There's a lighthouse. It's quite and peaceful. It's a great park hidden right there in a city where people think the only green spaces exist after a block's been leveled and the grass has started growing back again.
Cliff Bell's as you can see from the menu was established in 1935. I don't want to pretend like I know all the details of their story but I can say, from my experience, this place is awesome! It went under for a while and then somebody bought it and restored it. They didn't renovate, they refurbished, which I think is really cool and only adds to the unique charm. It's a blues/jazz bar. While we were there a 92 year old lady who recorded her first blues album in the 1930s sang with the band. I'm not the biggest live music fan but that was freaking awesome. She was incredible. I hope at 92 I can remember the words to one song, much less a five song set from the 30s. I've lived in a bunch of places and I can easily say that Cliff Bell's is the most unique music bar I've ever been in. Again, it's in downtown Detroit.
This was the last picture I took in the city. It was on the wall of an abandoned building across the street from Cliff Bell's. It stood out to me first because I really like this kind of art and I think this one in particular is really cool. The other thing that stood out to me is the contrast in perception I think people would have seeing this piece of art on a wall in Detroit vs. a city like San Francisco. In San Francisco pieces of art like this are everywhere and the hipsters, thugs and high class a like all look at it with some sort of appreciation, but it's seen as art. My assumption, because this wasn't an advertisement and it was on a building that was clearly vacant and behind a chainlink fence, that in Detroit it's probably graffiti. I guess this picture sort of wraps up my own feelings towards Detroit vs. other cities that I've visited or lived in.
Detroit is obviously in this battle perception vs. reality vs something in between. In today's media environment where the blood and guts lead the headlines, Detroit isn't exactly leaving the media searching for stories. But, if you take a look at the news in your city, is it any different? I lived in DC for a year and a half and it's lead the nation in murders/capita on several occasions. Even a city like San Francisco has it's bad parts of town, they're just pushed off to the side, out of view. I'm not trying to instigate a debate over the socio-economic ramifications of urban planning, but there's something to be said about at least trying to keep everything mixed together. It doesn't help Detroit any that it's biggest industry is on the ropes and has been for a while. I don't think I'm blowing minds by suggesting that if the domestic car industry as a whole hadn't taken such a huge hit, all those abandoned burned out buildings would be thriving industry and a city that can hold over 2 million people might still be busting at the seams.
I'm not from Detroit and until seeing it I was one of those people that blindly teased it whenever it was brought up. Detroit has won me over. All it needed was a couple people who still think it's worth saving to show me around. Imagine what might happen if the people of Detroit thought there as value in doing that with their friends, instead of throwing their hands up in defeat.
Detroit has three casinos, the MGM Grand, Greek Town and Motor City. The MGM Grand could easily be in Vegas. It's that nice! Greek Town and Motor City are both really nice as well, but not laid out in your typical giant gaming floor casino style. Both are in renovated buildings. Motor City is in the old Wonder Bread plant which is really cool and Greek Town is in something old as well. Brian, like Jill, loves Michigan, but especially Detroit so he gladly took on the role of tour guide and took us all over Detroit Saturday night once our casino hoping was done.
Detroit is an awesome city. I know that most people will read that and laugh because all you hear about Detroit is how dangerous it is, how there are no jobs and a plethora of other things you wouldn't necessarily associate with a city being described as "awesome." But, I've been to the city twice now, the other time was in the winter, and my opinion was only confirmed more on this trip. I like cities that have character. Cities that when they were built took the time to make their buildings beautiful. Most people when they think of the buildings of Detroit they think of abandoned factories and burned out neighborhoods. But there is some seriously amazing architectural details in Detroit. And not just the biggest buildings that make up the skyline as you're coming in. Pretty much 1 out of 3 buildings, regardless of size or stature in downtown Detroit has really extensive and beautiful details. They didn't just build a bunch of rectangles that shoot to the sky. They built character and that character, whether people chose to look past it or not, is still there today.
We ate dinner at this little place called Small Plates. It was like a tapas restaurant but not Spanish. We all ordered a bunch of stuff and shared. It wasn't the best meal I've ever had in my life but it was good. And, like every meal you buy in downtown Detroit, you're helping a place that obviously needs it. It was nice to support local Detroit business owners instead of eating at a Friday's out in the suburbs.
After dinner we went to Astoria in Greektown for assorted pasties of awesomeness. The place was so packed it took at least 10 minutes just to get your order taken. Not only were the deserts some of the best I've ever had, Astoria is full of character and charm. When people think Detroit, they certainly don't think places like this exist and that's a shame, because it's awesome. The Baklava I ate literally caused an "oh my god" verbal reaction while my mouth was still full from the bite.
Did you know that Detroit is the home to the only urban state park in all of Michigan? Yeah, neither does anybody else because the place was deserted. When we parked I was a bit nervous because it was already dark and we were on the riverside of an abandoned factory or warehouse. But, we were troopers and found a picnic table to eat our treats. I know I keep going on and on about how great it is, but this park was really pretty. It's waterfront location, the Renaissance Center and the rest of the skyline was right there. The Windsor skyline was just across the river. There's a lighthouse. It's quite and peaceful. It's a great park hidden right there in a city where people think the only green spaces exist after a block's been leveled and the grass has started growing back again.
Cliff Bell's as you can see from the menu was established in 1935. I don't want to pretend like I know all the details of their story but I can say, from my experience, this place is awesome! It went under for a while and then somebody bought it and restored it. They didn't renovate, they refurbished, which I think is really cool and only adds to the unique charm. It's a blues/jazz bar. While we were there a 92 year old lady who recorded her first blues album in the 1930s sang with the band. I'm not the biggest live music fan but that was freaking awesome. She was incredible. I hope at 92 I can remember the words to one song, much less a five song set from the 30s. I've lived in a bunch of places and I can easily say that Cliff Bell's is the most unique music bar I've ever been in. Again, it's in downtown Detroit.
This was the last picture I took in the city. It was on the wall of an abandoned building across the street from Cliff Bell's. It stood out to me first because I really like this kind of art and I think this one in particular is really cool. The other thing that stood out to me is the contrast in perception I think people would have seeing this piece of art on a wall in Detroit vs. a city like San Francisco. In San Francisco pieces of art like this are everywhere and the hipsters, thugs and high class a like all look at it with some sort of appreciation, but it's seen as art. My assumption, because this wasn't an advertisement and it was on a building that was clearly vacant and behind a chainlink fence, that in Detroit it's probably graffiti. I guess this picture sort of wraps up my own feelings towards Detroit vs. other cities that I've visited or lived in.
Detroit is obviously in this battle perception vs. reality vs something in between. In today's media environment where the blood and guts lead the headlines, Detroit isn't exactly leaving the media searching for stories. But, if you take a look at the news in your city, is it any different? I lived in DC for a year and a half and it's lead the nation in murders/capita on several occasions. Even a city like San Francisco has it's bad parts of town, they're just pushed off to the side, out of view. I'm not trying to instigate a debate over the socio-economic ramifications of urban planning, but there's something to be said about at least trying to keep everything mixed together. It doesn't help Detroit any that it's biggest industry is on the ropes and has been for a while. I don't think I'm blowing minds by suggesting that if the domestic car industry as a whole hadn't taken such a huge hit, all those abandoned burned out buildings would be thriving industry and a city that can hold over 2 million people might still be busting at the seams.
I'm not from Detroit and until seeing it I was one of those people that blindly teased it whenever it was brought up. Detroit has won me over. All it needed was a couple people who still think it's worth saving to show me around. Imagine what might happen if the people of Detroit thought there as value in doing that with their friends, instead of throwing their hands up in defeat.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Tour of California, Stage 3, What We Learned
We have the slowest, crappiest, cheapest, most un-reliable internet that money can buy thanks to Verizon dumbing down the service but not the prices. But, yesterday, I was able to do what all day I had wondered about and was almost certain that I wouldn't; watch the video feed of the Tour of California (Toc) once I TTd my butt home from work in a kit that was still wet from the morning's slog-fest in. That part isn't important.
I've got to admit really quickly that I was a bit disappointed when the video started and it was just the Versus coverage online. While there is not a better duo, at least in the English speaking world, than Phil Ligget and Paul Sherwen, last year's video cast had Frankie Andreu who would make fun of the riders for doing dumb stuff in the pack. He'd also often forget his mic was on and throw out some f-bombs for good measure. I guess I shouldn't really be surprised he wasn't invited back, though I found it highly entertaining.
Last year when they announced the date change for the ToC I went on record saying I thought it was a bad idea. Mainly, I thought that if you were going to compete against a grand tour for riders, that it made more sense to take on the Vuelta. I still stand behind those statements, but yesterday proved something to me that I thought, but I don't think I ever wrote down.
If you've read this blog enough you'll know that I'm no Levi fan. Not that I don't like Levi, I'm just generally not a fan of his riding style. I think that Levi has benefited greatly from the return of Lance and suddenly he's popular because he has a popular friend. I think most of Levi's fans probably don't even realize he used to follow wheels for Gerolsteiner and got dropped by Lance and others constantly during the Tour de France.
So, back to what I thought but maybe didn't write. We all know that Levi has won the last three editions of the Tour of California and my sneaking suspicion has always been that he was able to win this race because the was the only rider that was actually in peak form. Now, I know we could sit here and debate all day on whether that's his fault or not, or if that should even be a factor that detracts from his victory's, but what we saw yesterday I think proves my point. Last year on Bonny Doon Levi attacked and nobody went with him. Yesterday he attacked and you could clearly see that Michael Rogers and Dave Zabriskie both went across the gap with ease. In fact, Rory Sutherland probably would have made it had he not had to come around both Armstrong and Horner who had started soft pedaling as soon as Levi jumped to create a bigger gap quicker. Maybe Levi saw that the guys came easily so they all just rode a hard tempo instead of more attacking, but when the cameras were there, no one seemed to be in the pain cave.
When they got to the line, Levi finished third. Which means he won the least amount of time bonus of the three. We'll have to see how this all plays out but if I'm Levi I can't be comfortable with the fact that I came to the line with the two biggest threats to beat me and they both got bigger time bonuses than I did. Sure Levi's a good time trialist but last time I checked he's not the former three time world time trial champion or the two time national time trial champ. Those would be Rogers and Zabriskie respectively, if you're wondering.
We'll see how this shakes out but it looks like when the other guys are actually on form Levi's not quite so dominating. This will make things interesting as now it's going to be up to Levi to try and drop those guys on the Big Bear climb (Which isn't very hard according to a lot of the pros) to get back some time before the TT in Los Angeles which, isn't exactly a role that suits Levi.
Maybe I don't agree with where they moved the ToC on the calender but it certainly has made for a much more interesting race already.
I've got to admit really quickly that I was a bit disappointed when the video started and it was just the Versus coverage online. While there is not a better duo, at least in the English speaking world, than Phil Ligget and Paul Sherwen, last year's video cast had Frankie Andreu who would make fun of the riders for doing dumb stuff in the pack. He'd also often forget his mic was on and throw out some f-bombs for good measure. I guess I shouldn't really be surprised he wasn't invited back, though I found it highly entertaining.
Last year when they announced the date change for the ToC I went on record saying I thought it was a bad idea. Mainly, I thought that if you were going to compete against a grand tour for riders, that it made more sense to take on the Vuelta. I still stand behind those statements, but yesterday proved something to me that I thought, but I don't think I ever wrote down.
If you've read this blog enough you'll know that I'm no Levi fan. Not that I don't like Levi, I'm just generally not a fan of his riding style. I think that Levi has benefited greatly from the return of Lance and suddenly he's popular because he has a popular friend. I think most of Levi's fans probably don't even realize he used to follow wheels for Gerolsteiner and got dropped by Lance and others constantly during the Tour de France.
So, back to what I thought but maybe didn't write. We all know that Levi has won the last three editions of the Tour of California and my sneaking suspicion has always been that he was able to win this race because the was the only rider that was actually in peak form. Now, I know we could sit here and debate all day on whether that's his fault or not, or if that should even be a factor that detracts from his victory's, but what we saw yesterday I think proves my point. Last year on Bonny Doon Levi attacked and nobody went with him. Yesterday he attacked and you could clearly see that Michael Rogers and Dave Zabriskie both went across the gap with ease. In fact, Rory Sutherland probably would have made it had he not had to come around both Armstrong and Horner who had started soft pedaling as soon as Levi jumped to create a bigger gap quicker. Maybe Levi saw that the guys came easily so they all just rode a hard tempo instead of more attacking, but when the cameras were there, no one seemed to be in the pain cave.
When they got to the line, Levi finished third. Which means he won the least amount of time bonus of the three. We'll have to see how this all plays out but if I'm Levi I can't be comfortable with the fact that I came to the line with the two biggest threats to beat me and they both got bigger time bonuses than I did. Sure Levi's a good time trialist but last time I checked he's not the former three time world time trial champion or the two time national time trial champ. Those would be Rogers and Zabriskie respectively, if you're wondering.
We'll see how this shakes out but it looks like when the other guys are actually on form Levi's not quite so dominating. This will make things interesting as now it's going to be up to Levi to try and drop those guys on the Big Bear climb (Which isn't very hard according to a lot of the pros) to get back some time before the TT in Los Angeles which, isn't exactly a role that suits Levi.
Maybe I don't agree with where they moved the ToC on the calender but it certainly has made for a much more interesting race already.
Monday, May 17, 2010
Race Report, Poolesville Road Race 5/15
Here's what went down:
Before the gun:
- We lined up and the race official told me my number wasn't visible from the side. Pinning on a race number is like a fine art. I like to think I've gotten pretty good at it. It's a tough balance between getting it on there in a way that it's comfortable and keeping the official happy. The way they want it, it's not comfortable. I guess she wasn't happy with the pin job and the guy next to me had to fix it. I'm pretty sure these officials have never bothered pinning a number on themselves.
Lap 1:
- I felt like crap. I was about half way back in the field for most of it. I had no snap. Every corner seemed like a death march to get back on the wheel in front of me. I somehow ended up in a small pocket of guys who didn't want to ride close to anyone else. They were squirrely so I got out of dodge and moved up.
- The dirt section was uneventful with everybody riding really cautiously.
- Some guy crashed on a little down hill and everybody seemed to get around him. When I came by he was sitting on his butt clutching the back of his neck facing the direction of the race screaming at the top of his lungs. I'm not sure if he was hurt or if this was his strategy to draw attention to the fact that he was in the middle of the road. Hopefully it was the later. It didn't seem like an "I'm in pain scream." It certainly made me take notice. Oh, and I guess the fact that everybody was swerving around him also.
Lap 2:
- A group of about 10 missed a right hand turn and kept going straight. Equal blame should be on the guys who went straight and the road guard in that corner who as basically hidden to the outside of the turn and saying "left turn" while pointing to the right. Of course the guys who were numbers 11-20 went right and instead of sitting up to let these guys get back on, they hit the gas. I've never understood this tactic or etiquette in amateur racing. I'm not saying you have to sit up and wait every time there's a crash or someone gets a flat, but when something like this happens, do you really feel good if you won because some guys didn't make the turn? I shouted to wait, but nobody did so I had to go with the pace. What can you do?
- Gravel section: Uneventful except for the two guys behind me who were dropping F-bombs at each other for something. I thought they were joking till I looked back and saw rage in both their eyes. I was sort of hoping they'd fight. That'd have been funny.
- There was one guy off the front and nobody was riding. I took about a 2 mile pull to just see if the body would respond. I wasn't exactly punching the gas during this pull but at least I put my nose in the wind and came through the start/finish where Jill was sitting on the front of the group. That turn was sharper than I remembered and I almost overcooked it. Almost.
Lap 3:
- I moved off the front and flicked my elbow. Nobody came through. I look back and the guy behind me looks dead. So, I move back over to the front and keep driving it.
- Gravel Section: Finally some excitement! Three dudes go down on the inside of the turn. Me and another guy have to go around them changing our lines once we're already in the gravel. I see his rear wheel slide and I feel mine do the same. We both get back on the packed stuff and chase back onto the group. Well, actually that wasn't that exciting at all.
- I get to the inside of the group to get a shield from the wind on this back section. This position means I'm forced into the gutter a bit later as a couple guys are moving to their right for some reason. I can't say for sure, but this is probably where I hit some weird section of pavement or rocks or sticks or some sort of shrapnel.
- About a mile later a guy behind me is saying "NCVC you're flat." But there's like 1,000 NCVC riders per field so I have no idea if he's talking to me or not and since I don't feel like I'm flat I ignore him. He says it again. I look down and it doesn't look like either tire is flat. He rides up beside me to ensure that he's talking to me. I look back down, I'm flat. I throw my hand up in the air so people will go around me and I coast to a stop. I'm pretty sure I curse a lot in the process.
- I wait for the sag wagon. Day over.
It's a shame. I was starting to feel better and where I flatted we only had a bit more and 1 lap to go, probably like 10 miles or so left. Definitely enough to stay in and see what happened. Maybe take a last lap dig. I was trying to figure out what I thought might make the most sense. For all the hype built up around this race about how hard the course was, I found it to be just the opposite. I was feeling like total crap for the first 20 miles and was still able to safely stay in the field. When I pre-rode the thing solo I thought it was hard, but maybe that's because I already had 60 miles in my legs before getting there? Who knows. I have no idea who even won. Once I was flat and got a ride back to the parking lot, I walked back to meet Jill, we got in the car, and left.
An odd thing that stood out:
There was a lot of cursing in this race which I'm generally a fan of. I don't know if it was high nerves because everybody was scared to flat out or what but it seemed like the slightest touches or movement made guys fly off the handle at each other. There's one little steep pitch after the gravel section that nobody was really riding up very fast. On the second lap one guy moved over into another guy on the right and the guy on the right just lit into him, "M-fer, get the f off of me. Ride a straight f-ing line." The guy who receiving this lashing immediately blamed somebody else for moving in on him, which is clearly the right defense, even though as I was right behind them, it was totally his fault. This guy caused a crash a few weeks ago, he sucks at riding his bike in a straight line. But this was just an example where I was right there to see it go down. There were f-bombs been tossed around everywhere. Lots of angry Cat 4s. Must be something in the water?
Before the gun:
- We lined up and the race official told me my number wasn't visible from the side. Pinning on a race number is like a fine art. I like to think I've gotten pretty good at it. It's a tough balance between getting it on there in a way that it's comfortable and keeping the official happy. The way they want it, it's not comfortable. I guess she wasn't happy with the pin job and the guy next to me had to fix it. I'm pretty sure these officials have never bothered pinning a number on themselves.
Lap 1:
- I felt like crap. I was about half way back in the field for most of it. I had no snap. Every corner seemed like a death march to get back on the wheel in front of me. I somehow ended up in a small pocket of guys who didn't want to ride close to anyone else. They were squirrely so I got out of dodge and moved up.
- The dirt section was uneventful with everybody riding really cautiously.
- Some guy crashed on a little down hill and everybody seemed to get around him. When I came by he was sitting on his butt clutching the back of his neck facing the direction of the race screaming at the top of his lungs. I'm not sure if he was hurt or if this was his strategy to draw attention to the fact that he was in the middle of the road. Hopefully it was the later. It didn't seem like an "I'm in pain scream." It certainly made me take notice. Oh, and I guess the fact that everybody was swerving around him also.
Lap 2:
- A group of about 10 missed a right hand turn and kept going straight. Equal blame should be on the guys who went straight and the road guard in that corner who as basically hidden to the outside of the turn and saying "left turn" while pointing to the right. Of course the guys who were numbers 11-20 went right and instead of sitting up to let these guys get back on, they hit the gas. I've never understood this tactic or etiquette in amateur racing. I'm not saying you have to sit up and wait every time there's a crash or someone gets a flat, but when something like this happens, do you really feel good if you won because some guys didn't make the turn? I shouted to wait, but nobody did so I had to go with the pace. What can you do?
- Gravel section: Uneventful except for the two guys behind me who were dropping F-bombs at each other for something. I thought they were joking till I looked back and saw rage in both their eyes. I was sort of hoping they'd fight. That'd have been funny.
- There was one guy off the front and nobody was riding. I took about a 2 mile pull to just see if the body would respond. I wasn't exactly punching the gas during this pull but at least I put my nose in the wind and came through the start/finish where Jill was sitting on the front of the group. That turn was sharper than I remembered and I almost overcooked it. Almost.
Lap 3:
- I moved off the front and flicked my elbow. Nobody came through. I look back and the guy behind me looks dead. So, I move back over to the front and keep driving it.
- Gravel Section: Finally some excitement! Three dudes go down on the inside of the turn. Me and another guy have to go around them changing our lines once we're already in the gravel. I see his rear wheel slide and I feel mine do the same. We both get back on the packed stuff and chase back onto the group. Well, actually that wasn't that exciting at all.
- I get to the inside of the group to get a shield from the wind on this back section. This position means I'm forced into the gutter a bit later as a couple guys are moving to their right for some reason. I can't say for sure, but this is probably where I hit some weird section of pavement or rocks or sticks or some sort of shrapnel.
- About a mile later a guy behind me is saying "NCVC you're flat." But there's like 1,000 NCVC riders per field so I have no idea if he's talking to me or not and since I don't feel like I'm flat I ignore him. He says it again. I look down and it doesn't look like either tire is flat. He rides up beside me to ensure that he's talking to me. I look back down, I'm flat. I throw my hand up in the air so people will go around me and I coast to a stop. I'm pretty sure I curse a lot in the process.
- I wait for the sag wagon. Day over.
It's a shame. I was starting to feel better and where I flatted we only had a bit more and 1 lap to go, probably like 10 miles or so left. Definitely enough to stay in and see what happened. Maybe take a last lap dig. I was trying to figure out what I thought might make the most sense. For all the hype built up around this race about how hard the course was, I found it to be just the opposite. I was feeling like total crap for the first 20 miles and was still able to safely stay in the field. When I pre-rode the thing solo I thought it was hard, but maybe that's because I already had 60 miles in my legs before getting there? Who knows. I have no idea who even won. Once I was flat and got a ride back to the parking lot, I walked back to meet Jill, we got in the car, and left.
An odd thing that stood out:
There was a lot of cursing in this race which I'm generally a fan of. I don't know if it was high nerves because everybody was scared to flat out or what but it seemed like the slightest touches or movement made guys fly off the handle at each other. There's one little steep pitch after the gravel section that nobody was really riding up very fast. On the second lap one guy moved over into another guy on the right and the guy on the right just lit into him, "M-fer, get the f off of me. Ride a straight f-ing line." The guy who receiving this lashing immediately blamed somebody else for moving in on him, which is clearly the right defense, even though as I was right behind them, it was totally his fault. This guy caused a crash a few weeks ago, he sucks at riding his bike in a straight line. But this was just an example where I was right there to see it go down. There were f-bombs been tossed around everywhere. Lots of angry Cat 4s. Must be something in the water?
Thursday, May 13, 2010
The War Wages On
A lot gets made of the cyclist vs. driver civil war that has been waged. It seems like every month there's another magazine that puts out another list ranking it's 10-50 most bike friendly cities. Having lived and ridden in two cities that are generally pretty high on those lists and in one that doesn't I feel like with pretty good authority I can say that the general motorist in Portland is no friendlier to me as a cyclist than your average metro-DC driver. You might find that odd because of all the articles you read about how Portland is nothing but a series of bike lanes connecting one side of town to the other, and while that's true, so is DC. No matter how many bike lanes a city builds, the motorist who is forced to cautiously pass a cyclist, thus forcing them to slow down from whatever speed they were traveling, is going to be annoyed. That's just how it is. Portland is the owner of great statistics like 6% of their residents commute to work by bicycle and they won't build a mile of road without building a mile of bike path/lane. Those are great and all, but that's still 94% of people who use some sort of motor to get to work and would prefer their tax dollars go to something else besides infrastructure that slows down their motorized commute.
By now I'm sure that everyone is aware of the Tony Kornheiser rant. If you're not, allow me to recap without bothering to look for a link or even linking you to my own discussion of said rant on this blog. Kornheiser, annoyed by a new set of bike lanes that have been proposed, suggested that motorists just run bikes down. "Give them a little bump" is a much better paraphrase. Then the all mighty Lance Armstrong got wind of it, called Mr. Tony and they had a dialogue. Mr. Tony apologized and then Levi Leipheimer tweeted something that he thought made him sound tough saying he'd never heard of Tony Kornheiser. Got news for your Levi, he's never heard of you either. But I digress. I bring up this point because it's just one more example of how in today's world of where people want to be eco friendly and "green up their lives," there's still an on going battle for the right to the road between cars and people on bikes. I don't think it's going to go away, but there's a lot more positive thinking people out there than me looking to do anything to make even the smallest difference.
That brings me to my point, sort of. Somehow, and this is beyond me because I haven't been a subscriber to Bicycling magazine in about five years, I have ended up on their email distribution list. So, about once a week I am treated to the same electronic articles that convinced me to stop paying for their print version. Any one who can competently show up and not get yelled at on your fast local group ride will have a hard time finding any article in Bicycling magazine that is either useful or interesting. I feel the same way about Runner's World and Triathlete, but that's another topic for another day. The subject line of these emails is always the headline of the most important article and today's really caught my attention, "How to Drive Around Cyclists." I'm obviously a cynic but they really paid someone to write this and then paid another person to put it into a online friendly format with graphics they basically stole out of a 15 year old's drivers ed manual.
Please, take a second an flip through, but don't spend too much time, there's nothing in there worth reading. Maybe, even though I'm a cynic, I give people too much credit because the biggest problem I have with this is the entire 16 page/point article can be summed up in 1, "Use common sense." Maybe most people don't have common sense? Maybe that's a portion of brain activity that goes completely blank when they see an odd two wheeled person in front of them on the road. They point out all these factors like, the two second rule, the 3 feet rule, slow passing makes for safe passing (which I'm not sure I agree with), etc. These are things you teach to a 15 year old who is going to take a driver's test and by the time they are 16 and two weeks will have forgotten it all to simply let the common sense of driving take over. Having moved from VA to CA to OR and now back I have taken all three states written driver's tests. I am a really good driver. I've never been in an accident that was my fault and I haven't been stopped for speeding in over 4 years. Still, it took me two tries at the CA test to pass and I only passed the OR test on the first try by one point. The score on that test has no correlation with one's ability to drive a car. It has a direct correlation with one's ability to memorize a bunch of crap that happens less than 1% of the time when you're behind the wheel.
Regardless, isn't this little electronic pamphlet directed to the wrong crowd? Ostensibly the people reading it are the people on the bikes and when they are in their cars they're probably not the ones laying on the horn when there's traffic an a cyclist is keeping them from getting to the next stop sign two seconds sooner. I suppose it's a great effort to produce some sort of little manual on the 15 most important tips for not killing a cyclist, but shouldn't it be distributed to the drivers? There's a reason that Martin Luther nailed The Ninety-Five Thesis to the church door and didn't just distribute it at his underground meeting. It's safe to say that Martin Luther does not work at Bicycling magazine.
I think my point, if I'm making one at all, is that it doesn't matter where you live, how many bike lanes or multi-use trails you have access to, at some point, you have to ride in the road and chances are both you and the cars sharing that space, wish the other wasn't there. The driver doesn't need a lesson on how to get around the cyclist just like the cyclist doesn't need a lesson on how to let the driver's by, though sometimes, neither of these are true statements. But that's life. There will be cars and there will be bikes and as long as you don't hit me I won't throw my water bottle at you. I think that's a pretty fair compromise.
By now I'm sure that everyone is aware of the Tony Kornheiser rant. If you're not, allow me to recap without bothering to look for a link or even linking you to my own discussion of said rant on this blog. Kornheiser, annoyed by a new set of bike lanes that have been proposed, suggested that motorists just run bikes down. "Give them a little bump" is a much better paraphrase. Then the all mighty Lance Armstrong got wind of it, called Mr. Tony and they had a dialogue. Mr. Tony apologized and then Levi Leipheimer tweeted something that he thought made him sound tough saying he'd never heard of Tony Kornheiser. Got news for your Levi, he's never heard of you either. But I digress. I bring up this point because it's just one more example of how in today's world of where people want to be eco friendly and "green up their lives," there's still an on going battle for the right to the road between cars and people on bikes. I don't think it's going to go away, but there's a lot more positive thinking people out there than me looking to do anything to make even the smallest difference.
That brings me to my point, sort of. Somehow, and this is beyond me because I haven't been a subscriber to Bicycling magazine in about five years, I have ended up on their email distribution list. So, about once a week I am treated to the same electronic articles that convinced me to stop paying for their print version. Any one who can competently show up and not get yelled at on your fast local group ride will have a hard time finding any article in Bicycling magazine that is either useful or interesting. I feel the same way about Runner's World and Triathlete, but that's another topic for another day. The subject line of these emails is always the headline of the most important article and today's really caught my attention, "How to Drive Around Cyclists." I'm obviously a cynic but they really paid someone to write this and then paid another person to put it into a online friendly format with graphics they basically stole out of a 15 year old's drivers ed manual.
Please, take a second an flip through, but don't spend too much time, there's nothing in there worth reading. Maybe, even though I'm a cynic, I give people too much credit because the biggest problem I have with this is the entire 16 page/point article can be summed up in 1, "Use common sense." Maybe most people don't have common sense? Maybe that's a portion of brain activity that goes completely blank when they see an odd two wheeled person in front of them on the road. They point out all these factors like, the two second rule, the 3 feet rule, slow passing makes for safe passing (which I'm not sure I agree with), etc. These are things you teach to a 15 year old who is going to take a driver's test and by the time they are 16 and two weeks will have forgotten it all to simply let the common sense of driving take over. Having moved from VA to CA to OR and now back I have taken all three states written driver's tests. I am a really good driver. I've never been in an accident that was my fault and I haven't been stopped for speeding in over 4 years. Still, it took me two tries at the CA test to pass and I only passed the OR test on the first try by one point. The score on that test has no correlation with one's ability to drive a car. It has a direct correlation with one's ability to memorize a bunch of crap that happens less than 1% of the time when you're behind the wheel.
Regardless, isn't this little electronic pamphlet directed to the wrong crowd? Ostensibly the people reading it are the people on the bikes and when they are in their cars they're probably not the ones laying on the horn when there's traffic an a cyclist is keeping them from getting to the next stop sign two seconds sooner. I suppose it's a great effort to produce some sort of little manual on the 15 most important tips for not killing a cyclist, but shouldn't it be distributed to the drivers? There's a reason that Martin Luther nailed The Ninety-Five Thesis to the church door and didn't just distribute it at his underground meeting. It's safe to say that Martin Luther does not work at Bicycling magazine.
I think my point, if I'm making one at all, is that it doesn't matter where you live, how many bike lanes or multi-use trails you have access to, at some point, you have to ride in the road and chances are both you and the cars sharing that space, wish the other wasn't there. The driver doesn't need a lesson on how to get around the cyclist just like the cyclist doesn't need a lesson on how to let the driver's by, though sometimes, neither of these are true statements. But that's life. There will be cars and there will be bikes and as long as you don't hit me I won't throw my water bottle at you. I think that's a pretty fair compromise.
Friday, May 07, 2010
Cadel Evans Values Personal Space
Due to the fact that I get the majority of my cycling news from sources that discuss Lance's last bowel movement as if it's an indicator to his next TT ride (probably mediocre), I've been left to think that Cadel Evans is a meek, mild, shy guy who more or less just follows wheels and is afraid to take chances to win. I'm not completely sure that last part isn't true, but I like it's more likely that Cadel Evans is grossly aware of his own limiters and when the el pisterola hits it, he's well aware he's already on the limit and rides tempo to manage losses rather than chase, blow up, and lose a lot more. This isn't very exciting racing, but it is smart racing. I can think of another guy who for years and years rode with the same style and used to get the same criticisms but now seems to have revamped his image through twitter after hanging out with a guy who is really good at PR and personal branding. (If you can guess this rider, please do so in the comments and you'll receive an electronic long distance high five from TeamLandall.)
Yesterday, in my quest for bike tossing videos I ran across a couple videos of Cadel that I had to watch a few times to believe it was actually him. Maybe Cadel isn't such a soft guy after all. I know us Americans like to pretend like we're tough, but when it comes to feelings and shit we're all a lot more sensitive than our straight forward talking European and Australian Earth-mates. These videos seriously changed the way I think of Cadel Evans. I'm not sure it elevated his chances of winning any Grand Tours (although this Giro seems a little thin on high end talent whose real goals aren't the Tour de France.) but it certainly changed my perception of him as a soft guy who wouldn't punch back, literally.
I don't think he's interested in being interviewed:
The threat to cut someone's head off is probably enough, but listen to the laugh after he says it, creepy!
So, what have we learned today, Cadel Evans may not ever win the Tour de France but your critique of him should be done at a safe distance.
Yesterday, in my quest for bike tossing videos I ran across a couple videos of Cadel that I had to watch a few times to believe it was actually him. Maybe Cadel isn't such a soft guy after all. I know us Americans like to pretend like we're tough, but when it comes to feelings and shit we're all a lot more sensitive than our straight forward talking European and Australian Earth-mates. These videos seriously changed the way I think of Cadel Evans. I'm not sure it elevated his chances of winning any Grand Tours (although this Giro seems a little thin on high end talent whose real goals aren't the Tour de France.) but it certainly changed my perception of him as a soft guy who wouldn't punch back, literally.
I don't think he's interested in being interviewed:
The threat to cut someone's head off is probably enough, but listen to the laugh after he says it, creepy!
So, what have we learned today, Cadel Evans may not ever win the Tour de France but your critique of him should be done at a safe distance.
Thursday, May 06, 2010
Bike Throws, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
For some reason on my ride to work this morning I started thinking about people throwing really expensive bikes. I'm not really sure what prompted this, but it made me laugh. I started out thinking about Dave Millar tossing his bike in the Giro when his chain snapped. That made me remember Norman Stadler's meltdown after a flat tire at Kona a few years ago. Then I sort of wondered just how pissed I'd have to be in a bike race to actually throw my bike. The answer I came up with was pretty immeasurable because unlike both of these guys, I don't have Felt and Kuota on speed dial to ship me a new one. I got distracted earlier and wrote the stupid rant that is directly below this one. Instead, this is what I should have concentrated my efforts on. Here's the videos with a bit more explanation.
This was in the Giro a few years ago and David Millar was still hunting for a personal win to show everybody he could win clean. I really like Millar regardless of the irony of his anti-doping pilgrimage. He's in the front group and the winner is clearly coming out of this group. He said repeatedly he had good legs and was absolutely sure he was going to win. You know, they always say that. But, if you're in that position and your chain snaps with 1km to go, I'm pretty sure tossing the bike is justified.
While the bike toss in the next clip isn't actually captured, the meltdown from his inability to change a flat is hilarious! The situation is a bit different. Norman Stadler's entire strategy revolves around mounting a huge lead on the bike because he can't really run. You'd think that the possibility of a flat during a 112 mile ride is high enough that he'd have figured out how to take care of this before the big day. I've seen plenty of Ironman videos to know that other people have fixed flats and gone on to win. "ZEE TYRE!"
The term "bike throw" is actually used all the time in cycling. It's an action taken by sprinters that are close to each other and so they "throw" their bike at the line to try and get there before the other guy. I've always wondered if this is really effective but enough people do it, so it must be.
Here's a properly executed bike throw. It's actually a great example as these Cavendish and Husholvd are joking around, (It's the top of Mt. Ventoux and the winners have already showered by the time these two guys "sprint" for the line.) going slow and both of them actually throw their bikes at the line. It's quick, so pay attention:
And then there's this little gem I saw the other day. This is not a properly executed bike throw:
And, to answer his question, yes, there's nothing in the rules that say you actually have to cross the finish line on your bike. You both just have to cross the line. Tough win!
This was in the Giro a few years ago and David Millar was still hunting for a personal win to show everybody he could win clean. I really like Millar regardless of the irony of his anti-doping pilgrimage. He's in the front group and the winner is clearly coming out of this group. He said repeatedly he had good legs and was absolutely sure he was going to win. You know, they always say that. But, if you're in that position and your chain snaps with 1km to go, I'm pretty sure tossing the bike is justified.
While the bike toss in the next clip isn't actually captured, the meltdown from his inability to change a flat is hilarious! The situation is a bit different. Norman Stadler's entire strategy revolves around mounting a huge lead on the bike because he can't really run. You'd think that the possibility of a flat during a 112 mile ride is high enough that he'd have figured out how to take care of this before the big day. I've seen plenty of Ironman videos to know that other people have fixed flats and gone on to win. "ZEE TYRE!"
The term "bike throw" is actually used all the time in cycling. It's an action taken by sprinters that are close to each other and so they "throw" their bike at the line to try and get there before the other guy. I've always wondered if this is really effective but enough people do it, so it must be.
Here's a properly executed bike throw. It's actually a great example as these Cavendish and Husholvd are joking around, (It's the top of Mt. Ventoux and the winners have already showered by the time these two guys "sprint" for the line.) going slow and both of them actually throw their bikes at the line. It's quick, so pay attention:
And then there's this little gem I saw the other day. This is not a properly executed bike throw:
And, to answer his question, yes, there's nothing in the rules that say you actually have to cross the finish line on your bike. You both just have to cross the line. Tough win!
Who Are You Kidding?
Last year I worked for a company that started all of it's meetings with some sort of "share" time. This obviously annoyed me to no end because to be quite honest I didn't give a crap what everybody else at the table's favorite memory of a baby sitter was. These also annoyed me because not only was I forced to participate but because I wasn't interested in sharing actual details of my life with these people. I'd make something up that wasn't as outlandish as everybody else's stories and would once again be the office outcast.
One such meeting the opening share time question was "What's a pet peeve and how are you working on it?" People went around the table really talking about things they were actually working on in their personal lives. I think one girl even cried which forced me not to laugh. I'm not saying I'm perfect, because who is, but when it comes to the crap I'm working on in my personal life, to me, work just ain't the forum where I'm going to openly discuss that stuff, and, it shouldn't be for anyone.
As it rolled around to me I was torn between my current real answer, "these meetings" and how I was working it, "looking for a new job," and "people who wear the wrong socks in cycling." I went with the socks. I made up some crap about how you can't just have gym socks and don't be ridiculous and show up with tube socks. They have to be cycling socks and they they should be straight and pulled up as high as they'll go. To be honest, this wasn't an entire lie, but I am obviously not affected by other people's sock choice while on a bike.
This morning, I was reminded of that meeting because I received an email that cuts right to a life long pet peeve of mine, but one I have no intention of working on. That pet peeve is when people make completely empty threats to try and get something done. I won't go into the details of this one, but there is absolutely no merit to the threat as it was laid out. The more I think about it, I don't think it's the threat itself that bothers me, or rather the non enforceable consequence for not following the actions. The part that annoys me is that for someone to make such a ridiculous threat, they must think that all the people who read it are so stupid that instead of quickly realizing the lack of merit, they'll all be scared into doing whatever this person says. I find as an adult most of these empty threats made by people have some sort of financial link to them which instantly negate the person's actual ability to follow through if you ignore the action they want you to take.
When I worked at summer camp I was amazed by the staffers who would throw out empty threats at the campers all the time. The problem is, kids are way smarter than most people give them credit for and if you tell little Johnny that if he keeps doing x behavior he's going to get y punishment, but you don't actually hold him to it the next time he does it, he not only keeps doing that, but you just gave him permission to do whatever the hell he wants because he knows you're not going to follow through. I never had this problem as a staffer at summer camp because I had no problem taking every bit of little johnny's fun away when he didn't do what was asked. In the end, guess who never had follow up issues with little johnny?
It just doesn't make any sense to threaten some consequence that you can't enforce. It only makes you look stupid and you lose the respect of your peers. Whether it's your kids, your staff, your peers or your enemy, you're better off never crossing that line if you can't or don't plan to actually enforce what you say. And besides threatening people doesn't make them jump to action, it makes them all quickly form an alliance against you. And, in my own case that spurred this little discussion, I'm still sitting right where I was before I received that email. No action on my part is being taken.
One such meeting the opening share time question was "What's a pet peeve and how are you working on it?" People went around the table really talking about things they were actually working on in their personal lives. I think one girl even cried which forced me not to laugh. I'm not saying I'm perfect, because who is, but when it comes to the crap I'm working on in my personal life, to me, work just ain't the forum where I'm going to openly discuss that stuff, and, it shouldn't be for anyone.
As it rolled around to me I was torn between my current real answer, "these meetings" and how I was working it, "looking for a new job," and "people who wear the wrong socks in cycling." I went with the socks. I made up some crap about how you can't just have gym socks and don't be ridiculous and show up with tube socks. They have to be cycling socks and they they should be straight and pulled up as high as they'll go. To be honest, this wasn't an entire lie, but I am obviously not affected by other people's sock choice while on a bike.
This morning, I was reminded of that meeting because I received an email that cuts right to a life long pet peeve of mine, but one I have no intention of working on. That pet peeve is when people make completely empty threats to try and get something done. I won't go into the details of this one, but there is absolutely no merit to the threat as it was laid out. The more I think about it, I don't think it's the threat itself that bothers me, or rather the non enforceable consequence for not following the actions. The part that annoys me is that for someone to make such a ridiculous threat, they must think that all the people who read it are so stupid that instead of quickly realizing the lack of merit, they'll all be scared into doing whatever this person says. I find as an adult most of these empty threats made by people have some sort of financial link to them which instantly negate the person's actual ability to follow through if you ignore the action they want you to take.
When I worked at summer camp I was amazed by the staffers who would throw out empty threats at the campers all the time. The problem is, kids are way smarter than most people give them credit for and if you tell little Johnny that if he keeps doing x behavior he's going to get y punishment, but you don't actually hold him to it the next time he does it, he not only keeps doing that, but you just gave him permission to do whatever the hell he wants because he knows you're not going to follow through. I never had this problem as a staffer at summer camp because I had no problem taking every bit of little johnny's fun away when he didn't do what was asked. In the end, guess who never had follow up issues with little johnny?
It just doesn't make any sense to threaten some consequence that you can't enforce. It only makes you look stupid and you lose the respect of your peers. Whether it's your kids, your staff, your peers or your enemy, you're better off never crossing that line if you can't or don't plan to actually enforce what you say. And besides threatening people doesn't make them jump to action, it makes them all quickly form an alliance against you. And, in my own case that spurred this little discussion, I'm still sitting right where I was before I received that email. No action on my part is being taken.
Wednesday, May 05, 2010
A Rant of Sorts
Sometimes I fret over what non-sense I can spend a few minutes of day writing on this thing. Some of those days I come up with something that is just a little bit less pointless than everything else and so I write about that. Some of those days, like today, I can't really think of anything that would make for a full on post. Sometimes, awesome things just fall in your lap.
We've all had our run ins with customer service and as the world of business moves away from people and more towards automatically generated email messages it would seem that responses like the one below are going to be all the more common. Will someone on the other end even read this? You wouldn't possibly say this had their been a person on the other end of the phone as opposed to server space on the other end of the interweb. One thing's for sure, sometimes, it just feels good to say/type exactly what it is you feel.
(The author of this beautifully crafted email's identity will be kept anonymous)
Dear ProFlowers.com,
No way will I "finish my order" on "flowers for mom", despite your ridiculous 10% off offer that I just received via email. Advertising flowers for $19.99 and then charging $30 for delivery, $3 for some other bullshit, sales tax, and whatever other crap you tacked on is some crazy shit. My order total once I placed it in my shopping cart and provided my info was nearly $58 - for delivery of a $19 bouquet on Mother's day. I can't even begin to imagine what the total would be had there not been a special discount and a free vase on that order. It was reduced down to $48 when I changed the delivery date to the day before (but who wants to send their mom flowers on NOT-mother's-day?) Still some crazy shit.
So let's just break this down real quick: I spent time picking out the right flowers, filling in all your forms, all the while assuming that the delivery fees would be high, but somewhat reasonable. I was a happy camper. Then, all of a sudden out of nowhere, WHAM!! BAM! FIFTY-EIGHT DOLLARS PLEASE! Screwed.
You should feel guilty.
Regards,
Person
--
On another totally unrelated note I'm becoming less and less interested in watching the news with is sad because I feel like I'm just starting to get to that age where I should be more and more concerned about what's going on in the world. But, it's hard to watch the news when the leading story is the latest saga in who Tiger Woods is banging or that Kate from Jon and Kate plus 8 got kicked off of Dancing with the Stars and it makes her kids sad that people critique her mom. I got news for those kids, what those judges are saying is nice compared to how 90% of America feels about either of their parents. But I digress.
Yesterday, Jill sent me a link to a story on the Washington Post's website where an author literally did a write up a tiny pile of snow still left over from February's snow storms. I mean really? We live in the DC area, somebody is bound to have just gotten shot and that's at least better news than well packed snow that refuses to melt. They posted a before and after picture as if the snow had gone on The Biggest Loser or something. Why is that a story?
Am I the only one that is pretty sure Metro is being ran by an intern? This morning there was a report there will be adjustments to the Red Line. I don't know this for sure, but I've always heard that the Red Line is the most use of the five options. The adjustments were described as follows:
Add Cars.
Cut Trains.
Increase Time Between Trains.
But, if 2/3s of those jump out at you as the opposite of progress, don't worry, Metro authorities say that these adjustments will help ease Red Line congestion. Let's do the math. Most trains have 6 cars, but they can have up to 8. If you cut 1 train, that's 3 trains that now need 2 extra cars each just to break even. When you increase the wait you aren't spreading out those 2 cars per train as evenly as you would if a standard 6 car train showed up on the current schedule. That's just more people standing on the platform trying to squeeze into two extra cars.
I know this might be crazy, but here's an idea, how about adding cars to the same number of trains and keep the same schedule. Maybe metro is just being ran by idiots.
We've all had our run ins with customer service and as the world of business moves away from people and more towards automatically generated email messages it would seem that responses like the one below are going to be all the more common. Will someone on the other end even read this? You wouldn't possibly say this had their been a person on the other end of the phone as opposed to server space on the other end of the interweb. One thing's for sure, sometimes, it just feels good to say/type exactly what it is you feel.
(The author of this beautifully crafted email's identity will be kept anonymous)
Dear ProFlowers.com,
No way will I "finish my order" on "flowers for mom", despite your ridiculous 10% off offer that I just received via email. Advertising flowers for $19.99 and then charging $30 for delivery, $3 for some other bullshit, sales tax, and whatever other crap you tacked on is some crazy shit. My order total once I placed it in my shopping cart and provided my info was nearly $58 - for delivery of a $19 bouquet on Mother's day. I can't even begin to imagine what the total would be had there not been a special discount and a free vase on that order. It was reduced down to $48 when I changed the delivery date to the day before (but who wants to send their mom flowers on NOT-mother's-day?) Still some crazy shit.
So let's just break this down real quick: I spent time picking out the right flowers, filling in all your forms, all the while assuming that the delivery fees would be high, but somewhat reasonable. I was a happy camper. Then, all of a sudden out of nowhere, WHAM!! BAM! FIFTY-EIGHT DOLLARS PLEASE! Screwed.
You should feel guilty.
Regards,
Person
--
On another totally unrelated note I'm becoming less and less interested in watching the news with is sad because I feel like I'm just starting to get to that age where I should be more and more concerned about what's going on in the world. But, it's hard to watch the news when the leading story is the latest saga in who Tiger Woods is banging or that Kate from Jon and Kate plus 8 got kicked off of Dancing with the Stars and it makes her kids sad that people critique her mom. I got news for those kids, what those judges are saying is nice compared to how 90% of America feels about either of their parents. But I digress.
Yesterday, Jill sent me a link to a story on the Washington Post's website where an author literally did a write up a tiny pile of snow still left over from February's snow storms. I mean really? We live in the DC area, somebody is bound to have just gotten shot and that's at least better news than well packed snow that refuses to melt. They posted a before and after picture as if the snow had gone on The Biggest Loser or something. Why is that a story?
Am I the only one that is pretty sure Metro is being ran by an intern? This morning there was a report there will be adjustments to the Red Line. I don't know this for sure, but I've always heard that the Red Line is the most use of the five options. The adjustments were described as follows:
Add Cars.
Cut Trains.
Increase Time Between Trains.
But, if 2/3s of those jump out at you as the opposite of progress, don't worry, Metro authorities say that these adjustments will help ease Red Line congestion. Let's do the math. Most trains have 6 cars, but they can have up to 8. If you cut 1 train, that's 3 trains that now need 2 extra cars each just to break even. When you increase the wait you aren't spreading out those 2 cars per train as evenly as you would if a standard 6 car train showed up on the current schedule. That's just more people standing on the platform trying to squeeze into two extra cars.
I know this might be crazy, but here's an idea, how about adding cars to the same number of trains and keep the same schedule. Maybe metro is just being ran by idiots.
Monday, May 03, 2010
Race Report - Michael Murad Road Race
Saturday, May 1, I lined up for the first time this year at the Michael P. Murad Memorial Road Race. Everybody was complaining that it was really hot, but I sort of like it hot, so I didn't care about that. It was in the upper 80s and just 3 days before there was a high of 60 so I can see how it would bother some people.
The course is a pretty standard 8 mile loop. A couple really well paved roads and a couple country roads that don't get a lot of attention. There wasn't a single hill to speak of. This isn't to say there weren't a couple little rises, but a hill that almost everybody in the group is going over in their 50/53x15 isn't exactly going to do much damage to the group. We did 6 laps for 48 miles.
The results haven't been posted yet (way to go bikereg and the promoters) so I don't know my exact finishing spot. I feel like it's top 20 but it could be top 30. It's so hard to tell the line when you're seeing cross eyed. Either way, the result page won't tell the story of how I felt the day went, so I'll get on with it.
Last year in California I went into most races with the strategy of staying out of the wind and trying to sprint. This strategy doesn't really work for me because while I might be an ok sprinter, I'm not crazy like they are, as we'll come to see later in this report. So with this race I started with a couple goals.
1) Win.
2) Be active getting in breaks and starting breaks.
3) Don't pull back any breaks because somebody else will do that.
4) Stay in the front half at all times.
5) Finish with all your skin.
I can honestly say, for the first time in any race, I accomplished all but 1 goal.
The first lap started like most first laps with a couple guys on the front acting as if the finish line was around the next corner, then we got to that next corner and it slowed down. After we came through the finish line on the 1st lap I just wasn't happy with the pace and decided instead of being frustrated, I'd go do something about it. I put myself on the front and ramped the pace up just a bit, nothing drastic. After about a minute I moved left, flicked my elbow and nobody came through. I looked over my shoulder and saw that not a single person had bothered to stay on my wheel. Without trying I opened a gap of about 10 or 15 seconds and so I decided maybe I should start trying. Realistically speaking I knew I had no chance of staying away for 40 more miles, but you never know what might happen in a group of Cat 4s. One guy from DC Velo bridged up to me, which I was happy about, except he took the shortest pull ever and stuck me right back out in the wind. Then two more guys came up, both from the team hosting the race, AABC. The four of us tried to get organized. I'm sort of suffering like a dog as I've been off the front of like 10 minutes, most of which was by myself so I really just need a wheel to follow. The DC Velo guy starts yelling at everybody to work together. I yell back at him that I need to recover and he needs to take a longer pull. Meanwhile the 2nd of the AABC guys is literally just following his teammates wheel not even peaking at the wind. As soon as I saw this I knew this break had as much chance as if I were by myself. I took one more long pull trying to inspire my new friends, but when it was my turn to work back through the pace line I looked back and realized we were basically caught, so I sat up.
That effort hurt! It took a lot longer to recover from it than I thought it would so I sat just at about what I determined was the middle of the pack to drink, eat and gasp for air. About half a lap later I started to feel normal again so I began picking my way up through the field to get closer to the front. This was no easy task as the center line rule (can't cross the center line whether it's actually painted or not) was in full effect on every road and 4 guys from AABC decided they'd rather ride shoulder to shoulder on the front and pick each other's noses. For most of the day this was the pace, at times I'm told we were going 15mph. Why didn't someone go to the front and make it faster? Well, to be honest, it was a game of thread the needle just to move up one row towards the front because it was basically 3 or 4 wide all the way across the one lane we were allowed. The refs were being really strict on the center line rule relegating lots of dudes to the back so there wasn't much you could do. Also, see what happened with me when I just went up there and tried to pick up the pace. Those guys just let me roll off the front and nobody was going to chase until the group up the road was at least 4 deep. Then, they'd work to bring it back. This was sort of the story of the day.
With about 1.5 miles to go in the 3rd lap I was sitting about 10 guys from the front and again the pace was crawling and I was getting bored. Since Jill comes to all my races and basically just sits there in the sun for a few hours to see us go by 5-6 times I decided I'd try to get off the front for the sole ambition of coming through the finish line by myself so she'd be impressed/happy/proud/something. This time I went with a bit more purpose as I didn't really want to draw anybody out with me. It didn't take me long to realize I'd misjudged how close we were to the finish line but figured I'd already committed so it was head down until I got there. One other guy bridged up so we rotated a few times but he lost my wheel on the right turn into the final stretch because he grabbed his brakes and I didn't. I decided not to wait for him since I didn't care if this move stuck for another 3 laps, I only wanted to make sure it stuck through the finish line on this lap. With about 200 meters to go I glanced back and saw about 5 guys working to get up to me. They caught me just before the finish line and we started working together pretty well. I saw Jill smile when she saw me come through in this small group off the front and that really made my legs instantly feel better.
This group was motivated and another two guys came up to us. So now we've got 8 because the first guy to bridge to me latched onto the back of the group of 5. We were rotating pretty well, I took a smarter pull because I was now hoping we could make this stick and everybody was saying, "we've got a gap," "go, go, go" so you knew everybody was motivated to work. When I rotated off the front the next guy came flying by me way too fast and had essentially dropped the guy behind him. I yelled "Don't blow it up, ride tempo" and he backed off and let the next guy catch back on. As I made my way to the back the guy that originally bridged looked like shit and was fading. I asked if he was ok and he just shook his head no. There was a gap opening between him and the wheel in front so I asked if he could close it, he shook his head no. Since this meant I was now going to have to sprint to fill that gap, which my legs weren't excited about, I put my hand on his butt and slung him back up to the wheel. I figured if we could get just one more pull out of this guy that was better than letting him slip out the back. Also, it was easier to throw him up to the wheel than close that gap myself. I rotated through one more time before looking back and realizing the guy behind me was the head of the entire bunch. Good try.
That group seemed the most promising and about five of us stayed at the front of the group. It didn't take long for counter attacks to start going and when I saw three of those motivated guys jump, I jumped to go also. I was basically riding up the gutter already so when I went my move was a combination of sprinting, tip toeing on the edge of the road, shouting for guys to get out of my way, and riding through driveway gravel that spilled on the road hoping for the best. I made it up, we had five guys, we rotated once but nobody's pulls had much to them and we were brought back pretty quickly. Again, decent try.
At this point it seemed prudent to stay close to the front to see who would try and get away, but also start mentally preparing myself for the chaos that always ends up when the pace is slow and not that much of the field has been shed. There was a pretty senseless crash on the last lap. Overlap of wheels and a couple over reactions. I heard the wheels touch, immediately realized I was close enough to get caught in the dominoes so I got the hell out of dodge instantly to the left. Sure enough, if I had stayed put I'd have definitely caught a $3,000 Giant frame in my drive side. Whether it'd have made me go down, who knows, glad I didn't stick around to find out. The guy took out at least 10 dudes, maybe more. Hopefully they're all ok.
Like in most races, when the guys on the front hear cursing followed by scrapping of bike and flesh on pavement, they hit the gas as if they're trying to outrun the fall out of a nuke. I have no problem with this strategy and was happy to tuck in and hopefully make the group we'd be going to the line with a lot smaller. No such luck as the pace slowed and it was once again, groupo compacto.
The finish ended up being chaotic. Shocker! There's a big guy with tons of horsepower that races for NCVC in the 4s so I decided I'd follow him as long as I could and hopefully use him as a lead out. We came through the final corner somewhere between 5 and 10 wheels back. He hit the gas hard and for a second I couldn't believe how well this working out. Then, just as I had that thought, two guys came from my right side and decided they wanted to be on his wheel also and knocked me straight to the left out in the wind. I tried to get back on his wheel but I'm not good at the battle royale that goes down in the last 500 meters of a race. He was willing to risk crashing a lot more than I was to stay on that wheel and so he won it. And, apparently, he won the race too. Now being in the wind with 500 to go I quickly realized I wasn't going to just TT myself to the line with these guys so I started to sprint and it didn't take long before I realized that wasn't going to last to the line so I sat down and TTd, then I sprinted, then I TTd and then I sprinted. I'm pretty sure I was decelerating after the 2nd effort to sprint. The line seemed to be an infinite distance away. Finally it got there and looking around I think I was in the first 20 across, but who really knows.
Since the finish I must have replayed that finish a thousand times in my head and with no real fast wheels coming by to get on after I lost my original lead out wheel I don't know what I possibly could have done differently. I was happy to not sit in the group all day and complain about how slow it was like most of the field. The result is nothing to brag about but at least I made some efforts getting off the front three times and helping to at least shape part of the race. And, of course, it's always nice to finish with all your skin intact. That's it. Thanks for checking in.
The course is a pretty standard 8 mile loop. A couple really well paved roads and a couple country roads that don't get a lot of attention. There wasn't a single hill to speak of. This isn't to say there weren't a couple little rises, but a hill that almost everybody in the group is going over in their 50/53x15 isn't exactly going to do much damage to the group. We did 6 laps for 48 miles.
The results haven't been posted yet (way to go bikereg and the promoters) so I don't know my exact finishing spot. I feel like it's top 20 but it could be top 30. It's so hard to tell the line when you're seeing cross eyed. Either way, the result page won't tell the story of how I felt the day went, so I'll get on with it.
Last year in California I went into most races with the strategy of staying out of the wind and trying to sprint. This strategy doesn't really work for me because while I might be an ok sprinter, I'm not crazy like they are, as we'll come to see later in this report. So with this race I started with a couple goals.
1) Win.
2) Be active getting in breaks and starting breaks.
3) Don't pull back any breaks because somebody else will do that.
4) Stay in the front half at all times.
5) Finish with all your skin.
I can honestly say, for the first time in any race, I accomplished all but 1 goal.
The first lap started like most first laps with a couple guys on the front acting as if the finish line was around the next corner, then we got to that next corner and it slowed down. After we came through the finish line on the 1st lap I just wasn't happy with the pace and decided instead of being frustrated, I'd go do something about it. I put myself on the front and ramped the pace up just a bit, nothing drastic. After about a minute I moved left, flicked my elbow and nobody came through. I looked over my shoulder and saw that not a single person had bothered to stay on my wheel. Without trying I opened a gap of about 10 or 15 seconds and so I decided maybe I should start trying. Realistically speaking I knew I had no chance of staying away for 40 more miles, but you never know what might happen in a group of Cat 4s. One guy from DC Velo bridged up to me, which I was happy about, except he took the shortest pull ever and stuck me right back out in the wind. Then two more guys came up, both from the team hosting the race, AABC. The four of us tried to get organized. I'm sort of suffering like a dog as I've been off the front of like 10 minutes, most of which was by myself so I really just need a wheel to follow. The DC Velo guy starts yelling at everybody to work together. I yell back at him that I need to recover and he needs to take a longer pull. Meanwhile the 2nd of the AABC guys is literally just following his teammates wheel not even peaking at the wind. As soon as I saw this I knew this break had as much chance as if I were by myself. I took one more long pull trying to inspire my new friends, but when it was my turn to work back through the pace line I looked back and realized we were basically caught, so I sat up.
That effort hurt! It took a lot longer to recover from it than I thought it would so I sat just at about what I determined was the middle of the pack to drink, eat and gasp for air. About half a lap later I started to feel normal again so I began picking my way up through the field to get closer to the front. This was no easy task as the center line rule (can't cross the center line whether it's actually painted or not) was in full effect on every road and 4 guys from AABC decided they'd rather ride shoulder to shoulder on the front and pick each other's noses. For most of the day this was the pace, at times I'm told we were going 15mph. Why didn't someone go to the front and make it faster? Well, to be honest, it was a game of thread the needle just to move up one row towards the front because it was basically 3 or 4 wide all the way across the one lane we were allowed. The refs were being really strict on the center line rule relegating lots of dudes to the back so there wasn't much you could do. Also, see what happened with me when I just went up there and tried to pick up the pace. Those guys just let me roll off the front and nobody was going to chase until the group up the road was at least 4 deep. Then, they'd work to bring it back. This was sort of the story of the day.
With about 1.5 miles to go in the 3rd lap I was sitting about 10 guys from the front and again the pace was crawling and I was getting bored. Since Jill comes to all my races and basically just sits there in the sun for a few hours to see us go by 5-6 times I decided I'd try to get off the front for the sole ambition of coming through the finish line by myself so she'd be impressed/happy/proud/something. This time I went with a bit more purpose as I didn't really want to draw anybody out with me. It didn't take me long to realize I'd misjudged how close we were to the finish line but figured I'd already committed so it was head down until I got there. One other guy bridged up so we rotated a few times but he lost my wheel on the right turn into the final stretch because he grabbed his brakes and I didn't. I decided not to wait for him since I didn't care if this move stuck for another 3 laps, I only wanted to make sure it stuck through the finish line on this lap. With about 200 meters to go I glanced back and saw about 5 guys working to get up to me. They caught me just before the finish line and we started working together pretty well. I saw Jill smile when she saw me come through in this small group off the front and that really made my legs instantly feel better.
This group was motivated and another two guys came up to us. So now we've got 8 because the first guy to bridge to me latched onto the back of the group of 5. We were rotating pretty well, I took a smarter pull because I was now hoping we could make this stick and everybody was saying, "we've got a gap," "go, go, go" so you knew everybody was motivated to work. When I rotated off the front the next guy came flying by me way too fast and had essentially dropped the guy behind him. I yelled "Don't blow it up, ride tempo" and he backed off and let the next guy catch back on. As I made my way to the back the guy that originally bridged looked like shit and was fading. I asked if he was ok and he just shook his head no. There was a gap opening between him and the wheel in front so I asked if he could close it, he shook his head no. Since this meant I was now going to have to sprint to fill that gap, which my legs weren't excited about, I put my hand on his butt and slung him back up to the wheel. I figured if we could get just one more pull out of this guy that was better than letting him slip out the back. Also, it was easier to throw him up to the wheel than close that gap myself. I rotated through one more time before looking back and realizing the guy behind me was the head of the entire bunch. Good try.
That group seemed the most promising and about five of us stayed at the front of the group. It didn't take long for counter attacks to start going and when I saw three of those motivated guys jump, I jumped to go also. I was basically riding up the gutter already so when I went my move was a combination of sprinting, tip toeing on the edge of the road, shouting for guys to get out of my way, and riding through driveway gravel that spilled on the road hoping for the best. I made it up, we had five guys, we rotated once but nobody's pulls had much to them and we were brought back pretty quickly. Again, decent try.
At this point it seemed prudent to stay close to the front to see who would try and get away, but also start mentally preparing myself for the chaos that always ends up when the pace is slow and not that much of the field has been shed. There was a pretty senseless crash on the last lap. Overlap of wheels and a couple over reactions. I heard the wheels touch, immediately realized I was close enough to get caught in the dominoes so I got the hell out of dodge instantly to the left. Sure enough, if I had stayed put I'd have definitely caught a $3,000 Giant frame in my drive side. Whether it'd have made me go down, who knows, glad I didn't stick around to find out. The guy took out at least 10 dudes, maybe more. Hopefully they're all ok.
Like in most races, when the guys on the front hear cursing followed by scrapping of bike and flesh on pavement, they hit the gas as if they're trying to outrun the fall out of a nuke. I have no problem with this strategy and was happy to tuck in and hopefully make the group we'd be going to the line with a lot smaller. No such luck as the pace slowed and it was once again, groupo compacto.
The finish ended up being chaotic. Shocker! There's a big guy with tons of horsepower that races for NCVC in the 4s so I decided I'd follow him as long as I could and hopefully use him as a lead out. We came through the final corner somewhere between 5 and 10 wheels back. He hit the gas hard and for a second I couldn't believe how well this working out. Then, just as I had that thought, two guys came from my right side and decided they wanted to be on his wheel also and knocked me straight to the left out in the wind. I tried to get back on his wheel but I'm not good at the battle royale that goes down in the last 500 meters of a race. He was willing to risk crashing a lot more than I was to stay on that wheel and so he won it. And, apparently, he won the race too. Now being in the wind with 500 to go I quickly realized I wasn't going to just TT myself to the line with these guys so I started to sprint and it didn't take long before I realized that wasn't going to last to the line so I sat down and TTd, then I sprinted, then I TTd and then I sprinted. I'm pretty sure I was decelerating after the 2nd effort to sprint. The line seemed to be an infinite distance away. Finally it got there and looking around I think I was in the first 20 across, but who really knows.
Since the finish I must have replayed that finish a thousand times in my head and with no real fast wheels coming by to get on after I lost my original lead out wheel I don't know what I possibly could have done differently. I was happy to not sit in the group all day and complain about how slow it was like most of the field. The result is nothing to brag about but at least I made some efforts getting off the front three times and helping to at least shape part of the race. And, of course, it's always nice to finish with all your skin intact. That's it. Thanks for checking in.
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