Friday, November 30, 2007

finding good drafts

the one thing i am good at in cycling is finding good wheels. at the bike clinic i found m-coco's wheel out of a slew of people and look how good she is. at the track, i pride myself on being able to tuck in right behind the biggest older guy and get a sweet draft until the sprint laps. so the other night while biking home from my work, some dude with big panniers passed me somewhere in alameda and then i hopped on his wheel. and, man, panniers make for some sweet drafting. i don't know if that is really kosher behavior with bike commuters. the pace kept getting faster and faster, and then he dropped me on some corner as we were heading back into east oakland. i felt pretty lame. personally, i don't think it is very nice to try and drop a girl off your wheel when it is dark out going through east oakland. but i am from the midwest.

i realize i have been slacking on my blogging recently. very sorry. my life is just really boring these days. the above was the best story i had in two weeks. pathetic.

here are my quad measurements last week and this week.

Thursday, Nov. 22: 59cm (gobble gobble. .25cm increase!)
Thursday, Nove 29: 58.75 (oh well)

Friday, November 16, 2007

lesson learned: wearing a skirt always gets you farther in life.

i have always hated skirts. i only wore them when my mom made me on picture day. i also hate pink and purple. (i'm an orange & yellow type of girl)

since this summer i have worn more skirts than i have cummulatively my entire life. it all started because i started riding at the track, and it was easy to change my spandex on the infield if a put a skirt on. so i started wearing them to work on wednesday and thursday. then, my quads got really big....and my pants became teeny bopper-esque... so skirts truly were the best solution because they don't get tight when my quads were growing at lightning speed.

tonight i realized something new. skirts aren't only a matter of convience for changing & nice for expanding quads.... they also get you free stuff.

i headed into SF tonight for goldsprints roller racing. it isn't nearly as scary as i thought it would be, mostly because the bikes have the fork stand.... sprinting on rollers is a bit unnerving in my doorway at home... let alone after a couple of beers, with people yelling, and in an open room with someone right next to you. but, sigh of relief, the set up was pretty tame because of the forkstand. anyway. don't drink a beer before you do a sprint on the rollers. it made me ill and i thought i was going to crap my pants afterwards.

my first sprint was a bunch of fun... except i had my seat too low. but shit, i am friggin out of shape. it is weird when you can feel that your legs are moving slow slow slow...but you are getting more and more tired. it was a 500m sprint and i think i was 23 seconds or something like that. not so good. my feet are slooooow. anyway, the second sprint (for the girl final) i totally bit the big one and lost... i was pretty stupid and was 3 seconds slower that time. oops. better luck next time.

here is a picture of the last one i did.

anyway, back to my point, is wearing a skirt rules. i put on some spandex under my skirt for the races tonight.... mostly cause my jeans are a bit stiff and i thought it would be more comfortable. anyway, even though i totally lost-- the guy who was putting it on gave me a free hat for a prize. being a girl rules. i would have worn skirts a long time ago if i knew it got me free stuff.

Thursday, November 15, 2007

random ass shit

  • well, LA trip was just canceled and rescheduled for dec. 7-9. turns out ADT had a schedule change, so they aren't holding their 3-6pm training race class this week. working out logistical shit sucks, especially when after you figure it all out, you end up canceling because of late incoming information. oh well. it is cool we can still go in 4 weeks, but i am still bummed cause i was looking forward to a road trip as life is pretty much sucking these days, and i can't even blame it on PMS.....
  • fall funk.... what can you do?
  • get a new job. that sounded like a good, proactive idea. i start monday. i'll be working here. will be good to be back in community health. also, i will have a nice 10 mile bike each way to work. that will be way better than crossing the bay into SF and taking the 38L, the bus line that is the bane of existence and makes me want to slit my wrists on a daily basis. i hate that bus. i don't know what it is, but i am always the person that every random (crazy) person wants to talk to. i threw away my Labyrinth button that was pinned to my bag in a fit of rage one day because you wouldn't imagine the wide spectrum of people who just love that movie and want to talk to me about david bowie and muppets. god. i may look like a really nice person, but i promise when you get to know me i am a real bitch.
  • anyway, my couple year stay in academia has been educational for sure, but i am ready to say goodbye. although, my committment here won't wrap up for awhile, so the next couple of months i will now have the joy of having two jobs... as i am finishing writing the next best seller of health care policy books (look for publication in summer of 2008..... best seller/health care policy..... ha!)- oo la la. we just got our first outside review back. it was right on point. my favorite comment in the outside review was this: "There are no sentences that one wants to read and reread for their sheer beauty and turn of phrase." no friggin' shit. this is a book about health care financing, not chaucer.
  • other fun news is my roommate just bought a horse. she is an equestrian and jumps over stuff. she also wears spandex, but of a different variety. now that she has her own horse, i am hoping she will give me a pony ride.

look how happy i am. maybe i should take up horse riding.
  • as for my thursday measurment, here i am at 58.75cm still. i am not biking right now, so i expecting them to stay about the same or shrink shrink shrink.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

heed powder

so i finally tapped into that lemon-lime heed powder from timpani the other week. yeah, it took me awhile. what can i say, i'm a plain jane who drinks water.

it tasted...hmmmm...what can i say..... odd.... oddly familiar.....

i couldn't place that taste-- some weird sweet, chalky taste of my childhood i had forgotten. then i think i realized it: colored candy dots.


but in liquid form, still with the taste of paper residue.

i think that was it..... but i am still thinking about it.

Thursday, November 08, 2007

mike hernandez does fall cleaning.

once upon a time,one day in late summer, mike hernandez must have noticed that i wear the same jersey and one of two black shorts.

at this time, he took this picture of me at the track district meet.

i don't look so good, huh? i wasn't doing well. why didn't anyone tell me i shouldn't wear the same shorts day after day?! for real, there needs to be some FAQ given to new cyclists about this shit. it is embarrassing to talk about some stuff. how was i supposed to know there is something called "chamois cream" or that you shouldn't wear your shorts two days in a row? why doesn't anyone tell you this?!

early september was no fun. i was in a catch 22: if i dehydrate myself, i won't have to go through the pain of peeing multiple times a day...but when i do pee is will hurt a hell-of-a-lot.... but if i hydrate myself, each time i pee will hurt less because the acidity will be less, but i will still have to pee many more times a day. you can see my conundrum. saddle sores were no fun.

well, i finally learned the hard way not to re-wear your shorts and to use that chamois cream stuff. the problem was the washing the shorts so often, and them drying in time to wear them again.

scene change: mike hernandez does fall cleaning.

too bad safeway pulled sponsorship, but that meant i inherited lots of old clothes. (now anonymous commenter, please don't be creepy and make some comment about me wearing mike hernandez's old chamois. that is a very classless comment and not very witty to boot.)

i was excited not just about the bib shorts, but also all the winter stuff...last year i wore my brother's old running spandez from 1991 straight up -- without any chamois -- and a cleveland brown's sweatshirt. now i am totally pimpin' with vests, jackets, and other cool stuff. here is my new wardrobe additions (thanks mike!):
  • 4 safeway bib shorts
  • 4 safeway jersies (3 black, 1 white)
  • 2 safeway wind vests
  • 1 safeway jacket
  • 1 safeway skinsuit
  • 1 pair of safeway arm warmers
  • 1 pair of velo bella shorts (thanks sabine!!)
  • 1 reno wheelman skinsuit
  • 3 other jersies
whoa! that is a lot. i just like quintupled my wardrobe. when i go out riding with this safeway garb, i feel like a real bike racer poser. i mean, nothing like all that garb to make me look official....that is until you watch me ride and realize i am not official. team kits really make people look like they know what they are doing. that is bad for someone like me who doesn't know what she is doing. that is why i only wear half a safeway kit. either the tops, with generic black shorts.... or the shorts, with another top. fully matching in a teamkit should be reserved for real bike racers. and i am happy being a poser....

my roommates really make fun of my recent spandex obsession. when i started biking june '06 i'd go in my running shorts & t-shirt. then, i wanted to fit in with the bikers so i wore my long, full leg running spandex, hoping i would fool them that i was in bike gear. finally i got a jersey & shorts. then my friend lauren got me 2 jersies (that black castelli one and that pegoretti one from the thrift store) and a long sleeve jersey. for my birthday this past march, my friend tev got me knee warmers. those things are cool. i got armwarmers for myself. so, by the time the spring came around, i was pretty well geared up, minus the shorts department....

anyway, back to my roommates and my spandex obsession. when i got home with a garbage bag of all these new clothes, my roommates seriously thought i went off the deep-end. skinsuits? i am guessing seeing someone get into a "bike relationship" over the last year-and-half, has got to be weird. you suddenly disappear for long periods of time, get in accidents without much concern, start talking about weird stuff like gear inches, eat all the food in the house, and just be wearing funny clothes that look like halloween everyday.

with all these new clothes, the roommates were kind enough to humor me in a little fashion show. thank you betsy for taking these pictures and telling me what to do for poses. i would have been quite clueless without your direction.


betsy told me to pick up my bike. this was good advice, especially because mike herandez once told me: "always show the bike". i chose my track bike because i am in an argument with gunnar at the moment. plus, it is lighter to pick up.

as shown in the picture, this is me pumpin' it. "it" being the tires, not me running up a hill, pumping my arms.

speaking of arms, these are some safeway arm warmers. i am also wearing one of those wind vests-- what a cool invention!

oo la la. these are my track wheels that are no longer on my track bike, because i have been riding my track bike on the road.

here is another picture of a different wind vest! i am also putting my hair in a pony tail. although, i like to braid my hair when i wear my bike helmet, because sometimes if i wear a ponytail, i get headache with the helmet pushing on the ponytail. if i do wear a ponytail, i have it really low, under my helmet. i don't know how people keep their ponytails high and have it stick out in that hole. that always gives me pressure pain in my head, but i digress.

this is me attempting to pop the collar on that really warm safeway jacket. but that is kinda hard, cause there isn't really a huge collar. it is really hard trying to look cool in spandex...it is hard generally, but especially in spandex. this shot was intended to look more bad-ass. but i am from ohio and my people don't do badass very well.

betsy told me to gaze off into the distance in this picture and unzip my jersey some. eek. scandal. but, i don't have cleavage like m-coco, so it didn't really matter that i unzipped it. but i am wearing that $10 sheila moon sports bra under there that i got at surf city...and i like it very much, and would highly recommend it.

betsy told me to lie down on the couch, like i do when i come home. except now i am not sweaty like i normally am.

mike hernandez gave me a skinsuit he apparently crashed in. that is okay. i am a crasher too. i am not really mad or ungrateful about the hole, i just thought it would be funny if i tried to look mad.

this would be cool if my quads were so big they were ripping the jersey. but no, they are small at 58.75cm still. (see how nice i wove that in for the thursday post?)


this is the other skinsuit. dude, mike you must have a rack or something, cause it was a little loose for me in the chest.

here are those velo bella shorts, and i am holding some chamois cream for good measure.

this was one of the a random jersey mike gave me. this was very appropriate cause i like to ride with the AARP crowd. that is because i can keep up with them and they buy me coffee when we stop. and i am a gold digger.

mike, why on earth are you ridding yourself of a phonax jersey? but you certainly put it in the right hands.

the end.

Friday, November 02, 2007

surf city, a little behind the time

so i waited to write my blog entry cause i knew i wouldn't have anything come thursday when i had to measure my quads. just to get that depressing news out of the way, yes, i am tiny: 58.75cm.

surf city was a blast. the clinic on saturday was sweet. i pretty much got a one-on-one tutorial cause everyone else in my group had a year of cross races under their belt so they were ready for more "advanced things", and i didn't know how to do jack shit. carmen was awesome and i got totally sweet at that jumping off and on and moving the leg through, and had a great time utilizing my track 'n field skills jumping over barriers. (i was never a hurdler, but sometimes i would do workouts with the 400m hurdlers, cause i was a lonely 400m runner. i remembered their advice of counting my steps and did this when we did the double thingy, although i don't think it so much matters.)

if cyclocross was all just jumping on and off the bike, over shit, and up hills, i'd totally be schooling it. unfortunately, there is this whole element of riding your bike between that. it is a shame really cause i don't know how to ride my bike. yesterday in the shower i counted 32 black 'n blues. it always feels great when people tell you: "girl, he's really not worth it."

m-coco was sick on sunday for the race. i was very sad cause it is always fun yelling profanity at m-coco during races. she is a classy lady, even though i try to slander her. because of her absence, i could not wear my costume for the halloween parade; it would just have not made sense without her costume and (honestly) just be fucking disgusting. well, luckily, i learned some good lessons from my mom in ohio. "never leave home without a spare costume". tucked away i pulled out my ghostbusters costume from last year. i even had a spare and was kind enough to let grey wear the other one, cause he was a douchebag and didn't bring a costume. (ex-messengers, just too cool sometimes...)

here is me before the halloween ride, costume in tact!

here is me and grey after lap one. as you can see, i had already ripped a leg off my costume and broke my pack. that takes mad skill.

the costume race was certainly enough for me that day. it takes natural talent to fall during the costume race and nearly get lapped despite cutting the course twice. "aren't you doing the women's c race?" this was just a humorous question. as my mom also used to tell me: "if ya can't take the heat, get out the kitchen." and shit, man, i'm outta that kitchen.