Promoting - YouTube Clip

Still waiting on the town for 2010, so no updates for now on the Bethel Spring Series 2010. For a bit of filler, nothing beats some sarcastic, computer generated dialogue.

Warning: swear words and sarcastic frustration present and vocal in the below clip. Do not play at work, other sensitive environments, or around kids under 18.

Road Race Organiser vs Marshall (sic, at least for us, but in the UK, who knows):

It's not all like this, especially with the Bethel Spring Series. I have to say that, overall, the experience at Bethel is much better than "normal", with few of the ordinary race promoting headaches.

It wasn't always like that though, and the race always went off because of the most conscientious and hardworking folks.

When you go to a race, any race, keep that in mind. Do what Dave Wiens did at the Leadville 100 - thank the promoter, the folks marshaling, and ride your heart out.

Training - Dieting and w/kg

I woke up a bit hyper today, and in one of those early morning semi-conscious chats, told the missus that I'm glad I'm not a pro. The conversation that I had in my head went something like this, in a meeting with the team director (I was a pro in this little diddy).

Jonathan Vaughters motions for me to sit down.

"Congratulations on the contract. I hope that you're happy here, and I'm glad that you re-signed with us. So, SDC, let's go over your plans for next year."

"Okay, JV." (We're talking in initials here because it's cool. Or kewl. Or k00l.)

"This season you rode pretty well, but you lacked some durability in the Classics. When the pace got hot, especially in the slight rises, you looked to be in difficulty. Would you agree?"

"Um..."

"So I've talked to AL (Allen Lim) and them and we've figured out how to rectify this weakness."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, we figure that at 82 kg, you're a bit heavy, and at 243 watts for 20 minutes, you're a bit lacking in the aerobic area. To get a more optimal power to weight ratio, Allen said you need to do two things. First, he thinks you can bump up that 243 to at least 270, since you tested at 263 earlier this year. 290 or even 300 would be great."

"Okay..."

"Allen also said you need to lose, oh, like 30 kg. At 52 kg, you'd have a decent 5.2 w/kg ratio at 270 watts, and 5.76 w/kg at 300 watts. What do you think?"

JV smiles, sits back, and clasps his hands, peering at me through his glasses.

I frantically do some math in my head.

"Um, 52 kg is 114 pounds. I'm 180 right now. I haven't weighed 114 since I was in college."

"Well, yeah, there is the matter of losing those 66 pounds. But, hey, what's 66 pounds? It's only a month of catfood for 7 cats. It's 10 gallons of gasoline. Four bikes. But, look, ultimately it's just weight. Anyway, that's what you need to do. You can talk to AL about diet and such. I'll see you in a month."

Big grin from JV.

With that I got up to feed the cats. It's a bit more complicated than just tossing food into a bowl. See, Lilly has to eat special food, but she gets upset if she eats alone, so one of us has to watch them eat, then put away all the food when they're done. Cats, in case you didn't know, are like humans - they eat ravenously for a bit, walk away, let things settle, then come back for seconds.

Anyway, as much as I wanted to talk about JV and stuff, I had to get up and let the kitties eat. The whole process takes about half an hour, so I sat and pondered things while the kitties munched away. Then I could weigh in and eat.

I admit that I used to hope and wish and dream that I'd be a pro. Grinding out the pace on the cobbles, in the rain, mud, cold, hanging on as opportunists took their chances. Team gear, all matching, no worries on what to wear - all your gear would look the same.

Then the reality of earning, say, $21k as a former Amateur World Champion (like Greg Lemond) started to sink in. At a much later Fitchburg, I learned that some of the guys on a national class team, including a former Lemond teammate, made as little as $7000 a year.

Heck, I made more than that at the bike shop!

Anyway, I dropped that pro dream a long time ago.

And now, with my current diet, I realized how lucky I am that I have no genetic gift for aerobic sports.

Last night, on the trainer, I started doing some calculations.

At 82 kg, and about 243 watts (last current 20 min max), I made about 3.05 w/kg. If you subtract 10% for actual threshold (versus max sustainable work level), I'm at 2.7 ish w/kg.

This, in case you didn't know, is pretty terrible. Check it out - it would fall under the 20 minute mark, by the way.


Yep, you have to scroll down to about the bottom of the Cat 4s to find my massive 3.05 w/kg. You have to go to "Untrained" to find my approximate FTP of 2.7 w/kg.

Then, because I was listening to music on a laptop while on the trainer, I opened up the calculator and started figuring out what my weight loss could do to my w/kg ratios.

I plugged in my current weight - 76.6 kg - my 243 watt effort nets me 3.17 w/kg.

At my goal weight - 70 kg or 154 lbs - the same 243 watts gets me 3.47 w/kg, or just into the bottom of the Cat 3s.

If I can do 270 watts (7 over my record), and go to 68 kg (just a touch under 150 lbs), I'd be just below the 4 w/kg line, sitting at 3.97 w/kg.

That, my friends, would creep me into Cat 2 territory.

As a bonus, although my jump may not change that much, I should be able to improve my paper numbers from about 17 w/kg to about 20-22 w/kg. Likewise, I hope to get my sprint proper (10 seconds) from 12-13 w/kg to 14-15 w/kg, whether by increasing power, decreasing weight, or both.

I'll see how it goes. First the weight, then the power.

Promoting - Bethel Spring Series 2010

So the poll for the 2010 Bethel Spring Series has closed. The question - which days, other than Sundays in March, should we run the Series?

The most popular answers are Feb 28 and March 18. April 11 and 25 received about equal votes. I'd do some statistical analysis if I could, but I passed Statistics in school by guessing on 19 of 20 multiple choice questions (one final exam), so I don't know very much about statistics. Therefore I can't conclude that anything is statistically significant or all those fancy terms.

The poll also let me think about what dates I can and can't hold the races. (FYI - I didn't vote in the poll.)

Feb 28th is the last day of the North American Handbuilt Bicycle Show. I have a special place in my heart for such shows, and therefore I don't want to overlap it. I can think of some individuals (like the one that said "Uh-oh" on one of the helmet cam clips) who make a living in the NAHBS market, and they've also lent long and consistent support to the Series.

I also don't want to drag the Series out to April 25th. It's hard running the races. I end up a zombie after each Bethel until about Wednesday, which means that by the time I recover from the Sunday prior, it's about Thursday or Friday. Two months of that is a half month too much for me.

Then I have to start prepping for the next race.

So anyway, if I leave out February 28th and April 4th (Easter), that leaves April 11 and 18.

After a lot of thought, and lots of teammates telling me NOT to hold the race on the 11th, I've decided that there will be a race on the 11th as well as the 18th.

Yes, on the 11th.

Okay, I have to get my fire-proof suit on so I can fend off all the flame comments.

Seriously though, I figure that we'll lose one weekend in March due to snow/ice, and we usually have one bad weather week (a Nor'easter, with driving wind and sideways rain) where each race has like 20 riders. With just five weeks of scheduled racing, there's little margin for an eliminated day, especially combined with a poor weather day.

Now, to boost morale of participants, I'll have at least one or two announcements to make regarding the races.

That'll wait though because, naturally, first I have to get permission from the town. The fax went out, and now I'm just waiting for the next Board of Selectman meeting. Technically they have the power to shut down the race, but pending their approval, the whole thing gets rolling.

So, I wait with fingers crossed.

Training - First Ride Outside At Home

I have to put a lot of qualifications on the title because I've been riding, even if it may not seem like it.

First off, I started riding just before Interbike 2009, getting in about an hour or so on the trainer. Mind you, I was in some decent amount of pain (injury pain, not "I'm not fit" pain). I could feel all sorts of knots and lumps and stuff inside my right hip that I've never felt before.

The pain from the broken bone actually helped me a bit, forcing me to tilt my pelvis forward a touch to unweight the fracture. This got me lower and longer on the bike, something I've been missing and, frankly, unwilling to figure out exactly what I need to do to get back to that form. It's the position I had in the early-mid 90s, when I was at my best, so it was a nice side-effect to the pain.

Then, technically, I rode outside at Interbike, going for an hour-plus cruise with Kevin. I didn't realize it then, and Kevin was too nice to say otherwise, but we were crawling. I figure we were going 14-15 mph when I was going "hard", and maybe 8-12 over some of of the bridge overpasses. I did get going on one tailwind, slight downhill section, but I probably hit 28 or so tops.

Kevin, in case you didn't realize, is incredibly patient. He made it seem like I was flying the whole time.

After Interbike my pelvis made progress in noticeable weekly leaps. I started doing some trainer rides, suffering from "I'm not fit". I struggled to maintain 120-140 watts for an hour, and my heartrate seemed to soar whenever I approached 200 watts.

I contemplated riding outside, but I knew that to get out of our little development, I had to do a steady 400-600 watts to get up this pain-in-the-butt hill. I realized that, under duress, I struggled to hit 300 watts on the trainer. If I couldn't comfortably maintain 400 watts up that hill, I'd fall over.

Therefore I stayed indoors.

A couple weeks ago I finally could sustain brief, minute or so efforts at 250-270 watts. Riding outside became more of a reality. But it was cold and my pelvis still protested whenever I weighted just my right leg.

Last week I finally felt up to doing a 20 minute test. I worked admirably hard (I thought so anyway) and did a nice effort of 243 watts.

This, incidentally, beat my first true, red-in-the-face, 20 minute max effort of 235-238 watts, one on a very hard ride with SOC, the other a 20 minute test I did a few days later.

Therefore, I can conclude at least one thing:

I'm getting better at taking 20 minute FTP tests.

Because, frankly, I'm not that strong. I can't jump around at 1000-1100 watts, and I can't even start to think about reaching for the elusive 1500 watt line.

So my 20 minute FTP test simply tells me I'm getting better at taking the test. It's like SATs - I didn't get smarter or anything when I practiced taking the test, I just got better at the testing itself.

Anyway, regardless of my FTP rant, today I finally ventured outside.

I have to explain that for all my flahute-talk, for all those hardcore "sideways rain in hurricane like winds" rides, I'm a wimpy rider at heart. I can do all those rides but I prefer to watch a DVD and sit on the trainer. It takes me about a minute to get ready from sedentary to "ready to ride", and another minute to reverse the process.

When I'm soaked to the bone, jacket, tights, booties, gloves, jersey, hat, all dripping wet, all verboten from our cream colored rug, it takes me a few uncomfortable minutes undressing in our unheated garage, then padding over to the shower as quickly as possible.

Today I wanted to get some more mulch for our yard. And when I started loading it in the van, I realized that I had to strip down to a t-shirt to feel reasonably comfortable.

And I was still pouring sweat.

It was freakin' warm outside.

I got home and mentioned to the missus that I wanted to ride. And, being the missus, she told me that she thought riding would be better than doing the mulch (it was already unloaded at the various "needs-mulch" places).

So I started looking for my gear. It took a while because I haven't packed these things, in detail, since mid August. I finally found my gear back, neatly tucked away in a closet in the basement. I loaded up like a soldier prepping for battle, donning my Connecticut Coast Cycle gear for probably the last time. I made sure I grabbed everything - bib knickers, short sleeve jersey, long sleeve jersey, wind vest, and, the coup d'etat, the bright blue shoe covers.

I should point out that for the first time since August 11, I managed to stand on my right leg, and just my right leg, without holding on to anything for support. Yay!

Anyway, appropriately outfitted, I rolled on outside.

Things seemed foreign. The brakes felt odd. The front end wiggly, with no wheel stand holding it steady. I did some mini slalom moves to get a feel for the front end, and realized the rear tire, slick from the trainer, was actually squeaking against the pavement.

By the time I climbed the pain-in-the-butt hill to get to the roads, the squeaking was gone, my heartrate was up around 158, and things were normal.

I did my standard Quarry Road loop, never really made any big efforts, rolled on one hill, did a little jump on another (road construction eliminated the shoulder so I just kept pace with the car in front of me).

Being on the road, without pain to distract me, let me think of a lot of things.

I remembered how to do a track stand, both standing and sitting. That was comforting.

I realized I miss diving into turns. I miss sitting on wheels.

Specifically, I miss jumping out from behind wheels.

I miss blasting down a descent (the Quarry loop has no real descents). I miss accelerating out of the saddle, in the drops, jumping up to cruising speed.

I miss a lot of things about racing, for sure. But training...

My back was a bit tight, even with my slightly different posture on the saddle. My neck felt fragile - when I did a little jump, I got that crick in the neck thing. I felt pretty weak, no real torque in my jump, no smashing the pedals.

But it felt good to be out there. I wasn't the only one - I must have ridden past 20 riders in an hour, most of them dressed lighter than me.

My legs never betrayed me, not a hint of cramp or a twinge of pain. My shoulder, too, felt okay, even when I had to sit up and struggle with my vest, or when I stuffed some gear in my jersey pockets.

It felt good to get out on the bike. Refreshing.

Fun.

Yep.

I'm looking forward to my two, hopefully three "training camps" this winter. And, of course, to the 2010 season.

Now I have to go. I have a lot of mulch calling my name.

Racing - Trivia

Finally, CyclingRevealed has their trivia series going for the winter.

It's an interesting distraction. First off, I realize how little I know. Second, I realize how things I've thought significant are maybe, well, not so. And finally, it helps to see where we were as racers.

The site itself is an interesting archive and commentary on various stages of racing. I have to admit that I'm a Merckx-era onwards racing fan. I know little about Coppi or Bartali or "those guys" that raced in a black and white world (because, you know, before color, the world was black and white). Sometimes it's good to have the Cliff Notes version of history, just to get an overview.

No Googling and such for the questions. I take about 5-10 seconds to read the question, the possible answers, maybe eliminate a couple, and then click a circle.

Anyway, the first quiz is up!

(Okay, the folks there seem to be focusing on easier questions - I actually knew them all!)

Interbike 2009 - Ritchey Stems and ZTail Trade-in

One of my long time favorite stems is the one made by Ritchey. In some ways I'm a throw back kind of rider, eschewing the oversize bar thing, the oversize seatpost thing, and a non-subscriber to some of the uses of carbon out there.

Carbon use in oversize bars and stems, come to think of it.

It's not like I don't like carbon - I have a carbon fork, a half carbon frame (as well as a mostly-carbon frame - sans dropouts and BB shell), carbon rims, even some carbon derailleur pieces (which I avoided for a while and finally bought as part of a package deal).

But there are limits to my carbon consumption, no matter how light or airy a part feels. Just the other day I was at an LBS, and they had a nice little build kit in a shipping box. On top lay some pretty Ritchey WCS pieces, including a carbon bar. I picked it up.

Holy...

The thing felt like it was made out of styrofoam. I waved it around, my normal test for any "light" part. A light part changes direction quickly, a heavier one doesn't, and this one was definitely on the former side. It felt featherweight, airy, and it seemed to have more air resistance than inertial mass.

I put it down before I hit a wayward customer, employee, or slat wall hook.

You know, if I didn't race, I'd probably get a bar like that. A stem too, maybe even a post. I could see myself riding on some pretty light stuff, worried only about it not failing in normal use (like bombing down a descent). I could save my light bike for the nicer days, avoiding rain, excessive travel (like on a plane), and even night rides (where I tend to hit more potholes and such).

But since I race, and since I expect to bash my bike around, I don't want to take the risk. All the things I just listed in the above paragraph, that's all stuff my primary bike sees in an average year. It flies, night rides, races, gets bumped around in a car, maybe the back of a fully laden van (bouncing on top of folded tables, wheeled leaf blowers, propane heaters, and other "non-smooth" things).

So I tend to stay away from carbon for the more fragile pieces, like bars or stems.

Like I said before, it's not that the bar may fail while I ride - I mean, heck, I've seen aluminum bars fail on rides, and the guy somehow rode home on a one-sided bar - but in races there's a much higher chance of a fall.

And carbon doesn't like impacts.

I've seen guys tumble to the ground, essentially unhurt, but after glancing briefly at half their bar dangling from various cables, unable to continue. I don't want to deal with that.

Luckily Ritchey still makes really nice aluminum bits.

For the longest time I've ridden Ritchey stems, after an independent lab found them to be the best stem for the money. They were reasonably rigid, didn't let the bar slip, and didn't break very easily. Since I've met the person behind the independent lab, and since I trust his methods and morals, I went with the lab's findings.

I bought a Ritchey stem.

By chance it came in an angle and length I needed - 73 degrees (or minus 17 degrees if you will), 13 cm long. I really wanted a 14 cm stem, but those didn't exist back then in threadless + 73 degree.

When different companies came out with their oversize bars and stems, I stayed with my skinny, primitive 26.0 Ritcheys clamping some 26.0 crit bend bar.

Slowly I found my 73 + 13 + 26.0 stem choices limited. I managed to build up a small inventory of Ritchey stems, even descending down from their WCS line to find stems that were available and within budget.

Since I like crit bend bars, and no one sells one, I never got a Ritchey bar. And since I don't want setback, and Ritchey always had setback, I always stayed with Thomson posts. I like the two pieces - both aluminum, both reliable, both pieces you install and forget.

Of course, it's always interesting to try new parts on a bike. And at Interbike 2009, I saw Ritchey's zero setback post. It didn't have my one bolt adjustment and it was made with carbon, but if I wasn't a racer, well, you know.

Beautiness to the right.

The cool thing is that you can try them without necessarily risking losing all your money. In fact, you can check out the whole Ritchey line. See, they have a new trade-in program through ztail.com.

The way it works is that you get to return parts for a guaranteed percentage of the purchase price, based on elapsed time. For three months you get 80% back. Up to six months, 60%. Nine months, 50%. A year, 40%. A year and a half, 25%.

Okay, I may not be the ideal guy for this program, hanging onto kinda-sort out-of-style equipment for a decade or two, but for those that buy new cars (I've only ever bought one), or bikes (I've only ever bought two), this may be a cool program.

Think of it.

You set up your rig with some pretty Ritchey stuff. You race for the year, and just when the new stuff starts showing up, you send it all back.

Then you get half your money back!

Hm.

This could be addicting. I mean, okay, my road bike may be all set up, but how about my back-up primary bike, or, say, the tandem, or my mountain bike...

Let me look at the Ritchey stuff again...

Equipment - Thomson Seat Posts

When I build up a new bike, I spec out a bunch of the non-group parts in a specific way:

I want to install it and forget it.

What I don't want is a part that will loosen up spontaneously, or be difficult to adjust, or crack after 6 months of summer abuse.

At the same time, when people ask me about setting up their own bike, I tell them to get good non-group parts. Wheels, of course, but that's worth twenty posts itself. The other parts include the saddle, pedals, bars, stem, and seat post.

Each of these bits play a critical part on your bike - if one breaks, or loosens, or gets compromised in any way, your race is over.

Other parts may not be critical, even if at first glance they seem "critical". My good friend and long-time co-promoter Gene broke his rear derailleur cable in a critical race (he was working for me in the race). His bike suddenly became a two speed bike - 39x12 and 53x12. Nonetheless he contributed a lot to what ended up being a close win for me. He even launched a last lap attack to string out the field, per my request before the race.

In a more high caliber race, Tom Prehn (former winner of the Philly race, a long time domestic pro, and now the boss at Cateye) started off a race with a broken front derailleur cable or clamp. Whatever it was, he was out of luck, with no spare bike, at the start of a 100 mile road race in New England. He quickly realized that he wouldn't make it to the big climb halfway into the race if he has just his small ring, so he quickly maxed out his limit screw to keep the chain on the big ring.

Halfway into the race, on the big climb, he went to the front, rode in the big ring (of course), and pushed the pace. Everyone else, content to let him set the pace, simply followed him. At the end of the day he won the race.

The point is that if you can still ride or pedal your bike, you can still race.

But if your bars break, or your stem doesn't stay tight anymore, your seat rails disintegrate, or your seatpost drops into the seat tube, you're SOL.

You know, for "So Outta Luck".

A part is working well when you no longer think about it. Because of that I've been using Thomson seat posts since, well, about 9 or so years ago.

Seatposts, according to my "lose weight in the hidden, boring components" rule, end up a prime place for bicycle weight loss. You'd be surprised at how much some posts weigh. Light posts let the bike wiggle a bit better when you're sprinting out of the saddle. They can remove a good half pound off of some bikes, more on lower end ones.

I let myself get seduced by superlight posts back in the day. You could tell that my (younger) glazed eyes ignored various warning signs. I ended up losing my saddle a few times when bolts or clamps failed, one post start moving around when the post got crushed when I hit a bump (I was all of 140 lbs or so), and the wide assortment of parts I've saved from various different seatposts.

At some point, when I got sick of my posts moving, sliding, twisting, crushing, cracking, and snapping, I went looking for the lightest super reliable post possible. I ended up with two final choices, but one company's product has been reliably available through various shops:

Thomson.

When I put my Cannondale together, one of the most important things I did was to install a Thomson post. Likewise, when I realized I would be racing the Riggio track bike more often, I put one on that too. Even the Giants I had before had Thomson posts.

So, yeah, I like the posts.

They're reasonably light. They adjust easily, but don't move once you tighten down the adjusting bolts. I can forget about it once I'm done with it.

In other words, they work.

That's all you can ask from a post.

Training - Want And Will

So, in August, I ended yet another season of riding and racing. A bit prematurely, perhaps, but it was what it was. And, just like every year, I started thinking about how the season went, how I rode, and what I'd want to change for next season.

Actually, to be more precise, I thought about what I would be willing to do to change things for next season.

See, there's usually a huge disconnect (sorry, that's from my semi-corporate days... maybe I should say "chasm") between what I wanted to do and what I'd actually do.

For example, I always lament about my (over) weight. I kept trying to lose weight by burning more calories (training), but I never succeeded.

Why?

Because I never knew how many calories I consumed, even for a single meal.

So, now that I've kind of separated the two concepts for next year ("want and will"), I can redefine what I want (and can do) to do for next year.

Yesterday I talked about the HED wheels, a slew of wheels I think will really make an impact on "regular" Cat 3-5 racing. I also mentioned that I want a set of their wheels. Three sets, really, and more like five or so if I could have it my way. I figure that these wheels will help me, however slightly, in attaining my wants for next year.

However, I can't buy them, not now.

I know what I want to do next year. It's basically what I did this year, but better. Crits for sure, with focus on the sprints, the ability to bridge sub-20 second gaps quickly, and getting some better finishes. I have two goals there, one is Bethel (of course) and the other is the Nutmeg State Games (of course).

Track racing too, "peaking" for 2 events (one series and one weekend, both at the end of the year) but with an aim to race consistently in all track events. The efforts on the track are different from crits, with very little held back. My pedal stroke becomes much more important, and it seemed totally flawed this year.

Fitness-wise I'm probably 25 pounds overweight, can't climb anything longer than a couple hundred yards, and I have a cliff shaped power profile (in other words it drops off really fast).

That stuff is kinda same old, same old. Nothing new there, nothing unexpected.

I do have something new for 2010. I want to brush up on my emergency handling skills, like touching wheels and such. I feel comfortable in the pack, but I haven't explored sketchy condition limits for a long, long time (rain, oil-covered roads, panic braking on descents, etc).

Those above are my goals.

What can I do (and what will I be willing to do) to get there?

In the past I've worked on my fitness, with some success. I know what I need to do. I'm okay with that. For me, gaining minimal fitness is minimal work. It's when I ask more of myself that I falter.

For example, I've always wanted to lose weight, but I've never made it work. A long time ago a friend, a younger-than-me ex-pro, offered me some training advice. As I was overweight then (surprise), he recommended that I lose the weight first, then work on fitness.

I pshawed his advice. I mean, come on, he's just a kid, and he can train all day, every day. Who's he to tell me to lose weight first? Seriously...

Well, I never lost that weight. And no matter how hard I trained, I only dropped a bit.

And I remained overweight for years and years and years and years.

As I mentioned at the beginning, my season ended in August, a bit prematurely. Usually I raced through then, and would keep riding into the fall. But since I couldn't ride, I had to take time off.

That gave me time to think, to mentally let go of the 2009 season, and to look forward to whatever 2010 could bring me.

I decided that I'd try and do everything, at least "more", for my goals above.

Key to everything, I realized, was weight. If I lose a bunch of weight, it would make things much easier for me to hit the other goals. Keep the weight on and it would be the same story as this year - sorta kinda there but not quite.

And that means... yep, I went on a diet.

Me, on a scientific anything, is cause for worry.

Given that I usually have two breakfasts (early and "second breakfast", as the hobbits would say), with the second one being a caloric ton.

Usually that second would be a bacon, egg, cheese sandwich on a bagel, or BECS as we called it at the shop, with the sausage, egg, and cheese called SECS of course.

I had to have my coffee with it, with the prerequisite half inch of sugar and a good quarter cup of half and half.

Other meals were no better. Foot long grinders, dripping with cheese, half of a chicken or a rack of ribs or some other crazy amount of food. I'd regularly polish off a pound of pasta by myself for dinner, so, well, this whole calorie counting thing seemed a bit unrealistic.

Of course I never really seriously tried doing it before, but now, with 2 months of forced rest and relaxation, I figured I would give it a shot.

The biggest obstacle for me was keeping track of all the numbers. Too many numbers, too many ways of recording it.

Notebooks just wouldn't cut it.

However, in this day and age of the internet, I learned I could count calories anywhere I had an internet connection, or, if I didn't, I could look up a food and put it into an online food journal.

I started counting calories on my-calorie-counter.com, meticulously (just ask the missus) entering everything I ate in my "chart". The site has a bunch of "pre-loaded" foods (probably sponsors), but it allows you to add your own foods. So, for example, when I got some hummus that didn't show up in the my-calorie-counter database, I could add the data quickly and easily.

(Tip: it helps to have the product label in front of you when you do this.)

Anyway, for my 5'7" height, and my starting weight of 181 pounds (82 kg), I got some recommendation to limit my caloric intake to about 1800 per day.

1800?!

My second breakfast typically hits 600 on its own. My favorite stand-by midday snack was a 960 calorie bag of peanuts.

1800 for a whole day? That was a rude awakening.

However, using some of the missus's advice, along with some careful reading of food labels got me off to a good start. This quest for lower calories has dug into my blogging and my bike forums time, since I now count calories instead of typing words.

Counting calories has also changed my view of Stop & Shop, the local supermarket. I always liked the store, seeing as it's owned by a Dutch company, the one that is Albert Heijn in Holland. When we lived there (I was a kid), we went to Albert Heijn. AH was kind of like a security blanket for me, a reassuring sign in a mainly foreign country whenever I saw one.

Anyway, when I walked around with my calorie eyes open, so to speak, the friendly supermarket turned into an Evil Empire. Everywhere I looked, calories upon calories. Food seemed unnecessarily laden with calories and fat.

I managed to find some gems along the shelves. For example, I found Kim's Bagels, a lower calorie, lower fat bagel. Combined with Egg Beaters, Jennie-O turkey bacon, and no cheese (I can live without cheese I think), my second breakfast dropped from 539 calories to 180. I'd have to get some less sweet coffee, a little less fat free half and half, and I'd be nudging 200 for a nice, satisfying snack.

With findings like that here and there, I managed to trim down my probable pre-diet 3000-4000+ calorie days by about 1000-2000 calories. This means I've been averaging about 1700 calories a day.

Of course not every day went well. Two poorly planned days resulted in a 2242 day as well as a 2046 day. Both of these days resulted from me not having a second breakfast planned and prepared, followed by me succumbing to the temptation of a full on BECS, 100% of the real stuff.

Overall, though, things are going well. I'm normally at 1000 calories when I leave work, leaving a reasonably large 800 calories for the evening (dinner and perhaps a late stomach capper). On the trainer I've avoided sugared drinks, sticking with zero calorie Powerade and the like.

If I end up unreasonably low, like yesterday's 1280 or so after dinner, I try and pig out (relatively speaking), focusing on foods with little fat. If I'm riding on one of those days I'll drink some sugary Gatorade (I have a couple jars of the mix that I bought in my pre-calorie-aware days).

Today I've wrapped up my daily eating, and I'm sitting satisfied at 1710 calories, 30 grams of fat, and my body is just starting to shut down, i.e. get tired and cold.

Not bad, right?

So far, in two weeks, I'm down 7 pounds to about 174. Not that much, true, but it's a start. I figure I'll go for another 9 weeks, hopefully ditching a couple pounds a week, until the end of the year. If I can do that I'll be at 156, give or take a pound.

That, my friends, is a weight I last saw in 1999.

I hope it's possible. I just have to run a 7000 calorie deficit each week, and compared to the approximately 49,000 deficit from just the last couple weeks, 7000 ought to be manageable. I know my metabolism will adjust itself - my body is geared to survive, not to burn itself into oblivion. But by riding and exercising consistently, I hope to keep my metabolism closer to active than hibernation, with the ultimate goal, always in mind, of losing a lot of dead weight.

At the end of 2009 I'll see see where I end up.

Then it'll be time to start training.

Because all this effort has a short term goal:

Racing domination at Bethel in 2010.

Be forewarned.

Interbike 2009 - HED Wheels 2010

In some ways I've been an early adapter in the world of bike racing.

I'm convinced that my "good jump" back in the day was partly due to the fact that I rode 138 or 76 gram pedals (for steel and Ti axled Aerolites respectively, the minimal weight including cleats and hardware), that I obsessed about light rim weight, and that I rode aero wheels long before they became "de rigueur" of the pro peloton.

To be fair I never went as extreme as the true pioneers, but when I saw Coors Light clean up while on Specialized TriSpokes (with updates now known as the HED3), I realized my Zipp 340/440 setup wasn't quite as radical as I thought. I went to using TriSpokes for a long, long time, stopping only when I rode another company's wheels because I wanted to support my friend's employment there.

Aero wheels have always been a fascination for me, and for next year, I was looking for some way of bumping up my speed.

In 2010 I'm convinced that there's a new wheel in town, or rather, a new wheel company in town: HED.

They've been around for a while, and they've had an online store for at least a few years (because I always go over there and drool and such). But they're trying to set up a dealer network, something they started a little while ago.

Anyway, they've revamped their line-up for 2010, and man, it looks good.

It looks good enough that I want to sell all my wheels and replace them with HED's line-up, almost from bottom to top. I have rarely felt need with cycling - I liken it to my desire to get a power meter, or my desire to break into aero wheels back in the late 80s and early 90s.

What made me feel this way?

Let's look at what I saw at IB 2009.

First, a little while ago, I did a post on Faired versus Structural Aero Wheels. I happened to use HED wheels as an example, but only because they sold the same kind of wheels in both versions. To clarify things, HED sells structural rims for tubulars ("Stingers", with exposed spoke nipples) and faired ones for clinchers ("Jets", with hidden spoke nipples). The aluminum box-section rimmed wheels are named after some of the Northern Classic terms, like Ardennes or Bastogne or Kermesse.

Significantly for 2010, HED spent a lot of time in the wind tunnel developing their new line of wheels. And they found that wider rims make for more aero rims. Wider not just at the bead (the 23 mm rims introduced last year, like their base model Kermesses), but in the fairing itself.

Basically the rim needs to get wider below the brake track before it gets narrower.

From the 2010 brochure, it seems that making a rim really wide makes it more aero in certain wind directions, but it sacrifices aero in others. HED set out to optimize the maximum rim width to work with the wind angles most riders see.

And, apparently, they've made some huge gains.

For 2010, they proudly claim that their Stinger 4, a 46 mm tall and 26 mm wide rim, is more aero than their 2008 Stinger 8 (80 mm tall rim), and more aero than any sub 80 mm tall rim.

The Stinger 6, at 60 mm tall and 28 mm wide, is all that much faster, faster than any sub 90 mm rimmed wheel.

The Stinger 9, their tall wheel at 90 mm tall (and holding at 28 mm wide), is their fastest spoked wheel.

Curiously, HED makes no claims on the HED3 wheels, the TriSpokes made so popular by Lance's consistent use of the front wheel. Their rim widths (for all the wheels - clinchers and tubulars, 55 or 90 mm tall versions) remain at 19 mm, one that could be construed to be relatively inefficient. I figure they'll either come out with some wider HED3 (for the Tour?) or relegate the wheel to the scrap heap.

Anyway, based on the data and claims of HED, I figure the ultimate wheel setup, for 2010, would look like this:

1. Race wheels, the primary focus, would be tubulars. Ideally you'd want to stay under 1300 grams for a pair of wheels, this way you won't need specific climbing wheels. You may need to get a shorter height front wheel for windy races.

Choice: Stinger 6s, front and rear. For windy days or long, fast, gusty descents, a Stinger 4 front.

2. Training wheels, because you need to train with tall wheels if you're to understand how the wheels handle in all circumstances. The brake tracks are wider on all the 2010 HEDs so you'd want to get matching wheels.

Choice: Jet 6s, the clincher version of the Stinger 6.

3. Box section wheels, because for the really crappy weather, you probably want non-aero wheels. Plus the missus will need some wheels for her bike, and she liked the box section wheels more than the aero wheels she rode for a while. Since these would be the "beater" wheels, you could get lower end wheels.

Choice: Kermesses.

The one thing I don't understand or agree with is the Flamme Rouge ("FR" in HED's catalog) option. The Flamme Rouge is the "Red Flag" marking 1 km to go in a race, and implies something race related. For HED it means the hubs (in this case) and the rim/fairings get some special treatment. This includes a carbon hub body, Ti ratchet ring, Ti skewers, and some hi-mod carbon in whatever rim/fairing.

The Ti pieces and carbon body do little to lose weight. Hi-mod carbon is typically stronger but more brittle than "regular" carbon. Functionally I can't see the significance of the FR upgrade. It'll save you about 50 grams for the clinchers, about 10-15 grams for the tubulars.

For $200 I can't see laying out the money for the FR option. It'd be more practical to buy extra tubulars, a lighter cassette, or maybe some aftermarket skewers.

The FR option reminds me of the pricey and limited Mugen option offered by Honda on their Civic Si. The upgrades seem limited, and, embarrassingly, the Mugen was actually slower than the stock Si due to the bigger and heavier wheel/tire package. For $9,000, you could do a lot better by buying aftermarket items, and, like tactics in bike racing, investing in some driving schools to learn how to drive better.

Anyway, other than the FR option not seeming too special, the HED line up prompted me to think about moving off my current standard width stable of wheels.

It's a lot to invest though. 7 total wheels, 3 pairs plus a lone front, all so that I can swap wheels without adjusting derailleurs or brake calipers. If I wanted a spare rear race wheel, maybe one more.

Now, I could move the fronts over to the track bike, for sure, but that doesn't recoup any money for any new wheels.

And for me it's an all or nothing gambit. I want all the wheels or none of them.

Arg.

Um. Anyone need 1.5 pairs of carbon tubulars, a pair of carbon clinchers, and 2 sets of aluminum box section clinchers? Campy freehub bodies.

Anyone? Hello? Bueller?

Review - "Race Across The Sky"

Last night, with a bit of encouragement from SOC, the missus and I (and SOC and Mrs SOC) went and took in the flick "Race Across The Sky".

Now, since I'm not a hyper Lance fan, nor an avid mountain biker, and definitely not a partaker of any kind of a long race involving climbs, it would seem on the surface that this movie, one about Lance, a mountain bike race, and one that involves fourteen thousand feet of climbing, would not be my cup of tea.

And, in a sense, the race really isn't my cup of tea.

I mean, who am I kidding? 10,000 feet elevation at the start? A 3,000+ foot climb up to the halfway point? A long paved descent on knobby tires?

All these things scream "Not for SDC! Not for SDC!"

It's just like the Ironman, when I first saw the coverage of the Hawaiian classic. I couldn't swim 50 laps at the local pool fast enough to qualify for lifeguard training, I run maybe twice a year, and I hate time trialing. The Ironman, therefore, is not for me.

Yet I had a fascination with that race for a long time. It had less to do with the event, though, and hence the fascination. Honestly, if you look at it objectively, it's a pretty boring race if you look at the terrain. Okay, it's hot there, especially when the lava fields are flowing, but it's basically dead flat. No climbing to speak of, just roller type hills.

(I say this with respect to everyone that's done it because, frankly, I can't even ride that fast on a TT bike, forget about having to swim a couple miles before and then, after the bike, climbing off and looking forward to a marathon run.)

The participants made up the story.

And so it was with the move "Race Across The Sky."

It was all about the people, the town, the situation around the birth of the event, the situations surrounding some of the racers themselves.

Leadville was a mining town until they shut down the mines, putting 3200 people out of work in a town of 5000 (numbers from the race promoter).

Obviously this put a damper on some of the town's happenings. Ken, the promoter, started the event to put Leadville on the map.

As Lance pointed out after the flick, Ken has succeeded. With this movie out now, I imagine that the Leadville field will either swell or the chances of getting selected in the lottery will dwindle down to Powerball ratios.

I have to imagine that racers who succeed in getting into the Leadville 100 mountain bike race (1400 spots as opposed to the running !! race, limited to 500 runners) will be making treks up to the area to recon the course, especially since it's a one time deal.

See, if you don't make the feed station within 4 hours, you're pulled.

And if you don't make the finish by 12 hours, you're a DNF.

So it behooves those that gain entry to make that entry count.

Therefore there must be a reasonable number of people making the trek up to this town, maybe in pairs or fives, swelling the population by 0.1% (for a party of five) for a few days. They have to eat and sleep somewhere, and they'll need to buy supplies and such.

That's good for Leadville, the town.

The course makes Leadville interesting because, frankly, with mountain biking, whatever is out there, well, it's been done. Leadville is about as tough a course as you can get without necessarily risking people's lives. You know, like by having 20 foot drop offs and such. Nothing like that in the Leadville 100, just long steady climbs, long steady flat sections, and, um, more long steady climbs.

However, the people participating make the race what it is. It'd be boring to watch a race where, out of 1400 starters, about 20 are left in the first hour or so. What fun would it be to watch riders cross the line for five and a half hours?

Mountain biking offers less drafting help, due to its higher rolling resistances and lower speeds. Drafting helps, sure, but nothing like on a road bike.

Therefore, as Lance points out, Leadville becomes a very, very long time trial.

For diversions, you need to look at the folks that make up the race.

And let me tell you, the emotions, the elation, and the sorrow are real. I won't reveal too much, except that some of the support staff showed heart wrenching devastation when they realized that they rider, typically their spouse, wasn't going to make it.

On a lighter and somewhat ironic note, I found the pre-movie "talk show host" interesting.

(Btw, was it Richard Fries interviewing them? I thought it was but I may be wrong.)

You could see the riders off the bike, in a less familiar environment. The small-town, down-home Ken, the media-polished Lance, a somewhat stone-faced Dave, a grinning "aw shucks" Travis, and the young Matt Shriver who seemed to get less nervous in the post-flick talk versus the seemingly nerve wracking pre-flick talk.

They all had the telltale hunched backs of cyclists, all aching to get into that low, efficient position, even sitting on tall bar stools in the middle of the stage.

I thought the most interesting exchange came from the non-flick chat, the unscripted, unrehearsed, somewhat spontaneous talk between some of the main characters in the race.

In particular, Ken pointed out that "only Tour de France winners get automatic selection". Not only that, it seems that if a TdF winner enters the race, they automatically get second the first time.

See, Floyd Landis, in 2007, got second. So did Lance, in 2008.

Each time they got beaten by the last year's Leadville winner, in this case the same guy, Dave Wiens.

Then Lance cracked a comment, as the current winner of Leadville.

"You should invite Contador to Leadville in 2010!"

Or something like that.

I think he meant that if Contador showed up, then Lance would beat him, because Lance won in 2009. Meaning, I think the implication is that Lance would win and beat Contador if they both did Leadville in 2010.

I guess a side thing that Lance didn't really address is that this implies that Lance thinks Contador will win the 2010 Tour (since Leadville 2010 occurs after the 2010 Tour).

I thought that was kind of interesting, the implied assumption.

Because, from how the discussion went, if Lance won the Tour, he wouldn't win Leadville. Contador, on the other hand, wouldn't win Leadville because... he'd win the Tour?

Hm.