Anyone want to know about Oxbow?

The starting line is about a 7 mile ride from my parents house, and given that we were hear in Roch for Jen's running race, I previewed the route...and more. For those who did it last year, the course is very close to the same except the SW corner is now cut off. You exit a busy road (CR4)near the end of the course and take a gravel road to the foot of the "Oxenburg" climb where you start it all over. So bascially, after the start, you don't see that stretch of road again until the race is over and you are limping back to your cars. The finish of the race this year is at the top of the "Oxenburg" climb....for all you quick thinkers out there, that means we get to climb it 4 times this year. I stopped in at Rochester Cycling and Fitness afterward to say hey to Matt and crew... the only reason I mention this is that it is Matt's fault for including this 4th climb! Matt, the owner of RCF (and thus my sponsor), is a great guy, but he clearly has a cruel streak.
BTW, the gravel roads are dry, but there are a lot of potholes and rough corners. Cross or mountain bikes will work best.
For those that haven't done the race, there are very few flat spots, and the the course is 85% gravel. The "Oxenburg" climb is a steep, several hundred meter climb with grades as high as 24% (right now there is a road closed sign at the bottom of the climb that they use during the winter because it is too steep). Anyway, it is a fun relaxed atmosphere so come on down.

Being back to normal this week actually has felt ok...
Check out Jen's Blog for some more Vegas Pics.
http://www.jensrunninblog.blogspot.com/

Cycling Update:
I took Friday noon (in Vegas) until Tuesday noon off; well, not entirely, but at least no really hard days. I was planning on doing that until Wed, but the weather was sketch for Thursday and Friday, and I am a wuss after 2 nice vacations away from MN weather. Now, they are saying only 50% chance of rain today and nice tomorrow. Oh well, either way, I did 2 days of interval training Tues and Wed with hockey thrown in on Wed morning. On Tuesday, I did max effort intervals which almost forced me to quit because they hurt so bad. I found one of my own "secret" training hills in Shakopee; I heard that the Penn guys have a hill they like around here so I couldn't resist=) On Wednesday I put the knobbies on the 9r9r and pulled a group of road bikers the entire way south into a 15mph head wind. I was suffering, but so were the people drafting, so we all got a good workout. After the ride, my legs were making it clear that 3 straight days of hard riding would not be permissible.
This weekend I am headed to Roch to watch a 1/2 marathon race that Jen is doing and to ride with my friend/sponsor, Matt. We will probably end up doing the Byron race course once or twice....I heard rumors of an uphill start...could it be true?
Hockey:
I have had a lot of fun this season. It is going to be ending for me next week because I don't want to risk excess fatigue or injury during the racing season. It is really hard to bike after you get a slap shot to the thigh (trust me, I have tried).
Other:
I want to mention a couple of other sad things. One is that Franz, one of my great friends, lost his grandma this week. I was at her visitation last night...two months ago his grandpa died suddenly...three months ago my grandma died suddenly. It is a tough for people our age as it is a time when we are loosing family members. If you have older relatives left, SPEND TIME WITH THEM! You never know how much time they have left. The other thing is the I see Saul Raisin, a great American road prospect, is in a coma. He is in critical condition. I don't know him, but it still is scary. Keep him in your thoughts and prayers. http://www.velonews.com/news/fea/9701.0.html

On a happier closing note:
The Frozen Four starts tonight! If you are looking for me, you will find me parked on my couch (likely with a beer in hand) yelling at the TV. Go Badgers!

Time to head home....
After a great long week has flown by in Vegas, Jen and I are sitting in the airport waiting to fly home. We had a blast the last few days.
Tuesday Chris and I took it easy while the girls shopped their feet raw. We ate dinner at a place in the Bellagio which was way too expensive and not nearly big enough portions for me....isn't it kind of backwards that expensive = less food?
After Dinner we found this nice Colnago specimen sitting in a gift shop (some mens shop with really expensive and mostly worthless crap like $15K pens)...some customer had dropped it and cracked the one piece carbon stem/handlebar...ouch. I told the salesman that I would take it off his hands for $3k...he laughed.
Wednesday, we rented a car and went to the Hoover Dam. Damn, that is one impressive Dam.

Thursday, Chris, Jen (Chris's Jen), and I headed back to Bootleg Canyon. I went off on my own and did some good hammering. We ended a multi hour adventure with a pretty scraped up and bruised girl, one flat tire and 3 pairs of tired legs. For the first time ever, Stan's gu failed to fix my flat...it had already fixed 3 this trip=) It was my fault though, because there wasn't enough gu left. I finished the ride with a tube and bought a scoop and a half of gu for $6 at a local bike shop...what a rip! That night, I took my sweety out to the Eiffel Tour Restaurant in Paris....goodfood, but I figure that I should be really full after a $150 meal. The best part of the night for me was Jen's dress=)
After dinner, the Jens, Chris and I closed it down with some Fat Tire beer at ESPN zone. I had to eat again due to a weak dinner.
This morning Chris and I got up at 8 and went for one last road ride through the Lake Mead rec area. We beat on eachother quite a bit, and both of our legs were just about exploded after fighting the wind, traffic, and hills. The picture and salt on my face tell the story....needless to say, stairs were not my friend after the ride. We really have it good in MN when it comes to road riding. BTW, Las Vegas was voted one of the least biker friendly cities in the US.
I look forward to seeing you all back on the north siiiiiideeee.
go badgers.

Two days of seven are down here in Vegas….
We are staying at the Paris Hotel right on the strip. We got into our room and here is how 10 pieces of luggage including 2 bike boxes looks.

Day 1 was a 2.5 hour ride (note that both Chris and I have our dual suspension mountain bikes out here) which was basically a ride out to a trail, a short stint on the trail, and the ride home (to and fro Red Rocks Canyon 20 miles west of LV). On the ride home, we hit 37mph on a flat… Chris forced me into this sprint…yes it was windy. The only other highlights of the ride were that the trail was sweet and we were going full out at 10mph into the wind at one point on the way out. We found out later that it the moving air’s max speed was 47mph.. That night we cashed it earl, as we were up before 5am to catch our flight out of MSP.
Day 2 was a great ride. No two ways about it. We had the wind at our backs on the way out (we went back to Red Rocks). Once out there, we rode awesome single track for over 2.5 hours. My favorite part of the ride, the funniest part, was when Chris started screaming. I looked back, and there was a piece of cactus stuck in his leg (he was still pulling out ¼” needles well into the night back at the hotel).

Chris’s favorite parts were the wild donkeys we saw and the challenging “black velvet” loop. Check out the views....

The way back, after more than 3.5 hours of riding, was against a 10mph wind, but I found something in my legs that kept us well above 20mph the entire way.
Once back from the ride, we decided we should upgrade rooms to a suite. For an extra $85 per day, we moved to the top floor in a 600+ square foot suite with 2 full marble bathrooms, schweet!

When I wasn't watching Baskeball or Hockey, I was riding.
It was great to see the Badger smash the Gophers on Sat. The only thing that spoiled it a little was the loss to the Swix on Friday. The 'Madness was truely mad and all the upsets kept me glued to the TV for 4 days.
I wasn't a total bum however and I got some good training in too. Fisher and I completed one of the toughest rides of the season on Saturday. Luckily, the sun was shining so that helped us deal with the below average temps. We started out around noon from his house...neither of us had the motivation to get up and get going any earlier=) The plan was to go out 40 miles and back 40 miles...the catch was that we were riding dual suspension mountain bikes (not locked out either). After about an hour, Chris HR monitor was beeping at him because he was around 175-180. He paid for that later=) We hit 40 miles about 5 miles south of Northfield. At that point, the wind, from the north east of course, started to pick up. Chris was having some cramping issues, so I ended up pacing us home, albiet slowly. In the end we only had a 17mph average and we hit 80 miles on the nose thanks to a new computer I put on the fuel...either way, when we finished, I had to lay on Chris and Jen's living room floor for a while before I could funtion very well. Sunday was all about eating and watching more bball.
In other news, we are leaving for Vegas on Saturday at the butt crack of dawn. I can't wait to ride and relax in the warm weather!

How not to get bored riding inside....
Here is one of my top-secret workouts when the roads are bad and there is no daylight (last night)...
- 90 minutes on the trainer: warm up (5min), 30seconds on/off sprints (10min), 6x5 min threshold intervals w/ 1min recovery between, 2x10min at aerobic pace, 4x2min 1 leg spins; cool down
- 60 minute spin class w/ Jen: ride super uncomforatble saddle; listen to instructor talk about being in an aerobic zone; reallize, you are way past that zone...almost get calf cramps (darn kc's); watch crazy wiggly lady next to me and try not to laugh.
- Hot tub recovery

more snow tonite...just awesome.
Update: Manny 1, Roli 1...doh

What the heck happened to clear roads? It is a blizzard out there this morning (although I still made it to hockey by 6:15=)
I saw this weather coming and made sure to have a good weekend. Fisher and I went out on Saturday with 5 hours as our goal...actually we just had a route picked out and didn't really know how long it would take. It was the maiden voyage for the niner niner and Chris was on his road bike. The wind was fierce at about 20-25 mph and we fought it for about 2.5 hours right off the bat (from my house to Waconia). With about a mile left in the ride, I told Chris that my legs hurt, but he said his weren't too fried. I think he is coming into some good form this early on. Somehow (I think it was Chris's long pulls into the wind) we kept a good pace and ended up with an 18 mph average over 80 miles. That isn't too bad given the wind and a moutain bike.

Sunday, I took a 1.5 hour spin to clear the legs. I felt surprisingly good and could have continued, but luckily I didn't because soon after I got home, I got a call and had to make an emergency energy bar drop off for my wife who was bonking several miles away on her long training run for the week. She made it home fine after refueling a little.

The Wild game was sweet! Roli vs Manny....Manny 1, Roli 0. No Boogaard = no fights

So, on the niner niner, the thing rides great, it is really snappy out of the gates and climbs like a Merino sheep. I just need to find some tires that roll better on the road so I don't slow my ride partners down. Any suggestions?

My first "real hard ride" of the year was yesterday...while I didn't go no botties like some pro's out there, I did get out=) I managed a 40 mile ride at lunch on the mtbk with a 19.5 mph average. That doesn't sound like much but on an non-locked-out dual suspension mtbk with 30-35 psi in the tires, it sure fried me! I got back to work a little dazed, but after a quick shower and some food, I was ready to engineer stuff.

We are trying to organize a ride on Saturday...here is how it will work. We will wake up and decide in the morning tomorrow. The weather looks bad, but the radar on the day of never lies.
If you contacted me about the ride, expect a call from Fisher or myself.

Looks like another beautiful day. Hopefully I can sneak out for a quick one at lunch!

Who drinks bottled water anyway?

Actually I know many people that do. There is a time an a place for it, i.e bad well water, no access to tap water, THAILAND. However, for normal every day use it is such a drain it is on the environment.
Check out this link and send it on to any hummer driving, bottled water drinking, yuppie fools that you know of out there...Here are a couple highlights, bottled water: has more bacteria (in some cases, but never less bacteria), has no fluoride, is just tap water in a bottle in most cases, is very bad for the environment...need I go on?http://www.active.com/story.cfm?story_id=12769
What??? Dasani is just tap water???
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0304-04.htm

Anyway, enough with the rant. I just couldn't pass up posting this link when I came across it.

So biking...hmm, I finished 3 14-16 hour weeks in a row with some good hard riding before I left and over seas. Since Sunday, I have been doing RR stuff, well I guess the 2 hockey games were way to intense to be RR, but mostly RR stuff anyway. I am feeling pretty rested and will pick it up again this weekend. I think I am not going to lift legs too much more this year. It really takes the snap out of my legs for 24-36 hours and I will probably be better served using that energy to pedal.
Fisher and I are gonna ride hard 1 or both of the days this weekend if anyone wants to join us (Kato Crew, Oftedahls, etc). With temps above 40 this no longer seems like such a daunting task.
Only 2 more weeks after this week and I will be in the warmth again...this time VEGAS baby... the fuel should have signed up for a frequent flier program!

Do I hear a Niner Niner????
The new ride is a stock Trek 9.9 w/ the following additions: F80X fork, Crossmax Sls (I am keeping the x-lites for training/backup), Kenda Karmas, Selle Italia Saddle, and Egg Beaters.
Weight = 21.5 lbs

Chris Fisher has dibs on the Sid WC that this came with but if he doesn't want it, it will be up for sale (at QBP cost which is $555). It is sweet looking, as the OEM colors are black with red lettering. The only aftermarket one available is white.

Time to ride.