Still Here

Don't worry blogger fans. I am still here. Just been busy. Will have ride reports and other fun stuff for you tomorrow or the next day.

Wednesday-Thursday Ride Report.......

Wednesday nights ride was allot of fun.....Andy, Rich, Bill, Matt and myself did the Bar Slope this evening. Headed out east Pike to Hood school and straight across at the bottom to 286. 286 to Clymer and then to bar slope then home.. It was a pretty good ride with a few reindeer games mixed in.


Thursday Evening.........

Well it was you usual suspects thins evening. Mark , Andy and myself did the Three Man Loop the usual way we do it. steady and fast. My legs were burning before we got to hilltop and once we reached the turn at the Golden Pheasant toward Parkwood we never dropped bellow 21 mph until we were almost to the end..and as we all know that is just a steady annoying climb going across that road. Anyway we had a really good ride and had it lit up for the majority of it...man I'm tired. No heart problems either night to speak of.


Where were you on September, 11 2001??????

Wow it is really hard to believe that that day in history is upon us again.....I am glad to see that it has not become just a passing thing and is always on the minds of people. We will become victims again if we allow ourselves to be complacent which I am afraid has already happened to some extent.

I was actually sitting at my workstation listening to the radio when I heard teh first announcement of the first plane....to this day I cant forget the feelings of anger and disbelief I felt that day.....NEVER FORGET


So I hear that Lance Guy is going to try road racing again.......

Stupid I say.........egoimaniac.........I'm bored so I am going to go race my bike again.......the way I see it it will go one of 3 ways for him.......

1. It will be the best decision of his life and he will be even more of a cycling icon.
2. He will finally get caught doping .
3. He will fail miserably and be know as the guy how tried to make a comeback and made a fool of himself.I doubt this will happen but it would be funny.

I Will never go to a regular movie theater again.......

So my wife and I went to the movies a week ago. We went to see THE DARK NIGHT in IMAX...only $2 more than the crappy theater at our local mall and 10000000 times better.

Sunday-Monday Ride reports

Sundays ride was relatively easy for an outing toward Lusiousborough. Matt, Andy and Myself did the dark side and had a pretty good ride...Not too hard and not too slow. Lots of good conversation and just what I needed. Still not fully recovered and I needed a good recovery ride.

Monday Morning Ride......

Zewack and I did an alternate version of five points this morning. Started out Ben Franklin from his house and out to 422. then back onto five points road. Did the standard Five points loop from there until Creekside. From there we headed across to Fulton Run then took a right onto Marian Hill...OUCH. them n back Ben Franklin to Rich's.

Was nice to get out in the AM for a change adn I felt pretty good for the whole ride.

Just in case you don't know what a Prairie Dog is......

Well...this is what might come to mind......



But......This is a breif story of ones own personal Prairie Dog

Prairie Dog

Saturday morning started a little early about 5:30 AM with a rather immediate need to evacuate my system. OK race day poop, out of the way, that might be a good thing. Always good to know that you’ll be a little lighter for the race;) The Tour De Strongland mountain bike race started at 10AM and being my home course, I wanted to have a good showing. Unfortunately, about ½ way through brushing my teeth an audible rumble starts in my mid section and the need returns urgently enough to force me to the throne, toothbrush still in hand. After three more angry contributions and some Pepto; I’m heading out the door about 9 AM to still do the race. I’m feeling better and at least the cramps are gone. I don’t really feel sick or anything so I line up with the rest of the boys to start the race. Apparently there are no other bike races today in Western PA and about every fast rider (both road and mountain) have lined up at the start of the expert class race.

I’m lined up near the front knowing that a bad lead out to the single track destroys any chance of a decent finish. I feel a little grumble. Ah, just race day nerves, it’ll be OK. The gun goes off and away we go. I’m sitting about 5^th wheel on the express train to the single track. We are cruising along fast enough that no one can come around on this double track section to pass. Perfect. A little surge occurs and I hop out of the saddle to respond. That’s when I make my new friend. Sparky the prairie dog has made an appearance. I sit back down, clench up and Sparky hides away…for a little while. The entire first lap becomes a new game that really doesn’t involve cycling much. Sparky wants to come out and play, I try to contain him. Great fun!

Apparently when prairie dogs are kept inside they get bored. So to pass the time I guess they do what comes natural. BREED! It now appears that Sparky and his family are a rather prolific mixture of Irish Catholic and Mormons. No birth control in that group. By about half way thru the second and mercifully, the final lap, Sparky, his wife, his 12 kids, aunts, uncles, a couple cousins and some adopted refugee prairie dogs from China all want to come out a play REAL BAD! I’m now putting twice the effort into my sphincters than I am my leg muscles. Luckily I ride a perfectly clean lap (both literal and figurative) for fear that a crash would undoubtedly release the entire clan. With about a mile to go I am fantasizing about the port-a-potty at the finish. I’ve got my gloves off, by camel back unclipped, and my helmet off as I cross the finish line and am now putting out the hardest cycling effort of the day to outsprint the 70 year old women ambling towards the john. I power slide across her path to block her progress and beat her sorry ass to the prize, in just enough time to return the Sparky and his kin to the wild….Shew! Close one!

PS: Although I had a rewarding finish in the mountain bike race on Saturday (I didn’t soil myself) my placing was abysmal. The good news is that I conserved a lot of energy and came back on Sunday and vindicated myself by actually winning The Tour De Strongland Road Race II in a full on sprint, by beating the rest of the 11 man break away.

Thursday Night Ride Report

Nicoll, Andy and Myself were the only ones to show up this evening....buckle up and hang on. We did the Marion Center loop, one of marks favorites and probably the flattest 40 mi. ride you can do around here and believe me its not very flat.
We rode real steady and of course there was no chatter just rhythm. We actually didn't say much until we got to the last climb before Marion Center then the chatter started for about 2 miles or so and off again. Andy and I hung with mark until part way up the climb to the Lacerations Farm, I said "hey....this wreaks of effort , sat up and Mark just kept riding". I was still tired from the weekend and all Wednesday nights ride did was clear out the old lactic acid to replace it with new. So Andy and I just kept a steady pace back to Indiana and still had a respectable average at the bottom of the climb on Fulton Run. No heart issues this evening and a good hard ride....

I am "NOT IMPRESSED"........

So I have been riding a Giant TCR Advanced this year and I am very impressed....What does not impress me is the wheel set I got with it. It came with the MAVIC KSYRIUM ELITE...Now I have been riding KSYRIUM SSC SL's for years with no problem but these particular wheels really stink. They feel sloppy in the corners and wont stay true.

So I send them back, paying the freight the FIRST time and 3 weeks later I get them back not only is the rear wheel not true but one ride later it is really messed up. So I call and MAVIC and explain the situation to them and they're response is that they probably didn't not replace all the spokes and something else about something inside coming undone. So they offer up an RA# and say to send it back, to which I reply "why don't you just send me a call tag ", and they did. SO about a week later it shows up and the wheel is off again.

The wheel finally shows up at my door earlier this week, I put it on Wednesday before the ride and after the ride it is out of true again. I called MAVIC again on Thursday and we go through the same spiel again. I finally get them to agree,begrudgedly , to send me another call tag.Now as the day progress this did not sit well with me so I call back and ask to speak to somebody in warranty.I tell him the story and he asks me a few questions IE maybe this wheel is not strong enough for you...so you are saying I am fat...eh fella. I go on to explain to him that I'm not an elite racer but I'm no lard but either. We go back and forth a couple of times and he finally asks me what I want him to do. I tell him that all I want is to ride my bike and not have the wheel go out of true. He then says that he cant do anything without seeing the wheel.So why did we bother even discussing this anyway.Customer service is definitely not his forte......and fortunately this is my own personal wheel and not that of a customer.

The bright side to all of this is that I have been riding a set of Rolf Wheels, that by the way are a less expensive wheel than the MAVIC and what do you know they are defiantly more stable and much stiffer than the Elites and I am pretty sure the same would go for the SSC SL's. and after about a month of riding them they are still true....go figure.

What industry are you in........

So I call to order a couple of Cross bikes the other day as well as a Sport fitness bike for a customer. Now Cross season is just around the corner and good weather is upon us and guess what. nether style bike is available. The sport fitness is not available for about 3 weeks and the Cross bike not for at least another 4. How am I suppose to run a successful business when my suppliers cant supply me with product, and who's idea was it to release the new model year right at the tail end of the selling season. Close out the new and have no supply of the new......makes allot of sense huh. Oh and by the way there will be about a 16% increase in new bike prices across the board this year........OUCH!

Wednesday Night Ride Report

Ended up having a descent ride this evening. I hadn't been on my bike since the 24 hour extravaganza this pas weekend.Rich,Andy,Matt,John,Bill and myself did the Eastern Shore loop. We started out rolling slow out of town.I am glad for that because my legs were still full of junk from the weekend.My heart wasn't in it either. It was jumping around and actually went into affib once before we were even through campus. I actually at one point was ready to bag the ride but pushed on.

I was somehow able to keep it together and as we rode I continued to feel better and by about 5 miles in I was starting to feel normal again. My legs still weren't in it but my heart was starting to come around.I took really short pulls for a while and just kind of hid in the back but once we got near Virginia farms I was really starting to feal like muyself again and started pullling more and picking up the pace.

Somthing is missing here.........

Today was my sons first day of school. He has come to work with me every day for the past 3 years adn I am going to realy miss him. We dont alwasys get to do much when he is heare but we do spend allot of time talking.I am really going to miss him.


Matt update.........

So you might remember a week or so me telling a story about an abduction on our ride...well here is the rest of the story. When I arrive at the shop the following day it was kind of like the scene from Close encounters were all the war planes show up without their pilots only not as dramatic and Matt was actually standing there as well. It seems that his front derailure was a bit out of adjustment dropping his chaing, which bound things up forcing his rear derailure into his spokes thus breaking 5 and bending his front derailure.

Seven Springs Subaru 24 Hour Challenge

24 Hours of racing....It doesn't get any better than that. It was however a little bit warm but a far cry better than the last time I did this race.

Mike, Henry, Mark and I did the 4 sport Masters (Fogy) division while SAM did the I'm pretty sure I've have lost my mind Solo Division. We all rode really well with only minor mechanical's and mountain bike folly. Mike crashed 2 times both his first 2 laps, once while Hopping a log and landing on a rock, some guy ran into him while passing, some girl was standing along the trail and freaked him out and off of the trail and the fourth...well I'm not completely sure about that something about speed and a tree. Sam had a flat and Henry had a slow leak as well but was able to make it through his loop without having to fix it, topped it off once with a CO2 and stopped buy the tent on his way through to top it off with a pump.Mark hurt his calf on the run but was able to recover from it. As for myself I went down in the rock garden on my third lap and jammed my pedal into my calf on my last lap while all along trying to keep my heart beating properly.

My own personal experiences......

The day started out great and we arrived about 10am and got set up. These events are allot of fun and the atmosphere is awesome. My first lap was not going to be until around 4 so I set off to take some photos and hang with Jay and Liz for a while. We spent some time lurking in the rock gardens at the top of the course watching and looking for the best lines to ride through.

Eventually I headed back to our site to fuel up and get ready for my first lap. I was pretty relaxed and felt pretty good. I had a plan to just ride steady and really focus on keeping my heart rate under control by bombing through what ever I could and just setting a good tempo for the climbs.

Lap #1..... 4:45 pm - 5:09 pm

Ben was at the transition tent waiting on his team mate to come in so I said see ya to him and I was off. I knew I would be seeing Ben on the trail because he is such a strong rider. as most single speed guys are. The first lap went pretty well, I forced myself to just hold a good tempo, which was really frustrating because there were plenty y of places where I could have really ramped it up and shaved some real time off of my lap but I figured it was better not to. Benn caught me just before the Big climb which was at about the half way point, I believe Henry said that there was a 1000 foot elevation gain at that point. I was feeling pretty good until I got close to the top, my heart wasn't in affib but it wasn't in a normal rhythm either...push on. I cleared the top, fast as pancakes, and continued on to the second half of the course. This part was on top of the mountain so there was little climbing but plenty of rock gardens to keep it interesting. I finished with a better time that n I thought I would considering I was just riding steady and my heart didn't not beat funny until I sat down at tent. It stayed out long enough for everybody to feel my pulse and see my color change from normal to pale to normal again.

Lap #2..... 9:03 pm - 10:40 pm

Started getting ready at around 8 pm. Our site was right beside the long climb before the loop at the top which made it easy to gauge when it was time to start getting ready to go to the transition tent. I wasn't feeling 100%. I could tell I might be in for some trouble but by the time I was ready to head for the transition tent I was feeling OK again. I Chatted with Ben again for a while while waiting for our team mates. They were racing the regular, young stud, sport division and doing about the same lap times as we were.

So lights on and off I went....I love riding at night, Its quiet, except for the Ted Nugent concert that was going on at the main lodge, and you become so focused on what is ahead of you. Had a good steady lap....I am however always impressed by the abilities of other riders. I was passed several times during the race by the Visit PA guys, it was like they were riding on pavement, and I had my brakes on. The ride was mostly uneventful and was a blast.

Lap #3..... 3:01 am - 4:48am

I had laid down for a little bit,but did not sleep, you would think that it would be easy to catch a wink but in all reality it is nearly impossible, lots of commotion throughout the night plus you are all hyped up; I really was not feeling good but that can be a normal feeling. I got dressed and headed for my bike...crap my heart is defiantly in affib now. I grab my bike and start for the transition tent again. About half way there my heart comes back into rhythm......Thank you lord.

I checked in and chatted with Ben again. This time his rider showed up before mine. This only due to the fact that Henry had a to top off his tire twice. Had another descent lap just riding steady and getting around without any mishap or mechanicals., I did however go down in the second rock garden at the top. I came around the corner hit one of the big rocks that I should have gone around and before you know it I'm on my side in a pile of rocks laughing out loud.....back on the bike and I am off. Now I am cruising along at a pretty good clip on the latter part of the second loop when all of a sudden my bike feels like it hit a brick wall lunging me foreword but not off the bike. Just so happens that there is a big rock just barely on the side of the trail that I caught my pedal on as I was passing by, aha the perils of night riding. Liz was at the tent waiting to start her next lap when I returned so I chatted with with here for a bit before heading back to the site.

Lap #4..... 8:50am-10:30am

I actually must have passed out for a bit in the camper...the last thing I remember after my last lap was grabbing a bite to eat and sitting by the camp fire for a while. I also remember talking briefly to my wife and that's it, lights out.........then form a galaxy far far away I here the theme from star wars....seriously my son was humming the theme while playing with some of his toys. I did actually sleep for about 30-40 minutes which can be a bad idea.I awoke and steeped outside to a beautiful sunlit day.So I strolled over to a chair and had a seat.

Man did I feel bad. My legs and everything felt pretty heavy,I am pretty sure that I had been in and out of affib during my siesta, since this is usually how I feel after an episode. So I got up to try and walk it off...big mistake....I walked up to Tahoe and it was all I could do to make it. Crap I am totally flat and I'm on deck. So back to camp to get ready. I'm sure that one of the other guys would have gone in my stead but those that know me know that I would only do that as a last resort.

So I got dressed, all this time my heart is jumping around, and onto the bike.Fast as pancakes I exclaim as I head up the hill to the transition tent........amazingly though as I road up the hill I started feeling better...normal even.

I get to the transition ten and check in. Ben was there again so we chatted for about five minutes until he was off. Henry showed up shortly after that and I was off. I wasn't 100% but I knew I was going to be alright. made it around the first half with no problems then up the climb. Everybody riding was in good spirits. For most of them it was probably their final lap and the morning sun also has a positive effect. I made the big climb and off to the second loop. As i approached the second rock garden I heard somebody coming up on me fast so I said let me know wand I will let you by. He wasn't interested, instead he stuck up a conversation. What lap you on...how ya feeling....I hate these stupid rock gardens. We chatted for about 5 minutes or so then he was off.......your would never have that happen in a road race for sure. the only other thing of interest that happened during this lap was that my foot came unclipped and my pedal smacked the back of my calf.....ouch.


Sam is the man.............

So while the 4 of us were out doing our 17 laps Sam was out by himself doing 14 on his own. Bet he will rethink that one down the road. He ended up finishing 3rd overall and was in a field of guys that do this kind of stuff on a regular basis..........I am sure that he will blog about it here.


Final ramblings .......

I'm glad that my family enjoys going to these events with me. They give great moral support and I just plain like having them around.Of course my wife is always busy taking pictures so she doesn't get to be in them very often.

I have always been fortunate to either attract or choose the best of friends and it was great to have many of them around this weekend Mel, Jay & Liz, Bill & Lisa,Todd,Henry,Mike,Mark, Sam and his dad Kirk and many others that i did not mention here.
I don't think this had looks stupid....does it? My wife bought it for me you know......and by the way anybody that is a mountain biker knows that dogs, especially those that owners are bikers could care less if a bike goes by and for most of us are great riding partners.Make sure to let the organizers of this event know that.

The race promoters should be less concerned about dogs and more concerned about non-cycling spectators and make sure that they don't decide to take a rest right in the middle of the rock garden trail. Somebody could get hurt....just ask Mel

Its a good thing John wasn't on our team....He would have never been able to finished a lap with all the bottles and other debris that I saw along the way although he probably would have found Sam's tool.

If you leave your multi-tool laying along the trail somebody will find it. This actually happened to Sam .His dad went around to ask people to buy one and the very first tent he stopped at the guy had Sam's tool...weird.

Some people will dress in anything at these events.

The blond chick on the left is a dude the one in the skirt is not.

Beer and sleep depravity don't mix......

So we are done and we are tired and sitting back with a cold one. My wife asks me to keep an eye on our son while she strolls up to the lodge and I say no big deal. Now my son is a great kids as are all of the kids that hang around our crew. Almost every event is a family event including after race picnics and such. So like I sad we were just sitting there and my son comes over and asks me to take him to the BR. So we start up to the lodge and my wife is on here way back so she knows that I am beat so she offers to take him. So I return to the tent and some good conversation.Now I am not sure how much time had lapsed, but I start looking around and don't see my son anywhere and kind of get an empty feeling inside (now remember he is with his mother and I have not really slept for over 24 hours and I have been racing my bike), So i ask tho guys if they had seen my son anywhere? Of course they haven't because he has been with his mother for who knows how long. So I get up and start to kind of holler for him I turn and look up to the lodge and there he is with his mom dancing to the music.MAJOR BRAIN FART and a graet releif.

Cause and Effect

So you may wonder what some of the things I have found that trigger an affib atack.....

1. Lack of sleep
2. Dehydration
   
3. Hard efforts followed by periods of reduced effort (i.e.- after a climb on the descent or flat , bridging a gap in a race)
   
4. Thinking or worrying about it (the mind is a powerful thing)

Hey lets go racing......

So you can probably see where this is going....

Mike Maher, Henry Dimick, Mark Millican, and myself did the Seven Springs Subaru 24 Hour Challenge this past weekend.

1. Sleep deprivation
2. No matter how hard you try, staying hydrated is a hard thing to do, its not like you race your bike once and your done......you have to race it several times in our case Mike, Henry and myself raced 4 times and Mark 5
   
3. Mountain biking is combination of hard efforts followed by periods of reduced efforts
4. Worried constantly that I would have an attack during one of my laps thus letting the team down

Anyway we had a great time (race report and photos to follow).

Race report highlites......

3 Different Podiums for AG3R/indiana Cyclng........ and other anecdotal stories from the race venue

Seven Springs 24 Hour Challenge.....

1. Mike, Henry, Mark and Rich take 3rd int the Sport Vet/Master division
2. Sam Morrison finished 3rd in ths Solo division (1 guy..... 24 hours)
   

Pa State Time Trial Championships.....

1. Brian Hopkins took 2nd in the Cat3 misssing out on first by only 30 seconds

Thursday Ride Report

Did the reverse Five points loop this evening with hammer. Had a pretty good pace and lots of good conversation. Was actually nice to climb Fulton run a the end o fa 27 miler as opposed to a tongue draggin 45.

Man can that guy spin a yarn.....

Caught the DNC last evening and watched good ol boy Billy's speech. Man , if I didn't already experience that mess I would be ready to vote for him.


48 Hours til 24 Hours.........

Well....Im guesssing around 48 hours from now I will be starting my first night lap at the Seven Springs 24 hour challenge and it appears...atleast right now, that we are in for some good weather...YEA!!!!!!! the last time i did this it was cold wet and miserable and I actually ended up in the hospital because of it. So nice weather will be a bonus, not to mention all of the friends that I will have hanging around doing the race as well. Henry, Mike and Mark on my team, then Jay, Liz, Bil, Gene, Todd, Mel, Dan and many more riding for other teams, it should be an awesome time and I will be sure to report.


The latest buzzz on honeybees.......

It appears that it is possible that a Bayer pesticide may be responsible for Coloney Callapse Disorder. Many profesional beekeepers have been steering clear of this for som time now and now it appears that their resons were justified.

Government de-evolution......

So Barack Obama Finally has picked his Vice president....Joe Biden ???? Now all we can do is wait for McCain to pick his.........Now I don't know about you, but it concerns me that this is this the best that our representative parties have to offer.

Evolution......

Now as we all know we have had many great Presidents since the founding of our country....Washington, Adams, Jefferson,Jackson,Lincoln,Grant,Hoover, Roosevelt, Kennedy.......
and of course we had Reagan, that fortunately gave us a brief eight year reprieve from all of the chaos.

De-Evolution........

Nixon, Ford, Carter,Bush Sr., Clinton and of course the current Bush. What is really amazing to me is that some of these jokers actually came off of good solid representation. Bush Sr obviously learned nothing from Reagan and Bush Jr. didn't learn from his fathers mistakes and Clinton....well we all know the problem there.

Our country deserves better than what it has had the past 39 years...I am tired of voting for the guy I feel will mess things up the least. I could go on but this would take forever and I don't have the time. We all know where our country stands now and all we can really hope for is that whomever comes next wont foul it up anymore.

Sunday report from teh homefront....

What a crappy day. Except for the good sermon that Bill gave this morning I pretty much felt and still feel like crap. My heart was in and out of Affib all day.It has been a long time since I have had a day like today, so long that at cant remember and I will be even happier to forget.

Looking forward to tomorrow. Me and my little buddy have a pretty big day planed, unfortunately Gail starts back to School so we will definitely miss her.

3rd DNA Sample of Georgian Sasquatch Now Found To Be Conclusive......

Remember that the original 3 were......

1. Human DNA
2. Opossum DNA
3. Inconclusive

Hence the Suquahumossum, but now that the previously inconclusive DNA results have been confirmed, we have now come the the conclusion that what we really have here is a.......

Rubrachiquahumossum........

Break out your Summer Teeth.......

It appears that Dentists are more likely to pull teeth out or fit false ones than provide fillings or crowns under an NHS deal introduced two years ago, figures show. Just like good o'l Uncle Bunky, he had summer teeth.....summer here and summer there. I really don't have an Uncle Bunky I just thought that ws funny.


This is as close to off color I wll get......

"BOBBLY CLOUDS". The bobbly clouds that make this image so startling are called mammatus clouds - a name derived from the Latin word for breast. They hang under the main body of other clouds.

Convicted

So a friend of mine was in the other day and told me that some of his employees were disappointed that I had gone a day or two without updating my blog. Well there is a story behind that.

So I have been spending more time on my blogs these days, adding hyperlinks and such to help make it more enjoyable. This however does take some time, not allot but some. Anyway I awoke the other morning and headed for the living room when all of a sudden I was convicted. Not by the police but by my lord and savior Jesus Christ. What was my conviction you might ask. Well it is quite simple really, I have been finding more time to spend blogging than I have Praying.Never have I felt the lords presence so strongly as I did at that moment.

I know that God is always present,and sometimes His will for me is unclear to me, but often times his words are more like a whisper, that often come to you during prayer, but to have Him basically yell at you is awesome. To know that he is interested and cares about you is indescribable and is something I hope you will experience for yourself someday.

That all being said,I will continue to blog for your entertainment. I will continue to update you on rides and poke fun at whatever I can.

God bless

Wedesday night ride report

Did the reverse Tanoma loop this evening with Rich, Andy and Matt. We had a pretty good pace this evening but Matt seamed to be having a little trouble. So we occasionally let up a bit to let him latch back on, at least until he completely disappeared. Now like I said Matt had dropped off a couple of times during the ride but never was out of site. We turned onto Tanoma road and Andy said that he was only about 100 yards back so we just kind o f soft pedaled for a while, until we realized that Matt was no wear to be found. So we tuned around and road the whole way back to 119 and still no Matt. He new the loop but there is no explanation for his disappearance.

So we continued the ride but still soft pedaled for a while just in case mat returned to earth. We also stopped to look at the new bridge being constructed on Hood School road. Penn Dot is doing the work so we figure it ought to be finished just in time for our new years day ride......maybe.

Of course my heart went into affib as we stopped to admire their work but it cam back fairly quickly.

Ahhh the Indiana Fair is almost upon us.......

Get out your trashiest outfit and glob on the make-up....the Indiana County Fair is just about here. Just a friendly reminder to all that we still live in Appalachia. Fair food and all the counties best...I know that I cant weight.

Suday afternoon at RR

Old School at Roaring Run.......

Spent this afternoon at Roaring Run with Bill, Todd,Josh, Nina & Paul. We started out riding most of the older trails. These don't get ridden too much these days since there has been so much focus on the new so some of them were pretty overgrown. The older trails are pretty technical and are on top of the hill so, there isn't as much climbing as there is on the newer trails. Todd, Paul and Nina split off from the group as we approached the newer section so Bill, Josh and myself continued on.

We had a great ride and Josh is an excellent rider, so I co-horsed him into trying this.(first video) He did pretty good but came into it way too fast for all the more run out he had but he pulled it off. Sorry for the shaky camera, I thought that I was going to have to jump out of his way. We finished up around 5:00 and I was spent. All I had to eat before the ride was a bagel.My heart went into Afib a couple or times but came back almost immediately.



Another Chuck Sighting.......

So I had to stop by the store on the way to the ride, and what to my wondering eyes did appear but a familiar face on his Tommasini. That right folks...Chuck had shown up for a ride. It was good to finally see him show up for a ride. Its been a while since I have ridden whith Chuck. We used to spend allot of time ridding together. Of course Rich was sporting his latest team doping jersey (Phonak).

Saturday Afternoon Ride

Brownie (AKA Brian) was back in town and unable to make the excursion to Roaring Run on Sunday afternoon so He and I did a road ride today. We headed out airport road and did the Tanoma loop.Wow is he in shape these days. He had already done a 26 mile TT earlier today and then rode my legs off.

He isn't Happy with his performance though. He is tearing up the TT's but cant pull it together in a regular road race. I told him he needs to decide what he wants to do well at, either TT or road, and that it would be hard to excel at both.

Get out the Grandma Soap........

So I haven't had the luxury of having great Mother in law stories of my own. My wife's mother passed away early on in our marriage and she was a great lady so I would not have any anyway. But a good friend of mine does. He actually has to put out special soap for her when she comes to visit hence dubbing it GRANDMA SOAP.

Speaking of Mother in Laws.......

Not really but some guys descriptions sometimes give you this kind of visual, apelike and wishing they were dead.

Seriously though, these two dudes from Georgia claim to have found the remains of a DOA Bigfoot. They say that they were hiking deep in the Wooley Swamp, or something like that, and came upon this apelike creature, with reddish hair and human hands and feet(hey, don't bogart that joint my friend). They also have 3 DNA samples...

1. Human DNA
2. Possum DNA
3. Inconclusive

So what we have here is a Susqahumossum.....maybe. I don't know about you but they almost had me until they threw in the Possum thing.(Bigfoot,Baby foot and Possum foot) You decide.

In all seriousness though I am not trying to debunk them, I have seen and heard allot of strange things in the woods while hunting over the years, one of which to this day I question what I actually saw. And just for their sake, PA has between 14,000 and 15,000 bears living withing the confines of the commonwealth. How many have you seen?????

Speaking of Strange Sightings.......

It is rumored that Tow-Chuck will be retuning to the bike. It is rumored to happen today and Rich claims to have sen him in full cycling garb within the past week. I did see him in his car last week, and he exclaimed ere he drove out of site, "HAPPY CYCLING TO ALL AND NEXT WEEK I JUST MIGHT..."

The weekend is upon us....

Looking forward to another weekend of mountain biking. Brian is going to be home for the weekend so I imagine we will do a road ride tomorrow after I close them the family and I are going to see the new STAR WARS flick.

Talked to Stan at No-Tubes Today.....

SAM contacted me about ordering him a new set of Stan's ZTR 355 29'r wheels so I picked up the phone and called. This is the second time I have called and talked to Stan the man himself. Seems like a pretty cool dude, real high energy and ready to give his expert advise on proper wheel setup and such. THANKS STAN.

Parents these days or is Criminal-dar like Gay-dar???

So a week or so ago this kid comes in the shop looking for a master link. I get it for him and tel him the price which was $1.33, to which he responded "I don't have any money, my mom said I need to get a job , so can I work it off?" Remember that quote. Anyway I handed him a dust rag and set him to work, during this time here he asked if he could worlk off a skateboard, so I agreed. So last week he drops in and asks if his cousin could come in the store and without looking I said why not and he proceeded to say that I had banned his cousin form the store for steeling so I renigged and said no thus the criminal-dar. I am a little suspect of this kid already and he is hang'in with a kid that I know has stolen from me.

So he shows up this afternoon to do a little more work and I ask him where he has been. He says he had been helping out a relative and then went to spent the afternoon with a man with a needle and proudly displays his new tattoo. So I say to him, "that's kind of expensive isn't to which he replies , "my mom said if I could find somebody to do it that she would pay for it" , interesting that the same mother wouldn't pay $1.33 for a master link, different priorities I guess.

I'm about ready for a Huffy Toss.....

I hate working on junk....but it pay$$$$$$$$ $o Good....

Thursday August 14th

Nobody showed up for the ride this evening.Threatening rain so I figured that would happen. Nobody really likes to get wet and it looked as if some thunderstorms were headed our way.

Tickets..Get your tickets here.......

So Henry popped in today to visit and to pick up his new saddle. Its pretty cool but I'm not sure how much his stuff will appreciate it. We had a nice visit catching up on things since he has been gone for a few weeks. Unfortunately the Indiana Borough Welcoming Committee, AKA Meter Maid,o ops I'm sorry PARKING ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS was lurking nearby and gave him a thanks for shopping Indiana certificate, which amounts to a around $5 payable to Indiana County Parking Authority.

Now I would know how the 100's of people that visit the little walk-in clinic on the corner can park pretty much all day and get away with it but if I have a customer park for more that a minute they can expect a ticket.

RUDE RUDE RUDE.........

So I get a call today from what appeared to be a friendly Seasoned citizen. So she proceeded to ask me if I carried ride-on scooters, Now I have never heard of such a thing so I asked her to describe or be more specific as to what she was asking me. "Oh they are very popular" she says. "They sit low to the ground and have pedals on them". Still confused I say that I have never seen such a thing, to which her reply was "well they have them at Idlewild". So now the wheels start turning and I think to myself...So your looking for a carnival ride and you suppose it is very popular because the line for this particular ride was so long.(Little Rascals - Children sit down on the handcar and move themselves along the rails by turning the handcrank in front of them. Every little kid's favorite!) >So I again state that I don't have such an Item in my store and that I am sorry that I was unable to help her."OK then she says and i suppose she figures that I had stopped listening when she rudely says"your a bike shop and it has pedals like a bike so I supose you should have it". If I had only known that I could own the market on the Little Rascal Handcar I could have probably retired to the Carribian by now.

First of all lady its a BIKE SHOP not a Handcar/Carnival ride shop. I'm glad that I dont have a bad temper because it was tempting to Star sixty nine here and ask her to clarify what she said at the very end of our conversation, but sometimes you just need to let things go.

Wedesday August 13 Ride report

First of all it has come to my attention that some of you are missing all the hyperlinks in my posts They are usually this color and BOLD.So please don't forget to click and enjoy.

So....we had a good group this evening...... Zewack, Andy, Hammer, Matt, Monkeyboy, S.C. John, myself and Dr. Vitality. Now I like it when the docto show up because(beat and music from the Commodores brick house) da............dada......da.....da....da dadada dadada da.da.da He's like a brick.....wall......Like rid'in behind him...cant feel the wind at all..........Anyway we did a different loop combination tonight. We did the wall in Clymer. We headed out Airport road to Clymer, Into Clymer and up the wall. Dropped back down to 403 to Dixonville, then back to Tanoma then back to Indiana. Lots of climbing and plenty of attacks, with some good fast pace line work as well. I'm pretty sure that nobody had anything left after tonight's ride...cant wait til tomorrows ride. Only had a couple of heart flutters this evening. Had most of my problems after I returned to the shop. Hard riding is good for me so long as we don't really let up and that is the kind of ride we had. OUCH.

Sorry Dude.....

So Duane stopped by to day to help out for a bit around the shop and I noticed a slip laying there an figured it was for the bike he was working on. So I call the number and get a voice mail and realize that it is an older slip. So the dude calls me back, irritated, as if he has never mad a mistake and kind of reams me out. Sorry dude, I'm pretty sure that there is some kind of pill you could take for that.


Cool new logo......

As I said Duane was by today and he had the new artwork with him that he has been working on for the IUP Cycling Club. It turned out pretty good. Their first meeting will be August 29th, at 9:00 pm in the Susquehanna Room at the IUP Hub.



Whats up with those beer goggles.......

So BEER GOGGLES came up in an email blast today and I found this picture and thought I should post it for all of you to enjoy.............and for those of you who don't at least will understand the concept.

Tuesday August 12th

Just your average day at the shop today. Sold a few bikes and worked on some crappy bikes. More bad cable routing and the usual fair. Almost $200 later and the bikes are up and running.Yikes!!!!!

The waters are rising.......

So I get home this evening and it looks like somebody is washing the car since there is about that amount of water is running down my driveway. Now I know better than this and my intuition was right. So i start to investigate and it appears that there is some kind of water main break or something going on some wear above us, and upon further investigation I find the earth rising in my neighbors back yard. So we do the ethical thing and call the water company. Now they did arrive in a timely matter but after about 1/2 hour of looking around like he was really looking for something and a little more standing around with his hands in his pockets pondering the situation he decides that they will need to come back tomorrow,I need a job like that.Good plan except for the fact that I am pretty sure that both of our driveways are going to have problems.

Speaking of water......

Man can that dude swim. I watched a little bit of the Olympics late evening, and swimming was on the venue. Michael Phelps just destroyed the field in the 200 meter freestyle, setting a new world record9which was his own)and about an hour later won the 400 meter butterfly.He is going for 8 gold medals which is a feet in itself.

I also caught most of the men's team gymnastics event. It was pretty exciting, and the Americans were on fire. Its really amazing what these guys are capable of doing. The inverted cross oin the rings is unbbeleiveable. mI cacould just picture my arms breaking offf and my head plowing into the mat

Oh me o Mayo.......

Well here is the latest doping news. I refuse to rant about it, guily guilty guilty just read for youself.


Lookout Dirty Mike.......

If a pig can get mud phobia har far behind can mike be.

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Hangin, Fishin, Ridin and Ape'in

Spent the day hanging with the family. Slept in then headed out with my little buddy to do some fishing. After about an hour of driving around looking for somebody opened that sells bait. We ended up at the market in Creekside, got some worms, then it was off to Twolick Reservoir for a little father son time. We fished for about and hour or so, I was surprised to see the Reservoir was down at least 5 feet so our usual spot wasn't so hot, but we had fun anyway.

Back to the house after that for a little yard ape'in and some other foolishness, then we were off to the trail to do a little riding. We stopped at Spotts Music Center on the way to pick up a couple of guitar stands, then continued on to the trail. We spent enough time on the trail for it to start raining and headed home.

The coolest show ever......

Caught a rerun of the Sarah Connor Chronicles this evening. FOX is gearing up for the season premier on September 8th so they are showing the last few episodes from last season. If you are a Terminator fan this is a must see. Cool story line and not overdone.

Unbelievable......

So the Doping Olympics are on.....Spanish cyclist Maria Isable Moreno tested positive for EPO. What are these people thinking. A good friend of mine has started a crusade to collect the team jerseys of all teams that have been caught and actually writing in sharpie their actual offence. Unfortunately for him he will eventually end up with a jersey form every team that has ever ridden in the tour.