Back from France, bombs will make you scared but bats will make you dance

Greetings...
So Tasha is back from France...I'l let her tell you about her exploits, but it sounds like it was a pretty interesting trip. In Orly, on the way home home, apparently a bomb went off at the airport, then in the plane they hit some major turbulence and the planes nose went straight up, and caused people to scream and be sick and panic.

I picked Tasha up at the Dorval airport and I was so happy to see her that I left a few hours early, so I parked in economy and walked through half the parking lot to get there...then waited and waited. But a funny thing occured, I never really understood that airports were such a good place to make sociological observations. I could not get over how much joy and happiness was around the arrivals area as people were so excited to see their loved ones. I don't ever remember seeing so many happy faces in an airport. So, I walked upstairs to the departures area ans sure enough it was almost the complete opposite, people nasty, crabby, sulking, anxious, it was almost contagious. You would think it would be the opposite, people are all excited to leave and sad they are coming home, but this is not the case. All this to say, that it's good leave and go away and experience the world but it really allows you to just appreciate what you have when you come back.

Ok, nough SOC101. So the other night we are watching TV, well, Tash is sleeping on the couch and I'm doing Yoga poses, I sit to watch the finale of So you think you can dance and I see a bird in our living room...well no it's not a bird...it's a bat! I jump from my chair, yell, "bat, bat bat" trip over the lazy boy, and fall down trying to stay low to the ground so the bat does not get in my hair. Tash jumps, screams and comes upstairs. George had to go wrestle it outside. I have been having recurring thoughts about batman movies and every time I hear a noise I think there is a bat hiding upside down. Tash thinks I'm a big whimp. I told her I would have gone it to get the bat if I had a hockey helmet, catchers mit and tennis racket...I did this once before while I was in college dressed like this. Scary stuff those things have rabbies and stuff.

Other than that, Sears had the poor man's Espresso machine on sale so after about 20 hours of research and contemplation, I did it, I bought an espresso machine. Needless to say a couple days in and I did 2 five hour rides back to back, the first one I avg'd 39 km an hour for the first 100 km, and that was a loop...then I went super hard for the next bit and then insanely hard bits for the last hour...wow, that hurt. So my concerns this week have about how not to make a mess when transfering the coffee from the burr grinder to the espresso basket...lots of coffee on the floor. I think it's a a learning process. Also went through a bag of Kicking horse 454 in 7 days, by myself. In Cornwall there's not really much to do, so the cheap bugger that I am , I can justify spending a couple extra dollars on some good coffee since it is pretty high up there in there in the hierarchy of training...good coffee=good riding, so there it is. I'm not on the Robbie O Rancillio Espresso level yet...but everyone has to start somewhere. I even read an article about home roasting coffee, apparently you can do it pretty cheap. So look out for Dynamic Duo Brew, coffee darker than the tan on my legs...
That was funny.
Derrick

Natasha mixing it up

I just got off the phone with Natasha and she sounds like she is having fun. She says she's getting all crazy and putting the hurt on...today finished in a bunch sprint and apparently it was chaotic.
It's really fun to read the french updates, it's so dramatic.

I've decide to take this weekend off of racing and just do, well, a little training and mostly just not travel. I wanted to make the trip to Prov's but it's just not in the cards. I feel ok, but I know that my punch was not 100% last weekend. It's actually funny as I was watching the Tour, Paul and Phil were talking about current World Champ, Alessandro Ballan. They said he's only won 9 races in his professional career.
Moral of the story...
it's not just about winning lots of races, it's about just winning the right ones.
DSJ

Weekend wrap up

Yeesh...I wish I would have some big introspective thoughts into what went through the engine room this weekend, but I think it is simple, it just wasn't there. Wether or not it was self imposed by a ridiculous amount of training during the week or some misFORTUNE, I really don't know. Funny that I went all year without getting a flat and then one in the uphill during the OBC race, then another on the way to the crit. Call me superstitious...but that was a strange coincidence, just like it just wasn't meant to be.
Yesterday was just painful, I didn't really enjoy the style of racing and I probably made matters worse by letting my ego get the best of me.
Good news was that my parents came from Cornwall and I hopped a ride back with them to C wall as something was just not right being back in O town.
It's a actually really funny to think that as a bike racer, I have so many idiosyncrasies, I'm surprised I don't carry a horseshoe and walk around throwing salt over my shoulder.
I'm not sure I've talked about this before, but when your going good, it's kind of like a drug...you win it feels great, you are the Boss. But when anything but winning happens you have lost and you are searching for that victory and you just wanna ride yourself into annihilation to get it again.
I guess that's why so few people ever understand the mind of an elite cyclist. Winning is the penultimate goal. In a lot of ways its good, that's why you eat salad intead of french fries and why you ride 6 hours instead of 2, to keep having success on bigger level. I think that the guys who are really successful though learn how to care enough enough about their performance to be mad and frustrated, but then get over it in order to rise up to the next challenge.
So today's training will consist of the follwing...mini put golf...swimming...Wii...and not talking to anyone older than 10 years old.
DSJ

Elliott closing in...

So I still haven't spoken to Tasha, but it looks like she is now 2nd in the QOM competition.
The girl that is leading has more points, obviously, but I don't know what the scoring on the hills is, so impossible to tell how close it really is.
I would say it would be smart to sandbag the tt, which is tomorrow am, then try and get in a break without the QOM jersey, but Tasha is only seconds out of a top 10 overall, so hard to say, if it's an uphill tt she'll throttle it...so who who knows...can you tell I am missing her? I am stuck to having conversations with myself and making fictitious situations in my mind "...of all the things I 've lost, I miss my mind the most" (Ozzy Ozborn).

OBC and Tour de Bretange

Ok, OBC GP, woke up late, good thing bag was packed had 9 minutes to gather my things. Raining, cold, race starts, not bad, then flat, frig, Nash gave me a front wheel, chase back.
Get into break, not good today, barely pull through, not good in the rain today...could not put the hurt on, held on for 5th in the break, not great but oh well, Aaron was 7th pulled away from the pack.
THe thing about winning and is, it's a little bit of an addiction and when you loose it's a pretty shity feeling, but alas.....
On a better note , i read that Natasha is slowly moving up the ranks, she was 29th yesterday and sits 3rd in the QOM competition. Hopefully she had energy today, cause bike racer lifestyle does not fit well with 745 start today...hopefully she took the DD energy and put it to use!

Still have not talked to her, I hope she is having fun and can put the hurt on the girls from DSB Bank.
Tomorrow is another day.

DSJ

Natasha in France

Apparently, she will be doing the Tour de France!
The other women thought her legs were too sexy and have told her to race the men's race.
No that's not true. Apparently she finished in the pack today as 2 riders got away with 10km to go and she was in the bunch, so no worries.
http://courses.femininesassociees.over-blog.com/categorie-1228597.htm
You can read about it. Haven't talked to her as she is without Internet...I hope she is ok, without Internet that is, hahah. But seriously I'm sure she is fine...last I heard she was working on her French!
I went to Shawarma Palace and the dude gave me double chicken and garlic sauce for her...
but holly shit, I tried to ride my bike after that as I am commuting from Pincrest and wow...it took almost one hour to get home and I almost threw up garlic and pickled turnups...but it was just a burp...it almost smelled as bad as the vomit smell I encountered as I tried to take a short cut through the Byward market...but that wasn't me.
Anyways, bike riding is not to be done post Shawarma. I rode with flip flops and got passed by 3 people on the bike path!
Other than that, I write her emails and she does not get them, I just want to ride my bike for hours ans I even did a couple shifts at the CHC as a man nurse.
They said I looked like I belong on a beach as I am super laid back...they should see my face when I'm throwing down with 20 km to go, they wouldn't think I was laid back Luke then eh? Either that or I'm so endorphinated from the k's before work I'm just happy to be there.

DSJ

the happenings

I haven't been posting that much lately as the gypsy life has it's way of making time fly away. You would think that I would have all this spare time to just talk about what's going but it's not the case. Well maybe now, but lately it's been busy.

It's really nice to hear the positivity from the people in Ottawa in relation to the success RWR is having this year. It really goes to show what can happen when you put a good group of guys together and everyone has a role to play. I think would have to describe my role as some sort of wild animal with rabbies. Funny though how it has somehow given me an extra bit of confidence this year and I think it is pretty apparent. People have been asking what is different this year, and I'm not really sure, but I know that something is different. Not to be too philosophical, but my desire is different. It has taken a little while, but slowly after making the decision to ride full time, it is coming together bit by bit and things are astronomically different inside my heart. I find myself almost ripping the bar tape off sometimes when I ride. Like I watched David Miller try to go solo the other day and it inspired me to do the same thing in the crit, ok it was the tour of QC and not France, but an effort is an effort.

Even since Preston things have changed, funny enough. When I was off the front I just concentrated on thinking a few things, but this week I almost didn't think, I just shut something off, it's hard to explain, but I just did what I knew I had to do. Shit and Sunday the sprint was pretty close, I've never been at that level before....or maybe I have but just never really believed it. I don't really know what I'm trying to say. Today I wanted to do a ride before the the crit and I ended up riding 220km's today and still drilling it in the crit...it's crazy.

Funny how we always talk about athletes developing over the course of years, but the last 6 months for me have been huge and I'm no spring chicken. I guess alot of my philosophies of training have changed this year, not as scientific, no testing with lactate or numbers, I mean I look at the data but not more than five minutes, it just doesn't mean what I thought it meant.
The just go by feel approach a little more. But that being said, it is important to actually know what you are trying to feel and understand the demands of the particular racing you want to excel at. Aaron and I have had some good chats about training and that guy knows alot, he has an approach to training that may seem a little medieval, but it obviously works. I guess as athletes and coaches always looking for this magical bullet, but really I think we just make things alot more complicated than they really need to be. Seriously.

With Natasha in France I'm staying at Chateau Norm and Jane and au contraire to home, they are the ones cooking so it's pretty amazing...ok I sleep on an air mattress, but hey it's actually pretty comfy. Apparently Tasha is staying with a family in France and she always has their
dog slobbering on her, and also some air line Stewart was hitting on her on the way to France.
So far so good, at least they appreciate beautiful women in France.
DSJ

Tour of Quebec

So the Tour of Qc went well. Aaron got in the move the first day, came 3rd.
Then he won the TT in the Am, I won crit in the PM.
It was pretty cool as my dad was there to watch and we woke up the next day to see a full page artcle and picture in the Journal de Quebec.

Maybe I was a little too fired up for stage 4 as I attacked from the gun over and over and over and was pretty knackered in the last 3 km's and had the square root of nothing for the finale.

Sunday's course was pretty tough, a 21% gradient climb, short circuit x 17 laps.
We weren't able to capitalize on moving Aron into the green jersey, I went for sprint points and ended up 2nd in the black jersey competition, most combative rider.
We made a slight tactical error I think when I chased a bike reg dude down but it actually made the pace ballistic up the climb and Aaron barely lost contact and no one was interested in helping him re join the front group.
SO I just waited and played my cards in the sprint, I covered a jump then initiated the finale and lost by a bike length to Dionne and Otavio nipped me by a tub for 2nd.

RWR finished up 3rd in the tem GC, I was 5th in GC, 2 3rd's and 2 stages, pretty happy with that.

Thanks to the team for the support and the good efforts.

Tasha is in France...she even learned how to ask for hot water in french and she told me she will get her picture in the local paper as well...the challenge is out!
DSJ

Fitchburg Longsjo Classic

Tuesday blog post of last weeks race...yah it was pretty hard as I had Internet but just really didn't have the desire to write after doing each stage.

This race was named after Art Longsjo(pronounced Long'show) an American cyclist/speed skater who was the first person or perhaps American to compete at both the Winter and Summer Olympics in 1954. Two years after this he died in a car accident. He was from Fitchburg, MA and they created this race in his memory. This year was the 50thy anniversary of the race.

The hotel we stayed at was called the Crocksette Inn, it was not the nicest hotel, but the dinning room had all these pictures from years past, as everyone who is anyone in North American cycling has been to this race. It had pictures of a young young Lance, Greg LeMonde and others along the dinning room wall.

Anyways enough about that, this was a fast race for sure. Tour de Beauce it was not, the PRO men had a field of 180 guys. And it was all pro guys as they even had another cat 2 race for the Elites who were not pro...even the women's field started with 130.
This race was fast from the gun. The thing about American racing is it is usually fast, short courses, crit like in nature, but put 180 guys on small circuits that wind and go up and down...

We started the show' with a 15 km TT, it was a pretty cool course, with lots of fog. It went ok for both Tash and I, but proved that "ok" in a NRC race is worth about 40th place...ouch. Funny thing is I was going pretty fast...just goes to show you that tt's must be practiced.

Fridays road course was a zinger. 5km circuit with a steep 200 meter climb that was proceeded by a 100 degree corner in which you had to jam on your brakes, the was pinned at 60km/hr single file on the back side of the course. I attacked once when it started raining and shortly after my glasses fogged up, I took them off then got a piece of debris in my eye while the roads litterally flooded in front of us and I went backwards and was jsut a little too far behind to make the break that stuck. Tash made the front group, but just lacked some positioning in the uphill finale.

Saturday was the queen stage, 180 km for the boys and 120 for the girls. Man it was hard for sure. I covered some moves, got in a little mini break that came back, positioned myself well, but just was a little too far back on the last lap and had to close a bit of a gap at the top of the climb and it cost me in the end, I finished in the main group, but had used that top end needed for the end one lap too early.
It was a nice 200km of riding though as with the warm up and a little ride after I was at 200km for the day. Also, we hit 96.9 km/hr on the downhill...yah I told you it was fast. I was actually looking down a few times and saw 93km and tucked a little lower to try and hit 100...but just couldn't hit it.

Tasha was going for sprint points and apparently dusted the first few uphill sprints so convincingly the Collivita team gave up the chase uphill and waited for the pack to help.

Sunday Natasha wanted to try to get into top 3 for points as there was some sweet $$, but without a lead out her efforts were good, but not quite enough to get it. Good on her for mixing it up in the sprints with theses teams as I think she learned some good lessons about positionning and timing in these types of efforts.
I wanted to do a good warm up before the crit as this race was supposed to be preparation for next week and beyond but it was super hot and muggy so I barely rode 20 minutes before the race. An early break went and I just waited and gambled that it would come back as this was going to be a two hour crit. Natasha gave me some good feedback about the circuit and she was spot on...there were several places to move up without effort, but it had to be done slowly and I basically went from the back to the front and figured out how long it took me to do this. I had to do something to keep my mind focused as two hours is a long time to go round and round. So I drifted back, but not as far and did this again, then i stayed near the front as I could tell the race was actually starting, the break had been out all day, was loosing time. THe team of the leader of the race, those guys were going backwards, it was getting aggressive. This this guy from BMC team did the craziest move in front of the corner trying to prove that he was a big shot. Man this got me so mad as he basically tried to take me out...I wanted to punch him...but I just sprinted by him in the next straight away, I sprinted up to him and I was so mad I just kept on accelerating and found myself in a great position near the front...shortly after it was go time.
I went from the front to the break and rode through them and a couple guys joined, we were off.
We had a bout ten guys then Charles Dionne came across with two others I believe so we had 13 guys and we were in it for the win! I knew Charles was the guy to watch, obviously.
But with 3 laps to go they called out the Gamblers prime. It clicked, this is my shot, I got myself into place, I had to fight a little then on the last straightaway I waited and times it perfect to come around three guys from Team Type 1 to just get it at the line. Very close. I came around the outside just squeezing through a small hole that only Glen Rendall or I could fit through. People were shocked to see me come through as it looked like they had it and the announcer called out the wrong name as I went across the line. Ok this this cost me going for the win, as I finished 9th out of this group, which 9th actually is a good result at an NRC race, but lets just say it was worth it. Maybe you won't hear about it on Cycling news, and maybe I had the legs to win today but I took a gamble and it payed off. Sometimes you have to roll the dice. Really, it would have been nice to win, but the opportunity was in front of me so I did what came naturally without over thinking things.

A little respite today and I'm off to Tour of Quebec tommorow. Rest is for the wicked.
PS I knew it was going to be a good weekend as my number was 88...double infinity when it was sideways. Am I superstious? Maybe a just a little stitous.....but not super.