Contest over at Fat Cyclist
Fat Cyclist Forever Tattoo
I discovered Fat Cyclist about a week ago and have really enjoyed reading some of the great stuff over there. Today Fatty announced a cool little contest where you enter to win some DZNuts Chamois Cream, a DZNuts tshirt, or a DZNuts flexfit cap. Also on the list of prizes is a box of Jelly Belly Sports Beans.
What do you have to do? Help design a tattoo for one of his friends named Kenny. If you can photoshop something that’s great. If not, just describe what you think might be a good bicycling tattoo.
The full list of prizes and rules is available in the post here.
My submission is to the right and was accompanied with the following text:
“There I was…rolling down the trail when I come across two dudes taking pictures of themselves in their form fitting hot pants. The guy pictured below had some weird lookin’ jailhouse tat that said, “Fat Cyclist Forever” written across a red heart decorated with roses. I’m guessing the flames represented burning desire for this Fat Cyclist dude. I don’t know who Fat Cyclist is. Maybe it was his Daddy in the big house. What really did it for me, though, was what he was yelling. He’s standing there trying to pull off his best Arnold impression yelling, “Take a picture of DZNuts!”
Realizing there were two of them and one of me, I quickly snapped this pic and took off before I became another tragic victim of tough love.”
There you have it. Good Luck!
Read MoreBatten down the hatches; Fay’s coming!
Tropical Storm Fay path courtesy of Weather.com
Well, I had hoped we would avoid the worst of this storm but it looks like that won’t be the case. This thing has taken one of the screwiest paths up through Florida and looks to hit Jacksonville right in the grill. They’ve already canceled school for the kids for the next two days. I’ll be going to work tomorrow.
Alas, it looks like I won’t be riding tomorrow. If I did, I might end up like this guy. He’s let the whole extreme sports thing to go his head and affect his judgment. What an idiot.
Read MoreRide 25: New beginnings on the bicycle
After my open letter yesterday, today started my new beginning – I was going to start riding again today. It’s been about a month and a half since my crash back on Ride 23 and the effects of that debacle are long gone. I didn’t have high expectations today and just wanted to get the ride/mileage in. That said, I went to bed at 10…and didn’t fall to sleep until 12. Go figure.
The alarm went off at 5:00 AM and I hit the snooze. A couple minutes later I rolled out of bed and got ready. I was worried about it raining this morning because we had had a light rain most of the night. When I opened the garage door it wasn’t raining but it was overcast. The roads were wet and looked slick. All of this, combined with my recollection of the crash, didn’t give me a warm fuzzy but I was determined to ride. Throughout the ride I did get sprinkled on here and there but nothing major. I took all the turns slowly in fear of my bike coming out from under me. I wasn’t going to let the fact that I had new tires on get the best of me.
I got out of my neighborhood and onto my main straightaway without any problems. I could tell pretty quickly that I hadn’t ridden in 6 weeks. My hands, legs, and rear-end became uncomfortable way too fast. It was from non-use and I was paying for my laziness. Do you remember that great golf movie Tin Cup? Remember that scene where Tin Cup and Romeo are on the driving range at the U.S. Open and Tin Cup says, “My swing feels like an unfolded lawn chair!” Well, that’s I felt on the bike this morning. Not to mention I felt like I was sitting on top of a 2×4. I was paying for not riding and I knew it. All I wanted to do was get the mileage in to start creating a new baseline in my fitness. I’m hoping it won’t take me long to get back into the swing of things. Pardon the pun.
I saw a few folks this morning; a couple of runners and one cyclist who was out in front of me. All I could see was the flashing red tail light and I eventually lost that. He either dusted me completely or pulled off ahead of me. I’d like to think it was the later.
I think the one thing that bothered me the most was having to get through the intersection at the end of my ride. Up to this point I avoided this intersection by taking the sidewalk and using the cross walk but the crash back on Ride 23 has convinced me to stay off the sidewalk. I shouldn’t be there anyway. I pulled up to the intersection and it wasn’t too busy. There was one car ahead of me in the turn lane. The light turns green and the guy just sits there. I give him a second or two and he doesn’t budge. I start to go around him, he’s looking down at something, looks up, I slow down, and he takes off. I follow around behind him in the outside lane of a dual turn lane. I make it through just fine. What I don’t like about the intersection isn’t necessarily the traffic. It’s not being able to quickly clip-in to get going. I can’t do it every single time without fail and it slows me down and increases the amount of time I’m in the intersection as a target of opportunity. I guess it’ll come with time but if anybody knows some surefire strategies for clipping in easier/faster I’m all ears. Two minutes later I’m back home and have completed my ride. 13 miles in 50 minutes. Not spectacular but I was just trying to get the mileage in.
Fay Projected Path (courtesy of weather.com
I’m not sure how much more riding I’m going to get in this week. If you been watching the weather you’ve probably heard of Tropical Storm Fay that’s headed towards Florida. It’s expected to become a hurricane soon and run up the west side of Florida and move over Jacksonville (where I live) mid-week. Lots of rain expected. You can see the expected track in the pic to the right.
In light of the rain, numbness, and lack of fitness, it was good to be riding again.
New word: Road Slag – similar to welding slag, this is the asphalt droppings left on the side of the road (the exact place we ride) that forms a ridge, or mountain, of asphalt waiting to catch the inattentive bicyclist unaware and either throws them to the ground in a heap of flesh and metal or scaring them half-to-death by bouncing and jerking the handlebars around until you almost lose grip.
Read MoreAn Open Letter to Biking To Live Readers (both of you)
To My Readers,
I owe you an apology. Back on April 12, 2008, I made this post. It explained why I was overweight, what I was going go do about it, and why I chose to blog about it. I realized (with some help from a couple of readers (Pete and Arlyn), as of yesterday, that I had unequivocally failed to do what I had set out to do in that post.
Why you ask? Well, there are several reasons. Sure, I burned my hand here and I crashed pretty bad back on Ride 23 but I’m over those injuries and should be riding again. The only reason that matters, though, is that I have become lazy and lost focus of what this blog, and my mission, was about. Over the last week, instead of tending to my own health and fitness by riding, I tried to turn my blog into something it isn’t – a news site for bicycling. I’m sorry.
So, where does this leave me? I’m returning to what I started this blog about. Me and my fight to improve my health through riding a bike. I’ll return to posting about my rides but I don’t want the blog to turn into a boring training diary. I’ll post on other cycling subjects from time-to-time as well as my life as it relates to cycling (i.e. bike shop visits, local cycling events, opinions, etc.). I’ll also try and post some informative articles in weight loss and fitness. I think if I return to these core areas I can not only revive Biking To Live but also revive my riding, and in turn, my health. Hopefully my two readers (I say that in jest; I may have upwards of ten!) will appreciate this and I can reach out to those in similar situations to help them.
For those of you who have visited, commented, and encouraged me to date I sincerely appreciate it.
If you have an comments, or recommendations to improve this blog, I’m all ears.
Thanks.
Bryan
Read MoreBlake Caldwell of Garmin-Chipotle Wins Stage 2 of the Tour of Utah
What is it with this team? Jason Donald takes Stage 1 and Blake Caldwell, also of Garmin-Chipotle, comes back today to take Stage 2 of the 2008 Tour of Utah. With the stage win, Blake takes the GC lead.
Stage 2 of the Tour of Utah found the peleton starting in Ogden, UT and traveling 85 miles to Salt Lake City. Sounds easy right? Wrong! Between the start and finish were three climbs totaling 10,585 feet. The last climb occurred at mile 68 with the remainder down hill to the finish.
All the information I’ve read says the action was fast and furious on the entire stage with breaks starting early, getting caught, and more attacks after that. 60 mph descents were commonplace with several crashes forcing riders out of the race. There were 12 riders who did not finish. Unfortunately, it looks like Scott Nydam (BMC Pro Cycling) was one of the casualties when he went down hard and breaking a collar bone.
Caldwell and Lill made it over the last climb first with a 20-second advantage over an eleven man chase group. With only a 15-mile descent to Salt Lake City and the finish line you would think the group of eleven riders would have no problem catching the two leaders. That wasn’t the case though. There seemed to be a lot of confusion in the chase group nobody willing to pull them together to work as a cohesive unit until it was too late. That cost them and enabled Caldwell and Lill to open the gap back up to one minute. At the finish line it was Blake Caldwell beating Darren Lill by four seconds.
The current top ten in the GC are:
1. Blake Caldwell (Garmin-Chipotle) 07:37:40
2. Darren Lill (BMC Pro Cycling) 00:00:04
3. Jason Donald (Garmin/Chipotle) 00:00:18
4. Jeffry Louder (BMC Pro Cycling) 00:00:24
5. Brent Brookwalter (BMC Pro Cycling)
6. Glen Chadwick (Team Type 1)
7. Phil Zajicek (Team Health Net)
8. Cesar Grajales (Rock Racing)
9. Tyler Hamilton (Rock Racing)
10. Oscar Rivera (Rock Racing) 00:00:28
The team standings are:
1. BMC Pro Cycling Team 22:54:06
2. Garmin/Chipotle 22:54:06
3. Rock Racing 22:54:24
4. Toyota?United 22:57:02
5. Team Type 1 22:57:02
6. Team Health Net 22:57:02
7. Bissell Pro Cycling Team 23:00:52
8. The Fan Sports Network 23:01:51
9. Jittery Joe’s Pro Cycling Team 23:02:11
10. Successful Living.com 23:05:04
Tomorrow’s twilight criterium should be a little easier on the riders but stage 4 with it’s 14,000 feet of climbing and mountain top finish at Snowbird are looming.
For a very detailed stage 2 race report, see this article by Neal Rogers at VeloNews.
Read MoreCONNECT WITH BTL
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