Crazy boys

"It takes a special kind of craziness to be a professional athlete", so sayeth my wife, who is married to a doughboy who eschews all kinds o' pain.

While I hold these lunatics in high admiration, I am glad I don't have to earn my paycheck with these sorts of "workplace hazards", like:

Losing eight teeth in the first period, getting your roots trimmed, and coming back into the game in the third period (with about 100 stitches in your mouth). "It's the playoffs", he says.

Or take a puck in the face FOR THE SECOND TIME IN A SEASON.

Breaking a collarbone or clavicle while training or racing, and figuring out how best to prepare for the Tour de France, less than two months away.

Takes a certain type I guess.

The epitome of smooth

Pay particular attention to 0:17 to 0:25 of this vid:

Cyclocross dismount/remount at race speed on road shoes on cobbles (fercryinoutloud!!!) and doesn't miss a beat. Oh and he won the race too.

Also of note is the Mike Green-like mohawk (but with added mullet effect) hairdo on his mechanic who sighs relief.

Fabian Cancellara, man and beast.

Chain tension

While I was bloviating yesterday about how great single speed bikes are, I forgot one minor detail. Chain tension.

Almost had a "call home to get picked up" type of day, as my chain came off not once but twice. These ENO eccentric hubs, while very cool, are finicky if you don't get the rotation dialed in properly. Second time was the charm.



And it was nice to have some of the clubmates stop by as I was resetting the whole smash on the side of the road, as Paulie V, Karim, and Phil P. were out on this beautiful afternoon.

I was also thinking that the hipster fixie and single speed culture that has been hijacked by the big manufacturers is akin to stone-washed jeans, "distressed" furniture, and most things retro. Did you hear that? That was late 2007 calling me to ask for its cultural criticism back. I don't have new thoughts.

Back to the commute. Two blocks away from home the Dallas Ave ruffians were running willy nilly through the streets, so as I watched them traverse the street with oncoming traffic for the third time I made sure to yell at them in my best grumpy voice that next time I saw them making bad decisions I'd call their parents. Last thing I want to do is call anyone's parents, but I fully expect a call if my kids do something to sully themselves.

I do enjoy yelling at other people's kids, though. Something about making them feel that there are eyes on them all the time, even when they think they're pulling one over on us. Takes a village, right?

Hipster script

There's a bike shop near my office that sells reaaalllly expensive bikes, but then again, most shops do. In the effort to capture as much of a broad marketshare as possible, bike shops jump on the bandwagons that bring in the cash. While feeding fads in the short term, the products are so contrived as to be date stamped by their own style.

Fixies have been on the fringes of cycling since the eighties, when Kevin Bacon made courier chic, well, chic.



[Even though his "fixie" had a freewheel body, but that's like Bruce Willis using Pacific Bell telephones at Dulles Airport...details, details]. In the past 10 years or so fixies and single speed bikes have been in vogue as "edgy" ways to ride two wheels. I can't hold a candle to the written social criticism surrounding this culture, so I won't even try.

My teenager just entered his third year of teenagerism, so we decided to get him a bike that doesn't require the seatpost to be way past the minimum insertion point and a drivetrain that is orange with rust. As he rides his bike to school everyday and spins around the neighborhood just as often, a new ride was, and is, the perfect gift. We settled on a single speed Bianchi which is delightful in its simplicity and will give him years of service--the drivetrains and suspension systems of bikes geared (get it?) toward the Axe smelling crowd usually results in creaky, maladjusted, dilapidated bikes within a year, and that's just criminal. The best thing about this ride, though, is the non-obnoxious style of the bike itself. It's a Bianchi. It doesn't sport the dominant color, Celeste #227, though there is a small highlight on the top tube and the graphics are classic Bianchi bold. World Championship stripes at a few key locations. It's a bike that's meant to be ridden and used.

It doesn't have this:



Or this:



The suffocatingly unctuous cursive graphics on the Pinarello, coupled with the track bars and the half rubberized grips and the color coordinated deep rims on the Raleigh scream "phony baloney". I could go on and on, but that's done to so much greater effect here. And actually the bikes are overall not that bad, there's just something so irritating about the marketing efforts behind the designs...

Adding the Bianchi to our family stable made me re-think the configuration of one of my bikes, the one that I built when I succumbed to the fixie fad about 4 years ago. I converted my old Giant Cadex racing frame into a fixed gear machine with an Eno eccentric hub and some bullhorn bars. I enjoyed riding it for awhile. I perched on it and took the picture, with the sun behind me, of my shadow that is the masthead of this here blog. But then I didn't ride it for a long time. It just wasn't quite the right bike for itself.

Until last week, when I added a single speed freewheel and converted the stem and bars to their original configuration. Now it's a sweet singlespeed commuter, and suddenly I'm commuting again, on the bike. Which may be the domino that tips a bunch of other dominoes that may straighten some things out personally for me, since the last 18 months or so have been weird, as I have written. Or not.

Regardless, it's a great feeling to be able to commute to work on two wheels in the same amount of time as it takes in a 4 wheeled cage, with that much more clarity due to a short spin before and after work.

Hit and run

On my way into work today I was at the light on Connecticut Avenue where the Cap Crescent Trail crosses. Just sitting there, waiting for peds and cyclists to cross. It is a heavily travelled commuter arterial, and since it's a long green light, people are happy to dash across when their turn comes around.

Except for the young woman on the Trek road bike who was beginning to cross (in the crosswalk, with the walk signal in her favor) when suddenly she was tapped by a car that was turning right to go north. Not hard enough that she was thrown off her bike and severely injured, but hard enough to force her to unclip her pedal and put out her foot to make sure she didn't go down softly. Certainly enough to raise her adrenalin level, as the next thing I saw was the woman carrying her bike across the street while yelling at the driver who was pulling away.

Technically that was a hit and run, and it happened so fast that the victim didn't get a license number. I know this because I immediately pulled over to see if she was OK, and I asked her about the exchange. No "Are you OK?" or "I'm so sorry". Instead it was "You were in my way." I don't think I would be thinking clearly enough to get a plate number if some doorknob had the gall to be miffed at me for inconveniencing their right turn.

I told her I used to wrench at bike shops for a living and did a quick once-over. Her wheel was toast, but barely rideable once I opened up her rear brake. She headed out after thanking me for stopping, rear wheel ka-klunking down the trail.

It bugged me for the rest of the day that someone could be so callous as to "tap" a cyclist with their car and not think that there could be any repercussions at all. Worst case scenario ends in death; in this seemingly minor incident a rear wheel is ruined, trust that one is safe in a crosswalk with a favorable signal is eroded, and someone is driving away in a two ton behemoth thinking that cyclists are all assholes.

I hope the 20-something woman in the Washington Broomball League t-shirt on a mid level Trek road bike had a better day after that crappy start.

It's already been 5 years...

Tour of Flanders was yesterday. The Ronde Van Vlaanderen. I happened to turn on the live stream when Boonen and Cancellara made their escape and battled it out over the last 40K. Didn't watch the rest 'cause it was Easter Sunday and we needed to leave for church. Such is the life of a lapsed Catholic.

Such a great race, and emblematic of the Belgian mania for hard racing.

Went back to the archives to find a posting I placed on my club's listserve about my journey to see these classics:

From April 2005:

I thought I'd share a few of my experiences from my recent trip to
Belgium. As some of you know, I was able to coordinate a family trip
to Belgium on the exact week as the Tour of Flanders, Ghent Wevelgem,
and Paris Roubaix. My wife had lived in Belgium as a teenager and
always wanted to go back to visit. Her spring break was 2 weeks
before our trip, the kids' spring break was a week before the trip,
and mine was whenever I wanted SO WE DID IT WHEN I COULD SEE 3 SPRING
CLASSICS EVERYONE ELSE'S SCHEDULE BE DAMNED. Oh, and the family
vacation was fun too.

I'm not THAT selfish, but if you ever get the opportunity, go to
Belgium and see a spring classic, any spring classic. I met
Americans at every race, the Belgian fans were passionate and
friendly, and the locals in Roubaix (which is a decent sized city)
were helpful. We stayed in an apartment in Brussels and I took the
train to small towns that were way off the beaten path. If only we
had a train system in this country that was as efficient...oops, this
country is about 50 times the size of Belgium, so that's asking a bit
much.

The way it broke down was I saw the finish of Flanders, the start and
finish of G-W, and the finish of P-R. Without renting a car or being
in a British cycle tour, seeing starts and finishes was pretty much
the way to go, because you can see the riders up close, the team
cars, the buses, the mechanics, etc. There's also plenty of food
(frites and waffles and bratwurst type sausages) and beer and more
beer. I got some decent video, and in Wevelgem while I was waiting
the finish we watched local amateurs compete in a circuit race
through the small downtown area.

It was a Belgian week, as Boonen won the big ones and Nico Mattan won
Wevelgem emotionally only miles from his hometown. The scenes after
the races was controlled chaos, as the riders would book back to the
team buses, leave the bikes for the mechanics, and get on. If there
were no media obligations or other distractions, that bus was outa
there once it was loaded up. The Discovery bus was always at the end
of the line, ready to roll.

Some of the Americans I met were there to watch the races or ride
parts of the courses...I mostly met families; a father/son combo from
South Carolina that wore matching Postal kits; a traditional unit
from Houston (both former Cat 4's) with 2 year old boy and 6 month
old girl tagging along; fresh out of college dude with mom and dad
from Wisconsin, drinking beer and riding parts of the Tour of
Flanders course. I also met a guy from somewhere in the midwest who
was studying climatology and went to the finish at Flanders because
he had never seen a race and wanted to check out the fuss. He
noticed that I spoke English and that I was gesturing with a Flemish
guy about how to get to the finish from the train station, so he
tagged along. So as we walked to the town sponsoring the finish, the
three of us could communicate because I spoke English and bikin',
Flemish guy spoke Flemish and bikin', and climatologist spoke English
and Flemish. So by the time we got to the finish area Flemish guy
went to look for his mates and we watched the last 50K on the giant
diamond vision screen and saw Boonen roll in to the roaring crowds
and the Flemish lion flags and banners. WOW.

Got many more stories, but I thought I'd fill you all in on a pretty
cool trip, one that I've wanted to take since I saw this mag called
Winning with Sean Kelly on the cover winning Paris Roubaix--it's
everything I thought it would be.

Yeah it was pretty cool. Five years ago already. Time do fly.

Debacle

Some say that the definition of insanity is to approach a situation the same way every time and expect a different result. My current definition of insanity is to approach a lifestyle challenge in a manner that I KNOW will result in a less than positive outcome, all the while expecting a more rosy result.

To wit: A few days ago, I participated in the GamJams CompuTrainer Throwdown at Conte's Bike Shop in Bethesda. This was a Saturday morning, typically spent on the road with a group of like minded individuals spending quality time on two wheels. Of course, the snow and, previous to the storms, apathy prevented me from getting in some quality road miles, and I've been limited to some spinning on the trainer indoors, with no real structure or purpose other than trying to keep the legs moving.

When it comes to "preparing" for "competition", that doesn't really cut it.

Without going into any details, my performance was pretty abysmal. It was worse than even I thought it could be, even though I enjoyed (???) the process, the geeky technology, the ability to "virtually" race, though the sucking was a reality. And what's almost comforting is that I knew it going in, and knew that I would be up against some pretty motivated people, whose strength was not so much drawn from their fitness but from their sheer desire, or will, to be uncomfortable for a short time. The guy I raced with beat me by 3 minutes, an almost 10% difference in this short course. Seemed like a nice fellow, certainly new to this aspect of the sport (told me he raced BMX, so not that new), and definitely more energetic. Wish I could've offered him a greater challenge, but I didn't. On the bright side, I got to see James P. and Dave K., who rode in the earlier heat, two of many that I've met over the years due to this shared interest.

The benefits gained from getting to know a few new people with similar interests on a cold Saturday morning far outweighs the insanity that I sometimes put myself through as I spin my hampster wheel. I think that there's a strange logic to extracting acquaintances and cementing friendships out of this strangely sociopathic sport. Kind of like how a heat pump works: it extracts heat out of the cold air to warm the interior of a house via the compression cycle. Whaaaaaa? I don't know either. It just works that way.

Maroon Seven

I'm sitting at work today, after a (not unexpected) long commute in due to the constriction of lanes because of plowed snow, and I get a call on my cell from a number that I don't recognize.

"Hi Johnny, sorry to call you at work. It's Tom H......."

"Tom H......." Flashing through the dwindling memory bank. Nametoface, nametoface, doesnotcompute.

"Maroon Seven" he says helpfully.

"What's UP Tom!" He rides a maroon colored Seven, a beautiful titanium steed, and when I'm riding on a regular basis, I see him once a week, at least. Although he and I usually see each other in silly lycra costumes with dopey looking styrofoam lids, fat old geezers (or soon to be) who just like to ride, sometimes fast. Takes a few more clicks to recognize my riding buddies, especially out of context, but it comes through.

Anyway he called for some professional advice about the worrisome pile of snow on his roof, about to get more worrisome with the abundance that is falling as I type this. He wanted to know if he should risk climbing on his roof to get as much as he could off before more piles on. I got the particulars ('60's rambler, trussed roof), and told him he was probably OK, but I'd check around with my colleague and a couple of structural engineers, as collapsed roofs tend to happen when epic snowfalls occur.

The short answer was that he has nothing to worry about until the snow gets to about 4' deep on his roof and it starts to rain. The nice thing about building codes is that they account for serious record-breaking conditions upon which to base simple life-saving design principles--in our area it's snow loads of 30 pounds per square foot for basic wood construction, and even hillbilly construction complies most of the time. OK so there were a few collapses around the region, but they were mostly flat roofs and there are exceptions to every rule, especially when you're dealing with gravity. Just look at my gut.

So of course I HAD to use my bicycle wheel analogy about trusses, in which the individual members (2 x 4 studs or 14 gauge wires) are flimsy but when integrated and properly connected and made rigid via a diaghram or tensile construction, they are incredibly strong structures that resist vertical and lateral loads very efficiently. Kind of like the Washington Redskins, though they aren't integrated or properly connected at all.

Back to Tom. He's a pretty amazing guitarist:

Double treat

Two Caps games in two days. That doesn't happen often, but I'll take those opportunities when they come. Same goes for seeing old friends. My friend Tim was at both games, and having only seen him a coupla times in the past decade, it was great to catch up twice in a week.

The best thing about old friends is the ability to just pick up where we left off once before.

Tim and I used to train together. Not in an overtly serious fashion, but working in a bike shop with him and putting in some road miles, going to a few races, it adds a dimension to friendship, like any shared experience. So after finding our different paths, we would always have something to talk about when we would see each other at weddings or when he was in town. He kept on training, and eventually became a Cat 2. I kept on eating and would be a Cat 6, if that category existed. Category 2's race with professionals. 'Nuff said.

Icing on the cake was that the Caps won both games.

Capital Cross 2009

This will be short.

I first got hooked on CX watching this race, 5 or 6 years ago. The next season I put together a 'cross rig and did Charm City and this one, and cyclocross is now the thing I do.

Unless I'm not that into it.

This past Sunday being the last race of the season (exceptin' fer Cross My Heart on Super Bowl Sunday), but that's technically "next year", I dutifully attended this one knowing that my legions of fans would be there, and who am I to disappoint? As I went to registration to get my number, I saw 2 people go down hard in the icy parking lot, riding no faster than I was walking. I sidled up to the friendly (but cold) volunteer, handed over my license, and said, with a smile, "Just put me down for DNF. It'll save everyone some time." So she told me not to sign my release and asked her fellow volunteers just how to register a known result for a registrant who somehow could foresee this result. "Just a joke" I said. She didn't laugh, but then again she was stuck registering a bunch of certifiable loons who thought that "racing" in these "conditions" would be "fun".

The course was actually much more rideable than the parking lot, and after kitting up and pinning up I pre-rode through the muck, learned which lines to pick through corners, and familiarized myself with a course I've raced at least 3 times in the last few years, although under entirely different conditions.

It didn't do much good, as in the middle of the first lap I found myself off of the beaten track on a fast, icy section and went down, not so hard that it hurt but with such little control that I found myself oversteering every turn afterwards and being tentative in places I usually let rip. After almost going down again on a benign spot near the start/finish I just packed it in. Officially DNF, first race didn't finish this year. My mind was not willing, and in all honesty neither was the body. Here's a little taste of the fun:

Special thanks to Bill, who has been filming this fine stuff all season. My crash was almost in the same exact spot as that shown in the lower left corner at about 4:43 of the video, by the guy in blue, though I was already quite a bit behind Bill at this point. Don't quite know what I was thinking.

And of course, thanks to my friends who show up to watch us slog on through. And of course, my boys who I see on the odd Sundays in the fall--Kemal, Neil, Jeff, Paul, Jim, Steve, and everyone else. It's always a great time, even when it's not.

Next year is just around the corner...

Black Friday ride

There were only 16 people on our ride this morning, a manageable number that enables some good social interaction early, and given our collective post-gluttonous condition, we all agreed on an easy pace. The absence of ego-induced muscle flexing made for a relaxing ride, and the paceline was the smoothest it has been in many months. Then again, I haven't been on this ride much this year, so what do I know? Suffice it to say that the smaller number (there are usually 5x as many riders on this popular ride, and it usually happens on Sundays) enabled a smooth rotation all the way down MacArthur to the top of Old Angler's.

The classic 2 column rotating paceline is a simple process, though one that is often disjointed and sometimes dangerous, especially with large numbers on board. Broken down into more discrete groups, we can benefit from the efficiencies of this practice, and miles tick along with less effort. This is not new, and much is written and conveyed about how to ride a paceline properly, but the competitive nature of group rides often transforms these models of windbreaking into mini battles for position, which benefits no one. Today, however, was different. Nice job, boys and girls.

Me and the Mayor

OK so we've seen that Sr. Fenty, the mayor of the good city of Washington, is in the news for various P.R. gaffes. In his zeal to "get things done" and "live a normal life" he has succeeded in ruffling feathers thusly:

1. He shunted some public monies slated to develop parks and playgrounds throughout the city via the DC Housing Authority to contractors with whom he had some long term personal relationships. This end run allowed him to avoid the pesky oversight (aka "approval") by the DC Council, resulting in more anger amongst the politicos, as they were still miffed about his odd refusal to share Nationals and Bullets tickets. Why anyone would be angry about not getting to see mediocre sports products...oh never mind. Notice how they like to call his friends "frat brothers"? Ya know, a coupla words and suddenly there's cronyism.

2. Training on his bike with his mates from DC Velo and other local clubs in the middle of the day has raised the eyebrows of the humorless press, who ominously intone about running red lights, slowing down mid-day traffic, utilizing valuable police resources, and taking long lunches on the saddle. This is fodder for local newscasts and LooseLips in the City Paper, so we're in for a juicy few weeks of mayor and cyclist bashing. Yay. My only request for these "journalists" is to GET THEIR FACTS STRAIGHT about cycling, the law, and minding one's own business before they prattle on about how weirdos in spandex are interfering with their right to "use the roads that we pay for with taxpayer dollars".

So here's where it gets interesting, because 3 weeks ago I may have tipped the first domino in the whole sordid "mayor who rides a bike at lunchtime and funnels work to his friends" controversy, also popularly known as "MWRBLFWTHF gate". It's a mouthful, I know, but we'll get used to it, as the local press will surely use this moniker freely as they get to the bottom of things. Rolls right off the tongue. So here goes.

At the end of the process of converting a sow's ear into a silk purse, as they say, I often attend ribbon cutting ceremonies for rehab projects that our firm completes. I've mentioned before that the gratifying aspect of my work is seeing how we can literally change lives by improving the living conditions of the working poor (and working not-so-poor, and non-working poor, etc). The culmination of design and construction efforts is a show often attended by the mayor or whatever muckety muck happens to be running the jurisdiction of our projects.

Three weeks ago, in the Fairlawn neighborhood of southeast DC, we waited for the mayor to show up at the ceremony. The usual bunting and balloons festooned the newly landscaped front lawn of the building, a tent with food, drink, and TV cameras waiting, and small throngs of people rounded out the scene. About an hour after the scheduled time, the mayor pulls up in his SmartCar and wades into the "crowd", shaking hands and looking past each person, looking to the next gladhand. As he looked my way and shook my hand, I greeted him with a reminder that we had met at a groundbreaking ceremony this past April at yet another project. My hook at that time was a remark "Hey I ride with some of your friends". He stopped, looked at me, and we engaged in some conversation about the riding scene and some of our mutual acquaintances.

This time there was a flicker of recognition, as the bike was our common bond. So I pressed him further and asked him to bring the family out to DCCX that upcoming weekend. he politely declined, citing a busy schedule, and that he prefers riding on the road, etc. Maybe next year. Great talking to you, time to move on. So he stepped up to the podium, gave his remarks, toured a unit, and began to make his exit.

(Unfortunately for the mayor, this is what he missed)

On his way out, he needed to make the obligatory stop in front of the cameras, so as he (seemingly reluctantly) made his way to the news crews, he passed by me again. But he stopped, shook my hand again, and engaged in some more bike banter, asking my name, and talking cyclocross. As we chatted, I felt this odd sensation of quiet descending around us. Couldn't put my finger on it, but it was odd. We finished our short chat again, and he began talking to the talking heads. I left the site and headed back to work.

So later that evening I saw that his site visit was the lead story on Channel 5, not because the press wanted to focus on his interest in housing, but because the DC Housing Authority/Parks and Recreation scandal was brewing. Seems that while we were talking, it got quiet because, I don't know, maybe the newsies were trying to figure out who I was, and did I have anything to do with this "breaking news".

Look closely in the background and there's a renovated slum. It's much better than it used to be, really. Happier people live there for sure, and the intercoms actually work.

I give myself too much credit. What really happened is that they heard us talking about riding bikes and they decided to go jump on another "scandal". I know that this station hates the mayor, but c'mon. This piece is about as amateur as they come.