Gear Choice

With the short track race just a memory at this point, bike racing attention is being focused forward on upcoming things.  Besides the Red Hills Triathlon on April 9th the next big event on the slate is the Cohutta 100 MTB race in Tennessee on April 30.  100 off-road miles in the smokey mountains of Tennessee and Georgia.  I attempted it last year with gears and DNF'd.  It's a long story.  I decided a month or so ago to enter the single speed class this year and I have been thinking a lot about gear choice for the event.   I am sticking with the 34 up front but cannot decide between the 19, 20 or 21 out back.

Judging by the looks of these cogs I have put the 19, and 20 to some use (my go to gear for around here is the 18 that is on the bike now), but the 21 hasn't even been mounted up yet.  The thing that is making it tough to choose is the climbing up there for one thing.  There are long tough, hour long + climbs so I need a gear I can just mash for long periods of time, then there are long flat forest road sections and if I get too much gear I will just be spinning out at a low speed getting passed.  I am doing some research, asking around to other SS riders and keeping in mind my own feeling as to what I can handle.  I fully intend to use te 3 gears I will have on my bike that day.... sitting, standing and ,of course, walking!!!

Any suggestions?

Good dogs

This is Sailor....

..... he was born just under the window behind where he is sitting in this picture about a year and a half ago.  He was one of 6 puppies that our wonderful dog Maggie had and we kept him.  This is the first dog I have ever had that I have known literally since the moment he was born.  I watched him being born.  He got his name the moment he was born because his ears stuck out to the side like wings as if he could sail thru the air!!  The name stuck.  We all care for him very much as we do for Maggie but he is very different than her.  Sailor likes to be at your feet.  He likes to be with you.  He will get near and then just let his legs go limp and plop down and not move an inch.... until you move, then he is up and coming with you.  He does this in a nice way not a nuisance kind of way.  Companion, follower, friend.

This afternoon we had the dogs out playing some ball and discovered Sailor can back flip if you throw the ball just so.  Quite impressive...  Maggie has her own moves also but not as high flying as her son.

You will notice I made some changes to the look of the blog.  Let me know what you think! 

Stomp Diabetes Race Report

Yesterday was the Stomp Out Type 2 Diabetes short track race at Tom Brown.  Both KK and I entered and it was a first for both of us but in different ways.

For KK it was his first race and he didn't really know what to expect.  He had an awesome attitude going into it that he just wanted to have some fun and finish the race.  We got to there early enough to ride a little of the course, but the butterflies that normally come fluttering in the belly where there anyway.... for both of us.

ready to race

After we got checked in we rode down to a couple of the more technical sections so KK could get a game plan on how to handle them and possibly see where some passing opportunities would be.  We also rode from the start down to the entrance of the single track so there wouldn't be any surprises there.  At some point in our warm up ride the rear mech jammed up on KK's bike.  We got it sorted out but this would turn out to be a major factor in his race!  We talked some strategy and then I left KK on the starting line so that I could get out on the course for some photo ops.  It worked out pretty well as I was able to get some great race shots and cheer all the kids on in their race.  I know the trails pretty good and was able to leap frog thru the woods and get ahead of them for some pictures.

riding strong just after entering the single track

flying thru the rocks!

giving it all he had running up a steep climb

KK was in a solid top 5 spot and had a good gap on sixth with less than 1/2 a lap to go.  There was a bottle neck at the front and nowhere to pass.  As he came by me the last time he said his gears were acting up again.  

gears were starting to skip!!!!

Shortly after that things tightened up in the twisty section of the trail and the 4th place rider bobbled and KK rear ended them.  Somehow the chain on his bike wrapped around the rear derailleur. I had made my way back to the finish linen to catch the end of the race and as the riders started finishing there was no KK.  My heart sank as I knew he must be having trouble.  After the mishap with his gears he was unable to pedal and he ran the bike the rest of the lap and finished!!

I was so inspired by his determination and effort.  It was truly awesome.  He was disappointed in the outcome but as he had a chance to think about it he soon realized what an awesome job he had done in his first race.  Way to go son!!!!

There was a race between KK's and my class so we hung out and waited for the start of my race.  TP and I got a little warm up ride inn down the cadillac trail and got back to the start in time to take one more GU and get to the start line.  There was no single speed class so I lined up with all the guys in my class-- gears or not.  I think there were 2 of us running single speed the rest had geared bikes.  I knew my best chance to have a good race would be to get to the single track at the front so that I would not get bogged down behind the geared riders on the climbs.  I had decided to run a pretty tall gear (34X18) and knew I would need to power on up the climbs or it was going to be a long day.  The problem was there was a long open stretch from the start to the entrance of the single track and I had a feeling I would spin out before we got there and get passed.

Go!!

When the race started I dropped the hammer and somehow made it first into the single track.  I was able to open up a gap on second as we hit the climbs keeping my cadence up and staying on top of my gear.  about 3/4 of the way thru lap 1 I lost the front end in a corner and went down on a climb.  I was able to get up and get going without being caught, but the gap had closed up again.  I was kicking myself for making the mistake.  I decided I needed to put in another big effort to open up another gap so I hit it hard again and was able to open up a small gap.  Not long after this I rounded a corner and somehow picked up a huge snarl of vines in my rear wheel.  I made the decision to stop and pull it out rather than chance it and have it cause bigger problems.  I got it out and was able to finish lap 1 in the lead.

finishing lap 1

Lap two went great, no crashes or mis-haps.  I was able to extend my lead on second place but he was still back there.  I knew if I could get out of site I had a good chance to take the win.

Starting lap 3, feeling good

As I entered the single track for the last time I gave it all I had trying to check out.  At the sections that double back and I could get a look to see if anyone was there I saw no one!  I had a big gap.  For the rest of the lap I focused on riding smooth and clean,, hitting the climbs hard.  Over the last mile I kept thinking I heard a bike right behind me.  It was like a ghost bike, my mind was messing with me.  In the end I pulled out the win..... my first!

TP made the podium with a solid ride too!

 




 


  

Doughnuts and Tractor Trailers

Today was a busy day for me at the shop.  I was trying to finish up the week and get out of work a little early so KK and I could get over to Tom Brown and pre ride the race course tonight.  I have a good friend that works at the shop with us whose name is Ron.  Ron is 78 years old, has a pony tail, rides a Harley and loves the Lord!!  He also has blood sugar issues, as in diabetes.  Out of concern for him I have a habit of watching what he eats while at work, and if I see him hitting the vending machine for a candy bar I will give him some major grief.   I caught Ron in a bag of powdered sugar doughnuts this morning.  When I happened upon his little doughnut party he had a half eaten powdered sugar ball in one hand and was chewing up the other half.  When I caught him and pointed in utter dis-belief the piece he was holding seemed to sense my displeasure and crumbled in his hand.  As Ron tried to catch it the powdered sugar covered his clean and pressed shirt!!  It was hilarious!!  Since he knew he was busted he quickly grabbed another and crammed it in his mouth.  Hopeless!!  I love this guy!

look closely and you will see the bag of doughnuts sitting on the counter!!

what used to be a nice clean shirt.... that's what you get for eating powdered sugar doughnuts!!

 Just before lunch I needed to run to the high school to drop off some paperwork for the Bug.  I was running short on time and when I got to the street I needed to turn on this is what I found...

A semi blocking the road.  It was making a delivery to a store there on the corner.  As I sat there trying to mentally re-route my trip I noticed the sign by the front of the truck and cracked up.

One of the beauties of having a jeep is that they will go anywhere.  Even thru this narrow gap!!  Successful re-route.

As the day went on it became clear that the pre ride was not going to happen tonight, but we are registered for the race and tomorrow we will get there a bit early to see the course set up.  We have ridden there a bunch so it should be good.  Lots of pictures tomorrow from the race so check back tomorrow night or Sunday.  Pray for Caleb and his first race, that he would have fun and not crash!!

Spring?

If you had no idea what the date was and spent any time outside this week around here you would say we are squarely in the midst of Spring.  Circling thru the hood this morning the trees were making me fell like spring has sprung as well.  I don't think we are thru with the cold stuff yet, but I hope it lasts thru the weekend.  There is a short track race at Tom Brown Saturday morning!!!

The end of an era

About 12 years ago my dad, my father in law and I took on the task if assembling one of those wooden play sets from Toys R Us.  I was your basic two forts connected with monkey bars, with swings hanging from the monkey bars, design.  Today..... it came down!!  It served us well, and lots of fun was had by lots of kids on that fort.  It was even taken apart, transported from our old house and re assembled here with some modifications.  It was time for it to go.  The wood was getting a little on the rotten side, the fort was so small it was hard for KK and the Bug to even get in there.  We managed to save the swings that were added a few years ago as they are still put to good use but the main structure is now here.....

 ....... piled up by the street.   It is sad when an era ends.  It is a passing of time, it signals the beginning of a new one, ready or not.  In this case the era has to do with the kids growing up.  Taking down the fort tonight I thought a lot about when we built it and what a job that was.  I never could have done it without dad and Poppi.  I thought a lot about my dad and that was good.  Now we are in discussions about what to do in the back yard.  First thing is to get the grass back and then we will see what happens next.

Lego

Because there was no school today it made it possible for KK to spend the night over at his buddies last night.  They had a big time with Lego and KK arrived back at home sweet home today with this.  A Lego gun shop!!  I am not sure where he got the vision for this gun shop but it is complete with a cash register, display cases, battle helmets, swords, light sabers, laser guns and most importantly..... customers!!!  That's my boy!!

 

SNL

Wanna turn your house from this......

Into this.......

Then back into this.......

Then host Sunday Night Leadership at your house!!!  That's what we did tonight and it was awesome.  We had 51 Young Life leaders over tonight for dinner and a leadership meeting.  After we finished the meeting we had some great time of praise and worship....

Then some of the leaders had a bible study with some high school friends. It was a great night to connect with new leaders and catch up with old friends.

Wedding

Saturday afternoon we went to the wedding of a good friends son.  It was a great service and you know what happens at a wedding reception......

.......... dancing!!!  In this case a little electric slide line dancing.  Great times!!

Young Lives Concert

Young Lives is a teen mom outreach ministry arm of Young Life here in Tallahassee.  It is an amazing ministry working with teen moms as young as 13 up to 19 years old.  Over the past few months the leaders have been working with some of the girls on a project to turn their stores into song. Once they penned their stories a group of local singer songwriters got involved and helped to write music and lyrics to create songs of these amazing stories.   Friday night Young Lives held a concert to play the songs for the first time.  The songwriters each performed their songs for the girls and a huge audience.  It was an amazing night.  To me, the common theme to the songs was transformation, and the power the girls had found in Christ.

Harley Springer

I have been riding a new Street Glide since December.  Check it out on the "Road Trip" post on this blog (and when you do, the offer to buy a cup of Fuzion Yogurt for the first person to guess what I was riding, is no longer valid as I just gave you the answer to my question).  It is a great motorcycle and one of our best sellers.  I brought it in today and had someone who wanted to check it out, so I pulled my trusty old Springer out of the warehouse to ride while the Glide is shown.  There is just something special about this Springer.  It is old school, it rumbles, it has a tractor seat on springs, it is just a cool bike.  When I ride it, it just feels right.  I know where every thing is without even thinking about it.  It is familiar.  I have logged some miles on this bike.  Spent time on it, listening to it rumble for hours on end.

Our relationship with God is like this.  As I spend more time with Him, He becomes more familiar, more present, I hear Him more and more and His voice is comforting, authoritative, I seek Him more because I want to be with Him more.  Tonight as I ride the Springer home I will be thinking about Him as I rumble down the road.

this is what gives the Springer it's name.... the spring suspended fork

On the hunt

After hill repeats with my buddy Brecht, and dropping the kids off at school, I parked by the lake near their school.  Keep in mind this lake is a storm water collection area for the neighborhood.  It is a beautiful little lake and is surrounded by a great park.  I had gotten a cup of coffee from the jiffy store a few hundred yards away from the parking area, and was settling in to do my morning reading when I took a moment to take in my surroundings.  

on the hunt

It was a cool morning and the lake had a fog over the surface.  There were wood duck on the surface and coming in, geese both in the lake and on the shore, several heron fishing for a meal, some sea gulls swimming around, and if you notice in the top of this photo, there is an Osprey (one of two that were soaring) on the hunt for some breakfast!!  The sights were amazing but the sounds were even more awesome.  All these birds were making the noises birds make and it was really cool to hear.  As I took it all in the Osprey seemed to be focusing on one area very intently.  Circling tighter and tighter, darting, hovering, starting to dive then pulling up.  There was a group of fowl below him (or her) and I began to wonder if the ducks were going to be breakfast for this bird.  Figuring he was getting ready to dive, I readied the camera to try to catch the impact.  Sadly, this is the best I could do with my point and shoot camera, but I did catch it if you look closely towards the top of the frame.  It was more impressive than it looks here, especially when you could hear the splash and the sound of its wings lifting it out of the water.  The Osprey struck out on this dive and as he got back up to altitude he gave a mighty shake, kind of like a dog does when they come out of the water, and began searching again.  

look closely to see the splash down

  

First century of 2011

Well, it was a metric century but it is only February!!!  Today I had the chance to ride with a group meeting up with another group of cyclists that were riding to the State Capitol from Tampa to raise awareness for cancer.  The riders from Tampa left at 8 am Sunday morning and rode 100 miles the first day, 120 on Monday, with a headwind most of the way, and today they finished it off with about 60 miles.  A friend organized a ride from T town to leave out this morning to meet up with them in route and escort them in.  It was a beautiful morning and we met up with the group out on Hwy 98 and pulled them on into town.  By the time I got home I had 70 miles in!!

 About 25 miles into the ride one of our group had a puncture.  Whatever he hit cut the tire big time and we( Roger) had to use a boot ( an empty foil GU package) to keep the tube from coming out of the tire.  We fixed it and it lasted the rest of the ride!!

 While repairs were being made it was time to shed a few layers and enjoy some trash talking as well.

Roger, hard at work doing roadside repairs.  

out in the "dead zone" where I logged many a mile last summer triathlon training.

After we met up with the Tampa group we had there sag support as well.  They had two cars leap frogging every few miles in case someone needed support.  Eventually it was decided it was time for a break and we SAG'd along the side of 98.  The sag vehicle was loaded with all kinds of supplies, power bar products, candy bars, red bull, you name it.  I actually got home with more stuff than I left with!!  The power bar rep wanted to get a photo with us all holding some power bar stuff so....

All in all I consumed 2 honey stinger waffles, 4 packages of a new product called power bar balls (2 per package), and 4 bottles.  I stayed away from the red bull and the snickers!!

Most of the ride was along 98 which is where Brecht, Joel, Travis and I logged many a mile last summer training for a Triathlon.  I was thinking about all the hard work and good times that we had as I rode today.   We call this area the "dead zone" because it is out in the middle of nowhere, and it is dead flat.  It can get pretty windy out there too but today it was blue bird the whole way.

 When doing a road ride one does a lot of following, or drafting.  Everyone takes a turn out front (or most everyone Brett) and leads for a while then returns to the line of followers.  I was thinking today, as I was following for a brief moment :) through the wilderness area that we were riding about my Bible reading and the 40 years of wandering in the desert, following the cloud and pillar of fire.  If you get a chance read Numbers chapter 13 and you will see what I am talking about.  You will also read about my son's namesake.  I love this story in the Bible!!

Valentines Day

Need  I say more?

Slack Line

With a beautiful afternoon to enjoy we all just wanted to be outside and take it in.  We decided to use the winch on the JK and a tree in the front yard to set up a slack line.  It was actually pretty tight but once you got out a few steps away from the Jeep it stretched out and got slack.  It was challenging and fun.  Surprising how quickly we all got better at it.

Supper Club

FL and I co-hosted the supper club tonight with CJ and Amy.  With it being a couple of days before Valentines Day, guess what the theme was.  Here is one of the tables set up for the party.  There were 11 couples for a sit down dinner.  Lots of work, but it was great fun and well worth it.  As a bonus, our turn to host won't come around for probably a couple of years from now!!

Hill Repeats

Graced by sunny skies for the first time this week, it was time to get a ride in this morning.  Maybe it was the Bible reading I have been doing that lately has been about the process the Israelites went thru to move the Tabernacle every time God moved them thru the wilderness, but I was in the mood for some work of my own this morning.  I headed to the power lines after dropping the kids at school and "powered out" a dozen hill repeats on what was a very muddy hill.  Legs thoroughly toasted, I headed home and off to the shop.  Busy day but feeling great having gotten out for some exercise!!

It may not look like much from the top but it is a good climb

Wrestle Mania

Tonight's match featured Tic Tac (pictured here warming up the pythons) against T.R.X. (behind the lens, for your viewing pleasure).  Every once in a while we just get the urge to wrestle.  It happened to come over us tonight.  It started as we were clearing the dinner table, a little nudge here and there, and blossomed into a full blown, furniture moved out of the room sweaty match!!  Tic Tac put some new moves into the mix tonight like the "up and over", and TRX pulled out the old helicopter slam.  It was an awesome match!!

Any guesses as to who came out on top?

Home Again, Home Again, Jigidy Jig

one tired bug, bus driver is cheery though!!

The Bug made it home safe and sound from Washington DC this morning with the entire class from school.  The class trip began on Saturday at 2:30 pm with an 18 hour bus ride to DC.  Arriving in DC early Sunday morning, tours and sight seeing until 9PM Sunday night.  Crash and get up at 7 am Monday morning for more tours and a service project in the afternoon, sight seeing again until Monday night at 9:30.  Crash and get up at 7am Tuesday, put things on the bus, tour and service project until 6:30 pm, get on bus and ride home 18 hours or so and get home at 10 am Wednesday morning.  WOW!!!

Praises for the safe travel, that her shoulder is still fine and healing so perfectly, that she goes to a school that models servant leadership to the point that almost 1/2 the time they were in DC they were serving those in need!!  

Truckloads of trees!

We awoke to the sound of diesel engines this morning as the new oaks were arriving.  It was very exciting to see the trees on semi tractor trailers.  The city was completely prepared with a crane, trucks, trailers and earth moving equipment and lots of personnel on hand to unload the trees and plant them in their new home.  What was most impressive was the attention to detail by city parks and rec folks who took into account every detail when determining tree placement to the point of rotating the trees so that they faced certain directions, and limbs would be growing into the right spaces.

one of 5 truckloads of trees

new kid meet old timer

making sure the tree is planted just right

good thing there was a crane on site, these things are big

before......

....after

We now have some new neighbors, and with the new irrigation system and care that these trees will receive, they will be here longer than any of us!!

That's a big hole!

Many of you are familiar with the drama surrounding the trees in the park in our neighborhood.  The readers digest version of what happened is that the city did an end run on cutting down many (read "all") of the big beautiful oak trees (11 in total) for concern of the safety of citizens from falling limbs.  I must mention at this point in the story that in the 100+ year history of these said trees this never happened, but just to be safe the city spent $100k to remove them.  Many of us put up a hard fight, but in the end the trees came down with the promise from the city that replacement mature trees would be planted.

one of 9 holes that were dug today for our new trees

Fast forward to this month when work began to install an irrigation system in the park to keep the new trees hydrated once they get here.  At the same time a team of neighbors went to a special nursery in Ocala Florida to pick out the mature Oaks that will be coming to live in our park.  They are suppose to be quite large, and judging by the 9 holes that were dug today in the park they must be.  I am going to try to document the event with a before during and after shot from the same place in a future blog so look for it in the next few days.  I will apologize in advance for the Oak heavy nature of the blog topic but, hey, this is big stuff around these parts!