Sunday, August 30, 2009

Racing weekend

Weekend started with a prompt 5:45AM wake up call... I stayed at my Moms house because there was NO WAY I would have waken up in time at home, I would have rolled over and went back to sleep... I usually end up getting up at 6:15AM everyday anyways for work, but my body has also learned somehow when its Friday night and tries to get that extra 1 hr 15 minutes extra in... After 6 scrambled eggs, a bagel, orange juise, and a cup of coffee.. I was officially temporarily stuffed.. and my Mom wonders where all the food goes..

The TT went good for me, I won the Master A category with a time of 32:26... I think I could have gone harder in places, but we all think we can after a TT... if I nailed it there, that was 15 seconds... its hard to say.. I was hoping to go under 32:30 and managed that.. it was good to see the training program I was on all summer paid off.... bad thing is the program is over, so now I need to be creative for the next 2 weeks of racing.. do I revert to a cyclocross only training program now... or pick 2 weeks that would help for crits...

Cyclocross Sunday was awesome... arrived at 11AM to help with course setup... The A group started at around 4:45PM.. so it was a long day, and a long battle with our favorite provincial bird... the mosquito... it looks like summer finally arrived again.. for maybe the 4th day all year... The race started uneventfully.. I was at the front, but then lost my line going through some wet mud.. crapper.. anyways fell back a little and then Mr Singlespeed Dave Dorning pulled me around for probably 30 minutes and schooled me on every barrier... one day Ill get that remount figured out... The only reason I caught back onto Dave was because I have 20 gears.... but I think I used 3 all race... 46X19,21 and maybe the 23 at the end... I ended up 8th overall... quite happy with that especially not getting lapped like last year in cross... Im sure Olli is just getting warmed up though so Ill be looking for him to be coming from behind later in the year...

Next races are Tuesday Night Criteriums at Assiniboine Park on Sept 1 and 8, followed by Provincial Crit somewhere in 2 weeks...

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Cross Racers - TRP CR950 Brakes and Pads For Sale

I just got some Euro X Cantilivers with TRP Inline adjust pads for my XNight, so the Carbon CR950s are for sale.. they were used only last season, and come with Kool Stop Black, Koolstop Salmon (multipurpose wet/dry) , and Swisstop Yellow Carbon pads.. (front and rear for all sets) The brakes have fully adjustable up and down pad placement, and toe in...

Stradle cables, and stradle carriers included... retail price from labicicletta.com is $249 for the pair, the carbon pads sell for $65... I am parting with everything for $150

I will bring to the cross race Sunday, or if someone wants before the race I can arrange pickup...

Email camaroz28@shaw.ca if interested.

Oil Slick.. or something anyways....

Well the 1st of 3 extend the season Crit races happened lastnite... I arrived from work at the park at about 4:45 to start setting up the course... I got the leaf blower from Jayson as I had received emails saying the course was littered in debris... I was thinking yeah whatever a few twigs here and there.. well I arrived to basically find the road looking like a hurricane had run through... great... fire up ye olde leaf blower and have at er!

Things were looking good until I got out ofthe final sweeping corner which leads to the normal finish line... right out of the apex I start blowing and see what appears to be a large stain on the road.. after making the mistake of walking on it, and almost parking my ass in it... I decided to wait and considered cancelling the race... my thoughts were I dont need anyone crashing here and then putting the blame on me being the organizer...

Well after actually cancelling the race, and after a few phone calls, we decided to try and clean the mess up... Tim arrived with a I don't know how huge litre jug of degreaser which was promptly dumped on the spots, and then brushed like crazy... we decided to use the leaf blower now to dry the spots... of course the blower was out of gas, so now another adventure to go find 50:1 engine oil for the blower to mix with the gas... down the street to Shell... who (in)conveniently dont have any... so whip over to Crappy Tire by Polo Park... yoink! Some gas, some mix, and lets go blow dry the corner... After about 15 minutes of drying, it was a doable corner (with a few pylons added in just for safety factor)

Since I am on an easy week, and my aim on a personal best time at the ITT this weekend I decided to just marshall the course... it looked like a pretty quick race, and Don The Hammer Sawatzky won the race.. good work bud.. for those that don't know Don, he has one speed.. GO!