Done, capoot, finit. Yes folks, my season is over. I would have truly preferred to end my season on a high note, or at least not have a mechanical that would have allowed me to actually race my last weekend of racing. But, that is life and sometimes it doesn't work out like you thought it would. I have certainly learned a lot about racing this year, much more than I had ever learned in just 1 season alone. One of the things that really stands out to me however is the amount of wear and tear on my equipment there was this season. It was certainly more than I have ever had in years past. Here she is:
3 broken wheels
4 chains
5 sets of cables
4 derailleur hangers
2 sets of shifters
4 sets of tires
God knows how many tubes-way too many
2 rear derailleurs
2 broken shoes
3 completely ruined/shredded sets of kits
1 broken pair of sunglasses
2 ruined cassettes
Man, when did this get to be so expensive? While it is a bit of a bummer to look at this list and see how much stuff got ruined, I can say that what I learned along the way is impossible to put a price tag on as I continue to try to make a living out of this. Quite possibly the biggest thing that I have learned is that no matter how hard you work, or how much you want something-there are no certainties in this sport. Looking at where I want to go and what I need to do, there are thousands of people just like me trying to do the exact same thing. This just gives me even more motivation to do everything right this winter to get ready for next year.
But, I have a few things to do before that comes about. Excuse me, but I have a little bit more of sightseeing to do. I still have a few more cheese platters, oysters, mussels, and baguettes to eat and an unlimited supply of new wines that need to be tasted. Heading off to Paris in just a bit. I will let you know how it all went, but until then-ching.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Such is Life
"Man, thats a bummer." That is pretty much what I am saying to myself after the weekend. If you remember from around a month back, I had some bike issues. Well, my local bike shop did what they could do to get me going, we all knew it was not a permanent fix, but one to get me by. It certainly got me by for 4 weeks, but it did not make it through the weekend. Long story short, I raced for two days on a singlespeed back essentially. My shifter is busted and well, that makes shifting a bit difficult. I was either spinning my legs a hundred miles an hour or barely moving them. I finished both days, but nothing special.
On to more pressing issues. I got myself moved back into my place today, lets see if I truly get to rest there for more than a few days. The Giverny festival starts this weekend and I have an odd feeling something might just pop up.
And in even greater news, now that the end of August has arrived, so has nice weather. Today, I have had myself a day in the sun and actually got to wear a short sleeve shirt out on the town today. This is much better than wearing a jacket like I was last week or racing in leg warmers.
I leave you with a neat image that I took last night while out on my evening walk with the dogs. I headed up into the forest above my village and this is what greeted me as I was coming home. A clear sky as the clouds are receding and the rain with it.
On to more pressing issues. I got myself moved back into my place today, lets see if I truly get to rest there for more than a few days. The Giverny festival starts this weekend and I have an odd feeling something might just pop up.
And in even greater news, now that the end of August has arrived, so has nice weather. Today, I have had myself a day in the sun and actually got to wear a short sleeve shirt out on the town today. This is much better than wearing a jacket like I was last week or racing in leg warmers.
I leave you with a neat image that I took last night while out on my evening walk with the dogs. I headed up into the forest above my village and this is what greeted me as I was coming home. A clear sky as the clouds are receding and the rain with it.
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Blunt Crayons
Got a good one for ya folks. Once again, the fun just keeps on rolling. Had myself a nice little ride this a.m. as I am getting ready to go race tomorrow. Nothing special, just a bike ride. But, mid ride I realized that I was out of bed and would need myself a baguette for lunch. I must say, when I return to America, the fact that I am not going to be able to run down to the boulangerie and grab myself a baguette or two is going to be pretty tough to swallow. There is just nothing that compares to a hot, fresh baguette and a bottle of nutella. It is a match made in heaven and can make the time go by so quickly. Sorry, where was I, I had to wipe the drool off the table there. Anyways, I pedaled on into town to go grab that baguette and before I knew it, BAM, someone is on the ground. No, I did not wreck but, I nailed and I mean nailed some dude walking across the street. This guy just walked out into the middle of the road from behind a car without even looking and I had myself about 2 seconds to do something. That something was realize that damn, this guy is going to get hit. My options were either drill him or well, that was the only option. Thankfully, I did not go down and had not a scratch on me, but when I actually composed myself to see if he was alright, all he kept saying was "why are you riding in the road?" What? Can you believe that, this guy walked out into the middle of the road where there was no crosswalk or anything without looking and got hit. When I asked him what would have happened had there been a car coming instead of a bike and he got hit then? He said that would not happen because he would hear a car coming and would not step out into the road. Had he been in a crosswalk I would have been paying attention for him, but given the situation, the last thing one expects is a idiot to step out in front of you. Fortunately, he was not injured and the people walking by that got to see it were treated to a bit of a funny moment for their Saturday morning. At least a few other people were heckling him at the same time for making such a retarded move. There is a reason there are crosswalks and everyone stops at them for pedestrians. At first I generally felt bad about hitting the guy even though he was at fault, but given how he acted I no longer feel bad for him at all. More than likely he has been hit a few times previously is my guess.
The whole time I was just chuckling to myself as a friend of mine, who will go unnamed nailed an old Belgian women earlier this year. At the time of that accident, myself and the other USA guys could not stop laughing when hearing about the details of his accident. This just goes to point out that across the board no matter what country you are in, you will encounter people that are not the sharpest crayons in the box.
But, back to the whole reason that I was in town, and if you were wondering, the baguette was quite amazing and made a wonderful sandwich. I would have taken a photo of it, but it was just too good to let it sit there idle, even for a few moments.
The whole time I was just chuckling to myself as a friend of mine, who will go unnamed nailed an old Belgian women earlier this year. At the time of that accident, myself and the other USA guys could not stop laughing when hearing about the details of his accident. This just goes to point out that across the board no matter what country you are in, you will encounter people that are not the sharpest crayons in the box.
But, back to the whole reason that I was in town, and if you were wondering, the baguette was quite amazing and made a wonderful sandwich. I would have taken a photo of it, but it was just too good to let it sit there idle, even for a few moments.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
I was wrong
I lied folks. I am going to be the first one to admit it. I know that a few weeks back I said that nothing would surprise me anymore. Well, I got one upped and well, I am downright shocked. I headed out for a nice couple hour ride this morning, nothing too special other than a few flats. Damn, those sure are happening a lot lately. But the kicker is what I came home to.
Yes, that is my stuff put outside of my place. I have kept to a 20 minute rule in that I never unpack, I just take out the essentials and then keep everything in its place. What you see is that. Whatever is in little bags is my essentials that were out. Apparently, this next week is a big music festival here in Giverny and the people that own the place where I am staying can make big bucks by renting everything out. Thus, they took my stuff out and put some new higher paying folk in. Yep, you got it. I got the boot. A little bit of heads up would be nice, but that just seems to be too easy. Fortunately, I know someone in town, my director, and will be staying with him for a unspecified amount of time.
To put it frankly, I am feeling like these little guys right now.
I truly feel like that rod that got shafted into me a few weeks back is still in there and I am just along for the ride. I am twisting and twisting around just like these little chickens and someone is just watching to see at what point I am really going to go from raw to done, to really done, to fried. Stay tuned as we venture along this ride. I have no idea at what point it is going to take to get to that fried state, but from here on out, the choices are pretty limitless.
Yes, that is my stuff put outside of my place. I have kept to a 20 minute rule in that I never unpack, I just take out the essentials and then keep everything in its place. What you see is that. Whatever is in little bags is my essentials that were out. Apparently, this next week is a big music festival here in Giverny and the people that own the place where I am staying can make big bucks by renting everything out. Thus, they took my stuff out and put some new higher paying folk in. Yep, you got it. I got the boot. A little bit of heads up would be nice, but that just seems to be too easy. Fortunately, I know someone in town, my director, and will be staying with him for a unspecified amount of time.
To put it frankly, I am feeling like these little guys right now.
I truly feel like that rod that got shafted into me a few weeks back is still in there and I am just along for the ride. I am twisting and twisting around just like these little chickens and someone is just watching to see at what point I am really going to go from raw to done, to really done, to fried. Stay tuned as we venture along this ride. I have no idea at what point it is going to take to get to that fried state, but from here on out, the choices are pretty limitless.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
What happened to logic?
Gotta say, Erik is really starting to get tired of stupid french logic that he does not know where to even start. Shall we begin?
Yesterday was set to be a shit show of shit shows. I headed off to do a night time crit (remember that it is dark at night) on cobblestones. Thankfully only half of the course was cobbled, but the other half of the race was on a road under construction. Once I got to the course, I saw nothing in the way of lights on the course, nor did I see the organizers making any attempt to get rid of the cars that were parked on the course. Upon further inquiring I was told to be aware and just swerve around the cars. Nice. Thankfully it was a full moon last night and we had some light from that and some light from all the cafes and bar lining the course, but nothing else in the way of lights. Certainly made it interesting.
For the racing I was pretty content in the fact that I knew most of everyone there and knew that I was stronger than most of them. Schweet. Given what had happened the day before with cars, it was pretty funny to hear people at the start saying "hey, there is no cars to use today." However, this only added fuel to the fire from the emotions of the day before. This is where french logic or lack of really starts to kill me. In the race no matter what I did, there was a plethora of racers that would just follow me, not work, just sit on my wheel. Be it in a breakaway-no working. Be it pulling a break back-no working. Apparently orders are to not work with the American I have been told. We let 2 guys go up the road and with 10 teams in the race, that leaves 8 to pull it back. Nope. The french have this love affair with arriving at the finish solo and not working. Whatever I did on the day, nothing would work. Riders would just try and attack by themselves, flame out come back and try again, again and again. Had they worked with me, they could have had a shot at the win. The worst part is that they probably do not see that at all. And so the day went, lots of yelling, hand gesturing and general mayhem pouring over from the day before. Back stateside this is called negative racing and well, here its just called normal.
My frustration levels are pretty darn high with these people and my reserves that I have to tap into to deal with them are quickly dwindling. But, I was happy to see that the guy who won is a good mate of mine over here and I had no issues with that. The 2 eventually lapped the field and I helped him out a bit in the finale. Next weekend, he and his director said the favor will be paid back. Unfortunately, I got my ass chewed out after the race for this. Apparently, the French can make deals, but I am not allowed to. If I couldn't win on the night, I wanted to at least secure some help in some upcoming races.
Oh and those cars on course. Some people are going to be quite surprised to find some dents in their cars as people traveling at high rates of speed on bikes leave quite a mark when nailing a car dead on. But, I guess that the bright spot might be that it did not rain heavily on us or the night would have been even crazier. Alright, bring on this weekend and some climbs so I can do my thing. And so go another unique race over here.
Yesterday was set to be a shit show of shit shows. I headed off to do a night time crit (remember that it is dark at night) on cobblestones. Thankfully only half of the course was cobbled, but the other half of the race was on a road under construction. Once I got to the course, I saw nothing in the way of lights on the course, nor did I see the organizers making any attempt to get rid of the cars that were parked on the course. Upon further inquiring I was told to be aware and just swerve around the cars. Nice. Thankfully it was a full moon last night and we had some light from that and some light from all the cafes and bar lining the course, but nothing else in the way of lights. Certainly made it interesting.
For the racing I was pretty content in the fact that I knew most of everyone there and knew that I was stronger than most of them. Schweet. Given what had happened the day before with cars, it was pretty funny to hear people at the start saying "hey, there is no cars to use today." However, this only added fuel to the fire from the emotions of the day before. This is where french logic or lack of really starts to kill me. In the race no matter what I did, there was a plethora of racers that would just follow me, not work, just sit on my wheel. Be it in a breakaway-no working. Be it pulling a break back-no working. Apparently orders are to not work with the American I have been told. We let 2 guys go up the road and with 10 teams in the race, that leaves 8 to pull it back. Nope. The french have this love affair with arriving at the finish solo and not working. Whatever I did on the day, nothing would work. Riders would just try and attack by themselves, flame out come back and try again, again and again. Had they worked with me, they could have had a shot at the win. The worst part is that they probably do not see that at all. And so the day went, lots of yelling, hand gesturing and general mayhem pouring over from the day before. Back stateside this is called negative racing and well, here its just called normal.
My frustration levels are pretty darn high with these people and my reserves that I have to tap into to deal with them are quickly dwindling. But, I was happy to see that the guy who won is a good mate of mine over here and I had no issues with that. The 2 eventually lapped the field and I helped him out a bit in the finale. Next weekend, he and his director said the favor will be paid back. Unfortunately, I got my ass chewed out after the race for this. Apparently, the French can make deals, but I am not allowed to. If I couldn't win on the night, I wanted to at least secure some help in some upcoming races.
Oh and those cars on course. Some people are going to be quite surprised to find some dents in their cars as people traveling at high rates of speed on bikes leave quite a mark when nailing a car dead on. But, I guess that the bright spot might be that it did not rain heavily on us or the night would have been even crazier. Alright, bring on this weekend and some climbs so I can do my thing. And so go another unique race over here.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Busy
Sorry folks, I have been a bit busy lately. Like I had mentioned previously, I was going to be racing on Sunday, Monday and today, Tuesday. I finally have a free couple of minutes to let you know how the past 2 days have gone. This was Sunday. Victory.
The day was pretty straightforward. There was 1 climb on the circuit for every 8 km's. My plan was just to be at the front all day and I eventually made the break of the day which you can see. Not trusting the others in the breakaway, I eventually attacked by myself with 10 km's to go and just barely got caught after the line. All that matters though is that I won and I am quite pleased with that. But one has to remember to not the highs get you too high nor the inverse of lows get you too low.
On to Monday, and with that little bit of advice in the back of my mind, I set off to do what I could do. Unfortunately, the day was pancake flat and super windy-not my forte. Thankfully though I found the breakaway once again and spent the last half of the race stressed out of my mind. I should have known that the day was going to be hectic when at the start line, we had not yet even began racing yet and everyone was arguing with each other. The minute that the breakaway was established it was game on. Dudes were punching each other, pulling on pockets and general mayhem. I was doing my best to stay as quiet as possible thinking of the win, but I was not immune. I have to say there was one guy just super obnoxious and the center of the ruckus. This dude was super strong, but had caused a few wrecks. With one lap to go, 8 km's again, we had another wreck in our breakaway, cutting it down to 11 guys. We looked back and "knew" that the guys who went down were not going to be getting back to us on their own and we were dialed. Once again, the final 8 kilometers is always full of stress with everyone thinking of the possibility of a win. I was set and with 200 meters to go in the sprint, was passing the guy that was the idiot all day. Without any disregard, before I knew it, he was pushing me farther and farther into the barriers to not let me pass him that he actually wrecked himself out in the corner and forced me to stop. Because of this, I ended up second and not the first that I was in at the time. Damn. But, the best part is that the guy who won, was in the wreck with 8 km's to go. Do the math on that one folks. Everyone in the race cried foul about someone using the cars to get back into the race but the officials would have none of it. This is where the day got real interesting with people yelling, punching, and even more mayhem. The winner is Irish and well, his dad is not doing anything to help the Irish cause. I cannot imagine a time where I had someone straight up get into my face and start yelling at me like that. I was talking with some of the other teams as the directors were speaking with the officials, when the winners' dad came up all raged out and had to be held back. If there is an upside to this, in that 20 minutes, the new words and phrases that I learned are endless. At that moment, there were 2 protests going on but nothing came of them and I ended up second. But, on the plus side, the guy who was trying to wreck me ended up last in break and every team but his team and the winners team congratulated me after the race and told me that I was the real winner. At least a bit of respect is coming. To lose a race in a clean race is one thing, but to lose a race to dirty racing is a whole nother ball game. But, second place is not what I came here for and I am even hungrier now for a win tonight.
On to tonight, I am off to go do a night time criterium. I am pretty excited to get out there and race. Even better yet, I just found out it is on cobbles. huh. this might be interesting.
The day was pretty straightforward. There was 1 climb on the circuit for every 8 km's. My plan was just to be at the front all day and I eventually made the break of the day which you can see. Not trusting the others in the breakaway, I eventually attacked by myself with 10 km's to go and just barely got caught after the line. All that matters though is that I won and I am quite pleased with that. But one has to remember to not the highs get you too high nor the inverse of lows get you too low.
On to Monday, and with that little bit of advice in the back of my mind, I set off to do what I could do. Unfortunately, the day was pancake flat and super windy-not my forte. Thankfully though I found the breakaway once again and spent the last half of the race stressed out of my mind. I should have known that the day was going to be hectic when at the start line, we had not yet even began racing yet and everyone was arguing with each other. The minute that the breakaway was established it was game on. Dudes were punching each other, pulling on pockets and general mayhem. I was doing my best to stay as quiet as possible thinking of the win, but I was not immune. I have to say there was one guy just super obnoxious and the center of the ruckus. This dude was super strong, but had caused a few wrecks. With one lap to go, 8 km's again, we had another wreck in our breakaway, cutting it down to 11 guys. We looked back and "knew" that the guys who went down were not going to be getting back to us on their own and we were dialed. Once again, the final 8 kilometers is always full of stress with everyone thinking of the possibility of a win. I was set and with 200 meters to go in the sprint, was passing the guy that was the idiot all day. Without any disregard, before I knew it, he was pushing me farther and farther into the barriers to not let me pass him that he actually wrecked himself out in the corner and forced me to stop. Because of this, I ended up second and not the first that I was in at the time. Damn. But, the best part is that the guy who won, was in the wreck with 8 km's to go. Do the math on that one folks. Everyone in the race cried foul about someone using the cars to get back into the race but the officials would have none of it. This is where the day got real interesting with people yelling, punching, and even more mayhem. The winner is Irish and well, his dad is not doing anything to help the Irish cause. I cannot imagine a time where I had someone straight up get into my face and start yelling at me like that. I was talking with some of the other teams as the directors were speaking with the officials, when the winners' dad came up all raged out and had to be held back. If there is an upside to this, in that 20 minutes, the new words and phrases that I learned are endless. At that moment, there were 2 protests going on but nothing came of them and I ended up second. But, on the plus side, the guy who was trying to wreck me ended up last in break and every team but his team and the winners team congratulated me after the race and told me that I was the real winner. At least a bit of respect is coming. To lose a race in a clean race is one thing, but to lose a race to dirty racing is a whole nother ball game. But, second place is not what I came here for and I am even hungrier now for a win tonight.
On to tonight, I am off to go do a night time criterium. I am pretty excited to get out there and race. Even better yet, I just found out it is on cobbles. huh. this might be interesting.
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Not settled
Sorry folks for the tardiness, I have had myself a busy past few days. As you are aware, I had the opportunity to be a house sitter for the past 2 weeks which was great, but I am back at my place now, wait a second, I am not. Why the confusion Erik? Well, funny story guys. So when I went back to go to my place across the village I found out that the people who own the house had rented it out for the next 4 months and that I was going to be going elsewhere. Bam! This has been my fifth different rental residence in Giverny in only 6 months, do the math on that one. The longest that I have rested in 1 place has been 4.5 weeks. So onto the new place. I do not have any photos yet, but I promise they are coming. From what I can tell you it is in the Medieval quarter of Giverny according the the local tourist pamphlet. The building is around 400 years old and I am living in the attic. Bitching. While it may sound bad, it really isn't too bad. Its a bit unique and one just needs to watch their head when walking around. I have a toilet in the closet which is pretty classic, at least it is not a outhouse like one of the places I have been this year had. I did not have to use it, but the fact that it was there was still great. But, it is pretty fun crawling up and down a set of stairs/ladder to get to my room as need be. I am not bummed at all about it though as this is just another aspect of the experience of racing and living over here. This all only serves to make me a better person and grow over time. On that note, if you have a free ten minutes check out this article, it will certainly be worth your time.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/22/magazine/22Adulthood-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=general&src=me
Not to let that be my only moving fun, my director and his girlfriend got home on Monday and to my surprise, there was also a large UHaul. Apparently, the parents of Martine, Lionel's girlfriend, sold their vacation house in the southern part of France and since they were down in the South, they loaded everything up to bring North. Given this information, Erik became co porter to help with moving furniture and boxes of just about everything. Thankfully, Lionel had his brother from a few villages over to help out too because this little guy just is not that strong. But hey, I can say come the next day I certainly found some new muscles and could barely walk.
On to more pressing matters, I have found out that starting Sunday, I am going to have 3 days of racing. I will have to drive a bit to get to all of them, but I have 3 more chances to do what I came to Europe for-Race my bike as fast as I can.
And folks, I hit a pretty sad point the other day. Please look at my bottle of good ol' U.S. peanut butter.
Thank god I have a second jar waiting for me in the fridge.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/22/magazine/22Adulthood-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=general&src=me
Not to let that be my only moving fun, my director and his girlfriend got home on Monday and to my surprise, there was also a large UHaul. Apparently, the parents of Martine, Lionel's girlfriend, sold their vacation house in the southern part of France and since they were down in the South, they loaded everything up to bring North. Given this information, Erik became co porter to help with moving furniture and boxes of just about everything. Thankfully, Lionel had his brother from a few villages over to help out too because this little guy just is not that strong. But hey, I can say come the next day I certainly found some new muscles and could barely walk.
On to more pressing matters, I have found out that starting Sunday, I am going to have 3 days of racing. I will have to drive a bit to get to all of them, but I have 3 more chances to do what I came to Europe for-Race my bike as fast as I can.
And folks, I hit a pretty sad point the other day. Please look at my bottle of good ol' U.S. peanut butter.
Thank god I have a second jar waiting for me in the fridge.
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