Another week ticks off. Another cross race finished.

Middle of this week one of my Veloshop riders John Dorfer took a spill in the park and was out for a couple minutes. Ended up in the hospital for a couple days with a broken back! Quick action by JV and Patrick of Veloshop got John hauled out of Forest Park on a stretcher strapped to an ATV! I just read an email from him, he is off the bike till February, bed rest for the next couple weeks, 2 fractured vertabrae, stiches and gnarly road rash on the face.

Ouch.

Speaking of ouch. Did anyone else suffer like I did today at the Cyclocross Crusades Barton park race (aka: the gravel pit.)? I felt horrible! I tried to take the hole shot and just paid for it. It was kinda unusual, I can always make that huge effort and recover quickly from it and then motor it for the rest of the race but, I just died trying to stick with Carl Decker and Shannon Skerritt. Like 15 people cruised past me as I was wheezing and huffing in the first lap…

Cary Miller was riding so strong and blasted past me and I sucked his wheel for a lap, then he flatted and I bridged up to Mikkel Bossen and we dropped Timmy Evans (I think) and then Mikkel flatted!

I really felt bad. I had no gas and was not recovering at all. I held it out for 4th place behind Kevin Hulick and Shannon and Carl. Evan Plews was cruising up on me in the last few laps and if it had been a longer race I think he would have eventually got me.

In other exciting news: Steven Hunter and Mark Blackwelder took 1st and 2nd in the B race!

Hey, I’m going to end this post real quick. I left it hanging when stuff got crazy at the shop. It is way late now and I am just getting back from attending a Campagnolo seminar.

Damn. Overslept again. Been meaning to do these 2-3 hour rides the last few days and cannot get myself into the spandex in the morning.

The Veloshop is crazy busy like usual. Building up cross tubulars, ordering tons of product for the kids. Cyclocross fever is still in full swing. If I had to summarize: Chris King, track bikes, Spooky brakes, Phil Wood and, every color Velocity rim imaginable.

There was a nice little article in the Willamette Week about cyclocross this morning.

Quote: “Erik Tonkin sits hunched on a metal stool, his carved thighs hidden beneath loose gray pants.”

Meow.

Road season thoughts are creeping into my head. Stage racing, team bikes, sponsorships, personal priorities. I’ve got big road season fantasies. I always kinda do this time of year. I think I am fast at cross and that means I should be fast at road racing. Well, bad knees (I just can’t seem to do more than a couple hours without debilitating pain) and poor endurance has kept me from any real road racing glory. Not to add the Veloshop obligations. It is damn hard to find the energy to run the shop after a 4 hour ride and vice versa. Who wants to ride for 4 hours after building wheels for 10? Me, I guess.

Ok, I’ll stop the whining. I’m just kicking myself for not getting on the bike these last 2 days.

And, the verdict is in. I’m can’t be vegan cause I’m a fast bike racer. Your right, I’m not vegan anymore. I gave it up for the performance enhancing benefits of beef. Ha!

Lets talk about Roberto Heras for a moment. WTF? Everybody is getting busted for doping! The only good thing that could come out of that is, they have NOT tested his B sample yet and, if it (the B sample) comes out clean then that may bode well for the loveable Tyler Hamilton.

One can hope right?

Oh, I almost got in a fight with a commuter a couple nights ago. I blew a stop sign blocks from my house and this guy said “nice stop jerk” or something and I instinctively gave him the finger. Not that I go looking for trouble or anything. But, he looks back and says something like “Oh yeah! Bring that shit back here!” So I was like, Ok. I figured, what the hell. If some hippie on a bike wants to harass me for blowing a stop sign and then wants to bring it on…

See, I have this thing about following through. I really loathe macho posturing. Usually I just ignore it but, I like to stand up for myself you know? I’d rather not have a story like “Man I WOULD have beat them up if they would have turned around.” I’d rather actually step up.

“jigga what?”

Yeah, too much Kanye. (it must be all the meat I started eating! it is making me aggro!)

As I am turning around I realise how silly it would be for me to even get in an arguement about blowing a stop sign with another cyclist and I turn around again and keep riding up towards my house. He starts pursuing me and preaching and shouting about how we need to respect the law and karma and ends with, “I hope you get fucking hit!”

Geez!

Cross Crusades race this Sunday. Shannon and Eric are going to put the hurt on me. My little goal will be to stick to them like glue. No matter what the cost. If they are putting in consistent top 10 efforts in the UCI races then that is something to aspire to. I’ve got to step up to that level of speed.

Here are a couple of things I have been struggling with: carrying a line of bicycles in the shop and racing on another (non-veloshop non-vanilla) cycling team.

I hate selling complete bikes. Like bikes off the show floor bikes. I like putting together custom builds for people. They choose the frame and components, I usually build up some sweet wheels and spec out the dream bike. But it is kinda hard to keep up with demand and sell bikes sight unseen. Plus, I don’t get the good pricing that bigger shops do that carry big name brands. My pricing is much higher on bikes and build kits and I often undercut myself to keep it a good deal for my clients. But, a couple of my teammates have bought frames or complete bikes from other shops and I have been like “hey, I could have set you up with that!” but the appeal is actually having the damn bike in your shop so people can see it and touch it. Pick it up and say “yeah that’s like 18 pounds…”. So, I am contemplating buying a few complete cross bikes for next season. But, they must be bikes I would ride. I cannot sell something I would not be proud to race on.

And, racing for another team…

Well, I don’t have any Veloshop teammates racing with me on the road this year. It is pretty rough playing solo racer in a long road race. It would be nice to have a few teammates that can race at my level. So my mind wanders. Ideally I would find a team that is pretty serious and would be interested in helping with some racing expenses. The flip side is that I like doing my own thing and I think a lot of people respect me for it. I think I’ll be starting the season in my Veloshop colors and trying to finish the first few road races in the front group and just go from there. If it feels like I really need a team to ride with I’ll weigh my options. Maybe I can find a team for the bigger stage races and just do like a composite team thing if I can make time for the stage racing.

I’m off. Got to work so I can pay for this mess of a racing career.

A quick race report.

Muck. Snotty, mucky mud.

I drove down to Eugene Sunday morning after getting a few hours of sleep (loud upstairs neighbor). Mike Hilbrant, Beth Chase and Brian and I arrived with plenty of time to check out the course, practice and fake like we were warming up in the rain.

Our new teammate Sho cleaned up the C category race and then we got to see Nicole Nestlen take the women’s B race from the start. Impressive.

A cluster of Veloshop B category riders used this race to try out the Elite category with mixed success. I think it was a good test for them.

I had to set up my 29er mountain bike as a faux cross bike on Saturday when my cyclocross bikes did not show up in the UPS Friday. Guess I’ll get them on Monday or something.

It was so rad, rocking the full fenders and straight bars, I even spent an hour the night before cutting the outer knobs off an old pair of my Schwalbe tyres. Gave myself a blister!

I felt great during the race. I took the hole shot and led the first lap until the mudpit section where I was riding everything and a few people passed me running it. I moved back in to the front with Chris Brandt and then attacked him around the backside of the course and kept a gap for the rest of the race.

I had a few mechanicals in the last laps. Chain suck, derailleur getting jammed in the hardest gear, more chain suck. I had to stop and yank the chain out of itself more than once. I thought my rear brake was f’ed up too but, I think it was just packed with mud the whole time.

To be fair, I think I had a big advantage on the mountain bike. It would have been a different race if I was on a cross bike. It does weigh about 10 pounds more than my gucci cross bikes though.

Hey, I won some socks for Brian!!

I am SO glad to be home.

The trip to the east coast was amazing. I got to experience some different and challenging racing. There is a LOT of room to improve and get faster but, I achieved my first little goal of a top 20 UCI finish. The top 15 is going to be really tough to break into.

Visiting my best friends (Sarah and Thomas) in NYC was great, I have not spent much time with either of them in a long while, due in no small part to a falling out over ex-date drama. We never really did get to talk about a bunch of stuff but, I think maybe it was better to leave things as they are and just enjoy each others company for the week I was there.

I am back into the grind at the Veloshop the work is so damn satisfying. Everyday I just have to go and work for myself. It rules. I am really excited about building up some tubular cross wheels for my teammate Steven Hunter.

I’m right back to training. Though the weather this week has been AMAZING! Windy as hell and raining non-stop. I was anticipating my cross bikes to be back via UPS today. no dice. I may have to skip the Eugene cyclocross race this Sunday and maybe I’ll take my road bike out. Maybe ride down there or something. Or just go and heckle, or ride my 29er. I should ride my 29″ though I stuck some cross tyres on it and went down to the Sellwood cross practice and just felt goofy on it. Maybe I should just rock it mountain bike style.

My Veloshop teammates are really stepping up. Take look at this impressive photo. Beth has been putting it down. Gettin ‘er done. There is lots of Veloshop team motivation right now. Mike Hildbrant bought a team van to carpool us all to races. Brian, Steven, Patrick, Matt Hall and others are uprgrading to elite cyclocross this year and next. That is really impressive. All these cat 4 roadies are pretty dynamite in the mud.

Bridgette Stoick has been impressive this year too. The quality of women’s elite cyclocross has gotten so much better since last season. Teams like Velo Bella have infused highly talented women racers into the scene and Rhonda Mazza and Bridgette are having to really fight for thier results. They both get huge shout outs for finishing the USGP #3 at Gloscester.

Man, that race was epic.

Ok, gotta run, people keep calling me on my cellphone to haggle with me about bike parts in the shop. I should just get back, I’ll post more of this re-cap later.