Jenny's Adventures

The Seasons They Are a Changing

2011-11-03T13:03:00.002-07:00

The best unexpected gift: beautiful fall days. I once had a friend tell me that his favourite riding weather was when he could wear leg warmers, a long sleeved jersey and no gloves. At the time, I was living in Australia, loving the 35+ weather, and I quite frankly, thought he was nuts. I further attributed this strange attitude to the fact that he was from England and that IS summer weather, from my personal experience of summering at my Grandparent’s place on the North Sea. But as I’ve grown older and wiser, I’ve started to understand his wisdom. Honestly, nothing beats a crisp sunny ride in the Gatineau Park at the end of the season.

Now, if I’m to be honest, I’m not really sure that it’s fair for me to call this the END of the season, given that my season never really was. But as we learn with time, the world keeps revolving even if we’re standing still, and not racing the bike season doesn’t stop the leaves from falling or the feeling that the winter months are beckoning. However, the imminent end to snow-free roads does help me to appreciate the dwindling days out on the bike.

Yesterday I got such a gift of riding a loop in the park with my friend Sarah Coney while she was back visiting from Vancouver. We had a gorgeous day and it didn’t even matter that we were creeping along in the hills as we are both recovering from injury-prone seasons. I came home somewhat shattered (it was the first time I’d seen a hill in a number of months) but incredibly contented. All the pressure and uncertainty that can plague the higher levels of the game was washed away by the pure joy of riding my bicycle.

I am incredibly sad to see my team from 2011 fall away going into next season. The girls, with the help of superior management surpassed any expectations placed upon them this year on both the domestic and international cycling scenes. It was super exciting to watch and really motivated me to get back on my game so I could get out there and join them, which unfortunately will never happen. I would like to thank everyone involved for all their love, sweat and tears (yes, from time to time there are tears in sport, despite learning at an early age from Tom Hanks that “there’s no crying in baseball”.) A special shout out needs to go to the man who kept the team running smoothly all year long, despite having a million other things to do (I swear I have no idea when the man sleeps): thank you Malcolm. You made many of our dreams a reality. And a pretty darn glitzy reality at that! I would also like to wish all my teammates the best in their future endeavours. You are all incredible people who deserve every opportunity that comes your way. I really hope that I get to work with you again in the future.

So, as I sit here gazing out at the cold rain falling, I look forward to tomorrow’s promise of sun and above-freezing temperatures to roll around on my kick ass (more or less unridden) Specialized, but I think today’s a day to throw on the running shoes. I’m still not up to 100% health, but I’m getting closer and closer means that I can exercise on a daily basis again – which makes my heart glow. This less than ideal season has reinforced to me that you really do have to take each day as it comes. As a goal driven individual, this can be difficult from time to time, but it really doesn’t hurt to slow things down and think “hey, what I’m doing: here. Now. This is pretty great”. And to really enjoy those red and gold leaves – because before you know it the pretty little snowflakes will be falling from the sky!

The Jagged Battle of Recovery – Concussion Be Gone!

2011-09-03T14:46:00.002-07:00

BIG PROPS TO CANADIAN KIKA PENDREL FOR HER MOUNTAIN BIKE CROSS COUNTRY WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP TITLE!!! YOU ARE A INSPIRATION TO US ALL GIRL!

September has arrived with a vengeance. Where did my summer go?

I have mixed feelings about having the fall just around the corner (although you wouldn’t believe it given the heat and humidity outside right now!) Part of me is excited because that means that I’ve put in more healing time and maybe my body will be ready to get back to business soon, but part of me is sad that summer is nearly over! But regardless how I feel, it’s here.

The recovery is coming along - not nearly as quickly as I would like, but that would be the story of my season. It’s important for me to keep reminding myself that despite what I want to believe, recovery is not a linear process. At the end of June I made a large step in recovery, now I’m just waiting for another.

There are some days where I feel great and almost “normal” (like when I went shopping in London!) and then there are days where my head hurts, my ears ring constantly, and I’m happy to sleep most of the day away. The good news is that those days are becoming fewer and are farther apart. The bad news is that I’m not at a point where I can realistically resume training as I had been planning.

Each day is a bit of a game. I’m playing jump rope with the line of what I can handle. Sometimes I win. Other times I don’t! Through this tedious process, I have deduced that it is primarily my visual processors (yup, super technical term) that tire the easiest and consequently give me the most grief. This means daily activities such as driving, where you are constantly making visual calculations of speed are tiring, while fun endeavours such as video games are out. Too much of anything and I find myself sleeping over 12 hours a night and headaches are still a far too familiar frustration.

Still I keep up the hope that the next big health step will come. I dream about riding my bike in the near future and savouring every minute of it: the wind on my skin, the spin of my legs and the plain freedom that it brings. In the meantime I try to remember to take care of myself. That as one friend put it, I’m not doing “nothing”; I am “recovering”. How do you keep your stress levels down when doing nothing is a stressor? Hopefully I will take away new general relaxation and recovery techniques with me into the years to come of my cycling career and life that lie ahead.

As for the impending arrival of fall? I really do love September – and not just because it’s the month that harbours my birthday! It’s traditionally the start of new and exciting life things, Starbucks rolls out the Pumpkin Spice latte and it brings a bite to the Ontario air that reminds me of home in Calgary. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it will also bring the start of training for my 2012 season – but I know my body will tell me when it’s ready!

Weddings

2011-08-11T09:05:00.003-07:00

I'm back in Ottawa...well at least for a few days!

I just had the most wonderful trip to Calgary for Becca's wedding. She looked stunning!

As a picture is worth a thousand words - there you go. Unbelievable dress eh? I can't wait to see all her pictures :)

It was so much fun to be there and experience her special day. It was full of awe at how gorgeous she and Tim were, excitement for them to experience how special marriage is and reminiscing as it reminded me of my wedding. Just an incredible day all around. I love weddings. The family time is awesome and the celebration itself is just great.

Now I'm at home trying to recoup the sleep that I opted out of over the last week before jetting off to England with Susan. I'm excited for the trip as it will be great to spend some more time in England (this time for a more positive reason!)

My recovery is going well. I'm thinking that I should be good to start some activity in the next few weeks. My last headaches were at the end of June and my fatigue seems to be the one latent symptom - but as long as I pay attention and manage it well, I should be on my way to normalicy.

Also - as this week has been full of emotion and ups and downs, I would like to have a memory shout out to Grammy Skeet, who passed away early yesterday after a struggle with dimentia. She will be missed.

The Little Victories

2011-07-26T11:41:00.002-07:00

So last week while the rest of the team was ripping it up in Europe at the Internationale Thüringen Rundfahrt der Frauen I managed to keep myself busy on this side of the Atlantic. My days consisted of being a Tour superfan in the morning and acting as a landscaping foreman for my husband and his friends in the afternoon as we put a patio into our backyard. But first, let me back up for a minute to explain why I’m at home here in Canada instead of battling it out in the small streets of Europe.

Quite simply put: This has not be the season that dreams are made of (unless your dreams are drastically different from my own). Let’s rewind about 4 months ago to the middle of March when 2011 held infinite possibilities for my cycling career. I was coming off a fantastic winter training base of the trainer and Nordic skiing (a new combo for my new home in Gatineau, Quebec). My fitness was great and I was looking forward to an extraordinary team camp in San Diego with a great group of people who I am lucky enough to call my team! Unfortunately it was not written in the stars (despite my love of Tinie Tempah) for me, as after only 1 hour of great team riding at camp, I took a header off my bicycle at 50km/h that resulted in a separated shoulder, copious amounts of roadrash and a fairly serious concussion. I didn’t understand the repercussions at the time, but today, I’m still recovering from that violent meeting with the ground and my season was over before it really started.

Over the last few months, I have found myself identifying greatly with Sidney Crosby (if you’re Canadian or a hockey fan) as well as more recently with Jani Brajkovi, Tom Boonen and Chris Horner (if you’re more of a Tour junkie, like yours truly). Luckily of late, I seem to have turned a corner. Little as it may be, I have stopped having headaches in the last month and I’m starting to live more like a “normal” person. I’m not back on my bike yet and I still have a number of contraindications – but I’m hoping to be there in the next month or so as to mount my cyclocross assault. Each day is a test of my ability to balance the activity I think I should be able to handle with the rest I know I need and the consequences are rather unpleasant if I misjudge what I am capable of accomplishing. I’m learning to be easier on myself and accept that I need more rest than I think I do- a valuable lesson for an elite athlete!

I’m lucky to have had an incredible group of people to support me through the last few months including my husband, cat, family and my team. It’s coming back bit by bit :) and in the meantime, the boys in France have kept my passion for the sport fuelled. I have been a complete SUPERfan of the Tour this year. From watching the scary footage of Chris Horner’s crash to the captivating sprints and fellow Specialized team HTC’s killer leadout for Mark Cavendish to the incredible down to the wire GC fight, this year’s Tour has been the most entertaining Tour I can remember!

But if I’m going to be honest, it’s the sprints that get my blood pumping – quite literally. I have so much respect for the whole HTC leadout team with special props to Mark Renshaw – and I just LOVE watching Cavendish sprint. My heartrate must get up to around 140bpm as they rush towards the line. It’s the best replacement I can think of to being able to do it myself. In the meantime, I’m making great plans for our team for 2012 where I’m dreaming of Juvederm-Specialized replicating the train to deposit Joanie or myself to the line – it’s going to be awesome!

However, for now, I’m concentrating on the small victories. The days when I wake up and I’m ready to tackle the world (or in my case housecleaning) are becoming more common and I look forward to getting back on my bike to train for victory in 2012. I’m not a big fan of the “everything happens for a reason” cliché, but more of the, as my friend Alena puts it “you will learn something from your tribulations” life lesson. I have yet to find an eloquent wording for these past months, but I’m sure in retrospect it will make me a stronger, more tenacious person and athlete. I will take the wisdom gleaned from this year forward – so watch out, 2012 is going to be my year!

You can also check out this post on iamspecialized.com - it's pretty cool company to keep!

Turning a corner

2011-07-26T08:37:00.004-07:00

Hiya blog! Long time no see. Sorry about that. If I'm to be 100% honest, it's been hard to post over the last few months as my general attitude has not been as positive as I would have liked and I don't like to put my negativity out there. Reading about someone moping is not fun - so I omitted it.

That having been said, I have had some great experiences over the last little bit. About a month ago I ended up going to England at the last minute - not for the happiest of reasons - my Gran had a stroke, but it was great to go over and see the family and she's doing fab now. I had a fabulous time with my Mum, Gran and Grandad (as well as various other England-based family members) for 10 days. I always love going over to Ruston Parva - it feels like home. Plus it got me away from Ottawa where I contstantly think about getting on my bicycle! :P We went on walks in the countryside, admiring the beautiful poppies, roses and baby livestock. Gorgeous! My Mum also woke up the latent knitter in me by suggesting that we knit a jumper for my cousin Howard's upcoming baby's arrival.

Knitting has proven to be a great passtime for my concussed self. It allows me to be obsessive about something that doesn't require any physical activity or any tremendous amount of mental work. I'm loving it! Which is a bonus as I had a good deal of airline time going from Ruston Parva all the way to Vegas for Becca (my sister)'s stagette in Las Vegas! Yeah baby! It was incredible. Three nights, eight girls and NKOTBSB in Vegas. That's right - you heard me NKOTBSB. Musical obsessions from all three decades of my life. I heart them all.

It all came to an end far too soon, and unfortunately my concussion kept me in bed far too much to be able to do Vegas justice and I was unable to boy band hunt after the show. Sad face.

Luckily there was much television to keep me busy once I got home with the Women's World Cup AND the Tour. There were a number of days where I would wake up, go to the television (via the coffee maker) and watch the Tour from 8am until 11:30, have lunch and watch soccer from noon until four. In fact, I was lucky that I was concussed or else I would have felt incredibly guilty for dedicating so much of my life to the television - but as it was, it was a fantastic recovery! HA! At least that's what I'm sticking to.

Going forward, I have more travels in my future including some more time back in Calgary to get ready for Becca's wedding on August 6th (eeek!!! Exciting!) and then off again to England with Susan (my lovely mother-in-law) to help with some research for her new book and to check out London and visit Ruston Parva again :). All in all some great ways to keep my ming off the bike until the beginning of September when I'm hoping my birthday present will be to get back on the bike! WAHOO! Fingers crossed!!!

As for now, I need to get my hinie off the computer so I can do a little gardening before the impending thunder shower hits. I'm desperatly hoping that this storm Don't Turn Out the Lights - and if you didn't get that NKOTBSB reference - take a listen to their new song - it's fantastic!

I'm Awesome.

2011-05-24T07:37:00.003-07:00

I think those two words cover it ;)

A little background for you as to why I'm awesome? Alrighty - here she goes...

So it started off with my coach, DK, sending me a link to Kristina Groves' blog. It's a letter that she wrote on her blog to Sidney Crosby regarding concussions - and in my opinion, it sums up my situation quite nicely. I really appreciated her take on everything - so much so that I teared up while reading it. I have found the last few months to be incredibly frustrating and there was some solace in reading that I am not alone.

So just prior to DK sending me this link, I too, suffered a bit of a setback in my recovery. I guess I just pushed too hard and my body said "ah ah ah - you are not ready". Now I feel like I did back at the beginning - to sum it up in one word: FRUSTRATING. I was experiencing all sorts of emotions and felt that more than anything I needed a change of scenery...so I booked a flight to Calgary to see my family (Becca, my sister, just bought a new house - so it was an excuse to go see it) and friends.

On my first day in Calgary, I went to the local Starbucks to meet up with a friend. No more than 10 minutes after we sat down, Kristina Groves walked into the same Starbucks! Now, this isn't as coincidental as you might think, given that my Mum lives a whopping 5km from the Olympic Oval where the National team speed skaters train - but I was surprised. In my head I had wanted to tell her how much her blog entry had touched me - and now, the very woman was standing in the same Starbucks. So I should go tell her, right?

Well in hindsight (with the help of the awkward conversation that ensued when I did talk to her), perhaps I could have approached the situation a little differently. But as it was such a disjointed conversation - it now (now that I am over the embarrassment) makes for a good story...

So yes, that is why I am awesome. Think before you act...or at least speak!

But the message stays the same - and for those of you who have read her blog - my brush with her is somewhat analogous to her brush with Sidney. Cute, right? Oh man, I sure hope so! It has helped me to see that other athletes are going through the difficulties and frustrating times that I am. My good friend MJ warned me when it first happened that I would "feel like I'm making things up, but you're not" and I have had to hold onto those words on a couple of occasions to help me keep my sanity!

So where do I go from here? What is next? The answer is a resounding "I DON'T KNOW". I have no idea on the timeline. I'm desperate to ride my bike and feel good, to push myself and feel fit, and of course to race. But I need to recruit all my patience because I'm dealing with my brain and I won't do myself any favours if I come back too soon.

Therefore, please excuse me if my entries are few and far between these days, as I don't have much to report on. But as soon as my body cooperates, I will be back out there soaking in the rays and making the legs burn. And hey, I've been in Ottawa long enough now that I should really give the cyclocross season a go!

I'm Alive

2011-04-12T10:17:00.002-07:00

Sorry about the lack of recent update. To be honest, there hasn't been much development of interest.

I am, however, alive and back at home recovering. I'm lucky to have two of the most awesome "nurses" ever - the first in my husband who has been awesome with me since I've been home for the last week. Despite being quite bummed that I'm not in Europe - it is nice to be home. The other cuddle-monster is my kitten. It's really hard not to be awesomely happy when you have a purring kitten in your lap (except for when said purring kitten decides to try to take a chunk out of your arm or foot with his fangs). All and all - things are coming around.

I have a great support crew here in Ottawa. Martin Zollinger has been helping me to realign my spin (apparently when you take a header into the ground at 50km/h things tighten up and shift!) and I'm really looking forward to my massage with Craig this afternoon!

The weather has shifted here in Ottawa and I feel it's pretty safe to say that spring has sprung! YIPPEE!

Also - the team has been rocking it up - so while I'm sidelined at least I can live vicariously through them! Since I got home from Redlands, Lex has won Battenkill out east and Denise came second at Harris Roubaix out west! I really wish that I could make it to Calabogie this weekend - but I think I'm going to have to sit out again. I'm recovering, slowly, but surely (did I mention slowly?) but I'm going to err on the side of caution. Need to get out a full length ride before I try to race - which is too bad because I can't WAIT to show off how HAWT the new kits are - and I am enjoying the Hincapie chamoix as well! :)

On that note - my heart goes out to teammie Joanie who was over in Europe and after a great 20th placing on the 2nd stage of a tour in Holland (I'm not even going to try to spell the name), she got caught up in a crash and broke her collarbone. Apparently we both need to learn to stay on our bikes (and the sad part is that we were joking about it before team camp even started!)

But onwards and upwards. As my dorky book of the moment said "life is like an escalator - you just keep going on and up." Well you have to take inspiration where you can right?!?

Back to the Trainer?!?

2011-03-21T12:16:00.008-07:00

The good news: I made it down to team training camp in San Diego last Sunday evening. Got a few awesome rides in with Joanie, Rob and Keirnan Orange and got settled in nicely at our team house on the coast.

The bad news:
Day 1 -
Apparently hitting the pavement at 50km/h has some side effects...

Day 2 -
Damn I really hope this doesn't scar - I'm WAY too vain!

Day 4 -
Heading out for a ride - I scared the dude at the coffee shop I think...

My solution to not get sun on my scar... My teammates are a little embarassed by it...

Day 6 -
Healing up nicely...on a relative scale.

Unfortunately my shoulder isn't cooperating quite as much. The roadrash is healing quite nicely - but I also separated my shoulder so that's taking its time.
Through all this there is a little more good news though:

Crashing on a US military base has its advantages as I was well taken care of, and Specialized makes a damn good product:

Jokes aside - I'm doing really well and I'm just frustrated that the start of my season has been delayed by another week or two. No worries though - it just means that I'm going to be that much more eager to rip it up when it's time to strut my stuff!!!

And so it begins!

2011-03-13T11:13:00.002-07:00

First off, I'm going to apologize about the lack of picture - but the truth is - I'm sitting in Pearson Airport and the sightlines don't really provide for any real excitement. But tell you what I will do. I'll give you the mental image of Wicket via Chris' story from last night. Apparently he was sitting watching TV when he heard a splash, a yelp and then a soggy, wet kitten emerged at high speed from the washroom...or more accurately from the toilet...desperately looking for reassurance cuddles.

Chris informed me of two things: 1) post-toilet cuddles are wet; and 2) post-toilet Wicket is significantly smaller! :P

So back to my original thought: what begins you ask? Well my 2 month journey involving planes, buses and automobiles. I personally would have liked to substitute the bus in the equation for a train, however VIA rail does not let bicycles on the train route between Ottawa and Toronto (feel free to boycott their services on my behalf!) So Friday morning, Chris and I piled into the car and went on down to the bus station (after a lovely stop at the Morning Owl for a flat white...yummm!) and he dropped me off into another world. I was unaware that in order to board the Greyhound, you first needed to contract some kind of infectious disease. Knock on wood, but I don't seem to have caught any of the 48 different cold strains that were flying around the recycled bus air for 5 hours... I would also like to point out at this time that a bus is not either a babysitting service, nor a place to do your group project (although I wish the folks doing their case study on Ginny with AIDS the best of luck and if they need a stand in - I think I have memorized their little skit).

But I did make it to Toronto where I was saved at a random intersection by my coach DK (the bus blew its break line so we were abandonned about 2km from the bus stop - perfect end to a lovely journey! AWESOME!). We then went to the hotel where I was meeting up with my Dad and Dianne for Dean's end of year final show. It was awesome - super entertaining and great to see (at least part) of the fam.

From Toronto, I continued on the family visit and went to Guelph for the evening to see my newest parental addition before being driven back to Pearson Airport...and I haven't even left Canada yet!!! That brings us to the present where I am waiting in Terminal 3 (which is the lacklustre terminal - there isn't even a STARBUCKS!?!) getting ready to board a plane to San Diego - whoo hooo! Team camp awaits me on the other end and I really can't wait to give my new, lovely Amira its maiden voyage outside! YIPPPEEE! Plus I was getting super stir crazy on the trainer at home. I'm pretty much over winter for this year!

From San Diego the team (Juvederm-Specialized to be precise) heads to San Dimas then Redlands for the first showdowns on North American soil for the year. I love San Dimas - it's fantastic and fun - and then Redlands, which I have decided is the devil I know - so it'll be a blast too. More than anything else I'm really looking forward to working with these girls!

From there - the morning after Redlands (bright and early I might add), Joanie and I are jumping on a place that will ultimately take us to Brussels for a month of European racing. These are races that I have been dreaming about doing for the last 3-4 years - so I'm also super stoked about it! After we strut our stuff in the Canadian National team colours, Joanie and I will return to Arkansas to rejoin our team at the Joe Martin Stage Race...then I get to go home and see my husband and kitten. (At this point I will give a shout out to my unbelievably AWESOME husband who I already miss on day 3 on the road...)

So that's the plan for the next chunk. I can't wait for the awesome stories that will come out of it and the unreal racing that I will get to do. I promise to keep you posted and pictures will feature...but for now...really just imagine our poofy kitten all soppy wet. If you need some help, Youtube "Giving my cat a bath"...it's painful, but priceless!

Beautiful South Carolina

2011-02-27T05:17:00.005-08:00

So I'm not sure if I technically have met my goal of blogging while I was away per se. I have made it to the Greenville airport on the second time around and I'm heading home :( - when I checked in it informed me that it was -11 in Ottawa...a bit of a rude reminder when it has been close (or above) 20 all this week! Dreamlike.

Yesterday I was in heaven sitting on a curb in the parking lot in Clemson drinking a Caramel Machiatto from Starbucks in the sun. Wonderful. It was a perfect respite after a week of lots of leg breaking (and one soul breaking! HA!) hills. The riding down here is amazing. I can't say enough. I wish that I could stay longer - but I am looking forward to heading home.

I mean - come on - how could you not miss those two?!?

The camp was fab - an incredible group of ladies - loved every minute of it and it's been a long time since I've laughed so hard. Some light was shed on the fact that I think I've become a little neurotic with needing order and cleanliness in my old age (I'm sure Chris can attest to this) and may have wigged a few people out with my relentless need to have the dishwasher loaded CORRECTLY. Meh - what can I say...I believe I come by it honestly!

I think I'm going to have people withdrawl after such an amazing week. Good thing that I'm heading to my team launch in Montreal on Friday. Can't wait to get the Amira S-Works - gorgeous. I'm going to show off a little with a picture...I just can't help it!

I guess it's getting close to so-long SC...for now. I didn't even get to exercise my hulu watching time...oh well - I guess I'll have to save that for a few weeks from now when I head down to San Diego for team camp! YIPPEE! But I would have to sign off saying that this trip has been a 100% success...plus travelling sans-bike (thank you Matt and Craig) and carry-on only (I'm sorry Cara) has been a dream. They didn't even try to take away my chamois cream at securtiy. What a great day! The perfect end to an unreal week. :)

New Year's Blog resolution

2011-02-15T11:05:00.004-08:00

That's right folks! It's time for me to let you all know that I'm going to start blogging again. Hmmm...I'm not sure I even believe it myself - it's sort of like the omnious New Year's resolution that I make EVERY year (much like it's going to be THIS year that I turn into a twiggy runway model) and yet sometime between, well from looking at history, April and July things go awry. Fingers crossed that this year is better - seeings as blog posts are at their highest when I'm riding well and the wins are coming in!

Speaking of which - I have a new, exciting cycling home for 2011 - with Team Juvederm-Specialized. The new digs are also responsible for the new look - I had a good time playing around with the Blog template - thank goodness they make it easy for those of us who are less computer saavy.

Years ago Chris and I discovered the "muffin cake" at a lovely internet cafe in Coolangatta, Australia. Last night, for Valentine's Day (one of only about 3 that we have spent together in the 9 years we have been together! Shout out to MJ who has been my Valentine's date for the last 3 years!) I decided to bring back the Muffin cafe in good form - isn't it awesome?

I would like to also give a shout out to the newest addition to our family (and cutest): Wicket Reid.

I'm going to miss him a whole lot when I'm off galavanting on my bicycle in South Carolina next week!

Goal for 2011 #1: Blog while down South! I'll keep you posted to see how it goes!

First win of the year

2010-04-23T13:35:00.004-07:00

So apparently it takes a podium to get me back on the blog - mostly I just like the pictures :P. I constantly resolve to myself that I'm going to start blogging more often - well you all know how well I've been keeping that promise! :P

Now that the preamble is out of the way - Sunday was a blast. It's always a blast when you win - especially when things don't work out exactly how you would have liked. The race was fun - I teamed up with Karol Ann (who is off to race with her team Vienne Futuroscope in France next week) for the Calabogie Classic. We worked together to cover all the attacks launched by the Stevens and 7th Groove teams (I was really impressed with the level of aggression!) and very quickly a break stuck. I was the lucky one up the road and my compatriots were Allison Lampi (7th Groove) who drove the initial split, Rachel O'Reilley (a VERY strong ex-triathlete) and upcoming Canadian track talent Krista Ruby. The four of us were working well together - which was good, seeings as we got away less that 15km into the race.

I was very happy with how things were shaping up. I had the feeling that we had broken the pack as our lead had been inching up towards a minute with about 25km to go when...man, this is getting tough...maybe I'm not as fit as I thought...15 seconds later: nope, I have a flat. So now things start getting interesting.

I rolled on the flat for most of a kilometer as I watched the three girls, and what I thought were my hopes of winning the race ride away from me. But as I came upon a cluster of spectators by the side of the road I called out saying that I had a flat. One incredibly generous man quickly jumped off his bike and took out the rear wheel while one of the support staff for 7th groove helped me get it into my frame and off and running again. But not before the pack had caught and past me.

To say that I wasn't in the best of moods might have been an understatement, but I put my head down and tried to catch as much of a draft off the race vehicles as possible. Within' 4km I was back on the main pack - which on one hand was great, on the other - I didn't want 4th. I rolled up to Karo and told her I had a flat (she looked almost as impressed as I felt) and so we started to up the pace and try to bridge back up to the girls up the road. The rest of the pack was restless and before long we had a good race going on - unfortunately to the detriment of my previous breakaway companions.

We brought the girls back with a few laps to go. The race remained quite aggressive and on the final lap Karo instructed me to sit in and rest up for the sprint. She covered the front for me and set tempo for the last few 2km. This made my job really easy as all I had to do was sprint. I knew that there was a good headwind coming down the homestraight, so I kept repeating to myself to be patient. I wasn't 100% that I knew how to do this sprinting thing anymore, but with 300m to go my instincts took over. Here is a picture:

As I said, it's always a blast to win - and congrats to Sarah Coney who took 2nd and Jen Stephenson who rounded out the podium - both of them worked really hard out there and deserved their successes.

So I've spared you all the excitement of getting back into the racing scene at San Dimas (it was SO much fun to race!) The subsequent soul sucking drive from L.A. to Ottawa (highlight was DEFINITELY Nebraska where I got pulled over for going 81 in a 75...then when I was trying to make the time pass as I could not speed anymore - I had only 4 radio stations available to me: 3 country, 1 pro-life = awesome). Chris and I then moved into our new digs in the Gatineau (first house buying experience also awesome) and now I've jetted off yet again down south to Georgia. I'm here for two and a half weeks and will have 7 days of Speedweek crit racing followed by 4 days of Joe Martin. Fun times ahead - I'm so stoked to be back on the scene!

Signing off from the Dancing Goats Coffee Bar in Decatur, GA (my life is AWESOME)...

Nothing like a little reprieve

2010-01-28T19:13:00.004-08:00

So yup - I'm now right up there with the infamously BAD bloggers. I can say this with certainty as my life has changed a good deal since I last blogged.

First off - the biggest change in my life has got to be that I caved and moved across the country to be with Chris. Now I live here:

Okay - so you caught me...I do not live in the Canadian parliament - but I do now live in Ottawa - the Canadian Capital. That having been said, I'm busy wintering in Tucson (because apparently I'm acutally 75), but more on that later.

Chris and I are in the process of becoming real grown ups. We have purchased a house and will be moving in at the end of March - so very exciting. We will also be residents of Quebec - which fits in nicely as I will be racing for Specialized Mazda Samson next year - also a Quebec team!

My introduction to Ottawa was the CRAZY cyclocross series. Things that I learned:
a) Ottawa people (can someone help me out and let me know what people from Ottawa are actually called?) are fervently in love with cyclocross;
b) I am not in love with cyclocross;
c) The courses in this part of the world are more soggy, grassy and involved a good deal of running; and
d) I do not like this type of course. I miss South Surrey and being good at cyclocross.

So once my dreams of that pursuit were quashed I started to look forward to ski season. I got 1 week of skate skiing (on stellar new equipment which was an AWESOME Christmas present from Chris' parents) before heading back to Calgary to prep for the wedding.

Ahhh the wedding. It was awesomely epic. I'm really not sure that a picture can put it into words - in short it was the best day of my life to date. So much fun to dress up all pretty like and have everyone that I love in one place. And to marry such a man as Christopher...I'm a lucky, lucky girl. Okay, that's my sappy girl moment.

Despite my belief that no photo can represent this fantastic day - I needed to gratuitously put in a photo that shows off my dress. Because I am in love with it. Becca's shoe are also pretty fabulous. Becca makes the photo cut because she was a FANTASTIC maid of honour - I don't think I would have made it through the day without her. I am also really lucky to have such a wonderful sister in my life!

If you're iching to see more photos - which I'm sure you are - EVERYONE wants to look at me (HA!) check out our photographer's blog. Rachel is a friend of mine back from when I was a junior cyclist - she is awesome and it was fantastic to see her again - she also happens to be a fabulous photographer. Check it out here.

Which brings me to Tucson where I am trying to desperately rebuild my sad little body from last season's "mishap". So far so good - if nothing else I'm enjoying the sunshine! With all this extra time on my hands - here's to hoping I start being a better blogger... I do enjoy it when exciting things are happening. I might just have to start taking more pictures too...

So that's the update for now! Signing off from Tucson...man, I wish I had some chocolate...

Change of Pace

2009-08-20T21:27:00.002-07:00

So it's official. My 2009 cycling season is complete...well except for my potential clandestine cyclocross season - but I haven't decided as of yet so we'll see. I'm a little sad to see the end of it - but at least it was super successful so that makes it easier.

It has also given me a little more time to concentrate on the other things in my life - like wedding planning! YAY! This picture is from the most wonderful "soiree" that Chris' parents put on for the two of us in honour of our engagement/wedding. It was fantastic and a blast - not to mention a ridiculous amount of wonderful food!

Life it treating me well and my body is slowly, but surely mending itself - and I'm getting a good deal of reading in - and I've been so lucky as to have time to re-read the Twilight series. I love it. So fantastic. Life is good! ;)

2 Wins in a Row :)

2009-06-22T04:32:00.003-07:00

Since getting home from PEI I have been enjoying a great deal of time lazing about on Chris' couch here in Ottawa. I've been enjoying some good weather, some fantastic, uninterrupted internet time and of course some fun with the Christopher. I'm still a little brain dead from the fatigue of the last month - so I think I'll stick primarily to picture telling. Above was me chilling with some reporters post-PEI stage win. I think I was a little excited. There is a video of my talking to one reporter - but talking is an inaccurate statement as I believe that YELLING would more aptly describe what I was doing. The first time I watched it I was incredibly embarrased....so I'm not going to put the link on here - but know it's out there ;)

Anyways, yesterday I raced the Preston Street Criterium in the Little Italy area of Ottawa. The weather was CRAAAZY with some torrential downpours - but only in showers, and it cleared up quite nicely for the end of the race. Now, living in BC, we race in the rain a fair amount - but it still scares me a little - especially when I'm racing with a bunch of Ontarians (of which Chris' comment was that in his whole life he figures he raced in the rain in Ontario a grand total of 6 or 7 times). So I went to the front off the gun and didn't really let more than 2 or 3 people get in front of me. About 6 laps in there was a crash behind me and one of the masters racers I know pulled up beside me and said "don't worry - he'll get a free lap." At that point I figured out that we were in a break - which I was more than happy with. We kept working well together and built up a 20 second lead fairly quickly - and just before the end of the race we lapped the field.

Due to some confusion at the end (we caught the main field on the last lap), I got a little gapped at the finish and didn't manage to beat any of my breakaway companions in the sprint - but to be honest I was pretty fried in the last few laps anyway!

Honestly, I feel that the race wasn't as hard for the level of wrecked that I feel this morning - but I'll chalk it up to being a wee bit dehydrated (it was MUGGY here yesterday) and that being my first day of intensity on my bike since PEI.

Here's to Nats this weekend - TT on Friday, RR on Saturday - good times to come!

VICTORY!

2009-06-13T13:21:00.001-07:00

I won in Charlottetown baby! Final stage of the Tour de PEI - good times :P

More to come...

One stage to go

2009-05-24T00:57:00.003-07:00

To the tune of "Home for a Rest"

You'll have to excuse me, I'm not at my best

I've been gone for a month, I've been bonked since I left

These so-called vacations will soon be my death

I'm so sick from the bike I need home for a rest.

We arrived in late-April and Belgium was cold

We searched for the web on the side of the road

We never saw nothin' but curious townsfolk
Kept the wind at our backs with the speed of our spokes

CHORUS:

You'll have to excuse me, I'm not at my best

I've been gone for a week

I've been bonked since I left

And these so-called vacations

Will soon be my deathI'm so sick from the bike

I need home for a rest

Take me home....

Elsy Jacobs our first race to war
Julie’s break showed that she was surely hardcore
Next up was the Swiss, large mountains would yield
The beautiful lakes and wonderful meals

- CHORUS -

Bern World Cup brought us and the fans to the streets
The three k long hill proved to be quite a feat
Then next down to France with the poppies around
“So What I’m a Rock Star” was the common sound

You'll have to excuse me, I'm not at my best

I've been gone for a month

I've been bonked since I left

And these so-called vacations

Will soon be my death

I'm so sick from the bike

I need home for a rest

Take me home....

The gas tank is empty, L’Aude’ll be over soon
My legs are sore as I stare at the moon

I'm knackered again, come on sleep take me soon

And don't lift up my head 'till the the twelve bells at noon

You'll have to excuse me, I'm not at my best

I've been gone for a month

I've been bonked since I left

And these so-called vacations

Will soon be my death

I'm so sick from the bike

I need home for a rest

Take me home

Outdoor slippers

2009-05-13T07:27:00.003-07:00

Now I was the first to condemn these as a fashion. Well if I'm honest, my sister was the FIRST person to condemn these as a fashion...but I will reluctantly admit (after being on the road for three weeks) that they are conveniant. They are in fact my outdoor slippers.

Outdoor slippers may not sound that exciting, nor helpful to some - but for those of us who are constantly on the lookout for free wireless - outdoor slippers are a key tool. Take right now for instance. After having travelled through Switzerland, down to the mediterranean area in the south of France, I am sitting at a trailer park, under a set of concrete steps...all to bring you this invaluable information.

I think I'm just excited to get online. Racing starts Friday...YIKES! Here goes nothin'!

Grazie Trek. Danke Trek. Merci Trek. Thank you Trek.

2009-05-04T02:11:00.005-07:00

The view from my hotel window in Mendrisio, Switzerland.

Trek is the best company in the world. And I have proof.

They have managed to find me a new frame and it's currently being shipped to my hotel in Switzerland from the Netherlands - go multinational company. I owe them a world of gratitude and I can't explain just how happy I am!

But the beautiful landscapes here in Switzerland might start to explain my fantastic mood. It's gorgeous. The coffee is exquisite and I'm sitting at an internet cafe. This is the life!

Our dutiful mechanic Michel getting one of the girls water before we head out on a ride.

For Lisa: SUR LE POUCE! HA!

Open casket memorial

2009-04-28T10:36:00.001-07:00

Chocolate, Waffles and Beer

2009-04-27T11:40:00.003-07:00

Welcome to Belgium!

I am reporting live from Sambreville, Namur, Belgium. It’s gorgeous – I’m loving every minute of the riding and also the hanging out.

Life has kept me on my toes as the airlines busted my frame on the way over here. Nothing like a little bit of adversity while you’re trying to get over jet lag. I haven’t yet had time to have a memorial service for my Trek frame as of yet as I’ve been too busy trying to manhandle the airlines (Lufthansa to be exact) to try to get some cash out of them – but in the meantime I’ve been riding the National team spare bike…very lucky they had it over here – whew!

Other than that we’ve been hanging out in our team apartment for the week (complete with internet poaching that requires us to sit on the curb across the street) before we head to Luxembourg to race on Friday. The riding has been picturesque – including our hill intervals up the Citadelle in Namur this afternoon. I haven’t been feeling terribly chirpy between the cold that I contracted just before I left and the jet lag – but it’s coming around!

The roads in Europe have proved to be everything I had dreamed of – plus a little wind (or a lot of wind as the case may be). I figure with the bike and such (oh yeah my matteress is actually patio furniture – not sure why I chose THAT bed!), I hope I’m getting my bad luck for the trip out of the way.

Tomorrow’s a recovery day and I think we’re going to venture into town to find us some world-famous Belgium chocolate…I’m sure that it won’t disappoint. I mean they have chocolate in EVERYTHING (especially if it’s a breakfast cereal) so it must be good chocolate!!!

Until next time!

Ahhh Redlands - I guess you're alright after all! ;)

2009-03-29T17:29:00.004-07:00

Following my last capture all post - I decided to actually keep y'all updated on what's going on. As I believe I previously mentioned, after about 10 days in Tubac, I headed with the Canadian National team over yonder to California (where the temperature has been more moderate!) to take the line at the Redlands Bicycle Classic for the second year running and see if I could take a little dignity back after an excruciatingly painful race last year.

To say that I improved on last year's performance would be an understatement. I confuddled myself in the prologue by completing the 5km (uphill) prologue in a time 45 minutes faster than last year - and to be honest that was my first indication that I have brought a much stronger skill set out to play this season. Friday's roadrace was the race of my life. I believe I finished around 36th in a small group of stragglers just over a minute down from the winner. The day was hard with a couple of challenging climbs and some killer wind - but the conditions played to my strengths and I was stoked at the end of the day. Especially stoked as my major concern going into Friday's race was simply to make the time cut so that I could start the crit on Saturday!

Going into this race, I told myself that I was coming to Redlands to see what I had, but most importantly I was here to contest the crit. I had difficulty falling asleep on Friday night as I was so stoked on my performance from the day before, but I must have got enough sleep! The plan for the race was for me to help Joelle and give her a leadout at both the intermediate halfway sprint as well as the final (at this time I would like to give Joelle super props for her 10th place on Friday's Beaumont roadrace). Now, in the crit, I'm afraid I wasn't able to help her out, but she managed to place 6th regardless and I followed shortly behind her in 8th. All and all a great day at the office :)...which takes us to the Sunset Loop. But I mean really, what does one say about the Sunset Loop??? My first marker of accomplishment was when I was still with the group when the "neutral" car pulled off (after about 8km of climbing) as last year I wasn't able to hold on to the group for the start!

I managed to stay with the main pack until the 5th lap (with a good deal of chasing on the downhill I might add - thanks to the girls who helped me stay in contention for as long as I did!). But alas at the start of the steep pitch on the 5th lap I was completely toasted...I'm not sure if it had something to do with my lack of food consumption as I had been concentrating so hard to stay with the group (I will totally admit this is a rookie mistake!!!) Luckily enough I found a couple of super awesome girls who towed me around for the remainder of the 9 laps and we made our way down to the finish line. I will save EVERYONE my thoughts on the fact that we made it within about 250m of the line and then we were diverted off course for the boys to start (they were not pretty thoughts!), but I'm super stoked to have finished! Before today, I was okay with the thought that I may never finish the Sunset roadrace at any point in my cycling career! Also props out to Carrie and Sarah who rode likes STARS today - I'm so proud of you!

So yeah, it's been a week of surprises and pleasant ones at that! I'm stoked to start my season so strong (and it makes up for not getting to do the first Spring Series!!!) Thanks to Vince and Serge for taking care of the team for the last 2 weeks and also to my teammates for such an awesome experience. It was truly a fantastic group of girls full of positive energy and I will miss you when I get home :) But above all I would like to give a SUPER SHOUT out to Robert - the best host housing dude I have ever had. Not only was your house beautiful and welcoming - but you have made our time here that much better! Oh yeah and I will forever owe him for driving myself and a few fellow BCers to LAX really early tomorrow morning. Yes, he is da bomb!

But before I head back to the rain, I'm making a short wedding week trip back home to Calgary where I hope to get all sorts of wedding related tasks accomplished! I'm STOKED to see my family and really excited to get to check out the reception venue and hopefully find my dress! So the fun just keeps on rolling - hope all is fantastic with everyone!!!

Don't Forget Your Passport!

2009-03-23T11:59:00.010-07:00

And the title of this blog is more than a TV show played on TLC...it's actually sage wisdom - but perhaps I should start with a wee update of what I've been up to for the last few months before I get into the nitty gritty.

My travels commenced in early December with a unplanned trip out to Hawaii to help my sister and Mum get ready for the Honolulu marathon. Yes, I took that bullet and hung out in Maui with my bike for a week - oh how difficult is my life! The day after I returned home the snow started to fall in Vancouver (and we ended up with CRAAAZY 2 foot snowbanks...where do I live again?), but luckily I was only home for 48 hours before jetting off to England for some family fun time!

The purpose of our sojourn in England was to attend the first marriage of one of mother's parent's offspring (read: cousins on my maternal side). There were plenty of jokes about the fact that Karen is the youngest of the seven of us and the first to really grow up! Below is a picture of us in chronological age from Karen to Rosie - there are a number of other photos floating around from over the years that are far cuter - but I don't have access to a scanner!!!

The ceremony was fantastic and the party afterwards was even better! So great to spend time with the fam and have Granny show us all how to party it up! However, for me, by far the most exciting part of the trip was when my dreamy then-boyfriend asked me to marry him! The night before Karen's wedding we went out for dinner and I came home with a beautiful ring!!! We shocked my Mum - it was quite entertaining!!! Unfortunately three days later Chris and I parted ways in a rushed goodbye in the Heathrow airport (so romantic!) as I returned home and he jetted off to start his new flashy job as a policy analyst with the federal government in Ottawa. :(

So back to Vancouver...full of snow...BLAH! Seriously - this winter has been spectacularly bad! Lucky for me this has been the winter of training camps and in early February I headed down south for a series of camps starting with Team BC in Palm Springs and then off to Santa Rosa with the Trek team. Santa Rosa was a DREAM!!! I loved it - definately a week to remember. We were treated like rock stars - we even had our own chefs! We sported the awesome new Trek kits (and I'm SUPER bad at taking pictures or else I would have a picture of them for ya!). Bottom line being that it's SO great to be with such a positive, well run organization - I can't wait for the rest of the season! Below is a pic of my perennial teammate Leah Guloien and I gunning for it at the Valley of the Sun criterium in early February. (We're sporting the fabulous Team BC jersey)

HOWEVER, the real great story from the past few months (I'm still working on distancing myself from it to find it funny...not sure if enough time has passed as of yet) comes from my journey between leaving the camp at Santa Rosa and returning home to Vancouver for my 1 week of home time before jetting back down to the National team camp in Tucson (well Tubac to be more precise!) where I am now.

As part of the aforementioned rock star treatment, the Trek Red Truck staff drove the team trailer 16 hours south of the border to Santa Rosa. For anyone who has had to travel with a bicycle, you understand the utter relief of having someone show up with your bicycle unharmed by the airlines (and your pocket isn't assulted either!) While I didn't send my bike home with the crew (I was staying a few extra days in Marin county), I did send my very large duffel bag home - hoping that the airlines would be less extravagent with their baggage fees if I only had a bike bag to load.

That evening as we were heading out in the team van for dinner we were contemplating whether or not we should have locked up the rental house. We had yet to have done so during the trip, but I decided to make a joke and point out that while the bikes were now gone, it was only the easy stuff to steal that was left - like laptops...and passports. Right, passports - OMG...NOOOO!!! At that very second I realized that I, being oh so brilliant had shipped my passport back to Canada in the Trek trailer.

At this point I would like to point out that in general, I like to think of myself as a responsible, organized and intelligent person. Shipping one's passport back home is not behaviour fitting of someone with ANY of those traits! Needless to say, the following 48 hours were on the stressful side. I called (and in this order): Steve (who was driving the trailer home), Chris (who had just landed in Vancouver to come visit me!), my Mum (who can fix EVERYTHING...right?), my Dad (who has similar magical powers to that of my mum), Air Canada, Vancouver International Airport, the Canadian Border Services Authority, the Canadian Embassy in San Francisco and my coach Jeremy. There were a mixture of responses - mostly empathetic...and generally confused and landened with "how exactly did you do that?"

We tossed around a number of options on how to deal with the problem, but in the end Chris ended up scanning me a copy of my passport and my parents (who decided on a whim Friday evening to spend the weekend in Victoria) took my passport to the WONDERFUL folks at Air Canada who greeted me off the plane with it.

So in the end: no harm, no foul. However, I would still advise that you keep your passport with you while travelling!!!

And on that note, I bid you adieu from Tubac, Arizona with my passport in my purse!

National Challenge Champs

2008-08-28T12:08:00.002-07:00

You are checking out the very first Canadian Women's Team Pursuit Champions! Yesterday Steph, Laura and I laid it down to win our first event of Track Nationals over the 3km distance. We qualified in a time of 3:49.3 with a few errors leaving room for improvement in the finals where we rode faster and smoother to take the gold and the snazzy Atac jerseys that you see us sporting above.

For reasons that I do not fully comprehend, our event wasn't a "real" National Championship - regardless of the fact that there were 5 teams in competition AND the event is run at both the World Cup circuit and the World Championships. Regardless, Steph Roorda, Laura Brown and myself are the Canadian National record holders in the event! HA! We caught our opponents in the gold medal final with 1.5 laps to go - it's too bad though, I would have loved to see the time that we were setting down!

It's a good start to the weekend - let's hope I can build from here!

Oh yeah - and for those who are aware that I'm a brutally bad blogger when it comes to consistency - not much has happened over the last few months - I swear...I've actually been at home and catching up on my sleep! Well I guess there was a little bike racing in there too.... ;)

2008 Canadian Criterium Silver Medallist

2008-07-01T17:42:00.002-07:00

And here's a pic of the podium with my buddy Steph in 3rd! We raced hard and in the end Merryl took us on the uphill drag. Congrats Merryl - if I had to be beat by anyone - I'm glad it was you!

I'm hanging out in Quebec city with my Mum and sister (who arrives on Wednesday) for the next few days...mind you, I'm not all that much fun - I ride, sleep, eat and then waste time until it's socially acceptable to eat again! Today was a day exploring the hotel bed - now that I'm not in a crusty hotel room in Beauce I'm hoping to sleep a little better.

Next race: Saturday for the Nationals RR. It's a good course for me - so I just gotta rest up and get ready to go HAAAARD! Then I'm home for Superweek...it's been a great trip - now I'm looking to cap it off with a BANG!

Coupe de la Paix - Meneuse du Classement General (mais avec des accents aigus)

2008-06-23T17:49:00.009-07:00

Coupe de la Paix - General Classification winner! Check out the MONSTER trophy I got for winning the overall! Here I am with the wonderful Lemieux family that has hosted me while I've been here in Montreal. Special thanks to Catherine who has graciously allowed me to take over her appartment (and internet connection) for the duration of my stay - it was also awesome to spend some time with her!

I brought me home some hardware on this one. Yesterday and today I finished second (yesterday first in the field sprint as Karol-Ann Canuel of the Specialized team broke away in the closing laps of the race and held it) and today Joelle Numainville nipped me at the line for first. Going home I'm bringing with me two trophies, three medals, two jerseys, some cash - and I left the beautiful flowers for the Lemieux family. Not a bad haul all in all - and it was a great race to attend to boot!

And as for picture captions: The first is me winning the field sprint in Montreal-Nord for 2nd place. The second picture is the podium from Montreal-Nord with myself, Karol-Ann Canuel and Audrey Lemieux. The third and fourth pictures are me with the Lemieux family - the first with Isabelle and Serge and the second with Catherine!

Check La!

2008-06-19T17:03:00.002-07:00

This is BY FAR the biggest trophy I have ever won (it may be the only one that I personally have ever won).

I'm hanging out in Montreal at the moment and competing in La Coupe de la Paix. Let me tell you - they sure know how to put on a bike race here in Quebec. The first event was last night and it came down to a field sprint. On corner 3 a girl got herself tangled in my handlebars and crashed, giving a few girls a moment's head start. Joelle Numainville (ESGL 93 something) made the best of the situation and got a good 10m gap on me with about 500m to go. I chased hard and closed the gap, but I was unable to respond to her sprint, so she won the drag race up the final hill quite handily.

Today, going into the event, I really wanted to get me the yellow jersey (once you start on a jersey streak - you get greedy!). About 3/4 of the way through the race, after a particular active section where Specialized had attacked left, right and centre, Julie Marceau made the final decisive attack and I went with her. It became evident very quickly that the pack was out of fight and we worked together for the last 13km to hold of the field. In the end, I won by about a tire width as I misjudged my strength on the final sprint and had to count on a well-timed bike toss...but a win is a win! To quote Andrew Pinfold - you only have to be in the front for the final few meters...or centimeters in my case!

I'm pretty stoked as I think this is my first ever win in a breakaway AND I go into the third of four events in Montreal Nord on Sunday wearing the yellow jersey. Plus how could life not be great with that trophy (which weighs a ton BTW) and the flowers?

13 in 14 - A Success!

2008-06-19T16:51:00.004-07:00

If you are curious - that's 13 races in 14 days...and I think I'm finally recovering!

The madness started in Tulsa, OK where I attended Tulsa Tough with my Vanderkitten teammates. Personally that leg of the journey is one I would prefer to forget, but you have to have the bad days to appreciate the good!

After three days of crits in Tulsa, I was off to Montreal for le Grand Tour de Montreal - and there is no rest for the wicked. I left Tulsa at 6pm on Sunday (arrived in Montreal at 3am - but that's another story - although it's a good 'un) and raced in Montreal at 5pm Monday. I joined up with the National team (including VK teammate Moriah) under the direction of Luc Arseneau for the 5 day, 4 stage, Stage Race. It took me a couple of days, but eventually my legs came around and I was able to come 18th in the crit - although I really think I could have done better...but come on man - that finish was worth a WOPPING $20.75...watch out - I am making the big bucks!

From Montreal we made the trek out to PEI by car (about 10 hours by car - 15 hours by bus I would find out on the way back) where we were given 1 travel day and 1 day of rest before starting the Tour of PEI. For me, this was the real highlight of the trip. It was super cool to be in PEI (even got to see Anne of Green Gable's house) and I rode the best I have all season. I started the tour with a 4th place finish behind Rochelle Gilmore (Menkini), Tanja Hennes (Specialized Designs for Women) and Sophie Creux (ESGL 93). However, the more exciting part was that in this case, 4th was NOT the worst spot as I got to sport the top Canadian jersey (as seen above) - lemme tell ya, it was a pretty special feeling.

The rest of the week continued to treat me well as I got another two top 10s (8th in the 3rd roadrace and 10th in the crit after taking myself out in corner 2) and as a team we got MJ into the top 10 on GC to finish 9th! Way to be MJ! It was a great group of girls to work with and I truly enjoyed my couple of weeks. My two requirements for bike racing: 1) to learn, and 2) to have fun - were fully met. A big thanks to Luc, Andrew, Nena and Sophie for keeping everything running smoothly - I was sad to move on back to Montreal.

Watch out PEI - I will be back!

Check out the article on me :)

2008-05-28T07:12:00.000-07:00

It's HERE at Pedal Mag...

BC Cup win #2!

2008-05-26T16:01:00.003-07:00

Yesterday's race ended with me winning the field sprint - only this time I got it right as it was for the WIN...which is WAY more fun than 2nd place :)

My lack of blogging over the last 3 weeks has coincided with a relaxing little break at home - which is rapidly come to an end. On Wednesday I'm heading out east for a 6 week stint that will end with Nationals in Beauce, Quebec. Due to my travels and my dad's exciting summer plans to go to England and Scotland, Dad decided to make the trip out to Vancouver this last weekend to watch me race. I was more than happy to oblige with my second win of the season (and first against a female field) on a flat to rolling course in the south eastern reaches of rural Surrey/Langley. I figure I'm now 2 for 2 for field sprints at the BC Cups I've attended...just gotta make sure that the rest of the race plays more to my advantage ;)

It was fun to race with the girls at home and Marni and Alison respectively represented ValueAct and Aarons on home turf. Dad got a sweet pic of us rolling into the finish where we ended up:
1. Me!
2. Marni Hambleton (ValueAct)
3. Sarah Stewart (Total Restoration)
4. Alison Testeroete (Aarons Pro Cycling)
5. Steph Roorda (Team Giant)

I had a good fun time out in the sun - only real complaint being that the prize money was LAME. I paid $55 (non-late day registration) and for first I only won $125...kinda a brutal return on investment...luckily I'm off down to Tulsa where over three days there is $39,000 in prizes for just the WOMEN - crazy eh? Also if you interested in money - the Banff Stage Race at the end of June is boasting some sick prize moola with $1,400 for the Race win and $400 per stage...too bad I'm out east!

In the South

2008-04-28T19:57:00.002-07:00

Last Thursday, I flew into Atlanta and I'm not 100% sure I knew what I was getting in for. I've been having a bit of "culture shock" being down in the South and all - but in a good way. For instance, on Sunday I tasted grits for the first time and I keep throwing in a "y'all" just to keep it interesting.

Saturday night we raced Athens Twilight - and came away with a VERY impressive result - Jen Wilson took Vanderkitten's first podium of the year with a sprint to third out of an impressive breakaway group. Kele Murdin (who's guest riding for us) came 6th and I sprinted to 10th across the line in the group gallop...which wasn't too shabby considering that coming out of the first corner on the last lap I clipped a pedal (that's what happens when your heart rate has been 205 plus for the last two minutes - NO JOKE) and the bike did a cool maneouver (I learned it from Jenelle on the BMX!) and my wheel smacked the pavement pretty hard. I thought that I had put the thing out of true and I spent the next couple of corners praying that I didn't have a flat. Go figure, all I did was burp the tire so I made it across the line without any casualties...but I'm guessing that might have added a little to the rolling resistance.
Anyways - enough bike racing - I wanna talk about the SOUTH!

First off - this evening we are staying in Beaufort - sounds like a nice place...but remember prounounciation the A-merica way and it it B-U-ferd gorgeous eh? It's my second experience of this type as I was staying with Leigh in Decatur pronounced D-CA-ter...maybe I am not doing it justice...but I have found it entertaining at least!

The race description describes Beaufort as "surrounded by magestic marshland"...I find that to be a funny sentence...but hey, who am I to judge.

Bottom line is that I'm really enjoying the Southern hospitality (if poor pronounciation of French names) so far and I can't wait for the series of races we have coming up over the next 5 days!

Good Old Roubaix

2008-04-14T18:03:00.002-07:00

Harris that is. Alena pointed out to me earlier this week that this was the first year in 6 years that she hasn't taken the line for this event. I missed having her out there - but I will also use this opportunity to give a shout out of congratulations to Alena and Dean on their recent engagement. So I took to the line without my perrenial teammate - or any teammate for that matter...and it was a little frustrating to say the least.

I ended the day in 2nd by winning the field sprint after some good strong teamwork from Giant placed Steph Roorda off the front solo. There was an absence of horsepower in the pack and so a good deal of the chasing was left to yours truly. I have found a few fun pics - but I'm giving super props to Jono's mom for this super pro looking photo.

Needless to say, I'm looking forward to hooking up with the rest of the VKats down in Georgia next week - SE crits here we come!

Jenny 1, Redlands 1

2008-04-12T21:01:00.002-07:00

K, so I'm lame and I'm TOTALLY reusing team camp pictures (pirated from MJ's Facebook) but I wanted a picture - it makes the blog more exciting :P

But onto last weekend - I won't lie - it wasn't pretty folks - but I did come out on top of the Redlands Classic this time! Three stages (plus the prologue) and I got a finish...in with all the sprinters at the bottom of the list - but no DNF - and I'm holding on to that!

On the upside I now have a killer set of wheels on my BH courtesy of Spinergy. They are HAWT - nice white spokes and all - I'm liking. And for another shameless plug - my Specialized helmet. Chris has noted that he can see my entire head through the helmet - but it's the comfiest thing I have ever had on my head - partially because it's nice and light and ACTUALLY FITS my head. Neat concept I know - but it does!!!

Now I'm chillin and getting ready to defend my title at Harris Roubaix tomorrow morning. I'm up against a tough contingent of my old team :( the Giant girls and the other strong women of BC cycling - notably Sarah Stewart and her Total Restauration team and the Trek team AND a great number of other girls whom I'm sure will make things rather difficult for me tomorrow. But I've had a lovely dinner of spaghetti and homemade pesto (made by yours truly and I'm quite positive I will never be able to have store bought pesto ever again!). Should be a good one.

And for now I'm off to bed - hoping that my legs recover that little bit more from the evil hills of southern California by tomorrow's race!

REST WEEK!

2008-03-27T09:27:00.003-07:00

Yay - I made it!

Now I have less than a week before I conquer my race nemisis - the REDLANDS CLASSIC.

Mind you, this time I am WAY more prepared, but I'm still a little frightened and I'm readying myself to battle my demons from two years ago when I was time cut on the 5km "Stage 1". Good times!

In the last week I've made important discoveries - like - since I purchased my car last June, I have ridden more kms than I have driven. So the next time I'm trying desperately to "integrated with regular society" and someone asks how much I ride - I can tell them that in a year I ride more than I drive...and I drive enough to own a 2007 Versa.

The real question at this point is whether it costs more to fuel my car at $1.20/litre or to provide me with food...

That gave me a something to ponder while training with a great group of Junior+ athletes (the official age was U20) put together by Jeremy, last week. It was a fun to train with a different group and it was good motivation for the end of a build. The boys were entertained by my Driven shifters - I love it! It's so much fun to have a product that people aren't used to seeing - it gets lots of attention. Plus I like that I can shift down with my pinky finger when I'm on the hoods!

I'm chilling out this morning as part of my "makeshift" weekend as I am usually more busy on Saturday and Sunday with my "real job - ie bikin'" and so every now and then I need to relax during the week. Going to head out later this am (it's supposed to rain this aft, so I better get out before that!) for some power intervals. Yeee haw!

Here's to the start of 2008 - GO VANDERKITTEN!

SO CLOSE!

2008-03-17T17:50:00.002-07:00

This here photo in the Langley Times was SO CLOSE to being SO COOL - it's from the first weekend of racing where I won! - check it out

This weekend went okay. Snake roadrace was AWFUL - but I made it through...in order to go chill out on Bradner road on Sunday - I ended up 5th...wish I had done better, but you win some you lose some. :)

The kittens had a go of things down in CA this weekend, but were the victims of bad luck - especially Lizzer who has a multi-coloured face and bottom - feel better soon!!!

Ahhh, if only I were insightful

2008-03-10T13:51:00.002-07:00

The days when I am looking to procrastinate (much like today...) I spend WAY too much time surfing the net. Actually that is likely a true statement without any qualifications - I get up in the morning and check my email, Pedal, Cyclingnews, Canadian Cyclist, The Weather Network, and when I'm feeling intelligent, CBC.ca. Then I trundle into work and turn on the computer - where I intermittantly check those same websites throughout my 5-9 hour tenure (depending on my training load and my ability to stay focused on the task at hand...) When I really don't feel like doing anything I start checking out people's blogs. In all honestly, it's a pretty scary world the internet - you can learn a good deal about people you've never met.

All this being said, the number one thing that strikes me when I read other people's posts is - I'm boring. I can give race reports most weekends and beyond that...well...I could give tax tips? Although I'm fairly sure that would scare off anyone who wastes their time checking out what I have to say.... That, and I never have poignant, insightful rants. I guess some people have it - and well, I don't. Not to say that I don't have strong opinions (which I do), that I am more than willing to share (which I will!), but I just don't see myself sitting down to record my whitty banter.

So now that I've shared my inadequacies - this last weekend was the first full weekend of Spring Series. The best news of the weekend: Armstrong is over! It's a good time...it's actually hill repeats that someone decided to disguise as a race - maybe I'll like it more when I remove half my torso to lose 25lbs - until then...I'm stoked that it's over - and that I survived - and that I rode quite well! YIPPPEEEE. Props to Kika Pendrel who stayed with the front group of the Bs!

In all honesty - the day before was more my cup of tea with the roller Zero Ave course. In the end I was 4th in the sprint which is better than a kick in the pants. I came around the final corner (about 300m from the line) too early in the group and had to lead it out up a 3% rise from 250m. I gave it, but was punked at 50m and 10m to go by the rounding out of the podium - but I guess I'll live ;) On to next weekend of Snake Hill...because Armstrong's not hard enough!

The Most Elusive and Lucrative Win of My Career

2008-03-02T18:48:00.003-08:00

Each spring, up here in Vancouver, BC the largest development team in the area - dEVo - puts on a lovely set of 10 races held over each and every weekend in March called the Spring Series. Generally the weather is a little off of nice (read torrential downpour) and hypothermia is not unheard of...okay, well now I'm being a little melodramatic, but they do tend to provide true Canadian tough conditions.

This morning close to 300 riders congregated for the first roadrace of 2008 - River Road - Spring Series #1. I went in with a little bit of apprehension as last year I made the break with about 30km to go and was dragged along to the finish (with some moral support from both Cody Campbell and Jonathan Page) to finish up 3rd (thank you yellow line violator!). So last year's success haunted me a little as I REALLY wanted to upshow myself from 2007 - what with this being my first representation of the Vanderkittens on home turf. The race itself was fairly uneventful. Or perhaps that is not the word as there were more crashes than I could count (Laura get better fast!) and people were trying to attack, but in good cat 3/4 form, EVERYTHING was brought back. Oh - as an aside, at the Spring Series there are only 3 categories for everyone - A, B, C - I take part in the B category with all my buddies in cat 3/4 men, the juniors, the majority of the women, and often anyone else who wants to show ;).

Coming into the last 2km the pack was really very close together, thereby making it rather difficult to move around. On this course the finish line sits about 800m out of the final turn and today we had a good headwind rushing the straight. Consequently, I wasn't too concerned about my positioning out of the final corner as I knew that this one was a sprint of patience. Rounding the corner I was in the top 15-20 and I continued to move up. First to the lefthand side of the road, then I saw it open up to my right and I swooped to that side (doesn't that make me sound like a superhero) - then things seemed to go into slow motion as I realized that I was going to win. I jumped around my last two competitors in the last 50m to take it at the line... by at least 2 inches!

Bruce Denis was a great sport about losing to a girl ;) and Chris was impressed as he has difficulty beating Bruce on the track this winter! Speaking of which - huge props to Chris who was in a 2 man breakaway with 10km to go before his race was called due to a crash victim in the middle of the road.

And with the race report out of the way, why was this the most elusive and lucrative win of my career you ask? Well elusive - come on now - who doesn't want to ROCK the world in March - many people would agree that the Spring Series are the be all and end all of the season (please note the irony!) And for lucrative - well today kids, for my first place finish I took home a big 25 bones! That's right baby, making my net income for the day $(1). I'm not actually complaining as I really enjoy these training races and it's nice to have an opportunity to get some good, cheap racing in!

So now that win #1 of the season on my fancy new BH is under my belt, we up the training and prep for more success!!! PS - I am hoping that maybe there are a few pics online from today - and I will post one later if a suitable one is found.

New Season Resolutions

2008-02-29T20:43:00.003-08:00

I'm gonna reach for the stars here. Sure I would really be proud to eat perfectly and lose those pesky pounds, and I would really love to win a few big races - but what am I REALLY aspiring for this season? I'm going to start blogging more regularly. Yup - I am going to be a blog-o-holic! Luckily the bar from 2007 was set rather low...

The last month or so has been wikked. I had a wonderful week down in the Bay Area meeting all my fellow Vanderkittens - and I am pleased to announce that the team is fabulous. In the 8 days we were down there, I don't know if I've laughed so hard in a REALLY long time (good abs training)! And to top it all off - we came, we saw, and we made noise at the first NRC of the season! I finished up with a prime and a 9th place finish, which ain't so bad for the first time out - and it leaves plenty of room for improvement. Liz matched my prime and Leah sprinted to a respectible 14th place for a GC rider - plus we were good and aggressive - it was a BLAST!

But all that excitement sure took it out of me - and so here I am 10 days later FINALLY getting around to my "report". Mind you, in that time I've really enjoyed getting to know my new beautiful BH bike! So much NEW - so EXCITING! And now MJ is across the pond in France and I have no one to obssess about stuff and food - it's hard to make it through so maybe I will use the blog as an outlet... I am in particular love with my saddle. Dude, I said it before and again - the Specialized saddles are 'da bomb! Hot looking and pleasant to spend hours and hours upon - next week is the real test...riding it for 3 hours around the 200m Burnaby track...I'll let you know how it goes - but I have faith - PLUS I managed to get my old Powertap up and running as a track PT - so that should be fun all around...I just need to make sure I don't become preoccupied with watching the wattage and do something unbelievably dumb/dorky.

So I PROMISE I will keep on top of this here blog - if for no other reason than to share the dorky pictures that get taken of me on the bike (although for the first time out, I'm going to stick to the one of me putting the HURT on!)- but at least our kits are the hottest thing going - so that balances my weird faces out!

If I take away a 1 from 11 that's FIRST...right?

2008-01-19T00:11:00.000-08:00

My bike all pretty and good to go in our stall (pre-flat) Vanderkitten stickers and all!

Steph in the most comfy bed in the world and me in front of one of the stranger signs to have up in a restaurant (Chilli's in case you were curious!)

So here I sit in the hallway of a hotel (the internet doesn't work in the rooms) just after midnight on the evening after my very first TRACK WORLD CUP! It's been a fun week hanging out in what is possibly the nicest hotel I've ever stayed in for riding (and I've been sleeping really well - shall I go so far as to say there is a correlation???) The track here in LA is fun - fast and not bumpy (for which certain parts of my anatomy are pleased after the 6-day) and I'm enjoying seeing all the other teams and nations.

The most interesting part for me has been to see how I react to being in this environment. After a few class A meltdowns in my career I was a little concerned that I would freak out and compromise any chance of racing well. So in the week leading up I waited to feel out of control, I got on the plane and waited, I rode the track for the first time, packed my bag the night before, loaded the car to go to the track, weighed my bike to make sure it wasn't too light, jumped on my rollers to warm up, flatted my rear disk while warming up, watched while Bob (mechanic from the land Down Unda') and Mike saved my life by looking for an alternate wheel, and took my bike to be inspected for the final time - and I still had complete control...it was an amazing feeling - like I finally understood that I am at this level and that I belong here. It hasn't been the slightest bit intimidating - only really exciting! I've been waiting for years to race at this level and I'd built it up to be this unfathomable experience - but it was just another bike race. A bike race that I was 100% ready to do and so excited to be a part of the process.

After rolling a few laps of the apron, we all went to the rail and soon enough we were on our neutral lap. In all honesty - the 20 laps of the race were a bit of a blur. I fought for the wheel a couple of times, and I was pleased that I didn't really get pushed around. In retrospect I probably needed to be a "rung" of girls up the whole time, but you live and you learn. With 2 laps to go it was fully on and as I came round with 1 to go, I felt gased, but kept going. Two girls came around me in the final 100m and as I crossed the line I looked up to count heads - to see 10 in front of me...being 3 too many...

All that being said - I was really quite happy with the race. I would have preferred to make the final - I won't lie, but for my first shot - I felt like I did things well. I was SUPER happy with my preparation and the process and I have taken a few lessons with me for the next time out. I really wish I could race the points race tomorrow to test out my lessons, but instead I'm going to be a super cheer section for my teammates Steph and Julia. Being a spectator has its advantages as well (like not being stressed out when I'm still up at 12:26 from a Red Bull induced stupor) and I can learn as much as possible for my next World Cup - because there will be another!

Now I just need to start looking for a track team for the 2008-2009 season....

I'm a VANDERKITTEN!

2008-01-11T19:03:00.000-08:00

So here's the thing about giving people your blog address - it means that you should probably update it more than once every five months...so I'm going to have to work on that...

Luckily, life is ramping up for me and I have a bunch of rather exciting life (read: cycling) events going on at the mo'. The top of my list is being on the VANDERKITTEN women's team for 2008. The team has incredible management and the girls are supercool and I am STOKED! So to ease all the questions - no that's not our kit for the season - apparently the kit is going to be even cooler (although they had me at pink plaid), but we're waiting until the team camp for the unveiling...so I'll keep you updated.

Also - completely unrelated (aside from the kitty theme) - aren't my shoes COOL?!? While they are not technically Vanderkitten, they are still unbelievably cool and the fact that they match is a plesant side effect!

Okay - that was my forray into the regular world - back to cycling...so I'm heading down to LA on Tuesday to compete at my first World Cup on the track! I'm super stoked - it's going to be so much fun! Friday afternoon is the scratch race and, yes, I'm super stoked.

On a side note - a survey I filled out recently had me list my guilty pleasure - at the time all I could come up with is a book and ice cream in bed...but on second thought - it's bumping out on the couch watching some drivvel...much as I am doing right now - watching Degrassi: the Next Generation. I'm not sure why I love the show...but I do. I'm also going to give My So Called Life a shout out as Becca gave me the full series for Christmas and I'm reliving my high school years...Jared Leto and all (he is HOT!)

Here's to a KILLER 2008!

Busy time in July

2007-08-08T11:14:00.000-07:00

So, I'm going to be a complete cheater and just adjust an update email that I sent out - I figure it details what I have been up to AND I don't have to rewrite it. I am tired...what can I say?? This is a pic of me sprinting to 2nd at the Yaletown Grand Prix out of a 6 person break.

July was BIKE month as I totalled 12 days of racing (not quite the 20 Tour days, but a whole lot for me!). It was a great time and I pulled out some very consistent results - the latest of which being on the weekend where I won the final criterium stage of the Fantastic Four BC Cup Stage Race (I knew there was a reason I was waiting to send in an update!)
I kicked off the month with a 2nd place finish at the Yaletown Grand Prix (despite a good crash in the opening laps) where I sprinted across the line behind Gina Grain (2005 Silver medallist in the Scratch Race on the track and 2007 National Road Race Champion) - a position that would become rather familiar in the weeks to come.
Later that week we (my Giant team and myself) flew out to Quebec for the National Road Championships where I competed in the criterium and road race events. In both instances I had solid performances, but luck was not on my side and the results were not what I was looking for - but that's bike racing - and it boosted my desire to bring home strong results at BC Superweek.
The first weekend of BC Superweek is a killer. The organizers unleash us on a 3 day stage race on the hills of White Rock. These races are always tough with the increased prestige of the racing over regular BC Cups and the courses are designed with attrition as the deciding factor. Without a doubt I was still tired from the travel and the racing out east and did my very best to survive the racing. The highlight of my weekend was coming 9th in the road race on Monday. The result itself isn't all that impressive, but I felt that it was the hardest day on the bike for me this year. In the end, I was able to fight to come 4th in a field sprint despite being unable to stand up because my legs were so very cooked!
The next two days were difficult as I had to focus on resting up HARD. Wednesday and Thursday were the Tour of Gastown and the Giro di Burnaby (respectively) - two races that I had been targeting all year. For Gastown the weather didn't cooperate and we started the evening show in a cold downpour (which despite what people in Calgary say, is not a regular occurence in Vancouver in July!). Initially I was a little concerned about how the cobbles would handle in the wet, especially after my crashing track record this year, but I ended up being one of only 6 or 7 in the field who never hit the deck. About halfway through, three girls got up the road, including one of my teammates (who would later be dropped) and we were never to see the front two again. This left us sprinting for the third and final podium spot on the day. Coming through the final corner with 300m to go, I was on Gina Grain's wheel (also the winner of the 2005 and 2006 Tour de Gastown). I thought that I was gold and I went to move around her to the right - but I chose the wrong side. As I was going to pass, her leadout girl moved right and I was boxed in and pulled in my brakes...just in time to see two girls fly to the other side of Gina, so I crossed the line in 6th. The following evening I was determined to better my result. Gina and I had a matchup for one of the midrace primes that came down to a bike throw that I eventually one by 3 one thousanths of a second - most likely my highlight of the week! Unfortunately, I was only able to come up with 4th in the final sprint...behind the same 3 girls (in the same order) who beat me in the night before's field sprint.
As there is no rest for the wicked, Friday had us out (in the pouring rain yet again) for the Tour of Delta hill climb. Determined that a minute and a half effort could suit me, I gave it hard for this particular hill climb. I was a little disappointed with my 6th place finish, but it placed me well enough in the omnium and I knew that the next day would suit me better. The crit was once again innondated with rain as we took to the streets of Ladner. My team worked well together and we were aggressive, unfortunately as we came to the line we messed it up a little and I was unable to come around the winner from New Zealand - however myself and my teammate Lisa were able to sweep the rest of the podium. I was happy with the 2nd place, but I really wanted a win! Hoping that the road race would appease me, I went into Sunday tired, but hopeful. On the third lap a group of 8 got away, including myself and my teammate (and eventual winner) Leah Guloien. The group was slowly widdled away by a quick pace and in the end I outsprinted my two companions for 5th place - and 4th place in the omnium. A successful Superweek overall, but much to improve upon for next year.
The morning following the Tour de Delta I was cooked and looking forward to a little rest. Alas, the end of Superweek was less of a sign of a break and more of a signal to switch over to preparation for Track Nationals to be held in Dieppe, NB at the beginning of September. Hence why on Friday morning, despite a slight sore throat and a desire to sit on the couch and watch the rest of the Tour, I was in a car heading down to Seattle for the FSA Grand Prix track meet. It turned out to be on of my very best decisions as needed the track time to get used to that type of racing. The first night was a bit of a disaster as I was the strongest girl out on the track, but my speed and track smarts appeared to have taken a vacation. However the next evening, I came back and took 3rd in the Miss-and-Out and 4th in the Scratch Race - both of which would have been more successful had I simply sprinted faster!!!
Which brings us to last weekend at the Fantastic Four Stage Race in Kelowna, and the second to last stop on the BC Cup circuit. The race was a hill climb on Friday, a road race and a time trial on Saturday followed by a criterium on Sunday. Both of the individual events were a little lacklustre on my part, but I was able to salvage a GC position by taking 4th in the road race on Saturday almost two minutes up on 5th and by winning the criterium on Sunday to secure 4th place overall. I appear to have a good relationship with 4th as I also currently sit 4th in the BC Cup standings with one stop remaining (which isn't bad considering I missed two rounds while I was down in the States earlier in the season).
It's now safe to say that my road season is coming to a close. I may jump on the TT bike for BC time trial championships this weekend and a team time trial in a few weeks, but we will wait and see how the track training is coming. I'm pleased with the consistency I showed over the year and I'm looking forward to showing my new fitness on the track in September where I'm looking to podium in the endurance events (Pursuit, Points Race and Scratch Race).

If you're interested in more detailed race reports, my team has a blog at http://www.bcgiantcycling.blogspot.com/ which a few good pictures and fun accounts of racing. Also, our team website can be found at http://www.canadianwomenselitecycling.com/ where I am currently the cover girl! Check it out - Jenelle has done an awesome job of it!

I can't seem to be consistent

2007-07-07T18:43:00.000-07:00

Try as I might - I don't seem to have this blogging thing down pat this year. Last year I was awesome...this year I'm a little lacklustre.
Last weekend was the Yaletown Grand Prix - Canada Day crit downtown Vancouver = awesome. Was stoked - riding well, came second (need to work on that!). Then on Wednesday I headed out east here to Quebec for Nationals. Crit was Friday - team was stoked.
However bad luck came our way as Leah and myself made the 7 girl break before getting caught behind a crash and getting dropped (and making a mistake and not taking a free lap). Tough break. Falls under if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.
I think I've been on the computer too long today as I'm writing in computer speak...
Roadrace is Tuesday - we'll see what we can do with that!

Philly: the Second Time Around

2007-06-10T13:54:00.001-07:00

Two years ago I came down to Philadelphia for the Liberty Classic with the National Development team. I was tired from Montreal when I arrived and didn't have the best race, but the event left an impression. That evening when we left, I vowed to make it back to race this race yet again - today I echo those sentiments - I want to do well here!
I made it in safe and sound to my host house on Friday night (yours for only a $50 cab ride...) and walked into one of the most amazing houses I've ever seen. The family, the Carpenters have also been unreal - all you could ask of a host house. The weather was sweltering, but with promise of cooler temperatures later in the weekend. The good news: the weather people delivered. I woke up this morning to 23 degrees and overcast - dream conditions for the race. I rode out from the wall to the start of the race with my team in time to sit around for an hour before the start. All day I found that I was comparing to my previous experience; at the start line I was less nervous than last time, but nervous all the same! For the first 7km we rolled down at a pleasant speed - although my heart was racing at 80%! We hit the wall and I wasn't really where I wanted to be position wise, but I was pleased with how I went up it.
To be honest, the next 3 laps were pretty much the same - get into a position for the hill and give 'er up to the top. I was pleased with how I was riding as I made it over in the front peloton (not the front "challenge for the QOM points front") - like top 20-30, but I think all the other sprinters knew better than me and gambled that it was going to come back together - which it did... So I had calculated that the final time up Lemon hill (about 3km from the end) was gonig to be a pivotal moment, so I gave 'er going up the climb and Nicky was with me. Going into the final 2km we were money in like 8th and 9th wheel...then it swarmed. I was recovering my position from the swarm when a crash happened in front and slightly to my left - a bunch of sprinters - crazies :P So at that point I was slowed significantly and looked up to watch 20 girls go by much faster than I and Nurenberger at the front killing it. I rode it in - but was truly disappointed as I was SO ready to give Nicky the best ever lead out! Oh well, next year right???

Worst Pro Stalker: Part Deux

2007-06-09T13:10:00.000-07:00

I very well might be flattering myself in assuming that I might have a readership that follows what I do from year to year - but yesterday I had an experience that reminded me very much of a warm day on the Gold Coast when Chris and I spotted Robbie McEwan. Well yesterday while in the Denver airport (en route to Philly) I was casually walking to my gate when I saw who I thought was Floyd Landis. Going into panic mode (thank goodness I don't live somewhere where I see famous people all that often) and I made like 3 loops around trying to get a good look at him and decided that indeed it was the winner?!? of the tour de France. First thing I do? Text Chris: "Floyd Landis is in the airport - should I go talk to him?" All I needed was a little coaxing, but it turns out he's a super nice guy! I was so impressed at how he handled me approaching him - he even suggested that I try to find him at the race tomorrow when I went to take a picture, but my camera was dead (how cool am I?) - which is also why I don't have a pic with Floyd and I up here on my blog!

So I'm now hanging out at my host house in Philly - only blocks from the Manayunk Wall (what will make tomorrow's race interesting at a grade of 17% - luckily the Race the Ridge wall has helped me to put things in perspective and I think I can handle it). My road rash from last weekend (at provincials - ended up 5th...probably all you need to know - oh yeah and I crashed twice...maybe one day I'll think it was a good story, but for now it's a "learning experience" and I'll try not to make the 3 major mistakes that clouded my finish EVER again!) well it's healing and the legs are feeling good. I'm hoping for some slightly cooler temperatures (the SRM read 37C today on the ride), but everyone else is out there in the same temp, right?

I'm also really looking forward to seeing a few girls who I haven't seen in ages - including my teammate from last year Robin (who was my rock last year) and Genevieve Gagnon who I haven't seen in ages! Bike races are FUN! :P

P.S. Our host house is amazing and aparently when I'm done racing tomorrow, I get to come home to a killer partay...good times! Oh yeah that and they gave me the password to use their wireless - the key to my heart!

NRC PODIUM!

2007-06-04T09:47:00.000-07:00

I'll write more in a bit - it's been a week since this happened, but I now have pics - so this is me on the podium in 3rd behind Theresa Cliff-Ryan (Verducci-Breakaway) the reigning US National Criterium Champion, and Kate Bates (T-Mobile) the reigning World Points Race Champion.

....2 weeks later

So that was pretty cool - good thing I made it to the podium presentation. There was no posted time for the race - they were just starting when the previous one finished - so I had a flight out of Newark at 6:30 and we originally had thought that we were racing at 11:00. Alas, the first race was off at 11:00 and we were the 4th race - yikes! Luckily it was a non-issue as we started around 1:30 and we were only 30 minutes from the airport, but there was a little stress involved. So anyway, after the race I booked it over to the van and packed my bike in the parking lot only to hear my name on the loudspeaker being called over for podium. I took off running (check out the flip flops - not the quickest method of transportation) and I barely made it! Could you imagine if I'd missed it? Dude I would have been heartbroken. I don't think that smile left my face all the way home (and I even travelled on Air Canada!)
The race itself was fun. I had to talk myself down at the beginning "Don't get dropped! No Jen, there is nothing over the last few days to indicate that you are in danger of getting dropped...but still don't get dropped!" So in order to compensate for this, I went out guns blazing. Perhaps I was a little too aggressive to begin with, but I was having fun following wheels - I figured that I had nothing to lose! I went for a couple of primes...only won the points one - ooops - should listen to the announcer better next time...
With three to go, I knew that it was time to find Nicky and start to settle down - essentially gamble that things would come down to a sprint. It was a little hectic through the last lap, but it was all together coming up the final straight. With about 600m to go my guardian Kelly Benjamin (she looks out for me - she's awesome) told me "for God sakes Jenny find a wheel" to which I followed her up. Once a little closer to the front I moved out to the right behind a Colavita rider and with about 300m to go I hear "Go Jenny!" from behind. Assuming that it was Nicky wanting a lead out I gave it everything I had and sat down on the gear. I looked to my left and saw that I was out front - only Kate Bates was slightly ahead - but not making any ground. With 100m I started waiting for everyone else to come around, but only Theresa flew by and with 10m to go, I knew that I had it....I crossed the line in essential disbelief - but stoked! The only crappy part being that I didn't really know anyone there, so there wasn't really anyone to celebrate with - I missed my Giant girls! The race has jazzed me up though - I'm ready to rock Philly - this time Nicky and I will get the lead out right! :P

Getting there is half the battle...

2007-05-27T13:19:00.000-07:00

Well hello there from _____ (insert town I don't know), Pensylvannia. Today I'm enjoying my day off between the Kelly Cup (yesterday) and the Tour de Somerville (tomorrow). We've been hanging out with some friends of Nicky's who have been unreal and put us up AND fed us - really what more could we ask for???
So leaving Raleigh at 8:30pm was interesting to say the least - the good news: we made it to our hotel in Baltimore that night - the bad news: it was 3:00am! Our first stop on the road was for dinner at Outback - I was baffled to learn that they have "curbside" service now. While convinient - it really does bring LAZY to a whole new level - the server even comes to your window to take your order - combine that with large portions and greasy food no wonder the obesity rates are high! Anyways, we got back on the road heading up north and saw a million cops. Seriously, I have never seen so many police cars on one stretch of road in my whole life. Mind you, the real highlight was when we came to a traffic jam come parking lot (at 1:30am) and got to witness a high speed chase in the opposite direction - very intense! :P
Right, back to bike racing - so we made it the rest of the way, got a good night's sleep in a hotel with a great deal of "character" and headed off to a park in the middle of Baltimore for the Kelly Cup. The course was a big sweeping over with one chicane leading into an uphill finish (think crit uphill finish). Ninety girls took the line and so when the commissaire told us to take a lap, I backed my bike up to the line (having taken notes at NVGP last year!) and got a good start position. Saturday's race was less all out hard than Fridays', but the larger pack was a bit to get used to. I was feeling quite comfortable about halfway through when I prime was called (I think the first of the day), coming round the final bend into the hill I noticed that no one had initiated a sprint yet, so I decided to give it a go. Catherine Powers (Aarons) tried to react, but I had caught her offguard and took the prime (Aveda hair products). As we rolled the top of the course I noticed that four of us (Powers, myself, Sarah Uhl (Cheerwine), and one other) had a gap. One of the girls tried to get us to work, but I was fried and we were brought back fairly quickly. The whole race played out in a similar fashion with small breaks going for it, but never getting too far. I was comfortable to stay near the front (nice change from last year!) and with 1 to go, I was 5th wheel coming through the start/finish with the pack strung out. Going down the backside there was a great deal of confusion among the lead outs and we bunched up pretty good going into the chicane. I lost Nicky about this point and went through the chicane hoping that I was on the right side of the pack. A small altrication through the corner had one of the more aggressive girls decide to retaliate and put me into the gravel with about 400m to go - good thing I've done all that cyclocross, eh? hee hee. I stuck to the inside of the bend - betting on the gap opening up like it had been doing previously (most notably on the lap immediately prior). I went for it and finished 8th! I knew that I could do better than 12th - and way more girls were present today too. I think that I'm still really excited to be actively racing NRC level races and I'm probably wasting a little energy, but I'm having a blast.
Racing at this level is addictive - good thing I'm back down here for Philly in a couple of weeks! I'm also looking forward to Somerville with a few corners and hopefully a little less heat. My SRM said it was 36 degrees yesterday - and my heart rate felt it, as I don't think I was below 190 for the last 20 minutes....crazy stuff...
Here's to having a blast in Somerville...

Some press from Raleigh...

2007-05-26T20:30:00.000-07:00

Nicky after a kickin race - 3rd behind Kelly Benjamin and Laura Vanguilder (check out her quads!!!)

So I’ve made my return to the NRC – another year older and another year wiser. Raleigh Twilight Criterium – check – now off to Baltimore for the Kelly Cup Bike Jam. No rest for the wicked though as the transfer is 5.5 hours (I’m in the middle of it right now – aren’t laptops awesome!) and we finished racing at 7:30 were off up north to Maryland within the hour in order to race tomorrow afternoon…I’m excited.
The race itself was a nice warm up for me – I was able to be aggressive AND my teammate for the weekend got third! Yay for Nicky! I rolled across the line in 12th – my best NRC finish to date (but we’ll see about improving that over the next few days).
I took the line representing in orange with 30+ temperatures – which was a nice change to the frigid north – but takes a little getting used to. Today was honestly the second ride I’ve had this year without at least knee warmers…man it is cold in Canada! So the race started out as races do – I watched Kele Murdin move to the front and thought to myself “I think I’ve seen that move before!” I was finding it easy to move around up front so I thought that I would give it a go – I got off the front (mainly as the other girls were content to let me go) and was away for a lap and a half. After I rejoined the group I thought that perhaps my effort had been a little overzealous – but then Nicky got away with an Aaron’s rider and I was able to relax a little at the front trying to cover the bridge. In the end nothing was sticking and it became evident that we were going to be doing the bunch sprint. With 2 to go they announced a “gamblers’ prime” and I thought what the heck? Unfortunately one of the Aaron’s riders thought the same and came around me before the line to take the $200 – would have been nice! I was cooked but was pleasantly surprised when the pack slowed down around the backside, I did my best to move up, but due to my earlier effort had to content myself with 12th – which I’m okay with…but as previously mentioned – will improve upon. Baltimore here we come – plan: to get Nicky to the top of the podium!

I wrote this little blurb last night and today I was checking out the props Nicky and I got on Cyclingnews - check it out. There are a couple of pics (with cool captions) and a shout out to Nicky and I being a force in the race along with Aarons and Cheerwine...wikked - there were only 2 of us!!! http://www.cyclingnews.com/road.php?id=road/2007/may07/raleigh07

Halfway to Raleigh, NC

2007-05-25T11:45:00.000-07:00

As I sit at YVR awaiting my flight to Minneapolis, I have been overcome by guilt from an email I received from Kika and Sandra yesterday. ;) They were wondering if I was still alive as I haven’t really logged any blog time in the last well…two and a half months… The good news – the majority of that time wasn’t terribly exciting – somehow a blog about how I spent 40 hours doing some guy’s taxes who’s worth multiple millions of dollars just isn’t terribly exciting in print (you see!). In fact that most notable expression of just how that period in my life went was when I checked out my Visa bill for the months of March and April – there were three vendors – and ONLY three vendors that ever received my patronage: Safeway (you have to eat), Starbucks (for once I needed caffeine to function), and Easypark (I need to get from work to the track back to work somehow)… Mind you, during those charming work weeks (at the beginning I received an email from my manager indicating that we were expected to work 60 hour weeks – to which I said “but I like sleeping.”) I didn’t see much of the outside world. Many a night the turn around between when I got in the door to when I was out like a light was at most 15 minutes – party of joy…ask Chris!
However, during that time, I did manage to pull a few notable cycling performances out of the bag and here they are: 5 top 5 finishes in the Spring Series “B category” (cat 3 men); BC Cup #1 – WIN!, BC Cup #2 – 4th so I am the current BC Cup leader; a 5th place on a hill top finish in Walla Walla, WA; two 3rd places at US stage races; and a bum weekend where I (in a great choice of weekends!) decided to feel off and ride like crap at the Pan Am trials…really happy about that…
Outside of riding and working there truly hasn’t been much. I’m starting to recover from the GO GO GO lifestyle of working 50+ hours/week, training and racing – but in all honesty, I would love to have someone pay for me to ride and be a full time athlete…any takers??? Just imagine the luxury :P
Oh well, until then I’ll have to live with heading down to Raleigh, North Carolina for a series of NRC crits along the east coast ending on Memorial Day Monday (which is a regular Monday for you and me in Canada) in Somerville, New Jersey. I’m stoked to meet and race with Nicky Wangsguard and Vitesse Cycling and in crits – not the stage race circuit that I insisted on racing last year!
Also for those of you who need time wasting (although I highly recommend Facebook if you’re looking for something to suck your life away) the Giant Women (and yes, the joke has been made…more than once) have a blog at www.bcgiantcycling.blogspot.com that gives colourful commentary on racing in BC and the Northwest. My flight has been called – catcha later!

Yes, I am alive...

2007-03-05T18:17:00.000-08:00

I'm not exciting at the moment, but I'm alive.

It's been almost a year since we returned from Australia - and almost 3 months since I've written anything in here. I'm not convinced that anyone checks to see if I write anymore, but I thought I would start giving it a go - I mean come on - it's race season! I got home from work this evening and was inspired by reading everyone else's blogs - something that I used to do every single day...then I had to start making a living (oh boo hoo, I know!)

So what have I been up to? Well a whole lot of working, sleeping and training. All the stuff I like to do (oh yeah and the occasional time wasting on Facebook!) I suppose if I'm going to get nit picky, the race season actually started just after Christmas at the 6 day (where I won the women's ominium - little plug for me!), but the first official roadrace was out in Langley yesterday. The folks at Cycling BC put a little excerpt up at http://www.youtube.com/CyclingBC so check it out. You can see me struggling to stay with the boys in the break just before 2:00 (I think) and then my feeble attempt at a sprint shortly thereafter - which in the grand scheme of things worked out a-okay for me as I ended up 3rd in the B field (I was 4th, but one guy got relegated for a yellow line violation) - yay for me! I spent probably half of the race off the front in at least 3 different break aways and low and behold one finally stuck (thanks in great part to the efforts of Cody Campbell and Jonathan Page - who also were awesome at keeping me going in the break). It was a whole lot of fun and I think the first time that I've ever finished in the break - hoping that this is a sign of things to come!

Also we got our team kits this weekend and they are HOT! To go along with our HOT bicycles that ride like a dream. I'm a big GIANT fan at the moment - in fact to overdo a not funny joke I'm a giant GIANT fan :P. That's Alena, Kath and Leah modelling the kits at our Learn to Race on the weekend...as I said HOT!

Here's to hoping I put a post up here or there before the end of tax season - keep your fingers crossed!!!

When in Rome

2006-12-11T09:27:00.000-08:00

So I might have complained a little bit when there was snow everywhere - but it gave us (the new Giant women's team) a good excuse to head up to Seymour and bond on snowshoes. It was a gorgeous day and awesomely fun. I was stoked on Sunday to get back outside on my bike, but I suppose we're Canadian, so a rumble in the snow from time to time won't hurt anyone. Check out that view!

Walking in a Winter Wonderland...

2006-11-27T09:10:00.000-08:00

Yeah everyone in Calgary is going to laugh at me - but it's COLD here! :P Actually it's absolutely gorgeous and I get to sit back and laugh at how Vancouverites deal with the inclement weather. So far all the post-secondary institutions and a great number of the public school have been closed. We are on "arctic blast" alert - it's currently -3 out. I went showshoeing yesterday up on Mt. Seymour - total blast - but kinda scary when we started hearing the trees start to crack under the weight of the heavy snow. I'm lucky enought to have the day off, so I can sit inside and wonder at how lovely it is...on my trainer. I love the snow, but it's supposed to be in Calgary when I go home for Christmas so that I can ride my bicycle.

MAN I MISS AUSTRALIA! That thought runs through my head at least once a day - more when it snows!

Also, I thought that I would let everyone know the bad news. Despite the fact that we live less than 200km away from the epicentre of the explosion of the "Starbucks" world - we still don't have enough stores to keep the population happy - despite the kiddie korner stores on Robson street. Last week I was walking around Pacific Centre at lunch with my egg nog latte and she essentially accosted me to figure out where I had found the Starbucks. She was might disappointed that she would have to walk at least 500m outside to find it. I found it amusing...and my latte delicious!

Alrighty, now on with the day!

Water, Water, Everywhere and Not a Drop to Drink

2006-11-20T17:33:00.000-08:00

So, bottom line, I've been a little lazy in my updates...which has lead me to the epic struggle over the last, oooh 5 minutes, trying to decide which newsflash will provide more entertainment for my readership (thanks Mom ;)) The battle was between "no drinkable running water" and "9th at Cyclocross Nationals." By the size of the pictures - you can probably guess which won out in the end.

However, to start off, I would like to point out that our toilet usually does run clear. Chris and I clean the washroom regularly and we also have a good practice of flushing the toilet - therefore the discolouration in the water...not our doing. It's the water running in the taps. We woke up to some worse looking stuff on Thursday morning - I didn't have to wait for the water advisory to decide that it probably wasn't good to drink. The Vancouver area experienced a fairly epic storm last Wednesday. We recieved close to 150mm of rain (if that were snow it would be 1.5 meters!) and winds gusting to 100km/h. Wednesdays are track days, so I hopped into the car about 4:00pm and started what promised to be a delightfully long car trek out to Burnaby. Luckily Becca brought me the new JT album from Calgary a few weeks ago, so I got to rock out in my own private discotheque all the way there. One head-on collision, a blown over building under construction and 2 hours later, I came within sight of Burnaby mountain - no wait I didn't! There was nothing to see as all the power for a number of different areas had been knocked out. Apparently today, 6 days later, some residents of Lions' Bay still don't have power. And I still don't have water. Isn't one of the tenants of today's civilized society power and clean, running water? Good times, good times. The net result is that I have been constantly thirsty over the last bit - I guess it might be more productive to head out and buy some more bottled water this eve.

As for the teeny, tiny pic of me all muddy - that's from Nanaimo about a week ago where I was very pleased with a 9th place finish at Cyclocross Nats. It was a fight to the bitter end, as Sarah Stewart and I road the majority of the race together, only for her to crash with about a km to go and in the end I only beat Leah (my new teammate) by 2 seconds! Those are the best cross races though - the ones where everyone's going for it and battling it out - it was an awesome, fun course and I'm kinda sad to see the cross season come to a close. Having said that, I've been enjoying the "regular routine" of training and work - and a good amount of sleep.

Well I best be off - lots to do in the next month before I head home to Calgary for Christmas...I can't believe it's so close!

Lame-O Winter

2006-11-06T08:51:00.000-08:00

So I'm not sure if I'm the lame-o or if it's winter that's lame-o....but titles are an art right? ;)
We're in the middle of having our first real winter storm here in Vancouver and pretty much everyday I dream about being back on the Gold Coast. At no point was this a more vivid desire than last Thursday when I had my inaugral colder than hell ride over on the North Shore. Now anyone who's lived here longer than say a month (for which I should qualify - but apparently don't!) they will point out that heading to Horseshoe Bay when it's nasty out is a decidedly bad idea - I thought that it would be fun. Now, I'm thinking if you define fun as almost having frostbite on your fingers and tosies, then yes, I hit the nail on the head...luckily I think the ride knocked a bit of the stupid out of me and now all my winter riding stuff is being put to good use.

On the upside of being in the northern hemisphere in the fall - I've been loving the cyclocross season. I'm heading up to Nanaimo for nationals on the weekend which should be a good time. What's not to love? You're riding a road bike around the woods and every so often you hop off to avoid an obstacle...makes me feel like I'm 8 years old - I totally love it!

My sister and her friend Tory were here on the weekend - tons of fun - lots of money spent. But with Becca's influence, I'm not really all that surprised. I'm in the middle of trying to convince myself that I need it all - but hey, I'm working now....uhhhh

Well that's the random (somewhat mindless) update on how my life is going. Working definately makes the days fly by. I'm kinda freaked that it's already November....yikes!

Pumpkin Pie

2006-10-09T20:09:00.000-07:00

I must say, I've never really thought about it before, but Thanksgiving ranks right up there with the best holidays...mostly because of the Pumpkin Pie. During the last few days I've been stocking up on the PP in multiple forms (one of which I can throughly thank Chris' parents for as they brought Thanksgiving and all its culinary glory to us)- the best of which was offered by Dairy Queen. I'm not entirely sure who had the brilliance to come up with the Pumpkin Pie Blizzard - but it's wonderful! So that was the highlight of my holiday Monday (and yes, as of last week I'm employed at KPMG, so it's actually a holiday!), along with a lovely ride out to Horseshoe Bay with Chris.

Speaking of wonderful things - Vancouver is one of the most beautiful places in the world. Each time I cross the Burrard Street bridge (when the sun is shining) it takes my breath away to see the skyline with the mountains and the ocean...I'm just hoping the good weather stays all year (fat chance!) hee hee

I've also gotten back on the bike in the last few weeks. After three months off I decided to hit the races again, but this time on the cross bike. My new pretty Giant bike is great and after spending the first week getting my bum kicked down in Seattle, Saturday I was able to take second in the Bayside Cyclocross Classic...and now I have about a zillion bruises to show for it....apparently I still bruise REALLY easily. Guess I won't be wearing skirts at work for awhile!

Also on the exciting vein of events (for me, you will most likely find it mind-numbingly boring), we now have a wireless router, so I can play on the internet from the comfort of the couch...man, technology is great!

Fall is upon us

2006-09-27T11:15:00.000-07:00

Well the wedding season is over - and so for 2006, that means that my summer has also drawn to a close. Congratulations to Lisa and Alistair, Sarah and Todd, and last but not least Bekki and Anthony for declaring their love for one another and putting on great celebrations! :P

I on the other hand, am enjoying my last week of holidays in the gorgeous Vancouver sunshine (I need to enjoy it while I can!) before heading back to work! Yes, that does deserve an exclamation mark as I'm pretty stoked to be working back with KPMG - but this time in Vancouver. The last 18 months or so have been awesome, but I feel it's time for me to get this here idle brain of mine going again and I'm looking forward to it.

Another sign that fall has come is that I got possession of my new cross bike yesterday! Also rather stoked about this - it's such a pretty Giant! :) Get to test it out in true form this weekend with a pair of races - the first in Seattle at Star Crossed (super cool - the course actually goes through a beer garden) and then closer to home (and a personal favourite) on the Surrey course. Not sure how the "intensity" thing is going to treat me, but it'll be nice to get out there all the same.

I think that covers the "what's new" category. Oh yeah - come out and visit us - my lastest Bday present (from Daddy and Di) was a blow up bed for visitors - so now we can be good hosts! ;)

Beer, Pizza, Wedding Chapel

2006-09-17T12:58:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Chris, Sandra and I went to ride Mount Baker. I don't think we really knew what we were in for - but the epic ride called our names. We headed out to Abbotsford for 9am (it only takes an hour to get out there that early in the morning!) and crossed the border and commenced the 150km ride. From what I had read, I believed that we would be doing 40km to Glacier (the base of Mt. Baker), 40km up, 40km down and 40km home - the is some math missing somewhere in there...but that was all we needed to start our adventure ride.

Now what would an epic ride be without a good detour. Apparently I should have looked at the map (or the roadside signs) more closely, as we ended up taking about a 15km detour. But much to our luck with came upon a building advertising Beer, Pizza and a Wedding Chapel. Definately picture worthy - unfortunately for both you and me - I forgot my camera (not that I would have had room for all the extra clothing I had jammed in my pockets!) We got turned around soon enough and headed towards Baker. The ride itself was quite pleasant - it wasn't until we hit the 4 hour make that we had any inclement weather. Unfortunately, at 4 hours, we were still going up...making for a LONG day! The rain wasn't hard, and we knew we were near the top - so we pushed on. Good thing that we did too cause we were within a few kms and we would have been kicking ourselves if we had turned around.

Once at the top, we were greeted by hail. Yes, the mountain weather prevailed and we were in the middle of quite a bit of precipitation - not really what you're looking to have around when you have to descent for 40km! We had to stop twice on the trip down to try to regain feeling in our fingers as to be able to change gears and, more importantly break...man I MISS AUSTRALIA! We even ended up riding uphill a little - I resorted to singing out loud to take my mind off the pain...it is only September! Winter is going to be a LONG battle. Anyways, we made it out of the rain and continued down to the town of Glacier. I had lost the ability to shift into my big chain ring because of my frozen left hand and we were all expressing knee discomfort after riding for 2 hours at 50RPM before turning around and subjecting our joints to freezing temperatures!

At the end of the day it was a 6.5 hour ride - and the whole thing was amazing! The road is beautiful, the pavement smooth and the scenery picturesque. Definately a ride I would recommend to anyone just watch out for the mountain weather :P!

YIKES! I'm a quarter of a century...

2006-09-14T10:59:00.000-07:00

So I'm kinda conflicted about this Bday! Last year I was soaking up rays on a beach in Fiji - today I'm in Vancouver wearing a nice big, electric blue Lulu sweatshirt (courtesy of Christopher) and still not entirely warm. I'm in the middle of a bit of a quarter of a century crisis...I mean by 25 aren't you supposed to know where you want to go with your life? I know I want to be a cyclist...outside of that I just don't know - accounting, finance, or something completely unrelated??? I thought that I would have at least been in an industry for a few years before I start questioning my direction. I've spent the week at job interviews and applying for every position I come across that I qualify for - it's definately hard to convince full-time positions that they want to employ me - only give me 30ish hours a week and unlimited (unpaid) holidays. I am too demanding aren't I?

Okay, enough of the deep thoughts - I started my day with a run and a cinnamon bun and a pumpkin latte - what could be better???? I'm hoping to go for a ride later today and then a nice dinner (and cake of course!) Bithdays are GREAT! I'm still educating Chris that one's birthday is the MOST important day of the year - it's the only day that you get all to yourself (although I knowingly share it with Jenny Sweeney, Tricia Milner and Adam from elementary school) - but I'm loving it. I can't find any appropriate Bday pics, so I'm going to settle for Chris and I on our Heart Mountain hike - it killed me, but running has been easy ever since!

I Have a Home!

2006-09-07T13:46:00.000-07:00

So after being somewhat transient for the last 16 months, I'm happy to say that last weekend Chris and I settled into our place in Vancouver. We're living on the border of Kits and West Pointe Grey - apparently that's a froofy location for those of you who are curious...it's super close to the Eatery which is a funky Japanese restaurant - oddly enough it was one of the first places I knew in Vancouver and now I live about a block away - and we've eaten there twice since our arrival.
This week has been pretty chill - Chris started school and I've been trying to sort out the last bits of our house like getting internet (which we don't have yet, I'm currently at a wireless cafe), and waiting for our couch to be delivered...not to mention job hunting - but it's been really nice. The weather is absolutely gorgeous and we've been enjoying morning runs down to Jericho park - definately no complaints! Anyhoo, nothing too interesting - cross races are going to start up soon, but for now, I just wanted to include a few pics of my new abode. (You'll note that I strategically left out a pic of the living room as it's a great open void at the moment - but I just got a call to inform me that we're having the couch delivered on Monday!!!)

Kicking Around Vancouver

2006-08-16T08:40:00.000-07:00

Man, when I'm not racing, I'm really bad at the updates now aren't I? Well to tell the truth, that is in part because I have been pretty unexciting as of late. When I got back from Mexico I thought that I was all prepped to start training again as to kick some bum at track nats....alas, that appeared not to be the case after a week back at it, I was super tired again. I was pretty bummed out (luckily I had the ENTIRE second season of Grey's Anatomy to keep me entertained - which is an exceptional show by the way...only problem being that it actually makes me wish I went to med school....wierd!) So instead of stewing on what I couldn't do, I headed out to Vancouver for Lisa and Alistair's wedding.
It was gorgeous - I'm not really sure what else to say about it - maybe after the next two weddings I will be attending, I will be able to be more of a critic, but Lisa looked beautiful as did her bridesmaids and the whole thing was super great. I especially enjoyed that each place setting had a bag of JellyBellys...probably over-consumed on those.
My trip to Van ended up being a bit of a multitasking event. I figured that we could find a place in a couple of days and then head back home to AB before jumping back to Edmonton to race track provs - then assess my form before deciding on Nationals. Unfortunately, the charming people at the rental agency (once we finally found a place that we were interested in - we found an old grow op for just under $900/month in a super sketch part of town...lovely by all accounts - but it did motivate me to pay a little more for a place!) were dragging their feet and we weren't able to sign the lease until Friday. So no track provs...so no track nats....on to CROSS time!
So now the hunt is on for a cross bike...oh yeah, and a job! Thanks to the luxurious rent costs in Vancouver, I need to find me a job and a good one at that! But before I think too much about it, Chris and I are going to head out to the mountains for a mtb bike ride. We were going to go yesterday, but once we got there I realized that I forgot my shoes on the table...I was NOT impressed...but thems the breaks. We went out riding in the river valley instead and believe me, my skills leave quite a bit to be desired...Why is it that mountain biking always makes me feel ridiculously out of shape???
Anyways, so it's here in Calgary for another couple of weeks full of Sarah's wedding and my Grandma's 90th b-day before driving back out to Vancouver - to live! Exciting and yet a little scary all at the same time. Get to start up the training again and have some fun ripping around on a road bike with nobby tires - I can't wait!!!

The 3 Rs: Rest, Relaxation and Ralfing

2006-07-23T10:12:00.000-07:00

Classy, I know. Luckily the stomach discomfort didn't hit me until I was on the plane last night coming home from Mexico...at least I think it's lucky. Truth be told, if you think that you need to blow cookies, there is no where more encouraging than an airplane bathroom...but enough about the gross, yucky stuff.

So last week my sister, mom and I headed down to Cancun - the Palladium Colonial on the Riviera Maya to be precise - to help me recoup from a long season to date. The hope is that it's allowed me to recharge enough to start a campaign towards Track Nationals in September - I'm still holding my breath to see how things work out! As it was kind of a last minute thought (the most constructive of my "I'm quitting cycling forever" line of thinking during the roadrace at Nationals) we simply chose a last minute deal and crossed our fingers. As it was - we were incredibly lucky. The resort was gorgeous. The food was good for a buffet (if I discount whatever made me unbelievably unhappy last night) and the buildings were phenomenal. It was a dream.

Can't really say that I did all that much while we were down there. Lots of beach time (although a Mexican dude made fun of Becca and I yesterday for being so white after a full week in Mexico - but dude, I am SO tanned for me at the moment...I can't help my northern-European background!) and a good amount of reading and general relaxing. We had a few tropical storms, but nothing we couldn't handle! During the down time, we dug through the first season of Grey's Anatomy - to which I am now hooked and am currently trying to download the second season to watch as I recover from my vacation today. The first season of Degrassi Junior High was watched - including the episode when Spike gets pregnant - Canadian television history I tell ya!

So I'm back at home in Calgary - hopefully ready to get back on my bike - I'll have to learn to amuse myself as the Tour is over (we saw a praying mantus and I wished that I had had my camera so that I could have taken a congratulations picture for Floyd). So it's home time for a week, then Gran and Grandad arrive from England on Sunday before I likely head off to Vancouver on Monday - I really don't like to stay in one place now do I???

The Inevitable Crack

2006-07-04T09:11:00.000-07:00

So it happened. I knew it would, but it hasn't really been a ton of fun. After a week of lying in bed trying to get rid of a rather persistant virus, I headed up to Quebec city to get my bum kicked. Apparently getting sick, while it does prevent you from doing anything, it does not help you recover...all things that I know, but I'm learning all over again first hand. It was a rough weekend - the courses were great (the organization less so) and under normal circumstances I think I would have raced really well. As it was, my body decided that it no longer wanted to race and I was left going as hard as a possibly could - and getting NOWHERE!

So it's time for a little time off. I think I'm going to have to x-nay Altoona which is too bad, but there's always next year right? Time to take a little time away from the bike (I wanted to throw it in the St. Lawrence after quitting cycling about 6 times during Friday's roadrace, but it did make the trip back home with me) and I'm hoping to get away somewhere hot to lounge on the beach before ramping it back up for track nats.

But on to more interesting things like dreamy Boonen is in YELLOW! What a great Tour! First Georgie, now Boonen - as long as I forget that my Jan didn't get to start and neither did Basso and Valverde just crashed out today....Check out http://www.tomboonen.com/nl/fotos/ for HOT pictures of Boonen...might just put one up on the blog along with the picture of the shoes that I REALLY want...but I can't imagine paying $500 for. Aren't they cool though?

Okay, well enjoy the shoes and dreamy Boonen - now only Zabruskie needs to get yellow and it'll be the greatest tour ever (except for '97 when Little Jan won).

Lah Lah Lounge

2006-06-25T18:18:00.000-07:00

Now, this couldn't get any better if I had made it up - and I swear I didn't. This evening I went for dinner with the remaining half of Chris' family as Chris and his Dad took off on a road trip down to Ohio...he's doing a bike race there - best of luck! :) That left his Mom, brother Andrew and myself here in Guelph. Well, that's not entirely accurate as the female contingent of the aforementioned trio was supposed to be enroute to Road Nats in Quebec City - however my charming illness has us delayed by a few days. Apparently when we left Minnesota I decided to bring a charming cough with me - and things have progressed since then...and I'm about ready to be healthy again - my window of tolerance in which I must be healthy is down to only 2 days now...but I'm sure that the immune system will cooperate! (you hear that immune system???)

So yeah, I'm a little irritated of the timing of the sickness, but you can't choose these things now can you - but regardless, tonight's entertainment help spur on my spirits. So to start at the beginning, I had spent all afternoon sleeping and soon enough it was dinner time and no one had really given any thought to dinner. Chris' mom suggested we go to this great pizza place and so we were off (in the brand new red convertable beatle...I must get a picture of that!) As we walked into the restaurant we were informed that it would be $3.00 cover to watch the "show". Said show was a podcast (still trying to understand what exactly is a podcast - best description came from Andrew as a audio blog) and so we were in for some great live entertainment....and some that is good to talk about on my blog. As a sidebar - dinner at Manhattan's was INCREDIBLE - it was the first time that I've had vegetarian pasta in a long time that didn't leave me wanting meat - mmm...a delectable combination of sundried tomatoes, feta cheese, artichoke hearts and olive oil - it was AWESOME! Also on the awesome list was the second act up for the evening. This girl constructed a song entirely with her voice - not sure if it wasn't pre-recorded, but regardless, she had slowly built up with her accompniment and then sang - and it was gorgeous - I thouroughly enjoyed her act. The larger woman belly dancing (no wait, it was a flamenco/belly dance cross) was less enjoyable - partially because I'm not sure she wasn't wearing langerie...classy my friend classy.

The rest of the evening was enjoyable and helped me to understand that my musical talent is pretty much non-existant. The fact that people can sit down and write songs, with music and lyrics just blows my mind. I am also disappointed that we missed seeing Dee Something-Or-Other who was a top 20 Canadian Idol...unfortunately my sleep is also important to me.

So after that entertaining interlude in my life, I'm off to Quebec City to speak French and ride my bike with the top racers in Canada. I'm looking forward to seeing girls I haven't caught up with for awhile and getting back to Quebec City - haven't been there for awhile and it will always remind me of Marie-Claude and my grade 6 exchange. I DID the town back in 1993...I think it was then anyways...just hoping that the evil sore throat demons leave me in the near future.

Nature Valley Complete...

2006-06-21T12:40:00.000-07:00

So the camera’s fixed, but apparently I no longer remember how to take cool pictures for my blog…We did however accidently detour through Detroit on the way down there – oops! On the upside we were able to take a picture of “8 mile” – yes that is my claim to fame…and that was only a few hours into our 16 hour trek. (After writing I was going through my pics and I decided that in actual fact, everyone NEEDED to see the picture of the hugging bears on the highway - that' just for your enjoyment...no other good reason)...That’s right, Julia, Chris and myself decided that the most fun activity we could come up with last week was to drive to Minneapolis, Minnesota. And while I do grant you that they have an equivalent mall to West Ed (which I did not get to visit much to my dismay!), driving there requires that you chug through Ontario, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin and then Minnesota…That’s right – my US geography is going to be KILLER by the end of the year! Over the 16 hour drive (remember that’s 16 hours each way!) I learned that I still love Wisconsin. A land of cheap cheese lies near and dear to my heart – on the way out we stopped at a “Cheese” place – apparently Julia doesn’t get how my camera works, cause that picture doesn’t exist somehow…but I got FIRE CHEESE – and believe me, they ain’t kidding about the FIRE – jalapeno to be precise. Not quite as odd as the cheese fudge (that’s right, cheese that tastes like fudge, I had to sample it just to be sure!), but the fire cheese was far more versatile. Unfortunately, to contrast the wonderous cheese state (that also had waterslides EVERYWHERE – I wanna go to a waterpark!) I had to pass through Illinois. A State of irritating toll booths (we missed two of them on the way there and had to send the state $1.60 in the mail…definitely a class A system) and road construction. I think I lost at least 3 years off my life driving through there – oh yeah and the drivers are CRAP! If only I could find a way to drive through Lake Michigan and bypass Chicago – I’ll work on it for Superweek….So we got ourselves to good old Minneapolis – Eden Prairie to be precise – we were hanging out at our host house Connie – she was awesome! And let the racing begin! I can’t say that it was the most positive weekend of my life. I was all stoked about it until I didn’t sleep at ALL the night before the TT – Chris helped me out by going to pick up my race packet though and I trooped through and put down a solid ride (to tell you the truth, I was a little surprised as I felt quite sick to my tummy prior to the race). The next day was a complete gong show. Anyone who was there knows exactly what I mean. I don’t think I hear anyone say anything positive about it – there were echoes of “that was the hardest race I’ve ever done” all over the place. Here we learned that just because a race is flat, doesn’t mean that it is easy…I still prefer the flat.
Friday was the dark day in my racing year. After a killer storm – and I mean NUTSO, blowing hard rain, flooded streets, hailstones and a temperature drop of about 15 degrees – we took to the streets. I don’t think I was actually racing – I’m not proud of this fact. In fact, if I could erase one single race this year it was that one…luckily it seemed to serve as a kick in the bum. Plus, had we not had the crazy storm, we would not have been lucky enough to sit at a super sketch gas station for most of half an hour waiting for a taxi to pick up Robin. Like honestly, this place was a piece of work – I would have taken a picture, but I may have been shot in the process. We took Robin’s stuff out of the car and we were sitting at one of the pumps waiting and the dude inside came on the intercom and informed that we might want to come closer to the building as it was “more safer” over there. Upon approaching the building we found that the gas attendants were protected by about 2 inch thick plexiglass – but we had the crazy man with the lazy eye “protecting” us. A large fork of lightening scared me so bad that under the circumstances of the night I almost started crying…but now it makes for an EXCELLENT story…but as usual I’m just not doing it justice! :P
My legs carried me through the next two days and I tried to stay tough. Apparently racing 7 stage races and 37 days of racing in the first 6 months of the year is starting to take its toll on me. I am happy to say that I did finish the race – and in a fashion that was much stronger than the way I started out, which was nice. I’m resting up for this week, waiting to head up to Quebec City next week. I’m enjoying the action provided to me by the World Cup – specifically my boys from England who have advanced to the round of 16 and will be playing Ecuador on Sunday. This afternoon I’m dealing with the difficult question of do I fly to Quebec or take the train. The real question boils down to – is 8 hours of my life worth $200? I just don’t know…I appreciate any input.
Alrighty, it’s back to being a bum – maybe this week I’ll have the energy to work on my website…it’s about time!

Hot in Herre

2006-05-30T11:09:00.000-07:00

Apparently years of living in an igloo cannot prepare you for the weather in the southern States – who’d a thunk? I did try to reverse the effect of my natural tendency towards cold weather (it’s not my fault, my father is from Saskatchewan!) by heading over to Australia for the winter. The net effect is that I’m BETTER in the heat – still not good, and I would wager that I’m now a super wimp in the cold…hmm – was that a good idea? So, this lead in is going somewhere – I promise, here it is: Sunday’s weather was horrendous. It was 80 degrees at 6:30 in the morning and I swear the humidity was 100% - meaning thick enough to breath! ;) By the time we started racing it was already almost unbearable sitting out in the sun (must have been close to 35 degrees – like that switch between Fahrenheit and Celsius?), making for one of the least pleasant 33-mile rides of my life.

The terrain was unrelenting with constant rollers, which under normal conditions I would have loved. However, with such a small pack and my PowerTap in tow (and the associated 23 tooth cog), my legs felt rather horrible. I limped through the entire race having to sit out of the paceline for good chunks of it. We worked the two intermediate sprints to help me keep the green jersey, which wasn’t super challenging, as no one else seemed at all interested in what was going on. The sprints were fun though as it was a downhill go at it, so we hit some pretty good speeds. The girls on Kenda helped me through and I don’t know what I would have done without a feed, which is really quite sad in such a short race!

As we approached the finish and all the girls were settling in for a field sprint, Robin and Caroline attacked about 2km out. The motivation in the pack was minimal and so I just marked the rider who chose to chase. This conveniently gave me a great leadout coming into the finish and I just ducked around the girl chasing with 200m to go and took the field sprint, 12 seconds behind my teammates. Caroline took the win, which was much deserved after yesterday’s suffering, moving her into 3rd on the GC.

I was a little frazzled about just how horrible I felt during the race and needed to figure out how I was going to improve how my legs felt before the roadrace (although a soft rear wheel may have made the day more challenging than I had hoped). We went for lunch at J. Alexander’s again (they had been giving $30 gift certificates to the winners, so I went there 3 times this weekend!) and I ordered the “not your ordinary” Mac and Cheese – it was decadent. The cheese and pasta and bacon was so good, I honestly think I would order it for desert – keep this in mind if ever you find yourself in the south!

Monday (yesterday), was my last obstacle before a 2 week rest period and I was rather eager to get it over with. The stage ended in a 3.5-mile climb that again, I was unbelievably STOKED about. The fun started early as Robin lead me out for the hot spot sprint and we annihilated the field and easily took the win. There is something really fun about hitting top speed – unfortunately this time I didn’t have a wattage on it as I decided that my 27 was going to be a good friend of mine near the end of the day. About midway through the race things got interesting as I discovered that yet again, my rear wheel was soft. We were headed down a lengthy descent, but we were stuck behind a tractor and so we were moving really slow and I knew that was my chance. After a little miscommunication with the commissaire (I put up my right hand and went back to the car where he told me that there was nothing he could do about the tractor and I reiterated that I had a flat – isn’t that supposed to be universal bike language???) but I did managed to get the wheel truck to pull over. I will point out at this time that I then experienced the WORST wheel change in history. I had to get off my bike, pull out my back wheel and take the wheel from the wheel truck (the commissaire and the wheel guy were having a conversation). I then placed my wheel in, but after a few pedal strokes discovered that my brakes were rubbing, so I had to stop again. When I finally got going, I threw down going down the hill and came to a fairly close encounter with an oncoming car. Within minutes I was back on the back (no useful help with motorpacing or anything like that!) and we decided it was time to get things moving. The girls and I then took turns attacking the front, which was fun for us, and fairly miserable for the rest of the pack.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was right after Robin and I had been up the road together (for some reason they didn’t want the two of us to ride away from them…) then Chamblee attacked. The peloton actually just watched her ride away and while we have no idea what her gap actually reached, I would wager that it got upward of 2 minutes. We then road around painfully slowly in the pack for the next 25-30km and waited for the final hill. I had lost my computer with the wheel change and so I had NO IDEA how long we had to go – all I knew was that I felt better than yesterday, but still like my legs felt like they had gone through a meat tenderizer. We knew that we had reached the climb when we hit the 5km to go sign and Robin went to the front to set tempo. I was shed off just before the 3km to go mark and road it in to finish 1:23 behind Robin, the eventual winner (she caught Chamblee with 500m to go – kinda heartbreaking!) The climb wasn’t so bad, and if I had not been so fatigued from weeks of racing, I’m sure I could have done much better as it was only a 5-6% grade. As it was, I was happy to reach the top and hey, I figure, I was wearing the green jersey – I’m allowed to limp to the top of the hill right? I also managed to keep a grip on 2nd place in the GC – so really I figure I did my job…and there was a nice team payout as a result.

All in all, the race was great. It was the first time I really got to work in a team environment and I won’t lie, it was nice to be the ones doing the bullying instead of holding on for dear life just to stay with the group. I’m heading back up to Canada tonight and I’m excited to see Christopher and take a little time to chill out. I’m hoping to hit a shopping center today with my new buddy Sandy, but maybe we’ll do some sunbathing cause summer’s here baby! Last, but not least, best of luck to the girls at Montreal – I’m thinking about ya and your battle with Rigaud.

Oh and while I'm thinking of it - last night I wasted at least 2 hours of my life watching Laguna Beach. I love the OC, but even this is too trashy for me! And one last note - soon I will have my camera and I can stop only having babble...sorry about that. If I can get the picture of my kick ass outfit that I wore to dinner the other night from Caroline, that will go up though ;)

Podium? I Think I Remember the Front of the Group…

2006-05-27T15:38:00.000-07:00

Man, it’s been a big day in the life of Jenny and it’s only quarter to four. After a week of sitting on my bum trying to recover and watching the fuzzy channel (you could make out people fine it was just that they each had three heads, but it was the only daytime television that I wanted to watch – the selection included: The Cosby Show, ER and 8 Simple Rules to Dating my Teenage Daughter) last night I took to the racing bicycle for yet another stage race. It was my first aerobar allowed, flat time trial of the year and to be honest I was fairly stoked to give it a shot. The course was fairly technical and rolling throughout – the fun was amplified by the lightning and rain that greeted us in the 30 degree weather with humidity so thick I swear I was breathing water. I was the fourth rider off with my minuteman up the road (they were at 30 second intervals, but the girl directly in front of me didn’t show). The event treated me well and I was able to catch two girls in front of me, which is always a good confidence boost. I finished the 11km course in just under 18:30 and due to my choice to use the PowerTap (very TT like wheel don’t you know???), I now know that it’s true – I am a spazz when I time trial! The data is interesting and I hope to have some good empirical records on where I am at with my power to improve my training efficiency for next year. I managed to pull out my first podium of the year, 32 seconds behind my kicking teammate (and roomie for the last bit) Robin Farina who smoked the field in her Kenda uniform. Luck was also on my side as I beat out third place Rachel Tatum (a local rider who is not terribly experienced, but used to be an Olympic rower) by only half a second – guess it was a good thing I sprinted out of the final turn! My other two teammates rounded out the top 5 with Chamblee in 4th and Caroline in 5th (although on the original results they had her as a DNF!)
Due to yesterday’s results, we knew going into the criterium today that we needed to put some time between myself and Rachel – not to mention that I had my heart set on the green sprinter’s jersey. With Robin clad in yellow, we were all called to the line and ready to take charge – and that we did. After a month of racing with the nation’s best riders, Kenda had a chance to use team tactics to our advantage – our goal was to take top 3 and we passed with flying colours! Right off the line Robin and I charged the front in order to get used to the sweeping corners on the course that were surprisingly technical. As we were settling in, Caroline took her first flyer of the morning (as our sacrificial lamb of the day she spent a great deal of the race off the front). We made the other girls work to bring her back before reeling her in on the lap before the hot spot sprint. Robin and I countered Caroline and got a good gap off the front for Robin to lead me out for the first sprint. With all our POWER (hee hee) there was no contest and we rolled around with a gap on the field for most of a lap. By the time we regrouped it was time for Caroline to go check out the air up front again and so she continued. With the team’s help I took the second hot spot sprint (my heart rate hit 201! I shouldn’t have been looking at that should I?), but the decisive move was to come with 4 laps to go. Only four girls were left in the front when Caroline attacked. As we were trying to get Rachel to chase her down and she wasn’t biting, we called her back and I countered. The girls let me go and I road it home to a whopping 4-second gap on the field. That right – I took the WIN! And really more importantly I took the green jersey, Robin kept the yellow and I put 30 seconds on Rachel through time bonuses – and Kenda swept the podium. All in all it was a successful day at the office. A whole heck of a lot more fun than riding hamster loops up Mount Royale if you ask me ;) – although I am rooting for all the troopers who are taking on the hardest World Cup on the circuit this afternoon.
Tomorrow we have a circuit race of 33 miles (which seems downright lovely as it’s only 1/3 of last week’s race distance!) although the course is said to be somewhat unrelenting. Kenda is planning on continuing the domination (and learning how to ride together as a team) throughout the rest of the weekend – although I know it’s going to be a challenge. Monday (it’s Memorial Day weekend down here in the U S of A) is our final roadrace boasting a lovely 3.5-mile climb up into the heavens for the finish. As you might imagine, I absolutely can’t wait – better continue to build up my lead through the sprints! But it’s naptime so I’m out – but actually being an integral part of the race requires more frequent race reports. Oooh! Ooooh! And I forgot to mention that I purchased a pair of gorgeous shoes (for my bike of course!) – white Sidi Genius 5.5 – they are the bomb! I can’t wait to get them out on the road. Big thanks to Cumberland Transit for helping me decide that I really wanted them :P

Attention: The Summer Button Has Been Hit

2006-05-22T10:12:00.000-07:00

So for the second time this year I have been blindsided by the heat monster. Luckily, the living in Australia seems to have helped as I managed to actually finish the criterium this time, but it wasn’t a pretty sight. Which criterium you may ask – well this weekend saw me at yet another NRC stage race in Arkansas (how many can there be – well 2 and I’ve attended them both). This time the fun was in Russellville at an event entitled Tri Peaks Challenge. Every time I write that I think to myself – why did I put that one my schedule again? Tri Peaks it was with three major climbs in both roadraces that took place on Saturday and Sunday. Our teeny-tiny women’s pack of under 40 had the joy of completing the men’s distances of 92 miles (145km) on Saturday and 83 miles (138km) on Sunday – it was definitely joy on wheel. Not sure that I’ll make this event a fixture for my calendar.

As I mentioned, Friday evening was HOT – I’m thinking upward of 35 degrees in the sunshine. The first few laps of the crit were fairly tame, but that wasn’t an indicator of how things were going to go. I felt great (as one does at the beginning of a race) and I was probably a little too aggressive early on as yet again as I was resting near the back of the pack from an earlier effort when the decisive move with a few Victory girls (in a pack of 35 girls there were 10 of their team, so EVERYTHING had a Victory member), Alisha Lion of Webcor and my roomie for the week and Kate Bates in the Australian Champion styled Nurnberger kit. Everyone knew it was going away and I think the girls in the remaining pack were tired cause we just watched each other. But before long there was another flurry of attacks and I was keen to bring them back – but just blew myself and before long saw myself at the back of the pack as the second decisive move went up the road and I was stuck. The remainder of the group (about 8 of us with like 15 girls up the road) twiddled our thumbs for the remainder of the ride. Not to say that I could have ridden much faster – I was done…silly warm races. True to the spirit – the Aussie thrived in the conditions and Kate Bates outsprinted Rachel Heal in a two-man break that lapped our group on the last lap. As a general note of discontent, I’m sick of race organizers who are too lazy to get the actual results in correctly. They botched up the crit results yet again – this time in the time gaps – I mean how difficult is it really? Alas, all was not lost as I made the front page of the Russellville paper and you can see the kick ass picture on Cyclingnews.com here.

Getting to the line on Saturday was a little intimidating to say the least. The day held 145km of racing in store (with a pack of 35, that is a great deal of racing) and three mountains to ascend. I was climbing decently well, but the uphills were definitely taking it out of my legs. After the first and second climbs I was able to chase back on to the group as they would lollygag after boogying up the hills. The race was long and the apprehension of the distance was evident in the defensive nature of the race. The third climb saw my demise as Victory threw it going into the base of the hill and as we hit the steep pitch, I was out the back and was left to limp up the final climb. I was greeted at the top with a can of Coke which would have been even better if I hadn’t had to take two sips and then discard it as I had to scream down the hill to try to catch a buddy a few hundred meters up front. We road it in and was super stoked to be finished. That evening I made two goals for the following day: 1) to stay positive and 2) to climb with a group I normally wouldn’t be able to.

Was I successful? I think so. Staying positive was a challenge at times, but yes, all in all I did good. :P The girls were even less pressed to go fast in the second of two long days and we tempoed up both the first and second climb. Charm Breon of Cheerwine was not aware of the plan and she road hard up the first climb and got a gap that she saw through the rest of the race to take the stage win. I’m super impressed as this amazing woman stayed away for over 100km on her own on a fairly windy (and dull) course – good on her! After the first descent the group was a little jumpy and I decided to jump in with the aggression (which was kinda ironic as I had just finished telling myself that I was going to take it easy today so that I could climb the final monster well at the end of the day). However, it was well worth it as I got into a couple of spits – neither of which went anywhere. Girls were not willing to work though as they had team obligations making the experience a little disappointing. I did get a little glory though as I went to go contribute to the second split and the girls just let me ride off the front. My time in the sunshine wasn’t super long as I decided after probably 5 minutes that the effort was futile, but I think it was a good experience all the same and trying to actually race made it all worthwhile.

The next 50 odd kilometers were dull. Victory went to the front and cycled through to try to minimize Charm’s advantage. The pace wasn’t hard, but it wasn’t comfortable either (although with the wind, I know that it can’t have been fun for the worker bees at the front) and we sat for what seemed like forever in a single-ish paceline and the best word to describe it was dull. After the second hill a couple more girls went up the road and the pack took it’s time getting to the base of Mount Nebo. I arrived with the group, and unfortunately I was all out of care. I made my way up to the top, but it wasn’t fast and it wasn’t pretty. My fatigue level was high and as usual, my motivation works to its inverse. I did make it up however and was pleased that I made it through the weekend relatively unscathed. This morning I feel much like a truck has smushed me into the pavement and I’m looking forward to a week of internet and watching movies. I even treated myself to a DQ Sunday yesterday evening (it was even day appropriate)! I would have preferred marshmallow, but strawberry did the trick and it helped the 6-hour drive more bearable. I’m happy that I came out to Tri Peaks – it was great to be able to see a team function in such a cohesive manner as Victory Brewing does and I would love to be able to be a part of a similar dynamic. Congrats to all the girls that were there this last weekend – I think finishing is a feat in itself!

Carnage Make Me Sad

2006-05-18T10:27:00.000-07:00

So I'm not normally one to complain about the price of equipment because really, look at the sport I'm in. However, I have been faced with a bought of bitter disappointment over the last 24 hours. Just before my ride yesterday I looked at my bicycle and discovered that my beautiful, new Specialized saddle (the Jett 143 with pink and white) that I was ever so excited about purchasing in Australia has failed me. Apparently my crash on Sunday wasn't nearly as innocuous as I had believed. Just before I went down I pulled in my brakes to avoid the tumble and somehow ended up slamming the nose of the saddle into my upper thigh. Now on Monday I discovered the beautiful black and blue bruise (that I wouldn't show you with a pic due to its location, even if I had a camera - but I promise you, it's a good one!) and yesterday I realized that it's true - for every action there is a reaction. Unfortunately this reaction is my new saddle is totalled. :(

So now I'm on a mission to find a new saddle. The folks here in Little Rock at Competitive Cyclist (www.competitivecyclist.com check it out!) have been helping me out - but I am very sad that I am to move on past the pretty saddle...it's just that I can't afford a $150 saddle each 3 months. So I'm sad. I thought that you would like to know. But the Jett is unbelievably comfy girls - just don't crash...mind you, that's good advice any way you cut it!

Have I mentioned lately that I love hills?

2006-05-14T20:32:00.000-07:00

Well that might be an overstatement, but it appears that I’m going to have to start. Last week I chilled out in Nashville, Tennessee with my Kenda teammate Robin. In all honesty, I would love to tell you about how great the city was – that I saw the nightlife and it was a blast, but please remember who’s blog this is ;). So what I can tell you is that the place that Robin is housesitting at is quite lovely; there is a beautiful park loop of about 35km to ride and there is a kick ass coffee shop with free wireless (something that I am currently lacking at Starbucks). The truth of the matter is that traveling as a cyclist, most cities look similar – at least if they have television, internet and a coffee shop nearby.

Thursday morning rolled around and Robin and I were stoked to meet up with Allison (another teammate) for our fun, fun drive to Fayetteville, Arkansas. That is the home of the Joe Martin Stage Race – a pleasant place in the heart of the Ozarks – those are mountains by the way. I had a massive headache when we got in (somewhat reminiscent of the Dan driving shoulder…) but we made it to our host housing by 10:30 that evening. Our hosts were incredible and had a beautiful house that we called home for the weekend as the race organizers did their very best to kick the crap out of me.

The first day, being tailored to my exact skill set was a 100km roadrace with a 14.5km mountain pass at about kilometer 40. I can’t lie, I didn’t fair terribly well, but I did make it up and over in order to take Gatorade and Power Gels from the charming neutral feed at the top. I’ve been practicing thinking in miles to try and make the distances seem smaller, but somehow it doesn’t work all that well as a 9 mile climb is still quite long.! Once over the top I was able to work well with my small group of 5 to bring us home back to Fayetteville. On the up side, my time trailing seems to be in good shape as once we got off the uphill I actually felt quite good and aside from yelling quite angrily at one of the girls who wasn’t working with about 10kms to go (I was rather cracked at this point and I wanted to cry), everything went well. We only conceded 10:00 to the main group – almost twenty to the front girls, but whatcha gonna do? I just wanted to start the next day. Next year I’m going to make my life easier by making it up with a larger group – Cypress here I come!

Day two was killer. We were up nice and early for an 8:00 am start and 105km of fun (for those who were counting that’s over 200km in less than 18 hours). The course was a lollypop (translation – and out and back section with a loop on the end of it) and the attacking started just after the girls had a pee brake – oh about 30 minutes in (I didn’t need one so I just rolled ahead – gotta get the brakes where you can!) The pack seemed a little hesitant to make it crazy hard – I got the impression that people were tired. The hill was essentially two steep sections with a medium grade in the middle joining the two. Kelly Benjamin (who has been riding like a star) helped me out by telling me where we were on the course, which helped a ton! I made it through the first lap and prepared myself for difficulty on the second, but unlike the day before I held tough. I didn’t manage to stay in contact with the leaders, but I did get myself in a group of about 20 riders and we were able to regain contact with the leaders in about 10km. A few solo riders tried to get away in the closing kms, but I just sat in and prepared myself for the finish. Unfortunately the lead moto decided to cut me off and so I had to brake sharply to avoid hitting my second motorcycle exhaust pipe for the season and I rolled across the line last in my group – just making the top 50.
No more than 6 hours later we were back on the Blue machines warming up for yet another uphill time trial. Now, I can’t say that this form of testing my ability is my favorite, but at least it ended up better than Redlands. In warm up I wasn’t able to get my heart rate much over 170 (which is what I do many aerobic rides at), but I knew I had to give it. On the way up the 2.5 mile climb I kept telling myself that each pedal stroke counted – to which I was greeting each time by the equivalent of a screeching OWWW! The pain was over in just under 13:00 (whereas superstar Erinne Willock blased up it in 9:40) and I have now vowed to spend next winter time trialing up whatever hills I can find because I really must improve my ability – but this time I wasn’t time cut!

Which bring us to today. I knew that it was going to be a little crazy, not only because they put a freaking mountain in the crit course (elevation gain of 110 feet per 1.2 mile lap – that’s right, I’m going imperial), but because there was only 20 seconds separating the top 3 on GC. I don’t know if there is much to say except for it was fast. I went hard and about 25 minutes in I was sitting at the back of the lead bunch and one of the girls decided that she was going to kamikaze and make up a few spots on the inside, only to come crashing down in front of me. To her defense, I saw what she was doing, though “hey, that’s not a bad idea” and took her wheel – which saw me end up on the far curb with a sore finger. The free lap was actually quite nice and seeings as I only have a small (like quarter sized) amount of road rash on my knee and elbow, with my most severe injury being jammed fingers (didn’t know you could do that in cycling, but apparently it is possible!) the rest was welcomed. Unfortunately, about 15 minutes later I saw the end of my time in the front group. At that point I believe only about 30 girls remained (80 started the weekend) so I was proud of myself and determined to finish up – which I did. The major piss off being that the organizers got my placing wrong and instead of being in 30th about 4:00 down, they have me in 44th, 10:00 down. Now I know that the latter people don’t really matter, but it’s pretty irritating that I paid $135 to do their race and they can’t even get the top 30 correct!

So all in all the weekend was a success. Need to work on the longer hills, but it’s good to see that my power is good – luckily I get to work on my weakness next week at Tri Peaks. Again I ask why I thought that it would be a good idea to check out a race entitled Tri PEAKS, but it’s all about getting fitter right? Maybe this week will provide a little insight into what life is like in Little Rock, Arkansas – the hometown of a Mr. Bill Clinton – a man who could properly pronounce nuclear.

North Carolina - Could Ride Here Forever!

2006-05-04T16:12:00.000-07:00

This is my shout out to Boone, North Carolina - because it's downright amazing! The riding is phenomenal, the views are picturesque (sorry, don't have a camera yet to show you just how so!), and they have a kick ass grocery store (Earth Fare). Really, what else is there to desire? I've just spent the last 3 days up in Boone with Alisha riding up and down and up and down and then up again. It's been great for me - and boy are my legs ever feeling it! Each ride has seemed like an epic - especially today's when we finished off the last half hour of a four hour ride with crazy hard rain. Luckily it didn't get too cold, so it was more like being in a luke-warm shower...but all the same I was happy to be in the sizzling warm car, a hot chocolate in hand (just hoping that the PowerTap recovers!)

Sadly enough, it is actually the grocery store that prompted the blog entry. I'm a sucker for the peanut butter covered prezels - plus who could not mention a grocery store with a section entitled Nut Butters? So today's been to die for - and now I'm kinda watching Walk the Line while I play on the computer - I tell ya, I'm living the life!

As an aside, I also thought that you might appreciate the following bumper sticker: Frodo Failed, Bush has the Ring. Thanks to Chris for stealing it for his MSN name! :P

Another few days here in NC and then I'm off to Nashville before heading to Lafayette, Arkansas for the Joe Martin Stage Race - I tell ya - I get to travel to the best of 'em!

An NRC Crit Finish: 4 Years in the Making

2006-05-01T11:14:00.000-07:00

Yay a picture! Thanks Paul, for taking this beauty of me racing at Roswell!
Okay, so maybe that's not being entirely fair to myself - I have only attempted one other NRC crit - and I was only 19 years old but needless to say, this weekend was FAR more successful. My racing started out on the streets of Athens, Georgia Saturday evening just before 8pm. Athens is a twilight crit - meaning that we started racing at dusk and it was full on dark by the end of the race and while I didn't get hit by a beer can as someone I talked to did last year - I did get to enjoy the lively atmosphere. Picture a town inhabited by students (this is more of a unique idea for those of us from Canada where Universities aren't the center of a small town but rather a bi-product of our larger cities) and all the students have just recently finished exams. There is a whole lot of drinking - and even more atmosphere. Unfortunately, I'm not sure I was really in a state of mind to enjoy it. I took to the line a little nervous, but quickly enough, nerves turned to pain as the girls at the front put the hammer down. We were sporting team radios and we received some great encouragement from the other end - however, I'm not really sure that the race ever really did slow down, as they promised it would! The course is a long rectangle with the long straight being the homestraight and the backstraight - the latter of which had a sizeable bump in it. The major obstacle of the race was jumping over that each lap - I must admit as I got tired I was getting lazy and just waiting for the corners to catch up to the back of the pack. It was honestly more pain than I have experienced for a long time - but I was super proud that I finished with the group - especially as there were times when I wasn't sure I was going to. My legs seemed to come around about 5 laps to go - which I was okay with - and that enabled me to move up in the pack a little. I cut the final corner on the inside and was able to limp across the line in 17th place (got pipped at the line by two girls - could have been 15th!) I was stoked - maybe not something for everyone to write home about - but it helped get the cobwebs out and ready me for Sunday.

Sunday was a crit in Roswell, Georgia (oh yeah and for the record, I'm sad that I didn't get to check out any of the Atlanta Olympic venues - so I guess I'll just have to go back. Although it did occur to me that the velodrome is now in Bromont). The course was a little longer and less intimidating (possibly as I'd broken the dry spell in my racing, so I knew that I was able to race again - after the unbelievable fatigue that I went through at home in Calgary I was a little worried about where my fitness stood - but the verdict is good :)) The race started out and I immediately got myself closer to the front than I was the previous evening. After the pain of sitting tail gunner (I was pleased that Chris wasn't there on Saturday night, I feel that he might have given me grief for where I was sitting in the pack - which mayb have been much needed and some form of karma!) I decided to sit more actively in the pack in Roswell. I was definately more aggressive and even got my picture on cyclingnews! Having said that - I'm just a "Team Kenda Tire rider" - need to work on my street cred to actually get my name in the caption! It was a good step in my development at this level though as I learned that I can indeed make an effort and still be good to stay in the pack. I had a good time - but I missed the break and then a couple of subsequent bridges up to the break, but I guess I'll learn this with time. It's all about the learning curve - but I had fun and that's the main idea!

Now, I'm sitting in a coffee shop in Hickory, North Carolina as Alisha Lion and myself are internet-nerding it up. I'm spending the week with her and we're going to be all over the place which should be fun as it looks like a beautiful area and I'm stoked to see what's around. I'm keeping my fingers crossed about the Flames to finish off the series this evening - I got the T-shirt on and everything! I go home for a month and the Canadian roots shine right on through. So it's a couple of weeks of training before I head to Joe Martin (in Arkansas I think) so here's to riding the bike and I'll be signing off! (My camera should be back soon and then I'll be able to get some pictures out!)

The Age Old Question

2006-04-28T12:19:00.000-07:00

That's right, I have been sent down to here to Athens, Georgia so that Air Canada could challenge me with the age old question: Why is it not okay for me to fly without my baggage, but a-okay for my baggage to fly without me? Now, I suppose in all reality, I should be pleased that I even made it down here to Athens yesterday. My plane was late leaving Calgary so I was forced to do the 2000m-dash-with-shuttle-ride-to-terminal-2 in the Toronto airport before smiling nicely at the customs guard while dragging my bag and bike box through immigration only to arrive at the departure gate and have the woman in charge of boarding tell me that I was to be on the next flight. Well, conviniently enough, the plane was still nicely at the gate - the problem was that she had been "paging me since 1:10 (for info I deplaned the previous flight at about 1:25) and so I had been taken off the flight". They had been paging me because of the gross incompetancy of the women who I paid for my bicycle - she forgot to take the expiry date of my credit card. Alas, I made it safe and sound to Atlanta yesterday afternoon slightly after 4pm local time - the same cannot be said for my luggage.

Bike and bag showed up 18 hours later. This is life I suppose - but why do the airlines HATE ME? They left my bike in Melbourne on the way to New Zealand, they left it in Vancouver on the way to San Diego - it must be some kind of karmic kick in the pants...maybe I should be nicer to people? So as I'm putting my beautiful bike together, I discover that the idiot Air Canada baggage handlers have decided to leave a lasting impression on my paint job. I keep telling myself that it is only a bicycle....it's only an inanimate object - I'll get over it - but it's only a week old!!! The bottom line is that I hate airlines. Point final. And Air Canada is the WORST of about 11 evils - and part of its evil is that it's unavoidable. Maybe I should start a letter writing campaign - what am I going to change? I don't know, but if I learned anything at the University of Victoria, it's that I should protest anything and everything, even if there is no good reason.

With that off my chest, I'm going to go enjoy a beautiful ride through the scenic areas of Athens, Georgia. It's lush and green and should give me a good chance to acclimatize to this here weather (it's only 23 out and it's supposed to be colder tomorrow). Out the door I go!

Walking in a Winter Wonderland...

2006-04-22T08:22:00.000-07:00

So it's been awhile...the title of this post was supposed to be something about being back in Cowtown and enjoying the hoopla of the Red Mile and being right in the action of the Flames first playoff game. And while that is going to be a major topic here (I'm going back to my roots man) it is actually snowing here. Now, for those of you from Calgary, I know this isn't a huge surprise - and while I enjoy being home....the trainer just doesn't do it for me so much. To give those of you who aren't regular frequenters of this part of the world, the temperature here yesterday was 20C and tomorrow we are supposed to hit a high of 9C - but today there are flurries. No, not yummy McDonald's McFlurries but snow falling. But that subject has been exhausted - plus I'm heading out of the city next Thursday - maybe it's a blessing so that I can get all my errands done (you may notice that I am currently on the computer and not doing ANYTHING productive). Having said that, it might also be God reacting to the accountants at work who want me to come in today - still not thinking that's high on my list of things to do (but don't tell anyone!!!)

So the Flames won their first playoff game at the Dome last night! Carmen was kind enough to slave over the keyboard yesterday to procure the coveted tickets. We were in "the zone" which meant that we were in first come, first serve seating and ended up two rows from the very top of the stadium - but hey, we got to see the WHOLE ice rink. If you ask my honest opinion, the Flames were lucky to squeak out with the win. There were times where their playing was a little lack lustre. They need to shoot the puck more - too much pansy assing around in behind the oponent's blue line. Superb playing came out twice to kill 5 on 3s and if they had played with that intensity the whole time they would have dominanted, as it was they scored a pretty good goal in the second period only to be answered by the Mighty Ducks in the third. The ducks goal a pretty awesome experience - not only was the goal pretty lame (mind you, a goal's a goal!) but the entire stadium was silent - only the red goal light went on. Definately intense - I wouldn't have wanted to be a Duck's fan in there - in fact I don't think there was a single Duck fan! Calgary went on to score in the first overtime to finish off the game and send all the happy fans off to spend time with the Calgary police force down on 17th ave - definately a whole lot of alcohol was consumed (oh yeah, and did I mention that my opinion of the Flames not playing great wasn't a popular one amongst the crew I went to the game with?)

The truly interesting part about what was going through my mind as we were watching the game was that I was thinking about what those boys endure as professional athletes. I was thinking about the amount of travel, what it would be like to hit the ice, night after night and have to refocus with the crowd being so intense. Maybe it's cause I'm reading a sports psych book at the moment, but I was somewhat wrapped up in the behind the scenes footage!

And to address the fact that I haven't really updated this thing for about a month I'll give you a breif synopsis of what I've been up to: sleep, eat, work, train. Not terribly interesting - hence why I didn't feel that you needed to be bored with reading about how I was terribly exhausted from travelling, racing and now I was doing other people's taxes (which reminds me that I need to do my own today at some point). After two weeks of feeling like I might have mono again, I'm back at 'er and feeling pretty good - I'm on the new bike and pretty stoked to head down for the Athens Twilight crit. Should be good times! Oh yeah and check out what Becca bought me for Christmas - isn't it kick ass? All the cycling pins for the Beijing Olympics - definately cool! K, well I've wasted more than enough time, so I'm going to go jump on the trainer - for those cyclists out there - enjoy your ride and remember: Calgary is NOT a good place for a cyclist - stick to winter or indoor sports!

Tough Day at the Office

2006-03-26T18:12:00.000-08:00

Southern California has finally returned to the weather that the postcards and television shows promise (speaking of So Cal and TV - I'm finally caught up on my OC episodes). On Friday morning the pro peleton took to the street of Redlands for the Redlands Bicycle Classic - abbreviated. Not that I can really say that, as this is my first experience, but all the same it has been shortened to a 3 stage event (read, not a prologue and two stages, but rather a three stage event). Now many of you may think that I am crazy, however that slight difference cost me a weekend of sitting on the sidelines. While some people, like Amber Neben and my teammate Alisha Lion, experience success on the 5km hill climb, I did not. It was a painful experience that ended up taking me 15 seconds too long - the charming officials decided to enforce the time cut. Translation: the end of my weekend. I won't go into what a bastard move I feel that was, or how the officials said that they imposed is as we were "sandbagging it" which would imply that I wasn't going as hard as I could - which I was...however, I think I might be a little tired.

This here - I'm trying a new thing, just for Lisa - I'm going to try to seperate my paragraphs more...lemme know how it works out. So yeah, my weekend finished really before it started. It did mean, however that I got to ride the old Oak Glen course - and really, from what I've heard, you haven't really done Redlands unless you've gone on a group ride while the race is still going on. This isn't to say that I was happy, or proud, or not incredibly pissed off that I didn't get to start the beautiful crit in downtown Redlands (it was a super COOL course from what I could see). But I've realized that there is only so much racing that one girl can get through - and I've hit my limit. So it's time to head home and train, get my bearings under me and go get some RESULTS for the rest of the season. Besides, I hear what doesn't kill you makes you stronger... ;)

The San Dimas Stage Race: COLD and WET

2006-03-20T10:14:00.000-08:00

A picture of me leading the field at San Dimas http://www.cyclingnews.com/photos.php?id=photos/2006/mar06/sandimas06/sandimas063/JI6V2647
My North American season has officially begun! Friday afternoon saw my first race on this continent, and to be honest, right after I finished, I was quite aware that I would not remember it as a highlight of my 2006 cycling season. To my credit, the course wasn’t exactly hand built to my personal strengths – a 6.2km uphill TT. On the upside, I didn’t finish last – only 54th of 65 starters…so I did beat people. Just as I was starting up the mountain in the small suburb town of Glendora, California the rain started to pour. The temperature was decidedly un-Southern California and a small part of me thought that maybe I had a hope as the small climber girls might not have enough body fat to make it up the hill – alas they did…it was actually coming down that was the hardest part! Luckily I had my super-mom support and she was waiting for me about halfway down with a nice warm gortex jacket – perfect for the conditions. I then made my way to the van (I really must get a pic of it onto here) and warmed up with the help of some miso soup and the heater while I awaited Chris’ return.
We awoke Saturday morning to frigid temperatures, but the skies were clear. I tried to warm-up prior to the race, but even after 20 minutes of riding, my muscles still felt cold – really I felt right at home! I will interject at this point that these are by FAR the coldest temperatures I have encountered since leaving Calgary in August where it spend the better part of a month around 10 degrees and raining. So we rolled off to check out the loop, which we would complete 8 times for a total of approximately 92km. As was expected, we rolled along quite comfortably for the first chunk of the lap until we hit the major obstacle on the course – a climb of just over 1km. It was short enough that I could roll up the first bit without too much trouble, only starting to feel the burn a few hundred meters prior to the 200m to the top of the KOM. At that point, I would try to settle into a rhythm before powering over the last 100m with everything I had. The good news is that my climbing is coming along quite nicely (contrary to what Friday’s TT results would lead you to believe) as I was able to make it over the climb in the top half and usually in the second group of girls. The frustrating part was that I was routinely at the front of the second bunch over the top and would have to lead the charge down the hill to catch the front group. With KOM primes on laps 2,4,6 and hot spot sprints on laps 3,5,7 the action of the race was sure to serge. However, on the second of the KOM primes, the pace was high overtop of the hill and the field was split decisively with 7 girls going clear up the road. Next over the crest was a group of about 5 girls, followed by my group. With some excellent chasing spearheaded by the girls from America’s Dairyland we caught the smaller group in front of us, but the 7 girls up front we not to be seen again. The teams did not seem to be interested in chasing – mostly as the major teams of Lipton and T-Mobile were well represented with 3 and 2 girls in the break respectively. The hill continued to prove to be a challenge and we managed to whittle away the remainder of the field. The last time over the hill I pushed with all my might and managed to make it over with the front group. As we descended and hit the finishing straight, I saw the girls fighting for position, and I really should have made my way up there. Unfortunately, I was a little rusty with the finish line positioning, as I haven’t seen the front of a race for a while now! I made my move to get up there a little late and with 100m to go my legs were toast. I pushed to the finish line, but a few girls squirmed past me as I finished 19th. But the real surprise of the day was that the finish moved me up to 36th on GC – confirming just how bad my TT was the previous day.
With the hilly stages out of the way, I was stoked to hit the crit course on Sunday afternoon. The weather was once again chilly (and for those of you who have limited sympathy for me, please remember that while it may be colder up north, you are not necessarily trying to spend time outside in spandex in 5 degrees and raining) as we took to the line for a 50-minute race. Things started out quite nicely after what I had been exposed to in Australia and on the third lap I decided to have a go at stringing it out. I attacked through the start/finish taking 3 or 4 girls with me, however it was not to be and within a lap we were brought back. A lap or two later saw the first hot spot contest, as I had already had a good effort, I decided to let the other girls go for it. Unfortunately for me, right after the sprint, Anne Samplonius of Team Biovail decided to counter taking 4 others with her just as the rain (and hail) started to fall (including the on fire Lisa Sweeney!) As I was resting in the pack, I saw the move go, but was unable to follow and figured that the girls would respond anyway…but no such luck. I tried my best to get up there and I managed to help bring back a break off group of 3 girls, but the 5 were long gone. After that, things were decidedly frustrating in the pack. Lipton was represented in the break, along with Dairyland and CPT Colnago and for whatever reason T Mobile was uninterested in chasing. I tried my best to get the group fired up to chase, but anytime I put in an effort, I would find someone covering me (I would later find out that they were girls protecting the break mostly). The race itself was very different from anything I had experienced in Australia – mostly as I wasn’t killing myself just to stay on. It was decisively less aggressive and the net results was me feeling rather frustrated. On the final lap I tried to position myself going up the hill, but taking the wide line wasn’t the best call. As we raced down the hill I was smushed between a couple Lipton girls who, as I found out a little too late, weren’t all that interested in sprinting. I came out of the corner and tried to make up some space, but only managed to cross the line in 15th overall. Not too shabby, but not really what I had wanted either.All in all it was a solid weekend of racing. I think it was important in my development as a rider as I am now confident in my ability to play ball with the big girls. I am, however, looking forward to having a team to ride with next weekend at Redlands as I believe this is the first set of racing I’ve ever done where I can see the benefit of a team. I’m happy with my showing, especially in the roadrace, as I feel in prior years I would not have been able to stay with that front group. I’m off to a solid start and the fun is yet to come!

One More Sleep

2006-03-10T12:07:00.000-08:00

I can't believe it. Almost 6.5 months have passed since Chris and I boarded a plane to come to the land down under and now it's only one more sleep until we return to North American soil. The last week has been gorgeous - I've been unbelievably boring, but the landscape has been incredible! Thursday morning we jumped on an 11 hour train that brought us from Wellington to Auckland, well a town just south of there to be more exact (I can't remember the name, but I can tell you that when pronounced by a New Zealander our stop and the one before sounded really similar and Chris and I tried to get out at the wrong one!) We're staying with the Williams' (Liz who we were staying with in Melbourne - her family) and they are incredible. We went for a ride yesterday and it was unbelievable! The terrain is all rolling - but hard rolling - the hills go up, up, up then down, down, down! The entire train trip was pretty - rolling grass carpet. I believe that trip may have actually cost me money though as I'm now convinced I would like to return here to ride sometime! :P I'm still shaking out the cobwebs from racing (I slept 12 hours last night) and we'll head out on the road after we get to a bike shop this morning as Chris snapped his shifter cable while riding yesterday. We have one obstacle left: how to get to the airport - I'm going to see what I need to bribe Andy, Liz's bro, into getting us there! And so I'm signing off from what will likely be my last post from the southern hemisphere - it's been great...I love it...but I'm stoked to get home and see everyone!

Time to Sleep

2006-03-06T18:47:00.001-08:00

After two weeks of being a full on pramateur athlete (that is an amateur who must ride with the professionals), I’m ready for a good long nap. This afternoon Chris and I moved all our crap up 48 stairs into our new abode for the next couple of days, which is actually the house of one of the guys who Chris met in the feed zone over the last week. Five people live in this house (of which we have met only 3 to date) and they have been kind enough to let me be a vegetable on the couch for most of the next 48 hours. Yesterday I toed the line yet again with a collection of the world’s finest female cyclists, and someone up near the front decided to make the day miserable from the start. Right as the car pulled away and we headed into the first climb, 1km from the start, things started to go nuts. The course was a 6.2km loop through the CBD of Wellington (for my true blog fans, you will remember that CBD stands for Central Business District and is a fancy name for downtown). The first climb was a three-part climb of just over 500m gradually increasing from about 6% to almost 10% at the top (that felt even more difficult as the race went on). After the climb we whizzed down the other side for the better part of a minute before taking a sweeping left-hander up the feed zone hill. This hill wasn’t quite as steep and wound around for another 5-600m before shooting you onto a fast downhill and then back into the city for about 3km of crit-style speed. The start/finish was super classily placed on the steps of parliament (which proved to be a great viewing area for the final sprint!) and there were people lining the streets throughout the course. So yeah, right from the gun the heavy hitters decided to make today a selective race. The first three laps were completed around 10:00 which is an average of over 40km/h. The field strung out in a single file line throughout the flat sections and then blew up good going over the hills. I was positioned alright through the first lap and after the hills on the second lap was set up for a good position before a girl “gumbied” (nice word eh? Thanks Josie!) and crashed right in front of me. I managed to avoid hitting the ground, but I did get shuffled towards the rear at this point. Unfortunately, that positioning gerfuffle proved to be the beginning of the end as on the next lap a number of riders in front of me were gapped and while I made it over the first hill with the main pack, I had some difficulty regaining my composure on the downhill and struggled down on the flats. Early on in the next lap I was dropped and tried to fight back with about 7 other girls, but I didn’t manage to stay with the group (although they did make it on to another group shortly thereafter). That was more or less the end of my race. I kept the effort level hard as I wanted to get a good workout in with my last race of this block, but was lapped by Sarah Ulmer before too long. Now, while that does not sound terribly dignified that I was lapped, I will point out that Sarah did manage to chump the international field and lap all but 39 of the 111 starters on the day. I’d like to give some props out to my composite teammate and sweetheart Tina Pic for a 5th place finish on the day to place her in 4th overall for the race to be World Cup leader. Everyone in the field agreed that today was unbelievably difficult (it’s nice to hear that the big girls found it really challenging as well) and as I may have mentioned, I’m a little tired! Having said that, the last two weeks have been an incredible learning experience. I haven’t felt so young and new to the sport of cycling in a long time. I know that I have a great deal to learn, but it’s nice to see that I’m only a few steps away from “making it”. The girls at the top are most definitely faster than me, but it’s a level that I can understand and that I believe that I will be able to attain in the near future. I’ve met a load of super incredible people – friendly, encouraging – it’s been great. I’m motivated to hit the road (after my nap) and do a good block of work this summer to take one more step towards international success.

Windy, Windy Wellington

2006-03-02T17:55:00.000-08:00

Once again, we have found ourselves a new home - this time in the Angus Inn Hotel in Lower Hutt just outside of Wellington. The scenery has been fantastic, with the weather a little colder than we are used to, but all in all New Zealand is living up to its hype. In just four days I've determined that I definately have to come back to do some further exploring at some other point. The hills look inviting for training and the mountains growing out of the ocean are picturesque.
Having said that, it hasn't been smooth sailing...I'm happy to report that the Aussie attitude towards customer care has indeed transferred over to the airline industry where, as per expectation, we encountered a great deal of hullaballoo in getting the bikes on board. However, a long walk to a different terminal by Chris and two new shiny bike boxes later (retail $16.00) later, we were on our way...unfortunately the bikes weren't. Despite our appearance at the airport 3 hours prior to departure, we arrived in Wellington to be greeted by only one of our bikes. Now, out of a possible four, would you guess which one arrived? That's right, none other than Chris' track bike...talk about useful! Luckily our road bikes showed up about 12 hours later (just in time for the downtown parade), but my track bike would be another 24 hours in arrears. You might not think that to be a problem, but my tools and all my cycling kit was in that box - hence an issue...but I made it through. Is does make me ponder the fact that they will let you stay seated on the runway for hours if you make it to the plane without your bags on board, but they can choose to delay your bags??? I will NEVER understand the airline industry!
Anyway, with all that behind me, on Wednesday night with took to the first stage of the New Zealand Trust House Tour being a criterium right here in downtown Lower Hutt. The course was awesome - nice and technical and exciting. The race itself was quite tame as a group of 8 got off the front with all the major teams represented, so people were minimally motivated to chase. As I was just trying to get my legs underneath me, I was okay with that! I was well positioned throughout the race until about 3 laps to go when I was pushed right into a massive pylon and forced to come to a complete standstill before heading wide off course. I didn't realize just how good my position had been up until that point as a good 60-70 riders must have passed me. In the end, it didn't make a difference as the commissaires made a mistake and pulled all the riders except for those lapped off course (which was completely contrary to what they had mentioned in the manager's meeting). Consequently, those of us in the bunch all tied for 9th position (good thing that they spent thousands of dollars putting state of the art computer chips on our fork blades!) Speaking of managers - Chris has been fantastic! He's been running around like a pro and helping us out a great deal - three cheers for Chris! Unfortunately, in all the bustle, he has not had time to find his camera and so we are yet again pictureless...sorry!
Anyways, so yesterday was the famous double day - starting with a 100km roadrace in the morning, followed by a 1 hour crit in the evening. With only a few hours between the two, we ended up racing almost 150km! Now, that's a big day! The roadrace went okay. We all rolled along the undulating terrain for about 50km before hitting 20km of real hills. They went up and up and culminated on what felt like a mountain pass. Early on I was shed off with a group of other girls, but we managed to make it over the obstacles and rolled in nicely, 15 minutes behind the frontrunners. Not stellar - but stronger than I would have done last year. I just need to learn to push myself that little bit harder on the hills - I think my lack of confidence and experience at being able to stay in the pack on climbs shined through!
Once in the town of Masterston we were fed finger foods as a turn around before the crit. The crit was a thing of beauty - unreal fast and fun technical corners. It was fast enough that I saw a few good names blow up - including Rochelle Gilmore who saw her demise directly in front of me. I spent most of the crit near the mid to rear (I was sure that Chris would heckle me for it), but funny enough, when it was strung out, that was the most consistent speed. I had a good time picking one or two girls off each corner and slowly yo-yoing through the bunch. The best compliment I received however, came from Tina Pic (who is not only 4 time US crit champion but one of the NICEST people in the world!) who said that I was riding well. She complimented me on my positioning in the roadrace...good to see that I've re-established my confidence in the pack - it's just so much fun moving up through it! With one lap to go, one of the Chinese riders let a gap go as she was being dropped. I gave it my all to close it, but apparently the average speed for the lap was 47km/h, and as you might have guessed, I didn't succeed. I did managed to hold steady though, so that was good. Which leads us to the final stage this morning - the time trial. I can only hope that it was more successful than my TT last weekend, and due to the number of no shows and others who decided that it wasn't worth blowing the energy before Sunday's World Cup event, I feel that I might be charging up the GC - maybe top 75??? We haven't got the results yet, so I'm just not sure. The wind was howling, but I gave it a go and hey, I got a finish for the Tour, which is more than I can say for a good deal of the 124 starters. A finish is always a strong thing to have under my belt and I'm stoked for Sunday which will bring us around a 6.2km circuit 20 times. Apparently there are 2 power climbs per lap, but I can only imagine that 40 power climbs will zap the legs! I'll let you know...until next time!

FIRST WORLD CUP FINISH

2006-02-26T13:12:00.000-08:00

So I might have crossed the line in 76th place (of 144 starters), just over 8 minutes back, but I finished! I had 3 goals going into the race:
1) Stay with the front group for 4 laps (half of the race for a total of 60km), and
2) If I did get dropped to ride in within the 5% time cut as to get a finish and to ride it in with a group.
I succeeded on both accounts! The first 4 laps of the race were relatively tame and the field stayed in tact. The course had one hill in it similar to the hill in the tour de Delta, but a little bit longer and a bit steeper (for those of you in the bike game), and another gradual hill used for the feed zone. All in all, it was apparent that a sprinter could win on the course (as Ina Teutenburg showed quite aptly), but with the right tactics, the hill is hard enough that it would be possible to drop the pure sprinters. So yeah, the first 4 times up the hill were more relaxed - not to say that it was easy - but I chugged overtop of the hill in the middle of the bunch. Watching Ina was a little like a clinic on sag-climbing (where you start the hill at the front and let yourself lose ground over the climb as it allows you to take the hill easier) and it was interesting to see that one of the other T-Mobile girls was always a little farther behind - presumably to be there to bring it back if there was a split that Ina didn't make. On the 5th lap, the heavy hitters in the race decided it was time to turn up the heat. The field was strung out through the feed zone. Of course this was the lap that I was convinced that I needed a feed - and in doing so, I hit the bottom of the climb farther back that I had on the previous attempts. Consequently, as I crested the hill, I was in a group that had been somewhat detached from the front 50 or so riders. This made the jaunt over the cresh and onto the next bit of false flats absolutely lovely and not at all unbearable...luckily, we caught up in not to long. But I did say that it was on, and the next lap over the hill I was gapped again, and this time it had nothing to do with my positioning! Having said that, when I got to the top, I saw I was in good company and felt pretty horrible trying to hold the wheel in front of me. I looked up and understood why that was when I saw that it was Tina Mayolo-Pic trying to bring us back. This time we weren't as lucky as the front group kept pushing and it took us most of the rest of the lap to catch back on (probably 6 or 7 km). We had made contact through the start/finish and I realized that I had made a fairly decisive split - as I was moving through with the top half of the field...unfortunately, the little legs died out not long after and I found myself all alone on the race course. Strong winds and the fact that I had already done 90km made it a bit of a slow go, but luckily I was caught by another group not long after. I road it in with this group (perhaps known as the groupetto as the girls were rather adament that we take the hill chilled out - which I was fine with). I kept rotating through the front of the group though, as I was determined to get a real finish! In the closing kms the speed picked up in the group and I know it's lame, but I figured that I might as well stay at the front, seeings as I had been up in the top 15-20 of the group since I joined it (I wasn't to find out just how many girls were actually in my group until I looked at the results!) A few girls actually sprinted to the line, I tried just to rev it up so not too many girls passed me, but at the same time, I knew that it was in bad form to actually sprint (this may sound a little silly to those who don't bike race, but really, we're not in the race anymore!) So I'm quite stoked with the result - first of many World Cup finishes I'm sure, but this is a step that I needed to take. I'm off to New Zealand this afternoon and hopefully there will be more learning and exciting racing to come!

Geelong Tour – the racing has begun!

2006-02-26T03:53:00.000-08:00

Well here we are again – and so soon – racing time’s a here! I’ve been chilling with Chris and our flatmate (here in the caravan park that is) Trudy since Monday and well to be quite honest, the walls are starting to look a little boring! Trudy has also been riding on my composite team (Team Cheerwine/Bicisport) and we are right next door to two of our other teammates Kerry and Kelly – who are a total blast! The team is rounded out with Helen Kelly and Suzanne Ljungskog (two time world champion and a complete sweet heart). Really teamwork is a non-issue as the ability levels are the full range and the top teams (T-Mobile, Nurnberger, Nobili, Univega, Team NZ, and so on) are so in charge that we’re left to be – quite eloquently pack fodder…and that is the role that I have been taking quite seriously all week! ;)
The starting stage was an 8km TT along the banks of Portarlington. I road out there with the girls and got ready for my first Eddy Mercx style TT– meaning no aero equipment. My ride was there – nothing special, but I wasn’t 5 minutes behind the leader either – so first stage – check – on to the next. Without too much ado (we must have had at least 3 hours rest – and that was only because we were early in the start order) came stage 2 – a criterium around Portarlington. The course was 1km in length and was built on the side of a hill. At the time, I thought that it was somewhat massive, but after having ridden it again today, it wasn’t that bad – I might just have to blame it on the super fast girls! The major challenge came from the fact that the hill started after coming out of a greater than 90 degree turn, and with 140 girls on course, it’s kind of like a standing start going up a hill. I started the stage about 2/3rds of the way back and spent the first 8-10 laps trying to move up. Now, first the good news: I managed to make it into the group of girls who ultimately finished the crit; and the bad: in getting up to that group, I killed myself to get up there and ended up dropping off the back. It was okay though as I was joined by at least 40 of my closest friends and really the important part – there were plenty of girls who were dropped before me (note: the organizers have had their hands full getting the regular results set and so those of us from about 80 back aren’t actually placed properly…) So it was a solid start to the week and I was looking forward to the following day’s flat stage with a sprint finish!!!
But alas, my fun was somewhat spoiled during the stage 3 Barwon Heads Circuit race – and rather early on. With our second day in a row of overcast skies, we started off with the full tour roster as it was not possible to be time cut in either the TT or the crit on the previous day. The field was a little jumpy and I was eager to get up closer to the front, but was trying to move up the middle of the pack. As I was doing this, the police motorbikes were trying to make it to the front of the group. The first cop made it known what he was trying to do by honking his horn and sneaking up on the right of the pack. However, our second friend the police officer wasn’t quite as lucky – he started to follow the first chopper when all of a sudden a parked car jumped in his way…and you say – well Jen, was he not “parked” and I say “yes, yes he was” – but the police guy was taken a little by surprised and consequently tried to squeeze a little farther in on the road. As you may have figured out – this is where things went wrong – the motorcycle went down and ended up hitting a girl – consequently causing a crash. So here I was, only 5km into an 80km race and sitting on my bum beside a cornfield (well, it might not have been a cornfield as I’m in Australia – but it has the same effect!) In a bit of a daze-like-panic, I jumped to my feet and tried to get my bike running again – alas, it was being cranky and the chain’s crankypants attitude required about 10s of consoling prior to me jumping back on the machine. And so began the time trial back up to the group (mind you, I did have a television camera on me at the time, so maybe I’ll get some air time – that could be cool!) Unfortunately, despite a worthy fight with the caravan, I would be denied my prey. I was lucky enough about a lap later to find a buddy (a victim of a puncture) who ended up towing me around the course (I did my best, but she was definitely stronger than me). We worked well and kept at it, but ended up losing over 18:00 to the pack (which for 75km ain’t too bad I might add – seeing as there were 120 of them and only 2 of us), but it was more than the allotted 10% of the time and so we were not allowed to start the final stage. I was definitely disappointed with this news, but my teammates were really supportive, which was great, and I was able to take the time to sit back and recover in time for Sunday’s World Cup race – which is what I’m doing right now. Chris has been a phenomenal soigneur and our other support staff have been great as well. Can’t wait to give the course a go on Sunday – I’m aiming for a finish!

Penguins!

2006-02-12T18:48:00.000-08:00

Yes, indeedie – right here in Australia! You don’t have to go all the way down to the Antarctic to see the little cuties – plus here in Oz you get to see “little penguins” (how original eh? Yet another display of Aussie language dumbing things down to the lowest possible denominator: bird flu (not avian flu), Poppy day (when you wear poppies…we in the land of the Canuck call it Remembrance Day) but the good news is they are indeed little – standing at only about 20cm in full height.
So here’s the drill – you drive down to Phillip Island which is located about 1.5 hours south of Melbourne, purchase a $17 dollar ticket from the tourist center and gather down on a concrete amphitheatre and wait until the sunsets. Just after the sun goes down, the penguins congregate about 400m off shore where they form “rafts” of penguins and come into shore together. Once on the shore (soliciting many ooohs and aaaaahs from the onlookers), they gather together in groups anywhere from about 5 to as many as 20 to make the dash across the sandy part of the beach (probably about 30m in length). Watching them waddle across the sand (the ones with the big bellies getting left behind!) is adorable, but it must be rather energy draining for the little things. They do indeed walk like penguins (which is convenient as a whole type of walking has been named after them!) and every so often, they decided part of the way to the shelter of the bush that they are in danger. When this occurs the little things scamper back to the water’s edge at about five times the speed they had originally been moving and wait (presumably to recover) until the coast is clear. Much in the same way, once they have made it to the safety of the bush, you can see clusters of penguins recovering before the longer, but safer journey to their burrows (yes, they live in little holes under the ground – weird eh?). A steady stream of penguins roll up on the beach for most of an hour and while I am unsure of exactly how many we saw come out – apparently the evening prior 511 penguins hit the beach. The “Penguin Parade” was definitely worth our expenditure – plus the area down on Phillip Island is absolutely gorgeous – which is good as it provided some photographic targets, as we weren’t allowed to take pics of the penguins (the flashes scare them!)
So I figure that’s our last tourist stop here in Oz – which is kinda scary, but I’m starting to get ready for the World Cup as we head out to Geelong in a week – and start racing in 8 days!!! That having been said, once at the tourist destination, I remembered what drove me nuts about seeing those types of attractions. First off, it’s the Chinese New Year – so needless to say, it was rather busy…and like all good mobs – the people at the attraction felt that the rules were beyond them. They weren’t tricky rules, but sometimes “be quiet and sit down” although it seems to work on kindergarten kids, is a little lost on adults…I tell ya! :P Definitely a must see though – gotta love the penguins!

The 129th Austral: Australia’s Oldest Wheel Race

2006-02-05T16:34:00.000-08:00

Tonight saw us heading back to the track for some old time wheel race fun. After the weeklong escapade in Tasmania, it felt rather old hat really, well except for the fact that we were frolicking in the Vodafone Arena which will be used for non other than the Commonwealth Games track competition in about a month’s time. As a side note, if I had $5 for every time someone asked me if I was here for the Comm Games…Anyways, the event had a large media draw – but as can be expected, the women’s races were merely an afterthought (I will refrain from complaining bitterly at the sexist nature of this sport – and in a country that easily boasts the world’s best women cyclists…but I said I would refrain). The real draw was the men’s sprints – the film-guy from Channel 10 actually told me that he was there to see if Shane Kelly and Mark “Frenchie” French were going to knock each other off their bicycles – have a bingle, if you will. Alas, no such luck – although the Japanese riders did have a good go at taking as much of the field out as possible – a special props go out to the guy who took out two guys a lap and a half after the end of the race – super class!
So I’m sure you’re wondering how my races went – without a doubt…well the good news is that I have indeed improved since leaving Tassie 5 weeks ago. I feel better, am going faster – bad news: I still didn’t manage to get any kind of result out of the deal. The evening started with a good warm-up, in which I was pleasantly surprised to feel my legs were ticking over well despite a good deal of hill work at the beginning of the week. Yes, all that warm up for 18 laps of a 250m track. I’ll grant you, they were a tough dozen and a half – but only 18 all the same.
First up on the night’s agenda was the 12 lap scratch. Based on how I had felt on the track Thursday night and my experience in Tassie, I decided to play it cool during the scratch. To my pleasant surprise, I felt stellar throughout the race. Unfortunately (there does always seem to be a BUT in my stories doesn’t there?) I got a little boxed in a gapped with about half a lap to go. In all reality, it was my fault – I really should have moved up with 2 to go as I was feeling good – but as I said to Liz, the beauty of bike racing is that there is always a “I could have done that better.” So the last lap had me trying to close a 10m gap on the front 5 girls – I managed to shrink it considerably, but was left to cross the line in 6th place. I was actually quite pleased with the race.
About an hour passed before our wheel race during which I went up and visited Chris (the somewhat power-drunk folk at the velodrome wouldn’t let him onto the infield). I was place on the 40m mark with the girl in front of me a mere 5m ahead; I closed the gap pretty quick and we were well on our way. The girl in front of me pulled up just as we were closing the gap on all the front markers and I kept going to pull us even with just over 2 laps to go. Just as we made contact, one of the front girls attacked and managed to stay clear for the win. I got stuck high for the last 500m and consequently was not able to finish as strongly as I would have liked, but to my pleasant surprise, only 1 of the girls from my group finished ahead – and it was Liz (she started on the 10m), so I was happy for her.
We’ve made it home and it’s another one of those late nights. I’m too hyper to head to bed quite yet, but the miserable choice in television programming suggests to me that I should probably hit the hay and read a little more of the Memoirs of a Geisha. Oh yeah and for good measure, I’m going to plug http://www.womenscycling.net/ as their writer was kind enough to make me feel special and interview me…maybe there will be something cool!

World Records Falling from the Skies

2006-02-02T21:03:00.000-08:00

Well we might not have been able to make it out for the Commonwealth Games, but we managed to make it out to the Commonwealth Games Swimming Trials the other night. Yours for only $38 a head, we were privileged to the wonders of Australian swimming – translation: the fastest national competition in the world. That is, we got to witness it from high up in the bleachers – row W to be exact – as for like all Aussie sports they come out in swarms to bring in the records - and this week was no different. During the week of racing at least 3 world records have fallen here in Melbourne including Leisel Jones’ 200m breaststroke which at 2:20.5 (I believe – and for the record, that’s faster than I ever managed to swim a 200m freestyle…not by much mind you…) she took over a second off her previous world’s best. It was phenomenal to watch as in doing so, Ms. Jones also blew away the rest of the field by over 7 seconds (and yes, one can only presume that the second place person will qualify for the Games and most likely do very well!) and so we’re thinking she most likely wasn’t even tapered – there’s a scary thought for you! So yeah, lots of stars in the pool – we saw the “Thorpedo” give ‘er a go in the 100m freestyle semis (he won the finals the next evening) and Libby Lenton attempt to reset her world record in the 100m freestyle, which she set the previous evening in the semis at 53.42. Unfortunately, she didn’t quite hit the mark – only 53.5 – but it was enough for the win and rather impressive all the same.
That night I went home and dreamt of swimming – it was kinda freaky actually…don’t think my love for the pool will ever die. I just can’t get over how young some of the kids making the finals seem – when you’re in a sport like cycling you forget how young some of the swimmers can be (Leisel Jones attended the Sydney Olympics at the age of 14). A few of the girls in the finals were born in 1992 – that is 11 years younger than me! Which frightening enough makes them 13 or 14 – so yeah, I’m feeling a little better now, that is rather young… But the evening was well worth it (although I would have loved not to have paid – a women walked up to us in the foyer of the pool asking if tonight’s tickets had been free as she had 2 extra she was looking to give away…grrrr!) I can only imagine just how exciting the actual Games are going to be!
Back to cycling…you knew you couldn’t avoid it! I’m off to race in the Vodafone Arena tomorrow night in the Austral Race – which is, for you trivia buffs, the longest running wheel race in Australia. The Vodafone Arena will be the home to the Commonwealth Games in just about 6 weeks – I’m actually pretty stoked to race. And while I’m thinking about it – our roommate Liz will be competing in the sprints and 500m TT – you can check out an article on her here http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/sundaystartimes/auckland/0,2106,3557372a6469,00.html – she’s my new STAR! As you can see – the city is starting to anticipate the excitement – plus we’ve hit the final week countdown until the Winter Olympics!!! Oh yeah, and I bought a new saddle today – it was somewhat of a necessity as my last one had completely disintegrated with the top layer peeling off at the tip with much of the foam coming off with it – but the new one is super pretty – it's Specialized and white and grey and pink - what more could I ask?! Alright, I’m going to sign off now as if I get into anymore of the details of my life it’s going to get rather mundane – but I’ll definitely let you know just HOW COOL the Austral is. Toodles (my tribute to Chris…)

On Fire in Adelaide

2006-01-22T17:19:00.000-08:00

Keeping with the cycling agenda, one would think that this would mean I am going fast...however I literally mean that I think I was ON FIRE. We were lucky enough to head over to Adelaide for what was apparently one of the worst heat waves in 3-4 years...oh yeah and we were racing in it as well! So first things first, Adelaide is an amazing city. I know that practically every place I've been in Australia I've been impressed by it and thought that I might be able to live there, but Adelaide definately takes the cake. Despite people telling us that it was a bit of a lame city (well I must admit, I didn't check out the nightlife...but honestly, it wasn't on my list of things to do), it was our favorite city by a long shot. The population comes in about that of Calgary and the city is well structured with its roads (that is quite a treat here down under). We were lucky enough to stay with friends of Alena and Ryan's (whom they met on their Feejee Experience) just outside of the downtown core - and at the foot of a rather amazing mountain. Unfortunately as I was racing I didn't get to check it out, but apparently it's some of the most amazing riding around.
The racing, on my part was a little lacklustre. Be it due to the extreme temperatures (oh right, I'm not sure I mentioned that it was 43 degrees on Saturday - 43 degrees - VERY HOT!) or to the fact that it is only January - I had 15 minutes of thunder...and then I wilted off into oblivion...essentially off the back. We competed in 3 races - on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday - each day with respective temperatures of about 38, 41, 43 - all of which were raced in the heat of the day (5:00 for the first, and 11:30 for the other two) - oh yeah and the heat didn't come down at night...it was only a balmy 30 in the wee hours of the morning and the a/c left quite a bit to be desired! So yes, started the first race - pretty much setting myself up for heatstroke as we were on our bikes for over an hour prior to the start. Not my smartest move, and I definately paid for it as I watched my heartrate rise unnaturally high and then my legs give out. I figured that perhaps my day was over when I started getting heart attack symptoms! So that was day 1 - 15 minutes in the group....kinda boring - just exploded.
Getting ready for day 2, I was determined not to make a similar mistake - so I shortened the warm-up had an entire cooler of cold liquids and took her chill. Judging from the first part of the race, I seem to have adapted quite well. As is common in Australian racing, right off the gun of this triangle criterium course (one of the sides was uphill at about a 2-3% grade) people were attacking. I had the presence of mind to make my way to the front on the hill and I sat in the top 5-6 riders (the fields were just over 40 each day) for the next couple of laps. On about lap 4, Alexis Rhodes attacked on the hill and there was a little hesitation from the group - I figured I would give it a go and I jumped on her wheel. To my surprise, we actually got clear and for the next 5-10 minutes I was in a break with Alexis Rhodes, Nat Bates, Kate Nichols and my friend from last week Leanne Manderson. It was pretty cool and it's been immortallized on cyclingnews.com in this picture http://www.cyclingnews.com/photos/2006/jan06/tdu_women06/index.php?id=tdu_women062/DSC_9369 - and also an article with my name in print at http://www.womenscycling.net/2006/EventsPages2006/TDU/Race2.htm - unfortunately, as these things go, I exploded at about the 15 minute mark (yet again) and road it in until I felt a little dizzy from the heat at which point I exited the course. An action for which I am still kicking myself, because if I had kept going, I would have been in the top 20 and in the money...never leave a course unless someone is pulling you off...I really should know that by now!
So for those of you who can read patterns - guess what happened on day 3 - the hottest of the hot. The race was aggressive, I road the first half without any issues and then imploded phenomenally at about the 15 minute mark. What can I say? The girls are fast and I was born in the cold land of Canada...it's been a good learning experience! And hey, at least I'm not the guy on the South Australia.com team for the Tour Down Under who passed out on my bicycle from the heat and crashed at 70km/h....good times!
We're now settling back down in Melbourne for the next month of hard training before the insanity begins - gonna work hard, and get fast....maybe I should start doing rides over 15 minutes long ;) hee hee - man times flys when you're having fun...I mean really, check out Chris' hat! (it was one of the ones tossed from the parade that preceeded the JCTDU - Jacob's Creek Tour Down Under) -editor note: the picture was substituted for a pic of Ryan - can't find the other one....Oh yeah and as one final aside - the girl who won the 3 race series made $10,000...I mean really life's good! I'm gonna come back here when I'm FAST! :P

Tassie Wrap Up

2006-01-09T17:20:00.000-08:00

Well it's better late than never right? That appears to be my mantra at the moment as I finally get the wheels going again after returning to the mainland a week ago - yes a full week ago. After spending time learning about wheel races and remember what it is to go FAST again, I have pretty much been sleeping for the last week - oh yeah and finding a place to live in Melbourne, and training...sounds rough - at least for an athlete ;)
As an appropriate wrap up, I've been trying to decipher the lessons I've learned over the week of racing as to improve upon my results when I return (as I promise you I will) and to give as a guide to any poor North American who thinks it is a good idea to go race Aussie freaks in the dead of winter. Now, don't get me wrong - by freaks I mean the good kind, the freak of nature that I always wished I could be. I'm talking about the Leigh Howards of the world (of which there may only be one) who can compete with some of the fastest men in the world at only 16 years of age, and the Ben Kerstens who can close a 30m gap like it ain't no thing (he does make me think of Dan though who would always get frustrated when Jim Fisher was dropped in a Tuesday night crit - "but you can go over 60km/h for a minute - how on earth can you get dropped? You should be able to close that gap easily" he would say). And the question arises, how does a mere mortal like myself compete with a system that pounds speed and mileage into kids at such a young age?
For those aspiring to compete at the carnivals, I shall start with this - SPEED. Get your leg speed up and work on sub-maximal starts. As the pushers hurl you up to over 20km/h you don't need to go from a dead stop, but getting up to speed quick is the key. Second of all, work on you anaerobic capacity. With most of the races ranging from 2-5 minutes going hard for short bursts is what you are doing - good training, but tough to get off the couch and do. Additionally, everyone here can sprint, so don't count on blowing the field away - as I said earlier, I am in an upsidedown world where my strengths are no longer useful...maybe I will get some Aussie influence while I'm over here.
With those two suggestions encompassing what I think YOU can do to compete, I must make comment about the system over here. I have found myself wondering, over the last 2 weeks, if I had been born in Australia would I still be racing? Would they have found me to be talented enough to put into one of their State institutes at the tender age of 16 (in this hypothetical situation I probably would have started riding earlier!) to rear my cycling talents. All the girls that I was racing where there, not representing teams, but rather their State institute - they have clothing and bikes and one can only presume coaches. I, in fact, would love to sit down and chat to one of the coaches here. Do they do things differently, or do they simply run enough athletes through a sufficiently difficult program that they produce the vats of talented, fast cyclists that they do? The closest to this kind of information we received was from Mark Jamieson's mother who mentioned that he was off to a two week Commonwealth prep camp and as long as he didn't get sick, he was going to compete - they would tell him in which events upon completion of the camp. As an aside, I give a big shout out to Mark as he is super personable and also one of the hardest bike racers I have ever seen. In one of the 16km scratch races, he broke away with a few other fellows from the gun only to drop each one of them and get caught with less than 5km to go. Somewhere near the end, the pack caught and passed him, but he didn't give up and with 3 laps to go he re-caught them. Upon catching the pack he went uptrack and attacked again. It didn't work, but man, it was impressive!
Anyways, I think there is much that we can learn, as Canadians, at both the macro (system) and micro (athlete) level on how they develop their cyclists. Speed from an early age and unbelievable role models seem to be the ticket. On Saturday Alena, Ryan, Chris and myself headed out to the Bay Criterium Series to watch Robbie MacEwan take out the 4th of 5 races. It was pretty incredible to watch as there were at least 3 tour riders in the field (also Baden Cooke and Simon Gerrands - who you ask - that's right, random Australians that we have never heard of ride the tour - and do well!). However, the highlight of the day was in fact getting to talk to the veritable voice of cycling - Phil Liggett. He's a super dude - was awesome with us - chatted a wee bit about Lance. In fact he told us that he was in Calgary for the Cancer fundraiser earlier this year - the funniest comment coming from Lance in a shock of dismay at having to get on his bike when it was -2!
The bottom line is - this is a cycling inspired nation! Coming here has bolstered my desire to be fast and given me a watermark for what is necessary to be world class. Racing over here is like nothing else I've seen - aggressive and fast - and I can't wait to race again (which will luckily be soon in Adelaide). Any bike racer would be lucky to make the journey to the land down under - I'm sure I will come back smarter and faster - not to mention more inspired!

The Rain Delay - Gotta Love the Track!

2005-12-31T18:26:00.000-08:00

So I thought that I would spare you all the crazy minute details of the second night of racing at Devonport as it was much the same as the previous night. I did, however get in a break during the scratch race with Katrina Heir (attending the Commonwealth Games for Scotland in the TT and pursuit) and we were away, but got reeled in with 1 to go. The crazy part is, that's probably the closest that I will come to winning a race here (in a break I mean)! So that was great - I also made the final for the 2000m wheel race where I was in good position with 1 to go but just couldn't stay on top of the speed - at least I know what I need to work on for the next little bit! So that's the short and sweet version of that evening. The definate highlight of the evening however, were all the adorable little kids who wanted to get a high-five as you rolled around to your event. Made me feel like a rock star - loved it - I wanna come back here next year! On a less positive note, yet equally outstanding, my lungs are dying - too many people smoking where we were warming up combined with a solid week of track - yeah the hack is back! Both Chris and I are hitting our groove a little more - but I really do think something is a little wrong when the only place I feel normal at the moment is on my bike saddle...a form of psychosis I tell you.
Yesterday saw a change of venue as we got to do a crit in downtown Bernie. It was "hot dog" shaped, which was a nice way of saying one long road with a U turn at each end. This resulted in an absolutely painful acceleration at the end of each straight - have I mentioned that the girls here are fast. It's the first crit in a long time that I have started hoping that I can stay in. As a result, I was probably a little more conservative that I normally would have been - but I still gave it a go once. It didn't last long though, as Belinda Goss attacked (in a much more convincing fashion I might add) just after and we got a bit of a gap - but the girls weren't going to let her get away. A little while later the field did let 2 girls get away and we were left sprinting for 3rd. I finished up 6th behind Belinda Goss, Peta Mullens and Jessica Berry in the field sprint - just out of the money, but I figure it was a better finish than I have seen prior to then. So that was my New Year's Eve. We were in the hotel room by 9:30 and called it a night shortly after that - we are party animals! Only to wake up this morning to pissing rain. We went into Bernie (where the carnival was supposed to be held) and grabbed a coffee at the McCafe where we ran into a commissaire and were told that the races were postponed until tomorrow - so I think Narnia is on the plan for today.
Oh right! And a Happy New Year to everyone at home! This will probably be the longest year of my life - only because I get to start it 18 hours before those of you in Calgary! 2006 has been rainy to date, but I figure things can only get better *as long as it doesn't snow here*!
And with a few thoughts to leave you with - here are a few games that I have started playing since I got to Australia - quite funny really:
1) How many BTs on the track at once? Chris figured that he got up to 9 in the A grade scratch race the other night
2) How many Lance Armstrongs are on the road? Very rarely do we do a ride where we do not see at least one Postal/Discovery/Yellow yersey (or combination of the 3) rider on the road
and finally 3) Fake or not? This one can only really be played at the beach. And while it may seem in poor taste for me to mention this one - you would be truly surprised at the number of visible female augmentation we have been witness to in Oz. Maybe it's easier to justify if you live in a bathing suit...

SOOO cold!

2005-12-29T14:48:00.000-08:00

Okay, so it's only Australia cold, but really, what’s going on? I think I’m having flashbacks to Nationals in ’99 – it’s supposed to be summer…but it’s cold! But it’s not racing so the show must go on. Another night and more racing – and I’m improving slowly but surely. My lightning wheel race (1000m) heat went really well. I caught the girls on the mark ahead of me (I started on the 25m) and then we quickly caught the girls ahead. Honestly, it could not have gone better – so I finished 3rd in the heat behind Jessica Berry and Belinda Goss so on through to the final. The final was less successful. There was a group of 7 girls from the back markers – but for whatever reason, the other girls didn’t really want to work. I ended up taking 2 pulls in 500m – so I did my part, but we aren’t going to catch the frontrunners if the fast girls aren’t willing to work. I was however, much happier with the state of affairs this evening. Right now might be the time to point out that we were talking to a new buddy of ours who said he has won 4 or 5 of the wheel races. However, in order to do this, each time he had to pay off at least 6 people in order to do it – so yes, it’s a bit of a gong show to say the least!My second, and only other race (which has proved to be a point of contention with all the female riders – we have an international caliber field, but as it the case so many times in women’s cycling we are not given the respect in terms of number of races and prize money that we deserve) so yeah, second race was a 4km scratch race. It was fast (again!), but I felt that it was my best race to date. It was a little sketch – I absolutely love that I have to turn my bike – that’s not normal – the banking usually helps you out a little more. But I made it to the end – unfortunately though I was shuffled to the back in the closing laps and didn’t get a good position going into the sprint. That having been said I moved up through the field during the sprint AND we dropped people that weren’t me! I was pretty stoked – still haven’t got my podium though!

Day 2: the Silverdome - yes, I'm still cycling, but doesn't it sound important?

2005-12-28T04:59:00.000-08:00

The second night of racing proved to be as educational as the first – only this time my inner fire is starting to burn. With my self-confidence on the track returning, I was pleased to get to race in a most beautiful facility. The Silverdome in Launceston is an absolutely beautiful track – it feels incredibly fast and the atmosphere is awesome! The afternoon session started at 2pm, but I only had one event to contest – the Elimination. Now, anyone who knows the events, understands that tactics play a huge role – quite often more than fitness itself. I, myself, seem to have an interesting affliction of either doing incredibly well, or quite badly – my mid-range is somewhat limited. Unfortunately, this evening proved to be more of the latter. Off on the neutral lap, I thought that I was in good – sitting pretty in the top 5 girls near the bottom of the track, but the positioning was indeed too good to be true. Just before the end of the neutral we were swamped by the back half of the field overtop and I ended up in the back-half of the field – somewhere I didn’t really want to be with this kind of speed on hand. I managed to fight and play the devil for about 5 rounds, with my luck soon running out. On the lap I was eliminated I probably could have shot a gap coming around corner four between one of the Scottish girls and the field – but at the time I felt it was a little dicey, and didn’t really want to be known as the girl who caused the crash…but in retrospect perhaps I should have gone for it! :P
So, with the first race out of the way, I got to deal with the most exciting part of the evening – my new Kenda stuff has arrived!!! I’m super excited – nothing is more fun than new team stuff – so I got to sport it for the first time in the scratch race. After a more than humbling experience last time, I decided that I might as well try to give it a run off the front. Under the advice of a fellow competitor I also geared up – I believe that both the change in mentality and the slightly bigger gear helped me to fend for myself much better this evening. I did manage to pry myself off the front for about a millisecond – but the group was just moving too fast and I was countered immediately. However, the group did stay together and it came down to a bunch sprint. In the final lap there was some potentially bad clashing directly above me, so I backed off a little, but came around to finish 7th – not bad, but improvement is definitely being made.
Bring on the final event of the evening – the 2000m wheel race. Anger is the only way I can sum up how it went down. Off the line I somehow managed to drop the two girls starting on the 50m mark with me, while at the same time get more gapped by the rider on the 60m mark. Consequently, I ended up giving it my all for a lap and a half before the other 3 back markers caught up. By this point I was somewhat cooked and jumped on the back of their train. Unfortunately, despite the draft, Jessica Barry (who started on the 30m mark, and I can only imagine got a bit of a boost from the other two girls on my mark getting a slow start) road me right off her wheel. The whole experience was rather humbling, and needless to say, we didn’t make it up to contest the sprint. Therefore no final…but the positive part is that I was angry about it. How is that good you ask? Well, the thing is, the other day I was resigned to the fact that the other girls were faster than me, now I’m starting to get a little feisty and expect things of myself – I’ll be rocking by the end of the week! (because we all know that physiology can definitely change in a 7 day period…)Next it’s off to Devonport tomorrow – another day, another chance to get better…and I was to WIN! :P

Boxing Day - First Day at the Races

2005-12-26T01:53:00.001-08:00

And I'm trying to recover. Man, was today ever an eye opener - I'm just not used to getting beat quite so much on a track bike. It's like all the Aussie's have my exact skill set (all speed and bike handling) it's just that they are better at it - I was humbly reminded that while I missed out on the Canadian 500m National Title, I would have been like 8th in the Australian junior field. The speed is just unreal - and I don't like being dropped on the track!!! :P But I figure that I will race into it.
Part of my performance (or lack thereof) has to do with the type of racing they do over here. Most of it is handicapped as to allow the up and coming riders (such as a U17 girl I was chatting to before the final of the 2000m wheel race) to race with world class competitors (Belinda Goss is the heavy favourite in most of my races after having medalled in the scratch race at the first world cup). The organizers decided that I would be placed on the 25m mark (that would be 25m in front of the fastest girls on the scratch line) for the 1000m wheel race and as follows, the 50m mark of the 2000m wheel race. It will be interesting to see if they keep that mark for me in the days to come.
Racing at the Latrobe Recreation Centre started this morning at 10:00 with my first race being the 1000m wheel race (in case I have not made it clear, a wheel race is the handicapped race). My first jaunt on the track in Australia was a little lacklustre. After two months of long miles, the kilo that I was subjected to was a little on the harsh side. I managed to catch the Kate Cullen (attended the last world cup for the UK - competing with the Scottish team here in Tasmania) relatively quickly, only to get blown off the wheel in a bit of confusion about 400m in - I never really recovered and consequently did not make the top 7 in order to move on. Chalking it up to experience, I looked forward to the slightly longer 2km wheel race later in the afternoon.
Luckily, the 2km did indeed treat me better. I was at the 50m mark with a (very nice) girl from New Zealand named Rosie McCall - and together we were able to make up the majority of the handicap - however the speedsters on the 230m mark managed to elude our efforts and stay away. I squeaked into the final, finishing 7th in the heat with a turn of speed at the end (it was nice to feel fast comparitively!!!) The final played out similarly, but Rosie (who also made it through) had 4 or 5 girls behind us. Again we were unable to catch the girls who had started on the 230m mark, but this time I was blown off with just under 1 lap (approx 400m) due to a bit too long a pull into the wind on my part followed by the last lap speed serge.
After a bite to eat and a little recovery time, I was ready to tackle the 3km scratch race. I felt fairly strong and in control - I was riding my own race - but again the final serge of speed caught me out as the wind blasted me on the final lap. However, despite this, I feel like it was a solid day of racing on my part and the lack of results are more due to the excellent calibre of the field.
Just one day here and my outlook on track racing has changed a little. First off, my legs are not that big - most of the girls here are about my size, but with larger legs...and they are beating me. Second of all, I totally understand how the Australian dominate any racing that is FAST. From a very young age they are teaching their athletes to go fast over very short distances - and then you can extend the distance - a great example of this is Jesse McLean - one of the other competitors here is a former World Junior Pursuit Champion (from only a few years back) - but I'm starting to get it. Finally, track racing can be interesting to watch. The thousands of people who attended today's event (and I would guess that they weren't all here to watch the "chop" and running races!) are a testament to this - but then again, all the racing is geared towards the crowd. Short, fast, exciting and anyone can win - top this off with an announcer that must have experience at a horse track and it was quite the spectacle!
Chris had a similarly "for experience" day. He felt that a combination of an overly optimistic marking from the officials (he was looking for something a little more than 180m over 3km - those boys are cooking!) combined with some of the fastest racing he'd ever experience led to a painful, yet fun track experience. He had varying levels of success in the men's 2 and 3km wheel races as well as a 5km scratch race - not exactly his ideal set of races!
Tomorrow we get to rest up to prepare ourselves for a 5 day run of racing (Chris and I are definately feeling the intensity!) As for the picture - it is a Tasmanian Devil. Now I realize that the tasmanian devil has NOTHING to do with today's post - but Becca had made a special request and how could I possibly refuse???
Signing out from a girl who hopes my fast twitch muscle fibres wake up!

Christmas Eve in a Wind Storm

2005-12-24T15:31:00.000-08:00

Well it ain’t snowing – mind you, sounds like it might not snow in Calgary either – but the rain is pelting against the door and we’re in high Christmas spirits. Checked in this afternoon to our home for the next week of track racing at the Bass and Flinders Motor Inn in the scenic town of Ulverstone, Tasmania. Seems like it’s going to work out well – making due with only a microwave and a bar fridge for our Christmas feast – however, we do have lots of garlands and Christmas Carols. Berdt is super festive as you can see – surprisingly enough only a few people have commented – we think they are under the impression that we are nuts!
On food related topics – Chris has been keeping up his protein intake over the last week – this hit home particularly when I was checking through my pictures and found three in a row of Chris eating various meals. We didn’t, unfortunately, get a picture of the BBQ Chris cooked up while we were in Hobart consisting of 2 steaks, 2 lamb chops and 4 beef sausages – and all that for only $6.47…we also had vegetables, but that’s of no consequence. Now, the impressive part being that I only ate 1 steak and half a sausage – leaving the rest to Chris – which he finished off quite handily. As my dad put it – it was most likely equivalent to about half the protein my sister ingested the entire time she was in China (which was about 3.5 months)…so yeah, he’s trying to become a bodybuilder – or at least that’s the best I can figure!
I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas – definitely weird not to be home but “I’ll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams”…

Berdt Goes to the Doctor

2005-12-20T18:45:00.000-08:00

Great news! Chris and I gave ourselves a starter motor (plus installation labour) to each other for Christmas - isn't that romantic??? Yes, I am stoked. I am also happy to report that after a 3 hour car hospital visit (with a much shorter surgery time of just over 15 minutes - we were there for when he woke up in case he was frightened and couldn't figure out where he was), I had a successful start this afternoon. No coughing, no studdering, in short, no sickly noises - only the hum of the Ford Falcon engine (after 310,000 km - a threshold we officially surpassed earlier this week). It is only a transplant - slightly used if you will - but hopefully it should work out well - at least we don't need to fret about stalling, or getting off the ferry anymore. Besides, Chris was just getting too darn good at the push start ;)
In other arenas (we have covered the car, so naturally the next news to share is about bicycles) we climbed Mount Wellington yesterday - I believe it may actually be the highest peak in Tasmania - and it's well worth it. Two hours of climbing put you just over 1000m above sea level and you can see forever! It's gorgeous....it was however, a little chilly coming down seeings as we didn't have to pedal for 20km!
Today we have the great stocking mission on tap. Chris and I will set off into the great metropolis of Hobart (population of just over 100,000 I believe) and stuff the greatest stocking ever (barring yours Momma!) - I can't wait - it's gonna be SOOO much fun. I do, however, need to get off this computer in order to do that though - so if I am stranded without internet until after Christmas - Merry Christmas all. I will be thinking of you as the sun beats brilliantly (the UV index down here is off the map!) or the rain pelts down on us (in which case it gets unbelievably cold!), but I wish you all the best white Christmas ever - I'll let you know just how weird it is to be in the middle of summer!
I would also like to give a shout out to the city of Hobart - it's really very beautiful and the people are amazingly friendly. We both have really enjoyed staying here - it's A1!
Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Let the Games Begin!

2005-12-17T18:22:00.000-08:00

...but not for us - but man, is it ever a good story! Chris has been referring to it as the best Canadian landing since Dieppe...but I'll start from the beginning.
After leaving Coolangatta, we headed down (via Seal's Rock for another great surfing lesson with Deano) to Sydney where we spent just under a week with Rob and Alex - had a great time, but were ready to move on and ride somewhere that wasn't Centennial Park (the 3km loop got a little old after the 3rd consecutive day! So off down to Melbourne we went where Sandy and Laurence and the kids (plus a new 10 week old kitten and 8 week old Lab/Poodle puppy) generously let us invade their place again - even Chris couldn't avoid the pull of the adorable young pets! So yes, that got us to heading over here to Tasmania.
Finding the ferry was a bit of a challenge and proved to provide a little entertainment when we got on a toll road with no possible way to pay the toll - this of course resulted in Jenny freaking out and getting off the road as fast a humanly possible (while respecting the rules of the road and using the appropriate off and on ramps that it) - but we got there in time (it was a really good thing that we had left ourselves 2.5 hours!) and hunkered down for an evening on a ferry. The ferry was pretty cool and went unbelievable quick as we were sleeping - and only once did I fear for my life as I woke up from a shift in the boat and had sudden images of the Titanic float (or is that sink?) through my head...but I'm still here!
Getting off the ferry was a bit of an ordeal - but Berdt decided to start - so we had achieved our first success of the morning - next mission: get to Rosebury to race bicycles. After a coffee stop just outside of Devonport we were off driving on small country roads through beautiful countryside...and masses of water falling on our heads. We both were a little apprehensive about the rain (they had been racing on the track in the rain in Brisbane - so there was no accounting what the crazy Aussies would do!) but we drove straight there - and in fact, straight through the town as the population tops out at about 1500 - but it is a major mining town on the West Coast (we would soon find out that the reason it was a major settlement is that, as the locals put it, it only rains 5 days a week - it drips off the trees the other 2!). We did find the track (a lovely circular asphalt construction around a footy field - appanrently we can look forward to more of this!) but we felt that there was something amiss as we pulled up. As we were ushered into a parking spot, all we could see was big burly men and soon enough they figured out that we didn't fit in. "Oh, you are bikies! Didn't anyone tell you?" At this point we were rather concerned - turns out that the bike races were postponed for a month due to the rain (go figure!) but that we were free to stay and watch the "chop". Of course, good times ensued. We saw 5 horus of lumberjack competition that day - the competitors ranged from 8 to 82 years - pretty phenomenal and I must admit they were handy with the axes. Although apparently the referee screwed up and placed one of the competition logs in a heat - and there were some nasty words exchanged as a result!
Rosebury then turned out to be one of the best experiences here on Aussie soil (although I'm not sure we are strictly in Australia here...we're in Tasmania!). Loris, one of the event organizers, took us in for the evening and took us out for dinner with the gang. It was a great time (although it did confirm that I am NOT a small town chicka) and the next day we got to be a part of their town parade!!! (see the picture) We were going to go for a hike after the parade (right down main street I might add), but we have gone soft and the rain chased us out - that afternoon we drove over 5 hours (which I'm pretty sure you have to work to do on the island) by heading over to the "tourist" town of Stahan (pop. 750) and over the interior all the way to Hobart. By the time we arrived I had pretty much lost my mind - but we were in good spirits - plus the guy at the only LPG suppling petrol station on the West Coast checked out Berdt and his battery and we now officially know that it is our starter motor - so all was not lost in the detour to Stahan.
As an aside - I know you all like to hear about Berdt - it really does highlight the advantage of a new (pre-grunge era) car!

Re-starting the Adventure

2005-12-03T01:08:00.000-08:00

And we are on the road again - funny enough, despite a two month hiatus, nothing has changed when it comes to being on the road. The drivers here are still sketchy, my temper is short, the scenery is beautiful, and Bernt has decided to act up (oh goodie!) and I can't get internet access to provide you with photographic evidence of our trip. :P
After a great final week in Coolangatta, complete with crazy thunder storms (I swear I was up for like 2 hours, and every time I started to fall asleep I was awoken by another crash of thunder - just unreal, I guess they got 6 inches of rain about 10km up the road!), the start and end of The DaVinci Code, the purchase of the newest Diana Gabaldon book (which I'm super stoked to start tonight) we hit the road this morning (as Chris' coffee hit the windsheild). We said farewell to our temporary home in the morning and went to say goodbye to the Markwell Cafe for breakfast. Chris decided to be a devil and get a coffee to go - so we head off down the road. No more than 100m after we take off there is a roundabout. As we navigate through this roundabout, Chris is checking out the map and forgets that he has placed his coffee cup on the dash - only to get it in his lap half a second later. It was a riot! He's come around - mostly with the help of the coffee shop being dudely and giving him a free coffee to replace the fallen one.
So we were on the road again, for a mighty 80km. Byron Beach was our first destination as we wanted to say goodbye to the northern coast in style (it was of course the most beautiful day we've had all week and we were driving!!!) After a jump in the sea and a sunbake session we were back in the car headed down to Port MacQuarie (we are creatures of habit, what can I say?) where I am yet again standing at a computer terminal at the same campsite as I was 2 months ago! The only hiccup in our travel today was in Cough's Harbour - of all places! We stopped to get some gas and when we went to get going again, the blasted battery wouldn't start. Luckily a lovely lady gave us a boost (after the gas attendant almost killed himself with the booster wires - he got a good lesson on 'completing the circuit' - ie lots of sparks!) - it was nice that neither of the other parties involved questioned how a car battery wouldn't work only minutes after it had been running for 3 hours - I certainly did! So we got going again - but really we should have known better than to try to stop near the Big Banana - it's a cursed town I tell ya!!! While I'm thinking of Berdt maintainance - I have a poll question: when the car is leaking oil and you have to replace it entirely every 1000 or so km - do you have to pay to get the oil changed? Because really, the oil is recycling itself - ahh the backpacker car dilemna - but I would love to hear what you think.
Barring no other problems, we are getting up tomorrow to do a lovely ride only to hit the road again. Our first stop is Seals Rock for another surfing lesson (Chris is decidedly disappointed with his current improvement - beind none as we have only surfed the one time!) and then off to Sydney's northern beaches and Sydney to see Rob and Alex. Then over the next week we are going to make our way to Melbourne via the Great Ocean Road - that being the road on the south-eastern corner before checking out a few digs and looking for jobs in Melbourne for a week prior to our departure for Tassie on the 16th. The next few weeks will be undoubtably eventful as our journey re-starts...but please keep your fingers crossed for the well-being of Bernt!!!
And a very Happy Birthday to my Momma!!! December teh 3rd is her special day - love you lots!!! Later kids...

Muffin Cake

2005-11-25T22:14:00.000-08:00

Ahhh the muffin cake - the signature internet dish...as you interject "what on earth are you talking about crazy???" Well until a few days ago when we found a hot spot in our living room, Chris and I were travelling into town to use the internet at a cafe that offered free internet (as opposed to the place in Cairns that wanted to charge us more for using the laptop as opposed to their computers - how warped is that?!?), so the weekly visit usually included a muffin cake. Don't they look delish??? That's cause they are, and the only other snack that is topping my charts at the moment is an apple and peanut butter combination - you should give it a go (did I mention that I'm training a good amount at the mo?)
That is the story of the muffin cake - only one of the wonders brought to you by the Gold Coast of Australia - not sure if it's indigenous, but it's a pull...and so we're staying another week here in Coolangatta. Not necessarily because of the muffin cakes, we do have a few better reasons (like the beaches and my job and not having anything to go to) and the hope that all of next week will be like today: beautiful and sunny. Then after my ride in the morning I'll be able to head down to the beach to work on my tan. Of late, this hasn't been possible as the weather has been a little lacklustre. Rain has come in most afternoons after a brutally hot morning - like the inversions we get back home, but the storms are coming in at like 2 or 3 in the afternoon. Consequently everyday has been a bit of a race with the weather to get home. I'm not sure if I've mentioned, but when we first got here 2 months ago it was crazy hot (like it hasn't got that warm since) and they have been praying for rain - they hadn't had a wet season for 10 years. The first day we were here I joked around with a guy on the group ride that they needn't worry now that Chris and I were here the rain would invariably come...and low and behold. I mean it's great that they are getting their rain - but did it have to happen on my holiday? Chris and I are thinking of lodging a complaint with the tourism board ;)
But despite the inclement weather, we made it out to the local track twice this week. The track is located about half an hour up the M1 from here in the town of Nerang. As the picture shows there is very little banking and consequently you have to turn in the corners, but it gets the job done now doesn't it? If I were to pick it apart, I might also mention that the whole track is on a bit of an incline so you're actually going downhill into the finish straight and it's something like 356m long (another rather useless distance), HOWEVER I think we could learn a good amount from the Australians here. The facility is always open and free of charge. The lack of banking makes the track accessible to everyone on all sorts of bicycles, and the kicker being that they have constructed a criterium circuit around the outside of the track. The support buildings are also pretty impressive - including covered stands for spectators. Bottom line - it was pretty cool and both times Chris and I pretty much had the entire track to ourselves - definately no complaints.
Although not a track bike, in bike nerd talk, my brand new BLUE bicycle has arrived. It's a wee bit depressing as my mom now has a bike in her posession (despite UPS' best efforts to harm it in transportation) that I will not see for another 4 months :( - but if you want to check out a picture of it look here: http://www.rideblue.com/rc4.html On a related note - if you are interested in (or know of anyone who is) purchasing a 52cm compact super wonderful Specialized Allez Comp with Dura Ace - lemme know. It's on the market.
Without any appropriate segway, on a more pop culture note, we have also managed to download the first seven episodes of the OC. Consequently I'm a very happy chicka - probably need a little more sleep though. I do however have a concern that I was friends with Taylor Townsend in high school (and I won't even let myself consider the alternative!) Also - they better not play around with my Seth and Summer relationship -- they just are not allowed!!!

The Worst Pro Stalker Ever

2005-11-20T16:51:00.000-08:00

This is a picture of Surfer's Paradise (your call on whether that many buildings can be considered paradise!!!) from the beach at Burleigh Heads where we were yesterday. Can you guess which building got hit by lightning???
I’ll start by diverting those of you who aren’t interested in bike nerdism to the second paragraph (this includes my darling sister who will undoubtedly be rolling her eyes at the moment – Becs head on down past this schlock!) So yeah, Chris and I were riding out to do intervals on Friday afternoon when a couple of well clad lads road by the other way – after a little discussion we decided that it was Robbie MacEwan and his buddy the Belgian champ (I haven’t a clue who that is – Chris does, however if those who aren’t bike nerds are still reading, Robbie is a sprinter dude who has won the green jersey twice – provided that some random dude I road with when we first got here had his trivia right. On a more entertaining note, he also named his child Ewan – which for the record makes him Ewan MacEwan – bad idea…) So yeah, we figured it was them, thought “hey, that’s cool” and kept on with our ride. However, on the way home, we came out onto the main road and there they were again! Using my cat like reactions (which were tested a few years ago in San Fran when Dan and I thought that we saw Cippo, let him and his Saeco teammates get a few minutes head start and then we gave ‘er to catch them – yeah somehow it didn’t work out) so yet again, I saw the pro, thought about it, Chris and I had a little discussion and then about a minute after their passing we started hammering after them. We hoped that they would get caught up in the ALWAYS congested intersection – that was clear – so again I found myself giving everything (which after the intervals wasn’t terribly impressive) to try and catch a pro cyclist. Which brings me to the next question: who do I think I am? Why do I think that I can give some bloke who can finish the Tour de France a minute or so head start and then catch them? Now, to my credit, they both were sprinters (and Cippo wasn’t known for finishing the Tour…) but yes, it was a little ridiculous…not to mention – what were we going to do when we caught them? So hi – invite ourselves over for tea…a little beyond me – but it was a fun few minutes as Chris and I impersonated the commuter-dude who is intent on racing you home on the Goose…
K, the bike nerdom is done – now onto my life for the last week: ride in the morning, lounge around in the afternoon (unfortunately not outside as it has been crazy windy…mind you from all accounts of the weather at home, you probably don’t care to hear about this!) and then head over to work. In my week as a waitress, I think that I’ve covered a good long list of the don’t dos – I have mischarged customers and had it come out of my paycheck (actually it took my WHOLE paycheck…nothing like working for free!), I have almost (that being the key I would say) spilled food all over customers, and just last night, I managed to serve a vegetarian a plate of keema (meat) samosas. In the last case, he informed that he hasn’t eaten meat for the last 30 years and there was no way that they were meat samosas – so I just ran with it…but I hope that he’s not sick today! But despite my booboos, I am very much enjoying myself. I’ve got to meet quite a few really interesting people – who seem to pay me for talking to them – and they are all rather keen on my accent. That haven’t been said, I have also had someone tell me that I have a Queensland drawl when I talk (mind you I’ve never known anyone who has referred to a drawl as a positive thing!), and another guy tell me that I must just have been born in Canada as I have an Australian accent – honestly, I think they were both on drugs!
Speaking of drugs, in case you were wondering – if you plan on heading over to Bali – don’t take drugs with you. Don’t smuggle drugs in – they will find you, put you in jail and hopefully not sentence you to the death sentence…a little intense? Yeah, you might say. The same goes for Singapore by the way – this is what I have learned from the newscasts here in the Land Down Under. In the next week a young Australian is going to be hung in Singapore for smuggling $26,000 worth of drugs into the country…not the best idea at the best of times – really don’t do it when the penalty is death…what are people thinking? Also topping the news stories, and Aussie model is returning to the country (we got to see her flight home on the television) after serving a 3 months sentence for being found with 2 ecstasy tablets in a club. Really folks, if you’re going to do drugs – head over to Victoria – they don’t seem to really care there! Sorry, that’s my dumb person rant for the month.
But things are going rather swimmingly here on the Gold Coast. Bottom line is that I’m loving life – there is nothing in the world like the coastline here – I tell ya! Oh right, and for those of you who have been concerned as it’s been a few weeks since the last Important Australian Sporting Event, the Socceroos (that is honestly what they call their National Soccer team) beat out Uruguay for a World Cup spot last Wednesday – it stopped the nation. Speaking of winning moves, a high five goes out to a Mr. Eric Holland from both Chris and myself.

Wet and Wild

2005-11-15T20:10:00.000-08:00

I may have said that I was going to Australia - but did I mention that the US is alive and well here? Not only are there terrorist "threats" all over the place (seems a little far to come to bomb somewhere if you ask me!), but there are Warner Brothers themeparks coming out your ears! On Monday Chris and I opted for the wet one of the bunch (as opposed to Sea World or Movieworld - we are going to California in a few months), but it was great! My favorite was a double tube ride that shot you down over humps so fast I thought we were going to catch air. Fortunately we stuck around late enough to out-do the families - by about 3pm all the 9 years olds were tired and we got through as many rides in the last 2 hours as we did in the first 5. Good fun had by all.
Other than that, things here in Coolangatta are going swimmingly. We are planning on heading south again in about 10 days, although as I have procured myself some employment, we might stay here a little longer. I'm a waitress at an Indian restaurant about 3 blocks from our place and enjoying it. It's a pretty relaxed environment and I've managed to get a few monster tips from people feeling sorry for the poor Canadian backpacker - I ain't complaining! The major downfall to this new situation is that we have to ride a little later in the day so that I get enough sleep - but it hasn't been cripplingly hot (yet) - although today was one of the windier expeditions.
So to sum it up - life rocks! I love it here on the Gold Coast - but I'm excited to move on too. The only crappy part at the moment is that my new Blue bike should be delivered to my Mom sometime at the end of this week - awesome...I get to see it in March....:(
As for the picture here - isn't it great that they sell SARS in a can here? They are far too concerned with "bird flu"...Chris said he really wanted the picture to be taken in the supermarket with a token asian guy behind him...but I wasn't quick enough...k, I lie - we haven't downloaded those pictures yet, so I decided to put a picture of our picnic with Alena and Ryan when they were here on the Gold Coast (they have since headed down to Melbourne).
I can't believe it - we've been here in Australia for 2 months now and we're off down to Tasmania in a month - on a 10.5 hour ferry!!! Why that sounds exciting to a girls who has lived on Vancouver Island for the last 3 years, I'm not really sure...but it does!
Anyways, hope all is well where you are!

Captain Cook

2005-11-03T21:24:00.000-08:00

I must admit – every time I see a crocodile all I can think of is Peter Pan and Captain Cook – so there was a whole lot of that yesterday. We headed out to Hartley’s Crocodile Farm (farm as they breed crocs to sell for skins) – but it was one of the best animal viewing areas I’ve ever been to. The highlight of the day was the very first boat tour where they took us into a lagoon with 18 crocodiles and fed them off the side of the boat. Chris actually got the most amazing video footage – that I would put on here if I could – but you’ll have to see it when we get home!
We ate real crocodile meat for lunch (described as a cross between chicken and fish – but it was verging on a little leathery) so that was a treat and saw a lovely young woman handling the most deadly snake in the world – the Easter Taipan. I actually figure that all the tourist items that we have taken advantage of since we arrived here in Australia have had to do with the sun and beaches – or weird and wacky indigenous animals. Which leads me to my ignorant person of the day rant.
So we took a bus transfer up north to get in the croc park (as it’s halfway to Port Douglas for those of you with a map) and on the way we picked up an older British couple who sported perhaps the most pretentious accent I’ve heard in a long while. They jumped on the coach and we drove down the beach where they had just recently placed the stinger nets. A little background: stinger nets are placed in the warmer waters to create “safe” areas to swim in as the box jellyfish is somewhat deadly – not like the fun bluebottles that we get down on the Gold Coast. So yeah, they had placed the nets in the previous day and the woman comments that she was happy they got a swim in before that – it was just that more pleasant (at this point I asked myself if she thought they attracted the stingers, but I still gave her the benefit of the doubt). However, about 3km down the road she then proceeded to ask our guide if they would also have stingers on these beaches…now perhaps I’m being a little intolerant – but really. Come on now – it’s an OCEAN – I’m guessing that the whole concept was a little beyond the woman – but I honestly felt a little like I was watching This Hour Has 22 Minutes’ talking to Americans – but this time it was snooty British…sometimes I wonder about people – but she did give us a good deal to talk about later that day.
One might wonder what Chris and I have been up to here in Cairns other than being super tourists – and the answer is “not much.” It’s been great – although we are both looking forward to jumping back on our bikes tomorrow (and maybe heading up to Noosa where we get to see the big boys of Australia cycling duke it out in a crit – I want Baden Cooke to win!) Cairns has been everything we were expecting – namely hot and gorgeous and it has given us a chance to interact Aussie style with some locals. Consequently, I’ve been working on my Oz vocabulary and here are a few of my favs:
True: Used in a context of “you’re kidding me”
Flash: As in I have a flash bike – we might be more inclined to use flashy
Fair Dinkem: Chris’ favourite and I haven’t quite figured out how to use it, although many a postcard try to explain it!

Reef Magic

2005-11-02T21:09:00.000-08:00

Unrelated quote of the day: “There [Lance] is – right where he belongs between the boobies and the rap stars.” A charming quote from my lovely boyfriend in reference to where the Lance magazine was located.
So you walk into the Reef terminal and there are a bazillion different providers eager to take you out to the Great Barrier Reef – so how do you differentiate yourself (and the commerce student in me comes out)? But honestly, how do you decide who you are going to pay your $150-$200 for a day out to one of the wonders of the world…I just don’t know. We had a little advice from Keith’s (2nd cousin – not going to get anymore into the relations – as one of the people here mentioned – we’re “prick” relatives) girlfriend Faith who organizes tours for a living – her advice was to go all the way to the Outer Reef…but that doesn’t narrow it down all that much. But this is my take on it:
So the first key is to give out a free voucher for your cruise out to the Reef. Really that makes all the difference in the world – and Reef Magic had us won at that…but then, let’s sweeten the deal. Let’s take you out 500m and have one of the gear boxes fail on the motor – take another 2 hours to get back to the original dock – all the while feeding us fruit and snacks, only to get back and have the impatient and irritating 25% of the clientele get off the boat. At this point, I wasn’t completely convinced that we had made the correct decision (that having been said, we weren’t the honeymooning couple that had had a boat break down on them twice in two weeks) – but then the company moved on and gave us complementary snorkel tours and wetsuits – and I was actually impressed. So we were a behind schedule by a bit – but the day was incredible – so for those of you planning on heading out to the Reef in the near future (which is undoubtedly most of you!) – Reef Magic is the one I reckon.
Once out at the Reef (after I was a little concerned that I was going to lose my lunch on the way out there – apparently I take after me mum) we saw some of the most incredible fish – I really can’t believe the colours! There was one fluorescent striped fish that was my favourite and we saw a Nemo fish – the whole experience has made me want to see Finding Nemo all over again! There was one ginormous fish that was kinda ugly, but cool and we also saw a manta ray – or perhaps a stinger ray – but that made my day!All in all Emma, I dub the Reef festivus fun – it definitely had the potential of falling miserably under New Year’s fun – but it’s a winner – a definitely must do!

Makybe Diva - it's a horse!

2005-10-31T20:59:00.000-08:00

Another day, another major sporting event here in Australia – but today it’s the Melbourne Cup. The most important horse race on the Australian calendar occurs on the first Tuesday of every November and is titled “the race that stops the nation.” Makybe (pronounced ma-kie-be) Diva took home her third straight win this afternoon making Melbourne Cup history – the nation’s pretty stoked. In Melbourne it’s a holiday (however, as Hannah and Michelle put it – it’s instead of Halloween) and the holiday has some of the more atrocious hats I’ve ever seen, but the rest of the country just seems to call it a day at noon to head off drinking…which is of no great surprise.
Chris and I celebrated this wonderful event by betting on a horse (when in Rome), well two horses to be exact, and neither did anything, so we’re out $8 – but the nice thing is – that’s what I was expecting. We’ve been up in Cairns since Friday staying with my mom’s cousin Penny and her family who have been incredible! Spoiled yet again, we’ve now been to a real Aussie barbie with lot-s-o meat and two Australian sports stars. Apparently my 2nd cousins (well they are mom’s cousin’s daughters) have a knack for dating celebrities. The eldest is married to a footy star who’s team actually won the Grand Final (great sporting event from September in Melbourne) a few years back (his name is Ben) and the youngest Nicole is dating a rugby superstar Billy Slater and the two of them were in the paper this morning. However, Chris and I – although we were close to these sports stars, didn’t manage to speak to either one of them…mind you we didn’t know at the time what we were dealing with!
Tomorrow we’re off to the Reef – the big Great Barrier Reef – I understand that I can head home after this…then on Thursday to a crocodile farm. So we’ve been kept busy here in Cairns. Yesterday we went up to a small town called Kuranda (I think) in the Rainforest and took a gondola down (we both took amusement in the fact that it was made by Pomma) and it was absolutely beautiful. Everyone’s been dudes here – just unreal – we are really very lucky – well if you discount the fact that we didn’t win anything better on the Melbourne cup and Chris’ sunglasses were devoured by Penny’s dog Keela (who is adorable).
Saturday we’re off “home” to the Gold Coast, where with any luck, Berdt will have kept the air in his rear right hand tire (which seems highly unlikely at this point) and we won’t have another escapade with the car (again, highly unlikely) – so again, nothing but fun from the Ford Falcon (there was a horse in the race called Leica Falcon – Chris remarked that they might have to push start it!). Life’s great – no complaints…I’m super stoked to see the reef!!!

Sell your soul

2005-10-18T21:07:00.000-07:00

Yes, and for $14/hour plus bonuses, you too can sell your soul to the devil. Chris and I both had the opportunity to partake in an afternoon of "telesales" yesterday afternoon. I lasted an entire shift of 5 hours while Chris only made it just over 3. Definately a proud moment for both of us - sad when the greatest accomplishment is actually quitting the job. We're still here in Coolangatta and we thought we had got the perfect job: 12:30 to 4:30, airconditioned, our feet up and not bad pay...well it might be under the title of "too good to be true"...and so we sit here at a cafe at 2:10pm the next day...unemployed yet again and soaking in the beautiful weather.
All I can say in my defense of not returning is that I'm fairly sure working there compromised my integrity - and I would like to think that its worth more than the aforementioned amount...in fact I like to think of myself as a morally upstanding individual and tricking people into buying advertising space didn't fit into the picture somehow. I did however feel a little better after talking to Chris and finding out that he had indeed seen an output the previous day and it wasn't simply organized crime...but definately verging on it.
As if anyone really needs me to tell them this but, DON'T GIVE OUT YOUR CREDIT CARD INFO OVER THE PHONE. Apparently they didn't get that warning here in the land down under - cause this company was making sales...very shady indeed.
But other that that forray into freaky, things are going well, I believe that I am going to ride for an American team - Team Kenda Tire for the 2006 season and I'm stoked. The manager seems really on the ball and I'm going to race a whole different calendar based mostly in the states. So that should really be a different experience - which is what I was looking for!
The weather isn't prime - haven't been in the water for a few days, but I'm doing my rain dance every night and it seems to be holding off for the moment...I'm sure to be back on the computer if it doesn't :P...lata!

We got a visitor...

2005-10-12T23:52:00.000-07:00

So we're settling in quite nicely here in Coolangatta. Found a few cool bikes shops (we got a couple free beanies - tuques for the rest of us - from one of them - why they even manufacture the things here is beyond me!) and we're enjoying the lifestyle. I'm still searching for the moneytree though - maybe one of the million eucalyptus trees grows money...the seethrough part might be difficult though...
Yesterday we tried out "the crazies" training ride. Guess what - they aren't kidding. It is honestly the most insane thing I have ever experienced. We contributed our part by getting up at 4am to meet up with a few guys at 5 to ride up to Mermaid Waters where the ride starts at 5:45. We caught up with the 80 or so other keeners and wheeled around for about 5 minutes before EVERYONE in the group started hammering as hard as they could for the next hour. It was highly unpleasant and just plain bizarre. We ended up hanging out with a few 75 year old men and a masters world champ - not to mention that one of them was on a fixed gear...mental.
But that's when the joy comes in - we got home (at like 8am!), had a little nibble, a little nap and then headed out to the surf. Just in case you're wondering - no, life does not get any better than this!
Unfortunately we had a little critter come and drop-in late afternoon. Well actually little isn't the correct adjective - it was HUGE! And ugly - and Chris was a wonderful boyfriend and killed it while I went into the other room. I know I'm a really big baby - but at least Canadians can kinda understand where I'm coming from - here the woman where we rented the place from just about laughed at us last week when we mentioned that we had seen a cockroach. Her response was "they won't hurt you", which I suppose if you live in a land with 127 breeds of snakes (most of which are poisonous according to our friends at the Healesville Sanctuary) you do need to prioritize. So I didn't sleep all that well last night as a result, but I'm trying to be strong.
We had our first electical storm last night - they get a few good downfalls! But again, the internet is pricey - it's far cheaper just to call home - how ridiculous is that?!? So I shall be off...