Oh look, I have fitness now!

Eugene

So, after Walla Walla I guess that helped my fitness a bit.  Because I made the break didn't sit in and stayed with the contending field at Eugene Roubaix.  Seriously, wtf?  On lap 1 once we turned on to Crow Rd there was a bunch of action as one could expect and I closed a gap to a group that included Liberles, Hoefer and a few others including my favorite new addition to the OBRA peleton, Marek Litinsky.  All of a sudden I look back and we have a massive gap.  Then Bedford and two other contenders bridged up.  And I was like, well, I guess this is the new peleton.  It was so weird.  Basically everyone else dnf'ed and it was an Oregon Cup race.  Most people just quit and didn't get flats.

Post by Portland State Cycling.

Anywho, I had a lot of fun.  Marek was being all aggressive which is great to see because so many OBRAnians just sit in all the time and don't do anything.  Bedford and Liberles both did some attacks, but about 5 of us all from different teams organized into a paceline that chased down Bedford.  It was beautiful.  In the end I got on Marek's wheel for the sprint but couldn't hold on, so I got 4th while he was 3rd.

Post by Portland State Cycling.

Tour de Bloom

I think skipping the mass start hill-climb was an excellent idea in hindsight.  Cause I got to watch the Grand Floral Parade instead:



And I therefore was fresh for the crit.  The course seemed to be a dramatic improvement over the super sketch backside of the previous course and the final corner was super fun.  We went down Orondo on the bricks and passed within a foot of a beer garden crowd at McGlinn's and then raced into the corner going downhill praying each time that my wheel wouldn't slip out and that I wouldn't run out of pavement on Wenatchee ave.  A breakaway got away early and ultimately lapped the field.  I hung out at the front and managed to maintain a good enough position in the final lap to get 10th in the race.



I think I might be starting to get a hang of the crits.  Great Success!

The road race was definitely the most epic race I've done so far this year and may turn out to hold that place.

The race started innocently enough with no rain and it looked like it might stay that way.  We rolled out onto the 102 mile three lap course and there was plenty of jockeying for position.

Once we began heading east we got slammed with a massive crosswind.  Echelons began to form and one started rolling away quite convincingly.  I fought hard to work my way into the next echelon and after a few rotations, the peleton was long gone.  Sucking a wheel was impossible that day.

Our chase echelon was working great with neither the peleton or the first echelon in sight. It was clear that there were some stronger riders than others since we were dropping people from our own echelon as the lap went on. As we rounded the corner to go west we saw two things: the first echelon ahead of us and a nasty wall of rain headed straight towards us. The rain hit us before we caught the first echelon. When we caught the echelon, everyone was suffering from both working so damn hard and from the rain which at times felt like hail. So what was the logical thing to do?

Attack! Yes sirree I shot straight by everyone like a maniac and managed to drag Brian Hitchcock with me. I thought there would be a reaction and a new echelon would form, but instead we found ourselves with a 2 minute gap between both the echelon we caught and 2 additional wackos further up the road!! And this was with 40 miles to go just after I missed my feed since I could barely see anything let alone my mom handing me a water bottle.

Brian and I were holding our gap both ways, but were eventually joined by two strong riders as we echeloned east. We didn't make any dent into the two ahead of us, so it became clear that we were racing for 3rd. As we turned west, the vulture in me spotted weakness in Brian and one other guy, but that the 4th guy was very strong. So what did I do?

Attack! I just started riding hard off the front and after a bit of bucking around, the strong guy dropped the other two and bridged up to me. I wanted third so I did my best to seem like I could keep up on the remaining hills. With 1k to go we got into cat and mouse mode. He made me go first and teased me with a small gap that I bought into too early just before 200m. We were among the few finishers that day that came in as a group. Love it!

I ended up at 8th in omnium points and was the first non-Canadian.

Banana Belt 2

Well, after the 100 mile crosswind race, this whole 77 mile Banana Belt seemed like a walk in the park for me.  Leading up to the race though, there was some tension within the team.  In Banana Belt 1 my team didn't do the best despite having a 7 person team in a 24 person race.  We all met for beers and general team discussion the Thursday beforehand and there was a lot of finger pointing and grandiloquence of what should be done.  I kinda just sat there and ate chicken wings.  Sherm asked me what I thought and I said that "bike racing leadership shouldn't be appointed, but is demonstrated in the race."

Anyways, I got a ride out there with one of our "I'm just getting back into racing after 4 years of living another life" teammates.  The race was fairly typical Banana Belt stuff I guess with all the rollers providing lots of opportunity to attack and stuff.  Dwayne Farr looked quite strong that day, but it was Kyle Medlin that went for a solo effort on lap 3 or 4 that lasted a good 1.5 laps.  After this, Mike Kath and Erik Hofland always seemed to be getting themselves in these teaser breaks that were just a little bit up ahead.  I started getting a little aggressive on lap 5 or 6 where one of my attacks involved going right before the dam hill.  Our team was doing great at making sure they followed the strong wheels with Jeremy especially being an absolute nuisance to Bedford.

Just before the final lap, Bedford and Bourcier were trying attacks and I covered some of those.  Then, I sensed the field was a little tired, so I put in a good attack.  Nobody followed.  The peleton didn't react immediately.  And just like that I had a 40 second gap.  It was a ways to go, but I was feeling great.  I tempoed well up the dam hill and still had a good gap after that, so this was serious.  My moto-official was encouraging me and leading up to the finish it seemed like the peleton was closing in, so I put in some good digs up the final hills.  I looked back before the sprint hill and the gap was still big.  I powered up the last hill in a big gear and poster finished.  Our team led out Sherm who ended up in 4th.  That was a pretty great day for the team.  Oh and guess this race made Jeremy my favorite newest addition to the OBRA 1/2 peleton.

Anniversary Weekend

After BB2, I met my girlfriend and headed out to the coast for a romantic 1-year anniversary where I proposed to her on Sunday.  And she was quite surprised but said yes and we're both quite excited.

Crit Season is a bust for me

Man, I seriously suck in the last 5 laps of crits. Like badly. Ok, maybe not as bad as those who crash out of them, but I think after the final big crit of the year last night I'm really disappointed in myself. This whole frickin season my best result in a crit is 10th. That just sucks. I didn't win any primes and the only cash I won was at Redmond Derby Days where it payed 20 deep. Seriously, here are my crit results:

Tour of Walla Walla: 85th same time
Mutual of Enumclaw: 53rd pulled out of race
Capital Stage Race: 44th pulled out of race
Mt Hood: 60th same time
St Honore: 17th same timeish
Redmond Derby Days: 17th same time
Cascade: 31st same time
Vancouver: 10th last from break
Franz Bakery: 16th
Cirque du Cycling: 20th

So yeah, I'll go over those last 3 here.

Vancouver

After more trouble than it ought to have been for me, I bridged up to the break of the day.  Eventually it was 10 of us and eventually I could not keep up a reasonable place and got last from the break.  That sucked.

Franz Bakery

So this race I set a record for most spectators coming to watch me.  I had my Mom & Dad, my Mom's friend and her friend's husband, my cousins Eric and Laura and then Laurel, her sister, her sister's husband and their 3 kids.  And all I could show for it was 16th place and in the process I relinquished my 4th place Oregon Cup standings and ended up 7th on year which is good, but not good enough damnit!  I was so angry at myself after that race because it is a race I have come close to winning twice and I really like bread.  It was also immensely stupid because as shown in the photos below I was in a good spot with 4ish to go and just totally blew it the last 2 laps.







Cirque du Cycling

Lots of money on the line for this one. Jordan was saying he was bringing extra medics for the races and Eddie was telling me I need to line up on the line for this race. And it was almost about the thunderstorm. Well, I lined up ok, it didn't thunderstorm and I avoided crashes. But still on the last lap or maybe the second to last lap I thought I was doing good and was something like 4th out of the 180, but by the time I got to the next corner I was out of the top 10 and gave up. Gosh that sucked.





I am truly in disbelief as to how badly I suck in crits. Not cool.

Oh, I almost forgot...

I finally won at Tuesday PIR by doing a successful stompie from a break.  Going clockwise I sprinted with 1k and then held a good speed and the gap all the way to the finish.  Then after getting some dinner at Eddie's I biked home in the dark and while going on Broadway a guy in a Mercedes took me out while diving in for a parking spot.  He felt really bad and settled it out with me by giving me $200 from the nearest ATM.  That is just sad that my crit winnings are less than that crash compensation. 

All right I am done complaining hopefully.  I'm not doing the Gresham crit and am focusing on Eugene for now.

Negative Racing

I didn't have a very good weekend of racing results wise.  I should have been able to do better than high teens and 23rd in both races.  I could blame it on the 3 crashes that happened right in front of me, but on the other hand Zak crashed and still won it.  I could blame it on the big team presence from HPC and Team O, but on the other hand Tim Reinhart and Steven Davis made that break without having a 10-person squad.

And on top of that it sucks that there isn't even a fall back of at least having a teammate who did get the prize, all I'm left with is a disappointment in myself.

Enough ranting from me, not all weekends can be awesome.  Next up for me is Redmond Derby Days, Montinore and then I'm probably guest riding for Team O at Cascade.

The Success Equation

The problem with bike racing and every other competition for a scarce resource in this world is that not everybody can get that scarce resource. However, sometimes it seems like some people have a seemingly natural and unexplainable ability to excel in the area where they can easily obtain something where others struggle desperately to no avail. However, it is no coincidence that some people are just better at some things than others are.

This entire world is discrete. There are a certain number of people in this world, there is even a certain number of matter in this world, the point is that nothing is infinite in this natural world. And furthermore, rules hold together this world: gravity keeps matter close together, thermodynamics cause weather. And even furthermore there are patterns to everything: certain ways to race a bicycle race that gives you a good chance of winning and certain things to say to women to make them attracted to you.

On a spiritual note, however, my Lord Jesus Christ is infinite and has the power to accomplish anything despite the laws and general patterns of the world since He created all that. But on the other hand, His way of doing things can dramatically differ from what any one person can judge to be good, bad, preferred or even desired. So even though it can be possible for a paralyzed man to desire to win the Tour de France, this man is subject to the conditions placed on him by God.

No matter how strong of a bike rider you are, since you probably don't have such a superior amount of fitness that you can ride away from everyone since you are constrained to the general abilities of the human body, there has to be some management of the exertion of the potential energy you have. Similarly, with women (the other obnoxious area of my life where it seems like it's impossible to achieve success) since I am constrained by the amount of base attractiveness I have relative to every other douchebag competing for the same woman, there has to be some difference in my methodology for achieving my goal. So, I have come up with an equation to describe this problem:

Success

This is the end result that you want. In a bike race, usually the result you want is to be the first across the line. With women, I want to have consistent companionship with a woman that loves me how I like to be loved and enjoys receiving my love as well. So, how to get these things?

Situational Awareness

Do you really understand what is going on around you? In a bike race, do you know how many miles are left in the race? How to tell who is feeling strong? Or how good you are feeling? The world around us feeds us data about the current state of everything. But how good are you at determining exactly what the world is telling you? When this bonehead Evan from Guinness makes an attack 5 miles into a 70 mile race, how likely is it that he will ride faster than the other 50 riders for the next 65 miles? In the sprint, who is the sprinter that knows what wheel to take and where should you position yourself prior to those last 3 turns?

With women it is just as complex, but my awareness is so bad that I can barely guess what is happening. And at times I have let my feelings rage out of control to the point where I'm so excited about a woman that I can't see that she's actually not as good as I think she is. The point is that each situation has particles of information located all over the place and the more of this information that the brain can process and catalog, the more informed one will be when the time comes to make a decision about what action to take.

Strategy Formulation

So, how to achieve your goal? To win a bike race you have to ride hard and fast, right? To get a girl you have to "be yourself", right? Unfortunately for things that are hard to get, it is usually not simple. In fact it is annoying and painful and at times compelling to make one try harder.

If you ever fail in succeeding, you probably did something wrong. Perhaps that breakaway attempt at mile 5 of a 70 mile race was not a good idea. Maybe I shouldn't have been so nice to that woman that wasn't all that interesting. To achieve your goal there are patterns that can be more effective for certain kinds of situations. To win from a bike race, your timing must be just right to be first across the line. To get into a loving relationship, both parties must be interested in and working towards the benefit of each other.

The challenge is in the details of how to achieve your goal. And typically and even statistically if you really want to study it, there are patterns that generally can be followed to obtain a certain result. There are patterns that rarely work such as breaking away 5 miles into a 70 mile race or being the most boring person on earth to a woman, but then others patterns that are usually more successful like being behind a good wheel up until the last point of a field sprint or with women... actually I don't have much advice to offer with that. But the more ways one can identify to achieve their goal the more arsenal one will have in trying to achieve their goal.

Execution

With whatever strategy you use, there is the slight matter of actually carrying it out. You can be in exactly the right spot at the right time and still execute poorly and thus not achieve the level of success you wanted. For example, at last year's Franz Bakery Crit I had planned on sprinting for the win, but pedaled through the final corner crashing myself and then the field passed me, however at the Salem Crit I sprinted for the win on a 500m straightaway.

Luck

Luck can be anywhere in the spectrum between good and bad. If you had no idea what was going on around you and you didn't really have a plan, but the result of whatever you executed was success, than you had good luck. If you did not achieve your desired result despite thinking you were aware of your situation and came up with and executed what you thought was the best possible strategy, then you had bad luck. Luck is an interesting factor because it basically represents a situation you were not aware of or some strategy you weren't realizing that you were doing. If everything about the world is known and all possible strategies and their outcomes are already known then luck is a passive variable in the equation.

Bad luck for example can range from being struck by lightning to getting a flat tire. Yet since the world is discrete these items are not random. There are patterns to lightning and you're much more likely to be struck by it if you bike around holding a 40 foot metal pole sticking into the air in a thunderstorm in Florida. But even with the flat tire, the chances are far less likely that you'll get a flat tire if you slap on a brand new tire in substitute for the tire you've been riding since last season. Luck is an opportunity to learn more about the world and various situations and what strategies you can design to combat such a problem in the future or if whatever caused the good luck is replicable, perhaps this can be used again to achieve success again.

Resources

No matter how well you sense things, pick good plans and execute them well, you are bound by the physical resources at your disposal that you will need to accomplish the goal. If you want to win a bike race, you will need to have a bike. If you want to win a time trial against Fabian Cancellara you better have an immense amount of fitness available to use. In the case of the paralyzed man who wants to win the Tour de France, while he himself may not be physically capable of doing it himself, there would be nothing stopping him from giving other resources of his own to another person who has a body functioning well enough that he could accomplish that success.

Putting it all together

Success is tough because it requires a keen situational awareness combined with an effective strategy and then decent enough execution of that strategy or strategies all assuming you have enough resources available to achieve your goal. I've personally got a lot to work on in both the situational awareness and strategy formulation departments. With biking I need to be aware of the course and competitors and how much effort I am able to exert over the remaining distance. With women, I've got to be able to sense what they are feeling like and if I'm being treated well enough by them. And then I've got to have a whole range of tactics to employ in my bike racing from attacking at certain times or even having teammates do work for me. With women, it's really weird how they react to certain strategies and it can often times be surprising what strategies are effective.

Anyways, Racing...

I didn't do Hagg Lake because I got really sick the night before due to what I believe to have been a rotten tomato. So, this weekend it's up to Washington for Sequim and Mason Lake.