Weekend Wonder

Took my nephew Coleman (he's 4) to Snoqualmie for his first day on the slopes. He had a little anxiety when we tried to ditch him at the Kid's Corral and then again when we saw him later. We asked him if he would go skiing again, and without batting an eye, "No."



Coleman only last a half day - and slept the entire way home. We got back in time for me to do a ride before we were off to dinner with my Mom's new flame's family. They are really nice people!

That night Ryan and I went to bed by 9:30 to get up early Sunday morning and ski a blue bird day. It was amazing. Check out the views.







We got up to Crystal around 8:45am and parked. The initial skin was 2.5 hours all uphill. We contemplated a big tour or do some laps in the Cement Basin area. Due to the stability of the snow, we decided on the later and had 10-12" of untracked powder the entire day. I would say it was one of the best ski days of the year! When we got back to the parking lot the inbound skiers said it was one of the busiest days they had ever seen at Crystal. Funny, we only saw one other party the entire day. Yay for powder days!

A few more shots

This is Sonya, climbing in Arboli and kicking ass.



This was taken at Montsant during one of two rain days. The cave had some hard climbs in it - the easiest being a 7A. Which meant, no climbing for moi.



This is what happens to your hands when you climb on jagged sharp limestone for 12+ days.

A break from the funk

It's actually not raining outside at the moment.

Sorry about that previous post - I think that was some counter culture/ post relaxing vacation reality stress coming out. But it's peaked and I'm over it. :) Shoes.

Got an email from Suz asking the 1/2 ladies if they have a preference to ride with either the Cat 3 men or the Masters A/B field for the first few races of the season. Personally I'm happy with either group - it's a kick ass workout and simulates elite level racing the best. But more importantly, we only have 8 weeks to go before the local early season racing starts. I don't know about you, but I am STOKED to get some racing in. Be gone zone 2 doldrum! Hello intensity!

I can't wait to break my chicken legs out of their tights and show their ferocity to the world. :)

Just to cheer you up....

Not sure if I posted this here - but if you need a good laugh, here you go!

Did a 2 hour ride yesterday morning along the Burke and for the first time ever, I thought to myself, "I hate Seattle." Whoa. Things are getting serious.

So I vow, from this point forward, to no longer ride the Burke for 2008 (between the U and Log Boom). I'm doing it for Seattle.

my own personal training camp

Siurana, Spain is located approximately 2 hours southwest of Barcelona in the San Padres Mountain range. It is accessible primarily by car due to its hilly landscape. Siurana was "discovered" by the rock climbing community in the 1980's and has seen a lot of development since. No wonder why - the village is perched atop a huge limestone crag and has thousands of bolted sport routes.


This photo was taken across the gully on my way to Arboli, a neighboring village. To give you an idea - a bird would probably only have to fly 1.5 kilometers to get from Siurana to Arboli but by bike it took 15k.

So why Siurana? In case you didn't know - Ryan's a climbing feign. Originally we were going to go to Thailand but due to the civil unrest and probably lack of cycling roads, we sought out another nice weather winter destination. (Not to mention this area is frequently by climbing heavyweights Chris Sharma, Piatxi Usobiaga, Graham, etc.) Toni, the owner of the camp site we stayed at, has won numerous world cups and has a nice little set up. He rents bungalows for 60 Euro a night, which sleep up to 4. Since we had 5, he gave us an extra mattress for free. Unlike previous Euro trips, this seemed like luxury. We had running HOT water, heat, a roof over our heads, etc. The only issue would be contemplating climbing back up the road to the bungalow or hitching a ride. (It was 6k from the main road from Cornudella de Montsant and gained about 500m of altitude.) Don't worry - I never hitched a ride. :)



This is the view from the road that travels between the campsite to the main village of Siurana. You can see the Montsant mountain in the distance and the windy road below. The best part? The roads were immaculate. They often hold the world cup indie races nearby (between Capafonts and Montral) and put down new asphalt quite often.

I mentioned there were 5 of us - Ryan, myself, Jesse, Sonya and Orion. They would climb all day and I would pedal several hours through the landscape. My companion was my trusty Kona. Everyday we would awake by 9, head to the cafe that served bocadillo fritta (egg omelette's with potatoes and zucchinis, sandwiched between fresh baguette bread smeared with tomatoes) and then they would head off climbing around 11am. Some days I would do a loop and meet them then attempt to climb, some days I would do a longer loop and come back to the bungalow and relax.

We had completely different vacations. I saw the entire surrounding area and they saw lots of rock.



This was my favorite village - Capafonts. It is perched in the middle of a small valley surrounded on all sides by rock formations and gullies.



From Capafonts I circumnavigated Montral - whose refugi is barely seen in the distance.



This is the view from the Montral village. Simply breathtaking.



Freshly paved roads that are barely wide enough for two cars to pass one another. Luckily I saw maybe 5 cars on each 3+ hour ride I went on. I saw maybe 5 cyclists total - half of which were mountain bikers. Honestly, I felt like I was stealing something. Everything was so clean - so carefully kept. No glass on the roads, no abandoned cars on the lands- the Spaniards know how to live.



I decided I could live here. So what if the roof caved in and there's no heat?



This is Ullemolins a terraced village on the 242 regional road.

Luckily climbers require rest days, which meant we got to head down to the beach and do some site seeing. It was warmer down there - about 12 C - but still chilly. I didn't think it was possible - but this girl managed to find boots to match her hair. Wow.



Now - back to climbing. As long as you were in the sun - you were fine. The moment you stepped out, freezing cold. But the views would take your breath away.



Ryan has been climbing for about 10 years now. (He'll probably correct me. :) He trained hard prior to setting off for Spain and planned his peak perfectly. He managed to flash at least 15 7A+ (about 5.12a). Um.... can you say, BAD ASS?



So you're probably wondering, what does flash mean? He basically walked up to the climb, with no prior knowledge, hung quickdraws as he climbed, and completed the climb from ground to anchors without falling once.



Yes, he's part monkey. But luckily not hairy like an ape.



The jaw dropping La Rambla Direct - rated 5.15a and repeated only by the worlds elite climbers. This is a view from under the climb - and the following gives you an idea of just how overhanging the route is. Other than the crack, I don't see ANY holds.



The guy hanging is jugging up a fixed line to work the upper moves. Because these routes are so long, often climbers will work the route in sections in order to master it. The hope is to be able to redpoint it - climbing from bottom to anchors without falling. This is different from an onsite or flash - because they have been on the climb before.

Of course we had to visit Barcelona on another rest day. Our mission - see as much of the city via walking as possible. Here's Gaudi's famous Familia cathedral - maybe it will help you understand the saying "that's so Gaudi!" He didn't really like details much - rrrrriiiiight.



We of course had to eat some tapas while there - but the Spaniards eating schedule is totally different from ours. Shops close in the middle of day from about 2-6 for a siesta and then they don't start eating till 11pm at night! By that point we were starving and couldn't wait to chow down on some finger food.

Because of this siesta, we would often find ourselves desparate to get some food right around 6. Corundella is the nearest village with groceries available and was a 6k drive down the road. So when we happened upon a supermarket on our rest day near Cambrils, we went a little wild. Between 5 of us, we spent 150 Euro on groceries.



Our favorite delicacy? Nutella and animal crackers. Thank GOD it's harder to find Nutella at the store. (But I hate to admit it, I found it at Fred Meyer's already and NO I did not buy any. ;)

Simply put - I have way too many photos to put up on one blog. These were just some highlights. My goal is to collaborate everyone's photos together and make them into one nice slide show. Our friends Ben and Danielle have a projection screen at their house and have graciously offered to host a showing. If you're interested in coming and seeing more of our adventure - please let me know!

Blurry Eyed and Fuzzy

So that's what happens to your vision when you wake up at 4:30 am in Spain, fly direct from Barcelona to New York, have a 4 hour lay over and then hop on a direct flight from NY to Seattle to arrive at 8:40pm PST. My math may be off a little bit - but I think we were traveling for about 24 hours. And it was worth every minute of it.

Luckily I have the day off from work today so downloading of the photos will have to wait till tomorrow. I miss that place already. The olive orchards, the whindy roads, the sunshine and rustic feel of the San Padres mountains. It's even been a little bit of shock not hearing Spanish every where - something Ryan and I plan on learning as part of our New Year's resolution.

Where to start? Simply put - that was one of the funnest vacations I've had. Roaming around seldom traveled mountain roads, seeing how minimally the Spaniards live, enjoying new foods and great company.

But for now, I think I'm going to rest my weary eyes one last day before getting back to the grind and reluctantly returning to reality. I still feel ultra relaxed and rejuvenated - and more than ever, ready to get back to the bike.

(Just to give you a taste - I put in 24 hours of riding, burning over 14,000 kj and climbing my heart out. The land is not flat - far from it. And what goes down, must come up, over and over and over again. More to come...)

Audios!

Oh just wait till I post a trip report on this place. It´s been amazing! I highly recommend coming here - being a climber or not. Time to get back to playing!

fELIZ Navidad

Greetings from Siurana! We´re having fun!

Shoes, Cookies and Presents

My mom, sister Marcy, Ryan and I got together on Monday night for some sugar cookie making and decorating and to celebrate Christmas. My mom tends to excel at gift giving - she even had something for Makiah. She quickly snatched the treat out of my hand and hurried off to her dog bed to commence the chewathon.



We followed a serious butter fest sugar cookie from my new favorite cookbook and it took a while to figure out the consistency. But once it finally started to roll into a monster ball, I divided it into two discs and put it in the fridge to chill. And a new trick I learned- put parchment paper on both sides of your cookie dough to prevent the dough from sticking to your rolling pin. (Notice smiley Makiah in the background - she's such a people dog.)



Next came the baking, and then after they cooled completely, the decorating. Ryan's homemade icing was good - a little runny though and it made for a hard precise decorating medium.



Of course we couldn't just fill up on cookies - and my mom came prepared with a childhood favorite of Portuguese Bean Soup. Don't worry - if you didn't get enough fat intake from the cookie scraps, you will most certainly get there by downing some sausage soup! Nothing that tastes that good can be good for you!



After dinner we did our gift exchange and Ryan hit the nail on the head with the soap shoe dispenser. (Originally it was a re-gift from Carrie at the elephant exchange this past weekend. Ryan saw it, wrapped it and we had a good chuckle about it.) I swear he used a whole thing of tape to wrap it - but it was well worth it. My mom was squealing in delight, "where on Earth did you find such a perfect gift?"



We headed back to the kitchen to complete our cookies and Marcy and Ryan both kicked out the final touches on the heart stopping treats. They looked great!



And of course, Marcy's favorite creation - a sky diving santa wearing a G string. Nice work Marcy!

It's hard to follow up the CT...

Thank you all my faithful female readers who got a kick out of the last post. It makes me laugh thinking how hard it made all of you laugh when you read that well thought out and carefully crafted post. HA!

The Cougar

Today was very productive on the surf front - I just couldn't pass this one up.

Thanks Jesse -

This was created by our Spanish interpretor Jesse. Thanks for the laughs.

Ryan

Stiff Neck

Yet another bad ass weekend of fun fun fun!

Kicked off the long winter nights with a sushi party with chef Melanie directing all of us how to make sushi. Turns out we bought one too many spider crabs and eel and had a few pieces of sushi leftover. The good news - everyone walked away with stuffed bellies and happy faces.

We went to Uwagimaya on Thursday and picked up some necessary ingredients - can't forget the MSG! Luckily only the mayo and the eel had the sixth food group in it - speaking of which - eel is super fatty with 265 calories in one teaspoon! According to Ai, this fat is what makes the ladies more attractive and attaches to the hips. Bring on the Omega 3's and pack on the ba-donk-a-donk butt.



The ladies had the first attempt at the rolling and made cute petite little rolls. They were perfect bit size pieces. You could even talk while chewing them down.



Then the guys had gave it a go and made some macho man rolls. Check out Ryan's big rice sushi fix! He attempted to eat it in one bite too and was chewing for a while. And then he made some oyster sushi and spread on a shot-to-the-dome chuck of wasabi.






The next morning, Ryan got up at 5 and I slept in till 6 to meet up with Julie and head up to Steven's Pass for some inbound skiing. Ryan went with some fellas to Crystal area and did some back country skiing. Julie and I planned on meeting Karen at the clock at 9:30 and by 9:50 we were itching to go with no sign of her and headed up the mountain. It snowed all day - and the powder was great. They still need more snow - a couple of rocks were exposed and they have yet to open the back side of the mountain - but all in all it was a great day! We managed to ski up till 3:30 - a record for me, especially on tele skis. The slopes were crowded though - with way too many people on the mountain. We saw evidence of a collision under the Skyline chair - a good excuse to do more moguls and harder terrain.

My legs are starting to come around and they weren't nearly as sore and sluggish as last week. Afterward we headed to Leavenworth to Karen and Anne's bungalow nestled on the Wenatchee River off of Icicle Creek Road.. They fed us enchiladas and we had some laughs over dinner. We also had the annual Ti white elephant gift exchange - and I finally got rid of the infamous penis shorts! Carrie is now the proud owner of the statue David nude colored shorts, well until next year.

The next morning we woke up and headed out for a few hours of skate skiing. The snow was great and we built up a sweat on fun rolling terrain. At one point, we were cruising along and some guy was approaching us, I decided to go in hot into a down sloping corner, lost my balance and did a cartoon looking maneuver, yard sailing and taking out the cross country tracks. We all laughed pretty hard - although this morning I woke up with a crook in my neck. I sure wish someone could have caught that on camera - classic!

We worked up an appetite and headed to the Sleeping Lady lodge for some food and decided to try the golf course, across the street from Karen's place. It was much more challenging with tons of hills and descents - not to mention deer poop. My dumbass thought it would be fine to roll through it and it stopped me in my tracks and I went down hard. Good times, good times.



Thankfully I have a massage booked for today and I can get my neck worked on!

I've been struggling with getting on the bike lately - specifically the weekends. Will it really hurt if I take a mental break from riding long, wet and cold rides on the weekends and instead run my legs into the ground while descending mountains?

So this weekend I get to hang with some Avanti ladies and laugh our butts off on the slopes. Photos to follow....

GRD

We got home at 11:45 last night - waaaay too late for attempting to get up this morning in time to meet Peter and Shawn at Stoney G's for a morning jaunt. But surprisingly enough, I roused myself out of a deep slumber and was out the door by 7:35am. I'm going to be a hurting unit as the day wears on, I'll tell you what!

I've been scrambling lately to get things done before we head out to Spain NEXT FRIDAY. Stoked!!! I finally picked up Miller's compact bike box (I contacted him weeks ago and just now got over to Team Miller's house to pick it up), dropped off the old TV at the dump (it's been rolling around in the van for about two months - ever since we got the new one and it cost $37 smackaroos to get rid of it!), returned some stuff at Home Depot that I bought for our gutters and didn't end up using. I even had time to bake some Almond Biscotti. The days are whizzing by!

We are quickly approaching the winter solstice too - the shortest day of the year. It's all uphill from there though and we start building back toward the summer solstice - yay!



This is where we will be by the way - 60 degrees and mild temps. Hellsya!

White Fluff Addiction

You know it's bad when you start checking the snow report more than visiting your daily blog haunts. Things are getting chilly around the good old PNW - and that means white pow pow to be had in the mountains.

Suddenly our rustic cabin in the Methow is sounding really appealing despite not having any heat source. Who cares? We'll be skiing our brains out.

I did get up and move my legs in a circular motion outside this morning and it felt great.

Welcome Little One!

Proud new parents Sol and Cassie welcome Regan Tate Daughtery to the world on December 1, 2007 weighing in at 8 pounds 5 ounces. Way to go guys!!!

We were fortunate to visit them earlier in the week while they completed their stay at the Northgate Hospital and got to hold Sol's new "little Bud." It was funny hearing their account of picking out a name. Cassie said that Sol was insistent on a S name and they had already agreed on Tate for the middle name (a family name) and of course, she'd get Sol's last name. But any name starting with an S would leave the babies initials with STD and ridiculed for life. Cassie responded with, "it's like naming your baby HIV. Not happening." They are funny.

Weekend Warriors

I officially kicked off my first ski weekend of the winter this past weekend and am paying for it dearly this morning. The knees are tender, the body fatigued but my grin factor all weekend was HUGE!

Friday night was Ryan's office Christmas party and quite different than years past. He works for a home builder in Bothell and due to the real estate market fluctuation, they let go 40% of the office staff as a precaution. They also reduced their party budget significantly - in years past they've included a huge assortment of Costco party gifts people could bid on using fake money. (Items like personal computers, Ipods, a week vacation in Alaska, etc.) This year everyone was asked to bring something under $25 and people would still bid on them. Booze went for a whopping $1200 - pretty funny. We re-gifted some wine - shame on us! But some lucky $1200 bider had some nice red zin.

Saturday morning was an early start - up and at em by 4 am - on the road by 4:30. Orion and Sonya picked us up - and we headed north to Baker area to do some backcountry skiing. We arrived to the parking lot just as the sun came up - making for some awesome lighting.



Our route was to head up to Table Mountain area, assess everyone's ability and desires for the day and then make a call of where to go from there. The avalanche danger was pretty low - and the sky was cloudless - a perfect day for being outside and skinning around. We met up with Brent, Emily and Dave and headed out the ridge. Emily just got a new split board and had a difficult time with skinning - we traveled over a technical section and she took a fall into some trees and had a hard time getting out. Ultimately she and Brent decided to do some yo yo's on a guaranteed powder section while the 5 of us did a one day classic tour around Table Mountain.

The visibility was amazing - you could see Shuskan in full effect with its two hanging glaciers, Glacier Point, Mt Rainer and of course Mt Baker. It was absolutely stunning.



Luckily Dave was familiar with the area and guided us through the ridges and gullies. There was quite a bit of avalanche activity from the previous storm during the week - but when we dug a snow pit and did some analysis, we were confident we were safe. Talk about amazing powder turns and getting those first tele turns of the season! It was fantastic.

It was a long day though - at one point we boot packed to the top of a run and I remember wondering to myself, why am I here? But the next few powder turns quickly turned that frown upside down. :)

Our skin skirted around a lake - some brave soul had skinned across the lake before - but we were unwilling to risk a chilly dip in some ice cold waters. Instead we went around - and skinned for probably an hour and 15 minutes before finally arriving at the top of the saddle and shedding our skins for the last time. Talk about sloppy skiing down to the bottom - my legs were D-U-N.

The best part about skiing all day - is the sharing a good laugh over the days blunders while drinking beers at North Fork Beer Shrine on the way home. If you ever find yourself skiing at Baker and need some food - it's on the 522 just past the Sumas Y and has great pizza and beer.

The next morning came a little too early for the ski clinic I signed up for - so I decided to make the afternoon session and take my neighbor Jo. We had a great time learning some efficient V-1 techniques - thanks to an excellent instructor Eli. I was pretty tuckered out last night when I got home and the legs are definitely feeling it this morning!

The hiatus is over though - and this week it's back to the bike - I guess. :)

You gotta know when to hold 'em....

The frantic gift preparation phase hasn't quite hit me yet - but it's bound to start next week. Luckily we're leaving the country over the holidays and won't be doing the enormous gift exchange we usually do - but still have a few things we need to get together before leaving.

Speaking of traveling - we forfeited some tickets last winter to Beaver Creek because I pulled my hamstring right before we were supposed to fly out. We had a year to use them - and pay a $100/ticket change fee to exchange them. The deadline is tomorrow - and yesterday we finally found something reasonable. Check this: $159 round trip per person from Seattle to Tahoe Feb 1-4. And with our credit, as well as change fees, we only paid $11.38 out of pocket. Hellsya! Not to mention the killer deal we found by staying at a casino on the lake - we can gamble just minutes from our room. Let me tell you - Ryan and are a HUGE gamblers. ha! You gotta know when to hold 'em; know when to fold 'em; know when to walk away; know when to run.

We saw Larry the cable guy last night, and no, I'm not a closet hick. Talk about an interesting crowd that goes to see his act at the paramount. Larry's humor is pretty funny - he's definitely a dirty guy and likes to talk about poop. He's a man of one line wonders and strung about 1.5 hours worth of them together. One that sticks out in my mind, and this may not be appropriate for some of you younger readers, but you're going to hear it somewhere....

"I once took a picture of my butt hole with my camera phone and sent it to my aunt. She texted me back and said, 'boy that's the worst pumpkin pie I've ever seen!'"

Guess you had to be there. But the mullet man sitting in front of me was howling.

Near record breaking rain

Washington State Governor Christine Gregoire declared Washington in a state of emergency yesterday after the second highest recorded rainfall in 50+ years. SeaTac airport recorded 3.77" of rain in a 24 hour period.

I woke up to the constant tap tap tap of rain against the window. And then I listened a little closer and heard the undeniable sound of water inside the house. Uh oh. I rushed downstairs, expecting to see the basement awash in 12" of standing water again (remember our $48,000 broken water heater last winter?) relieved to find it was only water running through the aquifer in our over flow sump pump tank. Phew.

But I could still hear water running - and checked the other half of the basement to discover our reoccurring flood area and happened upon 7" of standing water. Luckily it was contained in the basement entry way. But if it gets much higher than it could over flow and start draining into our basement. Sweet.

Next order of business - a trip to the Home Depot. I figured the issue was in getting the gutters to kick the water further away from the house. The sump pump isle was filled with people, looking frantic at the empty shelves and empty Starbucks cups in their hands. I found some pipping, gutter adapters and duct tape and headed back home.

My earlier attempt to get rid of some of the water build up did nothing - the pond was as big, if not bigger than it had been when I left. Next step - find out why the gutters were leaking so bad. I should have known - they were FULL of leaves and crud from the roof. Whoops. Apparently we missed our annual gutter cleaning. (Which boils down to I didn't nag Ryan enough this year to get them cleaned.) 2 hours later the gutters were working like magic and I was able to bail out the flooded basement.

Short story: I saved our homestead and Ryan owes me dinner. :)

I finally get to get out on the bike today - and am STOKED! (7 hours of trainer time in the past few days will make anyone CRAZY.) It's in the mid- 50s today and other than the occasional flooded urban stream, it should be one of those ear to ear grin rides. :)

MAD PROPS TO JENNIE REED who rocked the World Cup Keirin with a Silver medal. Way to go Jennie!!!!

Why do you ride?

It's that time of year when the holidays settle in and the motivation to get out and ride start to wane. The sun makes a rare and welcomed appearance about once a week - but the other 6 out of 7 days include gray, dark rainy skies. The temps have started to dip - hovering just above freezing and regular bike commuters start to drop like flies from the busy Burke. Soon it will only be the hard core cyclists who take to the road and have a crazy grin (or is it a cringe?) pasted on their faces.

As a racer, you have to have a mind over matter attitude or possibly fall victim to short trainer rides (I mean come on, who can seriously ride on the trainer for over an hour?) and, heaven forbid, not ride at all. This will be my 4th winter of riding and I definitely have new found respect for racers who refused to ride in the winter anymore.

So what do you do to combat this overwhelming urge to sleep well past the designated team ride time on the weekends? How do you fight the quick-to-pass guilt of only doing 1 hour instead of 3? Why not skip the gym and go out for some winter beers with some buddies? We're naturally supposed to pack on the winter weight, right?

I'll tell you why you slog countless hours in 38 degree rain; because all of the blood, sweat and tears that you put in throughout the winter become readily apparent in the sweet warm summer months. And when everything comes together and your legs feel like they could churn out 400 watts for hours - you'll know deep down it all started with those cold winter mornings that you rousted yourself out of bed and took to the streets solo.

Old School

Jerry Baker graciously allowed me to borrow some old photos and memorabilia from his personal collection of Marymoor history. I came across some sweet old photos. There's even one from before the railing was installed around the banks!






And here's one of Rick Adams, our excellent host when we raced down at Hellyar this past summer. This photo was probably taken back in 1977 or so.





And the fabulous Rebecca Twigg, on track to win a national title, world championship and medal at the Olympics hailed from Marymoor. She's tearing it up with the fellas - in the sprinters lane. Her 1990 3000m pursuit time still stands as a track record at 3:52. That's super fast for such a slow outdoor track! She is such an inspiration.

From 19 down to 13

Wow what a week. My desk is covered with things I put off last week in prep for the Thanksgiving gorge and long weekend. I just filtered through my emails, sent off bill payments and am starting to get a handle on preparing for Spain in less than a month. Time is flying by - and yet, at the same time, I feel like I have more time on my hands than last year.

I have to admit, I'm a little panicked about not having the insane saddle hours built up already. I've been averaging 13 hours a week per month and that seems a little low. This time last year, I was putting in solid 19 hour ride weeks, with multiple intervals thrown in the mix. I figured the best way to get better at climbing was just to do as many climbs as possible. I really started to notice a difference - and felt amazing. I was climbing like a mad woman. So amazing in fact, I didn't feel it when my hammy popped and couldn't figure out why I couldn't walk the next day.

I guess I just calmed myself down - and am realizing I need to have more faith in my coach. It's scary to get out of your routine - and this is the first winter without being under Miller's coaching. It seems strange, but I'm sure I'll adapt and get used to the quality, not quantity I was putting in before.

It'll be interesting to see how my body handles less work and how this translates into racing.

Bottom line - make each pedal stroke count.

I love noodles

In case you get sick of eating Turkey tomorrow, you could always have some noodles.

Thanks to Ryan...

Make sure you have your volume turned up on this one....

Link

Booked our tickets to Beaver Creek for Presidents weekend - STOKED!!!

CHILLy!

For once it didn't rain all weekend. But it didn't get sunny either - but I'll take a gray non-threatening sky any day over a drizzling wet one. I'm sure cyclists all over the Seattle area were stoked on todays break from the steady downpour that created many epic riding stories from yesterday.

We headed up North to Snohomish on a zone 2 ride - winding our way through the ever growing suburbs and quickly spreading sprawl. The once quiet back roads are now becoming main routes - and combining big diesel trucks and cyclists two abreast don't always mix. But the conversation was good and the bike handling better as we meandered up and down the valley floor.

The Pacific Northwest rules. Were else do you get solid 40 degree temps throughout the entire winter? We might have, say 2-3, sub frozen temp days, but that's it. It really makes for good riding year round - if you can handle the rain. And as Clay, Iona's hubby mentioned today, where else do you find the totally decked out "rain bike" with dual front and rear fenders with buddy flaps extending almost to the ground? It's definitely a Seattle cultural thing.

To celebrate my nearly three weeks on this diet thing I bought some Oysters today at the Ballard Farmers market. YUMMY. I can't wait to devour them.

It rained, it poured and luckily I wasn't hung over...

Phew, all that dancing made for some tired legs today! Just teasing - once the chocolate came out only the conversational volume got turned up and the voices became more animated, much to my dismay. And maybe it was the downer Radiohead I had playing that didn't put them in the mood. Oh well.

Our next ladies night is "Casino" night and we're planning on wearing either prom dresses or old wedding gowns for the festivities. Hopefully we'll go down to Tacoma and catch some boxing too! Feather boas are a must.

Anyways, we had a good time last night and experimented with a bunch of fondues - from French onion, pesto bree, traditional swiss to peanut butter chocolate. And of course there were bottles and bottles of wine - which people did good at polishing off! I think I dumped 10 bottles this morning. Nice work ladies!

Of course this morning came early and I'm a little tired from hosting and got to dodge hundreds of Husky supporters on the trail.

AND BIG NEWS!!!! The Sonics won last night in double overtime vs Atlanta 126-124. Their first win of the season. GO SONICS!

Ladies night

I actually have non-cycling friends. And to prove it, we have a ladies night once a month at someone's house and ditch our hubbies to celebrate our estrogen.

Tonight it's at my house. Luckily Emily arranged all of the food items - thanks Em! So all I have to do is make sure the shitter's clean and strawberries are on the table. (No connection there, don't worry.)

No one is really a hard core drinker so what do we do to entertain ourselves you ask? Dance Party 2007! Yep, we have a dance off. Well, hopefully we'll have a dance off. The theme is fondue and after my last experience (New Year's Eve 2005) - as soon as the chocolate hits the pot we'll be ready to get our grove on. Time to break out the Yo! Bell Biv Devoe.


OR even better.... ah the 90's...

3 down, 7 to go

It's been a week and a half and I'm already starting to see some results from calorie counting. It took a little time to detox from my steady diet of sweets, but now that it's been a little while, I'm not experiencing the cravings I used to. More than anything I'm learning about my personal nutritional choices and how to make my body perform better.

I've always been a strong proponent for exercising as means to lose and maintain weight. But sometimes you travel in circles when you put in a solid 3 hour ride and then come home to binge on cookies and beer. So exercise isn't the only way to do it- having an awareness of what you're eating helps too. Who knows - this may be the missing link for taking my pedaling to the next level?

Just call me Dr. lab rat. (This picture was just too fitting.)

Doing something for yourself

When's the last time you decided to do something for yourself? Take an ordinary day, and spend say 10 minutes out of it doing something for you, and only you.

I cleaned out my bottom dresser drawer. Big deal - except in it were underwear from my freshman year of college. They're gone now. :) Elmo hit the trash can. Is it weird to good will your old undies?

It's sunny!

The legs are starting to feel recovered from the weekend - but thankfully I don't have to push it this rest week. It's beautiful outside right now and I'm looking forward to an easy ride.

Hope you get to enjoy it too!

After signing into blogger, I noticed a new item posted on the "Blogger Buzz" board all about to do lists. Reading further, this woman created a book of the hundreds of to do lists she's collected over the past 7 years. She's put a connection between what people write on their lists and how it defines them.

Interesting.

It left me wondering if I should start keeping all of those lists - because maybe the keys to the universe can be mysteriously unlocked by looking at how much granola I've put on those lists over the years. Or maybe my answers to life's little dramas can be unfolded by weeks worth of scribbled to do lists.

I think it's time for a Freudian approach and pull out the old journals - I'm sure there's some revealing stuff in there.

And as promised, something from the depths of my journals. This blurp was written Sept 24, 2000 when I had first started focusing on boxing. (That bout lasted about 3 competitive years - I saw a Washington State Welterweight title and was an alternate on the first women's world championships.) It's pretty much transfers to cycling though - and I still believe a champion is made a day at a time.

"Stand up straight," is what my coach always tells me. "Fight 5'10", not 5'8" or 5'9. You're height is an advantage, use it." I have a bad tendency of hunching my shoulders. So I decided the only way to prevent it is to have good posture all the time. At least keep my spine straight when I'm sitting and standing. Everything practiced outside the ring transfers directly into it. Bad habits suddenly appear and good habits are easily forgotten. It is a constant struggle. But after months of practice, hours of grueling work and endless days of sweat, there will come a day when everything comes together like clockwork.

Oh the kitty!

(That title's for you, Zana.)

Just got home from a fun weekend up north in the land of maple leaves and hockey. But we weren't visiting to partake in either of Canada's finest offerings - we did some sweet track racing at the Burnaby Velodrome. Ryan came with and so did Makiah - although if you ask her, she spent the weekend golfing. Poor thing got sick in the car Saturday night and we discovered a nice little mess to clean up around 11pm when we got back to the car. GROSS!

I like Jamie's highlights/lowlights so here goes:

Highlight - Screaming through the corners and getting enough g force that you feel the boards creek and moan underneath you.
Lowlight - Hearing people moan from having face to face contact with the boards and pulling out the splinters. Our very own Annette Hanson had a rough go in the unknown distance race and had some nice road rash from crashing down the track. My thoughts are with you Annette and I hope you feel better soon! (Luckliy no bones were broken.)

Highlight - The hubby came and gave me encouraging words after each race and was given my well earned prime money ($25 Can, $28 American!) from Jeremy Storie. He got a little tanked in the beer garden, but who can blame him?
Lowlight - Cleaning up dog shit and vomit after racing my legs off. Gives me the chills even thinking about it. We're screwed when we have kids.

Highlight - Narrowly missing someone's head when he crashed right in front of me. I pulled an ab muscle trying to avoid him.
Lowlight - Putting in a monster attack during the 6x20 points race with 48 laps to go and getting caught, chewed up and spit out the back, eventually pulling myself wondering if I ate some thing wrong or what? No, Jen. You just didn't have the GRRRR and put in a fruitless attack. Damn!

Ah track racing - it was nice putting some time back in the saddle for the weekend. Kirk O'Bee is my new hero - that dude is fast, relentless and cagey. Super fun to watch him dominant race after race. Fast like a bunny!

Our sinking dollar

I've always written in a journal. When I was younger, I'd keep a diary with me at all times and misspell everything. It was pretty comical (thank goodness for spell check!). And then I have this habit of substituting words that you understand what I mean when I say them, but in all reality it's nothing close to the word I should be using. Ah the English language. I've kept all of my journals - and it's funny to go back and read them. I'll see if I can come up with a goody next time I pass through memory lane.

So onto stuff that matters! Um - right. I can't think of anything.

The Canadian dollar is worth more than the US dollar. As of today, our dollar equals 0.9420 of a Canadian dollar. Crazy yo! Border crossing into the US today at the Peace Arch as of 11 am is an hour and a half. Ouch.

T minus 26 hours before I have my lungs bleed out of my chest. ;)

Oh and this is for all you cat lovers out there - I love you tube.

Just one of them days

Yesterday was rough. I had a hard time pushing the pedals around mentally for some reason. Maybe it's because I've done just shy of 6 hours in two days, solo - mid week and along the same tried and trued routes and I'm at the end of the build cycle - or maybe it was just one of those days.

They don't come that often - luckily. But when they do, I begin to wonder, why am I tormenting my body this way? Wouldn't it just be easier to pull over, whip out that cell phone and dial a ride home? Of course the thought crossed my mind but I've only acted on it once - two winters ago in the freezing ass cold Seattle drizzle in 38 degree temps. I figured yesterday wasn't that bad - so toughen up there and put that tool in your toolbox. Who knows? Maybe during a road race it will be the same conditions and you can push through it.

God, I love track. Long live banked velodromes and dry weather.


Going to go see Sarah Ellis the wonder massager to hopefully iron out the last kink in my armor. Since last time, my hammy hasn't acted up at all, knock on wood. My back is starting to loosen up and things are almost back to normal.

Ryan's joining me in the venture up North - YAY! We're stopping in the Ham on the way up to visit his folks. http://www.burnabyvelodrome.ca/

Surfin'

Wow there are a lot of bull shit boring blogs out there. I just got time warped in cycling nerd land.

May your blogs be spicy and juicy. And if all else fails, make some shit up!

Yesterday the sun set at 4:48pm. 4:48 PM?????!!!! Yep, 4:48, pm.

Only 4 more months of darkness.

Tonight I plan on doing a nice volume ride - 3.5 hours, and get to pack some extra weight for lighting once the sun goes down. I don't know how people do it who have a full time job and can't see the light of day. Talk about becoming a hermit.

I actually like riding in the dark - it's kind of like Star Wars on a bike. I remember this ride last winter where it was dark and I got three flats. One down in Renton, another in Bellevue and a third on Juanita hill. Good times. It POURED on me that day. The type of rain that cars were having a hard time keeping their windshield wipers fast enough, while stopped. I remember calling my mom and telling her I was going to be a little late to dinner. She offered to pick me up, but I didn't even consider it. Sometimes you have to be stubborn - I was warm, although wet - and another hour on the bike wasn't going to kill me. Actually, it's one of the rides I remember most from last winter. Funny how that works.

Headed to Burnaby for the weekend for some racing - should be a blast! Although going from zone 2 to zone 86 is going to hurt a little. ;)

Time to get serious

Got in some excellent ride time this weekend but came to the conclusion that it's time to get serious and start making each pedal stroke count. I'm focusing on climbing this road season and one of my goals is to drop 10 pounds. Don't worry - I have ample room to do it. Ideally I want to become a lean mean fighting machine that can hang on the hills.

It's going to be rough - but I've made up my mind. No more screwing around - I'm even going as far as employing a calorie counter (thanks Zana!). Good bye my sweets... I'll miss you.

Team Ride

Even though I told myself I would avoid the Burke at all costs, I rode the Burke today. It's hard putting in the miles and if you avoid it well then you forfeit 1.5 hours in the saddle. After all, it just means I'm building a bigger base, so what the hay.

We have some great new ladies joining the mix this year and they are super excited to learn. We did a big loop up Hollywood Hill and then through Woodinville. We descended my favorite steep pitch and while going down Linda got a front flat but managed to hold it up right! Turns out she had a huge chunk of tire shredded from her bike and it needed a boot. (Unfortunately two tires were wasted to figure out the problem.) Talk about an adrenaline rush, I'm sure! I think the team rides should be named after Linda since we continue to discover the wonders of bike mechanics. (Remember last time with the broken chain?)

Thankfully Kenny was there to do the obligatory man duties (fix the flat while the rest of us yacked away). And now my legs are a little lethargic since I definitely didn't drink enough liquids while riding. I came home and one bottle was 3/4 full. Bad Juice, bad!

I tried some chocolate milk for the recovery drink and although it made me feel better while chugging it, I'm not sure it did much. ;)

Fantastic Friday

My new training schedule allows me to relax on Fridays and not do anything active. Ha! As if?! Does raking a back yard full of leaves and bagging it all count as activity? You bet.

The tree trimmers came today and cut down a dangling willow branch. It broke during the last wind storm we had. I had no idea how big it was until I watched them slowly lower it to the ground with a rope. I counted the rings later - 15. And to think, it was one of the smaller diameter branches. Left to its own demise, it definitely would have taken out the green house.

Ryan worked from home today so we walked Makiah to the Essential bakery aka "Crack House." Their pastries, breads and coffee are to die for. We ran into my neighbor Jo and she volunteered to help me with our out of control ivy hedge Sunday afternoon. Yowsa - that's going to be some messy lame work! I'm going to have to try and make room in my garage for all of the bags. Anybody want to help me with some yard work? I'll pay you in beer and food. :)

Should be a good weekend - headed out on a nice ride in the morning with the ladies and then potluck that night. Then on Sunday headed over to Vashon with Zana and Joanna for some hilly fun riding. Ryan's off to Cali to climb of course. We haven't spent a weekend together in about a month!

Apparently kids are into trick or treating at the mall more than at houses. I didn't have a single trick or treater last night! Bummer, I guess I'll have to eat those kit kats.