I'm no english major, but...

This is ridiculous.

Now, interest swings to the yellow jersey and Michael Rasmussen might surprise many tomorrow in the time trial as he is a very annoyed man after his Danish Cycling Federation decided to suspend him from representing his country at the World Championships this year and the Beijing Olympics next.

Phil ligget is a badass, but that is one hell of a run on.

Time trials arent bad

I love it when I don't feel like total crap at a time trial. Yesterday was one of those times. I'm pretty excited because I think this time I really went to my limit. Heart rate just below 185 going out and a little more over coming back. Another time trial tonight and saturday I'm leaving early for RAGBRAI.

Stuff

I don't have enough creativity to come up with more than a paragraph of material, so here is some, uh...stuff.

That was quite the storm last night. Much better enjoyed outside rather than inside.

I think Bush should be impeached.

Boy did my ass get dropped today at the group ride. Maybe I didn't dig in enough, I'm not as sore as I should be.

A lot of racers like to bash ragbrai. I think its a good time anyway.

I think it would be better for the environment if instead of trying to produce a car that got 200 mpg, we put that energy in to making sure all SUV's got at least 25 mpg.

Can we really fight terrorism?

Hiding a bike from your parents is a much harder ordeal than you would think.

I'll bet Barloworld will be happy tonight.

I spilled espresso in my dads car. On the positive side, the car will smell like coffee for three months. On the negative side, I spilled espresso in my dads car.

Was Rick Paulos' post about Donald Baxter hilarious or what?

A 20....wait 40k time trial.

I missed the turn around for the 20k, so after a quick debate in my brain I just decided to keep on going and do the 40k time trial. My time was 1:03:14. I believe my time for the 20k would have been around 28:50 or so based on the average. It is hard to say. However, I'm glad I did the 40 because it was a much better workout. I think I will do the 40 for the Iowa state time trial also.

Looks as though crashes might take out as many as Operation Puerto this year.

Maybe running isn't so bad.

I ran the Mount Vernon Heritage Days Five Kay Road Race Today. This will mark the fourth time I have put on running shoes this summer. Fortunately I felt very good and ran a 21:30, which achieved two of my goals which were: 1)Beat 22min. 2)Beat my parents. After a 60 or so minute spin tonight I'll be sure to get to sleep right away because it's another early one tomorrow. Wake up at 5:30, get on the road at 6:30, arrive in Cordova at 7:45, warm up for 40 minutes then race the junior 20k division. Should be pretty humbling because I'm sure plenty of IS-core kids will be there.
Also my good buddy Steve is leaving today, so I'll probably be training alone for a while (except for Carson.....i guess... :-)). If you read this, good luck with everything man.

And those pictures that I'm sure you were all on the edge of your seat for, will sadly not be arriving. The camera ran out of batteries so all we have is a picture of one of the fancy houses.

Clear Lake

Bicycle Blues and BBQ road race. Hot and humid, that really killed me . I got dropped from the second group 10 miles to go and rolled in at 23rd place. Not what I was hoping for but it happens, maybe I don't have the legs to do well in cat 4's races yet.

Since the highlight of this trip was definitely not the race, I was able to enjoy some other parts of Clear Lake. Ate some pizza at a downtown place (forget the name) which was super good. I rode around for about an hour and rode past some really cool looking houses and some wind turbines. The lake was sweet also, besides being really big it seemed to cool to the town off a little bit.

Pictures to follow

Jimmy's Sunglasses: A short story

Funny thing happened the other day. I pulled off my $30 glasses to clean them on my jersey, and the lens shattered. Damn. After looking online at a couple I decided on a pair of Rudy Project's. The next day I drove down to Iowa City to visit the fine folks at Iowa City Medical. They hooked me up with the pair I wanted, and in 45 minutes I was on the bike. I could really tell I was a lot faster. Not. At least they look cool.
Clear Lake race tomorrow. It will be a hot one for sure, temps in the 90's and humid. Who wants to be my domestique?

Today is a good day.

I no longer feel like I am 300 lbs. Thats good. I wish I could do the time trial today, but I need to rest for BBBBQ. I hope it is worth it, I believe all9yards is going to show up with about 50 guys which could be a problem. Oh well there are more important things in the world, like this.

Until next time.

I think Carson is the only person who reads my blog

The past few days have been weird. Thursday was the group ride, Friday recovery. Saturday I raced in the Tech Tack Teicher RR, and placed 6th and won the cat 4's. A good result on paper, but I felt terrible. Could not get up the climbs like I should have and barely pulled off a good sprint. No big deal, it happens to everyone. Yesterday I rested and got a cold. Today after 9 hours of sleep I felt great and did about 30 minutes of AR which really felt good. I'm looking forward to starting VO2 intervals and the BBBBQ road race in clear lake to make my legs sore again.

Here is the plan for the week:

Tuesday: 1.5 hour EN on bike, hang out with friends in afternoon, community band concert in evening

Wednesday: Get up at 5, do a VO2 ride, go to work, shower & rest, then go to fireworks in CR with Marybeth

Thursday: Another EN ride to rest up for the race. Probably lots of yard work but an easy day.

Friday: Rest on bike, have friends over for a bonfire

Saturday: 30-45 minutes pre-race early. Drive to Clear Lake and chill there, maybe watch the blues festival.

Sunday: Road Race, drive back to Mount Vernon