Lets wait and see. I hope I can race Kayle in two years when I get my upgrade points the clean way.

My goal for the long week was to get 320-360 miles. With thursday out of the loop it looked very unlikely for this to materialize. Woke up, made some coffee… drank it all, made another pot, drank THAT, then I went to a friends place and had one more cup. By now I was as high as I could be on coffee. I felt like I was at a party drinking non-stop and going to the bathroom every 5 minutes…

So we are chatting and decide to give it a go on the riding. It was dry, but time was running out so I only got 35 miles in.

Friday we had a group ride with team people. We decided to do Swamis in reverse and all I could think of it to SAVE for saturday cause I knew I would be going big. We had our little moments of manhood… you know, some little attacks and some good clean fun, but it had taken a little bit out of my legs. Total for the ride was around 90.

Saturday came up and I was not feeling too hot. People were jumpy and the big guys went to the front once or twice to calm things down. Of course that meant they drove it hard to the front and for those 45 seconds the pace went really high. Once everyone sees neil going there is an instant awakening in the group and a bunch of cursing and sighs… I know I did.

Overall it is getting faster and I know now that my sprint days are over. There will be no more of ME arriving 10 seconds, 30 seconds or 2 minutes after they are done sprinting… those days are gone.

So I made it to the church, filled water bottles and off we went again. I had left a couple of matches on the road and I was feeling it. I got dropped before two other girls and even though I could see them I could never close the gap. They were strong, i was actually trying hard to close the gap, never happened.

So on the way back to the coast there were some more attacks and it made the ride a very good one. I decided to go short and make sure I emptied the tank on the road. It made no sense for me to suffer for another 60 miles, 88 was good.

Capped the weekend with a nice easy ride. It wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be, but it was nice, very nice. Good pace and good distance.

I ended up with 280 miles, which is OK I guess.

Next week I have regatta and I am trying to fit in a VO2 max test… so I need to rest… for both

I don’t know much about the team, but it is a team and they have big plans for next year. I hope he gets to ride the Tour of California.

For the record, I don’t think there is a nicer guy out there. I would love to see him kick some major ass next season… dish out some pain on the peloton.

Not sure how I got the motivation, but I went out and luckily I came across a group of friends and pretty much sat on. My legs felt like wet noodles. Overall I felt in more control of my mind, but the damage to the body was already done.

last couple of days I have been trying to recover.

I have to be honest and I can remember vividly how delirious and wacked out of my mind I was after the Sea Otter road race. To this day, that was the hardest racing day on the bike for me. This weekend, Saturday, was the hardest training ride of my riding life. I remember going up hills in Morro Bay and trying to no keel over, I remember riding 10+ hours with thousands and thousands of feet of climbing during my insane ride while the fires were happening, but this weekend might take the cake.

Why?

I broke down. I completely feel apart on the bike. Complete meltdown. I wanted to stop and cry, right there.

I started Swamis and did not manage to finish the sprint. I am not sure what happened, but the sequence of events led me to a horrible ride.

Thursday night I was invited to a fu-fu dinner and the food was excellent. Open bar and all you can eat lamb chops. I did damage there. Next day I could not eat anything. Went without breakfast and lunch. Ate a bit a night. Saturday morning ate 4 eggs and a PB jelly sandwich.

Rode to the ride and form the get go it was faster. It felt faster. The hills were harder, people kept attacking, I was feeling right but kept trucking along hoping that it would do what it always does.. slow down and then i can recover.

Pace never got slower, i got dropped after exploding on a riser. Got to the church and people were already riding away.

NOW THE STOOOOOOOOOPID part.

I decided to go long loop. To keep this short and sweet, i basically blew up 8 more times and guys were really nice to tow me back to the very small group. I would have been in trouble if I were in good shape, I was, in the group, the weakest rider and not feeling good just slowed things down a lot more.

I thought of catching a cab, but I was 80 miles from home and I did not have the cash handy. So I kept going, sitting in and struggling. Got to Solana Beach and thought about catching the train home, but Rob (who I convinced to ride long) convinced me now to ride home. I knew I had Torrey and Presidio hills to go over and I KNEW in my mind that I would not make it home alive.

I kept telling Rob to go home and not worry about me. I did not want to cry in front of him. It was a weird feeling… I wanted to cry cause I felt like it, I could not control it.. I am not sure what was going through my head… I was fighting a panic attack, but my body was exhausted.. It was a really strange feeling.

In any case, I made home with cold sweats. Could not eat or drink anymore. Was so full of crap, I felt sick. I was cramping, my gut was sticking out, my arms were sore. MY ARMS!!!!!!!! Did not even turn them once.. how pathetic.

I took a shower, got in sweats and sat on the couch for 3 hours. Tried to recover. Thinking what tomorrow’s ride would be like.

So, the other day I filled up my scooter. $3.52. I was really happy about that. I remember it costing me $5 to fill her up. It is very nice that I get to ride the scooter for a full 5 weeks and on a $3.50 monthly budget… It is really awesome. This morning after my rowing workout I filled up my car too. It had been about 5 weeks also and I haven’t seen a receipt for under $30 in quite some time, and that was a full tank… good for almost 400 miles. So I am spending around $33/month on gas, which is what I used to spend in a week before LaFonda came into my life. It has really paid off. One thing that I do crave is the speed… every time I look into a crotch rocket I remember what it feels like to crash and I can’t afford it..

General Motors. I have been hearing about this mess for the last 2 weeks and yesterday on our ride it came up. I found out that people that got hires before 2001 or maybe later are making $75/h average. That is right!!!!!!!!! SEVENTY-FIVE dollars and HOUR!!!!!!! For tightening screws!!! Well I am sure there are other jobs that require some brain power.

Now, imagine making that type of scratch and living in the midwest. It is the equivalent to $150/hour over here. What car company does that? These guys at GM are all fucking lunatics and the unions screwed everything up. I really, REALLY hope it all comes down in a big fucking fireball. I have no compassion for ANY of the people at GM. If you made that much money you better have some saved for the bad times. So no complaining that it is over. Who the hell did not see that coming? Stoooooopid people.

Who makes cars that nobody needs? America is producing 4 million EXTRA cars than is demanded. GM has a FIXED $4000 added to EACH car to cover benefits for their workers. WTF? Argh, I can just go on and on… but the bottom line is, let them all die…. who needs a new car every year, what kind of business model is this? I am pissed.

BTW, my cycling weekend will come up today… what a weekend.

I remember a while ago i posted something about him and was asked to take it down. I am just so suspicious about anyone. Now after all the doping allegations, the lawsuit and the unprecedented low profile that he has kept he is not on Rock.

I personally could give a shit but something happened. He was going really good.

In talking to people that have been racing for some time, they compared him to me at some point. I mean, he was packfiller and all of the sudden the results started to come up. All of the sudden was a 2 year period, so not so fast, but I can’t see myself leaping as high as he did, even riding full time (doesn’t help that i am a pussy, right).

Anyways, thought I put that out there.

Wonder what happened to Iggy and Brock. I like those guys.

Last weekend I once again made it to the church with the swamis ride. I felt pretty good about it.

Sunday, as we all know was a shitty day (weather wise) and I decided to not ride the Greta Western loop and hit the coast with a teammate. Lo and behold conditions deteriorated and in no time we caught ourselves doing way too much work. My plan for the day was to do a coastal ride and put in some big efforts on some stretches. Well, the wind did not permit that and we were basically on for a good 90 minutes - non-stop.

Right there and then we thought that it might had been a smarter decision to do the climbing cause at that point it all felt the same. 20-22 mph into the wind… I was averaging 300+ watts. In fact, the numbers for that day were off by 1 or 2 watts from my best race last year. Granted the effort was only half the time, I was pretty amazed what wind can do. No wonder these skinny dutch guys are good climbers… not a freaking bump in Holland but they still manage to win climbing stages in many races.

On the way back, for a split second (10 miles or so) we had a tailwind and it was to ride 100w and go 28mph. But hen as always the wind turned and once again we found ourselves fighting it. My teammate branched off to his house and I had a good 20 miles of that shit to pile through. All and all it was a great weekend, but I need to do the 7-hour rides in order to get close to what every body else is doing… I just can;t find the time to put these hours in during the week.

Work has been pretty crazy and there is time for nothing else. Kinda depressing.

The pace has been very light lately and I am actually surprised. All I remember from last year is me riding by myself with some other dingle berries, but for the last two weeks I have been able to stay with the lead group.

It might be that the size of the group and peloton dynamics is helping me jump form group to group, but the point is that I am finally making it to the sprint.

Yesterday it got pretty ugly in the last small ascend. The field splintered into 3 smaller groups and I got caught in the last one. To my delight (disgust) I saw that Horner was there too. He went pretty hard with Cody and then a line of riders started to form behind these guys. Not everyone made it to the groups ahead… I was still in the last group, dangling about 50 yards behind the lead group until somebody closed the gap.

I am sure these guys are slowly getting faster and faster on the rides. In the last 2km there was a vicious attack by a teammate of mine. It was pretty brutal actually and I was really impressed. He has been secret traiing and it looks like it is paying off big time.

Anyway, I am sure this nonsense will end in december and I will be riding by myself through the forest.

One odd thing that happened was that there was a cop “following” us. He actually broke all kinds of rules trying to get pictures of the group. I am thinking that there will be some mass ticketing in the next couple weeks, just like what happened to SDBC a month or so ago. Guys better watch out…. stop at the lights!

It doesn’t really matter for his team cause they are gone, but I wonder if we will see him around. I am not really counting on seeing him at the first ontario next year, but who knows….

I feel his pain though… It’s tough to make a penny cycling and if that is all you can do than you have to do what you have to do…

Tomorrow is the big day.. mean, the day that I get dropped REALLY hard from Swamis. It would be interesting to see if Lance shows up. Chris is here, so maybe they can go for a quick coffee ride and we can tag along.

Last week was slow and I think I might be prepared for the pain that is to come and the embarrassment it is to show up at the church 5 minutes after everyone else… oh well… i picked the only sport in which I am overweight… tough luck