Beer of the Week(Pumpkin Special)

Back At It....Literally

The rollercoaster of life never seems to stop. Sometimes your on top of the world. Other times your ass is dragging at the bottom of the barrel. For the those aforementioned times there is a certain delicate balance that can be achieved through obsessive time management. A time management of one's social, physical, emotional needs/skills within one's circle.

Wow, I'm off the soapbox.....At least the deep physiological one...Now to soul dumping

WTF have I been up to...well riding the roller coaster for sure. Came into the season feeling on top of the monster roller coaster. Only to flub up my toe which put me into a spiral or maybe that's a repetitive cycle. Hence the roller coaster. During my two weeks of down time I tweaked my back, nothing new I thought. Wearing the clown shoe set me up for injury. Why? Here's why.

Reach down to grab something BOOM! Sharp pain as in someone putting a hatchet into my sacrum on the left side. Take it easy for a couple days, ditch the clown shoe, get on the bike and things seem to be going good.

First race of the season I do a spectacular crash/save in the sandpit. BOOM, back flares up again. Two weeks of easy does it(along w/criticism) things seem to be fine. Next up Wisco the back is in no better shape. Pull myself out of Sundays race due to the inability to pedal with my left leg. Not happy with my weekend.

Then the day before my escape from the man BOOM, end of the day emergency wire body harness switch the back decides to tell me that wasn't the smartest thing to do. For those that don't know, a wire body harness extends from the front of a car to the rear, carrying all essential electrical connections, grounds, and other such important items to make modern cars run. On top of that the job requires that said harness be removed in a very hurried manner. Actually in a matter of 3 minutes before it enters another area for more complicated assembly.

Wake up in the morning to exit to Ohio 3. Go to put bicycle rack into the hitch BOOM. Absolute lock up of lower back. Spasms as I try to straighten up, take a step, hell do anything! Not good for racing. Manage to get back into the house get an ice pack and into bed. Give the mwi traveling circus a heads up to my sad situation. Contemplate my next move. With much regret, sadness, anger I give up. Send a text that I'm not going to make it.

Make it to work on Monday, barely. Give my team a heads up to my situation. One thing I love about my guys/girl is that we do look out for each other when times are needed. I respect them all for that with loads of appreciation. Monday afternoon make to the Chiropractor's office which I hadn't visited in 13 months. Very proud of my strength/core/FUNctionally training I implemented on myself. I do walk the walk, talk the talk for those that need to know. Dr. Josh gives the "Wow, I haven't seen you this bad in years" speech. Thanks! After some painful manipulation, off I go to put heat/ice for the next hour. Go back Wednesday and Friday for the same treatments. Note I wasn't on the bike during this time, nor lifting, yoga. Nada, nothing, roller coaster in full effect. The next week I come in Monday and Wednesday with improvement enough to decide to ride Thursday night.

Pack up to meet the mwi crew at LouVull. Make it to the park to ride the course. Second ride in two weeks. Great course, rode the sand pit 5 times without any worries. Things seem to be going well. When the race starts reality sets in. I'm out of shape. Oh well, I'm going to enjoy myself. I have a blast riding the course. Third ride in two weeks starts a little better. But only for a couple of laps then that damn thing called reality sets in again. During the weekend I had the opportunity to chat with women from Hudz team which was really nice to get some perspective.

Now I'm back to some form of workouts but still taking it easy. The back is still giving me a heads up its not 100%. But with my new found perspective I'm going to be movin on and off the CX bike.

New Bat Time, New Bat Place...

I'm obviously under the influence to even plan this again.

Beer of the Week

Beer of the Week

Boss Cross Kinda of Weekend

The Boss Cross gang put on another spectacular weekend of CX! They even ordered up perfect weather, what more could you ask for? People? Well they showed in droves. Each field was packed with new, fresh faces. The CX thing must really be catching on after so many years? I'm thinking we are going to see some people with new found skillz for next season. Yea!

Well my race report went up the mwi blog. Since I didn't race today I came out to get my points for spectating. PRObably getting close to my cat 1 license. Think I will be getting some good points the next weekend. Race weekends aren't all play some work is required.

Since I was spectating I thought I would shoot some pics. Bad thing was the camera died with only 2 laps into the race. FAIL! Now the connection between Blogger and my photos is a big fat FAIL! Pics tomorrow....maybe.

So if any of you folks happen to be traveling to do CX race's and happen to see the mwi compound don't feel like you can't come up and say HI! Just tell the fella's your from KC. We welcome all! If you need assistance make sure to check us out. We are fully stocked, with tools and knowledge of sorts.

USGP #1 In the Books

The CX season really doesn't seem to be 'official' til I rock it up to Wisco. The first stop in the USGP traveling circus make's it stop in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin. Service Course to mwi team is Milwaukee, which is just about an hour from Sun Prairie. Each year the mwi crew seems to 'earn' a little more workload. In workload I mean that we have responsibility of housing, transporting, entertaining or generally babysit some PRO's.

Word spread fast that again we would be helping Molly Cameron again. Next on the grapevine was that Tim Van Nuffel was in need of transportation, housing, and general entertaining. Then the bombshell came, Francis Mourey was in need of some assistance. Not just him though, his wife, his mechanic, and enough gear to fill up the rented Suburban that Dr Roadrash picked up.

As soon as I rolled into Crankdaddys shop I was informed that we were to go pick up TVN and father from the airport. No time for coffee, or food off we go the Belgian's are expected in less than a hour. Rocking the Crankdaddys van to pick up TVN & Father we got stuck in endless reconstruction of the highways in Wisco area. Absolutely amazing how much of the state is in perpetual repair. Arrive at the airport JIT for me to grab a sandwich for $8 then watch for a PRO to walk into the airport. TVN is not what either Herman or myself were expecting. To say Euro's can be stereotyped could be so true. Just sayin.

Take TVN back to Crankdaddys to assemble his bikes then drop him & his dad off at Rosco P Fasttrains. Trying to talk to Belgians can be very difficult. But at the same time very entertaining, at least for us. Probably? Yeeessss!

From this point on things become a blur. I know we it made it to the Kennedy Compound with Molly, The Belgians, Chilli, Herman, LeBam, Jess, Roscoe, and Mo. It's so great to go to the Kennedy Compound every year to visit Bernie & Terry. They both are amazing in the fact that they take us in like their own children. Cooking, cleaning the whole nine yards for us. Especially me since I get a dozen or more zucchini chocolate chip muffins for the trip back home. AND YES Terry they made it back this year. I didn't eat one of them!!

Set up our mwi compound. Holy Shiittee we are rolling big time. At some point in time we arrived at the number presentation. Blur. Woke up in the morning finished setting up the mwi compound. Got ready to race. Raced. Went fast in the corners. Went slow in the straight aways that were very long & yes very straight. The mwi boys rocked it making my disappoint disappear. Ate food, drank liquid, got cleaned up and ready for the PRO race. Busy moving from one side of the pit with four bike's and two guys.

PRO race over after an hour of fun. Next up Meet Molly Cameron BBQ. Yes it was a meat and vegan cookout. Adult beverages were handed out so to was pop(soda) along with LaBam cupcakes. Some PRO's got a visit from the bakery. Word was it was a very popular visit. Brake down the compound, drive to the Kennedy's shower, snack, then sleep.

Wake up and back at it. To my surprise Molly jumps in the SS to roll to the venue. She wound up helping us in getting our bikes to the pits. Really was awesome to see her giving us a hand. Stage. Line up. Second row start for me. Didn't help. Midpack fodder. The course was changed from the day before to my disadvantage. The backside technical section turned into a straightaway from hell. Swear it was a 1/4 mile of grass. Suck for me. With that section now changed the only real 'technical' section was the hillside strangler. Hard to describe. Climb up a hill cross the ridge then descend to a 180 with three railroad ties then more running up to top. At some point my back decided that riding sidesaddle was a really bad idea for me. Still feeling the effects of my sandpit digger from Hermann. So with 2 laps left I pulled the plug.

But the weekend wasn't over. More pit work. Tearing down the mwi compound. Loading shittee up sending everyone on their way. All but Molly. She stayed with us for another night. That night we rolled into a vegan diner(sweet place) shot the breeze then called it a night. Off to Portland Molly went, back to Less Scummit for me.

Photos of the weekend:

mwi Race Blog

• Patrick is the 'new' recruit. He garnered a WCA point so a nickname was suppose to be chosen: Bacon
• Herman can't run as fast as he can ride.
• Dr Roadrash made a sweet landing in the gravel while tooling in the pits
• Chucker makes me nervous as hell before a race. Boy get your shiittee together
• Roscoe P Fasttrain is still fast with a bunk knee
• Herman can be a bully
• Chili is going to have a restraining order from KFC by Kentucky
• LeBam Bakery makes PHUCKING AWESOME CUPCAKES! Team Cannondale approves.

I would like to thank the mwi crew for all the hard work done by each and every member for such a wonderful weekend. I'm very lucky/pleased to have such a good group of friends that put up with me. I really appreciate it.