A bike and a Mini...Van

On the road again......

2008-03-29T12:31:00.000-07:00

I got back on the road again. It was nice. I havent been out on the road it was nice to get back out there. I meet up with the Keaton at starbucks and we down river des peres and up through south city towards the arch. Stopped and go some oranges from the one and only Soulard. 4 for a dollar. Can't beat that. Then went and chilled by the arch for the mid ride break. Got the classic arch picture. This has to be the most over taken shot in the world. It makes you feel artsy though when you take it. The river is still pretty high.
You can really tell by the Lewis and Clark statue. Then it was up washington ave through fopo back to webster.

When we got to webster there was a suprise waiting for me at my car.

He yelled at me this morning for parking in the lot so I moved my car over and not directly in front of Ben Franklin. So i decided to go talk to they guy about it. I was pretty pissed off. I had to wait for like 30 minutes for him to get back from Lunch. I go in there and we start yelling and hes just being a jerk. Nothing was being accomplished so I decided to just walk out and forget it. Then I'm walking out of his office and mumble fine i wont park here I'll just tell everyone else to and he comes storming out of his office and is yelling "Son you got something else to say to me" and I say" no sir, I'm just tired of dealing with a dick." He didn't like that so much. So I start yelling at him in the front of the store. He then threatens to call the police and see what they think. I was like whatever i'm done with this. I was like have a nice day go back to your frames and balloons. So BEWARE of the crazy Ben Franklin owner.

yeah.......

2008-01-13T19:45:00.000-08:00

So I have nothing to write about when it comes to cycling. I haven't been on the bike in about a month and half. I have been busy with everything you can think of. I have been skiing a lot and probably will be for the next month or so i could care less about riding right now which kind of sucks. I just dont feel like getting back on the bike.

XC IS OVER!!!!!!!

2007-10-24T17:41:00.000-07:00

Cross Country is over whoohoo. The season is over and I had my last cross country race EVER. Kinda sad but then again not really. It was a good season the team has changed a lot and isn't as much fun but I'm happy I stuck through and finished out all four years. Now its time to get back on the bike and I am happy about that.

That is pretty much it. I've been really busywith school and other things. I'm almost done with my college applications so not too much longer and I will hopefully know where I am going. I got new skis a couple weeks ago they are pretty ballin' they are twin tips also so i'm gonna have to try and pull some crazy stuff on them. Can't wait to get skiing again and on the bike again.

Peace
Mike

happy austin?

Walker, Texas Ranger

2007-08-03T07:05:00.000-07:00

This past week I've been waking up and noticing that Walker, Texas Ranger has been on TV.
I haven't seen this show for ever. Its nice to see Chuck Norris Kicking some ass instead of doing Mountain Dew Commercials or trying to sell excercise equipment.

Seeing this also reminds me of when I was up at Brown University earlier this year. One night we stayed up till like 2 in the morning with our RA Mike and told Chuck Norris Jokes. Warning their not all that funny unless it is the middle of the night. This also reminds of this video of Chuck Norris getting his ass kicked by Bruce Lee and seeing Chuck Norris getting his ass kicked is something you don't see everyday. I couldn't get the video on my blog but here is the link.

Peace

bikes, guns and fried fish... what else can you ask for?

2007-07-28T20:03:00.000-07:00

My mom and my brother are down in New Orleans doing some college visits so it is just my dad and I for the weekend. I woke up around 8:30 and went out to do my workout. I had a crazy hard workout today. 2 hours with three 5 minute race efforts and then a 15 min race effort. It freaking sucked. When I got home My dad was in the yard messing around with his father's day gift that just came in.

Believe it or not that is a pellet gun. My older brother got it for my dad. The thing has a scope and a silencer on it. It is freakin crazy. The thing even has a little kick in it when it shoots. I took a shot with it and i popped myself in the eye with the scope I wasn't ready for that.

After that we were off to the Skeet club. I was excited because I havn't gotten to shoot lately b/c of cycling and just being busy. I use to shoot a lot. I use to be a captain on CBC's skeet team but ended up stopping that and doing Ultimate Frisbee. I was also excited because I got to see hot my "shooting" specific lens worked for my radar's that i missed ordered. The lens worked out pretty well. I shot ok. We shot 3 rounds of skeet. I shot about a 20/25 which is ok considering I havn't been shooting much. And after that we went and shot sporting clays. Sporting clays is pretty cool because you get to shot at a lot of differenet and challenging shots. We shot another 4 boxes of shells(25 shells in a box.) I have a massive bruise on my shoulder. Im not use to shooting so much. It was fun. It was nice to get some quality time in with my dad.

After that we went over to my brother and sister in laws house. We fried up some fish it was fun. It was also nice to play with my niece and my new nephew. I'm off to go do some summer reading.

Peace

State TT and other stuff

2007-07-25T22:05:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was the State TT.

It went pretty well. I got third with a time of 31:43. I was happy with my time. I was on Austin's bike which was nice. The only problem with that was that I had only ridden it the Saturday before the race. I think if I would had some more time on the bike I could have done better but, who knows. Martin was first with a time o f 29:23 and Keaton was 2nd with a time of 31:21. Yeah that is right we swept that.

The summer has been going pretty well. It is hard to believe that there is less than a month left of summer. I still have to do all of my summer reading which SUCKS. The race season has been going well. A few weekends ago was Proctor cycling classic. Keaton and I loaded up the Mini van headed up there. The hotel we stayed at was pretty nice. We were right in the middle of Peoria. I didn't realize how big Peoria was. The RR didn't go so well. I was in the Race for about 30 mins or so and then on one of the rollers I just slowly moved back and before I knew it I was chasing to try to get back on and I couldn't make it back. So, I just dropped out after a lap. The next day we (keaton, Martin, Logan and I) race the Jrs crit. We were all working to try to get Logan the state jersey. The pace started out FAST. I was kinda going off after a few laps and was acctualy off but with a couple other guys we were able to get back on. I was sitting on the back when I saw a visionquest making a move. So I jumped on that chasing it down and after he was back in, I was done. I got shelled right of the pack. I finished the race riding with like 3 other guys. Logan ended up gettin the Jersey so its all good.

I didn't get a chance to race the 4's race because my cleat broke like 10 mins before the start of the race.

Winghaven was two weeks before proctor. The weather was nasty. It was drizzling the whole morning. Which made it even worse than if it had just poured. The road was like ice. The 5's race started about and hour or so late. I went down in the first 30 seconds of the race in the first round about. Some idiot in front of me hit is breaks when he didn't need to and started fishtailing and went down. I couldn't get around him and went down. I didn't feel like racing anymore after crashing and I just dropped out.

The summer is going pretty good. I am looking forward to the State crit in two weeks and then the tour of KC in 3.

PEACE

SUMMER!

2007-05-29T12:32:00.000-07:00

So its been awhile since I've updated my blog because I've really been busy with school and other stuff. I'm finally out of school, so I should be better at updating my blog.

So lets start with Tour of STL. I got 5th in the Jrs race on Saturday but only because I lost a coin flip. Joe Earsome and I were sprinting for the line and he somewhat sat up and I didn't and threw my bike at the line and no one could tell who won or not by eye. So they went to the camera but the camera wasn't working. They were going to call it a dead heat or something like that basically a tie but they couldn't because they said they were going 5 deep in medals but they didn't even do that. I didn't figure that out till after waiting for like an hour and being late for ultimate Frisbee State tourney. Ultimate didn't go so well. We played hard we just couldn't do enough to win any of our games even though a lot of them were really close. FoPo's jr race went pretty. I stayed with the group for the entire race until the last lap. Mesa had all of their jrs in the race. It was only the Fick, Nate, and I in the race. I was upset that I didn't get a chance to sprint against Joe again but we'll have to save the show down for later in the Season.

2 weeks ago was Joe Martin. That was a lot of fun. Keaton, my Dad and I head down for the weekend. The RR was fun. The pack exploded on the first. I made it over the first climb with about 3 guys or so. We then caught some more people. By the time we made the turn off the loop and head back in we had about 8 guys in our group. We hammered pretty hard and lost a few of them. I tried to get away from the group. I got off but they brought me back in about 2 miles from the finish. I got 2nd in our sprint. The TT pretty much sucked. Heres a pic of me dieing on the TT
The Crit the next day wasn't very much fun. I didn't get a good starting spot and got gapped of after like the 2nd turn. I tried hard to get back on but couldn't make it back on. So the same kind of thing happend. I got in a group about 5 and we went around. I got 2nd agian in the sprint. I didn't have anything left in my on the uphill finish. Over all it was a good weekend. I ended up 25th. Which is about half way so im not too disappointed. It was a fun to race against new people.

Last weekend I was in Iowa/Illnois for the snake alley crit, Melon City crit, and Quad Cities Crit. It was a lot of fun. Snake alley was fun except that it rained. It poured before the race and then it stopped so we got to ride alittle bit before the race and then it poured right before the race so any of the drying of the course went to waste. The rain made the snake hard. You couldn't stand up with out slipping. On one of the laps I stood up at the finish and my back tire slipped and I unclipped on accident and almost went down. Overall a good race. I finished like 30something out of 59. Austin got 3rd I think. The next day was Melon Cities. I didn't like this race so much probably because before the race on my first lap I crashed. I didn't know there was a speed bumb at the bottom of the hill. I was with Luke, Martin and Austin and were goign down the hill and I was eating my banana. So I only had one hand on my bars when we hit the speed bumb and went flying. I slide about 30 feet or so but I didn't drop my Banana which was weird. There I am on the ground and the dang banana is still in my hand. Nothing really bad happened to my body just a little road rash on my hip and some bruises. I got a huge scratch/chunk out of my fork and my handlebar tape got chewed up. I started the jrs race but dropped out b/c my leg hurt. I rested up and then did the 5s race. I didn't stay with the group long but kept on going with some other people. I ended up 15th in the 5s race. The last day was fun. I really liked the course. The jrs race was really fast. I was with the group in the back. Then there was a crash on the last turn towards the finish. I had to stop to try to get through it. Luke and Logan went down but were ok. I rode with with 2 guys for the rest of the race. The 5s race was fun. I moved up well in the first couple laps and was doing fine. Then about 6 to go I pretty much just ran out of juice. I started to drift off the back. I kept on pushing it and was able to finish the race. I got 20th place. I was happy. The race seemed hard and faster than any other race I have done before. Overall it was a good weekend.

Peace

Rain, Rain, Go Away

2007-04-10T19:54:00.000-07:00

So It needs to stop raining on Tuesday Nights. I haven't been able to do a Tuesday night since the first one which stinks.

Easter was good. We had all the family over. Got to see my cousin that I haven't seen in a long time. We had a massive Easter egg hunt for everyone. We had a Kid's Easter Egg hunt with like candy and little toys. And then we had a Big Kids Easter egg hunt with money. I ended up with like 15 bucks because I had to pick up my sister in-law's nephew who is like 5 up because he fell. So i missed out. But it is all good I made up for it later that night when we played Black Jack.

Keaton and I had a good ride out to High Ridge and back on Saturday. We made pretty good time getting out there from Starbucks about hour and 10ish mins. The wind was pretty bad in some parts on the way out. We pretty much went straight back down. We decided after deciending to stop at the Gas Station on 141 instead of up top. We ate and took down some water. We hit Marshall pretty hard. I was happy for the first time I was able to Big Ring it. It was a pretty good ride Cold but good.

The Junior ride last Thursday was super cold. We did TTs. I didn't do very well. I had trouble breathing and My nose kept on running. I still did better than last year's TT and we did it later in the year and It was better weather. So Its all good.

Peace

Fine I'll update my blog.

2007-03-31T15:36:00.000-07:00

Ok Its been a long time Since I have updated and a lot as gone on since then. I'll start from the beginning

The month of February was good. I was able to get a lot of training in and stayed pretty much on my plan which was good for me. The only bad part was that I got the flu about a week before Froze Toes was suppose to happen. The flu sucked. I am sure that for now on I am going to get a flu shot because everyone else in my family got one and I didn't and I was the only one to get the flu.

Froze Toes got canceled for its original date was the 25th of Feb. but got moved because of weather that didn't come. So It got moved to the 4th of March. I had to do the jrs race because they had two Cat 5 races but one was 19+ and the other 40+ so I couldn't do them so I did the Jrs race. It was fine. We all stayed together till the women's race caught up to us and then we hammered to pull through the women and get back ahead. I was fine for awhile but I pulled to hard and I slowly drifted back. I tried to get Matt back on the group but we would get close and I would pull off and Matt just couldn't make it back on. I stayed with him and another kid for most of the race until about 3 miles out when going up a hill they fell off and I finished on my own. I ended up 5th.

Next was a Tuesday night Crit. They started early this year because of the new daylight savings time change thing. I always enjoy doing these races. I was happy to get a little bit of crit fix taken care off. I won't be able to race a real crit till the Tour of STL. I dropped out because I was tiered from Ultimate Frisbee practice but it was still fun.

Next is that we went to Paris. No not Paris, Texas

Paris, France

My Mom found a really good deal at the last minute so we were off to Paris for Spring Break. It was a fun surprise not so good for the training but fun. The only bad part about Paris was that it rained everyday except the day that we left and it also sleeted twice. It was fun though. We did a lot of the regular tourist site places it was cool. The neatest thing we did was on the last day we had Dinner in the Eiffel Tower. It was really cool. I missed my bike I had to run over it which stunk. It was a fun spring break.

And last Hillsboro-roubaix. I was a little worried about this race with only having 3 days of riding under my belt after getting back from Paris. I felt fine warming up and everything and then there was the Parade Lap. I started doing the parade lap with Mikey B, New Mike, Keaton and Martin. We were fine just sitting there and talking and then we went into this turn after the hill on the course and as im going down i slide out and hit hard. I cut up my arm and my knee and some rash on my hip. My knee is really swelling up now from the fall which sucks. The worst part about this is that as I'm sitting there on the ground there is some lady asking me if I have seen her powertap and the answer is no. So I pull my self up and clean up my cuts a little bit and roll out to the starting line. I wasn't feeling bad yet but as soon as we start rolling my whole body started to ache. I lasted about 10 minutes with the race and those were some really sketchy 10 mins and I just sat up and let them go. I only did one lap but I passed up like 5 or so people that dropped from the group. The course is so sketchy at this race. All of the corners were pretty much dirt and gravel and the roads are not all that good anywhere on the course. I don't see why it is the Number 1 road race in the area. Its at the bottom of my list.

Ok so now everyone can stop telling me to update my blog.

Peace

Baby its cold outside

2007-01-28T10:02:00.000-08:00

Its like 15 degrees outside right now and I was tired of riding on the trainer so I suited up and headed out. One might as what you should wear when it is 15 and -3 windchill outside. Well I have the answer for you:

-Bike gloves
-Ski gloves
- 2 pairs of bike bibs
-Long underwear bottom
-Long underwear top
-Arm warmers
-Leg warmers
-Hat
-Neck Gator
-Ski Socks
-Wind vest
- 2 Jerseys
-Soft shell Ski jacket
-Helmet

It really wasn't that bad out there when I got going. The only thing that got cold was my toes. My water bottle did freeze up. I never thought that would happen but it did.

Peace

Froze toes in 28 days and counting!!!!!!

Pre Ski trip

2007-01-11T21:03:00.000-08:00

This weekend I am goign on a Ski trip with my youth group at my church. We are going to Granite Peak in Wausau, WI.

It is about 9 hours from St. Louis. It was crazy fun last year and this year should be even more fun. Here is a video from last years ski trip.
St. Paul's UCC Ski trip 2006

The only bad part about going on this trip is that im missing another good weekend of training. I havn't been on the road for about 2 weeks. It stinks. I really just want to get back to riding on the road. I am tierd of the trainer. 45 days and counting till Froze Toes!

Peace

Greeting from Colorado

2006-12-27T21:46:00.000-08:00

I haven't written anything for awhile because nothing out of the ordinary has been going on. Just school and group rides on the weekend.

We are now in Colorado till the 3rd. The snow is really good out here. Copper has a base of like 40 inches or something which is crazy for this time of the year so everything is open. I am ready to get some good powder skiing in. There is another big storm that is suppose to come through in the next few days. The only bad part about being here is that I can't bike at all which sucks. Dave wants me to run 2 days and then take a day off. I ran today it was rough nothing like running at 9600 feet.

a little preview of you all are missing out here in Colorado

PEACE OUT

Snow Day and SAT

2006-12-02T06:21:00.000-08:00

So yesterday I had a snow day. Nothing really happened. I just slept and chilled. I wanted to go sledding with Martin and Keaton in Webster but my mom wouldn't let me drive. So I just sat at home and watched TV and then rode on the trainer. I went to a b-day party that night but couldn't stay out late because of the SAT but it really didn't matter anyway. So, I wake up at like 6 30 this morning to get ready for my SAT down at FOPO community college. I get all they way down there to find out that the canceled the SAT. So yesterday was a bust and this morning was a bust. I need to think of something kickass to do today and tonight.

Peace out

Its been a while

2006-11-27T13:08:00.000-08:00

I have been to lazy to update this thing. Thanksgiving break was good. Rode Thursday with Mikey B, Austin and Big-T. Friday rode on my own around SOCO. Saturday killer ride to high Ridge and covered bridge with Rusty, Austin, John, and Martin. That was a rough ride. Rough 50 miles. Sunday rode on the east side of the river. That was an interesting ride............

I found this on the internet it is pretty funny and true

You know your a cyclist when........

you have more water bottles than you have drinking glasses.
you have more cycling jersies than work shirts
your first inclination upon hearing the numbers 36x24x35, is that it's a funky new triple chainring setup offered by Shimano, instead of the measurements of the hottest Playmate of the Month.
your legs are smoother than your girl friends.
The first thing you ask when you regain consciousness is "How's my bike".
the nicest pair of shoes you own have cleats in the soles.
when anybody mentions a distance you immediatly think how long it would take to cycle it.
You use your helmet as a hair-styling device.
You practice track stands and bunny hops in your spare time (Martin)
You could use your tan lines as a ruler.
You buy a car based on whether or not a bike will fit in the trunk/back
your car has to stay outside while your bikes are stored in your garage.
your Windows wallpaper/screensaver is the latest TDF map.
You own "American flyers" and/or "Breaking Away"
You dream of winning the lottery, and the first thing you think of is "how many/which bikes can that money buy?"

This weekend sucked...........NOT

2006-11-07T17:08:00.000-08:00

This was a good long weekend. Friday went car shopping with my brother and my mom. Then just hung out at my friends house. Saturday I was sick in the morning so I didn't get a chance to go to XC state. CBC had a strong showing 4th place which means our team was all state.

Sunday we had our team ride down in Webster Groves. Everyone showed up in full force, Mikey B, Rok, Martin, Keaton, Austin, Turner, New kid(still don't know his name), and Logan. We did 40 something, a lot of stopping and going but it was a good ride. There was a tie to be "Le gardien de la colombe" between Martin and Austin. The tetris showdown was put on hold and the leader for the week of November 4th will be decided at a later date. Post ride the older members of the group, A.K.A. everyone that can ride the rides as sixflags, from the ride went to go see BORAT. By far the worst and yet the best movie of all time. Its a must see. WARNING: not a date movie though!

Monday we got the new "Family Car." A green 2007 honda Element. Its pretty cool a lot of room for stuff. Don't worry I will still be making appearances in the Minivan.

PEACE OUT

Why not?

2006-10-17T19:16:00.000-07:00

I decided to start writing a blog. I just spent the past 30 minutes or so reading some so I decided why not make one of my own. Last Saturday Martin and I went to go see Austin run with the big boys at Borgia. Sunday we had our Jr ride. It was cold but not to bad. It started out with Turner, Austin, Martin Mikey B and me. As we were leaving the parking lot Mike's chain broke. So it ended up just being Austin, Martin, Turner and me. We did way too many city limit sprints. We did 15. The score for the day was Martin - 7 Austin - 5 Me - 3. Three was pretty good for me. PSAT tomorrow I need to do good so I can get the National Merit Scholarship thing.

Peace