Tuesday Outdoor Ride

Team,

I hope everyone is doing well so far this Christmas season. I am super excited about the 2012 season and another great year with Speed Theory. 2012 is the year of the triathlon for me. I am very excited about competing at Ironman Coeur d'Alene and then racing the World Championships in the fall with Michael Godfrey in Aukland New Zealand. This is going to be a freaking epic year!!!

Tomorrow, December 27, is my birthday and I'm planning to celebrate it by riding outdoors. I'm thinking about heading out around 1:00pm. I am willing to drive somewhere to meet others that are off from work and willing to head outside for a ride if necessary. I saw quite a few cyclists on the paths on Saturday when I was out running, so that is an option. You don't have to bring me presents unless it is a Blue Helix, medium tall wetsuit, or a super fast rear disc. New shoes would be awesome too!

If there is anyone interested in coming out, let me know. I can be reached by email at echeloncad@gmail.com or cell at 403-607-4523.

Have a great break and have a safe new year.

slayer dan

Merry Christmas, Speed Theorists!

Fellow Speed Theorists (and all the other ABA/ATA members that read our blog),

Wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Pack in all the Christmas baking you can this week: January 1st means off-season is officially over. Stay tuned to the blog for a Speed Theory x-country ski day in the new year.

Darcy "Finally in Cat 4" Gullacher

RR speedsuits

I'm seeing a lot of pros wearing these now... essentially skinsuits with pockets:

http://www.slipstreamsports.com/2011/04/22/castellis-new-road-race-speedsuit-showcased-in-roubaix-victory

Champion System now has a "distance skinsuit" in short and long sleeve versions:

http://champ-sys.ca/custom/cycling/skinsuits/custom-distance-short-sleeve-skinsuit.html

What does everyone think? Do we want to make it part of our club kit?

Silver Springs XC video

Teammates Melody Switzer and Marilyn ran with cameras last weekend, as did Simon's 13 year old daughter Sarah. Cat Brown's (now Cat Young's) husband Mike wore my fourth camera and had a solid race.

The race route followed the trails just west of the traditional 'Side Show Bob' and included a lot of the trails you would have ridden if you own a MTN bike in Calgary. This was the hardest race of the series in terms of its relentlessness.

Shelley Bender had a breakthrough race and Brad Barron (of the Crankys) continues to improve. It was great to see Mark Fewster (formerly of Gary Alexander's TRS Cycling) back in the action and local triathlete Cam Ellum make an appearance as well.

Here is the link to the video.

Trev

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Tucson 200KM Brevet, base Miles, sort of !

A few of you know that Trev and a few of the Speed Theory team members have participated in a cycling sport that you hear my brother Tom and I talk about called Randonneuring. For the past couple of years a number of us have headed down to Arizona to participate in a few of their events and this year is no different. Trev, Paul and a perhaps a few Rando guys are heading down to the 200KM event on January 7th. I think a few more of the team members should join us this year so I'm extending an invitation. It's a way less crazy sport than Ironman and contrary to Trev's approach to the sport it is not a race. You can get event details and a run down on the sport on the Arizona Randonneur WEB site. We usually let Trev tire himself out the day before the event so he drops below super-human on the bike. For team members interested in hanging out in Tucson until the following Thursday your welcome to stay at my home.

The only word of caution for those wanting to ride together; the Canadians have developed a reputation for coming down and hitting this event hard so if you want to hang with Trev's group count on a 28-30km/hr pace while riding. Of course you can ride at whatever pace you want, you have 13 hours to finish the event. For those staying on we will re-group back in Tucson. Others may choose to head up to Phoenix if they're flying out on the Sunday.

If your interested let me know and will sort details out.

Lockie, I'm hoping to drag you out from the east for a third kick at your favourite event:)

Stephen Kenny

AKA Relentless

Bike Light

I bought this light a few weeks ago and it’s so crazy bright I want to buy a second one for my helmet. http://spokegrenade.com/

It’s rated at 1000 lumins which is seriously bright. At MEC you can buy a 1000 lumin light for $400.00 or a 1400 lumin light for $770.00. This baby was only $110.00.

The problem is they don’t sell them in Canada. I had mine delivered to my brothers place in Tucson and it finally made it to me here. I emailed the company and they’ll send me one (after some begging and pleading). I can get a 10% discount if I order 10 or more.

The light is not quite a spot light but it’s not really broad. They claim 3hrs on full, 5 hours on medium and 8 hours on low. I suspect medium will be fine for most road riding, high for mountain biking. Even low is pretty bright.
I have not had it very long so the jury is out on the long term durability, however, it gets good reviews so confidence is high.

Let me know if you want one. So far I have two on the list. I’ll put the order in by Friday so get back to me quickly if you want one. If I can get 10 then they would be around $100.00 plus some shipping. tom(at)mapitfirst(dot)com

Tom

One step closer to an AB Superweek of Cycling. ..and a dream (inside Calgary) hill climb route

I just got our 'Event Application Package' emailed from the city for our JayLap Downtown Criterium. Even though it is a fair bit of work, the filling of these forms and waiting for confirmation is standard procedure now for this event and since we continue to host an exciting, safe, family-oriented, race it should be approved. The city seems to be really good with quality control on the events it lets happen. This means more work for organizers, but their event planning department really has it going on in terms city service coordination at the right times.

The more exciting news though is that we were also emailed an 'Event Application Package' for a hill climb route I have thought would be excellent within the city and put cycling and racing even more on display! I haven't applied for this route before for a couple reasons: we have been hosting enough races, I wanted our Criterium to gain traction within the city and not put that in jeopardy at all, and frankly I was hesitant since the route is on some major roads.

So I filled out the forms a while ago to apply for this route to be held on the Friday evening of our cycling weekend. It is a 7km predominately uphill prologue style event. This would bring the first event of the weekend into the city and separating it from the Criterium in time a little more will take a lot of stress off our membership!

So, as it stands right now, our vision of the JayLap weekend is a Friday evening Power Hill Climb Prologue, then the same two awesome races after that, the Crit and the Bergen Boiler. This takes the driving out of the equation on Sat, which I believe is significant.

We have been discussing a lot of exciting combination options with Joel from Niklas Group about an Alberta Superweek of cycling since our events are held on back-to-back weekends. This change in structure to our race reduces the overall driving involved (even for out-of-towners), ups the coolness, and would enable a better continuity for cyclists racing all events!

Below is my dream in-town hill climb route !! It would be crazy safe as there are ZERO opportunities for traffic to cross cyclists or vice-versa. Check it out!

Okotoks 8km X-Country Race Video

I put together a fun video of last Saturday's race. You can watch Frank attack me and show me a clean pair of heels by the end. It is also fun to watch the race from a younger person's perspective. Thanks to Josh Ukrainetz for filming for me! Lots of team mates in this race.

Video is here.

Throw it on during an indoor trainer session and sprint when each view finishes!

Trev

A rainy day in Siam

Here is a short race report from the Phuket 70.3. My swimming sucks, at least it was uneventful, 1250 metres in the ocean then 650 metres in a fresh water lagoon. Conditions were great,I just didn't go very fast. They describe the bike course as technical, that being negotiating villages with chickens, water buffalo, scooters, motorbikes and dogs. Also lots of tight corners, limited opportunity to be in the aerobars. Yes those dogs. On the route recon on Thursday I noticed hundreds of street wise Thai muts everywhere, lounging on the side of the road. Race day got them mobilized, you really had to be sharp and try to predict where they were headed. It started to pour rain at about 30k into the bike. Torrential downpour, Bangkok style, made the steep uphills and downhills really difficult. The only way to get traction was to sit and crank at about a 40 cadence. The upside of the weather was there was no sun, still hot and 100% humid but not bad for racing. Being a little bit fearless on the bike gained me a few positions, being half blind and riding without glasses made it interesting. The run was ok, I raced maybe slightly above my current level of fitness, almost collapsed in the last kilometre of the run. I talked to an Aussie in my age group after the race, he told me I had a good chance of a rolldown slot, Vegas is a little far for the asia pacific guys. So i went to the ATM and pulled out 12,000 Baht and was lucky enough to get the second and last slot in my age group on the rolldown, that was exciting. There was a Kona slot as well but that didn't roll down. I'm sure that's the closest I'll get to a Kona slot. Fantastic event, great organization and volunteers, the peninsula takes this event seriously, great for the economy. Now i'm going on Thai time for a while. Thanks for reading.

Mike's done the Thailand 70.3 (Asia-Pacific Championship)

Just looked up Mike's finish at the Thailand 70.3.

It is Sat. evening as I write this and he has already woken up Sunday morning and raced a Half-Ironman.

Looks like a tough bike and run. If you go to this website and type in Healy, you can see Mike's splits. The pros only rode around 2:14 for the bike, which indicates a tough ride that would sap the power out of the age-groupers.

Nice work Mike, 8th in your age-group.

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Okotoks 8km X-Country Race today.

Great racing conditions today made for some fun racing.

Comprising of the Strathcona-Tweedsmere nordic ski and running trails, today's race had well over a hundred competitors. For me it was for sure one of the best races of the year with me being taken by Fast-Legs Frank in a great back and forth which had both of us hacking up lungs at the end!

Lots of friends and teammates there.

The pictures are of Marilyn Taylor, Carl Miiller, Mike 'JC' Godfrey, Slayer Sigouin, Frank and me.

Here is the Garmin Data from the GPS Contour+ Camera

Here are the Results.

I heard Thomas went out for a big Cyclocross ride today.. no THAT is hardcore.

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race prep - thai style

Arrived in beautiful Phuket Thailand on Tuesday after 22 hours flying. The only people more uncomfortable than me on the long flight were the Chinese national basketball team, legs everywhere -Korean Airlines 777 are not configured for tall people, dinged twice for the bike box but at least the bike made it at the same time as me.

Temperature is steady every day, 33 C, 70 % humidity, great for the tourists, ok for racing I guess.

There's 1000 entrants here, mostly Aussies it seems. Someone actually recognized the Speed Theory jersey, asked if I was from Calgary or Vancouver. Good to be able to get my sponsors name out there. Thursday was an official bike course recon day, roads closed for the recon, which is a good thing. We were guided by Jurgen Zack, the Jens Voigt of the triathlon world. Good that half the racers turned the recon into a race, keeping up with Zack. Another rookie mistake might have been doing the entire 90 k three days before the race! Slayer, if you are reading this, I have 2 days to recover. I wanted to ride the steep hills, I have a 28 on the back, glad I did that, if it is wet, there's no traction and you have to get off and walk the hill, memories of Penticton gravel roads.

Disc not recommended here, should have brought 808 maybe, lots of road bikes too. Sorry Kyle, I will have to replace your speedsuit, the entire back ripped open today before I even got in the water. Big waves and swells in the Andaman sea, but no jokes about tsunamis.

Ah yes, I hate shaving, these ladies were sort of amused, something new for them, they are obviously not from Patong. 300 Baht, the looks from passers by, priceless. I'm 14 hours ahead of you guys, I can post a race report before the race really starts Sunday morning. I'm writing this on a Blackberry playbook so it might look awful on the blog.

Cycling Explained

Thanks to Brent T. for posting this on Facebook. Only too true...

Cycling Explained
by: nofinishline