Puncheur Cross

A great little video produced by Sheldon over at Bikeridr featuring Marcy and me!

Scott's almost brand new cross bike.

Guys, teammate Scott Bratt picked up this awesome cross bike so he could race the Midweek Mayhems while his new Felt cross bike from Speed Theory was coming in. His new Felt is in and he needs a place to hang it in his garage. I am putting this on the front page since it is a crazy price and I wanted to award the awesomeness of getting an interim race bike to hit more races! Below is the email I got from Scott:

Just wondering if anyone from the team may have any interest in a 2012 Ridleys X-Fire CX bike I bought this fall (from Ridley's bike shop in Kensington) and rode 4 times (once in Nose Hill and 3 races) - I needed a bike on short notice until the one I ordered from Speed Theory came in (which just happened last week). Officially I think its a 56cm frame but the seat tube is just as long as my new 57 cm Felt (though the top tube on the Ridley is one inch shorter than the Felt - I measured it). It has Shimano 105 deraillers, FSA crank, Shimano wheel set, Tektro brakes. Original retail list price was $2499 but it was on sale for $2099 (with GST I paid $2205). Hoping to sell it for $1700!! or whatever you think is reasonable (I deducted $125 per ride!). You can take it and ride it to see if it fits.

Here's a review:
http://cyclingmagazine.ca/2011/11/sections/gear-reviews/bikesframes/ridley-x-fire/

Cheers, Scott.     Scottbratt  at   me   dot  com

STC weekend racing round-up.

Dan after completing Worlds

Mike, Bob, and Slayer competed in New Zealand at the Age-Group World Championships. I haven't heard from any of them, but it looks like all had good races, with Mike even snagging fastest Canadian in his age-group. Results here.

Thomas at the Lion's Den Cross on Sat.

Thomas and Marcy competed up in Edmonton at the Lion's Den and Puncheur Cross races on Sat and Sun respectively. They only have 4 more Cross races to go before completing every single ABA Cross race of the season, which is no easy feat! That is 11 races so far out of 15. Add to that 3 midweek mayhem races each and they have concentrated A LOT of racing in a short period of time. Results here.

Sat also was the Spray Drag 7.3km Uphill 'Run' out in Canmore. The most stacked and hardest race I have done since..... my last Cross race :) Teammates Rebecca Morley and Erik Cramer joined me in the sufferfest. Here is the Garmin from my race. 411m of elevation in 7km?? OUCH! Results here.

Mark finishing leg 2 of 3.

Tomo about to cross the 2nd of 2 creek crossings!

Sunday was the Confederation Park Relay hosted by the CalgaryRoadRunners. This is the second stop in the 10 race XC series that spans the winter. I love these races as they are super for keeping motivation up over the winter and are perfect for cyclists since they definitely benefit cycling progression as well. A few extremely high quality cyclists of the likes of Dustin Andrews and Bailey McKnight also did this (the secret of these awesome races is getting out). Teammates Kyle Marcotte, Ryan Murray, Rebecca Morley, Tomo Tsuchida, Jenn Joss, Carl Miiller, Mark and Marie Michalski, Fast-Legs-Frank, and me all raced hard. Results here.

Holy lots of racing still going on !!  Anything else?

Age Group Doping

Trev's (joking) prediction of 93 age group dopers in Darryl's division in Kona might be a bit of a stretch but I read today about Kevin Moats. He is in my age group and had signed up for my upcoming Ironman Florida. Moats always finishes first or second in M55-59 depending on if Joe Bonness is on form or not. Anyway:

 October 18, 2012 (Tampa, Fla.) — Today, World Triathlon Corporation (WTC) announced that an independent three member American Arbitration Association (AAA) panel issued its decision that American age group athlete Kevin Moats committed a doping violation. Moats has received a one-year period of ineligibility for the offense, effective January 30, 2012, and has been provisionally suspended from WTC competition since notice of the adverse finding.
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WTF is going on? At that age you would think some maturity would set in.
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DJ Mike, Slayer Dan, and Bob in NZ

Hey everyone,

Slayer, Mike, and Bob in there Canada kit!

I got an e-mail from Mike G. yesterday. Mike, Dan, and Bob all arrived in NZ safe and sound and are busy prepping for this weekend.

[Update by Trev]  Just got this photo in my email this morning!

Mike, Bob, and Slayer in NZ

You Gotta Watch This

This is what I won't be working on during the off season, because I'm not magic.

Watch The Best Road Bike Video Ever

Awards night, awesome Thomas, the NZ contingent, and Kona update.

Thanks to all those that came out to our big Friday night party. We had about 12 people at the velodrome pre-party and we were treated to super weather and fun riding. We will use this resource way more next year now that I know we can rent it quite easily and inexpensively. I will bring this up at the AGM and propose how we can use this facility for skills and tactics development as well as training. Everyone had a great time and Mark Enter awed us all by his standing start kilo time!

The party itself was a great time. Lots of stories shared by people and Brad had to make an additional beer run which always indicates the evening is going well. Another thanks to Lesley Kenny for hosting.

On the 'Psycho-Cross' front, Thomas raked in 2 more 2nd places this weekend to earn the criteria needed to be upgraded to 'Elite', the highest step until he is picked up by a trade team. Congrats Thomas!

We have three club mates (Mike, Slayer, and Bob) currently in transit or possibly just having arrived in New Zealand. We will attempt to keep you updated on their races this coming weekend. All are competing in the Age-Group World Championships for Olympic Distance Triathlon.

Darryl Parry competed in the Ironman World Championships this past weekend and posted an 11:49 time. He got 94th in his age-group, but the USADA has open a case file on the 93 competitors ahead of him, so we expect him to take the win!

Greetings from Kona

Well, I'm sorry that I'll be missing the festivities on Friday night. So's Pam - she finds the event entertaining and ... enlightening. I've missed more than my fair share of  STC things this year. The only race I managed to get to was Pigeon, where I characteristically frightened my only teammate in cat 4 by jumping too early down the right side and being absolutely no help at all in the finale. I did cramp magnificently afterwards, so that's something. 

The rest of my year revolved around long time trials, preceded by a swim and followed by a nice cool down run (LTT,PBAS,FBACDR - just to keep it simple). The whole point was to try to qualify for the World Championship  LTT,PBAS,FBACDR. It's held here in Kailua-Kona, where the concept of a cool down run is entirely conceptual.

We (the Parry's) are making a wee vacation of things. My 16-year-old daughter is doing about 4 hours of homework a day and my 13-year-old boy is pretending to do about half an hour of homework a day. I thundered into the sand pretty good while boogie boarding yesterday, so that's off the menu until at least Sunday.

Right now I'm filling my time with short effort swimming, BIKING and running. Also checking out the competition, who are all skinnier, fitter and more well acclimatised than I am. Of course I did pass Mirinda Carfrae and Dirk Bockel (they're professionals at the LTT,PBAS,FBACDR thing for the uninitiated) while out for my morning bike ride this morning, so maybe I'll be okay. Anyone who's a cool cat knows that it really only matters 1) who has the biggest chain ring and 2) who gets off the bike first. Of course the winner is the one who finishes the cool down run first, but that's just what The Man says.

I vacillate. Some times I'm really keen to get out there and rip this thing apart, but mostly I keep telling myself that the hard part is over. I qualified, this is the celebration. Given what it feels like to run through the lava fields in 30 degree heat with no shade and the humidex set at 38, it's going to be a strange kind of celebration.

So, have an excellent party. Thank your hostess profusely. Don't throw up on her furnishings. Come Saturday morning, while you're nursing your well deserved hangovers, spare a thought for those of us who aren't quite finished their season yet. We'll be thinking of you (incoherently, while hallucinating about snowfall and pleasant, cool English country gardens).

This Friday ! I hope you're coming to STC's Main Event!

I hope most of the team is able to make it to this Friday's year-end story telling evening and awards night.

Please email Lesley here if you haven't already to tell her you (and partner possibly) are coming.

For the awards night, it is great when people bring stories of teammates to share with everyone. They can be funny, inspiring, or just plain cool.

The club has rented the Velodrome for some fun cycling from the hours 4:00pm - 6:30pm. Come out and give the track a try if you never have and we'll have some fun casual events lined up.

The weather is looking like it is going to cooperate!  See a lot of you Friday.

Trev

ps: Daryl's excuse for missing the STC Night is about the only one acceptable.  :)  Good luck Daryl.

Wishing Darryl best of luck at Ironman Hawaii

Darryl win be racing Ironman Hawaii this coming Saturday in Kona. You can follow Darryl live on www.ironman.com

Go Darryl!

Congrats Shelley !!

Teammate Shelley just smoked a 3:24:46 final time at the Kelowna Marathon !!  Simon ran with her to log the same time.

Congratulations Shelley, we all know how much work you've put into this and it is absolutely great to see the plan come together. I have been smiling ever since I saw the result!

Congratulations for ex-STC member James Curran for winning overall in a time of 2:51:05!

If there is anyone else I have missed, please let me know.

Trev

Mt. Graham Hill Climb

I'm not trying to compete with Darcy and Harley on the hill climb post, both harder men.  Mt Graham is 2 hours east of Tucson, basically in the middle of nowhere Arizona.  Trev and I heard about this race late summer, lots of badass talk about how tough it was and true too form when Trev "heard bad-ass tough" he wanted to "Crush It".  By the end of August I was done with the bike, it had been a long season starting in January with 200KM Brevets and finishing trying to get back in race shape to help the team at the end of the race season.  Didn't quite get there but had fun competing and meeting many of the new team members.  Basketball, gym workouts, scotch and moderate riding were now the norm.   I was out and Trev started to realize he had time constraints so we would look into it another time.

Now I'm down in Tucson at the local bike shop a week before this race, its also the Arizona Sate Hill Climb Championship and the trash talk is so thick you're choking on it before you're a foot in the door; Nasty, hardcore, suffer-fest, killer, 7- 14% grades, rated HC and then "Relentless", fuc*..it, I'm in.  I'll go and participate, recon for when you guys come down; Brevets, Mt. Lemmon general pre-season training.  Perhaps we should add it to the bucket list of suffering.  It just so happens I'm in the shop having an 11-28 put on my 6-pound training wheel, after the race I had that 28 blessed at a church.

This is a mass start race, all categories, which makes me a little nervous even though it hits a 5% grade right off the bat.  For the first time in my life I enter my masters age category, starts me at the back of pack and keeps me away from the young studs where I have a bad tendency to want to try and keep up. Start easy, find a comfortable pace, cruise up, no pain and low on the suffering that was the plan and I actually executed on that.  After getting harassed at the start, all in fun, for wanting to drag my rear light and Rando size tool bag I'm set to go.

After 1 KM I'm right at the back and I can see the guns off in the distance.  By KM 8 I'm in a groove spinning the 28, I now think I can hold this effort forever from a cardio perspective and my legs would be the problem.  Now the one thing about a mass start is that you can start to hunt, riders up the road become targets you know the feeling.  I pick up a group on my wheel and I start reeling in other groups, just a tad little effort and three riders are rolled up, I don't sit in just stay at my tempo and roll by, typically the guys on my wheel would stay with the new group and a couple of riders from the caught group would jump on to my wheel.  This goes on all the way up.  Of course most riders I'm never going to catch but no one goes by me, ok until the end, that parts coming.   I'm steady all the way up, it is steep and unforgiving, the switchbacks remind me of the mountain stages in the Grande Tours in Europe and there is no relief until the last 2 kilometers.  The climb goes up 6000ft in 20 miles climbing to 9100ft with mostly 6-9% grades hitting 11-14% in sections.  The scenery is spectacular, although I stop talking to riders on the way up, it didn't seem appreciated once we hit 20km.  With 8KM to go I have two riders with me, they sound like two steam engines behind me their breathing so hard.  One guy attacks often and he is in the big chain ring the whole time, freaks me out, no way these two guys are going to last, they are way over the rivet.  I keep bridging the attacks dragging the other guy with me.  1000 meters and these guys are still there; 100 meters and they both pass and beat me to the line.  A race within the race, tons of fun.  Here's the good part, the thing that gives me hope, both those guys were in the 60 + category.  They had snot all over them, sweat dripping of their bikes and partial lungs coughed up resting on the front of their jerseys.  The next time when someone asks me "Stephen why do you keep doing it?"  I'll smile and think of those two dudes. I was 1:47 getting up, very happy with that time as I thought it would take me 2:15

Yep put it on your bucket list.

Stephen

Road Warrior Gala... don't forget to RSVP !!

Team, please RSVP to Lesley according to the invitation if you are planning on coming. It would be a shame if we didn't buy enough beer and food ?!?!

Also, we always like to present some serious, but mostly fun awards to some attendees and if you let us know you are coming, then it really makes it easier for us.

Also, now that it is October, it is time to start thinking of fun stories or gathering silly little 'awards' for your team mates to present to them with a funny story.

I have successfully booked the Velodrome from 3pm - 7pm!! So we will get more details up on when to be there. Keep our collective fingers crossed for good weather! We will make this a family friendly event before you get the babysitter for the gala part of the evening.

Trev