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• Landlocked Sailors? Riding with the Wind in Colorado

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This is a guest post from my buddy Joel Ankeny. Joel told me this amazing story about his great-grandparents and I thought it would be great to share with all of you.

Almost every cyclists knows these lyrics from the Harry Dacre song “Daisy Bell”.  On September 18, 1934 my great-grandparents brought this song to life on their wedding day.  My great-grandfather, Adam Preisinger, came from a family of well-known cyclists – all of his brothers and sisters raced.  He served as the chairman and secretary of the Century Road Club Association (CRCA – Still in existence today as the biggest cycling club in the USA) in the 1930‘s.  Later in life he officiated many of the races at the Lake Clifton, MD track.

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The coolest thing about today was that it was the first big step to really sharing my love of cycling with both of my boys.  My youngest son especially has taken a keen interest in watching cycling races with me, asking all about the riders and what they’re doing and he loves coming to watch daddy race…although at the last time trial I did, he decided to cheer for “the fast guy” instead of me.  Turns out it was a pretty good pick because “the fast guy” was Tom Danielson of Team Garmin-Transitions!  What I love though is that my kids have developed an interest in cycling at such a young age.  They “help” me work on our bikes together, they fill my water bottles before my rides, and my little one gets on his bike and races me to the end of our street just about every time I leave for one of my rides (you can see one of our earlier “races” here).  But today, we inched closer to sharing something even deeper.

I’m a huge fan of Paul Fournel’s great book Need for the Bike, in which he describes some of his experiences riding with his father through the Haute Loire, about the first time his father let him lead out the ride, and the first time he dropped his dad.  And more than anything, you can really feel the unspoken bond of love and genuine friendship that Fournel developed with his father one those rides through the mountains of France.  I guess in some way, today was our first step towards creating memories and bonds like this too.  I can’t wait until they’re old enough to go on rides with me through the Rocky Mountains as we share the love of the road, the bike, and each other’s company.Similar Posts:

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I ran a little poll on Twitter tonight and asked “What’s your favorite cycling book?”. Thanks to everyone who answered. Here’s the list I got back (in no particular order or ranking) along with links to the books on Amazon.  So, what’s your favorite?  If it’s not on the list, feel free to add it to the comments.  By the way, in case you were wondering, my favorite is Need for the Bike by Paul Fournel.

• The Rider by Tim Krabbe
• Metal Cowboy by Joe Kurmaskie
• Bobke: A Ride on the Wild Side of Cycling by Bob Roll
• Curious George Rides a Bike by H.A. Rey
• The Art of Cycling by Robert Hurst
• Roadie: The Misunderstood World of a Bike Racer by Jamie Smith
• Bear on a Bike by Stella Blackstone (my kids love this one!)
• Dog in a Hat: An American Bike Racer’s Story of Mud, Drugs, Blood, Betrayal, and Beauty in Belgium by Joe Parkin
• Ten Points by Bill Strickland
• Tour De France by Graeme Fife
• Derailleur: A Cycling Murder Mystery by Greg Moody
• It’s Not About the Bike by Lance Armstrong
• The Yellow Jersey by Ralph Hurne
• The Giro D’Italia: Coppi Vs. Bartali at the 1949 Tour of Italy by Dino Buzzati
• From Lance to Landis: Inside the American Doping Controversy at the Tour de France by David Walsh
• Lance Armstrong’s War: One Man’s Battle Against Fate, Fame, Love, Death, Scandal, and a Few Other Rivals on the Road to the Tour de France by Daniel Coyle
• Flying Scotsman : Cycling to Triumph Through My Darkest Hours by Graeme Obree
• Dancing on the Pedals: The Found Poetry of Phil Liggett, The Voice of Cycling by Phil Liggett and Doug Donaldson
• We Might As Well Win: On the Road to Success with the Mastermind Behind Eight Tour de FranceVictories by Johan Bruyneel
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This week in Colorado, the wind gods have not been happy and they’ve been content to bash Front Range cyclists with plenty of howling gusts.  This morning I was out on a ride in 25 mph winds with gusts as high as 36 mph.  I looked for every way I could to tuck myself out of the wind, hide near roadside scrub, take a longer route to get a little more tailwind for a few precious minutes.  But then, somewhere around 40 miles into the ride my mind shifted back to my childhood growing up on Long Island.  We were always out on the water and the wind was everything.  We learned to look for the slightest indication of onshore or offshore breezes; ripples on the flats, whispy clouds, the blowing beach grasses.  They became a natural part of life for me.  The wind was in your soul and you never had to think about it, you just naturally knew where it was coming from and how you could exploit it.

Then my thoughts came back to cycling in Colorado.  I think that sailor deep down inside me is still there.  Now, instead of looking for those old familiar ocean signals, I look for how the prairie grasses are moving, how those little landscape and utility marker flags are flapping, how the clouds are blowing off the mountain tops.  And of course once I know where the wind is coming from, I have to work to shelter myself from it or find a way to exploit it.  So I guess there is a bit of the son of the sailor in all of us who ride out on the roads with no ocean in sight.  It makes me think of the movie Wind with Matthew Modine and of course the old Jimmy Buffett song Son of a Sailor…which was stuck in my head for most of my ride today, but that’s a topic for another post.Similar Posts:

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Here are my March numbers from Daytum.com:

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• On the Road: Palm Springs, CA

Last week I had the good fortune to attend the ESRI Developers Summit in Palm Springs, California.  I also had the good fortune to rent a road bike and get out on the road in some nice warm weather compared to the 12 inches of snow I left behind in Colorado!  The trip started out a bit rough.  First the bike rental company (Big Wheel Tours) delivered the wrong bike and definitely the wrong size…the bike was tiny! So I was stuck with it for the first night of riding.  Then for my first ride, I got some “local” advice that turned out to be not so good.  I ended up spending 40+ miles on super congested roads with no shoulders to speak of…oh yeah, and on a bike that was way too small for me.  Not the best way to start a trip.

But, the next morning, the sun came up, Big Wheel Tours exchanged the bike to something a little nicer (and really made good by refunding some cash), and I found myself on some sweet, quiet desert roads.  From then on the rest of the week was great.  I was able to get in some good climbing up the Palm Springs Tramway Road and some good riding out on the flats in the valley too.  Overall I put in six solid rides and had a great time out there.  Here are some links to a few of the rides I did on MapMyRide.com.  I didn’t map the bad rides so these are all good deals.

Palm Springs Tramway Loop (30 miles)
Pines to Palms Highway (50 miles)
Dillon Road Loop (40 miles)
29 Palms Highway (48 miles)

One word of advice if you do ride out in the Palm Springs area….start early!  The roads out of downtown Palm Springs (where I was staying) do get a little crowded early on, so plan on starting around 6:00-6:30 in the morning to beat the rush.  Also, check out the Hotel Zoso.  It’s a sweet hotel and doesn’t break the bank either.  If you’re curious about what the roads look like out in Palm Springs, here are some pix from my recent trip:

• March by the Numbers

I might be a little late posting this as the weather is beginning to warm and we’re all starting to emerge from our winter training caves.  But, I thought I’d throw my indoor training playlist out there along with some links to other cool places to get workout playlists from too.  And please, if you want to add your playlist or other playlist links here, leave a comment with your training favs or links to other places to find great training music.

Playlist Links

Cadence Revolution: Awesome music for cycling to.  Plus, they have great companion mixes for the EpicPlanet/EpicRides DVD series.

Tiger Spin: Playlists for spinning along with some good spinning workouts too.

Spinning Music: A huge collection playlists for spinning broken down by intensity type (Wamrups, Climbs, Sprints, Cooldowns, etc.)

Power 10 Spinning: Lots of 60 minute spinning playlists.

JogTunes: Playlists for running and based on beats per minute (BPM).  Great if you’re looking for music for certain cadence zones.

InTheGym.net: General work out music.

My Personal Training Playlist

Adam and Nathan Totally Kicking Ass – El Ten Eleven
America Is Waiting – Brian Eno/David Byrne
Anatomic – Afro Celt Sound System
Believe – Ozomatli
Belly Disco (Beatfanatic Remix) – Karminsky Experience
Big Business (Slow to Speak Remix) – David Byrne
Big Cat – Afro Celt Sound System
Black Tambourine – Beck
Boop (Skeewiff Remix) – Ursula 1000
Can’t Stop – Ozomatli
Chick-A-Boom (Chris Joss Remix) – Joe Bataan
Chino – El Ten Eleven
Coco Do Mundo – Electro Coco
Creo – Ozomatli
Defiant – Brian Eno/David Byrne
Divisions – NOMO
E-Pro – Beck
Every Direction Is North – El Ten Eleven
Exilio – Thievery Corporation
Exploration (Medeski, Martin & Wood Mix) – Karminsky Experience
Forest – Big Blue Ball
Further in Time (Remix by Mass) – Afro Celt Sound System
Help Me Somebody – Brian Eno/David Byrne
Here We Go – Ozomatli
Holographic Universe – Thievery Corporation
The Hong Kong Triad – Thievery Corporation
Hot Cakes – El Ten Eleven
I Like Van Halen Because My Sister Says Their Cool – El Ten Eleven
The Jezebel Spirit – Brian Eno/David Byrne
Jijy – Big Blue Ball
K10 – El Ten Eleven
Liberation Front – Thievery Corporation
Limbe – S-Tone Inc.
Linda Cancao – Barrio Jazz Gang
Lovers Of Light – Afro Celt Sound System
Missione A Bombay – Nicola Conte
Nevermore – Afro Celt Sound System
The New Pollution – Beck
North 2 – Afro Celt Sound System
Nu Tones – NOMO
Numb Tooth – El Ten Eleven
The Outernationalist   Thievery Corporation
Release (Remix by Rollo & Sister Bliss) – Afro Celt Sound System
Remember Tomorrow – Mo’ Horizons
Riding The Skies (Remix by Mass & Simon Emmerson) – Afro Celt Sound System
Riding The Waves – Afro Celt Sound System
Road To Benares (Bombay Dub Orchestra Remix) – Thunderball
Shadowman – Afro Celt Sound System
Shaolin Satellite – Thievery Corporation
Stereo Tonic (Boca 45 Remix) – Thunderball
Un Simple Historie – Thievery Corporation
Wanderlust (Mark Stent Remix) – Bjork
Warning Shots – Thievery Corporation
Whirl-Y-Reel 1 (Beard and Sandals mix) – Afro Celt Sound System
Whirl-Y-Reel 2 (Folk Police mix) – Afro Celt Sound System
Whirly 3 (Remix by Simon Emmerson, James McNally & Mass) – Afro Celt Sound System
Who’s To Blame – Ozomatli
Wrong Alley Street, Pt. 1 (Fort Knox Five Remix) – Chris Joss
Youthless – Beck
3 Plus 4 – El Ten Eleven

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Be grateful for your life, every detail of it, and your face will shine like the sun, and everyone who sees it will be made glad and peaceful. Persist in gratitude, and you will slowly become one with the Sun of love and love will shine through you its all-healing joy – Rumi

How amazing is that?  So what makes you happy? Is it being alive, waking up, something simple?  I hope so.  Check out this awesome video from Jon Rawlinson to see how people from all around the globe answered this simple question:

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This week I had to travel to San Diego and I found myself working out at the hotel “fitness center” on a recumbent bike trainer. As if that weren’t bad enough, I forgot to take along my powdered drink mix for my water bottles. I had to resort to finding some kind of “sports drink” within walking distance of my hotel. Regularly I use Hammer Nutrition’s Perpetuem. I really like the stuff from Hammer because it’s made with all natural ingredients and doesn’t contain added sugars. But, with no bike shops in site, I headed into the nearest bodega to find only Gatorade. I haven’t drank Gatorade in years so it kind of shocked me when I looked at the nutritional information panel to find that it contains 14 grams of carbs per 8-oz. serving, all of which were from…you guessed it…sugar. And not just sugar, but upon further examination of the ingredients, it’s all from 6 percent high fructose corn syrup (glucose-fructose syrup)…YIKES!!! Well, I needed something so I grabbed some Gatorade and ran with it.  I guess I’ll be more careful to make sure I bring my own drink mix with me next time I travel.

It got me thinking about sports drinks in general and really, there is so much “junk” out there. It took me a long time before I found Hammer’s drinks and gels, but before then, I switched like crazy trying different drinks. So many of them are loaded with sugar or don’t contain protein (which, if you’re doing anything over 2 hours you should seriously consider having). And a lot of those loaded with sugar contain high fructose or fructose sugars which have been proven to be pretty bad for your body. To me, it’s pretty important to make sure that what’s in my water bottle (a) helps my athletic performance on the bike and (b) isn’t doing damage to my body or my muscles. So, my question to you is, what’s in your water bottle and why do you like it/use it?

Disclaimer: I am a Hammer affiliate, but used their products long before I ever started blogging.  I did not write this post because of my affiliation with Hammer nor am I paid by Hammer to write about their products.

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I’ve recently been reading Carl Sagan’s classic book “Pale Blue Dot”.  Right off the bat, in the very first pages of the introduction, Sagan so clearly and succinctly summed up the significance of our day-to-day minutiae and even our struggles as a species compared to our relative size in the universe.  While describing the image above, in just a few sentences Sagan dismantled all of the posturing and pettiness that we engage in day after day, year after year, and generation after generation.  If we could all read these words and understand that our lifetimes are too short and our significance so minor in the grand scheme of things, maybe we would be able to be more at peace with ourselves, our lives, and each other.  Here’s an excerpt from Pale Blue Dot.  I hope you find it as thought provoking as I did, and maybe, just maybe, the next time life’s trials and tribulations seem inconceivably large to you, this might help you put things into a little perspective:

“Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there–on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves…There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.”

If Sagan’s words and the image above don’t put our place in the universe into perspective for you, take a look at this amazing video from the American Museum of Natural History which illustrates in perfect scale, just how small we all really are:

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I have a 3 year old son who seems to have some amazing clarity and insight into life. It never fails to surprise me when he says something that stops me in my tracks and makes me reconsider everything. Maybe it’s because the mind of a 3 year old is uncluttered and unfettered by the ingrained biases and rules that we “grown ups” live with. Anyway, this weekend was Valentine’s Day and my little guy was eating a box of Sweethearts (you know…the little candy hearts with catchy sayings on them). Well, he got one that said “Dream Big”. He thought about it for a moment and then said “Actually, I dream little. That’s why all my dreams come true”. SLAM! In two short seconds he hit the “grown up” idea of dreaming big in the solar plexus. Almost as soon as he said it, he was on to the next thing and smiling and enjoying his life.

But, those few simple words dove deep inside of me and got me really thinking. We were always told as kids to dream big. And there’s nothing wrong with that. In fact my little guy dreams of being the first person to walk on Mars. But I think that we get so hung up on our big dreams that we forget or lose sight of those little ones. And by getting caught up in our big dreams, we usually set ourselves up for disappointment of some kind or another. If we’d focus more on those smaller goals (our “little dreams”) we’d find out that we accomplish amazing things every day, just in small increments. By recognizing these smaller goals we’d feel a sense of constant accomplishment and that leads to a sense of happiness on a very frequent basis. So, maybe my little guy is on to something. As far as I can tell, he’s the happiest person I know. So go ahead, dream small and make your dreams come true!Similar Posts:

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So, there you have it, some sage advice from the climbing master!

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So, now that I have a good long term goal looming out there at the end of July, I’ll have to start setting some short term goals to keep myself on track.  That should help me stay focused on the task ahead.  Well, that and a printout of the race profile that will be hanging in front of me in my home office and in my training cave!  So, that’s my main goal for 2010.  What’s yours and how are you staying motivated to reach it?

Here’s the route profile for the hill climb:

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1. My very old LOOK Kevlar 2000 Carbon fiber bike.  The bike fit and gearing exactly match my current road bike.  I still love this bike!  It’s old but it’s so comfortable.

2. Cateye Cyclosimulator CS-1000.  This is another oldie but goodie.  This trainer is so stable.  I love it because I can really do some good sprint workouts on it and never feel the slightest wobble.

3. The weight room.  The people who lived in our house before us left these here (guess they didn’t want to try moving it…I don’t blame them!). It has just about everything I need for some basic weight training.

4. The big blue exercise ball.  This was originally my wife’s but I’ve commandeered it for doing core training and lower back extensions.

5. Yoga mat.  I do lots of stretching, yoga and core work on here and it makes the floor much more comfortable to be on during those tough core training days.

6. Yes, those are tiny weights.  You can stop laughing now! I actually used those during my recovery from a ruptured disc last year, but now my three year-old uses them when he “works out” with daddy.

7. Power fan. An absolute necessity for indoor cycling!  Even here in bone dry Colorado you’d be dripping wet doing indoor rides without one of these bad boys.

8. My 2000 Ride for the Roses poster. This poster gives me so much inspiration when I’m riding.  The 2000 Ride for the Roses was the first time I met Lance Armstrong, Miguel Indurain, and Eddy Merckx.  It was amazing meeting these three legends all together (17 Tour de France victories between them) and it was even cooler doing the Ride for the Roses with Lance and Big Mig back in 2000!

9. The essential DVD/DVR combo.  I couldn’t train without these.  Although, thanks to a dispute with Comcast, DirecTV (and hence my DVR) doesn’t get Versus anymore!  So much for recording the spring classics and the Grand Tours!

10. Reduce, reuse, recycle right? Well, this is my contribution.  I used to work out in front of a nice big flatscreen, but when I moved my training cave to this spot in the basement, it seemed like a good thing to use this old TV as my video monitor.

11. Training videos. Again, I couldn’t train indoors without these.  I wrote a post recently about my favorite training DVDs and these ones on the shelf are some of my favorites from Spinervals and EpicPlanet.

12. Another fan.  Yes…I sweat…A LOT!

13. The Nordic Track.  Yet another item commandeered from my wife’s fitness collection.  I use this in the off-season to do some cross training.  Can you tell I don’t like the cold? I even cross-country ski indoors!

14. Smart Cycle. My little guy loves doing workouts with me. He often gets on this little Smart Cycle and rides along with me.  He always reminds me when I need to drink and when I need to soft pedal.  Check out this video of him training with me.

15. My training log.  I record everything in here.  Workouts, heart rates, sleep, diet…you name it, it’s in there (well, almost everything anyway).

16. Bananas, bananas, and more bananas.  I do a lot of my indoor workouts first thing in the morning when I wake up.  That means no heavy foods before  I work out, so I keep an endless supply of bananas at the ready for an easy-to-digest pre-workout snack.

17. HEED.  It’s my favorite drink during workouts.  All natural, hi-carb, low sugar and great electrolyte mix.  The only thing I can’t get past is the name.  Every time I look at it, all I can think of is Mike Meyers as Stuart Mackenzie in “So I Married an Axe Murderer”…”HEED!  PANTS!  NOW!”

18. Towel stack…again with the sweating thing.  Towels are essential.  I go through at least two every workout.  YUCK!  And yes, my wife won’t touch them or my jerseys/shorts when I’m done.  Can you blame her?

19. My trusty Polar heart rate monitor.  Between this and the power meter on the Cateye trainer, I’m always able to work at just the right intensity level.Similar Posts:

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