My blog was boring me . . .

. . . so I changed the template to this cornea-searing green one. Enjoy!

4-Low

"ATTACK!"

A friend of mine is fond of telling people to "put it in 4-low" (those of you who didn't grow up in little redneck towns in Norcal and who don't understand the term may find reference material here). By "telling", I mean that he screams it at them while they're suffering through a race (road, DH, whatev), or when they're working, or when they're eating. Basically it's kind of a slogan like HTFU. At any rate, it's what I'm going to be doing for the next month. Putting it in 4-low, that is.





After two soul crushing weekends of racing post-upgrade (that's a joke, by the way - my soul remains un-crushed, I'm just trying to be funny, probably unsuccessfully) I have four weeks of hard training before my next race weekend, which will be followed by a nice week and a half long taper to Mt. Hood. And by "hard training" I mean, put-it-in-4-low, HTFU, go-suffer-like-it's-your job, training. Reaching for new power numbers, 17 hrs a week, awesomeness. I'm really stoked about it. Not even being sarcastic, it's gonna be rad. I really do adore my coach.





So if the blogging is a bit infrequent(er) in the coming month, you'll know why. But fear not, because after spending a month in 4-low there should be several weeks awesome stories about my venture northward to Mt. Hood, the 1 hr. sufferfest that is the district TT, the comedy of errors that will undoubtedly constitute the Tour de Nez, and a defeated limp through the streets of Nevada City.





I freakin' love my life.

Slaughtered

Ahhh, the Sea Otter. Tell me again, why did I decide to do this race as my first P1/2 race? Guess I didn't really think it through. Basically, it was hard, and I got smoked. Not that I expected to win or anything, but it was rough. I didn't have rock-star legs, I didn't feel rested going into it, and I didn't recover properly between days. I think without those contributing factors I would have done better. Again, I wouldn't have won, but it wouldn't have been quite so rough. To Recap . . .

The good:

• I finished, and wasn't DFL, in my first road race as a 2!


• I got to race on the Laguna Seca Raceway again, and descending the corkscrew with a pack of 50 women was a blast.


• I hung in for almost 1/2 of the Circuit Race, and got to see my teammates off the front!


• After the Circuit Race I got to walk around with my awesome teammates and schmooze our sponsors. Rad.


• I am the Alternator Queen.*

The bad:

• I was dropped on the 2nd lap of the road race. Brutal.


• I was dropped 53 minutes into the circuit race. Consequentely DNFed.

The ugly:

• Totally sleep deprived for the whole weekend.


• Didn't get to eat dinner until 8:30 PM on Friday.


• Felt like I had to do stuff after the road race, instead of laying down and taking a nap like my body obviously needed. Idiot.


• *Car broke down on the way home, spent an extra night in Fremont, and used my latent alternator installation skills to get us home.


• Crushed the corner of my palm whilst removing old alternator, resulting in a puffy, bruised, and blood blistered hand. C'est la vie.

Anywho, in the end, it was a great experience, and awesome (expensive) training. I KNOW I can race successfully at that level. I just need a few more watts, a few more brain cells, and another year (or 3) of hard work.

Next up is Wente! I've never done this race, and I'm super excited about it! Followed by a month of no travel, which I'm equally excited about, and then . . . . dun dun duhhhh . . . Mt. Hood! Which I'm terrified for. But excited. Mostly excited.

Catch Up

Please enjoy these low resolution cam-phone images while your party is reached.

Ice cream birthday cake. It was supposed to be red velvet with chocolate ice cream, but it really just looks brown. Tasted good anyway.

With raspberries and REAL whipped cream. None of that crappy (yet alarmingly delicious) cool whip crap.

The birthday boy.

My easter hyacinth. Smells amazing.

I looooove my doggie. Cute.

Coupla weeks ago, first trip up Mt. Rose of 2010. Boy was it cold on the way back down, tho.

On the way up, looking at the mountain.

My NEW TT BIKE! Can't wait to get out to a race with her.



My road bike pretending to be a TT bike at Madera. In the Day's Inn.

Halfway up Geiger Grade a couple of weeks ago.

Okay, I'm going to race the Otter Slaughter next weekend. First race as a 2. I am going to get slaughtered all right.

FINALLY!

I got my cat 2 upgrade! 1/3 of my seasons goals - done!!! Now ready to suffer it out with the big girls! Ohmygod I'm soooooo stoked!

Just for fun

Because it's a good shot. Thanks Hernando.

Frustration

I have the hardest time thinking of blog post titles. Seriously.

So, I raced Copperopolis on Saturday! I love that race. Ended up third, after three of us dropped the rest of the field. It was a good race. For some reason I just don't feel like typing up a long report about it. I didn't win, but I raced well, my fitness is good, I'm content. Well, no, I want to win, but no regrets, except that I wish I had 20 more watts, but I don't. They'll come, watt by watt, some day. I'm cool with that.

Right now I'm trying to get my cat 2 upgrade. Like, I requested it, was denied, but then realized I had entered 2009 as the year for one of my recent races, instead of 2010, so homeboy told me my points had expired. So I resubmitted it with the date fixed. And pretty much pleading that he give it to me, or else my points are going to start expiring for rizzle, starting next weekend. If he doesn't give it to me I'll probably cry and eat some chocolate. And then go race Spring Hill this weekend on Cody's birthday, which I really don't want to do, but otherwise I'm going to lose a bunch of my hard earned points from Copper and Sea Slaughter last year. Decisions decisions. Just give me my upgrade already! I'm there, I've earned it, and I've been a cat 3 for 4 years! Obviously I haven't spent all of those years working towards it, but at this point I'm pretty much done with being a 3. It's like going to college for year after year after year, learning lots, progressing with your class work, and then never graduating. Like, oh, sorry, that class you took last semester has expired, you have to take another one. Crap.

In other news, my job kind of sucks. I mean, I like working in a shop, but my employer seems to think it unimportant to set and maintain regular pay periods. And then on my last paycheck, that was 5 days late, I was totally underpaid. Almost quit yesterday, but persuaded myself not to. No, scratch that, I chickened out. Probably for the best, but I'm getting really sick of not knowing when I'm going to be able to pay my bills. Plus, you know, it's a violation of federal and state labor laws. Grrrrrrr . . .

Anyway, I'm off to enjoy the (freezing) sunshine on my TT bike today. Weeeeee!