DONT CALL IT A COMEBACK

OH SNAP!!! The Grand Rapids Symphony (my hometown symphony) has an opening for 2nd bassoon. Time to start staging my return to my classical roots!! 4 months to prepare!!

back training

Training camp is in full effect, and the weather has been outstanding. I have a camera now, so I am trying to see if I can figure out how to make it work. Here are two of my new teammates shawn and brandon. Good times so far.

two good hands

It is amazing how easier life is with two functioning hands. I did get used to the cast, but I forgot how nice it is without it on. I have been doing all sorts of strange things this week. Since I got my cast off and a 100% go ahead jones from my doctor, I have just been going nuts and doing all the things that I normally don't do. I have vaccumed TWICE this week and I even made my bed once--weird. I don't know where this bizarre behavior is coming from and it makes me feel a little unsettled on my insides. I also finally cleaned out my car from a summer of racing...I vaccumed that too. Cleaning the car was an interesting, I found a whole bunch of waterbottles filled with urine underneath the seat that must have been there for a while. It didn't look or smell like mine...hmmm.
Rich Harper just came in--we are going to ohio for a meeting.
It looks like his eyebrows are waxed and he has been spending a bunch of time in a tanning bed.

not much going on

I know I have internet access all the time which isn't necessarily a good thing. Now I don't have an excuse for not responding to emails and such or for not posting on this enthralling blog.
The main reason I haven't posted is because not much has been going on, but here are the top ten highlights of last week:
1. Mixing diet sprite and gatorade. It is a wonderfully fizzy and refreshing beverage, I highly recommend it.
2. Going to the local cross race and realizing that there was keg of microbrew in the truck next to where I parked...oh yeah it was a good day.
3. Taping Rocky and watching the entire 3 hour movie then realizing that I had stopped the tape 10 minutes early and I missed the entire end.
4. Hearing about everybody having so much fun racing cross and not being able to do it. That makes me real happy.
5. Being able to ride in the freezing cold, but not being able to put a glove over my cast. The inside sweats terribly and drips down to my fingers which then proceed to freeze--literally.
6. Having the power steering go on my car. It is awesome trying to parallel park with one hand and no power steering. I can do it, barely.
7. Walking around work wondering what that terrible odor is and figuring out that it is my cast.
8. Going to the cross race and parking next to that truck; that was really awesome, it was really good beer too.
9. Writing this entire entry once and then having my computer freeze up and having to do it all again.
10. Watching the entire paceline staff race cross. That actually was a ton of fun, they are a motley bunch, but had the most fun out of everybody. I enjoyed watching them--especially because of that truck.

Despite some of the sarcasm things are good. I have been riding again and it feels great and I am more motivated than ever. The weather here has been great for the most part. It was sixty today with no wind. Made for a great ride.

Props have to go out to my good friend NATO on his stellar cross season which he capped off by crashing twice on the last lap of the state champs which put him off the podium by one spot. Oh well, I can hear him giggling about it all the way down here.

GO LANCE!!!

Its all over now

I HAVE REJOINED SOCIETY!!!
I now have the internet--high speed internet--oh yaaay.
So I haven't updated since I started my blog because I haven't been CONNECTED!!!
I am quite excited!!
So a bunch of stuff has happened in the last months, let me tell you about it. Oh wait, nothing has happened.
My wrist is still broken and I had a wonderful thanksgiving at home in MI.
I get my cast off on JAN 2 so 5 weeks to go. I guess the bone I broke is THE worst bone to break in your wrist and it takes forever for it to heal. It is healing and it is about 3/4's there, but not yet.
I went home for thanksgiving and had a great time. It was good to get away for a while because I hadn't left WS since august. I came back feeling good about things so I built up a pimped out flat bar road bike especially designed to ridden with a cast. That's right--IM BACK. First ride is tomorrow morning. I'll let you know how it goes. It is supposed to be 72 tomorrow. I love NC!!

I have new tenants

So I decided to rent out space in my mobile home aka my 92 camry with 220k on it.
I got the idea when I took the trash out of my garage after it had been there about a week and put it in my trunk. I then drove the garbage to work where there is a dumpster. I removed the trashbag from my trunk and noticed there was a hole in it. I then noticed this mouse running rampantly around my trunk. I then noticed another one and another one. Sweet.
So how do you get mice out of ones car? I am not sure. The first course of action was to leave the trunk and all the doors open for two days. That didn't seem to work. I then drove my car into the garage shut the door and opened the car windows and let the car run for a couple hours. I guess i didn't leave it running long enough because I saw one as I was getting in to turn the car off. So I had to go one the offensive in a major way. I lined the entire car with glue traps, I mean I LINED the entire car. There was no place in that car that didn't have a glue trap on it--LITERALLY!! Yeah I got em all--I think. I haven't seen any and my star crunches are still intact. WHEW
A lot has been going on. I went to vegas for the first time for interbike a few weeks ago. That was fun and I actually had money for gas on the way home--barely.
Last week I went down and crewed for Mark Hendershot at the Solo 24 MTB World Championships. He did AWESOME 4th place baby. That was an experience in itself.
Other than that I get my big cast off in one week and then get a small wrist cast for one more month. I have been jogging lately and it sucks. The best part of it is when I am done the sweat drips out of my cast slowly for the next 4 hours and it smells very pleasant.
Check out the latest ROAD mag. I hear there is a really good looking dude in some ad.

damn dog

out for 3 months

tour of ohio--check out the new white kits

Tour of Ohio is over. We did great. I got 8th Andy 9th and Abe 10th overall; Marco was 1st in Sprint Comp; A&F pb INFERNO is 1st Team.

More to come

chillin in Cbus

The annual tour of ohio is in progress right now and the a&f cycling team is in full throttle. The race is going great and it is awesome to be back in columbus. I am staying with my old roomate-teamate-friend nate z. Nate is a bike messenger in downtown columbus and decided to do the race as well. This is his first race of the year and he is doing great. He has this awesome apartment on the south side and it has been awesome staying here.
The race is good. Yesterday was a super tough circuit race where the field was whittled down to about 40 people (started with 80) The course consisted of continuous rollers followed by super tight turns--it was great. Andy A got in the second group and finished 7th GO ANDY. Abe, myself and apparently Jered all finished in the main group (15th-30ish) The team worked their butts off all day--I mean they worked so hard it was ridiculous and awesome. There are some really fast guys here, so I hope the team can pull out a top ten--that would be great.
Today we did the hardest race I have done all year--by far. 6 huge climbs within 60 miles, actually within 45 because the first 15 miles were flat. Our team had a wonderfully tactical race and EVERYONE contributed--it was great. Abe and Andy both ended up in the top ten and I finished 18th. I realized that i don't go up hill as fast as a lot of people. I was at the front of the race until the last climb, which is only 2 miles from the finish, but I couldn't do that last climb, it was aweful. I thought I might have to walk, but I made it in. Abe and Andy are both in a great position for good overall finishes so our focus is going to shift to them for the remainder of the race. Good stuff. Tommorow is a circuit race, friday is a time trial and saturday is the worlds hardest criterium. I think I have done three of those this year.

big win in louisville

The Abercrombie and Fitch racing team won a regional criterium this weekend. It was awesome. Rich Harper sprinted out of a 8 man breakaway for the win. It was a great race and the team raced awesome together--taking home 1600 in prize money. Thanks Texas Roadhouse (race sponsor) for the money.



I am in MI right now for a day and then off to the Nature Valley Grand Prix. I am super stoked to race because they have an overall amateur category--although there will be a lot of good amateurs there. So stay tuned and we will see how it goes.

Training camp #327

So trainging camp #327 starting on sunday and was supposed to continue until thursday came to a close on monday night. We (ryan gamm and I) did our weekly hour goal in two days--so we are done training for the week. On sunday afternoon we did the infamous triple hump which took 6 hours and then we ate, went straight to bed, got up and rode 8 hours and 45 minutes. Training camp is over, ryan went home and I am going to work. Actually Ryan found out last night that he had to work last night and tonight, so he left this morning--I am so sad now.
We did RIDE for 8 1/2 hours yesterday we were gone for 9 1/4. I was the most epic ride of my stay here in nc yet. We rode north to the blue ridge parkway (60 miles away) and then rode on the parkway north for 25 miles before turning right and heading home (another 60 miles) the ride totaled 240k with massive amount of climbing. We followed the ride up with grande burritos, grande dos equis, grande milkshakes, and a bunch of sleep. It was AWESOME. At the time, yesterday around the 6 hour marker when we stil have 60 miles to go I was questioning my intelligence and continued to question it until I was sleeping last night. This morning however LIFE IS GOOD. Mainly because I did that ride and I never have to do it again.

I'm bAaack

I am back at the library, back to this booger covered keyboard. The keyboard is black so you can't see all the dirty snot on it--what you don't know can't hurt you.

I know I haven't posted in a while, but I have been racing my bike all over the place and I don't have a laptop or internet acess when I am on the road--at least that is my excuse. So I will pick things up from where I left off which was in Louisiana.

I left Louisiana and went the the Tri-Peaks stage race which was back in Arkansas. It was a 3 day stage race with an opening day crit and two hilly road races. The crit was awesome, it started real fast and the field split in half, luckily I made the front half. I ended up sprinting and getting second in the field sprint, but at the time, I didn't realize there was a breakaway up the road, so I really thought I got second. Good thing I didn't win because I would have done a victory salute and that would have been a bit embarrissing.
The road races were fine, the last day ended on a 3 mile climb at 22% and I gave up within 100 meteres of starting the climb. I can't hang with those skinny little boys. So as a result, my overall placing wasn't too high--oh well.

After getting back from arkansas I was home for a few days and then left for a four day criterium bender. The first stop was raleigh nc which is an NRC crit and was at night. It started raining shortly into the race and then it started pouring. At one point there was at least 1 foot of standing water in a corner--no exageration. The field splintered and I was at the front of the race with only 21 people left in the field. With two laps to go two guys in front of me crashed and I hit the pavement ripping my bottle cage right off my bike and taking some very nice dedachi tubing with it. :( That bike was awesome and now it has a hole in it and there aren't anymore in that size. I am devastated, never has my bike fit me so well felt so good underneath me. Those days are over, I am afaid. I am not giving up, I have a tube of jb weld just waiting to solve the problem.
Anyway I got back on my bike and got 21st place. Still in the money, but had the potential to be a good result. Mad props to my teamate rich who got gapped off in a corner and rode 15 laps (miles) solo and didn't get lapped--now that is an accomplishment. He ended up 25th.

The next morning Rich Harper and myself left early and drove up to batlimore MD for stop #2, another crit called the BikeJam. We met Todd Shaker and Jeremy Grimm (both teamates) up there. I broke my cleat in half on the second lap. Luckily I wasn't pulling up hard on it so I didn't crash. There was neutral support at the race so I got a toeclip put on and took a free lap and ended up finishing in the field. We do get the team of the day award because I jammed on my brakes and took a bad line through a corner which resulted in me taking out my teamate Jeremy Grimm. SORRY GRIMM--Hope your ribs feel better soon. JK he is ok...I think.

After the race we drove to round #3 which was in Bound Brook NJ. This was the only stop that was Not NRC. I ended up getting a break and rich blocked like no one has blocked before--I am surprised he didn't get punched, but he took it for the team. I ended up getting pimped in the sprint so I got second. It is funny, you can race so perftectly all day, but if you screw up the last 10 seconds, you don't win. I'll take the second place.

Round #4 was the Tour of Sommerville which is a very big race. All the hitters were there. Rich got two primes, which is no small feat and all of us stayed in the field. I attacked on the last lap and got about 10 meters on the field, maybe it was feet, but ended up 28th, Rich also got in the money with 32nd. I love big money crits because the prize money for 28th place is still $240. Not bad for an hour of being packfill.
Mad props to Todd Shaker for finishing sommerville on his first try. That is no easy feat, especially when you can count on one hand the number of crits you have done in the last decade. Good job Todd.

I am home now for some much needed recovery time and then off to the Nature Valley Grand Prix in minnesota on June 15. Now that I am home, I should be able to update more regularly from this wonderful high tech library.

Congrats to Danielle Musto and Mark Hendershot for coming down to North Carolina and showing the rednecks how yankees race ultras. SWEET!!!!

Yes I got spanked in Arkansas

So I was really excited to do the Joe Martin Stage Race in AR last week--especially coming off a week of super fast crit racing, but unfortunately I got sick--real sick--and yes I did race which was stupid. I am finally starting to feel better, so hopefully Tripeaks this weekend will go better than last weekend. Oh yeah, even if I wasn't sick my chain still would have broken on the second stage and I still would have had to ride Sean's (teamate) 53cm bike 50 miles solo to the finish. That was not fun, but I wish someone had a picture of it because it must have looked hilarious. Anyway we will do better this next week. Hopefully Ryan Gamm won't break another fork and 2 more wheels which he managed to do on the first stage--he also had to borrow a bike and ride solo all the way to the finish. Hopefully Andy won't break his cleat on the last stage and have to pull out and not get a finishing time and therefore having to dnf the whole week. AHH the joy of stage racing.
I am in Lousiana right now which is very enjoyable. I am going out to get some VOODOO BARBECUE tonite...yum.
I leave on thursday to go back to AR for another stage race, this one will go better I hope.
Congrats to Danielle Musto and Mark Hendershot for winning their 12 hour races this past weekend. Maybe soon Mark will learn how to spell my last name properly because I have only known him for ten years now.

I like big bikes and I cannot lie

The World Series of Criterium Racing has officially come to a close. I escaped without a single scratch on me--I definately left a bunch of rubber on the pavement--but no skin. There were 6 races total with 10,000 in prizes each day. As a result there were 150 guys there every night. Oh yeah, the races were all 50 miles each...ouch. I held my own, I finished 19th, 23rd, 19th, 27th, 18th, and 15th which put me in 28th for the omnium and officially the highest ranked amateur. Holla.
Every single one of these races came down to a field sprint which means there is incredible amount of movement and swarming and elbow throwing while we would jockey for positions. It is probably the scariest thing in the world...it is usually scary at 28mph, but we were going close to 40 at the end of a lot of these stages. Someone ripped their shorts on my sti shifters--no joke--I didn't go down, I almost did. My bike is so stable, I think it would take a linebacker to tackle me to get me down--KNOCK ON WOOD. Seriously though, I got caught up, pushed over, chopped in corners, hit pedals, cornered off road in to a yard, and hopped curbs all at about 30mph and the bike just did what I wanted it to every time. Pretty Cool.
So I am now home for a couple days and then I take off to Arkansas for 2 seperate stage races and hopefully a trip to Louisiana in between.
The library is closing now, but I have some good stories coming up that I have to share. I should write a book about traveling with rich harper. it would be entertaining to say the least.

athens and roswell

The first two races of the 6 race "USA CRIT SERIES" were this weekend. Saturday was the infamous Athens Twilight Crit and Sunday was the historic Roswell Crit.

Athens is the craziest race in the world. It is awesome, 180 racers and about 5000 drunken fans surrounding the course. Intense would be an understatment, it is really an experience that can only be understood by watching the race and racing it is even more insane. The Abercrombie and Fitch team had 9 racers showing up to race. 8 of us hit the pavement (somehow I managed to avoid the crashes) We broke one bike, one wheel, and one wrist. Chad, the director extroidinare, broke his wrist and reid broke his frame and wheel.
The crashes were crazy I saw two of them right in front of me and both times I was first or second through them. The first one looked like someone caught their handlebars in the metal barriers at 40 mph and just flipped over. That one took out a good 30 or so people. I managed to sneak through barely and get back on the back of the pack. The second on was similar and again I was able to catch back on, that time I was the last person on and I was at the very back for the next couple laps.
Besides all the crashes the race was a typical NRC crit for me. I started at the back, tried my best to stay in the middle and out of trouble and then move up with about 5 laps to go. It worked all right and I snuck in for 19th place. It seems that I am always in the 15th to 25th positions in all the crits, no better and no worse. Athens is a great city and this event is the coolest on out there by far. There are so many people out watching and cheering it really makes you feel like a rock star.

Sundays race was the roswell crit which had at least two crashes as well. Reid got tore up again badly and broke his carbon handlebar, bennett crashed badly and someone told me he broke a rib and his arm but still finished....thats crazy.
Our team did well today and most of us ended up finishing towards the front. I tried to move up as best as I could, but started a bit late and managed a 23rd place. I would say that the whole weekend was a great success. These were the first national events for me and I was a bit apprehensive going in because sometimes these races can seem impossible to finish, but I felt good and it was a great confidence booster.

I have two days off to mend my aching legs before the series starts again on wednesday which kicks off the final four days in a row. Reid P and myself will be at all of them so hopefully things will go well. I hope reid doesn't run out of equipment.

I have new sunglasses and shoes--they are hot--thanks chad.

Athens Here We Come

I just got back from VA last night. The Tour of Shenandoah is awesome. The roads up there are probably nicer than Ashevilles I bet. The event is running very smoothly this year and the racers all seem in good spirits. The A&F team is doing great, Jered and Andy are in 31 and 32 which is weird because each day they have finished like 10 minutes apart.
Athens Twilight is this weekend and some Abercrombie boys are heading down here and tonight and then we will continue on tommorow to GA. Should be a good time. Twilight crits are the best if you can get fired up for them, and they are terrible if you don't feel like doing them. Luckily I am getting quite pumped up so hopefully it will be a good race. It will be a good race if I dont crash--that is always the first and most important goal. We shall see. Athens is followed by another NRC crit in Roswell GA on sunday. Stay tuned for a complete report on monday.

I know

I know I haven't been posting lately and this is quickly turning into one of those blogs that exist for a short time and then peter out. Anyhoo the reason I haven't been posting is because I have been having too much fun not dealing with the internet. Mark Hendershot was in town and we were busy making fun of each other for about three weeks. It was a great visit and he stopped by a race on the way home and won by a 1/2 hour.

I am on my way up to the tour of shenandoah to drive a support car for two of my teamates for a couple days and then it is off to Athens Twilight which kicks off the USA Crit series which I am doing as well. 6 crits at $10,000 a piece. Should be fun. I put a 55 tooth chainring on to help me out.

Happy Birthday to my bro Rich. He is now officially a master...well kind of--his is the big 30. Congrats.

Hopefully I can start posting on a regular basis, I just haven't had a chance to get to my wonderful library lately, but I should be able to get to it soon.
Enjoy the weather and daylight.

spring time

It is so nice down here right now, the leaves are all blooming and it is very green and colorful. I think spring is probably my favorite time of year, especially when the time changes.

My brother rich and his wife rachel came down for a few days last week. It was awesome. We rode bikes ate food and drank beer. Life is good down at the farm. I have been enjoying seeing my family and I appreciate them driving so far to come see me. I should have some pictures from their trip soon so stay tuned.

Mark Hendershot is here right now--hence the lack of updates--enough said about that. His wife roberta cooked us so much wonderful food it is awesome. We have been eating like kings, at least I have...I actually haven't seen mark eat yet...which is probably for the better because his full-figured behind keeps on getting dropped on the climbs.

Tonight is the first time trial at the lowes motor speedway. I guess it is a southern tradition because there are like 300 people registered. I am going to do it on a tandem with my teamate. Not any tandem though, this is a medium/small which means it is tiny. Moreover I am going to be in THE BACK!!!! So basically I am going to be spooning andy while I ride this time trial. It should be fun and I hope I get a picture with us because we have matching aero helmets and skinsuits...it should be a riot. We are going to try and set the course record so stay tuned.

Enjoy the spring!!!

race recap

Good stuff is going on down here in the SE. The A&F team was in full effect at the rock hill omnium. There were three events, the street sprints on fri night, crit on sat night, and rr on sunday morning.


The street sprints were a riot. 7 people in each heat, the winner would move on to the final and 2nd and 3rd place in each heat would go on to a last chance qualifyer. I got second in my heat and rich harper (rockstar teamate) won his. Jeremy (teamate) also got second so the two of us went on to the last chance qualifyer where jeremy gave me the leadouts of all leadouts. I ended up winning that heat and moving on to the final. In the final I led out rich and worked great but we got pimped by some guy who obviously trained specifically for this event--he was moving. So as a result rich was 2nd in the ominium and I was 4th.


The crit was intense. 120 starters and I as usual ended up lining up at the very back. It was a technical course, but a good course for a bigger guy, lot of high speed turns. I ended up getting in a break about 10 minutes in with Jed Schneider and Scottie Weiss and we rolled. We took turns and just kept on cranking, we didn't sprint for primes or try to mess with each other. We worked really hard together and at one point we were basically caught, but we kept on cranking never giving up. The teams that missed the break were driving the field and just blowing people out the back left and right. We kept on cranking and cranking and eventually we were out of sight again. On the last lap we started looking at each other. Scottie attacked and I waited for the others to chase, jed did for a little bit, then sat up. I jumped across to scottie and then attacked before the second to last corner and held on for the finish. It was by far the biggest win of my life. I was sooo happy afterwards. I even signed an autograph. Photos courtesy of Rock Hill Bicycle Club

The road race was a death march. To win the omnium, I just had to make sure that scottie and jed didn't win. I sat in most of the day and my teamates worked like dogs. They were awesome...they just buried themselves to keep things together. They rock. I ended up sprinting way too early and just finished with the field, but I still won the omnium. GOOD STUFF.

It sure is fun racing on my team, they are a bunch of characters and I couldn't ask for cooler people to race with.

So the b&b is open again this week. My brother and his wife are here as is the notorious mark hendershot so I am sure I will have a bunch of crazy stories in the next couple days.

I went motorpacing...southern style

My new bike is awesome, I built it up this morning without to much cussing and took it out on a ride. It handles awesome and it just seems to fit perfectly under me. It is so stable that I rode down pilot mt no handed eating a powerbar and talking on my cell phone. I wish I had a camera to take pictures of it--it is so hot!!

So I took it out on a ride, it is awesome here today; 70 and sunny with no wind. I went way north on rt 8 and then looped around through hanging rock and saurtown. I was about an hour and a half away from home going down this hill when this crusty old southerner passed me on a moped--not a scooter--but a moped--with no helmet on and drinking a 40. NO JOKE. A moped is a mini motorized bike that has the bike pedals on it. Anyway he passed me on the downhill and I was thinking it would be cool to pace off of him, but he was quite a bit ahead at this point. Well on the uphill, the thing got so bogged down that I was able to catch up, and at the top we were hauling. I must have drafted him for 30 minutes, it was awesome--it was a great workout, because I would have to kill it to keep up with him on the downhills, but the pace uphill was pretty cool. The only downside was that he was smoking the entire time--I mean the entire time. I guess you have to chain smoke because it is hard to light them while you are going 30 mph. I ended up sweeping from side to side and trying to anticipate the exhales so I would avoid them. I would have loved to get a picture of that. This old guy with no teeth drinking a 40, smoking, and driving this old piece of a moped, while I pace off him in my abercrombie kit. I'm not enitrely sure he even knew i was behind him. I was worried that he would look back and freak out, but he didn't. It was priceless.

My brother and sister-in law are coming down on sunday for a few days--that should be a ton of fun. They have this cool dog named oscar--he is a weimeriner (sp?) Anyway I am looking forward to the company. I have realized that I enjoy things more when there are people around. Mark Hendershot will be joining us as well so its going to be like spring break north carolina style....if only I had a hot tub.