THE JERSEY has arrived

I became a fan of Slipstream Chipotle last year when I saw them in the 2007 Tour of California. I'm even more of a fan now. They are doing great things for cycling's reputation and they have some very talented riders. You can see Steven Cozza (mustache man) sporting the kit below in the 2008 Tour of California.

I decided to wait on getting their unusual (orange and blue argyle) kit until the new version came out this year. It turned out to be a slightly painful and comical wait. I received an email notification from Teamcyclist.com in early March that said the Slipstream kits would be available to ship on March 11th.

I didn't place my order and I'm glad I didn't. Upon each successive trip back to the website the expected ship date had moved a couple of days to the right. March 11 became March 16 then 19, 23, 31, then April 4, 5....26! You've got to be kidding me! The expected ship date went from March 11 to April 26 in 2 and 3 day increments for about a month and a half. Isn't there a better way to do this? I thought this was insanity.

Pearl Izumi, the Slipstream clothing outfitter wasn't much better. I couldn't find one mention of their sponsorship of Slipstream anywhere on their website, not one word. You would think they would be proud to represent one of the top U.S. teams and a transparently clean team at that. Now the only thing Pearl Izumi has on their website is a little tab with the title "shop Slipstream." I'm not a web designer, but with today's technology, it seems their website needs some improvement.

Enough complaining...on to the good stuff. The bib shorts aren't available yet, but the jersey and socks are...

UPS came yesterday and it felt like Christmas! I thought it was fitting that the jersey came yesterday since at the end of yesterday's stage at the Tour of Georgia Slipstream was position 1, 2 and 3 in the GC overall. 1. Trent Lowe (there little 135 lb Australian climber), 2. Dave Zabriskie (TT specialist, U.S. TT champ and all arounder) and 3. Christian Van de Velde (all arounder as well as a great TT rider). Tom Danielson, their other pure climber is coming back in to form and is 17 seconds off the GC coming into today's decisive stage that finishes on Brasstown Bald! Levi will be really tough to beat and he's only 4 seconds off of GC.


This first glimpse of the orange and blue.


The jersey and socks.


The socks in the longer style that is popular now. I'm just looking forward to an awesome tan line. Cezanne loves quirky socks and she honestly wants a pair of these.


And the jersey is on! This is a medium and it's actually a good fit. Standing up it is a little tight, but in the bike position, it's actually not as form fitting and there is extra material in the chest and stomach area. It's tough to get something to be absolutely perfect. I don't own any Assos cycling clothing, but apparently they've mastered the "it doesn't fit correctly standing up" but "it perfectly melds to you when in the riding position."

So, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. Unfortunately I don't have my road bike, it is with Trek and they are working on my "crash replacement" issue since I've got a nice score in my top tube. I can guarantee I'm not wearing this jersey on my townie. I'll have to think about getting my mountain bike back operational. They only problem is that I'll need a new seat post, new rear tire and tube, new pedals, and new mountain biking shoes. That can easily be upwards of $500. We'll see.

Trip to Monterey

I have to try to "one up" JW with that pic he posted of the cute puppy. Puppy always trumps full grown dogs in cuteness, but I love these 2.

Cezanne and I made our way up to Monterey a couple of weeks ago. I had to go up there for a 5 day Human Resources Officer course at the Naval Postgraduate School. We went up early and spent Saturday and Sunday enjoying Monterey. It was a little warmer than usual, so it was absolutely beautiful. As usual, we had some great food and did a little bike riding and hiking.

We chose a little less extreme hike and walked around Point Lobos Park, just south of Carmel. It was beautiful.




We caught a glimpse of a lot of seals and a few sea otters. This guy was rolling up to shore.



There were a lot of "neat" little areas along the trail that I tried to capture with a photo, but it just doesn't seem to do it justice.



Another one of those neat areas...


Looks like spring in Pacific Grove! We had a really nice ride. We didn't go as far as we did when we were on our honeymoon, but it was fun. We got some great views of the coast, the pink coast. Cezanne won the King of the Mountains and the Sprinters jersey. She's a wizard on the bike! :)

Ahhh...the good stuff. We had a great little picnic on the grass overlooking the coast. We picked up some prepared foods from Whole Foods since it was easy and we brought a 1/2 bottle of one of our favorite wines. From left to right: Our reading materials, Oprah's Magazine for me and Velonews (cycling magazine) for Cezanne. Mango, ciabatta bread and cheese, mixed olives, mixed berries, water bottles (tried to keep our wine in the shade), and our wine in their perfect cup holders, my shoes.

It was a great trip as usual. Cezanne and I are working towards retiring in Carmel. I heard property is dirt cheap there.

An interesting week

My highschool buddy Mike came down from Los Angeles a few weekends ago to do some hiking. We decided to pick out something rigorous, so we decided on an 11-mile round trip hike to the peak of El Cajon (pronounced kahon for you non-Californians) Mountain. The weather was perfect, in the mid to high 60s. You can see the peak in the background to the left in the below pic.

There were big boulders all along the hike and the last 1/2 mile of the hike was on a pseudo trail that entailed a lot of bouldering.

A pic on the way down.

The hike was tough. I would have gladly done a 50-mile bike ride than do that hike. What made the hike extra special was what we found when we got back down to my 4Runner: a busted window and missing power tools!

What are you going to do? Note to self: Don't leave a "Ryobi" bag visible in your back seat. The jerks didn't take anything else, just the bag with my circular saw and drill in it. Now I can't do as much manly stuff, like sawing and drilling stuff just for the fun of it. They didn't even steal my REI gift card which was in plain sight. They also didn't take the pots and pans I had in there. Are you getting the picture that the 4Runner is (was) being used as a little storage unit? Well, all that stuff was "on it's way" to my real storage unit given the 450sq feet of condo space and the 2 adults and 2 > 60 lb. dogs that make it their home. Good thing is we didn't leave anything else (iPod, wallet, phone, etc.) in the car when we went on the hike.

The lot that we parked in was specifically for the Open Space Preserve and it was right near a busy road. The thieves probably know that people park there and then don't come back for 5-7 hours. The window was fixed 2 days later. The glass company comes out to your house! It took less than 20 minutes.

And the icing on the cake for the week was a little snafu I had with my bike. At my typical turn-around point in my "during the week" ride I was off using the public restroom when behind me I heard my bike come crashing down. Nice... Funny thing is that I've placed the bike in that exact position over 100 times before in the past 2 years. There's some missing paint and I nice scratch/gouge through the "M" in the "Madone. Thanks to JW for the suggestion on the crash replacement program through Trek. I'll probably get the chance to bring it in this Thursday.

Why I'll never be a professional cyclist

Besides the whole not blessed with top tier endurance sport genes, lack of tunnel-visioned drive and focus on being a professional cyclist, lack of time to dedicate 4-7 hours a day to riding...

These are the other, more important & pertinent reasons why I'll never be a professional cyclist:

1. 4cm of handlebar spacers. I'm working on getting it down because this is decidedly not pro.

Cancellara is slightly more "pro" in this respect: http://www.cyclingnews.com/road/2007/tour07/tech/probike.php?id=/photos/2007/tech/probikes/tour_cancellara_csc_cervelo/Fabian_Cancellaras_Team_CSC_Cervelo_SLC-SL_anatomic_bar


2. Once you wear #594 in a charity ride, you're not allowed to go pro. A weird rule, but a rule nonetheless.


3. Who ever heard of a Greek professional cyclist?


4. These little bird legs can hardly walk me to my car let alone power me up a hill or a sprint to the town limit sign.


Yikes, this last shot is probably one of the most unflattering shots I've seen, but hey, that's what you get for being a recreational cyclist, and not a pro. Pay no attention to the 1.5 lb weights under the dresser, that's the limit of what I can press and curl.

Finally...Amgen Tour of California (ATOC) Prologue 2008

I think I started drafting this blog entry over a month ago...  But, never got around to finishing it.  I guess I've been busy being lame.

On Sunday February 17th, we traveled from San Francisco down to Palo Alto to see the Prologue (opening time trial) of the ATOC.  We had it all planned out before we left San Diego: Saturday, take the BART from the airport and use our feet and taxis to get around.  Sunday, take the 10am CALTRAIN to Palo Alto and a later train back to San Francisco.  Monday, rent a car to head north to see Stage 1.  

The first mission on Sunday was to find the "Blue Bottle Cafe."  I read about this place on the internet.  The title of the article was "A $17,000 cup of coffee."  This cafe bought a siphon machine from Japan, which is supposedly one of the purest ways to brew a cup of coffee (it brews a single batch) and extracts the truest flavors of the beans.  

We set out on foot once again from our hotel to 66 Mint St. in San Fran.  We found the Blue Bottle Cafe, but not because it had any signs outside!

We promptly went inside to weigh our options.  I decided on a "siphon" cup of coffee for $10.  I made sure to ask the cashier about putting cream and sugar in this coffee.  Not recommended and frowned upon.  That wasn't the exact response, but we got the hint.  I figure it's kind of like going to Mortons or Ruth Chris Steakhouse and asking for A1; it's a no-no.  

This is how they made the coffee.

The hot water is sucked up into the cylinder with the coffee and then somehow (magic and trickery of course) it comes back down into the sphere.  

It makes enough for 2 cups.  Yummy!  To be honest, this was not my favorite cup of coffee.   I've got to go back to my old stand-by, Peets.  My love affair with Peets started when I lived in Monterey when I had a cup that my stats professor was offering after our final exam.  Love at first sip.  I started out on the Italian Blend, went to Major Dickason's for the longest time, now I'm back and forth between Major and Arabian Mocha-Java.  It's what I look forward to every morning.

The schedule worked out to perfection.  We hoofed it pretty quickly to the train station and got in with about 3 minutes to spare.  Once we got to Palo Alto the mission was to just check things out.  This wasn't like the Tour de France where you have to get in one spot and stay there for hours to save your place.  So we wondered around and saw some of the team buses and riders warming up.  I really wanted to see the Slipstream-Chipotle guys.  Cezanne is still on the fence about me getting and wearing their kit.  Anyway, the just got picked up for the Tour de France, so that is huge for them.  Below is Christina Van de Velde from the U.S.  He and Dave Zabriskie transferred to Slipstream-Chipotle from CSC.  

David Millar below, from Scotland.  He's transferred from Saunier-Duval (spelling?).  These guys need to lose some weight!  

One of the guys warming up on the Prologue course.  It was really short, 2.1 miles I think.

The start times.  This is such an exciting picture, it doesn't get any better than this! :)

Dave Zabriskie warming up below.  I can't tell if he's on an airline flight or warming up for a time trial.  He's changing his iPod tunes (from Whitney to Celine I'm sure) and just took off his light blocking/airline sleeping eye cover which you can see in the picture.

Dave warming up and mustache man (Steven Cozza) in the background.  Cozza's TT suit was a little insane, as I'm sure most of them are.  It was really see-through from what we could see and we could mainly see the buttock area.  Dave did not have that issue.  I guess his American Time Trial champ kit is a little thicker.  How do these guys sit on the tip of the saddle like that?  Maybe because they get paid to.

Cezanne and I with Thomas Voeckler.  I forget if it was the 2004 or 2005 Tour de France where he wore the yellow jersey.  He was really nice.  He just rolled up on his bike, sat there by himself, and watched the riders come by one by one.  I asked him if he was going to be in yellow this year and he said he tries every time.

Fabian Cancellara tearing up the Prologue below.  This guy is an absolute beast.  He's been incredible so far this year and I think is the guy to beat at Paris-Roubaix.  He one buy a large margin for such a short course.  He crushed the TdF Prologue last year.  He almost caught up to the motorcycles around one of the turns.

And Fabian one the Prologue and after Levi rode we hoped on the train back to San Francisco.  Me listening to my tunes, switching from Whitney to Celine of course.  I sometimes pretend my nano is a phone and Cezanne hates it.  Maybe because I bug her about getting an iPhone.

My Favorite Tour of California picture

He used to be known to me only as "mustache man."  I will now refer to him as Steven Cozza. 

Saturday Fun Day

Cezanne and I had a fun day on Saturday.  

The schedule went a little something like this: 1) Chris goes on bike ride/Cezanne goes to the gym and gets her nails done, 2) we try out lunch at a place we've never eaten before, 3) a visit to the Scripps Aquarium, 4) chair massages at "So Relax," 5) we get mochas at Chuao Chocolate Cafe, 6) we watch the Notebook.  The only thing that would have made the day better would be to add in a hike, a Dave Matthews concert, and watching the Notebook 3 more times.  The last part was a joke. 

Everything was a success except for the massage for me.  Holy geez, my upper back is really sore.  I've had about 5 massages my entire life and I never wanted any of them to be over, until this one came along.  It was painful, it was excruciating.  I don't think I'm a wimp, but this was insane.  Not that there's anything wrong with it, but they don't speak english that well, so I didn't try to let him know what he was doing was killing.  That's my fault though.

Anyway, my upper back is sore to the touch today (the slightest touch).  I'm pretty sure that's not what I was looking for.

Got to snap a picture of the "Giant Squid."

The infamous sea cucumber.

The view of La Jolla Cove from the aquarium.  It was actually really windy on Saturday.  Last night we heard thunder for the first time in a LONG time.  I think I've only heard thunder once or twice in my 2.5 years in San Diego.  It was strong/loud enough to set off a bunch of car alarms at 3am.