Shattered.

Today is the first race of the 2009 season, Fontana Ca. The pro men have 5 laps to do. I had a good starting position and solid first lap, I was in the top 20 and comfortable. 200m after the feed zone, going onto the 2nd lap I somehow wrapped my rear derailer around my cassette and shattered it. I knew as soon as I looked at it that there was nothing that I could do and since I was past the tech zone I was not able to just go backwards to the pit zone. I would of had to walk/run the full lap to get it fixed. I was done. Only 24 min into it and I was done. I stood there completely bazzled at what had happened. I am not one to let these things get to me, but sometimes it just sucks. I now have three weeks until the Sea Otter and I am planning on getting some solid training in while in Tucson.

News From California.

US CUP #1 Fontana Ca. The course is similar to last year, with a bit of a different twist on it. In my opinion it is much more fun than the course that we raced on last year. It is a bit shorter, tighter and steeper so it will be a more spectator friendly race course. Fred and I arrived here Wednesday evening at around 8pm, we were going to be picked up by Emily and Adam when we landed, only they had a slight delay because Adam's bike was late arriving in Tucson, no big deal we(I) grabbed a few hours of shut eye waiting in the airport for our ride. We made it to the hotel by midnight and to bed by 1am, which with the time change felt more like 4am, and that is almost the same time that I would be getting up to start training through the winter. All in all an uneventful trip here.

Back to the bike, so this course is great, almost un-relentless climbing or descending and that is the way a mtb race should be. Hard. The heat here is not that bad, mid twenties with cool nights. I really like the way the bike rides, it is like day and night compared to last years Top Fuel. I found it to be one of the most balanced rides ever, and that was after 2.5hrs of solid off-roading. I can hardly wait until I get to see what it races like. Well time to go get some good old "Truck Stop" java. Mmmmm Java.

Snow Mountain Biking !!!

I got to ride my new Trek Top Fuel 9.9ssl today! It was a bit cold out this morning when I started my ride, but with the sun shinning it quickly warmed up. I felt great, maybe it was me or maybe it was the fact that I was on a new ride! I was planning to just stick to the road, but with a nice frozen snow pack on the sledding trails it was way to tempting to giver a go. It was amazing! the trails were perfect and hard packed, natural berms, whoops and jumps made it feel like I was riding a world class trail. Now the bike, it was fast, as soon as you pedal it you just want to go! Smooth, light and responsive. I can hardly wait to Fontana this weekend. It weights in just under 22lbs ready to go, cages, bar ends etc. all included. Happy trails!

A sprinkle and dash!

Training is going well, race reports will be coming next weekend. It has been a beautiful march for riding and just being outside. I am really finding it hard to believe that racing is here already! Anyways below is a little Tim's rant. Enjoy.

Coffee, Tim Hortons, Roll up the rim. How many of us have increased our coffee consumption in hopes of winning something, anything, and have only found a "Please Play Again" under the coffee cup rim we were so eager to roll up. I have, I played time and time again. I have tried it early in the morning and late at night. I have had coffee in all different sizes from small to XL. All I have won to date is another bloody coffee. I really wonder how much there sales increase with this silly game? It is not even that great of a coffee. And the best part is that half of the time they somehow mess up my order! Half of One milk, one sugar. Sounds simple enough, but never seems that way. Holly crap someone doesn't want the world famous "double double". Ya who in their right mind doesn't want a half cup of cream and half cup of sugar,? Why even bother eating breakfast? I guess some skip it for a good ol' "double double". Back to my half of one milk one sugar, which half of the time has ended up being everything from a cup that was half full of coffee and half full of milk to a coffee that had so much cream in it I thought I was drinking warm triple churn coffee flavoured ice cream. Anyways so I have come to the conclusion that I now have to ask for not " half of one milk one sugar" but a simple sprinkle of sugar and a dash of milk. Hopefully this may seem easier.


-- Post From My iPhone

Here's a mouthfull!

Posted form my phone so pease ingnor selling mstakes and gramer ( me fail English that's impossible). Pppfffff. No seriously.

Over the last month there has been quite a bit going on with me. I have learned how to sail, pretty cool. I snorkeled for the first time, in water that you can actually see things! And as a bonus you don't come out and have to peel any leeches off of you. So I guess I will start with my trip to the BVI, duh. It was as good as anyone could imagine and then some. I had 15 amazing days with a highlight or two on each day. The weather was solid for the most part, some people complained about the two days of rain that we had in the middle portion of the trip. Coming from -30 and going to +30 who cares if we get a couple wee rain showers.

Now my biggest worry to me was, how am I supposed to train? I am coming from 16-18 hr weeks and going to be on a boat for 15 days. I had no clue of what to expect. To my surprise, the training situation worked out quite well, 2 hrs a day was what I needed to maintain the fitness level that I had worked so hard for all winter. I did not want all of those 5 am mornings to be for nothing. Don't get me wrong here I knew that I was going to have a wicked time, it is just that if my training were for pure fun, I would not be worried with what I got in and didn't get in. This is business. I have to not just be a fit person, I need to be a fast cyclist.

Our days (meg and mine) consisted of waking at sun up, going for a kick ass run/ hike, usually around 1.5-2hrs. Returning to the boat, pulling anchor, and setting sail (or starting the motor) and hitting the high seas. No more than 2 hrs at sea and we would be arriving at our next destination for the night. Usually by 2pm. We would then go snorkelling and proceed to open the bar (a cooler) for happy Arrrr. Ok maybe a exageration, 3pm the cooler opened. We had some sick days under the sea.! Sea turtles, eagle rays, 1 manta ray, some serious barracuda, tarpon and all sorts of other crazzy shit to try and touch. No seriously it was like we were in the imax 3d theater and it was starring us! I am so hooked on snorkelling. The sailing may take a couple more times on the sea to break me in. Knowbody got sick (excet of each other) but if you have never sailed before, when the sail touches the water because you are tipped so far sideways, and when you have no clue how much it takes to tip the boat over it makes it a wee bit nervy.


As for the land adventures, running, hiking, sun tanning boob watching (another story) . Straight up, the running was world class. Half road half trail and each day seemed to best the previous. Needles to say I arrived home (itching to get on the bike) with no fitness lost and one reguvinated mind. I went from no running, I had been riding indoor and xc skiing all winter, to 245km of running in two weeks. I have some blisters and kinks but the payoff was well worth it. We were able to experience all the BVI had to offer. We drank rum like the pirates did, ok ocasionally we had beer, and painkillers but none the less we drank a boat load of booze (pun intended). Props goes out to the captain and crew( me included), I was the dingy captain and in charge of getting the up most imortant provision, The Ice!