022: seven days

I am seven days into my annual attempt at growing a beard. Out at OR there were tons of dudes with killer beards and I admit, I got beard envy. I also recognize that 21 days has typically been my limit for beard growth. I think monkey’s cut off is much shorter than that, and frankly she holds some leverage that is far more powerful than any beard envy. Let’s hope she doesn’t pull that card until at least 22 days…

Saw this on the internerd and wanted to share with Buddy and Rachael:

Ken has been hawking his race pretty aggressively. You can register here. I wish him the best, but also know that races grow organically, very few events draw huge crowds right out the gate, even if you throw a ton of money at them, even if you question the commitment of all the masters in the region.

Most promoters aren’t making money off of their cross races. We have never come close to breaking even on Granogue Cross. Monkey and I won’t make the race this weekend, the combination of Monk’s injury and our current financial situation dictate that we stay close to home. Good Luck to the crossers heading out there…

Did the smack-down ride last night, which should really be called the smack down of fatmarc’s ego. Super solid group last night. The super elite of our community were absent, but that didn’t mean there was a lack of firepower. Sure there were no cat 1’s, no Canadian Olympians, no skinny new cat 2’s and no disco dancers, but there was a tough group of solid, strong, smart, talented experienced rider there. Doyle and Jay Jay are the savviest of all. Sadly, I am not talented, smart, strong or very experienced so I got it handed to me pretty good last night. I can barely spell savvy.

At the core of the smack-down are 6 hard hills, not counting as much suffering as flat-landers like myself can try and dish out in between hills. I’ll admit that you’ll probably drop me on the hills, but I’m going to do my damnedest to make you suffer in between the hills. Meatloaf said 2 out of 3 and bad, I made it to the top of three and a half of the climbs with the group, the other 2 and a half, well not so much. I wasn’t even in the same damn zip code.

After being dislodged from the group half way up the final hill, I was kinda spinning in, when I saw Best in Show waiting for the autobus. I threw it in the big ring and started charging for him, until he turned around and started to bail with Dr. Collins. I pulled the plug on my chase and rode in with the Shark, Amy and President Ryan.

Best thing someone said to me tonight on the ride, “the word survival isn’t even in your vocabulary is it?” The best compliments come from CZ, always. I never expect them either.

You know, I know most of you will have no idea who any of the people I referenced above are, but I do. The names are changed to protect the innocent sort of. Still hope you can follow the story.

Got on the scale this morning and was south of 170 for the first time in 2009. I’ll admit I know this is less a product of smart eating, and hard work than the end result of chasing a bunch really fast guys over six stupid fucking hills and squeezing a ton of water out of my body. What do you want? I do come from a long line of wrestlers. Now to make it stick.

Wes, this is for you.

What can you do for $8 ? I don’t even want to know what a $8 BJ looks like.

Thanks for reading.

Respect
Fatmarc

“rule no. 6: don’t take yourself too seriously”

021: smoothie

pretty mellow week.

spent much of it in Salt Lake City for the Outdoor Retailer Show. It was awesome to see many of my friends that I rode with on the hybrid pedal tour. That was outstanding.

outside of making a couple of smoothies for some friends at the show I didn't do too much riding this week.
I did make it down the shop to help my brother with his recent bike fit issues. He tackles the Pan-Mass ride next weekend. While I was in there the large man was bouncing around as he got his first mountain bike and was clearly stoked.

His wife asked him," are you happy you have your new toy?"

The large man again bounding around the shop says, "yeah, this is awesome. I can't wait to be biking, I'm gonna ride all over the place, I'm gonna ride here, there, I'm gonna have fun" Then he turns and points squarely at me and announces," I'm gonna get skinny like that dude!"

I smiled broadly, and told him that I don't think I had ever been called skinny in my life. The shop boys all laughed, because of course they know I am fatmarc.

we'll see if I can't try and get out on a bike this week.

respect
fatmarc

“ it is true we are in the midst of a recession in the financial world, however we are seeing a renaissance of the human spirit.”

020: ronde van mulica

Jan, Monkey and I had a nice pasta dinner Saturday night. I had too many of these:
that lady on the bottle kinda reminds me of my grandmother in law.

Early Sunday morning Jan, Bilson and I headed out to the Ronde Van Mulica road race in south jersey.

When ever I go to jersey, I have a practice of greeting who ever is at the registration table with a joey tribiani style "how you doing?" You know when in Rome...

Today when I got to the table for the 35+ race, I was greeted by Rita, who before I could say a word dropped me with, "how you doing?" - fuck, I was out "how you doinged." Anyway, Rita told me she was Bob's wife, who I have been pretty friendly with for years, and that she enjoys the blog. That was nice. Rita said that Bob was surprised that I was doing a road race. Strange days indeed.

As Bilson and I got ready, he pointed out that our teammate LVG was in the men's pro 123 race. I comment that I was glad she wasn't doing our race. Rich looked at me strangely and asked why ? I commented, " I can't handle being the lead out train for her can you?" Jan pipped in, "I can't handle that pressure." We all laughed, and headed to the line.
the race went well. Jan and I were pretty aggressive the first few laps getting into a series of breaks that would last for a few minutes, or half a lap, only to be reeled back in. If nothing else I figured we helped to keep the pace of the race high. the race was a 5 lap 50 mile event. After 3 laps of trying to make something stick, the best of which had 8 of us with 30 seconds on the main field, but only 4 that wanted to work, I figured I better sit in and try to survive. (read stopping racing like a moron, no breaks were going to stick today.)

That 4th lap was really fast, and I hid out pretty well. I full expected the 5th and final lap would be the hardest. As we headed through the start finish Bilson rolled up along side me. "hey man what's going on?" he asked, I was kinda jammed up, and smiled at him. Rich was riding smart and chillin' in the pack for the first 4 laps. I think he had a cup of coffee and a bagel. He was totally relaxed, and fresh. The race was coming to a close, and he was coming to the front at the right time. Bilson is a 100x better road racer than Jan and I.

So as we come into the final straight, I figure I'm gonna sit up and roll in. I'm in the pack, and it's kinda sketchy back there and I get scared. So I decide that I'd be better off near the front. Just then I notice a couple guys from westwood moving to the front, I jump on their wheels and follow them into the top 20.

At about 1500 meters, one of the westwood fellows shifted left, I tried to steal his lead out wheel, he came back over and I was forced off the road. I was kinda pissed, as I spun in the dirt, clearly my mistake, and to make matters worse, I decided to bunny hop back on to the road and into the pack. Miraculously I made it. Clearly this wasn't safe, and I put the pack in jeopardy with both of these moves. But I pulled it off. Fate favors the bold. Must have been the the rogue ale, I was feeling bold for sure.
Just inside 1000 meters to the line I was running in about 15th. I had expected the entire road to open up for the sprint, but it didn't as our harley riding escorts kept up in the lane. Jan with Bilson and tow came by and signaled for me to get on the wheel for the lead out. Just as I was about to hook up with the Charm City Express, another brother jumped on Bilson's wheel. I thought I was screwed, but as I looked up I saw an opening, and I started sprinting.

Two, Three guys in front of me raised their hands indicating that their leadout was done and they were rolling in, I slipped past them and surged for the line. Frankly the finish came up quicker than I thought, and I admit as I counted the fellows rolling in front of me : one, two, three, four, five- SWEET I got 6th! I was pretty stoked and really surprised. Jan and Rich and I grouped up and full of smiles talked about the fun race.

To my surprise I got a nice envelop with some green stuff in it for my efforts, which I happily split with my teammates, and we called it a day.



I haven't done a road race in a very long time, I will admit that was a fun race.

respect
fatmarc

"what's Klingon for I'm going to die a virgin?"

019: math geeks

So sometime last year a discovered a new part of the game which I have grown to love. Time Trialing.

I mean, I don’t love it the way I love cross, but there is something special about time trialing, I like to think of it as cycling’s dorky little math nerd brother.

Cycling is largely a game numbers. Weight to power ratios, heart rate zones, power outputs. At it’s purest form time trialing is simply how much power can you put down for a given distance, for a given time.

The beauty of this game is that is gives you a stake in the ground, it gives you solid baseline and a comparison of where you are fitness wise. Take for instance the cape may TT I did in 2008. 10 miles 17:45. A year later, I’ve been working on my positioning, and TT efforts, and I did the exact same course in pretty much same condition in 16:30. Sweet.

The other beauty of the numbers is that it gives you an immediate gauge of where you stack up in the world. The numbers they don’t lie. 40k in sub hour, is good. It's a standard for the working class joe. But let's take a look at the master’s national championship results for this year. That race was a 25k time trial. Go with me here, My 59:59 equals about 20k in 30 minutes; I would have had 5 more km to finish up. Feldman did 29:43 for 25k. Ouch. Let’s make it even worse Cancellera in the 45k worlds race in 2007, did it in 55:41. I suck. The numbers don’t lie…

If cyclocross is bike racing in it’s purest form, in my opinion, TTing is the farthest from that, if not for pinning on, or gluing on a number I might not call it racing at all. Rarely when I do a TT I rarely get nervous like I do for a cross race or team mtb race. It’s all empirical, you go out and ride by yourself and suffer in solitude. You push yourself as hard as you can, there is no soft pedal or as far as I can tell too much tactical in a tt. You go out put down your best effort. At the end of the day, yeah they rank the times, but often my goal regarding time is set before the race, and I find myself satisfied regardless of how I ended up ranked, if the time fell where I wanted…

I will admit, the culture at a time trial is nothing like a cross race. As a spectator it’s like watching paint dry. The racers range from guys who would never dream of entering a mass start event, to the beautiful minds...

I imagine these guys being the guys that look at a page of numbers and see a pattern, That can read binary code just looking at it. Geeky, but wicked fast...

I’m not busting these guys, they are freakin’ amazing; truth is I wish I could be one of them, on some level I always admired math guys, the super smart, but me, I ain’t that bright, liberal arts major, and my math classes were really low level. Y=mx+b was as far as I got.

Nope, it’s not cross, it’s probably the farthest thing from cross, but it’s the truth, it’s a lot of suffering crammed into a short space, and man I kinda dig it.

This my attempt at buying speed. Not a part on the bike less than 7 years old. wheels have both been raced in cross; cross bikes weigh less, but i do love this sick monster.

pizza and beer were good tonight.

respect.
fatmarc

"For sure I’m going to get arsy at some riders, because, you know, I’m an asshole," said Cavendish. "But it’s irrelevant their nationality, and irrelevant what they look like, or where they come from. Because, like I said, I’m an asshole"

018: fifty seven minutes and twenty one seconds

Went to the Iron Hill Twilight Crit Saturday night. Lots of fun.

C3-Athletes Serving Athletes was tinkering with the idea of a white skinsuit for the coming cross season.
They asked me to model one.

Needless to say the idea has been suspended indefinitely.

Hunter (Amy and peaches' boy) won his class. (SWEET)

Chappy and Sanford:


Sanford, Liz, Rotten and Nancy:

I hung out with these hooligans most of the night:



the 3/4 race through corner one:



I love me some Shitpanski.

look it's Ali and Rich Bilson:

the start of lap 2 of the pro race.



okay I admit it, I'm a closet Myerson fan. Say what you want, he helped shape cross in the US, he took that on, he didn't sit back and bitch about things, he took action. That and every time he posts on facebook I get to say to my wife, "No He didn't!!!"

poor new cat 2 Kid Chris is heckled by the hooligans.



Monkey makes some new friends:



If anyone ever doubted that Kelly was the man, you better recognize.

After a very fun Saturday evening, I left the house at 4:30am, and headed out to Carlisle, PA for a 40k TT (that's 25 miles for those scoring at home). The course out there is good for me, it has little rollers that a bigger guy like myself can build up some momentum. The course is out and back, with the out having a slight overall rise to it, and the back having a slight decline. It's really kinda flat, but the little rollers add up. I hoped to drill it going out, and use my mass and my momentum to rock a good time coming back. What I didn't account for was the headwind that was waiting for me on after the turn around. I had some bleak spots in the return 20k. I swear I was pretty much dead on the bike for the final 5k. DEEEP IN THE PAIN CAVE. REALLY DEEP.

Alas, I held on for dear life put up a 57:21, :22 seconds faster than my time last year, and I was the fastest of the 6 cat 4's that were there. I only point that out as it was also this time last year that I was 6th of the 6 cat4s that showed up for a TT over in jersey.

So it was a good day, I have that going for me. I'm pretty pleased with that time. Last year at Church Creek, stone flat one loop TT) I did a 59:10. Curious what I can do there?

thanks for reading.

respect
fm
"You have to wonder at times what you're doing out there. Over the years, I've given myself a thousand reasons to keep riding, but it always comes back to where it started. It comes down to self-satisfaction and a sense of achievement. "

017: black or white...

Jan Blanc

Jan Noir

Nachos

New pillow
everybody should have a crazy dog for a pillow.

very legal e-town and pmp.
Mellow world lately. 40k TT for me this weekend, should be a good test, and a chance for me to see how things are coming along. The winds are calling to me, the cross countdown has begun.

Been working hard in the lab, but have much to do still.

Rode with Diane and Breyla-la around the fairhill course last weekend.


Saw fireworks too. But then again I live in Cecil County, there's fireworks every Friday here.

Monkey's Cat 5 tattoo- on her arm.

don't ask. It's surely my fault.

Been spending a lot of time looking at Kevin's slide shows, the pictures are great, but the music over the pictures... too freakin' good. 100x better than the prime time tour coverage. Craig Hummer and Bobke, who I used to like can both suck it.

Maybe more interesting stuff soon.

Respect
Fm

"it's always the dreamers who push the envelope, develop the new paradigms. Go big or go home."

016: clutch

Like everyone who probably raced at Marysville last week, I find myself with some poison ivy on the tops of my feet. Like those dawgs needed to be any uglier.

All I can think is that between laps I was wearing my flip flops which were no protection against the evil three leafed weed. Hopefully I can get it dried up before it get all silly itchy.

Rotten Robert wrote a post this week that I wished I wrote. I feel like I need to comment on it, as one of the things that has kept me engaged in racing my bike for almost 18 years or so, is that for all that time, and sometimes, all that time being agonizingly bad, each season I feel like I have learned something, I have developed, I have gotten better.

I like that cycling isn't something that you can't learn overnight, that you may be talented, but raw talent can is not always the deciding factor in a race. I love that cycling has it's local heroes, and Jedi . Over the years I have cherished hearing stories about local riders that came before me, and the more experienced riders passing that info down to me. I would not be the rider I am without the wisdom, and sometimes lumps passed down to me over the years. Names like Todd Forrest, Cass Ramirez, Nancy Wadell, John Guetner, Dennis Smith, Mark Wise,Mark Epstein, Andrew Mein, Nick Riddle, Fuzzy, Tom McDaniel, Rick Mihills, Terry Blanch, Doug Mills, Katie Compton. All folks who took time to impart wisdom, and sometimes lumps that helped me be a better cyclist. Frankly, I still listen with unabated attention when these folks talk about riding and racing. Yes, even Todd.

A couple years ago I had the opportunity to ride for the Fort Factory team. I was a B rider on an elite team. Although that experience was far different from what I expected, it was a season that I would and will cherish as an opportunity to learn from our region's best riders. That was the first year Wes won the elite MAC. He really began to come into his own that year, and watching him work through that was awesome. Perhaps even more beneficial to me was the chance to follow around Yozell, Fergie and Gunnar Shogren. Getting to pit for Yozell was and is a duty of honor. He takes his racing seriously, and expects his pit crew to be on point. Ferg and Mike prepare for cross as I imagine artisans of our craft have for decades. They approach it with a reverence, and dedication, never losing sight of the fact that it is a love. Gunnar was just insane, and watching that madness roll and develop was amazing. After taking 3rd at nationals that year he said to me," that was a good year, I wasn't sure it was going to go that way but it kept getting better and I was getting stronger as the season went on" Currently my team situation is pretty great. We are a mix of young talent, and some pretty awesome sage wisdom. I am lucky to partake of that fountain and I'm happy from time to time to offer a nugget of information that maybe helpful. I won't even get started on the wealth of information that I can tap into with Mayhew. He looks at ever opportunity as chance to learn, and in turn be able to teach.

like I said, Rotten Robert wrote this great post, that I wish I wrote.

pictures from last weekend via Don Pagano.

respect.
fatmarc
"the ability to persevere is often the difference between success and failure."