029: twelve hours of cranky monkey

This weekend I completed the 12 hours of Cranky Monkey Bike Race at Quantico Marine base with teamed with Dan Tille and Chris Mayhew. Hard, but fun day. I suffered a lot. I felt like I suffered well. Luckily, I had great teammates to keep me on track.

• I last did this race in 2007. We took second in the coed class. Course is hard. Terrain is tough there, steep quick climbs. No place to rest.

• A couple of folks commented that they thought the course was easier then back in '07. They are wrong.

• the heat was a big story, after my first lap, my I pretty much felt light headed all day. Not a good thing. Luckily, the legs felt good.

• We raced in the 3 man open class, falling just one year short of qualifying for the 105+ masters group. Class was DEEP with talent, really good riders. Congrats to DCMTB teams , who dominated taking 1st and 2nd both with 13 laps. Evan Ellicot posted the fastest lap, on a single speed, at 47 and some change... A team from Newark (go Rich Willey!) took 3rd, and the USMC team took fourth, crushing my hopes and dreams on my final lap. Welcome to our house. we are going to kick your ass now...
  

• 25ish teams in our class, we battled between 7th and 4th all day long. On the final lap I took off just 15 seconds from fourth. I attacked hard and at mile 3 had made contact. I tried a not really smart pass involving some slower lapped traffic, and placed my nuts on the stem at high velocity. I didn't hit the deck, but kinda blew it. 4th would end up taking 3 minutes out of me in the final 6 miles. That one will sting in the morning. I just didn't have it in me. Don't worry my nuts are fine, my ego a little more bruised.

• We set up a sweet compound with Blakey and Travis. Travis was badder than Arnold Swartzenagger in the terminator. Blasting out 9 laps, and having time for a 10th , but not needing to do it to, Travis won the 35+ solo class. Blake meanwhile steadily drove home a 10th place finish.

• Did I mention it was really hot out there?

• This is Dan's wife and daughter. Dan is teaching her the ways of the force. She told me what Jawas say. She also enjoyed her first gummy worm ever, courtesy of me... Another youth turned to the darkside...
  

• according to the Garmin my laps were 51:34;54:02;58:25; 57:05... I like the negative split for the 4th lap. That's always a good sign; either that or I really blew it on the 3rd lap...
  
  
  

• Monkey of course was there and laid down the law at the compound, telling us what and when to eat, when to get to transition, and in general being the benevolent dictator that all endurance relay teams need to be successful in these events.

• At the end of the day, I was pleased with our ride, I felt good, but the heat hurt me. No excuses because frankly everyone had to deal with it. We got to walk up to the box and get a sweet pint glass for our efforts. Who else makes manpris and a long sleeve jersey look this good on the hottest day of the year?
• Thanks to my great teammates Chris Mayhew and Dan Tille, who both rode like bawlers. Mayhew had the hot laps for the team, and locked up our trip the the box with a smoking 4th lap. I was lucky to get to race with them, and would look forward to doing it again.

• These guys all love manpris:

• Thanks to Monkey for the support, thanks to Travis and Blake for being such solid compound mates. Travis pictured here:
  

• Thanks to NCVC lead by Erik Lever for heckling the crap out me all day.
• As she has been know to do, Diane kinda adopted the dog next door: cash was his name .

• Diane and I got home a little after midnight Saturday night. After greeting Riley and Layla, my first move was to apply a couple layers of Boudreuax's butt paste. It was getting a little raw in the deep darkness that is my under carriage; don't worry everything is cool now.
  

Thanks for reading...

respect
fatmarc

028: like a glove

Last night Monkey and I snuck off to one of our favorite crossy spots to ride. Although we were on our mountainbikes, we both had interval workouts to do, and as we bombed around the spot that we lovingly call, "the fatcave" we were giddy thinking about cross.

This was Monk's first "workout" since recovering from her injury. It went well.

I was playing mental games with myself all week. Not having raced since April, looking at the cranky monkey this weekend I have been a ball a nerves all week. I sneeze, and equate that with "I must be coming down with a cold..." I feel every pang, every tightness in the legs, and wonder if my legs are right. Getting out and opening it up, chasing Monkey around the "fatcave" and it's all gone now. I felt great. It was awesome.

I've been hard on training partners over the years. Buddy, Peaches and I kinda chased each other out of mountainbike racing. After a couple of years of being my number one training partner, E-town went back to law school. Jan had a couple of years, and now he's back on the west coast. Seriously, I think it must be my deodorant or something.

But Monkey, monkey has always been there. In recent years, as we have both focused in on cross, she's been my best partner. No offence to anyone above, but chasing her around the course, is always the most fun. Even on a hard interval day. (sorry Etown, you have a nice ass, but Monk's is much better...)

After last night's ride, I felt pretty peaceful. It was great training with Diane. Things were very good. The efforts went well for me. Any nervousness that I may have had, has past. Gonna be a fun weekend for sure.

thanks for reading.

respect

fm

027: Monkey's Luscious Melons

I know what you are are thinking, two posts in two days?
What the frig man, is this facebook or the Fatmarc Vanderbacon blog?
Clearly not facebook, if for no other reason than fatmarc vanderbacon blog, doesn't offer you an option to "like" our posts.

Diane made a kick ass peach and blueberry cobbler this weekend.
after our ride today, we each had a handsome helping.

Monkey, " you know, we can't sustain ourselves on peach cobbler alone, we should make something with some sustenance."

Me: "speak for yourself, I'm going to have more cobbler!"

Spent the past two days realizing that I am not a very good mountain biker anymore. Two places that I clearly remember riding well, and consistently, the brandywine rock gardens and Wiss, both kicked my ass this weekend. I feel like an old man yearning for my glory days, but clearly I remember clearing those sections on my rigid single speed. With that memory, I successfully botched, dabbed, crashed, slid, skidded out, an generally failed to clean sections.

Now, Saturday after watching l-web clean the rock gardens on her first try, I did successfully make it, on my 4th try. The guys we were with didn't believe me when I said she was a better technical rider than me. Thanks to Dusty, Joel and John for a great ride Saturday.
Sunday, Monkey and headed up to Casa De Rock, and over to the Wiss to bomb around with a very fun crew of folks. I appreciate everyone's patience with me, as I am not so great in the rocky stuff anymore... Brilliant day lots of fun. Thanks to Kelly and Anne for being great tour guides...
Next weekend, I'll pin a number on for the first time since the Baker's Dozen. I'm competing on a three man team at the Cranky Monkey with Mayhew and Tille. I'm also excited to get another crack at the Quantico course. The last time I raced here was back in 2005, and though we did finish on the podium, I was in a death spiral, and my legs never felt good the entire day. I'm going in this year with much fresher legs, and I'm pretty excited to see if I can improve upon my last performance. Couple that with the fact that I think our class is pretty stacked, there should be some good racing... Lets just hope there aren't too many rock gardens... Ugh.
more about Quantico later... I have an entire week to stress about about that...

but first perhaps I'll run off to the fridge for another helping of this awesome peach cobbler:
thanks for reading.

respect
fatmarc

ps: yeah I know I'm missing the Weekend on the Farm. Considering I did 3 mtb races last year and 2 of them were at the farm, I need a little variety here. I'll miss Kuhn, I'll get back there... I promise...

026: okay that's a little odd

So Friday night I found myself standing in Victoria's Secret shopping for underwear with my wife, and LWeb, talking on the phone with Mike Kuhn.
weird huh?

maybe this giraffe is even more weird.

maybe not.

riding Wiss tomorrow with the Queen of Rock.

Details to follow. Or not.

thanks for reading.

respect
fatmarc vanderbacon

025: rolling with the unholy rouleur

Jim kinda nailed it (again)

"I'm more sad about it than angry when somebody with a doping conviction shows up at my race; I don't bear any malice but it's a rider whose results I can't fully exult in thanks to what they did to themselves and their peers in the past. I forgive, but don't see how a promoter or a fellow racer could ever forget."

this makes me feel better:



I'm not a nike guy. (see last weeks post) but this ad gives me goosebumps.
I'm a sucker for the verve.


thanks for reading.
respect
fatmarc

024: it puts the lotion in the basket

I sure as hell hope the my epitaph isn't "good husband, decent cyclist, wrote angry emails..."

I'm sure I got it from my father. He taught me that we all have a voice and the ability to impact change. He taught me if you care about something, you have to help foster it, and give back to it.

you're probably saying,"WTF did fatmarc go and do now?"

I got some news last weekend that upset me, added to recent years of frustration, I voiced my opinion. Well, you could just go here and read it.

All I am saying is that we need to have a little freakin' diversity.
Maybe one of these days, I'll just get asked to leave. "thank you Mr. Vanderbacon, your ass can go home now." UGH.

Our camera is still totally dead. New one is in transit. More crappy photos from my phone.

two great rides this weekend. Monkey hosted the sturdy girls Saturday as we have 16 people, 13 of which were ladies, come out for a three hour tour of fairhill. It was one of the most enjoyable rides I have ever done. Anne Rock, has a little more on her blog.

Sunday was a day spent chasing Buddy, Jay Jay, Benny the Jewlar and Leo around fairhill. Buddy picked a fun loop, but man I think we climbed the entire day. Fun was had by all.

Photo Blog;

You mean to tell me Baltimore, MD (murder city USA) can have a street festival with out any Chaos,

But Newark Night has three of these? And yes, I can't believe she caught all of that on tape.
tape!? how old are you? Do you even really know what tape is?


Can you really have too much Rock? Me? too much Anne Rock is never enough.


Sweet Johnny can't get enough of the chocolate covered bananas.

After 20+ years of riding, I have to admit, if I'm gonna be redlined, hanging on for dear life starring at some one's butt, I'd sure as hell rather stare a these butt's.

this guy is really sick of AT&T dropping his calls...


thanks for reading.

respect.
fatmarc

023: join me and we can rule the universe

That's right two passions, okay obsessions, of my youth have joined forces.

Star Wars

and

Adidas


pictured here are my over 20 year old Adidas wrestling shoes. Although I haven't wrestled a match in almost 20 years, I haven't coached a wrestling team in over 15 years, and I have no plans to ever coach again, I will not EVER let these shoes go.
look closely here at the tongues on these:
yup that says made in WEST GERMANY.

a couple of days ago I saw this:



and since then I have been on a mad quest for these:
It fucking says skywalker on the side of the shoe!!!

or these:
low top storm troopers, with shell tops!!!

everywhere I go, every website: SOLD OUT.

fucking fan boys.


they'd probably never take the bastards out of the packaging.

UGH!

anyway, I rode my bike tonight. I did efforts. They were hard. My legs felt better after my ride than before. More efforts in the morning. I like to ride my bicycle.

thanks for reading.

I'm going to fall asleep with visions of orange high tops in my head.

respect.
fatmarc vanderbacon
supernerd.

022: hanging out in the streets

So this is the California Taco dude.
So Saturday afternoon, I'm standing in "Newark night" with my wife, my brother and his kids. This young woman, somewhat buxom, a little rough looking, but still not horrible on the eyes, comes up to the California taco Dude, and well begins to molest him.

it started with her, shimming back to him and shaking her ass, giving him a little lap dance.

My brother poked me, " are you seeing this?"

Diane spoke up, "oh my god..."
Next she spun around wrapping her left leg around his torso and flinging her head back smiling at her friends...

"as you videoing this?" my brother asked.

"fuck, my camera is broken. I got nothing, this is hilarious!" I replied.

Finally, the young woman, all the while being photoed by her friends, spun back around dropped to her knees, and thrust her face into California Taco Dude's Crotch.
we lost it laughing out loud.

As Breyla-la, Heidi and Tab came back to our little group, my brother suggested that we follow these girls, "i just have a feeling where ever they are going is going to be where the show will be..."

Aside from the molestation of California Taco Dude, the night was much more family oriented, and we had a great time. My niece and nephew even got a little face time with Lord Vader.
Sunday Monkey and I loaded up the cross bikes and headed out to Philly to enjoy the big bike race. We were lucky enough to have Ann Rock as our tour guide as we rode around the city to check out the different vantage points. We cheered for friends in the race, cheered for drivers in the race, and enjoyed the Morgan's bbq. In addition to Anne we were accompanied most of the day by Naomi, Steve, M, Nishat and Dave. We wrapped up the day at lemon hill. It was awesome.
Coolest thing I saw all day: So this jelly belly kid took a big flyer and was on a solo break most of the day. Of course the peloton caught him as the race was wrapping up. He was hurting, and had the final 3 trips over lemon hill in a small groupetto off the main pack. One of the Jacques Mayne boys, pushed him over the top. Total classy move. that was cool to see.

As I mentioned before, our camera is broken, so most of these pictures are stolen from facebook, the internerd or my phone. Anthony got the nice shot of Rock, Monk and I.

Our camera has been on a slow path to death since getting caught in a pocket of water at Gloucester last year...

great weekend

thanks for reading.

respect.
fatmarc

021: tired

Coming in to this week, the legs felt good, riding well. Feeling great. Mentally on point. 4 park ride last weekend was super fun.

Original Plan was to race Ironhill. Why not, I feel good, got good form, know the course well, why not?

Then Anne Rock came along with a better offer. That's right, I sold my soul for Anne Rock and Roll.

I went a little harder than I thought I would this week. Proceeded to get dropped on the peoples ride last night. Mentally tired; just not into it. blah. Blair and Wilson are sick fast. I am not.

here's some skateboarding:




I'll be at Ironhill 9:00am Saturday to set up the course if your interested in helping drop me a line...

thanks for reading.

respect
fatmarc