unofficially approved by the entire country of mexico

why am i sucking so bad on the bike lately? today i raced a C crit...C CRIT...and was totally wasted at the end. so much so that i couldn't bring myself to race B directly afterwards. and the C race was only 20 laps (10 miles). granted i was on the front for practically the whole time and won a few primes, but i still expected to have plenty of juice left to do B's. i was making such great progress from september to april until i broke my collarbone. and now that i am healed enough to ride/race i can't seem to get out of this 'lack of motivation' funk. im sure some of it has to do with the results or lack thereof that i have been getting. and the inconsistency of my training. but honestly, am i ever going to get back to where i was headed in early april? seems like it is all cyclical. by that i mean that poor results get me bummed about riding so i dont make the extra effort to ride as much, yada yada yada.

i just hope that i will have some resemblance of fitness for toona so at least i can work for one of the guys on the team. chasing breaks and closing gaps etc. if nothing else that will help me get in shape relatively quickly. or i will just get dusted. either way, it will be far from where i had hoped to be at this point. cest la vie. i should probably just stop bitchin and get out and ride, eh?

grainer would be happy to know that i have become a full fledged supporter of paolo bettini over the course of the past couple years. so needless to say, i am rediculously stoked that he won the italian national championships a few days ago. i hope that his new italia kit will look similar to his older one, pictured here, because it looks freakin sweet. or even better possibly? what a stud.

quick-step is my ultimate dream team. they are primarily classics racers and sprinters. they race in belgium (sweet nectar of the gods). they have great cohesiveness while at the same time holding onto so many phenomenal racers and world/national champions. boonen, pozatto, bettini, nuyens, tosatto, juan miguel garate. epic. this year they have won overall or stages in milan-san remo, the tour of quatar, kuurne-bruxelles-kuurne, paris-nice, tirreno adriatico, the tour of flanders, the giro, and the tour de suisse. those are some heavy races for sure.

racing for them and wearing the united states national champion jersey/kit. two huuuge dreams of mine. until then, i just need to ride. straight up.

guess what comes on hbo in the month of july? thats right, the 40 year old virgin. are you as excited as i am? man what a hilarious movie. come on over, we'll watch together.

dream big. he who lives without dreaming, accomplishes nothing.

you do the dancing, ill make the jokes

family visiting + hanging out with fellow trainees + riding my commuter home at 3 in the morning = a pretty good summation of the past several days. oh, and $118 for a round-trip mini-vacation to philly sunday through wednesday? thank you southwest.com! ive also had a chance to get out a little bit more and meet people. nothing like a little social awkwardness from yours truly to make for some great introductions. random jmuers at the fresh fish and meat market, an art exhibit owner promoting a nude painting exhibition in a couple weeks, and friends of co-workers serve as a slice of life i am slowly being enlightened to. what can i say, i am a people person.

today was also my first distribution of the official stava business card. ok, ok. it was to my state farm insurance agent when he asked for my work address. but that still counts, right? and i even let him keep it!

i might do the c crit tomorrow, just to get my lazy butt into gear again. it half depends on the shermanator and if he is going to actually come into pittsburgh this time. the other half is just on my motivation and whether or not i can beat traffic on the way home. i swear, i am so hot and cold when it comes to motivation for riding my bike. such little things will make me incredibly disinterested in training. and then it only seems to take the tiniest spark to get me rolling again. like when i recently ordered these three t-shirts online (and no, i am not going to tell you where from)...

speaking of, i still need to get frames for my two new bike posters. one is a vintage french scene with bikes leaning against some cafe in front of eiffel's tower. the other is the famous shot of andy hampsten going over the gavia pass in the giro d'italia in '88. he still is the only american to have ever won the giro. quite amazing, especially if you see the poster of him riding through the snow solo. instances like that seem to get me motivated pretty quickly. inspirational athletic heroes who overcome extreme odds to show their inner gut and strength.

its a shame so many athletes are becoming tainted by performance enhancing drugs and such. im not saying i think my heroes are on epo or viagra or whatever. i am more bummed by the shadow dopers casts on the entire sport and the athletes i look up to. side note: i have never liked lance a whole lot, other than the fact that he would stick it to the europeans who didn't respect american cyclists back in, oh 1998-2001. i mean athletes more along the lines of chris horner, tom boonen, paolo bettini, jakob and blatecky (you know they are juicin), even somebody like alan webb. this is by no means limited to cyclists. its just such a drag. but i guess that is up for their pr managers to fix, eh?

this weekend is looking like its going to be quite glorious. while i can't boast of rediculous romps through the streets with zee germans, i will be doing my fair share of romping across the state of pennsylvania. friday is looking like it might be another tailgating and pirates game evening. you should come if you are in town. saturday will most likely be my testing for the new cycling coach. 10 mile tt down at the oval. sunday i fly out to the city of brotherly love and iverson spottings to celebrate the history of our country with the liberty bell itself. challenge erin's grandparents to a slip-n-slide contest, see who can eat the most white hot dogs (whatever the hell those are), and check out the fireworks serve to be just a few of my outrageous activities until wednesday when i fly back to pitt and thus to work. but it will only be a 2.5 day work week, which will be absolutely sensational (if you haven't noticed, i am not so good at thinking up interesting words. you should talk to my boy zack, he is like a walking sat test).

im out like a pregnant woman's bellybutton (i only say that because there are sooo many pg women at work. like you wouldn't believe).

comedian you should check out - ted alexandro

attack of the anthrocon

so i was in the middle of a fabulous weekend spend with erin here in the iron city, spending our morning walking through the strip district fresh markets and down to state point park, when lo and behold we see a person walking with a tail. walking around like he was just another stranger on the street. after each of us recovered from the wiplash of our double-takes, we began to see more and more people walking around downtown with tails. blue tails, striped tails, polka dotted tails...it felt like we were stuck in dr. seuss' "go dog go". and these were not your run-of-the-mill tail-people you see every day. another of their common attribues seemed to be wearing knee-high doc martens and dark makeup, while carrying around a stuffed animal of some sort that matched their tails. so after walking through the convention center where these anthrocons were assembling, we quickly drifted away to enjoy the beauties of downtown on a clear skied saturday.

the rest of our weekend was spent tailgating the pirates game and seeing the breathtaking fireworks show after the game from our seats. we were sitting so high that i thought the fireworks might have actually been below us, but it was a great time nonetheless. we went on the incline, went out for dinner, and did some shopping out at robinson where i also showed her...bum bum bummmmmmmm.....my office. well, i really didnt show her inside, bc i forgot my access key, but i showed her the building.

the week has been quite uneventful otherwise...i have come down with a little throat bug so that has kept me off the bike since i raced last wednesday and got 7th in the B crit.

well the family is here and i am going to show them around town a little for the next couple days. cheers

steel in a nutshell

here is my take on this lovely town they call the steel city...

• its quarterback is retarded for not wearing a helmet on his crotch rocket. at least now he has a new friend in kanye who can give him advice about eating through a straw. him and my paizano malibu
• the people are incredibly nice, with the exception of the loonies you see from time to time with so many hospitals in the area
• the drivers are very mellow. this fact seems to bother many of my colleagues, but personally, i don't really mind. it seems like everybody basically knows the roads and traffic patterns pretty darn well, which is impressive b/c the town has such complex roads. i dig it
• there is nowhere to ride in town except the oval, unless you want to drive outside of town for a few minutes. which i have no interest in doing
• traveling over the bridges is beautiful no matter what the time, weather, or rush. namely, driving home from work and coming out of the fort pitt tunnel to dive straight over the monongahela into downtown is the best part of my day. gorgeous

don't bring that kool-aid to no gym
party!

- scott van pelt

flava flave!!!

well its not quite the surreal life, more like cribs. here are some pics of my apartment. bear in mind these pictures were taken the day after moving in so things were still quite catastrophic...















bedroom facing the small lot in the back of the apartment















other view in the bedroom

kitchen/living room. desperately in need of some furniture

time to go ride and test out this new hrm. might have a couple guys from the team crashing here mid-week to race and hang out before they leave for an ohio stage race. then on friday the beautiful erin comes for the weekend. this should be a great week.

good eats and comfortable seats

last night was a blast when a bunch of the trainees got together out in oakland. it was a great way to kick off my first night on the town in pittsburgh. i rode the old commuter bike to meet everyone down there, a mere mile and a half from my apartment.

the first bar the 10+ of us decided to invade was this place called boomerang's. coindicentally enough, the only boomerang in the entire bar was the tiny one above a doorframe in the farthest back corner of the establishment. dollar yuengling's was the highlight of boomerang's, as was losing my v-card to a touch-screen game called photo match or something. it was outstanding. the computer displays two images side by side, seemingly the exact same, and you need to find 5 differences between the pictures. zack and his gf leigh broke me in and later paul came over to help out.

after a couple rounds of photo match, everyone convened over by the electronic dartboard for some competitive kricket games. 2v2. lots of fun. kind of makes me want to get a dartboard for my apartment...probably not the best idea.

then we made the long trip nextdoor to another bar called hemmingway's for $1.50 coronas. hilarity ensued when dan started to take pictures and paul was throwin his gangsta signs. pimpin aint easy. just ask paul.

and to cap off the evening, andy decided to tell me shortly before everyone split that people get mugged sometimes downtown. specifically telling me his sole mugging story of when he only had 2 bucks in his wallet and was even with a couple friends when four homies took their money one night. so i did what any other skinny white boy with a bike would do after a half dozen yuengling's in him, i rode home as fast as humanly possible.

time to go figure out how i am going to handle these overdraft fees. thats right. plural. i am that retarded. gd.

living on ramen for the week.

downgrade

this evening i raced at cat c crit downtown. it was really a great feeling to be in the mix again, and an easy confidence booster to be able to sprint well for primes and the finish. while my legs felt like garbage, i was able to pull together a 2nd, 1st, and 2nd in the 3 primes and was also able to move up about 30 places in the outside lane, in the wind, over the course of the final half mile lap to come away with 7th in the final sprint. lapse in thinking, i thought we had a lot more laps and decided to catch a rest for a lap in the back of the group when in fact we had a lap and a half left. whoops. but man some of those dudes were suuuuper squirly, bobing and weaving and weaving and weaving and bobing. seriously cutting across the entire road about 3 times looking for an opening. i. d. i. o. t. s.

if i can come up with some clean cycling laundry by tomorrow evening i am planning on making it to race the b crit. i dont imagine my legs will be too horrible as today's crit wasn't more than 18 miles. and everybody has been saying that the b crits aren't really that much faster, just more tactical. and less sketchy. riding banked turns around a track is a trip, especially when you are riding 3 across. your velocity through the turn as well as gravity can combine to create some fishy situations. but i dont think anybody went down. and surprisingly not many guys dropped from the start.

today at work i set up my good ol 401kizzay. it will be really nice having money put away without me even thinking about it. i am the kind of person who needs that in order to really save some serious money. and its a good thing i am starting it right away, because it is pretty scary when you figure that people my age will need at least $1 million to retire on and live moderately as well as retiring age being pushed out to about 85 or 90 by the time i get to that point. wowsers. that is a drag.

time to take care of some more chores around the apartment. until next time crimestoppers...

be shady

move - successful. welcome to shadyside.

i have arrived. i would appologize for the chasms between blogs the past few weeks, but i was simply been having too much fun hanging out with everyone in harrisonburg and getting my life in order to move up to pennsylvania. but now that i am up here and situated (with bitchin' digital cable for internet and tv) i intend to jump back on the writing bandwagon on a more consistent basis.

if the past 2 days have been any indication of how life is going to be here, i am really excited. the town is so incredibly diverse. with the dozens of different districts in/around the city, there are literally hundreds of different posh places to check out on a daily basis if one had time. i am really excited to get the social network rolling and explore some more. i have done my fair share of exploring already, what with cruising on my bike around town when it hasn't been raining (whick would be oh, about 5 hours on friday), driving out to north park to go on an epic bike ride with some of the nhv crew, and driving out to robinson to shop till i drop. i am getting comfortable with the streets and directions.

the apartment was way better than i expected as well. i thought that my bedroom faced the main street (negley) but it turns out that it faces the "backyard" or as its more commonly known, the resident parking lot. but back to the apartment itself...its huge. my bedroom is enormous. i went out and bought a giant desk from ikea, i have a bookshelf, a big bay window nook, a dresser, and an electric fireplace, my bigass bed...and i still have a ton of extra floor space. the other room is the kitchen/living room. i am in desperate need of some furniture in there, but it will fill up quickly as it is about half the size of my bedroom. the two are connected through a giant doorway with two swinging doors. i was going to take pictures tonight to put online but its dark and i am lazy/tired. look for those in the future.

now the negatives about the apartment. don't worry, there aren't many.

• there is no ac
• there is no microwave
• i dont have cutting knives or furniture
• 6 or my 8 windows don't have blinds or drapes of any sort, thus dangerously limiting my ability to walk around naked
• if somebody wanted to break into my apartment, it wouldn't be very difficult...IF i left my windows unlocked. don't get any ideas.

thats about it. i've got a pretty sweet set-up going on, i suggest you visit. and its going to keep getting better as i get more comfortable with ideas for layout and earn money starting on monday. 11 months of training is quite a long time, but i am looking forward to it. to rub in the really sweet parts about my neighborhood...i live in a really old victorian house converted to apartments, surrounded by hundreds of other victorian apartments in a big old-school suburb. i am about 4 blocks away from a whole foods. 1 block from a giant-eagle (grocery store). next door to eckerd (which also has a few groceries). 2 miles from the washington blvd oval crit (which is super fast and fun. im stoked to race it on wednesday). and about 4.5 miles from pnc park and heinz field. living in a big city is a trip, definitely something you can't really prepare for if you have never done it before, which i have not.

i am pooped from my ride with the guys today. we toasted a fast 60 mile ride with some really steep climbs north of town. i thought harrisonburg had some nasty climbing, but up here the climbs seem a lot more undulating and steep. total elevation changes over the course of the same distance ride in pittsburgh compared to harrisonburg seem to be at least 2:1 (ie if i did a 40 miles ride in harrisonburg and wound up doing 2,500 ft of climbing, that same 40 miles in pittsburgh would give me 5,000 ft of climbing). it would be interesting to find some sort of research data that would prove me right, any takers? but the guys i rode with were great company, and could really move. they dropped the gimp on several occasions, but it was a good fall to reality after getting a little over-confident riding around again in harrisonburg. whoop i can't wait to race again!! still need to convince keegan to visit next week to possibly race the crit with me. alien, if you are reading this, let me know if you are coming. ive got a comfy air-mattress.

i also need to get a hold of the bus schedule. i think it may be free? but i could be wrong. definitely worth finding out. maybe i will explore by bus tomorrow afternoon, head out to the strip district and downtown or squirrel hill. or go back down by pitt (spectacular buildings) and cmu (a vintage and beautiful campus). there is so much to do and see, and i have only struck the tip of the iceberg. i am incredibly excited.

lets get this road on the show...