Trainer Party Pics

THE DAY'S REWARD

Turkey Day

Not much to report right now, ready to eat lots of food tomorrow, and bike at some point too, maybe. Basically just ready to eat lots for sure. Bought some Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale and Point's St. Benedicts Winter Ale, will drink that as well. Yum.

Um, Is It Spring Yet?

How about that little snowfall we had yesterday, I've never seen .20 inches of snow cause so much trouble as it did last night. My drive home took 60 minutes, it's normally 15. I passed 3 accidents and countless cars that couldn't get up a 3% grade because it was too slippery. Luckily the 4WD Xterra had no problem going up hills, unfortunately I had trouble going down them though as no amount of 4WD was stopping anyone heading downhill. I had to lay on my horn once so that the guy in front of me knew I wasn't stopping as I was sliding downhill towards him. He took off just in time as I finally slid to a stop right where he had been. Way too much fun for me, can't say I want to do that anytime again soon.
Anyways, if you've read my previous posts the last week or so you've seen that my body is constantly adapting to my position fixes and screwing itself up as fast as I can fix it. I thought I had the problem resolved with some stretching and position changes but my body quickly figured out how to circumvent my fixes and get itself all screwed up again. I rode about 3 times in my new position and it felt pretty good, but not great, at least I wasn't rubbing the seatpost for the most part. I took two days off the bike and when I got back on this past weekend my leg was rubbing again. I never took the bike off the trainer, didn't move it, no changes at all. So how could it work fine one day, then a couple days later I was back to rubbing on the seatpost? Well, who knows I guess, that's what I've been having trouble explaining. It seems every time I think I'm good, things go wrong again a short time later. So, this weekend after trying to ride multiple times I finally did some more position changes and got pretty close to square on the bike again. I will be back to hittin' the trainer again tonight and we'll see how I feel. I'm hoping as long as I keep up my stretching and concentrate on what my body is trying to do, that I can overcome whatever structural issues come up again. Basically it's back to square one again, I've kind of been on and off the bike a bit the last couple of weeks so it's time to try to get on a regular program and make sure I stick to it as long as I have no issues. Normally I'd be doing more hours on the bike and things like Muscle Tension intervals and FastPedals, and Tempo work already, but for now I'll just be concentrating on riding and working on my form for the next month or two. I was off quite a bit this summer so it's back to the basics. I don't feel the need to catch up to everyone because I'm not really looking to race heavily like I was hoping to this past year, I may do 3-5 races next year, I don't really see myself being able to do much more than that since I probably won't start until the 3rd or 4th race of the year. I'm going to do probably the two important ones just for fun, the State RR and the State Crit and then not really sure what else, it's all up in the air. So anyways, that's the tentative plan, and of course I can tell you with 100% certainty that it will change, that's how things usually go.

Status Quo

Well, not much has been going on since Monday, it's been pretty status quo. This is the time of the year where the training gets pretty monotonous, the weather gets crappy and there isn't much to talk about. There are no road rides to describe during the week since I'm always in my basement, the view is always the same. The weather has been crap all week, basically a constant drizzle, mid 40s, typical November weather. I've been in the weight room twice this week and doing the weight workouts feels really good, no complaints from the muscles. I was a little sore the first day and after that I've felt really good every time I've lifted. I'll be doing a few more weeks of lighter weight, high reps and then I'll move up to a higher weight, medium number of reps, and then finally I'll do power work later in the winter. It's good to have Dave up in the weight room with me, I get to talk bike stuff the whole time and it's great motivation to get my butt up there, some days I might have just gone home if it was just me. Hopefully having me there gives him the same motivation, from our conversations I'm pretty sure it does.
As far as riding goes, I'll be riding tonight and tomorrow and both days this weekend as well, although riding inside or outside is yet to be determined. Temps in the mid-30s and a slight chance of snow and rain are in the forecast, seems riding outside is doable at this point. I'll decide tomorrow though and plan my routes out appropriately tomorrow night to get the most out of routes that are a bit sheltered from the cold and wind. I'm thinking this weather will keep most people out of a park by my house that has some trails so some mountain biking might be in order for fun.
I know I have to do a beer review tonight or tomorrow, it's been too long, I'll be drinking a beer tonight so I'll have something to throw on the blog for your reading pleasure, or to bore you even more. Either way. Well, that's it for now, until next time......

1+1+1=3

You're looking at the title and probably thinking, wow Brian, you are really smart, you can add. Uh-huh, I'm practically a genius. Actually the numbers refer to how I had to break down my training this weekend so as not to die from trainer-induced boredom. I decided I just couldn't ride on the trainer for more than an hour at a time yet for a couple reasons, one is that it's really boring, and two is that I needed to get some things done during the day this weekend. I had to split my workouts to be able to get in a full 3 hours yet accomplish some yard work and house work as well and the best way to do that was to ride once in the morning, once in the afternoon, and then once again at night. I did One-Legged pedaling in the morning, mainly for the benefit of my weaker left leg which is part of the cause of some of the biomechanical issues I've been having. I basically did a 15 minute warm up and then did 5 minutes on, and 5 minutes off for the remainder of the ride. In the afternoon I did Muscle Tension intervals, for these my reps increase to 10 minutes on and then 10 off with only a 5 minute warmup. I did these in the 53x13 at about 55 rpm and really concentrated on pulling through the whole pedal stroke, it was definitely a good workout. My night ride was a nice recovery type ride just to clean out the legs from the two workouts earlier in the day and to burn a few calories that I desperately need to get rid of.
The rides felt pretty good actually and mainly because I did a couple things to help out the issues I've been having. One is that I changed my position on the bike to something that opens my hip angle a bit more and put one more Lemond Wedge in my left shoe, and two is that I've been very diligent in doing my stretching and yoga. The stretching has been a huge help, my hamstrings, hip flexors, and back muscles were super tight and I've cranked the heck out of them in the last week. The yoga then helps strengthen my core and helps with some added flexibility. I've noticed the difference on the bike and have significantly improved the clearance on my left leg from the seatpost, I can actually ride without rubbing my shorts against the post now. I'll definitely be keeping up the routine of 30-45 minutes of stretching and 30 minutes of yoga every night for the foreseeable future, it doesn't take a lot of time and the benefits are well worth it. If it prevents me from going crazy on the bike, then why not. So, that means that I'll be back on the trainer for this week after taking last week off the bike to get back on the straight and narrow (literally). The weather is getting worse but like I said in my previous post, if it's not raining or snowing hard then I'll be out on the weekends. Eventually when the bad times come (that would mean snow), then I'll get back out and do some snowshoeing which I had a lot of fun doing last winter. That's it for the training stuff for now....
......Not much else going on, I did some bathroom work this weekend as well. Basically I'm re-doing the walls in our half bath because the previous owner had so many patches and paint splatters and some crazy popcorn type paint on one wall that they needed to just be completely re-done. I've got one more wall to go but that one is going to be tough, it's the wall with the sink, built in cabinet and the toilet, so it won't be easy to work around. After I'm done I'll re-paint it all, put in new molding, and it will look brand new.
I also finally replenished my beer stock this weekend with a Sam Adams Winter Variety pack which includes the standard Boston Lager, and also the Winter Lager, Cranberry Lambic, the Holiday Porter, the Cream Stout, and the Fezziwig Ale. All of them are good beers and now that I have something to review I'll put up a couple of reviews this week.
That's it for now, until next time........

Slow Burn

Slow burn, that's what it feels like to do yoga and the deep stretching that I did last night. It's not like a sprint on the bike or intervals where all of a sudden your legs and lungs burn, it's a deep, slow ache as the muscles stretch, and during yoga as I move in to the different positions. I really needed to get back on track with my core work and stretching as I've been neglecting that of late. I'm taking a few days off the bike while I repeat some of my physical therapy exercises that I was doing back in the beginning of the year. I need to stretch out my hip flexors, my hamstrings, and strengthen my core a lot more. I was pretty loose in the Spring after PT but have since tightened up again and I feel it when I'm on the trainer since my bike has no lateral movement. On the road I can compensate for my tightness by leaning my bike, sorta like I'm riding in a major crosswind, my bike is angled relative to the road. I can't compensate for that on the trainer so it's difficult to ride comfortably. Soooo, back to basics with the stretching and then I can get back on the bike hopefully tomorrow or Saturday once I feel a little better about the tightness I'm having. Tonight I'll be doing the same thing as yesterday, about an hour of stretching, and then 30-45 minutes of yoga. The yoga helped to relax me as well last night and I think I slept better than I have in a while.
This weekend looks like crap right now so we'll see what the plans are after I check the forecast again tomorrow night. I worked on the Pinarello last night to get that ready in case I feel like riding a bit in the rain on the road, and I'll get the SS ready tomorrow in case I feel like riding on some trails near my house. I could care less about the colder temps, I'll ride down in to the 20s, but I don't want to ride if it's pouring and I could get wet AND cold, that's a recipe for sickness for me. We'll see how much it's going to rain and then go from there, either it will be a decent weekend in the cold outdoors or if it rains too much then I'll swap between the rollers and trainer depending on how my muscles feel. Either way tomorrow will be weights as well after work, doing all lower body stuff, lots of reps with lighter weight.
I know I haven't posted a beer review in a while, I'm actually out of beer right now so I need to make a run this weekend, especially if it's cold. I'll be inside and will be working on the house, so might as well have a beer or six. ....or more. Anyways, that's it for now, until next time.......

More Beer, Less Biking

That is what's in the works. I'm going to put my off-season trainer riding on hold for now until I figure out my asymmetry issue that has plagued me since I started riding again in 2006. I still can't ride the bike without rubbing my left leg against the seatpost, I've worn completely through two pairs of short legs riding this way and deformed the left side of two saddles in two years. I'm done riding until I can figure that out, I'm just completely perplexed, it's really freakin' pissing me off. More beer drinking for now I guess, less riding.



Seriously, WTF???!!!!

Let The Sun Shine Down...

...on me today. There was supposed to be a bit of rain in the forecast today and when I checked the radar this morning after I woke up there were spots of rain out west and a bit north of us. I figured I'd do some yard work for an hour or two and then check again to see how close it was going to get by 11:00 or so. I picked up some leaves for a bit, mainly cleaning them from out of my bushes and flower gardens and then checked the radar again. It was looking pretty good and right around 11:30ish the sun actually came out, but of course I had planned on watching the Packer game at noon to see if they could beat the Titans. It was a bit of a conundrum but I decided that a ride in the sun outweighed the Packers today, this could be my last chance for a sunny ride in 50-something weather, although I really, really hope not. I decided to keep it short today though, only 2 hours, for two reasons; one, I decided to do one hour of stretching and calisthenics, and one hour of yoga this evening as well as the ride, and two, I rode 4 hours yesterday and my butt is sore. I did a pretty flat route from New Berlin to Big Bend then to Waukesha and back to New Berlin. No other bikers out there today and I only saw one runner as well, everyone was either finishing their end-of-year yard work or inside watching the Packer game. So where were you all? Anyways, it was a great ride, I felt really good, the weather was nice and the only problem was my previously mentioned sore butt. Tonight I'm going to do some stretching, crunches, leg lifts, push ups, and then an hour of yoga as well. I'll be starting that at about 7:00 and then after that it will be close to bed time. My boss is out Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday so I have a feeling the first part of the week will be a little hectic, I better rest up so I'm not crabby at everyone when I'm getting hit from all directions. Well, no pictures today, that's it for now, until next time......

How Many?

How many days do we have left like today, it wasn't exactly the warmest but it is November 1st, I'll take mid-50s and sunny any day of November. I'm not going to do a full re-cap right now because it's dinner time and I'm really hungry but I did 4 hours today from New Berlin to Waukesha back to New Berlin and then went on the Oak Leaf trail to Franklin and back home to New Berlin. It was a great ride, here are some pics for now, more to come later.

Ready To Embark

Oak Leaf Trail Bridge
Fox River Trail

I Feel....

....a vacation day coming on tomorrow. The weather has been kind of crappy of late but I've been stuck at work anyways during the day so what does it matter really I guess. It looks like tomorrow is supposed to be really nice though so I've decided to take a vacation day to get in a long ride. Right now a long ride for me is 4 hours, anything more than that right now and I'd keel over, that's about my max at the moment. After my ride I'll be showering and changing quickly to go to lunch and drink some beer with my friend Jason, that should make for a nice afternoon to relax my body after the ride. Not the greatest recovery for a longer ride but beer has carbs in it so I'll be replenishing my glycogen stores, um, I think. Hopefully we have as good a time as our last endeavour to Ray & Dots and Bennos, this time we won't drink the new Schlitz though, that stuff is nasty. So, I'm looking forward to a good day, it's a good way to celebrate Halloween and close out October.
As far as weights and bike training go, I forgot I had to work late last night and even though I brought all my workout clothes I had to fore go my lifting and head home. I didn't want to be eating dinner at 7:30 so I decided to just lift tonight instead and then obviously I'll skip it tomorrow since I won't be at work to utilize the facilities. Monday it will be back to the normal lifting program, I hope. I rode the rollers last night as well, another 75 minutes, and I felt pretty good. I watched about 45 minutes of a lame movie, "Stuck", about someone being hit by a car and then left in the windshield for dead while I was riding but I had to turn it off because it sucked so bad, I wouldn't recommend renting it. Other than that, the weekend weather looks pretty good although Sunday could be iffy for a little rain so hopefully I'll get a lot more yard work done and the plan is to do about 3 hours each on Saturday and Sunday on the bike as well. DST ends on Sunday as well and I'm not looking forward to the extended darkness, I'm going to have to start tanning or something to get my fix of radiation. That's it for now, until next time.........

Sore Start

Well, yesterday was the first day of weight work for the off-season and I have to say I was pretty sore today. I guess underneath my fat I actually have abs because they hurt today, my legs were pretty sore as well but after getting the blood flowing on the trainer tonight they are doing much better. I'll be back to hitting the weights tomorrow, I'll do different muscle groups tomorrow, more upper body and core stuff, and then will go back to the lower body on Friday again. Tonight was just a short ride on the trainer, only 75 minutes but it was more than enough for me since the first few rides in the basement are always the hardest. Jeez I hate riding inside. Anyways, not much else to report, here are a few pics of my newly cleaned bike below. A clean bike is a happy bike.......

Yardwork, Yardwork, and More Yardwork

Yeah, that was the theme for the weekend. The forecast called for a chance of snow showers overnight and possibly today, but thankfully I haven't see anything resembling snow yet. When I saw the forecast on Friday I knew that it was time for me to get some remaining yard projects done before the weather really takes a turn for the worst, the high is only supposed to be 39 today for cryin' out loud. So I made my list and set about finishing as much as I could over the weekend. Saturday I didn't accomplish as much as I had hoped, I think a combination of the wind and the persistent clouds made it difficult to get motivated. I slept in a little bit and then did some things around the house and then took a nap, it's hard work doing nothing you know. After waking up I did some more cleaning around the house and then basically called it a day, my motivation was completely lacking so I said, "there's always tomorrow". I think the onset of SAD is to blame for my dismal attitude, that would be Seasonal Affective Disorder, I think I get that at the onset of the first cold days of the Fall, I have some ideas to combat though this year, hopefully they work. Anyways, Sunday was a new day and I was full of energy (probably from the 13 hours of sleep) and the sun was actually out although it was still windy and a little chilly. I think the sun provided the motivation I needed to get out and I took full advantage of it until it finally set just before 6:00. I cleared the lawn of all those stinking leaves, I really wish they would have all blown off the trees yesterday but I still have quite a few trees yet that have to get rid of them so there will be at least another week or two of raking. I also mowed my lawn again with the push mower, that always takes about two hours as my lawn is a decent size. After that I decided to work on splitting logs and after maybe an hour and 50 or so logs I decided that my arms and shoulders couldn't take it any more. Cyclists are built well in the lower body, our upper body isn't meant for all this manual labor and I'm feeling it today, my arms are hurtin'. After splitting the logs I stacked them all up in front of the house for easy access once we start using the fireplace, I used the wheelbarrow to move them so that really wasn't all that much work. Once the logs were stacked I decided to do some transplanting of my Iris bulbs to extend the flower bed on the side of my house. I think I hacked a few of the bulbs so hopefully they recover and come up in the Spring. A new, thin layer of top soil and compost was laid over all the Irises and they are now set for the winter. The next and last project of the day was to take some lawn edging that has been sitting in my garage for about two months and dig a little trench and put that around the shrubs and flowers surround my garage. An hour later I was all done with that and called it a day as it was time for some dinner. I had thought about riding the trainer but I was too sore for that so decided to do some yearly maintenance on the Cannondale. I replaced the brake and shifter cables, took off the bottle cages and cleaned up the 4 or 5 layers of Accelerade that had built up over the year, gave the bike a good washing and put on some new bar tape. I still need to replace the chain and clean the cassettes but I'll do that more towards the beginning of the new year as this chain still has a little bit of life yet, very little, but enough to get me to January. I will be doing maintenance on the Pinarello (my road bike with cross tires) this week as well as that will be my winter bike. I didn't use that much last year so that will just get some cable cleaning and lubing, a chain cleaning and a good washing. The Specialized will get worked on next week and that needs quite a few things done to get it back to riding shape, basically it was used this year as a parts bike for my Cannondale, so a few things need to be replaced with other spare parts that I have laying around. I'll also get the SS all lubed up next week and ready to ride as well as it will be taken out in the rain and snow and I'm sure that crap is coming soon. That's about it for now, the plan is to start weight work tonight and do that Monday, Wednesday, and Friday until about the end of March. I'll also be hitting the trainer on a regular basis now, basically I'll try to stick to a more concrete plan instead of just riding when I feel like it. It's time to get off my fat butt and get going again, I'm not looking to lose a ton of weight this off-season, but 198 lbs. won't cut it either. Well, that's it for now, until next time.........

Too Much Beer....

.....and not enough biking. That was the theme last night as we had a celebration at Chammps for work and pretty much my whole evening was spent consuming Guinness and pulled pork sandwiches, oh yeah, chicken wings too. It was a good evening spent with co-workers in a nice relaxed atmosphere, of course everyone is relaxed because they are consuming lots of booze right? Definitely. It was all free, all night, which a lot of people took advantage of to the fullest. Loaded up food plates and bottomless glasses were the norm as I looked around the restaurant. I enjoy people watching at these events because when you get co-workers out of their comfort zone in the cubicles or get to see what they actually wear when they don't have to wear the business outfit, it's pretty amusing. I was drinking soda the second half of the evening so when others were starting to slur their words I was getting sobered up, that was the best part of the evening. "I shink I'd haf tooooo mush to drink, but dish ish reallllly a goot time"....um yeah, that line made me laugh when it came out of the mouth of an inebriated co-worker. Anyways, good times all around. So having done that I obviously didn't bike last night which is fine as I'll make it up tonight and this weekend although not sure how much I'll ride outside as the forecast is not looking all that great. It might be time to get out the SS and the rain gear for some long rides this weekend. Let's just hope it doesn't snow.

Leinie's Fireside Nut Brown.....

....is a really good beer, although a bit tame it really does the trick as a seasonal beer. I picked up a 6 pack the other day and it was money well spent. I was looking for something a little different as I normally get a brand of Oktoberfest beer this time of year, normally Sprecher, and when I saw this I knew I had to give it a try. Here is the link to check out the description yourself but I'll pretty much post all the info from their site below. The beer, a Lager, is a version of an English-style nut brown with English two-row malts. Alcohol content is pretty low at 4.9% but that just means you get to drink a lot more of them before you have to cut yourself off. The color is amber (no, not brown) although it is on the darker side of Amber, and as soon as you start pouring the smells just start opening up from the beer and then as you reach the top you get a nice head that lasts just long enough to get in a good sip or two. The smell is overwhelmingly roasted malt and caramel/chocolate, and a bit of hazelnut. The taste, don't be surprised, hits with a nutty flavor first and then the caramel and chocolate come right behind, a very smooth and satisfying combination. This is an easy drinking beer, meaning for me it's easy to drink one right after another, it goes down sooooo smooth and the tastes linger in your mouth calling for more within minutes, make that seconds, of finishing the first glass. It's a beer that Leinies recommends serving chilled at 45 degrees but as a comfort beer that's too cold for me, especially if you do as intended and sit by a fire, you want to be warm right? I poured my first at 55 degrees in to a room temp glass and it was more satisfying than the second one that I poured at the cooler recommended temperature. The colder temperature takes something away from the beer in my opinion, I didn't get the robust flavor that I had in the first pour, it was too crisp for me to really take in the flavors. Go ahead and try out different temperatures for yourself, I'm going to go higher than what they recommend to satisfy my own tastes, see what works for yourself, it never hurts to experiment. All in all, this is a solid 3 mug beer that you will not be disappointed with, another score for Leinies.

Oh yeah, I rode on the trainer tonight as well, but that's boring stuff, nothing special, just 75 minutes to keep the legs moving.

Weekend Re-cap

My weekend was pretty uneventful, I guess now that it's turning colder and October is nearing it's end, it's time to finish up all that last minute yardwork before we start getting frost on a nightly basis and then of course that first snow shows up at some point in November. Basically all I did this weekend was yard work and got in a couple of rides, of which one was quite enjoyable and the other was a little bit of a bother. Saturday I started by doing some driveway work, basically patching, leveling, and sealing. Once it warmed up I headed out for a 3 hour ride by way of Waukesha to Big Bend and then back home. I felt great and could have done a lot more but really had to get my leaves picked up and the lawn mowed. So after riding for 3 hours I ate a little bit and went right to working on the lawn for 2 hours, I had a ton of leaves to pick up and underneath all those leaves my lawn needed mowing. I only got the front done in those two hours, normally that's all it takes me to do the whole lawn. After the lawn work was done in front I moved in to the house, ate some dinner and settled down on the couch for a movie. Basically an uneventful day as I mentioned; eat, work on driveway, bike, eat, work on lawn, eat, watch TV. Sunday I was woken up early in the morning by the howling winds and realized that the 3.5 to 4 hour ride I had planned was just not going to happen for me. I just didn't feel like fighting sustained 25mph winds for that long, especially since they were gusting up to 35mph. I got up, realized we had no food in the house since Sunday is grocery shopping day and asked my wife to go get me the Deluxe breakfast at McDonalds which she happily obliged. Yeah, it wasn't the healthiest breakfast but I had a long day of yard work and a ride in front of me so I needed something with substance that would sit in my gut for a while. After eating I headed out and worked on picking up the leaves in my backyard which wasn't quite as bad as the front because the trees in back hadn't shed much of their leaves yet. I picked up as much as I could and then mowed that with the push mower for another 2 hours worth of yard work just like Saturday. After I finished that I ate some lunch, only a can of soup, and then headed out for a shortened 2 hour ride, not what I had planned but at this point of the year what's another hour or two of endurance pace riding? It's not going to hurt to cut it short right now. Basically the ride was a nice quick jaunt of 25-27mph with the tailwind and then a leg busting 15mph heading back home against the headwind. I was glad to be done and was cursing the winds for ruining what could have otherwise been a really nice October day. I did see a lot of rec cyclists and joggers on my route, I think everyone sensed that the nice days are starting to wind down so they were getting out in spite of the wind. After my ride I did some grocery shopping with my wife, ate some dinner and then hit the couch again for some relaxation. All in all it was a decent weekend, no frills, but sometimes that's a good thing, I like keeping things even keel.
Well, my work schedule is calling for a 4:50a.m. wakeup so it's time to go to bed, my beer review will come tomorrow, and after what will be a long day of work I may have to refresh my memory with another bottle before I start typing. Until next time.........

Just a Precursor

Well, I had a lot going on this weekend and am finally sitting down at the computer but unfortunately it's to do some work I forgot to do today while I was so busy. So I have to get that done now before tomorrow morning. I'll do a weekend re-cap tomorrow sometime, but for now here is a picture from my ride today, lots of leaves in Whitnall Park, I had to ride down the middle of the road to stay out of the leaf piles. Also, I'll do a review tomorrow of Leinie's Winter Seasonal beer, the "Fireside Nut Brown" English style Lager.



Whitnall

It's That Time

Fall colors are in full bloom or close to it, the air is getting crisp and for some of you the weekend bike rides are getting shorter. So once it's time to cut back on the cycling or move the training indoors when the snow starts flying, what are you going to do? I'll tell you....you should go on a brew tour and spend some time sampling some fine beers right here in the area, and I'm talking good beer, not a Miller tour. I shouldn't be so down on Miller, I started my beer drinking lifestyle sucking the top of an MGD bottle until I discovered the wealth of microbrews and wonderful imports that were out there. I was young and naive, I thought MGD was the best there was, and I'm not going to knock it now because I'll still take an MGD if it's offered, but the occasion is rare. Anyways, here are two in the Milwaukee area that I highly recommend, Lakefront Brewery offers a great tour, and the tour is actually a learning experience for those wanting to know the process in detail. Along with the tour you get a glass and of course you get to sample their selection of beer. There is some humor in the tour as well and for those that have been on it, you'll know what I mean. If you want to know what I'm talking about, then go on the tour!

Sprecher Brewery is also a good tour, but the tour itself is very basic and offers more information on the history of Sprecher than it does the detailed process of making the beer. The best part of the Sprecher tour is sitting in the indoor beer garden afterwards to sample the beers and then you get to move on to the gift shop. The gift shop has all of their normal beer selection along with most of their seasonal beers. The best part of the gift shop and something that I recommend you do, is to purchase a bottle or six of their Premium Reserve beers. It's about $20 a bottle but well worth the price, especially for the Russian Imperial Stout and the Bourbon barrel aged Pipers Scotch Ale. One bottle of the Russian Imperial and you are set for the night, it's an amazing beer and one that I need to stock up on again sometime fairly soon.

If you are looking to take a drive out of the city, then there are plenty of other brewerys around the state, too many to list here but a couple are Tyranena, New Glarus, Great Dane, Leinenkugels, Angelic Brewing, and Capital. If you are looking to get some food and sit down to eat and enjoy a few beers, then I'd recommend Delafield Brewhaus, Water Street Brewery, Rock Bottom, and Milwaukee Ale House. Delafield Brewhaus has a great sausage platter that you could pair with at least 2 of their 4 standard beers on tap, either the Pewaukee Porter or the Delafield Amber. Normally they have 3 to 5 more beers on tap in addition to the standards but those change often and are not listed on their web site.

Today is my birthday and I'm hoping to make it down to Sprecher maybe this weekend to get a couple of bottles at least, I think it would be a good idea for you all to get down there as well, or any of the other brewerys. Support your local brewery, even if it's Miller.

These girls love their beer, so should you....(sorry Lis)

All-Rounder??? Uh, No.....

If you haven’t read my previous post then go ahead and read that first and come back to this post….go ahead, I’ll give you time……ready then? Well now you know what this post will be about then. Basically I’m trying to figure out how I want to approach racing next year, although my racing will be minimal I’m obviously not just going to train haphazardly and not prepare as I should. I look at the calendar of races for the WCA and I wonder to myself, is it really worth trying to become as lean as I can be for racing a calendar of events in Wisconsin? We have 2 road races of note with any climbing in them, Baraboo and Denzer, and Baraboo to me is really a power climbing race, Denzer is a little bit more than that. The Baraboo RR hills are steep, but c’mon they aren’t all that long, Denzer is really the only race where a “climber” would have an advantage in any race in Wisconsin. Holy Hill in Superweek, I don’t think so. A power rider and good sprinter can handle Baraboo and Holy Hill, soooo, I can’t really see where being 6’1” and 160-some pounds would help me in any Wisco races, I think it’s better to play to the strengths of racing here. In my opinion, that strength would be sprinting as we have so many criteriums, and looking back at the results from this past season it was a lot of the same people winning the races over and over. I checked back to 2007, then 2006, and yes, it was the same guys winning. Guys that were power riders and really good sprinters because those are the abilities that are needed to win races here where almost all of our races are flat. There are races with opportunities, Evergreen maybe, only because that course is kind of messed up in that it goes through a winding section that’s about as wide as a foot path, then down a curving hill, then up a hill, and repeat. The skinny section and the subsequent downhill create some places to get away and then maintain the gap on the hill. GDVC has some opportunities as well because of the crosswinds usually, Elm Grove because of it’s dangerous turn before the finish, but a lot of the other races I can think of usually come down to a sprint. The State RR is tough but usually it’s a decent size group going up that hill to the finish, the long hill is a tough one but it’s maybe a third of a mile if you count the part that levels off at the top before it starts to go downhill again. Don’t get me wrong, there are some tough races in Wisconsin, but they are usually won by the strong men and the sprinters. So, how does that affect me? Well, the last two years I was really striving to get down to 170 to 171, but was accepting a racing weight of about 174 because I just couldn’t get much lower. I really had to starve myself to get down to 174 and it was especially hard this year. I think I’ve decided this year to just shoot for what I need to do in different terms, and that is to lower my body fat % to as low as I can go while building muscle and power to enable me to be a better sprinter. I’ve done some calculations and my guess-timate is that I can be about 180lbs and my body fat will be low but I won’t be starving myself to get lean and I also won’t have to stop doing yard work because I’m afraid my arms will get too big. I have a big upper frame, my shoulders are pretty wide and it doesn’t take much for me to build up some good size lats, shoulders and biceps. I’m not going to worry about that this year, I’ll do what I can to lower my body fat as low as I can go without sacrificing power and then I’ll be happy with that even if I can’t go up the hill at Denzer. I’ve been a better sprinter than climber the last two years so it makes no sense to kill myself to be 170 when I should just play to my strengths, although my strengths right now aren’t all that strong so to speak. Either way, I’ll do a lot more sprint specific stuff this year, work a lot in the weight room and then hope that whatever hill work I do will keep me with the group over the little bumps that I do have to go up. Denzer is probably off my calendar but Baraboo is still a possibility. The State RR is up in the air right now, but I’m not counting that off my list yet either because of my lack of climbing ability, maybe just pure strength will keep me with the group there. Right now it’s all a little premature to say because who knows what will come up. Last year I had a big work project come up that completely derailed my training, the same thing could happen in 2009 and I could end up getting fat on the couch again. Right now though, I have a plan, we’ll just have to see how that works out. Until next time…..

Thank Goodness That's Over

I'm glad to be home, I was getting too fat out in Florida eating all that delicious food that my company so graciously paid for, although they don't know the tally yet for my over-the-top consumption of said food. A little bit of Bahama Breeze, Tilted Kilt, Moxies, Smokey Bones, and Green Iguana all contributed to a weight gain of about 3.5 to 4lbs., yeah, I ate THAT much. Soooo, it's back to the "good" nutritional program now that I'm home and I'll be sure to watch my calorie consumption until the next holiday where I'm sure I'll eat a little too much again, but nothing like the 5 day bender I go on when I'm in Florida. I'm feeling a little under the weather today from being in the germ capsule that some people call an "airplane" and also from going in and out of air conditioning for 5 days, one minute it was 70 degrees then it was 90 degrees. A few days of that and my throat was hurting and headaches were pretty constant. As I mentioned in my previous post, no biking was possible but I did get in two walks and did a little jogging during the walks as well. Those two walks probably prevented me from hitting 5+ lbs of weight gain, at least I kept it below that. Basically that was my trip to Florida in a nutshell; hot temps, lots of air conditioning, lots of food, and a little exercise. Now that I'm home it's back to biking and taste testing a few more beers. Sunset is making cycling difficult as it will be tough to get out when the sun is already gone by 6:15 now-a-days, but I will make the attempt to ride for an hour after work with the light system and then maybe 30-60 minutes inside after that. I'll be doing that for the next few weeks in addition to longer rides on the weekends as the weather permits, basically if it's not raining then I'm riding outside. I'll also start weight training in a couple of weeks after work and then head home for the trainer rides. I'll do all that fun stuff through the beginning of December and then I'll start to ramp up my program. What is my program this year? Well, I'm just going with how I feel at the time, it's going to be an ebb and flow kind of thing.....something difficult to maintain as the weather gets colder and my motivation wains during the dark, winter months and then an unfolding and fervent desire to get out and ride as the white shit starts to dissipate in the early months of '09. I always have a basic plan, which then becomes a detailed plan as I start to get a feel for my fitness, and then it becomes meticulous preparation on an OCD level as the races near. Right now I'm in the embryonic stage, a beginning if you will, just riding, getting that bottom layer of the pyramid built and that will entail some weight work as well, building up the muscles, ligaments, and tendons. Riding and lifting, basic but key to my offseason workouts and I'll be doing that for a while until I feel I'm ready for the next stage. I'll tell you about the next stage some other time.

As I think about what my offseason workouts will entail I'm stuck in a bit of a quandary as to which direction I want to go, sort of like those old Dungeons & Dragons books where you could pick your next move and then turn to page 47 and find out that you just locked yourself in a room with death wraiths. Um, yeah, I was one of them, a RPG geek, but that's where I'm at right now with how I want to approach my season. What page do I pick? Go left down the wooded path, or take a right onto the old stone bridge, either way the hero usually ended up fighting something. Maybe it was only 5 goblins with great success, or it was an untimely death with 100 ogres. The best part of those books was being able to go back, turn the page to the other choice, re-live the adventure. In cycling, depending upon the path I take, it will be harder to turn the page once I get going down my path. What is this big conundrum you ask, nothing so big really, but both paths require a lot of work and going back after picking a path will be difficult. So, the choice is, do I put my eggs in the sprinting basket or the climbing basket (you thought I was choosing between mountain biking and road biking didn't you, maybe not)? It might not seem like a big choice but one of those choices will take a lot of work on my part and the other not so much, but both will be quite detailed in their preparations once I do decide. How do I decide, what difference will it make to my training, why bother making a choice? Well, this post is long enough, check back tomorrow to find out the answers to those questions and I'll have some good explanations. A quick teaser is that we all aren't Lance or Alberto, we all aren't great at both and we all aren't going to be riding the TDF any time soon, so in the races that we do around here (WCA), it's important to make a choice. That's it for now, until next time.........

Florida

A trip to Florida means business and no pleasure, although I do get pleasure in eating lots of wonderful seafood. Being in Florida through Sunday also means no biking, but I will be doing some pushups and situps in the room and also doing some daily jogging as long as it's not raining. Temps in the upper 80s and 50-60% chance of rain most days, typical Florida weather. More info on the training program to come next week and I'm thinking I'll sample some local brews and post a review or two next week, maybe even while I'm still in Florida.