Off Road...finally.

I can't describe to you how nice it is to be finally riding my mountain bike consistently. I thought for a couple months that I was slowly turning into a roadie. Whoa, it's like a bad dream, a nightmare in fact. I'm just joking roadies....but not really. In any case, John is on a field trip to Arkansas so Chad and I are flying solo here in EC. We went for a nice ride down at Lowes Creek, and other than a few incidents we had a darn good time.

We were cruising down a nice section of single track, and I, thinking I was JHK, came into a corner a little too hot. I wouldn't have minded it at all, except I was 6 or 7 feet in front of a bridge when it happpend. I managed to slow down a enough so that I didn't go smoking into the water below, but I was really really close. The situation reminded me of the movies when a semi half falls over a cliff and the guys inside start moving real slow towards the back of the truck. I managed to pull my self back to level, but only because my rotor had kept me upright. So needless to say I have a mega bent rotor that needs replacing. It only gets worse from here. After removing my front brake and wrapping it around my handlebars so we could keep riding, Chad's bike, which was resting on the side of the bridge falls over and lands against a metal sign post. It was sad to see a decent scrape in the side of that beutiful candy red paint job.

Other than that though it was a great ride!

Thats it for now,

Chase

Durand Durand

This weekend was a tornado! Friday night my mother and two of her lovely friends joined Chase, John, and I for some dancing at Eau Claire's eloquent Vienesse Ball. The dance itself is crazy, the entire UWEC student center is turned into a dance/music hall. Everything from women's acapella groups to Scottish bands, moldy cheese to White Russians. We couldn't seem to get enough and after dropping our dates off I finally hit the sack around 2:30am.



I woke up to the sound of my buzzing alarm at 8am. I ran down stairs for some oatmeal and pre-race pep talk before loading up the scort for Durand! It was a super day for racing. Slightly over-cast with the sun peeking out occasionaly and winds out of the north at a much gentler demeanor than normal. I lined up with the big dogs this year so there was sea of GP and Flanders riders all looking lean and tan. We did five laps for a total of sixty some miles. On the first lap you could cut the tension with a knife, which I think that goes hand and hand with the first race of the season, and it was Dan in a two man break off the front. The break was out front for a couple laps and the pace stayed at tempo until we were once again whole. "The move" came on the fourth lap when I least expected it (on the fastest and realitivly flatest section of the course)! A monster surge at the front, with myself around 20th wheel, left gaps in the field and me behind. I was really pissed at myself at this point because I knew all the major rollers were in that group. I knew I needed to act so I made a desperate attacked from the front in hopes of catching back on. A GP rider followed me but didn't pull through until he decided to attack me! Drooling from the mouth I was force to limp back into the main field as the ten man break road off. After that point I knew I need to cut my losses so I conserved some until the final climb. Another rider from our group made a gut busting attack and I followed. We broke away but I was toast! He wanted me to pull through but I couldn't. At this point it was a struggle to push 360 watts and he must been at 400. We were only a five minutes from the finish so I humped it in crossing the line in the low teens. Overall I'm happy with the result especially considering my power tap hasn't read over 400 all spring, which is soon to change as the mountain bike season rapidly approaches.

In other exciting new Chase and I made the drive back to Spooner for the day to build up our new mountain bikes! They are sweeet! I'm in love with the white pin strips on the candy red sparkling bass boat paint job! And if that wasn't enough PCW got a sweet face lift in the jersy department with double the style points on our dark to baby blue lightning yellow outfits! Louis Garneau made our stuff this year and the quality is through the roof (I sound like a used car salesmen) but in all honesty its baller!

World is your playground!
Chad

New Developments

Hey y'all, sorry we've been so long without an update! I know I say this everytime, but we have really been busy with school and visting the family for Easter.

Moving on though to the new developements.

1) Chad and I now have Mountain bikes! We EP'd them through our shop back home and they should be in today! It is going to be awesome to get off the road finally. Chad is the proud new owner of an Elite 9.9, and I'm sporting a Fuel 98. They should move us down the trail pretty quickly.

2) The PCW 06' clothing is in and on its way to Eau Claire. This could not come at a better time. For one, I'm down to one rideable pair of shorts, and two, we have a race this weekend.

3) So on to the race. The durand road race is this Saturday. Chad is going to try his luck in the A race, and John and I are going to try and bring one home in the B race. It should be quite the race. I predict alot of early season attacks that last 15-2o seconds before they run out of fuel and come wimpering back into the group with their tails between their legs. Plus the forcast says wind and rain. Ohh yeah!

4) Chad and John and I are all starting to get faster! Enough interval and threshold workouts to go around. Heres a powertap file of one set of intervals I did on monday. This is all I have, no cool pics like john. He's really starting to figure out that camera!

Thats all I have today. Happy Easter everybody! Ride on.

-Chase

Got Banana Boat?

Today and yesterday were scoarching rides in the hot hot sun! Temperatures have been in the high 70s and we have been taking full advantage. In the last six days I had four 4+ hour rides with some good intervals at threshold. I seem to be coming into form but there is still a ton of work to be done.

If you look real close you can see a burn on my left shoulder from the hole in my jersey.......


Can you tell I'm not wearing a shirt?
And on the legs double sun burn, one from today and one from yesterday! When will I learn.....


Tomorrow will be a shorter ride with sun block before we head to Spoon town for some Easter Dinner, oil change, and Thule parts for the upcoming race venues.

World is your playground!
Chad

I feel like George

Two days ago I was doing some acceleration stuff on my bike and I had what I like to refer to now as a George Hincapie experience. For all you who dont know, this is when a Trek product unexpectedly breaks/bends/snaps...etc, leaving the rider at the side of the road thinking, "How the hell did that happen?" Now don't get me wrong, I love Trek. It's just that lately they've had some "minor" issues. I realize, that on the grand scale, my problem was maybe a few notches down on the "oh crap" scale from what happended to Georgie, but I'm still pretty proud of it!

Here's some pics of my big chainring, it bent right over, almost half and inch!

And another.




So there is one for the books. We tried to bend it back, but it just won't hold a chain. The folks back at Riverbrook we good enough to order me one up so I can get back on the Road quick.

The season is coming ladies and gentlemen,

Chase

Its all good...

This past weekend was good on fronts. Good rides, good blogs, good results, and good times!Saturday John and I headed south on the road bikes for some good hills and some threshold intervals. The first intervals of the year are always a shocker but I think they went pretty well. I have the power tap hooked up again, thanks to Maggie at Cycleops, (as a side note Cycleops has very good customer service) and it is always fun to see watts, the know all tell all of numbers. Anyways the ride was good, lots of sun, hills, and spectators. John and I were chased down and passed by two middle school aged kids on their moped. The kid on the back was carring a BB gun and their ride was wound to the max as they crawled by us. We decided they were "urban hicks" since they replaced the fourwheeler with a moped and the 30-06 with a BB gun. Sunday's ride was solo but much of the same with slightly cooler temperatures. I headed Mondovi way and found some new dirt climbs which are always exciting, especially for the mountain bike blooded. I rolled over several dirt passes and through the woods connecting cty HH to cty Z. All added up it was just shy of 6000 cal knee warmer tan weekend.

On the college front we headed over to 137 Saturday night for a shindy in EC's down town. Things got a little crazy for most but John and I just laughed as our amigas and amigos danced their cares into the night! On sunday night the atmosphere was slightly different as we prepared for Pairis-Roubaix. We were all excited except for me because in my hast Sunday morning I accidently refreshed the velo page with out thinking...Fabian, I was screaming inside, of course I wanted George to win! It was good anyways but I quess thats racing and freak things happen!

Of course I could not get away without mentioning SeaOtter! "What a mess" would be an unstatement from what I heard. Tj was even delayed on his ride home due to a mudslide! A big props to all the midwest and rockymountian riders for the good results! I hope to see some good blog updates from the racers.

Today I also payed my tution deposit for next semester. I am locked in for classes next fall and believe it or not they haven't kick me out yet. As of now it looks like I will be on the market for a high paying teaching job some time in December of 2007!

Train Hard Train Smart!
World is your Playground!
Chad

This one's for Ron Kay

Well this one is for Ron Kay, who feels that we dont update nearly enough. He's definitively right. So enjoy Ron.

The last few days, John and Chad and I have been placing some bets down on Paris Roubaix, and also on the Seaotter. Since the seaotter is close to finishing up I'll lay down the overall predictions that we made on sunday of last week.

Chad-Todd Wells
John- Kabush
Chase- Bart Brentjens

Paris Roubaix is going to be quite the event around here at school. Well at least for five or six of us. We actually get OLN here in the dorms, so we'll all be riding inside, no matter how nice it is outside! Priorities!

Heres the predictions:

Chad- Hincapie (Go Georgie!)
John- Peter Van Petegem
Chase- Boonen (is it obvious that I chose first?)

Now that the predictions are out there, let me make this entirely clear. Just because I picked Boonen to probably win the thing, I would like nothing more than for someone to wipe the floor with his big mouth. That guy is pretty confident. And George, you need to go this year. No more of this, ohh I made the winning move, now I can just sit on and let the other guy win. No, you are gonna drop it down this year, and bring it home for the US of A.
















And a big shout out to Sam Shultz for his huge race at the Seaotter TT yesterday. Sam is on the U23 team, and could be my new hero. Here's to doing it again today in the short track Sam! Heres a pic from velonews of the podi from yesterday's TT, check out all the mud on Sam, he didnt even know he made the podium!

Ron, here's your quote for today. I think it reflects some of the trails you guys put in this summer, and the many more to come!

"Really good mountain bikers are lousy judges of trail difficulty. We haven't a clue, we just ride."
-John Olsen

Well thats it for now, more later, and more ofter!

-Chase

Check this out!

In the spirit of Nick Martin's last update I found this great video clip. This guy is juggling to a beatles song with 5 balls. It doesnt look at all possible! Check it out!

Unreal Juggler

Chase's Coffee Corner

Sorry John, but today I'm doing my own little coffee corner talk. This is a one time thing, so I won't be stealin your mojo all too long.

I'm sitting in the davies center today, sippin a cup of crappy coffee from Jazzman's, the campus coffee shop, and I thought since I have a little time on my hand I'd throw together an update. Plus, Tristan is complaining that between the two of us we dont update enough. Well this one is for you Tristan, mostly b/c I dont want to upset you and your enourmous wattage. We need that power on our side!

I dont know squat about coffee, but to comfort John I will say that what I am drinking can be described with a soft but sweet acidity with a wholesome body. It has a nutty caramel aftertaste with superb balance througout. It is very evident that jazzman's searches for coffee beans with unequaled passion, and finds them at their natural peak flavor. The smooth bright finish, makes for the start of a harmonious day. I am very confident that this blend puts most inferior roasts to shame, especially the floral aromas of Alterra.

On the riding front, Tj has had me working pretty hard on the intervals. The weather has been rainy and gloomy around here, so I've been on the trainer. A couple days of 2.5 hour interval workouts on the trainer and I think my head finally got the best of me. I rode a couple intervals in the basement on Sunday, and then I snapped. I started kicking shit and swearing. I swear if I had the right tools, I would have cut my bike in half, and throw it through the first pane of glass I could find. So I went outside into the rain, and suffered for a while longer, then rode home with my tail between my legs, pouting the entire time. If I wasnt so worried about my ego, I would have cried for sure. Haha, but no one said it was going to be easy. Just so your all not worried about me, the next day went just fine, and I dont really want to kill my bike anymore. gotta go to class.

Tomorrow's a new day,

Chase

Efforts 'n' Rain

Yesterday John, Craig and I head south to the hills. Things started out innocent enough with talk of the summer's races, bike parts and girlfriends but once we hit the hills the animal instincts took over. We rallied up and down several hills, a couple town line sprints, and some good temp before we hit the eye of the storm. Things were rolling smoothly for a short time until...BAAAM!! I look back and Craig is haulted to a stopped on the side of the road....I had thought he went down for sure. At first glance it looked like his frame broke, but it turns out his blue vest, same color as his bike, flew out his jersey pocket and into the rear wheel! It locked up his rear wheel and blew out his casing! Big props to Craig for keeping er up right and an even bigger props to Jess for picking him up! We rolled in just over four hours with some good efforts. Considering it was my first ride with threshold efforts my legs feel good today, but I was dissapointed to see rain slapping my window at 10am, but wait its actually 11am! I think today will be a trainer ride along side "interval maniac" Chase while watching the original Stars Wars flicks.

Quote of the day:
"You can say that climbers suffer the same as the other riders, but they suffer in a different way. You feel the pain, but you're glad to be there." -Richard Virenque

World is your playground!
Chad