Xterra Torn Shirt

Since Dean is too shy to do a write up on this race I'll do a write up for him.

Dean Hewson kicked some major ass at the Xterra Torn Shirt Triathlon last week. He came out of the swim in the front of the pack With Eric Fernando and Jeremy Hansen. Since neither of them finished the race Dean wins the award for best swim of the day.

With Dean in first place on the single track he did his best to hold off the fast riding Jim James, who had a killer bike split on his home town course, for as long as possible. Unfortunately, this wasn't very long.

On the run Dean was in second place battling the pain of a bruised toe from an earlier bike crash, trying to pull back Jim James until Kaleb "the galloping gazelle" Van Ort flew past him on his way to an eventual first place finish. Dean held off all other contenders to finish 3rd on the day and get a best in class age group award as well.

Although Dean probably doesn't remember, I remember meeting Dean at this Torn Shirt race many years ago. He had just destroyed 98% of the field, and most impressively, he did it on a cyclocross bike.

When they announced the awards I found out he was in the 35 - 39 age group and I was thinking, "there is no way that guy with the white santa claus beard is 35 years old." But I couldn't figure out the logic in why an old man would want to sand bag in the hardest age group.

Soon afterward the rule making curmudgeons at Xterra outlawed cyclocross bikes for Xterra competition. The no cyclocross bike rule is now known to some as "the Dean Hewson Rule."

Now Dean rides a mountain bike, but to this day he still can't be stopped, with podium places at nearly every event he enters.

The legend of Dean lives on.

Team Get a Grip - The Champs

This year Xterra decided to incorporate a team challenge into their Xterra Cup events. Simply put, this makes a team competition within an individual sport where the top 4 finishers score points for the team.

Below is the message from the Kahuna Dave Nichols letting us know we won. We beat Melanie McQuaid's team, team Mel Rad.

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You guys won. You figured your teams results correctly at 405. MelRad had 300something

GET A GRIP
100 + 16 = 116 for Dean Hewson
100 + 12 = 112 for Teodoro Ramos
100 + 2 = 102 for Cheryl Stine
63 + 12 = 75 for Bill Driegert
TOTAL = 405
Not used
41 + 16 = 57 for Derrick Fluegge
41 + 12 = 53 for Ken Dorado

DN

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In addition to the team title Dean, Cheryl and Ted were crowned Xterra Midwest Cup Champions in their respective age groups.

Nice job team.

In other news, this weekend I'm going to Des Moines for the Hy Vee Olympic distance triathlon. I will be racing in the Elite division with a lot of other athletes from the Well Fit Elite team. I'm really excited and think this will be fun. But then again, I'm the type of person who thinks getting his ass kicked is fun. After beating each other up in practice every week since January, we finally get to see how we stack up against each other in a head to head match up.

Chicked

This weekend was the Well Fit Steelhead 70.3 training weekend presented by Get a Grip. Since I coach the Well Fit Steelhead training group and am on the Well Fit Elite Triathlon team and the Get a Grip Cycling team I figured I better represent. Overall it was a pretty good weekend hanging out with everybody, teaching them triathlon stuff and getting to know them better. I also have a better understanding of the challenges my athletes will face on August 1st when many of them will be doing what will be for most of them their first 1/2 IM.

After a BBQ at the house we rented the drinking games began. I learned that to be on the Elite team you have to be a really good drinker. Long story short, at the prodding of elite teamers Kristen Wrede and Marc Robertson I drank more than I have in a long time, but I also discovered I am pretty good at drinking games.

The next morning the training group went out for their ride on schedule. At the time everyone else was leaving, I couldn't get my fellow elite teamers out of bed. We show up to the staging area long after everyone else was gone. The elite members (Marc, Kristen and me) set out on the ride finally and it seemed like they were hell bent on reeling everyone in.

The initial pace was aggresive and I'm thinking everyone is hung over and is just working out the cob webs. Marc qualified for the 70.3 Championship last weekend and Kristen says she has a stress fracture. They'll probably slow down once cumulative fatige catched up with them.

On we ride forward hammering away. OK, this pace can't be sustained for this long I think to myself after we make the first turn at mile 12. At mile 20 I think, alright, I'm taking soft pulls at the front and sitting on their wheels the rest of the time. At mile 21 I'm feeling ashamed of myself for drafting off a girl. At mile 22 I get over it and draft more. At mile 25 they drop me on a downhill and in retailiation I attack on the next hill and get a pretty good gap. I keep riding a solid tempo at 300 watts and before I know it Kristen has bridged back up to me and she doesn't even look tired. I can't believe it.

Mile 30 I'm feeling pretty gassed and notice my heart rate has been at about 90% of max for a while. So far we are averaging 23.6 mph and most of that was into a soft headwind. The only recovery I get is when we slow down for stop signs, but then we accelerate up to speed as fast as possible.

Kristen is taking the majority of the pulls but when Marc recovers he charges to the front and makes us chase him. At mile 40 I blow and let them pedal away. I soft pedal home battling cramps in my hams and take a short cut back to the cottage.

Postrace, they said they did the ride in 2:16 averaging 23.6 for the whole ride. They reeled in everyone who left a good 1/2 hour before us. I don't know much about IM bike splits but I just read that the winner of the Rockman did his ride in 2:10 and he set a course record. I would guess the profile of that course to be similar.

I have my excuses, but I could say that today without a doubt I got chicked. Kristen is a damn good rider and she needs to invest in a road bike. She could go far in this sport. Marc is pretty good rider too, and I will have to ride with these guys some more as I prepare for Nationals and Worlds.

Podium Girls

Yesterday I was riding along the lakefront riding tempo on the TT bike and catching and dropping people left and right. I catch one guy in a white assos jersey who looks like he is waiting for me. I put in a dig and turn around and he is still there. He looks like a pretty good athlete, I'll see long he can last. After that I put in a power move to drop him, he moves around me and takes a pull. WTF??? this never happens on the lakefront. This guy must have raced before. We keep testing each other out without exchanging words. I hit a bump and drop my water bottle. He waits ahead and we keep up the two man TT to the end of the path.

At the end of the path we ride easy before turning around. Finally we speak. I ask who he races for and he points at my jersey and says "your team."

No shit. I never knew. Nice to meet you David. Glad you're on our side.

We cruise north at a pace not as fast as the way south, but still pretty fast and stop at the Soldier Field Crit.

These are only training crits from what I understand, but the set up is really nice. There is a race announcer and they make a big deal out of the awards. There are even podium girls at this race that take a picture with all the top finishers.

Now that's what I'm talking about. More races should make a bigger deal out of the awards presentation. I mean, sure, our accomplishment of winning the local weekly crit is pretty small in the grand scheme of things but still we worked our ass off for that little piece of glory. The least a promoter can do is recognize that acheivement and have some podium girls to congratulate us and have the crowd cheer for us.

It's a lot better than annonomously picking up an envelope of cash that is basically a refund of your entry fee (if that) at the end of a race.

After that I finish up my ride and go for a run.

Oh yeah, last but not least, I would like to welcome the newest member of the team, Russ Kuryk, to the Get a Grip fraternity. He is new to bike racing but he is also a member of the Well Fit Elite team. He is a strong cyclist and he should move up through the ranks quickly. He plans to make his debut at the Fox River Grove Cycling Challenge this weekend.

David, Russ, I look forward to racing with you guys this year.

Greg Lemond

The press portrays Greg Lemond as a bitter, incoherent rabble rouser. I disagree and find him to be someone who cares about the riders, a fair competitive landscape and the future of the sport of cycling.

I was alerted to this video via bikesnob NYC, where he ripped Lemond to shreds. After seeking out the video on youtube I would have to disagree with snobbie on this one.

See for yourself. I was only the 120th viewer of this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDy5NLVkliU

Sincere Product Review - El Duke

In order to support my bike buying habit and have the ability to afford some new cross bikes for the fall I need to part with some bikes from my stable. One of these bikes on the sales block has tar all over the frame from when I rode over a street that was being repaved. In order to make this bike look nice again I needed a product that will remove the gunk yet not ruin the paint job on the bike.

I found out about El Duke when I saw it on the jerseys of team Half Acre. Curious about what it was, I looked it up online. I found out it was an environmentally friendly non toxic degreaser.

http://web.mac.com/eldukedegreaser/El_Duke_Degreaser_/Home.html

Since I am always cleaning my bikes and testing out different degreasing products I stored this away in my mind so I would remember to buy some for my next big cleaning project.

I couldn't get the tar off the above mentioned bike with any other product so I went to Rapid Transit and picked up a bottle of El Duke. It's a good sign when the guy at the store who sold it to me seemed really enthusiastic about this product.

Well to cut to the chase, this stuff is great at getting off tar and it seems really good at degreasing too. It moved quickly to the front as my favorite bike cleaning product. It removes gooey substances better than goo gone, it doesn't have a noxious odor like simple green, it doesn't burn my hands or ruin metal finishes like some high power auto degreasers I use.

El Duke is all pros and no cons. Go out and buy this product.

Rainy Dayz

Another day, another rain storm. Chicago is the new Seattle. People from Seattle actually tell me it is raining less there. The one good thing about living in Chicago is that you can complain about the weather year round.

I'm getting kind of tired about reading about biking. After years of reading these magazines the how to articles get so repetitive. It seems like I've already read every coaches theory on training while trying to sell his program, and every product review funded by advertising dollars. I want to read some innovative thinking in relation to bikes if there is such a thing. Give me something new.

With all this rain I have a lot of time to read these magazines that have been piling up. Random thoughts to follow....

I think I mostly just look at ads. I really want the XX. Dear SRAM, I am currently unsponsored by a component company. Perhaps we can work together and I can test out these XX products for you. I am a slightly above average off road triathlete who can test out your products on the Xterra circuit. I am very hard on equipment so your products will get a true stress test under my legs. If you are interested in this fantastic opportunity, leave a message in the comments stating you would like to work with me.

The Specialized ad "I gambled everything on the Muur" is really cool. The picture captures Stijn's gritty look of determination on his face as he powers away from the pack on the cobbled climb. The crowd looks happy as they cheer him over the top, Belgian lion flags waving. Anybody who can get me the poster of this ad, it would be greatly appreciated.

Awesome, Team Get a Grip is prominently featured in the full page ad for the Chicago Criterium.

According to Chicago Athlete Magazine, in a desperate money grab the Chicago Park District is going to start charging for parking soon. I like driving my car to the 31st street beach and then doing brick workouts with my car as a transition area. Now I'll have to pay $1 an hour to park. Jeers to the Chicago Park District, Jeers.

Give me a break, T3 is coming out with an Ironman branded bed that will supposedly help you recover better. It has a padding that has been "clinically proven" to do all kinds of wonders for your body. Whatever, you know what is good for recovery? Sleep, I don't think it matters what mattress you are on. I'm calling BS on this one... unless of course T3 wants to send me a queen size mattress to product test. Dear T3....

Who is this elite triathlete Jen Perez in these EAS ads? She's hot. I think I'll have to add her as my Facebook friend.

Mountain Bike has a 5 page article that is supposedly going to answer once and for all what is better, a 26 or a 29. After spending all the time reading this article, I learned nothing I didn't know before and it provides no definitive answer. Total time waster.

Until next time...

Finally got it off my conscience ...

... just joined CAMBR. I've felt bad for not joining and kept saying I would. After reading about the IMBA and land manager meeting this coming weekend, I decided to pony up with my fiscal support. I wasn't able to join Derrick, Ted and the others last weekend for the trail workday, but I hope that this is just as meaningful in CAMBRs great efforts to improve local trail riding.

Reading a discussion in the CAMBR forum was a good reminder that membership money is only 1/2 of the story. A list of all the local riders who support CAMBRs cause is equally valuable. The more names they get, the more weight their land utilization suggestions carry to improve existing trails and building new ones.

I'm adjusting to life in the O.P. and joined a local ride this morning. Both the weather and the pace was brisk. It starts about 400M from my place, so waking up at 5:00am should be the only thing keeping me from joining regularly.

Ulysses

I just got back from a ride and was thinking it's pretty cold out there for June. Shiiiit, it's pretty cold for March. I can't feel my fingers, or my hands... or even my arms. Damn, I was under dressed with a long sleeve jersey on. Oh well, at least it didn't rain today.

I'm from Chicago. You might be faster than me, but I'm tougher than you.

Spotted on the Lakefront path: Kangaroo toe, guy riding with his helmet on backward, little girl crying on the side of the path because she can't pedal her bike forward into the headwind. Suck it up Sally.

I'm increasing my run mileage and realizing, you can't be both a good runner and a good biker. It's a conundrum of my training.

From my last blog, I'm not hating on all dog walkers on bikes, just the dumb ones. I think riding your bike is a good thing, and spending quality time with your dog is a good thing. As the arbiter of common sense, here are a few rules: 1) if you can't ride a bike, don't try to ride a bike and walk a dog. There are some basic skills you gotta bring to the table, and if you don't, someone's going to get hurt. 2) don't yank on the dog's neck. This probably pisses them off as much as it pisses me off. 3) keep the dog on your right hand side. This keeps them on the right hand side of the path and out of the way of traffic. I had a few more rules, but I forgot them already.

I wonder what Hemme's doing now?

So THAT is what intervals feel like?!?

Had a great weekend and netted a 3rd at the Wonder Lake Crit. Well run event on nice smooth roads that proved to be plenty wide despite many racers comments.

I did my first ever structered trainer interval workout this morning. Goal was 6 x 2min with 3 min rest. Wow, those suck! They will probably become "fun" in a sadistic kinda way as I see my power increase, but I had to bag the first one at 1:20. I was able to regroup and finish the other 5 once I knew what kind of suffering to expect.

I am humbled after reading about JPow doing 400watts for 5min just to "open up" the legs. I'll just have to keep chipping away at that rock.

J-Pow's Journal:

I was doing an opening-up work out for an upcoming 'cross weekend last November: five minute efforts at 400 watts and I noticed this young dude with a cut off t-shirt, Vans sneakers, Camelbak and a 1980’s Motobecane with down tube
shifters. I rode by and said ‘yoooo’, focusing on the task I had in front of me.
After five minutes I glanced back and I hadn’t lost my man with the Motobecane.
“WOAAAH. REALLY? Could that have just happened?” I thought to myself,"I need to get this guy's info because he’s talented — he just kept up with me on a
30-pound Motobecane and Vans sneakers.

I'm all moved into to the pad with Nicole. We're still trying to find a space for everything, but she's awesome and agreed to clear a space for my trainer. I also got a kick of having my own tifosi this morning too.

I'm sure I thoroughly confused her too. When I pedaled she watched me, when I stopped and the hub of my wheel started clicking she watched the wheel. I got a kick of pedaling, stopping, pedaling, stopping just to watch her.