To Do List

Ignore the Dwyers

Win triathlons

Engage in boygang activities

Claim I’m being preyed upon by the girl pack whilst actually preying on them

Write to do lists

Be a fail

Misquote mystery men

Shake condensation out of all water bottles

Watch Spongebob

Be insulted

Shave legs

Wear hats in a specific rotation

And thats all.

The Boy Gang

I believe that one of the best things about Notre Dame is the dorm system. Among other things, the dorms are single sex. While there are certainly drawbacks from the gender relations point of view, the benefit is some awesome male bonding. Over my brief time at school, I have joined a boy gang. We don’t sing and dance like a boy band, rather we hang out, watch TV, help each other, pick up chicks, wear manpants, eat and speak rudely, give great man-to-man hugs, play pranks, play sports, and generally be an unstoppable force of manhood. The boy gang includes the following: Me, Tully, Colin, Tom, Joey, Jeff, Dan, Alex, Shane and Bobby.  Others try to associate themselves with the boy gang, but are not true members.

My favorite thing about the boy gang is Sunday Brunch. I know that sounds gay, but when explained in detail it seems better. Generally after a weekend of debauchery, adventures and excitement, we all need a lot of sleep Saturday night/Sunday morning. As it is, we all get up around noon on Sunday and collectively head to the dining hall. From there, we all get our food and meet at our regular table. The next 45 minutes are spend in non-stop hysterics. Everyone has a great story to tell about their weekend’s exploits, and more than a few embarrassing things to remind their compatriots about. We brag about girls we picked up, stuff we stole and things we got away with. We remind our friends of ugly girls they hooked up with, awkward places they peed, where and when they passed out, and how much they professed their undying love for their roommate. All in all, there is a lot of exaggerating, and a lot of laughter.

SHARK WEEK

If I was in charge, it would be a National Holiday.

Its a Trap!

Bookstores! They are amazing, but I always get sucked into them and end up spending waaaaaaaaaaay too much time there. I want so many books, I can’t handle it. History books, bicycling books, books about star wars, books about zombies, books I’ve heard a lot about, books I’ve never seen before. Today I was just in a plain old Barnes and Noble, but I got lost for almost two hours. There were so many books I wanted, but I managed to escape with only two. First, Max Brooks’ Zombie Survival Guide, because you can never be too prepared for this inevitable disaster, and Cormac McCarthy’s The Road because I have been recommended it on many occasions, and I want to read it before the movie based on it comes out.

San Rafael Twilight Criterium Report

I crashed. Or in greater detail:

At the San Rafael Twilight Crit, I was racing in the men’s E4 field. The pace started out very fast, and we dropped a lot of the field, whittling the peloton down from 100 to about 40-50. In the second half of the 40 minute race, he pace began to slow as people started working on positioning, and I counter-attacked on one of the primes. I didn’t quite catch the guy (missing out on what was sure to be a sweet water bottle) and he didn’t seem keen to keep up the break so we sat up a bit and waited for the field. As the clock wound down and the lap count went up, I was sitting in about 15th place, and moving up. One of the sides of the crit was an uphill, and I was planning on attacking there on the last lap just to see what would happen. On the second-to-last lap, on the opposite side of the uphill, there is a downhill (obviously) and then a sharp right turn into the final straightaway. The peloton was wide indicating people shifting for a good position coming into the final lap, and I was probably five wheels deep in a three wide peloton.  Swinging down right into the straight, the guy in the lead of our line went too wide, and hit the guard rail. He went down instantly, taking the whole line with him. I hit the brakes and tried to swerve, but there were too many bodies and bikes in my path and I flipped over to my right. I got up quickly, as the race was still going on, and I move myself to the side of the road while paramedics helped people who were injured then I.

Injury Summary: Severe road rash on my right knee, knuckles, thigh, hip and elbow. My back appears to have been scrapped by a chain, and on my upper right arm I have three deep gashes likely form a chain or chainring (since it was very greasy). And, I was pretty bruised up.

Bike Report: Broken spokes, broken saddle, trashed tires, torn handlebar tape, general scratches.

Good news is: I’m gonna be ok. I have done spinning, and just started running. Now that my sutures are off I can swim again too, so the triathlon is a go! And, the race t-shirt is sweet. And, I got a rad facebook profile picture out of it.

Oogling in Sausalito

I have discovered that I have the habit of shamelessly eyeballing bicycles.  Any time one rides past, my head instantly turns. If I’m driving and a car with bike on it passes, my eyes are no longer on the road. I check components, size, geometry, brand, frame, age etc. all in a few moments.  I was recently on a casual bike ride into San Francisco, and we parked in and rode through Sausaltio. This is a town I have discovered that I am very fond of. First, there are TONS of bikes and bike stores. Second, there are no fixies to be seen. Third, it’s near SF, but not right next to it. Fourth, its small and has a lot of cool downtown shops right on the waterfront. The only big flaw I can spot is that it appears to be ultra-wealthy and snobby.There are a lot of art stores, and a lot of people on $10,000 bikes in full matching team discovery channel kits going 12 miles an hour down the road and going through brake pads on the slightest descent like its nobody’s business. These type of rich yuppies who suck at cycling but have way better stuff than me are one of my huge pet peeves (since I am particularly snobby and judgemental when it comes to bikes myself). So maybe I’ll just find someplace else to live.

PS. They are gonna build a velodrome in Santa Rosa!!! Now I can buy a track bike without having to be a dumb fixie hipster.

New Velodrome in Santa Rosa

Cycling Fuel Reviews

Here’s a breakdown of 6 of the most common sources of carbs, nutrients, vitamins, energy, caffeine, calories and/or flavor currently used by cyclists.  I have tried almost all of these recently, and the pictures are the specific brands of each type of product that I have sampled.

Sports Beans:From “Jelly Belly”, these are a pretty neat idea. They have a grood range of carbs and vitamins without too much sugar or calories. The package is pretty easy to open and they are pretty easy to consume while riding. Eating ‘healthy’ jelly beans is an interesting idea, but I feel like it psychs me out. While eating these on a ride I feel like, ‘I’m eating candy, this should make me feel sick because of all the sugar.’ It’s psychosomatic, but I just feel like they should hinder me instead of help.

 

Gels:there are tons of these out on the market right now, and they are generally accepted as being pretty dependable for all types of endurance athletics. They are really easy to consume, even though the texture is pretty weird and slimy. They are small and fit well (like tucked into tights in a skin-suit) while combining lots of grood carbs, caffeine, electrolytes etc depeding on the variety you get. I really like these, as I use them the frequently. The ND cycling team got a bunch of free Carb-Boom gels, so those are the only ones I ever take, cause it’s a well known fact that free stuff is way better. 

Bars: The classic. Endurance athletes have been relying on bars for a really long time, and I am no exception. I have switched brands quite often. The little store at ND sells a lot of varieties of Power brand bars, so right now I’m into those, but I’m always open to different varieties. When I was a runner, obviously I didn’t eat while running, so I got into the habit of eating bars before and after races. I haven’t changed much, and usually only eat bars just before or after riding.

Chews:These things are new, and frighten me. I have only tried them once, so I can’t tell you about how grood they are, but I found one major flaw with them. They get stuck in your teeth like no other! Cycling requires a lot of focus, and that is impossible when you are trying to get a bunch of gunk out of your molars.

Powders:Even classic-er. While the powder you mix yourself isn’t quite so old, Gatorade revolutionized the way endurance athletes hydrate. I buy jars of powdered Gatorade (regular type) and mix it into my water bottles. That way, I save a ton of money, and I can make it less concentrated than in the bottles. I haven’t tried recovery powders, but I have heard grood things and I’m very interested…

Energy Products:A few times at school, I mixed sugar free RedBull and Gatorade in water bottles while riding, and I could notice a little more energy with no crash, so that is an area I want to explore more. But what really intrigues me are ‘Energy Shots” like 5-Hour Power. A couple teammates use these during races, and say they work great. They also say they make you feel like the Hulk and you think you are about to rip out of your jersey. I think I’m going to try one before the San Rafael crit, cause I’m gonna get shelled anyways, so why not try?

Crazy Cycling Moms

Anyone who is familiar with youth sports can tell you that some parents take it way too seriously. In Soccer, football, basketball, baseball are the typical sports that kids participate in. At each of these events one can usually find some parent (or parents) that are taking the game way too seriously. In an attempt to live out their dreams of athletic excellence through their children, these parents push their kids to extremes, argue with refs, lobby coaches to play their kids more, and generally take the fun out of everything. However, as a little kid who wasn’t very good at sports, I always took solace in the thought that the odds of becoming a pro athlete were so dismally small, that none of the kids who were pushed so hard to excel would end up going to the JC (cause they focused on sports instead of grades), they would end up getting menial jobs, never move out of Sonoma, and eventually become a crazy sports parent themselves.

I was right.

The interesting thing is this: I have found that crazy sports parents also apply to cycling! Junior (18 and under) cyclists are rare, as competitive cycling is not a major sport for little kids. Yet they are out there racing! Juniors look so funny on their miniature sized bikes, but some of them are really fast! They also have one thing in common, a crazy mom. These women are typically overweight, unintelligent, and wearing a lot of floral print. I don’t know where they come from, but I can’t imagine that they had dreams of being a competitive cyclist as young girls, and are trying to live that out through their kids.

Favorite Places: Part 2, Mary’s Pizza Shack

Mary’s Pizza Shack, known to locals simply as Mary’s, is a Sonoma culinary landmark.

The original shack opened up in 1959 I believe (as they just had the 50th anniversary). Back then, it really was a little pink and white shack on highway 12 in Agua Caliente. That location is now gone, and there are now a bunch of Marys’ all over northern California. However, my mom still remembers going into the kitchen to stir the sauce for Mary herself, getting made milkshakes, and getting paid a nickle for every piece of silverware she retrieved that had fallen under the porch. Good times.

Marys, it seems, has always been a focal point for Sonoma’s teenagers. This is probably because of the infamous free bread stick basket. Every non-school night you can see many Sonoma teenagers rolling into and out of Mary’s for free bread sticks and to use the bathroom.

I really love Mary’s, and I probably eat there an average of 4 times per week (when I am in Sonoma). What I love so much about it is the familiarity. I know every person on the staff, and they know me (many are high school students). I know everything on the menu. Its just like in that show ‘cheers’. Being a regular can feel really good sometimes.

PS, the food is excellent. While many people hate on the pizza, I love it. The garlic fries are fantastic. They have great hot sandwiches and hamburgers. The soups, salads and bread sticks are also all excellent. You really can’t go wrong with good ‘ol Italian cooking. Most importantly, however, is the crown jewel: Ranch Dressing. I have heard from cooks there that some nasty stuff goes into the ranch, but I don’t care, I put that stuff on everything.

Favorite Places: Part 1, McKenna Ranch

When my mom was little, her brothers were very close friends with a boy who lived across the street from them. Young Pat McKenna’s mom died when he was little, and his dad was an alcoholic, so he was essentially raised by my mother’s parents. Pat inherited an unknown fortune and a big ranch from his father when he too died. Now, Pat lives on McKennaRanch with his wife and two children. While in no way related to me, they are treated essentially like family. Their ranch was a really fun place to play as a little kid, and eventually i started working there over the summers between school years. Now in my 6th season on the ranch, I have worked from picking up rocks to advanced jobs like irrigation work, pruning, tractor work etc. While the ranch is my place of employment, it still has elements of the magical wilderness that captivated me as a little kid. It seems much smaller now, and I have travelled across it many times, I am amazed to constantly find new things.

Aside from the house, the ranch has the following cool things: Pool, fort, organic farm, vineyard, orchard, pack of dogs, turkey, wildlife, creek, pond, fields, hammock, greenhouse, fountain, croquet course, rock walls. The terrain is extremely varied, and there is a great deal of wildlife to be found. I have seen foxes, coyotes, all sorts of lizards, amphibians, and birds. The house next door has beautiful horses. Inside the house, Pat has set up the dining room withbookshelves, huge cabinets filled with hundreds of awesome old lead toy soldiers, all of his historical reenacting gear (uniforms, guns, swords, accoutrement’s, etc.).

I wish so badly that I lived there. i think that keeping the ranch running would be a very fulfilling life. I could always try to marry Pat’s daughter and inherit the ranch, but I think I’ll settle for working and visiting this amazing place instead.

Here’s me at a typical day at work.