on Mercury's wheel

some worm stole my bike.

2009-10-18T17:11:00.000-07:00

as well as a wheelset that i already had sold. Broke into my apartment in a 2-hour window of time, in broad daylight, used some bolt-cutters, and opened the lock on my garage door, and lifted the stuff inside, left most of it, just took my 2008 stumpjumper ht and a powertap wheelset. bastards. i'm sor of afraid of what i will do if i catch them.

1 man wrecking crew

2009-10-07T07:35:00.000-07:00

ok, it's more like 3 or 4 man, but we are tearing apart the bike shop. Growing tired of a person, who does not employ me, telling me what and how to do, my job. Hopefully it will all be over soon.

Enjoying the new dude at the shop, john. I'm not 100 percent convinced that he likes me though. I'm sure he'll grow to like me, cuz hey, i'm pretty awesome.

Went to long beach comic con. Bought a LOT of key issues. Too good a deal not to pass up. Also, good to see that Geoff Johns spends some time around the weight pile. So man sloths at comic conventions. I think my personal fave issue i bought was:

In this issue, they tie, although, it's clearly barry allen being cool about it, because he smokes superman at least twice later on.

I've grown rather fond of the flash, who is in fact the worlds fastest man, which is kind of ironic coming from the worlds SLOWEST man. Speaking of slow, cross kicks of for myself this weekend. Getting ready to do some hurting.

kick in the door...

2009-09-26T09:02:00.000-07:00

today, in the middle of my post ride cooldown, after an inspirational ride, with one of the the I.E.'s most inspirational team's most inspirational members, andrea hensler, i decided i need to work with the blessings God has given me. Blogging.

I have been sitting in on this whole blog thing for a while, while actual strong riders like chopper are straight up pulling train. So sit up a spell chop, let me take a turn.

Really enjoyed riding the bike today. Really. Only for like 2 hours, but it was great. Gonna keep the train-a-rolling with a ride tomorrow, and the redlands cyclocross happy hour on tuesday, and the beginning of my cross exploits in irvine. Loving it.

Now, being a member of a team with the notorious chopper, i have learned lots. Tune in here once a week for some words of wisdom from old chop chop.

pain in the neck

2009-09-05T07:46:00.000-07:00

This week has been a nightmare. First, i got a cold in the middle of the hottest patch of the season. I'm pretty much over it now, but it was definitely raging at the beginning of the week> Then, just when the cold started giving out, i woke up with a huge pain in my neck. The old "slept on it wrong". Well, this is sore neck day #4. I think it may be time to get a new pillow.

new bike

2009-08-27T08:26:00.000-07:00

so i got a new bike.

i know wht you're thinking, how many does THAT make, but this one is slightly different. This one has a grand total of 17$ invested. Its an old P.O.S. gitane that got donated with a rear freewheel wheel and a crank, seat, seatpost, headset and stem. I scavanged the rest from my bone box at work. only purchases were chain and brake, totaling 17$. I think i'm gonna give it to the wife, tho it is a tad big for her. What the hey, it's better than spending a piss load of money on a bike that doesn't get used, like many richbitch bike shop patrons. Riding the bike is SUPER fun, and has resparked my longing to ride. Think i'll be dusting off the 1x speed cross and go for a little ridezies this evening.

i really need to keep up on this thing.

2009-08-18T21:09:00.000-07:00

so lately, here's the run down:

Comic books. Lots of 'em. Pretty stoked on Blackest Night, captain america:reborn, and hulk and daredevil.

Tried my hand at doing merch for a band. I would rather have been kicked square in the nuts, so i welched out on half of the agreement. 's ok though cuz i got virtually none of what i was told i would get, so is it really welching?

Riding my bike? Nooooooooooot exactly. I've been riding it for transportation. But as far as suited up and hammering out a couple of intervals? Nope. Do i feel bad about it now? Nope. Will i feel bd about it when i'm weeking softly in the shower after turning in a 19th place finish for every race during cross season. Probably.

I have been enjoying tuesdays off. It's sweet. Looking forward to Interbike and some quality vacation time.

What else? Cut the piss out of my finger at work, and i think my finger might be turning into a zombie finger. That's pretty sweet.

i tried to tell the photographer that it violated my tribal religious beliefs

2009-07-20T21:07:00.000-07:00

but they took the picture anyways.

Im sort of a big deal in the bike service game, you might have noticed. Yes, when you hear a creaking in your bottom bracket, i will personally call your ass out by getting you to come out into the africa heat to make the sound for me in your wool slacks and penny loafers, as pictured here:

and god forbid you drag me all the way outside to make the noise for me and your bike "isn't making it out here....wierd."

then i have to explain to you that the $250.00 you spent to shave the 68 grams on your ti-spindled pedals, may well be the reason for the noise seeing as you way 195 pounds and the pedals have a 158 pound rider weight limit. How about you do an extra lap on sunset once a week for a year and save yourself a whole 5 pounds, for free!

Training and technical advice. Now that's what i call service.

's is how i feel after i ride and kickbox the same day...

2009-07-08T21:25:00.000-07:00

at least im the one doing the hitting in kickboxing...

here's a week recap for you.

2009-07-02T21:01:00.001-07:00

started doing this...

ended doing this...

i'm starting to get pissed again.

crits

2009-06-25T23:17:00.000-07:00

are the pits.

that is all.

KrAcckkkkooOOW!

2009-05-31T17:02:00.001-07:00

I think i am going to name my new bike the punisher due to the painful nature of cross and it's black and white color scheme. Also, i think im gonna peel off th headbadge and put a punisher skull on there. Also, i'm gonna look into changing the "GARY FISHER" to "THE PUNISHER", what the hey, all i have to do is change the gary f part.

2 days off!

2009-05-25T21:01:00.000-07:00

that's right, 2!

Epic rides on both days. Thanks genius feature on my ipod. That little feature shaves off the 20 minutes i spend before a ride making a playlist, or waiting thru the boring parts of albums while i ride. All bases are covered with that one, aptly named, feature.

Today i spent memorial day at a sushi restaurant yelling at the waiter. Went to josh's house to watch the fights/ultimate warrior documentary (awesome). Then watched the steve-o documentary. What junk show that dude was. Stoked to see him clean, but, as a sober individual, i still don't get the whole self defeated "i'm a total loser, and that's just how it is" aspect that all NA or AA people tend to have. Don't get me wrong, if it gets you sober, i'm all for it, but, can't one be a little more positive about the person who you are now as opposed to how wrecked the person you were was? It just doesn't strike me as that type of organization.

Banged out another half an hour at tempo at home and now im too spun to sleep. Pisser.

KA-BLAM!

2009-05-18T19:48:00.000-07:00

so, this is the beginning of the 4 month long gut-check that i like to refer to as period training. Most people are in the thick of it, i am starting my base mileage and resistance training. That's cuz i'd way rather kick total ass in the cross season than any other race season in existence.

Got my bike and promptly put 'er on a diet. 21 pounds out of the box (YIKES). now i got it down to just a scooch under 18. yay.

Let me just say, i have never been a weight weenie (truth), and i have never even weighed any of the other bikes i own (also truth). That should give you some idea how serious i am about kicking some ass this cross season. I decided to keep it real and get a steel cross bike this year come hell or high water, so right away i was nervous about the weight. Also, i don't feel as if i have committed any weight weenie specific crimes. No booster kits with 27 different ti and lightweight alloy fasteners. Minimal carbon parts, and the ones i do have i bought on the cheap (150 gram seatpost 35 bones!). My main point of contention was the wheelset.

Let me start off, for those of you who don't know me, by saying i hate shimano. However, this year i decided to forgo the gluing of 90 dollar tubulars, and try out this new fangled tubeless that the kids seem to be so hip on these days. It seems like a good way to run whatever tire pressure i want, get a sweet ride quality, and very pragmatic to boot. In the world of tubeless road stuff, we have shimano, campagnolo, and fulcrum to choose from. If you run anything that campy makes, off road, it voids the warranty. My shop doesn't deal in fulcrum. Sorta thinned the herd of choices so to speak.

Now, hutchinson MAKES a cross specific tire. Could i wait for us to get one in? Hell no! That's what stan's is for! So i opted to do a stan's kit on my new dura-ace/bontrager jones cx combo. Took a little cajoling for the rear tire to seat, but the front was very cooperative. In order to get everything sealed properly, one has to use a high pressure that is not conducive to ride with no tube. Of course one back's off the tire pressure before one tikes this tubless setup for one's maiden voyage.

Well, not this one. I got about 3 blocks and, well, just read the title of this post.

also...

2009-05-12T21:20:00.000-07:00

i have reached my quota of one sissy-rock band to get into for the year. Band of horses.

for those of you keeping score that's

2007-Jesu
2008-crime in stereo
2009-band of horses

the worst part about any bike...

2009-05-12T21:17:00.001-07:00

is waiting for it to show up. Wheels too. The worst part about wheels is waiting for them to show up. And headsets.

gettin shat done

2009-05-08T13:42:00.000-07:00

heres the rundown:

Cut Andrews hair
Sent out the Xbox
sent out the ebay stuff
gonna talk to dorthy wong later about putting on a cross race(s) in socal
bought some brakes
picked up my once errant keys
ate lunch
scoped the sitch at gotschalks (snuggies for 15 bones? sign me up)
Puttin more stuff up on fleabay
cutting johson's hair

and my reward for all of this?

BOOM!

Beyond Hypothermia.

2009-04-27T08:16:00.000-07:00

let me just start out by saying, 24 hour races are intense. I don't mean it in the keanu-reeves point-break super-bro sense of the word, i mean it in its most literal and real sense.

as it appears in the miriam webster dictionary;

intense
1.existing in an extreme degree - check
2.marked by or expressive of great zeal, energy, determination, or concentration - check
3.exhibiting strong feeling or earnestness of purpose; deeply felt - check

It was a 5 man team, which i can see why has its own category. Any more and you can organize things to maximize sleep and stuff. Any less would be like, what's the point, i should've done this solo.

Fist lap i was a total spastic. This should be no surprise to anybody who has seen me ride a mountain bike, but i still got in under an hour (my goal for the weekend). I saw some dude who looked like the trail reached up and punched him in the genitals and throat. He did NOT finish the first lap. So that was encouraging.

Second lap i decided to take it easy. I wanted to go for a super even keel pace and not spaz out on any of the climbs, as my technical skills are not up to par and 3 of the climbs i would say are above par. It went really well. No falling, couple of times i had to walk, but im starting to get it, which is good because its getting dark.

Third lap was crazyness. It was in the 30's. Let me just say it was a new experience. I don't ride at usually night, and i don't usually ride a mountain bike, so, you do the math. Thanks to Joy tho, for hooking me up with the light. Combining that with the light i already had as a helmet light made SUCH a difference. Still at this point the downhill sections were sketchy as hell. Completely rutted out and several lines to choose from one of which was the correct one. Not easy at night.

4th lap. Pure insanity. 4 a.m. Shadows were jumping out at me. My mind was playing tricks on me. All i could think of were fear and loathing quotes:

"I hate to say this, but this place is getting to me. I think I'm getting the Fear."

"24 hours of adrenaline is what the whole hip world would be doing Saturday nights if the Nazis had won the war. This was the Sixth Reich."

"A drug person can learn to cope with things like seeing their dead grandmother crawling up their leg with a knife in her teeth. But no one should be asked to handle this trip."

"I was right in the middle of a fucking reptile zoo, and somebody was giving booze to these goddamn things. Won't be long now before they tear us to shreds."

"Jesus, bad waves of paranoia, madness, fear and loathing - intolerable vibrations in this place. Get out. The weasels were closing in. I could smell the ugly brutes."

"That's fucking machine guns man, they're firing at us!"

"this bicycle belongs to the world bank! That money goes to ITALY!"

The crazy thing about lap 4 is, i could actually see myself handling better, and getting up the climbs with little skateboard scoots as opposed to walking.

5th lap. I was done. I had desire in me, but the legs were simply not there. For the interim in between my 2 consecutive laps i was just trying to get to sleep. Not enough food consumed, water was frozen, moral was low. That was the craziest lap of them all, because even though i was annihilated and defeated mentally, i still got the lap done in an hour flat. Crazy! My skills have definitely improved.

pics soon.

on the eve of the eve....

2009-04-22T19:47:00.000-07:00

of our 24 hour race.

Me, sergio, andy, joe, and, jason are about to head up to idyllwild on friday for the 2-4. Pretty excited. I've never raced a mountain bike before, and this seems like it'll be fun. Due to my uncanny ability to shake it, i have scored us sponsorships with both Tifosi sunglasses and Stell Coffee and tea, which, if you know my illustrius history with the distributors of said sunglasses and coffee, wasn't hard. Still tho, free gear is sweet.

The race doesn't begin til saturday at noon, but we're gonna go up early and go for a little night ride. Should be fun. THe menu for the 2-4 looks to be: burgers, carne asada tacos, bagels, cereal, and various endurance fuels. I'm doing celebrity mountain biker and revered educator Joy D.'s hair tomorrow, perhaps she can educate me on more effective fueling.... looking at the list right now i'm thinking i can bring better items to the table.

If i'm not back by 4 on sunday, call the police.

holy hell

2009-04-17T14:04:00.000-07:00

east bound and down, so funny. I laughed til i drooled.

BAT FIGHT with Will Ferrell from Will Ferrell

Am I Demon?

2009-04-12T18:21:00.000-07:00

I think this is pretty much the inspiration for my hair. I think this is the direction it's going reguardless just based on how its growing. It fits as well as socks on a rooster that besides growing my hair i ride bikes. Still though, if danzig just showed up at a race, stomped everybody and vanished, i would be pretty stoked. That'll be the goal i guess.

FACT

2009-04-10T19:56:00.000-07:00

This dude gets LAID.

Vicente Fernandez is the man. I think i would like to go see him, but i wouldn't understand crap tht went on/what he said. That'd suck.

Crafton today. Crafton tomorrow. Good training. Geared up for team lazer wolf/24 hour race/camping extraviganza. Might get to break in my new tent/sleeping bag next weekend for A.J.'s astronomy trip. I'm thinking LOTS of hot chocolate. Maybe marshmalows as well. Could be good. Could be great.

time to get bloody

2009-04-07T08:20:00.001-07:00

Do i have a problem with overconfidence or am i just plain dim witted when i never factor in or consider eating crap on mountain bike rides?

Went to hulda crooks and up the good old jedi. Ate some shite about 4 times on the way down. Nothing bad, just slightly skinned up and it was mostly due to the fact that those XTR pedals i have are death traps. Definately going back to eggbeaters.

Still tho, i never even thing about how often i eat it until im getting up off the ground going, "oh yeah, i remember this..."

Also, hulda crooks was SUPER sandy and loose and i only have one light, which was not enough.

any ways, i ate some crap but i had a blast.

time to get dirty

2009-04-05T22:40:00.000-07:00

so the mountain bike dilemma is done.

And there she is. At least this time i got what i wanted, for the most part. If i was going to get a singlespeed i wanted a rig 29er. If i was going to get a geared bike i wanted a hardtail 26 in bike.

Dude who owned and rode this bike for a grand total of 5 rides, went OTB and broke his back. What a pisser. Not for me tho cuz he got rid of it on the fire sale tip. Hopefully the bike has excersized all of the crash demons out of it. The bike is far from stock with crossmax wheels which i will be working in a tubeless setup (adam, watch your hands), and a fox RLC fork. I don't really like fox stuff, but everybody else seems to, so i think i will be selling this fork and getting myself a sid. Also it has an XTR cassette, xt crank, and xtr pedals. Gonna be getting rid of the xtr pedals too. I dont know if i like them, i dont wanna know if i like them, i'm used to crank brothers from cross season, so that's what im doing.

I think i'm gonna start slow by doing 6 laps at the 24 hour in san jacinto.

Did i mention i have the handling skills of a thumbless orangutan?

huffy

2009-04-03T19:46:00.000-07:00

i am obsessed with huffy bikes.

First off. Huffy= so much cooler a name for a bike than so many bike manufacturer's names who try to sound cool/tough. Specailized? Lame. That's a description, not a name. Trek? Lame. I still think spock when i think trek. Cannondale? Ok, cannondale gets a pass because of the train on the fron and the use of "cannon" in the name. Still Huffy for the win.

Second off. Ever watch a movie that is so bad that it is awesome a la evil dead or strange brew. That's how i feel about huffy bikes. It amazes me that you can buy a full mountain bike with more gear combo's than my road bike for a mere 99 dollars. First words outta your mouth are prolly gonna be something like "but the quality dude..." Shut your suck hole. It still blows my mind that that grouping of like, nuts, bolts, cables, levers, a freewheeling mechanism, and steel is under 100 dollars and it can be fixed to ride enough to get you around town (i know, i preform that miracle on the regular).

Third, like it or not, i feel like huffy has a more solid history than even Schwinn bikes in my opinion. Sure, schwinn had its heyday, a paramount with nuovo record and mavic seups still gives me a raging semi, however, schwinn sold the eff out, so they are turncoat bastards and can get bent. Huffy has always been shot. Lessin you count this pic of bob roll on a huffy in paris roubaix.

That's anther thing, i dont give a rats ass how many of his bikes ben serotta put a huffy headbadge on, them shits was a huffy. Davis Phinney rode a huffy, Bob Roll rode a huffy.

Also, today, one of my favorite passtimes went down at the bike shop. Huffy tossing. Eddie chucked the piss out of this huffy that somebody was donating (good luck finding replacement parts for that mother...). It was awesome, but more for the hangtime than the distance. But it was still awesome. There needs to me more of this. ALso some of you out there in blogger land might be like, "oh steve thats effed, you say you love huffys but you chuck em and break em and crap" Put a sock in it. Thats the best part about a huffy. After all is said and done, its still some bike that science cant figure out why it runs for a total distibuting cost of 12 bucks. NO matter how abused, how used, how thrashed, how annihilated a huffy is, its like a roach. At the dawn of the Nuclear apocolypse, there will be 2 things left. Huffys and the zombies who ride them.

Im seriously considering getting a huffy tattoo.

FML.

2009-03-15T18:53:00.000-07:00

for those of you who dont know, or for those of you who are bummed out about your life right now, and are of the persuasion that misery indeed loves company. www.fmylife.com.

in other FML news: this weekend was the 5th annual "feel my legs, i'm a racer" race. For those who are into the whole brevity thing, it is sometimes written as FML. How appropriate. Here are a few shots i took with my phone when i wasn't cramping, gasping for air, or bleeding from the eyes/anus.

this is the second climb. I think it was called eldridge. See that spec waaaay up there between the trees that kind of looks like road. That is road. The same road i'm on when i took this photo. On one of the times when i tacked back and forth, i stopped because my front wheel came off the ground. I unclipped and it was painfully obvious i was going to have to go over to a neighboring driveway if i wanted to make it the rest of the way up that lame excuse for a street.

I dont know how to rotate photo's because i am one half cave-man, and one half awesome. This is the top of the first climb

This is the famous fargo. 30% grade. Yes, 30. It is the steepest paved road west of the mississippi. No. Just no.

this is the descent after what i think was the 4th climb. Im pretty sure this is the one where an effing BUS bottomed out and was stuck up at the crest. As in, it had to wait for a tow truck because it was without use of a couple of wheels/drive shaft.

It was fun and it was my good friend sasha's birthday. She's sweet, but her living situation is a bit less than sweet. She's getting kicked out of her house, and the roommate who owns the house, (the one doing the kicking) without saying a word, lurked out of the shadows and into the room where i was sleeping, looked at me (right when i was about to get to sleep) looked around, and crept back into the shadows. Even with all the physical tortures i went thru this weekend, that was by far the low point.

Good food after the race. Good game of kickball afterward where i'm pretty sure i threatened physical violence against every member of the opposite sex/opposite team (hey, i did my part to rep the IE at an LA race). All in all good clean fun. I need to climb more. A lot more. I think i'm gonna do ride around the bear, and breathless agony. FML.

In other FML news, today was the celebration of my 31st birthday. FML.