no jacket!

last week i had to get out there, get those hours no matter what. mother nature cooperated with single digit temps and murderous winds. f it. my blood's so damn thick at thick at this point i could ride in the arctic with a bikini on. hit my goal hrs last week, forced myself to take yesterday off and am feeling really good about things. all the months of "rest" taken from the bike while moving our shit to vermont has paid-off huge, not in fitness, but in desire - the urge to ride is overwhelming.

put-in most of the planned hrs during the wk, so the wknd was all about cruising. headed-out saturday on the road bike down a dirt (ice and snow) covered road. a few miles into it, feeling good, found myself going 35-40 down an ice-covered hill and that little voice piped-up and reminded me that there was very little friction between the tires and the road, tapped the brakes and down i went, sliding sideways, still clipped in, got a 100 yards before coming to a stop. was kinda fun, but knew the next one wouldn't go as well and headed for some pavement. en route, a flock of the most perfect sheep i've ever seen stood in the way. 20-30 pink-nosed sheep with perfectly groomed coats stood in the road, catching some early morning rays. pushed through and onto the east warren rd where a stiff headwind greeted me cooly, but the best thing about a strong headwind on a loop ride is the ride home - and it was the ballz! pushing all the gear i had, flying-up the 15miles of rt100 in less than 30mins, good times.

55 degrees this morning, first time in a cpl months i rode without a jacket, insulated pants, booties, gore socks, full head/face mask, blah, blah, blah - you know, so much gear that you spend more time getting dressed and undressed than riding. it was great - had me up sprinting and jamming on it, kinda a celebration ride i guess.

looks like i've got a lot of catching-up to do after reading Harlan's most recent post - double century's this past wknd for that guy - no secret why he's fast. you get out what you put in, mix-in some talent and BAM! you the man. you the man Harlan.

looking to the 100miler season opener in TN, just need to pull the trigga on a plane ticket. i have no idea how the fitness will shape-up six weeks from now - hoping to suck-up the drive to CT for the Root66 season opener the first wknd of April to get an idea of where i am, but it's hard to justify 4hrs of driving each way for a 2hr race - when i could just stay home and put-in a nice 6 hr ride and still have time to drink beer...

spent part of the wknd learning how to tap our Maple trees. sugaring is a pretty simple process, just very time consuming. tap tree. sap goes into bucket. bucket goes into big pan with fire underneath. syrup is left. not something i'd do on my own by any means, but my neighbor built-up a sugar sack with the help of some friends, enjoys collecting the sap, and has a good system going - and i've got plenty of excuses to stand around at night drinking beer watching the sap boil-down into syrup. in a few wks we'll be eating pancakes with syrup from our own trees.

tapping the trees:

Seneca and I scoping-out conditions on our local mtb trail:

future cyclist?