Finally some good weather

 

 

 

The beginning of summer has been fairly crappy this year, with lots of cold weather and rain (and the occasional 100+ degree days). The other day, we finally had some nice weather, so what better to do than go to the bluffs with Tara and watch some trains. Needless to say, we were not the only people with this idea, but it was not too busy. I love being back in NE Portland!

Moving in party

 

 

 

Yesterday we also had a very fun moving-in-party. It was fairly mellow as we started at four. However, there were some notable occurances, so read on. Our guests brought a plethora of tasty food (the most ambitious showed up with about fifty hand-made salad rolls, together with a stack of three containers of different sauces for them; he may be a contender for the local "Johan and Sus" title of food bringing). We chatted, played records, and generally had a splendid time. A couple of hours into the festivities, Brie showed up with her beau in an ice-cream truck (their summer project). I got a mango and pepper fruit stick, which is an interesting flavor combination. We had other celebrities come by as well, such as Don Ho, complete with a chicken-coloured sweat shirt. Nice!

The old girl gets some paint

 

 

 

Yesterday we finally got the velodrome good and painted. This springs moody weather meant that we could not apply paint the scheduled day a few weeks ago, so we spent that day scraping and patching the larger holes. As a result, the velodrome has not been that great to ride on; kilo night cost me $100 worth of tubular tire for my disc wheel as I got a cut across the bead. Hopefully there will be less of that now that we have dolled the velodrome up and scraped down the worst bumps.

Pursuits went really well; the night was cold and a little bit windy so times were not stellar, but I banged out a respectable time for a first of the year ride. With some luck I'll be able to improve on the pacing a bit this thursday, as there may be a slot open to reride if not too many people show up. Training has been going very well for me, with new power records for shorter distances, and some good riding in general. Yesterday was sprint night, and both I and Amelia had very good rides, both tactically and speed-wise. The popularity of track racing in the lower categories seems to be holding up; to fit the sprint tournament into the alloted time we had to cut rides from three laps to two, which felt a little bit unusual.

Riding kilos

So the traditional after effects of the seasons first kilometer time trial has now finished manifesting themselves. Here is the score so far: 1) Several small pukes about ten minutes after getting off the bike. 2) A sore throat from hyperventilating random air particles that went away after a day or so. 3) Insomnia the night after the ride, and bad sleep for about two more days. 4) Cold sores all over my lower lip after a few days from a depressed immune system. And all this from just a little bit than a minute on the bike. I am already looking forward to my four minutes on the bike this thursday!

(It is good that I like riding kilos, isn't it! Also on the upside: they were not this hard the first few years I rode them, and they do get easier during the season as you adapt to them).

The tree I loved for three days

 

Once upon a time we moved into a new house, and there was a giant cool tree in our yard. After we had enjoyed the house for three days, some guys showed up and took it down. It was epic. To console us, the landlords left a six foot spindly tree, that will be awesome in fifty years.

That is not to say that our house is not cool now, but you see what I am saying.

Track race premier

 

 

 

This week was the track racing premier for this year, and as usual we started with timed events---500s for the ladies and kilos for the men. Amelia rode a very strong time, coming in fifth in a very strong field (all national level ladies). My ride was about .3 off last years PR which is very good, placing me second in my field. Interestingly, the gym work seems to have paid off---we both rode very fast first laps and have some work to do on our last lap.

Fixed gear riding in Portland seems to have grown the interest in track racing a lot this year. After 75 people had registerred, the organizers had to cut off registration as there would not be enough time for everyone! This is great for the sport.

Then yesterday was 200m night in the sprint series. A fair amount of people showed up here too, but everyone got the opportunity to ride two rides at least. My legs were toasty after the kilo and a mid-day massage, but I managed to bang out a time only .3 seconds slower than my Alpenrose PR (without using aero equipment, to boot). Amelia did great too, putting down a ride that was comparable to her best of last year.

Today Amelia is racing the Eric Kautzky memorial race, while I stay home and do some efforts on the road. I am up in the air about whether I should do any mass start racing at all this year (I did none last year, and that worked out well). For now I have decided to hold back.