Congratulations getting your power meter up and running.

Here's your promised assignment. >>>

I stopped riding anyway. I am totally into a new sport now… it is competitive couch sitting. I am getting really good at it. I hear the higher the number on the scale goes up, the better you can be. Besides cycling is for girls anyway—shaving, wearing tight clothing, gathering in groups… that is all I see at school throughout the week.

Hope you had fun on your little ride today... GIRLS!!!!

Peace,
Your friend at WV

BTW: Do you think I could take some time off my couch to come over to school and watch the shaving, wearing of tight clothing, and gathering in groups?

And Love,
Nobody's friend at ARC

HUMP REPORT

Special mention goes to Kevin Haley for taking on Saskwatch all on his own on Route 88 coming into Pine Island, thus allowing Andreas to rest (while holding Kevin's jacket) in order to save himself for the sprint.

Everybody better look out. BLASTER got strong.

It's almost deer season, and the package store is open.

Also, tell Bob to check out this link. >>>

He is letting me read it first (even before he himself) just so long as I promise not to ruin the book for him by revealing the ending.

However, I know none of you are going to bother reading the book but will be curious to know the outcome, so (while Dr. Art looks away), the rest of you can click on the link at right.

It is a full scan of the entire final page, so you can read the surprise ending for yourself. >>>

I'm a young girl who lives near you guys, but I'm sure you don't know me.

In any case, here's my problem.

I am supposed to be inheriting (not really soon, but sometime) a wealth of special biking memorabilia.

Unfortunately, the collection is lacking when it comes to beautiful high-end bicycle frames.

I have heard that recently some incredible painting technologies have been applied to bicycles. How can I convince my father to add a great one to the collection which will become his legacy to me?

A couple days ago using the Brourman Slow Motion Walking exercise (which is very Romanov like), I realized that I have actually become incapable of balancing on my left foot.

Brourman states that in the stance phase one's ankles should be tight, not wobbly, but the paragraph remains mute about how that should happen.

I spent a few days trying to get my ankles tight, but I just didn't get it. Since the time I was very young I have always had weak ankles.

Then it hit me, "Wait a minute. There doesn't seem to be much muscle mass in the ankle, maybe none at all so far as I can tell."

I popped out my Calais-Germain Anatomy of Movement and looked at this page. >>>

I'm just weak and can't do it very long… yet.

Anybody who gives a shit about their performance should have all three of these books within easy reach.

BTW: Calais-Germain also has a companion book of exercises which puts the whole mess in deeper context.

Also, you may as well get the Calais-Germain book on breathing while you're at it, and women might enjoy The Female Pelvis Anatomy and Exercises. I sure do!

HUMP REPORT

Today Mary's back wheel came out of the drop-outs when she stood to blast up the hill at the stop sign on the end of Oil City Road, and she lunged over her handle bars landing squarely and almost flat on her face while just managing to catch herself on both forearms.

She gives credit for the save to her five hours a day of floor exercises saying,

"The old Mary of just last year (the one who couldn't even stand on her pedals) would have definitely been severely damaged in that fall. My new strength and flexibility probably saved my life—if not my collar bone! Look at me dance. Am I not lithe?"

BTW: I'm pretty sure Jim Tooker tried to kill me.

I said, "Look, Humberto, you've got nothing to prove. You have already done all that racing stuff and kicked everybody's ass in the process. Even your most recent comeback and dabbling back into racing shows you are an enduring and gifted competitor. Why would you want to risk your health (and your family's well being) by taking a chance like racing with who the fuck know's who, everywhere the fuck knows where, and for who the fuck knows what? And just think how bad all those people are going to feel getting their asses kicked by you again. The losers on the Hump are plenty enough. You don't need that shit."

I hope Turtle Boy listened to me.

Some call it
Pedaling Pilates,
but it's not.

Some say
Cycling Chi
but it's not.

Some declare
Martial Arts on Wheels,
but no.

It's not even
Handle Bar Ballet.

It is
Cycling
Performance
Simplified.

What's the deal with that?

.

The only thing published so far is the draft outline, so maybe the person speaking is a genius and has figured out where we are going with it.

Of course everybody is vox mic'd with Sure SM58's, and there's the obligatory Moog beside Billy's piano—which piano sound became famous enough for a booth at an AES show of the time to plug people into headphones, and say, "Here. Play this keyboard and listen."

"Fuck! Man, that's the sound!!!"

The sax is mic'd with an AKG C414 EB which was standard for that application at the time.

Of special interest is the keyboard laying on top of the B12 in front of the sax player. It appears to be a Voyetra, which was featured on my own Factory Preset album.

The jargon for that noise is "machine noise," and it can be heard during the drum intro of the first tune on Factory Preset.

When my album was new, that noise drove me nuts, and I was embarrassed, but now I like it, because (just like it does for the Billy Joel concert), that noise places the album at a very specific time.

It's just not a time anybody wants to go back to, because (for example) the big calling card for the Voyetra synthesizer (shown in front of the saxist) came from the fact it had a "tune button" which fixed all the nonsense of tone drift in the analog oscillators as they warmed up.

The Moog and Prophet were much more problematic.

HUMP REPORT

In our continuing effort to drive Lauren Warren absolutely fucking bonkers, we give you this. >>>

You know our average was 21 mph, and on the 50 mile an hour downhills, I just backed off, because I knew it wasn't going to hurt my standing, and I was sort of hoping to be alive after the race.

Anyway, after about 30 miles I started feeling great. I didn't know I had that kind of endurance, but those younger guys were already cracking.

I'm starting to feel like the old Humberto again.

You are the old Humberto, but it's not "again." It's for the first time.

Tour de Catskills

Humberto Cavalheiro 30+
  First stage 7th
  Second Stage 6th
  Overall 6th

Albino Moita 40+
  First Stage 4th
  Second Stage 6th
  Overall 5th

Pedro Furtado Cat 5
  First Stage 7th
  Second Stage 7th
  Overall 7th

The hills today were Mountain Road

x 5!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If he were here, he would only say, "There are no hills," and complain about the absolute inability of anybody born in this country being able to ride as good as the Portuguese.

Just think if they trained!

Ok, so we had a good day yesterday.

The hills are monsters (Mountain Road x 3). It rained hard the whole race.

The USCF Official told us to make the wrong turn, and we were all lost for about 15 miles—all under heavy rain.

We missed a 3 man breakaway, but the team did really good and finished in the Top 10.

The 52 mile race ended up 67 miles.

Have fun today!

The Power Agent software does not save the names of Intervals unless you put a note in the Notes section and save it.

Plus, that "Save" button is grayed out until you put in at least two (2) characters in the Notes field. You can use spaces, but I usually put in 'tt' as in "Test, test."

I probably don't have to mention that you can drag focus on a section of the graph, and rename it as a new interval.

Plus make sure they know to review their charts by switching to "None" for Smoothing and Sampling factors, and not to use the default "10 samples" for each.

Find out if Michele remembered the PowerTap data for backup is found in the ".poweragent" folder under whatever user name they have on their computer. Like this. >>>

Then just when I really started to enjoy it… you were done.

Bring it on baby, you and what peloton?

However, I am pretty sure they have already had one for some time, but on first using it they realized just how excellent Mary's numbers are, and they are reluctant to publish their own.

Poor Cranky.

How can I help?

I just got that guitar a month ago, and I hadn't played one in about 20 years, but the moment I picked it up, I realized that I could play every bit as bad as I ever did... and right off the bat without even practicing.

HUMP REPORT

1) Albino (TBA)
2) Humberto Cavalherio

They were so far ahead of the other riders, it isn't even worth mentioning the rest of them as even being in the ride.

Apparently, Albino's calf muscle is somewhat on the mend.

You'd think somebody would send us Albino's last name, so we can stop referring to him as, "…that Portuguese guy who finished 3rd in the World in Masters."

I mean, really, we've got Humberto's last name (even call him Turtle Boy), and we don't even have to mention his two Gold Medals in the Empire Games anymore.

Is it just because you heard I called out the entire Portuguese National Guard and spared no expense in time, effort, and money, just to get this? >>>

MCCAIN TAPS GOV. SARAH PALIN

Quick! Turn on your televisions before somebody notices, and the guy who did it gets fired.

Imagine how pissed off the Republicans are going to be after they thought they had it all figured out: "We're losing for sure, so why not pretend to run a woman? She'll never see the Oval Office."

I've read up to page 50. Hopefully B will read it b/c did you read the part on neuropathy?

Well, he's had that since his chemo treatments 2 yrs ago. Would like to see if the exercises can help him.

Excellent stuff!

Not that there's anything wrong with it, but you do know that she's a tri-athlete, don't you?

This should perk you up. >>>

I disagree, but the photo immediately conjures up Aerosmith’s, “Dude looks like a lady” and Tone Loc’s, “Funky Cold Medina”.

You have to wait to the part about “Sheena” in the song, but check it out: >>>

What can I say, I like strange music, stuff that makes you go hmmmmm…

We have received complaint regarding the mentioning of lesbians on this website.

Since we are, after all, American Road Cycling (and couldn't use the American flag if we weren't), we are very sensitive to such issues as the one about family values and others of its sort.

Therefore, we fully understand concerns about the lesbian issue, and feel it behooves us to clear this matter up once and for all.

Unfortunately, we must confirm that the problem you are having with lesbians is actually a confirmation of your worst nightmares, and what you were most afraid of is actually true.

It is a little known fact that lesbians are not actually gay, per se, and really don't hate men, nor do they hate having sex with them.

Of course SlingShot can have sex with them anytime he chooses (and does); because he is so very good at it, it doesn't even matter that he is a fat old man.

It is really a matter (as you most feared) of them only hating to have sex with YOU.

As it turns out, lesbians don't hate MEN, they just hate SMALL PENISES.

We have considered your complaint and realize that it is time for this site to take the appropriate steps.

Henceforth, American Road Cycling shall be renamed and conduct all business under the heading: All Lesbians, All the Time.

See? And you thought nobody cared.

We know that while you like to complain about it, you actually do like looking at photographs of scantily clad beautiful lesbians, so to get things started in the right direction here is a photo. >>>

Your job, if ever again you run into somebody claiming to be Lauren Warren, is to explain to her that nobody reads this website, and nobody else who posts here is real either.

Thank you for your help in this matter, but be careful, because (in order to throw you off) people claiming to be a Lauren Warren often look like this. >>>

I placed 3rd overall, and, and… Michele placed 6th in her age group and set a PR on the course for herself by just about 4 minutes!!! Very exciting! : )

So, I got to meet “ddoT” today for the first time!

Now I know that ddoT is Todd spelled backwards! Aha! He said to make sure to let you know that he finished just 8 seconds behind me today.

He is very nice and it was great getting to meet a “real” person who posts to the ARC site!!! I was really starting to feel like I had been living in a fantasy world where nothing is real and I didn’t know it! Scaaaarrry.

Good to see you got your excuses out at the top, though, before mentioning that your imaginary friend ddoT was within 8 seconds of your sorry ass.

At least Michele is doing well. Must be from all the resting up before the race.

BTW: ddoT, stay away from my gays!

Almost immediately thereafter, I did the same thing using a new top secret (but often maligned) special technique and posted a 19.3. That's an increase of .5 mile an hour on each and every one of the miles overall.

I am not going to tell anybody what the secret is, because after all it is MY secret.

However, I do want it duly noted and recorded that I have now officially kicked the Widder's ass, and don't you dare give me any guff about this.

Dr. Art has offically kicked the Widder's ass.

Therefore, assuming no complaining protest is filed which prevails through the legitimate grievance process (there is none), the Widder's ass is hereby kicked and shall remain so until further notice.

Congratulations, Art. You have kicked the ass of a 54 year old woman. We hope you won't mind if we don't bother asking what the secret is.

Of course that person is a well known "skimmer" so would have missed the point that I found the terms to be extremely vague, and that if you look them up online all you get is offers for gym memberships, health clinics, etc.

Therefore, I just this moment popped open one of my book closets and pulled out a sampling of the books that are already here, and which close study of them has given me the insight to realize that "hip flexor" and "gait muscle" are vague terms which may or may not mean a thing.

Missing from the pile is my full scholarly text on chiropractic medicine used in chiro schools which Mary threw out, because I was constantly asking her to stand up straight and on both feet.

Fortunately, a "girl" finally sent a book to Mary about standing up straight and moving around a little bit, so she is finally taking this shit seriously, so Bob can finally get back to his work in Hatha and Raja Yoga which he had melded to Chi Gong in order to come up with Boga and Boblates which he was deeply involved in when they met, and which was doing miracles for his health and well being.

Now however, there is that little matter of endless distractions, and Mary's job is supposed to be primarily: TO KEEP PEOPLE AWAY FROM ME.

Better put that link to the books photo again for the skimmers.

Hump Report

1) Andreas Runggatscher
2) Humberto Cavalheiro
3) Dave Freifelder
4) Albino (TBA)
5) Glenn Babikian
6) Roger Focco

In a hotly contested final .073 mm, three of the locals managed to beat out a 3rd in the World, Masters Champion.

Afterwards Glenn Babikian was heard to comment, "Look… the guy was wearing my team colors, so I thought he was going to help me! Turns out he was working for Team Turtle Boy—who, by the way, was also wearing my team colors. Is nothing sacred?"

No, Glenn. Nothing.

What is not shown in the photo is Albino's recently severly pulled right soleus and the associated inflamation of his gastrocnemius, but keep heart, boys.

Maybe before his calf gets any better, he'll pull his groin in a landscaping accident, and you can all continue to tell your friends how fucking strong you are.

Here's a before and after photo of Widder.

On the left is her in college (just before she met me), and on the right is a few weeks ago after being trained by me for 30 years.

You might notice the large sculpture had to be dismantled when she left school, but she did get to keep a smaller one which is now shown beside her in her museum room.

I know... we've got a ways to go, but I think we are making progress. >>>

Anyway, I've been using that Egadzooks book she's been talking about and am having trouble with one of the Gadzercises, or whatever they call 'em.

I've been working on the Static Back Press for a couple days now, but I don't think it works for me.

I lay down with my feet up on the bed, then I scoot myself all around the carpet, but so far I have only been able to get balloons to stick to me.

The light bulb in my mouth still won't light up!

I am already sure I'm wearing the correct wool sweater. Plus I am fully hydrated, so the bulb base is plenty wet.

I heard lots of watts are important. Should I get a higher wattage light bulb?

*stands for
Jimmy
Olson,
cub
reporter,
friend of
SlingShot
(imaginary)

Nice write-ups for the E-cises, I am finding it very interesting. I do have a different view of the wall crunchie position, that being if you are executing the e-cise properly, making sure that you press downward through the elbows and through the scaps and traps while relaxing at the same time, making sure the move is truly coming through the abdominals, then it is still the very best position for this particular exercise. I have found that when people rest their hands on the top of the chest, there is a great tendency to shift the work to the shoulders and people begin to shrug and pull through the shoulders. So, either way can be beneficial for the e-cise depending on the individual as long as there is guidance with the person performing the exercise. I find that if you watch the person carefully during the movement, you will know which is best for them. I really look for any compensatory movements and make fine adjustments and make the individual aware of where they are “bailing” out and what to look for and feel for when they are performing the exercise. Just my 3 cents worth (inflation) ;).

~L

Personally, I wouldn't show up for a Pilates, group ride, gymrobics, dance to the oldies with doughnuts afterward community party smack down, or such thing, if my life depended on it, so I wouldn't have a clue on how many thousands of ways people can misunderstand the simplest ideas.

My own experience extends only to the time I was teaching Tennis and Handball in a college P.E. course, and I asked the class to finish up by jogging three laps around 2 contiguous courts before going to the showers.

After they got half way through the first loop, I realized some of them were actually going to keel over and die on me, so I let them go after one lap. Even the strongest were already winded… and this was about 30 years before sedentary obesity was identified as a major health problem.

Since then I have never understood the need for certifications, programs, methods, routines, gym equipment, or any of that, because if people would just get off their fat asses and do something, those things wouldn't be needed much anyway.

Plus, people usually just use those things as an excuse in phrases such as, "What you really need to do is work on your core, I know a great Pilates class over at the gym, and we always have ice cream afterward."

I can't even get a half dozen people to understand watts is watts is watts, and 260 of them equal a 23+ mph average, and 260 watts really feels pretty mild, but you need an objective reference to know you are doing it. The last person we showed it to, still thinks Mary was just fucking with them.

Which reminds me, if I don't get up and away from my computer, my back is going to spasm, and it's going to take me (and Dr. Art) three months to get it back to functional.

I just spent the entire morning trying to Google a definition of "gait muscles" vs. "hip flexors" to see where glutes fit into the equation, and all I found are come-ons for gym memberships and quasi-medical health clinics.

I finally gave up and just went to Amazon and ordered the entire works of Joseph Pilates in order to see if there is any possible way that stuff can be any different from Egoscue, or calisthenics for that matter. It's not like the human body hasn't been around for 60 million years and doesn't follow the laws of physics, or anything like that.

Reminds me of the time I thought, "Of course that Atkins shit is nonsense, but I'd probably better be sure I understand it before I start ranting about it," but when I went to Barnes & Noble I found out an entire industry had been spawned around an idea which the supposed author had not even written a word about. There was not a single book about the Atkins Diet written by Atkins himself.

And now Michael Phelps is going to whore himself out to Sugar Frosted Flakes based on two frames of a video which clearly shows that they clearly show nothing.

Ow! My back.

Which reminds me of those obviously dysfunctional hump backed olympic divers who have all had their shoulders pulled 10 degrees beyond vertical by constantly tucking tighter in order to get that last 1/2 of their three and a half triple double gainer into the water without the Olympic version of a belly flop—which is two drops of water going the wrong direction.

Shit. Now my knee is creaking.

Therefore, I finally got to the exercises in Egoscue 1992—except for the ones I've looked at specifically for Mary.

Everybody reading along should be aware that the Abdominals (Wall Crunchies) shown on page 85, should not be done with the hands behind the neck as shown.

That allows too much of a tendency to pull on the head and stress the neck. Place your hands palms down on top of your chest.

The behind the neck style is old school, and we all know better than that now.

You're just going to piss people off by trying to act like you know something. My advice would be to avoid the parking lot after The Hump from now on.

Well, we went to Woodys!

It was as good as you said.

However, as I sat there eating onion hay, a cheesburger, and a vanilla milkshake, I looked at B and said, "Mary is sabotaging my weight loss on purpose." ....ha!! How was that for 1000 cal lunch?

But I am confused over your calorie count. It appears you drank 1/4 of the milkshake, and nothing else.

As an aside, you are aware that when I first met Mary my nickname was Seldom Fed, and that I put on 10 lbs the first week? >>>

Editor's Note: Yes that is a pony tail down to the middle of SlingShot's back. That lasted 7 years and was featured in a crowd scene photo (maybe High Times or something) at a Watkins Glenn rock concert (65,000 people) where The Grateful Dead and The Allman Borthers did the music for one of the heaviest trips Bob ever had. Somebody was walking around handing out blotter tabs for free. Three would have probably been enough.

At least he didn't have to go to the hospital for that one. Mostly all he can remember is cowering in a tent scared shitless as helicopters circled around outside in the rain.

The other thing he remembers is the specific thought that, "Fuck. Concerts are no good for listening to music. This is just a bunch of people wandering around all fucked up on acid and alcohol, and the closer you get to the stage, the worse the PA sounds."

I just noticed Mary was awake (because she farted real loud back in the bedroom), so I asked her to listen, and I read this from page 78 of Egoscue 1992:

In a normal week at my clinic I draw on literally hundreds of exercises. I have made some of them up from scratch, others are borrowed from yoga or are updated versions of moves going back to elementary school physical education classes, and there are variations on familiar workout routines.

If I tried to reproduce every one of them here, I'd be falling into the trap I decried at the beginning of the book: Complexity wold take over. We'd be smothered by it. In the clinic, I have the luxury of fine-tuning the treatment routine. I can see how each patient reacts and adjust the program accordingly…

After reading the excerpt I held my nostrils and said, "Sound familiar?"

Mary said, "Yeah, he's your twin," and she farted again, but the really good part is this.

Mary said you asked her what exercises she's doing and what order (very important), and she'll write you about that separately, but get this.

She self diagnosed herself as Condition II and has been following the prescribed exercises in the prescribed order, and best of all: she figured it all out on her own!!! Finally.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Lauren.

You too, Pedro.

Get hold of Pedro and thank him, thank him, thank him.

The dicionário is perfect, perfect, perfect!!!

Only three symbols vary from straight IPA, and they were easy to map. Quite simple really.

There is a pretty good chance that I now have the only full standard academic reference dictionary for European Portuguese in the country. Everybody else has that bullshit pretend Brazilian Portuguese.

I'll put together a comparison chart like this one for French, so I can get an overview of positional changes.

Then I'll start daily drills on the consonants, vowels, semi-vowels, dipthongs, and nasals.

It won't be long before I can learn another Portuguese word and get going on a new Poruguese joke. My "bom-dia" is wearing pretty thin.

This is just like the Egoscue exercises that are all the rage with Mary... and almost as exciting.

Mary is so excited by the new process, she enlisted a local club president (Big Bianchi) and one of the main instigators of local spin class cycling smarts and strength (Louie, The Prince of Pain) in order to send Lauren this special thank you. >>>

For all you kids reading along in the Egoscue books, be aware that the hip rotational arrows of Fig. 17 (p. 66) and Fig. 18 (p. 68) in Egoscue 1992 are contradictory to the text on pages 65 and 67.

That may be enough to clear up some readers confusion, but just in case, here's a quick rundown.

Page 65 Paragraph 5 makes a statement about when the "…right hip opts out," and that description is not nearly specific enough to distinquish that situation from what is described in the next Paragraph 6 (pp. 65, 67) as "…another scenario."

After that the clockwise rotation described in Paragraph 1 and 3-4 of Page 67 does not follow the arrows of Figs. 17 and 18 which show a counter clockwise rotation for a situation which is otherwise the same as described.

I was hoping to find an updated more correctly edited version of these descrptions in Egoscue 1998, but that text does not contain the same level of consolidation of theory and focuses more on describing specific exercises.

My guess is that another source is out there somewhere which will have a more explicit explanation of hip rotation and its implication, and I'll be looking for it.

Otherwise, these two books have proven so extremely valuable, I have added Egoscue 1992 to the refernce list of CPS.

Why does Mary have her personal best watts?

On the other hand, Mary knows her heart rate zones. She doesn't need a cheat sheet.

It is her speed and power that keeps getting better so fast that she needs a note… and that is happening without even stressing her heart rate zones!!

When these power meter doohickeys get cheap enough for humans to afford, everybody is going to be kicking themselves for not having mortgaged their house to get one earlier… assuming they get faster sampling rates and more immediate response times in the meantime. Showing average and current watts on the same screen display wouldn't hurt none neither, and an actual integrated functional heart rate monitor (not the crap currently provided on the PowerTap) would be a big help. While I'm wishing, I may as well mention, they should record each pedal separately (from a real measurement not a guesstimate from the hub or bottom bracket), and they should show discrete back pressure too. But I'm just dreaming of a world where something might work right.

What was odd about Louie's interest is it implies he doesn't have web access, because all Mary's numbers are published for the world to see right over here. >>>

Eee-gahs-cue

But what is IPA?

i.gas.ku

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is the phonetic system of the International Phonetics Association which was begun in 1886.

It was developed as a systematic approach to transcribing every possible sound for all world languages. It has been especially useful for linguists and anthropologists studying groups who have no written language.

Most serious dictionaries use it, and I'm hoping my academic reference Portuguese dictionary (to be here any day) will use it.

Here is a link to something I put together which has really helped me with my study of French, and it could never have been done without web technology plus the work already done by the IPA.

Look at this massively helpful comparison of the major differences between French and English.

Notice how obvious it reveals a major difference in French: the t's, d's, n's, s's, and z's shift toward the front of the mouth, and the "sh" and "z" (as in azure) shift toward the back, leaving a portion of that little ledge just behind the teeth never touched… unless you wish to maintain your accent for cuteness sake.

This is the sort of broad approach to complex systems that really helps in the learning process.

It is the sort of thing done very well in the Egoscue books, and the approach I used in Impulse and Strength, and the approach I am deep in the middle of with Cycling Performance Simplified.

I was shocked to find that an overview so simply stated and logically derived as the techniques in Egoscue has controversy surrounding it.

Of course there are minor problems with the Egoscue books, but they seem to be a matter of slight oddities in expression and should not take away from the main points being made… points which are elemental, essential, and just plain common sense.

Otherwise, personally I have never picked up a book that did not have at least a few minor issues and errors, and Egoscue was no different.

In Egoscue 1992, figure 4 on page 14 shows somebody having MATERSALES instead of METATARSALES.

Figures 1 & 2 on pages 7 & 9 respectively suffer from non-intuitive graphing of the 90° aspects of human anatomy.

Also, in paragraph 4 on page 8 there is a contention that these right angles are, "…irrefutable evidence that man was designed to move."

There are 90° aspects to my house (I put some of them in myself), and my house was certainly never meant to move. In fact these little right angles help it in not moving.

I'm sure there was something left on the editing floor with that explanation in the Egoscue book, but that sort of thing easily crept into texts before modern text editing software made changes so easy.

However, the unfortunate use of "men" not "people" was pretty standard back then, so I'm sure it was not part of the "deadline" issues.

Page 11 paragraph 4 also makes a very bold statement implying that "symmetry" is the human condition except in rare cases of major childhood injuries, which probably makes sense if you are trying to get people who are crippled and bent from their sedentary lifestyle up off the fucking couch and onto the dance floor.

I sort of agree despite the 2 hours Widder and I spent practicing identifying asymmetries in the strides of absolutely every one of the women in the Olympic Marathon. I'm assuming that just means we are bringing a finer lens to the observation than did Egoscue, of the sort that makes me find some tiny little error in every book I read.

Of course, the little mention on Wikipedia of somebody losing $1250 of their hard earned dollars when a clinic closed without notice, and left them no recourse within the system, is really an indictment of bullshit out of control marketeering, and it has nothing to do with the good common sense of the techniques described in the books.

You might be interested in this link below to a little book that I saved from oblivion after I saw it mentioned in almost every serious text on the subject but found it almost impossible to track down.

It comes as close as anything to being the perfect model for Cycling Performance Simplified (as do the Egoscue books) whereas this ChatterBox post does not… Cranky already decided it was too complicated and stopped reading just after paragraph one. We'd be lucky if Gapper even read your question.

In any case, you may know somebody who would love to see this. It's called:

Principes De Phonétique Française: a l'usage des étudiants anglo-américains
- Pierre Delattre, 1951

You can find more about IPA at Wikipedia.

You calculate the chances of catching an event which is tracking events 100 times a second, exactly at the moment an image is grabbed which is being captured only 30 times a second.

You'll never get to see the actual high speed film if there is one. There's no need to.

They are playing it for a mass American audience who, on the whole, is quite willing to gulp and believe they are seeing anything they are told they are seeing.

If you show two video frames next to each other, each of which shows both men's fingers on the wall, but you say they clearly show one got there first, idiot fans are happy to believe it without question.

All you gotta do is call it a "surge," and everybody is glad to believe it made us winners.

I'm sure both frames will have been Photoshopped by the time you read this anyway.

Granted, standard video is 30 frames per second, so 3.33 of those "win" margins could fit in a single stop frame, but all we get to see is the video which caused the controversy by not showing a fucking thing.

Nobody has shown the actual high-speed capture proof yet.

But forget about that.

I have totally changed my attitude about the Olympics. In fact a whole new level of excellence is going to be achieved during the next games… if they institute the obvious next step.

Remember that little girl in the opening ceremonies who turned out to be lip syncing some other kid's vocals who wasn't quite cute enough.

In the next games, I'm hoping they will take that technology to the gym floor.

I am really sick and tired of watching little girls flipping and dancing around on beams, bars, and vault horses whose taught little bottoms aren't quite what they might be.

With some clever editing, every stretched leg, tweaked leotard, and shy glance could come from a real beauty.

Who cares if the person doing the actual tumbling has spent a grueling lifetime bringing it to the level of a champion? Let’s have stand-ins for them also.

Why should young musicians who have worked equally hard as the gymnasts be the only ones who get to hide in the shadows of anonymity.

Thanks for adding the link to her ITT notes.

Here's the most recent addition to the online version of the book. >>>

Track down how to say that guy's name and send us the pronunciation in IPA. I've searched the web and come up empty, even when I looked on the website for the book itself.

I know of a famous bicycle maker whose name is just off the norm enough that I have never heard one person pronounce it correctly.

In fact, it has gotten so bad that I have stopped believing that the one person I know who actually knows the guy (so I figured he had it right) could be pronouncing it correctly.

Make sure the pronunciation has provenance. That is to say, it is the way the guy himself pronounces it.

For Lauren's Ears Only

I especially liked the term: "design motion" and sort of wish it had been set center stage.

However, given the vintage of the books I can understand how large chunks of unifying theory got lost in the shuffle.

Way back then, it was a lot more difficult to alter and organize subject matter on the fly.

I had my own problems revisioning Impulse & Strength, and it only predates the first of those books by a year.

As opposed to the Egoscue, it was about gaining control of motion which is specifically outside of design motion paramaters.

After all, there is nothing in evolution that provides a natural preparation for holding an oddly shapped wooden box in an off axis cradle and precisely hitting metal strings strung across its face in a way that results in wildly unexepected sound sequences. That was tough stuff to formalize, especially when the final goal was in constant flux. A lot like a cycling, wouldn't you say?

I am happy to know I won't be shackled with such organizational hamstringing for Cycling Performance Simplified.

The tools for sheparding the process of discovery, development, and articulation of the results in a parallel manner have really come a long way.

That is why the working version is significantly further along and more detailed than the online samples. I am giving the whole process the full benefit of an organic growth model.

Hell, streamlining and finalizing the Flight Check alone, could take several months of hands on practical trial and error. It's already in its seventh incarnation.

In any case, combining concepts of design motion, compensating motion, and the difficulty finding exercises which do the correct job of strenghtening the design motion muscles while leaving the compensating muscles out of it as done in the Egoscue books is pure gold, and the exercises in it have already helped Mary.

Lots of people have heard me trying to explain why we aren't worried about strength exercises with Mary, or actual interval work (or anything else until her functional problems are remediated) by saying, "I am not about to waste my time training the wrong fucking muscles."

It is good to see somebody else understands exactly what that means.

Widder said, "These are for my bunions," which has become a major topic around here but only for the last 10 years.

I said, "Great!! Show me the section in the book."

During my review of that section, I was getting more and more excited because of the crisp clear solid logic.

When I started to look up the terms 'tarsal' and 'plantar' to make sure I had them straight in my head, I thought, "Mary just read this. She'll know. I'll ask her instead of opening the dictionary."

"Huh?!," she said, "I didn't read that part."

So somebody (that would be me) went on a tirade about jumping into details without understanding the underlying theory and function.

I said, "Look. It's not enough to just do the exercises. You have to know what the exercises are doing for you, and more importantly why. Did you read anything else in the book?"

"I just looked at the 90 degree part, but it was just exactly what you've been telling me… you know about 'adductors' and 'abductors' and that sort of stuff."

So I asked, "What are those?"

And she got them quite backward, but only in the case where she came even close to describing their function, so we had a little discussion about sagittal, coronal, and transverse planes.

I finished with this, "Here's how I remember. Look at my feet. An abstraction takes something away from the scene, right. If I move my feet apart, I use my abductors. If I put my feet together, I have "added" them together using my adductors. Get, it?"

I do believe the Widder is on the verge of tracking down Lauren and kicking the shit out of her, but I'm thinking she'd better get her feet in order before she tries that!

-------------

It was a cool autumn morning, actually late November.

Widder had finished her Flight Check for the record attempt, and she was just turning around to face the starting line.

She was trying to control her nerves, but the images of the past year flitted through her mind.

It had been pretty bad. She had been plagued by good health. Not one single person close to her had died in years, nor were any of them diagnosed terminal even on this day. Even her coach was alive.

Because of her hard work and dedication to painting watercolors, her art career provided success despite the general economic malaise around her, and she continued to enjoy wealth beyond her wildest dreams.

She herself had not suffered even one major cycling related injury. All her bones were intact.

Mary knew full well that under these circumstances nobody in history had ever achieved a significant athletic performance, but she was a champion and would try.

She coasted up to the starting line, and things were great. What was she to do?

This is what we've been talking about, baby. >>>

Oh, man, Albino's easy ride fucking kicked my ass, I'm fucking dead. He dropped me on 32, he dropped me on 207, he dropped me on 208, he dropped me hard on Angola.

I'm calling immigration…

Fuck… click.

End of message...

I'm sure the guys from the FRONT of the FRONT GROUP at the Hump (all of them somewhat slower than you) will be very excited to make Albino's acquaintance.

Does this mean you have reassessed your feelings regarding Lou Dobbs?

Nobody ever had much interest in kicking your ass, Humberto, so this is just another example of foreigners coming over here and taking jobs nobody else wanted to do.

I'll even include a simple bathroom scale exercise that should make the problem clearly understood by everybody… even you.

CAT 2/3

   9th Place - Humberto Cavalheiro
11th Place - Andreas Runggatscher

Those are results from today's Tour of Vernon Cedar Mountain Road Race, in Vernon, NJ in the Cat 2/3 division, the top level offered in this race.

Humberto and Andreas finished the 66 mile course in 23.2 mph, which ironcially is only one tenth of a mile faster than we have been told the FRONT of the FRONT GROUP finished the Hump today.

It appears that not having Humberto and Andreas to push the pace at the Hump allowed everybody to back off some.

Otherwise, think about it: twice the distance of the Hump, bigger and harder hills, and faster.

It was well run, and well serviced. In fact, Joe Straub paid his entry fee, then showed up and handled feeding duties, despite having recently broken his collar bone and scapula in a race up north.

I hope this doesn't mean that Humberto is going to go nuts and start training again, or something stupid like that!

Here's something else. >>>

I know you went out of your way to get the actual time of the climb, and wient the extra mile to do the calculations, but you'd probably better keep that information to yourself.

Well, ok. Tell the Widder, because she can use the information, but otherwise, you are just going to get people pissed off again.

The following paragraph is for the Gapper.

Gapper, you can stop reading now. What did you say, Mary? He already did? Ok, back to the Hump

We stopped during our Hump workout today (which was ok for Dan Buckley, because he recently broke his pelvis in a sprinting accident so is much more amenable to going easy and taking breaks than he used to be), and we put Mary at the bottom of Ridgebury with a cell phone, and me at the top.

When the FRONT of the FRONT GROUP came off the turn onto the climb Mary said, "Start the watch."

When the first wheel passed me at the top, I hit the stop button.

It was 0:05:01.34, a de-facto Hump record.

Preliminary calculations confirm what I have been trying to get Mary to understand for some time.

If she had hit the bottom with the group, ignored their testosteroned first 15 or 20 second burst to nowhere, but dropped immediately into her own spin and held it, she would catch them by the top, and would require a 107.777 Watt average to do it.

We call those "warmup watts."

Of course,, those are just preliminary results, but still.

All you kids out there who do not have power meters, but would like to do something rational to stop getting dropped by the FRONT of THE FRONT group on Ridgebury, just go over and practice the climb from bottom to top under 5 minutes. The trick will be to go easy where you have to, and not let up at all where you don't.

You are welcome.

About the only thing the Olympics are good for is giving Russia cover from the media while they invade a neighbor the day after U.S. advisors left the scene of the crime.

Here's an example similar to the Olympic situation.

I know a local music teacher who runs the performance program in the local school system. On one occasion just before the yearly recital for the band (which lots of the students worked very hard preparing for, and for which each one of them was relying on every other band member to attend in order to present the truth of their achievement), the teacher (who one might also say worked pretty hard in this endeavor) was called by a parent who told him their kid could not attend—because of a dental appointment.

???

On being asked how a dental appointment needed to be scheduled at 7 pm, and on the very day of the recital, and could not be rescheduled to allow for a very important milestone in the student's academic life, the parent finally owned up to, "Well, my husband wants to watch the final of American Idol."

Other students had also expressed irritation that they would not be seeing the final of that bullshit TV charade, mentioning it was, "…music related, so shouldn't that count?"

The Olympics offer just such a nonsense diversion from true sport.

In fact, there is, on this very tomorrow, the start of a local road race called: Tour of Vernon Cedar Mountain Road Race which is in Vernon, NJ. Just around the corner.

We have intercepted a few e-mails from a local cyclist (one of the real deals) who has tried to get other members of his so called team to go to the race and work together.

In fact, one of those e-mails mentions, "…if we don't support local races, there won't be any more of them!"

The only stuff he has been getting in response is whining about fees, etc.

Except in the case of one other true champion who only wears the team colors in kind support and knows better than to risk his family's future on bike racing, I'm sure it is a matter of those team posers having a strong feeling they would rather stay home and watch the Olympics (faux sport), instead of actually going out and engaging in true sport themselves.

Unfortunately, I am powerless to help the guy (even so much as mention his name), because any hint that I agree with him, will certainly fuck up his reputation.

Plus, I just clicked through looking for the TV weather in order to decide what Mary's workout tomorrow will be, and I came across the Olympic opening ceremonies.

Seeing so many people working in such a massive and desolate group lock-step gave me the chills.

It looked too much like Wal-Mart for my taste.

It also reminded me, Mary's last horse trainer was a former Olympian, and the idea of that success making the trainer's career would be totally insane.

A number of years ago, we watched as a group we called "The Warwick Ladies Club" bailed out on her after she went to bat for them against an alcoholic barn owner who was putting their horses in jeopardy.

Actually, this trainer is one of the finest educators I have ever run across, so that incident was only a blip on her radar.

She now resides on her own farm in Florida state teaching and training as good as it can be done.

Her Olympic experience has certainly had little to do with her success, and the local equine community (here in NY) lost a chance at true excellence in the process of making it easier for her never to come back, despite the amount of time they all spent trying to impress people that their trainer was an "Olympian."

Otherwise, I heard somebody has already been cut from the Olympics for drug use. Now there's a happenstance roll of the dice for you.

You got to the games. It was your only shot at a life. You said the wrong thing to the wrong person. They called in your blood samples on you.

Here's a little concept all you fuckers may have forgotten.

It's called: the here and now.

Get off your cell phones and drive.

I just got off the phone with a fellow at Cadence Cycle in Philly, and he had said that PowerTap has done some tweaking with the wireless model, and just this past 2008 they put out one that has worked out most of the kinks.

Do you have a 2007 or 2008 wireless power tap?

We really could not be doing the stuff we are doing for Mary without it. That's not to say there are not still serious issues with it. [See post ##2901 for the summary of problems.]

I believe the operant terminology in what that fellow from Cadence Cycle's said would would be, "[Saris] has worked out most of the kinks." With the emphasis definitely on "most."

As far as we know, what we have is 2008. We have a friend who has also gone through this dance routine, and has heard the same party line.

Our friend was told (by Saris) that his HRM problem was because he needed a newer "coded" strap, which he got (and which we already had), and he said it is better.

He only has to hit the "find" function when his HR drops out. That means holding down two buttons for the count of 3, which is obviously unacceptable if you would rather perform at your best, instead of wasting time and effort fiddling with equipment.

None of the problems the unit poses for us seems much of a problem for our friend, because on closer questioning it becomes apparent that he hasn't got the slightest clue what the data is telling him anyway.

Clever charts and graphs have a way of diverting attention away from the fact they aren't telling you anything.

Another friend Leah, who was just here this week (and lives near Floyd and all those people), says she knows lots of people in the same boat as our friend.

She said, "They've got the power meters but not a clue how to use them." Then she pumped my brain like you wouldn't believe, which I found far more tolerable than if she had spun my legs off… as she could have at any moment.

I assume she meant that most people can set them up correctly, get data out of them onto their computer, but still don't have a clue why they would want to.

Our friend just goes out and rides with his, downloads the data, and uses it just like he would a standard trip computer's mileage and average mph data. That's probably why our friend and the rest of them have not registered massive complaints. It really isn't that important to them.

During today's workout with the PowerTap, I paced behind Mary and interpreted the data for her in real time, while pointing out how the thing should not require a tag along SlingShot to make the data useful… that the thing should be reporting her power specs fast enough for her to gain a feeling for what's going on by herself.

I would feel changes right away, wait for the CPU to report it to Mary, then explain why the delay had caused her to misread what was happening. That only happened a few dozen times during the most important part of our training ride. Pisses me off, but at least it gave us a basis for the lesson.

In any case, last week I downloaded the most recent firmware update from the Saris sight for the CPU, and it hasn't changed a thing with regard to our own problems with the unit.

Some people might not understand what "firmware" is, so here's a summary.

The CPU and Hub have software that is programmed into them at the factory. If hardware such as the PowerTap is designed with the future in mind, it is possible to update that software without replacing the unit.

That is to say, a 2007 unit with a firmware update becomes exactly the same as the 2008 unit, because it is really only the software that is being changed anyway.

Such a change is called "firmware" because it is seen as halfway between hardware and software.

You aren't getting a whole new yellow box (hardware), and you don't generally change its internal software except by way of a specialized process which is rarely done. Therefore, it's not really considered in the same context one usually associates with "software," so it is termed "firmware."

That way, the manufacturer can sell units that are resistant to obsolescence.

Firmware is generally considered a free upgrade, because you are really buying the unit with the tacit understanding that, "…this thing is fucked up, but if you buy it now, we will use the money to fix it."

The ease of doing such things over the web has somewhat blurred the distinction between software and firmware, and the firmware update for the PowerTap was indeed effortless.

It didn't fix anything that is important to us, but it was free and easy.

Years ago one would consider software as part of computers, and firmware as part of external boxes (or specialized functions such as basic bootup software in computers), but that's just a history lesson.

In any case, that nice smiling statement you got, "…well, there were some problems, but most are now fixed" is standard sales jargon for, "You may as well buy it from me, and right now."

I watched this crap unfold with personal computers for about 20 years, before they actually got standardized and stable.

Probably the most aggravating part of those years was hearing so much about how much better Mac's were than PC's, until you actually talked to somebody with a Mac and found out they were having exactly the same problems as PC users, there just wasn't as many of them around to bitch about it.

Of course, there was a large cadre of people who professed being in love with their Mac or PC, and that was always because they never used it much, or for anything important… like most of the people with power meters now.

However, like I said, we just got in from our daily PowerTap workout, and we've been using it just about every single day for the past seven months, and I am reluctant to raise much of a stink, because the pitiful, paltry, under sampled, almost useless data it provides is still light years ahead of the stuff people relied on before.

No wonder nobody has a clue about what makes them faster, or how fast their hero's actually are; or rather, I guess I should say, "…are not."

…and why people still think I'm making this shit up.

I went through this nonsense with personal use computers for 15 years, but I'm too old to go through it again with this technology which is not yet ready for pime time, and likely never will be, given the really, really, really, small market, coupled with the fact that hardly anybody with the technology has yet learned how to use it in the least.

Here's the short list.

1) Worthless as a HR monitor
2) Cadence sensor not much better
3) On-bike CPU display partially useful
4) Sampling rate far too low
5) Too expensive for most humans

1) We have worked long and hard (since day one 7 months ago) trying to get the HR monitor function going, but we have failed miserably at getting it to work even minimally. It is unlikely Mary averaged 48 bpm on last Saturday's Hump as the data reported. Calls to the manufacturer are always met with kind and curteous service, but I would choose getting treated like shit if the thing would only work. At least we had the good sense to have her wear her Polar HRM for her last 1-Hour ITT, so we know she did just under 19 mph average with only 80% of her threshold rate, down 5% over her early spring trial… and that with gains in efficiency, not in conditioning.

2) We have managed to get the cadence function working within 80% of excellent by adding the sensor (not relying on the hub guesstimates), but just today one of Mary's CPU's recorded the data while the other did not. Plus she thought she had earlier tracked the problem down to the CPU being sensitive to which of her two antenna mounts it was on, but today the whole thing did a total reversal. When we got home from her workout, her "interval" CPU did not have cadence data, while her "current" CPU (the one which previously refused to work) now had the data. I reviewed the wireless setting for each, and they were both assigned correctly. She also performed "find" functions prior to the workout. Sad.

3) The reason Mary has two CPU's is because "current" and "average" watts cannot be displayed at the same time on only one CPU. It is a little surprising this wasn't fixed in the most recent firmware update, but this is the Stone Age for such devices. Plus nobody is really using them in any serious manner, so the manufacturer is unlikely to be getting good feedback.

4) Another indication of the degree of the Stone Ageness for all power meters is the low sampling rates. I come from an audio background, and two tones begin to be heard as a single tone when they begin within 26 microseconds of each other. That is to say, human response for such events requires only a separation of 26 one millionth of a second to remain distinct. Sampling rates ranging from only 60 to 700 times per second (the current industry range across all power meters), is insanely too pitifully slow for doing close work of the type we wish to do with Mary's training. Most of you don't have a clue what I'm talking about here, because either you don't have a power meter, or you don't have the slightest idea about how it should be used if you do have one. I could do without the fancy charts and graphs if I was just being provided good data.

5) I guess the final kick in the shorts comes from the expense. We have been absolutely flabbergasted to find that people, who will easily pay a few thousand dollars for a bicycle of questionable performance gain, still balk at the expense of a device which (if it really worked within correct specs) would have more impact on their performance than not eating sliced bread.

The people we have talked to who are using the SRM report the same sort of nonsense, but at $4000 dollars our senior.

We will still be using Mary's power meter on a daily basis, because we already have it, and the piddling little bit of information it provides is still an order of magnitude above any of the other even slower, less precise, and considerably less fashionable performance meters, but the sum total of strikes against power meters has placed the book on hold. I'm not going to waste my time training the wrong muscles (Mary's leg problem has to get fixed before true interval work begins, especially the Fusion Intervals® that I developed for her), and I'm not going to waste my time writing about something that does not yet exist.

I just gave Leah a seminar about the tools we need that don't exist. That was in line with explaining to her how a Computrainer is easily fooled into showing that both your legs are working totally smoothly in tandem, even when you have one of those legs clipped out and resting on a box beside the trainer. In fact, you can even make the Computrainer think the shoe on the box is the only one spinning the pedals.

Check back with us after Mary completes her 23+ Widder's Hump (pretty soon now), and after the technology matures to at least adolescence. In the meantime, we'll just leave the laudations of power meters to the likes of those lackeys who have already proven there incompetence and idiocy by wasting their time at such things as the Olympics and other such corporate charades.

They'll probably all be disqualified by drug tests by this time next year anyway.

At least the power meter has allowed me to explain concepts to the Widder using irrefutable objective data (now confirmed on hills with a stop watch), which she would have never believed otherwise. Good thing I kept notes from our Florida tests, too, in order to refute her recent contention that she was performing better then than now. When I showed her the objective data, she piped, "Oh, that's right. I had it confused with my 12 minute tests. I am much better now," and that despite three months off with an injury.

Her actual conditioning is way down, but her performance is way up due to the drills on efficiency and remediation of her leg/butt/sciatic problem. At least I've got her stopped from wrenching her joints out of alignment in the name of PAIN.

What more could one ask for?

Editor's Note: If you weren't so fucking bored with your life, you wouldn't be bothering to read this, so don't blame us about it being too long. You could just do what Cranky always does. Skim and pretend you were listening.

In case you missed it, check this out, but be careful. It might make you say that word again. >>>

I just have this say to say about that: I don't care who you are, if you see a Leah, you do what the rest of us do. You run. You run your ass off.

PS: Enough with the Matrix references.

I know, ambitious after only being 2 weeks out from Ironman Lake Placid – so I was told, but we couldn’t resist.

I LOVE the sprint distance! When all was said and done, I am now second place National Champion in my age group and 5th overall.

I messed up in transition and went to the wrong bike rack which cost me some precious time (still in ironhead mode), but boy did I have FUN!!!

My legs weren’t good and snappy like they usually would be (due to all the ironman training and the race), but I was very happy with my results.

I am pretty certain that with a few more weeks of recovery in the legs, I could have taken the overall championship. The times were very close.

Michellie High Pillow Yasson did awsome as well. She was 12th in her age group!!

It has been sooooo much fun watching her get so much faster and stronger this past year.

The course was absolutely beautiful. The funny thing was looking at the swim (750 meters), and after swimming 2.5 miles in ironman it looked so incredibly short.

It really made me laugh. It was such a great weekend and race.

B – we really need to get Mary into triathlon sprints! She would kick some serious arse out there in her age group!

There are very strong women in her age group, but she is an amazing athlete on the bike, and I am sure she would do really well in both swimming and running.

Let us know when you want to start, Mary! ;).

Given many of their experiences, some of them were beginning to believe it might not have been so much fun for anybody.

I guess Mary is ready for organized competition.

As soon as the conditions are met in Hades, she believes she can peform well in the ice swimming division.

My own personal pleasure will be watching her run above bunions on which she can barely walk.

She does mention, however, that when she gets there the fun will likely be over for everyone else in her age group… and maybe some others.

In the meantime, she will just content herself beating men half her age and three times her strength on her bike.

Looks like there's a trend developing.

One is Lauren Warren (massive cycling credits), and the other one, of course, is Humberto (winner of the Hump this week).

Apparently, the faster you are, the better you understand.

Attention, Pretty Boy (or whoever else might have some easy way to contact Joe Straub)

I don't check the website usage logs anymore, so I have no way of knowing who still sees the ChatterBox.

In any case, somebody make sure Joe Straub reads this and then clicks on the video link at right.

I just found out that Joe Straub broke his collar bone, and the thought of it is driving me crazy.

I myself broke my own collar bone seven years ago, and not an hour has gone by since, when something I do is not in some way negatively impacted by the aftermath of it never healing.

For me it is an aggravation, but for Joe it could be a catastrophe, because his business absolutely depends on him being strong and looking the part.

Not only will I never again do a respectable military press, the possibility of deltoid flys, laterals, or pull-ups are now gone forever.

I can't even stretch into an easy Yoga asana placing my left arm drapped over my head without feeling like my shoulder is being stabbed by a jagged calcium knife… which it is.

Not to mention, I just read about avascular necrosis in Floyd's book and realized immediately that I probably have a ticking time bomb in my shoulder. The growing effects of the nerve damage is still pretty minor, but that shard in my shoulder is fucking dead.

Like I said, for me it is not very consequential. I just can't pull up on my handlbars or rest my fucked-up back by leaning on them, but if Joe Straub ever ended up looking like me, his livelihood would be in sore repair indeed.

A month or so after my collar bone snapped, it began to seem as if it was not going to heal properly, and I started thinking through the process. Nothing online gave me a clue about what to expect with a bone break.

Anyway, at some point (after first being amazed at how wonderful the human body is to heal such a thing), I realized the collar bone is really just like a coat hanger, and your shoulders and arms are like a sports jacket hanging on it.

Then I stepped through what breaking it would mean physiologically for that sort of structure… how the body has to start by rebuilding a thin microscopic tube, then fill it first with ultra-tiny little calcium deposits and slowly build strength back into it till it can finally be called bone again—all ready for the next crash.

All that has to happen without having some subtle event, such as reaching for a sports drink, blow the shit out of the whole process, so it has to start all over again, very delicately.

I remembered all that when I heard Joe's bone was broke.

I tortured myself for awhile trying to figure out how to time a trip over to Straub's Gym in order to get there at just the right moment when Joe might be around, so I could give him the little visual aid shown in the video linked at right.

Turns out I ain't got time for that, and I'm sure Joe doesn't need one more interruption at work, so I'll just present it online.

At least that way I won't spend a lifetime feeling guilty, because I didn't even say one fucking word about it. Plus, everybody else can see it too, so I'll never have to mention it again.

In summary:

HEY, JOE!!! Take a look at this video.

How the fuck is that jacket ever going to hang straight again?

If somebody suggests and offers you an extreme cure (for instance surgery and six months off your bike), take it.

That's all I'm saying.

Otherwise:

Today's Hump Results

In a no holds barred, clear finish with absolutely no questions asked, Humberto grabbed the win.

SlingShot is demanding partial credit for suckering Kevin Haley into a pointless chase at the turn onto Round Hill Road.

He is also asking forgiveness from Dave Freifelder for getting him caught in the cross fire.

SlingShot can only offer the following advice to Dave.

Next time somebody does something stupid like chasing SlingShot (who isn't even on the ride), don't be a knucklehead and follow the energy wasting attack.

Get behind Humberto and hold onto your glycogen until the sprint. If you've got a little ATP left, hold off using that as well.

Really, Dave. Chasing SlingShot today made as much sense as surging to catch the guy in front of the TDF Peloton who is running up the hill with his pants down.

Kevin's an idiot. Let him go off and do such shit on his own.

As for Humberto: You are quite welcome. Glad I could help.

Is the cycling book for real?? Because if it is… FREAKIN’ AWESOME DUDE AND DUDETTE!!! You are both amazing!! Where can I get a signed copy when it is released??

Watt on…

~L

In fact, there are people who have actually phoned her to tell her how it cannot be done.

Even just this morning after our regular workout on the course she had to endure a tirade about how stupid the goal is, how she might as well say she's going to try out for the Olympics, and how dare she show up to group rides and not play the game anyway.

Then we had to listen to the supporting evidence against the possibility of her doing it, and once again it was just your run of the mill unreliable, unobjective, unrepeatable pseudo gossip based on nothing.

Fortunately their line of dislogic was easy to follow, because it was proferred at full lung.

Mary said, "I don't get it. Why does anybody even give a shit about it one way or another? It's just my own personal goal. What's it got to do with anybody else? How impotent are these people?"

Of course, we are not surprised that you understand, Lauren, because you have ridden with us, and you have these credentials, so you know just how possible it really is.

I hope publishing your accomlishments here again doesn't get you in trouble with all the so called strong men you routinely beat.

How 'bout those arms on Pop Pop Jinks?

We do not under any circumstances publish copyrighted images on this website.

On the other other hand, we haven't fucked with the Bicycle Doctor, Rich Cruet, in over an hour now, so it probably evens out.

I bailed out at the bridge under construction (bottom of 106) and rode back through Monroe home to Sugar Loaf.

Widder stayed with the ride till the top of Rte 6, after they did half the race course loop to Tiorati circle, then down Seven Lakes where they almost got taken out by a screeching swerving car who failed to yield at the circle coming off the PIP.

But check out this 6 minute spin section coming up Rte 6 after the car incident.

Ignore the HR data (in red), because it only proves once again the PowerTap is mostly worthless as a Heart Rate Monitor.

Makes me wonder if Big Bianchi's massive 1-hour 200 watts @ 133 bpm avg wasn't just a HR fuck-up.

Otherwise, here's what I've been talkin' 'bout, man. >>>

It wasn't until I was in the car with the Widder on the way to the ride that I found out it was being led by Steve Jinks.

I don't like him. Never did. It's bad enough to have to look at him after the Widder has gone on and on about how good he looks, what great shape he is in, how she never really noticed before, because he's always got something funny to say, and by the way, "You know he's older than you, but no old skin. Great arms."

Then he always ends up having something to say.

Quite frankly, I don't find any of it amusing, and when I heard he was leading the ride I could only think, "Wait. That doesn't sound like a Poker ride.

Sure enough, when we got there I couldn't find a single Poker.

Some John guy pulled me (under protest) to the first hill (way ahead and out of site of the group), when I said, "You won't be here to see it, but this isn't going to make any difference at all. Ryan is still going to catch me before the half way point of this hill."

Fortunately, or not, Widder was holding Ryan back with chit chat, so he didn't catch up till the top.

That only set me up for a few dozen more repeats of the same, getting dragged along with no recourse but to hang on and hurt.

Of course, they all made me stand at attention at the top of every hill, just so Jinks could point out how I had been hammered senseless.

At least on Donkey Hill, going up to 284, I had enough sense to talk to Ryan as hard and as fast as I could—pretending to be interesting. That slowed him down enough for the Widder to block everybody else, so I even survived that climb.

But I want my money back. My legs got torn off for the rest of the ride, and I never did see not one single fucking Poker.

You should just apologize it hasn't been trimmed so that the pages lie evenly on the rightmost side.

Also, you might want to give him this tease line from the new book, Cycling Performance Simplified:

"Your potential is never defined by any metric other than the results of your own development piloted by an informed investigation of data derived from a reliable objective and repeatable source."

Today, ddoT moved up to riding with the big boys, and somebody mentioned that you actually have Empire State Games Medals from 1989 and 1990.

As for those medals... >>>

Today's Hump Results

BTW: Are you sure it was the same time? That's almost physically impossible.

Why, just the time it takes for the light to get to the camera alone would make the person on the left side register later than the person on the right side.

Maybe, we should ask Dave about it. He might have a good theory.

Do you have an extra copy of Impulse & Sound laying around? I'd like to read it, but I hate reading on the Internet and don't have a printer.

--Ryan

Otherwise, I have three left over that never got trimmed, because Mary got rid of her mat cutter when we got the big production machine.

I could let you have one, if you promise to return it.

In any case, I would hazard a guess you already know all the stuff in it.

BTW: It's Impulse and STRENGTH. Sound's got nothing to with it. Ok, maybe something, but still.

This should answer your question about how Mary's training ties in with music study. You will notice a very familiar process.

I'm betting Cranky was looking to get drunk and wax nostalgic about some old music she heard.

When I'm up near the front on a hill, it is nowhere near my resposnibility to pull you at a pace to your liking just so you don't get dropped.

Next time keep your fat foul mouth shut!

Now go clean your bikes.

Here is an article on PowerCranks. Some pretty serious racers swear by them.

Most of us do one legged pedaling drills in the winter to help with the dead spot issue. I hate doing them but it helps.

Try pedaling in a moderate gear at 90 rpm for over a minute, and you will know where the dead spot is.

Each week try to increase the amount of time you can pedal smoothly with one leg.

Thanks for the exercise.

-----

After the ride, I had a chance to read the article, and I see the clear logic in the PowerCrank design, but I also view it as a beginner's transition to a new way of looking at their spin.

I would love to put people on a PowerCrank (sort of like training wheels) until they get a basic sense of what I am talking about with Zero G spin exercises.

For example, take the exercise you mentioned. It seems you are asking for the spin to be done under a moderate pressure. The problem is that any pressure into the pedal and crank can be used as a stabilizing crutch.

Also the directive that this will reveal the "dead spot" might be more correctly stated as "you will find where your own dead spot is," assuming a rider has only one dead spot, which as we have seen is probably better termed a "weak spot" and which actually is probably a series of weak spots depending on who's doing it.

The exercises we have been developing for the Widder are actually designed to get rid of all dead spots and would be best used in a master class for people who have mastered PowerCranks use and the underlying concepts.

I followed the link back from the article to the manufacturer's website, and still didn't find any scientific data about where, how, and why any supposed "dead spots" exist, nor anything that would point to a limitation in human physiology that would imply an insurmountable barrier does exist.

Still this little tool is certainly a step in the right direction, and the tendency to put back pressure in the pedal is something we have been looking at for some time now.

However, I would be interested to find out what the author of that article thinks they are going to learn by taking their new skills back to their Computrainer… which is pretty easy to fool into thinking you are riding smoothly with two legs when you are using only one.

Of course, that statement of hope (to see what their Computrainer reveals) comes at the end of the paragraph which mispelled "road" as "rode," so maybe they were already losing their focus on the article.

To see why we are so thankful, copy/paste the following line (including quotation marks) into a Google search:

"cycling performance simplified"

One would have thought the phrase already existed somewhere on the Internet.

This Morning's Hump Results

In a close and hotly contested finish:

1) Roger Focco from Skylands
2) Joe Struab
3) Humberto Cavalheiro

Suffering from the results of a lackluster lead-out from SlingShot, Turtle Boy got snipped out of the win by a well placed scissors maneuver snapped by the two winners right at the finish.

That is not to say that Tutrle Boy is a loser.

It just goes to show that stumbling upon SlingShot near the end of a ride which he has not been in (and has neither ability nor business being anywhere near), then relying on his wheel to set you up for a win, makes about as much sense as asking a homeward bound farm worker on a mountain bike to pull you back to the parking lot.

Actually, the farm worker would have a shot at it. SlingShot does not.

We have your rubber bands.

Hey, Lauren!
Looks like nobody else showed up.

Who the fuck is Lauren Warren?

Finally, I don't feel so much like a babe cycling in the wilderness. Others are really starting to get this.

I guess I should mention that Mary's real-world results match the calculations for being in the Drops, while she remains on her Hoods or Bartops.

That would imply we have gotten her efficiency above the calculator's 95% default.

Also be aware that on the bottom of that homepage, there is mention that Greg LeMond's 1989 Tour de France Final Stage would calculate to a 513 watt average, but that is highly unlikely.

The World Record 1-Hour time trial is significantly below that, and it is unlikely he performed that effort during a Tour Stage.

Drafting is not accounted for in the calculations, and there is an immense difference when you are on somebody's wheel.

This year in Floriduh, we were riding into a strong head-wind at just over 20 mph with Mary pulling.

I moved in front of her, and we stepped it up to 22 mph, but her power meter showed she had dropped to the bottom of her warmup watts behind me… which would usually net us 14-15 mph on an in and out.

Everybody should check out Floyd's book "Positively False" on this, because he publishes results from his power meter used during the Tour.

In any case, this calculator, that you just sent us the link to, replaces the one I found last winter which is now offline.

The calculations are more or less the same as the other one I found, despite this one being much simpler to use.

Thanks. Thanks. Thanks.

You are hereby granted an extension of your ARC membership for one year for free, and that is a grand total savings of 2¢, had you not already put in yours by virtue of this submittal.

I am working on a new project which will be greatly enhanced if everybody googles American Road Cycling and clicks through to the ARC homepage.

This Morning's Hump Results

In a close and hotly contested finish:

1) Dave Freifelder
2) Humberto Cavalheiro
3) Joe Straub

Once again, the chase group was nowhere in sight.

That raises her performance level for those benchmarks from that of an Untrained Woman to that of an Untrained Man.

Here's an old frame grab of the room you were in.

Don't tell anybody what happened there, nor what you saw.

I've seen the Green Screen Fight'n' Machine photo of Mary.

So what good is it?

Tell Lauren about the time I used the wheel behind you, and my HR was 20 beats higher during the warmup.

And tell her about the time we swapped wheels on the last half of the Suncoast Trail loop in Florida, and you noticed a big difference right away.

Explain we don't have objective data about the specific difference, because we don't have two power meters to use at the same time, so your holding of the warmup watts was only your feeling for it, which may not be totally accurate.

She might not want to use the wheel in competition, just for workouts. Of course, the data was important enough for Floyd to take the hit on speed to use his in the Tour.

The data was especially important for you, Mary, to learn what workouts are and how they help. Lauren knows all about training, and how you work and get better.

Tell her I'm sorry I forgot about the speed thing."

However, at Lauren's level of competition, the riders around her might know a thing or two about cycling, so the margins for error in performance may be a bit tighter.

You know what I mean about Lauren, but if not, better take a look at her credentials again at the head of her power meter article. >>>

Despite that, this morning the first thing I have to endure is a "reminder" in my mailbox that I have "training scheduled."

I flagged it as spam, then added "trainingpeaks.com" to my filters list.

You would think people would learn that sending busy people unwanted e-mail is no way to build equity in a brand name.

Why would I want to hear anything from those bozos? I know significantly more about training and computers than any of them, and it will be years before they catch up to my curve.

One of the things I know about training is that it is always better to be out on your bike rather than pouring over lists of unwanted e-mails.

What's wrong? Is it because everybody knows what a waste this fucking website is, so you can't even get a guest lecturer in for change? Don't you know any real competitors?

Here, watch this. You've probably heard about Lauren Warren. I'll just go tell her to send in an article, and she'll comply, no questions asked.

Wait here. I'll be right back...

There. See? That wasn't hard. Take a look at this. >>>

It would be rude of me to disagree. >>>

Turtle Boy Title Yanked

Also, the specific language used in the article has been revised in order to more closely reflect the actual facts.

Unfortunately, the article failed to mention that the group chasing Humberto got close enough to see him finishing up the series of red lights at the junction of Routes 6, 17M, the Quickway, and that godawful mall.

Therefore, and more specifically, Humberto has been found guilty of an onerous Failure to Time the Light infraction, an offense from which there is no appeal.

In summary, Humberto is being fined triple cracking fees based on a payment which is to go to every other cyclist on the ride, because he allowed them to get close enough to actually hope they would catch him.

That level of disappointment cannot be tolerated, because this very sensitive group of riders is hopeless, so they can't bear seeing hope kicked around like that.

That is why the fine was doubled (from an original assessment stemming from the simple light timing infraction) in order to mitigate the large number of false hopes passed around in the chase group behind him.

Also another increase (bringing the total up to a triple fine) was levied due to the actions of Humberto's friend Pedro who acted in complicity by being the one who pulled the group all the way back close enough to see him five lights away.

Everyone knows this, so we shouldn't have to repeat it, but Pedro is Portuguese, and he has been cycling for a full three months.

It is a well known fact that after two months of riding a beginning cyclist is deemed a cheater if they are Portuguese, because even after one month of cycling the Portuguese are way too strong for other riders to deal with.

The odd divergence from standard practice used here, where the crackee is being fined instead of the crackers, that is to say Humberto is being fined for his cracking of every other rider in the ride, rather than those who cracked being fined for cracking, is done so ARC may finally establish itself as a solid member of the big time cycling community where combatants are routinely fined large sums of money for the timerity of trying to protect their good name in a public forum.

This action is the final step required to raise ARC to the level of World Class Cycling Authority, because we have long since qualified for having a process so arcane, obtuse, and opaque that it is indistinquishable from an all out attempt to fuck a stranger in the ass.

We are sorry Humberto lost his title, but we feel very pleased with ourselves.

In case somebody missed the article, or is interested to see the langauge change granted for the section about the stop lights, here is a new link to it. >>>