You've got about three hours.

You don't get to call yourself a Straub Swatter without verification.

Anybody who would lie about anything else is just plain pitiful.

And really, to fuck with Joe you don't have to beat his current self timed record, but only his older Official Time.

If you can beat that, we'll make him prove his current time, but you can't, so don't even bother worrying about it.

What can be done, however, is a baseline can be set, then somebody can beat it, and Joe will have to hand over the damned Kain Cup.

Then he'll have to do the climb again to get it back.

I can tell you this: Joe wants to go up that hill as much as anybody—which is to say not at all.

He'll be back.

I'll take a pass on the kick in the nuts, however.

Since there are no mailboxes on the Mt. Washington climb, I will ignore Don Stark's strategy and try for the path of least resistance—if I make the attempt.

As for my question re: heavier and lighter bikes, I was thinking back to the great physical and psychological lift I always got by switching to a pair of much lighter shoes when it came time to run races.

Of course, gears may minimize such actual or perceived advantages.

In the link contained in your response to me you mentioned Elvin King.

I suppose this video tribute is to the same Elvin King you mentioned.

I provide the link here in case you haven't seen it. >>>

The way he is described rings totally true and shows the impact he had on generations of actual runners after his first job teaching the likes of me.

Get your power meter, so I can compare your results to other local fames.

For example, Twin Lynn has been reporting her spin class watts, and I had to be the one to tell her that her numbers are equal to the old Turtle Boy Compu-school specs, which is to say she is performing very close to the best the local club has to offer.

It is a fact which is purposely hidden from her by those whose interests run counter to her knowing the truth, by that I mean everybody she rides with, despite the years she spent as club president.

Her brother (valedictorian graduate of Compu-school) sure to fuck will never tell her.

By the way, here's a photo of Lynn taken just this morning on the Appalachian Trail.

You may notice hunched down in the middle is Nuclear Dan Buckley former winner of numerous bi-athlons and currently recovering from a broken pelvis--the result of a hard interval on Warwick Turnpike. >>>

Sorry to accost you and Widder so abruptly, but if you knew how many times I've passed the studio on my bike hoping for such an opportunity, you'd (possibly) understand.

Inspired after I left you and neared the end of my ride on Bellvale Rd, I decided to turn left up Kain rather than right towards the Iron Forge.

Happily, my untimed assault was successful, but as I rode I started wondering if there are any rules regarding the "line of climb" up Kain.

Must one stay on the right side of the road or can one follow the shortest route, thereby crossing from right to to left and vice versa as necessary?

Failing to find any CliffsNotes for Cycling Performance Simplified, I have begun reading the long (and only) version with much interest, as consistently as my ADD will allow, and am considering buying a PowerTap wheel from Williams Cycling—since I alreading have a set of his wheels.

In the meantime, I would like your opinion as to whether there is any value or harm in using a heavier bike for training and a lighter bike for timed events.

It's what I do now.

Both bikes have the same geometry, but the aluminum training bike is 3 1/2 pounds heavier, has slower tires and 30/46 12-30 gearing, while the carbon bike has 34/50 12-27 gearing.

Then as I kick you in the nuts shouting, "There ain't no rules," I get the jump on you over the starting line.

In truth there is a large contingent of riders (Don Stark most notably) who adhere to the belief that the best "line of climb" is what is called: Delivering the Mail.

Wildly traverse the road back and forth bumping into every mail box.

However, the top Kain theorists universally agree that the best line of attack on Kain is the line of least resistance, which is (as is the case for all great theories) a description of something totally non-existent.

As for Cycling Performance Simplified, you will be happy to note that it is currently under massive restructuring, so it will look different every time you read it.

Perfect for your ADD and left handed bikes with the big rings on the inside.

I just donated $20 to Wikipedia.

You only use it 24/7 three-sixty-five.

But NOBODY is allowed to post unless they are working on something significant like a Kain Assault or Mount Washington Race.

Everytime I see him all he talks about is his kid who is freewheelin' it in South America, learning new langauges, building echo friendly houses, and getting ready for an extended trip up the Amazon with his Yoga instructor friend looking for something resembling themselves.

I didn't have the heart.

Blamed the lack of treats on fears Widder and Shot would make good on their promise to break his nose if he ever showed up with food again—trying to pull Bob off his program.

He also whined about not having his Powertap setup yet, because he has to take his bike down to bolts and clean it first.

SlingShot yelped, "What's your problem? Ain't like it's a fucking carburator."

At which point Bianchi launched into a monologue about how he now has an overhead cam sitting on top of the carburator in his china closet and how that makes it all very eBay worthy.

SlingShot just stood their blankly with visions of sugar plums, etc.

I was really hoping to break his nose.

Those specs are not inconsequential.

Now that I came over to your spin class and showed you how you can get 600+ watts (what you thought impossible), here is a little tidbit for you.

If you want to stay with Kevin Haley on the hardest part of Ridgebury, all you need to do is:

24 sec @ 546w

He will be generating more power, but you are lighter.

Here is a link to my Kevin specs. >>>

We are almost fully recovered except for the second concussion I got a few days back into training, when I blacked out and hit the tile floor and cracked my cranium – sheeeesh!

No one told me to wear a helmet INSIDE the house!

But all is well: Paul is putting our bikes back together again.

Absolutely insane how much utility you squeezed into such a simple screen.

Now I understand why they said you are encoding for a post tweety-face world.

TWIN LYNN'S
WILD COUNTRY
MOUNTAIN ROCK SCRAMBLE

On this morning's Wild Country Scramble, Twin Lynn finally had enough of Widder and Jen Cavalheiro way up ahead of the group pushing the pace (hard as could be), so she veered off the mountain pass and started trailblazing to make sure nobody knew where the next turn was going to be.

That kept a lid on it... more or less, so much so that even SlingShot could manage the pace afterwards.

Bucky only had to come back and help him across the water once.

The times they were quoting for the run seemed on the slow side, so I confirmed online that the 1.5 mile sign really meant a mile and a half.

Given the fact only yesterday morning I was explaining to Widder how our 4 mile hike/run on the Goosepond Mountain trails compared favorably to what could be expected, and was giving her some baseline numbers as to when we could start considering our performance worthy of interest, I decided to take a look at some military stats.

Therefore, I looked up charts to compare what we have been doing with objective fitness standards.

I immediately found an error on a chart, then realized the URL said it was on "Coast Guard" dot COM, not MIL.

I found the actual government site (where the chart did not contain the error), and decided, "Why stop with just Coast Guard? Why not go all the way and get the Marines version?"

Long story short, the Marines site was buried a few pages deeper into Google searches (more popular to pretend to be a Marine I guess), and when I finally got to the site found it was more or less un-navigable.

I assume it is because ignorant jarheads have no Internet skills and are quite willing to just follow orders and never ask any questions anyway.

Somebody ought to grab hold of their website and drag it Booh-yahing into the 21st century.

In any case, didn't much matter to me, because by the time I found specs on the Marine website similar to those found on the Coast Guard site, I had already realized the Marine baselines are all tied to doing stuff with a lot of equipment strapped on your back, so not well suited to our purposes.

I defaulted back to the Coast Guard charts.

Turns out we are doing very well indeed... and better every day. >>>

INTERCEPTED EMAIL
HUMBERTO TO PAUL

Hey Paul,

I am seated here planning my retirement.

I plan on retiring at the age of 50, or maybe just working part time.

Will you give me a part time job?

I am sure by then I will be gay like the rest of you and shave my legs for no reason.

Do you think it's a possibility?

Sent from my iPhone

And since you certainly know full well just how sensitive Paul is (you might be causing him to nick the inside of his upper thigh and bleed out), this could be deemed attempted murder.

About one hour into the hike we came upon a wooden slatted narrow railess bridge crossing a raging cold stream.

Brat being her usual self was charging ahead and attempted to cross the bridge.

The slats between the boards were pretty wide apart, and her two hind feet fell thru.

She got scared and turned back.

I walked across, but she would not follow.

Bucky, Lynn, and Bob crossed.

Still she stood on the bank.

I went back again and tried to coax her with roast beef.

Nothing.

She stood shaking and whining staring at all of us on the far bank.

Just as Bob turned to go back to get her, Bucky pushed past Bob and plodded back over the mold covered slippery bridge.

Buck barely had room to turn his 115 lb massive body around in front of Brat, but he managed, then spread his toes wide and slowly and carefully showed Brat how to cross the bridge!

She stuck to his butt like glue and followed him across to our amazement (and my tears)!

What a Disney moment.

Widder

LYNN MEYER CYCLING SPEC

    Lynn Meyer, 130 lbs
    1-hr @ 200 watts = 21.31 mph

That performance is Cat 3 for Women

Congratulations, Lynn!

Jen posted a new personal best of 58:28.81 taking nearly 6 minutes off her previous PB for the loop.

Of course, once again Jen's husband (a cyclist of some renown) chose not to participate in the event deeming it, "Over my level..."

As the saying goes: "The only thing more aggravating than a Cavalheiro in a sports competition, is a Mino."

So when you combine the two, you've got real trouble.

BED CRAMMMM!

They always fatten their Presidents up like a fucking Thanksgiving turkey.

They made it illegal for Humberto to do any more belly flops in the Atlantic.

Fuckin' idiot.

Not me!

Slingshot can usually tell us apart.

He is one of the few, so either he got us confused, or alzheimers is kicking in.

It is a legend spoken throughout the universe before time was time.

Maybe it was just Mary Ellen (Slider) saying, "That Lynn. I'd really like to sock her."

Probably points to the reason I can always tell you and Mary Beth (Cranky) apart.

I don't bother focusing on minor details: like who's got the big fat ass, and who doesn't.

On second thought, I guess I really have no idea at all why I can tell you two apart.

Well, I got off to a bad start with the Egoscue book.

I went to the bar that night you gave me the book.

I drove home, and I had a lot of stuff with me, and I dropped the book between the car and the house but didn't notice it.

Too buzzed, I guess.

It rained that night.

The next morning I found it in the driveway, and it was about half soaked through.

I hung it up over the dehumidifier all weekend, so it's just about dry.

Fortunately the pages did not stick together, so I can read it even though it is a little stinky!

I started reading it, and so far it makes perfect sense.

My problem is, I feel like my body forgot how to move, because I don’t move enough.

Then throw some injuries into the mix, and I'm a mess.

So…if Egoscue understands the reason, he must have figured out the cure, and I am looking forward to trying this out: I think it's going to work.

Thank you, to you and Bob.

Lynn

When Mary told me she wanted to give you the book and why, I was relieved to know that your quitting every ride in the last 5 years whenever I've still been anywhere near you at the top of the first significant hill, was more than just my presence.

I was getting pretty depressed that another person had started using me as the litmus test for, "Shit I can't even beat SlingShot? I'm too fucked up to ride... going home."

In any case, I said, "Here's the problem. Lynn's a long time jock. Used to play soccer. She already knows all the stuff in the Egoscue book."

Guess you sort of forgot about it.

Get strong again, so I can kick your ass righteous.

There is nothing I appreciate more (well, that may be a stretch) than your coddling missives and diatribes, and if ascending Kain is what it took to coax these last few eloquent gems from you, then I am glad I did it.

I do want to make one small correction, however.

I may have been the one who told you Joe Straub ran a 2:14 marathon, as that was the time reported to me by a third party, after you had told me he had run in the 2:20's.

Well, as I should have known, you were correct after all.

I met Joe a few weeks back at a Saturday ride and he told me his best marathon time was 2:28 +.

Hardly shabby by anyones standards!

My address is ████████████.

However, I am also happy to stop in Sugarloaf to pick up the DVD's and pay homage to Widder should she see fit to descend from the attic.

Fucking loser. I thought he was fast, or at least used to be.

No wonder Crackhead Ryan thinks he can beat him mano-a-mano on Kain if they start together and go up side by side.

"Take his ass at the top," is what I think he said.

In any case, we'll send you the DVDs, so we'll both be off the hook, and you can always stop in just for yuks.

Widder will not have to be coaxed down once she hears you are in the shop.

She'll drop out of the attic like a load of bricks on your head.

I think she's already upped the ante to, "Bull-motherfucking-shit... bull-motherfucking-shit..."

Greg, click the "Edit before publishing" toggle (so nobody gets to see it), then post your physical address, so we can send the DVDs.

I hope this helps.

I can't even get ahead of your postings.

But with the DVDs all taken care of, I can finally shut down the Chatterbox and get back on my rollers.

The fun doesn't happen until afterwards when somebody starts telling you about all there great cycling accomplishments and you casually ask, "Impressive. And what is your Kain time?"

The fun of watching them scraping their toe on the ground while hemming, hawing, and stuttering at that point is really indescribable.

As for age group placement, I'm not sure if you mean the 64 year group, or the 10 month group.

Doesn't much matter, because on Kain, "...we don' nee' no stingkin' age groups."

That means you are now Number 6, on top of Widder while I am number fucked in ways you can't imagine.

A word about the 5 people on top of you.

First off: they are all younger, most of them considerably.

Number 5, just above you, is Humberto Cavalheiro, and on the day he rode the wild Kain, he had just returned from racing with the Pro's in the mountains of Portugal, and had become a mainstay well off the FRONT of the FRONT FRONT group on the Hump where we often saw him time trialing solo at least a mile and half ahead near the finish.

Number 4, Andreas Runggatscher is of course another well known consistent leader off the FRONT of the FRONT FRONT group and trains with a Powermeter as do most major contenders to racing fame.

Number 3, Glenn Babikian, is well known for not only winning his races and time trials, but actually winning entire race series, and what he accomplished on Kain (at over 200 lbs body weight) is only now just beginning to be understood by riders on the street.

Number 2, Ryan Muehlbauer (the first Kain Assault World Record Holder), is head of the Warwick High School music department so laid waste to the myth that people in the band are there because they can't be athletes.

And last but not least Number 1, Joe Straub, is an absolute legend with an earlier Marathon time of 2:14 — which by the way would have been a World Record Marathon when I was competing in high school track and field.

However, that was before the U.S. went all Eastern Block on us and fully professionalized all Olympic sport, and the fact that the professionalizing was accomplished by the very selfsame guy who recruited me for collegiate track and field (and under whom I studied as a P.E. Minor) does nothing to assuage my hatred of Pro athletes engaged in amateur sport.

But that's another whole story.

In any case, it is no wonder Joe holds the current Kain Assault World Record.

Otherwise, there is no shithole age grouping on Kain.

You just ride and compare yourself against the best.

Besides you are on the leader board above the fitness guru who's DVDs you won!

Now he'll have to come back and stop lying about how slow he is, Widder be damned.

Which reminds me, last time I saw Widder she had retired into the attic with her Computrainer bringing along all her charts and graphs.

All I can hear is her up there erasing then scratching in new numbers and recalculating her workout schedule while mumbling under her breath, "Bull-fucking-shit... bull-fucking-shit..."

Hope you’re happy.

Your DVDs are in the mail.

If you beat Widder my life will become a living hell.

He's just a fucking runner!

What does he know about Kain?

KAIN REPORT

OK, the Kain DVD award is being expanded.

Due to the fact that nobody would man-up and admit to failing on Kain, and then neither would anybody who ever had (or had not) previously made it admit to having tried again, ARC is now offering the FREE, Dr. Larry Grogin DVD set: "Back to Life" to anybody who will just admit they have even ever heard of Kain.

Somebody better grab it soon, because after putting on 13 lbs at Palletman's prompting, then taking it off again to remain under 150 lbs for four days last week until getting involved in a coding stint, SlingShot may just decide he needs to keep the DVD's for himself.

Seems SlingShot's recent programming was not all that avoidable and is much easier if done while eating two apples instead of one, but the subtle result of the profound underlying infrastructure expansion required to accomplish the task will allow a somewhat automated future for the next 10,000 instances of such as this week's acquisition:

- A brand new -

Endico rep in Princeton Forrestal Village
(across from the Westin)
Princeton, NJ

Almost forgot, the Chatterbox is temporarily open for either signing up or reporting.

On Palletman's suggestion, SlingShot took a break from his relentless competitive scale work and achieved a personal best weight gain of over 13 lbs in just 7 days... with no end in sight.

When SlingShot complained to Staff about the gain, we told him to stop worrying about it and go out and have a drink.

Thanks again, Palletman, SlingShot was beginning to look like Crackhead Ryan but has now regained near bulbous human proportion so will fit right in with the local club rides.

Yes I did choose not to ride last nite, but instead join my friend Artie Keys and his side kick Jeff for a cold beer at the former Trailside Pub.

No, you are not the type of loser who whines about how cold etc, etc, it is.

However, you are the type of loser that weighs himself after every bowel movement.

I think there might be some type of term for it...perhaps anorexia...or something like it.

You may want to see a head shrinker.

So thank you for that.

As for the other, if the head shrinking will take a few ounces off me, I'm all for it.

If that were true, I would not have shown up for this evening's Trailside Ride, because I would be whining about, "It's cold, and it's going to rain, and I don't want my precious fancy plastic bike to get wet."

And I would be saying it just like General G Douglas (here's my brownies goodbye) Allen.

Or maybe (being a total fucking loser), I would show up like Palletman but leave as soon as SlingShot takes his eyes off me to go do his Flightcheck.

More likely (being a total fucking loser), I would not have even shown up at all, just like all the other total losers who didn't even bother to tender their RSVPs.

If I were one of those sorts of total fucking losers, I would have missed that double rainbow (after the freezing rain) where the proximate end of the larger of the two could be seen sitting in front of the treeline of the field (near the old Private Pie) less than 200 yards off the road.

Not to mention the full sky double arc of those perfectly formed prism sisters.

Glad I'm not one of those total fucking losers.

HUMP/KAIN REPORT

Pumped on endorphines and adrenalin after Thursday's ride, James Loucher (as yet unnommed, will probably be Pretty Boy's Bitch) bubbled over claiming he would do a Kain Assault after this morning's Hump.

Therefore, we are reporting on the Hump even before it begins.

Report: After a heated Hump in which James Loucher (unnommed) came as close as can be to winning, he decided that Kain wasn't so necessary after all.

In a related matter: due to the fact nobody will man up (as did Tom Folkl) and admit to having tried Kain but failed, we are expanding the new DVD Set award to include the first person who has/or has not previously failed but now completes the climb.

No matter what time is recorded (or not) with no mention required regarding any (or all) previous failures.

And remind people the Chatterbox is temporarily open for either signing up or reporting.

Are they real or just something you copied off YouTube onto a CD?

Look <<< left and right >>>.

Take your bicycle over to Kain, go up it a few feet, call it quits, report back and win the Back To Life DVD Set to get your ass back in the game and wipe that smile of Pretty Boy's face.

His Royal Manatee Humberto Cavalheiro (formerly Turtle Boy) probably thinks it is.

Probably just called to see if Glenn knew where all his landscaping jobs in Tuxedo Park got washed away to while he was in Florida.

HUMP REPORT

I did pretty good on the Hump this morning, but what I couldn't stop playing over and over in my head (like an endless video loop) was what I saw you do on Thursday's group ride.

You know, on Twin Arch Road when the fast group hammered past us with all their catcalls and such.

I guess there was maybe 15 in the group, and it felt like a car passing, so I figured it was over.

They got about a hundred yards past us, and all of a sudden I heard you behind me mutter, "Watch this."

Then you came around, jumped and went after them, which I thought was really really funny (another SlingShot joke), "Like that's going to happen.. ha, hah, ha."

But you kept going and finally caught them (after easing up at one point to avoid an oncoming car), and you went all the way up their left side to the front and was yelling something at them, but I couldn't hear what.

I saw it happen but couldn't believe it, and now I can't even tell anybody about it, because everybody already thinks I'm crazy, and this would flag me as over the deep end!

Impressive, but what I'm still wondering about is why you came back so smiley and giggley.

What was the secret joke?

You know, on the final approach to the finish, I thought Tom went back to grab help in order to attack at the line, but turns out the new guy had gone down on some Hurricane Irene gravel near Camp Laguardia, and Tom went back to help him.

A yoeman's task, and Tom had kept a good eye on him, even while attacking those hills on Oxford Road and Greycourt.

Anyway, catching the fast group wasn't all that hard for me to do.

I anticipated the fast group would be going hard there, because Twin Arch Road (with its false flat) is one of the traditional spots they like to hammer hard.

But my data shows I only had to kick it up to 34 mph in order to catch them, and when I got to the front I was only pacing 31 mph while trash talking (yelling), "Bunch of losers. Is that all you got?! Somebody better be pushing some pedals here. Did you all think that me and Bianchi had to be going that slow? We are in the middle of an actual training ride. At least somebody here ought to try working for once in their life."

I assume they were all feeling pretty fast and strong at that point, if not for the geezer riding beside them (side saddle) and pointing out it wasn't much of a performance they were all full of themselves over.

I'm sure none of them could have imagined I had started 100 yards behind them going only 18 mph, jumped, caught and passed the full group to the front, and used only a percentage of my potential to get there.

The whole thing was less than 2 minutes, and I only jumped to 579 watts to get going and held only a 389 watt average while catching and trash talking.

A personal best for the most significant part of that would really have been over 543 average, so it was probably only impressive because you saw me start by spinning up to 123 rpm cadence... while standing!

What got me giggling was Glenn Babikian (Pretty Boy, aka Mr. Augusta), because he was sitting on the back and heard me coming, so I got to see him peeing his pants laughing.

I knew Glenn was just waiting for Keith to fuck up and take a pull.

FREE DVDs for KAIN

We have always been aware that numerous people have been trying the climb but on finding they are not even able to beat an old woman (Widder, 57 yrs old) on the climb, they have not been reporting it.

Mr. Folkl has proven his true character by manning up and admiting his failure, as opposed to all the others who are, as SlingShot has so correctly put it, "... a bunch of spineless losers who are determined to stay that way!"

Tom will no doubt eventually succeed on the climb, and in the process surprise lots of other folks on how well he does (listening Joe?).

Therefore, in the hopes of helping somebody quit being one of those Kain challenged losers, American Road Cycling is offering an award for the next person who will admit they tried Kain but did not finish.

The prize is a boxed set of 5 DVDs (unopened) with workbook outlining a 28 day course for improving lower back function—which the winner will certainly need after their attempt.

This lovely set is valued at $80.00, well actually that is only what SlingShot paid for it, but his review said, "...the workbook alone is worth more than $80.00, and the DVDs are sure to be invalualble!"

In any case, the Chatterbox will be temporarily open to the public in order for people to schedule their attempt or place their admittals.

Be sure to click the "Login" button (not your "Enter" key) after entering the Capcha word.

Somebody's going to get that DVD series (for FREE), use it to get their back moving, and kick my ass with it.

But how bad could cycling industry slight-of-hand subterfuge get?

RICK SANCHEZ RIDES NAKED

I effect Toe Clip rode naked which really pissed off SlingShot, because he had purposely brought a second CPU just for the specific purpose of syncing to Toe Clip's hub in order to kick his ass using the stolen crunched numbers.

Apparently Clipster had anticipated the possibility of cyber attack so chose to leave his data recording device at home while bringing only a lame excuse of needing The Bicycle Doctor to service his wheel before he could use it again.

However, it does seem there might be some truth to that, because recently Big Bianchi (a top mechanic for Mercedes) failed miserably at trying merely to swap a Campy cassette onto a Powertap hub for a quick lesson regarding, "See how light a pressure on the pedals is required to get you a 20 mph average?"

So if a former bicycle club president and current top mechanic for Mercedes can fail at such an apparently simple task, it only goes to show how hard the cycling industry works to make sure people remain without standards and objective references, therefore stupid about the truths of performance.

Seems everbody makes a lot of money selling people "magic" of the kind which only they can provide.

That's why the Kain Cup is such a jewel.

No "Age Group" categories, no gender bias women divisions, no counterproductive group bacchanals after, the only entry fee: your 2¢ which you can put in at any time.

Just you, your stop watch, and the slope.

Hell, you can be a transgendered octogenarian with an eating disorder for all we care.

Just you, the climb, and the watch... for comparison to those on the ARC Leader Board.

Even if you don't believe what you see on the board, you can keep track of your own personal leader board.

Even if you get kicked off the ARC Leader Board for spamming, you can still enjoy every benefit you would have ever enjoyed otherwise by being on it.

You still get a no bullshit, objective reference to your own performance and improvement.

No magic here (so no money changing hands), just a reliable objective reference to the firm understanding that you have kicked Doug and Cranky's asses, and there's not a goddamn thing they can do about it.

Tour de Goshen Report

In a surprise upset, Paul Labrie took (at least) a Bridge Prime away from Glenn Babikian.

Pretty Boy was so upset about it he almost left the ride but chose instead to spill his guts to SlingShot saying, "You know, one was maybe ok, but when he took another, I don't know maybe I should just go home now."

To which SlingShot responded, "Just shut the fuck up and get in front of me."

Paul Labrie had no comment as he gathered his wits for the next prime.

Glenn must have really been upset to come up short in the Prime(s), because spilling your guts to SlingShot is like handing the devil a discount coupon on your soul.

Otherwise, the Tour went as usual as the front group made SlingShot squeak until he popped on the first hill at which point they turned their attentions to Tom Folkl.

Some people complained that SlingShot is an obnoxious loudmouth asshole.

I meant to get everybody complaining.

I'll bet Paul Labrie wasn't complaining about kicking Glenn (Mr. Augusta)Babikian's ass.

KAIN CUP UPDATE

Check out yesterday's Kain Assault results.

Somebody almost beat Widder and is all full of themselves for coming so close. >>>

Here's a teaser link in the meantime. >>>

YEAH!!! West Memphis Three are FREE!!!

However, this one came titled "An Instant Classic" to which SlingShot thought, "Right, McNeilly knows a classic? I don't think so," and looked at it.

We begged SlingShot to let us post the link and he agreed after we yelped, "Instant Classic? Damn straight!" >>>

BIANCHI SETS NEW PERSONAL BEST
AND CATCHES ONE

Under tutelage of one of the world's finest coaching staffs and accompanied by SlingShot, concierge trainer, this evening Big Bianchi took a full 24 seconds off his previous Personal Best on the Harriman 106 Climb.

Compatibility issues with Campy vs. Shimano hubs are still being worked out, so SlingShot came up with the idea that Bianchi could approximate power metered riding by pacing according to SlingShot's output—stuck on his wheel.

Two weeks ago SlingShot needed 176 Watts (to Bianchi's near 230 Watts calculated after) to stay on Bianchi's wheel for the first long climb in Harriman.

The goal this week was for Bianchi to attempt making SlingShot hold 180 to the top.

SlingShot's job was to shout out numbers if they got too high or too low, and give performance advice in the meantime.

Said SlingShot, "By the first minute and a half, he was already at the 214 mark, which is more Watts than people have finished with the front group of the Hump, plus that 214 was my Watts (Bianchi's had to be near 260), so I kept cautioning him to ease up some, and quit overworking the uphills in order to save some for the flats and reversals."

Just before the last step at the top, the pair caught sight of a rider they had seen in the parking lot at the start of the ride, so SlingShot allowed Bianchi to pop his average up from its current 188 to 191 in the last few hundred yards.

Doing that allowed Bianchi to finally catch his first strong rider after a long and arduous climb!!

Otherwise, our two lads judged the 24 second faster time was just a bonus, because speed is arbitrary and subject to capricious turns of fortune, while beating their 180 Watt goal by 11 Watts was an objective definable reference showing an absolute improvement in performance.

Congratulations, Bianchi, on a job well done.

He will do a lot better (with no more effort) once we work out the Campy vs. Shimano compatibility issue and get him hooked into a power meter where he can see the numbers in real time.

This cycling stuff is very, very, very counter intuitive.

Ryan could repeat them more or less at will... any time, any place.

Can't you give them a little taste?

Ryan has been complaining that while he can easily take every hill on a ride, the group eventually catches him again, and he has to work to stay on their wheels on the downhills.

Of course, the first suspect would be his big ring being too small, so I had him perform a couple tests to see what he can actually do with his current gearing.

We did two tests:

1) How fast can Ryan go without spinning out?

2) What exactly is Ryan's maximum cadence (spin rate)?

The power meter allows us an objective measure of speed and cadence, so there is no guessing on this.

At 33.06 mph Ryan was only spinning 106 rpm while maintaining 536 watts (peaking at 546).

In the second test Ryan's maximum spin rate was 190 rpm, plus he maintained an average of 188 rpm for 8 seconds (@265 watts because I told him "no pressure in the pedals"), so it is unlikely he is spun out when the group catches him.

Therefore, it is most likely he is blowing himself up on the uphills, and is still in recovery mode when caught, at which point 75 watts would feel like 900 watts.

I have it on good authority that one of Ryan's neighbors (with others) actively works to trigger Ryan on uphills, just for the very purpose of toasting him for the downhills.

In summary, if Ryan would work a little more convervatively (only hammering those riders "slightly" on the uphills, not absolutely decimating them per usual), he could probably stop whining about how he is always getting edged out in the sprint at the finish.

Editor's Note: Ryan should also understand that a group working against him as a team will always win—Phil Liggett's continual overstating the possibility of the reversal of that simple fact notwithstanding—just ask Tom Folkl.

KAIN ASSAULT NEWS

Crackhead Ryan just set a new Personal Best on the Kain Assault beating his old time by 5 seconds during an attempt he judged was, "...spun pretty easy, just seeing how the power meter works."

Joe Straub only beat his own PB by .79 seconds on his last attempt, so Ryan currently holds the prize for Most Improved.

There is no trophy for this, Ryan did it just for the pure satisfaction of beating Joe at something.

Sorry, Joe.

I did a quick calc of his performance before he rushed off, and I told him it was an International Pro Performance.

I put in the wrong weigh-in weight as 25.2 lbs instead of his actual 125.2.

The true numbers calculated to a mere Cat1 Perfornance.

Coming soon: Ryan's full power data report.

HUMP REPORT

Given the severity with which Big Bianchi overworked himself on two other separate rides this week as he tried to get SlingShot to breathe hard even once, it is assumed he had one of the worst Humps of his life.

We only report this so Bianchi doesn't spend the rest of the day whining, "I don't know what happened. I was doing so good this week."

How do they spin their cranks so fast?

Practice, practice, practice.

To which I should add that practice doesn't make perfect, only perfect practice makes perfect.

BTW: That 250 number comes from Arnie Baker's seminal 1996-7 book "Smart Cycling" on page 62.

Even today, you will not find a single thing in Carmichael Training which was not already covered by Arnie in 1996.

The book is only lacking where the current generation of on-bicycle power meters have revealed false logic with regard to efficiency of pedal stroke, but even Carmichael Systems has not addressed that as yet.

Actually, a good recordable cadence counter can give you 99.9% of the functionality of a power meter once the basics are understood.

The first basic is that you should use a cadence counter to record what you are doing, thus allowing you to focus on other aspects of spin performance, so you don't have to think about your cadence while doing an exercise… sort of like a tape recorder to check your banjo phrasing… or like a reverse metronome.

Widder is currently working on bringing her Functional Cadence up from 91 rpm to 92 rpm, with a longer term goal of 95 rpm, a cadence she has already averaged on Kain to the first driveway.

We are doing a number of exercises in order for her to achieve "perfect practice" for cadence as well as the rest of her training.

Kain Cup

Trophy wife. >>>

I was going to beat Joe's World Record but was told I would have to be officially timed.

How does he get away with this self-timing bullshit?!.

Now taking the cup for the rest of this year will require an Official World Record.

We'll make you an offer.

You take your sorry ass over to Kain, get an officially timed Assault, and if you beat Joe's previous (official) time you'll take the World Record plus the Cup, and we'll make Joe prove his new time to get them back.

The bottom line is: JOE STRAUB IS THE MAN.

If he said he beat himself, then he beat himself.

ARC is actually in favor of all self-flagellations, but it you want to say you beat Joe, you are going to need a witness.

WORLD RECORD KAIN

Friday morning Joe Straub awoke and remembered it was his wedding day.

He also remembered how everybody always says marriage is pretty much the end of one's life (no more hobbies, interests, fun), so he needed to get a few niggling little commitments out of the way before the big commitment took over.

One of the primary chores to do was a Kain Assault, and it would be a good day for it, because Joe's intensive crash schedule has been on the low side of late, and he is almost functional in several of his few remaining unbroken body parts.

In any case, his assault really didn't take much away from his wedding day preparations, because he beat his own World Record and set a new Kain Assault All Time Record of 5:40.00

This beat his old record by .79 seconds, and left plenty of other seconds in order to get to the church on time.

Actually his SRM data (for this self-timed assault) shows his effort began and ended at 5:32.00 and the other 8 seconds was used up trying to hit his timer.

Joe himself noted that it was actually 5:37.00 when he crossed the finish line, so we're giving it to him.

Obviously any of those times beats the current Kain Cup time of 16 minutes, so Joe also becomes the current holder of the cup.

Crackhead Ryan filed a protest but was unsuccessful with it.

Pretty good start to a wedding day for Joe, so he stopped by ARC Central took the drug test and dropped off the data.

Joe was looking pretty good considering all his race-broken bones and fun-ride concussions. >>>

He didn't take his unsuccessful protest well. >>>

NEW WORLD RECORD SET
KAIN ASSAULT

This morning on the way to his wedding, Joe Straub took a moment to stop off and set a NEW WORLD RECORD for the KAIN ASSAULT.

Details to be published shortly.

I heard you and Widder actually showed up for a party over at Twin George and Nilsa's house.

Especially odd since it started like this. >>>

www.mcneillywoodproducts.com

Sorry, SlingShot forgot to put http:// in the link text.

All fixed.

www.mcneillywoodproducts.com

Doubly fixed.

We have to publish the following in hopes Palletman will stop spamming the known universe with notices.

As of June 8, 2011, the McNeilly family has moved!

Our new contact information is:

Address/Phone:

209 Canter Court
Goshen, NY 10924
(845-615-9035)

Dan cell: 845-781-6053
Ann cell: 845-544-5732
Jack cell: 845-551-1769
Mark cell: 845-551-8077

Home email: mcneilly.ann@gmail.com

Work email:
   dan@mcneillywoodproducts.com,
   ann@mcneillywoodproducts.com

Jack: jmcneill@haverford.edu

Ann McNeilly
209 Canter Court
Goshen, NY 10924

mcneilly.ann@gmail.com

Dan McNeilly
McNeilly Wood Products, Inc.
120 Neelytown Road
Campbell Hall, NY 10916

Phone 845-457-9651 ext 302
Fax 845-457-4220

email: dan@mcneillywoodproducts.com

www.mcneillywoodproducts.com

Just to update you, I now carry the tools and equipment necessary to change a tire and can actually change it myself provided I am watching a youtube video while doing so.

My record is about 90 minutes so far!

I enjoyed our conversation last night and am considering all you've said.

I did find my email in Chatterbox and my resulting nickname, I think it was the complimentary "Fucktard."

However, I must appeal the assignment of this moniker since it was "She-who-must-be-obeyed" herself that put me up to sending that email!

I appreciate your reconsideration.

By the way, I did a little research on Joe Straub and can tell you I was never anywhere near as good a runner.

In fact, a mutual acquaintance told me he was NYS HS group champion in cross-country, ran at William and Mary and has run a 2:14 marathon.

I have been unable to confirm the marathon time, but, if anywhere close, it humbles my pedestrian 2:35.

Good thing Bianchi was taking it easy saving himself for the Hump, plus he had that stupid-ass single speed and was blowing up real quick on the hills, or I couldn't have stayed with him long enough to take off the 5 lbs of water weight required to become such a mumbling mute.

As for Joe, that does seem to be the Straub we know, and I would have asked him about his marathon time when we just saw him and Glenn Babikian out on the Wisners spinning easy before tomorrow's Hump, but Widder and I were walking the new puppy, and they only slowed down to around 30 as they went by.

The 2:14 time does sound right for him though, and I always describe it thus: "When Joe finished marathons he was always looking at Kenyan asses."

As for reconsidering the nickname, we convened a gathering of the powers that nom, and it turns out it was "She-who-must-be-obeyed" herself who came up with the name, so the committee's hands our tied but thankfully not fully bound and gagged as per usual.

Also, sorry for the delay in getting back to you: my Heritage Trail ride today was extra long because I went double slow marveling at how loud hail can pound on a helmet while trying to decide just how golf ball size would feel on my back and arms, and if this was it.

An hour and a half of that shit and you don't even mind going through the dark overhang up near Monroe after being totally blinded by lightening flashes if the canopy stops them from popping off right next to your head.

In any case, I'm sure you have already found the Kain Course, and the rules, but Widder prepared you another look at the finish line just to be sure. >>>

I was testing my hip on some hills, and Four Corners was near the end of the ride where my hip was blown.

Here is a quick comparison of the numbers:

Lower cadence, more raggedy spin, less efficiency.

Our FRONT rider on Ridgebury was gaining 26x his input, while SlingShot was actually pushing harder but enjoying it much less.

There are a few other minor details of difference (weight among them), but we are looking at the big picture here, so laboratory controls are not needed.

But a picture is worth a thousand words, so here's a link to a rollover chart comparison.

Compare Front Rider vs SlingShot

The legend for the graph colors is at the top of the Chatterbox above.

If you have done the pop-watt and pop-coaster exercises like I suggested you will be ready for this.

Do a few pop watts in a very easy gear spinning up to 120+ cadence.

You should be able to top 600 watts rather easily.

Now get in your big ring 11 and try the same thing.

You'll be lucky to break 300, but look how much torque you cranked into your bottom bracket.

Get it?

I always just track my Watts like everybody else.

Why should I be watching my Torque?

In fact, SRM's and Computrainers only report Watts, and don't even mention Torque.

Unfortunately, Watts are almost as disjointed from your actual performance as is your Heart Rate.

Here's an imperfect analogy.

THE BRICK WALL

Go find a good sturdy brick wall and put both hands against it, brace your feet against a curb or something, and push as hard as you can.

How many Watts you got there?

The answer is: 0 (zip, zero, nada).

You've got no Watts at all, because the measurement of Watts includes displacement, and the wall has not moved at all.

Now grab a bathroom scale and push it against the wall.

The bathroom scale will tell you how many pounds pressure you are pushing into the wall.

You've still got zero Watts (because the wall didn't move), but now you have a reading of how hard you can push.

Now you can judge if the workouts you do are making you stronger, or weaker.

Same thing with the Torque measurement on your Powertap versus looking only at the Watts output (sorry, SRM and Computrainer users), the Torque tells how hard you pushed, and the Watts show what your effort did for you.

You have seen in the examples below that our anonymous front rider achieved a massive variance in how hard he had to push the pedals per Watt, and in the sprint he almost doubled his output over input.

Say you are doing repeat sprint intervals (like on the Wisner flats), you could easily be surprised by the high number of Watts you averaged for any given amount of effort.

However, if you looked at the Torque you would find it always follows very closely to how hard you knew you pushed the pedals.

Just like in the gym, you know how much weight you are pushing, and if the same weight gets easier, you know you are getting stronger.

Just as the slighter movement of the bathroom scale against the brick wall was measureable, the Torque reading on your power meter gives a more accurate view of your own effort.

The way it works with the Powertap is: Watts are a summation of everything involved in your effort (including slope, wind, your weight and efficiency), while Torque is more specifically a measurment of your force on the pedals.

BTW: If you do the Brick Wall excercise, and the wall moves, you are almost ready for Kain... unless you are Doug.

I was really hoping for more from you.

Didn't you see anything else in the data?

There's enough for me to write about the rest of this year and most of next.

For instance, the Sprint.

You'll recall that our master of the spin achieved a mechanical advantage of 26x gain for output over input during the hardest 10th mile on Ridgebury with a 27.5x gain for 11 seconds of that.

Very impressive indeed.

I have schooled the Widder using a number of techniques bringing her standard numbers up from 17x to only 25x under ideal circumstances... and that took a lot of work.

However, in the Sprint at the end of the Hump, the rider you stole the data from actually achieved an output gain over input of 44.6x.

For review, what he got out versus what he put in was:

Output Gains over Input

1) 26x

2) 27.5x

3) 44.6x

Yowsa! No wonder the lad is hard to beat.

I'm not surprised, because I've seen him ride, and I know what I'm looking at, but you should take a look at his efficiency spread. >>>

HUMP REPORT

In another hotly contested Hump a twist ending left riders wondering.

Today, Douchebag Kevin Haley and TP Joe Straub actually worked together as a team in order to act as lead outs for Keith in his seamless win at the Hump.

Lots of people are still scratching their heads about what happened to them on the big climb.

Fortunately, Bin Laden is dead, and resources can now be turned to tracking more nefarious characters, so one of the team cars intercepted the wireless power data from Ridgebury of one of the areas most efficient riders.

On the graph linked at right, note how their 103 average cadence netted them almost 26 times their input torque for a 668 watt average on the steepest part.

That was some fine spinning.

Not likely, because in the post race interview, Keith only responded, "Sorry Mr. Liggitt, but I don't know anything about lead outs . All I know is I spent the whole Hump trying to kick Kevin and Joe's asses, and at the end I finally did it."

Makes it rather unlikely Joe and Kevin will be getting any warm and fuzzies for their effort.

By the way, I abstracted a section out of your intercepted tenth mile hardest part, and found a 11 seconds had an average cadence of 110 which gave that rider torgue to watts of over 27.5 x.

Fuck 'n A.

Turns out it is just a variation on Ohm's Law specific to the solar energy industry.

P = I x E

There's only one place Bianchi could have picked that up.

Having long ago acheived excellent marksmanship, Bianchi really ought to stop shooting himself in the foot on each and every pedal stroke.

Everybody else decided to go do some pussy ride (so flat they had to make it 5 ½ miles long) instead of suffering the indignation of losing to a school marm on (0.7 mile) Kain.

For the High Point TT today, these results were posted:

Senior Men
   3rd Dave Freifelder

Men 45+
   1st TP Joe Straub
   2nd Douch Bag Kevin Haley
   4th Pretty Boy Glenn Babikian
   5th Tin Man Tom Folkl

Men 35+
   1st Andreas Runggatscher

Women Cat 4
   2nd Cranky Mary Beth Henderson

Eventually Dave and Andreas will do something stupid enough for noming.

You do realize, Crackhead, that none of these people ('cept Joe) has beaten you on Kain, and only Glenn has been man enough to even try.

I'd get comfortable with your Kain Cup, Ryan, and build a permanent case for it in your man cave.

HUMP REPORT

Enough people were missing from the Hump today that Humberto might have won it again.

She was all pissed off that Frank Wolfe won an "I Puked On Kain" award, because she had just come in from doing 4 x 12 min x 155 Watt intervals on the trail wherein she also puked but gets no award at all.

Then she noticed that Frank and Ryan's pictures were added to the banner above... she was livid!

Chatterbox is closed.

It is my first cycling performance award.

I've added watching Breaking Away to my training routine, so I can perfect the stick through the spokes technique.

With Ryan out of the picture (as he is now a father), I may just have to make a solo attempt at Kain this weekend.

My goal would be to post an actual time.

With any luck, that will setup another attempt to break an hour.

The key for me will be to do it when the ***** stand is open, so there is some motivation.

Oh, and to have an empty stomach before I start. -Frank

Sorry for the censorship, but ARC is disallowed from publishing words which might trigger bad behavior.

And Crackhead is a father?

He doesn't look like he has a care in the world.

Those people have had plenty of time to get their shit together but have proven they're not even be fast enough to sign up for the attempt.

Must we remind you that ToeClipGuy posted within 6 minutes of your opening the submittal form.

If a Time Trial is the "Race of Truth" then Kain is definitely the "Ascent of Actuality" and nobody wants that.

The Chatterbox is closed.

Once a ToeClipGuy, always a ToeClipGuy.

However, SlingShot, you'd better explain what happened to open the Chatterbox Submittal Form.

Like my nightly walk around the lakes in Monroe, it doesn't actually impact my conditioning, it just diverts me away from the refrigerator.

Anyway, as I approached the restaurant I saw a shitload of fancy bikes all over the place, and the main fatty sugar banquet room was full of a group ride.

There is often a group there, but I always ignore them, because you all know my orietation toward a ride that ends up in a restaurant: it ain't no ride at all.

Plus, I am already way too fucking famous, so I would really prefer not meeting another single human being if I can help it.

I said hi to a couple people I knew standing a little further down talking to someone with one of my favorite motorcycles, so I was focused on looking at that vintage Triumph Bonneville.

I was stepping into the parking lot when I heard, "SlingShot?!" from behind me.

I turn around, and there was Daniel Izon (featured in Spin Bitch Chronicle #14), plus he was the person who first pointed out to me that my left knee had stopped tracking correctly (10 years ago), and additionally it was he who took a hit on on a crash incident which was probably my fault.

He is also an Oncologist.

One of the nicest people on the planet.

So I talked for awhile, brought him down to see Mary's studio for the first time, and showed him American Road Cycling online.

Plenty of time before we followed him back to the ongoing bachnal, Mary coming along so she could see all the bikes.

I tried to get the ride leader to take the group over to Kain, but they wanted to have nothing to do with it.

Of course, the stronger riders (if you can call them that) already knew about Kain, but their eyes rolled back in their head at the very mention of it... just like the local club riders.

I did observe one thing though: apparently the slower that one rides, the fancier the bike they will be riding. [I believe Doug's bike must have cost him $50,000 or more.]

Anyway, at least that's the way it appears with the Bicycle Touring Club of North Jersey who find it much better to ride all the way up here in order to find a decent mile or so without a stop sign, traffic light, or ugly industrial development... which pretty much defines New Jersey.

But poor Daniel, too bad he moved away.

He really deserves better than the pack of social cyling wannabe's he's hooked up with.

Therefore, I opened the Chatterbox Submittal in case Daniel wanted to comment, but more so for the couple of people who pretended to be strong enough to ride Kain (if they chose to) but were obviusly spooked away by the thought of a Kain Cup... no matter how easy it should be to win at this point. >>>

Since the same thing hit iTunes and MySql home page with reports calling it the largest attack in Internet history, I don't feel so very bad about letting it get in here, because those places have an office full of people watching, and I am just myself, but I found it and fixed it here before any of those others even knew it was happening.

I still doubt it hit 3 million computers though.

So I've been watching activity on the website again but thought it was a robot hitting your old secret "Toe Clip is here" page.

Today, I opened the submittal form again, because I ran into somebody out in the real world who might want to use it, and it would be rude after my big write-up about Kain for them to get here and be closed.

In any case, I hope you know the Kain Cup is up for grabs and in a very vulnerable state.

Ryan made sure the situation is very much like somebody in a snowball fight yelling, "Free shot! I won't move."

You could run over right now and take ownership of the Cup at only a 15 min 59 second effort.

The similarity to a freebie in a snowball fight is expanded by the fact that Doug has a snowball's chance in hell of ever beating a 16 min Kain climb.

I began with a review of past records and was surprised to find that Crackhead Ryan (current Kain Cup holder) was actually the very first Kain Assault World Record Holder.

After that I pounded the pavement and heard story after story about how this year Ryan has been staying back with the slower group on the Hump and counseling them on climbing technique... apparently you can take the teacher out of the classroom, but not the other way round.

In any case, he only does that until the Ridgebury climb where he offers a proof of concept to his crew by bridging the gap up to the front group—while never revealing his strength by letting them know that he has caught them.

Obviously, Crackhead had bigger fish to fry and wished to avoid becoming a target until he had the Kain Cup firmly in his grasp.

To that end, Ryan teamed up with the Little York Cycling Club (whose clever quietness to this point has been dismantled by recent events), and he orchestrated the perfect burgling of the Kain Cup, swiping it out from under the nose of Joe Straub's momentary grasp.

Of course, Joe Straub needs no introduction.

On the other hand, Pierre-Francois (Ryan's partner in this crime), is a decorated scholar who has otherwise not shown a terrific interest in cycling but who was very much interested in seeing the results of a true team effort (as assembled by Crackhead), and he saw that with no confusion.

Besides that, Pierre-Francois used the Kain climb to gather data for an independent study regarding finding the simple mathematical formula describing the rule of thumb conversion of mechanical gain for cycling torque to watts (which is at the very core of every modern road bike design) if 100% efficiency were applied to the pedals.

Even SlingShot himself has found this project elusive, though he is certain the calculations exist somewhere, certainly in the hands of the developer of the Powertap... despite the current employees of the company having lost sight of it as arcane knowledge like how the pyramids were built.

Otherwise, Pierre is on the fast track for solving our dependency on foreign oil, the matter of ozone depletion, how to get laid, and all sorts of other intractable mysteries.

Frank (who worked hard enough on Kain to puke) is also a formidable cyclist gearing up to win the upcoming NYC Gran Fondo, and that is no small feat due to fact that event is not even a race.

Therefore, the only thing I could come up with to account for Turtle Boy's question was noticing that on the past records, Mr. Boy is significantly down in the standings.

Could it be mere sour grapes on Turtle Boy's part, associated with his realization that the Kain Cup has now passed over to somebody he has never beaten on Kain, and said cup is likely to remain at the top of the board for the remainder of this year being passed back and forth only between Ryan and Joe?

American Road Cycling is now out of the Kain business.

A better question (one with room for discussion) would be, "Why doesn't anybody good ever win the Tour de France?"

I forget Ryan's house number, but we will find a suitable way for the two skinny lads to battle out any remaining contentiousness.

Between Ryan's impending fatherhood and my ill advised entry in the NYC Gran Fondo, there should be plenty of trash talk fodder coming from our street.

Hope to see you out there.

Frank

It looks like this:

And neither can you.

I estimated my time of 8:03, because I was about 2-3 seconds away from the official finish.

Anyway, I went halfway down, and PF was still chugging away, so I talked to Frank for awhile as Kain continued to kick his ass, and then I followed PF over the finish line.

Against my advice, Frank sprinted at the start and was off the bike by the 1st or 2nd driveway from exhaustion.

Since I was able to do a Kain and a 1/2 without raising by pulse, I can bring my 8:03 back down to around 6 minutes, but I'll have to work if Joe rides again.

But Ryan, I must point out that since you didn't actually cross the finish line first time up, the official baseline for this year remains at 16:19:59.9975 (just under Frahnswa's 16:20 )... which means you will be powerless to stop even Cranky from grabbing your Cup.

Not to mention, poor Joe is still all laid up (snicker, snicker), so what can he do about it?

Nothing.

Guess I'd better start putting together a new Leader Board & Kain Cup GPS.

However, as his official Sponsor, the boy would never publicly humiliate me.

Feel free to see him privately to hear him trash talk the old man.

If he does get the medal, I will be renting it for a large sum over the next four years, longer if grad school is involved.

Or maybe I should just suck it up and plan on a dawn assault next January 1st.

Is there a cutoff time for the first ride of the year?

Get there at midnight December 31 and hit the start line as the ball falls for all we care.

First one up, gets it.

Doug wasn't going to try anyway.

In the meantime, as for podium sluts might I suggest:

And who said anything about "public" humiliation?

I'm sure a slight muffled smirk at the dinner table 10 or 20 times a week will provide the perfect quantum of patricide for the boy's entertainment.

Medal or no.

I'm guessing that in your capacity as the kid's sponsor, you should be in charge of getting the story from Ryan regarding who takes the Medal, and if the Cup gets passed over to Joe or is retained by Ryan.

Little York Takes Top Kain Honors

The members of the Little York Cycling Club headed out at 7am this morning to beat the rain and try Kain Road.

We took the flattest route possible to get there while the newbies listened to Ryan explain the intricacies of the climb—as only someone who knows every little pebble through experience and obsession could.

We crossed the start line according to age in reverse chronological order; so, being the oldest and most senile, I took off first.

I was about halfway up when I blew!

Chunks... literally.

Fortunately, I was far enough ahead of everyone that there was no photo op, a small compensation at best.

When Ryan chugged by me, he looked over his shoulder and smiled.

He was enjoying himself and taking it easy.

I was just happy that we didn't do Hoyt Road first like he wanted to.

Then I heard, "I can seee youuu!" as my kid came into view.

It was his first ride of the year, and I was going to get caught.

I started back up as Ryan descended to check on us.

Those two twigs continued up the hill together, leaving the old man for the scavengers.

I crested sometime next morning (it seemed) and saw them chatting away, already recovered.

The final times for the day:

     Ryan 8:03
     Pierre-François 16:20
     Frank 10:55

In honesty, my 10:55 was for the first .45 mi, because my clock stopped first time I barfed on it—but I did finish and have witnesses.

- Frank    

If Ryan had the forethought to start after Pierre-François, and then did not cross the finish line his first time up, but came back down to pick up Pierre-François and let him go over the line first, then we have this situation:

Pierre-François takes the 2011 Kain Baseline Medal (to wave in front of his loser old man forever after), while Ryan takes the Kain Cup, grabbing it away from Joe Straub (who never even touched it, saw it, nor heard about it before).

Otherwise, Ryan gets the baseline medal, and Joe takes possession of the cup which is where it will probably stay till next year.

Of course, Ryan is but a lowly music teacher (until we can bust the fucking Union), so he's probably not bright enough to have figured this out.

However, Pierre-François is a mathmatical genius who maybe crunched the numbers before the climb.

In any case, all you other insipid weenies out there (Doug) may as well go fart, because the Medal and Cup are lost to you.

Check back here as we nail down the deets.

Oh yeah, the Medal and Cup looked like this. >>>

Details are a little sketchy.

Actually, it was only a pothole they hit...though possibly Grand Canyon sized.

Some say it was Shawn who went in first.

They contend Joe was on Shawn's wheel, and they were well behind Humberto working hard to catch him.

Others believe they were actually on Humberto's wheel, and it was Humberto who first went over the hole, but being accustomed to running over shit he barely noticed.

Some think Humberto was in fact right behind them and said, "Joe, you take the high road, I'm going around this way," so avoided any verifiable involvement.

In any case, after Shawn hit and went down, Joe used Shawn as a hill repeat by climbing his entire length without the benefit of knobbies.

Of course, everybody knows how considerate Joe is, so nobody was surprised to hear that Joe immediately got off his bike to see what Shawn thought about how good he was climbing, but sensing the ride was mostly over, Joe laid down for a rest and went sleep until the Paramedics arrived to wake him up.

Somebody or another got an airlift to someplace or another.

What is clear is that Shawn received enough stitches for everybody to start thinking he has taken up wearing bulky hand knit wool toboggan caps.

Otherwise, there are many who say it was a case of Humberto stopping for a pee break to use as an excuse for why he was already so far behind, and he never saw any of it.

Which is possible, because when asked about Shawn later Humberto could only say, "Who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?"

Your decision to "...win the Hump, just one more time," did that come before or after you asked me to have Joe Straub follow me on my ill fated Grand Canyon Jump?

I am done.

See you next Spring !!!

We can kick him while he's down.

In fact, I have a little suggestion that I have told some people privately, but since Joe is off his bike for awhile, I might as well tell everybody.

Here's the plan.

With just a couple people working as a team, we can fuck Mr. Straub real good.

It will only take a team of two (2).

Decide before beginning who will finish first (just like in the Tour de France but with no drugs needed).

Then the two of you go over to Kain, and the chosen "winner" will start 15 seconds ahead of the chosen "loser" (soon to be ultimately the kicked-Joe's-ass winner).

The first person (winner) must go up Kain slow enough for the second person to easily catch them, although the term "easily" is somewhat nonsensical on Kain.

At the top, the second person must use full restraint to resist passing the person in front, while the person in front must steel their will against dropping the second person off their wheel.

The result will be this.

The first person over the line will take the 2011 Kain Baseline Medal, and the second person will of course have beaten their time (by starting 30 seconds later but catching up), and so they will take the Kain Cup—which cup had just that moment passed over to Joe when the first person set the baseline.

In summary: Joe will have taken possession of, then immediately lost, the Kain Cup without ever having seen it or even known of its existence!!!

Of course, since Joe is injured, the person taking over the Kain Cup might keep possession of it long enough to show somebody.

I should however mention that even if Joe were laid up in traction, he would still be able to beat Doug on Kain, and rather easily at that.

Quite frankly, got me exited too.

Did he look fast or slow?

You know Patrick: he looks fast even when he's slow.

He was just finishing his ride and was going to get on the Heritage Trail at the Chester Train station and go back to Goshen.

He said he had been contemplating going over to Kain but decided to just go home.

I tried to reinforce his interest in Kain by mentioning this. >>>

I meant to say, "...a big hairy albino potato with arms."

Hump Report: Portuguese Edition

Humberto got dropped, Pedro got dropped, and Albino got dropped but pretended to be helping Mary Beth.

Pretty easy to do, since that's the way it's going to be.

He asked to see my guitar, and I made the mistake of letting him get hold of it.

Motherfucker played it better than I ever did.

I hate him.

Hope he can find some positive in it.

The rest of you better take advantage of this brief moment. >>>

I ran into him on the street, and he said:

"Orthopaedic x-rays show a partially separated shoulder and possible fractured rib. I am scheduling an MRI and CT scan to confirm this and rule out fracture of the clavical. Bottom line is I'll be off the bike for 4-6 weeks. I can't lift my arm as cofirmation to this."

Even after his brief coma, it seems Joe does know where he's at.

After today's pothole crash (where he left his face in the crater after Joe Straub ran over it), the doctors knitted Shawn the World's first ever full hand hewn surgical thread balaclava.

HEAD OVER HEELS
FOR CYCLING

Dan (Palletman) McNeilly is proud recipient of this years ARC Spring Draining Ditch Award.

A passing observer recorded Dan's self initiated forward three and half gainer into a culvert, flagged it a stuck landing, and promptly called the local officials for the unconscious air lift to Westchester Medical Center.

Dan is now back home enjoying his new found noteriety and sipping on Hot Tawdries.

AMERICAN ROAD CYCLING
PHOTO EXCLUSIVE

Shocking unretouched actual photo of Cranky Mary Beth Henderson with her hand in her lap playing with her totally exposed fully visible pussy. >>>

I have tried all the Computrainers, watt meters, and training rollers I could find, but nothing comes close to truthfully portraying actual real world racing.

Can you help me out?

I guess that was little insensitive.

Ok, for the record:

Humberto is not a girl.

Humberto is a fat girl.

Thank you for the email.

Mary will never be able to explain this (she couldn't even explain to Mary Beth why we were wondering if she does real mens military grade push-ups), so I'll have to give you the run down.

When Mary told me she got email from you, I immediately assumed it must be because you saw the Kain Cup posting.

That got me thinking about, "What if Kevin was the first one up Kain (not just some Turtle Boy loser)," and that inspired a great story.

It goes like this.

You (Kevin) go up Kain right away, and real easy, because no matter what time you set for this year's baseline, the first one up gets the medal.

Then, since nobody can win the Cup just for going up Kain one time early in the year (or beating themselves afterwards), that would mean the Cup gets turned over to Joe Straub (the current Kain Assault World Record Holder) in order to get things going.

That would also mean Joe takes ownership of the Cup just because Kevin went up Kain once (a very American Road Cycling type result).

Additionally, if (on your baseline run) you could manage to go slower than my own personal best (8:55) that would set a baseline that just about anybody (except for Doug Allen and Big Bianchi) can beat, so the next person up would have an easy time of taking the Cup from Joe, just by beating Kevin's slower than SlingShot time.

Then you yourself could go up again once you get in shape and take back control of the Cup thus handing Joe another defeat all the while without anybody having had to beat his World Record Time.

Will Joe feel like a total loser or what?

I know it will be hard for you to go up as slow as my own time (no matter how bad of shape you are in), but it will really add to the story—which story makes no sense at all unless someone of Kevin Douchbag's Haley's stature is the person to cause Joe's Cup to be taken away from him and by somebody going much slower than his own best time.

Just come over and we'll time you, and maybe stand in your way to make sure the baseline is slow enough to attract some contenders, maybe even that Fat Fat Potato Fuck Humberto.

Maybe the new Kain Cup and trophy awards.

Those photos of Humberto.

He looks like a big potato with two arms and two legs.

A shark eats a turtle to become a whale?

How about a little something I can use for a screen saver that incorporates your svelte appearance.

Of course it's obvious to anybody coming in contact with Widder that she is loopy as a skywriter, but that still doesn't explain why the steady stream of dogs.

I heard you guys didn't have one when you met, and had no interest in it (not to mention SlingShot is solidly apposed to the idea), so something had to get the puppy mill started.

Where did it all begin?

You are correct, we began defiantly against the idea, realizing that what we wanted to do in life would be easily thwarted by kids, puppies, and any such similar nonsense.

Then we got a call from Mary's mom who said her sister had found a stray dog which we should take as our own.

We were young and naïve, so when we finally went down to New Rochelle saying, "No fucking way. We don't want anything like a dog," we were unprepared for what was to happen, not to mention oblivious to the true sitation.

We were standing in her mom's kitchen still saying, "Fuck a dog," when blam, hopping around us was one of the most beautiful creatures alive.

Full of energy, good looks, and excited plans… that dog was more or less exactly just like us.

We did run some newspaper ads, posted flyers, and checked with the local shelters, but nobody came forward.

Like I said, we were too naïve to realize the true situation: how this was an obvious top level show dog, how no such dog would ever be found without a collar, and how no dog so thoroughly trained to subtle voice and hand commands would ever be "lost" or dumped for being overly energetic.

Plus the next morning when Mary walked the dog to the top of Sugar Loaf Mountain, and then lost her when she ran away to hunt on the way down, only served to confirm in our minds that the dog had probably just taken off from her previous home, and was now once again lost, this time to us.

The fact the dog showed up at our door a couple hours later, having been lost miles away in a perfectly foreign environment with no clues other than scent, was something totally lost on us.

We just assumed, "Wow, that was lucky. What an odd coincedence she found her way back."

It wasn't until my recent review of our life with German Shorthair Pointers (a rather rare, very specific, somewhat tightly controlled breed) that I realized the full truth.

This was no stray.

Mary's sister and her husband (boy friend or whatever) were the sort of people who would get aggravated at a neighbor's tree dropping leaves in their yard then "accidentally" cut it down along with taking out all the large trees and rich growth in their own yard.

Her sister had obviously had it with the energy of their neighbors dog, stole it, removed the collar, and presented it to us as a stray in order to get rid of it.

Anybody who didn't know those people would take this as just a conspiracy theory, but we had enough confirmation of their character in the following years, to know full well (in retrospect) what happened.

In any case, Mary got attached to that dog and was so devastated by its death 10 years later that I immediately pushed her into getting another, and despite daily promises that Spatz would be the last, it was obvious that Widder would never be whole again without an immediate replacement… despite the fact that there is no such thing.

What's next, cute kittens?

In terms of speed you do not know the half of it.

I have myself accomplished a personal best recovery.

Within only three days of the event, I have already quelled my own weeping to less than 1 hour durations—spaced as far apart as up to 15 seconds.

What do you guys do, just toss one out and get another?

Why such a quick puppy replacement?

R.I.P. Spatz

June 29, 1997 - January 29, 2011

At 1:30 this morning, Spatz went down to her favorite spot in her favorite shop window, curled up, and went to sleep.

Hell, maybe it is just somebody's wikiwink.

And don't even get me started on telic, atelic.

Somebody better get in charge of this shit already, and right now.

Even with half of them gone, she still has twice the brains of Palin.

If we put in photos of kids, somebody's dad might be tempted to show it to their sons, daughters, or wives.

Totally innapropriate, to say the least.

I'm shuttin' you down.

I was thinking of this. >>>

And here's the thing: wrapping it all up in a t-shirt wouldn't have helped a bit.

I just moved up one in the Hump standings.

Yeahhh!!

Guess Cranky's got his ass under control, because he's even to the point of calling her Sweetie.

Too big an oil slick out in the Gulf for your taste.

We've got so much money to burn, why not a bonfire?

Who cares if that's the equipment Chuckie needs for pedaling to work in minus 2° snowy weather.

You know, it gets cold around here too, fella, and people still ride the Hump.

Here's a picture of Cranky fresh back from her 9° ride today.

Yet another humongous Chuckie oriented download.

I guess we just have to be thankful he never sent you any goddam fucking detail photos.

First I have to endure a fucking way too giant stanky ass download, then the final picture is marred by that ugly skinny butt'd Chuckie!

Is that the best you can do?

Bet the fucking snow out in Michigan put an end to his fucking cycling career.

Of course, there are always people involved in it who break that mold if only to prove the rule.

She has been hitting consistent personal bests on both her bench presses and the Computrainer.

However, after she did a 1-hr @202 watts last week, she burnt up her Computrainer, so we are stepping through the process of setting up another one.

The good news is that her frying of the stationary finally spurred her to break out her Powertap wheel, and now she is running both at the same time.

Turns out the Computrainer is giving her between 20-50 watts less than the Powertap (which is as she thought due to how hard the 202 watts were), so we are establishing baselines again.

Also, the Computrainer consistently reports speeds that are under what we have experienced on the road for any given watts… and that is something we have heard others mention, "… it's harder on the Computrainer than outdoors," is a much heard refrain.

We will have more specifics on the exact nature of that phenomonen as she gets her new setup spec'd out.

Her 202 watt hour on the Computrainer reported at just under 21 mph for the hour, but outdoors she can get that at about 190.

You may recall her personal best 1hr-TT on the Hump (two years ago) was 174 watts, which put her past the Camel Farm and almost onto Lower Road off Rte 1, and that was a 19.3 mph average for the 174 watts… not to mention it is uphill to that point, plus she had a headwind.

In any case, she is certainly performing at Cat 3 for MEN for Long Haul Time Trialing (given her Power to Weight), and I am excited to again being handed readings on her Torque, not just the Computrainer Watts Only…along with the fact that it doesn't give us a reasonable graph to show just where problems are occuring.

Tomorrow's workout is for her to do 6 high torque hard intervals to find out where we are relative to what we were doing outside, to calibrate the tools, and to get ready to repeat workouts we would have been doing on the Suncoast Trail, Pinellas Trail, and Fort De Soto, if only we had not had to stay home this year for radiation therapy.

She will also do a longer easier interval so we can figure out why the Computrainer starts grabbing after about three minutes… thankfully we now have the Powertap to confirm that she's not making the whole thing up.

Overall, she has been very excited to find out how much better she can ride now that both legs are working and she is more or less even on her saddle… and that only took two years to accomplish.

This is all coming along a lot faster than I expected!

Guess how he did?