Switzerland is for Cows, Dairy Products and Singlespeeders

This past weekend, we headed to Zurich for the Swiss SingleSpeed Meisterschaft (Championships) 2007.



Edit: I've been asked to say that Kera was the only participant in the womens category. Therefore, to her, she wasn't the champion.

I'll get this out of the way now. Kera won the womens category. That's all you need to know. :-) Basically, she won every race that she entered. I didn't do as well as I'd hoped, but that's the way the 29'er singlespeed wheels roll. Right? I think I came in (after 4 races) about 7th. Midpack or so. Not bad for the oldest guy there by about 10 years. I did pull off 4th in the uphill time-trail and the night race.


We arrived with Isaac in tow (the new Swiss SingleSpeed Champion). Everyone hung out at Christophs new shop. La Flamme Rouge and had a nice night reconnecting with people.

Kera, Isaac and I were lucky enough to have a place to sleep in Guy & Barbras place. Wow! What fantastic people they were to stay with. We can't thank them enough. A nice breakfast in the morning, lots of coffee, some wine, warm showers. Who can ask for more? Not me! Thanks again you guys. By the way, I'm not a fan of kids, but I liked yours. They were o.k. by me.





Saturday saw us doing a Down Hill singlespeed race in the early afternoon, then we were off to a nice lunch cooked by Cecile. From there we did a really cool orienteering race to the top of a mountain. I helped Kera as she's not the best navigator in the world. 'Sides, life's often more fun in pairs. Along the way we picked up Mickey as well.




After we reached the top of the mountain and the tower (last mind you), we had cake & coffee provided by Christophs parents. Max (from last years race) arrived on the scene here as well. We then headed down the mountain on some of the toughest trails that I've ever ridden. Think roots, rocks, drop-offs often at 45 degrees or more with a little bit of dirt accidentally strewn in between. I was last down that little game too.

We then went back to the shop for awhile for a few beers and then off to Lake Zurich for a BBQ dinner and the night race. Dinner was great as were the beers consumed as well. Around 11:30 we were given race numbers and herded through the gauntlet that is the Theater Spectacular (lots of drunk people that we had to thread ourselves though) and over to a private piece of land for the night race.

We walked the course where flashlights with cone-things were placed in short cones on corners. The only hill was three or four steps up to a bridge and one off the other side. As it turned out, this little obstacle was 1/2 the fields undoing. We did a Le Mans start and off we went. The last person on each lap was pulled. I actually expected it would be me. Somehow though, I kept going and going and going. Next thing I know, I'm one of the last people out there. I think I got 3rd on that thing. Odd.

Sunday we did breakfast with Guy and headed off to the mountain on the West side of town for the uphill Time-Trail. Just for the record. F-in Ugh! I think that everyone had the same opinion. Fun, but damn it hurt. I really wish that I'd have brought the camera for the look on people's faces. Also the view from up here is fantastic!

So, we had some snacky lunch things, the award presentation. Again, Kera is the Champion. She won a Titanium SingleStar and I won a cool Chris King T-Shirt for my efforts.



Kera made this great bag that went to crazy Serge.

As usual, many more pics here - Flickr

So, this Friday we're off to Scotland for Single Speed Worlds and then a few days of vacation and travel around the islands of Skye and Islay. Lot's of photos will be forthcoming. No worries on that one.

2 Years and counting! 20 August 2005

Today is our two year anniversary. Hard to believe how fast it's gone by. I suppose, living the lifestyle we live that it's not surprising to have it zoom by so quickly.

In any case, I just wanted to note today as Kera's easily the best thing that's ever happened to me. Happy Anniversary honey!

I posted all our pics from the Wedding on Flickr. so that everyone that wants to can check 'em out. There's plenty there to entertain you for a few minutes.

More stuff for big SiSies! Aug. 1-3 2008 - Don't forget it!

Just in case the last post wasn't enough for you. Here are a few other tidbits that are floating about on the web in regards to the '07 SiS. Also, PHATY has released the '08 date already. Now that's planning!

Videos #1 & #2 are from the SingleSpeed race.





The concert that we missed...



This is the start of the Dusk till Dawn part of the race.



More SingleSpeed racing.



Just in case anyone is interested in coming over and doing this next year... Here's the info.

Fragen?
Wann?

1.-3. August 2008
Was?

Nacht-Mountainbikerennen für Solofahrer sowie 2er- und 4er-Teams
Wielang???

2. August 20:52 Uhr bis 3. August 5:59 Uhr
Wo?

In Weidenthal im Pfälzerwald
Ist das was für mich?

Das erzählt hier Kathrin oder auf English Ed
Schlafen?

Camping ab Freitag dem 1. August an der Strecke
Hotels und Pensionen siehe Kontakte
Schaltung am Rad?

Ja! Und ohne ist auch erlaubt!
Modus!

Jedes Team kann die Fahrer so oft oder so wenig einsetzen wie es möchte!
Es gibt keine vorgegebenen Reihenfolgen, alles ist möglich.
Ein Viererteam ist auch dann ein Viererteam, wenn nur ein Mitglied die ganze Nacht durchfahren würde - haben wir alles schon erlebt!
Solofahrer dürfen Pausen machen so lange sie möchten, die Wertung geht trotzdem weiter, also vier Runden fahren, fünf Stunden schlafen, eine Runde fahren oder auch nicht. Es wird das gezählt was in der Nacht geleistet wurde - egal wie und zu welcher Zeit!

SiS Report or how we spent a Sat. night in Pfalzerwald.

My ever glamorous bride being chased by a pack of men!


Aren't we the hot pair?

SiS is the acronym for Schlafflos im Sattel (Sleepless in the Saddle). In short, it's a dusk till dawn race that's located in a small town (Weidental) somewhere between Heidelburg & Frankfurt.

As a former race promoter (yes, I helped found this merry group), I have a pretty high standard for what I think a race should be & do. More often than not, races in Europe tend to exceed my expectations. Case in point as with the French Singlespeed Race in Piolenc, France that I wrote about a while back. This weekend's race was equally well done.

Another thing that I've come to love about singlespeeders the world over is the community that develops. It doesn't matter whether you're a fattie, a "Fit-Fucker" or someone that just loves bikes and the people, you're welcome to come and be there. It really impresses me. People get to know each other and will drive hours just to hang out with people that they may only see a 1/2 dozen times a year but still really consider friends. It's very cool. The rest of the world could learn a lesson from that.




There's this thing about singlespeeders and dressing in drag. Hmmmm.

Mind you, dealing with singlespeeders s very often akin to herding cats. Between the excessive amounts of beer & alcohol generally consumed and the sport cigarettes that many participants partake in, it's often tough to get people to be in the prescribed locale at the appointed time.

PHATY, Erik, Kylie, Stephan & everyone else did an excellent job with the weekend! We had fantastic weather (warm & sunny in the daytime and clear at night but chilly). The people were very cool, the food was great and so much more. Coming from an Ami. perspective, the course was on the edge of too short but I'm not complaining. It was great! Rolling single/doubletrack with a nice long uphill in the middle. The course ended with a rough, arm & hand killing downhill too.


Kera in front of me...preriding.

Anyway, we prerode the course with a number of other people on Sat. morning and then did the German SingleSpeed Championship race in the early afternoon. After that, we all hung out for awhile, ate some dinner and then people prepared themselves for the dusk till dawn part of the weekend.


Me at the start.

The race started well, I felt good and was in good position. I had to keep in mind that I would be riding for a long time and that I was on a singlespeed. In any case, I turned a couple of quick first laps even with crashing (not badly) on both of them. After that, I settled in and adjusted to night riding with a head light (which I hate as I can't see shadows for depth). Using the Digital Headtrip first turned out to be a good idea as I switched to the Digital 12 bar light later and actually speeded up a bit.


Me in the middle of the night.

In the middle of the night I started to get way tired and decided to stop for a bit and rest as I knew that I wasn't in contention as the SRAM guys were passing me like I was sitting still. I also knew that I was running low on a light that I liked and wasn't ready to switch to a borrowed light.
http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif
So, I slept for a bit and finally woke up and headed out again about 3 a.m. My thought was that I had enough light to make it till daylight. Luckily, I timed it perfectly. My light lasted until 1/2 way through my last lap. By that time, the sun was up enough to see all of the course clearly.


Me finishing.

For some reason on my last lap, I started to bonk but I knew eating with 2 km to go was pointless so I just rolled on. The finish line looked fantastic! It felt good to roll over say hi to Kera and thank her for all her help throughout the night. She fed & watered me like a kid and without that, I'd had have had a rough night.

Thanks hon! I'm looking forward to next year already. I think I place 24th in solo (regardless of geared or no). I'm not thrilled with it, but there were some really fast guys there and had I continued, it would have put me a lot further up in the standings. Oh well... more for fun and to fly the Boulevard/KCOI/BikeSource flag for awhile.


Kera with her feet up. Thankfully, she didn't do this the whole race. She was the only reason I managed to go as long as I did.

My buddy Marty took a photo of nearly every 29'er in Germany. You can check out our photos & the "official" SiS Flickr group.

Movin' on...

I've mentioned it briefly and I didn't want to say too much until it was a bit more finalized. Well, now it is, we're moving! On Thursday morning, we did pretty much what amounts to the closing.

Believe it or not, here in Germany, they actually read the entire contract to you and the seller. That way, there is nothing hidden or misunderstood. The lawyer makes changes as he/she goes. A very interesting process as they read technical law in Deutsch at an amazing speed.

Our new place is on the opposite side of downtown. It plops us within a couple of minutes of the Isar river, it's close to the mountain bike trails, we get super easy access to road riding, trail running and so much more. That's just the sporting opportunities. It'll also put us in an interesting Italian/Turkish neighborhood. That, for us, means that we have lots of great produce and ethnic food in the area. It also puts us very close to the Autobahn as well. That means about 20 minutes cut off of every trip out of town heading anywhere but north (which we do very rarely anyway).

Pics of the new place are here. I'm sure that I'll be adding many more to the pool. Keep checking it out.

We still need to turn in our notice on the apartment that we're currently in and we've got to finalize the installation of the new kitchen as well. Beyond that, it's just planning the move itself and all the utilities moving too. A rough guess puts us moving somewhere in at the end of September to the middle of October.


Where said kitchen will live.

We had a good meeting with our kitchen designer today and got all that pretty much finalized. We're meeting him this week at the apartment to do measurements and see the completed projects.

This weekend we're heading northwest for a couple of races on the same weekend. It's a combo of the German singlespeed championships and the SiS race. Entry fee for the singlespeed race is a 6 pack. Appropriate for singlespeeders? No? No worries... we've got Bavarian beer to bring with.





Keras finished a couple beautiful bags lately. Check 'em out. We're working on getting her an official website up soon too.



I finished Keras commuter/singlespeed bike over the weekend. It turned out quite cool. It's not a Badger (if you need a new bike go with Rob), but it's much more suited to sitting out in the elements day in and day out than something that nice. It's most comprised of spare parts that I had around the basement along with a new part here and there. Check it out here if you want.

3rd is a winner for us!

Last weekend Kera and I along with our friends Matthias & Christian 'raced' in a 12 hour race in Külsheim. A tiny town not too far from Würzberg. It's beautiful country with rolling hills, fields and small towns. Plopped right in the middle is former tank training base. Believe it or not, it makes for a damn good area to ride mountain bikes!



We headed up on Friday along with Matthias. I'll have you know, the man knows how to fit a lot of stuff in a car. We managed to fit all of our stuff (3 bikes, camping equipment, etc.) in to his Passat. It kind of seemed a bit like loading up a clown car. Looking at all the bikes and stuff on the ground, I would have said it would never fit. In fact, I think I did say it.

We arrived around 9:30/10:00 p.m. to a mostly full parking lot and camping area. After looking a around for a bit, we said hi to a number of people that we know, accepted delivery of some stateside things from a buddy and then found a place to plop our stuff for the weekend. Thanks to the promoters, they'd put up military style tents that sleep 10 or about 6-8 comfortably (with equipment). We then had a couple of beers and headed to bed. Well... three of us did. I think Matthias & Christian stayed up till 2:00 a.m. or something.

The next morning, we awoke, wandered down to breakfast and COFFEE! Then I knew that I needed to get back and get ready for an 8:30 meeting and a 9:00 start.

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

One thing I need to mention. Something that I hope will always amaze me is the amount of love, blood, sweat & tears that local communities here put in to events like this. I'm sure most people in town ride a bike at least to/from work or to the store. However, I'm guessing 75% or more of Külsheim came out to help, donate food or time and then just hang out and support us.

This has happened in every race that I've taken part in here. It didn't matter whether it was in Italy, France, Austria or Germany. It also didn't matter whether it was summer or winter, people love to be a part of it. I think that I understand why I'm so fascinated by it all. It's because in my 10+ years of race promotion I had a handful of people that were always there. It didn't matter what you wanted or asked them to do, they came to help.

Then, there were the others. The were the people that would say "I'll volunteer if..." or you'd have to say "I'll give you or pay you...." Last time I checked volunteer had a little different meaning.

Main Entry: 1vol·un·teer
Pronunciation: "vä-l&n-'tir
Function: noun
Etymology: obsolete French voluntaire (now volontaire), from voluntaire, adjective, voluntary, from Old French, from Latin voluntarius
1 : a person who voluntarily undertakes or expresses a willingness to undertake a service: as a : one who enters into military service voluntarily b (1) : one who renders a service or takes part in a transaction while having no legal concern or interest (2) : one who receives a conveyance or transfer of property without giving valuable consideration

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

Back to my story.

I got ready, went to the meeting and then lined up for the start. We did a loop around the small base 'town' and then back through the start/finish area. Oh.. we were following the mayor/burgermeister wearing a Top Hat on the back of a tandem mountain bike whilst doing this. After the start/finish, they peeled off and we were off.

I say that we were off... In reality, I should probably use a slightly different term as the ground wasn't really wet, just really soft. It felt a bit like riding continually through water. Having the constant resistance will wear your ass out. Trust me on this one!



My, should I say, everyone else's plan for me was to do 3 laps or 3 hours right off the bat. I did two (I could have done more) and had Kera go. She did her couple and the course started to dry out as the wind kicked up a bit and the heat soared. By the middle of the after noon, we were racking up laps and we sat +/- the middle of the overall placings. We never paid much attention to our actual places though.





Later in the afternoon, I went out again, did 3 laps (2 of my fastest) and then Kera (who the heat really bothered), Matthias & then Christian. About 7:45 p.m. they announced that anyone coming in after 8:00 p.m./20:00 would not have that lap counted. So, we were anxiously awaiting Christians arrival to see if I could do another lap. Stupid me, I'd never checked what my lap times really were. It was all just ideas of time in my head.



Christian arrived about 8:10 and I deemed it a bit to late for me to attempt another lap. I knew if I did one and it didn't count, I'd be pissed! As it turned out, I could probably pretty easily have completed a lap as my slowest lap was about 43:06 and my fastest was 37:02.



Anyway, we were just having fun and had no clue that we were even in the running for a place on the podium. We ate some awesome dinner provided by Anna & Christian, had a couple of beers and a lot of water and then wandered down to the award ceremony. The started working their way through the awards and then started reading off the names of teams in our class. They named a few, then 1/2 dozen or so with the same laps as us and then said (in Deutsche) that we'd gotten 3rd. What the....?!! Woohoo!





Up we all went. The mayor gave us our cool trophy, a cool book from Specialized celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Stumpjumper and we each got a bottle of local wine. Not bad for a 35 Euro entry fee. Guess we'll have to go back next year to defend the crown.

A bunch of pics posted here and here

I just wanted to say two more things. Thanks to Kera, Anna, Christian & Matthias as well as everyone that helped or was with the Külsheim race. A definite good time. I forgot to mention that 3 of the 4 of us were on singlespeeds for the race too. :-)

Next up... SiS. PHATY...we're coming to see you bubba!

Life's pretty good....

If you look under my profile photo on the right, you'll see a new feature. It's an email sign-up that you can use. It'll shoot you an automatic email each time that I update. If you do that, can you shoot me a message letting me know so that I can take you off the other email that I send out. That way you don't get two messages. O.K.? Thanks!

Next.. we did a beautiful ride last weekend out by Garmisch. F-in beautiful I might add! Here are a couple of pics and a link to the rest of them (mine and our friend Matthias').









Other news: I'm back in school doing an Integration class. Last time we went to get me a work permit, they told me that I needed to do this to get long-term residency and work permits. Also, we're doing the apartment search thing. I'll let you know more as things pan out.

Hope that everyone is well. Ciao!

Looking in to the future

This post has been hanging around for a bit. Figured that I might as well post it as the first thing is happening this weekend.

I think most people know that I don't usually spend a whole lot of time or effort looking in to the future or the past. Mostly, I tend to live day-by-day. Granted, this might be great if you're a practicing Buddhist monk or alcoholic but I need to live in the 'real' world once in awhile.

Therefore, I need to make a schedule of sorts for the upcoming weeks and maybe even months. On our plate currently are these events...

4th Külsheim 12 hour race
Schlaflos im Sattel night race
Singlespeed World's in Scotland with a little vacation

The 12 hour profile -


The SiS info. -



I would like to have done the 24 hour race in München again this year but the people that run it won't answer email and definitely have one of the worst websites ever produced for a promotional group this large. Hence, the reason that we're doing the Kühlsheim race. Well, that and the fact that a lot of the people from SSEC in France will be there too.

Funny...after I wrote the above comment, I was actually asked to participate as part of our gym's 24 hour 4 man team. If I hadn't already signed up for Külsheim, I'd have probably done it. However, it's more cool that Kera gets to be a part of it too.

We've also booked our trip to Vietnam in late Dec. through early Jan. '08. More on that later.

The possible move thing seems to be coming along as well. I'll let you know about that as it gets finalized.

Lastly, my Deutsche course is coming along. It's a lot of work, but definitely worth it.

I made in a National Mountain Bike Magazine...in France!

Kera just got a few pics of pages out of a French mountain bike magazine sent to her by our buddy JB. Velo VERT is a French mountain bike magazine that not only helped sponsor SSEC but also did a fair amount of coverage and the guy might have even raced. Can't tell you for sure. However, it's cool that a Euro mag. was there to cover such a cool event.

Not only that, I got my photo in the article. It's in the series of pics on the 3rd page. Kera and I are in one of the two pages of the group. It's hard to find us unless you know where we are though.





A zillion other photos from SSEC07 here - on Flickr

Kera and I raced in the Tegernsee marathon yesterday. We both did the "B" loop after much contemplation. I did it on the Black Sheep as a singlespeed and she on her Retrotec.

I finished 132nd out of 258 of male riders and Kera did much better at 24th out of 44. That's the total number of riders that did that loop. It's not broken down by class. I'll have to see about that too. Now, looking at the final results, I finished 35th in my class (under 50) of 87 racers (considering I was the only singlespeed I saw all day, I'm not complaining) and Kera placed 18th out of 34 in women under 40. Not too bad of a day for either of us.

The Tegernsee race is our favorite race course around here. It's just about right. You're not totally spent at the end, but you definitely know that you've done something hard the previous day when you wake up the next morning. The scenery is cool, you get a lot for the 40 Euros (i.e. an Adidas Clima Fabric shirt, a bunch of energy bars/gels, a water bottle, vouchers for a beer and a meal and more). Not a bad deal at all. Considering that the shirt is at least that much in itself.

Once again, I did my best to pass on the SS whilst climbing. Unfortunately, the other riders don't care and/or understand that I need to move along at a slightly faster pace to get up the mountain without walking any more than normal. So, due to this problem and my lack of overall aggressiveness, I end up walking more than I'd like. The funny part though, I end up passing people even walking. Guess that's not all bad eh?

Two...Two posts in one. Kinda like Certs!

Got my old Curtlo back a few days ago. Since then, I've spent a large amount of time screwing around with it getting it ready to ride. You know what? Rigid fork singlespeeds are so much easier to deal with!

My Curtlo is running a large portion of SRAM corporate goodies. Noir 3.3 crankset, SRAM 9.0 shifters & ders., a Rock Shox Reba fork and more. Those items alone are a royal pain-in-the-ass to install and set up. The Avid disk brakes would be easy too if I didn't have to shorten the fluid lines too. I probably should have just stuck with the old BB-7's and made it easy on myself.

Anyway, the bike is pretty much done. I've now talked to WTB on the phone and ordered a new freewheel kit (just hope it's the right one) so I'll have a set of wheels for both bikes...eventually. Here's a pic of the Curtlo.



Also a pic of the jersey that I'm wearing in the SSEC pics as well. I love this jersey. I've coveted one since I saw them last year at SS World's. I now have one. Well, I've had it since SSEC. I've also got a French one too that I need to take pics of for you as well.



..

I finished one class today and I start a new one at a different school tonight. It also appears that I'm going to teach a real estate oriented class for a friend too. Cool! A bit more money and it'll keep me out of trouble.

(This is previous to the other post)....CONFUSED YET?

A race in Tegernsee this weekend. Haven't decided which one I'm doing, yet. There are 4 different races. I can't remember the first one, but it's fairly short, B is 57 km with something like 1100 vertical meters, C is 58 km's with 1900 vertical meters and I think D is 85 km with something like 2500 vertical meters. It'll be B or C for me. Probably B so that I don't leave the parents hanging for the whole day. I'll let you know what I decide.

As usual... more pics here. Flickr

By the way... the book I'm reading is really good! JPod - Douglas Coupland. He also wrote Generation X and other good ones as well.

Once again, it's been awhile. A long while.

Last weekend saw us heading southwest toward the Provence region of France for the SingleSpeed European Championship '07. It was a trip that we'd both been looking forward to as we were going to get to see some of our favorite Frenchmen (David and his brother JB). Both are incredibly nice and talented guys that we met about a year ago at the Swiss SingleSpeed Championships.

I also knew that there were going to be a number of people from around Europe and the U.S. that I'd known through the web, via MySpace, Flickr & various blogs. I was also looking forward to meeting them as well. As it turned out we got to meet a number of very fun & interesting folks (i.e. Peter from Surly, Chuck from Salsa, Phaty, Erik, J.J. & more)

It took us almost 10 hours to drive there from München, but it was definitely worth it. I'd kind overlooked bringing some of the important info. with us; say like the name of the campground, directions and a few other things. After a couple of panic & angst ridden calls to RottenMac we were on our way A few short minutes later, we were in the camping area surrounded by a group of about 100 singlespeeders from around the globe. Ahhh... home!!

David & JB ran over to give us hugs and Euro-kisses! Then over came Phaty & Erik to introduce themselves and invite us to sleep in their cabin. From there, we paid for the weekend and put our stuff away or the weekend. Out came the bikes and a few minutes later we were off to dinner in town with the group. Night #1 saw us eating mussles grilled on a pit fire along with FRENCH FRIES...duh! and about all the French wine that we could down.




After dinner was the Derby. If you don't know Derbying you might be better off. It's basically a free-for-all where the last man/woman riding wins. It often ends in a drunken heap. After that we headed off to the campground for a few beers and more introductions.




The next day we skipped the downhill run on Mt. Ventoux (yes, the famous one from the Tour de France). Instead, we headed off with Erik, Phaty & Stephan for a tour of lower France. The Reader's Digest version is what you'll get. We started out at a winery in the small lower Alps (wine wasn't so good, but the olive pate was awesome), we stopped and looked around an Abbey that looked like a castle, crossed the street for one of the best meals I've had in ages, then off to Arels (where Van Gogh was), the Mediterranean Sea and then Agine Morte & last stop was in Avignon were we had dinner and saw the outside of the old Popes Palace before heading back toward the campground were we arrived about 12:30 a.m.

Saturday saw us off to have a group photo taken in an old Roman amphitheater in Orange, then a group lunch in Piolenc and off to the secret location of the race course. It was really warm, maybe 85-90F, and wearing a kilt made the temps go even higher. It also didn't help that I was severely dehydrated from a few days of drinking alcohol & coffee rather than water.



We stood around and cooled off while drinking some water and as race time approached we were told to go down the hill and around the corner for the beginning of the LeMans start. While waiting, our bikes were all moved from where we'd laid them. Off we went on the run. As we hit the top of the hill we realized what had happened. Some bikes were off down the road, others, like mine were pretty easy to find.



The race had begun. I went in to the woods about 5th. I stayed there for awhile until the long hill where the heat & dehydration started to mess with me. I continued on doing the best I could and drinking most of my two bottles before the finish of the first lap. There was some water and food to be had at the start/finish and I took advantage of it.



Off I went in to the 2nd lap. By this time, I'd passed a number of the people again and for most of the 2nd lap it was another guy on a cyclocross bike, the eventual womans winner and myself trading places constantly. At one point, the woman took off and managed to stay just out of reach of me for the rest of the race. I only saw one other person, a woman (who, as it turns out, was the wife of the guy on the cyclocross bike) right before the finish.

The course had a bit of everything. Some really nice singletrack, some technical stuff, some climbing and other things. I really had a good time riding it and would love to again if they manage to pull the Worlds race in a year or two. That'd be very cool! Anyway, the new bike performed well. After installing the setback seatpost, the seat was in the right position as was the handlebar, etc. I only had one problem, as I crested the last little hill, I heard a pop from my rear hub and then nothing. I crossed the finish line about 50 meters away as though I had no chain.



Thanks to Kera, Chuck & Peter I was pushed and pulled all the way back to Piolenc. We hit the showers and then went back to Piolenc where the local bike club put on a fantastic dinner for us along with a Mariachi band and dancers. About midnight was the awards. Kera & I won Salsa water bottles and the bag that Kera had donated was given away to the 2nd place guy. The 1st & 3rd place guys were disqualified from the drawing for various reasons.

Sunday morning, we ate breakfast, said our goodbyes and headed back toward München. Traffic flowed well till we hit Germany where there's a lot of road construction as they're trying to make it AutoBahn from München to Lake Constance. We got home safely about 6:30 and I set about downloading pics. No sooner than I got 'em downloaded and Kera was playing on the Mac and it just shutdown. The next day I took it to be looked at and the guy just rebooted the internal power supply.

Photos are all uploaded to Flicker now. You can see them here - Flickr pics

For the wrap-up. I ended up as first Deutsche across the line for the day. Kera and I seemed to have been at least in part, adopted by the Deutsche group, the overall "French" are much better than we make them out to be and lastly, France and it's food are fantastic! I can hardly wait to go back.

In the last news, I'm probaby signing up for an integrations course so that I can pass the German language test and get closer to getting the German version of a Green Card. I'll probably have to work evenings and ride early morning to make it happen, but it's important enough that I need to do it. Kera and I have been trying to get out a few mornings a week and get some riding in so it shouldn't be that much of a hardship.

This weekend I have the Garmisch marathon and I've made my bike a 9 speed for the event. It's only about 65 km's but it's also something like 1800 vertical meters. Ugh! The old Curtlo is probably back in Heidelburg, but the guy accepting it is out of town this week. I should probably have it by the end of next week. Then I'll have one geared bike and one dedicated singlespeed.