stefan swecker

big leagues

2010-08-08T22:21:00.004-05:00

So there I am. The start line of the biggest race of my season. errr more like career. 30 thousand people line the course in downtown Charlotte just as the sun begins dipping under the skyline. A whopping $50 thousand is up for grabs in the Pro Men's race. All the best teams from across the nation, with all their best riders are there. What a feeling it was...I was pumped! Even just moving through the crowd to get to the course all the spectators clear a wide path for you to ride through, then proceed to stare as if they thought I was some young phenom pro hailing from Germany. (little did they know that this was NOT the case). The nice lady next to me on the start-line barriers seemed very interested, which was cool and funny at the same time. During the call-ups (where all the biggest and best are called to the front row) she asked how old I was, what the requirements were to get in the race, the average ages of the riders, and how long the call-ups would last. Lots of cameras were also out, awkwardly taking pictures of me trying to figure out which pocket to put my gels in.
Anyways, now on to the race. Last year, when I had to watch the race as a spectator, I remember the first few laps of the race being a pretty civilized pace. Well, it started out pretty fast. I wasn't as far up in the field as I was hoping so I put in some efforts to move up. Just as I started making progress, around lap 3, I hear the announcer scream RIDERS DOWN! Seemingly split seconds later I see rear wheels in the air, tires exploding like gunshots, brakes are squealing, the awful sound of metal and carbon clashing, and the smell of carbon brake pads burning hot trying to avoid going down at 32mph. Luckily (I think), I landed on a guy and his bike. Well, my right hand went into his rear wheel spokes and then I rolled. 2 more guys (and their accompanying bikes) fell ontop of me. What was really funny was that after everything had calmed down, some guys tube blew up like a gunshot. So I wait until the guys and bikes are pulled off of me. Nothing felt broke, and nothing was burning or stinging too bad. Finally I got up and found my bike, which took some effort to pry my pedal out of a guys zipp 808 rear wheel. Luckily all that was harmed on my bike was a dropped chain. I rolled to the pits, and while doing so realized that my pinky finger (pretty brutal, I know) was bleeding pretty bad. Apparently when I landed on the guys wheel one of his spokes split the tip of my finger up into the fingernail. And of course since my Heart rate was pretty high at the time of the wreck the cut and cuts on my legs bled more than what they should have. Turns out I was one of the luckier ones. I saw lots of broken frames, folded carbon wheels, and lots of blood. In all I think about 40-50 guys avoided the crash (there were 130 starters).
So I get put back in, but unfortunately I get back in at the back of the field. And so begins the slingshot effect. Basically the course is shaped like a figure 8, without crossing over itself. At the ends of the long straightaways there are 4 turns. The front of the field takes these fast (like normal) and maintains speed out of the turns and back into the straightaways. The back of the field (where I was) crept through these turns (the peloton acts like a slinky when its so big) but then it was an ALL OUT sprint on the straights. The slingshot effect was my demise. I could see the front30-40 riders in a nice big pack at the front, but it was single file stretched out for us with no time to rest the legs. If it ever did lull enough for me to think I could move up positions, the front was already accelerating again. What a tease. This went on for until about the 55 min mark, when a couple of riders passed me right before the finishing straight then proceeded to open up a gap to the field that I couldnt close. I gave the guy behind me a nice good madison handsling so that he didnt have to close the gap all by himself. hopefully he was thankful of that.
My power data from the race was fun to look at too. While I was in, I hit PR's for nearly all my wattage ranges, even though the legs felt a little fatigued coming into it. I was kindof bummed to have not met my goal of finishing, however I feel more motivated than ever to keeping on this good balanced training path. I'm seeing improvement each year while still keeping this whole bike racing thing fun.
Next up is Oak Ridge Classic, but that's not before I head back to school for just shy of a week for my LAST year in college. wow. I can't believe it's already here. I'm so excited!
Thanks for reading.

stefan

Crossroads report 1

2010-08-06T10:43:00.003-05:00

It's here. The big races of the second half of the year. 5 nights of twilight crits. Fast, fast, fast. So far, we're 3 races in, so let me give you a rundown.

Day 1: Mocksville
70 riders came to the line today. A couple of UCI pro teams (kenda, mtn khakis) showed up today. Jon and I didn't get the greatest start, but I tried to move up as fast as possible. The race started out fast...it basically was kenda throwing punches against mtn khakis and vice versa. I got up to the front after about 15 mins and started getting in moves and mixing it up. I was hoping if I got in a break with the guys from the well represented teams, then they would let us roll, but that wasnt the case. So here comes the finale. the announcer is screaming "2 to go, 2 to go". I move up into the sea of kenda and mtn khakis riders. We are diving into the turns like no other. We come into last lap. The announcer is screaming "1 to go" now. The crowd is going nuts and the leadout is getting faster with kenda and mtn khakis driving it at the front. We dive into turn 1. Im sitting about 9th wheel. coming out of it I see a guy getting into the curb about 3 or 4 places up. He hits the pavement. The 2 guys infront of me and myself have nowhere to go but straight. We all hit eachother and the ground at 29mph. After I roll back over and the field passes, there is about 6 of us on the ground. The kenda rider is giving the guy who caused the wreck a nice mouthfull of kind words. Jon did great and finished in the field. I was pretty bummed...getting taken out last lap sitting top-10 is not the best way to end the first day, but I was happy to be mixing it up with the big guns.

Day 2: Concord
Today, even more fast guys show up. This time, its Bissell, New Zealand National Team, Mtn Khakis, and Kenda with full squads. Wow was it fast. So many guys were throwing attacks left and right. I moved up fast and started mixing it up. At one point a break with about 2 riders from each of the big teams up the road. I thought this would be the move that laps the field, so I try to bridge. I end up bringing one bissell, one mtn khakis, one kenda, and one bahati racing guy with me. I pull for about a lap but no one else will come through. I'm absolutely dying and we only have a 20 meters to the front group. The other guys start countering my move and next thing I know we are caught by the peloton and immediately absorb the front group. Ouch. So then I start going backwards...faster than normal after a hard effort. I can't hang on and after a few laps I just give up. I stop and after I little spinning around I realize that my front wheel is wayy out of true and rubbing the right brake pad. Apparently in the crash on night 1 I landed so hard that my wheels were knocked out of true. The potholes on this course then made it all worse and my front wheel wouldnt roll. No wonder I was dying! My mexican half-brother Jon did great and battled it out for a while until guys started opening gaps up. After closing numerous gaps, he had to pull the plug. Overall, I was just pretty pumped to be throwing down with some of the best guys in the country.

Day 3: Salisbury
I was finally ready to get redemption. My bike was in perfect working order. The legs were feeling great. Storms rolled in late afternoon and so we had a nice beautiful rainy twilight crit. I wasn't too nervous about this actually. This year, I've had pretty good results in rainy crits, especially at Athens and french broad. I knew if I raced right it would play out in my favor. Jon and I got first row starts, which was pivotal. We started, and I was sitting top 15. I didn't move behind this place the entire race. The farther front I was the smoother it was. Even sitting about 15th I noticed that gaps opened up and guys werent as comfortable with the conditions. At one point I saw about 20 guys going into the wheel pit from a crash farther back in the field. That gave me extra motivation to stay in the front. I got in a couple moves, but this wasnt a very good course or conditions to throw massive attacks...instead a fast steady pace was set. With 1 to go I was sitting about 10th again. I wanted to move up even farther just because I knew there would be some guy again in over his head and sketching things up. So I went ninja on the backside of the course and moved into 4th. Coming out of the final turn the sprint opened up and I didnt pass anyone but no one passed me. It seemed like it was nearly impossible to move more than 1 place in that sprint. I was pumped though! Finally I saw what I was capable of when everything is working right.
Tonight is Statesville crit. Since I'm doing the NRC big show race in downtown charlotte tomorrow night I don't wanna dig too deep tonight so I'm setting up the mexican missile (Jon) for a good result. I'll probably pull the plug about 30 mins in or so unless I'm feeling fantastic, but I don't wanna jeapordize my chances at a descent result (for me=finishing) at Presbyterian Invitational.
Well, its time for a nice spin ride.
Until next time.

stefan

racing legs

2010-07-31T14:07:00.004-05:00

Hello friends!
Well my training block is finally coming to an end. And that means that the big races of the 2nd half of the year are here. Next tuesday begins Crossroads Cycling Classic , 5 days of racing. 4 of which are twilight crits (bike race at night in downtown centers for those not up to the bike lingo).
I do have some good news on multiple fronts.
First, last week I got my Cat 1 upgrade (basically, amateur racers are categorized from cat 1-5, with 1 being highest and 5 lowest). I no longer have to worry about upgrade points...finally! The only step up from here is Pro, but by no means am I necessarily counting on that at all. I am just happy to finally be a 1. I've worked hard to get here and am really thankful to be at this level. Now just to try and hold my own with the big boys!
Secondly, since I got my upgrade I was able to get into Presbyterian Invitational . Its an NRC race, so basically only Pros and Cat 1s can race in it. It has one of the biggest prize lists of all domestic races...$50,000 in the men's race. Winner takes home $12,500. wow. My goal:finish the race. It will be that fast, and I will be thrilled to merely finish. I mean, I already reached such a huge goal by just getting into the race, so the rest is icing on the cake.

The legs are feeling pretty good. Ive been doing some short 2hr rides with some tempo thrown in to keep them nice and open and am excited about 5 nights of twilight crit racing. Mi hermanos Jon and Josh and I are headed up early tuesday. We are staying in a nice plush extended stay suite for a couple nights then are (tenatively) headed to my aunts house in Concord for the remaining nights. Should be a blast.

My sister Lindsay and my niece, hannah, came down for a visit this week. We had a great time relaxing and playing some tennis. My goal was to get Hannah to start walking, but she still is pretty dependent on her little lion walker.

Last week, my roommate Jake came down for a couple days. We rode a little, ate some good food, and even went on a legit hiking/camping trip. We went into the smokies and hiked out 8 miles, camped, then hiked back in the next morning. it was great fun! And we survived and didnt get eaten by any bears!

Jon, Josh and I have had a moustache contest going for a while now. And it culminates at Crossroads. I'll try to get some good pics. Mine is really really really dirty. Jon and I are contemplating using some Just for Men to darken them up a bit (darn blonde hairs). Josh has no problems in this department. Hopefully it will look pretty awesome for a couple of skinny shaved-legged 21 yr olds with dark moustaches to be racing around at night.

i'll keep you updated on the races.

until next time.

stefan

finding my legs

2010-07-18T23:21:00.003-05:00

So I made it back from Italia. We established that last time. Since then, I've adjusted well to the American lifestyle of butter, high fructose corn syrup, hamburgers, ice-cream (not gelato), and more butter. I have, however, managed not to indulge too much in these things and I've been having quite a fun time attempting to replicate my favorite Italian dishes with my mom. We've made some great stuff that is super healthy and tastes sooo good. It did help that I came back with the right info about what is good olive oil and the best balsamic vinegars. Plus I still have some parmigiano reggiano so all hope is not lost!
My main focus after coming back has been training, more or less. I lost a little weight in Italy and still maintained and/or gained a little power so that gave me some extra motivation coming into my big training block. So far, I am 3 weeks into my 6 week training block, which culminates at Crossroads Cycling Classic. The first 3 weeks have been pretty tough...loads of tempo work and some threshold work, but mainly focusing on volume. Last couple weeks have been between 20-23 hrs or so with some racing in there. Needless to say, I am quite fatigued but it is all part of the plan to be feeling super sharp in 3 weeks.
On to the racing. Last week I headed up to Bristol, TN to do the ETJC Crit. First race back but I was feeling pretty good coming into it with a training mindset and having a big week in my legs. I took a couple digs off the front during the race and my "kick" or acceleration felt like it did earlier this year during my Athens build. Halfway through the race I took a flyer off the front and a guy from the Metro team (we call them the Metrosexual team) tagged along. He would never pull through, just sat and sat and sat on my wheel despite my numerous attempts to get him to cooperate and work together. Well I had enough of that, so I gave up the effort coming into the finishing straight one lap and all of a sudden I am on the ground and the metrosexual is cursing at me! He ran into me in the middle of the turn and was blaming it on me! My only response was "you've got to be kidding me...you're blaming this on ME??" Well we get back in the field...he starts whining to more people, we exchange more words, more people start yelling at old grumpy man for being such a negative racer (and more importantly such a negative person). From the crash on the race just got weird and people weren't really racing their bikes so I just sat on and realized how much my butt hurt.
The week after the crit was the biggest week. 4 hr rides pretty much every day and tempo and threshold, plus some good road rash on my right cheek. Awesome. Well there was only about 1 day that was truly a struggle to finish the day. On saturday Jon and I headed to Asheville for the French Broad Cycling Classic road race. We were really fatigued coming in, but that was the plan and the race, with its long climbs and stacked field, was sure to give us a good day of training. And it did just that. I got popped from the lead group on the 2nd to last climb, then caught up with Jon on the last climb to finish 31 and 32. Hard day.
Sunday was the crit, also in Asheville. Still a stacked field, but the course suited us a little better and we're more of "punchers" style-racers than climbers anyways. It rained before we got there but the rain ceased for the pro field start. The first 30 mins were tough...a few moves got up the road but nothing substantial. We knew coming into it that 2 guys on different teams were within 1 point of eachother in the overall omnium race so if they were in moves, I had to be in that move. But globalbike (team of overall leader) kept reeling the breaks back in so I decided to not even try to go off the front and instead save it for the last few laps. Well here came the rain. It came down hard. Our race was shortened at one point from 9 laps to go to 5 to go. Globalbike had a train chasing the team Ion rider who was off the front (#2 in the overall) with Jonathan Clarke from United Health Care Pro Cycling on their wheel. What better wheel to be on than a legit pro! So I sat there, held my ground til 1 to go. A Battley Harley Davidson rider came up on the outside around the globalbike train on turn 3, I followed (came in a little to hot into the turn), got into the grass a little, got back on pavement, then came around a couple guys to seal 3rd place. Yes! I was pumped...not too bummed to be beaten by a couple of legit guys.

Training for the next few weeks should start going down as far as hours go, but I'll probably start doing some higher-intensity stuff.

On the non-bike racing side of things, Jon, Josh and I headed out late Thursday night/early Friday morning and saw the midnight showing of Inception. All I can say is it blew my mind. My mind has never had to think like that before and I loved it. Those of you who have seen it know what I am talking about, but for those who haven't, GO SEE IT!. I didn't get in bed until 4am that night but I have to say it was totally worth it. totally. like I said, go see it. Here's a pic from one of my favorite scenes of the whole movie.

ciao
stefan

LOTS more pictures- Chianti Wine tasting, Rome, bike rides, and more...

2010-07-05T17:28:00.013-05:00

let the pictures begin- Island of Elba

2010-06-30T23:53:00.003-05:00

arrivederci Firenze

2010-06-30T22:40:00.002-05:00

I said goodbye to Florence, but what a sweetheart she was. 6 weeks I will never forget, and sooo much i learned. But we did, Italy and I, kind of leave on bad terms. I'll talk about that later.
First...the next thing I did since my last post was the "big ride up my sleeve". Well that ride was from Florence to Siena and back. just about 95 miles round trip. not a single flat section in the entire ride, except for maybe the cobblestone roads leaving out of Florence, but those just get annoying.
It took about 2hr 45 mins to get out. I came into the town of Siena then immediately U-turned and went straight to a cafe I had spotted on the way in. I got a nice grande prosciutto con formaggio panini that hit the spot. Then about 30 mins out of florence I stopped at one of my fave little cafe's and got a cappuccino. Now, bear in mind that I was 5 hrs in at this point, with just a sandwich, breakfast, and an energy bar in me, so the espresso in the cappuccino hit me like a ton of bricks. Walking out of that cafe, I felt like I hadn't ridden but a 5 min warm up. I romped over hill after hill for the last 25 mins, then I completely died with about 5 mins left as I was coming in through town. But I can't complain about that. Needless to say, the 92 steps up to my apartment were harder than usual that day.
The next day consisted of packing and cleaning and getting my last minute shopping done. I got a couple bottles of wine to bring home, some balsamic vinegar (i have fallen in love with this stuff), and some parmigiano reggiano for my fam and my sis to enjoy. ( I was in Kroger today and they had parmigiano reggiano for $20 for almost 1/4 of what I got! insane)
So I packed up, blah blah, sad goodbyes to all my new friends, more gelato, then 5 am cab ride to airport.
Here's where we left on bad terms, Italy and I.
So, obviously, I have to check my bike. Well I go to check in, the clerk takes one bag, then proceeds to tell me to "take the bike downstairs to the far sliding door, go in and down the hall then ring the door bell and someone will come pick the bike up. Pay for it to get flown out then bring the bike back up here." So I drag the thing all the way back downstairs to the far door. Go through the sketchy hallway, ring the little doorbell, and find the guy. Well he tells me that "no you leave bike with me. It has tags to go home, so it will go home. You don't take bike back upstairs to her." I explain what I was told to do. "Let me say again, clealy. Bike will go to your home. People upstairs are very, very, verystupid" (he said it like it was 1 word). So I listened to him and left it. So then on my way back upstairs I noticed someone I recognized from upstairs at a different counter paying for oversize luggage. Then I remember that she had given me (no joke) a post-it note that listed the flight and had "1 bike" written on it. So I showed this to the lady (whom I was never told to see), she gave me a receipt for paying for it, I took THIS upstairs and got my boarding passes. wow. terrible organization.
So the flight was terribly long, no surprise there. 9 hrs or something from Rome to Chicago.
Arrive in Chicago and have to get my luggage through customs. Welllll I find my box and the lid is just sitting on it...the tape is all broken. I could literally lift the top off and everything was exposed. So I checked everything out for a while, whipped out the tape I packed in there and was taping up my bike box in the middle of baggage claim. Got some weird looks to say the least.
US Customs and security was a breeze and organized, which was a welcome relief.
Made it to Knoxville, but bike didn't...it was still in Chicago, BUT it got delivered home that night with everything there.
SO it is nice to be home but I do miss alot of italy for sure. Back into the training groove is nice, and surprisingly I'm already over the jet-lag after just 1 day (I read travelling westward is much easier to adapt to). My coach has me doing alot of volume right now (22+ hr weeks) and lots of tempo to get ready for the second big goal of the year Crossroads!!! (first goal of the year was Athens, which I would say was a great success)
Well pics will be coming soon, I promise. I am just now finishing editing and downloading alllll the pics from my camera, and it is a timely process.
peace
stefan

when in Rome...

2010-06-25T05:37:00.002-05:00

okay, SO...time is winding down here in Italia, but I am in denial so I wont talk about only having 2 days left.
next subject. last weekend was quite eventful...I did some big bike rides but nothing monumental happened on them so I guess thats the extent of that subject.
I did happen to go to the Opera...went and saw EVITA. It was in the Boboli Gardens in an outdoor theatre, which was supercool. It did mist a little and they had to pause the performance but it was nothing to ruin a show over. Either way it was a cool experience.
We also hit Rome, which I loved. Granted we did only go for 1 day (left really early, came back really late) but we hit all the sites we really wanted to see. First we hit the Colosseum, which, out of all the historical landmarks Ive seen here, was my favorite. I took the audiotour and learned some cool stuff. It was just neat to think I was standing in the place where scenes from Gladiator were played out. After the Colosseo we hit up the Palatino and Foro Romano which were basically archeological ruins of the old Roman city. Cool stuff as well.
Next we headed to the Trevi Fountain (I will get pics up here one day I promise) and passed by the Piazza Venezia in the process. What is cool about Rome is that there are all kinds of these archeological ruins mingled in with the modern buildings and stuff. The detail and size of some of the statues, fountains, and buildings is insane. You really just cant capture it in a picture.
The Trevi Fountain really was cool. I mean...Im not the worlds biggest fan of fountains, but this one is so different. The way the statues come out of the formless giant rock is awesome. I wish I could have seen it at night!
After this we hopped on the metro again (subway)and took it to the Vatican. I almost got chills walking into St. Peters Square. We just sat there for about an hour and people watched (didnt have enough time to go into the actual church or museum...apparently its about a 4 hr journey at least with no turning back). We saw some other stuff that I cant think of the name of right now, but needless to say it was amazing to see...Brad informed me if what we were looking at was in the movie The DaVinci Code or Angels and Demons which was a pretty common thing.
Yesterday was San Giovanni holiday (St. John was the patron saint of Florence). There was a big parade through the streets with traditional costume and big drums as well as fireworks last night...which I imagined as a warm-up to the 4th of July for me haha. People were everywhere...i had to wait in line for at least 10 mins at my favorite gelato place, but it was so worth it...it was so fresh that when I ordered they had to go scoop it out of the churn/machine into the cup. soooo good. Other than that Ive just been shopping for gifts for friends (and myself) and marking off things from my "to see/do before I leave" list. Im about to head up to the Duomo and then go see The David today. tomorrow I have something up my sleeve for a really really long bike ride. sunday pack and relax. then I will be in knoxville 6pm on monday, which is certainly bittersweet. I would be lying if I said I didnt miss home and America, but I would also be lying if I said I wanted to leave here.
see you soon america

stefan

weekend in the sun

2010-06-15T10:17:00.002-05:00

Well this last week has been great...after returning from a big weekend at Elba, a couple days off the bike was a must...I was not used to riding 4 hrs a day yet!

So first off Ill just say that I dont do too much on mondays through thursdays....usually they consist of class (long days on tuesday and thurs). But on mondays I ride with a couple of locals every morning at 10am. We always head out into the Chianti region (its more of a territory...the valley region stretching between Florence and Siena is called Chianti) for about 3-4 hrs. Lots of beautiful rolling hills is what makes up Chianti...we hit alot of 1kilometer climbs as well as a few longer climbs of 5-6 kilometers (about 3 miles), but nothing really more than that exists in Chianti (neither does flats). Lorenzo (the main guy I initially met) and I were the only ones yesterday...we did an awesome route out in Chianti. Of course, no ride is complete without a mid-ride espresso stop, so we stopped at a town called "Greve in Chianti" and I got a cappuccino and a nice chocolate croissant (or brioche). It is pretty hot here...not kidding. Its humid and 85-90 degrees most days...not crazy humid like the southern U.S. though, so I am grateful for that!

So last friday our program toook a trip to Siena and San Gimignano...I had already gone to Siena when andy was here, but its such an awesome town and we had a free tour-guide this time so I learned a little more. San Gimignano was really neat too...famous because it still has standing medieval watch towers from the medieval ages...17 still standing I think. There used to be 90 if I am not mistaken! I cant imagine seeing that on the skyline!
Saturday I woke up early and headed about an hour out of Florence with a group for a hike through the vineyards and a winetasting in Chianti. It was one of my favorite experiences thus far....I am a sucker for hiking and this area was beautiful. We learned all about the process of making vino (wine) as well as how to taste it and how different flavors arise in different wines. Did you know the most expensive part of making wine is the cork!?? We tried 3 different wines and a licquor called Grappa (made from the grape skins, and tastes like gasoline). The first wine was Chianti Classico which was my favorite. The second one was a fruitier one that was made with 100% Sangiovese grapes (chianti classico is a mix of grapes) that was still amazing, but not the best. The 3rd was another red wine typical of tuscany (I forget the name), but was not anything to rave about...It was much more subtle than the rest. The wine tasting took place in a small house/villa...they made us fresh bruschetta with homemade olive oil, salami, prosciutto, pasta with pesto, pasta with pomodoro sauce (tomato), and biscotti for dessert. I ate until I couldnt eat anymore!
Sunday was much more chill...I slept in ( which I actually havent done but twice since Ive been here...believe it!) and Brad and I headed to the Santo Spirito market, which was basically an italian garage sale/flea market. I couldnt find anything worthwhile, but my mamaw would have been in heaven! So many antiques.
This weekend is open as of right now. I am debating on heading to an Opera tonight or thursday night here in Florence. I think that would be pretty awesome to see in Italy. Rome is on the agenda for one of this weekend, but not the whole weekend. I kind of only want to go just to see the main sights...Ive learned that you need to spend at least 5 days in a city to really get the feel for what it is all about...one of the reasons I didnt want to travel out of Italy while I was here.
anyways...pics will hopefully come soon. once again, there is no internet at the apartment so I am using the school computer that doesnt have my pictures on it, but you can always check for updates on my picasa web album!

ciaoooo

stefan

Isola d'Elba

2010-06-08T11:16:00.004-05:00

Well this past weekend Brad and I headed out to the Island of Elba, a small island off the coast of Tuscany between the boot of Italy and the island of Corsica (France). It was cheap to get there..about 10 euro train plus a 19 euro ferry ride (since I had the bike it was a little more expensive). The island is so legit. There are about 8-10 main towns that make up the island, and they are spread around the whole thing. But the towns are tiny...just big enough to hold a couple of small hotels, a few small restaurants, some shops, and a gelateria and cafe. It was pretty cool that they also took a "siesta" from about 2pm til 4:30 at least. So when we arrived at 3, ALL the stores were closed! We didn't know what was going on. But we came to realize this was just part of the Island mentality. Everything was a little bit slower here, and a little more lax. A cool place for sure.
I took my bike so the first night I went out and explored for about 1.5 hrs...it was gorgeous...tall mtns falling straight into the sea with evening fog rolling in.
The next morning I got up and went out for a longer ride...I did the western loop of the island, which was insanely beautiful..seriously insanely beautiful. The island became one of my favorite places. It was like the twisty alpine climbs and decents that you see in the Tour de France, but then you'd be riding along the coastal cliffline the next minute with crystal clear water. I even saw some mountain rams near the mtn village of Poggio. It was a cyclists dream. Later that evening I rode out the east coast of the island, which wasn't comparable to the western half. I mean, it was still breathtaking, but the tallest mtn was on the western side and the roads were not as good on the eastern side. All in all I still loved the riding. You could probably ride around the whole island in about 5 hrs or so. I logged in 4 hrs and about 70 miles, but i missed one coast line. The second day we switched towns from the town of Procchio to Marina di Campo, which had a few more options as far as hotels and restuarants, as well as a larger beach. I spotted a cool secluded beach on one of my rides so I definitely took note of where it was. Had some good Gnocchi with crab meat...the seafood definitely tastes different there...a little sea-saltier than I've had before.
On the last day I headed to the beach that I had spotted the night before...we were leaving that afternoon back to Florence so I had alllll my stuff with me, but It was just a really really heavy backpack haha. I locked my bike to a tree then began the short but steep hike down to the beach. The hike down was pretty sketchy, honestly, but it probably didn't help that I had a 30lb pack on my back. But once I made it to the beach it was allll worth it. Crystal clear water with black pebble stones and large black rocks jutting out of the ocean with a few yachts spaced around. I explored around for a bit, swam, got threatened by some seagulls, ate my typical nutella and bread snack, swam some more (the mediterranean is SO salty), then packed up and started my commute back to Portoferraio (the main port town) where I met up with brad to hop back on the ferry. I didn't see on the map that I had to do a big climb to get to Portoferraio, but regardless I was dripping sweat by the time i arrived at the ferry. The ferry ride back was somewhat sad...i really didn't want to leave, but at the same time it was nice to get back to Florence (its starting to feel quite home-like for Italy). But now its time to head out for a bike ride in Chianti! So nice!

ciao
stefan

update #2

2010-06-08T10:37:00.001-05:00

The Giro! And other stuff…
Well this past week was a little tamer than the past. Andy had to head home, so we went to a restaurant that was recommended by a local as a favorite of the locals. So we went there…I think we were the only foreigners in there, but it was great. It was a lot cheaper than the tourist traps and the food was amazing. I had watched No Reservations with Anthony Bourdain in Tuscany before I came here. On the episode he ate lardo, which he said was one of the best things he has eaten. Basically, lardo is just like it sounds like. It’s pig fat soaked in oil and herbs like rosemary for a long time. They had lardo as an option on the antipasti menu, so andy and I were brave enough to try it. Its served as strips like bacon and you just put them on bruschetta. It was pretty good, I’ll admit. The texture was a little weird, but it was super flavorful. After dinner we headed to another restaurant where we heard had some of the best cheesecake. It was amazing. The chocolate sauce was homemade I think. We met an older couple from Florida at the table next to us. They had been travelling since the beginning of May and were traveling all over Europe. They still had 3-4 more weeks of travel left! Well after we finished our dessert, the older lady leaned over to us and told us that we shouldn’t worry about the check and that they would be taking care of it. Wow! It made our day, maybe even week. Note to self…when I get older and if I am comfortable money-wise..pay for a few college kids’ dessert. It will mean a lot to them.
One of the admins at the school I’m at is a pretty avid outdoorsman and one of his neighbors is a cyclist, so he gave me the hook up. He called his neighbor for me and we set up a time to ride. He’s on the U23 Italian National Mtn bike team and is also in school. He showed me a good route (and more importantly for me, the best way to get out of town around the busy streets) out into the Chianti region famous for its wine. It’s amazing riding out there.
The weekend was pretty chill. I did two big rides on Friday and Saturday that left my legs pretty tired. On Sunday I wanted to watch the last day of the Giro. I knew it was in Verona, but that was about it. So I went to the train station and bought my first ticket. This would be the beginning of a long, stressful day. Even though I selected to leave from that train station, the self-service machine bought one for the station on the out-skirts of town. Mistake #1. Lesson-double and triple check travel tickets. So then I bought the right ticket. Lucky me got on the train that just happened to have technical issues, making us arrive 50 mins late to Bologna. That delay made me miss my first connection to Verona. Once there, it was already 2pm or so and I was beginning to second-guess on whether I should even try to make it there or just go back, since I didn’t know if the race was close to being done or not. I looked ahead and bought my ticket for my return from Verona (which was smart because the last train out of Verona was 7pm…next train out was 3am). I talked to one of the ticket agents about when the next train to Verona left, and she told me I could take a certain train that was going beyond Verona, but would stop there. This was in half-italian/half-english though. So I got on the train, and was paranoid that I was going to miss my stop. My ticket had other cities listed as like “to Verona via pggi ra”. I had no idea if that meant I should get off there or not. One stop was in a town like Poggio Ravenna or something, which looked like the un-abbreviated name on my ticket. I decide to just stay on because it looked like a town of nothing. So then I began second-guessing myself and wondering what I’d do if I came to the end of the line and never saw Verona… Two stops later I arrived in Verona. What a relief. But I had no idea where the Giro was..Verona looked pretty big. I walked out of the train station and looked up and saw a helicopter. Given what I knew about bike races, this was a good sign. So I followed the chopper until I was standing under it. I looked around and there it was. The bike race! Ahh I was so excited. I watched the race, headed over to the team trailers, then went to the 200m to go mark and climbed up on a big pillar and watched it all. Cycling is so big here. When an Italian pro would ride by the crowd would go nuts. Especially the race leader Basso…the roar was deafening. Once they finished I headed back towards the train station and stopped at the Cervelo Test Team bus and found Ted King (American cyclist) and talked to him a bit. I must say, after a day of being lost by myself it was relieving to talk to an American. The train ride back to Florence was easy…one stop in Bologna but I didn’t need to transfer. Once I got into Florence though, we stopped at the station I wasn’t familiar with. And lucky me forgot to pack a map of Florence in my backpack. So I was lost for another hour or so, riding the bus around until I found something familiar. I still don’t understand how I got so turned around in Florence that night. But I will admit, watching the Giro d’Italia salvaged the entire day of botched travel.
Next post will be all about my travels on the Island of Elba..one of my favorite places. ever!

stefan

overdue update #1

2010-06-08T10:35:00.000-05:00

Well we haven’t had internet at our apartment for the past week or week and a half. So this may be the first of 2-3 consecutive pre-written posts.
So I’ll start with 2 weekends ago. Andy and I headed out early to the train station on Saturday to head to Siena. It was a cheap ticket…7 euros or something to get there. Siena is gorgeous. It was like someone took the oldest buildings and houses from Florence and plopped them all on the short steep hills of Siena. All very colorful houses with amazing views. There aren’t too many attractions in Siena, so it was a short day of sightseeing there. We went to the Duomo (which was built to rival and surpass the Florence duomo). It was so intricate. There wasn’t a plain wall, ceiling, or floor tile. Everything had some sort of design or artwork on it. It was my second favorite Duomo second to the Cologne duomo in Germany. Next to the Duomo there was a big tower/terrace that overlooked pretty much the entire city, where we had some amazing panoramic views. We also we to the Piazza del Campo, which is just a large opening in the middle of Siena. This is where the spring bike race Monte Paschi Eroica finishes, and is also where the bareback horse race the Palio is held. If you’ve seen the latest James Bond film Quantum of Solace, then you’ll remember the horse race in Siena at the beginning. Also pretty cool….Andy and I were always in the hunt for where James Bond pulled his car into Siena. We found this archway on a hill that I thought looked familiar..once we got back home we looked it up and that was where he drove in! We were pretty excited.
Once we had eaten a little lunch full of garlic and pasta we headed back to the train station. Then we did something that I’ve always wanted to do in my life. We went to the train station and had no idea where to go next. A train for Pisa left pretty soon, and we figured Italy wouldn’t be complete without a picture of us kicking over the leaning tower, so we chose Pisa on the whim. Pisa is pretty dirty. We got there right at 7:30pm or so and everything was closing down. Everything. So we basically sprinted across town to the tower, took pics, ate a quick dinner, then left. But we did end up with some great pics and a good day of travel.
The next day we headed with a group to Cinque Terre. I had only seen pictures, but from what I had seen it looked beautiful. Basically its 5 fishing villages spaced out across the coast by about 6 miles. There is a road that connects them, but there is also a hiking trail that connects all of them. The first couple of towns were very touristy…the trail was paved and was packed with tourists. But once we got to the second village (Manarola) the trail became a real hiking trail and thinned out a lot. The trails would basically just take you along the coast and then you would end up walking right through the downtowns of the villages. The seemed to just cling to the cliffs. Apparently the reason for them being so colorful is so that the fishermen could spot their village whenever they were out at sea in the fog. It was a great day and we ended it by relaxing on the beach in Monterosso for a couple of hours. They had some great food here too…I had gnocchi al pesto Genovese for one meal. Since Genova is where pesto originated, it seemed like a must to get for me because we were so close to Genova. It was such a simple meal but one of the best I’ve had in a while. Since then, I’ve been going to the fresh market and buying fresh gnocchi and pesto..it’s that good. Needless to say, after that weekend we were exhausted.

stefan

update.

2010-06-03T10:45:00.003-05:00

Well I apologize for the lack of updates, but we have been without internet at the apartment the last few days but I am alive and updates will be posted soon!

Stefan

Classes, bike ride, the market

2010-05-18T12:00:00.004-05:00

Well now that I've done some cool stuff...I figured you guys should know about it.
I started classes yesterday (monday). My classes this semester are Intro to Italian Language and Contemporary Italian Society/life (italian sociology class more or less). The italian life class will probably be the harder of the two, but thats simply because of the couple of papers we have to write. However, I'm not complaining since this is such a great break from Biology-related material. Its refreshing really.
Italian language is actually a fun class. Since it is latin-based, it is much like spanish in many ways, just with different pronunciations and ways of saying things. Si means yes in both languages. Grazie is thank you in italian, gracias for spanish. Per favore is please in italian, por favor for spanish. You should see the similarity here. I've definitely got the two mixed up though, but its getting easier. I've caught myself having german phrases mixed with spanish and italian running through my head. I can't imagine being fluent in more than a couple languages!
I also ventured out for my first bike ride in Tuscany on monday. It was a little intimidating, I won't lie, but once I found my way through the one-way roads and less-trafficked roads I was in heaven. Mansions, vineyards, switchback climbs, beautiful views of Firenze. You'll have to check out the pictures for sure. I think tomorrow I'll head out the south side of town and see how quickly it gets rural there.
I ventured into the market by myself on Monday...I felt so proud of my self after it too! Its amazing in there...fresh everything...and cheap. I got 3 servings of homemade ravioli pecorino e pere (pecorino cheese and pear), which is one of my new favorites, and I attempted to ask her what to use as sauce. She said "no pesto. oil and parmesean." So I went and bought fresh parmesean, which actually tastes much sweeter than what we have in the states. I also ran across whole sundried tomatoes for really cheap...I eat them like candy now. So I put all of the above together for dinner tonight, which was super easy but one of the best meals I have ever made.
We also made the trip up to the Palazzo Michaelangelo where you can see an amazing view of the city at night. Heres some pics from the last couple days. Check out my picasa album for all my pics.

ciao
stefan

Picasa Web Gallery

2010-05-16T07:39:00.001-05:00

I just created a picasa web album...I'm going to dump every photo from my trip on there, but post the highlights on here and on facebook. Here's the link!-
http://picasaweb.google.com/108629467374092505637

stefan

buongiorno!

2010-05-16T05:53:00.007-05:00

Hello! Well I finally made it to Italia! I'll start from the beginning.
We arrived at Knoxville airport. I was really hoping not to get charged for my bike ($100+ one way) so that was the initial worry. I was talking to one of the guys behind the counter and we talked bikes for a while...he was a cyclist as well, and was the first one to mention to me that it was $100 to fly out the bike. I didn't play dumb, just said yep I know. So then the guy (different one) who was helping me told me that it was $100 charge. I pulled out my credit card and he walked away to get my luggage tags...I put the card back in my wallet and he never asked for my card again. I think he officially had to ask me but he had no intention of charging me! This was win #1 of the trip.
So we flew out to Newark where we had a 2hr layover...then off to Rome, where we had a 4 hr layover (this one was rough). Finally we made it to Florence.
Our taxi drive from the airport to the CAPA (study abroad organization) center was really exciting. I think we (no joke) grazed about 10 walkers or cyclists on the road and killed 2 pigeons. I learned from that cab ride that you definitely need to watch what youre doing on the streets...you never know when a stealth cab is going to graze you on the streets.
Our apartment is pretty cool...we have a full kitchen with table, a small bathroom, and a decent sized bedroom. The coolest part is that we are one of the more centrally-located apartments of the program...we can literally walk out our front door and we are in one of the main markets of Florence (where they sell everything..food, meat, leather everything, fabrics, souvenirs, everything). The only bad part is that we are 3 floors up. This didn't seem like much to us either but the ceilings in our apartment are at least 16 ft high, making 3 floors very high (we climb 92 steps to get here). We don't officially have wireless, BUT we found one of our neighbors who does! Hopefully they won't mind us using occasionally for thenext 6 weeks.
Our first meal here was a margherita pizza...it was really really really really good. Lots of olive oil on it, and the cheese and tomato just tasted much more quality. And it was big! We think that we could split a pizza and get gelato after and that would be a full lunch! Not too bad.
I also had my first Italian cappuccino yesterday...and I have to say it exceeded my expectations. The froth was thick and flavorful and the espresso was rich and strong.
We had our CAPA orientation yesterday as well. We got alot of good info about Florence and our classes and our trips. Afterwards we all (16 of us-14 girls, 2 guys haha) went out for some pizza with one of our group leaders. She told us good tips on finding the best gelato...she said look at their Pistachio gelato-if its bright green then its too artificial and won't be as authentic, but if its an off-tan/green color then its more natural. So we used this tip last night as Andy, Brad (my roommate) and I went out on our first gelato hunt. We turned down 3 places before we found the right one. I got dark chocolate (it was black it was so dark) and mint mixed. It was delicious...hard to describe but it was almost creamier or more shapeable than our ice cream back home. Much less sugar too. It almost was like a super thick chocolate mousse.

I'll work on getting a flickr account made so that I canjust dump all my pictures into it. Until then I hope you enjoy all my pics below!

ciao

where have I been?

2010-05-11T19:26:00.003-05:00

Okay, soooo its kindof been a while. Not real long, just like 11 months. no biggie at all. I was sleeping...err something like that.
So here's 11 months condensed down in text. I'll hit the high notes.

Cycling-wise its been really great. Last winter was roughest ever...lots of snow and cold temps, but I did do a whole lot of cross training, which is paying off now. Went to cyclocross nat's in Bend, OR...was riding top 15 until I flatted, which was a bummer but it definitely fueled the motivation fire. I got hooked up on a new team based out of knoxville called the FGS Elite Cycling team. Its a great team headed up by my coach and other great friends including my junior racing right hand man Jon Crowson and other local guys. We've shocked some people thus far this year with our results...check out our Facebook page and/or website. Collegiate road season started late February (like the 20th or something) and I've pretty much raced every weekend until now. First non-collegiate race was Hell of the South...got 3rd in the field sprint behind a 3 man break, which I was pretty happy about...got to test the legs for sure.
Next race was Dogwood races in knoxville...I attacked first lap and 1 other guy came with, then Jon bridge up with local leg-breaker Brad Spears. Jon and I knew to start attacking Brad (strongest guy in break) with about 4-5 to go, so Jon went first and amazingly held the gap for the big huge WIN. Brad pipped me on the line for 2nd.
The next race weekend was Athens twilight. After being barraged by our parents to not race (100%chance of rain [and crashes]) we (Jon and I) still went for it. Pro 1,2 morning race was first... about 80 guys started, 50 finished. Jon and I were super active...Jon took the world's riskiest last lap solo attack to get caught 200meters from the line. bummer! But somehow I had enough of a kick to come around everyone for my first win of the year. Huge! That win qualified me for the Amateur Finals race that night (the top racers of each category [most from pro 1,2, least from beginners categories] are all (100+guys) put in a 30 min race to warm up the crowd for the paid professionals. Lots and lots and lots and lots of crashes are known to happen in this race, since the lower category guys are "reaching" a little over their heads making it a little bit sketchier. So I stayed top 15 the entire race, played it smart, and knew I had to be 2nd or 3rd wheel out of last corner. Last lap the peloton was strung out single file, I was sitting 3rd wheel, and just after the last corner I came around both guys to pull out the 2nd win of the day infront of 10,000 people. Talk about a rush. I'm still looking for one good picture of it unfortunately. Needless to say that probably made my season.

Last weekend was the Tomato Head crit in Maryville (hometown). I really wanted to do well here since I was on home turf. I was aggressive from the start again, attacking second lap and pulling Chris Brown (not the rapper) out with me. Shenanigans he is fast. Brad Spears and teammate Jeff bridged up and we lapped the field. Last lap was pure chaos being mixed in with the field ( I was hoping we'd have the advantage with our other 2 teammates in the field) and Brad and Chris got a slight gap on me coming into final 2 turns, leaving me with 3rd (which I was still pretty jazzed about). Brad pulled out another awesome sprint and came around for the win. kudos
Now for the not-cycling category of life.
School is getting better..each semester is going to be easier from here on out. I was very blessed with my scholarship at school to get the chance to study abroad this summer in Florence, Italy. Therefore I'm basically starting the blog up again to show you guys (if there is anyone reading?) some cool things I'm learning and witnessing. I'll be there for 6 weeks, so hopefully exciting things happen. I'll be sure to take lots of pictures.

oh, and if you've been to Italy before and think I should see ___________ (insert cool attraction/city here) then post a comment. I would hate to get back from across the pond to find out that the worlds only chocolate-filled swimming pool was 20 mins from Florence. cause that would just be lame.

Stefan

deutschland +stuff

2009-06-22T14:25:00.002-05:00

Okay, so I hope you enjoyed some of the pics I put up. Thats not nearly all of them, but just a majority of the ones I found to be my favorite. I may add a few more.
SO, I have lots and lots of stories from across the pond, but I will tell you just some of the little stuff that I found interesting.
First off , they have the coolest freaking doors ever. They can tilt in and open like a regular door.
here's a pic- http://www.advancedwindow.biz/Fgallery5-1.jpg
Eating out, getting a drink was rather expensive. For a coke (.2L) was over 2 euros...no refills on anything, and no ice. I'm the kind of person who drinks like 1-2 cokes or teas before the meal, then more during,so this was a tough adjustment. Drinking water was probably one of he more expensive beverages, while beer was far and above the most drink for the money.
We stayed in a tiny little village, Bethingen, in Saarland over in west germany. We went to Luxembourg (15mins away) numerous times for diesel (30cents cheaper per Liter)and to see the movies there in English. It was crazy to see that the vast majority of movies, music, and TV were nearly ALL american. There would be a couple of german or french movies here and there, but everything else was U.S. movies. Music was the same way...Axel, our friend's dad, spoke almost no english, but when we listend to the radio on the back porch he would tell us the name of the artist playing, like Madonna or something!
Every day, a meat truck, milk truck, and ice cream truck come throught the villages for the older people who can't make it to the bigger towns to stock up on goods. They'll make a couple passes through the villages ringing their bell and you just go out and buy the stuff. One day Andy and I were brave enough to go get Ice Cream from the Ital Eis truck. Somehow we had a conversation with him through our broken German and his broken English. He talked about how he was from italy, how is ice is genuine, and if we knew Al Capone. No joke.
The little villages were cute, but the big cities like Cologne, Munich, and Trier were the coolest parts of the trip. That's where some of the genuine parts of the culture really show.
Once I got back from Euroland it was time to hit the training hard. I'm really gunning for a couple races in late July/early August...Cascade Classic and U23 Nationals...both in Bend, OR. First week back on the bike was 16 ish hours, and I've just been ramping it up each week up to next week which will be a little over 20 hrs. My coach has me doing a TON (sometimes 3 hrs per ride...nonstop) of tempo during these first few weeks of the high volume, to get my training load up so that I'll really get the full effect of the high intensity stuff he will be throwing at me within a few weeks of my big races. Regardless, it feels great to actually have time to get out and train without too much other stress...much different from when I was training during the school year.
Right now though I'm sitting in a Hospital in Columbia, SC...getting ready to be an uncle in any minute! Little Hannah will be spoiled by me with chocolate, music, and good food undoubtedly.

Later
Stefan

Deutschland by Picture part 1

2009-06-09T23:18:00.009-05:00

Deutschland

2009-05-31T11:29:00.002-05:00

Well hallo everyone....I took another long hiatus from the blogging world, as you can tell, once again. This semester was extremely hard, but I'll go into more detail on that later.
Right now I am in Bethingen, Germany with a few friends. We flew out on the 26th of may and are leaving on June 6th, and we are having a blast. I just wanted to drop a line to let you know that I am still alive and am going to try to keep this thing updated.
So far we've hit Germany, France, and Luxembourg in the past 5 days and have seen some really cool stuff. We have seen some sweet Castles and Chateaus, and some really really old stuff (2000+ years) in Trier and the surrounding area from the Roman empire days. Up soon is Cologne (with the Lindt Chocolate Factory) and Munich, which should be some more great stuff.

Auf Wiedersehen
Stefan

back at it

2008-12-31T10:53:00.002-06:00

Well I hope that everyone had a great Christmas. Tomorrow brings 2009, which doesn't exactly change my outlook on anything, it just really is another day.

So here's an update on what I 've been doing lately on the non-cycling front:
Chelsea came to my house and then I went to hers on the week and a half after we got out for school. I was still at that point ramping up time on the bike, as well as finishing off my weightlifting for the year. So that was a really fun couple of weeks with no stress and time just to enjoy things. Now, I'm working about 4 days a week or so and riding. and that's about it. haha...seriously that's all I do right now.

On the riding/training front, all is good. After I had mono, I had lost about 4-5 lbs (much of which I think was muscle mass)...so the first couple of lifting sessions were pretty tough and made me very sore the next day. But after about 3 sessions, I was back where I left off. After another session or 2 I was 3-4 lbs heavier (muscle mass I hope)and was increasing the weights each time I lifted. I also started doing some intense plyometrics routines after the workouts, which were fun. Riding while I was lifting was still not too intense, but I could tell that each ride I started to feel better.

Now I'm filtering in some longer rides through the week as well as at least 1 big ride on the weekends, which is what I did last winter.

Thats all for now. Hope everyone has a great new year's!

stefan

where have i been.

2008-12-05T14:34:00.006-06:00

oh wow, so I definitely forgot about this thing for a while, and I apologize for that. I'm sure you guys were all just itching to hear about my next move, but I have some good reasons (excuses) however.
1) About 4 weeks ago I was diagnosed with mononucleosis/epstein-barr virus/kissing disease. I felt really crummy for about a week, so I went to the clinic here in columbia, where she said I had what seemed to be a "touch of the flu" so she put me on some antibiotics. Well fast-forward 4 days to my body just completely aching the worst it ever has, especially my spine and neck. So we then got worried that I could be getting spinal meningitis, so I went to the ER. Chelsea kept me company for the 4 hour wait in the waiting room, along with reading me to sleep. So after a few blood tests and some nose swabs the doctors had ruled out spinal meningitis, flu, bacterial infection, and the last test was for mono, which the doctor really didnt think I had. BUT the test results came back positive for mono, which meant 2 weeks of NO excercise whatsoever, resting/napping whenever possible, NO cyclocross,and sleeping some more. So for a solid 2 week period I would wake up, breakfast, go to class, lunch, come back and nap until dinner, eat dinner, do homework or watch a movie, then go to bed...pretty exciting stuff. But over turkey day break, I was given the green light to get off my butt, which I was really itching to.

2)the other big time-consumer has been school. I'll keep my complaining about this to a minimum since this is getter rather long-winded, but I'm officially done (as of today) with classes (finals are next week though)for this semester (which was really hard). Only one of my classes really kicked my butt, of which we had to do a really useless plant collection (sorry to all you botanists). I figured it wouldnt' take TOO long to finish, but I ended staying up (along with everyone else in the class) until 3:45am to put the stupid thing to rest. One of my friends stayed up until 5:30. But I came to a cool realization at around about 2:30 or 3am-ish, when it stopped being "late in the day" and started being "really early in the day".

But now I'm back on the bike (sort of) and plan on ramping up the training once I get home and away from tests (and plant projects). The weather here hasn't been the most condusive to training either...its already snowed 4-5 times and it seems to snow/rain/sleet every other day. Oh, and while I was off the bike I disovered the greatness of the show House. If you hven't ever watched it, it's pretty amazing. I've been watching episodes online lately when I don't wanna study. I'll leave you with some pictures to recap what you have missed.

Underoath Concert (where I probably could have gotten mono, since everyone was sweating profusely and the lead singer spit into the crowd)

I created a romantic evening for chelsea and I. I made mahi mahi with pasta along with some sparkling grape juice to top it off. She said that I did good.

And finally, last night we had an "ugly sweater christmas party". I did pretty well on finding an ugly sweater, so I wore it proud.

it's been a while

2008-10-27T10:48:00.004-05:00

Well i'm terribly sorry for being such a terrible blogger, but my life has been more or less consumed in school for the past 2 weeks or so. Before fall break, I had midterms, then after fall break, I had more midterms. So all in all I'm finally done with tests for a little bit, which is quite a relief.

Fall break was oodles of fun. Half the week was spent doing some good rides and building up my cross bike, while the other half was spent with a visit from chelsea. It was definitely a much needed study break from school.

I also got a few new toys...one being a wireless SRM and the other one being my cross bike finally fully built up. The cross bike is a blast to ride and the SRM was so incredibly easy to install that I was giggling to myself with excitment. I also got some new mtn bike shoes, which look pretty sick. The whiteness will be gone very shortly.

This past weekend I hit up USGP for a day. I was still a lowly cat 4 CX rider early last week, but managed to get an upgrade with just a few collegiate cross races under my belt. I was interested to see how I felt after so long from intensity, but my legs felt absolutely great. I started 75th out of 76 riders (call-ups were by order of registration), but managed to move up to around about 10th-15th place by 3 laps in...I was chopping the crap out of people in turns, but hey it worked. Going through the sandpit on lap 4ish i clipped the barrier post, which in-turn toasted my shifter, so I was stuck in my easiest gear for the rest of the race and dropped back about 15 spots to 30th. But overall, I was really happy with how the legs felt, and I could definitely tell a difference from the weights I've been doing.

This weekend will be the first collegiate cross race with the team. The race is in Missouri, so I'm not necessarily looking forward to a 10-12 hour drive or so.

This thursday my roommates and I and a few others are headed to cincinatti for the Underoath concert. I'm sure 99% of you hate this music, but it seems like my music taste has changed quite a bit since being in college. Anyways it should be a pretty insane concert no doubt.

time for class
stefan

Chicago in pictures

2008-10-05T23:05:00.004-05:00

jibber to the jabber

2008-09-24T16:46:00.003-05:00

So it's currently 59degrees according to the thermostat in my room right now....we should have known better than to let my warm-(okay, hot-) natured roommate put his bed right under the thermostat. This post might take a little longer to write than others considering I have to go outside and feel the radiant warmth of that big yellow blob in the sky. Who knew it could be winter in september?!

Anyways, the last week has been pretty great. This past weekend the parents came up for a visit along with one of my good boyz from home for a college visit. In addition to being able to see my parents beautiful faces, I was treated to the uniting moment of myself and my new bike, who is yet to be named. Anyways...the bike is beautiful, and will look really trick once I build that bad boy(or girl) up completely. But for now, here is a sneak peak.

Since I was here this weekend, we decided to play Public Safety (or at least drive the P.S. golf cart around campus) for a night. Little did we know that by leaning, e-braking, and turning the wheel, we could do some pretty incredible slides and skids.

Today was Malvina-Farkel Day here at school. Basically the whole jist of the thing is that class is cancelled for the day, the police squad (2 or 3 cars) of Columbia drives through campus with sirens and horns on, we are woken (or waken?) up at 6:30am or so, and everyone goes out and does some service in the community for about 6hrs. After that, we come back to a slip-n-slide (which was sort of lame) as well as a mud-pit (yes a pit of mud, which is not lame). There are pictures of it, but they are currently not in my hands. It was a pretty sweet day.

What I'm most excited about is that I fly out to Chicago tomorrow morning for a 4 day trip with the scholarship that I got. Last year, we went to New Orleans, which was phenonemal. So we are basically treated to some fine dining and some amazing experiences. It's truly a blessing to do all of it and to be treated like royalty for 4 days. So I'll be sure to treat you guys to some good pics.

later

stefan

officially off-season

2008-09-15T16:28:00.003-05:00

So here I am laying in bed in the middle of day...which can only mean one thing....it's the off-season. Last monday brought in the beginning of my 2weeks(ish) off the bike completely. And was it nice! I always become amazed at how much time riding puts into a day. Although last week I was slammed with test after test after test, I still realized how much free time not riding bikes gives you. It's also nice since I'm allowing myself to pretty much eat whatever my heart desires...chocolate chip cookie dough seems to be a common theme these days, as the dark chocolate selection in the metropolis of Columbia KY is rather sparse.

Here's a quick update on what happened last weekend. The legs felt better than I really expected this late in the season, and I had some descent wattage numbers. Turns out that my coach/teammate was really riding into some crazy form, so we basically rode for him all weekend. In the crit, me and 1 other teammate legitimately spent 85-90% of the race on the front drilling it to prevent any huge acceleration attacks. Nothing was in vain, as John came away with the overall omnium title ahead of all the regional studs. Pretty sweet weekend.

Today I started my new strength lifting program. I can go ahead and tell you that I'm gonna be crazy sore tomorrow. This is the first time I've ever really lifted for a reason, but the reasoning behind it all seems pretty logical. A rider's main goal is to increase their own threshold power, and more importantly, their watts per kilogram. SO, since I'm about as skinny as I need to get and can't lose weight, then I have to increase my power to raise my W/kg number. My coach used to lift as a hobby before getting into cycling, so we drew up a plan together that should really put some umph into my legs.

My cross bike is in, but is at home...so it's kind of bitter sweet, but I should be united with it this weekend whenever the parents come up for a nice visit. I'll be sure to put up some pics of the bad boy whenever I get him built up.

Season 4 of the Office arrived in my mailbox last week, and it's calling my name...

later
stefan

heres some pics of the race last weekend...

in the groove.

2008-09-04T00:29:00.003-05:00

Well now that things have started to calm down for the most part, I figured I would update you guys on what life's been like here in the black hole of ky. Classes have been great...not too much homework so far, and they're all interesting classes for the most part. Last weekend, Jake and I headed to Louisville on friday night to watch our other roommate, Weston, at bmx nationals. I have to say that I have never seen bmx racing, but when the big boys get up there it's insanity. 20 secs of pure adrenaline. It was intense. I have some sweet pics from the races. After the race, we headed to CPK (california pizza kitchen) for a little treat away from the caf. food. I had the pear gorgonzola pizza which was incredible to say the least.

On our way home Jake and I had an interesting trip. We straight up got lost. Not sure how we did it, but we drove for about an hour and stopped at a gas station for directions to learn that we only moved like a half an inch(that's how i measure things on maps) on the bad boy. So then we thoght we knew our way back home...but we didn't. Got lost again. Almost ran out of gas. Then finally arrived back at school at around 1 a.m. It was acutally kind of fun since there was really nothing better to do and nothing to rush back for.

Labor day was pretty chill...stayed up here at school the whole weekend. Rode my bike on some new sweet roads and showed some of the new guys some other little dirt path roads.

So here's one of the good stories from cali...it's probably one of those "you had to be there" stories, but it completely fits the orange county girl stereotype. So, I'm sitting on the jetway in the plane with a girl about my age and her mom in the seat behind me. Obviously I have no one else to talk to, so naturally I start listening to their conversation. Well..actually they were loud enough that anyone on the plane could really hear their convo..but they were just jabbering about little things. The girl would flip through her magazine and say(in a whiny, high-pitched voice) "I wanna go to New York and be rich. I love the New York lifestyle mommy. I'm gonna go there one day and live that lifestyle and party." Strike one. Next one..."Gosh, we're going really far huh?" Strike two. Finally.."I should have called Lauren (apparently her friend) so that we can meet up in Atlanta and have lunch. She lives in georgia mommy." Mom:"Georgia is a big state honey. Lauren isn't from the Atlanta area." Girl: " Are you serious?! HA oh my GOSH. Is georgia big? I thought it was like...small."
So basically the bright little girl though that georgia was a city is what it comes down to. Then was obviously my cue to stick in the headphones and listen to some loud music.

On a different note, I'm headed home this weekend for the Oak Ridge Race. I'm itching to get back into a race, but I'm also itching to take some time off the bike. I can tell it's definitely taking me longer to recover from some of the rides lately, so there's no doubt how knackered my body is.

peace
stefan

back to school

2008-08-20T20:17:00.003-05:00

Ahhh....finally a little relaxation time. It seems like i've been incredibly busy the past weeks...I never got to update you on the RR in cali. Well, the RR was okay...I got pulled with a group of 20. A group of 40 got pulled just infront of us, making a whopping number of (drumroll please) 13 riders racing the last lap. It was a great experience, and I actually came away from California more motivated than when I went out. I know what kind of work I need to do this offseason to really kill it next year, so that's so motivating.

I got some good sun out in Cali...it was almost a mini vacation. Mike and I rode out to Huntington beach one day, and also went out to Redondo one day for some r&r.

When I got back from the west coast, I had 4 days to get my life back together, unpack, repack, and drive to school. But I'm finally settled here and have a day of classes underneath my belt. My classes are getting more and more interesting which is good. Gone are the days of public speaking and english composition. Now I'm taking Anatomy and Phys, Exercise and Conditioning, and some classes that I'm actually interested in.

We've got a stellar team here at school now. Alot of fast roadies which is always good. Next on the plate is the oak ridge race on the sept 6-7 weekend. After that I hit my offseason break, which i'm still really looking forward to even though I'm hella motivated to get a jump on next season. But a solid 2 weeks off the bike to get my body fully absolutely completely recovered is very needed this time of year. My legs are tired!

I'll try to put some good pics and a few stories from Cali maybe on the next post.

later

Cali baby

2008-08-09T00:35:00.006-05:00

Hey there folks,
Sorry for no updates up til now, but we've managed to busy ourselves for the most part. 3 words for California: beautiful, sunny, traffic. We're staying in Anaheim. Never before have I realized all the big names that are near here..Anaheim, Laguna, Corona, Santa Ana, of course LA, the list goes on. Anaheim is basically the latino ghetto of them all. I believe we're the only non-asian people at the hotel as well. Seriously. What is unbelievable is the traffic. I mean, 20mph on the interstate at 3pm in the afternoon today.!?

Regardless we are having a blast. I'm rooming with a 2 time world champ, mike olheiser. He ended up getting 2nd in the Elite TT which is great. He was in the hot seat until nearly the end, when a guy came in with a killer time to put 55 secs on Olheiser and 2+mins on 4th place. Incredible. I warmed up with the guys and rolled around a little while they raced. The TT and RR are in the Laguna Hills area, which is beautiful..mtns, desert, with the ocean near....It's great.
The next day was the U23 crit. The race was around Anaheim Angel's stadium. I wasn't too excited about traveling across the U.S. to the nation's top event to race in a parking lot, but it ended up being fine. 120 guys started. I finished 37th. I'm very pleased with the result. There was (of course) a terrible crash with 2 to go that split the field, but I was just at the head of the back end of the split, so I was just happy to still be alive and upright! Apparently one guy's wheel completely disintegrated...no spokes were found, a rim was lying by itself, and the hub went flying in the air. Worst injury was an open compound fracture of the arm, which is pretty nasty. However, It's promising for me with 3 more years in the U23 field...I can only go up, and definitely motivated from that.

Today was a nice rest day. Rode out in Laguna Hills again today and soaked up the sun. Then headed out to Redondo beach in the afternoon, and soaked up some more sun. I'm getting dark enough to fit right in with the latino crowd here! All I have to do is start saying "sup, homes" all the time.

Tomorrow we're riding out to the coast, then relaxing and hydrating all day...sunday is the big 115mile road race for both our elite guys and my U23 race. Definitely will be tough. I'll post pics asap.

Wish me luck!

what's ahead

2008-08-03T12:08:00.003-05:00

Wow so it's definitely time for an update.

So last week was the TN state time trial as well as the Jeff Roth Crit. Both went, well, rather poorly. I didn't expect much in the TT, I just some experience in riding a 40k tt. Once again I walked away from the TT telling myself that I needed to ride my TT bike more. Muscles being used to the position makes a HUGE difference.

The next day was my hometown crit. I proved to be quite trigger happy in the first 15 mins of this one. I averaged 45watts above threshold for the first 10 mins, completely blew the engine and then rode around the course for another 45 mins. Kind of a bummer to race that one like that, but if you learn from your mistakes, then you actually have to make mistakes...ha. But we DID deliver my teammate Jason Jeannsonne for the "W" with a solo effort of lapping the field!

Yesterday was the TN State RR. We had a whopping 15 person Pro, 1,2 field. I'm truly getting sick of racing with 14 person fields quite frankly. Basically the race was extremely negative, with everyone racing for themselves except myself, Jeannsonne, and John. John and I went into it planning to race for Jeannsonne. First lap was a little split with a group of 7 or 8 (HALF the field) up the road. Myself and Jeannsonne were the only ones to chase, and once we had done our turns a couple of guys attacked our chase and blew our group to pieces. Not exactly the coolest way to attack in my book, but whatever floats their boat! I think 9 guys or so finished the race.

Next up is the U23 National Championships in Orange County, Calif. I fly out Tues. with the Marx and Bensdorf Elite squad. I'm pretty excited, although I'm not expecting anything along the lines of a result this year, being my first year in the U23's. Experience is what this one is all about...and soaking up some Cali sun!

Oh yeah! and I was on velonews.com! (sort of). This pic was in a reader submitted gallery.peace!

Stefan

ramblings

2008-07-21T20:02:00.004-05:00

Well that was weird...a weekend at home?! As strange as it felt to sleep in my own bed for very extended periods of time, it was very welcomed. I had the chance to clean my room a bit (yes, I still do that) and finally completely unpacked my suitcase from Fitchburg and Cascade. After Cascade, I took 3 days off from bike practice, which the body definitely needed....Almost 40 races so far this year, and only 6 non-race weekends since March 1st.

This weekend is the TN State time trial in lebanon on saturday, followed on sunday with the Jeff Roth Memorial Crit here in downtown maryville. It's always nice to race 3 mins from the start! If you live in maryville, you had better come out and watch.

Oh, and I saw Batman this weekend, and I have to say that it was one of my favorites. Heath Ledger was absolutely phenomenal, and I believe that he got just sooo consumed with his character that it carried over to real life...anyways, go see it.

AND the TDF is absolutely spectacular this year. 6 guys within 50secs. of the yellow jersey...with 2 mountain stages in the alps in 2 days?!? Without someone being so dominant, it seems to me like it's becoming a more level playing field....
hasta luego!

Back at it

2008-07-17T22:09:00.007-05:00

Hello everyone,

Well after a small hiatus, break, transition (whatever you wanna call it), I am back home and back at my daily grind. So obviously, I have yet to say a word on here about my trip to Cascade Cycling Classic in Oregon. While I was out there, I rarely had time to sit down and write a post, so here it is...

Bend, Oregon is amazing.

Okay, i'll go a little more in depth. I'm loading this post with pictures, however, so I'll mainly explain those. Well, the race was in Bend. At an altitude of 5-6,000ft, it never reached a crazy hot temp, and there was ZERO humidity. I also did not see a cloud for 5 days. No joke. The racing went well. Got a top15 in the crit, moved up 20 places in GC after the RR, placed well in the TT for having no aero setup, and survived the brutal circuit. The racing was beautiful, and the experience was great. Some call the race Cat 2 Nationals, as it is the strongest cat 2 field in the nation. Being a cat 2 for only 4 months so far, I'm very happy where I'm at for sure.

Good story: The RR was my favorite stage. A fairly short 71mile, point to point RR with a finish ontop of Mt Bachelor, a solid 10 mile climb. Warming up, the altitude cause us to feel like we were taking in huge breaths, but we were just breathing normal. Kind of cool. Coming into the finish, we're approaching the top of the mtn, and I'm really heated up from going so hard of course, but I look off to the side of the road to the big snow banks. That's a big mind trip! Made me do a little double take...I'm surprised I didn't just stop, pull over, and take in the views. I only finished 2mins down on the leaders that day, but the longer climbs out there seem to suit me better.

Other than the racing, we ate at some of the finest places Bend has to offer. One of the guys on the team is really focused on experiencing new things, and he wanted to share his love of fine food with us. I, of course, did not object to this! Enough blabbing for me, enjoy the pics.

In Portland, we ate at a place called Mcninnimin's, which was an OLD school converted into a restaurant. It had a bunch of small bars throughout the place, as well as a courtyard. Not your usual restaurant.
Along with some other tall peaks, Mt Hood was always one that you could see from just about anywhere.

The base of Mt Bachelor, where we climbed to the top to finish out the road race.
Like I said, no clouds.

Bend=1/3rd desert, 1/3rd canyon, 1/3rd snow-capped mtns. Eating at one of the many fine food establishments in Bend.

A little artwork at the restaurant. It's a Garmin-Chipotle rocketship, which is flying to the moon for zero-gravity altitude training.

Forest fires delayed our trip a bit on the way to Bend, but I just went to the top of the mtn, unzipped the pants, and pee'd out the fire. Problem solved.

You can't pump your own gas in the great state of Oregon, so they hire slaves to do it for you. Okay he isn't a slave, but he does have to pump gas for everyone....
Our crib...

Bend has a river/pond lake thingy (for lack of a better term) that runs through the whole town and empties into the big pond/lake thingy (pictured below). So you can basically float through town into the downtown pond. Brilliant! This dude is pushing a bike down the hill. I'm not sure if he understands the fundamental idea behind a bike.

We thought (and were hoping) that we saw Mt Saint Helens erupt or something, but it was actually a forest fire on Mt Adams.

There's nothing like ending 2 back to back stage races with a burger and fries.adios

Stefan

home

2008-07-07T21:20:00.003-05:00

Whew, what a day. Got in to nashville last night at 12:30, drove to friend's house, went straight to bed, then woke up this morning...at 12:15. a solid 11hrs of straight sleep. 4 days of racing plus a full day of traveling and flying really takes it out of you. I have to say that my arm is a little stiff from the fall yesterday. I really don't have much road rash, but I think the pavement was just so dirty and dusty that I slid on dirt rather than asphalt.

Looking back on the week it was a blast. All the stress for the week was on enjoying ourselves rather than results. Everything was made so easy for us. The team mechanic, Jason, from Birmingham bikes must have been given tools for his 1st birthday, cause the guy could tune up a bike to better than perfect, and could do it in less than a minute. All he had to do was point at a part, twinkle his nose, and voila!. Ater my crash, I had a brand new kit in my hands before I had taken the torn one off. What awesome support!.

Here's a youtube video from our descent on the road race. We were going 55-60mph on the descent pretty much every lap. Cookin!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=kMUIH05H8Nk

In other news, Will Frischkorn from Garmin-Chipolte killed it today and got 2nd in the Tour in what was one of the most exciting stages I've seen in a while. Pretty awesome result for a first year Tour rider on a first year Tour team.

6km to go in the evening coverage, then back to bed.

Stefan

stage 4

2008-07-06T17:06:00.002-05:00

2 posts in the same day. Crazy, right?! We've been sitting in the Manchester, NH airport for a few hours, so I figured I'd throw in an update.

Today was a 25 mile crit in downtown Fitchburg. It was super fast, once again (big suprise I know), and still had a 100 rider or so field. I had great positioning all race, and after one of the sprint point laps with about 5 to go I had a little dig off the front. I looked back and just saw the field strung out chasing...no one wanted to join, so I pulled the throttle down a little and joined back into the top 15 or so. Guys started getting nervous with 2 to go, and with 1 to go the mayhem ensued.

Coming into the second to last turn I was top 10, then a huge group of guys jump inside going into the turn at full speed. Not surprising to me at all, but when you get some guys diving into a turn at full speed then the guys on the outside are going to get pinched into the curb. Well that's what happened. All I really remember is flying through this turn and seeing all the outside riders hitting the curb and haybales. I hit a guy, endo'd over mine and his bikes, and...well..crashed. The bike was fine, I was fine, all is good. I just got a few scrapes, bruises, and road rash.

Summary:
Bad news: I crashed.
Good news: I got my pre-requisite of 1 crash for the season out of the way.

stages 2 and 3

2008-07-06T09:24:00.002-05:00

Okay so a super duper quick recap. Friday was the 92 mile rr. The feed zone climb was super steep, and going up it full speed took its toll on me. My legs still didn't come around, so I got tailed off the back a little. THEN, realized I had a rear flat. Since the SRAM car had already passed, I had no way of getting a wheel. So instead I went back to registration, went to the SRAM car there, got a wheel, and then went back out on course and finished. I was happy to finish, cause i hate the thought of a DNF.

Yesterday was a little better. The legs felt a bit better and quicker, and ended up in 9th. It was a tough 3-4 mile circuit that we did 16 times. The finish was on a STEEP .5km climb that we big ringed every time. I think we averaged around 27 or 28. That result salvaged all the other days for me.

Now i'm about to get kitted up for a 25 mile crit. Should take us well under an hour to complete...so only a little more pain and then jump on a plane to Chicago, then back to Nashville. Let's hope for another good result.

The explosion heard round the world.

2008-07-03T21:48:00.003-05:00

Well today I looked fast...I borrowed a pair of Zipp 999's YEAH!!!.
I'll post pics later.

Right now i'm winding down about to hit the hay. Just wanted to throw in a quick update. Today was the TT, a gradual uphill (sort of a stairstep type climb). Well I was told by so many people to not kill it too early. Long story short, I went out too hard and blew up HARD. Didn't get my legs back until 2k to go. Kindof a bummer, but i gave it what I had and that's how it happened. I'll live. The group of guys we have here are pretty funny dudes. We're staying at the luxurious Fitchburg State College dorms. Back to dorm life huh?!

But today it seemed like everyone either did really good or really bad and blew up. I'll live to see another day. Tomorrow is 92miles with some brutal climbing. Not sure what to expect.

later
stefan

the essence of the taper

2008-06-30T20:35:00.001-05:00

This past week has been pretty chill. A couple of days of threshold/vo2 work thrown in with a whole lot of super chill stuff=taper. It's pretty nice letting your body super compensate after 5 months of non-stop racing. I'm interested in going back and checking out how many races i've done this year...i guesstimate it to already be more races than last year, and it's just only almost july.

Other than training, I had a nice visit from my friend chelsea from school, and we headed up to cades cove for some awesome hiking and swimming in some crazy-cold water at abrams falls. We take it for granted the amazing scenery we have here. People drive from across the country to see the mtns., and seem to be in a state of awe.

I had to give up my babies ( my road and tt bike) on friday, since they had to get on the trailer to head up to massachussetts. So, I ended up robbing the demo bike from the bike shop, which happens to fit me nicely and be a good ride. It's an Orbea Lobular. It climbs great, but you can't take your hands off the handlebars without feeling scared of the thing flying out from under you.

While i'm at it, here's a pic of the bike that I got from school. A big shout out goes to Dave Poole and Coach Grigsby for getting us a full sponsorship on the frameset, plus getting a hook up on other components and what not. I'm pretty sure that this is basically a Pinarello F4:13 frame without the Onda curves (some of you may know what i'm talking about). I'm anxious to build it up after these big races. Tomorrow I head out to Nashville to chill at a teammate's house before waking up early wednesday and flying out. I'll try to keep you uber up to date. Stage 1 is a TT, so hopefully I can hold my own.

Peace!

Avery Trace/Cookeville Crit

2008-06-23T22:22:00.005-05:00

Well (regardless of what the results show) this weekend went great. I felt like I really raced my bike.
Like I said earlier, the road race was crazy hilly with some pretty nice climbs. Today it just so happened that some PROS wanted to show up. Once again, Olheiser had plans of his own, soloing the entire race pretty much and taking the win. For us mere mortals, the race was still on. The first of the 4 or 5 climbs was okay, the second climb was the worst, but then when we hit the 3rd climb, I just told myself to CHILL cause I felt like I was all over my bike trying to get the power. So once I settled in I was climbing comfortably in the top half of the field and never got gapped off the back.

What made the day even more stellar was when myself and spencer beamer rolled off the front about halfway through. We would eventually be joined by 3 of his DLP teammates, a Team Type 1 rider, and the one and only Brad spears. Well we worked great together, then hit the last big climb and our group exploded. 3 riders went up the road. I was playing it super conservative, since I figured those studs would smash the last climb. A couple guys got dropped, and my group of 3 worked together, we thought we had it, but then guess what?!? It was just like you see on the tour stage...we got caught with 1k to go. I look back and see brent bookwalter on the front. so close.

The TT went...well it went. I did come to the conclusion that I really really really need to ride my TT bike more, since my position is so much more aggressive than before.

The crit was great. I had a 20min wattage PR. Since the GA state crit championships didn't let pros ride in it, all the pros from GA had the clever idea to come and race in the TN state championships. I felt really good today and so I decided I'd be a little aggressive. I threw a few attacks, and got some gaps. One I thought would be really good was when I got off the front with a Clinica Union rider(pic below), and we had a solid group bridge up including a Team Type 1 rider Emilie Abraham, us nat'l team rider, a couple of DLP riders, and Bostick. Well it didn't stick. poo.

So then Bostick told me to go with 2 to go and he'd open a gap up in a turn, which he did. I got a gap, was joined by a Marx and Bensdorf rider, but we got caught with under 1 to go. I finished in the pack, but probably at the back. Either way, this gives me some big confidence in my legs going into Fitchburg and Cascade.

Right now, I'm headed into my taper, so it's time for some super-compensation for all my work that I've put in up until now. I'll probably be itching to go super hard in the next week and a half, but i gotta save those matches for another day.

peace

stefan

p.s.-oh and jon found the world's largest zip tie we believe.

mo' racin'

2008-06-19T22:47:00.002-05:00

So this weekend I'm headed over to Cookeville/gainesboro TN for Avery Trace Classic. Its one of my fav. courses of the year...almost reminds me of a Tour stage with a couple big climbs to start off, a long flat plateau in the middle and then some a few climbs near the finish to shake things up even more, not to mention the 1k finishing hill. The TT is 9.1 miles board flat except for 2 short hills towards the end.

Sunday is the TN State Championship Crit in Cookeville. Hopefully the Tristar boys can put up a big result there.

Training has been pretty good here lately...the legs feel 10times better this week than they did last. I'm headed into my taper soon for my big july.

Tour of Ohio is going on right now, in ohio of course. I did it last year but not this year. As of right now the studly mr Matt Winstead just moved into the yellow jersey. That a boy. Here's a nice pic of matt that I found on the avery trace website when matt was a mere cat 3. now he's throwin down with some of the best in ohio.

Also , my bike from the LWC team came in the mail just yesterday...I didn't even know it was coming! Its was a pleasant surprise coming in from a ride with a new bike on my front porch.

WORD!

stefan

soto

2008-06-15T22:07:00.002-05:00

What I learned today and yesterday....Pros are fast. I kindof already had that thought in my head, but it was reaffirmed this weekend. 2 crits in Nashville, one was a technical crit of 1.5 hrs, and the other was a wide open crit of 1hr 15 mins.

Saturday's twilight crit was amazing. Lots of fans, lots of money, lots of fast racers. My legs felt great the first 20mins or so, then BOOM!. I was trying to move up too much on the hill instead of just chill, among other things. Basically I should not have freaked when little gaps were forming. Anyways, the lap I got popped on must have been when some attacks were going off the front, because the back of the field was total carnage. Either way, it was awesome racing with the big boys in front of such a big crowd at night in downtown Nashville. A break of 4 got away, but Olheiser (who lapped the master's field in the earlier race) went to the front for 4 laps and pulled back the 20 seconds the break had! INSANE! I guess thats what a top 10 at 2 of the biggest NRC races so far this year will get you. My power for the first 2o mins was by far the highest I've seen since an early collegiate race, and that was the only other time it's been quite that high...that made me feel a little better....just a little.

Sunday was the opposite of Saturday night...wide open, middle of the day, no crowd, HOT!. Pretty much the same riders as last night though, so once again it was crazy fast. First few and last few laps were roughly 29mph avg, with the middle of the race averaging 27mph. The legs came around again for me...this time I played it cool and only moved up when I really needed to or when it was a good time to. Michael Olheiser (Master's World TT champ) soloed off the front for the win despite Toshiba and Texas Roadhouse's lead out trains. With 2 to go, I told myself I HAD to move up, so I blitzed up the side on a few of the straights and landed in the toshiba leadout train, sat in for a bit, got swarmed, and then was amazed at how far out the pros were sprinting. I held on for 25th. I'm pretty happy with that seeing the fire power that was in the field.

I'm craving a nice long road race.

later
stefan

Soto

2008-06-13T21:40:00.003-05:00

Tomorrow I'm headed up to Nashy for some big money crits at the Edgar Soto Crit Series. Tonight was a 1k time trial and some type of sprints, but neither of those really suit me at all so I'm saving everything for tomorrow night. Tomorrow night's crit is in downtown nashville, starts at around 7:45 and lasts for an hour and a half ( so it'll be a twilight crit YES!), AND has $10,000 in just our pro1,2 race. These boys (health-net) WERE supposed to show up, but for some reason they were taken off the registration list. Instead, they're throwing down at Nature Valley. Still though, Toshiba-Santo, Jittery Joes, and DLP Racing are all showing up with some quite studly racers, so it should still be wicked hard none the less. Goal for tomorrow night: make it in the top 25 money spots and actually do something in the race (hopefully my legs will be nice and spunky). Sunday's race should be fun as well, since its one of my favorite absolutely wide open crits. Should be a fast weekend!

Training has been going pretty good. This crazy heat wave we got hit with last week was not good for my acclimatization to the heat, which takes like 2o days or so. Instead of gradually building to the low to mid-90s it just shot right to 96 degrees,which really takes it out of you! But i think by the time I'm headed up to Fitchburg / Cascade i'll be completely acclimatized..hopefully.

I'm off to bed
wish me luck

"okay thats definitely a 10"

2008-06-10T21:34:00.005-05:00

So today was a complete day off. Not a day off the bike, but off from my extremely stressful job at the bike shop and from all the other high-strung activities that I get caught up in. (I really hope you're picking up on my sarcasm here). Now I'm sure you're asking ,"I wonder what this kid does on his day off?" okay, you're probably not, but it went a little like this.

I ended up going to bed at a very reasonable 11:15 last night, woke up at 5:45 to pee, and then didn't wake up until 11-11:15. I take this as my body's way of telling me that he's tired. A solid 12 hrs of sleep did feel nice however.

Since my legs felt dead this past weekend, the last thing we want to do is make them even more toast and overtrain me. So today I did a killer 1 hr ride at active recovery wattage. Then my mom was oh so nice as to hook me up with a deep tissue massage right after that. Thanks mom! The lady told me that her scale was "1 you can barely feel, and 10 feels like you're about to die". Well apparently my IT band was in need of some work, because it felt like she was ripping the thing out of my leg. She kept telling me that "this should just feel yummy!"...my reply "yeah it doe...s...okay actually thats definitely a 10". My legs felt noticeably more "open" after though, which is def. good. She was also "very happy for me" because I was so flexible. Stretching is cooler than sliced bread.

Then I came home, washed and waxed my car cause she's been so nice to me with all the travel lately, so I really need to return the favor. Now here I am.

Here's some pictures from Bristol crit thanks to big boy Dave Avery. Check out his website for more. Tomorrow's ride looks like a 1.5 hr SUPER easy ride like today. Hopefully this will spark up my legs again in time for this weekend.

The dude's legs in front of me are freakishly large.

Here's a picture of the finish...if you look REALLY close in the back you can SORT OF see me. well at least I finished in the finishing group of 18ish riders. That makes me feel a little better...seeing that it was a couple of PRO riders who cleaned up.

peace

Stefan

long time no talk.

2008-06-08T20:34:00.002-05:00

sup folks.

Well this weekend was back to racing. We headed to Johnson City, TN for the Roan Groan RR along with a TT and crit.

Well my legs didn't feel sooo fabulous last week during the training rides. I hoped they would come around for the RR, but they just didn't. The course was only 55miles, but ended on an 8mile climb at 7-8% avg grade, along with a 3mile climb and another 2 miler or so before. I faired well on the earlier climbs, but once I hit the mtn, my legs hit the wall. I was climbing at almost 40 watts below threshold (which is where i was wanting to climb at). Anyways, I really don't wanna sit here and waste more of your time with complaining.

The TT went really great...well, sort of. It was only 1.7 miles around an industrial park road. We did 1 and a half laps of the loop. I changed my TT position last week quite dramatically, and apparently now i'm "lower than piss", as stated by my teammate. Good news: My finishing time was 4min and 6 sec., less than 2 sec behind my teammates who can actually time trial. Bad news: my official time was 4 min. and 16sec....I, along with nearly 100 other races (not joking) got penalized for crossing the single yellow line through a corner. Since the loop doubled up on itself i figured we had the whole road. I thought wrong.

The crit was great. Hincapie team showed up with a full squad, Industry 9 had their squad, along with the already present Brent Bookwalter of Team BMC and a handful of the other regional studs. So the race was really freakin fast. I hung in for a 15th place, 6th in cat 2's. I was very pleased, and my legs actually felt like they wanted to go somewhat hard today.

I'll post pictures whenever I get them.

later

hometown throwdown

2008-05-26T22:23:00.004-05:00

This weekend was the TomatoHead Omnium in Maryville/Knoxvegas, so it was super nice to be able to sleep in my own bed the night before a race. I didn't know exactly how the legs would respond after these couple of "maintenance weeks" in prep to my july plans. Well they ended up being quite "spunky", as Kent Bostick puts it.

The RR was 78 miles of a 18 mile circuit I think. It had some wicked climbs (all of which I've ridden many many times) that are just short steep little boogers. Well first lap was crazy hard...the break was trying to form...I got off the front a couple of times with 1 or 2 others, but the field didn't like the combo so we got pulled back. Once the break went, it was gone because every team was represented in the breakaway group, so no team put in a concerted effort to chase. Not a bad scenario. So we took 1.5 laps pretty easy (comparatively), and really threw down the last lap.

Well I was a little ancy on the climbs on the last lap...the whole day I was feeling, just as mr. olympian world champion Kent Bostick put it, "spunky". So on one of the longer of the steep climbs (eddie's hill for all you local readers) I was ready to launch. At the bottom, I was actually looking for another gear but the 12 ended up working just fine. My attack to get away was a solid 30 sec. effort all the way up the climb. I averaged 716watts and 27.5mph going up the climb. ouch! I kind of surprised myself.

So that little effort brought out the likes of 2 other strongmen and the one and only Bostisaraus. I attacked our group with 1k to go hoping to spoil the sprint, but I was reeled in and still ended up 9th on the day.

The TT was pretty terrible honestly. I cracked a little over half-way through, but still managed a 9th place finish with a 26.2mph avg, which felt fast but wasn't really compared to the really fast dudes.

The crit was in downtown knoxville and was awesome. A couple of the Krystal team guys vanished after saturday, opening the door for us to throwdown. I was really aggressive during the first of the race, and my coach and teammate John Hart countered a move and soloed out. He eventually was joined by a few more. They lapped us with about 15min. to go. So then I could stop just covering moves and actually counter them. So my teammate and I kept continually countering eachother until I got away for a lap and got a prime, then he got away with 3 to go or so. He pulled in the 5th place, while I won the field "sprint" for 6th place with John getting 4th or 3rd I believe. Not too shabby for a day's work!

My SRM was maxed out with files by the time the crit rolled around cause I was too lazy to download it all weekend, so i have no power from the crit, which really blows, but I don't think I did anything too crazy so no biggie.

All the images on this post are courtesy of racer/photog Dave Avery.

Be sure to check out his ba-gillion photos on davidavery.wordpress.com.

peace out!

stefan

summer!

2008-05-22T22:25:00.003-05:00

wow its about time for me to do a real post.

So last saturday was the Tour de Blount, which is the local century ride here in maryville/townsend. It was a great ride...myself and adam winck finished together in 4hrs 43 mins. according to the SRM file. Here's some info.:
Time: 4:43:04
Work: 3423 kiloJoules
Training Stress Score: 337.2
Norm Power: 237watts

Not bad for a day's work. These past 2 weeks are more of "recovery weeks" for me....We ramped it up starting early in late feb/early march, so it was time for a bit of recovery. Next, we ramp it up HARDCORE for July.
I'll be flying out to Massachusetts on July 2nd to do Fitchburg, a 4day stage race. After that, I'll fly back to Nashy for 1-2 days, then fly out to Bend, Oregon for the Cascade Cycling Classic, another 4 day stage race. So, I'm hoping to be on some crazy form from July 2-14. When I come back, I'll either wanna go out and hit some local races if i'm on good form, OR I will be super tired from all the racing with national studs. Either way, I'm just looking forward to the experience.

This weekend is the TomatoHead Omnium here in Maryville/Knoxvegas. Saturday is 78 mile RR in the morning for the pro1,2 guys, and then a 20kilometer TT in the afternoon, with both races being in Maryville. Sunday is a crit in downtown knoxville. Races start at 1230 I believe, and the pro1,2's go off at 6 pm. Come out and watch!

Hopefully we'll rip some legs off and score some sweet results. I'll keep you posted.

Peace
stefan

here it comes!

2008-05-19T22:17:00.001-05:00

http://www.dz-nuts.com/

Oh yes cycling fans. It is coming in just a couple of weeks.

Sorry for the lack of updates...more to come.

later
stefan

meth-minnville, TN

2008-05-13T21:02:00.004-05:00

Hello my people. This past weekend I raced in Mcminnville, TN, which apparently is the meth capital of TN. SCORE!! I stayed with my buddy Jon for friday night, woke up at 4:45am and drove to the race.

So saturday was a 110 mile RR, followed by a 2.5 mile uphill TT. The RR was tough...if you have never done or heard of Highland Rim RR, its basically just a pain in the ass. The first 20 miles are nice and rolling, but then you hit a 2.5-3 mile climb at mile ~18. It's pretty steep, but a nice climb. After the climb is where the route becomes retarded. It's 34 miles of 2 and 4-lane highway that just rolls. It's really monotonous, and it really blows.

So for the first lap, I avg'd 321 watts for the climb. Pretty high for me, but enough to handle for 18miles into a ride. The start of the 2nd lap was where I was supposed to get my feed...but Mr. Winstead decided to pull the ultimate fred move and crash in the feed zone...the musette bag grabbed his handle bar and yanked him down. So, I had to swerve left to miss his dismembered bloody pile of a body (okay not really), and my feed was on the right, so I missed my feed. DOH!

Hmmm..so I got a neutral bottle of water, somehow made that last me for 25 miles, and then got more water at the next feed.

The 2nd time up the climb came at mile ~80, so that didn't bode too well for me. I got dropped, teamed up with some other mortals, and rode in the rest of the 110 miles in 4.5 hrs. I ended up in 19th, and they paid 20 deep, so that's not too bad a reward for finishing.

I can't say much for the TT...except that 2.5 miles uphill after 110 mile race in the morning is not fun.

The crit was great. Geri Mewitt from knoxvegas and another rider got away before turn 1 (not joking) and lapped the field. Eric Murphy and another 2 also got away. The field split at one point, and once everyone got back together I attacked and had an immediate gap. A Hincapie/Coca-Cola guy came with me, and while the field was checking itself we were killing it. 1 guy bridged up, bringing my break to 3 riders total, and we had a gap of 40 secs. over the field and were 15-20 sec. down on the break infront of us. I got 2nd in my break "sprint", giving me a 7th place overall. Alot better than I had expected for my first year in pro1,2's!A sweet pic of Jon:

So that's the lowdown of the weekend. There were only 4 or 5 cat 2's this weekend...everyone else were cat 1's, so it's kind of cool to race with such studly guys.

until next time.

stefan

done!

2008-05-09T10:13:00.003-05:00

That's right folks, my first year of college is in the bag. I won't go into some sappy love story about how much i'm gonna miss my friends and people from there (which i definitely will), but I do have to say that it is nice to be home to a real town, with a real coffee shop (like the one i'm in now), with REAL chai tea and other girly drinks. It'll also be nice to spend some time with the fam and old friends...and my dog of course.

Anyways, I have today to just chill at home, work on my bike, and then tomorrow morning I'm headed to McMinnville TN for the Highland Rim Cycling Classic. Since I upgraded, I now enjoy the privelege of doing 2 laps of the 54 mile course. 54miles + 54miles =108miles = lots of pain and lost of fun. It will definitely be interesting going into the evening uphill TT with 110 miles in my legs, but all the other pro1,2s have to do it too, so I'm really looking forward to really being able to dig deep this weekend. Wish me luck!

I'll give a race report sometime early next week, hopefully with pictures. I'll leave you with a picture from the GA Cup TT in Chattanooga.

peace out

stefan

dodgeball + spandex + baby oil = prize money

2008-05-03T19:40:00.008-05:00

Wow, sorry for the way long break from the blogging world. I actually fell off the face of the earth there for 2 or 3 days, but thanks the the time machine we have here in the dorm room, I was able to go back and not fall off this time.

ANYWAYS, umm well last weekend my buddies josh, jon and I hit up the tour de georgia stage up brasstown, and then drove immediately after the stage to athens twilight, hitting 2 of the biggest races in the southeast. The TdG was great...it super motivating to watch and see the pros in action in-person just inches away. It gives me alot of motivation to get there someday.

Levi got beat thankfully.
yup michael ball. yup.Jon and Ivan and Ivan

Then Athens was great as well. The race was super fast and hella fun to watch. I won't go into details, but it was fun...the pictures explain it better than i do.

Then was the usual training and homework during the week that kept me busy among other things. We had a fundraiser for the cycling team, where everyone took shifts to ride 12 hrs and had a collection jar out. Me and kip decided to sport the aero helmets on the rollers to draw more attention, which it did. mission complete.
We obviously wore the helmets backwards of course...terradactyl style.

And Thursday there was a dodgeball tournament to benefit the cancer society that took place on the tennis courts at school. Well our team name was team spandex, and we were pretty terrible...a bunch of skinny, spandex clad, baby-oiled cyclists with funny tan lines trying to throw dodgeballs with all of their 'immense' upper body strength. My right arm is still sore. Even though we lost every game, we did win best dressed hands-down and recieved a $50 prize. Not too shabby. Well enjoy the pictures everyone, hopefully i'll keep you updated a little more in the coming weeks. Next week is finals week, so that'll be a big pile of... uh... fun!

and once again, a big thanks to sarah for the pics of the roller ride and dodgeball. you can check more out at http://picasaweb.google.com/lukas.sarah/RollerRideDodgeball
The others were taken by yours truly.
peace
stefan

cheese curds and bike racing

2008-04-22T14:41:00.005-05:00

That's right folks, this past weekend we headed out to the great dairy state of Wisconsin for the collegiate regional championships.

First off, I want to proclaim my new found love for wisc. cheese curds. I'm not the biggest cheese lover, but these things are hella good.

Anyways, Saturday was the RR. 8 laps of a 10 mile loop. For all you non-accountants out there that is 80 miles. Finally we had a collegiate race with some real distance. Well unfortunately, my legs were just not in it today. I held on for all 80 miles and pulled out a 16th out of about 90 starters. Not too bad.

The next morning was the TTT. This time it was just Kip, Jake, and I, so we couldn't afford to drop anyone. We rode the course super smooth, avg'd 26, and pulled out a 4th place out of 9 teams. I'm feeling the need to get a disc wheel for my tt's though so that I can truly sound like an airplane. I like it.

Later the day was the crit in downtown Madison around the capitol building. This winter was rough on the streets in madison, so there were some nice separations in the pavement. With that being said, I would easily say that there were 60 flats in the race. One lap saw 4 guys in the pit at once. I flatted once, Kip flatted through a turn and crashed, and one buddy of mine cracked his carbon wheel. Other than that though, the crit was great. I had my racing legs skrewed on tight, thew a couple of attacks, got in a couple of breaks, and finished 11th out of about 60-70 starters. I'm pretty pumped about that result. My best result of the collegiate season came on the most stacked field of the year, so thats always a good sign.

That's all for now. I foresee a nap in my very near future...we didn' get in from the drive back until 4 a.m. on monday morning. I didn't get to bed til 5, and I woke up 2 hrs later for class. So i'm playing a little catch up. once again, thanks to sarah for the pics. my camera never left my bag for some reason.
life is good.
our school spirit. spelling LWC. I suck at c's. Jake looks like hitler.

recovery...

2008-04-15T21:10:00.005-05:00

Well as i'm sure that everyone has been checking my blog every hour of every day, i'll end the misery and finally post something new...

Well as some of you know I headed down to Chatt town this past weekend for my first race as a 2. I have to say that I was a little surprised to find out that a good number of NRC and Euro-pro guys decided to use the race as a little warm up to the tour de georgia. So, Toshiba-Santos brought a full squad, Jittery Joes had about 7 guys (including Giro d'Italia rider Trent Wilson), along with some other teams like Inferno Racing, DLP Racing, and other strongmen like world masters TT champion Mike Olheiser.

The TT went well for me, finishing 49th out of about 70 i think. The guys who normally beat me by 1.5 + mins only beat me by less than 30secs., so as my coach said, "I would kill my old self in a TT now." There's still room for improvement though.

Between the TT and Crit, Winstead, Sam, Ty, and I took Winstead's brand new Land Rover LR3 out 4-wheeling. Apparently the LR3 is "equipped for every situation", but not in our case. We ended up getting a flat on the way down, so Matt floored it back out to the main road so that we didn't have to change it on the trail. Unfortunately, Sam didn't make it back into the vehicle before Matt began his endorphine-fed mania of driving out of the trail. So he got a nice 2 mile hike for his crit warm-up.

Speaking of the crit, it went well. My legs were tired from the TT, and with 2 to go Toshiba really ratcheted up the pace (we averaged 27.5). My legs didn't have any kick left and I finished about 20-30sec down.

The RR was the highlight of the weekend. I really didn't know how 92 miles of racing with this caliber of riders AFTER a day like saturday would treat me. The race was fast (25 mph avg), windy with some crazy crosswinds, and packed with a stacked field. Basically the cross winds and the climb dwindled down the field each lap. By some miracle of God, I made the selection on the last lap up the climb. A group of 10 pulled away on the climb so we were racing for 11th. By yet ANOTHER miracle, I had somewhat of a kick in the end to finish 15th! I couldn't believe it...some 96 guys started and I finished 15th in my first pro1,2 race. I'm pretty pumped.

My legs felt weird yesterday, but I went out for a little 2hr jaunt today and they felt great.

I'll keep my eye out for more pics and post them.

peace

stefan

Indianapolis

2008-04-09T14:50:00.005-05:00

Sunrise in Indiana... Sorry for the uber delayed update on this one, but hey things happen.

Well this past weekend the team headed out to Purdue/Marian College. We hit a little bump along the way (literally) but once we got it fixed we were rollin again.

This is the presidents house/walkway for his dog when it rains...

Saturday kicked off with a crit in the Marian College campus. It was kind of sketch, with a couple of sweeper-chicanes, but was a super sweet course at the same time. Well the team pretty much played the race perfectly...Kip got in a break with Bennett and a guy from Wisconsin. Once they had a good 10-20 sec. gap, myself and a couple of guys from Marian and Wisconsin went to the front to disrupt any organization. That worked out for us and kip took 3rd while I came in in 16th.

The next day was the TTT in the morning and the RR (more of a circuit race) in the afternoon. In the 6 mile TTT, Kip and I ended up pulling away from Jake and Greg on the hill, and the 3rd rider counts as the team's time, so we waited for greg and finished in a reasonable 6th place.

The circuit race was tough...there was a pretty steep 1min. climb. We climbed it 9 times. At the top every time I was pretty delerious, and a couple of times my hands went numb. Gotta love that feeling! So Kip went up the road with a big group of other guys, and ended up getting 2nd by a few inches. I came in with Jake at 22nd place.

One of the other highlights of the weekend was getting to hang out in downtown Indianapolis on saturday night. This is probably one of the coolest cities I've been to. First we hit up the Chocolate Cafe, which was very satisfying, and then we headed into the mall, which is on all different sides of the street but the different parts of it are connected above the intersections. We saw a few Bentleys and some other really nice cars that aren't expensive at all.

Greg's burrito...I don't know what to say....

I'm also officially a Cat 2! This weekend will be my first race as a 2 at the Georgia Cup race in Chattanooga. It feels pretty nice...there's a little less pressure now as far as upgrading goes. Now I'm just one step closer to being considered "fasst". Now every race will be a constant state of being in the pain cave...whopee!

later

stefan

lexington

2008-03-31T16:46:00.006-05:00

It all started at 5:15 am on saturday morning, as Jake and I headed out for a day of bike racing in lexington, ky.

After a few mumbles and grunts to eachother, Jake and I somehow headed out on time.

But SOMEHOW, we missed an apparently important turn and ended up in a wrong town. Now, I'm not one to try and figure out directions, so we pulled into a barber shop, asked directions, and got pointed in the right direction.

So we high-tailed it to lexington and arrived at the race 45 mins until start....barely enough time to register, potty, kit up, potty again, and then spin around. But it all worked out.

So...the race. It was a 3/4 race, so it was a little sketchy. I thew an attack or two, got a gap on one of them with a couple of other dudes, but they wouldn't work...just sat on my wheel. Finally, one lap split up the peloton a little, so I attacked with 3 other guys and we immediately had a gap. Since the field was split up a little, there was no organization, so our gap ballooned up really quick. First time check was 1:00, then I head 2:00, then 2:45.

The wind was insane....it felt like a cross/headwind the whole course, so there was some sweet echelon shenanigans going on. Fast forward to 1 lap to go, we had already dropped one guy, and I'm not one to wait on a sprint so I attacked and got a little gap. I couldn't shake one guy, so I ended up with 2nd, which was a pretty sweet result out of 55 starters.

Feeling pretty good about the result, I decided to do the pro 1,2,3 race as well. Me and the other cat 3 who won were the only 3's to race. A break got up the road. I attacked a couple times to bridge up, and a Texas Roadhouse guy and a Bolla guy just sat on my wheel, but they had teammates in the break so i was out of luck. Eventually a chase group of 6 formed, which I got in.

I got dropped with 2 to go, decided not to be such a little girl, bridged back to the group with 1/2 lap to go, and channelled enough energy to pull out 4th in the group sprint. I ended up with 10th overall in the 1,2s, which i'm pretty stoked about.

me being a little girl:

until next time

stefan

cool things are cool.

2008-03-26T17:40:00.005-05:00

So i woke up this Monday morning back at school to none other than snow itself. What the heck!? What kind of a welcoming is that, after coming back home from some nice 70+degree weather and sunburn! It was pretty janky in my book. Then yesterday, it was a balmy 68 degrees. Thank you global warming.

Riding lately has been hella-sweet. Tuesday I got in some killer race winning intervals, then came back to the room, switched bikes, and went and did some Team Time Trial practice. We did a couple of 15min intervals, and were absolutely hauling on the second of the 2. I was riding blind on the TT bike, but Greg said we were up around 32 for a good part of it. We were super smooth and can hopefully put out a good result at the collegiate TTT in indiana in 2 weeks.

My only real picture from spring break (is actually Sarah's): The gang made a pit stop at the house before heading to Bryson City for a camp. They got some quality cooking (thanks mom!) and got to spend some good time hanging out with Kasper (dog) and watching more than 30 channels.

The success of spring break: aka tan-lines Well its time for our usual "mexican night"

you stay classy

success...

2008-03-21T20:21:00.002-05:00

Spring break checklist.

1. set tan-lines for the rest of the season. check

2. Slipstream-Chipotle getting invited to the tour. check

3. don't think about homework. check

4. ride bike. check

5. go to disneyland? hmm yea that won't happen.

Not much going on here...just had a little extra volume for bike practice this week. I'll have pictures posted sometime.

As I was peacefully flipping through the latest velonews, I saw a "Let Levi Ride" ad, with Levi himself, posted up on a page. Now i'm not too fond of the guy...he seems really egotistical (whoa big word) for me, and this didn't help. How about a "Let Astana Ride", or better yet how about the guy who actually won the Tour in the first place... "let contador ride". I guess American could better relate to Levi, since he is american and all. But oh well.

On a different note, one of the coolest races in my book starts tomorrow. Milan-SanRemo, a nice short 185 mile race, is always pretty entertaining. I'm gonna go with my man Fabian Wegmann for the win.

good ideas...

2008-03-17T22:21:00.002-05:00

Well i'm officially on spring break...which basically means that I can do nothing but ride my bike alot and watch alot of TV and not get ridiculed for it. It looks to be a great week for bike practice and making tan lines.

I got a new seat. a new selle san marco concor lite. i'm pretty sure if you look under "style" in webster's dictionary, then its picture would be there. more importantly...my butt and the seat are now best friends, so that's always a good deal.
Also, I came up with a great equation:

The new dura-ace carbon crank + the new solar-powered SRM + a wireless SRM = something really amazing?! (and probably really pricey as well)

Thats the extent of my thinking since i'm off school.

On a more serious note: drug testing is getting pretty strict...at this past week's Paris-Nice, the french anti-doping people are now taking not just urine samples, but blood and hair. I'm glad that they are taking this really serious, but after reading this story, it seems they aren't taking in the human aspect of it.

i'll be out on the roads of maryville alot this week, so maybe i'll see you out there.

later

stefan

Missouri

2008-03-11T21:00:00.006-05:00

Hello everybody,

Well this weekend we headed to the state of Missouri. Early friday morning (when we left), KY got nailed with a giant snowstorm...the college got like 4 inches or something crazy. But we skipped out of this snow nonsense and went and raced our bikes.

Saturday was the RR. It was beautiful outside, except for the fact that it was 30 degrees with 15mph winds. WHOOPEE! So for the first time in my life, I double-chammed it (wore 2 shorts for all you non-cycling speaking things out there). I also wore knee warmers under the leg warmers, and nearly every layer of jacket/jersey/baselayer that I brought.

So...back to the race. We started, it was fast, and an attack went off. As most people know, its pretty darn important for a team to be represented in every breakaway, and at this moment I was perfectly placed. SO, I attacked, went hard, and chased, went hard, and eventually caught up to the leader (I made that sound longer than it really happened). Well we had 5 guys, 1 dropped, i dropped (my heart rate was hanging around 200 sitting on the illinois guy's wheel (he won)), and then everyone else but 2 dropped.

So, i sat up and waited for the field. Now folks, this was only about 45 mins into the race, and I had already blown up, so I though that I had set myself up for disaster. The rest of the race was in the "pain cave"...every lap I thought I was gonna get popped off the back, but it never happened...and I finished in the field. Kip got a stellar 6th place. So then we went out for some amazing food at the Pasta Company.We also spent some time in the pool. I kind of didn't pack swimtrunks, so I sported the new, extremely fashionable boxers. I got some weird looks. Apparently my tan lines freak some people out.
Sunday...crazy hard crit, but I loved the course for some reason. It had a giant hill that was kind of really hard. From the gun there were some nice gaps forming in the field. I ended up sticking with the front group (which dwindled down to about 13 riders). I got dropped, somehow channeled superhuman strength and bridged back to the lead group for a few more laps. My coach called it a "heroic bridge back to the chasing pack from the brink of death by Stefan which I am still in shock over." Apparently I inspired him. I tend to do that alot these days. (okay i'm being sarcastic) But anyways, the "inspiration" only lasted about 2-3 more laps, then I was done with the lead group. I did happen to norm 316 watts for the 20mins though!!

So I rejoined with the main pack for the rest of the race until 2 laps to go. I sort of can't sprint worth a flip, so I attacked, held the gap for 2 laps, and finished between the front group and the main field. Not too bad eh? Kip got just outside top-10, I got somewhere mid teens, and Jake got top-20 as well, which means we scored some great points. here's a shout-out to Sarah Lukas, who won her very first race on a bicycle this weekend in the RR. she is also one of the "photographers" for my blog. She uses the support of her stuffed animals to go fast and win races now...i'm not even joking either.

oh, and i've also taken up bodybuilding in the downtime...pretty obvious huh?

on the road again

2008-03-06T12:43:00.004-06:00

hello everybody,

Once again, we're hitting the road this weekend. This time its a little, well, alot farther than last week was. We are headed out to Columbia, Missouri this weekend for a RR and Crit. The weather looks a little depressing...a high of 30 on saturday with 15mph winds(with sunshine though) and a high of 45 or something on Sunday, with no wind. Hopefully all will come together for another weekend of sweet racing.

Like I said earlier in the week, this past weekend was a great weekend on the power side too. Hitting a 20 min. PR on saturday, and then turning around the next day to increase the power by 14 watts was really good for motivation. I ended up pegging 20mins at 302watts on sunday. Not too shabby for my first race weekend of the season! I would like to work my way up to 310 watts....that would put me right at 5 watts/kg, which is getting into the big watts per kilograms. (hopefully someone out there knows what I'm talking about) It's nice having power to make goals like this, which is something that is purely fitness and not relying on doing good in a certain race to necessarily achieve goals.

Maybe we'll do some more karaoke this weekend like Greg and Jean did last weekend!

We figure an 8 hr drive, so I'll be seeing alot of van time. How exciting is that Kip?!?

Wish me luck!

later

stefan

why i love my bike...

2008-03-03T20:43:00.011-06:00

Well folks, I would have to say that this weekend was quite successful. We rolled out of LWC at noon on friday and headed to indiana this past weekend for the Depauw collegiate road race and crit.

Saturday was the road race...first race of the year. I felt really good going into today's race. My legs felt kind of fast, especially for March, and I was anxious to see what kind of power numbers I would put out. The course was a rolling 8 mile loop and was really really fast. Men's A road races usually consist of pro1,2 riders with some 3's mixed in. The first 20 mins was super fast...crazy attacks trying to get the break established.

Once the break did get established and off the front for 3 laps, the Indiana univ. team (a good 15 riders) went to the front to bring it back. It was quite a sight...10-12 red jerseys drilling it on the front. Me, Kip and Greg sat right on the back of the train, with the rest of the teams sitting in too. So, obviously chasing like they did, some of the IU guys started hitting the wall about 2k out. 1k out, a rider attacked, I was 1 wheel back and countered his attack, which hurt really really bad. A big crash happened in the chase for this attack, so a few guys went down. I ended up being the first LWC rider across the line in 12th place out of 50 starters, which i'm pretty psyched about. Kip, who had to ride through someone's front yard to miss the crash, ended up in 19th.

For some reason, I was just sitting in at one point in the road race. And then I began to think about how amazing this was. It was descent weather, and this was just what I needed for my lack of motivation last week. It felt great to finally be back to racing.

Sunday was a "crit" but was more of a circuit race...4 turns in 1.2 miles or something like that. Super windy, so of course the race exploded. Kip told me to go with one of the attacks (which ended up being the race winning break) but once I got about half-way across, someone in the peloton threw down and caught me. After this, the whole race exploded in the head/crosswind section. I was in the pain cave big time from the effort, so I got shelled into the chase group.

I flatted about 30 mins. in, casually walked over to the pit, changed my wheel and waited for the group (I don't know why some people rush to get wheel changes when you can just rest??). So I jumped back in and found myself finishing in 16th, while Kip hung in there to pull out a nice 9th place. Only 20 riders ended up finishing today...it was brutal. There were some big names that completely missed the splits, so it was a pretty weird race.

I'll update you later on my power files from this weekend, which set a couple of PR's! And it's only March!

Other than that, here's some more pictures from the weekend, which was a blast.

In other news, I got a 103 on my organismal biology test!! The class average was 57, so I might have killed the curve.

later

stefan

here comes the pain...

2008-02-28T13:15:00.004-06:00

2 updates in 2 days....woo i'm on a roll! Well this weekend will be my first collegiate road race of the year....the coach pulled the plug on the race last weekend...people were sick, and it snowed alot (which cancelled saturday's race), and was way cold.

But this weekend is a green light....the legs have been feeling quite good all week, and with the whole road team going, it should be a blast. The race is at Depauw in Indianapolis, so only a 4 hr. drive won't be too bad. It'll be interesting to finally open up the legs, and hopefully we can set Kip up for a nice finish. We'll be leaving tomorrow at 12, which means I get to miss organismal biology!

Here's a pic of the race set-up for my bike:

I'll have updates soon about the races. Wish me luck!

later

stefan

why it pays to act smart...

2008-02-27T15:27:00.011-06:00

hello everyone,

Well as i said in the last post, this past weekend was the Begley scholars day. It was kind of nice being on the other side of the desk (I got to interview the kids this year, while last year i was the one being interviewed) and seeing how everything is scored and what-not. Each of the begley scholars (there is a total of maybe 15 or so at the school) interviewed 5 students. We score them mainly on their personality....which is sort of weird, because there sort of is this type of personality that they're looking for. We don't know any history (GPA, ACT scores) or anything like that, but they put that into consideration later on.

But getting the Begley is pretty sweet let me tell you! Tuition, room, and board are paid for, as well as being priveleged to go on the Begley trip each fall. We go to Thoreau's 4 Great Cities-new orleans, san francisco, new york, and chicago. Last fall was new orleans, and it was insanely amazing. We stayed in a sister hotel to the Ritz Carlton, and went out to Commander's Palace, Court of Two Sisters, and Breakfast at Brennans, and then some other stuff too. I can't imagine how much is spent...flying us out, paying for $100 a plate at Commander's palace, paying for the new orleans cooking school (which was sweet), among the other stuff...it just blows my mind.

But its so awesome. Next fall is the Chicago, which should be just as nice or better. We'll probably get some good Chicago-style pizza. Apparently in San Fran we visit the Ghiradelli chocolate factory, so I might just die that day, we'll have to see.

Life back in the real world is pretty normal. I'm over the sickness...i only have one antibiotic pill left! woo.

There is still alot of this type of weather though...(snow and cold if you can't tell)

...which leads to alot of riding inside and watching lots and lots and lots of movies!

Well i have 4 loads of clothes in the washers that need to be dried....that's right mom, i'm doing laundry!

later

stefan

i can't think of a good title for this one, so this will have to do...

2008-02-22T17:11:00.005-06:00

Well, onto post numero dos. i'm holding down the fort here in columbia. It's pretty funny here on the weekends...a good 75% of the students leave for home, making the campus a ghost town by 2:00 on friday afternoons. So the only people left after the mass exodus are the athletes, who are all foreign or out of state-ers, so the campus is pretty weird (diverse would be the fancier word).

The weather here has been pretty awful-terrible...below 40 everyday with rain/freezing rain/wind, or is nice and warm....with rain. Not good for motivational purposes at all.. or health for that matter. Over the past week, it seems like EVERYONE is sick, including me. I'm on antibiotics and an inhaler now, so i'm feeling a little better...trying to play the cards right so that I don't dig myself back into a hole whenever i get back on the bike though.

Tomorrow is the big Begley day here at lwc, so I have the privelege to interview incoming freshmen for the scholarship (which is the one i got). A part of me wants to act like the interviewer from hell, but that would only really provide amusement for me. Downside of this day is waking up at 730 again (like every morning of the week), but the positive side is cheesecake and some actually quality food.

I'll leave you guys with a couple of sweet photos (should provide for some laughs), the first one being from the latest of our team meetings, which happened to be a massage clinic...unfortunately due to the numbers in the class, I was partners with my roomie jake, who is also a male. i am not gay. jake is not gay. end of story.

note:it was a leg massage, jake just took his shirt off for photo purposes...it kind of adds to the dramatics.

The second is from mtn bike nat's at the top of beech mtn (where we stayed). Me and kip got a little bored cleaning bikes, so we played around with some illusions some more.

later

stefan

giving it a go

2008-02-20T15:06:00.000-06:00

Well folks, there comes a time in every person's life when they have to create a blog (not really), but for me, that time in life is now. So after a few requests (and I mean a few) I've decided to give this blogging thing a go.

So for my first official post, i'll give you all an update on what life has been like thus far.

First, I was born.

Then, I went to college.(I may or may not have skipped a few details)

Somehow or another, I was talked into riding these machines known as "mountain bikes" in college. Like road and cyclocross bikes, they have 2 wheels attatched to a frame. Yea, it kind of blew my mind too. So during the "mtn bike" season, I crashed. Many times. End of story.

Next up was cyclocross. It was quite a blast. We did a few collegiate races, then hit up nationals in Kansas City. Riding on snow and ice on a cx bike is quite the experience. Cleaning the bikes in the dorm room showers was quite the experience as well.

And now is about time for the type of riding the truly makes sense...road. Our first collegiate road race is this weekend in columbus, ohio. With a scorching high of 34 degrees and snow, it looks as though we'll have a nice weekend.

Oh, and I also went to class during college.

Well, thanks to all of you who took time out of your days which are most likely much busier than mine. Please leave any questions, comments, concerns, suggestions, or anything else that would make my blog better. topics of talk are also welcome

later

stefan