Happy Holidays!

We are off to Albany, NY this morning for the holidays with my peeps, followed by a 5 day stop off in Indianapolis to see Greg's peeps. I wanted to wish everyone a great holiday (whichever you may celebrate). We return before New Year's so I will definatley be up for some weekend rides (get ready Joy!). Over the next week I will be seeking out local gyms and XC/snowshoe trails to substitute for my bike! Also we will see how many Christmas cookies and bottles of Vermont's own Long Trail Ale I consume ...

Murphy is happily vacationing in Palm Springs at Chris & Steve's house with his canine cousins Sydney and Sophie. We don't think Murphy will want to come back home with us after all the fun he will have out there!

This is the little guy I am most excited to see back at home... My 9 month old nephew, Noble:

Brrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!

Unfortuantely I don't have any pix to share , but at least I am being timely about posting another blog!

I recruited Joy to do both training rides with me this weekend. She gets the benefit of doing longer weekend rides in preparation for the longer races at the expert level. I benefit from a great training partner who helps motivate me to stick to my schedule. it's a win-win situation!

I switched Sat and Sun's schedule around a bit so that my friend Marc from Ottawa could do some MTB'ing before heading back to the Great White North on Sunday. Marc borrowed Greg's hardtail (noticeably lighter than Marc's bike back home as he commented during the ride). We hit up Crafton (one of Marc's favorite local rides from his days at ESRI). The ride was fun, Joy and I got a good ride in (we did a couple repeats while Marc chilled and took pix of some mountain bluebirds, but we were FREEZING! My toes were offically numb! I am in big trouble over the holidays in upstate NY and Indianapolis if I get cold in Redlands!

Sat night included a rally over to Victoria Gardens in Rancho Cucamonga for some rapid Christmas shopping. We did the majority of our shopping at REI, and tried our best not to just buy everything for ourselves. After REI we grubbed at Red Robin. Had a glass of cab sauv and a turkey burger! YUM. Good fuel for the next day's ride.... We rallied to Border's where I officially bonked after searching around for more gifts. We managed to make it over to the Gap to buy some adorable clothes for our niece and nephew. We also came to the conclusion that once we have kids of our own, we wont be providing Gap clothes for them until they stop growing (unless other people buy it for us of course!)

Sunday's ride was great and not as cold, but I was happy I had on my Smart Wool bike socks! Joy and I both chugged some Emerg'n C (Greg and Joy were both coming down with a cold again) before heading out on our 5 hour road ride. We headed out towards Riverside and happened to run into some folks Joy grew up with. Tito and Zack. They asked us to join along and we ended up picking up another rider (former road racer), Toni. The three of us ladies realized that we would be great training partners and have some upcoming plans for some local tough chix rides. During the final hour of the ride, all Joy and I could talk about is what was for lunch. I proceeded to Chipotle for a yummy lunch after the ride.

Greg and I capped off the weekend with some more shopping and officially experienced burnout, coming home with very few items. However we are mostly finished! We have a bunch of boxes to ship out at the post office today. Thankfully the post office is right across from work!

Transitioning ...

Last night I made my official announcement to Chris & Desi that I would be leaving Team Backbone to ride for Team K&N Performance. It was a decision a few months in the making, with many sleepless nights and stressful days. I never thought this would be so hard to do, but it showed me how important my four years riding for Chris' teams (CFR and Backbone) were.

I think back to the first phone call I got from Chris & Desi inviting me to join CFR. I had met them through Gabe (formerly of SuperGo Santa Monica). I listened to two super-charged and energetic people talk about CFR and where Chris wanted to take the team. I was excited just listening to them describe the people and the resources Chris was working on getting. I remember my first CFR meeting at a mexican place in Burbank. I was excited because only a few months earlier, I was thinking of ending my short MTB racing career (I had recently finished grad school at U of Wisconsin - Madison and had raced for Saris (bike racks). So I thank Chris, Desi and Greg who got me excited about racing again and taking it to the next level.

Over the four seasons with CFR/Backbone, I recall so many fond memories. There are so many stories to tell, it's hard to figure out where to start. I have seen the roster change over the years to a great squad with some outstanding talent. I remember when Bert and I were the only expert racers, and over the last two years that list has grown substantially. One of the best examples is to see Ara move up to expert for 2006. I have seen him become such a strong racer and will never forget our kick butt performance at 12 Hours of Snow Summit last summer. We were the only sicko-s on the team who were down for the sheer pain of endurance racing. That day with Chris, Greg, Short Stack, Ara, among others, was such a special day! Probably one of my favorite race days of my career. I will never forget sharing a condo (1 room condo!) with all of those boys the night before. Due to bear-like snoring, Short Stack was quarantined to the porch.

Here is a short list of some key phrases, events, etc from my years racing!
- Schwanstucka!
- White Chocolate
- Solvang Century with the whole gang
- Camp 'N' Rizzle
- Big Bear Condo weekends with Chris/Jim/James dirty jokes in full force
- Mike Jones!
- "this sucks, I want to quit!" - common terminology used by me during races
- KENDA (need I say more!)
- meeting Mary!
- Sea Otter 2004 (3rd place!)
- Big Bear National 2004 (silver medal!)
- Beauford and Boone, some of my favorite puppies!
- Growing as a racer and meeting new people
- Sagebrush 2003, my first expert race. with Chris running along my side encouraging me to a strong finish.

I could go on forever about this stuff! I know you all know how much this team has meant to me over the years. I want to thank Chris (and anyone who has ever supported me .. and all of you who have contacted me with words of support) for EVERYTHING that you have ever provided for me, or done for me. Thanks to everyone for encouraging myself and Teri as we transition into the pro ranks. It will be a tough road up there, but we will give it our best shot! I am looking forward to Teri and I working together on our new team. We have been through alot this year in many ways, but we are ready for this new endeavour together.

I will still be out there supporting everyone (if you will let me) and I am excited to see EVERYONE continue to grow during 2006. I hope to see everyone out there at the races and hopefully we can still get together a ride once in a while! you are all my friends (and family!)

Chris & Desi, we go a long way back and I don't ever want that to change.

Skater Chick

I made my official debut on our skate ramp this past Saturday. Apparently Greg couldn't get any action shots of me because he was too busy coaching me or trying to keep the dog off the ramp while others skated. So the photo to the left is what I would call the poser shot, me trying to look like a skater. Yes, those are my own pads and helmet. Actually I needed the help! I took a couple bad spills and I was still hurting pretty bad today. Feels kind of like falling while snowboarding, except on the ramp you fall on masonite!

Greg and Corey (who have been skateboarding since age 8) had a great time breaking in the ramp and we got some great pix! It was a fun day and my legs definately suffered after having already been on a road ride that day. Skating on the ramp is like doing continuous squats (even more so than snowboarding! Good cross training except for the falling and getting hurt part!

David Kaiser stopped by to check out the skate action and play with the pup, Murphy enjoyed himself ... so much that he dozed off pretty hard for a while...

Greg did his first real skating since his July knee surgery. He didn't go too crazy with the tricks, but got a few grinds in... yes those are honking knee pads he is wearing. He ordered custom pads to fit over his stylish knee brace. Greg lived vicariously through Corey and made him do the more difficult tricks. I was happy with this choice and Greg's knee is still in tact.
In other news: We got our long-awaited copy of Off Road to Athens in the mail a few weeks ago. Finally got around to watching it over Turkey Day weekend. We were fortunate enough to attend a showing at the Sea Otter Classic in April. It was a very inspriational film and yes... it made me cry (surprise, surprise!)! I think seeing the riders get emotional (especially Alison Dunlap when she comes to the realization that she would not be going to the olympics) was especially tough to see. It was also interesting to see that the top pro riders are in fact "human" and have bad days too! Who would have thought!

I finally kicked my cold, but now Greg has it! I gotta be on immunity watch this week...

I wonder if Jonathan Weaver is freezing his arse off this week up in Boulder!