Great Success!

Well, I headed up to lovely Spearfish, South Dakota last weekend for my first Xterra (off-road triathlon) of the season, and to quote a famous Kazakh, it was a great success! After a kind of rough swim (Spencer - wetsuit = sinking like a rock) I fought my way through the pack on the mountain bike and extended my advantage on the run to win the overall. It's fun to win a race once in a while; that sort of thing doesn't seem to happen that often for me out here in Ballerado. You can read all about the race in the Rapid City Journal, as fine a news source as I've ever seen.
Also, props are due to our comrade, Kiel for pulling down a top-10 in the National Championship crit last weekend. Next week he's racing the Tour de Toona – allez Kiel!

Obama Video

Who says politics are boring? This video has reinvigorated my enthusiasm for our country's democratic process.

This shit is priceless!

From the Facebook Group "Bicycles or Women?"

Epic Winter Park Trek

On the Sunday after Crankworx last weekend, Kevin, myself and Abby decided to go on a hike, starting on Berthoud Pass, finishing in Winter Park — a super knar shuttle run. It was a pretty nice day, but the clouds were moving in fast and we were all glad to be in a car by the time the rain came around 2 or so. It was so gorgeous up above treeline in the Vasquez Wilderness. The only bummer, from my perspective, is that this beautiful place can never be enjoyed on a mountain bike. While mountain bikers are low-impact trail users, scientifically shown to have a similar environmental impact as hikers, they are unfairly excluded from all Wilderness areas. It's really important to protect our land for future generations, but there are other ways to do it besides Wilderness designation.
Anyways... the hike was wicked sweet. We saw some ptarmigans, a guy skiing one of the snowfields (I was jealous), found some sweet stuff on the ski hill and totally blew out the legs hiking down Mary Jane to get back. An awesome day in the mountains, capped off by some sweet, sweet ice cream at the Dairy King in Empire.


Still a bit snowy up around 10,000 feet.

For all the photos visit the links below:
Album 1
Album 2

Mt Evans Throwdown

What better way to celebrate our illustrious nation's birth than to climb a mighty peak on our bicycles? Our crew set out in the wee hours of the morning on July 4th with heavy hearts because one of our comrades just had all of his bikes stolen... so lame! If you see any sketchy dudes trying to sell Blake's bikes on the street, take them out at all costs — shoot first, ask questions later.
Nonetheless, we soldiered on and tackled the 14,264 ft peak in the cool morning mountain air. As we passed numerous recreational riders, Kiel and Rolf broke away from the pack, heading off to do battle alone in the wasteland above treeline. I hung back and kept a steady tempo in the grupetto, knowing that they weren't a threat to my GC aspirations. After 2:40 (So close to Tommy D's record!) and 7,540 ft of climbing, we reached the summit, where we took some pictures, ate a little food and then got the hell off the peak after watching some nasty clouds roll in and developing mild cases of altitude sickness.
The ride down was fast and furious and was only made better by gorging on Rolf's cookies once we had returned to the car and dismounted from our trusty steeds.



It's a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll...

a classic CAF I pic

With all the rain, the lake is sure to be a blast. A blast you say on the eve of the eve of the eve of the eve of the eve of the fourth of July. So we'll celebrate some Independence, and maybe we'll do it with some roman candle wars or by playing toss the gasoline soaked tennis ball or by throwing twenty bottle rockets straight into the firepit. Ah the entropy. I just heard Bill Cosby say, when denouncing youth violence, something like there's too much entropy today. So funny. The lines at the apple stores for the iphones are absurd. I'm still using 2 cent stamps to make all my old stamps proper. Bruce Willis is a badass. ok bye.

Kiel is Back!

Holler!!

Alexandre Vinokourov is your daddy.

That's right, Vinokourov will win this year's tour de france bien sur.

-the lion

ps- where is the kiel monster?

Tubing

Today I took advantage of a day off work to go conquer the mighty Boulder Creek, tubing style. However, the creek gods were apparently out to get me and dragged me into what seemed like every rock in Boulder Creek, giving me some nice scrapes and bruises to remember the experience by.



To add insult to injury, the creek also snagged my car keys that were tied to my bathing suit, and Spencer had to come to the rescue. Thanks Spencer.

CAF Throwdown in VT

Oh, snap. You know it's going down when the Chamois Army Fort spreads to the East Coast. Need any further proof of our nationwide dominance? I think these photos are adequate evidence...



Represent!




Getting my croquet on.



Congratulations, Meredith!

The New Guy

Hey everyone. In case you're surprised to see a new member to the CAF blog, let me introduce myself. I'm Andy and I'm taking Kevin's spot in the house for the summer. I'm originally from Richmond, VA and I'm out here in Colorado for school. I just finished my first year at CU, and spent the spring semester racing for CU's road team and had a blast. For the summer, I'm just chillin at the fort, working at Performance Bike Shop, and training/racing. Work sucks, but riding has been great. I've done two races so far: the North Boulder Crit and the City Park Crit in Denver. The North Boulder Crit was pretty much my first race outside of collegiate cycling, and I ended up doing alright, placing 12th in the 4's race. This past weekend in Denver, I raced the City Park Crit. This time, the combination of riding for my new team (AE Sport) and being pissed at the registration people for charging me a late fee AND a fee for not being registered under a team made me ride a lot harder. I stayed at the front pretty much the entire race, taking 2 primes and sprinting for 4th at the end. I made back my race entry fee and more, so needless to say I was much happier. Now I'm looking ahead to this weekend, when I'll be in Fort Collins doing the Rist Canyon road race on Saturday and the Fort Collins Crit on Sunday before I leave to go back to Richmond for a week. This weekend's race has a LOT of climbing in it, so hopefully it will suit me a little better. I'll let you know how it all goes.

Teva Games

Well, I just got back from my little adventure at the Teva Games, and I'm pretty blown out. I did the Ultimate Mountain Challenge, which was a downriver paddle, a mountain bike race, a 10k trail run and a hill climb TT on the road bike. The overall was points based, and unfortunately the paddle was pretty heavily weighted... 25 minutes in a boat is apparently twice as important as 2+ hours on the mountain bike. Lame! Oh well.


This, I like.


This, I do not like.

my blister, move and willys, beer urinal, and the lake

IMBA Shenanigans

This is why I love my job so much. I get to do lots of fun stuff for work, but also, foolishness like this is permitted, if not encouraged.

Lou Dobbs is my hero of the day

Let's play a little game called "just the tip of what Lou Dobbs recently said:"

I couldn't help but wonder as I watched monitors bringing images of the marches and demonstrations from all across the country, who should really be protesting on May Day. What about the millions of legal residents who followed the long, drawn-out process to secure a visa to enter the United States lawfully? Maybe they should be protesting. What about the seven-figure backlog at the Citizenship and Immigration Services agency of people who are following the rules. Should they demonstrate?

What about all of our fellow Americans who are being marginalized by the massive importation of illegal, low-cost and mostly uneducated labor into this country? Perhaps those citizens should take to the streets. And what about the more than 250 million Americans who make up our middle class and those who aspire to it whose wages have stagnated and who are paying for the social, medical and economic costs of illegal immigration? That's a big march.

If yesterday's demonstrators and their supporters in Congress and corporate America are serious about their deep desire for American citizenship, why don't we hear any of them clearly say they're willing to give up dual citizenship? Or that they're willing to learn English and surrender demands of bilingual education? Or declare they embrace English as our official national language? Or demand that illegal employers of illegal aliens pay for the social, educational and medical costs now borne by the taxpayers?

Trip to Grand Jct

Well, Kevin, Kiel and I had a rather busy weekend. We headed down to Grand Junction for some riding and some racing. I was there mostly for the RMCCC Finals, but I got a nice long MTB ride in on Friday with Kevin. He has pretty impressive riding skills for a track dork, if you ask me. We camped out, I got up early and did the conference director thing at the race on Saturday. I also hopped into the USCF race, but that was unremarkable. Sunday was the crit, which was pretty fun to watch. Kiel just barely got nipped at the line in the sprint. Oh well, that'll motivate him even more for Nationals. I would have gone riding afterwards with Kevin and some of our other friends, but my body was telling me, "Noooo nooo, please just take me home to the TV!" So I did. Too bad. Maybe Kevin has some photos, but for now, I don't have any to post. Cheers.

New Shoes

Is there anything finer than a pair of new shoes? ... I didn't think so. Sounds like young Kiel has been up to his old tricks again, getting a win in the collegiate crit in Durango last night. Unfortunately, he got tangled up in a crash today and banged up his elbow. It doesn't sound like anything major, so he should be fine. Tietzel was sitting pretty at 8th place in the overall for his stage race in Nebraska, so hopefully he'll keep on keepin' on and bring home some more hardware for the CAF. Kevin is very tired from his trip to Mexico and currently sleeping. He was 8th overall, no thanks to his wanker partner.

Heinous Itchyness

Well, it serves me right. I brag a little about how nice the weather is going to be in Chattanooga, and sure enough, it ends up raining most of the weekend. To top it all off, I got into some poison ivy and now have a knarly rash on both of my forearms. Aside from that, it was a good trip. I had some fantastic barbecue, saw some live country music and bluegrass and did a little mountain biking. It'll be lonely at the Fort this weekend; Crinny's gone to Dallas, Kevin's in Mexico, Kiel's in Durango and Scott's in Nebraska, so stop by with cookies or something. It would really make my day.

Riding My First Pro Six

Got an invite to Augascalients, Mexico to ride the big show with some Euro Pros. Leaving on Sunday. Should be a complete trip! I am looking forward to seeing how high the real Six-day bar is. Much more info over at SuhrTheBlur.com

A Little Vacation

Well, folks, I'm off to Chattanooga Wednesday evening on "Business." I'll technically be on the clock, helping out with a Subaru/IMBA Trail Care Crew visit, but anyone in the know will tell you that it mainly involves riding, drinking and cold chillin' like a villain. Plus as a little bonus, I'll have some nice weather to enjoy. Hmm, let's compare forecasts:
Thursday & Friday
Boulder: Highs 38-40, snow
Chattanooga: Highs 69-77, mostly sunny.

I'll see you all Monday night!

p.s. Give Crinny a call or stop by the Fort... he's bored to tears with that broken back and would definitely appreciate the company.