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Team OYB: many days on the road...but big fun!
Well, we're finally in San Fran. Whew.
Cute to see the flamers for my previous trip report. True colors, eh kids? So here's the latest trip report! We camped our way across the West. Great sage smells out there. The wife and I would trade bike rides for an hour each day. The kids have been great. The biking has really let us get a feel for where we've been rolling. It was kind of intimidating rolling into the Denver/Boulder area, though. I've never seen so much pavement and traffic...as well as so many outdoor rec amenities. It was like cars, freeways, bikepaths, roadbikes and biker people everywhere. Made my head spin. I could still sense the old towns buried under the recent decades, though. Boulder's new public library is really something. Possibly over the top. Well, totally over it but why not. I checked out Peter's classic "Vecchiolo" (sp?) roadbike shop in Boulder---too bad he didn't have vintage road bike parts for sale, though. I needed a bigger rear cog! I thought I had my mt gears on the bike when we left town but I only had a 24. I got the word about the final TDF TT in his shop, which was nice. Then I went and rode up Flagstaff for my daily ride. Man, that was hard in the 24. I recall I used to do that ride in about 24 min's...this time 1 hr. Ugh! What a difference the right gear makes! I'd thought I had the 28 on. (I'll try to get a bigger gear in the Bay Area.) Then we hung out along the Creek for a few hours before driving into the mts and camping in the boonies. Visited relatives in Craig...nice cowtown. Steamboat also seemed pretty neat. I'm just impressed overall with the amount of bikers I've been seeing. Saw a low recumbent tadpole trike on tour. Not many other tourists, though. Visited a great old family candy factory in Provo, UT: Startup's. Independent, owner-operated multigeneration biz is where it's at, man. Then for our purposes we had our best time so far. I was going to meet Pete Vordenberg finally for breakfast as we rolled thru the Park City area. But he said why not join the gang for a workout at Soldier Hollow. So our van rolled into the venue just ahead of theirs the next morning. What fun! I got to train with the US Team! And get yelled at by the bosses! It was great meeting Pete for the first time. He said we could chill and watch or I could jump in. I didn't have my classic poles strapped to the roofrack for nuthin! Serendipity waits for no man. So I hopped in with the kids. They looked like kids anyway. A bunch of buff guys and gals. Still they seemed mortal until we started the hillbounding. Oh, it was a Level 4 Day no less. Ha ha. Joke's on me, eh? So we started with 4 hill-attacks at 110% Torin Koos showed us how it was done to kick things off. He looks like a freshfaced kid just standing around. But when he set off into that hill he turned into a Michael Jordan of XC ski training! Tron had said that everyone should go for big air up the hill, so Torin filled the bill. I'd never seen anyone look really cool doing hillbounds. But man he just floated and flew up that hill like he was on springs. His hips would come about 5 feet off the ground. What fun! After we did that 4 times we ran the Olympic 10k loop with bounding on every uphill. Yow! OK, I only did about half the course. And didn't bound all the hills. I was wasted and pasted. Still, what great fun. It's two days later and I still can't hardly walk. Altho my knee swelling went away the next day. Tron said I could come get killed with them any time. Thanks, man! : ) Pete said maybe I hurt my backyard cred with that bout of highend exposure. I told him that cheating is allowed in the Backyard Olympics. Look out, Mike! I got the edge, now! Pete and I are scheming up some cool new plans that I'll clue you in on shortly. OK, I'll tell you now: we're going to make an audio version of his book, with "more tales" included. Free bonus tracks. He has a cool western twang voice. Skiers drive a lot. His stories are a fun listen so we'll be offering a CD of them shortly. We actually discussed these plans after all that bounding while out jogging on the Soldier Hollow trails! I was very happy to be there. Dang, why didn't I attend the dang Olympics? What was I thinking? We all need to go to Olympics when they're in our country, man! It was a nice place. Our boy Henry really wants to find a rattlesnake but I didn't notice one while poling along out there. The gang was nice to the family. Martha set up the camp stove for coffee and breakfast in the stadium parking lot and she and the kids sat in the shade of the van for awhile watching us do kooky things until they went on a walk on the trails. Quite a few other regular folks were out there, too, pulling kids in trailers and such. Those US Team dudes are fast! They finished their 10k not long after I blew up for about 4k. They looked just like they were in a ski race! It was cool seeing them blast around that famous curve where Thomas put away the Italian. They worked really hard on technique so it really did look just like classic skiing. The coaches and other short-coursers rooted on the dudes as they blasted the last hills. Level 4, right... Level race is what it was! Podium here they come! I was most appreciative to be there. Next rides: Marin! --Jeff Potter PS: I hate giving up on RBR and casual civility but what the hey who needs the grief. Nowhere's perfect of course but I guess they can read about my visit to Boulder here at RSN instead. |
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