Wow It's Been A While...

I have been a little out if of touch recently. Long days and long nights. Between working Riding and watching the Tour de France, I haven't had much time for other things. I did get in a couple of good rides this week. Matt and I did a little jaunt around White Clay on Wed. and I managed to make the group ride at Fair Hill last night. Although Wed. ride was only 1:30 it was still a great ride. Last night I actually felt GREAT. Todd was setting his usual pace and I was stuck to his wheel like a piece oh horse shit. Our ride also included Brent (getting stronger every ride) Biddle, Jay Jay, and Kurtee. We banged out 2:30 and covered most of the park.

I only hope last nights effort doesn't hurt me tomorrow at Marysville. I am in a position to move into 1st place in the Elite Single Speed class. I never thought that would happen, but Travis has bowed out in order to race at home and this leaves the door open for me. It's kind of weird, all that I've been doing is showing up at all the races. I guess consistency

pays off. Well I am headed for bed.

Thanks for reading,

Buddy

Rides, Restaurants, and Birthdays!!!

You have to love a holiday weekend. This one is always extra special because it is Rachael's birthday, Sunday is her actual birthday but we started celebrating yesterday.

Saturday Matt (run forrest), Kurtee, Brent, and I rode at Brandywine. Brandywine used to be an awesome place to ride, lots of single track, and lots of technical stuff to keep you on you toes. Over the past few years things have changed and not for the better. They have mulched a lot of the trails and now they have started to close some of the fun ones. We did make the most of it and had a good ride. I flet much better physically but couldn't ride a rock garden to save my life. I cleaned alot of stuff but not as much as the last time I rode there.

Saturday night I took Rachael out to dinner for her birthday. We tried a new place called the Orchard located near Longwood. It is a pretty upscale restaurant that just happens to be BYOB. That is good for me because that means I will always have good beer when I go there. We got there and they take my bag with the beers in it, they chill them then bring out to you as you need them, pretty cool. We get seated and they hand us menus and little flash lights to read them with. I thought that was kind of cool too. Now for the best part, the Food, Rachael chose a blue chesse, endive, and walnut salad to start the for her meal she had the lamb chops. Both were very, very good. I had the duck and mushroom spring rolls and for dinner went with the lobster rissotto, which also had mussles and clams. Again, both were extermely good. We chose the same desert, a chocolate pistachio tart, which was, you guessed it, delicious. I would recomend this place for special occasions only because it is a bit pricy, but definitely worth it.

Today we decided to ride the Fair Hill course again. Marc was the ride leader, plus he was the only one that remembered the course. We had a very nice group today, fatmarc, Matt Doyle, Jay Jay, Mike K, Kurtee, Leo, even Paul S came out since him and his wife were in town for the weekend. We took off from the same spot as the poker run. Marc was setting a nice steady brisk pace. I was feeling OK but not great. We had a couple of mechanicals and ended up losing Kurt and Mike. The pace was still good as always with Marc it was consistent. He broke it down for Doyle in terms of climbs, basically it is a 4 climb course. He is right about that, sure there are other hills but nothing long and brutal like the 4 mentioned. Me personnaly, I hate #4, Marc doesn't think to kindly of #3. These climbs are pretty spread out except for 2&3, they are pretty much back to back.


Right after Mike and Kurt took off we lost Leo and Paul, I was alittle worried about Paul because he doesn't know any of the trails, but he was with Leo so I knew he would be OK. After that we hit south park and the pace seemed to pick up a little. I was starting to hurt a little but was still hanging in there. We were coming down the yellow trail and I Followed Marc over the tree stunt. Now I have ridden this tree several times before without a problem, until today. Right at the end my back wheel slipped off the tree and I went tumbling down the trail. I sat there for a second and started to assess my various ouchy spots. I hit pretty hard, but got up and kept going. I have to admit I wasn't the same, I was in a little pain and it seemed to take a lot out of me. I also knew climb #4 was coming up. I pressed on and grinded up it. I then proceeded to drift to the back, I knew we were almost done and I was just going to ride easy the rest of the way. It all worked out I caught back on when Matt D flatted. we still did the course in 2:10, not bad with a big crash thrown in. As I was getting ready to head home Leo and Paul came rolling in, seems they did a slightly extended version, but it was all good.

Well, thanks for reading
Buddy