Hitting the dirt

Went mountain biking again this morning, it was my 4th time this week! Been hitting up the local mountain bike trails a lot and giving the mountain bike some love. Been doing really early morning rides before work with my manager John and my fellow co-worker Frye. Anywho, thought I should do the write up on my mountain bike so here she is.

The bike is a 2006 Cannondale Rush 1000 with the Siemens Mountain bike team paint job. I bought the bike barely used from Mark Cooper the current manager at the International Bike in Greeley. I hardly did any research on the bike before I bought it, and I have had no regrets whatsoever.

The wheels are Mavic Crossland UST that came stock on the bike, I currently have Maxxis Crossmark Tubless tires on it. The wheels have been awesome, completely bomb proof, everytime I tune up the bike and put the wheels in the truing stand I don't have to touch it! The tires are what came on the bike as well and have been fantastic. Just recently I have put a lot of holes in the tires so I'm not running them tubeless right now. I might be getting new tires soon, any suggestions?

This next picture is of my rear derailleur and cassette. The shifters are SRAM X-7 Shifters with a SRAM X-9 rear derailleur. The front derailleur is a shimano LX. The SRAM shifters are really nice, and all the shifting is done with your thumb.

This next shot is of my cranks and pedals. I have the FSA afterburner crank, and crank bros candies for pedals, as you can see my shoe has rubbed all of the powdercoat off of the crank (thank you answer mountain bike shoes) but I guess it makes me look hardcore...not really. The pedals I picked up on closeout nice and cheap. I was running eggbeaters for a long time, but I like the candies much better.

This next picture shows my Avid Juicy Seven Hydraulic brakes, which are awesome and I highly recommend. In the backround you can see the SRAM shifter, the pedros lock on grips.

This next shot is of my FSA K-force handlebars. These aren't the stock bars that came on the bike, this was one of the little upgrades that mark had done before he sold it to me. Carbon bars are a nice bonus.

This next shot is of my seat and seatpost. The saddle is a Fizik Aliante Sport saddle, basically a cheaper version no carbon pieces and such. If you want a LAZ Boy style saddle Aliante is the way to go. The saddle sits on none other than a Thomson Elite seatpost.

The rear shock is a Fox RP3 with Pro Pedal. The Pro Pedal really helps with climbing and gives you more options than just a lockout. Flip it to the plus side when you climbing and down to the minus with descending, it makes a difference for sure.

This last shot is of the Cannondale Lefty Fork. It looks a little goofy but, it does perform, and has taken everything that I have thrown at it. It has a lockout and a rebound knob right next to the stem, for easy access.

Whew, I hope I didn't bore everybody to tears but thats it. Anyone who is considering getting a Cannondale Rush, don't look any further because it is awesome.

One more thing, this is for Colin Don and Corey.
MILKSHAKE!!!

I was reading Matt Shrivers blog and I could hardly believe it! He is even on a BMC it makes my night.

Pictures from Ft. Collins Criterium

Before the start


One of the first few laps

Accelerating on a flat stretch

Chasing the break


Chasing the field after the crash in front of me



Well after a lot of talking about putting up pictures some are finally here, thanks for checking in

So its been ahwhile...

Well Hello all of my faithful readers, I finally have a picture up! I actually do have a camera now, but since I am at work I can't upload them to this computer. But the photographer was able to snap this photo at my race in Ft. Collins last weekend. I will get the other ones up soon. This race ended up going pretty well, I was in the group the whole time, sat in, worked a little bit, dodged a couple of crashes to stay in it. Then with four laps to go a 10 man pile up occurred in front of me which gapped me out of the main group and out of contention. I chased real hard for 4 laps, and finished about 20 seconds off of the main group. If you look back to last year, I stayed with the group for roughly 2 laps and needless to say I could have done better. Its good to know I can stay in the group in a Cat 4 race.
Then I did the Tuesday night crit again up at Table Mountain in Golden. Seeing as there were a lot of Thunderstorms and rain going on that day there wasn't a huge turnout. But some of my teammates from Metro State showed up and we all made the race interesting. We started with a 14 man field, and it split up right out of the gate. Some guy from Al's Barber Shop/Wild Oats attacked from the beginning. I followed along with a guy from Green Mountain Sports, and my teammate Yuki following close behind. It was obvious that we had some horsepower in the break, and had a really good chance of staying away all day. I held on for roughly 7 laps, and eventually the kid from Al's Barber Shop/Wild Oats took the win. I finished 4th overall, and 1st in the chase group sprint. Overall a pretty good day for the weather being so bad.
Aside from racing I have just been working, and riding a lot. Lots of fun, thanks for checking in...more pictures soon

City Park Crit, and Tuesday night Crit

Well this past sunday I participated in the City Park Crit in downtown Denver. The race was pretty flat for the most part with a couple of round-a-bout style turns in it. I started the race with Brian and we both ended up getting gapped out and chasing the rest of the race. We were joined a couple of times by people, but after the wicked chase pace that Brian and I put on, it would have been hard for anyone to stay on. Anyway on the last lap I attacked right before the last turn, and nipped Brian in the sprint. About the wicked pace, it wasn't wicked at all, I'm sure Brian will elaborate in his blog.
The tuesday night crit was much better with me actually hanging onto the pack for the entire race. The course was up on table mountain in Golden with a false flat uphill finish. It was a 12 lap race with sprints on every other lap. I sat in for the first 20 minutes or so until one of the sprint laps. Usually somebody had attacked for one of the sprints but on this lap nobody had yet. I had good legs so I went for it and tried to mix it up a little bit. Burned quite a few matches with that effort, but was able to get back into the group and rest a little bit, and wait for the end to happen. I wasn't really sure how many laps we had left, and when we finished, I wasn't quite sure that we were done yet. But I think I finished somewhere in the top 20 or something like that. Anyway the race went good in my mind and I'm really looking forward to this weekend for the crit in Ft. Collins. Anyway I'm off to bed, big day at work tomorrow.