Hanging out in SoCal, and racing too…

// March 20th, 2007 // A Day Down Under

G’day readers,

I say that quite loosely, as i am not sure how many people are reading my new blog here at missingsaddle.com! If you are reading, please make a comment so as i know the comments thing works! It isn’t that hard really, i mean, i figured it out… You only need to leave your email address and a name, you can even make up a name if you like. The email address you leave will not be sent random emails trying to sell you stuff, it is just so i can be told by email someone has left a comment at the site. I am mainly sending this message to Wilksch, DeLuca, Dad, (Keally!),(she is in brackets as she just made a comment!) and my other regular comment makers, cos i am missing reading them!!!!

Well now that i got that whingeing out of the way i can continue with an update!

OK, I just figured out that i had a heap of comments waiting to be approved, MY BAD! I didn’t realise i needed to do that, so now i will make sure they all come through! I left my little sook up from the previous paragraph so everyone can have a laugh at my expense! What a goose! Oh well, the coments thing is sorted now, and i am sorry if your names were mentioned!!!! haha!

Things are going well here in San Diego, and last week i got to ride with two very good friends of mine from Orange County, who made the trek down to San Diego, Marc, and Patrick, from Laguna Cyclery. When i came to the States in 2005, on my own, these guys were fantastic in helping me out, getting me to races, and finding me a place to live, so it was great to be able to ride with them again!

We got to do a great ride, which somehow we ended up on one of the rides we did two weeks ago at training camp, and had a great time catching up. It was great to see they are both still doing well, and hopefully they will make it out to Redlands to watch the race there this weekend. For anyone who does go, you will know if Marc is there, because you will hear him from a mile away!!!!

At San Dimas, we got to do an uphill TT, which is always fun, followed by a road race, then a crit. While warming up for the TT, i came across a sign warning people in the area of Mountain Lions, and to please keep children in sight at all times. I figured i didn’t want to venture too far off road myself, because i am sure a mountain lion could do a bit of damage to me too, not just a young child!

Willo showed off his trendsetting style, getting changed out of his cycling gear, but leaving his cycling shoes and shoe covers on! I think it is going to be the new “in thing” and all the fans are going to start doing the same thing…

San Dimas was a bit of a nightmare for Jittery Joe’s. The TT was more than likely won by our Japanese star Cesar Grajales, but some timing confusion meant he was given 4th place for the stage, but we still had big Neil Shirley in 3rd, so it didn’t matter too much.
The next day we had the road race, and all was going good, and then when the split happened and we got Cesar and Neil in it, it was great! That was until they both punctured within a kilometer of eachother, and didn’t get back to the break – you couldn’t think of a worse way to have the race taken out of our grasp! At the end of the day all we could do was laugh!
Also, Cesar made up for the bad luck of Saturday by winning the criterium on Sunday! Wicked!

On the way back from San Dimas we saw a truck that tried to enter the freeway as fast as a formula one driver, and found that he probably doesn’t have the cornering ability of one of the race cars. I reckon i did a good job a snagging the photo as we drove past pretty quick! Makes for an interesting blog photo too!

One other interesting photo taken out training was on our way to the coast on a coffee shop/recovery ride:

We were crossing a bridge and got held up by Willo, complete with his cans from the night before. It was difficult to get past him, but we did manage. I reckon he did a good job of being able to ride with so much stuff hanging off him and his bike!

Wel dudes, that’s all for now. We leave for Redlands tomorrow, where we are hoping to have luck on our side, and get a good GC result for the team. Things are going great, and i am sure if luck had gone our way on the weekend, Cesar or Neil could well have been in the leader’s jersey at the end of the weekend.

This page still has a bit more developing to happen, but it is headed in the right direction. So i hope y’all are enjoying it! Feel free to comment, or even if you don’t feel like it, just do it anyway!

Laters…