Le Tour de France 2009

In case you’ve been living under a rock somewhere and didn’t know, Le Tour de France starts tomorrow July 4th! Personally, I can’t wait! Stage one is going to be a 15.5km time trail between the principality of Monaco and France. Day 1 is always exciting and I’ll be torn between heading out for a ride myself or sitting on the couch watching. Here is a link to the official website where you can stay up to date on all the standings and watch live video. Also, for all you folks who might be home during the day over the next three weeks, OLN is broadcasting the action. 

Vive Le Tour! 

June Training Diary – Ken

It’s funny how perceptions change. With experience comes a wisdom that guides and shapes everything forward.

The same is true on the bike. It was just a week ago that Sheldon came down for the 2009 Summer Solstice – The night before we were sharing laughs over a pint and we started talking about potential strategies going into the Transrockies. Where we were going to try and push, where we were going to try and go with the flow. It was all good, I could see the race materialize before my eyes.

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Sheldon’s June Training Diary

June, ahhhh… How fondly I remember you. It doesn’t feel like that long ago June felt so very, very far away, and well, now it’s passed. Where did the time go? When I decided to join Ken and commit to the Transrockies I knew it would be a huge undertaking. It would involve dedicating my week nights and weekends to training – to turning myself from a guy in moderately good shape, into one capable of marathon distance stage race mountain biking. Sounded easy enough…

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’09 Summer Solstice

Summer has officially begun, and with it came the annual Summer Solstice XC race in Bragg Creek, Alberta.

The course doesn’t to vary tremendously from year to year, and there’s good reason — It’s a near perfect compliment of aggressive sustained climbing, long winding descents and of course some great views of the foothills/rockies. This year there were also some new stretches of single track added as well – They’ll be better once they mature (in my opinion), but were still a great way to mix it up.

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Diesel Power

As I get closer and closer to the Transrockies, my training rides are getting longer and longer. What used to be a 1h30min ride 4 days a week, has turned into a 2h, then a 3h, and now they’re pushing 4hours. The pace of these rides isn’t manic; it’s more sustainable and consistent and this makes sense considering something someone said to be a few months ago about the TRC, “it’s about staying out of your anaerobic zone for as long as you can.”

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Balloon Tire

Ken and I were out for a ride yesterday. It was supposed to be an epic shred through the Edmonton river valley from my place to Terwilliger (a singles-track mecca) in the south west of the city. The ride there went to plan – including both of us surviving our own spectacular spills. Ken’s slide out won for most blood drawn, while I’d have to say my endo over the bars might have won for style points. Both of us walked away from the spills no problem and we made it to Terwilliger where we thoroughly hammered the the trails for a good hour. One the way back however, I felt my rear wheel was going “thud, thud, thud…” and when I looked down it looked warped. I stopped immediately and got off to take a look.

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Spandex Bibs vs. Shorts

Epic Battle #1

When I first stated looking into bib shorts I found myself generally ridiculed, both by my wife and more significantly my friends – One of which referred to my set up as a “onesie”. As I spoke to more and more cyclists however, the bib short consistently rose up as as the “pro” choice. As such, I decided that bibs deserved at least a chance to earn a spot in my closet.

Generally speaking, I’ve never really been adverse to spandex, I’ve worn it for a quite a long time – albeit previously under “cooler” baggy riding shorts. As my training regime became more structured and I began adding road rides to my schedule I eventually lost the baggy shorts and just went with spandex, though for a shorter, more recreational ride I’ll still pull out the ‘baggies’. Many non-cyclists may think spandex is ridiculous, but when it comes to cycling, it’s standard gear, less cumbersome than other materials, keeps you cooler, and here to stay so learn to love it!

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Canada Cup, Edmonton AB 2009

Canada Cup, Edmonton AB – 2009 from Sheldon Smart on Vimeo.

Although I wasn’t in this race, despite planning and training for it, I did get to watch some wicked national level racing, and cheer on some of the locals guys that I know. Dana, sorry about your chain, man… You were killin’ it till it snapped! Sam, good to see you out there bringin’ the beats as usual. Peter, 4th place Masters Expert! Wooo hoo!!! And Paul, I think you said this was your first race in 4 years, so welcome back! 

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The Bike Shop

Ever found yourself leaning back in your chair dreaming about how great it would be to open your own bike shop? I know I have. A lot. Bike shops are one of those magical places to me. The second I walk in and smell the rubber, I get excited. That might sounds a little funny, but I know I am not the only one.

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QWERTY Bike Grips

It’s not often I run across things that satisfy my inner dork as well as well as my inner rider, but when I came across these QWERTY keyboard handlebar grips, I was in dork/rider bliss. It’s a happy Wednesday.

via SwissMiss