This one goes out to all the rain dogs “enjoying” today’s world championship road race. For I am a rain dog too.
Archive for the ‘Bicycle racing’ Category
‘Everywhere I go it rains on me’
September 29, 2019Water under the bridge
July 27, 2019
This bridge over the Albuquerque Riverside Drain is just off the Paseo del Bosque bike trail south of Interstate 40.
There was a little water running on Thursday’s 66km ride down to the bosque and back, so I could feel the Tour’s pain when Friday’s stage got its icy wings clipped and today’s was likewise heavily edited, basically dialed down to a 33km, mass-start uphill time trial.
“See, Frenchy, if you keep your water in ditches it won’t make a mess of your bike races.”
Here in ’Merica, happily, we restrict our water to ditches so that it does not interfere with our bikey rideys. Because freedom.
Also, moreover, furthermore, and too, we have air conditioning to take the edge off those 110° days.
The “monsoons” are in session here at the moment, and so far the precip’ has been arriving around dinnertime, which is nearly as good as keeping it in ditches. Open the doors and windows and let the fresh air in.
Meanwhile, somebody else threw the doors open and then bolted right on through. Congress just beat feet for a six-week recess. And “recess” seems just the word for this cluster of kindergartners, though the exodus leaves the biggest toddler of them without any supervision, however childish.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see a “For Sale” sign pop up outside the White House.
Whoops. Too late.
This just in from Le Tour
July 26, 2019
I bet Katie Compton would’ve finished this stage.
Gravel is no longer a Thing®. Pass it on.
So 15 minutes ago? How about 85 years?
July 18, 2019
Don’t let the clouds fool you. That’s steam boiling off my bald noggin.
Seventy-one at 5 a.m. No, not me, the temperature.
And that’s outside, mind you. In the office, it’s 78.
We have at least three days of the roast-a-rama ahead, so it’s ride early or not at all. Hunker down in the air conditioning like we did as kids at Randolph AFB outside San Antone. You were either marinating in poisons and pee at the O-club pool or camped out in front of the Fedders window unit, playing Monopoly. Venture outside and you’d sink into the tarry streets like a dinosaur at La Brea, later to mystify alien archaeologists.
The God of the Tar People, discovered when a skeleton was unearthed by Vulcan archaeologists sometime in the distant future. Historical note: Like many a cartoonist, F.O. Alexander got stiffed for his work drawing characters for Monopoly.
“Chlorine must have been an essential nutrient for these semiaquatic creatures. And their god appears to have been this fellow with the archaic headgear and outlandish facial hair, who seems possessed of astonishing wealth.”
The Masi Speciale Randonneur review for Adventure Cyclist has been shipped, as has the August cartoon for Bicycle Retailer. I’m been thinking not very hard about an episode of Radio Free Dogpatch, but it seems podcasts are so 15 minutes ago, just like blogs. Or phrases like “so 15 minutes ago.”
In other news, Ginger Hitler has taken his song-and-dance routine to another Nuremberg rally, where he debuted a new three-syllable chant (he’s a man of few words, which is to say he only knows a few). A new low? Not for long, according to Kevin Drum at MoJo.
And finally, Le Shew Bigge is heading into the Pyrenees, just in time for Zoom-Zoom Froome — who is absent while recovering from a nasty pre-Tour get-off — to be named champion of the 2011 Vuelta a España after Juan José Cobo rang the Dope-O-Meter®.
Yes, that’s 2011. We’re not all the way back to 1934 yet, but we certainly seem headed in that direction.
Roof roof roof
July 15, 2019
Behind the garage the sun is working its leisurely way up the east side of the Sandias.
Otro día, otro dolár.
Bicycle Retailer wants a cartoon, and Adventure Cyclist wants reviews. It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood. All is well, save for … well, you know.
Swear to God, this pendejo is gonna start strolling around with his little orange dingus hanging out, because why not?
Now, the Secret Service doesn’t have anything to fear from me, because I am renowned as a man of peace. But if some itty bitty brown woman with an interest in MMA were to start slapping all the rabies out of Orange Julius Caesar on CNN at prime time, well, I’d probably watch.
Speaking of spectacles, I am not watching Le Tour, though I check in from time to time via Cyclingnews or The Guardian. However, friends are over in Frogland for a closer look at La Grande Boucle.
One couple recently relocated from ’Burque to Lyon, which enjoyed a ride-by during stage eight, from Mâcon to Saint-Étienne. Another is just visiting, but I forget which stage they get to see. One more than me, I expect.
As far as I know, neither couple is motoring around in a Citroën 2CV. But they could be.
Tour de Fence
July 7, 2019
The Sandias as seen from the bottom of Elena, near the casino.
My invitation to Le Tour having gone missing in the mail, I’ve been compelled to ride my own damn bikes around and about in the Duke City.
The high side of the circuit, before dropping down to casino country and then climbing back up.
Between outings I’ve checked in with my old Live Update Guy comrade Charles Pelkey, who is sending his daughter Annika off to Iowa today. She’ll be working for Mayor Pete. No word yet on which horse Chazbo is backing.
In other news, my man Casey B. Gibson did a little surprise gallery for that Boulder-based journal of competitive whatever whose name eludes me. Seems they needed pix from road nats in Tennessee, Casey had them, and that, as they say, was that. Money even changed hands, which is always nice when one is on the job.
Another member of the tribe, Andrew Hood, is the only one of us actually on the scene in France. It being a slow day (team time trial) I joggled his elbow for old times’ sake to see what’s what. No reply yet, because The Hoodlum is a total pro — on the clock, doing the beez-a-neez, and probably not even into the rosé yet.
Meanwhile, The Guardian is doing a live update this year, and it’s not half bad. They’re kicking the shit out of Cyclingnews. I may have to pass them a few of the millions I’ve banked from my stints at Live Update Guy.
Phil ’er up
July 6, 2019
Another blast from the past.
Here we go again (crash, bang, shriek, ow, wow, yow, zow). …
De ’bate, boss! De ’bate!
June 26, 2019
Heading west on Meadow, which kicks off the mostly downhill run to Tijeras.
Welcome to “Fantasy Island,” with a side of “Survivor.”
A couple fantasies should get voted off the island after tonight’s Democratic “debate.”
I steeled myself for the ordeal yesterday by riding the New Mexico Touring Society’s Frost Road Loop, which was something of a spin down Memory Lane. It includes a few bits from the old state road championships circuit, where in 1991 Your Humble Narrator took second in the Masters 35 race after a late crash took out all of the serious contenders save for Laurence Malone (yes, that Laurence Malone).
Yesterday I finished first, Laurence Malone being elsewhere, along with everyone else. I’m still waiting for my gold medal, bouquet, and podium ceremony, though.
My take on the Frost Road Loop was a 40-mile round trip from El Rancho Pendejo, with a couple thousand feet of vertical gain, and it made for a nice change of pace from my usual rides, though NM 14 is under construction through much of Cedar Crest, the Old Route 66 shoulder was slathered in debris and gravel past Zuzax and Tijeras, and the wind — de wind, boss, de wind! — was much in evidence on the homebound leg because I got the traditional late start.
I think we had a little pollen-and-smoke action going on, too, because the snotlocker and eyeballs were grumbling a bit afterward. Not as much as they will be tonight, though. This “debate” is liable to be hard on the nose, eyes and ears.
Rebecca Twigg is homeless in Seattle
April 15, 2019No, seriously. She is.
Some lovely filth, Kaintucky style
December 16, 2018
Cyclocross! Getcha cyclocross here! Get it while it’s hot!
OK, so more like “Get it while it’s cold and sloppy.”
• Late update: Congrats to Katie Compton on No. 15! Damn, I love watching her race. She puts on the Great Stone Face, hangs out the “Open for Business” sign, and goes to work serving out heaping helpings from that 55-gallon drum of whup-ass.
