I was 100% behind the removal of radios from bicycle racing. I think it takes away from the moment. Takes the intellect out of the sport. Makes it mechanical.

Now I’m struggling with the same dilemma with cell phones. And the internet somewhat. Don’t get me wrong. There are times that a cell phone is indispensable. And the information that is on the internet is beyond mind boggling and useful.

But, it seems that a lot of people are so into documenting their doings that they aren’t doing them anymore. And that people are so into checking out what their friends are doing that they’re doing nothing more than checking out what their friends are doing.

Cell phones are a different dilemma. There is something to be said about being out somewhere riding and only having yourself and the guys you’re with to rely on. Just the possession of the phones takes away from that unity. It disrupts the flow of the ride. Even if no one is talking on them. It is strange when there is a flat or a pee stop, everyone pulls their phones out to check for messages or texts. It takes us all out of the moment. Changing flats should be like walking home from school when you were a kid. A good thing. A time to get the read on what’s going on during the ride. A time to catch a glimpse of what everyone else you’re with is experiencing.

I don’t have many photos from when I raced before there were digital cameras. I have some photos of where I was when I raced. But, unless a photo was published in a magazine, I had no photos from the race. We were busy racing. And enjoying the travel. We weren’t much into documenting it. Now the documentation seems to be nearly as important as the experience itself. The experience is 1000 X more important. A photo doesn’t come close. The sounds, the smells, the other million things that the picture doesn’t capture.

It’s kind of like racing cyclo-x. Either you get cyclocross or you don’t. And when you do get cyclocross, you realize how special it is. You realize that it takes a trillion skills simultaneously to do it correctly. So many skills, that no one person can possess them all. It’s you against the course. Then you against the competition. A photo can capture a glimpse of cross, but you have to do it to understand it fully.

I don’t know where I’m going with this. I guess it is something like, let’s try to spend more time living the moments. And while we’re living these moments, we should leave the documentation until later. I think it will add to our quality of life.

I was thinking how nice it is that the season, the road season, is starting up again. In Europe. Domestically.

I do like riding my bike. I like training. But, racing is why I train. I will ride no matter what, but I train to race.

At the end of last season, a lot of today’s domestic pros seem kind of less than enthused about racing. I was listening to a few guys talk at the end of last season and I keep hearing ” I have to go to” here or I got to do” this race or that race.

I think of it like I get to go to this race. I get to go there. There is a huge difference between have to and get to. There is hardly ever a race that I am planning on going to that I’m not looking forward to riding/racing. It has never seemed to be a job. It’s not a job. It’s a passion. A life. If it comes down to “have to”, I’m not gonna.

Salt Creek Criterium was today. The 2nd day in Tulsa. I knew today was going to be frustrating. It’s not ever good on the 2nd day of a regional race after finishing 1st & 2nd the day before. But, that’s fine.

I’m too tired to go over the play by play, although it was pretty interesting and kind of unusual. Brad Huff, Jelly Belly, showed up today. I realized he was going to have a frustrating day. But Brad knew it too.

Chad Cagle won today. He is from Tulsa, so it’s all good. Brian was 2nd. Chad’s team mate, Jason Waddell was 3rd. Brad was 4th. Nick finished 5th and I was 6th, but was relegated to 9th for going in too early after flatting. Whatever. Catherine made it 2 for 2 and is still at a 100% win ratio.

Early season racing is so hard. No matter how you look at it. But, there is no way to train that hard.

Spring is officially only a couple weeks away. I love spring. My favorite season by far. And daylight savings time is this weekend. The extra hour of daylight is good for all full time working racers. So, after next weekend, all you basement, trainer type, people have no reason not to get out on the road way, way more often. Maybe just put that trainer away until next winter.

Bromont, pit dog, seems to be already bored with racing.

Brad Huff and I were not going anywhere today.

They had the trainers set up in the middle of a freshly burnt grass section. Great air.

Burning has started already. Oklahoma is a couple weeks ahead of Kansas. I swear I'm not going to be around Kansas for that this year.

Drove down to Tulsa today. A 66 mile circuit race today. 12 laps of a 5.5 mile course with a 3/4 mile climb every lap. Pretty windy. I am feeling way below par, but love Tulsa and am always looking for warmer weather. Since I’m posting this on my phone, long story short-

After some normal spring racing and some pretty weird happenings, Brian and I got away with 30 miles to go and finished alone. I won the race last year, so it was his turn. Brian has now won 100% of the races he has entered this year. I’m 0 out of 3. But, today should/does count as one. Catherine is 100% victorious this year too now.

Tomorrow is another circuit race that they call a criterium. There are 3 of us here. It might be a bit less successful. But, hopefully not.

Photo-Winnings of wine, small stuffed cows and cash. And post race cheeseburgers. Couldn’t ask for more.

We were drinking a fair amount of wine during the KU game. I decided to get out my Campagnolo corkscrew for the occasion. Someone told me that Tullio Campagnolo invented this design. I have never looked that up, but he was a revolutionary designer/inventor, so it wouldn’t surprise me.

I got another blood test yesterday. It’s super cheap if you order it on the internet. I used EconoLabs this time. It is $19 for a CBC. There are other online websites that do the same thing. They send you to a LabCorp Blood Center. They are everywhere. Everywhere but Topeka that is. (I want to be totally transparent with my blood values just in case I get a call by a ProTour Team looking for a replacement player sometime during the season.)

This weekend there are a couple races down in Tulsa. A good road race on Saturday and then a circuit race on Sunday. It is supposed to be in the upper 60’s there so the weather should be nice, finally.

I was given this by some Campagnolo relative when I went to the Campy factory after the World's in 1985.

In use.

For record keeping.

Today, March 4th is the birthday of Antonio Vivaldi. He was born in 1678. If you read about him, you’ll see he lived a very interesting life. No matter what you think of classical music, there is no denial that Vivaldi wrote some pretty moving music. Probably the most well known of his music is The Four Seasons. You should click on the link and give a listen to some of his music. If you didn’t like classical music before, you will now.

As a side note, Michael Aisner posted this on facebook a couple days ago. I couldn’t agree more-I love that so much of nature is indistinguishable from magic. And I love magic. But I NEVER want to know how magic is done and always want to know the tricks of nature.

I’ve experienced this weird thing many, many times. I go on the road for an extended period and when I get home I’m amazed how much stuff I have to deal with. By stuff, I actually mean stuff. Life seems way more simple when you’re living out of a bag with the small amount of clothing, etc. that you brought along originally. Then upon returning home, there is just so much more. I know where I got it, I’m just pretty sure I don’t need it all.

I rode 2 1/2 hours today. It felt like I was back at square one. Hopefully it was full legs from traveling so much. It’s too early in the season to be this tired.

I made macaroni and cheese tonight. My grandmother used to make it for me all the time. It’s baked. And super good. I don’t make it as good as she did, but it is pretty hard to screw it up.

Tomorrow night is the KU vs. KSU basketball game. KU is ranked 2nd after losing last week and KSU is ranked 5th. KU has the longest home winning streak in the country going at 59 games straight. That doesn’t look good for KSU, but it is college basketball. KU has historically had some problems with Kansas State when they are ranked high and playing at home. Anyway, it’s a very important game for KU. Let’s not put a hex on them this time!

I’ve got a basement full of stuff. Luckily I don’t have to deal with it too often. Somewhere down the line I started putting up some of the race signs in the garage. Most are from European races, but some are from the US. I used to take them off the front of the team car after the race was over. Sometimes I had to “borrow them forever” from other places. Andy Hampsten and I “borrowed” the finish line banner from the final stage of the British Milk race. We brought it back to Michael Fatka for him to display in his shop, Michael’s Cyclery. That was an interesting night for sure. They don’t put signs on the cars anymore, they put decals on the windshields. That is a shame. Times change.

Baked macaroni and cheese. I only use extra sharp white cheddar cheese. And it's important to get just the right amount of milk. It was a quandary what wine to drink with it. That wasn't a problem when my grandma made it for me.

I just finished reading Joe Parkin’s book, A Dog in a Hat. I had been meaning to read it for a while now, but somehow never did. It was interesting to me because Joe and I have experienced many of the same things in bicycle racing.

I first met Joe in Belgium. I’m not sure what year. It must of been 1988. I rode many of the same races as Joe writes about in the book. I like that the most interesting things to Joe are observations that only he witnessed. That is a lot of what drives me in the sport. They might not have anything to do with the result. It is a oddity that catches one’s eye. New territory.

I rode the World Professional Road Championships in Ronse in 1988. I have no recollection of Joe Parkin in the race. (I agree with Joe that the crash at the end of that race was tragic. For both Steve Bauer and Claude Criquilion). I rode dozens of kermis races in Belgium. I don’t remember if Joe was ever in one that I rode.

I raced Philly when Joe was riding for Tulip when Zanoli won. I don’t remember Joe there.

Joe and I raced together on Bikes by Kyle in West Virginia thru Philadelphia one year. I didn’t know Joe too well before then. I knew that he loved setting tempo. Scott Monniger got into the leaders jersey and Coor’s Light was short on riders. Engleman had gotten sick and a couple other guys had quit. Len Pettyjohn came to us to “ask” for some help. I really didn’t have anything else going and didn’t mind being a mercenary. But, I wasn’t looking forward to the work. It was work. Joe on the other hand would have done it for free. He was itching to ride at the front in the wind all day. The excitement in his voice. I couldn’t comprehend it. But I appreciated it. To each his own.

I never experienced the drug aspect of the sport Joe writes about. Except from the “getting beaten up on end”. I was cognizant of it, but it wasn’t part of my bike racing sphere. I didn’t care. That was just the start of EPO era and the crazy oxygen enhancing drugs. Amphetamines didn’t make you twice are good. They might make you think your twice as good, I suppose, but it didn’t make a huge enough difference to make it fruitless for a guy like me.

Joe raced MTB internationally for a few years when I was on Specialized. But, his heart wasn’t into it. His heart was in racing on the road in Belgium and it is eloquently stated in this book. You should read it if you looking for a few small glimpses of the life experiences of a guy that lived the hard life.

Tonight was my last night in Austin for awhile. We went out to Chewy’s with Maureen. Chewy’s is one of Lance’s favorite restaurants in town, I guess. It is pretty good Mexican. Someplace you shouldn’t miss if you happen through. So, back to snowy Kansas tomorrow. It is nearly Spring, so it won’t be snowy too much longer. Just windy.

Good reading.

After camping out at her house for the better part of a month, Maureen still buys dinner.

At the Austin airport- a 10 ft. LAF guitar.

Back of a T-shirt of the guy sitting behind us at Chewey's.

The Birki is tomorrow. 53 km from Cable to Hayward. It has snowed a bunch there. So much so that the organization had to hire more front loaders to remove snow for the parking. A record 8500 skiers are doing the race tomorrow. It has been a pretty snowy winter throughout the country. A lot of cyclists are going to have pretty white legs probably through April at least. We’ve all be cursing under our breath and then there are the skiers in the Midwest, Northwest, Northeast that are loving it. I left Texas for the North Carolina Mountains for some special training. But, the weather changed so I’m trying to hightail it back to Austin for this weekend. The way the airlines have become, I think it will probably be fruitless.

Below is Team Radioshack’s Het Volk starters. Bjorn was probably skiing the Birkie last year. Now look. Good Luck to him! Watch Live here.

Team Radioshack
121 Fumiyuki Beppu
122 Sam Bewley
123 Daryl Impey
124 Grégory Rast
125 Sebastien Rosseler
126 Bjorn Selander
127 Gert Steegmans
128 Tomas Vaitkus

Nick asked Maureen a couple nights ago if she liked Menage a Trois? We all were taken back. Nick was talking wine. It took a little while to clarify.

Back to Kansas for March. The normal highs in Kansas are 48 for March 1st to 62 for March 31st. Even in Austin the highs have hardly been near 50 this past week. Maybe it might get back to closer to normal. I wouldn’t want to lose the pitiful tan I have.

Texas is a big Republican state with Austin a Democratic island. I heard it time and time again on the radio last week about the 9 inches of snow in Dallas. About “so much for global warming”. Now it snowed today in Austin. Just fuel to the flames. I had to go over to the Apple store to get my phone looked at once again and all the employees there were outside taking photos. I guess it was pretty unusual for here. The normal high is 66 now, so it’s pretty much colder than usual. At dinner, they closed the cafe 2 hours early because of the weather. The concrete was barely wet, let alone slick. It is strange what people get used to and what they consider extreme.

I needed a day off anyway. We rode 3 hours yesterday and it wasn’t that warm. But it was pretty windy so it wasn’t much of a rest day. Laying around today isn’t too bad. We went to Avatar at the IMAX Theater in downtown last tonight. It was awesome.

Better cancel school.

Normal sit down, candlelight dinner in the dining room.

Photo of a crosswalk sign from Oman that Trudi sent.