May | 2013 | Steve Tilford

How about that Tour of California finish yesterday? Man, did those guys look beat. That last hill must of been unreal. Guys were losing 10 minutes in 3 miles. It had to of been the heat. It was somewhere well into the 100’s. If you haven’t had a chance to check it out, here is a link.

Yesterday, I got a bunch of stuff done. Worked on a car Bill’s car, which got smashed from behind and I’m getting for Michael Fatka. It is a 1999 Subaru Outback with 80K. Pretty reliable car. I put new brakes on it all around. The headlights were super foggy, plastic and I got one of those 3M buffer kits from the auto parts store. It worked crazy good. I’ll post some photos.

I’m in a rush now. I have physical therapy on my shoulder at 9 am. That is way too early for me. I told Burt, my PT guy, that it used to be that I was coming in for pretty much a shoulder and neck massage and now it is for a weight lifting session. Pitiful weight lifting, but still weight lifting. I liked the massage better.

Right after, I’m driving to Lawrence and getting a blood test. I figure since I haven’t eaten in two days, that would be interesting. I go to EconoLabs.com and it seems pretty cheap. I’m doing a CBC, iron, and cholesterol. If you have a LabCorp near you, the EnonoLabs work.

Then I’m eating. It has been 60 hours. I got a lot of flak on the comments yesterday about fasting for a couple days. I wasn’t doing it for any specific reason, just thought it might be interesting. Kind of like when Forest Gump decided to go run, for no “particular reason”. It is kind of fun trying new things out, switching it up a little. I am mildly surprised how easy it has been. No real hungry pains. The main issue is just not having the routine of eating and snacking, of course. It couldn’t hurt anything because I’m already in a Spring funk that seems to last into early Summer. I am going to go to an allergy doctor and address it though. I figure since I’ve obviously met my health insurance deductible, I might as well make use of it and catch up on some health issues I’ve been avoiding.

I’m going to eat at the First Watch. It is a chain, I believe. There is one in Lawrence. Pretty good breakfast selection. I’m not going back into eating slowly. Just gonna start eating, like when Forest decided to stop running.

It’s going to be 92 today here. Pretty warm for May, a record if it materializes. Nothing like yesterday in California, but hot enough. Okay, got to go.

Headlight before.

Headlight after.

New brakes. I don’t know why I keep posting photos of brake jobs. I think it is because just looks so nice compared to before.

I was watching the Tour of California on the Internet yesterday and Paul Sherwin said something about Philip Gilbert dropping back and changing his socks during the race. I didn’t see it, but that seemed super strange to me. I’ve never even though about doing something like that. Paul said something about maybe Philp was putting on some special “ice socks” or something. I’ve never heard of ice socks. Socks with pockets for ice. I couldn’t imagine wanting to cool my body enough to ride with wet feet. Then Paul said something like, “Maybe as the reining world champion, he just wants to look good?” Right Paul, that is it.

Anyway, I was looking through my sock draw yesterday, looking for some light socks to wear at 94 degrees (not with slots of ice) and found the original pair of DeFeet socks that I got from Jacque Boyer. I believe he gave them to me at Sea Otter, somewhere in the 90’s. I have worn this very pair of socks, 100’s of times and they still don’t have a hole in the toes. I don’t quite understand that. Either, DeFeet made the socks much higher quality, or…. well, I don’t have another explanation.

Cycling socks are so interesting to a racing cyclist. They are an easy way for a “real racer” to identify a novice. Over the years, it is strange how the style or trends have changed.

Back when I first went to Europe, back in the 80’s, all the Pros and Western Europeans worn wool socks from Italy. I only had a couple pairs. I mainly worn super thin nylon socks I got at K Mart, which cost about 1/10 the price. It was sort of a status symbol by then having a bunch of Italian wool socks, at least to a poor kid like me. I remember going up to LaCrosse, Wis., to stay with Mark Frise before the Tour de l’Abitibi, a prestigious junior stage race. We were getting dressed to ride the first day and Mark opened a draw that was just stuffed with Italian wool socks. It dumb struck me. I was so jealous. Mark went on to be the first American to win the race.

When all the Pros were wearing short wool socks, the Russians would be wearing these mid calf socks made in Russia, I guess. It looked so weird. All the Eastern Europeans wore the same mid calf socks. We could never understand why they couldn’t get with the program and dress stylish.

When I was riding for Levis, we hired Jiri Manus, newly to the US, via Czechoslovakia, to help coach our team. Jiri had a stellar resume. He was on the podium in the Olympics and World Championships. He won the British Milk Race and the Peace Race, the two best amateur races in the world. But, he hadn’t westernized enough for our team. Roy (Knickman), kept trying to help Jiri catch up with modern ways. Jiri would pour a bunch of oil into a pan and fry bacon in the morning. Then he would crack a few eggs into the pool of grease and dump it all over toast. We, as cyclists, were avoiding most fat completely. Plus, Jiri would only wear, mid calf, white socks. That was the deal breaker. Jiri was let go. He went on to be the National Coaching Director for USAC for the next 20 years, so it was probably for the best.

When I started racing MTB, every good rider wore road cycling socks. All good riders except Dave Wiens. Dave would wear hightop black socks. Man, did it seem so out of place at the time. He took a lot of flak over the years, but he was the “inventor” of mid calf black socks for MTB racing.

Socks were short, now mid calf. It is sort of like watching the shorts that basketball players wear. Watching Magic Johnson and Co. back in the day, it seems that they are wearing hot pants compared to the knee length shorts the current generation likes.

DeFeet was the company that changed the cycling sock industry. Socks with logos. Man, was that a game changer. Socks that matched the kits. It was nearly as big a change for cycling as t-shirts with words on them were, in the 70’s, for the general public. We never looked back after that. Soon, there were a lot of copy cat companies of DeFeet, but they were the original custom sock people. Shane Cooper is the founder of DeFeet. He is a eclectic guy. His business card says something like chief sockologist on it. Pretty great title. Greg Demgen, a team mate of mine forever, worked with Shane at DeFeet for a long while. I’m sure that there were plenty of young riders jealous of my collection of socks at that time.