Better

This is my buddy Bill waiting out our only minutes of Rain while cycling the France. I realized that any day in France (wet or dry, rain or shine) exceeds any day at the office (or ranch). Cafe anyone?

I'm going to Heaven!

Its over.
Yes, today it ended.
Now I get to go to HEAVEN (aka Seattle)

Free, Free, Free.
LIFE IS GOOD!

Apologies

Gosh...the last 10 days have been crazy. I have not had a computer for those days because every electronic piece of equipment I travel with (and there are a lot of them) was stolen from my room in Miami Beach. I'm slowly getting myself back to the current times...just in time to leave for France. Also in the last 10 days I went from Tucson to Seattle, to Miami, to Vermont, to Lenox Massachusetts, to Hartford, CT...back to Tucson and now I will leave for Miami on Monday then land on French soil for 14 days of blissful riding in the Pyrenees AND the South of France. Please check out my TDF blog for the play by play that will start next week.

My Mix

I'm back diggin' music. Here is my list of most played from my Ipod (in order of importance) If you haven't listened to any...please do, they are impactful lyrics as to where I am:

Camille - "Ta Douleur"
Skye - "What's Wrong with Me"
Carbon Leaf - "Changeless"
The Fray - "How To Save a Life"
Indigo Girls - "Closer to Fine"
James Blunt - "Wisemen"
Athlete - "Tourist"
Jackopierce - "Three of Us in a Boat"
KT Tunstall - "Suddenly I See"
Toby Lightman - "Leave It Inside"
Skye - "Love Show"

State TTT Championships

Okay we had a great ride. It was a 40K race with a couple of gravel sections (300meters of it). I pulled really hard and probably spent 40% of the team time ON the front. I pushed the pace to an average of 24-26 mph for most of the time I was on the front. We flew. We passed three teams in front of us and knew we hit the podium. We missed being the State TTT Champions by about 1 minute, taking 2nd place. Our field was the biggest at 24 women...so we were pretty excited with the results!

Eighteen Inches

I arrived home (Seattle) yesterday. It was an odd journey given all the new and oddly applied rules in airtravel. I couldn't take tooth paste, but I could easy board with my deodorant, hard drive, computer, electric tooth brush with who knows what could have been packed inside. Oh...I also managed to make it through TSA with a knife attached to my wine opener (don't ask why I was carrying it...because I have no idea).

The most curious part of my travels was upon landing at SeaTac, I took the bus home. I often enjoy taking Metro (the bus) from the airport to my lovely home by the lake. The characters, sounds, smells are not always pleasant...but commonly provide humor and interest for the day and often the week that follows. So I play the scene:

A rather gregarious bus driver greets me as I board with my luggage; he is genuine in his wishes of good days for all those departing. I locate a seat just past those reserved for handicap (those that line the aisle) and sit a row back. A the very next stop a bulky black man with several non-descript tattoos in his 40's wearing a baseball cap places his bike on the front of the bus, boards the bus...greeting the driver like they were bruthers from the hood...then he sits in the first seat at the front of the bus facing the aisle. The conversation when something like this...

MAN: "brother, I tell ya...I've been traveling some distance...it must have been something near...gosh..10 miles."

DRIVER: "I hear ya. That will tire you out."

MAN: "oh yes, it works me."

DRIVER: "gives you a great heart."

MAN: "oh yeah...I've got a great heart man, it two ways brother, two ways."

DRIVER: "well its crazy out there. you've got to be careful. I'm a big bus and people think I can stop on a dime."

MAN: "I can stop on a dime."

DRIVER: "well statistics say that the more you ride..."

MAN: "don't you be spewing that nonsense. I'm not superstitious."

DRIVER: "I'm not superstitious either, but statistics say and chances are.."

MAN: "don't even say that! we create our own destiny bruther. There are only 18" from the head to the heart and once you think it here (pointing to his head) AND you make it happen here (pointing to his heart), its all YOU.

Its about this time...I realized these guys were speaking two different languages. One from his head, the other from his heart. I realized the INTENTION from where the MAN was speaking and it rocked my soul. I felt my eyes begin to water, my face lifted from the stress and tension. Just then, the man looked down the aisle and to the very seat I was sitting. His eyes reached into my soul...asking me IF I were living with INTENTION. He got up from his seat, having reached his destination and he said to me from the front of the bus..."you have the most beautiful eyes. take care sweetheart."

Red Powder?

More news is coming out of the Operacion Puerto affair, which seemingly has links to several different locations around the world. German magazine Der Spiegel reported that the Spanish Guardia Civil found fake EPO, originating from China, at Dr Eufemiano Fuentes Madrid laboratory, as well as anabolic products from a "secret laboratory". There are also reportedly small groups of "doping doctors" all over the globe with links to Dr Fuentes.

In their searches, the Guardia Civil found four envelopes containing a red powder, which is able to neutralise synthetic EPO so that it doesn't show up in urine tests. It's guessed that riders rub the powder on their hands and drop some of it in as they give a sample.

RAMROD

Well, this was my 5th year doing RAMROD. Wow, what a ride; 150 miles and 10K feet of gain in just one day. It is probably the most magical ride I've done and will ever do (well we shall see what the Pyrenees has for me in September). I rode this ride with 5 other stellar people and it was a total blast. We had Shawn, Kurt, Kris, Me, Lisa and Kris. We held together, working as a team the entire 9.5 hours of the day. We all committed to doing the 415 mile Ride of the Rockies next year. Come join us!!!!

Meditation at Lagunitas

A discovered love letter...
------------------------
All the new thinking is about loss.

In this it resembles all the old thinking.
The idea, for example, that each particular erases
the luminous clarity of a general idea. That the clown-
faced woodpecker probing the dead sculpted trunk
of that black birch is, by his presence,
some tragic falling off from a first world
of undivided light. Or the other notion that,
because there is in this world no one thing
to which the bramble of blackberry corresponds,
a word is elegy to what it signifies.
We talked about it late last night and in the voice
of my friend, there was a thin wire of grief, a tone
almost querulous. After a while I understood that,
talking this way, everything dissolves: justice,
pine, hair, woman, you and I. There was a woman
I made love to and I remembered how, holding
her small shoulders in my hand sometimes,
I felt a violent wonder at her presence
like a thirst for salt, for my childhood river
with its island willows, silly music from the pleasure boat,
muddy places where we caught the little orange-silver fish
called pumpkinseed. It hardly had to do with her.
Longing, we say, because desire is full
of endless distances. I must have been the same to her.
But I remember so much, the way her hands dismantled bread,
the thing her father said that hurt her, what
she dreamed. There are moments when the body is as numinous
as words, days that are the good flesh continuing.
Such tenderness, those afternoons and evenings,
saying blackberry, blackberry, blackberry.

Robert Haas

--------------

wouldn't it be cool???

Landis the new Lance?

I can't believe the remarks I read from Lance on Landis' win. One thing for sure...Landis is no Lance; he has much more class than the ass from Tex-ass. I certainly don't hear Landis talking smack...except that he's going to go race a few crits (what is he nuts?). I often read the blog funny tan lines and I think the guy covers the topic pretty well. Read it here.

Weddings and Things

I watched my best friend suze get married this weekend. It was a perfect setting; Lopez Island in the San Juan (of Pacific Northwest), sunny and 72 degrees. My buddy Guy and I flew up in his little Cessna - landed on the remote island and walked to the church. Wow, it really sucks to be me! (grin)

Ulrich's TDF Doping Plan

PER documents found in Operation Puerco...check this out!

For the first seven days of the Tour, Dr. Fuentes prepared him a series of hormones, insulin, cortisone, testosterone and blood transfusions, the newspaper alleged. It claimed that there was a "Roadbook" for the Tour 2005, which investigators link to Ullrich.

On the first day, according to the SZ, the hormone HZ was listed, the second day insulin I-3, the hormone TGN and cortisone, the third day TGN and PCH (a testosterone shot), on the fourth day HMG, a hormone mixture, a "rest day" on the fifth day, the sixth day insulin I-3, and on the last day, the re-infusion of his own blood, as well as insulin I-3 and vitamin E.

MIA to SEA

Just landed back in Seattle yesterday. Its time to ride in weather that is far more normal...
Actually, I'm climbing aboard my R3 sweet machine in just 10 minutes. See ya!

One word...Calzati

Thank goodness for Calzati, the young frenchman that stole stage 8 of the TDF yesterday...or Frenchmen around the country would be ending their life after the PK loss in world cup last night. GO FLOYD...or shall we say Praying Landis.

Go FRANCE!

Okay...with a name like Picard, what do you expect from me?.
We even have region name for our famous people (Picardy).Go Zizou!

One Dress

How cool is this...
A woman is making a statement against fashion and the foolish buying of trends. She is wearing the same brown dress for a year. I dig it! Check it out...as she attempts to make it work, and work, and work....
http://www.littlebrowndress.com/

Me Rocket

Here is a picture of me in the TT (stage 2) of the Mt. Hood Cycling Classic. I was a rocket!!!!

Our TDF Jersey design...

My friend Guy is really baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahd. He asked that sheep/goats be part of this year's tour de france cycling trip. I decided to design an official jersey for the adventure. I think he is going to love it.

Pyrenees Sheep Co.

Catch us if Ewe Can!
Tour de France 2006

Deadly Weapons...just ask Thor!

Innocent?

The french say that sex is as much a part of politics as drugs are a part of cycling. Oddly in the post Lance era the biggest dopping scandal rocks the tour de france just 24 hours before its start.
Oscar Sevilla, Jan's teammate from T-mobile was found to be named in the Spanish blood doping investigation. He along with 158 other althetes from several sports were "black listed." Now many complain that if these riders (Jan, Basso, Mancebo, etc.) were only accusted not proven guilty. However, I think about the inverse....what if we let them continue to ride in the tour...then the focus would be on them and their performance. I think it would destroy the race more than not having them in it.
Jan did win the tour de swiss...he looks a little cocky here for his medical.


Ivan's a pretty handsome guy...but gosh those tan lines are a bit much. I do notice that these riders have no pecks. I kinda like them that way.

Here georgie is amuzed that his name wasn't on the list. Okay...kidding, but seriously, I think they are all doping...WADA just doesn't know what it is...yet.