monday. the start of the flow.

October 22nd, 2007Tags: , , ,
| beauty, bike, portland, running | chris | 0 comments

what a day.

this morning i woke up with deeann who had to get up at 3:50am to get ready for her first day of work. the morning was very peaceful. we both made our way just fine. it’s about a 6 minute drive from our apartment(at 3:50 in the morning. a little longer in the afternoon). she’s thinking about taking her bike to the bus stop in front of the apartment, taking the bus to work and riding the bike home. both OHSU and the VA are up this ginormous hill that overlooks the city to the east. the view is unbelievable.

the sun didn’t show up until about 7:30, which surprised me. i started my day with a delicious cup of coffee. since the skies were quite clear i thought i would go for a run down to the riverfront to watch the sun and the city wake up. it was one of the more amazing runs i’ve been on. crisp air, leaves turning, sky painted all sorts of shades, people going to work, and mt. hood showing up. it was my first glance at mt. hood in it’s completeness. mountains always leave me in awe. it was such a blast running along the river and over the different bridges. it will for sure become one of my regular routes.
after i made my way home i starting cleaning and organizing. that went well. every now and again you have to turn up the tunes and sweat out some good organization.

then i went to get deeann. slightly busier at 5pm than 4:45am. however, it was a site to be seen.  as everyone gets off work and makes their way home you realize among many many other reasons(portland really goes out of its way to be environmentally friendly. more to come on that.) that the people of portland care about the earth. you would have thought there was some kind of bike fair or cycling event going on. nope. just people getting of work. EVERYWHERE. bikes all over the freakin’ place. it was AWESOME! all sorts too. custom single-speeds, fixed gears; you name it, it was on the road. can’t wait to break mine out soon. i’ll keep you posted on that.

then deeann and i went for a bit of a walk on the waterfront. the skies were so beautiful all day. perfectly blue and clear. you could see both mt. hood and mt. st. helen’s all day. there are just a few pictures from the day here.

tomorrow: laundry. can’t wait.

bicycle benefits

September 10th, 2007 | bike, green, green living, just stuff, other sites, randomness | chris | 2 comments

i ran across this this morning paroosing the treehugger website. i like it. just thought i’d share.

The Single Speed

August 27th, 2007 | beauty, bike, crazy, fun, green, green living, single speed, triathlon | chris | 0 comments

over the past week or two i’ve taken a little project on to convert my old red dawes road bike into a single speed commuter. i bought this bike back in 2003 on ebay for $300, added tri bars, new saddle and clips, and i was ready to race. at the end of the 2005 triathlon season i upgraded to this beauty, the cervelo p2 sl; a delicious combination of speed and design. since then the red dawes has been hanging in the garage lonely and depressed.

last week i finished its conversion from 24 speeds to 1. not only is this a great bike to train on but it’s a blast to ride. the best thing, i’ve driven my car 3 times in the last week. goodbye, gas pump. goodbye.

Dawes - The Racing BikeDawes - The Racing BikeCervelo - The Racing BikeCervelo - The Race BikeCervelo - The Racing BikeCervelo - The Racing BikeDawes - Single Speed GutsDawes - Single Speed SkeletonDawes - The finished Single SpeedDawes - The finished Single SpeedDawes - The finished Single SpeedDawes - The finished Single Speed

check out some of the conversion pictures and some more bike porn here.

the tour de france

July 7th, 2007 | bike, crazy, fun, just stuff, other sites | chris | 0 comments

Today the Tour de France starts with it’s opening Prologue with the first stage starting tomorrow.  If, for some unfortunate reason, you don’t know what The Tour is, simply stated it’s a race up and all around France and some surrounding areas.   They just happen to cover over 2,200 miles.  And if you haven’t seen a map of France, it is not a flat country.  Did I mention they do it all from July 7th to July 29th?  Yeah, 22 days and something like 1 day off.  Some equate it to doing a marathon every single day for 20 days straight.  Sounds like fun.
The tour (and cycling in general) is going to have a bit of a monkey on it’s back it seems for awhile.  Now that the celebrity champ Lance Armstrong is out of the picture and the gloom of doping alligations are riddled throughout the sport, I’m not sure when the sport will overcome it.  Or maybe it won’t matter.  Maybe this is something that most sports have to embrace(not condone, just accept that doping is here to stay) and figure out better ways of catching and punishing athletes.  It’s unfortunate that it is even an issue, however I do know fellow cyclists and fans that it really isn’t an issue.  They enjoy the sport for what it is.

You’ll be able to keep up with the race at letour.fr (be sure to click on the “english language” button) and at versus.com.

(p.s. This post was made using an iPhone)

Hy-Vee World Cup Triathlon!! – post-race

June 18th, 2007 | bike, family, morning, triathlon | chris | 0 comments

Hy-Vee World Cup Triathlon 2007

What a weekend! We had a full day of racing yesterday from my race in the early morning to watching the Men and Women’s Pro races in the afternoon. All day in the sun! You can see the pictures from all three races here.

My race was great! The course was beautiful, the weather was perfect, spectators all the way from the start to the finish, it was just a blast! I really didn’t train too well for this race, but mostly just wanted to enjoy it. I found myself taking it all too seriously last year and luckily was able to back off and enjoy being able to race again.

The Pro races were unbelievable to watch. This race was unique not only because it was a World Cup race in Iowa of all places, but that the prize purse was so huge. The winners of both the men’s and women’s races received $200,000 and an H3 Hummer. These athletes do this for a living. In order for them to receive this same amount, they would normally have to win 10-12 races. The cash given out at this race was HUGE! It made for quite the specticle. They started out at Gray’s Lake, did their swim-to-bike transition there, then rode to the capital building where they did 6 laps downtown, followed by 4 laps running. Watching their transitions was amazing. The would literally go from swimming to biking and biking to running in less than 10 seconds. It was amazing. My first transition time yesterday was one minute and nine seconds. I that’s not too bad for me. My second one was at about 45 seconds. Either way, these people could jump off their bike and put running shoes on faster than anyone I’ve seen. Not only that, but they would do each leg of the race so fast and with such strategy. It was a blast to watch.

So check out the pictures from the race!!

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