..little wheels..

2009-04-14T09:02:00.004-04:00

New Richmond, VA track and sun, and the new HBR jersey too. I think this might have been the final but not sure where everybody else went!!

The new .38Special in limited edition Chrome.. sweet!

And the car we want to buy, depending on time of day, latest forecasts from the doom and gloom merchants controlling the economy and the sphincter muscle in my bottom that might well let go at any moment if I don't stop worrying about things that I can't control.. :)

NMKY bloggin no more

2009-03-10T15:38:00.002-04:00

He's quit, the slacker. Now I have no idea what goes on in the land of the Wigan Big Mac, wrestling mums in Tesco's (not that NMKY wrestled mums, it's just that the women oop north are a bit tough) and how many times he'll tell me he's going to order a new bike.. which by the way he finally did, a Dialled at that too - though he doesn't have a blog anymore to post about the purchase.. When did he start talking about the new bike, longer than me wanting a Standard? I think it must be last year some time, still if he has the bug to race again and leave the mic alone that'll be a good thing.. Come on the NMKY, top 10 in 30-39cr I think this year.

Quicky

2009-03-10T10:02:00.002-04:00

Think that's the second time I've used that title.

The weekend has been and gone, in the 70's for the most part, was lovely. Saturday we managed to achieve very little, although I did my first Sushi meal on Friday night and my stomach was not feeling too chipper. In theory I love the idea of Sushi. I love fish, I love all the things that go into the ingredients, but I just could not get rid of the fish smell 24hours later, so that's kind of put me off. Still, I did it, and although we had a little 'earnest discussion' on where to park going to Silver Spring we had a nice evening. Saturday was all but done by lunch time, as we accomplished little, other than play with the cats and enjoy the warm air in the house for a change. The afternoon we headed over to Mo and James, and I promptly fell asleep on the couch, guess I must have been tired. I am not sure what happened Saturday night, we tried to watch Schindlers List, but that's a tough movie so I think we caved in and read in bed! Life of a rock star I lead.

Sunday was funday, all about the bmx in the nice weather. I spent pretty much the whole day down at Severn. Track was in great condition, a bit soft on the first straight, which was tough going on flats, but the rhythm section and third straight were flowing nice, so after a lot of gates I spent some time working combinations on that. I was planning on riding the new Richmond track, photos look great, but heard all sorts of conflicting stories about how good it is. NBL have employed a new track builder and I am not convinced by him, his tracks appear to be very very tame. Riders need pushing, not multiple rollers and 10ft wide doubles. I heard the Morristown indoor track was easy too, soo glad I didn't waste my money there. I read what people write on Vintagebmx about awesome the track was but all the riders that post are 30 something novs and cruiser riders. It's not about our age groups anymore, it should be about the young kids and giving them the opportunity to aim for Olympics etc, a dumb indoor track isn't going to create the next Mikey Day, they just get bored and quit. Ah well.

Work is good, busy, but manageable, hence the update this morning.

Nothing new on the car front. If something pops up I like then maybe I'll swap, truth is I can't decide what I want. Well, actually I can. I want a Ford Explorer to get my bikes in, just one that does 25mpg and no stupid door handles! Ford have taken to putting the door release on the end of the door armrest, but no handle to hold on to, it's below and in an awkward position. It's dumb, really dumb, and not at all natural. Christine nearly let the door swing into the wall when we tried one for 24hrs as she didn't know! I suspect Ford have had a lot of complaints.

Ok, back to my North Carolina proposal, ta-ta for now..

2009-03-05T10:11:00.002-05:00

Camp Woodward, PA.

This thing was huge, and in the mist too, couldn't see the landing on the first few laps. On my way to first national win on cruiser back in Sept 08.

Just got back from Vegas with the Mrs and brother in-law and his wife. Great weekend, although we all got ill with the squits and farts. It was like a pig pen in our room after 24 hours.

Got snowed in on Monday, as our connecting flight was through Boston back to DC, so we had to drive to LA and then get a flight home on tuesday. We did see Martin Sheen though, and some other actor dude, who was senile and giving his little dog a hard time! If I ever find his pic I'll name and shame, but I can't recall his name right now.

Richmond BMX has a new track rebuild, looks great, with a pro section too, can't wait for that. Also a new track is being built the other side of Richmond at a MX park, so that should be awesome. Although I've heard rumours the guy is playing politics already by not letting vendors in to trade! Don't know what thats all about but last time I looked a 520 Renthal chain for a Honda CRF doesn't fit a 44-16t on a bmx! Muppet. Hope it's all hearsay and BS, but it's good to have another track to ride and another track for the state series.

Loads of snow right now, but should be in the 70s by the weekend, hopefully I may get out on the BMX. If not will dust off the road bike for a couple of hours.

Work is super busy, really have gone to the other extreme compared to this time last year, so it's great considering how tough the economy is.

I am still looking for a new car, but with the previous comment in mind, slightly scared of dumping my money into anything in case things go pete tong. No job is safe and after watching a report this morning on tv about high salaried professionals resorting to janitorial work just to have money coming in, it might not be a risk worth taking. We are trying to re-mortgage though at a better rate, but with house prices dropping they are looking for people to have 20% equity in the house, we are almost there, but it's proving tough. My thought is, if they want our business and the $100,000's in interest they will make from us over 30yrs they can bloody well flex the $8000 we need to meet that 20% mark. It makes sense to me, everything is negotiable right now, especially with the money lenders I think. They are up sh@t creek like the rest of us, so for the sake of $8000, I would have thought they would be happy to help. Maybe our broker has no balls, we'll see.

DC, get in touch mate, let me know what your plans are, if you want a weekend to explore Washington DC come down. We can ride, you can borrow my S&M, and we can hit a few tracks. Glad all is going well for you up in NY buddy.

Just want to send my love to my Grandma, its my blog so I can. She lost her younger brother and sister last week. I'm glad she lives round the corner from mum and dad now. love you Nan.

Finally, an Australian I like..

2009-02-26T11:26:00.005-05:00

..other than Dame Edna Everage of course.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd

- Australian Muslims who want to live under Islamic Sharia law were told on Wednesday to get out of Australia , as the government targeted radicals in a bid to head off potential terror attacks.. Separately, Rudd angered some Australian Muslims on Wednesday by saying he supported spy agencies monitoring the nation's mosques. Quote: 'IMMIGRANTS, NOT AUSTRALIANS, MUST ADAPT. Take It Or Leave It. I am tired of this nation worrying about whether we are offending some individual or their culture. Since the terrorist attacks on Bali , we have experienced a surge in patriotism by the majority of Australians. ' 'This culture has been developed over two centuries of struggles, trials and victories by millions of men and women who have sought freedom' 'We speak mainly ENGLISH, not Spanish, Lebanese, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, or any other language. Therefore, if you wish to become part of our society . Learn the language!' 'Most Australians believe in God. This is not some Christian, right wing, political push, but a fact, because Christian men and women, on Christian principles, founded this nation, and this is clearly documented. It is certainly appropriate to display it on the walls of our schools. If God offends you, then I suggest you consider another part of the world as your new home, because God is part of our culture.' 'We will accept your beliefs, and will not question why. All we ask is that you accept ours, and live in harmony and peaceful enjoyment with us.'

'This is OUR COUNTRY, OUR LAND, and OUR LIFESTYLE, and we will allow you every opportunity to enjoy all this. But once you are done complaining, whining, and griping about Our Flag, Our Pledge, Our Christian beliefs, or Our Way of Life, I highly encourage you take advantage of one other great Australian freedom, 'THE RIGHT TO LEAVE'.''If you aren't happy here then LEAVE. We didn't force you to come here. You asked to be here. So accept the country YOU accepted.'

Now if only 10 Downing Street and the White House had the bollox to be that brave eh?

Genius..

2009-02-19T09:42:00.001-05:00

BEST LAWYER/INSURANCE STORY OF THE YEAR, DECADE, AND POSSIBLY THE CENTURY.
This took place in Charlotte North Carolina. A lawyer purchased a box of very rare and expensive cigars, then insured them against, among other things, fire.
Within a month, having smoked his entire stockpile of these great cigars, the lawyer filed a claim against the insurance company.
In his claim, the lawyer stated the cigars were lost 'in a series of small fires.'
The insurance company refused to pay, citing the obvious reason, that the man had consumed the cigars in the normal fashion.
The lawyer sued and WON! (Stay with me.)
Delivering the ruling, the judge agreed with the insurance company that the claim was frivolous. The judge stated nevertheless, that the lawyer held a policy from the company, in which it had warranted that the cigars were insurable and also guaranteed that it would insure them against fire, without defining what is considered to be unacceptable 'fire' and was obligated to pay the claim.
Rather than endure lengthy and costly appeal process, the insurance company accepted the ruling and paid $15,000 to the lawyer for his loss of the cigars that perished in the 'fires'.
NOW FOR THE BEST PART...
After the lawyer cashed the check, the insurance company had him
arrested on 24 counts of ARSON!!! With his own insurance claim and
testimony from the previous case being used against him, the lawyer was convicted of intentionally burning his insured property and was sentenced to 24 months in jail and a $24,000 fine.
This true story won First Place in last year's Criminal Lawyers Award contest.
ONLY IN AMERICA .......... NO WONDER THE REST OF THE WORLD THINKS WE'RE NUTS!

2009-01-21T13:30:00.004-05:00

Pic is of sunnier days, with my mates Joel (far left) and Jason in light blue. Good times, good mates.

Quick update, we have a new President, yay! I am very excited about this and totally support him. Hopefully good things will come. The wife and I spent the day in our jamas with laptops, coffee and the big screen watching the inauguration. It was pretty fantastic, lots of pageantry. Felt sad for Bush, not because he was leaving, but because he never commanded this sort of attention and interest.

Anyway, to more pressing matters. Apparently a behavioural psychologist has concluded that more English, as a percentage, died on the Titanic because, wait for this... we like to bloody queue! Seriously. Our politeness and "after you sir" killed more of us than our dear American, Swedish and Irish cousins on the Titanic because we were too busy keeping up appearances and it would not be British to jump the queue. I would like to say it's all BS, but somehow I really can imagine it and I can totally imagine me doing it too. Well, once I get my Visa and citizenship I shall become loud, rude and belligerent, drop the accent and wear bad clothes. I'm not going down with a sinking ship.

Hit the weights yesterday. Got a pic of Shawn DePrete as my motivation in the basement. You're not going to bet your dollars on me against him, but I need a target and he's it. Last it was win nationals, this year to see if I can get on his back wheel at some point.. that or get C to distract him as she has a little crush on him and his tattoos! 5x10 on the deadlifts, getting closer to my 300lb goal to. I'll get there before April I hope.

Bloody freezing here, I could etch glass with my nips this morning..

Please sign and help stop the morons!

2009-01-14T14:40:00.002-05:00

http://www.PetitionOnline.com/BMXCPSC/

Please sign the petition.

Some brainless moron has lumped BMX Racing in with kids toys. This means that all new products entering the country will have to be scrutinized for lead and other chemicals in the paints, in the same way toys do. Reason being kids chew toys and it's dangerous. Now, I've not seen to many kids eat a bike, eat dirt occasionally when you crash, but not chew a frame. Anyway, this is already having serious repercussions on manufacturers, so please sign the petition and put pressure on a waiver being included in the proposal to make bikes exempt.

thanks, Nigel

30 second update

2009-01-13T09:36:00.002-05:00

Ok, it's been an age, kind of lost interest a little in blogging. I did say I would at some point, but I've also been super busy at work and with Chrimbo got out of the habit.

So what has changed in my world - not too much to be honest.

Christmas came and went. We had a nice time with the in-laws, no UK trip this yr, not enough money, but we had a nice break nonetheless.

New Year fun and frolics were at Jacey and Amit's and we had a good time. I now want a Wii thing. C is a genius on Rock Guitar or whatever it's called. I have no sense of rhythm or timing so sucked horrendously at it. I can't even tap my fingers in time to a simple beat I make up in my own head, so I have no idea how to play a guitar game.

Raced the Christmas Classic in Lexington, VA. Only raced the Sunday as I had to work. The track was awesome, fast, some big jumps, great rhythm, every thing you want on a track. Chad Powers did a great job. I grabbed second place on the new Cruiser, and on flats too. Maybe I could have won, but getting over from gate 8 was tough, I got the snap and hole shot, but could only get half a bike in front of Ezell who did enough to push me up the berm and I had to fight me way through the pack a little to get on him, just ran out of track.

Good news is I picked up a new sponsor. I am riding for HBR now, and they pay my race fees and kit, which is great, all helps. I have to give a huge thanks to Jamie at Groove Merchants though for hooking me up with everything all yr. I am still running Jamie's stuff and support him 100%, he's a great guy to ride for and totally understands me accepting a ride with HBR. Kids get your parts from www.groovemerchants.net
HBR have offered me an SE, but I think I'd rather walk, so I am sticking with the S&M and Clayborn which so far have both served me well. Speaking of the S&M I've just put on a set of DXR's feels very good, def stiffer for sure. Looks a little different, cromo frame and big beefy ali cranks, but I like it.

Saturday just gone, Joel Clark and I hit up Hampton for the day. It was 60f, so nice to be able to get out and ride, gave the bike a good thrashing until the wind took me out in the rhythm and that was kind of the end of my day. Hopefully Joel and I are hitting up the Georgia National in a few weeks. Looking forward to that, as the track looks good. First race in 35x too. I think it's going to be super tough for sure with Thompson, Meaker, Cross, Deprete, Gomez. In fact it might even be tougher than 26-34x. Just got to be smooth, that's my only hope, cos I ain't going to pull any of those guys from the gate that's for sure.

I am back on the weights again. Had some real trouble with squats, my knee was swelling up and making it unbearable, so I have dropped them for now and am doing dead lifts instead. Not heavy weight, just more sets. I'd like to hit 300lb though and I think I can do it, so that's my target before the warm weather arrives and I switch back to daily sprints.

Job is going well, tough, but we are hanging in there. I am always slightly on edge about my role, as often a Proposal Manager is a luxury to small companies, but we are starting to make some headway and I hope the last few months efforts reveal some fruit for us.

Car is in for a service today. CV boots needed replacing. I didn't know my car wore boots, but there you go. I still want a pick up truck though. Should a miraculous windfall endow me with many coins, I shall be off to the garage to buy a pick-up truck.

We went to the DC motorcycle show on Sunday, starting to get an itch for a bike. Save money and miles on the Envoy, which is rapidly approaching 100,000 miles, and cheaper to run and buy than a new car too. So the Envoy can have a semi retirement and become the bmx wagon, well it is anyway. I'd like the new Yamaha FZ6r street bike, but something second hand will do just fine. And, if it's something I can rebuild and work on all the better.

I'll get some pics up shortly. Rich, we should be around this weekend if you want to call. Sorry we keep missing you and thanks for the card too. I do in fact have matching socks...

she's a beaut mate

2008-12-09T14:45:00.004-05:00

Taken me a couple of months to squirrel away the pennies and build her up, but at last the new Clayborn is ready to ride... well apart from some DMR Chain Tugs that are in the post I hope..

At home right now with a lousy cold and sore throat. Tomorrow is a fun day of Red Team Proposal reviews.. what a joy and how much am I going to concentrate knowing my new bike is in the basement wanting to be ridden??

Long time no speak

2008-12-05T10:38:00.002-05:00

Well, it appears to have been an age since I last updated. My parents have come and gone, I've still not built the new bike, it's bloody freezing, and I have been up my own arse writing two proposals, although today they come to a stop for a short while which is nice.

So Mum and Dad came. It was a fantastic couple of weeks, but over too soon. Still, I did get some time off to spend with them. We hit up Mount Vernon, in VA, George Washington's home. Well worth a visit, very interesting and in a beautiful setting. We had a great day, but it was probably below 0c outside, so it was a bit nipply.

The good thing about having Dad here is he can't sit still, which means odd jobs get done round the house. This time round he; painted the kitchen, put new skirting board around the kitchen to stop cats climbing into the walls and cupboards, raked the garden, installed new taps in the bathroom, fixed my leaking sunroof on green gerty (the envoy) and a host of other things as well. Lovely.

Thanksgiving was fun. It was the first time for Mum and Dad, and 27 Laurences, McNevins, Deux's, Miles and other families certainly made an entertaining day. It was good, the weather was nice and we finished the evening off with a bonfire outside which ended a great day. Of course there is always a 'but' with the Thanksgiving, and in my case it's another 10lb! Well, not just Thanksgiving, but I am 205lb, well I was last Friday anyway. Feel free to call me 'fat knacker' or 'fat bastard' when you see me. I have deliberately cut back on usual fare this week to lose a few pounds, its helped, but 205lb!!

So my training has to start in earnest now. I have been procrastinating and have not been motivated, mostly cos of hours working, but it has to start otherwise I'll throw the good results from Woodward in Sept. This week I've taken it light on the squats, although having now not done them for so long, light probably also meant maximum too! oh dear. I had a good 45 mins on the road bike on the turbo trainer to get a sweat up and my legs spinning again, and then squats last night. I need a routine, like I had last yr and early this yr, once I have that going again I'll be fine. Still, my legs feel weak, and I have no lung capacity whatsoever. If I race at the Christmas Classic I may well puke in THE helmet. I might sit in the stands and watch the pro's I think..

Some good news, Matt 'Bo' Allen is coming over to stay in March hopefully. He is hitting up the ABA/UCI race in DeSoto, TX, also the USAC Cycling Champs weekend (like our British Champs) and then is driving across country and will hopefully stop with us. Looking forward to that already. Aaron Shrosbree is coming too, so should be fun. I might well fly out and race with them.

If you happen to be in Florida at all check out the new St Pete Bmx track, (www.stpetebmx.com) looks fooking awesome, and I plan on racing there in Jan, if I don't go to Vegas with the family.

C is in LA this weekend visiting friends. I had a weekend of riding planned, but the weather may make a mess of that. Still, if no BMX, I should get out on the road bike for an hour or two each day, better than nothing. I do hate her not being here, I am not very good at being apart from her I've learned. I thought having the house and time to myself might be fun, but in fact it's an empty box, well except for the cats, so I guess I just love my wife very much.. a good thing then! :)

nothin' new

2008-11-17T13:08:00.003-05:00

Quiet weekend for the Hopkinson household. We, well by we I mean 'I', did very little. Saturday I cleaned the house in preparation for mum and dad coming tonight, whilst C was throwing a 'baby shower' for Mo. That went well and everybody had a good time by all accounts. Of course C was stressing about it all, what's new?, but it went off without a hitch. Saturday evening we headed over to Mo and James for a few beers with a bunch of their friends from NY and out of towners. We head a great evening, Kimi was thoroughly pissed and was funnier than ever, and as soon as the Champagne bottle opened my wife's louder, more belligerent, alter ego joined the party too. Thanks James! One sip of Champagne and it's like Jekyll and Hyde, still she did fall asleep in an instant when we got home.

Sunday we headed to the Irish pub for breakfast. In theory it was a great idea - a full Irish with all the trimmings - black and white pudding, tomatoes etc - but they let me down. The bacon was tasteless, only one banger and about 7 baked beans. We won't be going there again.

Sunday afternoon consisted of quality napping, watching the movie Sin City - great movie, I love the visual affects, and the fact that some incredibly hot women wear very little for about 2hours. Truly marvellous. Bean slept all afternoon with all 3 cats so she was perfectly happy. I could have made a purr-fect joke there but I restrained myself.

I hit the weights in the evening and got a bit carried away on the squats. I normally to 1 light warm up set, and then three heavy (for me) sets. I ended up doing 6 sets. I'm surprised my knees even move today. I've changed my squats a little, I put my bench behind my arse now, as my knees can't go past about 90 degrees with any significant weight on the bar. Good thing, is my leg curls are increasing in weight on my bad hamstring, but I still can't curl very much. Once they feel good again, I'll start doing dead-lifts once more. I ought to consider doing up body. I don't want to be fast and fat!!! Got to look buff for the wife.. or bmx moms! I only said consider, so I'll procrastinate for a few more months..

The new Clayborn cruiser frame should be here this afternoon, looking forward to that. Put the One up for sale, almost complete bike for about $300. It'll pay for the Clayborn and then some I guess.

My team idea is starting to take shape. I have made some good contacts and got some people interested in supporting me. I'd like to do something to help other kids out, get them to races, help with fees or kit or something. I love riding for Groove Merchants, Jamie is awesome, but I think so much more could be done, and I'd love to be able to get enough support that I can do something for those less fortunate than myself. We'll see, it may work out, it may not, but no harm in trying right..

Mum and dad here soon, very excited. Sod work this week.

$300. Tires also to go with wheels. Get in touch if interested.

new forks and bars..

2008-11-14T22:40:00.000-05:00

Sex is on Fire

2008-11-13T10:44:00.002-05:00

not my sex, but if you're a King from Leon (somewhere in France?) apparently your sex is! Still, bloody good record and I have purchased their new album from iTunes, as well as The Music's Strength in Numbers, their first album in 4 yrs. A great band. However, being new to KoL, I also realize how far behind my music collection is, and also my taste. There's me looking at Dire Straits and Genesis, and there are all these new bands to check out. Sutty, help me out here, recommend me some sounds please?

This past weekend, we were Boston bound for Crappo and Dave's wedding. It was an excellent time and I got to meet some of Beans friends from Uni as well including Megan Glaser, who had me in stitches the entire weekend! She was awesome. Also got to hang out with Jamie Nugget too which is always a treat. The wedding was great, went off without a hitch, although Crappo's younger brother decided to go for dinner with friends rather than attend her rehearsal dinner. Tosser. He also didn't want to come to the wedding cos she voted democrat. Complete tosser, and dumb ass wife too. I think he had to write L and R on her shoes so she could put them on properly. Sorry, Crappo. However, other than that, both Megan (Crappo) and Dave have a great family, although it's definitely a mine field trying to negotiate who has been married to who. However, Dave has a great brother, Josh - a teacher in Japan, who gave a great speech. He was a great guy and rides a Yamaha V-Max. You need big nuts to ride one of those. Also, Dave's dad owned several Vincents, and other classic English motorcycles. For the uneducated, a Vincent is about the equivalent of an E-Type Jag or Aston Martin DB5. Art on two wheels. My wonderful wife also gave an excellent speech. She never fails to amaze. I know I piss her off a good deal by being a muppet, but I am very lucky. She bought a tear to my eye and certainly had Crappo and Dave in tears. One other thing must mention Jenna's boobs. holy shite. how they stayed in her dress all night I'll never know. I think they were in a different State to the rest of her body. awesome.

Sunday we hooked up with Ross and Biz, had lunch and did a little walking and sight seeing, then headed home. A great weekend for sure.

Note to self. Don't try and use Jamie as an ally to buy a new car. She knows too much about cars and said the one I wanted was boring. I wasn't really onto a winner, but that blew my argument completely. damn.

Monday was work and more time at ManTech, I think they should be paying my salary at the moment. Tuesday was Veterans Day, so we unofficially had the day off. I did some work stuff in the morning, and seeing nobody was responding to emails, I headed to Severn and rode with the guys. Finally got a nice, consistent, line in the rhythm section. Pick up over the roller, jump little step, jump off backside roller to next roller, jump table, double, then manual onto the step up and bump jump the little double. Sweet.

Also got a nice pic of me in BMXToday, NBL's magazine, from Woodward National last month.

Got to hit the weights tonight, everybody seems to be stepping up and I seem to be doing nothing... again! Still last week, I hit 240lb (110kg) for 10 on the squats, after 3 sets of 20 at 190lb, so not too bad. I have been trying to avoid killing my knees and also working my weak hamstring too. As soon as the weather gets cold, my legs start to hurt. I need to move to Florida.

Mum and Dad are here on Monday, I can't wait. However, I have just been hit with several major proposals. Bollox.

Nice one my son, nice one

2008-11-06T10:54:00.002-05:00

So we have an African-American President elect, bout fooking time too.

Am so happy he won. I really hope this will make a difference, that he won't just be a figurehead, but will be as important as Kennedy, Washington and the other great American presidents. And thank goodness we have got rid of Chief MonkeyBollox and Muppet 'Dubbya' Bush.. I can't find another way to describe the man.

I spent election night with C's company down in DC. It was wild. People were going mad, the streets were full of people running around, cars honking horns, people hugging, it was darn cool and I am very glad I was there thanks to the wife.

It will be interesting to see how the next 4 yrs plays out, it certainly can't be any worse for sure, and I think Obama is strong enough to be his own man and make the difference. I really am quite excited.

Now, if we can get him to endorse a bmx track in every major conurbation, built by Hudu, then it will be a right result..

Off to Boston tomorrow for a wedding. Should be fun. Am expecting at least one drunken fight or argument, and I am sharing a room with my wife and two other chicks. Boobs everywhere. Lovely jubbly.. :)

Call Norris, I've just set a world record!

2008-11-03T09:06:00.003-05:00

According to my trip computer on my road bike during my 15m loop I hit a top speed of 79.2mph on Friday night! I'd like to believe that I am fast but that's pushing it. However, one point to note, the computer was spot on for my averages and for distance, so maybe I did really hit 79.2mph and maybe I am just fast as fook, so I am going to give Norris McWhirter a call and get my self on Record Breakers with Roy Castle and his trumpet..

Other things, hit ABA Severn after its rebuild. It's gone from being a fun play track, to "oops I've just left a nugget in my pants" crazy scary track. The first two straights are the same, but after the second corner a steep double, an even steeper and short table (like a spine almost) into a step, followed by a rhythm section that would be at home on most euro tracks, steep and deep! Scaring the poop out of people, which is perfect cos all the locals don't have a clue how to ride anything else. It consists of a steep roller, step up with roller on backside, roller, table, 3 three rollers, step up/step down. The last jump is shady, just not finished properly, but I guess it will settle in. It is mad. I've crashed in it a couple of times and I love it. This is the first time I have ridden a track since living here that made me really think and really pushed my ability. Needless to say local rippers had it dialled, Troy Farmer and Josh Grimes made it look easy. I am not so keen on the third straight, I can't hit it fast. The take off on the double was really shady and after a 'moment' I decided to play it easy and just float over it. Once it has wintered thought it will be awesome. At last Severn has stepped it up big time. I'd say tougher than most NBL tracks I've been to now. Great fun.

So as you can guess all I did was ride this weekend. Bean hit her bosses party on Saturday night. I didn't go which caused a minor war, but I wasn't feeling it. Sunday her allergies were really bad again and she spent most of the day in bed. Not sure what is causing this, but I think its being inside with the cats more on the weekend. It rarely happens during the week because she is not around them enough. We are going to have to start vacuuming the cats for their dander.

It's election day tomorrow if you didn't know. And if you had been trying to hide under a rock to avoid it all, don't worry McCain had a plan to get under that rock with you. He's a feckin geriatric and should be in a home under supervision, not running for presidency. Which leads me nicely to my conspiracy theory about the US anyway. How can a country so powerful allow people like George Dubbya and now potentially McCain run the country?? I want Obama to win desperately, but he's too much of his own man, how will 'they' control him. Call me Fox Mulder if you like..

a little cruiser action from Woodward..

long time coming..

2008-10-30T13:07:00.002-04:00

.. my blog update that is, not my sex life!

Well I suppose 2 weeks isn't really that long in the grand scheme, but apparently people have been waiting for my update. Well my wife has, and now I have mentioned sex in the first line, I'll be in trouble when I get home.

Where have I been I hear you ask? I'd like to say exploring new climes, venturing into the unknown, rocking the bmx, but nothing so exciting. In fact I have been stuck in a conference room for 2 weeks straight working with our partner on $130m and $6.6bn project. Yep, $6.6bn. I can't imagine what that would like in quarters (25c pieces mum), but I bet it would take some patience to stack it in nice little piles. We are coming to the end of the draft sections so I am back in the office and catching up on stuff. I have had time to update at home, but truth is the last few weeks have been pretty intense, and even though I have been working regular hours I have been blown away mentally by the time I get home. TV, dinner and bed has been the limit.

Random things to update on then.

First off, shout to my buddy John Paul Pfeiffer for his results at the South Carolina national a couple of weeks ago. JP took 4 from 4 in 26-34x and 30-34cr, not bad for an old fella.. :) John and I hit the 35-40 class after Christmas, damn I'm getting old.

I raced the VA state champs and came away with State No.1. Kind of cool. Sadly the guys in my class didn't show, well only 2 others, and it was pretty lame on a shite track. Sorry Richmond. The weather didn't help, but it really is piss poor. Still I hear Tom Ritz is coming in to rebuild and the people at Richmond are really committed to developing the place and facilities so that's super cool. Behind the track is a set of trails that would have DC Blog Icon wetting his pants. It's such a contradiction - poop track, unreal trails. I hit some of them, but the main line was feckin' ridiculous.

I started running again, and then stopped. I was totally into it but on my third night out, I got cramped up real bad, stopped, slipped on wet leaves and pulled my hamstring. Took me an hour to walk home. Fook that. Either I am buying a treadmill or I'll start the running again when I finally knock bmxing on the head when I'm 50 or something. So I've been tentatively trying to stretch it out as this weekend looks good for riding. I've chucked the road bike on the turbo trainer and am doing 45 mins a night on that, some spinning, some sprints, some high resistance just so my legs keep moving.

Here's a thought I had the other day. No matter what I'd like to believe, I don't really train, and when I do, very rarely do I kill myself. I do ride a lot however, almost daily when its warm. So the question is how can I still snap and stay with somebody that can squat 500lb for fun and guys that train their arses off? How is that physically possible? If I don't have the same strength as them, how can I ride with them? I can't figure this out, it shouldn't be possible should it? of course sprinting on a track is not the same as pumping out squats, although uses the same muscles but I don't understand the mechanics of it all the same.

Warlock had his Kuwaraha nicked. Bastards. String them up by the knackers I say.

The ABA and NBL schedules are out, and what a load of shite they are. Not sure how much racing I'll be doing over the next yr. Nothing at all local, except Christmas Classic and Woodbridge, after that I have to saddle the horse and trek into the wilderness to ride my bike. Pissed off about that, and one more nail in my coffin of motivation. If I had the skills I'd just ride trails, wear tight jeans and change my name to Daisy.

Got some great photos of Charlie, from my bro last night. He's a great looking little kid, hate missing him growing up. I don't know him at all and he doesn't know me. Also some cute pics of Bobbin Eames too. Thankfully she looks like her mum so will be fine. I hope we have a little girl too. 2010 is the yr according to the wife. I'm already giving my 'boys' a pep talk..

little bleeder

2008-10-14T10:42:00.002-04:00

Nope, we haven't got one on the way, I just managed to pump what felt like half a gallon of blood from a 1 inch wide gash on my leg yesterday! Over shot the big doubles to flat bottom, foot blew off the pedal and spun round in to my shin. I had a dirty set of Shimano DX's buried in my leg and when I pulled it out, blood went every where, including up my arm! How it got up there I don't know. Freaky thing is, no pain whatsoever, just lots of bleeding. A bit of gaffer tape and I carried on riding for another 30mins but I must have done something to my hamstring too as that went very tight and is extremely sore this morning.

So, what a beautiful weekend, temps in the high 70's and low 80's all weekend. Gorgeous. Saturday we headed to Rockville to help Ma and Pa Laurence move into their new abode, about 500yrds away. Cheaper rent I guess. We had a fun day actually, although I am glad it wasn't done in the middle of summer as I was getting a bit of a sweat on. I am a sweaty bugger for sure. Hormones or something!! It was good to catch up with them after their latest European odyssey. We also took the couches for an outing, well they needed the fresh air. We borrowed Ben's awesome Lincoln Mark LT pick-up and took our old sofa to be sent up to Hannover on the moving truck, but when we had done that, we realised there was no way we were going to be able to get the new sofa into our house. It was just to big to get through the back door or down the stairs. So our old sofa is back in the basement again.

Saturday night we went to a restaurant called Crisfield in downtown Silver Spring. Been open since 1945. The decor looked like it was from an old battleship circa 1945 as well. It's a fish restaurant, that is supposedly famous with the locals. We thought it would be cheap and fun. Apparently not cheap, and not all that good either. I'm in rush to go back soon. Still it delayed C having to go to Outback with me for another week. I've been here over 2 yrs now and still not been there, it will happen. NMKY has a plan to cross the USA in a camper for his 40th, mine will be to go to Outback and wallow in kitsch and tackiness to my hearts content. I had a bad case of the farts on the way home too.

Sunday I headed to Southern Maryland track. I've not been there before. In a lovely part of MD and in a great, well managed park, with houses dating back to the 1660's, kind of cool. Also it was next door to Budds Creak Motocross track, home of the 2007 or 08 Moto des Nations I think.
The track was great fun, first two straights were so long. I would say probably longer than P'boro's first two straights, you were blowing by the time you got to the second corner. The second straight was awesome fun. Three progressively longer doubles, with a long triple into the corner. Sadly the only way to get the speed to jump the triples was manual and tap through the first three doubles, jumping them was not giving me any momentum all, backsides were too shallow. But for an ABA track this was pretty aggresive, nothing like Preston back home, but really good fun. Apparently I am only the second person to jump the triples too. Had a great day out with Bruce, Jason and their kids. Cody and Little Jason are fun, they spend more time ragging each other than riding which is great to watch. I got the win in a rather broad age range of 14x to 35x! good for the legs if nothing else. Will be heading back for sure.

Dropped some new black S&M Race Forks and Chrome S&M Slam XLTS's on my bike over the weekend. It looks awesome, really stoked with it. I am thinking maybe a chrome .38 Special for next yr?

On the subject of Chromo, NMKY go or it, either one rocks..

Yesterday was Columbus day, after Sir Christopher of course. Not sur what he, founded America, who knows? But I had a semi day off. Our building was closed, so I did some adminny stuff at home in the moring, some jobs for C around the house and yard, and met my mate Chris in the evening to ride and promptly spurted blood on Severn BMX track. Sweet.

It could be all my fault..

2008-10-09T10:17:00.002-04:00

..since I left England, the weather has been poop, no summers and since I have lived in America the economy has fallen apart! Coincidence? Makes you wonder doesn't it. I am in touch with some pretty important spiritual vibes, so who knows?

This week has been good, not so hectic as the last few weeks and I am getting stuff done in preparation for a couple of large projects we are going to be competing for. Fingers crossed we are successful with them.

I see a French man won the Nobel Prize for Literature. Why? All the French do is strike, shut the whole country down when they go on holiday and their boss is married to some ex-model who has lost the plot and wants to be a pop star. That aside, I actually like Sarkozy, seems to be on point with most things. Anyway, they say French is supposed to be the language of romance - so 'tres bon' to Le Clezio. Personally I'm quite happy reading Beano or BMXWorld but there you go.

Went to gate practice last night. Not too bad an evening, it's getting dark and we have no floodlights at Woodbridge, so only got about 90mins in. I am feeling very unfit though. I haven't really trained since Woodward last month and it showed last night. I still had some good first straight pull, staying with the youngsters and A pro's comfortably, but I wasn't able to hit all the gates hard. Sucked. I need to pick it up again. I think it's about time I started running and got some lung capacity back.

The wife has not been well this week. She has had a lousy cold and actually took Wednesday off work, which is a miracle. I think the boys enjoyed her being home all day too. She is much better today though. On another train of thought, the wife stepped up her modelling career. Anything Sarkozy and Carla Bruni can do, so can the Hopkinson's. Today she was 'a hand stealing a wallet' in a campaign picture for her company. Awesome. It's not quite the front cover of Glamour magazine, or even soft porn, but we'll take the royalty checks. We do get royalty checks don't we pooper?

Got some new S&M forks and bars coming this week from my sponsor. I actually prefer the Odyssey stuff I run now, but S&M are helping the bike shop team out so that's cool. I'm thinking of putting on the new Alienation rims too. They are about 8oz lighter than Rhyno lites overall, big difference on my heavy-ish chromoly bike and they look awesome too.

ta' ra chuck..

can't think of a title

2008-10-06T14:20:00.002-04:00

Nope, no brain power today at all. Not that I am overly endowed with brain power at the best of times, but today I am running on fumes.. no gas in the tank at all.

Bean is not feeling to chipper, not sure what's up with her. She said she felt post natal or something earlier. I am quite sure we don't have a child so it must be something else! Sum ting wong! Still makes me laugh.

Anyway, I didn't get to spend a whole of time with my good lady this weekend. She worked Saturday and I was out all day yesterday. I really don't like weekends like that, even if I'm just around her to annoy the crap out of her, that's enough for me.

My weekend started a little early. I buggered off early Friday afternoon, grabbed the S&M and went to Severn to ride. I had hoped the race would be one, but the club is going through some turmoil with "he said" "she said" BS, which is sad. Hopefully it will be resolved as low and behold some of the people there have actually started to speak to me. I know I'm an arse, but I'm not an unpleasant arse am I? I had plenty of fun trying to do a bubba scrub over the big doubles. Whatever possessed me to try this I don't know, but once I bonked my front wheel on the lip of the landing whilst I still had the bike lying down I quickly stopped. That could have been very messy for sure. My gates are rapidly improving on the ABA start sequence, so much so that I was pulling and staying with my buddy Chris Agard from the lights, quite an achievement believe me. Chris squats 500lb for fun. I squat 200lb in sheer protest. I've put my Shimano DX platforms back on and with the Vans it feels like I am clipped, my feet don't budge at all. My first straights were on point so I was happy. I guess several cans of Abbot Ale can do that for you.

Saturday the wife worked, whilst I toured DC on foot. It has been a long time since I have been down town, in fact when NMKY was here in April. I enjoyed the walk. Went to the White House, had a nose around and was highly amused by some 60+ dude, slightly overweight pretending he was CIA and scouting around the lawns. Absolute pratt. For a start he had a hat on logo'd CIA. So that meant he wasn't. Then he was trying to do Thai Chee ( is that how you spell it?) and worse he was getting in people's business. What is it with Americans? I don't understand their level of patriotism at all, it's like an obsessional football fan. It's great on the one hand, and I do wish the English took more pride in their country for sure, but it's so over top here. It strikes me as faux patriotism in a lot of instances. Why is there a need to shout about it? If you are civic minded and want to contribute, well done my friend, but don't go on about it, do it and move on. And the whole thing of being a Veteran. Now that is tosh. Sorry, you are not a vet until some dip shit with an agenda has shot at you. Pushing paper around an airbase in Arizona does not put you in the same category as fighter pilot who has had missiles up his chuff, or some poor squaddie stuck in a cave on the side of a hill in Afghanistan whilst Taliban Tom takes pot shots at him. Can't agree with that all. You might be contributing to the war effort but are you putting your life on the line? I wonder if it was like this pre 9/11? Maybe it's just the culture here and one more thing for me to adjust to. Maybe it's just because England is so different and we lived through the 'troubles' and the fall out of the IRA that I don't grasp it. English cynicism, American optimism I guess. I'm guessing optimism is the right approach, but hard to change your ways.

Saturday night we went to Maneqin Pis, a Belgian restaurant up the road with Rachel, C's good friend, and her parents. We had a great evening. They are awesome people, really warm and friendly, and C was really happy to catch up with Rachel too. They also remembered Matt Allen from our wedding, I think he made an impression there. Now, if he was loaded he might be in with a shout! Everybody has mussels, supposedly a fav, but I went with the trout. Now I do enjoy a good trout on a saturday night after a few beers. :)

After that we went back to Rachels to watch the Wisconsin somethings take on the Ohio Brewsters, whatever, I have no idea, but college football is more fun to watch than NFL for sure. Still a bunch of girls in leggings and a helmet though. haha

Sunday I spent the day in Hagerstown. It was the MD state champs and I was doing a clinic. The race was a small affair, with only 17 motos, but somehow managed to take 3 hours to run. Good fun, except for the mountainbiker who ate sh1t over the triples. he walked away but will be sore today. My clinic started at 4.15 and we ran for about 3 hours. It was great, really good turn out, 31 kids in the end I think and I think they all enjoyed it. Certainly the parents were happy and we made $300 for the club which is great. I also had more people than the Stileman clinic. Maybe I can go into business. I love doing it though and the Hagertown BMX crew are a real cool family. Totally dedicated to the kids and keeping them out of trouble. Hats off to Brian, Diane, Chad and everybody else there. Nice to see something positive and genuine. Well after a bloody long day, I got home about 8.30 and passed out on the sofa. Bean had been gardening, and we now have pansies all over the place and fresh dirt for the squirrels to forage in. lovely

Happy Birthday Mum

2008-10-03T14:27:00.002-04:00

only a day late! Hope you had a nice day, miss you.

Check out sponsor www.groovemerchants.net yours truly being a tit, but I love Jamies coaching advice for the upcoming clinic we are running on sunday. Made me chuckle.

Happy Anniversary Pooper

2008-09-30T10:47:00.002-04:00

We've been married 2 yrs today. And we are still married. Hurrah.

Can't believe it's been 2 years, it has really flown by. It's been the happiest two years though. I can safely say I love my wife more than ever. Obviously there are moments when we want to throw large objects at each other, like Chewy, but we have had a great 2 years and so hopefully we will have many more to come. I love you Bean.

What's changed in two years here?

I've had 2 new jobs
We've bought a house
Got another cat. Gatsby rules, I love him.
We've bought 2 cars - black betty (the Subaru) and green gerty (the Envoy).
My brother knocked his bird up and they now have little Charlie.
I can't get my bird knocked up!! She's not having it.
I've bought and sold a motorcross bike
I've had 3 new bikes - Proper Proclaimer; S&M .38 Special and Masi Road Bike
I'm growing hair where I don't want it and losing it where I need it.
I've developed a fetish for beer.

Surely I've achieved more than this in the last 2 years, but then again maybe not. When I came here I thought life would be different, new culture, new things to do, fact is it might well offer that but you have to live. So you do exactly what you did before which is work 40-50hours a week, spend time with the family, ride the bike. Same shit, different country. Although now I do have my wife to share all the mundane with as well as all the fun, and for that I am truly grateful. She is pretty wonderful to me and I wouldn't change any of it.. well apart from trying to get her knocked up. ;)

Woodward Camp

2008-09-22T18:02:00.003-04:00

This Friday, after a pretty hectic work week, I headed up into Pennsylvania to Camp Woodward for the first round of the 2008/09 NBL National Series. Firstly it is situated in Bald Eagle State Forest, it is stunning scenery. A mountain bike and a few days to explore would be better, but the drive alone was worth the trip. Plenty of Amish in their buggies, antique stores and a town named Liverpool. Named for Liverpool, England - their words! No mention of the 'fab four' but it did look like the 'bizzies' (cops) had been chased out of town. Damn was it run down. It's just part of US11 Highway now, a super busy trucking route full of Adult novelty shops - i didn't find anything novel - and a sad, dilapidated town by the river.

So Woodward. Jumping Jehoshaphat, this place is unreal. It was like being 14 again. Big Dirt, Little Dirt, Cloud 9, Lot 8, all the places you see in the video games and I am there. Only get this, between $20-35 to ride each one, separately. Feck off! Dirt is free for a start. I , along with a bunch of others, paid $750 for 2 nights in a log cabin with one shower, one toilet and no heating! Damned if I am going to give them more money, that was disgusting. However, the place is unreal. On my list of riders watched, Bestwick, Steve McCann, Kagy, Dhers and some young Aussie called Andrew. This kid will be the real deal, 12 ft high backflips over the spine? He hits the same the same speed as Day does down the first straight in Beijing! Kid was super cool, and I spent a while talking to him and reminding him of rugby scores. He called me a 'whinging pom' - all good stuff indeed. Also some young shredder on a 12" pulling double whips out of the half pipe. He needed a bigger bike and had a super pushy dad, story of the weekend that. But another time. Well now actually. The 35x (read that how you will) who was about 100lb overweight, stiff as feck shouting at his 5yr old twins for not winning because they had gates 1 and 2 in the final. Piss off you fat bastard. I don't want to name and shame him, but he was bang out of order and making my blood boil! Lose some weight lard arse and set an example your kids can follow!

First comment on Woodward weekend has to be the awesome people from Hagerstown BMX who put me, or put up with me, all weekend. Diane Hullinger totally spoiled me and I got to meet some fantastic people, who really made the weekend for me. Hagerstown BMX has a great family vibe to it, 'roots' as Uncle B would say, wonderful people and I was very fortunate to spend time with them. I'm looking forward to going back next week and doing a clinic for their riders, least I can do after all they did for me this weekend.

So my weekend went very well. I rode flats for the first time in a while and felt so much better. I was disappointed with only a few riders in 30-34 cruiser, but good quality including Nat # 1, John Paul Pfeifer and Mike Hummel. We had some great racing and John was clearly fastest on saturday. He had a great first straight and it was enough to keep him clear of Mike and I. I pulled hard on the last straight but it was not near enough, 2nd place.

Sunday, I was determined to do a little better, and I was fortunate enough to do that. I got a great gate next to John, and managed to get my wheel in front in the tight first corner. I knew i had the track speed after that but I could hear the commentators comments all the time, so I knew it was going to be close. Third straight and I ballsed up the last jump and John came through on the inside, a little bit of bar banging and we dragged raced the last straight and somehow I came out on top. Great race, and not often I beat JP. On another note Mike Hummell and his wife had a little boy, Garrett, just after the Grands, congratulations to them both. Mike is a cool guy, only rides chromoly and flats..

All that's left of the Supercross track at Woodward...

quicky

2008-09-17T12:56:00.003-04:00

First, love to fellow blogger DC, he was also feeling left out on the love front - love to my fellow flat peddler, sometime clipper, always player..

So quick update.
Great weekend just gone, scorching hot, very sun burnt, made pro-am final including beating a couple of A pro's in my semi at Woodbridge. Didnt have a good final though, 9 laps in 2 hours was too much. Loved racing the cruiser again, and looking forward to hitting first national this weekend on it.

Saturday night we met up with a bunch of C's old school friends. Dinner at Sonoma, always a treat, and then back to their hotel to chill out. Great evening, really enjoyed myself if a little tired. C loved it and was really excited to see all her friends again.

Sunday, stupidly hot, so we hit up the movies and saw "Burn After Reading" - Brad Pitt, Clooney, Frances Dormund, John Malcovich, excellent movie, along the lines of Fargo.

Crazy crazy at work for both of us, a little stressed I think. Just got shit loads to do and so has C. She is working later and later and I miss her being at home. What are you going to do!

We have Jacey and Amit staying with us whilst their house is being completed. It's cool I have to admit. Amit is loving the cats, even though he is allergic to them.

Hoping I might hit gate practice tonight and bed in the new Profile wheels courtesy of http://www.powersbikeshop.com/ Chad made me some nice wheels with a titanium driver! bling! Not actually lighter than my old worn out SINZ wheels tho.

oh, get your hands on Meantime London Porter. An excellent ale, or porter I guess, great stuff indeed.

cheers

It's a baby Smurf

2008-09-11T13:56:00.003-04:00

Well I have to say this bought a tear to my eye this morning. My oldest and one of my closest buds had a little baby boy, Joel Ellis, with his wife on Tuesday. They sent some pics today. It made my day. Smurf will be a great dad. I know he has always wanted a family. I am really really pleased for them both. Great people, little Joel will be in great hands for sure.

Apparently my darling wife, and now my best bud NMKY, are feeling unloved and left out as I have not mentioned them recently.

Wife, I love you always and in so many ways both legally and illegally..

NMKY, I love you in as many ways a metrosexual man can...

Is that good enough for the both of you?

Had my anuual review yesterday, I am still in a job which is great news. I also had a healthy little pay increase and stock options added to my package. I am extremely grateful, especially in the tough economic climate here right now, I didn't really expect anything. I work for some good people who look after their staff very well. I am quite lucky I guess and shan't take this for granted.

Still leaning towards the Clayborn cruiser. Rebuilt bottom bracket again last night, one last effort, otherwise I'll be buying some DXR's to go with the Clayborn as well... muchos $, but what are you going to do..?

Wet and Windy

2008-09-08T15:30:00.002-04:00

..and that's just my bottom! Actually I have had a bad case of flatulence the last few days, don't know what's been wrong with my arse but I've been trumping like a good 'un.

So Friday night, I left work a little early and headed up to Winchester to ride with my buddie Jason. It was a gorgeous late summer evening, warm enough for shorts and a t still. I got there super early for sum reason so had plenty of time to warm up and fix the bike again. The One is tired, the wheels are in their death throws, or the bottom bracket but that's brand new, either way something sounds like a bag of bolts in a washing machine. A rebuild again tonight. It was a cruiser evening for sure, about 7 of us on cruisers all riding and getting some good gates in. I have to say mine were on point. I've not been on a random gate with a cruiser, but apparently they work ok. I had a good first straight going and made myself work. Only bad point of the night was Chad 'sublime' Powers half link snapping on about his 4th gate. He made a bit of a mess of himself sliding on the tarmac. Shame, cos we normally have fun riding together, he is smooth for sure. Bruce was looking good once we had his gates sorted. Sad point of the evening, newbie, novice, idiot, whatever you want to call him Ryan has decided to clip-in. Yes, after 3 months of racing he feels he needs! get the feck out of here. He's not slow, but has little skill yet and is totally out of control. He's also turned into a gobby little shite which he wasn't last time I was up there a few months back. Sad, I quite liked the kid. Still, I was a gobby little shite at 15, and am still at 34 so what do I know.

Saturday, it rained, and rained and rained some more. It actually started on my way back from Winchester Friday night, which reminds me of the two fat kids complaining about getting medium fries when they ordered large. I wanted to shout order a lettuce instead, but apparently a couple of other kids in the queue thought the same as me, to which said chubby kids scurried out of Wendies rather embarrassed. So, with all the rain we decided doing 'bugger all' was an excellent plan. We napped, we went out for lunch, walked around a terrible mall, and then went home for another nap. Quality. After the nap, we had a sandwich and went for Ice Cream. Apparently when you buy Ice Cream in the States you also come home with another pair of Vans shoes. Well that's what happened to me. On sale for $32! Rude not too sir! I know we watched a movie but I can't for the life of me remember what it was, but it was funny..

Sunday we tidied the house a little and played with the cats a lot. Gatsby is starting to settle down and leave Chewy alone. He has his moments still, normally on a work night, but he is soo cool, I love him. He does sleep on my back which is slightly odd and has a habit of biting my chin, equally odd and somewhat annoying too. In the afternoon I rode Severn again on the safety cycle. It was riding awesome after all the rain. I manualled from corner to corner the third straight, never done that on a cruiser before. I love that bike, I wish I could get another one, maybe I'll have to get Mum and Dad to bring me one over in November. If not I'll be ordering the Clayborn, or maybe a GHP Cruiser as that looks really nice. Chad just rang and has my wheels on the way, Profile sent a titanium driver by mistake and only charged me a couple of $'s extra, compared to the $50 it should be. Black hubs, chrome rims, should be sweet and go with anything I buy. Maybe the wife will want them for her anniversary present, she could do with some new cruiser wheels...

36th!

2008-09-05T15:03:00.002-04:00

What the feck? I dropped from 12th going into the Grands to 36th overall, bloody crap. The worst thing is, my points are actually high enough to take me to 18th I think even without Grands points, but because I didn't do the grands I get nothing. So the guy who is 35th actually has about 600 points and I have 1530! No Grands, no national ranking. So a whole host of guys slower than me, are ranked higher becuase they turned up. Bollox. Of course that's the way it's always been, so i knew it was coming and is the same for everyone, but still a little depressing..

Off to ride the safety cylce with my buds in Winchester, VA and maybe have a sherbet or two.

Storms hitting this weekend, so I'm holing up in the sack and resting..

Congrats Bill Young 26-34x #1

2008-09-02T13:04:00.003-04:00

Not too much has happened since my last post I do believe. Well, things have changed in the BMX world. Stumpy took the Elite Men Title with a win at the Grands, after winning the Pro Spectacular Friday night. Becerine took second and J-Rich 3rd. I heard the Top5 are all over 30, no imagine if they went Vet Pro? Dale Holmes looked good for the vet pro title but I heard he crashed or something in the main. Kenth Fallen took the overall, he's about 4 yrs younger than Dale too. Looks like I missed a good Grands, my mate Jason Morgan grabbed 2nd in 41+ Novice overall and Chad 'sublime' Powers took a great 3rd in 25-29 Cruiser, good on yer mate.

My class was won by Bill Young, congrats to the man, from an inside gate, with Pat Parker taking second. Pat was on it all weekend, but got gate 8 in the final and held high in the first corner. http://www.go211.com/videos/9036/ Still those 2 are in a class of their own in 26-34x. Wonder if Pat will go Vet Pro, although not sure he is 30 yet? I'm dieing to know where I ended up overall. Be great if I could have stayed in the Top 20, but I think with 104 riders and nearly 40 riders at the Grands in my class and all their points double, not likely. Check out www.go211.com for Grands coverage.

I rode sunday and monday on the safety cycle. I am really enjoying riding the cruiser and after I ride I don't get any problems with my wrist, which I am still getting on the 20". Got a bad case of throttle grip on the 20" too, I think it's the humidity but the new S&M grips I have put on will not stick to the bars, waste of $10 and $15 for nice ali end caps too! I will get some more ODI Ruffian Lock-Ons like on my cruiser, they are lovely. Tonight I need to hit the weights, not done upper body for about 5 days and my legs are aching from all the riding this weekend. Weights tonight and maybe ABA gates tomorrow night. Still having problems with the headset coming loose, it will not squash down. I am sure it's the stem. I have tried every combination of parts I have, the old stuff works fine, but I want the new, shorter stem on and it won't lock down. I guess new forks with a built in headlock will be the next purchase.

Last week was pretty quiet at work, I really don't like it like that, nor the fact I am in the office on my own. Still tomorrow I am interviewing somebody for an Office Admin/Jnr Bus Dev role and Josh will be back shortly from secondment so things should liven up. It's difficult to be motivated working on your own, and I need to be constantly enthused to get the best from myself. Things are starting to pick up again now though, which is good. I have been at IGI a Yr this week, tempest fugit and all that, but for the most part it has been great, and I have to say I do work for a good bunch of people, that I respect and are respectful. That's no bad thing in the money grabbing society we live in.

down the hatch..

'frog in a puff'

2008-08-25T14:22:00.006-04:00

So the first running of BMX at the Olympics happened this last week.. and my predictions were pretty good. Of course I wanted Shanaeze Reade to win, but it was never going to happen. She doesn't know how to ride with her head. All the talent and power is no good if you can't control it. I am not slamming Shinny, and her do or die attitude was awesome, very un-british of course, but said she came for Gold and nothing else. I just wish someone would tell her to turn it down a notch, there was no need to canethe crap out of every lap, nobody, Ann-Caroline aside, is close to her. And why nobody was helping her with her cornering is beyond me. British Cycling's lack of interest I think, get it out of the way and get her into the velodrome. She is a star though and whatever bike she ends up on in the future, I hope she blows everybody away. Liam Phillips had a good ride in the mens, ok he got moto'd and people are bitching about it on the 'net, but who's to say Kelvin would have done different and with the likes of Allier, Dewilde, Prokop and others going out first round, it wasn't a bad effort. Strombergs won and apart from one quarter bobble, he didn't look like losing. Only Mike Day had the ability to take it too him, and he got 2nd, so the best 2 riders were up there. I am gutted for Graves (an Aussie no less), I really like that guy, he's an awesome rider and for Sifosi Nhlapo, he deserved better, but he went for it and nobody remembers second place so why not.

I've been getting back out on the bike, the safety cycle (cruiser) a little. My hand is wrapped up with a brace and supports and actually feels ok. I just can't ride with gloves on with all the strapping which feels a but weird, but it's been good to ride. Had a good session with Chris and everybody at Severn yesterday afternoon, apart from one massive over shoot on the big doubles, all was good and my hand is starting to ease up. I've put a 58mm stem on instead of the 65mm i was running before, huge difference, can manual as well as I can on my 20" now. And some new DXR brakes so I can stop. For some reason the XT's wouldn't work at all.

I desperately need some new cruiser wheels, the hub on the back is shady and making all sorts of noises. I've rebuilt it several times now, they were just cheap wheels and are now over 3 yrs old so i can't complain, they've had a tough time for sure. Still straight tho.

Friday night was Abbey 'funbags' Greenburg's leaving do. She is eloping or something and off round the world. We had a good send off for her, although why we ended up in some euro style club bar I don't know. I couldn't hear a bloody thing. My hearing is going like my mums I think. I am going to miss her funbags though, they had a mind of their own and were all over the place. marvellous.

Saturday, after a nice lie in ;) we went tv shopping and purchased a Samsung 40" LCD HD tv, or something like that. The wife was insistent on 40", i tell her size isn't everything often, but she didn't seem to want to listen so the 40" tv looks like a feckin cinema screen in the basement. 37" would have been ok, but I am really excited anyway. We watched Bank Job last night to get the wide-screen effect. TV was lovely, but i doubt they are going to win an Oscar for the acting. Still Saffron Burrows is a little treacle.

Saturday night we hit an english pub near our old place in DC, called the Commonwealth I think. Had great english food, fish, chips and mushy peas, but we were bloody raped on the bar tab. $108 for about 8 drinks was disgusting and it wasn't like they were serving stuff that is rare over here. I was drinking cider, eric and bep on some ale and C on the wine. Next time I'll have a few sherbets before I go. But the food was excellent and we'll go again for sure, even had 'toad in the hole' although they called it 'frog in a puff'' ?? Seriously.

Today I start my new training program. Chris has written me a training program to help deal with all my injuries so I can still work out and start to get back in shape after a shitty few months. My knee is still odd though, so not sure how the weights will work on my legs, but most of the exercises are non-load bearing or very light weight for the next 3 or 4 weeks.

I've got the first of my permanent residency interviews this thursday, just biometrics and fingerprints i think. I've already done this, but for some reason I have to do it again. Still, the amount of money this is costing me i want to waste their time and get some value.

Work is quiet today, wonder how long that will last? I've designed some new brochures using MS Publisher. All good fun and I enjoy doing that stuff. I'll upload what I've done.

Cheers

Amish Country

2008-08-18T10:13:00.002-04:00

What a great weekend... and not a bike in sight. Lovely. As mentioned earlier it was father-in-laws 65th so we spent the weekend as entire family, all 10 of us.. and somehow we managed to come through unscathed and happy. We set off early Saturday morning to the Farm, where after much discussion about gas prices and where we should buy fuel, we headed out to Lancaster, PA. Just down the road from where we got married actually. The weather was perfect, mid 80's and no humidity and clear blue skies. We booked into the little hotel and hit the buffet lunch, not bad for $11 and then headed to the Hoover family. The Hoovers are Amish or Mennonite, I can't remember, or possibly neither, but certainly live a very humble life compared to the excess and trappings we rely so much on. They have 12 children, ranging from about 23 to 40 or so. Very quiet and kind, and traditionally dressed, they are wonderful people. I felt really humble and quiet embarrassed at times the way I lead my life, and the so called apparent need I have for fancy clothes, bikes, money, computers, tv's whatever. They have none of this, and not through lack of money, but through religious choice they believe in equality and therefore by all having the same there is no greed, envy, desire. What a wonderful way to live. I think we could all learn a lesson in humility and happiness from them.

We planned on staying for an hour, but we were there for about 3 or 4 hours. They farm tobacco which obviously they sell on, as well as other produce. The tobacco process is incredibly labor intensive and when they don't use machines to harvest it either, it is amazing how much they accomplish. Can you imagine cropping the 'ears' on 84,000 tobacco plants by hand? Talk about Repetitive Strain Injury! What was awesome tho, was as word spread that we had arrived the kids all started coming in from the fields on their bikes and horse and buggies. It was such a cool sight to see. Their yard full of bikes and buggies definitely made you feel like you had stepped back in time, yet we were only a few hours from DC. Quite surreal. They make wonderful furniture and paintings and leather work so we purchased a few things for the house. I think Bean and I would be happy being Mennonites, they ride bikes - great for me, and read a lot - great for Bean. However, they work damn hard - not so good for me. I have to say I am really glad we went there, made me appreciate what I have so much, but also made me realise that actually I don't need the latest and greatest to be happy. Sadly, I live very much in that world so how long this realization will last I don't know.

Saturday evening was finished off with a cold Guinness and a great burger at a little restaurant, where Sean got the whole palce to sing Happy Birthday to Ben. Sean has a gift with people for sure. He was talking with the Hoovers as though he had known them all his life. I'm sure he'd be best buds with the Pope after 10 minutes. I think Papa Laurence had a great birthday and he seemed really happy, even if Christa did lose the plot because Beckie paid for dinner.

After some Olympic viewing and a few more vino's we hit the sack. Sunday was another hot and nice day. We played some crazy golf, I got very crazy and finished last, and somehow my wife finished second. This is twice now she has impressed me with sporting talents, the tennis and crazy golf! The rest of the day was antique shopping and eating ice cream.

So we had a great weekend in all, great to be with all the family. The kids seemed to really enjoy themselves and we got a little sun.

Frustratingly my hands are still hurting quite a bit. I am convinced I have broken a bone in my left hand. I have full movement in both, just very painful at times. I ought to get them checked out. At the moment I am starting to get fed up of all the aches and pains. It's been one thing after another since May/June, first my knees, now my hands. I haven't been able to train properly for about 3 months. My body just feels like crap. I think I may use my hands as an excuse not to go to the Grands. I am not fit enough to race, and when I am not feeling fit I know my head won't be in the right place to race hard, just like Pottstown last week. Plus, I have my Citizenship application that starts on same day of Grands, so I really ought to deal with that first. I am pissed that I won't get a good ranking. but with all the nationals done I finished 12 out of 104 in 26-34x so that's a pretty good accomplishment I think. I have to set myself some goals for the new season starting Sept 21st. That will be my target, give myself some recovery time and then plan properly, with a structured training program for 35-39x.

Maybe a road ride or tennis tonight I think.

Couple of pics from Winchester State Race

2008-08-15T11:30:00.004-04:00

Matt Kelty (red), Leroy Moses (white, blue), both A Pro, and myself. I know they were probably not trying all that hard, but still feels good being next to the young guns - even if it was only for a straight!

ProAm Final. I'm in 3. This was about as close I got to the 'kids'. Good fun tho.

Scott, Ryan, Me and Rob in the Pro Am motos.

Good photo from Mr Larsen again

Aidan Peiser RIP

2008-08-15T10:33:00.003-04:00

What a crap start to the day, although nothing compared to what Aidan's family must be going through right now. I received an email this morning from Marc saying that Aidan had been killed on Wednesday night. No details yet, but possibly a car accident. Aidan, like his brother, was just a great guy to be around, never stressed at races, always happy and loved our little sport for what it was. Sadly, he has left behind a wife and 2 very young children. I am gutted, absolutely gutted. RIP mate.

I came across this pic this morning, whilst surfing the news! This is what drunk driving does to the innocent. They should feckin hang the bastard.. 1 dead and 10 severely injured.

Gatsby and remains of Profile seat!

2008-08-11T18:51:00.004-04:00

A few pics of Gatsby and my destroyed Profile seat after my crash this weekend. Idiot boy that I am. Oh, the wife has gone to buy tennis rackets. If anybody is in Silver Spring and wants a giggle, come and watch the two most uncoordinated people ever try and play tennis!

tough weekend

2008-08-11T10:49:00.002-04:00

A tough weekend, perceeded by a tough week - I should never have gone near my bike! I felt tired and not wanting to ride on Friday as I headed up to Pottstown National. I wasn't too keen n going, but I had not raced a national in months and thought the laps would do me good. How wrong could I be. The track did not suit me at all, a super short first straight with a shady jump in the middle and a table into the first corner, a steep and too short second straight meant everbody was over shooting stuff, a great rythym section and a short and steep last straight. I couldn't get any speed or any flow and even dropping down to a 43-16t didn't really help. My problem was the gate, it was so flat I really struggled to balance. This is usually my strong point but I got slaughtered all day. I crashed in pactice Friday and should have gone home then, it was an omen! Saturday after some mediocre motos (4-2-2) I had a good inside lane for the semi, only to slide off the gate as it dropped. Dead last. Somehow, I think in blind rage, I made it to second going into the second corner and thats where my race stopped. 5 200lb guys on kids bike on a track wide enough for 2 something had to give. Straight over the bars I went, taking down another guy (mike hummell i think) and my race was done. I have no idea how I crashed, what caused it, if I caused it, just one minute I was upright and the next I was lieing in the corner being run over. Needless to say the concrete berm won this battle. My bike is a mess, paint all off the top tube, new pedals and grips torn to pieces and worst of all my $65 Profile Carbon seat totally destroyed. My jersey is shredded, my back has some nice scrapes, my elbow is a lovely shade of blue and both wrists are pretty swollen as is my knee! Shoulda stayed at home and played with Gatsby. Weekend was a right off, not only did I lose my hotel money, but now I have to replace all the new parts I just put on the bike for the Grands, assuming I can ride. I feel flat, pissed off and totally not into bmx. I'll be ok by tomorrow but right now my face looks like it's been slapped by a wet fish. I'm a grumpy bugger today.

The good news is, Gatsby seems to be settled in well with Joey and Chewy. There are still some hisses and fights, but when I got in on Saturday night both Gatsby and Chewy were asleep on the sofa together so all is well. He certainly is treating our place like his home already, and seeing the wife and I only bought a house so we could have more animals so he should. Although a baby would be nice at some point wifey, just a little one..

After a busy week at work last week, looks like I have the same this week. Which is a good thing, stops me wallowing in self pity for being a complete novice on my bike at the weekend. I shall take this week off the bmx and get out on the road bike to keep my legs moving.
The weather is beautiful right now, low to mid 80's, no humidity, and blue skies = perfect. Although it does feel odd for a DC August to be like this, last yr it was in the 90's and 100's.

It was father-in-laws 65th yesterday, so next weekend we are having a mini family vacation somewhere in PA. Should be fun and will keep me off the bmx a little longer so that should help with the recovery if nothing else.

Maybe I might just take my cruiser to the Grands, if it's rebuilt in time!

The Great Gatsby

2008-08-04T14:02:00.004-04:00

Gatsby arrived Friday night. Poor little thing managed to puke in his cage and on himself on the way over. Still, I love him already. He's a real deep orange, with leopard like spots and big round eyes that make him look Korean or something. So far so good. We've had a few little spats with Joey and Chewy, right now he has taken to humping Chewy. Chewy needs to use his 17lb and put him in his place and all will be good. Although I have a sneaking suspicion he will end up the dominant cat, our two are too laid back to care. We also found out he doesn't like milk this morning just as we were leaving at 7.30 his brekkie came straight back up again! Nice.

The wife and I pretty much didn't move all weekend, we just stayed in and played with the cats. I think they liked having us around all weekend. Also it was good to spend an entire weekend with the wife, I love her lots. Sometimes we are so busy we just take things for granted, so it was good to just be together and potter around for a few days.

Saturday night we went out with Sarah, Christine's good friend from Woodley Park, and her new boyfriend. Great guy, so much nicer than the previous obnoxious little tit she dated before. Hopefully we'll get to hang out with them a whole lot more.

Sunday hit up Severn BMX. I am feeling rather angry about this, as 3 week before the national they are feckin' up all the jumps. They just have no common sense at all. They spent all their time turning the first jump, about 8ft wide at most, into a trail style jump. At the bottom of the start hill, with 8 riders hitting it! For fooks sake, it's ridiculous. Needless to say there was numerous crashes. You can't have a jump with no backside at the fastest point of the track and when the riders are closest together. However, in doing this, they totally neglected rebuilding and surfacing the rapidly deteriorating 6 pack, which would have been time, effort and money well spent. And, to make matters worse there is no concept of finishing off the jump. They just roll over it a couple of times on a quad bike and think that's it. So one good down pour, the dirt washes off and the ruts are exaggerated. I won't be at the national, but if I was an ABA racer and travelled any sort of distance I would be pretty pissed. That said it doesn't strike me as all that different from the standard of the majority tracks here - shite. Still I have Pottstown national this weekend, and whilst no big jumps, it is super smooth and full of tech fun stuff. I am looking forward to it. OK, rant over, and sorry to those people who do put the effort in, with limited resources, building tracks. I know it's not easy.

I have a super busy week this week. A couple of new projects are close to kicking off, so I have a ton of data calls to prepare for, I best go prepare then instead of sounding off.

My Dad is 21 and 40yrs today. Happy birthday pop, love you.

tire(d)issues

2008-07-28T12:44:00.002-04:00

The American spelling for Tyre is Tire! So I thought I'd have a little play on words and use tired to discuss tired legs and a tyre problems!

This weekend was a double header State race at Winchester, VA track. It's a tough track, not technical, but physically demanding, long and extremely bumpy. So after blowing a tube on my road bike last week and repairing it Friday night I decide to head out for a short ride to make sure all was working. An hour later and some hill climbs I get home feeling beat. This was rather stupid considering I know how tough Winchester track is. Also, riding the road bike a day before a race does my leg speed no good at all, as I found out first moto. I enjoyed the road ride, but not the night before a race is the lesson learned here.

Thankfully the weather was on the cool side up in Winchester. Last yr it was close to 100f, this weekend it was only in the low 80's which was a nice relief to be honest from the humidity of the last few weeks. Practice was ok, although my gates were shocking, too long away from NBL gate practice I guess. I managed to bump jump out of the second straight triple which was cool - manual the first roller and then hop off the second one from my back wheel down the back side of the jump. I got it down and did it in all my races. There was only 5 of us in class, but Scott Morrison was there who is usually a little faster than me so it was going to be good fun. However, I think I left my racing shoes at home, because to be honest I couldn't get motivated to ride all day and rode pretty crap. So much so that I ended up 5th after deciding I had had enough half way down the first straight in my final and sitting down.

I made the Pro Am final however and decided to give it one final effort. I had a good couple of motos picking up a 5th, 3rd and 2nd, even holeshotting one with Matt Kelty in (although my mates said he was just rolling!! damn!!) and Leroy Moses. So I summoned an almighty effort coming out of the gate, the kid next to me slammed my bars, I went wonky and twisted my tire/tyre out of shape! Pretty much the end of my race, by the time I got myself in a straight line I was about 5 bikes behind. I caught up to 6th, but then just simply blew up down the third straight and ended up last. My legs wouldn't even pedal and I thought I was going to pass out to be honest. I picked up a new tire off Chad and headed home to the In-Laws feeling pretty pissed off and tired.

I drove the 2 hours up into PA to Ben's brother's house, who was having a family BBQ and get together. My wife was well on her way, Jessie and Aunt Kathy were already pissed and the rest of the family was following suit. I ended up designated driver seeing as I arrived late, so was allowed one warm Yeungling beer and lots of pop to keep me going. We had a great evening. We don't see so much of the whole Laurence family, but we always have a good time, and seeing we are all close in age, it's good fun.

Sunday was spent lying in bed, at Dunkin Donuts, and house hunting, well looking at least. You'd be amazed at the size of house for $270k you can get in Hanover, you'd be like royalty. It really does make me think twice about all the money we spent for ours, but then I'd be working at Walmart and Christine would be a career receptionist somewhere. It's not conducive to the $$'s for sure.

This week we are getting Gatsby, our cat adoption. C is freaking a little, but I think they will be fine, and I would rather we take the cat than put him in a home. I am looking forward to it. I think he will be fine with our two. They are pretty laid back and I don't think it will be long before they get on.

Tonight, final coat of paint on the new door frame, new tire on the bike and early night I think.

Hot weekend

2008-07-21T10:26:00.002-04:00

It's been hot here, well into the high 90's and high humidity. Not pleasent to do anything in, so I kind of hid in the house most of the weekend. Friday night I did nothing more than mow the laws, kills weeds and watch TV. I have to say though, that lately if I sit still I seem to find a beer in my hand. This is worrying, a) because I'll become a fat bastard, but b) I seem to be enjoying it too much and want to drink regularly. I think this might be a result of the heat and a cold beer just feels good, but I don't need a couple of pints a night like I have been doing this last week. I'm an alchy!

Saturday, we hit the hardware store, paint and things. Bean has been doing a great job of painting the kitchen, she has done it all her self and is rightly proud of her efforts so far. Nice one. Saturday afternoon, after naps, I headed to Severn for an hours riding. It was 94f. I ended up riding from 4 to 8pm. Had an awesome session. Got the clips dialled in and felt much better on them. Manualled the whole third straight, all 7 jumps clipped in, flat out and was getting the bnump jumps dialled in, so am much happier. Bad thing is, I am still struggling with my knee, it feels like a trapped nerve in the top of my knee, it starting to get bloody painful and I really don't know what's causing it. No weights again then this week, just sprints and some road rides.
Saturday night Amit and Jacey came over, so the day finished off well with Amit's stories of screwing over sales people. Very amusing.

Sunday, we slept late and then went to the Diner for brekkie. I think it's starting to become a habit, but it's a nice one and we have fun. We bought some curtain poles and a few other bits and bobs from Crate and Barrel and headed home to paintin and DIY. Although we did squeeze in another nap as we had been up for about 3 hours at this point. After painting the door I headed out for a road ride. I was beat to be honest and my 12mile loop took me 2 mins longer than normal. I guess I was suffering from the heat and riding the day before. I am trying to work hard on the climbs still though, if nothing else. I have been reading a good magazine that had some useful tips to help with climbing. They paid off a little I felt. It's so weird when you know how to ride a bmx well, you think a road bike is piss easy, apparently not at all. How you hold your ankle when climbing is a big issue. Seriously. I tried the technique and until my legs gave up I think it was actually working. I think for the most part fitness is the key, so more saddle time, but that can wait until after the Grands as leg speed and strength is what I need now, that and quitting my new found alcohol problem!

Gate practice wednesday and this coming weekend the State double header at Winchester. I want to go up to 44-16t, but then it's the ProAm and i'd like to make a final or two again as it was fun last time, so maybe I'll stay with the 41-15t. Decisions, decisions...

Door

2008-07-17T12:01:00.002-04:00

Interesting title. We are having a new door fitted today. I don't envy the chippy being outside putting it in for us, its 95f today. Door looks good though, I'll post a pic to keep mother happy later on. Not sure how exciting that it is for my several readers, but nonetheless it's the first major bit of DIY to our house.

Speaking of DIY, the NMKY is having his garden landscaped, lets just hope it's all chippings or something so Mrs Monkey doesn't have to hold the baby AND mow the lawn. Rich did his bike ride at the weekend and it appears it was fairly uneventful, but fun. Good on ya. I think I would die doing 60 miles, although I am determined to cycle from Hanover to home this summer and that's close to 60 miles if not more I think. I'll wait 'til it's cooled off a bit though first.

last night I went to Severn. They have made some changes, three rollers around the first corner, seems to be ok I guess and they are going to alter the rhythm section a bit, which is good cos its pretty washed out now. I rode clips for the first time in months, and I have to say I hate them. They are faster, but I am not smoother in them. I am just going to persevere and work on it, but it's not bmx, it's plain gay. Why do guys my age, who aren't chasing vet pro dreams need clips. Seriously, whats the point? We grew up on flat pedals, why do we need disco slippers now! I think when I turn 35x after christmas I will be back on flats.

I forgot..

2008-07-15T14:38:00.002-04:00

... my unofficial, legal, wedding anniversary yesterday! Oops. Well, things have been so hectic it never even crossed my mind, not even once so I can make up an excuse. Good thing is so did the wife pretty much. She bought me some turquoise underwear to go with the myriad other colours she likes to buy me. She wasn't piss@d but if I'd forgotten the real one, my nuts would have been on the pillow next to me in the morning.

We had a good weekend. C had Friday off and pottered around the house and went and saw friend and things. Saturday I rode all day in 95f heat. Had a great session at the track, won 30+ open and then we hit the trails for a while. Had a good time and this time I rode more sensibly rather than pretending I was Brian Foster or somebody. Got a nice redneck sunburn to my arms as well, just need the beat up old pick-up truck now and I'll be hanging with the boys, chewing tobaccy and shooting possums before you know it.

Saturday night we went for Dinner at Sonoma with jacey and amit, abbey and adina. Was a fun evening and good to catch up with everybody again. Sunday morning we hit the diner and ate too much. We are really bad. We spent the rest of the day decorating, putting up pictures, curtains and other things. It was too hot too go outside. Sunday night Bean went and caught up with an old skool friend courtesy of Facebook. It wasn't all that by all accounts, so I don't think she is too bothered about seeing her again. Just talked about herself the entire night. I hit the weights Sunday evening. Back doing deadlifts, as these aren't causing my knees any problems like squats where. I guess the squats will give me a bit more explosive power, but there is no point in hurting myself doing them. I am starting off light on the lifts and doing them quick, just touching the floor with the weight and then straight back up again.

Last night I did 12 miles on the road bike. I don't want to do massive distances, just work hard on the hills and spin on the flat. My legs are sore today. I am trying to push super hard on the hills as best I can to make up for not being able to hit the weights hard lately. My brother would laugh at me as he flies up hills on his road bike without braking a sweat, where as I look like the 15yr old who just got caught stealing Playboy... hot and sweaty, with a far away look in my eyes! Still, I am determined to make the most of the bike and I am really enjoying it. I have to fix a puncture for bean tonight as she got a flatty, same problem every time, spoke into the tube. I have more rim tape on there than Halfords sells, its feckin stupid. I have even filed down the spoke heads. It's always the same spoke to. So I'll fix that tonight and swap my gear back to 44-16t for Winchester and set up my new clips too. Maybe hit gates or a local race tomorrow night.

Off to MacDonald's for a protein shake...

New bike pics

2008-07-09T21:44:00.004-04:00

A couple of pics of the bike.

Rich, check out the stem. It's a tube over the steerer tube, and the stem slides up and down it. I thought it looked sketchy, but it actually is so easy to use.

I prefer 0 degree stem, but it will do for now. Just put an old computer on it, from my BMX. And, Christine's boss gave me an almost brand new turbo trainer which is great for warm up for doing my weights. lovely jubbly.

surprise..

2008-07-07T11:49:00.002-04:00

The planned, surprise, birthday party went down a treat for the Mrs. I think she was super stoked. She really had no idea, considering how clever she is, I am going to give myself a hearty pat on the back for not slipping up along the way. We had an awesome time, so many people came and it went off well. A bunch of my bmx buddies came, Shitbreak and Dave came down from Boston, Mo plus bump and James and all the family so it was a really good time. Have to say though I couldn't have pulled it off without Eric and Bep who helped out soo much. I am really grateful guys.. We even managed to keep Christa in check when she had a kitten every time the phone rang. The only slight downer was the weather, it pissed it down as soon as Bean turned up, so everybody was in my house. My mum would have had a heart attack with the mess, but it was all good. We now have about 2 cases of beer and several bottles of wine left. I think I may dump them over the fence as the guys next door will appreciate them I am sure.

Thursday I picked up my new bike. I was out in West Virginia at 6.30 in the morning, grabbed the bike from Jamie and was back in the office by 8.30. The bike is awesome. I only got a couple of rides in over the weekend as I was so busy, but this week I plan to use it some more. A nice recovery ride tomorrow morning from weights tonight will be the first ride. I hope I can get out 2 or 3 days a week and a nice long ride at weekends whilst Bean is a sleep, that's my plan anyway. I'm very happy with it though, apart from brakes are a little spongy, cheap calipers, so maybe an upgrade later on and definitely some new pads now.

Saturday night we went to Christines boss' for dinner. Had a great evening. Her husband, Greg, is super cool and very funny. We were made to feel at home and for saying I am about as useful at a dinner party as birth control is to the Pope, we had a pukka evening. Also met one of C's colleague, JoJo Spiker. Not only is he cool, but he quite possibly has the coolest name ever. Rich, can you imagine commentating on that name.. "call the cops, JoJo Spiker just stole first place..". Not that you would use that line Rich, that's more of a Warlock one line.. :)

Sunday, after a lie in, I went to Severn to ride and watch the local race. Some little herbert told me "i would be better if i clipped in.." Cheeky monkey, just cos daddy bought him a race team! I laid down the law. Cleared all the second straight without pedalling after the first step, then manualled the whole second straight, with a jump to manual in the deep set thrown in and then asked him to do the same? cue wind whistling threw the trees and silence. I'll put my clips on when a title is on the line, not for a sunday scooting session. It was a good session though, but the humidity is starting to hit with a vengeance.

Just starting to plan my Grands trip. I am thinking of flying, $200 for a return flight right. It will cost more than that in gas to get Louisville with current gas prices. So that maybe my plan and hire a car there. Back on the training schedule tonight, have slacked for last month with my knee and calf trouble. I have no intention of making the Grands a wasted a trip, so better pull my finger out..

ta-ra

the wife is 30 today!

2008-07-02T10:23:00.003-04:00

Happy Birthday pooper! Can't believe you're 30. I liked having a wife in her 20's made me sound studley...! Now we sound old. C woke up to breakfast in bed, and some flowers and presents. I know how to look after my wife for sure. Actually that's not true, but last night I did set my alarm early to get up and make her brekkie, but apparently I didn't turn it on. I tried to imagine another 30 years for both us, and what it will be like to wake up together when she is 60. I expect it will be the same, just a little more wrinkly and maybe a different cat.

Last night I went to Severn to ride, made the most of easy traffic getting home so I threw the bike in the car and headed out. Had a good session. Manualled the whole third straight several times. I can do it fast, but not slow. Still, you don't race slow so I am not too worried. Be nice to bring that trick out at the national and pull a place or two. I've also been trying to learn downside table tops, I don't really get them, I think I just turn my bars and lean a little. Bloody stiff! I'll figure them though. Also tried out my new 661 Kyle Strait knee pads I bought, excellent. Well worth a look for anybody after some top quality knee protectors. So comfy to ride in and much better protection all round, as well as giving the knee some stability which I hope helps me. Some complete twat was also launching fireworks at the track, wouldn't have been quite an issue if he was 16, but he was about 40! There really are some dickheads out there. feckin' rednecks..

Dad is at the Dr's today to see about his fingers. They managed to save them so that's good, but how much use or feel he will get, only time will tell. I am kind of hoping that they might sew some brains on, or at least his arse to the sofa for a little while so he sits still, but I doubt that will make any difference. Still, at least he can't hold a ciggy properly at the moment, so maybe that will stop him smoking.. somehow I doubt it though.

Cheers

chilled weekend

2008-06-30T10:29:00.002-04:00

Well I did what I have been meaning to do for ages, and have a weekend off the bike. I slept a lot, put on about 5lb probably and thoroughly enjoyed my time with the wife and in-laws.

Friday I went to Severn after work, rode for about 45mins, but suffered in the heat. I need to keep an eye on dehydrating, that's a couple of times I've felt dizzy and its the heat. I stayed and helped work on the track after a monumental storm and the guys raced i think, but i was feeling poop so went home and hit the hay for close to 12 hours.

Saturday we headed up to the farm. Went to the Mansion on Saturday evening for dinner. Very good. Had a lovely rib eye steak and some really cool ice tea sorbet which was awesome. We then watched some terrible film with Kevin Bacon. I didn't think he could make a crap film but he really pulled out all the stops on this one, flip me it was shite. Still Kelly Preston was in it, and she's pretty hot, well until she got shot that is.

Sunday we headed to Hoss n Boss for some good old fashioned diners breakfast. Lovely. I had some sausage gravy thing, which i think had died a slow death, not the greatest but i ate it seeing as i was paying. We spend the rest of the day wandering around Codorus Park and Lake and looking at boats to buy with Ben and Christa. Even if we had bought one, it's a 3 yr waiting list to dock them. We stuck with the rental idea. Sunday afternoon was more napping and a leisurely drive home with a little 'open house' viewing. For $300k in Hanover we can get a place twice the size of ours, brand new, fully decorated and with appliances. It's crazy. Papa Laurence was trying to convince us to move there. I would.. if i could get a job like I have now and the same with Bean. We'd have built in baby sitters though, as Papa Laurence spent all weekend trying to bribe us to have kids. We are going to hold out a little longer until the bounty is at a decent rate and I can squeeze in another 2 wheeled form of transport...

crap nights sleep last night, ended up in the basement as i was annoying the wife. i think i went to sleep around 3am. Today is going to be a long day, but hopefully my new bike will be here this week.

Heard the Warlock finally got airborne this weekend, amazing how he can so easily be persuaded with food and he grabbed an A final place and Lauren made her first A final also. NICE.

laters.

Muppet!

2008-06-26T17:37:00.002-04:00

I am going to proceed this blog update, with I love my dad dearly... however he's a muppet! Today he managed to chop the top third of two fingers off his right hand. And, in his typically subborn way continued to finish the job he was working on before driving home 60miles so he could go to the local village hospital 'where people know him'. Honestly, I spent my entire child being called 'jonah' by him cos I was the clumsy one, doing daft shite all the time. Apparently some steel fencing fell on him, it was that heavy it bent the steering column of the tractor he was driving, so no wonder it took his fingers off. Mum is not happy with him. "there but for the grace of God go I". Oh, and mum had a mirror fall on her noggin today too and has a nice bump. That's them two and me binning it at the trails last week and jacking my knee up again.

So I finally ordered my new road bike. I just couldn't justify a $2000 sat at home, even when I get $700 off list, so I went for the Masi Gran Corsa Ali and Carbon frame and forks, and 10 groupset. It's more than enough for my needs to keep me fit and do something a little different than the bmx. I am looking forward to getting it.

Had a good session at Severn last night. Got some good pull on the first straight and my gates are improving on the ABA every week. Got some help from Matt Kelty on the second straight. No matter how long you have been riding a little bit of advice from someone else can go a long way. I got the second straight doubles down now. Pick up manual, tyre tap out and boost the triples. Took me a few attempts but i got it. Cheers Matt. Chris Agard and his mrs, Tammy where down with John, so it was a good session. Tammy is getting pretty good considering she has just started riding. She certainly doesn't seem to be scared to try, which is what it's all about.

There is always a good turn out at Severn, more so than at Woodbridge. I guess cos the track is easily accessible 24/7. Feeling it today though, bit dehydrated and sore. This is what I want the road bike for, nice recovery rides after a hard session.

Been a hectic week at work, got lots of irons in the fire, lets hope these deals start to grow.

Off home to love the wife.. or annoy her, which ever comes easiest.. or first.. :)

Happy Birthday Bobbin

2008-06-23T15:17:00.002-04:00

Almost forgot, its little Bobbin Eames birthday this past weekend. Happy Birthday Robyn.. :)

2yrs..

2008-06-23T14:58:00.003-04:00

I've been here 2yrs now, as of Saturday. Can't believe it. tempus fugit and all that. So it's been a happy 2yrs and I wouldn't change any of it really. We've had a few ups and downs along the way, sadly with the passing of Colin McNevin just after we got married - a pretty low point, but things have been good and I know I made the right decision coming here, even if I do miss family and friends a lot.

The wife bought me a new watch as a 2 yr anniversary present, which was cool. I have been banging on about getting an Omega for ages. I will still be banging on about getting one as they are a couple of grand, but she did buy me a nice Fossil watch. I love it, its white. But, she thinks I look a flamer with it! I prefer to be androgynous, but who's to argue which side the bread is buttered eh??

Last week I struggled to train, my left knee won't put up with any squats at all. I feel like I am trapping a nerve when I bend down, a bit like banging your funny bone in your elbow. I hit ABA gates on Wednesday night which was good. Had some good pull going on my flats and I am slowly starting to get an ABA gate.

Friday night I hit the trails. Apparently in a literal sense also. Tit. No pads, no helmet and I went for the big set which I've been wanting to do for ages. Guess what, came up short and over the bars. Luckily I hit something soft on the way down, but my right knee is now banged up. Still I did almost make it through, but why I tried it with no gear on and on my own, I have no idea. The trails are a good ride off the path back in the woods, I would have been up shit creek if I'd really hurt myself.

It's South Park this coming weekend. Not sure how I am feeling about it. Heard good and bad about the rebuild, and its never been good to me results wise, but I love riding there and watching the Pros. Just with gas prices, going up to watch is not really an option. I'm going to make a last minute decision I think.

Still looking for a new road bike. Just waiting my sponsor to see if he can get me a deal on the Masi Gran Criterium. Any bike in Purple People Eater purple is worth buying in my book. There are a few road clubs by my office and I'd like to get involved with one and maybe do a race or two next yr as a novice for fun.

I am swamped at work at the moment, so I should end my inane ramblings here. Good to be busy though, we are starting to grow our little business well now. Have a meeting next week at Norfolk Air Base, oh, and it just happens that Hampton track is just outside the air base, best take my bike with me then..

ta-ra

Tired..

2008-06-17T15:49:00.005-04:00

Don't know what's up with me the last few weeks, been feeling pretty tired. Have enthusiasm do to do stuff, just no energy when I get to it. And, its not like I need an excuse to be even lazier is it?

In the mix, in the ProAm and doing it for flat pedals and the over 30's club!

My friend, Alex Larson (A Pro), his dad is a great photographer and took a ton of pics of us all racing at Woodbridge recently. I like this one, leading W2, Bill Young down the first straight. It was home track glory, he kicks my butt most of the time, but it's great to race guys as fast as him and Patrick Parker.

Saturday I went to Hampton, VA for the State series. As usual nobody turned up - heat and gas prices being the excuse. Although I think running it in the middle of the day in a Virginia summer is also a contributing factor, that and distance. Chad Powers (www.powersbikeshop.com) had made some interesting changes to the third straight. Any Euro rider would have laughed at it, however most people were having kittens! It was steep, and you were screwed if you lot your momentum, but I enjoyed the challenge and want to go back and see if I can double through it. I'm sure I can with some practice. I took 2,1,1 after only 5 laps of practice. We got stuck in awful traffic. I raced the ProAm and took 3rd after an awful start, but an old skool one footed high/low saved the day and made me a whopping $26!

Sunday I chilled big time. Did jacksh1t actually. Annoyed the wife by being lazy, but then cooked up a great steak on the grill. We are definitely getting into the grilling lately. The meat always tastes so much better and we have fun doing it and then sitting out on the deck with the food. I was no not bothered about having a deck when we were house-hunting. I'm glad we have one though, it's a nice place to be on a summers evening.

Think I am going to give sprints a miss tonight and save some energy for the West Virginia regional. Some good points there and I can take it easy for while and ride the trails and maybe do some mountain biking or road riding.

toodlepip

2008-06-10T13:26:00.002-04:00

Pumping the rhythm for all I'm worth and trying to get clipped back in. I came unclipped coming out the second corner and couldn't get any cranks in before the section. I'm glad it was narrow otherwise both guys would have gone past me. I got back in by the end of the straight though and pulled down the last straight.. I wasn't about to wait another 2 yrs to get a shot at winning. These dudes are fast.

2008-06-10T13:24:00.001-04:00

Coming out the first corner in the final. Brian Meyer and Vin Morreria behind me, and my mate Phil Oddo in the FMF shirt making his come back. He cracked his skull at Woodbridge last yr! ouch.

2008-06-10T13:21:00.002-04:00

Second straight table top action over the doubles. The pro section was on my left, first one was no problem, second looked a bit sketchy to me and certainly wasn't faster..

..damn another pic, he must be good?

2008-06-09T19:46:00.003-04:00

or just lucky! Anyway, another Woodbridge pic in BMX Today. Scott Morrison to my left, Kris Lundgren out front, John Paul Pfeiffer outside him. I got third, after 1/4s and a super tough weekend of great racing..

Pfeiffer and Jason Lindsey on Scotts left rode 2 bikes both days!! too much for me.. :)

one to keep the sponsor happy

2008-06-09T19:37:00.002-04:00

Check it out! Me (310) and my good mate Scott Morrison down the first straight at Woodbridge National. This pic is in BMX Today. I'll be signing autographs later, and am happy to sleep with all bmx moms now I am famous..!

At last..

2008-06-09T10:12:00.003-04:00

I finally got my first national win over here on the 20". It's taken 2 yrs almost to the day, I've led three finals, only to crash in all of them and finally sunday it just clicked and I won!... but not without a near miss! The second corner had to be carved hard otherwise you'd end up on the slower side of the decision maker which I really didn't want to be on with two guys breathing down my neck. As soon as I picked up to pedal again out I popped right before the roller into the rhythm section. I didn't get the extra cranks I needed and got caught but as the straight was narrow nobody could really get past. I pumped hard, got clipped back in and managed to pull away on the last straight section. Was a little lucky I guess, but I won comfortably in the end. The nice part was I had a perfect, won all my motos and then the final. Day 1 I also won all my motos, got a mint start in the final, only to butcher the first straight step up and let 2 people past. I stayed in third to the line, even though I caught up in the rhythm I just couldn't get past.

The track at Lexington, SC was awesome, great facilty, good hospitality, it deserved a better attendance, with only around 80 motos each day. I guess the heat (over 100f all weekend) and the spiralling gas prices put people off. I hope they get a national next year though as it's on my list for sure.

My buddy Jason picked up a second in 41-45n and Bruce got the worse moto draw and unfortunately had to watch the finals from the sidelines.

check out www.columbiabmx.org for tons of awesome photos. Even one of me doing an old school table top for the dinner ladies on Sunday 8th part 2 i think...

Off to scare myself with the online bank account now..

Pointless, but I need one..

2008-06-05T10:34:00.004-04:00

Check this out from Specialized, absolutely awesome. Every Brit should ride one.. I'm going to start a trend.. Its Langster London. Mint.

On a trend I am not keen to remain a member of, storms and power outages! I don't understand this? And I certainly don't understand why we have been without power at home for about 14hours now. Its BS. I trust Pepco are going to give me a rebate, although I expect they will have some clause that discusses 'force majeure' and say it's not their fault! Well it's not my fault when the bill doesn't get paid.

Off to South Carolina tonight, I hear the weather is in the high 90's all weekend and sunny! Lovely. I really don't mind riding in the heat, it's the stopping and sweating after that's the problem. I sweat at the thought of sweating. I think I am secretly a fat kid in a skinny kids body.. ooh I wonder if I've just invented something new for the Dr's and psychoanalysts to discuss on day time tv!

To Schwin or not to Schwinn?

2008-06-04T09:50:00.003-04:00

NMKY, what do you think of this?

This is the 08 model, I may try and find the 07, it's the same just blue..

Don't tell the wife, but she did just drop a bombshell, supposedley I have been overpaying the monthly savings, cool.. i'll spend it before she can hide it somewhere from me.

spelling

2008-06-03T10:58:00.003-04:00

Ok, so my last post, the grammar and spelling was aweful. I have a new PC and I can't type on the thing at all. I am so used to a laptop.. And I write proposals for a living, thank goodness for spell checker (although perhaps I need to turn it on..)

:)

Its all for charidy mate, not arf!

2008-06-03T10:33:00.003-04:00

So the Cruiser Worlds ran on Sunday, and the UK old boys club rocked. Congrats to Dale on another #1, although he didnt look like he was trying all that hard and Flemdog who walked 40-44. Hilly took a fifth, Andy Shaw a 3rd and Ivesy a fifth i think. Great stuff guys, well done.

I am now motivated to rebuild and get back on my cruiser. It needs a clean for a start, hasn't been touched since Northern Monkey nearly got both wheels off the floor racing at Woodbridge. The bottom bracket is creaking like a good 'un yet again. I think it's the combination of a 3yr old ali frame and profile chromoly cranks. It will be completely stripped, repainted and rebuilt, or I may just hang it all and buy a new Crupi cruiser. I love them. I need new wheels and brakes for sure.

So the charity. Well it seems as though a few people are doing charity rides. my friend Mara is doing 194miles in CT or MA later this year and the Monkey is talking about one on his blog, when low and behold father-in-law sends me a link to one USAToday is organizing. I think it's a hint, something about giving back a little I guess and doing something I love. So I have a choice of 34miles, 65m or 102m in late August, the week before the Grands actually. Not sure if hitting up 100 miles is a good thing before the Grands so I'm going to opt for the 65miler. I will be good for this I think. Of course I need to go and buy a new road, bike, damn,.. well if you're going to insist.. I mean why not.. I'll have to hide it in the basement for a while and hope C doesn't spot it.

The weekend we went to NY for Jamies birthday, we had a great time, although after 1am I was starting to get tired and moody. I guess I can't keep up any more. Still the introduction of key lime pie perked me up somewhat. The wife consumed too much alcohol though and was feeling sorry for herself all day sunday. Lightweight. I was on it big time, I think I had 4 beers and a shot over 5 hours, no stopping me for sure. It was a great weekend and Jamie was on top form. She has some really cool friends too, so all in all a good trip.

I'm back on the bike doing sprints. My calf is holding out so far. Just plenty of constant stretching and I have it wrapped up so all is good. I guess I am going to have to jump everything at the weekend rather than manual to avoid straining it. Still I am looking forward to South Carolina, the track looks mint. If I can make two more main and pull some good results I will be in a comfortable position going to the Grands. I am not putting myself under any pressure though, the calf strain ruined my training for two weeks and unless I am doing something everyday I don't feel good, so SC will be about having fun. It's going to be scorching hot down there, so all the locals and Florida boys will be up front I guess. It's only just starting to get warm here, so I haven't had much time to get acclimatized to the humidity. Anyway, it's a new track and I want to hit the pro section, thats my goal. Anything else is a bonus.

More sprints or the track tonight with Chris Agard. Chris pulled off wins both days at PA this weekend at the ABA national, although it was a mudfest so he said. Chris should be in with a real shout of a Top 3 plate this year, maybe even the #1. Bring it East mate.

Jog on..

UCI BMX Worlds China

2008-05-30T09:18:00.002-04:00

wow, the Brits in the old guys class did awesome.

First off Marco made the final with a fifth, got a bit shut down out the gate and lots of carnage, but he rode good. Dan Clifford got fifth in the semi, thats a long way to go out soo close to the big show. feel for him.

30+, Flemdog, Ivesy and Andy Shaw all made the final. Flem was leading and killing it, got a bit loose down the third straight and allowed some sneaky frog to get by. Andy 3rd and Ivesy fifth. I've raced with Andy and Dave for years, both great riders and decent guys, so pleased for them both. Lets hope Flem gets revenge in cruiser now.

Masters final, Dale was on it all the way, but left a gap big enough to drive a tank through and Dinger went underneath him in the last corner (Dinger is unreal in the rythym sections), Dale fought back to win by an inch at the line. Hilly made another worlds final with fifth I think. Hilly is a legend in my book, trains his arse off and works a hectic job and totally deserves his rewards, well done Hillybags.

Nice one chaps. really pleased for all of you.

Todays conundrum, a new Staats Cruiser or a road bike. I need both, want both, don't want to get divorced if I buy both. Maybe I'll have to be super nice to my sponsor and see what he can do for me. Better win in SC next weekend then.

My calf is improving and I am desperate to get out and ride, but I know the more I rest the better it will be. I just want to ride though.. especially now I have watched the Worlds vids.. Maybe some sprints on Sunday night and see how I feel. I think I will race SC on flats. I don't want the pull of the clips tweaking my calf muscle any more than necessasry.

Anybody heard or seen the Warlock?

no Apples in this house..

2008-05-27T10:02:00.003-04:00

I had a rocking weekend planned, a little gardening, a little house work, some good times with the wife and some bmx.. well 'best laid plans..' and all that, it went tits up on Friday night. I leave work a little early and head out to Winchester for gate practice and to ride with my mate Jason. Jason maybe 40+ now, but his gate and fist dozen pedals are like riding against Flemdog. He has a real snap and pull. We always have a good session together and push each other.

Well the track was in pretty poor condition, the rains have been monsoon like lately and have really battered the rebuild. All of the straights had stones sticking out, so we hooked up the dragger to the quad, but it took about 3 hours to clear the place. We had some good gates going on and then right at the end of the session I went to bump jump the table on the first straight. It's about 15ft long, maybe less, but I am getting close to clearing the whole thing from a manual. As soon as I took off I felt my calf muscle give way, man did it bring tears to my eyes. Felt like some bugger had just stabbed my in the leg. So that was the end of practice and my weekend plans. Saturday I spent the day on the sofa, with my leg wrapped in ice. It helped for sure, but it does cloud the issue of South Carolina next weekend. Hopefully it will be strong enough to ride, I don't want to drive 500miles for nothing, but it also means it screws up my training. I have been pushing hard lately, squats, jump squats and sprints plus gates once or twice a week. I have been seeing real improvement. I feel I am as quick now with flats on as I was a month ago with clips on. Maybe, I might take my cruiser to SC and just ride for fun as I am not necessarily chasing a cruiser plate.

Sunday I felt better, I bought a support for my calf which is really helping, so we headed off to Lowes to look at doors and bathrooms, exciting huh and then we went to Best Buy to look at new PC's. We had the whole Mac conversation again, but truth is, neither of us would use a Mac to its potential. We use the 'net, C uses the basic functions for work all the time and we down load pics and music. I think I wanted a Mac because it looks cool, but I am a numpty with technology, so better the devil you know I guess. In the end we got a nice HP system including a good quality wireless printer, a wireless router and a Dell laptop for C for less than we would have spent on a Mac. It was a wise decision. Here's the rub though, we transfered all the old data we wanted from the old pc to the new pc and guess what, first time we re-booted it error message "Drive D has insufficient memory" For fooks sake. It has 360GB and we only transffered about 60GB of photos, doc and tunes. Drive D is the image memory, I guess for back up and recovery. I am sure we can fix it, but honestly, just short of a grand and first time it boots we get that! Bill Gates needs a sodding great slap or someone does at MS thats for sure.. :)

Good luck to all the chaps from the UK heading to China for the BMX worlds this coming week. I hope DC and Marco can bring back some W plates in 25-29x.

Also check out Wan's and Northern Monkeys (www.nmky.blogspot.com) comments on Crewe Bmx track. I heard its scary. Step up or go home I reckon, people want it too easy. Last weekend I rode at Richmond, it was something straight from the 80's. I'd love a track with steep jumps and something to be scared of again, bmx is getting lame, tracks are for progression, if you can't ride it, find one you can, learn the skills and then move on to the tough ones. I wish the NBL or ABA would step it up like Crewe, even though I would poop my pants looking at the pics.

Been a week..

2008-05-19T11:00:00.005-04:00

It has, its true, its been a week since I last updated. Work has been super busy and I really haven't had any 'quiet' time for a good while now. That's all good though and I am starting to make some progress into my new role. I still find it daunting. I am not the greatest at new business development, simply because most of it is relationships and I know about 4 people in this town, and also I am not that great with new people. I am just not interested enough and I am not very good at feigning interest. Still it is coming together and we had a great meeting with some senior people work for the DHS last week and a small business owner who's dad was Ambassador to South Africa, so that was interesting and productive. I am still enjoying things though and that always makes it easier to get up in the morning.

Last wednesday I hit ABA Severn for gate practice. Some super fast guys there; McGuire, Kelty, Eric Posey, Austin Loebbe, Josh Grimes. It did me good and was a hell of a work out. I rode for about 3 hours. They still kill me out the gate, but my ABA gates are improving rapidly. But the good thing is that they are not leaving me for dead. I can't stay with them at all for the first 5m, but after that the gap never widens and in some cases I am starting to close in when I get a good gate. I have got to hit the squats and sprints hard over the next few weeks though as I am now racing South Carolina in June and to travel all that way I have got to make it worthwhile and make the mains if I can.

The weekend, we had a nice dinner with Jacey and Amit, Abbey and her friend Lauren at a good little pizza place in north east. Good food and we had fun, although the hostess was a Muppet, so every body complained. Make the complaint once and move on. Also turns out no matter how educated a group of friends is, making a decision on a place to dine and a time is apparently beyond anything higher education can produce. Feck, we are crap.. Was a great evening though.

Saturday was a nice day, so I headed off to Richmond, VA for a state race. The track isn't all that sadly, but they have paved the turns and start straight and that improved it no end and the racing was fun. I only had 3 in my class, why they won't run everybody over 30 together and just give them the points they would have achieved in their respective class afterwards. It makes better racing and improves progression of the riders. Sadly, NBL is more concerned with moto count and trying to compete with the ABA.

There was a small pro/am turnout. Everybody was on my back to race it, and I could have made the final and maybe done ok, but I wasn't feeling it and it was another $25 on top of race fees and $60 in gas to Richmond. It was starting to get expensive and I am trying my best to save for South Carolina, a re-model of our bathroom and a motorbike. Diego Alejandre took the win, followed by Alex Larsen after Lee Moses slid out in the first corner and went down.

Jonny Culbreth crashed really hard in the pro-am and shattered his newly repaired collar bone again. I feel for him. He has been down a lot lately and is such a talented rider. hopefully he won't be off the bike too long. Also heard Jeremy Thompson went down in North Carolina practicing and smashed his wrist badly. As far as I can tell it's in a worse state than mine was, but the miracles of technology will have him back again. He is super talented and I was looking forward to racing him next year when I go up to 35x.

Sunday, I kind of chilled out. Went to Home Depot, bought a few things, got some stuff for the wife so she can make up pots for her plants. She is really getting into the gardening and enjoying it. This is fine by me, not just because she is doing a great job of making our garden look good, but more importantly she is outside and not in front of the pc and doing work. I watched Rossi win in Le Mans and ironed. I guess I'll have to mow the lawn tonight, as well as sweep the leaves, wash the windows and do some squats. Busy evening I guess.

Its monday morning here and I have a truck load to do. Have a proposal to write for SeaPort-E. Not 100% convinced its our bag as we don't have all the quals for it, but we might as well respond and see what happens. We have major pc and network problems too and a couple of pc's have got viruses on them, making a lot of thumb twiddling going on.

ta ta

Rich, when you getting that bike out, you could have made a final in cruiser at Mansfield judging by the videos??

she's gone..

2008-05-12T18:21:00.000-04:00

my winters work, sold it for a few bob more than i bought it for.. hope she goes well.

Tough Breaks

2008-05-12T17:55:00.002-04:00

I heard from my buddy, NMKY, that Kelvin Batey has been cut from the UK team to go to the BMX Worlds in 2 weeks. 2 weeks! What kind of notice is that? The BCF are a bunch of feckers sometimes, cos that's pretty harsh, that gives him very little time to make alternative arrangements. If they were thinking of ditching him, what warning did they give him and more importantly how long were they considering this? I'm bummed because I have a lot of time for Kelv, we came to the States together in 04 and had a great trip, and even though he wants to bone more BMX moms than Dale, he is a good guy! :) I hope he gets out there and proves his worth. There is nothing more motivating than someone saying "you can't".

However, I do have one point to make in defence of the process, but not BCF though, and I guess this comes because I write and reads contracts on a regular basis. If the BCF are funding Kelvin and they are doing so with the criteria of him achieving certain goals throughout the year and he's not met them, then he hasn't lived up to his part of deal/contract. And, so to spend money on somebody who hasn't delivered wouldn't make any business sense. I can see that, and maybe that is there justification. But sport is more than a business, sport is an emotion, thats why it exists; as entertainment for some and competition and achievement for others. And if Kelvin's past Worlds performances are anything to go by, well BCF has just made one rather large cock up!

Enough, but Kelvin I am behind you all the way buddy. And that's all I have to say on that.

So, I didn't got to NBL Howell. I wanted to, but my back was killing me, still is, and the weather has been atrocious, so Jason and I made the decision not to go. I don't know what the weather was like up there, I hope it stayed dry and was a good weekend, but I am glad of the rest and a great weekend with the in-laws. Papa Laurence is doing good after his hip operation and as usual Christa: aka Marie Barone, fed me wonderfully and sent me home with a load of goodies. One thing you can never say about the Laurence family is they skimp on food. Mother in law serves up some doozies for sure. Also Beps parents were over and Eric got the BBQ going so it was a good day and nice to be with the family. Still, I am not convinced about Grappa. Anybody had that sh*t? Fook me, it melted my toe nails and I was burping it up for the next hour. It made Christa and Kathy giggle for ages which was fun.

So, no riding in a little while for me. The weather is poop and my back is fooked, so I am taking it easy. I am up to my nuts in work right now, so I am not too bothered, I just don't want to get out of the habit of sprints and squats that were paying off for me. Maybe I'll hit the trails this week and have some fun.

Sad news, I sold the Honda dirtbike. I made about $200 on it though, I just never used it. Silly waste of money, but I learnt a ton and that will be good for when I buy my road bike. Gas is crazy so something that does 45mpg makes more sense and the simple fact is I want a road bike. i've wanted one my whole life, i've bought every book and magazine on bikes since I was old enough to read pretty much, so I think it's about time. I'm looking at used Hondas, the CB919 or CB600 ideally or maybe a Yamaha Fazer 600. What ever comes up. Got to go through the whole licencing thing again, even though I have a UK licence. They'll give me a car to tear up the road on without re-testing me, but I have to on a bike! Not sure of the logic there. You can probably do more damage not being able to drive properly than ride properly.

toodle-oo

2008-05-08T09:57:00.000-04:00

The new bike and race kit, courtesy of Jamie at Groove Merchants. Lovely Jubbly

Just a quicky..

2008-05-08T09:34:00.002-04:00

...said the Vicar to the Nun!! oo er!

So it's been a bloody busy week to say the least. My new role as Proposal Manager and Business Development Manager is pretty hectic to say the least. It wasn't on my career path, I was hoping to do very little and earn a lot, but sadly I am not an England footballer so I have to contribute something useful. I am slowly making headway into my work load though and to be honest it's fun and exciting most of the time, even though it freaks me out that I may have bitten off more than I can chew. Still the days are going fast and that's good and my bosses are happy.

Yesterday I hit the Vienna Inn for Chilli dogs and fries with a company we are partnering with. Now that's my kind of business lunch, all washed down with a cold yeungling beer (no idea how to spell it).

Hit gate practice last night, it was windy and my allergies were playing up. I have never had allergies until I lived here. What do they put on the ground to make me ill! Gates were good. I had the last straight rhythm down a treat and am hitting it faster. I want to do the step up to roller at the end. I think I have the speed, now its just getting the nuts up to do it! My gates were on point too, I was right up there with the A's and Vets that ride our track and on flats too. I really don' t think clips help me with pull from the gate, I feel no slower without them. They help me with things like pick up pedal manuals and cornering harder plus they make me concentrate better, but I really don't believe my speed from the gate suffers without them.

Coolest thing, I manualled the whole second straight, from berm to berm, super stocked. Anything Upshaw can do. Of course my mates bet me I couldn't do it again.. they were indeed correct, after 7 attempts I realised it was pure accident.. good job I didn't bet the wifes virtue, just a can of Mountain Due haha.

I have a conference call with HP in a minute, something about the Help Desk opportunity at US PTO. All pretty deep and meaningful. Working with federal govt is not a joy, they change the programs on a whim, you prepare one thing and something else comes up. Still I get paid for it so mushn't grumble.

The wife has gone home ill. Her allergies have been really bad, she slept very little last night, although she did fart a lot for some reason so she told me this moring. I'm going to buy her a large cork..

Off to Howell, NJ for an NBL national this weekend. Hopefully my back ache will have eased by then. If it's not one thing it's another. I always seem to be carrying some niggling injury.

The NMKY is still on his 2 yr come back. He did gates last night for 10mins. I'm proud of him. How much he talked during that 10mins though as opposed to riding is another question. Get on your bike Rich, it misses you. He'll be back soon for sure.

Ok, off to discuss contracts and teaming agreements, my world rules sometimes it really does.

"two butchers and a f*ck load of cutlery"

jog on..

Woodbridge National and Monkeys

2008-04-29T10:57:00.005-04:00

It's been pretty busy since the Monkeys arrived last wednesday, what with all the catching up and the race at the weekend, day tripping in DC yesterday to Madame Toussards (sp), I haven't had much time to update.

So the Monkeys arrived and it's been great having them here. Being a typical bloke I never think about missing friends from home, but when they are around you realize how important they are, so it's been a good fun week. Sadly, they go home tomorrow, but I think I may kidnap little Bobbin for an extra week. She is gorgeous and full of fun and inquisitiveness. She has been as 'good as gold' and I think she might have even provoked maternal feelings in the wife too!! I think they have had a good time here, so maybe this will be an annual affair.

If anybody wants a good giggle watch Rich try and put up the baby pram/stroller. You'd have thought it was rocket science the time he took.. my wife was very amused! :)

Friday we headed to Woodbridge, VA for practice and to register for the national. The weather was good and we had a great turn out for an east coast national. Around 125 motos each day. Some heavy hitters were there in the Pro ranks which was awesome to see - JRich, Pohlkamp, Becerine, DR, Upshaw, Randy amongst others. Their first straight pull has to be seen to be believed. Upshaws jump to manual over the first doubles and around the first corner had to be seen. It was pretty sick. He then promptly manualled the last straight and went from about 5th to 2nd whilst looking over at DR in the process. The kid has skills.

Well the last few nationals I have attended my class has sucked, with almost no riders there. This weekend we ran quarters saturday, and only 1 rider short of quarters sunday. To say it was stacked would be an understatement. Anybody in the semis could have won the finals. W2 Bill Young (made the final with Marco in Canada last yr in 25-29) went out in the semis saturday, but came back for a great win on sunday, sliding under me in the first corner and pulling away. Saturday I rode out of my skin, I had no choice, every lap was a final. I won my quarter and then in the semi ballsed up and dropped from 2nd to 6th on the third straight. Thankfully I built the last straight and swooped under two guys to grab fourth and qualify with a little local knowledge. Come the final I got a good pop, but so did 7 other guys and we all hit the first corner together. I don't know how we never went down but I came out in third and managed to hold it to the line. I was absolutely stoked. I couldn't have asked for more.

Sunday, 2 moto transfer, so again it was flat out. I took 2 2nds so I qualified for the semi. We were only 1 rider short of quarters again, that would have finished me off. Come semi's I drew gate 3 and somehow got a blinder and won comfortably. Pressure was off and I had made 2 finals in a really stacked class. It was a great feeling. The final I had gate 4 next to W2 Bill Young. I got a blinder again and was leading all the way down the first straight until I hit the first corner. I tried to avoid the mud at the bottom and left a gap, Bill and Pat Parker dived in and pushed me up the berm. I came out in third and Bill was gone. I tried to hang on to Pats back wheel but to be honest I was suffering by the third straight and decided third was better than binning it. Bill and Pat put a few bikes on me, but I was so happy, I really didn't care. This was the toughest race I had done since moving here and considering I am 34 and Bill is 27ish, to pull down the first straight like I did has left me grinning like a 17yr old virgin at the Playboy Mansion!

My sponsor, Jamie from Groovemerchants.net was there. Good to ride well for him and he also made the final on sunday in his class after some time off the bike so I think he was happy. My buddy Jason tooks wins both days and Bruce was in the mix was a third and fifth I think. Good stuff for all us VA old boys...

Rich rode much better sunday after struggling a little saturday. He still has great gates and plenty of pull, and he was starting to relax and ride better. 2 3rds took him through to the 30-34 Cr final. He had it tough though, with Jayson Lindsay, Pfieffer and Ezell Johnson, national 4, 1 and 2 respectively, but he pulled a great gate and first straight and was fighting all the way with the guy in 4th, just losing out on the line. I think Rich has the racing bug back though and with some practice on his skills he can be back up there again for sure.

Check out go211.com for the videos, particularly Elite Men and Elite Masters on Sunday. Nuts.

Jog on..

Its raining..

2008-04-21T10:25:00.002-04:00

Too bloody true it's raining. It was that loud last night it woke me up several times. This on top of thunderstorms all day yesterday has left most places flooded. The ride to work was slow and awful cos of the weather too. Not a pleasant start to the week, but more importantly it may have done considerable damage to our track before the National this coming weekend. Fingers crossed for some blazing sun to dry the place out.

So the weekend was good for the most part. I got a nice little ride on Friday night on the cruiser to stretch the legs, although I did get a few mozzy bites. I guess the white legs attracted them and I am a pretty tasty morsel if I do say so myself. Friday evening friends from Philly arrived and we had a few drinks and caught up. It was good to see them again. Jaci and Jay are happy people and the wife was happy to catch up with Jaci I am sure.

Saturday morning I shot off early to Woodbridge for gate practice. There was a really good turnout. A good bunch of pros and older riders. I felt like I got my pull going really well, even though I was on flats for most of the session and running a 44-16t. It seems that nearly everybody drops down to a 43-16t for Woodbridge but I was still staying with people. I am going to run a 41-15t, just for that extra little bit of spin. Woodbridge gets pretty tech after the first corner and not much room for overtaking or cranking so I guess it makes sense. It was a good session though and bloody hot, way into the 80's so I got nicely burnt and now have a glowing forehead.

After Woodbridge we hit up 495 trails. The big line was running and all the trail bosses were killing it and Lance Maguire and Eric Posey hit it after a couple of runs and were smoothing it. I am not ready for it yet, but it's my goal for this summers riding. I got through the main line after a few tries so I was pleased. They are not big, but tight and steep, so being a racer I either landed flat bottom or squashed it. Took me a while to relax and let the bike float over the jumps, but once I got it into my head I started to flow thru them quite nicely. The S&M def rides better than the One did at the trails that's for sure. Saving best 'til last I managed to crash on the smallest of small doubles. Its feckin tiny, about 2ft high, 5ft wide and slightly steeper landing, it kept popping me and I over shot into the face of the next double. Muppet! And scuffed my $60 Profile seat in the process to. All good for the soul though. By this point my head had turned a new shade of red so I decided to call it quits before I looked like an extra on Deliverance..

Saturday afternoon was family time and little Shanes 2nd birthday. We had a great afternoon, all the families together. Shane was super excited and running around in his sisters Princess dress. Very funny. Why can you get away with this when you are 2though? If my wife ever caught me running around in one her dresses I would have a lot of explaining to do. I don't by the way, well when I say I don't what I really mean is I do and she just hasn't caught me yet.

So somehow I ended up ruining a very good day, by being an arse to the wife. Papa Smurf is having an operation this coming week, I hadn't taken much notice of it to be honest and basically I kind of poo poo'd it all. Oops. I dug a very large hole for myself and really upset her. I acted like a wanker, no two ways about it. Sorry fartknocker, I love you.

Sunday we awoke to heavy rain, rain and more rain. So it was a day of painting and pootling around the crib (crib, what am I on about... like I'm a gangster?). I have nearly finished painting the lounge now, I just need to get to the bit of wall above the stairs which I can't reach or get a ladder too. A conundrum for sure.

Well, the Monkeys are here on Wednesday so we are really looking forward to that and seeing little Bobbin. I have to get nappies (diapers) and some baby food before they arive, although I haven't found Weetabix and Fromage Frois yet so not sure about that. Lets hope they bring some good weather.

Best do some work, got a lot on this week and as luck would have it, a client wants dinner on Wednesday night and I am at the airport. Maybe I could have dinner at Dulles.. :)

nowt much

2008-04-18T09:17:00.003-04:00

It's been a funny old week. I've accomplished much. Things have been really up in the air with work with my boss resigning. It has really thrown a spanner in the works and has left my office rather rudderless to say the least. I have to step up to the plate and get some things done and said, because I don't really want to be screwing around and waiting for the board to make decisions. Both myself and the PM who has moved into a more sales role, are not overly experienced Bus. Dev people, so we have a pretty tough hill to climb. Daunting and I am a little worried by it all too.

Monday, I hit the jump squats again. Have to say I am noticing the difference, but it really takes a good 3 days before I am over them. I guess I am putting in the effort. One thing for sure, I rolled up at gates on Weds without my clips, lets just say I gave a few of the chaps a pasting. I think I was one of about 3 or 4 people on flats. It's a nice feeling when you make the young 'hotshots' (in their minds at least) look stupid. I constantly reminded them I am 34 and on flats, the calling out business annoys the shit out of me. Just ride your damn bikes, nobody gives a crap about your 3rd moto at some hick race 2 years ago. Its bmx, nothing else. Still it was good to stretch the legs and lets hope some of the effort pays off next weekend for Woodbridge National. Top 3 both days is my aim, but I know its going to be a lot harder in reality. Still I want to win every lap when I am on the gate, regardless who is next to me. Got to be positive.

Off to a meeting shortly with Doc MaGee. I thought this was just a cool nickname, turns out he really is a Dr and ex US Army Rangers. I'm guessing he takes no poop from anyone. Going to talk about some up coming opportunities that my company and his can partner on.

The Pope has been in town this week, so DC has been super busy and the wife has been stuck in the middle of it. She has had a tough week again, but finally she talked to her boss and that helped loads I think. Last night she got home at 6pm, bloody miracle. We sat outside and had a drink in the sun, then headed off to the Mexican for dinner and an early night. It was nice to have her to myself for an evening. We also learned that I can read her mind when we play "rock, paper, scissors" - 7 in a row we threw the same 'object'. We have friends staying with us tonight from Philly (same place as the Fresh Prince!) and gate practice in the morning. lovely jubbly

Jog on..

RM59

2008-04-14T10:17:00.002-04:00

RM59? For those young enough not to know, it's the nickname for Robbie Miranda, bmx legend and now Sheriff in CA somewhere. Also, he grew up in Woodbridge just down the road from me in VA. When I first got back into riding again at Uni in about 96/97, I bought a Props video and made everyone watch it in the common room in my hall. Robbie's trails are on there and on saturday I got to ride them! Legend......ary! OK, so they are not the trails Robbie rode, they are undoubtedly smaller and a lot of the locals didn't even know who RM59 was, but the point is I got to ride there. It's like riding Sheep Hills in CA, the scene is synonymous with Robbie's name and that makes it pretty darn cool to me. Good thing is I also hit everything as well. OK, those of you that rode trails with me in England know that a) I'm crap at trails and b) they obviously weren't all that big. I'm guessing nothing more than 20ft and nothing over about 6 or 7ft high, but it was fun and great for my confidence and learning new skills. Still, it pissed it down after an hour and that was the end of the session, but it left me on a high all weekend.

So I've been putting the hours in on the bike over the last week, rode everyday since last mondays weights session and to be honest I'm fooked now, my legs are like jelly.

I hit gate practice friday night out at Severn, in Maryland. Rode with some of the Felt team (Matt Kelty and Austin Loebbe) and my good buddie Chris Agard. Chris is in my class and let me say this he rips, flats or clips, he will kill anybody down the first straight. He was on Kelty's backwheel most of the night. Kelty is 19 and A pro, Chris is 34 and has a family! He has trained super hard this winter and its showing, I was a couple of bike lengths behind all the time, even if I had my disco slippers on it wouldn't have made any difference. Props due for sure. We had a good session and Matt almost tripled the third straight. Bubba Harris is the only person to have done it so far, but I think Matt will get it before the summer is done. I managed to jump out of the step-up and into the rollers. Something I have been wanting to do for a while. It's not a big gap at all, just very tricky. Also, got the bump jumps down on the last straight, hit them all. Damn it feels good.

Saturday did some work at Woodbridge track ready for the national in a few weeks. Northern Monkey and family will be here for that one so it should be a fun weekend. Nothing to scare you Rich, just learn to pedal manual this week :)

Sunday went out to Winchester to help the guys with their track rebuild. This place is coming on a treat and I reckon if they could get it properly surfaced it would be the best track in VA. It's got some big jumps, some technical jumps, it's long and suits power riders and tech riders. Wait that's a proper bmx track, whats going on! They are getting the start hill and first and last berm paved this week. Have to give a shout to Kevin Lochner and Jason Morgan for the effort these guys have made as well as Chad Powers for helping them on the initial rebuild, its looking good.

OK, so I've been doing a bucket load of riding, so there has to be a catch. The wife has been really good about letting me get in a lot of riding and training. She knows I had a poop winter with a bad knee and cold weather, so I've been very lucky. Normally I only ride one day at the weekend so we can do stuff together the other, but she has been super cool the last few weeks. I think she has a secret plan though. It's her 30th soon, I think I am going to get a "well I let you ride all the time so I want something sparkly for my birthday" kind of comment. She probably deserves it and is very patient with me seeing as I am a muppet most of the time. I guess the Harley will have to wait until after her 30th then!

witness

2008-04-11T09:25:00.002-04:00

nope, i didn't see some old dear get mugged or gangbangers rob some dude for his rims (I actually don't know what I've just written there, not in touch with the yoof out here!). Anyway, it was a beautiful day yesterday so I hit up Severn ABA track with a couple of mates for some riding. Shorts and t-shirt, yes please. It was warm.
So local ripper Eric Posey was there, this kid can ride, I mean seriously ride. For you brits think DC, for my america amigos think Upshaw (just less shiznit!). We have a six pack on the last straight, about 5 ft tall and about 7ft wide. They are trailsy and fun, but useless when you want to hit them fast in a race. So Eric picks up way in front of them manuals the whole straight, ok that was cool. I've done it once or twice as well. Next time he picks up and bump jumps each one - ie taking off from the back wheel each time. This is a little more serious. I have a go, make the first one, sketchy as fook on the second and decide I'm too old for that sh1t. Next time round he bump jumps the first one, lands in a manual, bump jumps the second and manuals the rest of the straight. At this point people seriously went nuts, it was feckin unreal and he did all this at race speed, not playing, he was hauling! respect was due. For those of you that saw Kyle Bennett bump jump Orlando's doubles on the first straight a few years back that what it was like in terms of sheer ability and skill. It wasn't a balls to the wall huck, or a 20ft stair gap where you need nuts the size of bowling balls, nope this was pure skill and it was unreal. It wasn't something that could be taught, it was based on pure talent and I am glad i witnessed it cos its about the best bit of riding i've seen over here. Eric, I tip my hat to you my friend, that was a little special.

Needless to say the session got pretty fired up after that, some hard first straights with the guys which was awesome, I hit the first straight doubles backwards - huck to flat bottom, i thought it was going to be harder than that - i transferred from the first straight doubles to last straight doubles too. Came up a little short the first time, but all was good.

my wife has had a tough week at work this week, poor thing. I am going to buy her a little present at dinner time to cheer her up. I worry a lot about her, she gets a lot of sh1t and takes a lot on with her job. Fartknocker I love you.

bugger

2008-04-10T15:00:00.002-04:00

..i've just deleted the post I had written!

Ok, so I was saying that my boss has resigned for a better position. I am really pleased for her personally, she is a fantastic and honest person to work for and I have learnt loads from her. I shall miss her though, but the opportunity was too good and I would have done the same. I will inherit a lot more responsibility, not least leading the sales conference calls. That in itself is fine, I am a gobby arse, so happy to hear my voice, but there is a lot involved with prepping for the meeting so my workload will increase.. but thats good for me I think.

So whilst off to do sprints last night, i cycled past a charming young thing, all blonde and smiley. i guess she was laughing at me being on a bmx and why not? I'm 6ft 1" and almost 200lbs, I look an arse at the best of times. Anyway, after my session she is walking back the other way and again smiles, this time she starts talking. Not easy to hear over my ipod and Janes Addiction, so I stop. She launches into how cool my little bike is, where can she get one, why do I ride it etc? Obviously being the cool customer i am, i dont at all go red, get slightly excited over her northern european lilt and mention my wife in the first sentance!! Damn and bollox, how difficult can it be to talk to a girl in a tight t-shirt and shorts who had worked up a bit of a sweat??? I am soo glad my wife talked to me first, I am bloody useless at talking to pretty girls..

Also, turns out I'm a bit of a terrorist too. I look like one obviously, whatever one may look like that is. I do my sprints on a long quiet street, with only about 6 houses, so no through traffic. The guy at one end always says hello and I am very polite as he's a big ugly bastard and has a giant rottweiler/lab mix, the thing's nuts. He is the local community warden, whatever its called, turns out all the old folks have been complaining to him about me on my bike. He's a nice chap and pointed out my taxes pay for the road as much as his and i should keep riding my bike. Good on him, cos i didnt have the balls to make that comment to him first. However, quite frankly I was pooping it just looking at his dog, if he had let that thing loose I would have been history so I was going to go with what ever he said anyway. Still I might find another street for a while before the 'olds' get me arrested for over zealous use of the loud pedal.. the S&M.38Special.. :)

Jog on..

buttocks!

2008-04-08T11:23:00.002-04:00

Ah, one of the finer things in life, like a good wine, a good pair of buttocks can start the day well.

I have two thoughts on buttocks today. Firstly mine are very sore! Nope, my wife didn't roger me in my sleep, instead I dived into the Jump Squats, alluded to in a previous posting. Let me tell you, if the pain I am feeling today is an indication of the increased explosive power I'm going to gain then its worth it. If not, I am walking tentatively round my office like a penis for no reason at all!

Second thought on buttocks, and one slightly more disturbing. I am reading the autobiography of General, Sir Mike Jackson, until recently head of the British Army. He has head a stellar and interesting career to say the least and if I'm on honest I am slightly envious of those who are able work up the military chain. A far more interesting life style is lead for sure. So the buttocks thing. Well Mr Jackson is in Bosnia right now according to my book. Bosnia was, maybe still is, a pretty nasty place during the conflict there in the mid 90s. He has come across three Croat soldiers executed in a field.. with their trousers down. It turns out that the hatred between these warring factions is so intense that they had been buggered whilst being executed! Can you imagine that? Fookin Mookin! I could not get this image out of my head all night. Not only are you taking your last breath, but some body is violating you at the same time, horrific! I am now glad I am not a soldier!!!

scrambled eggs and bacon?

2008-04-03T09:06:00.003-04:00

Bugger! So I go to a folder on my PC which has, or should have, a load of information and brochures concering Server Virtualization - a service my company provides - and the folder is empty, nada, zip, zero! What the feck! More than slightly concerned right now to say the least. I hadn't touched the info in a while, but typically someone wanted it today to update and its not there. Bollox, feck, arse! At least I know what I'll be doing for the next few days.

So I hit gate practice last night down at Woodbridge NBL track. Damn good turnout for a wednesday evening and we were managing to run 2 or 3 gates full of 15+ experts which made it a good work out. After a couple of runs to get used to NBL gates again, I got my gates dialled in and was snapping hard on the new bike. I was super pleased and considering my crappy winter training, I was hanging pretty well and even put down a few flyers with some of the Single A's. Who knows how hard they are trying, but it did my confidence good. I've got to work on the pick up, pedal manuals for the first double tho, I was a little rusty, but its been 5 months since I last rode at Woodbridge so I can't complain. I guess the hard work I've been putting into the sprints the last month or so helped. I would have had my arse handed to me if I'd not been doing them. I've got to work on my first 5 pedals a little more, I still feel weak there. Jump squats is what I've been advised to do, so we'll see how much that helps. The Woodbridge track was running good though, a little sandy in places but considering nothing has been done over the winter, it was pretty darn good. However, looks like the weather isn't playing ball for our State Race and Pro/Am this weekend. Gutted, as I was looking forward to that and I heard we had a truck load of people coming from across the East to race and have fun. We'll see but I have a sneaky feeling it will be cancelled.

Yesterday I went to AFCEA NETCENTS 2 seminar for the Air Force. I thought it was going to be a boring morning, but I actually found I enjoyed it and learned a lot. Am I growing up? Bad thing was I missed the breakfast. I thought it would be weak Tea and sticky buns like the MOD back home, turns out the US Govt enjoys a good breakfast with my taxes. Damn. next time I'll go early and hit the breakfast. Scrambled egg and bacon? Yes please. Fresh orange juice sir? ooh, marvellous, fill 'er up chap..

Off to MaccyD's for a McMuffin, I've just made myself hungry. Don't tell the wife, she'll only want one too :)

BMX and Napa Valley, CA

2008-03-31T10:16:00.006-04:00

Ok, it's been another week, but only because I've been on my hols, or vacation as my American friends call it.

Vacation started early for me, about 10.30 on friday morning when we lost all comms in our building and we were buggered! Engineers didn't fix it until wednesday, but by then I was enjoying a little sun in the Napa Valley.

So, taking full advantage of not being able to work and a lovely spring day, my boss allowed us all to go home early. I grabbed the new bike to hit the track for an hour. 5 hours later and I was still there! Turns out every 30+ rider in Maryland decided the best place to be was Severn BMX track on Good Friday (21st March). There must have been about 40 riders at the track - hardtail mtb's, full suspension mtb's, cruisers, 20" - it was a damn good session, met a bunch of new people and thrashed the new bike. Most importantly my worries about riding chromo again were put aside, S&M have built an awesome bike and although, the first crank or two are a little slower from the gate, due to Ali being so stiff, the speed on the rest of the track is well worth it. I am stoked, thank you Jamie. (www.groovemerchants.net)

To the vacation. My wife and I, and good friends Amit and Jacey, headed out to Napa Valley, in lovely California, for a well deserved break for the mrs..(I am too much of a slacker to really deserve a break). We stayed in Calistoga at the Eurospa I believe it was called. Fantastic little place, lovely views, right on the edge of town so only a couple of minutes walk for anything we needed, friendly people (NSA Matt never shut up!), all in all a great place and perfectly suited to wine tasting trips all over the valley.

We met up with Amits friends, Dov and Laura. Great people. Dov, or David if you want to know his real name, is the manager of a reggae band. Dov, also happens to be a short, hysterically funny Jewish guy, so not in the slightest Rasta then! We had a great day with them, Dov introduced me to reggae big time and kindly gave me a bunch of CD's to listen to. Groundnation is his band and they are awesome. I am now a confirmed fan and will be hitting up iTunes for more at some point soon. Laura works for Gallo Vineyards so she took us to some great places for food and wine and showed us a good time. They are moving back to MD soon so thats pretty cool.

If you are in the Calistoga area hit up Sterling Wineries. You take a cable car to the tasting rooms and they have a wonderful little tour around the premises with stunning views and even better wines. We tasted many and bought several bottles, which turned out to be an indication of the coming days.

Having spent a nice few days in Calistoge, including a great cycling and tasting trip and visti to the Geyser, we headed for Bodega Bay. This was about an hour away through beautiful countryside, until we hit a place called Russian River Valley. It was like walking on to the set of Deliverance! It was a little scary. Without sounding like a biggot, it was 'trailer park' all the way! It was poor and run down and I guess short on work too. It was so surreal to find a place like this in the middle of such beautiful and prosperous countryside.

Bodega Bay is a little seaside resort, approx 400 houses and a 1000 people at the most. The Bodega Bay Lodge was right on the coast, with great views of the sea. We took some - windy - walks and pottered around for a few days, finding some great local wineries now that we were kind of in the Sonoma Valley area.

Well I dont want to go on too much more, other than to say we had a fantastic time, I got my wife to myself for a week which was wonderful and the Napa Valley was all that it was cracked up to be. I'll post some pics later hopefully.

oops, its 10:57 and I have a meeting at 11. Ta ta for now..

the new bike!

2008-03-20T15:31:00.004-04:00

Here we go, a little pic for all you BMXers and Cider drinkers our there... I think they are fairly synonomous with each other...

38 Special

2008-03-20T11:37:00.003-04:00

If you're a West Country boy you are probably thinking thats a rival cider to White Lightning, but alas its not. Nope, its my new BMX, - like I needed one of course - an S&M 38 Special frame and its bloody lovely let me tell you. I was in a bit of a dither about going to a chromo frame after 8 yrs on an aluminium frame, but I am glad I made the choice. Its about 5oz heavier than my old One frame, but now I can crash 'til my hearts content at the trails without fear of snapping it.

So why the new bike? Well my good friend Jason Morgan rides for a local bike shop team (http://www.groovemerchants.net/) out in West Virginia and Jason asked Jamie, the owner, if he was looking for another rider. Thankfully Jamie was and he hooked me up. Let me say this Jamie rules, - he has cool tattoo's, is obsessed with bmx and skateboarding and loves old classic english motorbikes! He's a guy doing something that he cares about and loves, and is helping bmx grow in West Virginia, Maryland and Virginia and supporting young riders. Thoroughly upstanding in my book.

So it's taken 2 weeks to write my second post, probably closer to 3, so I am crap at this stuff it turns out! I wasn't likely to change my spots over night. I have loads of good ideas and kept thinking about getting them on here, just forget to do it.

Ok, well I'm off to a meeting for a wee while, so I'll come back and add a little more later.

S&M rules
.. jog on! :)

sweaty pits!

2008-02-21T10:05:00.000-05:00

So, I have just been reading my buddy, Dan Cliffords blogspot as I do most mornings, when I figured I ought to write something myself. I don't have much to say right now but normally I have too many opinions on pointless and meaningless questions that wont affect our lives in anyway yet I love to shoot the crap on them. Hey, this is my blogspot and I retain the right to be a a-hole if necssary.

I suppose the real question with 'bloggin' is "will I keep it up?". Who knows? I'll have to create an entry in my calendar to remind me to do so on a regular basis. I'll start with best intentions, add some photos and litte anecdotes about my journey, what I'm doing living in the US when I am Somerset boy born and bred, rant about English rugby and why the hell Brian Ashton is picking that feckin muppet Balshaw at fullback over Lewsy, Tait or my grandam and anything else that springs eternal in my cererbal cortex (not sure what that is by the way, I read it once and am hoping desperately its something to do with my brain, or lack there of)

So whats with 'dem little wheels'? Well as an introduction to me and probably a fairly accurate assessment of my life in general, is that I have a bit of an obsession with things on two wheels, namely BMX. But I love mountainbikes, I love motocross and the almost etheral beauty of a road bike gliding along gives me just as much a kick as launching a set of doubles at my local bmx track in Virginia (www.novabmx.org). Its not entirely my fault, the wheeled obsession that is (I do accept responsibility for most other things in life though). My Grandma, Nanny Howley as she was known, bought me a Larry the Lamb tricycle when I was a couple of years old and I feel like I have been on a bike ever since.

Ok, I better do some work. This is my first post ever, I am a techno moron so dont expect wonders and I'll give a nod to my beautiful wife, who although still full of flu, is the real love of my life, just in case people think the bikes are more important than her.... as if :)

Cheers, Hoppy