Rimmer (1994-2010)

Our beloved kitty, Rimmer, lost his fight with cancer today.
He was very brave and stoic and battled this disease for a long time.

May you rest in peace, my darling. We will always love you.

South Beach, Miami

At the beginning of December, I spent a few days in South Beach with my friend Catherine. I had never been to Miami before and it was a fun trip. We flew down on a Wednesday morning and I came home Friday night.

We stayed at the Sagamore (The Art Hotel), on Collins. There were cool sculptures in the lobby, paintings and photographs hanging on the walls in the hallways and rooms, and the back stairwell was painted in a mural. There was a video garden out near the pool, featuring computer generated images. There was also beach access from the pool area.

After we checked in, we had a leisurely lunch at the Front Porch Cafe on Ocean Drive. Afterward, we walked along the beach path back to the hotel, changed into our swim suits and dove into the pool. It was heated and the temperature was just perfect. Later that evening we decided headed over to the Delano hotel and had a couple of drinks at the pool bar. They had lounging beds around the pool. It was a such a beautiful setting that paying $17 for a Mojito feel quite pleasurable. ;-)

For dinner we wandered over to the Shore Club for some Italian food from the restaurant Apo. It was delicious and we got a kick out of watching all the fashionistas come and go as we dined. As we left the hotel we passed a huge queue of folks waiting to get into a party in the garden. Later we found out that it was a private party for a gallery opening with attendees like Lance Armstrong, Shepherd Fairey, Dr. Dre and others.

We walked out to the beach and stumbled on a free concert featuring London artist Ebony Bones. They were really fun. The music was catchy and they put on a great show. Check them out on youtube.

The next day we walked down to the News Cafe for brunch, then walked along the beach path, and lounged around the hotel for a while. In the afternoon we rented beach cruisers and rode around Miami Beach for a couple of hours. The bikes were single speeds with coaster brakes. It took a little while to figure out how to stop without falling off... when you're used to freewheel backpedaling, it really takes a while before you can learn how to backpedal, brake and put a foot down all at once. I have to say, it really helped to employ cyclocross-style mounts and dismounts. It was good to have some forward momentum to get the pedals turning, and swinging a leg over, coasting and then stepping off worked a lot better than the other method of stopping.

We ended up riding out along the Venetian Causway and cruising around the little island neighborhoods. Many of the homes were decorated for Christmas - it seemed a little odd to us to have 80 degree weather and palm trees with holiday lights. I suppose it seems normal to the people who live there. It was definitely fun to see.

That night we had Cuban food for dinner. It was a really casual place and the food was simple. Unfortunately, other than fried plantains (yuck), we didn't have anything that seemed to be specifically Cuban. We had chicken and rice and beans. All very tasty, but not very different.

After dinner we took a swim in the pool. It felt so decadent to be swimming in the warm pool under the moonlight. The hotel had lovely soft robes for their guests, so even drying off seemed luxurious.

I was bummed to have to leave the next day. It was such a short trip, but definitely worth it. We brunched at the News Cafe again, then rode the bikes along the beach (in the sand) for a while before returning them. Then back to the room for packing and off to the airport.

For your enjoyment, I have made a list of the highlights, lowlights and oddities of the trip.

Highlights:

• cruising South Beach on beach cruisers
• swimming in the heated pool
• stumbling on the Ebony Bones beach concert
• decadent drinks at the Delano poolside
• rubbing elbows (sort of) with celebrities
• seeing postal carriers delivering mail by bicycle
  

Lowlights:

• $17 Mojitos
• a cockroach in the Cuban restaurant the size of a mini Clif Bar
  
• non-working jacuzzi bathtub in the hotel room
• obnoxious restaurant hostesses on Ocean Drive
• complete lack of respect or rights of pedestrians and cyclists - the light would change, the walk signal would come on, and 3-4 cars (especially taxis) would charge through the intersection prepared to mow down anyone in their path - 9 times out of 10 you wouldn't be able to cross the street until AFTER the walk light started flashing red

Oddities:

• while we were riding our bikes, we saw a black stretch limo equipped with a rooftop ski rack (where do they ski in Florida?)
  
• walking down Collins, we saw a beautiful woman wearing a teeny white bikini and strappy sandals draped in shopping bags (she was nowhere near the beach and needless-to-say she stopped traffic)
  
• while dining at the News Cafe, a dog came around to the tables carrying a bucket and begging for money (he was pretty successful, too!)
  

Very Late Canton Cup Race Report

I was really excited that Canton Cup was on Halloween this year. I love that race and it's always fun when people get into the spirit and race in costumes. Someday I'm going to get creative and give it a go myself. For the moment, fun & colorful stripey socks will be my contribution to my favorite sport. :-)

I carpooled with Leah, and we got there before the Mens 4 race with enough time for 3 preride laps. The course was a little different from the previous two years, mostly in the back section on the pavement in the woods, where the course went back onto dirt and over a log before continuing on the path.

The tiny barrier section was changed as well, happily, because it used to be super sketchy with the crazy downhill into a hairpin dismount. I was really pleased to discover the uphill section prior to that was either much easier or I am now much stronger (hopefully it's that) because there was no question that it was rideable.

Waiting for my race to start, chatting with friends and teammates, comparing socks and admiring costumes, I failed to pay enough attention when the officials called us to the line (perhaps I had been spoiled by G-Star and Providence's line-up by order of registration) and found myself in the back row. At the last minute I spotted a space in the 3rd row on the right side, went there, but then someone else followed me and stood to my right. This turned out to be unfortunate because when we started, I was effectively boxed in by people who were slower than me. I also failed to be in an appropriate gear (I really should practice starts - so important!) and when there was finally space to go into, I couldn't do it until I had shifted properly. Grrr.

For most of the first lap, I passed people (which is always fun), and luckily avoided the crazy crashes that were happening in the wooded asphalt section. I saw Guila on the ground with blood on her face, but she said she was ok, which was good or I might have been tempted to stop and help. I also passed Leah who was off her bike, but I wasn't sure if she had crashed or just had a mechanical.

I heard people cheering for me all over the course, which is always a bonus. When I crossed the start/finish line, I was shocked to see that we only had one lap to go - really? We only just got started.

On the second (and last) lap, I really wanted to catch up to the small group in front of me. I was going all out, but just couldn't raise my effort level enough to get to them. It didn't help that I must have been going a little too fast in one of the paved, slippery chicanes, and felt my front wheel start to slide out. I pulled up on the handlebars and shifted my weight enough to get the bike under control again, but it put me a little off my game, and made me slightly more cautious in the rest of the corners.

One of the MIT girls passed me just after the run-up when I boggled my remount, and I chased and drafted off her on the track, but lost her again in the barriers. Feeling slightly dejected, I wasn't exactly sprinting for my finish until I heard Cathy R. yelling at me that I better get going or someone was going to beat me to the line. No way! So I picked up the pace and managed to keep whoever it was behind me. I am really grateful to Cathy for telling me that because I didn't realize that it was happening. The race isn't over until it's over. Good thing to remember!

It was disappointing that we only raced two laps. I think that 30 minute races are too short as it is, but I was on the course for a mere 24 minutes! The leader finished in 22 minutes. There was a lot of time in between the fields - I don't understand why we couldn't have done a third lap. I suppose this may be a bit of sour grapes, because while I couldn't raise my game, I felt that I could have kept going at the same level for one more lap and that I might have gained 2-3 places if the race had been longer.

I wasn't very pleased with my race until someone told me that I ended up getting 18th place. With 37 finishers, this placed me in the top 50%. Yippee! This has been an elusive goal of mine for the past two years, yet I have achieved it in my last two races, which is a very sweet feeling.

All in all, I had fun, worked hard, learned some good lessons, and finished better than I thought. It was a good day with fun socks, great costumes, and good friends.

Here's my teammate Karin as a Yip Yip Martian.
It was my favorite costume of the day.
More photos of the race (by Geoff) at Flickr and Picassa.

Winter Vegetable Soup

I made a wonderfully delicious soup with some of our winter CSA vegetables. I wasn't sure what to do with radishes and a rutabaga, but the farm website had a recipe that included those plus carrots and butternut squash, all which we had gotten in the pickup this week. I didn't have all the ingredients so I modified it a little, adding some and ommiting others. It turned out really well, and I now think this is my favorite soup, pushing the Winter Barn Stew down to number two.

For anyone interested, here's my recipe:

4 cups vegetable stock/broth
1 large carrot
1 small parsnip
1 onion
1 cup daikon radish
1 cup rutabaga
2 cups butternut squash
1 can pinto beans, rinsed and drained
1/4 cup dried parsley
2T cornstarch dissolved in 1/4 cup water
1 tsp sesame oil
sea salt to taste

Peel squash and cut all veggies in bite-sized pieces. Sautee onions in 1 tsp sesame oil, add veggie stock/broth and bring to a boil. Add all vegetable pieces, beans, parsley and cornstarch mixture. Simmer 45 minutes, season with sea salt, and serve with crusty bread.

Break from Racing

I took a couple of weekends off from racing in October. One was to attend the Shining Light on New England First Regional Iyengar Yoga Conference in Providence, RI.

It was really great. I was able to take classes from some of the leading Iyengar yoga teachers in the country. It was also the first time that I have taken yoga so intensively. The conference was for three days, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and each day we had three 2-hour yoga sessions. That's 6 hours of yoga per day! It was a wonderful conference, and I felt great afterward. (A bit sore, but really stretched and lengthened. I went for a 5k run in the middle of all the yoga sessions on Saturday, and it was the first time that I've ever run and NOTHING hurt at all. It was amazing!)

The following weekend we attended Scott & ML's wedding, which was beautiful. It was a lovely ceremony, and the bride and groom were both radiant. As usual, Geoff captured the moment wonderfully.
The following day, I went to Franklin Park with Geoff to cheer him on while he participated in the Franklin Park 5K, which is a cross-country running race. Those of you who know Geoff are saying, "What??!!??", because as we all know, Geoff doesn't like to run. However, he wanted to see if the fitness that he has gained from all his years of bicycle racing could translate into something else. He didn't even really train for this event, yet he finished 20th in his age group! He ran at an average pace of 7:16 and finished 188th overall (out of 356).

I am so very proud of him! Considering that when I ran the Komen 5K it was on a flat paved surface, and that I had trained for it for about 6 weeks, I did a personal best pace of 9:54. Geoff ran amazingly fast and this was a difficult race - they were running across fields, through mud, up and down hills, and on gravel paths. He was really great. I don't know if he'll keep running, but if he decides that he wants to, I think he'll be very, very good at it.

Nice job, Geoff!

For all my Franklin Park photos, go here.

Providence Cyclocross Festival

What a great weekend! The weather was amazing and the race courses were twisty, up, down, and all around fun. After the races it was good times with good friends, watching, cheering and heckling the other racers, wandering around the bike expo and enjoying the glorious autumn weather.

On Saturday the we got to the venue 30 minutes before the start of the first race, so I had the chance to pre-ride the course twice, which was great. It was helpful to know what to expect, and also gave me the opportunity to warm up properly, which is something that I'm working on doing better. Then I registered and chatted with some friends, and got on my trainer to continue warming up. Had a totally zen moment when a hawk flew down to the ground about 10 yards in front of my trainer and just hung out there for a while to watch all the crazy bike people.

At the start I was in the second row, but had decided to start conservatively so I didn't try to contest the hole shot. The course was still pretty muddy from the rain overnight, and there were some sections where it was sort of slick. My slower start meant that I got to pass some people, which was fun, and I was pleasantly surprised when one of those people turned out to be Ivy, who is a Cat 3. I tried to put as much distance between her and myself as I could, in the hopes of holding her off for the rest of the race (which I did!).

I was really happy with the way that I did the barriers in this race. There was a long flat lead-up to them and I was able to swing my leg over and coast into the barriers smoothly, which felt great! I still can't manage to do a running, leaping remount, but I am getting smoother at remounting and don't need to come to a complete stop to remount anymore, which is nice and obviously saves time.

The one spot in the race which slowed me up every lap was the steep muddy run-up before the finish line. Every time I got to this point I felt like the mud was sucking me down into it, and it was all I could do to slowly crawl up that hill, leaning on my bike the whole time. It was probably only 15-20 seconds of "running", but it felt like the hardest 15-20 seconds of the entire race. I needed about 2 minutes to recover from that section every lap.

This weakness really hit home on the last lap, when I was closing in on Jill M from Cambridge and a Specialized rider. I was only a bike-length behind them coming into that run-up, but after that they were beyond my reach and although I sprinted strongly up to the finish, catching them wasn't even a possibility. Guess I need to work on uphill running sprints, huh? I ended up placing 23rd out of 39 finishers (not sure how many started).

Photo by Geoff Martin (beastgp)

On Sunday I was also in the second row for the start, and once again started conservatively. There were a lot more women starting this race and it was a big mess with lots of riders falling down in the twisty section after the start. Luckily I was able to move around them without crashing myself. The first lap was a little bit of a blur, mostly trying to avoid other riders and put some space in between them and myself. On the second lap I had a lot more breathing room, so I concentrated on riding well and keeping good lines. I passed quite a few riders with mechanicals. On the third lap I focused on staying in ahead of the riders who were behind me and tried to pick off a couple of the ones in front of me. I was shocked when one of those riders turned out to be teammate Cathy R, and saddened because it looked like she was in a lot of pain from a crash.

On the last lap, Ann (Sturdy Girl) was hot on my tail, and I tried to go as fast as I could up the finishing hill. She had a lot of speed on me and I could hear her coming around on my right. I stood up and sprinted for the finish with all I had (even going for a bike throw on the line), but it wasn't enough and she beat me by about 2 inches. Sigh.

In the end, I had a lot of fun on the course, and my legs felt a lot better than they had on Saturday. I had another good race, maybe even better than the day before, but oddly enough, my finishing results were exactly the same: 23rd place. (This time out of 44 finishers, and I'm told there were 13 DNFs.)

I am very exited to have a new set of nemeses and victims on crossresults.com. :-)

Of Cats and Flats...

(Or... why I'm not listed in the results for either day of Gloucester)

On Friday, our kitty Rimmer got sick and we had to take him to the cat hospital for fluids and medications. They let us take him home that night, but we had to bring him back in for more treatment on Saturday morning, so I missed Day 1.

Luckily our stoic little cat started to feel much better and to eat again, and he was well enough that I felt like I could race on Sunday.

Day 2 involved failing to get a decent warm up, watching my teammate Janet R crash, riding the sand, passing people as I got going, and then - smack! - I was on the ground. I wasn't sure what happened, so I picked myself up and kept racing, but soon realized I could barely keep my bike upright in the turns. I was about as far from the pit as you could get, so I called it a day. My front tire was as flat as a pancake. It was my first 'cross mechanical and first 'cross DNF. Oh well - got that over with. On to Providence!

Here's one of my favorite shots of Rimmer investigating the camera lens.