Hey everybody, greetings from Arizona. Down here with the Griffociraptor for a bit of the dirt racing. Today was the time trial which featured 12 starters in our category. Pretty pathetic but I guess it's the state of affairs when it comes to mountain bike racing. Similar to the Road Warrior (or was it Mad Max), when the bad guy sees Mel Gibson's pimped out ride and states, "it's the last of the big block V8's!" That's sort of where we are at with the fat tire scene. Well this race and venue kicks ass and Griff and I having been making the best of it. Yesterday we previewed today's TT course and did a lap on Sunday's Cross Country course. It is 100% single track. It's fast and smooth, but watch out there big fella, those are bonafide Arizona cactus looming just off of the trail. Today I saw Griff literally stuff himself into a non cactus like bush when he blew a turn. If it had been a real down to earth cactus, well I just shudder at the thought. It's lightning quick and I'm on the fast track to figuring this stuff out, lest I end up ass deep in a saguaro. I fared okay in the TT today getting clobbered by a guy named Scott Fifeld. He is super fast (not to mention really nice) and beat me by over a minute. He was the fastest expert out there (and I think if he would have raced pro would have come in top 20--probably top five in the semi pro) today of any category so what are you going to do. Some other guy beat me by six seconds which stings a little bit. He was kind of a hairy looking dude, but the guy can ride for sure. They are doing this thing as a stage race so the big dough is the Sunday 30 miler which will decide it all. Having said that, we have another TT tomorrow and I'm gunning for this guy. Griff finished down the list a little, but the boy is illin'. He's been hanging tough so I got to give him some props. The big show will be on Sunday as he's got a couple more days to mend. Like I said, 30 miles over uneven ground with cactus looming just beyond your line, anything can happen. Anyway, hope you are well and I'll try and check in tomorrow. Also, for those still reading, knowing that I was coming on this trip, I've been basically folding laundry all month. Tip: thong underwear does not really need to be folded but also doesn't really lessen the pile of clothes that still need folding. A towel is about the best you could hope to pull. Easy to fold, greatly reduces the relative amount left to be folded. So now you know. I'm out.

Johnny GoFast

So the guy in the funny looking green shorts is Brian Marcy. He can do one of those track stand thingies indefinitely. I actually watched him roll backwards down a hill still clipped in. The point is, he's got mad skilz. I like to think of myself as a mountain biker first, but truth be told, my ability is a bit stale at this point. So it was on Sunday that we got the old crew together. Bill Carslay, Steve Ouzounian, Steve Griffiths, B-Mar and I all went out for a ride in the Oakland Hills. Griff and I are going to the Phoenix Norba race tomorrow for a three day dirt stage race, so we felt it might make some sense to get out and practice a bit. We went hard in a couple of fast sections, but mainly we just rode with the whole gang like old times. Back in the day, we'd meet up every Wednesday to do a lap that would take about 15 minutes. We'd race it all out complete with a start. Most evenings we'd get in three or four hard laps and my skills have never been as good as they were back then. Sunday, we rode and laughed and talked about how we should do this more often. B-Mar lives in Oregon now, Griff is in Granite Bay, Oz travels the world as does Bill. My life has turned in a direction that doesn't allow me to get away that consistently, so we don't ride together as consistently as I'd like, but such is life. For one glorious Sunday, it was pretty damn epic. Anyway, hope you are well and I'll try and post from Arizona.

Johnny GoFast

Holy buckets, lot of jibber/jabber out there regarding the racing yesterday. I had a good time and tried to go hard when I could. My sprint in the end was more of a holy shit they're right behind me kind of thing more than it was a "I can win" kind of thing. Going into the last turn I got banged pretty hard by a guy that can shoot the gap pretty good. I was able to hang on (for dear life) and come through the last turn upright. I could feel the thundering herd beating down my neck so I went and faded toward the end. Good enough for 10th, and after a hard week and sticking my nose out there a bit trying to form a break, I was okay with the result.

I wish I could talk smack. I don't feel good enough yet to be able to sit somebody down during a race. The best I can do is talk to others that I've met and ask them how they're doing, general comments about the weather, inquire whether anyone is off the front, etc. You know, general just trying to fit in kind of stuff. But the stuff that fly's during the race really does deserve some commentary. Not like the stuff that happens in the majors under the I'm such an A-Hole sometimes thread. I tend to think you're not, Olaf, but then again, from my ability level I have no way to judge. Although trying to pry somebodies head off like a beer top seems a bit extreme, maybe in some culture somewhere akin to bike racing, this would seem acceptbable. I don't know. Anyway, we come barrelling into one of the corners at Zamora and low and behold, the whole Cat 4 peloton hits the brakes. Oh the horror. Failing to maintain 30 mph through a tight 90 degree corner is blasphemy in the bike racing world I know, but from where I was sitting 30 or so back, I really didn't mind going through at the "Deity of Your Choices" limit. So this yahoo next to me let's fly with a "why are we hitting the brakes and where'd you all learn to turn?" All I could get out was a muffled chuckle...but if that chuckle had any words to it, it would have gone something like this, "...hey pal, I know you just downgraded and all, but this is how we roll in the Cat 4's. Now I can't speak for the rest of my compadres, but I for one learned to turn my bike by riding my trainer. You dig?" But I didn't get anything out because there is probably a little to much pleasant in this Pegasaurus. Maybe I should take up crocheting.

Johnny KnitFast

So that’s my mom there and she’s celebrating a birthday today. She was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. She lived on the second floor of a three story brown stone walk-up off of Lincoln Park. She had one brother older and one brother that was younger. They were a well heeled clan and into the finer things in life. At least that’s the way I tell it because growing up a short walk away from Wrigley Field and not going to a Cubs game her entire life seems a statistical stretch. She is the last of a long line of PHD’s in the field of psychology. She has practiced it so much on me, that sometimes I think that I have a degree as well. Anyway, she went onto college in Appleton, Wisconsin where she met my father. They traveled back to Germany to study for a year and eventually they married creating four boys of unusual shapes, sizes, abilities, and personalities. Being a hot house flower growing up, my mother had seemingly no problem getting a bit grubby. It was either get comfortable going camping, fishing, to football games, and wrestling matches or run for her life. She opted for staying and has had to put up with all the grief four boys can throw at a person.

I’m fortunate to have someone like my mother in my life. The obvious is that she is without a doubt my biggest supporter. I’m not certain I can do anything wrong in her eyes and she only sees the unlimited potential in me. One time when I was in Minnesota, I got busted for urinating in public. The cop read me the riot act and threatened to take me downtown. I was cuffed and stuffed in the back of a cop car for a while where he checked my record. When it came up clean he let me go. The next week I was talking to my mother and she asked me how my weekend went. I related the story about getting nailed for using a public wall and ally as a toilet and my subsequent brush with the law and she said, “what do you think that cop’s problem was?” Beautiful. In school my mother pushed me to be more and do more than the average. She knew I was capable of exceeding limits that I put on myself. It's been that way with everything. Even today, she wants to know how my racing and training is going and has even been to a bike race to watch me suffer. I'm lucky to have someone in my life that sees my accomplishments and revels in them.

So it was a little over a year ago that I was punched in the gut regarding some bad news that my mother received. The kind of news that makes you stare up at heaven and really question the way things are. My mother was very brave about the news and that gave every one in the family great comfort. I've lost a brother to cancer and I've heard countless stories of others just as unfortunate. Watching my brother decay before my eyes was an awful experience. I am naturally an upbeat guy and I think anything is possible (no doubt because of the support through the years by my mother). But when I thought about the news my mother received, I could not understand why she would even try to carry on. If it was me, I'd curl up in a ball overwhelmed with depression. My mother was quick to feel my trepidation with the course of action and simply told me that she had to try to do everything the doctors said and that by trying, maybe something good would happen. And something did. She had to endure some incredibly harsh treatment. I've kept myself removed from a lot of the details, because frankly sometimes it's just to hard to bare. But from what I understand, they threw a house at her and something clicked. The doctors themselves are a bit perplexed, but at this point no one is really concerned about how my mother's body responded so well to the treatment. She has a new lease on life and that's a true miracle given the initial prognosis. Today is the second birthday that I've gotten to spend with her after receiving the bad news. At the time she was initially diagnosed, the doctors didn't know if she would make it to her next birthday, and here she still is. I've been around for 40 years now and it's funny that the greatest thing that I've learned from my mother I've learned only recently. You never stop trying and you never stop hoping. Happy birthday mom, and here's to the many more to come.

Your son,

Johnny GoFast

Man alive I love intervals. I got to do those short intervals on Diablo today at lunchtime. The plan called for 10 three minute pieces just below race rate. They're not so hard that your eyeballs cross and you can't stand the pain, but as the numbers pile up, jiggers they get tough. And I love that. Those three minutes are all mine. As I pedal, all I think about is that I'll never get those three minutes back, so I'd better make them count. And they're short, so go man go. All alone with no one to push me beyond the planned zones or to limit me from going hard enough, it's times like these that make me love riding my bike. Of course I'm bummed to hear that one of the strong dudes (in a cat 4 kind of way )on the Sierra Nevada team fell off his bike and broke his hip. He'd been animating some races recently and I had visions of sucking his wheel in a break some day. You hear crap like that and bowling and beer and chewing tobacco starts to sound damn good. As the Griffociraptor reports, the guy is already planning his comeback so I should keep training. With workouts like the one I had today, I think I will.

Let's reach into the mail bag:

Dear Johnny-
We here at EMC would just like to ask you where you learned to ride your bike. Putting it as nicely as we can, you suck! Gianni and MerkeleyMike

Hey Guys-
Thanks for writing in. Sorry about the "bob and weave" routine out there at MercoLane. I drank a six pack of Rolling Rock (which I call Rolling Wreck) before the race. Thought I was riding as straight as possible. But you don't get the nickname: The Pinballing Pegasaurus for nothing. Other names I've been called: Dr. Sketchy and Sir Brakealot. Hope to improve this weekend. As for the rest of you, you might want to find a different place in the peloton. I'm only a Cat 4 after all. Hey Mike, I enjoyed talking to you during the race. I was about to tell you how my skiing was the week before, but when I turned to continue our conversation, it was a different EMC guy next to me. Perhaps he was also the one that took issue with my riding "style" or lack there of.

Dear Johnny-
Here on the farm, we'd just like to get your input on what to name our two new pigs. You're so creative, we just had to ask. Clare Carver and Brian Marcy

Hey Clare and Brian-
Great to hear from you. I've enjoyed your blog site a lot. Anyway, our mutual friend Perry Plattus is the only cop we know. I'd suggest you name one of your pigs Perry and the other one Plattus in honor of him. Going with Ham and Bacon or whatever is a bit cliche, even for rednecks down home on the farm. My two cents anyway.


That's all I have time for today folks. Hope you are well.

Johnny GoFast

So I got myself into a little bit of a pickle last night with the wifeage. Seems we are in for one of those husband/wife Mexican standoff thingies. I climbed into bed last night way past my bedtime having spent the evening catching up with an old buddy of mine. I had a few glasses of wine and it being very late, my usual laziness was cranked up to 11, which led to my downfall. My head hit the pillow and it quickly became clear that my pillow was without case for the second night in a row. And this is how it went down:

Me: When do you think it will be when my pillow will be covered?
Her: Silence.
Me: I know you're awake over there. Don't give me the "silent sleeping" routine. I do that to perfection.
Her: Annoyed You know where they are, go get it yourself.
Me: I don't know where we keep them.
Her: I don't believe that. What would you do if we had a guest and they needed a case?
Me: Ask Maile (my daughter).
Her: That's such BS. You'd jump up and look in the hallway linen closet and find what you needed. If that didn't work, you'd sort through the laundry.
Me: Can't you get me the case? I'm really tired and my knee hurts.
Her: No.
Me: Please.
Her: You are so damn lazy.
Me: Knowing that, can't you help me out?
Her: No.
Me: C'mon. You can't have a bed with a pillowcaseless pillow on it. What will the company say?
Her: At this point, I don't care what they say.
Me: Are you going to put a case on your pillow?
Her: Yes.
Me: Well I go to bed earlier than you. I'll just steal your pillow.
Her: And I'll rip it out from underneath your head when I come to bed.
Me: You know, in the 50's this conversation wouldn't even be happening. You'd hop out of bed and happily get me a pillow case. And slippers and a pipe to boot.
Her: It's not the 50's.
Me: Is that it? Are you taking a stand for women everywhere? If you get me a pillow case, you're somehow being oppressed? Can't you just get me the case to show me how much you love me? Does everything boil down to some sort of half baked women's movement statement?
Her: It does now.
Me: Doesn't that seem a little silly.
Her: Doesn't it seem a little silly that in the time it's taken to have this conversation, you could have gotten the damn case, pillowed it and fallen asleep?
Me: Fine line between clever and stupid, that's for sure. How 'bout a little zooma-zooma over here.
Her: Belly chuckle

Hmmmmm. Don't know how to unravel this one.

Johnny GoFast

It would have been clever to crash into the lady on the bike to my right, but as you've learned over the past posts, I'm not clever. No, when I crash into someone, I choose about the direct opposite. I was jamming along today at lunchtime thinking all sorts of good thoughts about the race this weekend. We've got all sorts of secret plans in place which I factor into in a worker bee kind of way. If this worker bee has the legs, we will win. Anyway, I take a route through a parking lot dodging cars and carts and pedestrians and whatnot because the bike trail that goes behind the parking lot is always littered with glass. Instead of cutting my tires or getting a flat, I'd rather end up on someones windshield I guess. Again, I'm not the cleverest fellow around. So I spy myself a mom on a phone backing up the mini van. I also spy a Mejicano on a bicycle coming in the opposite direction. I can put two and two together while riding so I knew that the mini van lady would see Mr. Mejicano, apply the brakes, let him scoot by, and with the delay, I'd get by too whether she knew I was there or not. All went according to how my synapses had envisioned. All except for the fact that the Mejicano never saw me. He too was focused on the van. When I finally came into focus, it was too late. I had already started my desperate move to the right and when he looked up, he kind of froze. I had anticipated him seeing me and that he would swerved to his right and avoid the collision. When he didn't, I dove left. Right when he dove right. End of story. Two hombres in two wheel slides on a collision course. Bammm! He went down, being a slight fellow and my bike took the brunt of the damage being less sturdy than the Schwinn Varsity he was riding. I'm sure I'm bruised, which will show up the next two days, but no worse for wear. Had to straighten out the handlebars and adjust the brakes. A couple of wobbles in the wheels now, but nothing too bad. The wheels aren't that great anyway. The impactee is fine as well. In my broken Spanish and his broken English, we were able to determine that we were both okay. I helped him get his chain back on and I apologized and he did to. With that, we were on our way again. Again, would have much preferred to not have crashed, but if I had to, would have preferred the lady above. See you this weekend. Bring your A game.

Johnny GoFast

So I posted a while ago about taking over the laundry duties from my wife. What the hell was I thinking? She's off loaded a ton of those "women only" chores from the 50's on me already. Like I'd step up and be taken down by another. Isn't it enough that I load/unload the dishes, cook on occasion, take the garbage out, bathe the kids, put them to bed, etc.? There is a reason The Deity of Your Choice gave man alcohol and a remote. So today I struck and accord with the wife that will call for me to wash and fold one "load" of laundry for every race, team ride, or Saturday House of Pain ride that I attend. Seeing how I was willing to put more skin in the pot, I felt like this was a good deal. She liked the idea so much that she immediately started looking at the race calendar to see what she can cram in there. I'd better get the legs freshened up quick.

As you probably guessed, I couldn't stand it any longer and went skiing yesterday. Getting up there Tuesday night took a while, but wasn't too bad. Woke up Wednesday morn to hear the speaker phone telling me that the hill of my choice received 9-13" of new snow over night. Seemed like a stretch as there was only a trace at the cabin. But when I got to the hill, oh the glory. Untracked powder for as far as the eye could see. We (my older brother Michael and uber republican and good friend Carl Borgwardt) got into line at about 8:45am and were about the 20th chair up the hill. We skied untracked until lunch time even hitting one section just as it was being opened by the ski patrol. Some north facing exposures were holding waist deep stashes that made my powder penis go boing. Seriously. After lunch, we did two gigantic runs that featured the best powder I've ever skied. The runs are out of bounds and take you away from the base area, but oh my are they good fun. Sometimes there is a traverse line that gets you back to the parking lot and sometimes there isn't. Yesterday there wasn't and we ended up at some condos that are about a 15 minute walk from the lifts. Luckily there was a great Samaritan that gave us a lift back to the base. We had so much fun on the run that we high tailed it back up the mountain for another go. Shooting through the trees side by side with my brother and friends provides me with a joy that words can't describe. It's days like yesterday that make me glad to walk/ski this earth. Wish you were there. No doubt, I'm a lucky man.

Johnny GoFast