I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. Instead of having the traditional Thanksgiving meal with friends and family this year, Rebecca and I tried out our version of the Saxo Bank Boot Camp. Though I'm not sure how much faster this trip made me, I'm sure that it better prepared me for conditions such as was experienced during the St. 4 death march at the 2008 Tour of California. Our adventures included camping in the cold rain in Canyonlands NP in the desert? of Utah, hiking over slippery rocks/cliffs from said rain, camping in the freezing cold of western CO, riding in freezing rain turning to snow as I ascended, and driving through a snow storm which caused us to take backroads and culminated in traveling a 20mph curvy canyon gravel road where we saw only 1 other car in the 45 min it took to drive the 20 miles. Though we had a great time, we concluded that these near-death experiences (we're so dramatic) were signs that we should be spending Thanksgiving eating massive amounts of turkey and pumpkin pie with family. Lesson learned.
So, this training business is going okay so far tho I hit a speedbump when I caught a cold recently (totally unrelated to camping in freezing weather, I'm sure). I'm still feeling kind of crap but it's a snow day anyway here in Boulder so I don't feel too guilty.
Here is a recent interview I did with Amy Bush who freelances for U.S. Cycling Report. Amy is the woman whom I met at the Tour of Missouri and has provided this blog with pictures in the past. In the picture accompanying the interview, I'm looking pretty psyched about my 2nd place effort at TT nats. :)
Some boot camp pics:
the midway point of our 'treacherous' Canyonlands NP hikes. Also, one of my favorite places on Earth.
Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. I had never been here before last week and the dramatic sheer cliffs absolutely floored me. Okay, that's all I got. Hopefully my next update will be about how hard I've been training and how fast I'm getting...
