It has been about 7 weeks since I broke my shoulder. I've done nearly 2 weeks of training since I got back on the bike. I remember that my first longer ride outside was really hard: 3 hours was hard. It took about 2 weeks before I started feeling like I actually had some endurance. Wednesday, I rode about 6.5 hours, 5.5 with Christof, and it felt pretty great pushing hard on hills. I've had about 6 or so of these traumatic cycling setbacks over my short cycling career... it seems to always take about 2 full weeks of training to get that "groove" back... when the head and legs and energy and motivation returns. Just gotta force yourself to not think about the ground you've lost and the junk going on in your head... count on the fact that in a couple weeks... it'll all seem like a bad dream.

Wednesday's long ride with Christof spawned some great new vocabulary: high-attacher, non-remover, upward-migrator, transverse-relocation, et al. We'll define these terms later. For now, it's up to our commenteers to guess what they mean.

I almost crashed on the ride, though. We were laughing about how sometimes, when you ride by baby cows, sometimes they spastically run away, but it takes them some time to process whether or not they should run. They hesitate. The little cow is like "uhhhhhhhh, uhhhhhhh, thinking.... RUUNNNNNNNN!!!!" So, then I got the image of the hourglass that your mouse pointer turns into when the computer's working, over the cow's head. So, I was laughing at this image in my head:



But, then as Christof and I were laughing at that dumb nonsense, I hit a HUUUUUGE woodchip in the road at like 25mph, and my hands flew off the bars and I went all crazy and I somehow clipped my right foot out and used my right cleat to slow me down to an eventual stop. It wore the nubs completely off the bottom of my D/A cleat. Anyway, here is what I had to say to the woodchip- courtsey of my RAZR:



And, finally, this was funny at about the 260th minute of our ride... when you absolutely positively need a perv working on your new house.

---

So, big whoop, we raced the Jefferson Cup. Who really wants to read about Ian making pointless moves off the front, and defending JC champion Christoph throwing up in his mouth every time up Blenheim hill? Not even us. But, to summarize, Ian made pointless moves off the front, and Christoph barfed in his mouth. We both finished the race in the top 83.

The highlight of our Sunday was 70 miles together at the helm of "Wheel 1". After many laps passing the throngs of fans at the start/finish, Christoph gave them what they wanted:


Remember your first CAT 5 race? Most of us would rather forget. Do you remember how frustrating it was? Did you ever want to quit? According to racers, the JC CAT 5 race was one of the hardest on record. Just look what it did to the Wizza*:


Driving the chase group to a 14th place finish, the Wizza* dug to the deepest caverns of his mucus glands, and made us proud to be his biggest fans.

With the day's racing complete and the 'taints thouroughly sanitized, 2skinnypros mused about the source of Christoph's extraordinary flatulence. Popular speculation points to the marinated tofu bagel... but the truth lies in Christoph's hiney. (and we ain't goin there)


2skinnypros + 1chubbysprinter = 3chinnysprintos

---

Dear Mommy,

Cycling Camp was lots of fun. All of the boys were really nice to me, and we got along like beloved brothers.

Here we are getting ready for the annual SpeedRacer lookalike competition:


I was thrilled to receive the prize for most aerodynamic (and most likely to take a thumping from the rear).


We did lots of bike riding too. We don't have our new uniforms yet, but we still turned lots of heads on our new Merlin titanium bikes. They're really amazing steeds. After my just a few rides, I've totally fallen in love.

Except for the various comments about "queer spandex parade day", the North Carolinean folks seemed to really like us.


We also did some awesome training on some grizzy-gravel roads. Amidst the hammerfest, flat tires were our only respite from the wicked pace that Old Man Wirsing enforced.


After logging big-time miles for 4 days we were all pretty drained, so Monday we rolled "tranquilo" to the local coffee house. For Peter it was a long-awaited religious pilgrimage.


The highlight of the week was a special visit from Sexual Harassment Panda. In this pictre SHP is teaching Brad how to handle unfomfortable situations with strangers.


As you can tell, Cycling Camp was a really special week for the Rite Aid Pro Cycling Team. The guys are showing impressive early-season form, and we're all stoked to hit the race season with unprecedented focus and drive. Bring it!

---

Yesterday was the open house for the SPEED Clinic at UVA. Headed by Jay Dicharry, the SPEED clinic is the only thing like it on the East Coast, it is designed to be a high-performance resource for endurance athletes like runners and cyclists from all over the country. Using some very state-of-the-art equipment, computers capture and analyze your motion in ways that, basically, blew my mind. It's worth checking out: SPEEED CLINIC

I was basically there do demonstrate the equipment and be pro. Also, I was there to say rediculous things to the TV reporter. Check out the video, and click to watch the newscast!

---

The potential blog-energy of the past 2 days is very high. Time to blog it up, turning potential energy into kinetic. Christoph has been at Rite Aid Pro Cycling Team Training Camp 2006 since Wednesday, and has yet to produce a blog about it. Dude, a couple sentences will do. Christoph is also not returning my phone calls, which has got my stomach in a knot. Actually, what has got my stomach in a knot relates to the next photos.


I spent Sunday chopping up a whole dumptruck load of veggies and stuff for a homemade LENTIL soup. This onion was particularly potent. Tha P-Hen told me that breathing through my nose with the matches underneath will counteract the onion chemicals. Joke’s on me! Didn’t work. The soup was soooooouuper.

I rode 5 hours today. It was a breakthrough ride for me. The shoulder didn’t hurt. The back pain was manageable. My legs didn’t hurt. Every hour it became easier and easier to produce power. Speed just went up and up. I rolled back into Charlottesville at about 47 mph and side-skidded my rear wheel into my parking lot (leaving a sweet skid-mark), and threw my hands up into the air and yelled “lets make a pumpkin PIE!!!!” So, that’s what we did. H-Bomb came over and we whipped up 2 great pumpkin pies. I just slammed down a piece the side of my shoe.

Christoph’s 23rd birthday is Wednesday the 22nd. FYI. I hope Sheff will be sending him swift pumps to the rear. Oh!!! Christoph just called me from the commode at TC. All is right in the world again.

---

when you're angry and frustrated and can't sit still and just confused about life for no understandable reason and there is no song you can play to get your head right, and you don't feel like training......

go do VO2 max intervals

see you later.

---

Today was a pretty placid 3½ hour ride - zone 1 only, 220 watts avg. I am still very very weak in my left shoulder and my back is still hurting. So, I am just slowly creeping up the ride duration as the shoulder fatigue and back pain allow. The shoulder doesn't hurt, but being out of the saddle isn't natural yet... the front end of my bike wobbles and the shoulder gets really tired. Anyway, the shoulder strength is returning rapidly. I could only ride 1 hr on my first ride back, and a couple days later, I can ride 3½ hours pretty well. I will attempt 4½ tomorrow.

Anyway, today’s special event was evading a large, mean German Shepherd, which I’ve never seen on this road before. (I will not name the road here, so that locals must go through the same horror as I.) To set the stage… I am still being cautious and slow on downhills because of the shoulder strength. So, I went slowly down a hill into a little creek valley, and started climbing up the other side, maybe at about 9mph, it was steep. Then, outta nowhere, this dog is blasting through deep woods tearing ass right for my ankles. When certain dogs bark, you know they’re just playin’. This beast wasn’t playin’. He was hoping to eat my leg. Since I couldn’t explain to the dog that I couldn’t get out of the saddle to sprint and that my shoulder was in a sling a few days ago, my only option was pump out a seated sprint while soiling myself. Please enlarge graph to see the result.

---

My teammate Zach Bell just set a new Canadian record for the individual 4-kilometer pursuit. Racing in the Commonwealth Games in Australia, he hammered 4k in 4 minutes 31 seconds, smashing the previous record of 4'36" set by Brian Walton. What a stud.

I believe his success can be substantially attributed to his February retreat in the Charlottesville Cycling Monestary.

Zach documented his experience in a short movie, which has already been touted as the year's best "short documentary type film under 3 min set to monastic chanting".

Check it out: http://zerailleur.com/blog/archives/27

---

FIRST OFFICIAL RIDE OUTSIDE SINCE FEBRUARY 8th!!!!
ENDORPHINS FLOW LIKE GANGBUSTERS!!!!


53x12 only!!!!! Schwing!

---

Without going into much detail, I present one of my many opinions to you: life has loopholes. Magic pathways to success and inner harmony, if you will. Yesterday, this existential topic surfaced during a lunchtime conversation with an unnamed special someone. Little did I know that my future was being plotted right before my very eyes. The result of this "loophole" conversation is as much brilliant as it is shocking and horrifying. It would seem that the 2skinnypros are not the only ones in town with serious photoshopping skills:


FREEEEE MOOONNEEEYYYYYYY!!!!! Thanks Matthew Lesko!

__BIG NEWS__ for Ian is due out tomorrow.

---

I finally finished my Dominican photojournal. Huzzah! Click the link above for the 2SkinnyPros Dominican Reality Experience.

WARNING: content may not be suitable for minors. Contains graphic images of really ugly food, goat violence, and adult themes. Parental discretion is advised.



Today I drove to DC to get my visa for the People's Democratic Republic of China (ahem, yeah!). Team Rite Aid is officially GAME ON for the Tour of Chongming Island!

---

# of invitees: 30
# of invitees actually living in the greater Charlottesville area: 14
# of partygoers @ peak flowpoint: 25
# of gorgeous women: 13
# of songs on Ian's original playlist: 78
# of songs vetoed by P-hen: 17
# of Ace of Base songs on the playlist, post-editing: 6
# of bottles of Cava Cristalino champagne that Ian bought for the party: 5
# of bottles of classy champagne that Ian has purchased in his lifetime: 5
# of butcher knives wielded by Ian's hot date: 1
# of milligrams hangover-fighting L-Arginine taken by Ian post-party: 3000

technology highlight of the party: Ian's winamp visualizer pumped onto TV
dancing highlight of the party: Darryl worming his way across the floor
liquid highlight of the party: 1 liter Finlandia vodka

Christoph's hair volume rating, on the Hasselhof scale: 7/10
Christoph's dancing motion sequence: left, right, front, back, twist
Ian's motion sequence: thrust, thrust, thrust, adjust sling, thrust.

# of massive armpit sweatstains photoshopped out of these pictures: 3
amount of time Ian spent drawing boogers and devil eyes on party pics: 20 minutes

---

We're having a _huge_ dance party at Ian's pad tonite. We installed 2 webcams for you to check in on the action.

Note: webcams might take a while to load

CAMERA 1

CAMERA 2

---

Last night I drove my crippled self over to Christof's bucolic house to be see my #1 best buddy and hear some amazing/hilarious stories about his trip to the DR. It had been 2 weeks since I'd seen Christof. I greeted him with a man-hug (gentle, my glenoid cavity!) that was probably more appropriate for if I hadn't seen Christof for over a month. He had some yrrummmy sweetbread baking in the oven! (no, not thymus glands) Anyway, as I was hanging out in the kitchen, I noticed a pad out with some of Christof's chicken-scratch on it. I burst out laughing, and voila, we had today's blog:

Clarification:

Eat This:
spag (w/ peas, onion, chix, mushrooms, dried veggies, garlic)
popcorn
cornbread
quesedilla (spelled wrong!)
pickles
cool noodles & sauce
salad
vegetarian shit on rice
grilled cheesecheese on cackos (we assume, crackers?)
cheese sandwich
cheese omlet (spelled wrong)
Buy:sugar
razors
couscous

NOW. We can learn a lot about Christof from this list. Notably, he cares about the shape of his pasta, which means that he is sensitive and has a good eye for design and beauty, and women. He likes pickles, which probably that he's going to have wrinkly skin when he's old. Wouldn't grilled cheese fall under the more general category of "cheese sandwich?" Christof's craving for cheese probably means that he tolerates lactose well, but farts a lot. Vegetarian shit on rice is an adaptation of my famed standard "Shit on Rice," which is merely homemade beefy chili on rice, but Christof replaced the beef with extra beans (adding black to the kidneys). Finally, I will leave it up to our commenteeers to determine the significance of "sugar, razors, couscous."

It's 70 degrees here in Charlottesville, and I am going to take my broken glenoid to the University of Virginia, and teach a spinning class indoors to what will probably be an empty room, because it is Spring Break. I had the P-Hen lock my bike to our balcony today so that I wouldn't ride it outside. F*ck!!! 1 more week.

---

We're hosting a dance party this Friday (the 10th). If you believe that you should be here, and you haven't already received an email, please email me at ian@2skinnypros.com , and I'll bring it up with the invitation selection committee.

The playlist is _hot_.

---

After a grueling day of travel, I'm back in the US of A. Boy it felt good to a big lung-full of fresh air at Washington Dulles Airport. It was seriously delightful compared to the 2-stroke fumes I've been breathing for weeks.

Amidst my 1273 new emails, I was most shocked by the news that UVA Team all-star John Wade was injured in a crash last week at the William and Mary road race. The Whizza bites the Dizza? It can't be. Apparently his injuries required brief hospitalization, but he's vowed a speedy return to Whizzaform.

In a brief tribute to this chief of chiefs, I'd like to highlight some of the phrases he's contributed to the UVA team email list:

"Yeppers!"

"Peace*"

"Speed is sometimes your best ally*"

"Peace*"

"Mmmm...donuts. Mmmm...technical turning... aaaaaahhh."

"I'm not happy until I've responded to myself 3 times*"

"Safety is no accident*"

"It's always team time*"

"Proponent of a ride for all, young and old, good and evil*"

"Peace*"

note: all asterixes have been used in their orginal context

I hope you heal-up soon, dear Whizza!

In other news, I just uploaded 326 pics from my camera. I'm planning an elaborate photo-journal of this epic trip. In the meantime, I'll leave you with this pic from the sixth day. I'm sleeping in a traffic circle with my Dominican teammate Juan while the rest of the team went to get water and supplies for the second stage of the day. Juan blacked out in about 8 seconds flat. It took me one Tylenol PM and 30 minutes of Nick Drake on the ipod to help me fall asleep amidst the incessant honks of traffic and the annoying fella who kept trying to sell me sugar cane whenever I closed my eyes.

please disregard the enormous bulge in my shorts.

---

Christof arrives home from the DR today!!! Yaaaaaaayyyyyyy!!! I'm so proud of him, he is such a hard tryer. Good job to Dave as well for getting Montezuma's Revenge.

I am suuuuuper sleepy after teaching cycle this AM at the Boars Head. I had the ol' HR pegged at about 175 the whole time, and saw the 190's during the 'no recovery' sprint inverval session. The class loved/hated that section. I can hardly keep my eyelids open right now. Eyelids getting heavy.... veerrrrryyy heaavvvyyyyy. Boof. Im sleeping.

So, please help me to come up with a new selection of motivational exclamations that I can use in cycle classes. Some of my old favourites include: "go harder, try to puke in your mouth!!!", "this baby isn't going to have itself, ladies!!!!" , "you just washed your car, and a bird just crapped on your windshield... you're pissed, dig!!!!", "a redneck in a pickup truck just passed you and flipped you off... sprint after him and yell stupid things until he's out of sight!!!".... as you see I could use some new material. please post in the comments.

i just had my famous 6 egg white + one yolk breakfast snack. You can get a great egg-ucation on the Benton Franklin County Health District website, based out of beautiful Kennewick, WA.

Did you know that while eating too many yolks is bad (because of high source of cholesterol), the yolks have lots of good stuff, like:
- all of the egg's fat, cholesterol and almost half of the protein
- all of the egg's Vitamins A, D, and E and zinc
- most of the egg's phosphorus, manganese, iron, copper, iodine and calcium
- about 60 calories (in a large egg)
I LOVE EGGS.

---

hey-

Greetings from the land of potholes, pollution, and palmtrees. 1080 kilometers down, 120 to go.

D-Gal got really sick after stage 3. After a tortuous night of blowing up the hotel bathroom, D-gal attempted a start on stage 4 but he was forced to abandon when the legs simply couldn't press on the pedals. D-Gal and Katie set up camp in Santo Domingo's cleanest hotel while I continued the tour.

The race has gone pretty well. I'll post the complete story in a few days when I'm back stateside. It's been epic. There are some sick fast riders here. Lots of juiced dudes for sure. I managed a few top-10 stage finishes and worked my way to 6th overall. Yesterday I totally exploded on a huge climb and lost a bunch of time. You might have been able to see the mushroom cloud all the way in Virginia. Now I'm in 14th overall with 1 stage remaining.

I've been really lucky to stay safe and healthy so far. The racing is really sketchy. We've had to contend with potholes, goats in the road, goats in the potholes....

Last night the ceiling light in my room wouldn't turn off, so I threw my carbon-fiber shoe at it repeatedly until it finally conceded.

back at ya soon,

christoph

---

Last night I was browsing around on the web in search of documents that provide details about the medical prognosis for nondisplaced vertical (type Ib) fractures of the posterior third of the glenoid fossa. What I was in search of, naturally, was for some poorly designed amateur website to tell me that I only needed to wear my sling for 2 weeks, and that I could ride at the end of the third. (it has been 3 weeks and 4 days) I only found one result in Google that had any good details about glenoid fractures. BUT! The site was no longer in operation, and I had to click on Google's "CACHED" version of the search result. So, the page was actually a QUIZ! There was no an answer key on the quiz... but all of the questions related to glenoid fractures. Here is the one quiz question that applies to me:

Since this question is asking us to pick the false item, we use the simple rules for taking multiple choice quizzes. Choose the strongest option as false. Clearly, that is option C. 6-8 weeks? Totally immobilized? Bull. A, B & D sound like they go together. So, I have deduced from this cached quiz that my fracture will be healed by this Wednesday, and I can move it around a bit today!

Woohoo! Thanks shady outdated web quiz!

---

Ian just got a new Motorola RAZR V3c. Though I can completely justify a few extra bucks for a sexy phone, I refuse to pay a cent to the "Get It Now" empire of Verizon to acquire ringtones, et al. So, I 'hacked' my way into the phone using BITPIM and uploaded some custom ringtones I generated on there. (For those trying this out, the magic MP3 spec is 80kbps, mono, 32kHz.) You can also download your videos and pictures for free with BITPIM.

Anyway, I whipped up some custom ringtones out of some old Genesis!!! I have a clips from "No Reply At All," "Los Endos," "Cinema Show," "It," and plenty from the Lamb. Also, I made a clip of Phil's "Sussudio," which I have set to ring when that special someone calls. You could be thinking many things at this point of reading today's blog. Sure, you might be thinking to yourself "this skinnypro has too much time on his hands." Well, number one, I am a pro cyclist, and number two, I have a broken shoulder. You might also wonder why someone under the age of 40 listens to old Genesis... well that is another blog. Anyway, if you want to hear my ringtones sometime, I will be happy to play them for you :)

I am definitely getting to the point where I could write a very long-winded blog about how awful it is to get sidelined from racing and missing out on big events... but, seriously, does anyone want to hear that? No. I'm just going to continue writing about the crap that I'm filling my life in the meanwhile. Sheff posted a new blog in the CAT 3 Corner. A must-read.

---

I taught cycle classes today at the Boars Head & UVA!!! I'm so super-pumped to be back! I slammed my spin students with my one arm, ordering them also ride w/ one arm.
Also, Cool Honey documented my one-armed cookie baking nite. Thanks Mom, for the "double-yum" recipie! Also, I went to PT for my back injury today and started w/ some deep tiss massage. Yowsers. Ayers is slowly getting back up on the horse here. Another 2 weeks and I'm rolling out of the stable!! Exclamation point threshold exceeded... my apologies.

---