Cross rocks "part deux"

We have a new rider in town Mother Theresa from Mass-a-choo-setts. I think she shared some really impressive insights to why different people do cross and why its cool. So check out her blog at http://www.newbieontheblock.blogspot.com or in the Nest its located under Mass Appeal.

I think MT brings some good stuff to the table so lets eat! This is how the Hornet sees cross from an outsiders viewpoint.

The young juniors- these guys are fun. Bottom line they get separated, go hard and generally like the cool attention they get over the speakers. Every lap each one will look over, some will send a one handed point and others provide the "look-no-hands-ma" classic pose. It get's better after the race with the raffle, that's where the bike skills really come in handy. But, the best part is to interview the pups on mic regarding the tough spots on the course, it's worth it to make a few minutes early to the venue, just to hear this crack analysis.

The Men's C's and Women's B's- you have every kind of rider here. Fast ones in great shape, brand new to the technicalities of cross, and the vice versa crowd, as well as every kind of rider inbetween. This makes these races pretty interesting because placings are up in the air for a lot of postions, especially being that there are lots of groups. Sometimes you will see racers good too hard at first and pop, or more often than not, bridge groups each lap from almost nowhere. If you are in the Mens C's Please make sure you check in early, and if you are a new registrant, please, please come over to the announcing booth so we can match your name with your number. Last week the powerful Men's C's Not Listed Squad dominated, kicked tail, and garnered one-half of the top spots! We really want to yell your name loudly over the airways, so help us out.

Junior's 15-18- wow this is like watching whippets chase tennis balls in Central Park. No fear, fast and are willing to go down in corners at anytime, but usually don't. The trend this year seems to be Mitch Peterson look and ride alikes.

Masters 35+ B's- once again a different type of race. This race will sometimes have a cluster of 3-5 riders in the very front for the majority of the race only to break off at the end, or one by ones at the front end with small groups chasing. Often times with mechanicals, crashes and lead or postition changes, because a good number of racers have a chance... and are burying it. We really try to give insight to lead changes here.

Singlespeed- what the what? Like cyclocross isn't hard enough, lets give them one, uno freekin' gear. Hunh? Whatever. Problem is most of these guys are like thoroughbreds running the Preakness. Warp speeders who generally go pretty solo. So really its a TT in the cold and mud... with one gear! What next boys and girls singlespeed unicycles...backwards...in the dark!

Masters 35+A's- ditto on the 35+ B's, but a bit faster with a few more team tactics. These are savvy experienced cross riders who are going to play a chess game out on the course... the only problem is, most of the time they are redlining while they are trying to think. These guys don't go down much, but when they do... its hard.

Mens and womens A's- Simply three groups- fast, seriously fast and sick fast with superhuman bike skills. Generally, one gets the hole shot and blows up the field the rest chase sometimes in small groups. This results in a few changes from the start, especially near the end... but other times the top 5 can be separated by 5 to 30 seconds or more from lap one throughout.

More fun! Yeah, be Stevechops Lewis, the e-Flynn, Mike Pratini or the rest who decide to do more than one race, usually back to back. It's hard to pull off two top tens, but it is done.

The bottom line is cross is a riot, a real cool thing to bring the fam and friends to. Some racers will kill themselves to win, others will do so just to see what they can do, yet some work hard and smile more, 'cause they're just having a ball. While everyone is cheering, slamming cow bells or just delerious post-race, but most of the time with a grin (just watch Miss Julie, Hardwood or Team Rico) race and you'll know what I mean. Stevechops will even give you high fives mid race.

Lastly, again...please read Mother T's Oct 21st and 22nd blog entries, for the reasons why she digs the local cross-ings... I could have written my thoughts, but why when she articulates it so well.

Peace out,

B-Horn

Cyclo- Cross is mucho funno!

Announced Cross for the second time yesterday, the first was with the Marek... and yesterday with G-Love. Both days were a gas.

Working with Marek is like being on an ESPN7 cyclocross set. He has all of the sayings of an A-list broadcaster. Aka "cool as the other side of the pillow" sort of stuff, and he runs around like Sandy Perrins on crack... let alone the creative names he comes up with for certain parts of the course. I needed his help, my first race at RMR was the men's C's, which if I self graded my performance on a scale of 1-10, I would venture to guess that I was pretty close to a minus 14. But, after that it came together a bit better and was a BLAST!

G-Love (aka Luscious Jackson) is simply legendary at the task. Before, during and after races a ton of people come by to say hi and check in with the man. Yesterday, was a double whammy because we are both from the Boston area and big Sox fans (how else do you think I got the gig) so we, (ok, I) talked Sox trash throughout the race. I really look forward toward working with Gardie again, he made it really enjoyable.

Saw T-Mac at the UCA awards fest, and he announced on Saturday, so man, we have the Big Dawg of the Tour de Utah rolling out the commentary, sweet. So I guess what I'm sayin' is I'm a pretty lucky guy....go figure, those three are like Ramirez, Ortiz and Lowell, sorry I digress...11-2...sorry, three straight...whoops!

Matt Ohran, Jon Gallagher and the crew really do a great job with the setting up the courses, general organization, officiating and scoring, basically the whole enchilada. And lastly, all the sponsors donating a lot of time, support and cool stuff. If you have some spawn that want to play cross, bring 'em out, Canyon Bicycles of Draper will set em up on a loaner cross bike to see if Cross is for them, if it's not they don't supply violins, sorry.

Note from the Nest- Bob Walker went down at the barrier section yesterday, where he broke his leg... Dr. Kris was right there attending to him... and yeah he rode his bike to the car! Best wishes Bobchops for a speedy recovery, everyone will miss you man!

I am really impressed with the whole show, thanks for letting me be part of it. My goal now is to screw up less and less each race, I know- big aspirations. Anyway, up next, comments about Cross at the RMR on 10/13 and Wheeler on 10/21...

Out,

B-Horn

Put the telemarketers out to pasture!

Again some great info from Sean "the cell-mate" Hoover...

REMINDER...12 days from today, all cell phone numbers are being released to telemarketing companies and you will start to receive sales calls........YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THESE CALLS. To prevent this, call the following number from your cell phone: 888-382-1222 . (You must call on the phone that you want registered- this will not work from another number) It is the National DO NOT CALL list. It will only take a minute of your time.. It blocks your number for five (5) years.

Help others by passing this on to friends and the family members you actually like (sorry I added that part) It only takes about 20 seconds, (or the time it takes for Hardwood to down a Kiev-again I took liberty)

Thanks Sean, and if you let 10 friends know about this you will have good Karma for the rest of the year!

B-Horn

What do you think?

I want to promote an epic bike ride in the next year or two in the Salt Lake Valley that can't be duplicated anywhere near a major metropolitan area... Why you ask? Please read on-

Nicholas Negropante is a man that has a big goal and refuses to be told he can't accomplish it. He is the founder of a non-profit organization called One Laptop Per Child http://www.xogiving.org/ His goal- to provide a laptop to every child that needs one in Africa. He met with the leaders of three African Nations to tell them that he wanted to produce a very cost attractive computer to accomplish his goal. One leader in particular shared her (rather large concerns) like-

• We lack sufficient energy resources- can you make it super energy efficient, that will require low wattage?- Answer from N.N.- "sure!"
• These will be going to kids, can you make it extremely durable- Answer from N.N.- "sure."
• Can you make it solar powered?.."sure."
• Can you make it really sensitive to local hot spots? ..."sure."
• Can you make it so it is impervious to severe heat..."sure."
• Since they will be used outside can you make them glare resistant?... "sure."

(paraphrasing) "in fact I'll make it cool looking with neat software for music and a couple of interactive games, and make it e-book extraordinaire. Oh yeah, and my goal is to produce them for $100 US dollars each."

So, Nicholas went back to his production plant in Cambridge MA and had his team work it up... and now... it is rated very highly for its indestructibility, and might be one of the most sensitive units out there for hot spots... it is solar powered, is super energy efficient, is really cool looking, is bake tested in ovens to 140 degrees F, and has the cool software stuff he mentioned to her... Right now it's price point is $188 because of lack of production, but they may be able to produce this in the near future (based on volume) for get this, da, da, da, da... $50!

Now he needs governments, companies, organizations and individuals to donate $$$. He is offering a one and one special. You buy one for $399 dollars and one is donated AND shipped to an African child. Your purchase is tax deductible,so it is really just about $288 (based on your tax bracket).

Here is my idea (I would like everyone who reads this blog to let me know what they think, please!)

I want to establish an truly epic ride. It will be called the Daniel "Popa" Santoro Tribute ride for African Children.

It will encompass six Salt Lake Canyons, 16,000 vertical feet and run 130 miles...It will start in Draper, go up the North Side of Traverse Ridge to the Stop sign and back down then up and down Little, Big, Mill (to the gate), Emigration and City, ending at the top with a party...

This could be done (before) in conjunction with Lotoja as a training ride, it also would be invaluable to those training for the Everest Challenge. As you know everyone and there brothers asks this question to every cyclist around "did you do LOTOJA?"... now they may say... "did you do Popa's?" We are the only city, possibly anywhere, that has the canyons to do it, and the population of riders to make this ride a true great!

It gets better, like the MS ride we will ask for donations, all proceeds going to One Laptop Per Child, and we could even pick a sister African Township of say 3,000 school age children to try to meet the goal of supplying them all! Individual certificates go out to all who completed at least one canyon, this could be incentive each year to do more canyons, obviously promoting a more healthy lifestyle for the typical citizen riders. Each year we could pick another sister township and so on... It also makes us, as cyclist's, more human to non-cyclists in the community... when we do something truly altruistic like this. I'm really charged about this one, I realize the challenges, but whatever, look at what Nick did... he's the hero here.

Thanks for your time reading this, so what do you think?

B-Horn

Tour de Mizz

The V had cov of the TdM and it was cool to see the props that not only Louder got in the "Beer" KOM Jersey, but also for the Z-man and Burke... "who they call T-Bird."

and what a crash in the final sprint out... that was definately an "agony of defeat" clip, yet the dude got back on his bike and finished... man he deserved points in the "most industructable" category...

Good job Mizz, we need the Vs to cover the Tour of Utah next year!

B-Horn

Climber's Cup people...

Jon Gallagher is the man! He put on another great race and even ordered a tail wind, a big tail wind...to the tune of speed's hitting 40mph plus on the flats. So Jon does his race stuff, gets a quick warm up, then rips it up. He's going to Seattle this weekend and will do the World Cyclocross Championships later this year. The G-man waited to peek late, so keep an eye on him- he should do well... and by the way he looks like Levi from the back when he's spinning circles...

Talkin' 'bout doing well in the World's congrats to another one for Dirkus Cowleyus, he trained like a dog this summer, right up and through nationals, way to work it D.C.

Shaeffer is flying right now, obviously... he put in a great time, as did Zimble(men), yeah I pluralized him... Shaef-dog is going to the Everst Challange, I think he's gonna tame it, so good luck Bra, and to all the other Paul Tracy's facing it... I know the Boss is on form, hell everyone's strong in the P.T... but special kudo's to Jimmy Wingman, he's a power man by trade but always show's up to climb, lay it down!

Kash Johnson is a way fast climber, and yeah he's 15... He could be like another Mitch "Copper" Peterson...we'll get back to him soon...so what's Kash's nickname going to be... please vote...and feel free to add your own.

1. Kash "Valley"
2. Fast Kash
3. Cold hard Kash
4. Mo' Kash (double meaning in Utah)
5. Kash on hand
6. Kash in the bank
7. Rockin' the Kash-ba
8. Kash it in
9. Kash on the Barrel-head
10. Don't except checks...sorry I ran out

Mitchell Peterson is so fast there is no nickname... but he wears a cool uni with a big sherrif's badge on it, so I'll call him the Copper... he's kinda like a Mod Squad dude with that big hair... Mitch if you cut it you could gain about a minute on the climb, but the college chicks might not dig it... so keep your priorities straight and keep the coif...

New fast chick, ex-oly gal Abby Larson... second straight torching of a local Hill Climb... watch out for her, she is new to the sport...looks like the femme fatal version of Billy the Kid Demong who tore up the 3's this year. Way to go Abbith Climbith... latin is totally in for nicknames right now...

That's it for now, gotta bring the male spawn to guitar lessons ASAP or I'm DOA.

B-Horn

Talent

In the Hornet's Nest go to a blog named One Fast Squirrel (he's a hardcore Paul Tracy teamer from No-Cal) and check out the U-tube posted on the most recent blog.

Sanford and Son rules! That's talent.

B-Horn