more pics

I saw the coolest old chevy truck with a brand new Trek EX 9.5 carbon bike in the back. Then the special flame azeleas that grow in the higher elevations in West Viginia. And finally the cabin the freedom families are building near Big Run on Spruce .

LLC

Yeeha to Lea for getting 19th at Worlds and 2nd american lady. Maybe if she keeps getting faster every race she should be going to the Olympics!

Wild and Wonderful days

The days are so sweet right now in West Virginia. We have great great local racing with the Appalachian Classic in Grantsville. This race is so cool because they hug you when you register, give you a pint class, a t-shirt, provide you with some fun wooded singletrack, then feed you and if you win they give a dollar amount that is very close to what you get if you win a norba . The next race was West Virginia State Championships in Davis. Roger and Matt made a three hour race out in the Badlands over the bridge off of camp 70 road. Its so amazing how much of an effort they and Canaan Valley Institute have put into to trails there. Its so good to see mtbing is taking a positive turn. Of course the race was super muddy. It was a dirty, dirty affair. The great thing about riding in Davis is the mud is always rideable, power sucking, but doable. The race was catered by my favorite pizza place on the Planet....Sirianni's. Thanks Mike and Sandra for the best garlic pizza ever.

Then it was the Bucshi wedding at Elk River. I loved the humor and happiness at Paul and Megan's wedding and of course they both brought sexyback to Slatyfork. We had a great mtb ride on the tea creek trails eariler in the day.

Some friends are building a cabin on Spruce Mtn., about 8 miles from the highest point in WV.

The Race

My last world cup race.....yeeha! It was a fabulous suffer fest.(aren't they all?) I finished 37th...pretty much like all the rest. I was really only fast on the downhill. The downhill was so awesome. I don't think that there has ever been such an incredible downhill in a world cup before. So, so fun!

LLC was 20th! She did awesome and is so pumped. She has been on the phone for hours on Skype talking to all her mapleheads at home. JB is still racing at this moment. But Canadiancyclist.com is offficially the best race website with all their during race updates. Thanks Rob Jones for caring about racing and doing it in such a timely manner.

Scotland

Back at Ft. William or affectionately known as Ft. Bill. I didn't attend World Championships here last year, so the course is quite different than the last time I was raced here. Its not as technical. Its dry, fast and some long climbs. The descent has tons of berms and is really fun. The tricky part is that the berms have a loose gravel patch in them. Also, I feel like you can only go so fast. But at least its pretty long and a good ripper. There are no crazy Euro drops where you have to slam the brakes on at the bottom of it. This race has been voted the best three or four years in a row. They get great fans for being pretty far out from the cities.

The Scottish are so friendly. Everyone is saying welcome to Scotland and good luck at the race. Plus, the weather is good. The only miserable thing is the midges. Midges are tiny bugs that bite. They are like mini-gnats. They were eating Bork alive as he worked on bikes. They don't bother us on our bikes. The course marshals have the head nets on. I heard smoking a cigar helps keep them away too. Apparently, they don't mind garlic.

We ate at an Indian Restaurant last night that I remember being really good. But I guess I have really come to love the food at The Indian American Cafe in Harrisonburg. They have the best veggie samosas and veggie bryiani ever, oh and the best paneer, too . Plus trying to understand an Indian-Scottish accent is really hard to do.

My bruise really became a rainbow of colors. It is probably one of the worst looking bruises I've had in my racing career. But it doesn't hurt or anything. My knee is tons better and just is a little annoying now.

Tyrone has some dirty south in him. Lea knows more rap songs than anyone else I know.

We stayed up late wathcing "Entourage " last night. It really wound us up and tonite we have to turn it off way earlier so we can get better sleep. The sun sets at midnight and is up again at 4 am. Its weird.

Andorra

Andorra is the coolest country. It is a mountain hamlet. Its all about mountains. There are so many incredible paved roads. We have been out exploring . Today we had the most amazing ride. Plus, the rivers are pumping with so much water and rapids. Americans are into icebaths in very cold moutain streams. Euros are not.

Yesterday we went into Andorra La Vella. Its the big town around here. We did a tiny bit of shopping. Its basically like a huge duty free airport shopping mall. Its not really unique and actually kind of cheesy, but I guess its a way for all the skiers to spend more money. This place is really into skiing. Then we went to a thermal spa. Me, JB and LLC went to nurse our tired legs. Me and LLC snuck up to the exclusive club section and got to spa with floating grapefruits and into a beautifully tiled eucalyptus steam room. We also did the roman baths that are hot and cold water.

The race was brutal. I crashed on Thursday and hurt my knee. I had a horrible slap down crash. My knee was really sore. I took a bunch of motrin the day of the race and it was actually okay. But on the first lap I crashed so hard on the banked boardwalk section. It was wet wood and I hit the deck so hard. I have a huge rainbow hemotoma on my hip. So the race was merely surviving with the pain. Some days are just like that. I think I'm pretty good in the difficult terrain, but some days I'm stiff and on the brakes too much. Once you crash once, the chances of crashing again are higher. I was crying after the race and though that I should just pull the plug on this world cups, but a cooler head prevailed and I'm going to Scotland to see if I can do better. Lea and JB did well. LLC loves world cups and I expect her to move up each race. JB is starting to feel normal again and hopefully is hitting his summertime superfast riding.