New season is upon us...

Wow! Can't believe 2009 Racing season is now upon us. I'm going to be all Up-On my bike, just like I've been all winter. 2008 was a great season - I'm looking forward to all the new faces of the 'Recent upgrades.' Those Cat 4 pansies don't know what's about to hit them in the Ultimate Cat.

Here's a General Warning to all you 'Recent Upgrades':

Stay the F-Outta-My-Way!

If you did not win every race that you entered in the Cat 4's, do not even try and get to the start line early because the front row is not for winners, not losers.

If the races you won were only because "you were in good position and raced smart," kindly stay away from the front of the race in the Ultimate Cat. Races in this category are not won by bike handling skills and smart racing. They are won by being kickass like me.

If you learn about race strategy from any of the bike forums (bikeforums.net,roadbikereview.com, etc) please don't even bother showing up. I've seen the advice on those damn forums, and it is the advice of losers.

Example Post and Response from those forums:
OP:Hey all, I've got a crit coming up this Saturday. It's going to have four corners and probably around 50 people in it. This is going to be my first race, and I'm just wanting some tips and advice. Thanks in advance! Cheers!

Member1: Try and stay near the front, in the first 15 riders or so. Don't be afraid to get dropped, almost everyone gets dropped their first race. Good luck!

Member2: If you haven't done any group rides before, it might be best to stay closer to the back so that you don't injure yourself or wreck anybody else.

OP: Yeah, that was my plan Member2 - I was going to stay near the back to get used to riding in the group. My goal is just to finish the race and not get pulled.

Member3: Just go out there and have fun. If you get dropped, you get dropped. Like Member1 said, everyone gets dropped their first race.

OP: Thanks for all the responses! You've been such a great help. I'll let you know how things go. Hopefully I won't get dropped on the first lap, but I probably will because I've listened to the advice of losers.

Lastly, enjoy your time in the Ultimate Category. Remember, if you can win races in the Cat 3's, you are destined for greatness.

I'm off to fix up my wheels for this weekends race. I like to place chain lube on my wheels where the brakes pads rub so I don't accidentally brake and slow myself down during the race. If you want to have any chance of winning, I recommend you do the same.

Bought a power meter

Yep, bit the bullet and bought a power tap. It was used and a great price, so I had to do it.

There's so much that you can do with a power meter with regards to training. There's some sweet software out there that will let you know how much intensity you have during your workouts, the duration, your peak 1sec, 5sec, you name it sec watts you're putting out.

This software I'm speaking of will let a cyclist know, through line graphs, pie charts, and bar graphs how long was spent in different training zones and cadence speeds.

Athletes can use this to let them know when it is time to train harder, and when it is time to take a break. You can see if your power is decreasing, increasing, or hitting a plateau.

Many people buy these power meters so that they can properly pace themselves during time trials, using their functional threshold power (FTP) as a baseline for their effort.

You can use this thing to see what intensities you raced at, and the different lengths of time you were at those power levels so that you can then replicate this in your workouts.

People buy these things for a variety of different reasons.

I bought mine just to confirm what I already knew - that I am totally BADASS!

Guess I can sell this thing now.

Cycling Forum Douchebags

Please tell me that I'm not the only one who has noticed the amazing number of douchebags on cycling forums.

Instead of having them called 'cycling forums,' I vote to have them renamed, "If you stroke my fat, slow, pansy-ass cycling ego, I'll stroke yours more."

Let me know what you think.

My how time flies when you're kicking ass and taking names. The life of the Cat 3 Phenom has been nothing but great the past few months. I totally forgot that I even had a blog. I guess that's what happens when you are the greatest thing that has ever happened to cycling.


Short recap:
I was unfortunately forced to get a job due to the sole reason that race payouts for the 'Ultimate Cat' are despicable. I'm going to spend this off season working on petitions to combine the payouts for P/1/2 races and Cat 4 races, and give all of that race money to the Cat 3 race. We deserve it. The rest of those pansy boys can fight it out for the meager pickin's that they usually award us amazing 3's.



Be sure to sign the petitions when they come your way.



Some things I learned racing this year in the Ultimate Cat:



1. I really am a cycling phenom.



2. Yellow line rule is made for people who suck at life



3. Drinking 8 or more beers the night before a race is not only great race preparation, but in fact improves results. Need more details, just ask.



4. You do not have to train 16+ hours a week to be a Cat 3 Phenom, in fact, 8 hours is probably too much



Not sure if you're a phenom or not??? Here is an easy test:



First, buy a cycling license and spend the next two months upgrading to the Ultimate Cat.



Next, only train for 7 hours a week. This includes race time.



Finally, if you are able to crush/destroy/obliterate all those you race against, CONGRATULATIONS, you too are a cycling phenom.



Something else I have learned...Never pay attention to anything you read on the numerous cycling forums. They are filled with fat, d-bags who couldn't ride their way out of a paper bag. Have a race coming up and want some advice, shout me a holla (that means message me for you uncool old bastards)! I'll let you know exactly what you need to do to dominate those sissies toeing the line next to you.



I'll be posting again shortly, so check back.

Out of Town Group Rides

So I was on vacation this past weekend, and my bike was with me on the trip. I'm sure this would come as no surprise to all you like-minded racers out there. The only thing was, I did not take my regular racing bike. Instead, my old-school 80's Schwinn graced the bed of my truck.

Now, beings that I was in a new place, nobody knew who I was. This meant that they had no idea about the amazing power I am able to produce for rediculous amounts of time. I showed up to the local meeting spot (called the bike shop to find this out) for the Saturday hammerfest, wearing my athletic shorts over my bibs, and a T-shirt over my jersey.

You all can probably imagine the looks I received, as well as the warnings about the fast pace of the ride. One of the locals even tried to convince me I should wait up for the 'B' ride (cycling term for a ride that is filled with slow losers) so I wouldn't get dropped. I played dumb and pretended like I would do my best to hold on to the pace.

As soon as the ride rolled out of the parking lot, I began to drop the hammer. I glanced back to see the destruction that my quads were causing to the group, and the looks on their faces were priceless. The group was completely strung out.

I slowed down, just to give them hope, then launched another attack just before they caught back on my wheel. One guy was able to jump across (He must have been a former world champion to accomplish this), so I slammed on my brakes and swerved in order to shake him off my wheel. I then accelerated and left him in my dust.

I slowed again, just so these people could see how awesome of a bike rider I was. I kept myself about 100 meters off the front of the group for the rest of the ride.

At the end of the ride, I made sure to let the guy on the Colnago know that he was just demolished by a person on a $15 dollar bike. Man he must feel worthless. Talk about a waste of a great bike.

Overall, I think I really impressed everyone on the ride with my amazing speed and power. I bet they talk about my greatness for weeks to come.

The guy that I swerved in front of was a little unhappy, but I told him that it was not my fault he wasn't a good bike handler. He'd never make it in the Ultimate Cat.

I would recommend that the rest of you do the same next time you head to a new place where nobody knows how great you are. Fool them into believing that you suck because of the bike you ride, then shred their legs to bits.

Well, I'm off to scuff my beater bike up a little more. I want to make sure it looks even crappier for my next out of town group ride. Those losers don't know what's coming.

Something to Learn From

So I was browsing through one of the many online bike forums, and came across this thread. Now I don't post on these things, and in fact I rarely read them. I was bored, and I was hoping to read a good race report.

Anyways, here's the link

I wanted to bring this up because it goes right along with some sound advice that I gave earlier. To briefly summarize for those that don't want to read the report, or the unsound support for the poor decision made by the rider, here it is:

Original poster entered first race, which was a crit (for you non-cyclists, this is a short course that generally has a lot of turns and you complete multiple laps). Original poster began to get nervous about the high speeds in a corner, as well as the numerous other riders surrounding her. So what does the original poster do next?

Now there are many options one can choose here, but I'll narrow it down to a few with a multiple choice question:

Do you ______________________?

A. Continue on with your nervous ways and hope to survive the race

B. Slow down, move off the back, and pick your own lines while slowly trying to finish the race

C. HTFU (for non-cyclists, this means to Harden The Fu$K Up)

D. Remove yourself from the race to prevent the escalation of the nervous feeling, and also to avoid the potential for physical injury to yourself and/or your fellow bike racers.

E. Never find yourself in this postion, because you are on the front of the race, launching attack after attack, knowing good and well that somewhere in the pack you are making people so nervous by the insane speeds that they lose touch with what it means to race a bike and they choose option 'D'.

The answer to this question is obvious. In case you're the kid that always peeked at your neighbors paper on test days, here's a hint. What would a winner do in this situation?

I know exactly what I'm doing. And I know exactly what every other winner reading this is doing.

Unfortunately our original poster selected 'D'. In fact, I never even knew this was an option when racing a bike. But what made matters even worse, was that almost everyone on that forum told the original poster that they made the right decision.

There was only one person who even came close to offering up a comment from a winners perspective. That poster started off correctly with option C, but unfortunately the original poster should have never been in this situation to begin with.

So now there is a whole group of people that are reading that post, and thinking that the correct thing to do is to sit in a pack. And when you get nervous while in that pack, quickly pull yourself from the race.

You see my friends, this is why you never sit amongst the peleton (cycling term for pack of losers). There losing mentality will wear off on you.

So I'm a Coach Now

Got my first official coaching gig yesterday. Funny thing is, I wasn't even trying to become a cycling coach. But I guess this is what happnes when you are the greatest cyclist around.

I feel like that old MJ commercial - "Like Mike, if I could be like Mike. I wanna be, wanna be like Mike, like Mike. If I could be like Mike." I guess I've become the Michael Jordan of cycling.

Warning - Please do not confuse this with the douche-bag "Michael" that I discussed in an earlier post. I'm talking about the greatest basketball player of all time.

So the guy is a person from one of the local group rides. Let's just say he sucks a little bit of ass, but he wants to get better. I almost turned him down, because I don't like being affiliated with people who suck. Apparently he wants a training program that will allow him to be competitive in the 'I'm not good enough to actually race' rides that he does.

Like I've mentioned in earlier posts, I'm a winner. Winners only hang out with winners - but I'm making an exception because the price was right. Although I told him he's not allowed to pretend like he knows me.

So I've got this old guys program all set up, and I thought I'd go ahead and post it up here for all to see.

Consider yourself lucky, this is the same program that I perform every week. If it's good enough for me to dominate in the 'Ulitimate Cat,' then it's definitely good enough for him. And it's also good enough for the rest of you. No need to read Friel's book. This will work for all riders.

Monday: 2.5 Hours - 1 min all-out sprint, 30 sec rest. Repeat for the entire workout
Tuesday 4 Hours - Complete 3, 40K maximal effort TT's. Finish off with 5, 15 minute hill climb intervals
Wednesday: 1 hour of squats followed by 2 hours of power intervals
Thursday: 3 hours of counter-attacking your own attacks. No recovery in between.
Friday: 4 hour ride, keeping your average mph above 21 while wearing 10 lb ankle weights.
Saturday: Sign up and win your race. Never allow anyone else to take a pull.
Sunday: Show up to the local group ride on your mountain bike and proceed to call out, then drop, the fastest roadie there.

I don't believe in recovery days. Recovery is for pussies.

I also don't believe in warm-ups, or cool-downs. Those are for pussies.

If you feel you need to warm-up or cool-down, please do the following:

1. Go down to your local supermarket and find the feminine product isle
2. Find the biggest tube of vagisil they have, and then grab two
3. Walk to the cash register, and pull your money out of your purse
4. Pay for the vagisil, go home, and apply to whatever body part requires a warm-up or cool-down.
5. Repeat step 4 until your pussitis goes away, and then hop on your bike and drop the hammer.

Well, time to go do a little bit of carbo loading. I don't have an official race this weekend, so I'm gong to be crushing the spirits of the local group riders. I love to make them suffer.

Post on how to successfully counter-attack your own attack to come shortly.