I was devastated to come downstairs this summer (end of July) to find that I was missing not just one, but two bikes, worth about $10k, from our condo’s garage! I think I was too hungover from the Capitol Hill Block Party for the theft to really register but after breakfast I got online and tried to figure out what to do next… I reported it to the police, logged it in the Stolen Bicycle Registry (but I never recorded the serial numbers!), emailed our condo management to see if the cameras had captured it (oddly they didn’t), bookmarked searches for them on Craiggers which searches all the different craigslists across the country (Ellsworth Moment & Commencal), I then called a bunch of bike shops, no one had seen them. And now months later they’re still missing. Fortunately, All State was super easy to deal with when submitting an insurance claim.

I know I was a dumbass for leaving my bikes in my condo garage, even though it is secure, has video cameras, and they were locked (I watched a documentary on bike theft in the UK and now will never trust any lock again). I normally keep my bikes in my condo or in my storage locker, but (this is another blog post) we had a bit of a flood in our condo and had cleared everything out of the hall… And yes, I should have had the serial numbers. I have the one for my other bike written down. Excuses, excuses.

Now, to the fuckers who stole my bikes…

2009 Commencal Supreme DH – Medium: Be careful! I broke the frame on this bad boy when I cranked the seat post up to high racing Joe after a day at Whistler. Hopefully you’re not a fat ass, you wouldn’t want the frame exploding after you take a big drop. Now I did put a super duper big seat clamp on there to mitigate the cracks in the seat post tube, but you never now… But the rest of the bike is in good shape. It has a brand new FOX Van RC rear shock. I didn’t get the fork serviced though. It still had about 5 more days to go before servicing, FYI. The bike is also sporting a E13LG1 chainguard, the OEM one sucked. The best thing about this bike was the price. I scored it for half price on Chainlove. Sadly, haven’t seen any comparable deals since.

2006 Ellsworth Moment – Medium: Enjoy! The bike frame came from Gords in Winnipeg and then custom built down here in Seattle. The bike was freshly tuned, ridden only once or twice after the tuning and features a borrowed Racing Ralph tire ’cause I was looking for more rear traction and my shop was kind enough to let me try-it-before-buying it (could you please return it to Big Tree Bikes if you don’t like it?). Caution that the stem is a little long, I was going to swap it out, but maybe you have longer arms than me. Now maybe you’re smarter than me, but the FOX DHX 5.0 rear shock drove me bonkers. Way too adjustments. Good luck figuring it out, I’m not going to miss it!

Internet readers, if you ever see either of these bikes drop me a line at matt@mattgoyer.com. I’d love to get em back! My friends are worried I’m too lazy to buy new ones.

Day 2 in Maui!

We arrived yesterday around 4pm and made our way to Paumana on the south edge of Lahania after a pit stop at Quizno’s, the quintessential Hawaiian lunch stop :). (Note: our condo’s bikes leave something to be desired.)

While Chelsea and her mom hit up Costco I frantically called around trying to figure out what we’d do for the week. With light winds kiteboarding is not in the cards for the next few days so this morning after dropping off Chelsea’s brother and dad at the golf course I figured today might be a good day to rent a bike.

We stopped by West Maui Cycles which was recommended by the Maui Exposed guide book (we highly recommend this book if you’re going to Maui!) and I tried to feel them out on mountain biking versus road biking. They strongly recommended road biking as it has been raining recently and the two mountain bike areas are clay and when things get wet, the clay gets very sticky.

Sounded reasonable so I rented a Specialized Roubaix Comp Compact Rival for $60 for one day. A much nicer bike than my Specialized Allez Elite Triple! To be honest, I’ve been eyeing upgrading to a Specialized Roubaix, so I was excited to rent one. While I had pulled the pedals of Chelsea’s bike (mine were immovable) they had Shimano SPD-SLs so all I needed was shoes and kit. Though I did have to shell out $8 for water bottles :).

They recommended the West Maui Loop. 60 miles, “4000 feet of climbing”, counter clockwise. Sounds good! Off I went.

Now, two years ago when we drove the West Maui Loop I never would have imagined that I’d be able to bike this road. Since then though, I rode the Whistler Gran Fondo, training for which has put a little experience under my belt.

The ride was awesome. But seriously kicked my ass since I haven’t been on a bike in months. The road for the first half was nicely paved and easy going with a shoulder. The second half is in rough shape and for most of it is only one lane. I was very glad to have a nice bike like a Roubaix, but my arms and legs still took a beating. The killer part was the constant up and down required for every curve in the road, culminating in a huge uphill at the end (that I was not expecting!)

I also wasn’t prepared for the elevation gain. While they said 4000 feet of climbing, Google Maps is saying for the section I did it was 5800 feet! And had I done the full loop it is reporting it as 6600 feet!

Now towards the end of my ride I caught up with a rider from California. She asked if I had biked up Haleakala yet (the volcano on Maui). No, I hadn’t, it is 10,000 feet of climbing! Turns out she rode it on Saturday and said that if I was able to catch her, I’d probably fair just fine. Hmmmm… Competitive juices start flowing… Back at the bike shop, as I was returning my bike this evening, I asked about riding up and what gear I’d need since I left all my cold weather cycling gear in Seattle. The shop guy looked at me like I was crazy. “No one rides up it.” Well, it is possible right? “You’d need arm warmers, leg warmers, rain gear,…” No problem, you sell that right? “No. You’ll have a hard time getting that on the island.” Hmmm… “The weather isn’t looking good for the next few days. I wouldn’t recommend it.”

Well, I guess we’ll see if I do it. Seeing as how I banged out 6600 feet of vertical, 10,000 feet isn’t that far off :). But I don’t have any warmers. But I do have a North Face soft shell I could stuff in a pocket… Maybe this trip I should do the Haleakala downhill and opt to the uphill on a subsequent trip… For next time this post looks like a good primer on doing the rider..

Anyhow, tomorrow is scuba day assuming this light cold goes away.

Check out all my photos from the ride. A few are crooked since I didn’t stop to take them. And some have the “sweat” filter turned on :).

Update: Guess bike store guy was right about the weather. It snowed on Halekala at 10,000 ft closing the road for 6 hours. Sounds like last time it snowed was ’08 and ’06.

We headed up to Vancouver Friday afternoon but not without a few snags. I had tried to pick my bike up Thursday but it wasn’t ready, so Friday as we were heading out I tried to pick it up again only to find it was still on the mechanics stand and the mechanic wasn’t around. We were already cutting things close but we couldn’t leave without my bike :).

In Vancouver we met up with the gang, ate a large, but mediocre Italian dinner and finished the night with a round of tequila at the hotel bar.

5:45 am came early but we had to be at the line by 6:30 am for a 7 am departure. Here’s the group waiting for things to get started:

Shortly after starting we got the Lion’s Gate bridge to ourselves:

First stop wasn’t until Squamish where we feasted on pasta, pizza and wine and surprisingly ran into Dean and Jeff who I last hung out with in Panorama a few years ago on our heliski trip:

Unfortunately shortly out of Squamish my legs started to badly cramp up. Guess the 3 beers, shot of tequila and wine at the rest stop was a huge mistake! I don’t remember much from the second half of the ride because I was in a lot of pain and was focused on keeping things moving. Despite having to stop a few times because my legs totally seized up I finished in 5:30:25. A full hour behind Rob, but only two minutes behind Ming, Joe, Robert and Emmett.

Thankfully it didn’t rain (we got lucky on the weather, it poured the next day) but it sure was chilly at the finish line:

.

Thanks to Chelsea and Heather for driving with us to Vancouver and then driving our luggage up to Whistler. Took them almost as long to get to Whistler as it took us! In fact the fastest riders finished in about three and half hours and they probably took longer than that to drive. So tip for people doing this next year, get dropped off in Vancouver and have your significant others drive up to Whistler Friday night.

Post ride after some beers at the finish line festival we moved over to Dubh Linn Gate for pountine, nachos and more beers. Followed by a few hours in the Pan Pacific’s hot tub overlooking the village followed by a long dinner at 21 Steps. For breakfast we gorged on crepes. I think it is safe to safe that we ate all the calories we lost and then some.

The next day we drove home in the rain. It was shocking to see how many people were doing the return trip given the weather. And a big thanks to Chels for getting us massages at the Pro Club Sunday night. Perfect timing :).

More…

• My photos
• The results
• Rob: Whistler Gran Fondo Epilogue
• Rob: Whistler Gran Fondo Day
• Rob: Getting to the Whistler Gran Fondo
• Rob: Preparing for the Whistler Gran Fondo

The ride starts off pretty mellow out of Enumclaw up highway 410. We had our first rest stop at Greenwater where there’s a gas station and water. Only hitch was that Donald hit a rock and things got bloody.

Unfortunately Donald had to turn around, while we continued up to Silver Springs campground (just before the Crystal Mountain road turn off) where we filled up with water again. A few miles after leaving the campground is when the pain started and continued all the way to the top. The last three miles before Chinook Pass were TOUGH. But we were all smiles at the top. Up there it was pretty chilly. Fortunately McGarty had the foresight to encourage us all to pick up maps to stuff down our jerseys to stay warm on the way down.

After the ride we raced back to Seattle because Chels and I were racing in the moonlight race on Lake Washington:

See the rest of our photos.

The morning started at Rob’s with pancakes:

Though we couldn’t leave until we got Rob’s rack on my Cruiser which entailed some early morning metal sawing, “good morning neighbors”:

We started at the Newhalem campground and then headed North on Highway 20.

Note that there are no services on Highway 20 except water at Colonial Creek campground 11 miles past Newhalem so bring lots of food and water! Three of us had three water bottles (one in our jersey pockets), but Donald was wise and had just bought a seat post water bottle holder that we were all jealous of.

We had originally planned on going to Mazama and back but with our late start and pace we would have been riding back in the dark :). So after first crossing Rainy Pass at 4855 feet and then reaching Washington Pass at 5477 feet we turned back.

But not before trying to refill our water bottles at the info center at Washington Pass which oddly was closed!?

The way back down started slow:

But quickly cranked up to 40+ mph. But the “severe side winds” put a real damper on things.

Note, there are two tunnels. Both fine up hill, but on the way down the second tunnel is some freaky shit at 40 mph. While pretty short you can’t see a thing so cross your fingers there is nothing on the road!

See all my photos.

Here’s the route on Bikely:

The night before I was pretty excited and it was hard to sleep so I only got five hours of sleep. Since the race starts at 4:45 am I woke up at 3:45 am, the earliest I have ever woken up, and hit the road starting the Seattle to Portland ride at around 5 am with a bunch of buddies (Robert, Ming, Rob, Rob’s brother-in-law, Ryan, Glenn and Jay. Donald and Joe, where were you?). We skipped the start line (there was 10,000 registered riders!) and hit Lake Washington Boulevard which was gorgeous as the sun came up. Leaving Seattle we tried to all ride together but at the first rest stop Robert, Ming and I keep going while the others stopped. We then rode faster than we’ve ever ridden before to Centralia, the half way point, only stopping once. For the first hundred miles we averaged 19.6 mph, our fastest century yet. We were pumped!

After Centralia we found out that the ride isn’t as flat as everyone lead us on to believe. The next 70 miles proved to be pretty frustrating as all the pace lines that passed us were going much too fast for us to be able to keep up and we had to battle the headwind mostly ourselves. Fortunately the final 30 miles felt almost all downhill except the last 4 miles into Portland :). Once I crossed the finish line I was pretty wiped. I could barely talk, in fact, it kinda felt like I was going to burst into tears. At the finish line we were met by Chelsea and celebrated with beers and bad food. Followed by more food and lots of sleep (we scored the Hilton pretty cheap on Hotwire). The next day we ate a huge brunch at Mother’s, met up with Rob for a bit, tried to get some donuts, then hit the road, and ate some more!

Thanks to Chelsea for being our chauffeur, the volunteers at all the food stops, all the riders I drafted behind, the police for shutting down some intersections and everyone who cheered us on!

On the road home I read all about the three one-day rides hosted by the Redmond Cycling Club – RAMROD (ride around Mount Rainer) Seattle to Spokane, Seattle to Spokane via highway 2. I think I’m up for RAMROD but biking from Seattle to Spokane in one day is just plain nuts (it’s a training ride for the ultimate in ultra-crazy cycling rides Race Across America.)

If I do STP again:

• Better start time coordination so we can maximize sleeping in
• More sleep during the week leading up to the event (it was a busy week at work…)
• More chamois cream every rest stop
• Bring less food
• Bring ibuprofen
• More training?

Stats:

• Distance: 204.87 miles
• Elevation: 1,951 feet
• Peddling time: 11 hrs 20 minutes
• Started: 5 am. Arrived: 6:40 pm.
• Average speed: 18.1 mph
• Max speed: 35 mph
• Weight lost: 4 pounds

All my photos.

Now the tables have turned.

Mom, it’s it is not too late to join me in donating to the LIVESTRONG challenge!

But let’s back up a second…

I don’t know how this ride snuck up on me but before I knew it most of the cyclists at work were participating in Lance Armstrong’s LIVESTRONG Challenge, a bike and cycling event to raise money to fight cancer (the Seattle ride has raised $880,000 so far!). Since I missed the previous weekend’s century hosted by Flying Wheels, I couldn’t miss this one too. (For those who aren’t cyclists, a century is a 100 mile ride. A metric century is a 100 km ride.)

Fortunately, it wasn’t too late on Saturday to register and pony up a donation to get to my minimum fundraising requirement.

After a late night celebrating Ming’s birthday (the Grey Goose shots seemed like a bad idea, but in fact, did not slow me down) I joined the crew at 6:45 a.m. at the start line for the 100 mile ride (check out the map):

Here’s a video of us starting. We show up around the 13 second mark:

This was the largest ride I’ve participated in. My number was 1166 so there must have been a good 1200 riders on the line!

The highlight of the ride was definitely the start charging through the empty streets of downtown Seattle and then taking the I-90 express lane out to Mercer Island. At one point I looked back and was pulling what looked like 100 people in a single line (and no, I didn’t pull the whole way across). Thanks to the police and state patrol for doing a good job at closing off streets and intersections for us. I wish we had that every ride.

The lowlight of the ride was either the torrential downpour we experienced leaving Renton (seriously, cats & dogs were coming down) or the Montreux climb (750 feet, high grade, short distance). RiderX has a great description in his course preview of the climb which I’m glad I didn’t read before registering:

Montreux is, to put it simply, a beast. If you have a climbing cassette for your bike, bring it. If you have a small electric assist-motor, bring it. If you have a supply of EPO, use it. If you are like me, you will be spending about 20 minutes of time on this hill. On the upside, the pavement is excellent, and there’s also a view, if you have the oxygen to turn around and see it.

Right from the start, it’s at about 10% for the first little bit, then it will turn a bit to the left and ease down to around 7%. Then it will kick up to about 14% for a bit, taper down to 10%, up to 14%, and then there’s a nice section that’s even steeper. I was climbing at about 3.9 MPH on that section.

The worst part was that 2/3rds of the way up there was a guy dressed like a devil saying there was only 25 meters to go so I stood up and started to really pound it only to get around the corner and see that I wasn’t yet at the top! Glenn tells me this is a Tour De France thing:

The emotional part was seeing so many people riding in memory or in honor of someone. Not surprisingly, I too have had friends and family fight cancer. Fortunately, there were many supporters along the way cheering us on. It was very energizing to not just pound the pavement on another weekend ride but to actually get out and ride for something.

We made it! Here’s the Redfin boys (Dave, Rob, myself and Robert):

I’ll definitely do it again next year as the event was extremely well organized. The only fault I could find is that the beer garden was too far away from the food and in my exhausted state I was too lazy to find the stairs to get up there.

Next up, a 200 mile ride from Seattle to Portland on July 11th.

Learnings for next time:

• Start raising money ahead of time!
• Plan which rest stops to stop at so you don’t stop at too many
• Set a time limit for each stop to minimizing Twittering

My weak sauce stats (weak! we started off so strong…):

• Dist: 103.5 miles!
• Average speed: 16.5 mph
• Peddling time: 6 hours 17 min
• Elevation: 3900 feet

Related links:

• My friend Rob’s photos
• King 5 video
• Team Fatty report
• Another Team Fatty report
• Kent’s photos
• Andy’s post
• Post and photos from one of the motorcyclist escorts
• Mark’s report on Kent’s blog
• Wild Celtic Rose did a triathlon on Saturday and then rode on Sunday
• Komo news

And again, it’s not too late to donate!

Lang was my fitter and he spent an hour and a half with me measuring this and that.

When it was all said and done this is what he did:

Moved cleats back 1.0 cm and saddle back 1.4 cm, dropped handle bar 2.0 cm for slightly more aggressive position. Cleat and saddle changes should give more power and efficiency while handlebar change should give more speed. Also added 2 shims to left show and 1 shim to right shoe to correct knee alignment.

Turns out my seat height was good. Wondering if I had the best seat, he said my stock Specialized seat was actually pretty good.

We also weighed my bike and it clocked in at 20 lbs 14 oz with saddle bag but without water bottles.

I’m looking forward to trying out the new fit on Wednesday morning before work assuming the rain lets up :).

My other recent bike expenditures have been:

• Cateye V2c computer w/wireless cadence and mileage
• Cycleops Fluid 2 trainer – got a brand new one half price on Craigslist!
• Second carbon water bottle cage
• Pearl Izumi arm warmers
• Performance knee warmers

I’d like to pick up a pair of gloves but I can’t figure out what a good pair would be. Also, my cycling glasses are all banged up and I could use a new pair of those too. One thing at a time though…

This 44 page publication showcases the Kootenay Rockies, a premiere cycling destination. It is the definitive guide to mountain, touring and road biking vacations in the region.

Next weekend we’re headed to Whistler.