Jes,

Good stuff! You should talk to Dongo and Cameron about publishing your blog through the NEWS function on the club's website.

Rob

The problem is I break to many of the rules. For example, I'm to old and infirm to have a zero stack height on my headset. That said, I'll gladly laugh at anyone wearing a Livestrong bracelet.

My favorite is the one about training- Training is like fighting a gorilla. You don't stop when you are tired. You stop when the gorilla is tired.

OK, after reading this you can't say that you haven't been informed of the rules.

http://www.velominati.com/blog/the-rules/#5

The rules must be followed at all times alhtough I believe that the relative importance of the rules decreases as you go further down the list.

If you are beaten with a CO2 inflator for not following the rules you only have yourself to blame...

Timing was perfect- Lorena and I made it just after the salad course after Sophia's winter pageant (Ed- There is no place to hide from your poor four year old daughter's dissapointment). It was great seeing everyone after several months of cold.

There were plenty of surprises and good news- Darren M's better half was in the building even if she didn't participate in the dinner. They are also expecting their first bambino in August. Congratulations! It was good to see last year's rookie class was well represented and that most brought their better halves- Tony, Brad and Jack. Even Skip's wife Barb made a rare appearance!

Many thanks for the gift card and box o'beer. I'm the first to admit that aside from the occasional box of Stella from Costco my usual flavor is PBR or Miller Lite. A box of Belgian beer is quite a treat.

As usual the biggest complaint is that there was not enough time to talk with everyone that was there but what can you do when confronted with 30+ friends?

A group of families from Grayslake is planning a trip to Wimot on Superbowl Sunday to take advantage of the major media event that will keep people at home.

We will probably have a group large enough to take advantage of group pricing- $11 off the regular price of a lift ticket and a free lesson.

If anyone is interested let me know.

I'm tempted. It's easy. According to everything that I have read a fit person can only expect an improvement of about 3% a year. I've been working my ass off to break 60 minutes in the 40 km tt for four years all the while fighting against the natural decline that getting older brings on. If you get to focused on the result and lose sight of the method you are lost. Add a few million $$$ to the finish line and cheating is probably to be expected. That doesn't mean I accept it of course.

I can honestly say that I do not miss doing the indoor series this year.

Did you ever settle on a coach?

Lorena drove Nicole to the emergency room last week. I think her surgery was yesterday evening. No word yet on outcome.

Lorena is helping out with some taxi services to pre-school.

I've been a Lance Doubter for a long time. So much so that I pretty started ignoring any related headlines and of course I wouldn't think of subscribing to his Twitter feeds or that of his alter ego Juan Pelota.

This interview with the journalists who wrote the long article in Sports Illustrated last week is interesting. I appreciate the point that the FDA investigator is probably less concerned about the sporting fraud inherent in doping but is building a case based on the sale and transportation of controlled substances.

It is easy to forget when talking about doping in sport that laws are also being broken.

http://onlyagame.wbur.org/2011/01/22/armstrong-doping