OBARKMA rules!

Today before school Isabella, Gynnis (Izzy's BFF), Kay (Glynnis' mom) and I waived signs before school/work for about 30 minutes. The kids counted 146 honks, waives and thumbs up in that time period. Not bad for mostly homemade signs! It's felt like Christmas today - and I got what I asked for ~~ woo hoo!


And lastly, here are our pretty pooches, both with new haircuts, on a beautiful fall day this weekend.

Z-Z-Z-Zelda!!! and the Goathead

I have lots of catching up to do here on this blog. I just wrote a long email to my friends/family with an update on our new doggie (and how the kids have been throwing up all night - FUN!) which prompted Ken to tell me that I should just blog this stuff.

So we added to our family on Thursday by getting new doggie. She's a one year old gray miniature poodle and she's super sweet. We thought Oscar needed a playmate, and it's turned out to be true. He tormented her for a few days and now they're having lots of fun tearing around the house together. She's pretty scraggly looking and kinda stinky after living at the pound for about six days before coming home with us, and unfortunately, she can't have a bath till next week because of recently getting spayed.

This weekend was the cyclocross race at the Boulder Res which the COOL FUN people (that would be me) dress up for. I went as a goathead. I need to check the results to see if they put me down as racing for GOATHEAD RACING like I put on my ACA waiver. Fun race made way more fun by dressing up. I'm telling ya, you get much more cowbell if you are in costume!! I have to say my costume was not very aero and having the Stan's bottle on the back of my bike didn't make the bike any lighter. The gal who was behind me said it flipped down and was rubbing against my tire for the last few laps! ugh!!

Obama lost because you didn't vote.

well, hopefully this won't be the case because you got out and voted. and voted early like I did today.

this video is very funny. watch it here.

hellovader

this is what ken wants to be for Halloween. Frankie and i are going to be witches, Isabella will be a vampire bat, and Oscar will be a dog, i guess.

I love cyclocross!

Cyclocross is just too much fun. I like cross more than road, I've decided. I've also decided that my new MO is that I have to have to bring beer for after the race if there is not a beer garden as part of the race. Unfortunately, I've been sick for the last 10 days or so and (foolishly?) did two races in those 10 days but did not feel up to the post beer feed. Drat.

On another note, I won Women's Rider of the Year (like ACA BAR) and also Masters Rider of the Year at the track this year. I got some sweet green backs in exchange! woo hoo! As my friend Gary Peterson said, "A check always fits better than a jacket!"

Pink Yeti bling

Ken really needs to get his own blog. He likes everyone to *think* he's too modest to do so or that he doesn't have time, but in reality, he spends an awful lot moderating on Slashdot and reading his Powertap files! But I heart him anyway.

Well, today I was supposed to race the second Frisco cyclocross race but since I have this dastardly cold, I decided to bag it. I talked Francesca into helping me wash my mountain bike, air up and Stan's up the flat tires (since I have not ridden it since May!) and then we made this custom Hello Kitty Chain Slapper. I am mighty proud of it - two layers of flannel, velcro, and a great snug fit! Easily washable too! No more annoying chain slap noise. Now I just have to ride the bike...

Using The Strap-On In Public

(This post has been moved to this location.)

Points race, team events, getting home

Wow, what a week it's been. let me try to catch up here. I had a day off on Friday but played Bike Girl for Kenny. i hope he appreciated it. I did a lot of video taping for the team which was not that much fun, but hey, we all have to take one for the team, right? ha ha. So Saturday, I had the points race. Deb and I were both in it, and we were looking forward to having some fun. A couple of people scratched, one gal was kicked out because she was not the right category, and a few were added. There was only one entrant in the 30-34 group and she was going to ride with us, and she was a known fastie (Jan's term). Warren, the race promoter, told me the young chick was going to be told by the officials not to interfere with the outcome of our race, however, to make a long story short, she wasn't. I asked her about it as we rolled up to the rail, and she said that she was racing this one. We let her get off the front; she may have even lapped the field. We didn't really care because she wasn't supposed to be scored. Deb and I worked hard to get points, but this youngster gal decided to pull the other California rider around, and that gal ended up winning our race. Deb and I were second and third, respectively. Being the (ha ha - work people, are you reading this?!) diplomatic one, I talked with Warren after the race but he couldn't really do anything.

The next (last) day was the team events. Yet again, it was VERY HOT!!! As in 103 under the canopy on the infield, probably 110 on the track. Deb and I had the top seed for team sprint. We ended up with fourth but rode a much faster time than last year so we were at least happy with that. The two men's sprint teams also got 4th. That would be Kenny, Rich and Big Sock in the 50+ group, and Butch, Paulin and Pellitier in the 40+. For some unknown reason, they decided to run the team pursuits as one-ups rather than having two teams on the track. Oh my goodness, this took forever!! We finally got on the track at 3pm. We were seeded last which was great, so we knew what we had to ride. Last year, we got the top seed and were able to cruise to gold thanks to Rich letting us know exactly where we needed to be with lap times. This year we worked like crazy but ended up third. All I can say, is we'll be back!!

The bad news is that we rode sometime after 3pm and our flight was at 5pm. Not good timing. We missed the flight in San Jose but luckily got on the last flight out of San Francisco which put us home a couple hours late.

Good to be home. Tons of tomatoes and herbs to harvest (email me if you want some!) Now on to cyclocross season - woo hoo!

More pictures on the camera to come later.

More Results

OK, I am falling behind with posting here. I see Ken highjacked my account and did his own posting...It's been super hot here, over 100 degrees during the day, so I've spent a lot of time trying to stay cool in the swimming pool or just lying in bed trying to ameliorate my sleep debt.

Sprints didn't go as well as I'd hoped. I qualified second in the 200 to Julie Bautista from San Diego who won the sprints and 500 in 2006 (my year of two broken collar bones!) I won my quarter final ride pretty easily and was then matched with my teammate Deborah Kidd (from Santa Fe) for the semis. I beat her in the first ride, and then she took me in the second two. I was pretty tired for my bronze medal final and ended up in 4th. Deb got silver in the finals.

Marsha and Shannon did their points race (50+ age groups but scored separately). It was a really small field so it was hard for them to really do any team tactics. Marsha ended up with gold and Shannon with silver.

Vic Williams got bronze in his pursuit. Steve Whitmore got 19th.

Today the 40-something men and women sprint and the 30-something men and women points race. George Hertner and Dave Macintosh showed up, so more Coloradoan to cheer for. That's it for now...

Ken's sprint day

Today I had a 200-meter time trial qualifier in the morning, and then match sprint rounds afterward.  I was up against 17 riders, with the top 8 going to the quarterfinals, then the next four fastest doing a race for ninth through twelfth places, and everyone else just going back to the hotel.

I rode a 12.4 second 200 meters, which was good for 10th.  But the fastest time was 12.1 seconds, which means that there wasn't much that separated the top finishers.  Rich Voss qualified second with 12.2 seconds, and was surprised that his first round was not going to be an easy one.  Normally, the second qualifier would have a fairly easy ride against the seventh qualifier, but not this year.  There were a couple of upsets, with lower-seeded riders winning against higher ones, and a few of the best-of-three heats actually going to three rides.  Rich lost his heat, but won the eventual ride for fifth place.

I was in the ride for 9th-12th places.  Sprinters are heavily rewarded on this track when they ride from the front, as it takes a lot to pass someone here.  (The track has fairly shallow banking, short straights and long turns, which means that one has to ride a significantly longer distance to pass in the turns, and minimal opportunity to pass in the straights.)

I have a habit of watching the official while he or she arranges the little sticks with numbers written on them that are used to determine starting position on the track. I saw the number 1 flash by while the official was shuffling them, and I went for that stick.  So I had the inside lane, and the opportunity to control the race a little. I won the heat and got ninth place in the men's 50-54 age group, and so this stick-watching will continue in the future.

Ron Hargrave advanced to the semis in his age group, and he will be leading the first lap of Sunday's team sprint, with me riding the second lap and Rich finishing.

I'm happy with my riding today, much like I was with last Tuesday's 500 meter time trial (in which I got seventh of 27 starters).  I'm riding well, but it seems that all the fast boys in my age group have shown up.

Results from Day 2

Sorry, I'm falling behind. Yesterday was a long day. I'll get some pictures posted soon. Here's how we did...

Gold for Marsha in the 2k
Gold for Deborah in the 2k
Fourth for Jan in the 2k
Fourth for Shannon in the 2k
Fifth for me in the 2k

As you can see, the Hammer Betty Joes are ROCKING!

The guys did well too.
17th for John Boland in the 2k
pack finish for Steve Whitmore in the uber fast, way-too-many-people-on-a-skinny-track points race
Bronze for Steve Worley of Subway-Peerless in the 2k
Paul Mack and Shannon Fox (more Coloradoans) also did the 2k but I am not sure of their finishes.

I was happy to get on the podium in the pursuit since I have done no pursuit training at all this year, other than road TTing. On to the sprints today for me. Jan, Marsha and Shannon all have points races tonight.

one more thing

and the big news for me today was that my bike - my NEW bike - IS NOT UCI LEGAL!!! IT'S TOO LIGHT!! Luckily I had planned to use Kenny's Speedplay modified toe straps and that got me to the weight limit. Chris Kopp, I hope you're reading this!! Now I have an excuse to get the old school heavy steel sprinter bars that I think are pretty cool...

This is the first time I've seen them measure/weigh everyone's bikes, not just the folks who set national or world records. OK, I'm off to bed.

Evening Results Day 1

Thought I'd posted this last night but I guess I was really tired! Here it is...

I'm too tired to really write much. Here are the results from the evening session.

Silver for me in the 500m.
Fourth for Deborah Kidd in the 500m
Sixth for Rich Voss in the 500m.
Sixth for Mike Paulin in the kilometer.
Seventh for Kenny in the 500m.

Butch also did the Killer Meter but I am not sure how he placed, and John Boland did the 500 but I didn't get his result either. Oh, and Vic Williams from VC got bronze in his kilo! In hindsight, I should have stuck with my plan to ride a 90.6 but instead decided to gear up to a 92.6. Ended up with not much juice left at the end. That's racing - shoulda, coulda, woulda - but now it's on to the next race. The rest of the week will be spent in my 90.6 gear except for the 200m and maybe the team pursuit if we all ride bigger gears. Got the pursuit tomorrow morning. All of us gals pursuit tomorrow either in the morning or evening. Go Hammer Betty Joes!

Morning Results Day 1

...Hot off the press: Results for Hammer here at Nats...

Silver for Marsha Macro in the 500m
Fourth for Ron Hargrave in the 500m
Fifth for Jan Lischer in the 500m
Sixth for Shannon Lucy in the 500m

...More to come tonight...

Tooling around in the Bay Area

Well, we've had three days to ride the track and bum around town a little bit. On Monday, we went to Berkeley to have dinner with friends of Ken's. Ken missed a few turns a few times and we ended up turing around on Treasure Island. Here's the view from there. Oakland-SF Bay Bridge with San Francisco in the background. Alcatraz is off to the right but not in the photo. We had great Indian food in Berkeley. Yesterday we went to Alameda where Ken's oldest sister Vivian lives. We met up with her, Ken's youngest sister Alisa and Alisa's friend Robin. We had fantastic Chinese food in Alameda. Saw this carved watermelon at the entrance to some divey restraurant on the street. Pretty cool carving!

Racing starts today. I'm feeling less banged up and my road rash is healing nicely thanks to Tegaderm. I couldn't get a name sticker made in time for the clearcoating of my bike, so I got some nifty puffy stickers at Target to make my own. Here ya go. The other side says Kimmy.

I'm loving the green of my bike, and it's only rivaled by the pink and orange of Ken's bike. We are into color, I guess you could say.

bravery ribbon and a piece of the track

Well, we're here in San Jose for Masters Track Nationals. Rode the track yesterday and again today. I made a video of the track with commentary but Ken says it's too negative (the San Jose tourism board will hunt me down) so I'm not going to post it. Let me just say that the track is 335 meters, 23 degrees of banking, and feels like a cyclocross course at times. So it's long, flat, and bumpy. It will be fine. The weather is great and all of the Hammeroids from Hammer Racing Team are trickling into town.


The big news today was that I decided to take myself out on the track. I miscalculated what lap we were on during our team pursuit practice and was in second position. I tried to come around Deb just as she swung up for an exchange. We overlapped wheels and I went down. Luckily, no one else did, and I rolled like a pro so nothing broke. Got some road rash and trashed a skinsuit but was able to get back out there and do another few hot laps with my team. The dude who was sweeping the apron saw it happen and immediately came over and gave me a bravery ribbon (it says KIDS ON TRACK) and a piece of the track ( a little nugget of concrete). This is what they give to the juniors crash on the track. So it was 100% my bad and thankfully I'm ok. The bike, however, suffered a major ding in the toptube. Ouch.

Freewheelin at the Democratic National Convention

The DNC is over now but I wanted to post a few pictures from my time volunteering there.  I have to say that overall, it was really fun to have the convention just a mile or so away from our house. Thankfully, I always take my 1971 Schwinn or my scooter when I venture downtown, and my route to work and the kids' schools is via the interstate, so I didn't have to deal with driving downtown.  

So for the DNC, I volunteered with Freewheelin which is a program of Humana, and they partnered with Bikes Belong out of Boulder to bring 1000 bikes to the DNC (also to the RNC). My CBL teammate Kate Scheider works for Bikes Belong.  So with Freewheelin, anyone could check out a bike and ride it from 7a-7p.  There were cruisers, auto shifters, mountain bikes, and zippy single speeds with disc breaks (my personal favorite) from many mainstream manufacturers like Giant, Specialized, Trek, Schwinn and Raleigh. We had two single speed belt drive front suspension Spot Brand bikes. Those were sweet but reserved for the VIPs. Mayor Hickenlooper and some other governor rode those around.  Here are some pictures.

We were right next door to the Alliance Center also known as The Big Tent. It was the blogger headquarters. Google had half the building and had white leather couches, a smoothie bar and chair massages. I got to go inside when I was helping the Pedros guys figure out where to park. Lots of action here.

We had a bike with a wheel-powered blender. Here's Ryan giving it a try in the morning making smoothies.

This Spot bike is SWEEET! Can you tell Iiked it? This one had Barak Obama on the toptube in the name spot, but I don't think he rode it. I don't think it's going to the RNC with the other 930 bikes. Freewheelin is leaving 70 bikes behind for Denver to start a bike sharing program.

Tomatoes.

These beauties are from my garden. I think I have at least a dozen kinds of heirloom tomatoes this year. I am still into beets. You know, they are the new spinach? I made a TDF (that's to die for, not Tour de France, you cyclists!) beet salsa yesterday. Just grated beets, chopped cilantro, jalapeno and scallions from my garden, garlic, salt and lime. great on tacos.

I will shift my focus in blogging to the press agent for Hammer Racing Team as we travel to San Jose, CA for Masters Track Nationals this next week. But of course, I do have a little catching up to do with my time spent at the DNC with the bike sharing program Freewheelin. I think I'll omit my political commentary on John McCain's choice of a running mate which was the news today. Let me just say that this Hillary supporter is fully behind Barak Obama. If McCain thinks he's going to woo Hillary supporters with this woman as his VP choice, he needs to take some more Aricept!!

Beets.

I grew beets for the first time ever this year. I didn't think I liked beets, but Ken does, and they are supposedly easy to grow and uber good for you. Well, today I decided I like beets. I made this Raw Beet Salad by my fave Mark Bittman whose NYTimes blog is one of the few I get as an RSS feed. I also made his Grilled Flank Steak with Provencal Herbs which was excellent as well. Yum. Pair that with some new potatoes and Colorado Olathe corn. Tomorrow I may tackle the beet greens. (BTW, these beets are from my garden. hard to really capture the beauty of them. they are freakin' amazingly beautiful once you peel them!)

On another note, one of these days I'll post a picture of my new track bike - a custom frame by Chris Kopp, paired with a sweet Reynolds track fork and other goodies. Since it's painted sparkly green, I'm not sure if the backyard photo shoot will work since the yard is still pretty green, not yet a victim of the Colorado drought (which thankfully has not rained out any of the Thursday night racing at the track!)

Ahhh, summer.

Through my kitchen window, I heard this happening while making the kids' lunches last night. I actually think the kitchen window rendition was better. You know how it is to have to perform on cue!  

Singing In the Rain, by Graham Frederick Cox, age "almost three"

On a less than positive note, Francesca has strep throat, but as of tonight, she's no longer contagious. I sure hope I don't get it. I've had it 2x as an adult and it hurts like the dickens. I didn't think she really had it because she was able to eat and drink without really complaining. There's a reason I started calling her "Fireball" this summer. She's gonna be one mean crit rider someday! 

life in the hood

what can i say? i'm just not a regular blogger. i have too much to do and only so much time and energy.  i am now 39.5 yrs old, closer to 40 than 39. sigh. it's good though. i have a stable 3/4 time job, a kick ass husband, two wonderful daughters, a groovy dog and a wonderful garden that allows me to be a locavore, at least lots of the time.  As for the garden, I finally got the mulch in between the raised beds and now I'm waiting for Kenny to build the gate to keep the pooch out.  So, what's in the garden? a dozen varieties of tomatoes (many heirloom grown from seed by my coworker's husband), several varieties of peppers, beets, carrots, fennel, two kinds of eggplant, lemon balm, basil, oregano, sage, marjoram, lemon thyme, garlic, dill, several kinds of lavendar, rosemary, scallions, chives, onions, lots of different kinds of lettuce, including ROCKETLETTUCE (arugula), and plenty of weeds.  and my beloved composter!  This is my current dream job. Let me know if you're interested in my services...

Having fun on the bike again this summer with the wonderful gals of ColoBikeLaw.com.  What a great team we have this year - on and off the bike. Rivaled only by the Betty Joes of Hammer Racing Team!! woo hoo.  We're off to track nationals in September in San Jose, CA.  Kenny and I will get to go together again this year while my SuperMom comes from Indiana to stay with our kiddos.  She will graciously take a break from her current project Hands of Mercy in Sudan to play full time, live in grandma while we're riding the concrete in San Jose. 

We spent 10 days in northern Michigan again this summer just recently. This was my 39th summer up there in the same cottage owned by my SuperSuperGrandma Fay Squibb who is 93 and still living on her own and playing golf when she can. It really does feel like home especially in the years since my parents moved from my homeland of Texas.  Ken and I got to ride together a lot, and the kids had a ton of freedom to roam around and swim. 

That's it for now. Glad I made the time to post (but does anyone really read this?!!)

busy life

well, i have been way too busy to blog. i really like the idea of blogging, but i just can't make it fit into my life right now. kinda like taking vitamins or flossing my teeth. should do it more often, but the reality is, i am an episodic flosser and vitamin taker. TMI, huh?! 

what have i done in the last four months?? skate skiing, the Colorado Democratic Party caucus (i'm a delegate), lots of good cooking, lots of cycling (fixie riding and CX biking in the snow), the first annual Bitch n Switch party, and i guess that's about it, other than work, kids, keeping up the house, you know the boring stuff you do being married, working almost full time and having two wonderful daughters.  Isabella climbed to the top of the climbing pinnacle at REI, Francesca can roll her Rs in Spanish words like you wouldn't believe, Oscar has almost finished doggie school and Ken had two flats today!  that's about it! hopefully it won't be four months until my next post...