Time Flies

Wow my last post was August 3rd and it seems like I haven't had a second to post since then. Today is Marni and I's second wedding anniversary and we've had a nice day. This morning we exchanged presents with, you might have guessed, an unplanned bicycle theme. Marni got me a sweet Park mechanics bicycle stand which I've been using all day to work on my Fuel. I got Marni her a pair of pink Sidi mountain bike shoes she's been longing for ever since we found them on sale a couple months ago.

Yesterday was the fifth Winter Park series race. I lined up as usual but let the leaders take off hard up the initial climb. I was more interested in seeing how my legs felt and having a solid performance than contending for the win. Well it must have worked out because I had a smile on my face the entire ride. Even starting up the climb on lap two I was excited. I descended solidly but conservatively not wanting to crash a week out from my A race and ended up fifth with no mechanical incidents. Heck I'm even currently sitting in 3rd place in the series standings which is pretty amazing considering I'm treating them as mostly B races. As you can see, I was happy to wheelie across the finish line to the crowd's delight. After the race we hung around for Erik's start and then headed back to Denver. We stopped by REI to pickup Marni's new windshirt (Marmot Ion on clearance) and my 2nd REI Flash UL pack for Leadville. One refreshing nap and shower later we headed out to a great dinner at the Melting Pot for our anniversary.

And now for the Leadville prep news, did you think I'd forget? Today I used my sweet new bike stand to fully clean and detail the Fuel. With all the new parts and the Kenda Klimax Lite tires sealed with Stans it weighs in between 25.5 and 26lbs. That's a great weight loss from my starting point of 32lbs and even beats my goal of 27 lbs! Tomorrow I will try to fix my sticking pistons in my disc brakes and shorten up my chain with the smaller cassette. Then from here on out I just need to eat right, get good sleep and finish my taper. We'll be loading up the Element on Thursday evening and headed up to Leadville for the big day on Saturday. Five days and nine hours to go...