More and more people involved here. Already lots of talk about Ingonish, with a new batch of beginners interested in it. Our swim club (the CB Crawling Crustacea) is huge this year, with over 70 members. Our first Tuesday evening speed workout in Sydney had 27 people, and Velo Cape Breton is up to almost 100 members already this year. The group seems to gain more momentum as it grows, picking up more people like a snowball.
As well, there are seven of us from Sydney and area signed up for Ironman Regensburg, August 1st (Germany). Seventeen of us are making the trip, the other ten just to swill beer and check out fraulines (or the male equivalent for those so inclined*).
For anyone interested, we use a yahoogroup http://www.yahoogroups.com/, group name cbbarbarianstri We have photos, etc posted there, and anyone coming to CB can get connected with us for a workout through the site.
The Moose was a brutal drag back to reality for many of us. As well as the (possibly) unwelcome sensations of pushing your body slightly beyond it's accepted limits (burning lungs, burning legs, an uncontrollable need to vomit and/or quit) there were all the other signs that race-season was back; packing on Saturday night for all weathers and eventualities, getting up early on Sundays again, the race-breakfast (oatmeal, oatmeal and more oatmeal or if you're Rami a Maple Glazed and a black coffee), the Immodium (or generic substitute), the pinning of the bib (is it straight?), the long queue for the bathroom (how long does it take for Immodium to kick in anyway?) body-glide and, of course, remembering to shave our legs on a Saturday night.
In fact, I'd like to add another line to the "you know you're a roadie/triathlete/runner when...." jokes like "your bike costs more than your car" and "you get up earlier on Sunday morning than you do to go to work" and "you think of each hill as a cyclist/runner, even when driving a car". I'd add "you shave your legs on Saturday night in case you get lucky on Sunday morning" (rather than the other way around).
The reasons for shaving are legion, and I don't want to get into the whys and wherefores. So let us assume you have been the races, seen the guys with the shaved legs and decided it's time to go to the smooth side. Now what?As newbies (and I'm talking to the guys, you ladies know it all already) you've pondered the mechanics of it, may even stood in the shower and eyed the missus' Gillette Venus, but always stopped at the last minute as no-one ever tells you how its really done! I mean, its not really one thing one dude asks another, is it? As guys, we've got the hang of shaving per se, but the one great unasked question is always "where do you stop". We've seen guys stop shaving where their cyclinng shorts start, with the result that the look like Mr Tumnus. This, we suggest, isn't quite high enough. But how high is?
So as a public service announcement, we bring you the major anatomical landmarks of the leg (even if you can't see 'em, you can definitely poke 'em) and the relative position of triathlon specific clothing. We're not necessarily advocating any line as the right one, we're just laying it all out there for you to decide.
So, grab that razor and get hacking. Welcome to the smoooooth side
The TA has a history at this race; this marking our seventh appearance at the Moose run, the sixth with a number. As such we've run this race in snow and rain (in the same race), sun but screaming wind and cold, always cold. This year, the gloves were off, in a literal clothing sense.
Normally the pre-race chat is "what pace are you running" but on Sunday it was also "what are you wearing? Shorts? Really?". The warm-up settled it as all but one of us said 'no' to tights and 'yes' to shorts. One of our number decided "Shorts, definitely, these tights are way too warm. Oh my, I don't think I remembered to shave my legs"; thus highlighting one of the problems with early season races! You do need to remember to shave your legs the night before, just in case shorts end up being needed. How high is up to you as long as you remember which shorts you packed; the long baggy Premier League soccer shorts, running regular shorts or your trusty race-proven shorty-short tri-shorts. Nothing says "neo-Fred" like stubbly legs or a hairy line across your mid-thigh!
By our count triathletes only made up 8% of the field on Sunday. That's not to say that there were any fewer triathletes Moosing, rather than the good weather meant a record turnout of 150. Indeed, the race was slightly delayed as there was still a good queue to sign in with ten minutes to go. Rather than rely on our notoriously patchy memory, we came armed with a pad and pencil and came up with the following list (in no particular order); Kurt Stevenson, Ron MacDougall, Dan Thompson, Tina White, Steve Saunders, Laura Keefe, Ian Hayward, Brenda Topliss, Brigitte Sabourin, Lyn Vernon, Mike Kennedy and Steve Abbot. Furthermore Bev Richardson, Mike Pettipas and Shannon Read were there in support, backing up runners. Shannon and Mike were mobile on the course on their bikes, Shannon to cheer people on and Mike on official RNS business, topping his cycling togs off with a fetching fluorescent-green tabbard.
As predicted, Rami Bardessey won the overall, running within a minute or two of his course record. We mentioned in the preview that a ringer might turn up and put twenty minute into all of us, and we were nearly correct. A guy no-one had seen before, and whose name I can't remember despite being introduced several times (sorry!) signed on and ran a 1:30 for second place. He's aiming for a 2:35 at Ottawa this year and we wouldn't bet against it! The ladies also went as predicted, with Denise Robson winning with a two minute PB.
As the Duke of Wellington is reputed to have said "one may as well write the history of a ball as of a battle" and the same can be said of races, the perception of which can be quite different depending where, and when, you are. So what the TA saw of the race race might not be an accurate representation of the day. One thing common to us all was probably the perception of it being well supported. Not just by the race organisers though (which it was). In the preview we forgot to tell you about the relay; teams of three, each taking on ca. 8km. (after all, 25 km is a distance not to be taken on with alacrity) . The tag-zone was at the second/fourth water table at the corner of Cow Bay and Bissett Roads. This made for a little cheer-zone at what traditionally felt like the low-spot in the race and really made the event feel like a lot more fun.
One story we are familiar with is Laura Keefe's. She was locked in a battle for a good part of the race and came home second lady, or first regular person as we prefer to call it. She spent many of the 25 kms of it with Kurt Stevenson, who (for the record) ran a 2 minute PB. Remember how we said that the Moose wouldn't tell you if you were in shape for a spring marathon, but it would tell you if you weren't? Well, that huge result must have been good news for Kurt, who is preparing for his first marathon. Not that we think he's obsessing about it but he told us in days how long until the big day!
Knowing we had a date with a large plate of pork-based breakfast products we had to leave before the results were up, but when we find them, we'll post them. Big props by the way to the RD and RNS team who between them compiled a 150-strong results list armed with a stop-watch and clip-board.
We don't have any photographs yet either; the TA's overall visual impression of the race was something like this...
...but there were a goodly number of cameras pointed in the general direction of the race, so when we find any, we'll either post or link to them.
How did the TA do? Well, it wasn't our best Moose ever but it wasn't our worse either. As you might have guessed from the picture, was a hard day out. Of course, we probably shouldn't have gone out at our 5K pace (give or take a few seconds). We hung in there though, scoffed gels and played the mental game, concentrated on our form and tried to ignore that we weren't having "good sensations" in our legs (as a Euro-Pro cyclist would say). As a dress rehearsal for bigger, longer races in the depressingly near future it didn't bode too well, but Brenda Topliss has since convinced us that we made our mistakes in the dry-run and the main show will go fine!
A big chapeau to RD Tom Harmes, who as always puts on a great race and we were so happy that his event was finally blessed with great weather. Congrats to all for running great races; everyone was looking fit and seemed to be raring and ready for the season.
Our next date will be the Credit Union Atlantic Lung Run on Saturday April 10th; a pan-flat 5K around Pier 21 and possibly the fastest road-race in Nova Scotia. Then there's Stacy Juckett-Chestnutt's 5K and 4/28/4 duathlon double header on 8/9 May. Best go and sharpen up our fast-twitch muscles and lactic threshold then.
Well folks, the Sunday morning lie-in is officially history for another eight months; race-season is here. The Hypothermic Half or the Back To Basics 8-miler will have marked the first time most of us would have had the opportunity to pin on a race number this year and we know many of you did. Coming up this Sunday is the Moose run, but before we get to that, this seems like a good idea to look at the "How Many Races Did You Do Last Year?" poll.
This was for any type of race, not just tris or dus; you could count running races, bike races, adventure races, wheatever you liked. As far as we were concerned if they gave you a dossard or they wrote on your arm; it counted.
The most popular answer was six-to-ten, with just over 40% of you doing this number of races, followed by ca. 35% with between one to five and then a few hardy souls with over ten, with at least one person at twenty (pers comm). Ron MacDougall clearly didn't vote; by our tally he added at least twenty-five dossards to his already impressive collection; that guy has his own personal sponsor for safety-pins (and possibly ibuprofen)! We understand Ron has heard of the notion of the "taper" but bears no truck with it, and to be honest, it seems to suit him well.
These data support the data we have in the office for TNS sanctioned events, with a majority of members doing less than five races in the series, although last year Ryan Kemp did a knee-shattering ten events (which considering we only sanction a dozen or so is a huge number). Chuck in a Bluenose, Cabot Trail and the Rum Runners and there's your six-to-ten!
So coming into this year, how many races do you anticipate doing? We know that you won't have mapped out in excruciating detail what you'll be doing in the 3rd weekend of October (PEI marathon? NSAC Homecoming 5K?) but you'll have a rough idea of how you think the year will pan out, what your goals are, your A-races and B-races, so let us know. Same caveat applies; if they're going to give you something to pin on or print on your arm and contralateral leg, it counts!
So, back to the Moose. Of course, we can never say "Moose" without thinking "Loose", "Aboot" and "Hoose"...
As any with confirmed survivor of the eighties, we had to have the Bad Manners version, but for you traditionalists out there, here's the original Lord Rockingham's XI version....
and if you think you can understand that, then try Donald Where's Your Troosers.
And that's the easy-to-understand version!
Anyway, back to the Moose. It's traditionally a Boston warm-up but many Bluenosers test their form here too. The Moose won't tell you if you're on form for that spring marathon, but it will tell you if you are not. It's a pretty low-key event; no chips, just some poor sod from RNS with a stop-watch and a clip-board, you'll get a dossard but it will likely be from the 2005 race-series or something. Mark Stein will probably be giving it the usual though, although the music may be off in deference to the neighbours (how are we supposed to race without a bit of "Gonna Fly Now"?).
The Hoose this Moose is Loose in is the Buffalo Lodge in Eastern Passage (here). The RNS website has it starting at 10:00. It's free to enter, but a donation is gratefully accepted.
It's an out and back, starting from the Lodge. There's a little detour around a subdivsion to get the distance in at the beginning. Hang a left on the Cow Bay Road, pass the eponymous Moose and carry on to nearly Rainbow Haven where you'll turn left onto Bissett Road. Carry on to the turn, which is at the lot where they film the Tailer Park Boys. Then come back the way you came. The terrain is gently rolling, apart from the bits which are quite viscously rolling. It's historically windy. The last four editions have been under sun, but it has been known to snow. Despite it's low-key status, there are four water stops, at roughly 8 km, 13 km and 17 km and 23 km, but bring your own magic potion, it's usually just water.
After running all those rollers, you can be a bit punch-drunk come the end of the race. The Moose is what you're looking for. In case you manage to miss a huge fibreglass moose, look for the windmill instead. Failing that there's a water table here too. All of these signs tell you that you are nearly home. It's not the Citgo sign, but it's nice to know what you're aiming for. It's about a kilometre from the moose/birdchopper/watertable to the intersection, where it's a left and another kilometer to the finish.
Be warned, there is a little uphill here just after the junction that can be a nasty little sting in the Moose's tail. Take a leaf out of the TA's book should you be in a battle here; don't take the lead too early, bide your time, just let buddy/buddyess do the work up the hill (about 500m) and as soom as the road starts to flatten out and turn to the left, punch it.
This is a race that triathletes have really made their own recently. Well over 20% of the field are triathletes, and to be honest, it is often the first time many of us see one another after a winter of long dark solo runs and hours in the basement on the trainer. Honestly, sometimes the craic is more a part of this event than the race itself sometimes.
Rami "The Rocket" Bardessy and Denise "Pocket Rocket" Robson have a tendancy to win with course records (last year, he made it look so easy, at least the bastard could have broken a sweat, or made a show of it feeling hard), but behind them the racing is in earnest. We understand that Rami is going to line up this year and that the trash-talking has already started in earnest.
Behind Rami, well Ray Morehead, Harry Neynens and Terry Molloy have all performed well here and are all candiates for the T-shirt. Or maybe a ringer has moved into the area over the winter and is going to put twenty minutes into us all. Perhaps Denise Robson will girl the whole field for her first overall win in Nova scotia. She's due an overall (no pressure Denise).
After Denise, the ladies' race was very interesting last year, with Stacy Juckett and Marie-Claude Gregoire taking it down to the wire with 2nd place overall (or first regular person) going to Stacy, but only after some late final mile action.
We also understand that TNS banquet guest speakers Dave Nevitt and Ray Williams are going to do a double Moose (a herd of Moose? A mega-Moose? A tera-Moose? Meeses? we can't decide). Any bets on if the Cookie Monster will do the same?
So, instead of doing yet another long run around the pennisuala, why don't we see you at the Moose this weekend? Sunday at ten......
The votes from the Norwegian trousers poll are in.
The lead was teeter-tottering all week. The Nei's took an early lead, the Ja's came back quickly to take control by almost a 100% margin, the Nei's fought back to tie the poll before the Ja's found their second wind to take it. Without overtime (which is good because after last Sunday, we're not sure our heart could take it).
Not since we once suggested (not in here we hasten to add) that overtaking someone in the finishing chute was "not cool" has a question elicited such passion. Those bedazzling bukser are a polarising issue, somewhat like Celine Dion or sloping top-tubes. It seems that there can be no peaceful coexistence with these pants; it's either "OMG I so need a pair" or "OMG, no, No, NO", there is no middle ground. Their effect isn't just linked to triathlon; a colleague of ours suggested the Norwegian skip, Thomas Ulsred, could appear with or without the pants as far as she was concerned. Then again, Thomas appears to be the elder brother of Morten Harkett from A-Ha and Morten had the same influence on the fairer members of the sixth-form back in the day too.
Where does the TA stand? Well, we're not sure what it was about Argyle (the pattern not the region). Perhaps we were scarred by too many bad sweaters in high-school but it never really did anything for us.
We think we actually had this one. Yikes.
However, like so many things that were aggravating to us back in high-school; the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, learning to drive or the music of Dire Straits, age is forcing us to reassess Argyle.
To be honest, the first time we saw the Norwegian trousers, our eyes started to water and felt itchy and sandy, like our corneas had sunburn (and we suspect the aetiology was similar). Was it the Argyle or was it something baser, like white after Labour Day?
Granted, it wasn't the full Boss Hogg, but still, maybe this accounted for some of our visceral reaction. Argyle however, has been slowly and quietly (ahem) imprinting itself on our collective consciousness for some time now.
Apart from socks received from maiden aunts at Christmas, Argyle first appeared in our consciousness on the Garmin kit. Controversial at the time, the kit has evolved over the past few season with Argyle always maintaining pride of place, on the jerseys and on their bikes, as the team's unique visual identifier. We personally thought that the colours were maybe a bit too pale, especially with all that white on the jersey, but it's slowly grown on us, much to our surprise! And talking about socks, check out David Millar's Argyle beauties (Auntie Muriel, are you listening?)! So as much as the TA would normally never wear pro team kit on the bike, we would wear this jersey, in contrast to the Mapei or Gerolsteiner jersey horrors (shudders involuntarily)! And don't talk to me about the Footon-Servetto kit. Yikes!
Argyle even made it onto Garmin's wheels. Mapei never got their cubes on their Mavics (and thank goodness for that!)
Sugoi have their own take on Argyle too, and we've seen more and more of this on the roads.
As we all know, 40 is the new 30, Barney is the new Tinky-Winky and brown is the new black (and as any old-school roadie will tell you, shorts should always be black), so maybe this accounts for why we're currently grooving over the AG2R-La Mondiale kit, which has a serious Argyle vibe to it.
This we would wear!
So, after reassessing our reaction to Argyle we realise it does have a useful place in our lives, as indeed do the Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium, driving and the music of Dire Straits (even Walk Of Life), and compared to what pointed nastiness could be served up....
..... then perhaps those tartan trews ......
.... aren't really that bad after all.
So until next time, wear colours wisely and when it comes to Argyle trousers it's a resounding Ja, ja dahlink, ja, but remember; no capes!
A couple of weeks ago we asked you what your bicycle speed-record was. We told you about ours, a shade over 72 kph in the 1998 Hogmanay Triathlon coming off Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh (pronounced Ed-in-buh-ruh despite all written evidence to the contrary). It was the the first time we'd ever been on a closed course; the park around Arthur's Seat is a Royal Park and as such, relatively easy to get it closed down to traffic! For those of you who qualified for World Du's at Cyclesmith last June, we believe that this will be your course and it's a doozy. The 70 kph descent isn't free however; there's a whack-load of climbing on the back-side and the mini-roundabout half way down just adds to the course's sporting nature.
The data from the "how fast" poll were nicely Gaussian, with the mean max speed being between 70 and 80 kph. There were some daredevils amongst us though, with a quarter of you breaking 80 kph. We were slightly surprised not to have anyone in three digits though (Chris Milburn, you did vote, right?)! Perhaps some of you did, but you were concentrating too much on keeping it all together to notice the numbers! We should have asked if you prefer twisting descents or the fast straightaways? Here in the office we prefer technical descents, which is odd given our old club nickname of "Abdu" (in honour of the Tashkent Terror's penchant for spectacular chutes rather than our sprinting abilities), but we reckon the corners give us something to think about apart from "if I come off now this Lycra isn't going to protect me one bit".
A note of caution however; please don't think you haven't been living if you haven't done highway speeds on a bicycle. Just concentrate on getting to the bottom in one piece and dont worry about the numbers!
While we're at it, a clear majority of you reckoned that Gerrad Lewin and Tom Boonen were indeed separated at birth
We don't precisely know how this makes Gerrad feel, but at least it makes the TA feel relieved that we weren't seeing things.
The TA's legal department (well, not legal department per se, more like Sarah Wood, who also fills in as the TA's copy editor, mince-pie baker and conscience) reminds us to point out that Gerrad is, in fact, the cleaner-living separated-at-birth-twin and furthermore Gerrad has never sprinted through a level crossing to win a Classic.
Speaking of seeing things, we're also pretty sure we saw Cyclesmith RD Paul Shaw in Gladiator ("If you find yourself alone, riding in the green fields with the sun on your face, do not be troubled"), TNS Executive Director and conscience Sarah Wood in Four Weddings and a Funeral ("Bugger, bugger, bugger"), and we're convinced that Matthias Jaepel did in-fact win the '83 and 84 Tours de France ("sardines will be thrown into the sea. Thank you very much". Actually that was another enigmatic Frenchman, Eric Cantona and no, we don't know what that means. Nobody does). Clearly we're spending way too much time watching DVDs while on the trainer and the hypoxia/hypoglycaemia/hypomentalstimulation has finally done our collective head in! We can't wait to get back on the roads, all this aggravation ain't satisfactioning me...
'til next time, I hope you're seeing what you're really seeing....
