A lil GROUCHO wisdom

For the past month or so, my time spent on the bike has mostly been in the form of this thing they call "training." Hmmm, yes, THAT thing. I'm not entirely convinced that TRAINING has been helping me all that much. I've learned how to do these sharp, stingy things called 'intervals,' (yuck!) that just leave me wanting to ride my bike all dern day. Then I end up doing a lot of this other thing they refer to as "resting," and, while my body feels awfully fresh and sometimes springy, my mental state is a little out of whack (that may also be the College). This could end up working in my favor, as it looks like I'm interested in doing races all the way into late November or December. Perhaps having a serious p-a-u-s-e in the middle of the summer was a breath before the storm. Or an eye of fresh air, or sumthing.

Anyway, my theory for the weekend was that a more "distinguished" look might help my zippiness on the trail. I've seen it work for others.... And here we were, at the Fontana Dam Jam, with nothing to do but get a lil dolled up before the race....

See, check it out.... Right before the race, Kylie hits me up with a little stache love.


We line up at the start and I'm thinking at least I might confuse the other girls into thinking I'm a dude, then they won't try to pass me. As soon as Big Guy blew the whistle, us lady expert-pro's were off, and I knew I had to blaze up the first hill or risk being stuck behind the geared bikes. So I did, opening up a pretty sweet gap off the front. Up the first series of hills, around a few turns, and through a false downhill I'm sweating it up and loving being in the lead. As soon as I got to the second series of climbs, wouldn't you know it, my stache starts drooping off at the end- sweat got the better of me (and maybe my "interval" was over)!! In less than a minute, my little piece of Groucho had nearly fallen halfway off and 2nd place had my wheel.

From there on it was all a struggle... Halfway through the 2nd lap, I submitted to my fate and peeled the last dangling piece of tape off my upper lip. I guess I was just sick of hearing my breathe rattle past it. This must have given me a second wind, cause I perked up enough to pass one lady and get Kylie back in my sights. I ended up finishing 2nd expert, 4th overall, but I can only imagine what it would've been had my little potato stache stayed in it's place, and I'd spent my days chasing my boy-friends around on bikes instead of doing dingy intervals.