LaTour Musings

Hardest Stage: Stage 3, Hardwood Mills RR

Sweetest Stage: Stage 13, Kremis TTT

Most Dangerous Stage (and most fun?): Stage 16, Double-Right TTT, 4th man

Best Improvement from Original: Expanding TTTs, with first few counting all riders. Required teamwork, strategy, and guts.

2nd Best Improvement: September

Most Impressive Effort: Hannah

Got stronger along the way: Retro

Best New Rider: tatuOwen

Gutsiest Rider: xRay

Sleeper overall result-getter: HD

Underestimated the Pain: Kirk

Best New Help: Ryan

Best Old Help: Alison

Master Database Manager: Hick

Yet-to-be-realized LaTour Goal: 3 teams

Is that a long-haired llama???

Nope, it's a long-haired slacker and a short-haired llama!!!

Pain, fun, beer, and food. In that order, another LaTour de LaTonka is in the books. Hit the "weather hole" between 95 degrees 95% humidity on Saturday and storms and rain Sunday afternoon. Hard rides, great friends, and our first female participant!

Thanks to Hick, Ryan, Al, RJ, Mason, and Brady for outstanding support. When the soreness subsides, planning for version 3 will begin!

LaTour

September 4. Beer, food, pain. Lots of laughs.

Damn I better start trainin.

Gira de Seis Lagos est September 4!

HOLD your calendars boys...September 4 it is! Guaranteed to be one of the best days on the bike in 2011...be there!!! Invite your buds. The more the merrier.

Seis Lagos Teaser/Update

Go here for an idea of all the fun, fun, fun til her daddy takes the t-bird away...

www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4644399

Also, consensus is for a September event. Let me know availability of 9/3,4, or 5 (Labor Day), or the following weekend, 9/10 or 11. The bigger the better...and more competitive.

GSL Clarification

Oh ye of Brew-related nomenclature: "Century" connotes distance, not format. There will be plenty of opportunity to defend the green weenie, including TWO state-line sprints! It is not a matter of if there will be stages, just how many and of what type. Stay tuned.

Gira de Seis Lagos

The 2011 version of the LaTour de LaTonka is being planned! Exact format will be forthcoming. I suggest two options for dates - either Labor Day weekend (September 3,4, or 5) to wrap up summer, or mid-October (15th or 16th) when leaves will be at/near peak (a nod to luring Sammy and sister Deidre to PA. Not to mention Jeff and Phantom!). 2-3 months notice should allow for a decision and the hold on the calendar. Comment preference here or by email. The charter LaTour group is invited, plus anybody else who is a good fit for our fun-loving, apres-ride beer-swilling gang.

Posing a Question

September 2011...Labor Day Weekend...in honor of the Vuelta...Gira de Seis Lagos. Another mixed-team, one-day, multi-stage tour, in a geography you never ride. Some cruising, some racing. Much fun. You in?

Headed Home

What a trip. Ended it with a sunrise solo ride up the canyon before one final Boulder espresso. Spiritual. Thanks to Sammy and his clan (including our new little sister Deidre!) for exceptional hospitality, route guidance, and suffering. A couple hundred miles in 5 days. Not far, except that so much was upwards. Thank God what goes up must come down!

If you don't like this ridin'...do something else.

Knackered. Sunburned. Happy.

Half Way There

2 days of serious-ass climbing, everybody is doing well. Today was an easy 2-hour flatland spin. Gonna hit the mountains again tomorrow. Fat, tired, refreshed, and beginning to feel the energy return.

In My Mind I'm Going to Colorado

Now that I have that hockey silliness out of my system, time to be RIDIN' not HIDIN'!!!