Wowzas!

HOW COOL! I feel so privileged to have my 'diary' on cycling news! I'm so excited! I hope it is only the beginning.....time will tell.  I still have a long way to go, right now I'm just trying to get myself in as many bike races as possible for experience!!! I'm hoping for a guest ride at Nature Valley Grand Prix, keep you fingers crossed!

Yesterday was an awesome group ride in Durango.  Those guys and gals are FAST:) But hey, that is how you get better and at one point I had the chance to talk/ride with Ned Overend, what a great guy!

So today will be another good, long ride and the weather again is absolutely perfect!!!!

So here is the article! Tell me what you think!

http://www.cyclingnews.com/riders/2009/diaries/uswcdp/?id=uswcdp0906

Music

For those that don't know me too well should know, that I LOVE music! All types, all kinds, all the time!  When I was at work, while I was reviewing reports, driving in the car, working out, checking e-mails, WHENEVER! I love music:)

A couple of favorites: www.pandora.com, is a cool website that you can listen to music for free! You can pick your artist and then they will play that artist as well as others with similar styles, it is really cool!  Another web site that I just found out about thanks to Lance and Karen Webster, www.archive.org, a bunch of live shows from just about any band you are interested in hearing!

Some artists that I dig: Ryan Adams, Band of Horses, Brett Dennen, anything hip/hop right now:),  and the list continues to grow each day. 

Now back to your regular viewing program......

Weekend Fun

So this weekend is the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic(http://www.ironhorsebicycleclassic.com/), including a road race, time trial and criterium.  I've been here about a month now and this week is the first time I've seen precipitation and it just keeps on coming, the funny thing is that there is a chance of snow on the passes for the race tomorrow! That ought to make things pretty interesting:)

Just finished a great sushi dinner(East by Southwest) with Missy Erikson, Michael Engleman, Kristin McGrath and Mara came in towards the end after she finished her ride.

Missy finally (not really) kind of got the go ahead to ride EASY, so we got to spin around together these last few days.  It's good to see her back on the bike and happy again:)

So here are some random photos from the last couple of days or so.

  

Beautiful

Do you ever have those rides where you just want to see what's around the next corner and the next and the next?  I had one of those on Friday.  

I'm no professional photographer like my mom or Michelle but here are some pictures I took on the ride, it was just so beautiful!  The sky is almost dark blue when you look straight up and when the mountains just seem to crash into the blue, it is just breath taking!

Thank you

Thank you for my family for believing in me....

Thank you for my friends that are happy for me....

Thank you for the USWCDP(http://www.uswcdp.org/) for giving me the opportunity....

Thank you for all the people who put in a lot of time and money into the sport of cycling....

Thank you to J.P. for believing in me...

Thank you to my dog for being so cool! Yes I just thanked my dog:)....

Thank you to all those that give out great information without question.....

Thank you to all the guys whose wheels I tried to stick on so many times on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.....

Tour of the Gila

The Tour of the Gila was my first official NRC stage race and what an experience!  I had the opportunity to meet and hang out with Kristin Armstrong, she is a cool chick full of great information and advice and I was all ears!!!

So here are the results, http://www.tourofthegila.com/.  My goal was to train and finish and I did  both:) Gila Hike and Bike guys did a wonderful job and all the volunteers were awesome!  The town of Silver City is small but wonderful! Great food and great people!

I enjoyed meeting and racing with all the girls and wanted to say thanks to the USWCDP for the opportunity.  My next race is the Iron Horse Race in Durango at the end of May, that should be fun!

Thanks again for all the support from you guys back home, I miss y'all!