Near hard crash...

Still training for our time trial, today we were practicing our team rotations in the group of three. Going around 26mph I notice a red Jetta take the red light. I scream loud and start to slam the breaks. Billy's wheel rams my back rim and he loses control and flips over as he is trying to stop behind me. The Jetta came within feet of ramming us.  Never before have we ever been so close to getting hit.  It pretty much scared the crap out of us.  My rear derailler hanger broke.  Billy was luck that he just came out with a small cut on one finger and that is all... Considering the fall, it seems like it should have been worse....

Now we just have to count our blessings.

You have to thank God everyday for the gifts he gives you.

Billy Blogger: Helping a friend(s) finish out training strong!!!

Billy Blogger: Helping a friend(s) finish out training strong!!!: "Today I started my day at 4:00a.m.To ride with 3 awesome athletes Tom, Eric, and surge. I Got ready, put my bike in the back of my truck an..."

Seeing changes...

I want to lose weight! I want to look better! I want to feel good! 

 Those are all things many people say around these times, but how many people actually do something about it. In actuality, most of the times these words get said but never mean anything. But why? Well there are many reasons why, time being the main one. Why time? Because losing weight and keeping it off takes time. It takes exercise. Eating right is just a small part of it, we have to get sweaty. We have to burn a lot more calories than we take in. To lose one pound you have to have a 3500 calorie deficit. No way around it. The best way to have less calories without starving yourself is to burn them off. There are many ways to burn the calories but I chose cycling for physical reasons. I could not run or do any impact exercise because my back was shot. On the bright side, cycling is one of the best forms of exercise to destroy the calories.

I love and want to inspire people to change their lives. I've gotten my dad to lose 25 lbs just by not taking him with me to eat anymore. It was my fault others around me were heavy. I ate so they ate. Funny how that is but it is true. Another person I have been pushing is my brother. Every time I see him I ask for an update if he is eating well or going out to the gym. Those little questions might not seem like much but it puts it in their head that they need to keep doing it, a little reminder goes a long way. I always make sure to tell them they look better, fitter, or just plain tell them they are gaining weight. Honesty pushes you too.

Then we have Adrian. He is doing so well. Last year he joined me on my journey to lose weight only to stop and rebound like most people. All that work done only to give it all up because you want to be lazy. He had the time back then. He was still in college. No job. It was just him and his love of sleep and food. YOU HAVE TO MAKE THAT CHANGE. Now a year later he is picking it up again. But this time it's different. This time I can see that he really wants it. He set his mind to get it done. He is in the same mode I was in when I started. He is doing great. Now with less time because he is a teacher and has to make the effort to be at work on time, he is waking up extra early to get his miles in on time. He then goes to work and after work he does it again, whether it be cycling or going to the gym and spin. That effort is paying off. He has dropped 16 lbs in the past three weeks which is pretty awesome. He is also becoming a better cyclist. Today we did a pretty fast ride averaging 19.6 mph and was with us the whole way. A couple of weeks ago he would have given up within a couple miles. He has not missed a ride since he started. EFFORT PAYS OFF. I always ask him what food he has eaten. Now he counts all calories, a must! Some people say you can eat whatever you want as long as you exercise. True... If you want to maintain your weight. COUNT CALORIES.

Surround yourself with people that have similar goals and you will make things happen. Have a good time while doing it too and your life will be so much better, happier and fulfilling.  We back each other up. When one is slacking the other picks you up. Keeps you always on the go. Great people.

I'm still on my journey. 

My ride. 

I got my goals set. 

I hope that many people join me. 

It's a great experience. 

Staying on track 

Get ready for the Time Trial...

Finally got myself a time trial bike!  Well it's pieces from lots of friends bikes but it's beautiful :)  Have been riding it for the past two days and I have noticed a huge difference! I feel like I have more power, tucked in the aero position dramatically changes the wind resistance that I can maintain a faster speed.  It works.  The only part that I need is the front derailler but I pretty much only use the large ring all the time so until I can buy one I will keep it that way.

 Let's see what a difference it makes to have this bike on Sunday.  Right now just by doing our regular intervals, I feel like I can maintain a faster speed than before.

Looking Nice!

Surge Bikes.....

Train hard but rest...

Isn't that counterproductive? You have to train hard to get faster. Train more. Ride lots.



Recently I have not been getting a good amount of sleep and I'm starting to feel like it will eventually catch up to me. I have been developing a habit of trying to use as many hours of my day to do things. I'm up at 430 am to go and ride. During the day I go out to run errands and deal with managing our business doing those little things that add up and take time. At night I spend it relaxing and on the computer and time just flies, by the time I know it it is past midnight. I force myself to sleep. So those three and a half to four hours of sleep are wearing me down. Today we did some real hard intervals in which we had to maintain a steady heart-rate for 15 minutes. Pushing hard against the hard wind did not help either. While Sergio was in zone 4.3 I was up in zone 5! On tuesday when we did similar intervals it was the opposite. I was in zone 4.5 while Sergio was dying. Tuesday I was rested because Monday was my rest day.  While I might want to make every excuse in the book to make myself believe that its not me it is the environment, the wind, the pebbles on the road that are causing me to work harder, my un-aero shape, the fact that Sergio is a midget and had a aerodynamic drag coefficient greater than a Ferrari, that damn smell coming from Sergio every time the gets off his seat.  Those are all excuses I'm NOT going to make. You can not make excuses, you have to figure out what is happening and correct them.


So here I am at Starbucks again. This is my spot to relax and think about what I'm gonna do during the day. It's sort of like stress relief. I'll take it as my spot to recover. I have come a long way by changing the habits I have developed over the years. The reason I was the way I was was because I did not think. I did not realize what I was doing. I ate just to eat and did nothing about it, It was just the way of life. Well while getting a couple more hours of sleep is not as drastic as changing 115 pounds, I have to do it because if I want to continue progressing I need to train hard but also rest the way I need to rest. Minor things that you don't think affect you do in the long run. It took me a lot of years to gain the weight, now I got to catch things early before it messes me up later.



Here is Sergio still asleep, the best company you can have after a ride, stays quiet and leaves me alone! lol  But that is cool, he works hard, trains hard and knows how to listen to his body.  Exhibiting it here at Starbucks snoring for the past 45 minutes. 

So do as Serge does; sleep lots, but not like Billy who sleeps to much. Must keep a good balance to get better.

Another morning ride...

Training ride done. Three 10 minute intervals. It was a good ride. Dieting is working. Lost 11 lbs since last weigh in. Now got to keep this going.

Duck face.

High school drama. lol

Sunday recovery ride after J100...

Went out with Team McAllen Cycling for their Sunday ride to get in some miles to recover from the beating we had on Saturday's Jalepeno 100.  This has been one of the windiest week ever!!! 30 mph winds is nothing to do a recovery ride in.  You have to work just get stay on your bike.  We we did a good 40 miles with a good little pit stop waiting for a flat tire.  I helped out a friend of mine do a personal top speed record on her new Felt bike.  34 MPH with a horrible side wind is not that bad!

Breakfast after ride...

Went out for a quick 60 min ride today just to loosen up the sore legs and get them ready for tomorrows 100 mile beating.


Pancakes!!!!! I have been craving some all week and I finally got some! It wasn't ihop but Denny's satisfied it. Got the two eggs two pancake two sausage meal. Mmmmmmmm. Let the carbing up begin lol.


Billy was excited!


Adrian tore it up!

Ride Log...

ummmm think I have to rethink whom I ride with again.......  

34 miles, with zone 5 intervals done.

Interval time, getting there...

Done with a great morning ride just here at Starbucks blogging without my morning coffee. Forgot my money and my riding buddies are living on beans and rice so we are stuck here staring at each other pissed off that we are at a coffee shop and don't have coffee. Lol.


My legs are feeling better and I can see that Sergio and Billy are getting back in shape again. We will tear it up this year. As long as we train hard we will do good. We did three ten minute intervals keeping a steady pace. These will get longer as we keep getting stronger. Burned 2350 calories this morning. All before breakfast!

On a Sunday...

Sunday group rides.  A time where you can meet up with riding buddies and do a longer ride to see how your training is going and see where others are at.  Group rides are usually supposed to be good paced rides where everyone practices doing pulls,  rotations, echelons and other tactics that you can use during a race.  All awesome things on paper... but in reality... these rides usually turn into short races..... and by usually I mean always!!!

 Here is a little snippet of a magazine article I was reading on how to get back into racing condition....lol I guess it's a known problem everywhere and human cycling nature.  Well this Sunday ride was no different.  Went out with the elites this week and I knew like always it would be a nice fast paced ride.

 On this ride there were attacks, rotations and breakaways all of which we reacted on cue and performed very well.  Towards the end of the ride Billy and I started a break away and hit it pretty hard.  Another friend Oscar and another rider came along with us and we started pushing hard.  At first I felt as the other two were giving up thinking that they were convincing themselves why kill themselves and work so hard thinking that we were going to get swallowed up by the chase group anyways.  I took it on myself to motivate the group and told them lets pick it up, I felt good.  So I picked up the pace.  In a actual race situation the breakaway is supposed to share equal amounts of pulling time, no one cyclist pulls longer than they are supposed to.  My goal was to just not get caught so I pulled for around 3 minutes then rotated through the others to do another long pull about a minute later. I was alright with that, I knew the others were in pain, always think its funny when I hear one guy yelling "PULL!!"  and in a pain felt voice the reply is "I CAN'T" lol.  Well our breakaway worked out.  Later I found out that the chase was slowed down by a couple of red lights but hey WE GOT THERE FIRST LOL....  One thing we need to work on is tactics.  Later while talking to Segio about why he did not come with us I found out that he did not want to follow us because he as well thought we would be caught anyways.  Well thats good but one mistake he made was that he is on our team and he said that he was doing 29 mph pulls in the chase group.... so he actually wanted our team to lose?  No... I think he just did not realize what he was doing... But next time we all know if we are stuck in the peleton and our guys are up front riding hard, your job is to slow the group down or just not help at all, let others get tired or not even try to chase...  All in all it was an awesome ride. Ended the ride with an awesome breakfast and smack talking like always.  I think it's kind of funny how we talk so much trash to our buddies when all we did was act like douches and busted our butts on a training ride lol...

I also noticed that my 2 week old tire is giving birth... Whore!! lol

We need to get out there and RIDE!...

Got in one good 45 mile ride this week before the weather turned horrible again today.... THIS IS KILLING ME!!! We need to get out there and ride! Think and hope that this is the last cold front for this year.  We got a 100 mile ride next week so thats something to look forward to...  I remember last year it was hot and it is call the Jalepeno 100 because of the heat, so I'm stoked for the warm weather. I remember when I was fat and lazy, I prayed for the cold weather, now I despise it!

The real training begins NOW...

How do you get better when everyone around you gets better, the never ending battle of reaching the top.  Everyday that you don't train there is someone out there giving it all they got.  The past couple of months we have not given it the 110% that we needed to because of the weather and holidays.  Weather has killed so many miles that we could have and should have done.  But there are no excuses now. TODAY I got to start up again.  I pulled out my caloric intake app and I'm ready to start counting calories again.  The only way to really lose weight is to count the calories.  That way you know what you are putting in and see how much you have to work off.  Got to put in more miles.  Got to wake up early again and ride.  Got to stop eating so much.  SO MANY GOT's Now on to the do's.  

Taking off on the TT.

Billy riding very strong. Came in 2nd place on TT overall,  TARGET #1

Serg.    Thats all.

Cindy trying out her first TT.  Now she knows what she needs to do

Second one out, First one in!