New Transformers Trailer

OH MY GOD!!!!! THIS IS SO FRICKING COOL!

Sugar - If I Can't Change Your Mind

From Sugar's Copper Blue. You know this song.

Michael Vick-- True Scumbag

I caught a story on SportCenter about Michael Vick and his favorite hobby. Pitbull fighting. The ass likes to put his dogs in with other dogs and watch them tear each other apart. Apparently, he is a high roller and likes to bet alot of money. The story related that there is a pervasive culture in the nfl and nba of guys that own dogs and fight them routinely. The dogs fight until one is killed or until one is so injured they can no longer go on. Now, don't paint me as some sort of liberal nutjobg (Okay, I am), but Vick is scum and anybody that does this is scum. The videos they showed on espn churned my stomach. They suspend a guy for a year after being busted for pot twice in the NFL. This is exponentially worse and I hope it ruins his career. We thought Cycling had problems.....

WRECKLESS ERIC - WHOLE WIDE WORLD - LIVE 1977

Brought to you by Erikspeaks. A great old punk song. Covered by Will Ferrel in Stranger Than Fiction. Youtube is very cool.

John Ashcroft, the Hero?!

There is a revelation that has come out in the last two weeks that Ashcroft was pressured during president Bush's last term to sanction the dubious eavesdropping program initiated by President Bush. Apparently he had been fighting it and arguing it's illegality. Gonzales and Andy Card were pushing hard for it to be sanctioned by the justice department. There is an incident described in recent testimony where Ashcroft apparently was sick in the hospital with appendicitis and doped up on morphine. Card and Gonzalez come to the hospital to get him to sign paperwork authorizing the program. Ashcroft refuses. He then resigns with the successful reelection of Bush (Good Job, America! Now go to your recruiter and serve your country in Iraq. It's what you wanted, after all.) Gonzales is then promoted to attorney general and the eavesdropping program continues. It's pretty bad when John Ashcroft thinks what your doing is unconstitutional. The guy doesn't even believe in separation of church and state. Gonzales needs to go down and yes I am saying it for the first time, Bush should be impeached. His misdeeds and illegal actions are much more egregious than Clinton's ever were.

Sugar - Believe What Your Saying

My kid loves this song. He has good taste! Bob Mould's second band. (you might know his first) I just found out Extreme Noise is back open in MInneapolis and has moved. The only coop punk music store in the cities. It is a cool place and if you like punk, you should check it out!

Oasis - The Masterplan

Cool video-- "it's up to us to make the best of the things that come our way..."

The Tour.....

Food for thought.....
1996: Bjarne Riis-Admitted to doping
1997: Jan Ulrich-Retired due to doping allegations.
1998: Marco Pantani-Confirmed for doping.
1999-2005: Lance Baby!-"I am the most tested athlete in sports and I've never tested positive.
2006: Floyd Landis-Just finished trial for use of exogenous testosterone.

I have two points. If these guys were doping you know more were. At this point I think Lance fits right in here. I must be honest, (i hate to admit it) Lance is most of the reason I got into cycling. I loved his story. Now, I love the bike. Period. My second point is that this is beginning to look like a witch hunt. Be careful how we move forward with this and how we treat the men who come forward. If they are treated like lepers then it will discourage more people from coming forward and ultimately make cleaning up the sport more difficult. Ruining their present career out of a desire to make examples of them might be a huge mistake. Good judgement is required. I worry the leaders in the UCI and the Tour have shown they lack that.

Bjarne Riis Admits Doping

Zabel now Bjarne!

So Erik Zabel has admitted to doping in 1996, but only for a week. None of those green jersey's he won in the tour were a result of epo use. Are you sensing the sarcasm here. I like Zabel. If you have seen Hell on Wheels, you can't help but like him but c'mon dude only for a week? First Basso wanted to dope but never did it and now Zabel did but only for a week. Whatever......

So, that brings us to Bjarne Riis. Bjarne admitted today that he doped for many years and even admitted to doping during his tour victory. Bravo! It only took him 5 years after his retirement to admit to it. But, Atleast he did and boy when he did, he really did!

Yeah I took drugs. You betcha! I took them a long time. I'm not proud of it but I did it alot and You bet I did it during the tour I won. The yellow jersey is in a box. I'm not proud of it but everybody was doing it! Was I ambitious? Hell yes I was!

Some serious candor from Mister CSC. I like the guy and I appreciate his candor. He wants to move forward. He doesn't want his accomplishments with CSC to go tainted. I don't know how they can't with Basso, his relationship with Ceccini, and now this. Time will only tell, but it looks like we are finally getting somewhere in all of this.

Ciao for Now!

5/23/07Cat Fight on the View, Rosie vs Elizabeth

This is seriously good. The debate that should be going on across America devolves into a funny sad conversation....

Working Class Hero - Green Day

Here is a Lennon Cover By Green Day. Sounds good to me.

Quick ride in the Park

I went for a quick lap in the park today after an all day in-service to burn off the fish and chips I had for lunch. I ran into Bernie in the park and we road for about a quarter of a lap. Riding with Bernie in the park is like this.
Me: Hey Bernie how'ya doin?
Bernie: Pretty good. Good to see ya man!
Me: How many laps you doin? (pant pant)
Bernie: 5, How bout you.
Me: 1 then I gotta get home (pant, pant) Thinking to my self: stay on his wheel, god, I feel like I'm gonna puke! shit, why did I drink the stupid guinness.... Man he's frickin' fast. crap I soiled myself. I can hardly wait till they get this RAAM thing outta their system. Shit, this sucks.
Bernie: What else is new!
Me: Just started (Breath) a new (breath) job. (pant)(gasp) Hey man, why don't you just go on. I am just (gasp) taking it easy to(shit)day.
Bernie: Okay man, Always nice riding with you.

So I ride for awhile. And I am feeling pretty good. The legs are coming around and I have picked up the pace after blowing up thanks to the good old Bernmeister, when.....

(Riding up behind me comes.....)
Bernie: Hey man!
Me: Geez Bernie, that's nice you only lapped me in Elm Creek. That's great......
(I guess I gotta ride some more......)

So in summation while riding with Bernie is great, it can at times be a humbling experience.
See you on a ride.
Ciao for Now!

Lemond Testifies at Landis Trial

Today Greg Lemond testified at the Landis trial that during a conversation the two cyclists had, Landis admitted to doping. He also testified that a member of Landis' camp made harrassing phone calls to Lemond and used private information that Lemond had relayed to Landis during their conversation. Apparently Lemond had confided in Landis that he had been abused as a child and the harrassing phone calls cented around that. This case gets more bizarre every day. What does any of this have to do with doping or the Tour? Lemond seems to like to get into pissing matches with other successful American cyclists. Why doesn't he stay above the fray and act like the great he is? This however, is his track record. Even as a young champion, he liked to get into pissing matches with teammates publicly (Hinault, anyone?). It is just silly. Is the lab science bad or not? It needs to boil down to that. Period. All of the other stuff is conjecture. No one will win in this. It is such a waste. I guess I will go ride my bike.
Ciao for Now!

Smoking Ban in Minnesota for Oct. 1st!

Alright!!!! The legislator finally followed many other states in the country and took the line that smoking sucks and is bad for everyone's health and just because you want to smoke while you drink doesn't mean that the two are mutually inclusive. I for one am psyched that when I go get a beer with my friends I won't have to come home smelling like smoke and be coughing up the plague in the a.m. from some dudes marlboro red's the night before. I know what the argument is: What about freedom? What about keeping the governmant out of "MY" choices. Well let me tell you, When I am in a place where smoking is allowed there aren't alot of choices for me. I have to breath. YOu don't have to smoke. I work in a hospital. Do you know how much smoking related illnesses cost us all every year? End of life treatment due to respiratory illness is incredibly expensive. This inturn causes our health insurance premiums to go up hits us all directly in the wallet. So the next time your puffing away while complaining about taxes going up to pay more for schools or teachers think about how much that heater is costing the rest of us and not benefiting anyone at all, including yourself.
I feel better now.

Saturday Ride

A good group rode out of Trailhead at 7 this a.m. We did the usual loop and it was again a very good ride. People are continuing to get stronger and it is amazing how our group is rounding into shape this year. Andy mentioned that he thinks people are at another level this year. I agree. People will either be burned out by the fall or crazy strong. After the first loop, I rode up to Blaine to the garage sales for an even 50 miler. My brother in law had a bloody mary waiting for me when I got there. Thanks Patrick! Carol and some of the other folks were planning to go out west to minnetonka on the second part of the ride for some serious milage!
See you on a ride!
Erik

Will Ferrell and Lance at the ESPY's

Check it out.

Letter to Three Rivers Park District

Here is a letter to The Three Rivers Park District. I have withheld the name and address but thought everyone might be interested in reading it. You might be particularly interested about the biking part. It is topical as I was thanked by a slower biker (There aren't many....) the other day for calling out "on your left!" as I passed. She said "No one does that anymore!" Just food for thought:
To whom it make concern:

We have noticed the increase in rude bikers on the Three Rivers Trail every year. This year is even worse already than last year and last year was even bad.

The trail is right behind our house and we walk and ride our bikes on it almost every day during the summertime. The rudeness of the bikers while we are "walking" has been almost more than one can take. This morning it was not busy, but the 3 different sets of bikers that rode past, nearly took my arm off from passing WAY too close. They have vertually no regard for the walker what so ever! We had our dog and had to nearly jump off the trail to not get hit. They are riding way too fast and no announcements regarding passing and then ride WAY TOO CLOSE.

Because of the incident this morning, we did call the Minnetonka Police and reported what happened. Neither of us were HIT, but some of the bikers were probably only a couple inches away from my arm! That is way too close. They travel fast and 2 to 3 abreast, not caring what is in their way!

We need more patrols on the trail. We need possibly volunteers to stop these rude bikers and explain the rules of the trail! Vertually no one announces their passing anymore. It is so RARE. And, when 2 or 3 abreast try to pass, you almost must hit the ditch so not to get killed!

This needs to be addressed somehow before someone gets killed on the trail this summer. And, the weekends are so bad, that we do not even use the trail during weekends anymore. I would imagine many, many people are hurt or nearly hurt while out on the trail. We see near accidents all the time just from our backyard!
What can be done regarding the rude bikers?? Also, we have asked for more benches for years and the answer is always that there is not enough money. The parts of the trail we use the most, is from Hopkins area out to Victoria while on our bikes. We use the trail for walking from Country Village area out to Excelsior area. A suggestion for some benches would be Williston Road and the trail intersection; Hwy 101 and trail intersection, and man more areas on the trail heading out to Victoria. We find it shocking on how much money is being spent on signs and shelters for maps, etc., yet no additional benches are mentioned. The cost of more benches here and there can't be more than the cost of the concrete the signs and shelters and the cost of the signs and the shelters themselves. For several years I guestioned portable toilets be placed along the trail and especially at the trailheads. (Hopkins & Victoria) And, the answer was always there was not enough room on the trail for them. The concrete laid for the new shelters was more than enough room to place a portable toilet. So how could they be built? Would someone please respond to our email? We need to make the trail safer and more user friendly. More patrol and the addition of more benches and portable toilets. AND GET THE WORD OUT ON RULES OF THE TRAIL! One last concern we just thought of also, is that the trail is being used more during the AFTER hours than it ever was. We are concerned when people are walking past our backyard on the trail and it's midnight! What are they doing on there at that hour of the night? Plus more noisy.

We used to think it was a great benefit to live on the trail system, but don't feel that way anymore. Rude and LOUD people have taken over. And it's really sad it is in our back yard!

Any thoughts?

Basso Admits to Doping!

Well, It appears that Basso is admitting to his involvement in Puerto. I believe this is very good for cycling. It only took a year and the fear of being caught to get him to come clean. It now seems that he is only claiming to "ATTEMPTING" to dope and that his Giro was won fair and square. He says he never actually got the chance. What a load of crap! I was reading the wilcockson book on last year's tour and there is a part where Julich is talking about Basso and how honest he is and that Basso had come to each person on the team and told them personally that he had nothing to do with it. He said he would be crushed if Basso really was guilty as they were good friends and he trusted him. How very sad that Basso felt he had to lie to his friends and teammates. I liked Basso. I even tacitly supported his coming to Discovery. I, like many people, had my head in the sand. Now, the uci has to investigate and hand out even handed punishments. Like, for example, how is Valverde still riding? Blood bags were found with "valv" on them. This is far more evidence than they had to hold Basso under suspicion (Birillo, anyone?). The uci needs to be consistent (it never is). It needs to punish everyone, not just the stars (Ulrich and Basso). I guess we shall see how McQuaid handles this. I won't hold my breath that punishments and the investigation will go even handedly. Whatever the case, I hope that these names come out soon so we can get on to the business of the Giro.

My Ramblings

Good ride on Thursday guys! It was good to see Jay T. and Dave and some other people that I had not seen in awhile. It looks like regular rides are getting under way. This has always been a way for the group to get stronger. I felt much better on Thursday than last sunday. It is amazing what 10 degrees change in temperature can do on a ride. It was a little cooler and I just felt way stronger. I do think that century ride did help with my form alittle.
As far as on the procycling front, the Giro is coming. I mentioned in previous post that Tyler Hamilton is suspended. That now appears to not be the case and it looks like Tinkoff is planning on letting him ride. Popo is the leader of Disco and it has been announced that Thomas Voeckler will lead Bouygues Telecom. He was the guy that led at the tour a few years ago for a bunch of stages and was really inspiring.
I was talking with a friend on the ride on Thursday about the state of Pro Cycling with all the doping and what it was like to be a fan. His take is that we should just ride our bikes and make our own experiences. It is actually a really good perspective and actually a good outlook for life. So, I will end with that. "Ride your bike and make your own experiences!"
Ciao for Now.

'07 Tour of California Stage 4 Diary - Jens Voigt

Great interview with Jens from Tour of California.