We got notice today that the Good Life is getting the boot (from Eau Claire) on Feb 17 as seen below

I went to speak with Devon at mall admin and he essentially said that there’s no room for negotiation on even a date because they already have a contract with another group for mid Feb. I re-explained the Good Life’s nature and that we have a large amount of people of various backgrounds relying on us, programs, in addition to great media coverage and so on but, though apologetic, emphasised that there’s negotiation to be had.

So, where from here? 

-Find a new space (decide what we really want/need as this could be a good opportunity to get it)
-Make a timeline as to closing date, etc
-Find storage if needed in the likely scenario we don’t find a new awesome venue by the 17th
-Sell/get rid of as much stuff as possible

If you’d like to join the discussion, it’s happening over email so please message me directly and I’ll add you.

Thank you,

Jonny Bear

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Perfect…. hahah.  From http://www.cyclingtipsblog.com/ via facebook

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Mission
The Jason Lapierre Memorial Cycling Weekend has evolved into one of Alberta’s premiere cycling events over it’s 4 years. With the race’s ever increasing exposure to the public, the mission has remained the same: to highlight the engaging, exciting, pure spectacle of speed on two wheels and the end result of countless hours of training and a healthy lifestyle. An increased appreciation of the end result makes motorists aware of the need for cyclists to safely share the road with vehicles.

Event history
Speed Theory Cycling, was rocked to its core on July 19th 2006 when a motorist, deemed 100% at fault, ended the life of one of the club’s best friends while he was out on a training ride near Cochrane Alberta. Along with the cycling club’s own growth in the last 5 years, the idea of hosting a flagship bike race in the downtown core has been an overall goal to place racing in an accessible exciting venue for Calgary’s public. This increased exposure will put faces and names to the hundreds of cyclists training on rural roads with the hope of greater tolerance. 2010 marked the inaugural Downtown Criterium where 2 entire city blocks are completely closed to traffic and pure racing and the product of a healthy, active lifestyle is put on public display. Five different abilities of athlete are put on show with separate events all commentaried by a professional MC. The ability classes go from athletes who enjoy cycling at a ‘hobby’ level while incorporating family and career all the way to aspiring professionals who will be fighting for valuable results! With the flagship event’s move to downtown, the ability to host a kid’s race was also an opportunity that was not missed. The Kid’s Crit opened the evenings events with a bang being open to kids from 3 – 15 years of age. It is always a crowd favourite.

Spread the word about the race to as many people as you can.  If you have the time and the resources feel free to print one of the posters and stick them up around town.  The more that people know about the race the better.

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Rules:
Simple rules (from the spreadsheet entry form)…
-Submit your excel spreadsheet with picks to Kyle Marcotte (dukyle at yahoo dot ca) before 11:59pm Friday July 1st.
-You can enter multiple teams (Cost is $20 for your first team, $15 for your second, $10 for your third… per household)
-Results are final after each stage (so no drug overturn of results). Points schedule is listed below. Ties are divided by the number of stage wins, then stage points, then a coin toss.
-Trash talking is encouraged.

The spreadsheet/entry form is available now. Use this entry form, it makes the data entry so much easier on my part http://goo.gl/Sq7sl

Prizes (link to our prize list so far).

Scoring:
-Individual stage points: 1st – 25 points 2nd – 20 points 3rd – 15 points
-Yellow Jersey points: 1st – 150 points 2nd – 100 points 3rd – 75 points
-Green Jersey points: 1st – 100 points 2nd – 75 points 3rd – 50 points
-Polka dot Jersey points: 1st – 50 points 2nd – 40 points 3rd – 30 points
-Team placing: 1st – 50 points 2nd – 40 points 3rd – 30 points
-Yelow, Green, Polka dot and Team points are only awarded once at the end of stage 21 (but they will be updated so that you can see the swing as the race progresses).

The points will be updated as much as possible and posted on: http://www.calgarytriandbike.blogspot.com//

Again, all proceeds will be donated by the overall pool winner to the organization of their choice.  The pool winner will be receiving a tax receipt for the entire amount donated.

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I have Achilles Tendinitis (Tendinopathy)…. but, this is just a self diagnosis . After a ride to Cochrane the other week my achilles got a bit sore. I just assumed it was because I hadn’t ridden in a few months, and i guess i was right but i should have taken a bit more time off. Now i’m sitting in Pentiction with the sun shining, beautiful open roads just a few km’s away and my bike sitting beside me just itching to be taken out.

Rest and some anti-inflammatories, thats all i can do for now.

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While most of the country has been racing for months now, in Alberta the snow is only now receding into the Rocky Mountain foothills. As such, the Alberta Road Racing calendar will officially kickoff this weekend in Edmonton with the classic Velocity Stage Race.

Also kicking off their season is TOP GEAR/ROAD a newer Alberta team which has stepped up its game for 2011. In just its third season, TOPGEAR/ROAD has added a number of high calibre riders and sponsors over the off-season which should make them one of the top contending teams in Western Canada.

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For people who frequent this sight… you might see more engineering items on the blog now that i’m attempting the whole ‘iron ring’ thing.

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What happens to an impoverished developing nation town when you flood it with 20,000 bicycles? You lift three times that number of people out of poverty. Pedals for Progress and founder David Schweidenback have been shipping used American bicycles to Rivas, Nicaragua for the last two decades and the transformation has been incredible.

More at thebicyclecityfilm.com/?

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This is one of the Many videos posted on the NYVelocity site… head on over to

http://nyvelocity.com/content/features/2011/armstrong-sca-deposition-videos for the rest.

Check out this list of top riders Lance Armstrong beat to win the 2005 Tour de France. Most have been linked to doping. (from VeloNews)

• 1. Lance Armstrong, Discovery Channel
• 2. Ivan Basso, CSC – confessed to Puerto involvement and banned from 2006 Tour ()
• 3. Jan Ullrich, T-Mobile – connected to Puerto and banned from 2006 Tour
• 4. Francisco Mancebo, Illes Balears – connected to Puerto and banned from 2006 Tour
• 5. Alexander Vinokourov, Astana – tested positive for doping at 2007 Tour
• 6. Levi Leipheimer, Gerolsteiner — accused of doping by Floyd Landis and former Gerolsteiner manager
• 7. Michael Rasmussen, Rabobank – ejected from 2007 Tour while in the yellow jersey
• 8. Cadel Evans, Davitamon-Lotto
• 9. Floyd Landis, Phonak – disqualified as 2006 Tour winner for doping
• 10. Oscar Pereiro, Phonak – alleged to have doped by Landis
• 11. Christophe Moreau, Credit Agricole – admitted EPO use after Festina Affaire
• 12. Yaroslav Popovych, Discovery Channel – home searched
• 13. Eddy Mazzoleni, Lampre-Caffita – charged in doping conspiracy after receiving a two-year ban in 2008
• 14. George Hincapie, Discovery Channel — accused of doping by Floyd Landis
• 15. Haimar Zubeldia, Euskaltel-Euskadi
• 16. Jörg Jaksche, Liberty Seguros – admitted doping since 1997
• 17. Bobby Julich, CSC
• 18. Oscar Sevilla, T-Mobile – suspended by team in 2006 for Puerto links
• 19. Giuseppe Guerini, T-Mobile
• 20. Carlos Sastre, CSC
• Also, 23. Leonardo Piepoli, Saunier Duval-Prodir – tested positive for CERA in 2008

and of course there has to be a remix – HERE

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Copy the poster and spread the news.  Higher quality one (11MB) HERE

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Ten feet or ten miles, whatever it takes.
On May 13th — bike to work day — Take some time to appreciate the natural world around you. Whether it’s the path through the park or some ripping single-track, make sure to seek out some dirt on your way to work.

Dirt to Work from WTB on Vimeo.

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The inspiration for Rapha products often comes from the places, riders and stories of road racing. Our 2010 Club Jerseys were inspired by Johan Museeuw, Sean Kelly and Dario Pegoretti. To further celebrate these colourful characters Rapha commissioned three short films. The Rapha story labels were the inspiration, but the directors were given free reign to interpret them as they pleased.

Renowned film directors Nick Livesey and Adrian Moat took up the challenge, along with photographer and long time Rapha collaborator Ben Ingham. The resulting films are a delight, exploring passion, craftsmanship and the psychology of racing and getting right to the heart of the sport we love. It has been a privilege to work with Ridley Scott Associates and such talented friends on these films. I hope you enjoy them.

Check out the trailer – I cant embed it  on the blog –  http://www.rapha.cc/a-throw-of-the-dice

There are some other great ones on their Vimeo account you can check out here – http://vimeo.com/raphafilms

This is one of the better ones I think .

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Found this peach of a graph the other day and though it did a great job of showing what muscles are being used, and when they are in action within each pedal stoke.  There is a premium on the thigh muscles, particularly the quadraceps, the muscles on the tops of the legs. The gluteus muscle group is also very important.

But your upper body also gets a workout at the higher intensities by stabilising your core when on the bike to stop from rocking side to side. Also Biceps shoulders ect.

In other news….

Officials for the Federal Drug Administration have stepped up their investigation, according to a New York Times report. Among those they’ve spoken with are former cyclists who, Juliet Macur and Michael S. Schmidt write, “have supported and detailed claims that Armstrong and his former United States Postal Service team participated in systematic doping, according to a cyclist who has been interviewed and two others privy to the inquiry.”

Reached Wednesday in Denver, Armstrong told the Associated Press said he had no comment. As allegations surfaced during the Tour de France, however, he said he would deny doping “as long as I live.”

I found this poll as well….

Do you believe Lance Armstrong was doping when he won multiple Tours de France?

• Yes -  56%
• No - 43%

Total Votes: 853

Why is this such a big deal you ask?  it has to do with $$$!  Can you remember what team Lance was on while he raced?  US Postal service, linked to the federal government.  The teams budget was around €1,000,000/year, including secondary sponsors.  And where did the majority of this money come from…. tax payers!  So if he cheated…. its a big deal to government and taxpayers.

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I enjoy biking to work every day.  Not only does it get me there in the same amount of time that City Transit would, but i dont have to pay for parking, it wakes me up way more than a coffee ever could, and i’m lucky enough to have a secure enclosure to lock my bike in.  It got me wondering how many people on average bike to work in Canada, or even other countries….. and guess what I found?  A great infographic showing the percentage of people that bike to work and the percentage of obese people in each country. They almost seem to be related…

Click for Larger Version

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The American has been a critic of the UCI in recent years, and says that he is concerned by allegations that the UCI accepted a bribe to cover up a positive doping case involving Lance Armstrong.

The UCI has denied the claim, but admits that it received sizeable donations from Armstrong in the past.

His ideas

1: Use external agencies: “The first thing is to eliminate the drug testing from the UCI completely. Separate it from them. Work with WADA and Interpol and bodies like the AFLD [the French Anti-Doping Agency] and the different countries in the European communities. The key is separating the drug tests from the governing body…you can’t have somebody accepting gifts from Armstrong.”

2: Get the UCI to hand over testing funds: “The money for drug testing is currently being spent by the UCI. Why not put those funds towards an independent group that has cheques and balances and transparency?”

3: Continuously change the people calling the shots: “Rotating the elections of drug enforcement is something that should be looked into, so you don’t get one guy in power who decides to take a payoff and keep ‘fixing’ stuff. You have to do checks and balances so that there is trust put back in the system.”

4: Use more than one lab to test samples, thus backing up results: “Currently with urine tests or blood tests, you do A and B samples…what if you did A,B, C and D? I don’t know the quantity that you need of blood and urine, but I believe that there has got to be enough to get four samples, two each to two different labs.

“I don’t like it if someone casts doubts against the lab…this is what Armstrong and Floyd have done in the past [with the LNDD in Paris]. If you have two different labs involved, it creates transparency. I’m saying this because I believe the French lab is absolutely a credible one. I believe they are the ones who are being honest.”

5: Establish norms for all riders in order to be able to pinpoint sudden changes. “Use wattage, VO2 Max, O2 profiling and blood testing to start tracking these riders.”

LeMond’s idea is to utilise VO2 Max tests plus power meters to establish an ability-level for riders. His belief is that if a rider has a VO2 Max of a certain level, it should be possible to work out the likely limits to his or her performance, in terms of time trial and climbing speeds.

Any significant improvement on this baseline would be investigated in order to eliminate the possibility that the rider has been doping. The process would be a form of physiological profiling, much as the current UCI bio passport establishes an average value for blood parameters.

6: Reward those who cooperate with investigations/positive cases: “With the criminal aspect, I think a plea-bargaining deal would be really important. Relax the penalties for those who provide significant information, and punish those who refuse to do so.”

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Check out these amazing photographs from the Boston newspaper.

Part I

Part II

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Tour de France
Tours and Triomphe
Is the Tour de France getting easier?
Jul 19th 2010

THE 97th Tour de France finishes on Sunday July 25th in Paris after 3,642km (2,263 miles) of cycling over 21 gruelling days. Although this year’s route is regarded by many as particularly tough, it could be considered a mere jaunt through the sunflowers compared to earlier Tours. When the first race was staged in 1903 riders cycled 2,428km over six stages. But distances rapidly climbed to reach a peak of 5,745km in 1926, with the winner completing the race in 238 hours and 44 minutes at an average speed of 24.3km/h. Since then the length of the Tour has fallen steadily but the average speed of the winner has risen to around 40km/h.

So now that you’ve been called a sissy… what should you do?  How about attack Andy Schleck after he has a mechanical!  ya… and get the yellow jersey.  Now…. make a youtube vid about how sorry you are… ya.. do that.

Alberto Contador has posted a YouTube apology to former Tour de France leader Andy Schleck for the timing of an attack that sees the Spaniard now lead the race. The Astana rider admitted he wasn’t happy with how he’s taken the Tour’s yellow jersey, and hopes it doesn’t impact his relationship with the Luxembourg rider.

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