2012 TEVA MT. GAMES OF AND FLOATING...

Hey, I ain't no pro photo guy, but here are a couple of shots from today's Steep Creek competition. It was steep, and as perfect kickoff to the celebration.

 And everyone in town will be wearing these in three days...
 

IT ALL STARTS TODAY! LET'S GET IT ON TEVA MOUNTAIN GAMES!!!

4 DAYS of the greatest celebration of sport and lifestyle are about to be unleashed in Vail, Colorado. Year 11 of the Teva Mountain Games starts today at Homestake Creek and ends Sunday in Vail. It's the greatest most joyous weekend of the year in Vail. Be there, I'm gonna tell ya about it. BRING IT VAIL! With perfect weather in the forecast, expect 40,000 spectators this weekend.

 Today's Event Schedule

AM EVENT 10:00 Mountain Click Photo Comp - Start 

10:00 Steep Creek Championship - Start

 PM 6:00 Keller Williams Free Concert - Showtime

Friday's Event Schedule

AM	EVENT
8:00	Mountain Click Photo Comp - Start
8:00	Outside Adventure Film School - Film School
9:00	Bouldering World Cup - Female Qualifier
10:00	DockDogs Big Air - Wave 1
10:30	Casting Clinics - Start
11:00	Adventure Village - Opens
11:00	Gear Town - Opens
11:00	Green Light District - Opens
11:00	SUP Demo Pool - Opens
PM
12:00	DockDogs Big Air - Wave 2
12:00	Gibbon Games - Qualifying Round 1
12:00	Teva Slopestyle - Qualifier
12:30	Casting Clinics - Start
1:00	Kayak Freestyle - Qualifier
2:00	Bouldering World Cup - Male Qualifier
2:00	DockDogs Big Air - Wave 3
2:30	Casting Clinics - Start
4:00	DockDogs Big Air - Wave 4
5:00	Gibbon Games - Qualifying Round 2
6:00	Teva Slopestyle - Finals
7:00	Dew Motion Pres. Transcendence - Showtime
7:45	Eddie Bauer Short Film Series - Showtime
8:00	Teva Slopestyle After Hours - Party Time
8:30	Teva Presents "Frontier" - Showtime
9:15	C4 Waterman Pres. "Deflated 2" - Showtime
11:00	Teva Club Style - Party Time

IF YOU HAD ONLY BEEN AT THE TOWN MEETING LAST NIGHT...

I'm not even sure where to start on last night's Eagle Town Board of Trustees meeting. It does not really belong on this blog, but it kind of does. I hate the political rants on Facebook, so you get it here. I felt I should at least stop in and listen to the work session where no public comment would be permitted, and on the agenda was to be a discussion about the possible negative effects of one of the Trustees blogging, so I thought it would be interesting to perhaps learn some things. Eagle has a new recycling center coming to town which is cool. And if there is ever a vote to ban cats in Eagle, there was about an hours worth of discussion on that. There was some very troubling discussion as well, about where money is going to come from for a couple of future projects. The new Hay Meadow development, yes, 400 acres of more houses south of the ice rink, needs a water treatment plant. Cost of this project, PHASE ONE, is projected at $16,000,000, and then two more phases must be built. The cost to improve the proposed roundabouts at the I-70 interchange and Hwy6 for ERS is $17,000,000. Everyone of the trustees began staring at each other with blank looks when these numbers came up and the question was asked. "What if ERS never gets built?" EXACTLY you morons, this is what many have said all along. Guess what, if it does not get built, YOU are going to pay for it. And this was just the start of a very embarrassing evening. As I watched for three and half hours, behavior became very unprofessional between several members of the board. Scott Webster literally picked his nose for 30 minutes while Ed Sands, the town's attorney, explained the ramification of talking about banning cats in closed quarters with more than three seat members present. Papi fell asleep at least once in his chair. However the moment that took the cake was during discussion of how the Trustee's e-mails should be handled. This of course after the publicized e-mail correspondence between some trustees and others about their perspective on the appearance of one of the other trustee members who disagreed with them all on ERS. She was accidentally copied on this belittling and bullying e-mail, documented previously on this blog, and publicized the correspondence because these transmissions are a matter of public record. Well, to make a long story short, the person who accidentally copied her on this e-mail, Scott Turnipseed, along with Scott Webster, who acted like he was five years old all night, both chose to not participate in the new Town of Eagle Trustee e-mail program. What this means is the only way to contact your town trustees which you voted into place can only be contacted through their personal e-mail, and it will not be public record. This because they were involved in a scandal they started themselves with their less than adult behavior and correspondence. The entire addressing of these issues was truly embarrassing to sit through. You are both fired.
If you think I should stick to writing about cycling, skiing, rainbows and puppies on this blog, THEN DON'T READ IT ANYMORE. I'M ELGEE WITH A2B AND I'M OUT! 

OH! And I forgot to mention that the rec path that is supposed to connect up valley with down valley was NEVER considered during the remodel phase of the Eagle roundabouts, town engineers now claim there is no room to add or build this into the project, to which several trustees exclaimed, "find the room and make it work". Never happen.

THE DAY THE WIND TRIED TO BURY ME...

I'm not terribly proud of this ride for any reason, I typically embrace wind on long rides on beautiful days. But today was different. The wind battered me for the entire 80 miles, it was a series of Joe Frazier left hooks to the body for the entire ride, and it hurt, and it tried to pull the anger demons to the surface, but I kept them buried where they belong, for I am older and wiser, and I turned the pedals over one stroke at a time, until the suffering was over. There is something terribly romantic about a solo ride, with no help, in the raging winds of spring in the Rockies, there is also something incredibly stupid.

RYDER HESJEDAL WINS FOR CANADA AND OTHER CRAP

Ryder takes the Maglia Rosa on the final exciting day of this years Giro

and on a much more important note, the Brush Creek Elementary school held their annual biathlon for the fifth grade class and all the mom's that voted "yes" for ERS were out there cheering their kids on who were running and cycling in clothing and shoes they bought on line.

 

and Memorial Day weekend was spent in cool places like this,

 

and with these trouble makers looking for fossils, which was pretty damn cool, and we found a pile of them...I'm expanding my horizons, now all I need is a metal detector and a Speedo.

And on this Memorial Day, thank you to you all who have served, especially my Dad, who served in the royal Canadian Air force. 

THIS IS KIND OF FUN, THE BRANDI RESA E-MAIL SAGA, ATTACKED BY FELLOW TOWN BOARD MEMBERS, AND COPIED ON IT, OOPS.

 Brandi Resa who was recently voted to the town of Eagle Board was personally attacked by those who do not agree with her outlook for the future of Eagle, like a bunch of punk bullies in a grade school yard, via e-mail, and was COPIED on a forwarded e-mail which continued to belittle her. I got no room for big bad bullies, get rid of these clowns is what I vote.....this is beyond embarrassment, and copied is the former MAYOR of Eagle. These are unedited versions of the actual e-mails pulled off of Brandi's Blog. Click HERE to read the entire e-mail sequence....we got some sick and childish people running this town.

—– Forwarded Message —–
From: Scott Turnipseed
To: edwardwoodland@me.com
Cc: ‘Brandi Resa’ ; ‘Scot Webster’ ; ‘Kraige Kinney’ ; ‘Joe Knabel’
Sent: Wednesday, May 9, 2012 1:19 PM
Subject: FW: Town Board Meeting tonite

Thought you guys might like Maggies first impression of Brandi last night!

From: Jim Ash [mailto:XXXXX]
Sent: Wednesday, May 09, 2012 10:44 AM
To: Scott Turnipseed
Subject: Fwd: Town Board Meeting tonite

Maggie is so perceptive!
Sent from my iPhone

Begin forwarded message:

From: “Brennen Fitzgerald”
Date: May 9, 2012 10:27:32 AM MDT
To:
Subject: RE: Town Board Meeting tonite

Inquiring minds want to know what is going to happen to lovely Eagle Co!!!!!

Maggie quote of the night when she got home……”who was that crazy lady on the board…Brandy something?  She looked like she crawled out of a culvert!”  

See you all soon!

B.

Hello Brandi,

I just copied you on an e-mail by mistake and I want to apologize.  You will probably never forgive me and I understand that but I do want to extend an official and heartfelt apology.

Call if you would like and again I am sorry.

Scott Turnipseed

xxx-xxxx

I say man up my friend! You passed on the words, stand behind what you said and laughed at! No FLIP FLOPPING allowed on this one! Apology not accepted....

This entire correspondence of course leads to a point that there may in fact be a multiple way tie for the A2B Douche Bad of the Year in 2012. For those of you on this list who once considered me at least an acquaintance before this post, well, I guess we are not the best of company anymore, for you are all now deemed douches by me, and I do NOT hide behind my words, and I WILL not be bullied buy your good ol boys and girls club, what a disgrace to  the town of Eagle, get over yourselves.

HOW RIDING WITH LANCE ARMSTRONG SAVED MY ASS...

It's pretty damn good to be back in Eagle, Colorado as you might guess, even with the Eagle River Mall of Douches approved, which I'm assuming will be built if ever, when all the people who voted for it are dead. Apparently Eagle was going to be written a check for $1-2 Million immediately upon approval, I have not seen that check just yet but I'm sure it is floating around town. And I am looking forward to the half off of everything at The Nearly Everything Store in the near future. I'm gonna go get that hummingbird feeder I've been eye balling for the past eight years...at half off!

Whoa, back on track here. I rode with Lance Armstrong last night in Eagle, figuratively speaking, and was damn glad to have him along on the ride up to Mike's night out. I usually throw caution to the wind on these long solo rides and bring nothing, but yesterday I was actually PREPARED for disaster had it happened because I had Lance Armstrong with me. Somewhere near the far end of Catwalk, that nasty sound of a rubber nobbie ripping off my tubeless tire occurred as all my Stans squirted out of my front tire and left it's mark on the trail like the skid mark in Red Developments underwear when they fail to deliver to Eagle any promises. So I walked out to the clear spot at the end of the trail and contemplated. I had a tube, but it was a 26 incher and I've got 29 inch rims, oops. Ah! I had a bottle of Caffelatex Espresso in my pack! Bam! I dumped the entire bottle into the tire to try and seal the LARGE hole and watched most of the Espresso squirt out of the tire like Barbasol shaving cream. Fuck. And then, when the pressure in the tire got lower, the shit actually sealed! I topped off the tire and continued my journey which was heading to Mike's Night Out to do some trail work with the HTC, which is different than the HSC, but I have tools. So WTF.   :-)

The tire held until halfway up the hike a bike and then let go again, now it's turning into the fucking SS Minnow journey, a three hour tour, not.

This is when I realized Lance Armstrong was with me and that he could save my ass. So I ate his endorsed Honey Stinger Waffle and now had the perfect patch for my ails. With the 26 inch tube and Lance Armstrong actually getting in my rim and in between the tube and the tire, I was all set, and all was right with the world in Eagle, and there were lots of Grouse tracks which make me smile, and I got some trail work done, and Lance Armstrong slept in my tire last night and is still there. Thanks Lance, I owe you one.

The End

Another Great Adventure in Eagle, pre mall days.

A NEW STAGE RACE-MTB AYITI (HAITI)

There's a new game in town for those who seek adventure and a world class mountain biking experience. The first ever MTB stage race in Haiti January 30th-February 2nd. The Only 50-60 spots will be awarded to potential racers and the first two days of this event will be spent working with IMBA and the local community improving and educating the Haiti population on how to maintain and build sustainable singletrack trails as well as what their current resources can do to promote tourism and bring $$$ to the people of Haiti who still struggle after the disastrous earth quake which recently devastated their country. Click on the logo above for more information on MTB Ayiti.

I HATE HAVING TO DO THIS....BUT YOU GOTTA VOTE NO ON ERS TOMORROW IN EAGLE

 Most of you know how I feel about the Eagle River Station project proposed for development on the east side of town along Interstate 70. I think it sucks and is a potential nightmare for the town and valley. First of all, if you want to shop at a mall for your recreational activities, move to Glenwood Springs or Denver, and get out of Eagle. ERS is not going to save what you call "your town". It's gonna drag it into the dumpster. I'm not going to get into all the numbers and analytic analysis, it's a waste of time. I simply don't want a fucking mall in the town where I live. You probably are wondering what these photos have to do with anything. On my recent visit to Florida, where a jillion people live, most of the shopping malls there are dead, and I'm not talking just the little strip malls that were all put out of business by the mega malls every town had on every corner. I'm talking about BIG malls, empty and decaying. There was once a Target department store four blocks from my mom's place in NORTHWEST FT. LAUDERDALE, where millions of people live, literally, and it is now a HOLE in the ground, the store has been leveled with a fence now up and overgrown landscaping and piles of concrete randomly placed, and nothing is being  built in it's place. There is a WALMART going out of business there. It's sick. The most disturbing scene of all is that four of the golf courses I once played as a teenager close to home when I lived there are done, they are simply growing back over to a natural state as so many people have finally realized that golf is a waste of time for the money they had to pay to play and the cost of maintaining these properties became non profitable (sound familiar Cordillera?). These golf courses were all built in the middle of middle to upper class neighborhoods where real estate prices once flourished. Now these homes are on unmaintained property that is growing back to a natural state, it's a real estate DISASTER. Four golf courses are doing this, and that is within a ten minutes drive of my old home. It's sad and disturbing. This is the wave of the future. ERS is not going to magically put more money in people's pockets and turn around the town of Eagle, it's not going to happen, if anything, it will become a huge monkey on the back of our town. For the "blamers", you can talk shit on politics all you want and blame everyone else for your problems. If you want to change something then get off your ass and do it yourself. For me the past two years have been a challenge like everyone else, I've had my home foreclosed on, I've moved three times (thankfully back to Eagle the last time), I made some horrible decisions that cost me what little money I had left, and you know what, I'M HAPPY and I'm free of all the ball and chains, and I've reinvented myself as an event announcer, a journalist, a custom ski boot fitter. I also live in a town that has common sense and should tell Red Development to once again kiss off into the sunset tomorrow while we can still see a sunset that is not blocked by a fucking mall. Go away. Look at Stratton Flats in Gypsum for your Mall model, it's a disaster that NEVER got off the ground. Idiots.

And now, let's lighten it up just a tad, this is huntin.

2012 SUPERIOR MORGUL MEN'S PRO 1, 2 FINISH

Today had plenty of drama at the final piece of the Morgul Superior road race with overall omnium points and standing making some big a surprising changes. The tactics and racing were world class, and the finish so close. Chris Winn riding for Organic Horizon/Panache took a narrow win over Robin Eckmann which gave him the weekend's overall win in the omnium.

ZABRISKIE LIGHTS UP AMGEN FOR GARMIN-BARRACUDA

photo-John Pierce

Garmin-Barracuda rider David Zabriskie lit it up at the Amgen Tour of California yesterday to take the overall lead over A2B favorite Jens Voigt. With that said, with two large days of climbing left at the ATOC, Tejay Van Garderen (USA) BMC Racing Team is the rider A2B feels is best positioned for the overall win after a BIG day in the TT as well...I think this will be Tejay's to take. Tommy Danielson will have to be VERY aggressive the next two days if he wants to gain the top spot in Cali. Stand back, the fireworks are about to ignite.

LOOKS LIKE BIG LONG CHANGES IN THE WEATHER

We may be in for some hard changes in our cycling weather according to the KLST weatherman.

And then there is this guy...bastard.

IF I DID NOT AWAKE TOMORROW MORNING...

 At least I had today, on the bike, on a SS, and it hurt like hell. I know I'm alive, for sure.... every time I climb on that beast I can't believe what you SS's can do. The term "Animals" does not do you justice at all....

12 HOURS OF MESA VERDE, AWESOME.

The start

12 Hours of Mesa Verde Start 2012 from Larry Grossman on Vimeo.

Put this one on your calender as a must do in the future, if you can get in. 800 racers lined it up in Cortez yesterday for the 6th annual 12 Hours of Mesa Verde and threw body blows at each other all day. The riding here on Phil's World is nothing short of incredible, and there is other stuff down here as well as explained to me by Phil himself in a triple top secret meeting. Some very strange events presented themselves at the end of this race with some huge surprises at the finish line. Paul Gorbold and Yari Kirland took the solo honors...this place has some bomb riding and the 2013 edition has already been locked on my 2013 announcing calender...thanks to Dani and staff, you guys killed it!

TOMMY DANIELSON FUNDRAISER RIDE FOR THE COLORADO HIGH SCHOOL CYCLING LEAGUE, BIG FUN.

Yeah, it was a fun ride, more commentary when my schedule gets a bit more civil, but here are some video highlights from a stupid fun day.....

SOME CATCHING UP TO DO.....

My blogging has been pretty sleepy thus far in 2012, primarily due to life's bullshit. With that said, I'm bustin out as I'm now just about permanently resettled in Eagle, the summer season is kickin in full swing, I'm abouyt to be able to ride bikes again with some free time on the menu, and the past week was a whirlwind with a big MTB race called in Castle Rock, the Tommy Danielson fundraiser for the Colorado High School Fundraiser (vij to come soon), and of course the much anticipated and super fun Tommy Danielson Fundraiser ride and lunch which followed at Pasta Vino in Boulder (for only $50!!). It's been a blast, and I'll catch up with life here in bloggersville ASAP. The bass fishin and beach were stupid good in Florida, and Mom was treated to a monster time of a lunch at Joe's Stone Crab on South Beach in Miami for her 85th birthday...she pretty much rocked the place out. So you7 get this, the first internet acces and post from the airline gate in Ft. Lauderdale International Airport. See you in a few Colorado, I'm ready to come home...

WHAT DID YA EXPECT?

I'm intrigued by road racing and actually doing it. I like to do it on occasion, especially if there is dirt involved. I've done well a couple of times when I came into a race prepared. I have not been very well prepared for anything on a bike since about October, I'm still not. However, I do like to try and ride the Koppenberg each year because it is short and fun and hard. My first year in the 55+ category is this year on the road and it's the same as every other category, fast and difficult. On a very windy morning in Superior last weekend I found that out, as one small hesitation after a great start to the race created a gap to the lead dozen riders or so in a field of about 45 riders. In an instant I was hanging on for dear life trying to close a ten foot gap, then a twenty foot gap, then they were gone, and I was left to suffer with the rest of the chasers, some who also took me to the wood shed, but not all....being alive and healthy is a good thing, taking yourself too seriously is not....

Photos from Annette at MountainMoonPhotography

Left for dead to battle the rest of the chasers and pretenders at the Koppenberg, and loving every minute of it.

 

200,000 IS A BIG NUMBER

Addicted To Bicycles is thankful to all of it's readers for getting us to over 200,000 hits. Who'd have thunk a Jackass like me could pull that off?

A CLASSIC...

Indeed, a classic, still standing, as it was from the days of the Coors Classic and the Red Zinger, and I had the opportunity to announce this gem last year, now known as Superior Morgul. This 13.3 mile loop has a bit of everything  including many steep grades which pummel riders lap after lap. I'm slated to be back, and just for jollies to elaborate more precisely during the race, I rode the course 2.5 times yesterday to remind myself of the pain the course can inflict, even on a training ride and not under racing stress, and the finish climbing "the wall" is untouchable, and will crack all but the strongest once again.