This is the tunnel that leads from outside the 7 Eleven Olympic Training Facility Velodrome in Colorado Springs. It is the last thing you see before you pop up on the inside of the oval where today there was a world record broken. Today, Evelyn (Evie) Stevens rode a bike faster than any woman ever has in the history of this world over the course of an hour. She covered 47.98 kilometers in that hour breaking the old record set by Bridie O'Donnell just 5 weeks prior by over a full kilometer averaging 29.8 miles per hour. Her ride was near perfection. She rode aggressively and held tight to "the line". With under 15 minutes to go, while well ahead of record pace, Stevens began to feel the natural effects of lactic acid and fatigue and had some trouble holding her lines on course. The crowd rose up, and Evie Stevens battled through the pain of such an effort and was able to focus on the task at hand until it was completed, dead and buried. Despite knocking bumpers off the inside line of the corner exits half a dozen times or so, she made it to the finish safely, and now is the owner of the very prestigious one hour world record. It was a clinic put on by one of cycling's most talented road riders in the world.
Daimo Shanks, who built up Evie's bikes, poses with the record breaking steed.
A signed credential from Evelyn Stevens that I will hold onto forever. Today I called a World Record ride from a World Class athlete. The crowd was modest and loud. Due to fire code the Velodrome can only host 200 people at an event like this. Those were 200 very lucky people, and I was one hell of a lucky race announcer.
When I was in college at Florida State University in the late 70's and early 80's, I was really into a band called Kraftwerk. Techno Electro disco whatever you call it. I'll bet not one of you knew there was a song out there called Tour De France. Well there is.
And just like that, the opportunity of a lifetime is upon Evelyn (Evie) Stevens. The newly covered 333.3m Olympic Training Center Velodrome will be the location and USA Cycling has reached out to me, yes that's right, me...to announce the action at the track. I'm not sure who is more excited for the action, Evelyn or myself. It's gonna be a special hour for sure. Watch it live all over the internetweb as it will be aired across the globe. Hopefully you will be one of the lucky ones to witness the monster effort live....get after it Evie and I hope you like AC/DC.
Well folks, you did it, you live in a country where this is going to be your choice for who runs your country. Nice work. And my guess is that Hill is gonna take down the other douche bag choice rather easily. Wonderful. Here we go!!
Yesterday was a blustery day in Colorado, winds gusted to 100 mph in some areas of the foothills and mountains. The drive to the mountains to host the 2016 edition of the Fly Fishing Film Tour was fairly uneventful, the drive home was a different story, white knuckle at best. A big crowd came out to support the cause at the F3T tour and we raised a bunch of money for Project Healing Waters.
had been years since I busted out the muskrat hat to fish in the winter, it was cold out, so I busted it out on the Blue River, somewhere way down by Green Mountain Reservoir. It's still warm and was a gift from a trapper in Summit County back in the 80's when I was a singing cowboy at Keystone resort. It's a cool hat.
The drive home basically sucked until Silver Plume where the roads dried up and it was clear sailing. It's gonna be a pretty good ski day today. It was dumping hard and blowing a million miles an hour. Thankfully I only saw 2 other cars on the road all the way to the dry spots and I could drive right down the middle of the road for the 20 miles of this.
On a quick note to follow up on the Facebook purge, it is going to continue, if your Facebook feed is all about yourself all the time, you have nothing clever or funny to say, or I get spammed by your account all the time, you are fucking gone, deal.
Yea! I won! Here is a picture of me on the podium because I am so incredibly awesome and was born with a bigger natural engine than everyone else who showed up to race today! I am AWESOME! Just ask me! Yea for me!
There you have it. Today it was officially announced that after five years of struggle financially, the USA Pro Cycling Challenge has been cancelled for 2016. This has been coming for at least two years as the business model of the race really makes no sense. I was lucky enough to work with the LOC (local organizing committee) in the Vail Vallley the first two years the race rolled through there. People who ride bikes were pretty excited about it and everyone wanted to be a part of the action in some capacity simply because of the excitement generated with some of the best professional road cyclists in the world coming to Colorado to race. People volunteered jillions of hours of their time in every host city to make the race happen...hotel rooms, food, security, all huge expenses, were placed on the host cities and towns basically shut down the day of the race. You would think local businesses would flourish on these days, but most complained that no one could get to their store fronts from all the road closures, and people there to watch the race were not shopping, they were watching the race and moving on. The Schadens dumped an approximated 20 million into the race and got nothing in return, except maybe a few more Smashburgers eaten.
I went to dozens of meetings the first two years I was involved and I would sit there and ask myself "where is the money coming from and where is the return on investment?". The entire business model made no sense at all. Fans loved the race, but what were they doing to sustain it other than drinking and screaming at riders when they passed by?
In a day when pro road cycling is seen from outsiders as a pure freak show, with constant doping issues and motors in world championship bikes, who the hell is going to dump one dollar into supporting the sport many of us love...? Will this race come back as suggested by Shawn Hunter? It's gonna be a stretch. I'm not sure a USA based stage race has ever resurrected after shutting down from financial problems.
About ten year ago, I started making somewhat of a living announcing bike races. My long term goal was to always get to the upper echelon of this profession. I worked my ass off, and still do to make every event not just a race, but something much bigger. During the last two years I have committed to be really good at what I do and that is to announce events in the Rocky Mountain region and areas close by. The past year was a reality check for me, with two World Championship events in the USA, both World Cup skiing and the UCI Road Worlds, no offers came, all though there were rumors out there I was being considered for both events. I've taken on the assumption that my style simply is not pleasing enough or good enough to get the nod from those who make the decisions at the upper level. These types of opportunities will never come again for me as I'm rather long in the tooth these days, so I will concentrate on doing what I do best, which is what I've been doing all along. This race going away is kind of a final nail in my career advancement coffin,
The USA Pro Challenge has been a fun ride, but I think deep down inside we all knew the inevitable would happen, it is simple economics. Cheers Medalist, it was a fun ride, got to see a lot of great racing and great moments....onward.
There is this band called AC/DC. Their lead guitarist is named Angus. He is a legend. The band still absolutely crushes as we found out last night. Spectacular arena rock.
I'm sick of people asking me to fund crap on Facebook, for christ sake, FUND ME. And I'm sick of pictures of bikes being held up with fishing line that people have won races on. As if that is going to make me a faster rider. You put Peter Sagan on ANY FUCKING BIKE, and he is going to kick your ass. Got it?
If you are fortunate enough to live a long and fulfilled life, you will see this often along the way. To the living it makes no sense, to those afflicted it is the only answer and way to stop whatever demons they are dealing with. It must be an incredibly dark place to be in if you decide to take this path out, I don't recommend it, there is always help and people and friends who love you and care about you....but if the dark is all you see, so be it. A single day is precious, I hope many of you have learned that along the way, I certainly have. You do not get days back once they have passed, they disappear into a fog forever, but you have the experience and the memories created on those days, and that is a spectacular part of life. Find people you like, stay connected with them, do things you enjoy because you enjoy them, not because someone else told you to. Life is simple if you keep it that way, I've said that a million times in my life. Go ski, fish, bike, kite surf, hike or do whatever you do and find some sanity out there. I've lost cousins, friends and many acquaintances to suicide along the way, I've never tried or wanted to figure out what their demons were telling them to do, or why they did it. It's not my job to figure out what anyone's dark side is telling them to do. I will however tell you this....if you have a bucket of shit to deal with and are half a sane person, call me, let's go ski or something and work through it. Keep it simple friends, life gets hard for all of us sometimes, but if you look around you subjectively, there is a shit ton of fun and good people out there to help you through the pile. To be honest, my first thought was CTE, but that is for the experts to determine.....To think this guy could have been throwing double back flip tail whips today. Fuck.
It's been one hell of a winter, and I've been fortunate enough to have many of the really good snow days off by myself or with my fiance to go ski. We like skiing. I really like skiing, and all though I'm pushing 60 years of age, when it snows I can still kind of get after it a little bit if I dig deep enough. I really like skiing with Anna, we got her some new skis this year and she is really enjoying them in the soft snow which we have seen plenty of 2015/2016. She is on a Salomon Rocker 108 at 172cm. It's a fun ski.
2016 is off to a rip roaring start...including a big purge on Facebook. Facebook has turned into a festering pile of crap if you let it get out of control, so six weeks ago I sat down and manually deleted 2000 "friend" profiles on my Facebook account. It's funny, when I first joined FB, I friended or joined every single thing cycling related which was the problem, that came with a shit ton of spam and other issuess. It's gone now and I'll try to move forward with friends who are friends who may care about what is happening in my day, if not, they can unfriend me, no strings attached, I won't won't give a crap, trust me. I also had to let go of "friends" who posted copious amounts of bullshit about life, politics, themselves or who did not ever post things that are clever and funny....I'm on FB for entertainment and business purposes only. I tried to steer people to my Larry Grossman/Event Announcers page on Facebook as well as this blog, which is making a slow comeback from it's glory days, if it ever had glory days, and it is working. So if I unfriended you on Facebook and it hurt your feelings, don't take it personally, just change your personality and lighten up and maybe I will like you again. I don't give a fuck what your political views are, or what you think of others political views, and I certainly don't give a fuck about what you got for free from your sponsors, that is why they gave it to you, because they are your sponsors, so don't tell me how great it is, ok?
One more thing....if you like this blog, that is great, if you don't, don't let the door hit you in the ass...it's my blog, I can talk about me all I want here, you have a choice to read this bullshit or not.
I've had a lot of fun following people I like on social media for the most part. I have found that if your personal life is pretty incredible and full of fun and loving friends and worldly and awesome experiences regularly, some people resent that. It is also a turn off for people that have been born with the gift of good athletic genetics who actually believe because they can beat you in a race or some other type of lung busting competition that they are both socially and morally better than you and will take as many pot shots at you as they can when the opportunity arises because you have fun when they are not part of it. I find this a symptom of an extreme lack of personal confidence as well as having an innate "one up personality". Which is fine...enjoy.
I do not need to go into all the details of where I have been or what I have done, it is strewn across many places and friendships along my life path...I see many of my younger friends now locked up in the struggle of life's daily chores and requirements...and I think back to when I was their age and how simple it was in the mountains when I was that age...the ability to have one job and just ski and fish and ride bikes, which is what I did for many years. Times have changed dramatically and I have moved into another faze of my life and it is pretty wonderful. It's a shared life with nothing to prove..
And with that said, I will be reporting on how fucking awesome the AC/DC concert at the Pepsi Center was this coming Monday night, from row 9. One up that shit.
A place to come and hide away from life's daily bore, a place to smile and laugh....maybe even cry, a place to reflect on what's really important in life, where you go and who you go with....it's not about the pile of money you get to take with you to the grave folks.....your bank accounts should be a wealth of great experience and good friends. I am indeed a wealthy man. All attempts at humor on the site are just that, attempts. Most is untrue, all is purely entertainment.
Larry G
