Last posting Oct 2008?!

Jeez, its been awhile. It seems as though my life outside of cycling took over, the weather in IL has been terrible, and my training has been hampered by a persistent (and traveling!) ankle injury. So in a nutshell:

Training continued through the winter. 1/2 of it with my club and the other 1/2 at home on my trainer. The dvr and i got to be very good friends. while i enjoyed the decrease in travel, i really missed suffering through workouts with people other than Michael Westen, Shawn and Gus, the HIMYM crew, (yes all tv characters) and my dog Cooper. I started working with a trainer at my gym and she's been great. I continued with 'cross with the ChiCrossCup series but my fall at the USGP reinjured my shoulder and i had to take things easy. Then my hip started acting up after i badly twisted my ankle snowboarding the Colorado. IT band stretching helped. My club had a training camp in Indiana which was awesome (except for the Wall. Stupid hill.) Hip is acting funny again and now my knee has joined it. Injury injury injury. sigh. After 7 months, i'm thinking its time to get it checked. After Downers, that is.

Racing has been going on, even with all of the outside life stuff happening. Weddings, visiting family from Europe, crappy weather, and an extremely busy day job has forced me to start using a calendar to keep track of all the things i needed to do. I'm not sure when i turned into an adult. Throughout the season though, my racing has been getting better. its still a SLOW progression (which is annoying to this less than patient person) but i do see the silver lining and the fact that my fear is finally subsiding is GREAT. I've even been in a few "incidents" (crashes, rain, bumps) and managed to stay upright or jump back in? AND i've been called aggressive recently? Good stuff. Some highlights include Champaign, Elk Grove, Kenosha (Superweek), and the Soldier Field Series. Lots of races where i've improved, so once again, its something. Hopefully i can move from improved to awesome...like by the weekend.

In other news, which isn't new news since she's already back, but Jessi Prinner won the Juniors TT Nat'l Champs and went to Russia for the Junior Worlds as a member of the US Team. So incredible and so deserving.

A couple more races to go with the Road Season (the summer has gone so fast...) and then 'Cross starts up. With the mild summer we've had, there's been many days that i've had this urge to pull out my 'cross bike. I'm really excited for this upcoming season, with the Chicago Series and the USGP (now a 4 race series!). Ok, i think thats about as short of a write up i can make for...10 months...wow...