Dropping the hammer: A tale of two temperatures.

I'm aware that some of you out there may not live in Columbia, Missouri (midwestern Mecca of the bicycle), so I thought I would update those non-COMO residents with a few things we here in mid-Missouri are dealing with.  First, the current weather situation.

If you follow the green arrow to its tip, you will see a rough estimation of current wind chill factors for COMO.  Makes for some tough cycling to be sure.  But does it?  Standardly, if one braved this weather on their bike, say, to commute into work for example, it was only a subjective guess of how 'epic' the ride really was...or how much 'suffering' truly was incurred when one was bragging about said ride with their office mates around the proverbial water cooler.  But this problem has now been solved by a handy chart provided by the good folks at cyclocosm.com which allows you to calculate, and thus objectively determine your cycling commitment and level of suffering in cold weather taking into account both sustained wind speed and temperature.  The weather conditions are stratified into "Jens Factor" units and range from 1 to HC (hors categorie).

For your benefit, I calculated what the Jens Factor would be if you rode in to work this morning and marked it on the chart with a green 'X'.  We are definitely in the midst of Jens Factor HC territory which states:
Overview - suicidal heroism.  Apparel required:  Spacesuit.  Conditions: Apocalyptic, biblical, hardcore.

Secondly, non-COMO residents may also be unfamiliar with the regular column in the Columbia Tribune newspaper called 'Trib Talk' which allows COMO citizens to rant and rave about whatever they like.  On Sunday, Tribune editor Jim Robertson assembled the best-of-the-best Trib Talk comments for 2009, and  not surprisingly, many had to do with cyclists.

May 2:  "Do we have two diametrically opposed ideas going on here? We've got $23 million or whatever for the pedal group, and now we've got a $15 million parking ramp going up for cars.  Now, which do you want? Do you want me to ride my bike or drive my car, or should I just do both?

July 30: "I am tired of all this ranting and raving about bicyclists when it's pedestrians who are the real problem.  Nothing gets on my nerves more than when I'm driving downtown and have to wait for some gawking walker yakking into a cell phone and dawdling across the crosswalk when I have places to go.  Even families, no doubt groggy from a heavy meal of macaroni and cheese and hamburgers, can't get the lead out and get across the dang street.  Don't they see my signal?  It's even worse when you're two cars back and some tramp slows to a crawl while scoping Elly's Couture at 100 yards and you know you're not going to get through the light.  Don't get me started on the handicapped.  Don't they have buses to take those people where they need to go?"

Nov 18: "I have a question.  Us drivers can't honk at bike riders, we can't honk at pedestrians or grandmas in wheelchairs.  Can I honk at a deer looming at my headlights when driving?"

The last one I've chosen for you today has absolutely nothing to do with cycling.  I just couldn't resist.

April 24:  "This is for all you anti-gun, bleeding-heart liberal Democrats: I don't know about gun lovers, but mine is for self-preservation, be it human or animal.  I'm not going to be a statistic for anyone.  Six things I believe in:  I'm a Christian, I'm an American, I'm heterosexual, I'm pro-gun and I'm a conservative.  When the hammer drops, the bullshit stops.  Any questions?"

To which Robertson replies:  "That's five things."

So what are we to learn from this?  If these comments represent the sentiments of the average COMO citizen then people here seem to be generally frustrated that they (in order)

1) do not have access to parking ramps for their bikes,

2) are not allowed to run over the handicapped with their cars

3) are unclear about the civil rights of Cervidae

4) are having difficulties counting to six

That said, they do appear to be quite certain that when the proverbial hammer drops, the bullshit, indeed will stop.  Speaking of dropping the hammer and then stopping to shit, I thought it was time for a Lance update.  Aside from getting to winter train in Hawai'i (which, incidentally, has a Jens Factor of minus 10), one of the many other perks of being Lance Armstrong is that you have access to state of the art equipment in virtually every area of cycling.  Take for example a new direction of physiologic monitoring that he and Allen Lim are exploring involving the regular examination of his core body temperature.  Now if either you or I or members of say, Team Astana, wanted to monitor our body temperature during training, we'd be forced to go old-school and pop a thermometer under our tongue - or maybe use one of those ear probes.  Not Lance.  Lance is going inside on this job by swallowing a sensor in pill-form which will travel deep into his intestines and send back the vital data to a receiver.  Here's Lance about to pop the pill.

But the pill is only as good as the receiver reading the results, so they called in exercise physiologist, Dr. Stacy Sims to do the honors.  Now, one would think that with all of this fancy technology, the data would be able to be uploaded to a satellite and  fired around the planet so they could read the results back at RadioShack headquarters on the mainland.  Not so, and in fact, poor Dr. Sims still has to go backside.

Ok, so maybe she didn't have to go all the way backside, but still....

So I'm left with two questions...

First - Does another PhD have to fish the little pill out of the toilet when it's made its way through LA? Second - If the little pill had a camera on it - what would it reveal inside LA's stomach?  Perhaps a tiny, half-digested action figure of AC that Lance uses like a dog's chew toy for inspiration?

And out of curiosity, I contacted the people at Cyclocosm.com who have provided me with the information for training in Hawai'i at a Jens Factor of minus 10:  Overview: Sheer delight.  Apparel:  Board shorts or bikini, flip flops.  Conditions: Chance of warm, sunny day=95% - don't forget your sunglasses.

The boys over at Team Sky are also dropping the hammer on some new technology of their own which they revealed yesterday at the team launch party.  For 2010, they will be testing an alternative to current bicycle helmets.  It comes in the form of a new kind of hair shellac which forms their own hair into a protective shell, stronger than currently produced bicycle helmets, thus obviating their use entirely.  Here's a picture of Wiggins, Lovkvist and Boasson Hagen demonstrating them at the party, courtesy of Cyclingnews.

Stay warm everyone...

Pedal on!

Fear the 'Stache: Floyd Landis Comes to Columbia

It's mid-November.  But what many of you may not be aware of is that a movement is afoot to change the name of this, the eleventh month of the year to 'MOvember'.  The reason?  Because this is the month that millions of men around the globe are choosing to get in touch with their inner porn star, or favorite 70's televion actor, and bust out some hair on their upper lip (aka - the moustache or 'MO' for short) in the name of raising money for prostate cancer.  You can check out all the hairy details at Movember.com.  Or just watch this:



As you can see, the Movemeber.com organization has parterned with, among other groups, Lance Armstrong's Livestrong Foundation.  Not to be left out of the fun, LA himself has decided to try to jump into the moustachioed foray.

Unlike winning the Tour de France, it does not appear as though LA is having an easy time growing the 'stache and this one is looking a little weary.  But let's give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he didn't start growing this on November 1st.  But if this is the final product, I personally fear that throngs of Trek-riding, weekend warrior cyclists with canary-yellow bracelets will also now start sporting these flimsy monkey-paw staches to emulate their hero, no matter how follicularly challenged their upper lips may be.  And all will hail LA as being the inspiration for them to toss away their razors this month.

But alas, long before LA decided to try to sprout a pubescent wisp of hair up there, the moustache has had its presence in the pro-peleton.  Do not forget the truly spectacular porn-stache Garmin rider Steven Cozza wore as he won the Best Young rider jersey in the 2007 Tour of Missouri...

And a year later, upper lips were screaming for fear of being naked on team Garmin as Dave Zabriskie joined in the fray.

Surrounded by all of the cyclists of Garmin getting a piece of the MO-action, team physiologist Allen Lim's upper lip must have been feeling a little underdressed.  Being of Asian descent, however, can wreak some havoc on facial hair production, so one has to wonder if he might have been involved in the recent facial hair doping scandal, Operation Puerto Rico as he suddenly appeared with this little number that looks alarmingly stout.

But let's remember who probably has the oldest moustache in the peleton:  Mr. Floyd Landis.

And this is no plain moustache, but rather the moustache with the unconnected chin goatee - also called the Maynard G. Krebs if it stands alone.  Floyd has been rocking this one continuously since back in the days of US Postal:

As many of you know, Floyd was here in Columbia this past weekend to speak at a fundraiser for arthritis over at the Orr St. Gallery.  When I arrived at the benefit and approached him, I was completely struck by how small and lean he was.  We made small talk for a bit, and I was utterly impressed by how genuinely humble the guy is. At one point, I was asking him about his performance on Stage 17 of the 2004 Tour de France, and he commented about how amazing he felt that day.  Then he quickly added, "You know, it seems when I felt my absolute best and everything seemed to be going so well for me - that's when all the shit hit the fan."  My response was that that exact thing happens to everyone one of us - except when the shit hits the fan in everyone else's life, it doesn't get dragged through the media.

Various items were auctioned and dinner was served, during which you could watch Stage 17 of the 2006 Tour de France when he went on the now infamous solo breakaway to earn back the time he had lost when bonking the day before. Afterwards, Floyd went on to give his lecture, titled 25,000 miles.  This talk documented the number of miles he has ridden on his new hip resurfacing implant called a Birmingham Hip Replacement.  He further described just how much he endured prior to undergoing the replacement, riding on the osteonecrotic and osteoarthritic old hip in three Tours de France, and countless other races.  After the talk, he stuck around to speak with everyone who wanted to meet with him, and to sign various pieces of Team OUCH memoribilia that were raffled off during the benefit.

The evening was an absolute thrill for me.  If I was partially biased before I went, in thinking I really liked the guy, I certainly came away from the benefit completely biased in thinking the world of his honest, genuine demeanor.  One of the final questions asked of him was regarding what his plans were for next year.  To this he replied "I don't know.  I'm leaving my options open." 

Here's hoping we see a lot more racing from Floyd, wherever he ends up.  He is, in my mind anyway, a genuine American cycling legend.

Pedal on!

Under compression

While reading VeloNews online the other day, I came across a review of some new compression cycling clothing by a company called Skins.  The new top of the line collection is called the C400, part of the 400 series.  If you've not heard, compression technology is the latest (maybe not all THAT late, really) investigated method of improving post-exertional recovery.  It started in cycling with some techniques team physiologist Allen Lim started trying out on the Garmin boys in 2008 via a device called the NormaTec MVP boots...but what quickly were renamed, the "Space Boots".

In this photo, we can see Dr. Lim adjusting the 'Space Boots' on Canadian cyclist Ryder Hesjedal, who is obviously busy Tweeting during the process (as any self-respecting professional cyclist would).  The things reportedly provide a "peristaltic pulse" that moves the blood from the bottom of the leg toward the top in a series of repetitive waves.  Dr. Lim is quoted as saying that this is a machine "designed to externally compress the limbs in a way that mimics normal physiology..."  Now, the only structure I know in nature that provides normal physiologic and directional peristaltic (or wave-like) pulses is the gastrointestinal tract.  So the only situation in which the Space Boots are mimicking normal physiology for your legs is if you were waist deep in the rectum of a whale.....backwards.  But I'm quite sure this technology was nothing new to Hesjedal as Canadians have been rocking the Space Boots since 1977.

And check it out - they're only 16.99 and come in two different spacey metallic tones.

Sure - I can scoff - but there is real evidence that these things work.  After all, LA himself has been busting out the knee-highs lately as well.

I've always consider this high fashion and just thought LA was getting caught up with the times.  But it turns out that this kind of compression, referred to as 'static compression'  (because it lacks the whole whale-rectum pulsatile pressure effect) has been proven to relieve post-exertional muscle soreness.  In fact one study showed that following "soft tissue injuy from maximal eccentric exercise" the wearing of a compression sleeve "decreased perceived soreness, reduced swelling, and promoted recovery of force production."

Enter the world of Skins.  Or as the website says if you click on the "How Skins Work" button, "Welcome to the world of Skin's bioacceleration technology!"

The marketing scheme is the use of the Columbia HTC boys which can be seen clearly having just finished frolicking about in their Skins jammies with bare feet, as though they are in the midst of a slumber party minus the pillows and stereo cranking Love Shack by the B-52s.  But here, they are posing jauntily with hands on hips....all except....wait a minute.  Who's that in the middle who doesn't have to put his hands on his hips?  Hey - it's Mark Cavendish.  I find their postures for this photo not just a little unsettling, and seem to remembed that there are those that actually study body language and what people are subconciously saying through the positioning of their arms, legs, etc.  A quick search of this revealed the following:

On a website dedicated to the Body Language of the Hips, I found several interesting things.

"Hands on hips pushes the elbows sideways making the body look larger and thus may be a signal of power or aggression.  Men may use the hip thrust with other men as a signal of power ('my penis is bigger then yours' or 'I am so powerful you dare not attack my exposed and vulnerable parts').

Obviously the Columbia boys didn't assume these positions of their own volition, and were posed by the team owner and manager Bob Stapleton as a flagrant act of exhibiting his teams' loin-laden prowess in an attempt to compensate for something....Maybe this photo of Bob explains what that might be.

At any rate, at the center of the Columbia HTC photo on the Skins page is Cavendish.

Arms crossed and not smiling.  I wonder what we can determined about his mood?

"Arms can act as the doorway to the body and the self.  When they are crossed, they form a closed defensive shield, blocking out the outside world.  Shields act in two ways: one is to block incoming attacks and the other is a place behind which the person can hide and perhaps not be noticed."

Cav certainly does have a reputation for not wanting to be noticed, so that is a possibility - but perhaps another reason is that he wants to hide the robin's-egg-blue, Mr. Roger's-esque team zippered cardigan they made him wear for the photo.

Apparently the Skins compression fabric moves better with the body and excels in providing excellent skin moisture management, optimizing skin temperature and blocks UV rays. In a sense - it is truly like a second set of skin - but only better.  Some of the other details include the company's use of "body mapping" in which over 400 athletes' bodies were scanned and 800,000 measurements made of both male and female forms to arrive at the most anatomically form fitting apparel ever made. 

The Skins homebase is in Australia - but yet again - I think the Canadians may have beat them to the punch on anatomically form fitting, skin-like apparel, that is gender specific.

Pedal on!