madd fajita

Broken parts

I broke my ankle. My left foot has a black cast now. I chose black so people would not sign it. People are sill signing it. Sucks that it happened right before my birthday. But it is not too bad considering all that could have happened. I was supposed to go to New York my birthday but we are going 3\22-3\27. It is good timing as it will be warmer. That weekend is also the Red Hook Crit.

I have something new for the next 6 weeks I'm going to have to wear a cast.

Christmas in Maine

It is almost Christmas and I have been home as of six months yesterday. I love the apartment, and we switched some rooms around too. One room now has my computer desk complete with new Samsung LCD monitor. The other room now has our bed in it with my closet. Over a month ago I participated in the Dempsey Challenge. Last winter I could barely do quarter mile in 30 minutes. In the Dempsey Challenge I completed over 16 miles in two and a half hours. There's more to come. Our tree this Christmas is decorated with red lights and is as tall as me. The Christmas tree is our first tree as a couple. There is still no snow on the ground. I joined the gym in Brewer Snap fitness. I plan on going three times a week. Tonight Allison and Josh are coming for dinner. Happy Holidays!

I'm back.

It's been a long time but I'm here.

seaving Brewer.

I'm getting better. I need less assistance to stand--still some, but minimum. I am going to a meeting of people with brain injuries in Brewer, which makes me feel included in a group. I've been living in a rehab unit since 2009, but June 11th I'm moving to Bangor with Kierie. The apartment is big, with posters and more. I recently had surgery for a pump installment to combat excess tone. I feel good about it. I'm riding a trike recumbent and going more miles each ride. My goal is 75 miles by the end of summertime. It's a long road but I'm going to get back to where I was.

Leaving Brewer

I'm back.

II's been a long time but I'm here.

Kansas!

I just got back from my first trip to Kansas. My first time in the Mid-West actually. I flew out on Friday and stayed with my Aunt Laura in Leavenworth Kansas. My mom joined me and we hung out and visited with family until Monday morning. Most importantly we met my cousin Shannon and her husband Jason's new baby Adrian. Adrian's a fantastic little guy who has an endless amount of energy and you can tell he's going to be an adventurous little devil.

My cousin Tom is a pitcher for the Gary SouthShore RailCats and they were playing the Kansas City T-Bones, which provided the excuse to get the Kansas and northeast family together. They won the Friday night game, with Tom pitching, but lost the Saturday game (without Tom pitching... hmmm...). It was a fun time with expensive beer and Northern-League antics.

It was great finally seeing Kansas, the western area is a lot more hilly then I expected. Got to see a wild thunderstorm that let me easily imagine the possibility of one of the notorious tornados touching down. Also got in a short bike ride so I could sample the terrain of the area (thanks Ron!). Mostly it was great seeing family. Thanks so much to Laura, Randy, Shannon, Jason, Kayla and Tyler for putting us up and showing us around.

Baltimore!

I went to Baltimore for a few days with Kierie this week. It's a nice town, good size, some interesting views very bikeable, and some good food and beer. Met up with some old friends (Hi Andres and Morgan!), and did some sight-seeing. Baltimore, you're OK.

Mid-Summer in Maine

I visited Maine for a week. Was an opportunity to relax now that I'm unemployed. Caught up my friend Heath and his family on the way up. I saw some friends and did a lot of biking. Made the Monday Pat's ride, Wednesday Pat's ride, and the Friday Rose Bike ride. Spent some time in Belfast, which is great in the summer. Lots of Flea-markets in Searsport, and took a trip to the observation deck on the new Prospect-Verona bridge. Although I've been in many tall buildings in NYC, the 480 foot tall observation deck on the bridge seems soo tall since there's nothing else even close to that height around so you have no frame of reference.

Marion Photo Memorial

Marion Greaves: April 11, 1920 - December 5, 2008

Red Hook Crit

This year's Red Hook Alley-Crit was another great success thrown by Dave August. Last year I raced it on my Schwinn fixed-gear conversion (complete with kick-stand) and came in 11th, the last person neutralized/lapped just at the finish. This year I intended to race a bit more seriously on the Maietta, but I didn't get the seat-post problem fixed in time so I raced on the McBain. I was a bit nervous about racing 35 year-old couplered steel on a cobbled course, especially when the fork is flexy as a bendy-straw. The bike survived and I had a great race. There were 25+ competitors, but I stayed in the lead break and we lapped/neutralized all but the 6 of us in that break. I was out sprinted by JT for 5th, and the race was won by Neil.

I made a little video from footage Kierie shot. The vid was shown at Bike Shorts also. Watch the vid for more info. A more professional video was shot at the race which will be shown at the Bicycle Film Fest.

The New York Times covered it as well.

Berlin!

I just got back from a week in Berlin. I travelled there with a group of artists from UMaine and Syracuse. I stayed for cheap in their hostel, and they constructed some installation art in the Skulpturenpark. I met some cool people (Hi Ira! Hi Syracusers! Hi Cyclists!), and saw some cool things (Reich-stag, sculptures, walls, wacky architecture) and marveled at their clean, efficient and safe transportation infrastructure.

Berlin's a great city, but I'd say go there in the summer. Soo rainy in the spring. Also be sure to try biking around, it's very bike friendly. It was an interesting place, very easy to navigate, and a very strong US influence which made most interactions very easy considering I know 5 words in German.

Below are some pictures, but Click here for the whole set.

Monster Track X

I recently competed in Monster Track X. For those that don't know about Monster Track, it's considered by some to be the premier brakeless fixed-gear alley-cat in the world. It usually draws competitors from as far away as Japan and Germany. This year there were a few competitors from Kyoto and Copenhagen that came to try their skills on the streets of NYC. This was my first year racing in Monster Track. In 2007 I wasn't very proficient at riding brakeless, so I deferred entry. Last year's event was "cancelled" due to concerns over a tragedy that occurred in a recent Chicago alley-cat. Despite being cancelled an alley-cat was run anyway, but with a fraction of the competitors and the interest that was present in previous years and I deferred entry out of respect to the original organizer's desire to cancel it.

This year's Monster Track promised to be well attended and brought some stiff competition. It was very cold and started very late, which wasn't surprising as these particular organizers are the people that seemed to have been responsible for the concept of "messenger time" (starting 3 hours late). The race started shortly before darkness, and the manifest was entirely street addresses (which favors the messenger's memory and not Gabe's desk job). I lost a lot of time looking up intersections, and had a hard time seeing street numbers in the dark (eyes, not so great and I refuse glasses usually). I came in 49th overall. No close calls, didn't really end up too tired either which means I should have pushed it, but I was constantly afraid I would have been racing along in the wrong direction, so I'd stop to consult the map (which means you've already lost). Top 20 racers got to do a 2nd manifest, which brought their total to 37 miles, while my single manifest finish was only 20ish miles. Below is Crihs's winning MT manifest.

I'd also like to note that Alex rocked and won the Monster Track Gold Sprints (roller races) over Andrew LaCorte and Jody Pogue. Although the finals were marred by some bracketing/elimination inconsistencies, Jody and Alex beat some stiff competition for sure.

Brief trip to Maine

Kierie and I went to Maine last weekend. Rented a car, which was a big 4 hour fiasco with Enterprise since my credit is so messed up. But we made it to Maine and Sugarloaf. We stayed with Summer's boyfriend Larry at his fam's mountainside condo (deluxe!). We were initially going to snowboard for two days, but 40mph winds closed the loaf for Saturday, so we only shredded the 'gnar on Sunday.

After Sugarloaf we headed to Bangor to see the fam and check in with Paul (below).

Snowboarding at Killington

I just returned from a 3 day trip to Killington for some sweet snowboarding. Kierie, Andras, Andrea and myself reduced the entire Killington Mountain area to a smoldering crater. We shredded that thing so hard that 200 years from now children will be singing songs about our deeds. Andras drove us up and we all stayed at a B&B called Snowed Inn. One thing I must mention about Snowed Inn: They served Log Cabin MAPLE FLAVORED SYRUP at breakfast. This is UNACCEPTABLE and probably illegal to do at a Vermont bed and breakfast. I went down the street to a market/deli to purchase some real VT maple syrup for the remainder of the trip.

Everything else was great about the trip. It was mad cold on Friday, with a high of 6 degrees. It was also Kierie and mine 2nd time snowboarding. But it was amazing, our skills grew each day. We started the trip on slow Green learning runs, and by the end of the trip we were making full runs down from the peak of Killington mountain on "tough" intermediate Blue trails. The photos tell the rest of the story.

Old Man Gabe

Yesterday was my birthday, I just turned twenty-seven (27) years old. Dang! Unfortunatly I'm getting older. Fortunatly I'm still having more and more fun each year. Can this trend continue?? Will I eventually explode from having too much fun when I hit age 54? Or will the fun start to decline? All I know is that I had a great chain of events happen on my birthday thanks to my friends and co-workers.

At work I was presented with a stellar assortment of cupcakes from Crumbs. Four whole cupcakes for myself.

Kierie had instructed me to leave work by 5 for reasons that would be explained later. I left at five, and was told to put on crappy yet robust clothes and was escorted to... NYC Paintball where Justin, Kierie, Jody, Alex, Andras, Andrea and myself shot the hell out of each other. I learned that if I was ever in a real combat situation with real guns I would probably last all of 25 seconds before being killed repeatedly. I also learned that people have the uncanny ability to shoot me repeatedly in the pinky. Seriously, how the hell did they shoot me twice in the same pinky?

After paintball there were more surprises. We stopped by LIC bar for a recovery drink and I was met with the welcome surprise of having 25+ of all my friends be inside! It was really the first surprise party I've ever had, and it was really great. Getting so many bikers and non-bikers come from all over the city and gather in Queens is quite the feat. Especially since it was the coldest night of the year. Thank you everyone for coming out and wishing me a happy 27. I owe you all a bunch. And most thanks to Kierie for organizing or maybe bribing all these fine peeps to come out for my b-day.

Pony Up! The Report

I just got back from Pony Up 2 in Boston. Here's the run down on events. Alex, Jody and myself caught the Fung-Wah bus from Chinatown NYC to downtown Boston. I feel like I should mention that I ate almost an entire bag (10 of 12 servings) of Ranch/Pizza Doritos on the 5 hour bus ride. Once in Boston we headed to the Middle East for fries and to meet up with Ian. Ian's a Boston based custom bike builder and good friend of Jody. He was kind enough to put us up at his place for a night, and his girlfriend Sara was kind enough to put us up at her place for another night.

On Saturday we all convened at Diesel Cafe, and killed some time until registration opened. Although betting was scheduled to start at 3, we knew stuff really wouldn't get rolling until 6, and the race probably wouldn't start till 7 or 8. We were joined by Joel who I know from Bangor and now rooms with Beth in Boston. We got to the old coffin factory at 4, and almost nobody was there yet. Since we were unfashionably on time we left for tacos with two new companions and resident Bostonians Patrick and Francesca. Joel and I formed an alliance with Pat and Francesca to work (read: follow) them for the race, since the only thing I knew how to find in Boston was this taco place. Jody, Ian, and Alex decided to pass on the race, citing concerns over darkness, the impending snow-storm, and a desire to concentrate on evening's later roller-races "Boldsprints".

How the race worked is each rider paid $10 to race, and that counted as two $5 bets on yourself. You could also place $5 bets on any other registered racer. Whoever won would get split the $500 with those that had placed bets on them. The race started at 8:45, right when the snow started to come down steadily. Patrick, Francesca, Joel, myself, and one other rider did practically the whole race together. I wish I knew the names of sections of Boston so I could describe where we went, but alas, I don't. I figure our route was about 20, maybe 22 miles, and took us 1 hour 45 minutes to make all the pick-ups and drop offs. The snow was steady the whole time, and by the time the race was over 2ish inches had built up. Was very cold, and slightly hazardous, but bike handled very well, and I never felt terribly out of control. I had opted to bring the McBain running 48x17 gearing and 23c slick tires, instead of the Schwinn that has studded snow tires. Oh well, it made for a fun night. A fender would have also been good as I ended up so encrusted with salt that my pants could stand up on their own in the morning.

New Yorker's took the top 3 spots in the race (Austin, Kennedy, Dan), and I came in 20th out of about 40 riders. After the race there was an after party ($1 PBR), and supposedly indoor roller races put on by Chris Kim, but we headed out before they got started. Over night there was a total accumulation of 6-8 inches of snow. This morning we met some people for brunch, and then Alex, Jody and I hopped on the Fung Wah and returned to NYC. Thanks for the good times and the slush Boston. Nice to see you, and I'll keep in touch!

Here's the pics from the weekend.

Bike Links

New York Bike Messenger Association: Info, advocacy and events for bike messengers etc - www.nybma.com
Fixed Gear NY: Message board for NY Fixed riders - fixed.gr/nyc
Trackstar: The premier fixed gear shop in NY - www.trackstar.com
Kissena: Info about the Kissena Velodrome - www.kissena.info/track
Velospace: Photo sharing site for bikes - www.velospace.com
Maietta Cycling: Builder of my bike - www.maiettacycling.com
Prolly is Not Probably: Brooklyn based bike and style culture connoisseur - prollyisnotprobably.com
Rat Pack Hustle: Short sprints for NYC street racers - ratpackhustle.blogspot.com
Empire: A film about riding in NYC - www.empirebegins.com
Fixed Gear Gallery: Collection of fixed gear bicycles - www.fixedgeargallery.com
Boneshakers: Vegetarian cafe in Brooklyn with bike friendly atmosphere - www.brooklynboneshakers.com
Sheldon Brown: Bicycle Technical Information - www.sheldonbrown.com

Pony Up!

I'm going to Boston on Friday for a race and party. The second annual Pony UP! If you know me and live in Boston hit me up. If you know me, live in Boston, and ride bikes, then you should join!

Coffee at Dysart's

Allison, Tyler and I have a very hungover breakfast at Dysart's on New Years Day.

Bike Shorts 8

There's another Bike Shorts coming up. Bike Shorts is a NYC based film fest comprising entirely of short films related to the bicycle. (duh)

I've been asked to VJ it also, so it's your best chance to see me in action in the near future. Click the pic below to see info on the upcoming events. I believe there will be an after party as Galapagos has a bar.