Oh dear. Yes, it is as good as you've heard...or maybe have seen. I got my little paws on the GoPro Helmet Hero Cam HD and so far zoopa cool! I will be shooting when I can over the next few months and experimenting with splicing in audio to try and create some sweet keepsakes of rides we go on. I put together a brief video to show you all of what's involved with the HD Hero cam. Not awesome production quality on my part but you'll get the point of how this little gem works.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Here are a few very simple taster shots I snapped earlier today with the fam tooling around at the Boulder Reservoir. I can not wait to get this thing into the woods!

Braaap!

My dear friend Michel sent me some bummer news.

Davy Coenen, a popular mountain biker and crosser for the team2mega/Ridley crew in Belgium was diagnosed with brain cancer last year where a 2x3 cm tumor was extracted.

A year of radiation and rehabing and it unfortunately appears that Davy is not gaining ground on the disease.

I snapped this photo of Davy railing the sweet singletrack in Shriek Grootlo in Belgium in January 2008. A mere year before he was diagnosed with the tumor. He flowed that day. I focused on him that day while Brandon was racing because I loved his style. It was noticeable and hooked me. I learned from watching him.

Life is... Well, life just 'is'. Think on Davy as anything can happen. More importantly, put that extra strength down on those pedals each ride. Because you're healthy and you're able.

I was pleasantly surprised to wake up to this email today from my friends at Universal Sports!

"Hi Greg,

I wanted to let you know we will be broadcasting the Cyclo-Cross World Championships from Tabor, Czech Republic on-line January 31.  The broadcast will be showing the elite men’s and women’s races at 12 noon (ET), while the rest of the races will be offered on demand.  We are excited to offer the broadcast for this event again and hopefully highlight more Cyclo-Cross through the World Cup season.  Please help in any way you can to spread the word about the broadcast."

So you heard it! Spread the word! Click the picture to the left to head on over to the 'Cyclocross World Championships Dashboard' on Universal Sports.

Thanks to Matt Pacocha from VeloNews who forwarded me a brief article about the Dugast Diablo ban and all the hullabaloo it’s been causing since Sven’s testing of it in Eindhoven. I loosely translated this article originally found on http://wielrennen.blog.nl/. Molly Cameron also chimed in to me to state that he thinks the ban has been around for some time (still researching that….):

"Cyclocross riders may not ride with spikes or with small nails during World Cup events. The Dutch tire specialist Andre Dugast had a new tubular, called the Diabolo (Devil), made specifically for the conditions for Tabor. Dugast is no stranger to the cycling world, as most of the worlds best have ties to the company and race on their tires. In a first test of the course in Eindhoven, Sven Nys achieved a speed of up to 30 km / hour (!), Sporza reporter Marcel Wuyts says. During the World Cup broadcast next Sunday on Sporza a special segment on Sven Nys’ test of the tires in Eindhoven with be broadcast. 

Nys said in an initial reaction that the tires are phenomenally good. And a phenomenon they will always remain because the UCI has thrown in a wrench. When rumors reached the UCI on the spiked tires, they quickly reacted to ban. It would distort competition because less wealthy riders on the "old" treads will not be as competitive. Well, on an old tape you have to learn it? Seriously, it is not dangerous to life with nail bands around, crossing? Imagine that you are smacked against the floor by, say, a drunken supporter. See how quickly you’ll have to have a Czech doctor to find and pull all those nails out of your body.

Moreover, the Schwalbe tire manufacturer has a much longer relationship with spikes in its product range, but unfortunately for the racers, this involves an ATP band as well":

It pains me to not have been there on the beach again this year. A number of my friends made the pilgrimage to Za Motherland to race against the best, but it was no where near my deck of cards this year. It'll happen again some day. When the time is right for the family, I'll pack up the bikes again, set up a base camp and once again race harder than you think is personally possible.

Or will I make it back?

I've questioned lots lately. Can I keep this up...yet again? The mental cycles of build, try, suffer, finish, suffer (mentally) and repeat again are getting tiresome. This equally relates to revolutions on the bike we put in to get stronger, faster...with those revolutions on the merry-go-round we all get on to live and thrive.  Given the spinning that occurs and what it does to my head, I honestly don't know any other way to cope. So I clench my teeth and I go harder. I depend upon it as I love it so much, this sport, this suffering...this lifestyle of ours and our families.

So much is happening in my life. Some great yet some hard to pin an emotion or feeling on. Time will tell and I am forcing decisions...maybe nudging the universe again...but this time I am in greater control. My cross to bear.  My teeth to clench. My freedom to find. My hands on the stick.

A manufactured ethos is on the assembly line. It's an evolution that I can not believe is happening and shouldn't. And I need to hurl a wrench into it.

That is my revelation.

Stoked Philip chose the 35 A's to shoot that day! Rad little keepsake of the day.

And so, the last race is in the books. Sigh. I thought I already said that once and my last race was the Colorado State Championships. But alas, the cyclocross forces that be…forces as powerful as the Death Star’s tractor beam itself…sucked me off the couch, squeezed me into my skin suit and had me racing the open pro event at the Fort Collins/New Belgium Brewery cyclocross benefit to support young Skyler Trujillo on his bid for Worlds in Tabor in a few week’s time.

The race was kick ass! Fort Collins Cross, the organizer, held the event at the New Belgium Brewery grounds….where I’d done a few STXC races in the past.  It was an insanely fun course which had the riders on 100% dirt and grass…albeit snow and ice covered that was melting FAST in the 50 degree weather. It made the course challenging given the endless 180 turns which was SUPER creative given the land. There were plenty of off cambers, run ups and twists to keep you on your toes the entire time. I am confident that this course (with some modifications can be an EPIC place to race in our local ACA series. The host crew is passionate and would pull out all stops I am sure.

Honestly, the race itself was done in a totally fun atmosphere. I wouldn’t say it was a hard course racing atmosphere. Dudes were ‘going’ from the gun but I was more enjoying flowing and staying smooth than making my eyes bleed. About 25 starters toed the line, I flowed in 7th which I can not complain about having parked my ass on my couch pretty firmly since States. I had to extract my bikes from the basement and dust ‘em off!

Most importantly it was a great vibe for Skyler. A great group of companies donated products for a silent auction to help fund his expenses over seas. It still shocks me that this is required of us and USA Cycling simply cannot get it done for our best. But I digress…

8 months to ‘cross season.  I can hear the cowbells already.

(UPDATE: Mountain Flyer magazine has an excellent report on the fundraising race for Skyler here. Have a ready and take a ganger at Eddie Clark's amazing photos like those below!)

Here's a set of my Typhoons. Have a close look. Clearly on their last leg. Glued and sealed in 2008, they are still solidly on, yet starting to peel themselves from the base tape. This is an example of how water...when it seeps in and under the sidewall sealant (AquaSeal in this case) damages the cotton and wreaks havoc on the cotton.

Note that these sidewalls were sealed after the tires were glued on. I will be applying sealant before I glue this year, trying a new product alongside AquaSeal as well to determine which works best. Much like FMB or Challenge treat their products. Dugasts are sealed, yet I'm not sure with what! It simply can not stand up to the elements.

We are cavemen. We need to remember that. We are on programs that have us athletically peaking in December which is so outside the human's normal path of preparing for hibernation, it's incredible we even get out of our beds and done micro-think lycra to trod through the frozen mud and snow this time of year on skinny knobbies.

I am broken.

My body has officially decided to shut itself down. Aches, pains, and all sorts of head drama dominate my mental landscape. I feel like a highly tuned machine that's been left outside in the snow to rust.

Each year of my decade past has been identical. Post season winter depression. Spring contemplation. Summer preparation. Fall competition.

Always mental constipation. Tons of synaptical log jams...am I fit?...am I fat?...will I be fast?...can I do it again next year?...can I balance this yet again?

It's ironic how I push for the future then cry for it all going to fast.

Time to hibernate.

Ah, the sound of switzerdeutsch. I haven't heard you in a long time...that sing-songy variant spoken in the German speaking Cantons of Switzerland. You'll hear it in this video and others posted by this guy). What a BRUTAL course. Wait until you see the logs these guys have to scale and the style used to dismount to successfully get your shoe out of the clips-and-straps.

Get ready for Worlds....