Breathe deep, fall is here

Finally cool days and cooler nights are here.  It is so hard getting out of bed in the morning after the windows have been open all night and is feels so cool in the bedroom.  I'm hoping Fall lasts awhile, as it often seems to be here and gone in KC.

With cooler temps comes the cyclocross race season.  I'm not racing until October this year, but I have clinics tonight and on Saturday.  It should be good to work out a few bugs/cobwebs in a non-competitive setting, and to have a set of eyes watching your form.  I'm really looking forward to it.  I was up until 11pm last night getting my bike ready.  It's still not all the way there, I have to change my chainrings and get my tubeless tires set up.  No tubulars for me this year.  Yes, they are great, but they are pricey and more importantly, time consuming.  For the 10 hours you spend cleaning and gluing them up, you could go out and train for those 10 hours and get back whatever time you invested with faster performance on race day.  At least that's what I'm telling myself.  Training time is gold, as far as I'm concerned.

I had a great weekend activity wise, and I felt like an athlete going for a night jog on Friday night while everyone else is partying.  Yea, I'm a nerd like that.  Saturday I took the day off, and then Sunday I went for a quick 20 mile ride.  It felt good.  Monday I went out again for 50 miles and really had quite a time fighting the wind on the way home.  I was in the doghouse for not being home as much as I should have getting ready for K's party.  My legs were pretty tired at that point, but I felt ok.  My cardio seems to be in excellent shape after running, but my cycling legs suck.  I have 0 power and 0 endurance.  I'm glad I have a month before the next race.  I've been bulking up too, I suppose too many calories.  I'm at 188 (!) and was thinking I was headed for the 170's for cross, but I don't think that's going to happen.  Ug.

Anyway, my wife came through again (kudos to her) and we had another spectacular party.  I grilled up pizzas for everyone (nearly 30 people) and K had a great 3rd birthday.  He got a giant blow up bounce house for his birthday, and he loved it.  He's been asking to "I wan do gin" quite a bit.  He really liked the "yake" (lake), roller skating, the bounce house, and opening presents of course.  He's so much fun, which is good that he can offset the trying times, but they seem to be getting fewer and fewer.  As are his nightly outbursts.  We all slept awesome last night and the mood this morning definitely showed that.

So that's that.  I'll post up what happens at the clinic tonight.  I'm hoping my buddy Mulbery will join me out there tonight.  He needs to get out there and race.  No more wussy triathlon stuff.  There's not enough mud.  ;-)