2008 Recap by the numbers

It doesn't seem like that long ago we were just starting 08, putting together race calendars and preparing for another year of racing and riding. Now it's time to do that again, however here are some facts from 2008:

7500+ miles I logged on my bikes. If I was a car, I would be due for my first check up back at the dealership. To put it into perspective, that's the same distance as driving between Phoenix, Arizona and New York City three times!

685 hours spent training during the year. That includes riding, racing and gym time. If I could pay myself minimun wage for that time, I would owe myself about $5000.00

345000 kilocalories burnt during the year while training and racing. That's what I and most people would burn in about 173 days by just being there.

640 kilocalories/hour my average calorie rate during exercise.

37 times I either pinned a number to my jersey or zip tied a race number onto my bike's handlebar. That's about 3.1 races a month.

5 different states where I raced my bike.

Anyway, 2008 was a great year. Norma and I got to go to really cool places, meet great new people, we joined Adrenaline Race Team and a lot of other cool things, so here is my Best of 2008 list.

Best Race: Prescott Punisher. Things just seemed to click that day. I finished 2nd but mostly because I couldn't believe I was in second that instead of trying to chase 1st, I spent the last lap looking back for third to come by me.

Best Training Ride: 6.5+ hour training ride with Art in Durango going over Kennenbeck Pass. Going 20 miles out of the way, almost getting hit by a car, climbing to 12000 feet, running out of water, escaping a thunderstorm...all in the same ride.

Best Trail Ridden: Hermosa Creek in Durango. Even with all the mud puddles.

Best Moment: Winning bonus time sprint at the Summit Center Road Race. Doing that put me virtually into the race lead. Eventually I broke a pedal and couldn't contest the final sprint though!

Best Place Visited: Big Sky, Montana. We were there for Dan and Sarah's wedding. Awesome place.

Best New Product: Fox F80 RLC suspension fork. That thing rocks. And I am not even sponsored by Fox.

There are a lot of other year's best as well as worst, but I'll keep those to myself.

Now looking at 2009, there quite a few races that I am looking forward to. I am also eager to see the results of the training plan that Art created for me. All that time at the gym and on the bike doing drills and what not goes into action in just a couple of weeks.

In the meantime I'll leave you with a picture of my most recent acquisition:

I picked it up just a couple of days ago. It'll take a while until I put it together, but once I do, I may have additional motivation to do a few more road races.
By the way, I should have a new MTB frame too, however I am not sure if I can let it out of the bag yet, but it sounds like I'll be racing 26 inch wheels and the material is not carbon.

Best Wishes in 2009!

Pura Vida!