Neffness VII

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I just got back into town from a whirlwind trip back to Western PA and need to get some ride mojo going, what better way than with some Neffness?

I am pretty sure that Jolanda Neff is the Peter Sagan of Women’s XCO mountain bike racing, just with better hair, much nicer legs and (most likely) no want to pinch any podium girl bums… not to mention I have no desire to see Peter Sagan in a skirt showing off the bike geek tan lines on his thighs (unless he finally wins a fucking sprint finish!).

Photo via Jolanda Neff’s Facebook page, most likely taken by Bernard van Dierendonck

A Different Burger

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Long time Soiled Chamois readers (all two of them) are probably familiar with my early summer Cat 5 Cooking project entitled The Soiled Burger Project; a meaty attempt at making a burger that was tastier to my aging, dulling taste buds. In my opinion, the results were great and I eventually settled on a burger that I really enjoy eating and turns out perfect for me on a consistent basis. However, I started to enjoy a few too many of them. Many pounds of ground beef were happily eaten. Then, just as I started looking into buying my own cow, and just shy of developing SCOMS (or as it is unrecognized by and not at all referred to by the American Medical Association: Severe Chronic Ongoing Meat Sweats) I decided that I had found my burger and it was time to move on… time to move on to something a bit more, how should I say this… vegetarian?

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The Fat Between

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The past week was once again low on hours in the saddle and high on Dad duties and other activities. I’m not going to complain about that, I’m very lucky to have been given the opportunity (thanks to the size of Wifey’s brain) to hang out with my son during the summer rather than send him to camp or seek “baby” sitting so I can utilize my utter lack of education and useless past work experience working at Taco Bell…Not that there’s anything wrong with that (if you’re 17), Taco Bell makes some fine quasi, sort of, not at all authentic Tex-Mexican-ish foods that are beloved by the obese and stoned college kids world-wide (except Mexico).

However–as I mentioned in quick post yesterday–I was able to get out for a double dip of dirt on Saturday and slow-paced loop on Sunday. Joy!

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The Soiled Burger Project Final

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The Soiled Burger Project is over (hold your applause, please), and I gotta tell you, it all seems sort of anticlimactic. I made more than a few burgers over the last month or so, surely upped my cholesterol a few points and no doubt ingested my fair share of bovine antibiotics, that will most likely prevent me from fighting off future illnesses and leave me dying of consumption in the winter to come (again, hold  your applause).

All those burgers, all that meat, all that grilling and it has come full circle to the Burger 01.

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The Soiled Burger Project 03

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My plan on Tuesday was to get a nice long-ish (for me v.2014) ride in during Wifey’s day working from home. However that plan was–not so sadly–ruined by a series of ball rattling thunderstorms that rolled through Michiganderburgh. So I ran. OK, that’s a lie, I alternated running and walking on the treadmill for three miles. Then I made a hamburger on the grill for lunch and stoked my belly (the one I had just felt flopping from my waist like a flaccid penis for 35 minutes) with every calorie I had just burned and then some. Such is life… such is life as a cyclist who seems to ride less and less with each passing week, eats more and more with each passing day in the pursuit of a tastier burger and writes an almost certainly unread, pointless blog post series called the Soiled Burger Project… On, get this, A CYCLING blog! What the fuck?

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The Soiled Burger Project 02

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Last week, I introduced The Soiled Burger Project; my attempt to up my burger grilling game. In my opinion, Burger 01 was a success to my ever growing belly and dulling taste buds.

I was set to continue the pointless, calorie rich project as the week went on, then I ran out of propane, then I was out-of-town for three days, but hey, I’m back in town now, with some fresh ‘pane and I’m set to continue on with Burger 02, a spicy, sriracha sauce tinged, hunk of ground meaty goodness on a bun. Or at least that’s what I had hoped.

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The Soiled Burger Project 01

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So far this summer I have been struggling with my grilled hamburger skills. I’ve scoured the internet, flipped through magazines and even busted out some cookbooks looking for ideas, but so far, so not good. Everything has just been a bit bland. Hell, Wifey even recently declared that she’s “off burgers,” as she took a swig of Jack and threw the plate containing the half eaten burger against the wall, forcing me to tears (I made that up, Wifey doesn’t drink whiskey).

However, I am putting my early summer grill failures behind me and getting balls deep into trying to make a better, tastier hamburger all on my own (yes, I am aware that the use of the term “balls deep” may not be the way to start off a blog post about food. Sorry, it just worked).

Since my evening dinners will be void of grilled burgers until Wifey deems her palette ready for another go, I am resigned to working on building a better burger for my lunches. So after my ride today I set about making burger 01 of the Soiled Burger Project, an ongoing Cat 5 Cooking summer series devoted to my attempts to make what I believe is a better burger (welcome to the world of the unemployed). Your taste buds may differ, and yes, I am aware that referring to any food as “soiled” is not all that appetizing, I think we’ll all be OK…

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Scales

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Yesterday (on the road for 41 miles), and today on the trail, was all about the scale. No, not the scale that tells me that I’ve gained 40 pounds since 2005 when I started this blog, fancied myself an endurance mountain bike racer who eventually realized he just likes to ride his bike on trails, gravel and roads, drink beer, eat good food and sometimes race, but the pain scale. I have to say, that even though I don’t like pain, I like this scale way more than that fucking, lying piece of shit in my bathroom… Forty pounds my ass!

This week has been made up of the following: riding, bitching, moaning, hate, expanding my liver, stretching, core work, ice therapy (to that area that makes up the gulf betweenst my two giant love handles) and adjustments to my riding position. Right now, things are going pretty darn, not bad. In fact, today I completed my normal 16 mile loop and on a pain scale of 1 to 10 I think it was merely a 4… maybe even a 3. Woot!

To go back a smidge, I got out yesterday on the road bike. I felt like shit… I felt great… I felt like shit… I felt great. Grrrr…

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While I didn’t feel great over the entire 41 miles of crap Michigan roads, I felt well enough that I didn’t want to sell all my bikes and take up drinking and masturbation as my “go-to” hobbies (they will remain in the 2 and 3 slots).

And I as I said above, today’s slow/quick lap felt pretty OK… ish.

Later…. I have a couple other hobbies to take care of.

An Improvement of Sorts

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Ride Part I, the part where I reckon I was faster than last week for no reason whatsoever.

Last week I took my road bike out for the first time in 2014. I had written that I felt swell during the 41 mile ride but was sort of pissed to come home and check my files (which serve no real purposed to a schlep like me) and see that I was over ten minutes slower than my best effort last year. Thankfully things got a tad better today, even with a slightly gimpy-ish neck and back.

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