Madison

Candice was teaching me how to look "good" in a photo. Most of the attempts were ridiculous.


I got a cold after Madison. When I feel like I'm getting sick, I down a clove of garlic. It seems to work. Except for the coughing part.


People in Madison are really friendly. It's true what they say about the midwest. (The skeleton in back is the white Ben Harper)


Tom Schuler did Ironman Wisconsin with his two brothers. It was nice to see the brother thing. Good work fellas!


This was a little going away party for Dave and Candice who are opening a bike shop in Tuscon. Cool now I have a place in AZ to crash at.


Sweet bike congloberation in Madison.


They call him whiskers because he's curious like a cat!


Well, it has been about a week since I’ve returned from Madison, WI. I was in Madison for another Ironman event. Madison is a wonderful place. I think it is classified as the “fittest” or “healthiest” city in the U.S. Anyway you look at it, Madison really encourages the use of bicycles for fitness and transportation. Seems like everyone is commuting by bike. There are plenty of bike racks to lock your bike at every store. They have a great system of bike paths, wide roads with bike lanes, and miles of roads outside the city ideal for riding. The city itself has lots of shops, restaurants and places to chill. Whatever you want it’s there. (What happens in Madison stays in Madison.)

From a mechanic’s perspective, the week was pretty tame. All the athletes brought their bikes in good condition. Mainly, I just gave them a good polish, tweaked a couple of derailleurs, and changed the training wheels for race wheels. Last year Ironman Wisconsin was considered the hardest event of all the Ironman’s. It was 95 degrees with high humidity and very windy. This year’s race was equally tough with the exact opposite conditions. It was raining hard all day and in the 50’s. It was one wet day for sure. It was probably harder on the spectators.

In case you didn’t know, race day starts at 7am and goes all day until midnight. From 9pm until midnight the finish line takes on a party atmosphere. One thing that Timex contributes to this spectacle is called “the free schwag parade”. This is where we throw out hats and t-shirts to the crowd. I often don’t take part in the madness, but this time I was into it (it was a way to keep warm). It is amazing how 500 people become your friends when you have free stuff for them. It was fun to get the crowd yelling and screaming. Of course, I try to find the kids and mom’s in the crowd first. Some people are really grabby too. Practically reaching over the barriers to claw at you. Freaks!

Life at the shop has been equally busy as being on the road. We are already getting stuff rolling for next season. This is the time of year for renewing contracts or acquiring new riders. It looks as though the Colavita/Cooking Light team is finalized for next season. I’m not at liberty to talk about the roster but it looks like an awesome team talent wise and personality wise. Some great people to be around will be on the team.

Ben “Seal Man” Harper and I have been packing for Hawaii. Basically, we have to ship the expo and all the bike related stuff I’ll need for the Ironman World Championships. All the “crap” has to be loaded onto pallets and crates for the boat trip. I think we got it all done in 2 days and is expected to take 3 weeks to get there. Guess how many hats we are shipping? Something like 4,000 hats will be given away. Just for yucks, Ben weighed the pallet and it was 482 pounds. Wow, we are giving away 482 pounds worth of hats. Crazy! Fortunately we have a forklift to carry these things around. In college I had a job at Kodak that involved driving a forklift. I went to forklift school and passed with high honors. The moral of the story is to never pass up the opportunity to attend forklift school (or take typing class). My dad was big on me taking typing class in high school because he believed its something you’ll always use (who knew?). On an even more random tangent, the first thing I did by myself while working at Kodak was to carry a bottle of chemicals on a delivery. The guy who was training me said it was important to put this particular bottle in a “bomb bag” because if I happened to drop it, I wouldn’t have time to outrun the poisonous gas cloud. I always remember that day. It only got better from there on.

Here's is my intinerary for the rest of the month. Tomorrow I leave with SealMan to drive the Timex truck to Tempe, AZ for a triathlon being held there. After that we have a few days to play before driving to Vegas for the Bike Show. After a few days of wheeling and dealing at the bike show we are driving to Park City, Utah for Keith's wedding and more playime. Then it's back to Milwaukee the first week of October (then off to Hawaii, yadda, yadda, yadda).

Keep checking back. I'm sure to have some good pictures and stuff from the bike show.

Cheers,
DJB