Oh So Perfect...

Couldn't help but not post a pic up of Wells's new carbon GT Zaskar...damn thats awesome..

Liquid Lunch...Dinner and Breakfast.

A coupla weeks out from the VTT the boys have come together to formulate the first ever “Soup Week” in an attempt to shed a few unwanted numbers on the skinfolds. So far so good on night two we are feeling fresh and motivated for the liquid diet.

Norris has improved his veggie chopping skills outta sight whilst D-Mac works the peeler like no other. Soup week is alive and well…and hopefully we are still by the end of 7 days...bring out the ladle. Lator cw.

We're in for the long haul..

Daniel McConnell..the face of soup week 2007..

Seeing Red.

Another doper in the books...another day and the cycling world is just that little bit cleaner. Bit of a trend at the moment. One bit of scum at a time. It's tragic for the sport but refreshing at the same time to see these giants fall over the past few months. At the end of the day these clowns are ripping everyone off, especially the guys who cut their teeth 24/7/52wks a year to make a go of this sport and then get laughed in the face by the guy with the needle sticking outta his arm and a fat wallet. Its better to live on your knees than die on your feet. Screw you guys to hell. That's my 30 seconds on the soapbox...Im off to go ride my bike guilt free. The way it should be. Lator cw.

Welcome To Europe...Bundesliga XC, Germany.

Damn. On count back it’s been five years since I have pinned a race number on in Europe. From a fresh faced J.I.T (Junior In Training) back in 02’ for Worlds, last weekend was a long awaited return, taking the 6hr drive to St Margen, Germany. Must say I was pretty darn nervous to say the least. Like 147bpm on the start-line nervous. And that was only before the ‘six pack’ race, a nifty little 6 man heat around a 3minute section of the XC course with the top three advancing to the next round. D-Mac got us off to a ripper of a start in his heat, taking a nice second place and advancing through whilst scaring the shit outta me on just how frickin’ fast these Euros are. Hello World Cup hitters. So redlining before the start it was heart straight in the mouth stuff as I got off to a half decent start in my heat. Definitely used the 620mm risers to their full potential. On the gas in third place and dying, I got caught and passed into the last corner and got dogged for fourth place on the line. Welcome to Europe. Norris gave his all in his heat and unfortunately too came up short, leaving Macca to fly the boxing kangaroo flag, eventually finishing 10th.


So with unsettled sky we woke up on race day not sure whether it was going to stay okay or bucket down cats and dogs. We got the latter. The course was a pretty neat little affair, super short at bout 16mins with a cool bmx section, typical Euro grass field action and some hairy steep forest rooted chutes that were tricky in the dry and off trolley in the mud. Climbs wise there were only a couple, with the majority of the main one having to be tackled one foot at a time. And damn quickly if you are a native. So being a UCI ranked shindig the hitters were there, including Fredriek Kessiokoff, Ralph Naf and the Fumic brothers to name a few. Once again this was the big smoke. With a solid field of 75 I got a pretty good call up in the third row in a race where I had know idea where the hell I should end up. Off the start it was super fast as expected and having a good start and a few close calls on the descents I came through the first lap in 23rd. And that was pretty much all she wrote, going backwards steadily from there. Definitely a little under done after 7wks of no racing I guess you could say it was a pretty ugly affair for the next 7 laps, coming home in 42nd place.

D-Mac puts in the big ones...

Going a little stir crazy on the drive...it happens from time to time..

Norris is quite the artist...

So that was it, the Euro racing account is now open and it’s time to build on last week and try and get the form cranking for this weekend, a Swiss Cup in Bern. Hopefully it’s on the way up from here...ciao, cw.

Good Day Sunshine.

Today was just one of those days where it just is great to be alive...reco day for us honks and the sun was out tapping along some sweet ass Italian roads..doesn't get Eddie Vedder than this really..over and out..cw.

Tour De Farce...

…ahh I don’t want to even waste my brain. Clear out the rats cause we don’t want them. Enough said. Those guys don’t deserve space on this site.

So today D-Mac and I hit up the mtb for the first time in a long time and boy was it great, with the Canadian Cap’ sending us out on an adventure, forgetting that he rode it on a 5 inch dually whilst Mac Attack and I got our teeth rattled out. Oh so worth it though.... Except for the nail that found it’s way through Macca’s tire 5m before being back on the tarmac.

Once again Norris pulled out a ripper of a soup for dinner tonight, the man has some hidden talents in the kitchen cause this is at least $21.95 on any table back home…

Bit of history grace the walls of the Mapei testing centre..

All in all another wicked day kickin’ it Euro style. The sun is definitely shining at the moment..lator cw

Resume Normal Transmission..

I am back and in one piece! 3 weeks of the hardest training I have ever done up at Stelvio Pass are in the books and I must say it’s nice to be back at base and have regular Internet and get the old blog going again. I’m sure everyone is sick of seeing the last post for three weeks straight.

So a little background on the ole’ Stelvio pass, she’s a pretty mean peak at 2700m and a climb that featured in the Giro a few years back. With a few different ways to ascend up, the main one is a nice 48 hairpin, 26km 2hr slog in the 27cog bad boy. At 50rpm. Definitely some hardcore training when you combine this at the end of a big day smacking out the kms with some of the homelands best roadies and a dash of ProTour riders for good measure. Most days I finished cross-eyed as you’d expect.

Highlights from the three weeks had to have been going hunger flat my first time up the hill…in the snow…and then seeing Elvis. Three weeks of not shaving in the ‘beard off’ competition that has now left me with some very whisky tango chops and mo’ combination. I must say it was pretty friggin’ unreal to head out on our biggest day and hit up 3 climbs featured in Giro’s including the Motorola, Gavia and back up the Stelvio. Quite a tidy 4525m of climbing.

"Mapei Day" was a riot, 2500 riders pinning up the Stelvio along with a few crazies who decided to run the 21km. Hats off to AIS staffer Laura who did it one foot in front of the other...damn i thought pedalling the thing was tough.

So in our final week us mtb boys were getting more than itchy with most of us having almost a month exclusively on the tarmac. A quick little off road session at 120psi cured the blues, although hike-a-bike with road shoes over rocks is not so recommended. Oh and just for the record only one puncture and plenty of heart in mouth moments. Spewing I didn’t have the camera.

On a sour note we did unfortunately get some stuff pinched while we were there, including one bike and my helmet. Pricks.

Big thanks to all the AIS coaches and staff who kept us all motivated and well looked after.

So D-Mac Daddy arrived yesterday fresh as a daisy off the plane and raring to go. Awesome to have the big fella back in town. So we start racing this week at the Bundgelsia Cup in Germany and this boy is hanging to pin the number on like nothing else. Enjoy the rest of the random pics, over and out, cw.

A perfect match...thanks for the package kat ;)

Norris had a little ear plug incident..must have been my altitude snoring.


The beard brothers!

Jose' Hernandez returns!



I think Cypress Hill wrote a song about this...

When razors attack.

The old drive the van onto a train that goes through a mountain trick..

The snow must go on..

What do you mean we went stir crazy alone on a mountain top for three weeks..?

Deep Freeze

Well we are into week two of camp here and things are heating up. well on the bike yes, but the dumping off snow up here at stelvio every other day has made things pretty darn fun. Snowball fights both on and off the bike help to distract from the main 26km, 48 hairpin sub 2hr climb to get up here after every ride. Definately a nice way to finish big days on the bike with some very handy roadies. i miss my mtb...! lator cw.

Holding Pattern..

Just letting ya know here I am up at Stelvio Pass, some 8100ft in Northern Italy at the moment. So with virtually no net connection up here the blog will be pretty much dead until this 3 wk training camp is over....hope everyone is having as much fun as I am...lator, winston...oh yeah there is full on snow here...madd..