Minneapolis Mask
Mid-August, Minnesota, a cold rain is absolutely monsooning downward.
And I am planning on racing 26.2 miles tomorrow!
I think I might need to use this swim mask in addition to my helmet.
Instead of a skinsuit, a wetsuit would be nice too, or maybe just a thick, greasy, protective layer of extra strength ben-gay (it works surprisingly well).
Racing bicycles in the rain is a twisted kind of fun I used to enjoy a lot. But inline racing in the rain sucks!!!
Even the coffee shop I am working in has turned the fires on. Is it a Minnesota thing to have open flame-pits in the middle of coffee shops?
Omigosh, it’s so NASTY outside!!!
Competing in foul weather becomes a mental thing, as many athletes give up before the race begins. So I am now working on convincing myself I LOVE THE RAIN, and it’s PERFECT conditions for my weight & skating ability.
In other things, I’ve been working hard on this blog upgrade.
What you see here right now is barely 50% of what it will eventually look like, the left & right sidebars especially will be completely different. I am moving VERY carefully (upgrading from wordpress 1.5 to 2.2 is extremely geeky) & making double backups every step of the way.
Even so, for about a half hour on Thursday I thought I had completely KILLED this blog.
I thought I had lost every one of the 418 posts, every one of the 2,467 comments so far!
Have you ever heard stories about writers typing up manuscripts, & then losing them? Or people who lost laptops full of years of work, painters whose studios burn down, athletes who experience catastrophic injuries & know it as they are being carried off the field.
It was truly one of the more horrible feelings I have ever experienced.
Suffice it to say, BACKUP EVERYTHING that matters to you! Digital storage is cheap, fast, and it just saved everything that you are seeing right now.
Filed under: on the road
Hey Andres!!
I envy you… the weather is the same here but there it looks rather cool! Here is 95 degrees >:( . So enjoy it!
Be tough out there in the rain tomorrow!
I see a beautiful dry clear St Paul morning with fog coming off the Mississippi and burning off just in time for the start. Good luck to you and all the SLIC skaters. I will be watching for the times all day on the web.
The upgrade looks great!!!!
Nice layout Andrew!! That reminds me that I should install my other 40gb drive as backup..
I hope you liked Minnesota, I’ve only been to Wscaaansin.
Foresight will save you - thanks for backing up.:)
Flahute, my friend!
At least you have your skates. The airline has lost Kim and my skates, it is midnight and there is no sign of them. What to do?? We are calling the airline, the airport is no help and we might as well dream of how fast we could’ve waterski down st paul’s streets.
HAve a good day tomorrow! WET!
Eric.
Holy cow Kim and Eric!!! This is such a dilemma, especially for ice. You can’t take blades on the plane because basically they’re knives, but then they might be bent in your luggage or lost. I remember Tony Morabito frantically trying to come up with alternatives when he came out to SLC for olympic trials in 2006 (am I remembering it right Andrew?). I think Tony had even shipped his instead of risking it with the airlines.
AArgh! Even if it is raining and miserable you still want to be out there doing the race you traveled for. My heart goes out to you both. Actually, the race is probably going on as I write.
Siento mucho lo que te pasa broder! Espero aparezcan pronto sus patines!
I always take my skates onboard with me!
For those of you transporting ice blades… could it work to send the blades 2 Day Air or Priority Mail to the destination point while you take your boots on board? It’d definitely be challenging for international travel!
I’ve flown to SLC four times and driven four times. When driving, it’s nice to not have to worry about the blades–’cause they’re right with you! When flying, I use an aluminum tool case I bought at Lowe’s which surprisingly accomodates up to 17.5″ blades. In that case, I pack my maple comets and two pairs of maple gold’s. I have never had an issue with the transportation of my blades except for the case the suitcase that contains the aluminum box usually weighs a ton and can’t wait to get to the oval.
Ok, it was raining bucket loads so I suck at weather forcasting. Hope nobody got hurt.
The skates finally appeaed at 3am… We had to be up till that time on the phone cussing at some poor should in bombay that did not know if the bags where showing up or not. anyway, with the stress of the bags, no rest, and barely getting of a serious flu, I did manage to start the race. Kim bagged it since it was really grey, cold and windy. Anyway, I started the race pretty good, andrew came up behind me at about mile 3 and asked me how I felt…. I told him the truth “Like shit” Anyway, any hope that the rain would stay away came to a scratching halt on mile the far end of the race course, WHERE IT WAS WET! anyway, as I am skating I clicked skates with another skater and slid into the aspahlt scraping both my knees. I ponder the possibility of getting up, sprinting and catching up… but a voice inside said… ERIC…. THIS IS GOD!! HOW MANY SIGNALS DO YOU NEED TO GET IT?? GO BACK, TAKE A HOT SHOWER, AND GET TO BED!!!
So I just cruised back to the start line, told kim I am outta here and that was it. Andrew will no doubt give you guys a more detailed description of the crappy race it turned out to be. The Pro Masters went out like a flying bullet and “we” cought up to the pro elite” in less than 3/4 lap. But not everyone kept that pace.
Anyway, it was nice to see everyone!
Eric.
Andrew… Forgot to tell you that the translator is actually pretty good. Sentence structure sucks, but a machine cannot fix that. I was really impressed.