Tour of Hope Kicks Off

This morning at 10 AM, the Tour of Hope, led by Lance Armstrong and a team of 24 people who have been touched by cancer have left San Diego on a 9-day journey across America.

So, since most of us can't ride along, I thought it would nice to provide you all with the link to page where you can follow along via a Google Map which shows where the riders are. This map will show where the riders are using the Google Maps API and GPS, so you get updates as to where they are within about 30 minutes of when they passed through.

Here's the link!

Enjoy!

Phi Delta Theta Katrina Fundraising...

Chico Greeks were able to take a break from hazing and partying (said with tongue in cheek) to raise a little money for victims of hurricane Katrina. Even the Chico State University President, Paul Zingg, was in on the fun as you can see by the picture to the right which show Zingg and A.S. President Thomas Whitcher getting a little hair cut. Note that Whitcher is one of three Phi Delts elected as A.S. officers. The others being Chris Porter who is the Vice President of Facilities and Sevices and Dustin Struble, AS Commissioner Community Affairs and IFC Director of Communications.


The first I heard of this fundraising plan was via an email I received shortly after the hurricane through our alumni listserv stated that:

Dear Brothers,

As you may have heard, Phi Delta Theta has lead the charge on the Chico State campus to raise money for those effected by Hurricane Katrina. Originally we set our goal at $10,000. However, seeing that other organizations were wanting to join in our efforts we created the Greek Hurricane Relief Coalition and raised our goal to $15,000. In addition, at every $3000 increment one of the AS officers will shave their heads (3 of which are Phis).

As well, there was an article in the school paper, The Orion, stating their intension. So, as with most of the projects Phi Delts take on, this was a major success and was noticed by the local community with a front page article in this mornings Chico Enterprise Record. Read it fast as my link to the article is only good for 14 days as of 9/28.

Way to go Phi Delts for their efforts and participation in helping raise $20,000 to give to the Red Cross!

PROUD TO BE A PHI !

Tom Boonen Takes Cycling World Championship

Thanks to the folks over at Cycling.TV for serving up the free coverage of the World Championships in Madrid. After 273K of racing and one fairly long break towards end, it all came back together with about 20k to go, but then many attacked came from Vinokourov who seemed to really do a lot of work to make the last break work along with Bettini. But then with 500 meters to go, what was left of the peloton, caught the break and then Boonen just did his thing to get to the line first.

The Spanish seemed to be the main protagonists with up to four riders in the biggests break of the day, but that could also have to do with the race being on home turf. But the Italians had Bettini in the break and he seemed to be having a great day, but just couldn't put the win together in the end. Sprinters who were picked to challenge such as Petacchi and McEwen didn't make that final group and left the door open for the next major sprinter, Boonen, to win.

With Boonen's palmares at such a young age, he's 24, he seems to be the new cycling superstar and this win proves it!

Congratulations to Belgium and Tom Boonen!

Provisional
1 Tom Boonen (Belgium) 6.26.10
2 Alejandro Valverde (Spain)
3 Anthony Geslin (France)
4 Marcus Ljungqvist (Sweden)
5 Murilo Fischer (Brazil)
6 Jakob Piil (Denmark)
7 Alexandre Kolobnev (Russsia)
8 Andreas Klier (Germany)
9 Julian Dean (New Zealand)
10 Martin Elmiger (Switzerland)
11 Janez Brajkovic (Slovenia)
12 Steffen Wesemann (Switzerland)
13 Paolo Bettini (Italy)

Check here for photos

Additional Info On Iraqi Juniors Team

Cut and pasted from CyclingNews.com article.

Van Dessel Cycles sponsors Iraqi juniors

In a gesture of goodwill, Van Dessel Cycles has agreed to sponsor the war-ravaged Iraqi junior national cycling team. "They are riding the city streets of a war zone because they are so dedicated to this sport," said Mathew Werner of 'Cyclists for Cultural Exchange'. "They were using ancient equipment - really old and decrepit bikes and clothing."

Van Dessel Cycles, seeing the plight of these Iraqi riders, decided to help. "We read an article about the group Cyclists for Cultural Exchange, which stated they were looking for help with their support of the Iraq junior national team," explained Van Dessel's Edwin Bull. "Always eager to give back to the cycling community as a whole, we couldn't help but get in touch and offer assistance."

Along with other industry leaders like Shimano, Ritchey, Giro, Fizik, Carnac and Smith, Van Dessel Cycles allowed the Iraqi team to turn in their rusty old steel frames and provided 10 of their Flahute racing frames. A mix of carbon fiber and aluminum, the Flahute provides its riders with the responsiveness that a racing frame demands, meaning a generation of Iraqi cyclists won't be forced to forego their ambitions of competing at international level.

New Feature to the blog...

So, uploading pictures to my blog is quite nice when I only have a couple that I want to show off or to make a point in a specific post. But when I've been on a trip and have taken a bunch of picture it can be a real time consuming hassle. So, I've got an account at Flickr.com and have been uploading pictures there, which has been great, but that didn't really solve my immediate problem.

In the process of uploading a large number of older pictures I came across this Java feature of Flickr where I can place some code into my template and viola, embedded pictures. It's pretty nifty and I've got it setup to scroll through all the pictures at my Flickr account.

You can find this new feature over on the right side of the page under the "My Flickr" heading. Enjoy!

Feel Good Story...

I came across this story over at VeloGal's blog. The original article was from a Santa Cruz newspaper.

You should read it yourselves, but the lowdown is some folks in Santa Cruz are raising money for the Iraqi Junior National Cycling Team who's Italian racing bicycles and gear were destroyed during the looting of Uday Hussein’s palace, where the bikes had been stored. The group has been raising money by selling custom-designed jerseys emblazoned with the Iraqi team’s name, Iraqi flag and colors. The feel good part is that they reached their goal of raising $10,000 to equipe the team of 10 riders with bikes, but are now $1000 short on covering shipping the bikes. If you're interested in helping the info is in either article. Kudos to Matthew Werner, a local Santa Cruz cyclist and Cyclists for Cultural Exchange board member, who seemed to be man behind the fundraising.

Will Weather Affect Tour of Hope?

With the beginning of the Tour of Hope set to start one week from today, I am wondering how the weather might affect the ride. The ride is expected to pass through Houston, TX on Monday, October 3rd where there will be special event with M. D. Anderson and Texas Medical Center cyclists joining the Tour of Hope riders in a ceremonial ride. As well, there is supposed to be a community rally and concert by Sisters Morales. Will Hurricane Rita affect the running of the Tour of Hope through the south of Texas?

With the evacuation of Houston and most other communities in the southwestern coastal areas of Texas in effect, it seems as if the storm is bound to do some serious damage to the area. I've been looking at the Tour of Hope website, but haven't seen any updates as to their plans if the storm devastates the area.

With all the evacuation occurring in the state, I would think it might be dangerous to ride a bike on the hiways while these evacuees are returning home. Not to mention the flooding in areas where the Tour might go through or even the debris on the roads.

Well, one way or the other, this will truely be a Tour of Hope!

Something Funny...

Well, I haven't had much going on hence no posts lately. But, I've got a little laugher that was posted at FixedGear's blog and originally posted at Bobke Strut blog. So, here is the link.

View of the conference I'm attending at the Embassy Suites in South Lake Tahoe.



[Posted with a Treo 600 & hblogger 2.0 by Tony]

Lance News...

Even in retirement, Lance still gets the headlines. This time the headline reads, "Armstrong & Crow announce engagement" and in the article, it's also mentioned he might ride the Tour de France in 2006.

Quoting the article at CyclingNews.com...

The seven-times Tour de France winner has also been contemplating a possible come-back at the French Grand Tour 2006 although the Texan retired from the sport just a few weeks ago. "I'm thinking about it," Armstrong told The American Statesman's Suzanne Halliburton. "I'm thinking it's the best way to piss (the French) off," he added, in response to French newspaper L'Equipe, which reported on August 23 that it had proof that Armstrong used the banned drug EPO in the Tour 1999, the first Tour the American won.

WOW! I thought that it would be hard to just up and quit at the height of his career, but really didn't expect this. We can be sure that if he does come back to ride the Tour that he'll be prepared to win again.

As well, Lance is helping victims of Hurricane Katrina by donating $500,000 through his namesake cancer foundation that will be used primarily to assist cancer patients caught up in the aftermath.

Camping Wrap-up

Although I've been back for about 5 days, I have spent most my free time catching up at work and home as well as working out. So, here is the camping wrap-up...

Saturday morning, my brother and his wife arrived from San Jose and after getting their tent set up, we went for a bike ride in the Purisima Open Space.
It was the first time I had ridden my mtn. bike since October of two years prior. So, needless to say my brother had the advantage since he only rides mountain, not to mention he has a full suspension bike and he is 15 pounds lighter than I. So, now that my excuses are out of the way I can tell you he kicked my ass going up hill. Speaking of up hill, there was plenty of it in this ride and it was really steep, steeper than I'm used to on my road bike. I guestimate that many of the hills we were going up had inclines of 20 to 25% and I had trouble keeping the front wheel on the dirt most of the day.

The ride started by riding out of the campground and down HWY 1 to Higgins, Higgins to Whittemore Gulch Trail all the way up to Skyline Blvd. Then down Skyline to Redwood Trail parking area and down the Purisima Creek Trail to Grabtown Gulch Trail. Then to Bordon Hatch Mill Trail back to Purisima Creek Trail back to the trail head. Then it was basically an easy ride back to camp shy of one large hill.

The rest of the day was spent either cooking or hanging out at the beach playing with the kids near the ocean. As well, we celebrated my dad's 62nd birthday, early, with cake and a Brasilian rum. His birthday is really on September 4th, so Happy Birthday Dad!! Here is a link to the all the pictures I took while on the trip which I have uploaded to Flickr.com