As Long as You Get There

Cyclists are a special breed. We ride long distances on what a large percentage of people consider a toy, we wear lycra (electively), ride through weather most wouldn't dare venture into, and have a strange ability to suffer with style. But more importantly, we have a large support group. Whether it be friends, family, teammates, or strangers, no matter what there's always someone to give us a hand.

I'm proud to be a part of this eclectic family. My new tee celebrates the camaraderie of cycling. Two riders pushing on, and like we all know, some days the legs just aren't there. It's that little push from our partner that gets us there. You can find this and other fine velo-centric offerings at the FreeBird Velo shop on Etsy.

RBC Sunset Loop

My my, how fast weather can change, which is rare to say in Southern California. The women's Sunset Loop stage was sunny and mild. 3 hours later and the western sky looks like a scene from Something Wicked This Way Comes. You remember that movie right? They showed it on rainy days in elementary school, I used to hate it, gave me the heebies. Anyways, dark skies were coming and it was not looking too promising for the men. Needless to say the mens field got obliterated after the rain started. Much respect to the guys still making it downtown to the finish line. As always, a big thank you to all the teams making it to Redland's and racing your hearts out. It's amazing to have such talented riders race in our little old city. Congratulations to Megan Gaurnier and Phil Gaimon for holding their leads throughout the entire race.

RBC Crit Time!

You know, I ended up venturing out Friday morning to the Beaumont stage, but the photos ended up being a bust. Apparently I can't shoot focused pictures while my head is trying to escape my body, all the while my body wanted to get back in bed, colds suck. Enter sad semi colon eyes and parenthesis mouth. I did find some new roads while in Beaumont, really good ones too, twisty country roads. So I'm back on the street today, in the legal way, for the Redlands Classic Downtown Criterium. Is the word criterium even used or is crit the true term? I don't know, but here are some photos from this afternoon, have at it:

This woulda been so good focused, so look at it in an artsy-fartsy way.

2012 Redlands Bicycle Classy Classic

Time Trial day. I usually get pretty bored watching time trials on TV, tuning in when the last 5 riders que up. But when it's live and it's all uphill I like it. So here it is, todays time trial, sorry but I missed the women this morning, they finished up before I got down there. Small field compared to the 200 men.

Oh yeah, congratulations to Phil Gaimon and Megan Guarnier.

So here ya go:

Redlands Classic Weekend Sneak Peeky

I've mentioned before on Twitter and I'll say it here: next weekend is my favorite weekend of the year. The Redlands Bicycle Classic is coming to town and that means for a week I get to ride around my local roads along with riders who are thousands of times better than me. But I don't care, I enjoy seeing the shiny bikes, team cars, new kits, and random professionals. I try to keep my enthusiasm to a minimum in front of Hubby because he doesn't understand my sickness and I believe he's embarrassed of my growing nerd love of all things bike.

Your dear author suffering in second place. Due to random illness's and

general malaise I'm passing on the public race and

doing the R.U.F.F. ride, in support of our local dog park.

Keep an eye out on this here blog, Twitter (@freebirdvelo), and my new up and running Tumblr page. I'll start on Thursday with the prologue and continue through the weekend, so look for pictures and whatnot's. Haven't figured it all out yet, I usually just roll with it.

Here's some of my shots from last years race so enjoy!