Paper Shoes

So, here I am at one of new favorite places (the Panera downtown on Lake Eola) studying for my last final exam of the semester tomorrow morning at 7. Biology. It's a truly riveting subject. Okay, that was a boldfaced lie. Anyway, the smell of summer is lurking, and I like it. Time to live my life without the lingering thought of tests and papers in the back of my head. I need to find a job to get some bread stacks in my pocket though. I feel it's going to be an amazing summer though. Traveling all over, racing my bike, hopefully making another large leap in my chasing of the dream. Speaking of, I FINALLY have my new time trial bike in rideable condition. Took me long enough...and I had to take parts off of my other bikes just to get it up and running, but it's pretty sexy. For those who don't know what a time trial is (I'm going to assume every person that might read this blog doesn't know) it's when cyclists race alone against the clock. The rider covering the given course in the smallest amount of time is dubbed the winner. Aerodynamics play a huge role in it (since you ride alone with nothing to draft), thus the weird looking bike and wheel. You pretty much ride flat out as hard as you can, until you go cross-eyed in pain. I did my second TT ever on Tuesday night, second time riding the new bike and I got 6th...lame. Was hoping for better. I finished two measly seconds behind 5th. I rode a 14.2 mile course in 31 minutes roughly. You do the math. Anyway, I should get back to studying instead of wasting time on this here internet. Keep it hard. And here's a picture of my newest toy..

I give today two thumbs up

I skipped class today to go ride for 5.5 hours (about 100 miles). Such a beautiful day in the FLA, I had to.

Fulfill the Dream

It's amazing. Really is. So here's the low down. I was totally failing my Biology class there for a while. I got a 14 on the second test. Yeah, I would've put a gun in my mouth if it wasn't for the fact that the professor dropped the lowest test grade. Anyway, I knew I had to kick it into high gear. I went to tutoring, bought the study guide textbook, everything. I did a little better on test 3, but not a whole lot. I raped myself even more. Everything. Totally scored a B on the last test and with my super high lab grade, I now have an A in that class. From F to A. All that's left is a 100 question final exam. Keeping my fingers crossed. But this isn't just a freak occurance. My Statistics class was a bomber too. I was doing like, mediocre. I had a fourth test coming up and if I did decent on it I wouldn't have to take the optional final on the same day as my huge bio exam. Even though I knew how important that exam was, I didn't study for it much at all. I've been busy stressing about other things, and spent all weekend racing my bike too. I didn't know shit going into it. I studied for it in the library for like 40 minutes before I went in to take the actual test (most of those 40 minutes were spent zoning out while listening to my ipod at that). Came out of that test thinking I bombed it. Looked up my grade tonight. GOT AN A. Missed one question. With that test grade, I am now done with the class and don't have to take the optional final. That is just like, way too awesome.

I'm building something...

Just a personal observation... People constantly talk about how making sacrifices to reach a given goal is so hard. The classic example is that of the athlete who gives up all of life's youthful indiscretions to focus on their craft. You know, the 12 year old who goes and does soccer drills for hours after school. The college student who actually doesn't go out drinking every other night but instead focuses on studying non-stop hoping to graduate with a high GPA and get into med school. I think it's all shit. If you really want something bad enough, those "sacrifices" aren't so hard to make. I constantly have possible distractions popping up in my life, but I take a second and think. I usually ask myself "how bad do I want to win" and it becomes a pretty easy decision.

Anyway, less than two weeks until my last final. words can't describe my jubilation.

Legendary

So last week was pretty shitty. My grades are not all that great and the semester is almost over. I realized I'm broke and I didn't get the job I was shooting for at the UCF gym. I felt like crap on the bike. Basically, I was just feeling sour towards everything. Then came yesterday, Saturday. One of the greatest days ever. The culmination of all the hard work that I've put in this season so far paid off. I lined up for the most epic race of the season. An 80 miles road race called Webster-Roubaix (pronounced Roo-bay). We rode a 10 mile loop eight times, but each lap had a 2.5 mile long section of horrible dirt road with the start/finish halfway through the dirt section. I'd never been so nervous before a race start. I seriously thought I was going to get raped. I started the race, rolling out on the dirt and in that first 1.5 miles of racing, there were crashes everywhere, left and right. It was completely surreal to watch people eating it all around me. Anyway, on the first lap of this 80 mile race I went to the front and drilled it, started a split consisting of me and 11 other guys and the race was over. We had a 5 minute gap on the rest of the racers, but still had about 70 miles to race. Slowly but surely, guys in the break were popping left and right. By the last two laps it was just five of us left, and eventually just three of us left duking it out. I was suffering so bad the last 3 laps. I was cramping from my feet up to my hands. My legs were locking up. I was in the ultimate pain cave, but I fought through it with every ounce of strength I had because I knew this was my day, it was now or never. Fast forward to the finish and I ended up getting third...not first but still epic. It all came down to my mustache and pink bike.

I sold my soul to the open road

Watch the first minute and 35 seconds into this video. It's pretty legendary.