01.13.2010 | 9:57 am
At the beginning of this year, I hinted at taking some risks in 2010 — at leaving my comfort zone. Today I want to tell you a little more, and ask for your patience and support.
For 2010, there are three big projects I want to do. And while it’s probably unwise for me to announce something before I have anything to reveal, well…wisdom’s never been my thing. So:
Project 1: Fight Cancer More Personally
I of course plan to ramp up Team Fatty for another big year with the LiveStrong Challenge, but I’ve been thinking a lot about what I’ve learned from Susan’s battle with cancer, and how others who have been caretakers similarly learn a lot during these fights. This post from back in September got me to thinking: I would love to collect stories and tips from other caretakers in some kind of online forum, interview people in greater depth, and then publish what I’ve learned.
A “Caretaker’s Companion,” essentially.
I probably sound like I’ve got a delusions of grandeur problem when I say this (although not only when I say this), but I think this is the best idea I have ever had. Something that could really help the people who take it upon themselves to walk the path of cancer treatment with a loved one.
And it is something I really know and understand.
Project 2: Write Something Big and Fun
I’ve mentioned before that I wanted to write a book. What I didn’t mention is that I actually finished a proposal, shopped it around, and got no takers. And looking back now, I think everyone was right to not take that proposal. It was about too many things and had no arc to it.
So I’m working on another proposal now. It doesn’t have the failings of the previous proposal. It’s about one thing, and the very premise promises a big arc. Also, it’s something I think a lot of people will enjoy reading, and I know it’s something I can make into a very fun — yet, amazingly, informative — book.
There are a couple of big issues with this proposal, though:
- If the proposal is accepted, writing the book won’t be easy. Because the research — yes, research! — and preparation for it will consume my life. And then there’s the writing.
- Even getting the proposal finished is turning out to be a lot of work. Which is where my first request for support comes in. I want to get this proposal done, which means I need to write a sample chapter that goes with it. Which means I need to spend time with it. And I don’t have a huge amount of time. The obvious answer is for me to, for a couple weeks, blog a little less so I have more time to finish this proposal. Essentially, I think I’ll post on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday each week, giving me four days each week to use the time I’d usually work on the blog to work on the proposal instead. So I’m asking for your patience while I do that.
I know, I know: I haven’t said a word here about what this proposal’s actually about. And I can’t, at least not yet. I can tell you, however, that it’s the kind of book you’d expect from me, and the kind of book I’ll enjoy writing.
Project 3: A Best of Fat Cyclist Book
In a few months, I will have been writing this blog for five years. I think, during that time, I’ve written probably close to 2500 pages. Out of that, there’s probably enough good material to make a 250-page book. What I’m thinking of doing is the following:
- Organize my favorite posts by topic (How-To, Fake News, Epic Rides, Fighting Cancer, for example)
- Introduce and annotate each post, giving background on where different posts came from, additional thoughts and nonsense that didn’t make the cut when I wrote the post, and stuff like that.
- Include favorite comments for each post.
- Self-publish the book, making it available on a pre-order basis.
I kinda have my fingers crossed that this book will be what makes it financially possible for me to work on the other two projects. Which may be wildly optimistic and naive of me, but “optimistic and naive” has worked pretty well as a life philosophy for me so far.
Other Things Are Afoot
When I wrote my New Year’s post and said it felt like a year to take risks, I meant it. However, I expected to take those risks while still trying to keep the status quo intact.
Non-risky risks, if you get my point.
Since then, my status quo has been shaken in a couple of big ways. I won’t go into either right now, but I will tell you that one is public knowledge if you know where to look, and the other wouldn’t be a very difficult guess to make.
So status quo is out the door. In a lot of ways. And I’m looking forward to doing some things I’ve wanted to do my whole life.
In short, 2009 sort of grabbed me by the throat and took me for a ride. With any luck, I’ll repay the favor with 2010.
As you might expect, I’ll write about here as I go through it. In excruciating detail, and with excessive use of em-dashes and parenthetical comments.
PS: Does it sound like I’m having a midlife crisis or what?
Comments (83)
01.12.2010 | 12:09 pm
Today, I am going to violate one of my own cardinal rules of blogging: “Don’t blog about blogging.” There’s a very good set of reasons for this rule, not the least of which has to do with the potential triggering of a catastrophic time-bending recursion paradox.
But the more likely scenario of blogging about blogging is that you become so self referential that you forget that all the interesting things in the world happen when you’re nowhere near a computer.
Still, rules were made to be broken. Well, actually that’s just a feeble excuse frequently offered by people who are about to arbitrarily break a rule, but there you have it.
Oh dear. I seem to be breaking another of my cardinal rules: “Don’t let the introduction go on too long. Get to the topic at hand as quickly as possible.”
Well, you know why I’m breaking rules willy-nilly? Because I’m feeling dangerous, that’s why.
Our Story So Far
Yesterday, I posted a story about how I ran 13 miles on Sunday, and how it hurt and I farted a lot and my nose ran and stuff.
This 13-mile run was part of my crash-training program toward a trail marathon less than a month from now.
Touchingly, many of you showed concern for my welfare. Sample comment excerpts included:
It’s madness in its purest form. The pain will last a lot longer than you think. The chance of injury is nearly 100% (no, this is not an embelishment).
And this:
No offense, giving onself a month to train for a marathon sounds really stupid. I envision total disaster, as well as serious orthopedic injuries.
And this:
Fatty, forget about the girlfriend for a second and listen to me: you shouldn’t be doing this race. You’re not ready. And you’re going to hurt yourself in ways that will take a lot of time to heal. I know, it hurts the ego to admit that, especially when you factor in The Runner. But if she’s really a serious runner, she should know that and should be talking you down from this, not letting you do this to yourself. That kind of mileage takes months to build, so your bones and musculature have time to develop the strength to take the pounding. It’s not the same as the bike, ask Lance!
…
Be careful. It’s not worth crippling yourself over, man!
And this:
Most of your reaction to 13 miles is normal, but think again what 26 will be like if you haven’t had a chance to either do (or recover properly from) anything approaching 26 miles. Most training programs limit the longest long run to 20, but none would try to shoehorn that in your timetable.
I’d question shooting for that marathon on such a compressed training schedule.
And this:
in theory of course, your cycling legs give you the lungs and strength to do some damage. You really need to build up to the pounding to your bones and joints that distance running does to you.Sounds like you can do a 1/2 but 3wks till doing a full could be ugly.
And one guy posted a link of his story of how he did a marathon on eight weeks of training, the telling of which reads like “Ernest Shackleton II: This Time It’s Personal and Pretty Darned Angry.”
There is more, of course. Lots more. You should read all the comments, if you’re in the mood to be persuaded to not do something.
I Know Something You Don’t Know.
By nature or culture or choice, I am an over-sharer. It’s a useful trait for a blogger; I’m able to comfortably talk about things most people wouldn’t. Here’s the thing, though: I don’t over-share everything. At least, I haven’t yet.
One of my traits I haven’t really delved into so far, for example, is that I am in reality fairly tough-minded. I stick things out. Finish them.
Another of my traits is that I do these things cheerfully.
And I generally do them my own way, without taking a lot of stock in expert opinion.
And — maybe least important — I have one hell of a set of lungs and a pretty decent set of legs.
I am willing to bet these attributes, combined with my lack of training, against anyone who thinks I can’t or shouldn’t do a full marathon.
Here’s my specific bet: I will finish the Death Valley Trail Marathon (all jeep road, 2000 feet of climbing), and will beat the time I finished it last time I tried (4:39), seven years ago.
Seriously. Bet me. Tell me how much you’re willing to bet that a guy named Fatty who’s trained for practically no time at all won’t finish, or that I won’t finish in 4:38 or less. Tell me how confident you are in all your experts and experience vs. my pigheadedness, massive quads, and big lungs.
Whichever one of us loses donates that amount at the other’s LiveStrong account — or if you don’t have an account or want to have me donate to another worthy charity of your choice, note that in your comments and we’ll work something out.
Gauntlet Thrown
To make a long story short, I’m ignoring everyone’s advice. I’m doing this race, and I’m foolish enough to believe that I will do it faster than the year I trained for it. And I’m willing to put my money where my mouth is.
Are you? Or are you chicken?
Post your bet in the comments section. I’ll reply with either an accept or decline (with explanation) for every serious bet.
Bear in mind though, one stipulation: Just as I — if I lose the bet — will pay up and will write a lengthy post about how wrong I was, if you lose the bet you must pay up and write a lengthy comment about how wrong you were.
Regardless, a few weeks from now we’ll have raised some money in the fight against cancer, and either I or a lot of you will eat some humble pie.
Mmmm. Pie.
PS: If, on the other hand, you think I can do what I’m saying I can do, feel free to leave a comment saying that, as an incentive, if I finish the marathon in 4:38 or less, you’ll donate $X.XX to my LiveStrong Challenge. That would be very cool of you.
Comments (130)
01.11.2010 | 9:29 am
A Reminder-Style Note from Fatty: I need your help in my ongoing quest to be a perpetually award-winning blogger. So please do me a favor and nominate me for a 2010 Bloggie, in the “Best Sports Weblog” category. Details on what you need to do — as well as suggestions for other blogs you might want to nominate (cuz you have to nominate at least three blogs (not necessarily in the same category, though) — are in my post from Friday. Today and tomorrow are the last days you have to nominate me, so please don’t delay in facilitating my admittedly pathetic obsession. Thank you.
In less than a month, I’m going to be running a marathon. No, waitasec, “running” is not an accurately descriptive word, because I know I won’t be running the whole time. Maybe I should say I’m “performing” a marathon? Executing? Attempting?
Doing?
Regardless of the description, On February 6th, for the second time in my life, I will be trying to do the Death Valley Trail Marathon (a writeup of my first time is here).
Which means I kinda need to get serious about this whole running thing in a very short period of time.
General Observations on Running
A long time ago I wrote a post about how I’d never take up running again. Which just goes to show that you should never believe anything you read on the Internet.
The truth is, cyclists and runners should understand each other better than any other two kinds of athletes. Consider:
- Both sports require you to earn your legs over a period of several years
- Both sports let you start from home and go
- Both sports encourage you to wear a lot of brightly colored, reflective polyester
- Both sports let you see stuff and go somewhere
- Both sports require dedication, but can be extremely satisfying, eventually reward you with a zenlike state as you ride / run
- Both sports are likely to get you honked at by people in trucks who have just been forced to veer slightly and go around you, thereby making them very, very angry
And you know what? I really seriously believe it: cyclists and runners generally understand what the other guy is doing and why.
But none of that helps me right now, because I’ve got a problem, which was brought on by the following sequence of events:
- About two months ago, The Runner and I signed up for the Death Valley Trail Marathon.
- Concurrent to this signup, I began trail running with aplomb.
- About six weeks ago, I started really enjoying trail running and abruptly upped my mileage, going from five-mile runs to nine-mile runs.
- I immediately messed up my right knee and left achilles tendon.
- I could not run at all — and in fact only barely hobbled along when walking — for several weeks.
- At about the beginning of the year, I began running again. Just a few miles.
So. To recap, I just started running. A month before the marathon I’ll be doing.
That’s OK, though, I’m sure I’ll be fine. I just won’t have much of a “taper” period before the marathon.
How to Fool Yourself
As part of my crash course in preparing for a marathon, I am running four times per week. Mondays, I run six miles. Wednesdays, I run eight. Friday, I run four. Then I do a long run on Sundays. With the “long run” getting a couple miles longer each week.
Yesterday, for example, I ran thirteen.
OK, “run” may once again not be a perfectly accurate word.
I will explain.
The Runner and I planned a thirteen-mile out-and-back run: start at home, go 6.5 miles and turn around. I have to say: out-and-back courses are an excellent tactic for running: you feel fine during the first half of the run. You get to fool yourself: “Oh, I’m just going for a 6.5-mile run right now.”
And then when you turn around, well, you’ve got no choice. You’ve got to get home. Because when you get home, you get to lay down. Which can be an incredibly strong draw.
And I must say, I was going pretty strong for the first half of the run — there was a few miles of relatively flat running, followed by about a thousand feet of climbing in three miles. And running uphill is definitely my strong suit — I was able to even sorta kinda stay caught up with The Runner.
Problems, In Ascending Order of Severity
Once we turned around, though, problems began to occur. And for whatever reason, these problems increased in severity.
First, my gassiness increased a thousandfold. I think it’s all the jostling. And the thing is, when I run, there’s no getting around the farts. They’re coming out. Furthermore, they’re coming out loudly. And still even furthermore, they’re coming out in rhythm to my footfalls. Frrrp-FRAP-frrp-FRAP-frrrrp.
The Runner tells me that there are clearly-stated rules of runners’ etiquette mandating that I drop behind her whenever I’m going to fart. I don’t know if there really is such a rule, but I don’t think our relationship is at such a point where I ought to challenge her on that.
So I just run behind her all the time. It’s the safest thing to do.
The second thing that happened on yesterday’s run was that I was caught in a conundrum: I was hurting, I wanted to slow down, I wanted to whine, and I still wanted to appear tough. But that’s a real problem: the “being tough even though you’re hurting” thing is mutually exclusive with the “wanting to whine and slow down” thing.
I came up with an ingenious compromise, though, one which let me have my Cake of Pain and Pity, and eat it too: Grunts of Pain. Every few minutes — I would time them — I would emit a short “ugf” sound, and then not comment on it.
The Runner — dutifully — would ask, “What’s up?”
“Oh, you know. Nothing,” I would answer, in a terse, manly staccato, letting my my pain and resilience be the subtext of the message.
“OK, good,” the Runner would reply, not slowing down at all, and definitely not calling me a brave soldier. Which means I clearly need to help her understand subtext and the meaning of staccato pronouncements sometime before the day of the marathon.
Third, I got cold. This manifested itself in the following ways:
- Nasal pendulum: Sweat mingled with snot coming out of my nose, and dripping off the tip. This viscous nastiness would hang off my nose and swing back and forth in time to my running. If I swung my head little, I could get it to do a loop-the-loop. Sadly, The Runner never saw this, because I was running behind her and farting at the time. Which makes me think: I’m quite a catch, aren’t I?
- Slurred speech: As the run went on, the sun went down and it got cold outside. Before long, I could feel a slowness in the way my face and lips moved, especially my cheeks. Then my speech became sluggish-sounding and slurry. It occurred to me that I was probably hypothermic and should probably be on the lookout for dangerous thoughts such as, “I think I’ll lay down in the snow, just for a minute. It looks warm and soft.”
- Giddiness: I said to The Runner — in a slurred voice, natch — “I think I’m going to go lay down in the snow for a minute. It looks warm and soft.” And then I started giggling uncontrollably at my joke, even as I realized it wasn’t that funny of a joke. “Hm,” I thought to myself, “I believe that my mind has been affected by the cold.” This made me laugh even harder.
Fourth, I ran out of gas. This was a weird and revealing experience for me. When on a bike, I can pretty much always stay on the bike. Even if I bonk, I can still turn the cranks. But around mile ten, I had to walk for a while. I simply didn’t have the power to continue running. “Sorry,” I said to The Runner. “I suck.”
“That’s OK,” she replied. But you know, it’s not all that comforting to be told that it’s OK that you suck. Which I did not tell The Runner, because I was preoccupied with how inviting a nearby snowdrift looked.
In a minute (or three), we started running again. After a mile or so, I had to stop again. This time I didn’t even say anything when I slowed to a walk, because I kind of hoped she would just keep going, seeing as how she was running easily and comfortably.
It was then that it occurred to me: the places that I was having a really hard time with were the flat sections. When running uphill, I’m still at least sorta using my cycling legs. When running downhill, gravity is my friend. But flats — those are not easy for a non-runner. Flats are where you find out that you have not yet developed a good stride or running cadence.
Plus, there’s the cyclist’s mindset — an expectation of how fast ground should be covered. On the flats, cyclists can just haul, especially if you’ve got gears. Distances disappear quickly and easily when you’re riding on flat ground. When running, though, flats take time and energy, and you’re only incrementally faster than when you’re running uphill.
In other words, the flat sections got into my head.
Afterward
Eventually, we made it home. And while subjectively it seemed like I had been out forever, really it had just been a couple hours.
And that’s maybe the single biggest difference between running and riding: how long it takes for something to feel epic. On a bike, two hours is nothing for me. I can go hard for two hours and still be fine when I finish. Have a normal day.
Two hours of running, on the other hand, left me completely blown. I was exhausted for the whole evening, went to bed early, and slept hard the whole night.
And today…well, I can make it up a flight of stairs, but I do have to plan for extra time to do so.
So now I’m considering that in under three weeks I’m supposed to run twice as far as I did yesterday.
Yeah, that shouldn’t be a problem. At all.
Comments (113)
01.8.2010 | 8:24 am
I have many admirable qualities. I have a twinkle in my eye, for example, and a ready smile. I have a firm handshake and can be relied upon to repay loans to friends.
Furthermore, I keep my hair neatly trimmed, chew with my mouth closed, and shower every single day.
I guess you could say that I am very nearly a perfect man.
However, in the midst of my nearly innumerable strong points is one — yes, only one! — failing: I need positive reinforcement.
No, “need” is too weak a word. I require it. Demand it. Crave it. Dream about it.
Which means, from time to time, I’m going to ask you to go vote for me for some award or another. It’s just part of who I am. A tiny imperfection in what would be — I think you’ll agree — an otherwise perfect specimen of a man.
But right now I am not going to ask you to vote for me. No. Because right now it’s Bloggie nomination time, and so I am begging you to go nominate me.
Asking for a vote is much different than begging for a nomination, you see.
Here’s what I would like you to do. It’s a pain, so you may actually need to follow the steps here:
- Go to http://2010.bloggies.com/ .
- Nominate me and a couple of other blogs. The award I’m really gunning for is best sports blog, though I wouldn’t complain if you nominated me for other categories, too. Because I’m shameless. Anyway, you have to nominate at least three different blogs, so here are some suggestions of who to nominate and for what:
- Scroll all the way to the right side of the page.
- Enter the obscured “captcha” words.
- Check the box that says you wouldn’t mind being on the panel of voters who chooses the finalists.
- Enter your email address. It’s important you don’t enter a bogus one, because you’ll have to verify your vote by email.
- Click the “Submit Your Nominations” button.
- Go to your email inbox. Within a minute, there should be a mail from “Weblog Awards” with the subject “Tenth Annual Weblog Awards vote verification.” If there isn’t, check your spam folder.
- Click the URL in the email to verify your vote.
Please Hurry. I’m (Still) Begging You
The nomination period for this award ends this Tuesday. Now, I don’t know if that means it ends right at the beginning or at the end of Tuesday. Regardless, there isn’t much time.
So please facilitate my personality defect and go vote for me now.
Consider this: if I win the “Best Sports Blog” category here, it’ll be my third time, and I won’t be eligible to win it again after that. Which means I’ll leave you alone.
That right there is enough of a reason to go nominate me right now, if you ask me.
Comments (61)
01.7.2010 | 8:35 am
A “Hey, I’m On The Radio!” Note from Fatty: I’m on The Story with Dick Gordon today. You can listen to it on public radio stations or listen to it online here (the Listen Now link is at the bottom of the page, and the direct link to the MP3 file is here).
I am not a reckless consumer. I consider all my purchases carefully, and do my best to do without if I can make do with what I already have. Consider, for a moment, my bicycles. Clearly, the Superfly 29″ fully rigid singlespeed and the Waltworks 29″ fully rigid singlespeed are very different bikes — one has a carbon frame, one has a steel frame. And they have different cranks, too.
Similarly, my Orbea Orca and Trek Madone serve very different purposes. One, for example, is a high-end, featherweight carbon road bike. The other, meanwhile, is a high-end, featherweight carbon road bike.
I have shown similar restraint in my acquisition of bike clothing. I have, at this moment, thirteen pair of bib shorts, which is not even enough to get me through two weeks, unless I do some laundry. As for jerseys, well, while it is true that I have dedicated an entire bedroom in my house to holding all the jerseys I own, I have worn many of these jerseys more than twice.
As a final example of my prudence in bike-related gear selection, allow me to show you a photograph of the paltry number of hydration packs I currently have in my possession.
Sadly, this selection of seven packs is diminished from the number I should have, because I loaned my college-attending niece my Camelbak HAWG — the Camelbak I used when I rode the Kokopelli Trail Race — a year or so ago, and have not seen it since.
Also, I am not including my CamelBak VeloBak in this photograph, because it is a strange creature, neither fish nor fowl. I am not sure whether it belongs in my jersey room or in my hydration pack nook. Also, I have not yet worn it outside, fearing I will either draw derisive comments from friends or be captured and imprisoned as a member of the Borg Collective.
Really, though, my hydration packs are only a subset of my backpack / messenger bag menagerie. Here is the more inclusive collection:
Ten. Plus of course the permanently-loaned HAWG and the peculiar VeloBak. And also I think I have one more CamelBak MULE laying around somewhere — probably stashed in a bin somewhere, and still holding about 40oz of apple-flavored Cytomax I mixed back in 1998, before it occurred to me that apple-flavored Cytomax is the most vile stuff on earth. Especially once it’s gone warm in a water bottle.
Wow, I just had an involuntary shudder at the recollection of a sports drink.
Now, I expect there are a few of you who may believe I have too many packs and bags, especially of the hydration pack variety (between eight and ten, depending on whether you count lost, stolen and Frankensteined hydration packs).
To which I reply: pish-posh.
Each of these packs / bags is a critical and often-used item in my cycling life. Which I will prove right now.
The Crumpler Bumper Issue
Crumpler sent me this pack , hoping that I would write about it. Which I am, now. And it’s a really great bag, I think, although I have not yet ever actually used it. Still, take a look:
Yeah, I’ll bet Crumpler is thinking right now, “Hey, we should get Fatty to do our product shots for us. He’s that good.”
The truth is, at $65 (and up, if you want fancier colors), this is a good price for a hydration pack that holds a lot of stuff. Or at least I assume it would hold a lot of stuff.
The thing is, though, it’s really rare for me to have a bright orange drinking tube that I’m reticent (yes, I’ve used both “reticent” and “menagerie” in today’s post — FatCyclist.com is your one-stop fancy vocabulary shop) to use it, ever. Because once you’ve used a hydration pack’s bladder even once, no matter what you put in it — like, even if you were drinking rubbing alcohol from your hydration pack, which would incidentally be a very bad idea and I am not recommending at all — it’s going to start growing mold and algae and probably fungus and other miscellaneous flora.
Which is cool if you like to think of your hydration pack drinking experience as akin to sipping from a mossy stream.
But I don’t.
So the Crumpler sits unused. Someday, though, I’m going to put some stuff in it, and go for a ride, and then I’ll give this pack an even more authoritative review, if that’s even possible.
Or I’ll give it to someone who wants it, maybe. Like, maybe my niece will give me back my HAWG if I give her this.
The CamelBak Mule
I don’t even know how many Leadville 100’s this CamelBak has seen.
Oh, wait a second. That’s not a Mule. That’s a Blowfish. Which means that my MULE is for sure missing. And also, it means that I can’t tell the difference between some of the products in the CamelBak line.
It’s easy for me to remember when I last used this particular CamelBak, because it’s still got the snacks from the trip. Specifically, it has graham crackers, fruit snacks, and granola bars, along with what I am sure is still perfectly drinkable water.
Though I am not confident what would happen after you drink the water.
Those snacks tell me that this was the CamelBak I wore when hiking to Timpanogos Cave with the twins last Summer. And since, if I remember right, the twins each had to pee into specially-made plastic bags containing absorbent silica gel during the tour of the cave itself, I’m a little bit nervous to investigate this bag further.
Though I would like to see if I could find some more of those ultra-ultra-portable potties. Those were handy.
When will I use this pack next? Next time I need to go on a ride on a geared bike, that requires around 100oz of water, a jacket that won’t fit on me or in my jersey, and a bunch of snacks that I don’t mind being a couple of years old.
Ergon BD1
This is the wackiest pack I have ever owned. The frame swivels and holds the pack off your back.
And the strapping on the back is perfect for holding a pair of snowshoes. Which is what I most recently used this for — The Runner and her dad hike to the top of a local mountain every month without fail, and I’ve started joining them on their monthly adventure in OCD-land.
Also, I kinda think this might be a pretty good pack for taking on the Great Divide Race. If I were ever to do such a thing, I mean. Which would be utterly foolish.
But it would give me something to talk about on the blog, right?
The CamelBak Pakster
This was the first CamelBak I ever owned. Dug and Bob (of the core team, not the Mackenzie Brothers from the Great White North) got it for me for a birthday present:
This is from back when dinosaurs used CamelBaks. Things were much simpler then: A rectangular envelope with a velcro closure at the top to hold the bladder, a zipped pouch and a mesh pouch to hold stuff, and a bungee cord to hold stuff that wouldn’t fit in the pouches.
Padded straps cost extra.
To my dismay and delight, this CamelBak contains an original Powerbar, peanut butter flavored. Which causes my mind to boggle for a few reasons:
- That I ever ate the original Powerbars at all.
- That anyone ate the original Powerbars at all.
- That it only crossed its expire date two years ago.
Does anyone have an “I ate a complete original Powerbar while riding a bike and lived to tell the tale” story?
Come to think of it, I wonder if the original Powerbars are still for sale, because it would be an interesting stunt for me to try.
Checking…
Wow. They are. I’m going to buy one. I’ll report back with my results in the near future. Wish me luck.
The Camelbak Classic
Here I have the CamelBak Classic, which is the minimalist version of the Camelbak — it just holds your water, a multi-tool, and maybe one very small snack:
I actually only bought this because I went into REI looking for a bladder to replace one of my grody, moss-infested ones, and it turned out it was cheaper to buy this whole CamelBak and then rob it of the bladder than it was to simply buy a bladder.
Which makes this the saddest, loneliest, CamelBak that has ever lived.
The CamelBak Rocket
Of all the CamelBak’s I have, this is the one I’ve used the most:
The fact is, the Rocket may have been the best CamelBak ever made. The straps were nice and broad, the bladder was just right for a medium-sized ride, and you could get to everything in the cargo area with a single zipper.
Back before our singlespeed days, Kenny had and used one just like this.
And then we started riding singles.
And now, it’s rare to see anyone I ride with on any CamelBak at all, anymore.
Still, the CamelBak Rocket does have the distinction of being the stiffest pack in my collection — with years of sweaty minerals filtered through the nylon, it’s practically a board.
The Ellsworth
Um, I honestly do not know how I got this one:
And I didn’t know Ellsworth made hydration packs, either. It’s still got the tags on it, and is in “new-but-kinda-dusty” condition.
But I’m sure this will make an awesome riding pack for me, at some point. Or possibly a terrific birthday / Christmas / wedding gift.
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