Perry's Wheel

I feel cold, angry, confused and empty. 12 hours ago, I was told that my friend, Perry Lyles, had passed away. One never knows how they're going to deal with situations like this, and I guess I still don't. I've heard of people describing it as "the new normal," and I guess that's a fitting analogy. Life must go on, even if it is a little bit dimmer and slightly more pale. Perry Lyles was a devoted husband and father, a fierce friend, and a great man. I am honored to have known him for the short time that I did. My life, and many others, was made significantly better because of him.

I first met Perry right at about a year ago, as we were gearing up the training sessions in preparation for the Ride to Austin. He was not the most demonstrative of men, so it took some time to get to know him, on and off the bike. Time, thankfully, was something that we did have. Over the course of many, many miles, I got to know a caring, passionate person that always had an ear to listen, a joke to crack, or a story to tell.

Cyclists are a tight knit bunch as it is. To the outside observer, it seems to be such an individual sport. Granted, we are all only as fast as our legs will take us, but we work together to push through pain, both physical and mental, to get around that next bend, up that next hill, or though those last few miles on a hot, hard ride.  As P3C3 riders, we are even more like family. Through the bike, we get to know each other and rely on each other like extensions of our own self.

I rode with Perry in the heat and cold, sun and rain, in the pre-dawn fog and in the clear blue sky of a summer afternoon. He was a stronger rider than me, so I spent a lot of time holding his back wheel as he pulled me around Upstate South Carolina and parts of Western North Carolina. He was an unwavering force on the road, and he got me through many of my first really long rides last summer.

He was also there at Donaldson every week, keeping the pace steady, taking pulls and periodically putting upstarts like me in our place in the little unsanctioned sprint zones we'd hit on the Country Ride. Every time I looked around, there he was. As the summer wore on, the post-Donaldson tailgating and trash talking became as much of a fixture as the ride itself. We'd always rag on Perry for his customary "Booty Sweat" shower that he take in the parking lot after every ride (He always had an old Arizona Iced Tea jug filled with water that he dump over his head to wash all the sweat off. Before long, we are all doing it). It's memories like this that keep coming back to me in technicolor.

In the Fall of last year, Perry's son, Taylor, started riding with us, and I could see that talent on the bike was a family trait. I got to watch a father-son dynamic that I can only dream to replicate if I'm lucky enough to have children. The two of them were friends, and I got to watch Taylor blossom on the bike, even as he did dumb kid stuff by launching off the front and missing a turn every once in a while.

As a newer cyclist, my days were more uneven. Some days I was on, and others I was off. Towards the end of the summer, I had a strong period where I was giving Perry a run for his money on a couple of rides, but that would always come and go. Through all of that, there was Perry's Wheel. I could always grab on and he'd tap out a smooth cadence, taking me where I needed to go. It's ironic that the last time I saw him was on a bike, but not out on the road. It was in a trainer class, and wouldn't you know it, he was set up right in front of me, as if he were pulling me like he's done so many times. If I had my way, I'd be back there right now, even if only for a moment. I'm going to miss that feeling, and I desperately miss my friend.

I just wish there had been more time, and my heart aches even more for his family. Life is so beautiful, but death is so random, and this has shaken me to the depths of my soul.

I'll see you on the other side, brother. Save a pull for me.

 Perry Lyles: 1963-2010

Gremlins

Well, I've been meaning to post here for a while now, but it appears that gremlins have invaded my home computer.

Any time I try to do anything it asks me what program I want to use, even for simple stuff like, oh, starting Internet Explorer or Firefox. It's got to be some kind of malware but antivirus, though it finds some stuff, has yet to kill this thing off. Alas, I've yet to find a solution and I fear that it's gonna take a reformat on the machine. Ugh

Do any of you techie types out there have ant suggestions? Pretty please?

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone. Any spelling errors are due to fat, clumsy thumbs.

An Open Letter to Winter

Dear Winter,

I really hate that it has come to this but I'm afraid we're going to have to stage an intervention if your current behavior continues. You see, we have always had a contentious relationship. We really do appreciate your existence because you provide a break from the often stifling heat of South Carolina and help us appreciate what have here, where we get to play outside pretty much 9-10 months out of the year.

You even provide the added benefit of dumping snow on little slices of heaven like Steamboat, Colorado, where we periodically get to go play in the snow.

An example of Winter behaving correctly in Steamboat

You, Winter, are the counterbalance, the one that keeps us honest, that tests our resolve. You send us inside to toil away on trainers or to simply hibernate in front of the television, dreaming of warmer and sunnier days. This is all well and good, but, sheesh, this is getting out of hand.

As I sit down to eat lunch while writing, this is the view outside my kitchen window:

This is not the Louisiana Bayou. It's my back yard.

You, Winter, have turned my back yard into a swamp. You, Winter, have decided, Montgomery Scott-like, to transport us, in terms of climate, to Belgium. Now, we love just about everything about Belgium: the chocolate, the beer, the cycling culture... Did I mention the beer? You, Winter, have however immersed us (pun intended) in the one thing we do not enjoy about Belgium: the weather.

This, my friend, must stop, and we would greatly appreciate your cooperation in ceasing and desisting all crappy weather activities until further notice.

And it is not only humans that dislike your current practices:

Seriously. You're making Jake sad, and he's NEVER sad..

Shiveringly,

The Yummy NOMs Brain Trust

I'm MELTING

Or, at least I WAS melting, for a very difficult 18 minutes 15 seconds last night. Case in point:

ahhh Whattaworld, whattaworld...

Last nite, I headed over to the Greenville Cycling Center  to participate in an indoor time trial on the computrainers to support JDRF. This would mark not only my first time on Coach Jim's slick computrainer set up, but also the first time I did a time trial in any format.

I even got to do it with some friends:

The hardest, and the prettiest gals in the Upstate Peloton

Robin's always so dang composed, she should join OREC

I, on the other hand, am rarely composed, but I've got this melting thing down

The wifey, channeling her inner Cavendish

Why is this important, you ask? Well I'm toying with the idea of bike racing this year, and, to that end, I joined the Greenville Spinners Racing Team just to see if I like the whole racing scene. To be honest, after hearing of several good friends crashing at local races as well as being a little turned off at how seriously people take themselves at these things, I'd been a bit resistant the whole idea. I like riding my bike, and typically, I like to keep it simple. However, after serious lobbying from the wifey and a couple of my P3C3 mates, I decided to dip my toe. I still don't know what races, or even how many I want to do this year. 

Then last night happened. It wasn't epic. I didn't even ride that strongly, but it was really cool to just saddle up and tap out 10k of full on effort on my own. I might be on to something here, especially when 10k of effort affords me the ability to demolish something like this afterwards:

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. This is the best part of being a cyclist

So, now, I've got to a) get a TT bike (WOOHOO! TOYS!) b) figure out how to ride it, and c) scope out local TT races that I can ride in.

Shouldn't be too hard. Stay tuned for updates, and until the next time, stay hungry, friends...


ps: Thanks again to Jim Cunningham for having the event, and also to April at The Living Pixel for taking all the pics. My sweat has never been captured in such stunning high definition.

Gauntlet

Well, so much for lots of updates all the time. I gotta shake these winter cobwebs.

In any case, we at Yummy NOMs want to congratulate the wifey on entering the blog world with her new space, The Wandering Cyclist.

She's going to be giving updates on her training plan, and race goals for the year, so go back early and often for tales of inteval workouts, blisters, carbo-loading, and other wonderful goodness.

I should also mention here that I'm participating in a training program as well, even with the same trainer. We have different goals, but we will be doing a lot of the work side-by-side, I'd imagine. No chance we'll end up getting hyper-competitive with eachother... None. Not at all...

(sewing machine leg kicks in..)

Seriously, we won't be talking smack or anything...

(getting really fidgety now)

Ok, ok... fine, the gauntlet is being thrown down. You think you can blog better than me. BRING IT ON!!!

(all better now)  

The Return of the NOMs

(The sun rises and shines through a window, revealing a dusty space, stale after months of neglect. Our intrepid consumer of The Good Stuff peers in, reluctant to enter for fear what he might find left behind. Luckily, he realizes that he is simply talking about a metaphor, and a pretty weak one at that...)

Oh, you thought I was gone? Pshaw. It's only been, oh, almost 5 months since we last saw each other. They tell me that patience is a virtue, and for all three of you who visited this space back in the fall, I'm sure I've been pushing the limits of that virtue.

See, this whole blogging thing gets pretty daunting as you get behind and watch the various stories/posts you want to write pile up like a sink full of dirty dishes that you just don't feel like emptying. After a while, there comes to be so much that you don't want to even begin. Better just to blow the house up and move on. Ok, maybe not blow the house up, but you get what I mean, right?

To that end, I won't be providing a JD-style blow-by-blow of rides, meals, conversations and all around hilarity that has occurred in the past few months, but here's a couple of highlights:

1. We completed the Ride to Austin. I won't begin to describe it. If you want to learn more about it, go here to see my and everybody else's updates along the way. I'll only say this about the experience: other than receiving the immense blessing of meeting and marrying my wife, the P3C3 ride is the greatest thing I have ever accomplished.
2. The first ever Casa Zeta Christmas Pizza Festa went off with a minimal amount of fuss and introduced a lot of friends to some NOMalicious grilled pizza recipes.
   
3. Thanksgiving, blessed, wonderful Thanksgiving came and went. Many delicious NOMs were plundered that day.
4. The wifey and I successfully navigated the annual Florida Migration at Christmas, and even managed to get a ride in.
5. Because of crazy cold temperatures, and a couple of bouts with illness, my wife and I have been pretty much off the bike for the past month, which sucks on approximately 73 different levels. As I sit here and write this, she's finally out riding the UWBL ride, a favorite of both of ours that we did every weekend last year, but have yet to complete until today. I'm still fighting a chest cold, so I'm currently trying to ignore my trainer sitting in the next room calling me names like "softie" and "wuss."
   

Anyway, like my trainer, this space has been sitting in a corner of my mind, mocking me for a quite a while now, and I'm here to declare that we are back, although probably not better than ever. Hopefully, dear reader, you will continue being patient as we work out the kinks and flex the muscles that have atrophied during our long hibernation. We going to try to keep this up more regularly, with shorter posts, random thoughts and musings, updates on a little thing called the FTC (the first rule of the FTC is that you DO NOT talk about the FTC), and many other topics. As the weather warms, I'm certain that the Master of All Things Epic will rear his head again and contribute some suffering fodder for your reading pleasure, so fear not if you have returned looking for epic ride updates.

Until then, my darling ones, stay tuned for the dawning of a new age here at Yummy NOMs.

Into (and out of) the Mystic...

Van Morrison has a few songs that just seem to capture the... well, the IT of a situation sometimes. "Into the Mystic," really is a love song, and not so much about mysticism and whatnot, but Van does a good job of evoking a lot of imagery in the song, to the point where you can really "smell the sea, and feel the sky. Let your soul and spirit fly into the mystic..."

On Saturday, we were nowhere near the sea, but we did feel the sky, and, if you ask me, my gypsy soul got rocked like way back in the days of old...

Dawn Patrol

We got the dreaded email from the Master of All Things Epic last week, naming the time and the place (6AM and the Simpsonville Sports Club parking lot) for our next P3C3 training ride. The wifey and I managed to rope Vinnie, charter member of YNHPF into joining us, so we had a nicely sized little group (somewhere in the neighborhood of a dozen).

We set out in the dark, like last week, but that's where the similarities ended. We were gonna be riding rollers this week. Lots of rollers. We'd also be seeing some pretty wild patches of fog, which, as the sun rose, gave the ride a truly mystical theme. Hence the title of this post, for those of you scoring at home. We're gonna let the pics do the talking for the first half of the ride. Here we go:

 

 Dawn set the stage

 

 We hit more fog banks than we could remember

I. Love. This. Pic.

Random streets become eerie in the early morning fog

The sun starts coming out in my feeble attempt to get artsy

Of Backsides, and good rides...

It's always fun to ride with like minded, similarly skilled people. It's even more fun to ride behind like minded, more highly skilled, similarly sized people. Vinnie, our globetrotting friend who, when not working his tail off in a very successful career doing something that I definitely couldn't begin to understand, is also training for an Ironman. So, he's very strong on the bike. He also, like me, has a large frame for a cyclist. Unlike me however, Vinnie has a pa-donk-a-donk kiester, which makes him the perfect person to pull on the flats to help, um, break the wind in front of me (Thank you, I'll be here all weekend. Be sure to tip your waitress. Now get your mind out of the gutter.)  Case in point:

 

It's like tail wind (pun intended), that slipstream is so big!

Anyway... Jokes aside,the first 30 miles disappeared quickly, but my tension level was on the rise. My trusty steed, Fred the Tennessee Stud, was not having a good day. The cassette and the rear derailleur were making so much noise by about mile 35, that I was seriously considering putting Fred out of his misery, tossing him into the woods and hopping into the sag wagon. At the halfway point however, Fred and I found salvation at what must be the most immaculate country convenience store on the planet. 

I'm not kidding, it was a family owned place, and you could eat off the floors. I came in and asked the wonderful lady if she had some WD-40 (a MacGyver favorite right up there with duct tape) on the off chance that I could lube Fred into being quiet. She checked every where, to no avail. I thanked her for being so kind and resigned myself to creaking and squeaking my way back the last 40 miles.

To my wondrous surprise, however, she found the lost (and very rusty) canister and came and got me. I crossed my fingers and doused Fred's nether regions, swearing that I'll do better about washing and lubing the chain in the future. About three gallons of WD-40 later, and I decided that was all I could do, but then a funny thing happened...

It worked, and the mental lift I got from that had me riding super strong for the rest of the route! So strong in fact, that I was able to goof around and catch my buddy Perry in a couple of sprints and climbs. Perry, also a fellow P3C3 rider, kicks my butt on a regular basis, and, though I wouldn't say I won any of the little skirmishes that I started out on the road that day, I did make him work a couple of times...

Which brings us to...

The Perry-Flavored Suppository (almost)

At the top of one of the many quick steep climbs, I thought I had gapped Perry and was feeling feisty. So, like the good little moronic newbie bike rider that I am, I kept blasting off the front on this fun, twisty little lane that we were on, doing my own little personal time trial, and pretending like I knew what I was  doing. There was a SHARP left hand bend followed almost immediately by a right turn that we needed to take, which I wasn't expecting. I grabbed the brakes, thinking I might be able to just make the turn, but, unbeknownst to me, Perry had snuck back on my wheel, probably to teach me a little lesson. If not for a quick hand on the brakes and some nifty handling on Perry's part, I might just have had an uncomfortable trip to the doctor. Rookie mistake, I guess. I need to learn to check my six more regularly. Perry was a good sport about it, which I thank him for, because I was pretty mortified.

Random Nathan update

I don't know where to put this, so I'm putting it here. Our friend Nathan joined in again, this time clad in a Slipstream kit with a white jersey, which I guess made him the best young rider in the GC or something like that. Just like last time, our view of him was decidedly one-sided.

  

I'll see the other side of him one day...

Anyway, the rest of the ride went off without much incident, with the sun getting higher and hotter. We were quite happy done by the time we rolled into the parking lot 85 miles and 4500 feet of climbing later.

Awards and Accolades

The Master of All Things Epic had engineered a little contest themed around the Little House on the Prairie, with the grand prize being an ice cold Fat Tire (a.k.a. God's Recovery Drink). Now I'm sure you're thinking "Wow, that sounds both creative and cool! How come you haven't talked about it until now?" The answer would be, due to my horribly deficient Little House knowledge and subsequent performance in the contest, I lost, and we don't talk about losses here at Yummy NOMs...

That being said, to the victor go the spoils. Congrats to Perry, winner of the first Little House on the Prairie Contest Thingy:

 

He can hardly believe it...

 

We even had podium girls

We at Yummy NOMs have a belated award however. Being follicly challenged, yours truly was ineligible for this contest, but were are proud and happy to bestow the first ever Arnold Poindexter Award for Awesome Helmet Hair to...

 

 Vinnie!

Whose resemblance to this guy inspired the creation of the award 

 

Yeah, how many people do you know that can take it from Van Morrison to Revenge of the Nerds in less than 500 words? It takes skillz, friends. Mad skillz...

All in all, it was a great ride, capped off by a lazy afternoon of post ride football and mexican recovery NOMs, which were mystical in their own right. Anyhow, we'll be heading out on our first annual Colorado Training Camp next week, so stay tuned for pics of mountains and tales of tasty western treats. 

'Till next time, stay hungry, friends.

NOM!!!!!