Nick Waite

Hey folks, I have changed my blog site location to: www.nick-waite.blogspot.com Believe me, it's better. Seeya there! -Nick

Alright, first one out of the way. Yesterdays stage one in Brussels was gnarly fast and dangerous as expected. It's always a bit of a shocker jumping into the first euro road race of the year. A mountain bike race comes to mind when I think of how to explain it. The Gun goes off and it is aggressive with lots of yelling and elbows being thrown.... and that's only the neutral start! Once the 5k neutral ends the speed ramps up incredibly and we start getting buzzed by race official moto's and the team car's speeding up to the breakaway group with dust and rocks getting flung into the field as they pass. Stage one was hot. 95+degrees hot. There was a break that contained two of my teammates I missed in the first 45k lap so the rest of the race was spent baking in the peloton focusing on getting my musette each time around. The main field got pulled with 2 local laps to go much to everyone's content since we were all thoroughly suffering in the heat. As far as the GC is concerned, I lost a ton of time so my goal is training and making the day's move the rest of the week. Not exactly a fitting course for me with almost no climbing and the potential for wind on the open, flat roads. Still getting the equipment dialed since can't use my trek over here. Hopefully the SRM Power Meter will work today so I can see exactly how hard the racing over here is. Hunter will be stoked to with the data from a full Euro trip. Leavin' in an hour for stage two. I'll try not to miss the break today. -Nick

Sleep was intense last night... Deep and filled with sideways thoughts of everything I'd been thinking about all day. Only woke up once and slept solidly until 10 A.M. so I felt pretty good today. I went for a couple hour ride on the narrow, FLAT farm roads in between the small town of Izegem and the City of Kortrjick. No H2's round here as they're wider than most of the roads. Pretty mellow day, really. The mechanics were buzzing around all day working on bikes for the 5 day stage race starting Wednesday in Brussels. The masseur was also in giving pre-race rubs. A nice perk after yesterday's mega-travel day. Looks like the painters and carpenters paid a visit the house since the last time I was here. The white walls upstairs are now purple, the green 70's paint scheme in the living area now orange. A new cage-like structure with a lock around what used to be the office as well. Yeah, Matt, there is a place like that right down the street... -Nick

I woke up yesterday, today.... or sometime and I've been traveling through time zones ever since. My morning spin in DC before boarding my flight to Belgium seems like a distant and memory and my sleep thus far is a mind twisting total of a couple hours at best. Never easy flying to the great cycling-mad continent and toyesterday was no exception. The plane was delayed in Dulles because someone accidently engaged the plane's inflatable emergency slide... Anyway, that set a whole host of other schedule problems once we reached the TIELT train stop 3hrs late...and of course no ride in sight and no answer at the only contact # I had. Ended up bording a few different buses to IZegem all while trying to remain awake enough not to miss the stop. After a hefty fatigue laden walk my buddy (another Nick) and I arrived at the stinky Belgian address we'll call home for the next un-known amount of time. First race is Wednesday. 5 days in and around Brussels. Off to my dream land.... -Nick

It seems that my blogging is becoming more and more sporadic as the season progresses. It's for a good reason, though. That reason, friends, family and random others who care enough to be reading this, is that my time of late has been spent on the road. Indeed, happily spent jamming to WVMBA events all over WV with good friends. Happily spent.... well, being pulled in directions away from the computer. Training, eating for my A+ blood, Hanging out with some cool girls, planning, driving (as well as getting the occasional(2) speeding ticket), taking the next step, hitting the podium and questioning have all been part of my reality since my last update. I'm in Mount Snow, VT for NoRbA # 2 at the moment. Drove in last night with Suzy Q and JB. We drove by a freshly thumped moose on the side of the road at about 10pm. there were a bunch of people around waiting for the local Butcher to show up to salvage the meat and tan the hide. The course is wet at the moment but could dry quickly as there is some cool, dry wind blowin' pretty hard. Looks like a few World Cup heavy hitters will be on the line Saturday. Should be good. I'm ready and stoked for the showdown... -Nick

Hanging in the misty NC mountains with the trek crew. JB and I drove yesterday and showed up in time for a few dry laps on the course. Straight up and straight down is the basic description of the course... It begins going right up the slope and zigzags all the way up on double track and gravel roads. After the 1250ft of up and up a nice techy down would be nice. Instead, its a couple of fun but short fresh-cut sections between ski slopes. It's raining now so they promise to at least be sketchy. Didn't ride the course today because it's going to change way too much by tomorrow. for now I'll be sleepin' out on the Trek deck. More later....

That's why we call it Wild Wonderful I suppose. The eternal unpredictable weather patterns of WV.... Or maybe that's the excuse to look outside and say what the hell? Anyway, my adventure over the last two weeks has been limited to an epic drive down to Charleston with Chris Phillips for a Steve Thaxton and World Wide Chiropractic visit. Unfortunately that same time was spent becoming ill with some sort of late Spring super bug. A couple days of achy fun followed quickly with a cold just to cap it off. Last week was designated for rest and low milage anyway so it actually showed up at a fairly convenient time. Besides, being less than 100% gives you perspective on how nice it is to be 100%. Missed the "Hanncock 100" last weekend and a fun time @ the Chris Phillip's bike compound in Mo-town. No worries, though, Matt Marcus was there to keep things under control even after the girls showed up. Doh! These Mtns. are for sure a place of complete solitary living. Nice place to live, train, eat and everything else focused... Roger and Matt are starting to crank up @ Blackwater bikes. A comfort in this low traffic quite place. I'm feeling healthy again with the help of my new A+ diet. Here comes the training and some big goals - NC, NORBA June 10-11, MT. Snow NORBA the next weekend and the following weekend in Mt. St. Anne QB for the World Cup.

This week has been pretty mellow so far. Almost anything seems mellow compared to the last three weeks. I've been enjoying the weather and reduced saddle time and have been taking care of some business as well. Monday was spent doing Davis stuff ( BWB, post office, Flying pigs). Tuesday I drove to Baltimore for an interview with Spokes Magazine and a (fun?) Vo2 Max test. In 12 min. you go from one end of the pain spectrum to the other. It's a good thing the test isn't any longer because otherwise drowning in your own saliva that accumulates in the gas-mask could quickly become an issue. Grabbed some Sushi in this really sweet euro-style market afterwards then drove the 3hrs back home. Full day. Today was equally as productive with less driving. I got new tires and wiper blades for the Subaru and even got a quote for the new muffler I'm going to need soon... It was so warm today. 80 I think. Good riding weather but since it's a rest week...I took a nap on the porch instead. Woke up to the USADA folks at my door for some out of competition drug testing! Of course I just went before they arrived so I had to sit around and quaff water until that time came again. -Nick

Good times. Last week was completely consumed by WV-style training and racing adventure. A couple fun days over 5hrs and definitely no rest highlighted my fatigued and foggy week. Got to end the block in style with a super rough but fun day @ the Cooper's Rock WVMBA race on saturday. I went up the night before and stayed with Christophe in Mo-town then headed up to the race (only 20min away) in morning after a few espressos. I'm always amazed at the power of a local race to give me butterfly's as I drive up to the venue. Good vibes! The event enjoyed a solid turnout with 175 or so racers, good spectating and pizza galore at the finish line! I was a bit concerned before the event because of the precarious state I was in from my training over the last 5 days and not to mention Tour of Shenandoah the week before! A red bull brought me up to an acceptable level of energy to at least survive the start and mad-dash to the single track. All was well after stumbling through lap #1 trying to follow the locals through the super technical sections. After figuring out the proper lines I took the lead in the final two laps and put it on cruise control to the finish. I won the race and then went for a nice cruise with Matt before heading back to the Phillip's house for a post race barbecue. Matt and I drove home that eve via the Brandonville pike up and then up the Terra Alta pike. Fun jammin' through the dark, twisty back WV roads with a couple exhausted bikes on the roof and listening to music talking about the race with a good friend. Days to remember I tell ya... I'll be taking it a bit easier this week as now it's time to let my body re-calibrate. I plan to check out the Hanncock 100 next weekend. -Nick

I may have finished the tour of shenandoah last sunday but my tour has not yet ended. I'm back home in the WV mountains being pushed out every morning with the mission of finishing the monster block of training Hunter has put together for me. We talked about doubling up on stage races for the training but the original plan of heading out to New Mexico for the tour of the Gila never came to fruition. Instead, I get to stay home and rock out on my home roads in Tucker and Preston county. My own personal stage race. After a couple mellow days following TOS I jumped back in wednesday with a sweet 4hr jaunt through the hills-and a trip over the always painful "Sugarlands" climb from Saint George up to the wind mills on 219. I scrolled to the bottom of my on-line training calendar for the day and read the words "I want you to be completely cracked at the end of this ride!". Indeed, after 3.5 hours starting from Aurora and heading over Stemple Ridge, down limestone, across holly meadows, up the hilly part of 72 (throw in big efforts over all of the climbs), up back hollow (fast!) and finally over Canaan heights into Davis to meet my buddy Matt Marcus for 45 minutes of motor-pacing behind the subaru at 32 miles an hour, I was pretty sure I was close to being cracked. I rode home from Davis just to make sure. 5.5 hours for the day is pretty good for stage two of Tour de home, eh? Three more days to go ending with stage 6 on Sunday @ the Cooper's Rock WVMBA MTB race.