The Yin and the Yang

We'd all love to be spending our winters riding in southern Spain where the roads are great and the weather is always agreeable, but sadly thats just not the case. Up here in NorCal it can get a little nasty at times and there's just not much to do but saddle up and take it like a man.



It can get to a point where its either just too brutal to go outside, or you've simply done too many days in the rain and can't muster the courage to get out the door. But you can't skip a ride. No no, thats a slippery slope and soon enough you'll find yourself riding only as far as the coffee shop and then only on the brightest and nicest of sunny days. No, if the gods conspire to rain on your parade you have to do the one thing that anyone with a true love of riding absolutely despises: get on the trainer.

For those of you who don't ride a trainer (or rollers if you're a champ) is a device that lets you set up your own bicycle to ride in place like a stationary bike. For those of you who do ride, you'll be familiar with the trainer as one of the most hated, yet necessary, parts of being a bike racer. Its kind of like going to the dentist. You hope you don't ever have to go, and if you're lucky your visits are rare, but when you do go its torture. I've heard some east coast pros say that if you can't ride the rollers for four hours a day you're not a real bike racer. To them I say: I could punch myself in the nuts for four hours, but it wouldn't make me an ultimate fighter. Riding the trainer sucks, straight up, and don't let anyone tell you any different.

Like I said though, sometimes you don't have a choice. That happened to poor @PhilipMooney my teammate (and housemate) the other day, and I took a few seconds of footage of him suffering like a dog:



Luckily its not all rain and rollers up here in NorCal. For every freezing nasty rain ride or trainer session I've had a dozen gorgeous rides on some of the most scenic roads America has to offer. And lest you think I'm lying, here's one last boring video that despite its lack of action clearly proves we can ride outside in the sunshine in February. Huffman wasn't even wearing knee warmers.



The Napa scenery is nice to look at, but the most impressive part of this video is my camerawork. Imagine what I could do from a motorbike!