This year yours truly was working the expo with Trek and thus part of the traveling circus entertaining the crowds at each finish line. Each day began with a two hour setup, followed with a full day at the booth and finished with a two hour tear down before driving a hundred plus miles to the next town. Somewhere in there we had to eat and try to get some sleep while attempting to keep up with projects back at the office. Yep, a full schedule at full tilt.

Interested in hitting the road with the race circuit? Let’s run down some of the fun and not so fun stuff from this year’s event:
Transfers
Having worked traveling stage races in the past I can say I have some experience with long transfers. Some of those transfers have felt pretty gnarly after a long day of changing wheels or when you have to get up at the crack of dawn to drive an hour to the start line. Having just participated on the Expo side of things, I feel it may be worse on the traveling circus. For teams and the support crew, each day ends with a stay in a hotel either in the finishing town or where the next stage starts. This keeps the transfers down to a minimum. For the folks in the Expo each day ended with a long drive to the next finishing town. Considering most stages were long road races the average drive for the expo folks was over a hundred and twenty miles. Yep, long days.

Weather
From experience you learn to come prepared for a variety of weather conditions. Each of us had our favorite rain gear on hand and it was put to the test this year. My gear included water-proof shoes and a long ‘pit’ jacket to keep from getting wet. The rain this year was so bad it poored down my long coat and socked the lower portion of my jeans. This lead to wet socks and then wet feet. Yep, water proof shoes only protect from the bottom up. Needless to say, we cleaned out a sporting goods store of rain pants and wellies while in Santa Cruz. As the race went on the weather improved and we were in shorts and skirts by the time we hit Southern California. Maybe the 60’s aren’t shorts weather but when you live in a winter wonderland, its hard to turn down the chance.

Personal Affects
With thousands of people cruising the expo keeping track of personal affects can be daunting. This year our group lost an iPod and a cell phone amongst other stuff. Though on-site theft occurs, its the late night break-ins that really suck. After assembling our bikes the first night we moved our tools and gear back into the trailer. Due to the weather we opted to keep the assembled bikes in our rooms. Lucky for us that saved our Expo potential. That night our trailer was broken into and we lost both our (my) tools and the single bike we had stored within. Yes, we had a quality lock and no, they didn’t cut the lock. Instead they beat the lock mechanism until it broke and the lock had nothing left to hold onto. Rumor has it Giant was worked on the same night but their parking space was close to constant traffic and thus not a viable option for the thief.
The next night the Astana vehicle was hit and Lance’s new time trial bike was stolen along with two road bikes. Needless to say, once the word got out about Lance’s bike ours was forgotten. Hey, if anyone finds a marble gray tool box or argyle Madone road bike in Sacramento, let us know.

Lance Fans
In case you hadn’t heard, Lance is back. Along with Lance’s return came the throngs of Lance fans, cancer survivors and those supporting cancer initiatives. I have never experienced crowds of this magnitude in the States. Heck, its pretty rare to see crowds that large in Europe.
During the early part of the week Trek had on display one of Lance’s 1274/27.5 bikes. This made our booth very popular with the Lance fans. By mid week we had Lance’s back-up time trial bike on display as well. This created quite a stir especially considering his 1274/27.5 TT bike had been stolen a few days earlier. Let’s just say the expo traffic stopped at the Trek booth as people fought to get their photo taken with the bikes, take photos of their children with the bikes, touch the bikes, pretend to steel the bikes and ask us a lot of questions about both Lance and the bikes. My roommate mentioned I was answering those questions in my sleep by the end of the race.

The final night was capped off with a gathering at the Elephant Bar. Tech crew, support crew, team staff, riders and expo folks all took a long breather over some beer and great stories. Ready for next year…you bet we all are.

Celebrities on the road:

Thanks to Drew Axt and Dave O’Connell from Trek for photos

Ed Note: I added some photos and a video to yesterday’s report.

Most of the riders loaded into the bus this morning with a few sticking around for later flights. Tara and I weren’t flying home till 8pm tonight so we had one last day to spend in China. We said our good byes finished breakfast and hit the Good Luck Beijing desk (the promoter) for some help with the taxi. They walked us out the door and found us a taxi that would take us to the Wall, wait for us and then take us back.

The drive began with some back roads before hitting the highway and about an hour later we started to see mountains. Once in the mountains the buildings began to look more traditional Chinese (based on pictures and books read in the past). As we drove through the mountains we began to see extensions of the wall. Then we started to see signs and lots of buses stopped near buildings off the side of the highway. We began to wonder if our driver was taking us for a ride as he kept passing these areas. A few minutes later we saw exits for The Great Wall at Badaling (or Ba Da Ling depending on the signs). He eventually made his way over to this exit and drove through a toll booth.

From here the drive took us through some strange parking lot with an giant elephant structure on one side. The elephants were life size with many of them creating a building of sorts while two others were leaping at each other to make an entrance. Our car turned left, away from the elephants, and drove down a hill. Another left turn and we saw people, lots of people. There was a smal village of sorts here with hundreds of people milling around. It took a few minutes for our driver to locate a spot and with luck we ended up directly in front of the entrance. We paid the driver 400 yuan, he gave us a note paper with his license plate number (every taxi looks the same) and we headed off toward the stairs. Both of us were thirsty and hit a stand for Cokes (okay, her’s was diet).

We bounded up the stairs, followed people around a corner and saw numerous lines for tickets. One was for some visual theater, another for tour guides and another just had signs with prices for each person by age. We didn’t know if we had to have tickets as there were no signs. Thus I stood in line while Tara took off around another corner to see if she could figure it out. Nope, too far to see. Thus we purchased tickets (45 apiece) hoping that we didn’t just get hosed. Tara said it would be funny if they just built a builing, added a ticket counter and waited to see how many suckers they could get. Around the corner of another building we dropped into the actual village. Low and behold there was a Starbucks. American culture is bleeding into every corner of the world.

A couple blocks up the street, past numerous vendors we found a tunnel barely large enough for most American cars. We squeezed through, as were the throngs of people, while crazy mini-mini-vans drove through at mach speed. On the other side we found more directional signs and more steps. We entered a large open space between buildings, watched people and noticed we no longer saw the signs for the great wall. Great, we just got ourselves lost. We turned around to head back and discovered a giant gate stating “Great Wall” and a smaller sign telling us to enter here. Yeah, we felt dumb. And yes, we did need tickets.

Remember the older days at Disneyland when your parents squeezed your arms and dragged you around hoping not to loose you in the crowds? If I had brought a kid here it would have been the same with me. There were thousands of people on the wall. No line at the LA County Fair or a sporting event compares. I can’t think of anything or anywhere in the states that compares. Even the Olympic village in Atlanta (pre-bombing) had less people and it was packed.
I also hadn’t anticipated the workout. Tara and I had spoken to folks over the past couple days and they spoke of the option of walking or taking the gondola. They also said you could take an alpine slide like trip down. The walking option as supposed to be about a mile and a half. Tara and I had already spoken of walking. Heck, she’s an athlete and I used to be. We should be able to drag our butts up and down the wall. The walk was more like a hike and really more like a minor workout.

Hey boys and girls, the word of the day is STEEP. So kids, remember, whenever anyone says the magic word you are supposed to scream…yeah, memories of Pee Wee’s playhouse… So, lets practice:
My calves say STEEP, we all scream AAAHHHHH
My thighs say STEEP, we all scream AAAHHHHH
My heart says STEEP, we all stop screaming because I am trying to catch my breath.

The only places on this wall that are flat are the towers and you have to climb to get there. Yes, climb! The first section of the wall we climbed was easy, twenty some steps. The next section was a few hundred feet long and super steep. If I were wearing my clogs I would have slipped out of them, that steep. We walked through a tower and found a slight drop before the next steep section. This one got really steep. Yeah, San Fran has nothing on this. Tara and I figured this had to be about 30 degrees and it went for a while. The we hit the stairs. These took getting used to as they were about a foot deep but only two or three inches high. The stairs were also built into the slope so there was a grade to each step as well.

Another building and more steps. These rose up very fast and some of these steps were a foot plus in height. Imagine climbing two stories in twenty steps. That’s how it fealt. Check out the photos below, You’ll see how steep it is. And let’s not forget you are fighting through a crowd of people, some who can climb at your speed, some who are dying in front of you. I think I bumped the back of someone’s knee with my head.

At the next tower the route was split with a guard forcing the upward crowd to head right around the tower. This is where we found the flea market in the sky. There were five or six booths set up selling trinkets and one where you could dress in old Chinese outfits and get your picture taken just like the cowboy photo booth at Knotts Berry Farm.

This is where we had to get aggressive with crowd control. The group was not moving as many were stopping to ogle the crap on the tables and some just stopped as it was the first flat spot in a while. To make matters worse, the trail on the other side narrowed to a single person’s width and dropped down some large steps. At the bottom of these steps we found the alpine cars to the right and an open gate to the left.

The cars were similar in style to mixing a traditional alpine slide cart with a kidding car at an amusement park. We considered taking it down the hill but it veered the wrong direction and looked as though it went to the wrong parking lot. We could probably take it but the road from there to our lot looked pretty far and we were running out of time. We told our taxi driver we would be back at noon.

We opted to go through the gate, around a bend and turn around. This left us with another steep climb up into this tower. The other side was a bit freaky as we almost had to climb down the tower steps to get to the stairs. Some of these blocks were pushing two feet in height.

Once out of the tower and down the steepest set of steps we revved up our engines and headed back the way we came. I know I hit someone’s head and another’s back with my knee on our way back. I’m not kidding, it was that steep. I commented that this would be an easy place to fall backwards as all you would do is sit down. We also chatted about how it was too slick of a course to be used in a downhill race.

This is when we came upon an older couple who had just made the same trek. Age really isn’t an issue here. They keep plugging away. Tara says she needs to determine their secret diet so she can keep kickin’ for years to come.

Once off the wall and back onto the market street Tara went about looking for trinkets for family members. The closer we got to the parking lot the more aggressive the sales people became. Tara dared me to bark at them, like a dog. I considered it but opted not to as I fealt myself starting to laugh. She began to dart away from them almost like a football player making his way through defenders on the field. She picked up an umbrella and some chop sticks before we made it back to the taxi and headed home.

For some reason traffic was lighter on the way back allowing us to arrive at the hotel quicker. This is when things got funny with the taxi driver. When we got out he asked for 600 Yuan. This was confusing as he only charged us 400 for the way out. Tara gave the guy funny looks while I went to find a Good Luck Beijing person to help translate. Turns out it was 600 total for the trip so we only needed to pay him an additional 200. That converts to $80 for an hour plus drive out, a two hour parking lot wait and an hour drive back. Yep, only $40 for each which is about the same cost as a taxi drive from the Vegas airport to the Venetian.

So, that’s technically the end of my trip. We met again at 4pm, took a shuttle to the airport, checked in, got on the plane and made our way home. I think Tara slept. I was surrounded by kids. Most slept ‘cept for the one right in front of me. ARGHHH!

That’s right, blue sky today. There was a breeze (read windy) and we could see the sky. Not only that we could see businesses behind the track and hills behind the amusement park that is beside our venue. We didn’t even know they existed and both are closer than two miles. Yohan, one of the UCI guys that has been here for weeks, said it was only his third day under the blue. Crazy…

Today was race day. The staff and male riders hit the bus first so they could run their practice before the women arrived. This is when I noticed the drop in humidity. Okay, it was still humid and I was still sweating, but only sweating when working. The previous days I would sweat sitting down.The women arrived an hour later and set about preparing for their practice.

The men’s racing started first with their quarter finals. Each heat ran three times and the four people in each heat with the lowest commulative points moved on to the semi-finals. We started with eight guys in the quarters and four made it to the semis. The first heat included Mike, Donny and Danny. Danny took a tumble in one of his runs and it took forever for the med’s to move. He ended up getting up and walked out on his own. No real damage. Randy was in the second heat and Kyle was in the third. Steven (Cisar), Tyler and Nic were in the fourth heat. Donny and Mike progressed to Heat 1 of the Semis while Steven and Kyle made the second.

Twenty minutes later the women hit the stairs to start the Semis. Jill, Kim and Arrielle were in the first heat. Amanda was in the second. Once both heats of women were run the men hit the stairs for their Semi heats. Just as with the Quarters each heat went through three runs and the top four from each group, the ones with the lowest accumulated points, moved on to the final. Jill progressed for the women as did Donny on the men’s side.

The poor women had to endure super heat each time as the folks in the staging area kept sending them up early. Tara was kind enough to hit the stairs with an umbrella a couple times. Plus Jill was complaining that they were taking too long between runs. As an example, I walked Jill up the stairs for the final, walked down, found Donny, made sure he was okay, watched him hit the first few steps, walked over to the side of the course and still had a couple minutes before the finals began.

Jill finished 5th but may have jumped to the front in UCI points. It’s just a rumor that I heard. The women’s race was won by Shanaze, the reigning world champion. Donny got a bad start but passed them all on the second jump. He appeared to fade a bit toward the end but was able to fend off a late surge by Afro Bob. Television coverage of the finals are here: http://www.cyclingbmx2007.org.cn/en/video/2007-08-21/12922.html

Next came the awards ceremonies and that made my cleanup task difficult. Some of the items I needed to collect were behind the barriers that had just been moved to make room for the ceremony. I waited for the women’s program to finish and then snuck under the barriers and past the Orange people. I weasled my way to where Ken, Steve and a couple other Fed’s were standing. A couple photographers were stationed on top of the Gatorade cooler thus I had to wait until the ceremony was over. Lucky for me as the ceremony was pretty cool.

The top three riders were lead in by a lady wearing an elegant Chinese dress. They were followed by a few other women wearing matching uniforms. Each rider’s name was called from third to first and they stepped up on their respective platforms. Then dignitaries were called up to present awards and gifts. First each rider was given a stuffed character matching one of the five Chinese Olympic characters. They were then each handed an item in a plastic case. The dignitary stepped down and another stepped up to hand each one a bottle of champagne. That’s when the real fun began. They all pulled their wires and started shaking their bottles. Donny had trouble getting his to pop and was drown by the other two. Finally his popped and he hosed off the photographers.

Once the fun was over I grabbed the inflatable cooler and dumped the remaining ice over the edge onto the track. Oops…I also dumped a couple large pieces of trash. I then picked up the Gatorade cooler and dumped the ice on the ground and handed our guys each a bottle of water. Steve gave me an odd look when I dumped the ice at which I replied with “it’ll dry in under ten minutes.”

Once back at the compound I went about collecting our gear so that we can wait…and wait…and wait. We still had another forty minutes before the bus arrived. During this time Redman stopped by and was chased down by some Chinese fans. He had been commentating during the event and they liked his work. Photos, some filming and they were off. That’s when I got the call to grab some stuff out of Donny’s bag and run it over. I found Mike holding his flowers and watching as Donny was mobbed by fans. Donny was then marched off to drug control, where Jill was taken earlier, and later went to a press conference.

Eventually we dragged our stuff down to the bus and made our way out. I think we were the last team to leave.

A short while ago I finished helping Mike pack up the trainers, his bike and some gear for tomorrow’s trip back to the airport. Most of our crew is leaving at 8am. Tara and I don’t fly out until 8pm and that’s a long time in the airport. Thus Kai helped us arrange a trip to the Wall before we hit the airport. Sweet! One last sight seeing trip before coming home. I have never done this much site seeing before.

champagne baby

That last link should be a video.

Bubba Harris crashed just after the first jump on the 3rd straight and busted his ankle. I don’t know the extent of the damage; however, I do know he is currently at the Olympic hospital and is most likely still in surgery now. More below…

I was up late last night running errands for Mike. Namely I was printing out today’s schedule and sliding copies under the doors of our riders. I then stayed up too late watching the Empire of the Sun. Never saw it before, liked it, cried. I think I hit the pillow for sleep around 1:30ish, way too late. To make matters worse today was an earlier day. Thankfully I had woken up a couple minutes before Romero’s call at 6:30am to chat about Jill’s SRM.

The first bus left the hotel at 8am and we again entertained the sensor folks. Mike, Kai and I unloaded my tool box, my gear bag, five bikes, two trainers, two Gatorade coolers and a few other goodies. Kai then left for the hotel to pick up the next group, Mike went about getting our stickers for our radios and I dragged the stuff through the sensors. The guys in orange finally figured out what we were doing and actually lent a hand today.

The bikes were dropped off with another group in the venue to have their timing sensors added. Mike and I then went about setting up camp. The bikes were finished around the time the riders arrived cutting down on my time to set up Jill’s SRM. It was ready to go by the time Jill was ready to ride minus the wheel sensor for speed. (I found it later sitting nicely on top of my television in the hotel room)

Each group today was able to practice a bit in the morning before the time trials began. The Supercross events are run like automobile races where the athletes compete in individual time trials on the course for qualifying and heat placement. The top 16 women progress to the main event and the top 32 men. They are then split into heats of eight where the fastest and the slowest (or 32nd fastest in the case of the men) go in one heat. The second fastest and second slowest go in the next and on and on until you have eight people in each heat.

The women’s time trials were first and we held the top three spots for a long time. That means USA showed on all three lines on the big screen. As more and more riders finished their first time trials our riders dropped down a bit. Everyone was in at this point except for Tara.

The men then hit the staging area with the riders ranked top in the world last. Our riders were rocking including Bubba who was really going big. That’s when things went wrong. He went down after the second jump of the 3rd straight. He tried to save it and crashed. We couldn’t see the crash from our standpoint but did see him roll over to the side of the course. Then he lifted his left leg into the air and we all noticed that there was something wrong with that foot. It appeared that his shoe had partly come off. After staring for a second more we noticed the shoe was still on and that it was his ankle that was twisted oddly. This is when the crowd let out a large oooohhhhhh followed by a silence that allowed us to hear him wailing in pain. (video here: http://www.go211.com/videos/1105)

Mike K. was the closest person from our group having stationed himself just past the finished line. He was there quickly while Berlin, Bubba’s pop, ran down as quick as he could. Once they got him rolling I headed over to the steps to retrieve his bike. As I approached I could see Bubba squeezing the arm of one of the people who were carrying him on the backboard. He was squeezing hard.

Mike and Berlin followed the stretcher. I took the bike back to the compound. A couple trips to the med center followed, with the help of Stacy, to pick up gear like his helmet and shoes. Luckily I was not there when the shoe was removed. I can only imagine how much that had to hurt.

Mike then asked me to stand outside the med center to keep our riders away so they could stay focused. We still had a few riders to run their first time trials followed by the second runs. A few minutes later Bubba was wheeled away with our tranlator, his father and others in tow. This allowed me to go back to working on bikes and playing water bottle boy. I spent most of the day making sure the riders had liquid to drink allowing Mike to spend time watching the riders on the track.

After the first runs we had the top two times and a few riders in the running. We also had a couple that were close but just outside the number of spots. The second runs for the women ended with Arielle holding the third fastest time with Amanda, Kim and Jill progressing as well. We had one rider not participate and another, Tara, arrive this morning in time to practice and hit her runs. She just arrived from a mountain bike event and was still transitioning from the larger bike size. This had to play a factor in her timing.

Some of the men’s field decided to roll their second runs as they already had top qualifying times. A few of them entertained the crowd with fancy jumping and various tricks. Once the men were done we had the top three fastest times and eight guys qualifying for the heats. This meant that Mike and three riders would have to stay behind for the press conference while the remainder of us returned to the hotel.

On the way to the bus I was accosted by the folks in orange at the sensor. They saw me coming and asked if they could get a picture with the American Team guy. I stood there for a while as nine guys wanted their photos taken and then a group shot. Greg thought it was funny and took some photos as well. I’ll try to get a copy of at least one. I thought maybe they mistook me for an athlete. Kai said they wanted a picture with the “super strong guy” from America, the guy who can carry heavy boxes over long distances. Yep, guess I made my mark there.

Once back at the hotel I hit the shower, headed to dinner and again went about printing tomorrow’s schedule and sliding them under doors before sitting down to write this.

Another busy day for me so not too many quality photos. I was able to take some shots of the staging area and some early morning training shots. The shots of the guys show them in the air on the last jump of straight two, jumping over the women’s second turn. As to services:
4 gear changes
2 flat tires
3 cleats replaced
2 pedals replaced
SRM computer installed
7 wheel alignments
unknown amount of stem alignments
seventy bottles prepped
eight tools loaned out.

Yep, the other mechanics are learning that I am the go to guy for fancy tools. The Italians came to me as did the Swiss, the Brits and some other country. I even loaned tools to the mechanic working for the current women’s World Champion. (The men’s is onour team) Though I came better equipped than most I was still missing a tool. I wasn’t able to change Tara’s rear gear as I needed a larger spanner than I have ever used. I will have one for next time

Bubba Update as of 9:45 pm – minor fracture, major dislocation of the ankle. They reset his ankle and are not performing surgery at this time. The bad news: his Olympic dreams are dashed, at least for ‘08.

Yes, today was hot and muggy. I knew it was going to be bad when I looked out the window at breakfast and noticed our semi-blue sky had disappeared again. Maybe today will be like the day at Tienaman Square where you could look directly at the sun and not damage your eyes. I told the riders to treat it like elevation training, less oxygen…

Today was practice day at the track. The first set of guys, those ranked in the top 90 in the world, got to ride at 11am. The rest of the guys rode at noon-thirty with the ladies following at around 2pm. Mike and I got an early start leaving the hotel around 8am so that we could set up our spot. Ah you should have seen the sensor folks trying to lift my tool box onto the belt and then the giant golf bag filed with the work stand, pump and spare parts. Their punny arms could not handle the things I carry all the time. Comical.

Due to our ranking in the world and the number of riders we were given two rooms. Some countries received one while others had to share. We set ours up with the funded team in one room and the remainder in the other.

I then left with our interpreter, this cool guy “Kai” from Trek China, to do some quick shopping. The first stop was Gome (say go-may). Kai likened this to Best Buy, I thought it was a cross between Circuit City and the Sears of olden days. We stopped here to pick up a couple fans and some splitters. They were out of splitters but had a large selection of fans. Kai chatted with the ladies working the showroom floor and we picked out a couple. They were super expensive…one cost around $20 US and the other was maybe $25US. Then we got to watch two groups of women race each other to see who could build theirs faster.

This took a while and we still needed to pick up some gear and bodies from the hotel. As luck would have it we got stuck in Sunday traffic and ended up fifteen minutes late to the hotel. Kai jumped out of our bus and ran to his minivan so he could finish the shopping. I ran upstairs and picked up our lunches, water and fruit from the restaurant. Having ordered it yesterday it was ready to roll.

Back at the track I gave the folks with the sensor another experience as I kept jumping out of the bus with more bags to put on the sensor belt. After the two fans I dropped my radio, phone and watch on the tray, walked through the scanner and then everything stopped. One of the guys freaked out because my radio did not have a certain sticker on the side. He showed his sticker, which was written in Chinese, like I knew what it said. He called over a military person and then tried to explain something else. I informed him that I had already gone into the facility numerous times with the radio and no one else stopped me. He told me I could bring it back as long as I turned it off. So, I turned it off, shoved it deep into my pocket and began carrying items the football length walk to the elevator.

Kai wasn’t so lucky as the confiscated his. Turns out you have to register your band with the local military. Later in the day Kai said this allows them to monitor what you are saying. We laughed and then he proved it. While we were standing near the track, some local staff were having with their radios. Kai stated that one of them was complaining that the radios didn’t work. you could tell these guys were frustrated. Then a gruff voice came over their radio and they had a look of embarrasment ontheir faces. Kai said that a military person responded on their channel telling them to hold the button down longer. Freaky…

So, back to my adventure…

More confusion as the people operating the elevator watched the pile stack up outside the door. When it was finally my turn I shoved a box of water into the opening, jammed everything in and then pulled in the last box. Two locals jumped in as well and were talking to each other about all the bags of food. I made gestures that I was a very hungry large man and needed all that food. They laughed.

Once at the top I did the same making a huge pile outside the elevator. My first trip to the room ended at an entrance that I had used before. They had changed it to an exit. The ladies monitoring the gate wanted me to take a long walk around. Luckily Mike was there and I was able to hand him stuff over the barrier. The ladies didn’t mind that, as long as I did not walk through their passage. They were doing exactly what they were told to do. After three trips one of the local workers figured out I needed help and lent a hand.

Once that was done I set about fixing a flat tire one of the riders had earned on his ride to the track. Upon pulling the tire off I noticed his rim strip wasn’t covering half of the spoke holes. Duh! That should have flatted earlier. Once that was done and our bag of bottles prepared we heard a pop and then the hiss of another flat. We checked the bikes in the room and discovered Amanda’s front had given up the ghost. I pulled that one out and the valve stayed in. Turns out her rim was too sharp and it cut her valve causing the mishap. I fixed that one, shoved some tools into my pockets and walked over to the track. Yes, I said my pockets. I know I preach the value of a chest pack but there was no way I was going to wear that in this weather.

The guys were fast and spent a lot of time in the air. You could tell these guys were pros. The next set of guys included two of ours and many Asian riders. Our guys flew like birds. The Asian guys spent a lot of time dragging their brakes and riding the women’s course. They could jump but not very smoothly. I couldn’t watch much of the second group. I hurt as they continually cased jumps and landed poorly. The ladies took off right away and rode the course for a while. Amanda, Kim and Arielle were itching to ride the ramp so the walked the stairs and posed on top. The officials saw them, decided to close the side gate and let them down. During this time Jill had made her way up there as well.

Just as our riders were about to take off one of the Aussies appeared out of nowhere and spun down the ramp. So much for being the first women to ride down a Supercross ramp. Yes, this is the first time that women have had a Supercross course. Our ladies, ‘cept one, were doing great. They cleared the first jump with no problem, cleared the second and either cleared the third or jumped to the top and manualled the back side.

Once of our riders sat at the top for a while, a long while. Once they started running the gate she decided it was time and took her first run. She made it over the over the first jump and around the bend. Her second run, sometime later, did not go so well. She tapped her backwheel on the landing and wadded. When she got up you could see she was hurting. She spent some time back in the room before giving it another run.

There were few mishaps today though a couple were quite big. One male rider cased a landing so hard his rear wheel exploded. His tire blew, his spokes were hanging all over and he lost a portion of a flange. Another male rider broker his handlebars on the step up before turn one and shot over the top of the turn, taking a flag with him. On the women’s side there was nothing quite spectacular but some nasty looking wads. One gal from Australia lost it in the air and came down on her bike. She was able to get up and walk away but her team said she had to be taken to the hospital. There was our rider and then there was this one Chinese gal. She dragged her brakes all the way down the amp and began manualling over the first jump. She made it over the first hump. It was the second hump that got her.

You could see she was loosing her rear end from underneath her. It appeared as though she were going to fall backward, like young kids do when they are learning to pop wheelies. For a moment it looked like she might recover or just fall over. Then she did totally looped out (back flip) and landed on her head. It hurt to watch. At the time I was running Jill’s video camera. Maybe she will put it on the internet. It’s definitely You Tube worthy.

By the way, Kai is a retired professional high jumper. While competing for the team in Shanghai he met a woman in Beijing. He quit the team and moved to Beijing. His team made him sign an agreement that he would not compete for the Beijing team for four years. He decided to retire instead.

I didn’t get much as far as photos today as I was working on bikes and making sure the riders got their water between runs.

The day started off early as I woke at 5am with a gnarly stomach cramp. I tried to force it out, if you know what I mean, but had no luck. I also tried going back to sleep and had little luck there. Due to my crampy stomach I ate the smallest breakfast of the trip so far. I also drank a half gallon of water, popped two aspirin and have been trying very hard to catch mini naps.

The goal for the first half of the day was picking up our credentials and taking off at 10am for the track. That didn’t work as planned. Our group had registered with the UCI and it turns out the promoter wanted additional information for the credentials. This meant collecting everyone’s passports which took more than an hour. Then we played with waiting game. The poor riders would go upstairs and come back down. And up and down… Around noon I received a call from Mike asking me to call the riders, tell them to do lunch and then meet us downstairs.

I was able to eat more for lunch but still felt a bit crampy. Plus I felt a minor fever coming on.

Once gathered our bus driver took us on a short, say 5km, drive to the track. We tried to enter from the front side of the track where both Mikes had gone the night before but were turned away by the security. Okay, they were really skinny guys dressed up in military outfits. I have seen them around town a bunch and they don’t look any meaner or stronger than our hotel security guards. Nobody wants to test them though as they might pull off some killer karate.

Turns out that entrance is the spectator gate and we were supposed to enter from the back side. Another km around the hill and our driver dumped us off at the entrance tent. This was quite comical as we had to unload our pockets and walk through a metal detector. As at the airport, if you set if off you had to visit the person with the wand. Some of the guys didn’t want to remove their belts and opted for the wand. The funny part of this is that the athletes who rode their bikes to the track handed them to security guards who walked them around the sensor and gave them back. Not that it would happen but a rider could be packing something in his bike thus making the metal detection system useless.

From here it was a short walk to the elevator that took us up the equivelent of five stories to the main track area. Once out of the elevator we found the warm up area, the team tents and made our way to the track.

I need to take a moment to state some slang from various generations here: Whoa! Sick! Wicked! Damn! Holy Crap! Wow! That’s the course. I have never seen a BMX Supercross track and the only way to describe it is huge. This aint your local BMX track.

The start ramp is a bit taller than a two story building. Then there are all the jumps, sick jumps. Both women and men drop off the start and run down the same first straight away. The second straight away splits so the guys can hit some major flight time including a big jump over the girls second turn.The landing puts the men directly into their second turn which shoots them into another straight away where the riders are again offered two courses. Technically both the guys and the gals an take either course but the big air spots are faster. Typically the men take the bigger course while the women take the lower route. After the third turn they share the same single lane into the finish. It’s going to be huge and I hope I am able to see some of it. The mechanics are typically stationed in the tent to help out riders who are not yet on the course. This happened at the Olympics in Atlanta as the mechanics at the mountain bike race, including me, saw nothing during the race.

Some riders are freaked out, especially one of our women. The men are talking about how much damage is going to occur to equipment and the number of riders that are signed up. I have heard that there are 32 Chinese men signed up to run the course. The riders are speculating that most of the Chinese, if not all of them, won’t make it past the time trials.

We jumped back on the bus at 2:15 and made our way back to the hotel where we set up riders for interviews. The first four were at their interviews at 3pm with the second group at 3:45pm. Then I set about working on bikes. One tube replacement, one brake cable and housing job, one brake lever replacement, two wheels trued, one King hub tightened, one steering system overhaul (cleaning) and a couple tires aired. Then it was off to the computer for some catch up time.

Around 5 Mike stopped by and we worked out our arrangements for the next day to make there were no mistakes with transportation and we had food and liquid for the riders.

The fever is gone but there is still a slight bit of cramp left. On the positive side, Ihave been checking the scale every morning and I have ost nine pounds since I arrived. I am sure some of it is water weight due to the sweating but I have been drinking a lot too. Maybe its all the walking.

Oh, the velodrome is next door to the BMX track. Its a beautiful dome building.

Here are other reviews of the week here in China:
www.jillkintner.com
Arielle’s page

Some of the riders beat me to breakfast this morning. Maybe that was due to my staying up till midnight last night. Krystal and Amanda are still afraid of the majority of food at the buffet. They don’t seem to be vegetable eaters though Amanda swears that potatoes count.

Most of the riders took off for a ride and later told us stories of people trying to steal their road markers (water bottles) and a couple people almost jumping into them by mistake. Turns out one woman wasn’t paying attention and the riders came up on both sides of her. She saw one of them on her left and freaked out. Her reaction was to turn right and start running which happened to be where another rider was perched. He dropped a foot and planted a quick pivot before wrecking.

During the next few hours I caught up on some paper work and computer time while helping out a few riders. One chain replaced, one wheel trued, four tires pumped, two trainers handed out and four radios charged.

At two we hit the road for another bus trip, this time to the Silk Market. It’s also known as the Pearl Market and is truly a six story indoor swap meet. We made a left turn off of our street and spent the next forty minutes driving down one street. We drove by various consulates, the Olympic baseball stadium, numerous fancy buildings and drove right by Tieneman Square. Yes, we made it to the Square in about fifteen minutes less time than the day before.

A few miles later our drive pulled under a bridge to make a left U-turn and a couple blocks later were at the big glass building. I had heard rumors of the bargining abilities of this place and the killer deals. I had heard of the crazy sales people but no one had truly prepared me for what lay inside.

Imagine a swap meet where the sales people call out to you and don’t beg you to buy but attempt to force you to buy. I was constantly yanking my arms and hands out of people’s grip. They regularly called out “hey guy” or “hey buddy”. I was told to buy my wife a Gucci purse or buy myself a new pair of Nike or try on a Rolex. At one point I had a young lady on each arm trying to pull me into separate booths. The guys wearing hats lost them numerous times as the sales ladies would steal the caps in an attempt to hold them hostage until the guys bought something. They also made fun of my larger center section. One gal told me I was having her twins. This was especially entertaining with Redman and Bubba’s father as both are 4x guys. Redman played it off well. He would agree to buy something if they could find something his size. They said they had his size but gave up trying after a while.

They had clothing areas, sporting goods areas, electronics, luggage, silk, jewelry, lots of shoes and much, much more. The longer we were there the more of a game it became. Redman said this was better than some parties he has attended. Some lady wanted me to buy underwear. I mentioned that I don’t wear underwear to see what response I would get. She then told me I was a dirty boy and needed to buy my girlfriend underwear. Later I heard Mike K tell a person that his boyfriend didn’t like that style of underwear. Again lots of laughs.

At one point Mike and I were both negotiating with the same lady for different things. He wanted a Louis Vuitton belt, I wanted some funky purse for my daughter. She told me 50RMB, I told her 20. Then she and Mike fought with a calculator. She told me 30RMB and I started to walk away. Mike beat her down on price some more and I told her 20. She told me 30 and I started to walk away again. She then asked if we were brothers and Mike said I was his father. She laughed and gave Mike some price he didn’t want. I waved a 20 at her and started walking away. She responded with “what color you want”. Mike got the belt as well.

The two of us then left the building and hit a Starbucks down the street. We found a spot next to the window and spent some time people watching. This was definitely more of a multi-cultural area than the zone around our hotel. Lots of Eurpeans and other Asian groups. While Mike sipped his iced espresso we watched as people entered minivans in the lot out front and later came out with bags full of bootleg DVDs. I saw Transformers, Simpsons, Rush Hour 3 and more. Just crazy…

At six it was back to the hotel with many a good story to tell. After dinner I helped repair a flat, adjusted some brakes and then spent some time helping DR with his new watch. The dial was jammed and he wanted it to show the correct time and date. This was probably the most delicate task so far as it was a fancy watch and we didn’t want to scratch or dent any portion of it.

So, a milder day with fewer pictures. I didn’t want to take my camera out at the Market as I was afraid it would disappear. I kind’a wish my family was here today. Not because the prices were so good but because the experience was so unique. That was the best English I have heard this whole trip and they had a response for everything.

By the way, some of our group fear that our hotel is full of spies. Each floor has a security guard and they already know our names. Most of the people at the buffet have our rooms memorized and the receptionist and help staff know us by name. I don’t mean they know our name when we call from our room. I mean we walk into the lobby and somewhere there says “Hello Mr. Clinton”. Plus they always seem to know when we are not in our rooms as turn downs occur when we skip out for just ten minutes. One of the riders suggested that there are secret panels in the rooms and the security guard gives the spies the okay when we leave the room. They then go through our stuff and skip out when the guard tells them we are coming back. Freaky, not true, but definitely keeps you on your toes.

Supposedly the gym was only one block away, which it was, but we never would have found it on our own. We had to walk around a building, take an elevator to the 16th floor, walk down four sets of hallways and then up a secret set of stairs. Once we located the gym Mike, Peter and I tried to work out an arrangement for the riders. This is a private gym with annual memberships and they don’t get walk in requests. Thus we had to deal with six people involved in the gym before working out a price for the riders. The whole time Mike is trying to explain that they are the US National Team and that one of them was the current World Champion. He’s also trying to make sure he can receive a receipt which they just didn’t understand.

Peter got them to commit to 130 RMB each (about $18) for the two hour work out. We mentioned that the riders might want to come back a couple more times and squeezed them for 100 RMB per person per time. Then there was the paperwork and trying to explain that we did not want to pay for all three visits for every rider on that day, that we wanted to pay each time they came. Some of the riders mentioned that this would probably be the only time they came but we weren’t going to tell them that as it would affect the price. After about an hour of negotiating and making the initial payments Mike, Peter and I were able to split and leave the riders to their workout. We were told later that the folks at the gym asked them to pose for a picture before leaving.

Mike spent the next little while working on plans for the next couple days while I did some bike work and caught up on some computer time. Then it was off to lunch, more bikes and then our first tourist trip.

We met around 2pm and everyone jumped on the bus ‘cept for Jason who heard that his bike had arrived at the airport. Our bus driver drug us through town, in an air conditioned bus (yeah!) and dropped us off near some side street cafes. Just before we stopped it began to dump rain and some ladies nailed the bus once we stopped. They had umbrellas ready for 10RMB each and we bought a bunch. Not two minutes later the rain stopped. The humidity stayed though and got worse as the day progressed.

The rest of the trip was on foot. One long block later we hit a major intersection just before the “gates to the city”. We crossed the road (underground) while trying to avoid the postcard people, oddball vendors and the folks trying to shove booklets into our hands. After we dropped under another street we ended up next to the gates.

After some photos we walked around a large building and ended up in Tieneman (spelling?) Square. For those of you old enough to remember, this is where the students waged an unsuccessful protest against the Communist Party. Maybe you saw the student standing in front of the army tanks?

From here we hoofed it to the Forbidden City. This required us avoiding kite sellers, more postcard people and kids pooping into bags. Yes, you read that correctly. Most of the young children in this area were wearing shorts with open seams in the back and their parents would hold them over plastic grocery bags when they had to go. This happened right in front of everyone. Okay, so we follow our dogs and pick up their poop with plastic bags. It’s sorta the same thing. I guess diapers aren’t an affordable item here.
A couple more underground passages and we ended up at the front gates.

As soon as we walked through the first gate we were nailed by numerous people who wanted to be our tour guides. One person followed us for half an hour before he finally gave up. We walked past some fancy structures before learning that we hadn’t reached the Forbidden City yet. We found the entrance, learned there was a 60RMB entry fee and made our way toward the door. This was when a lady flashed her credentials to prove she was an official tour guide and that all we had to do was get her a ticket. This was performed and we were on our way.

Inside was beautiful and our guide knew her stuff. She told us about the bricks on the ground, all eleven layers of them. Turns out the emperior was afraid of his enemies tunneling in. She told us about the palace buildings under construction and how they have to be done before the Olympics. She talked about the real gold and jade artwork on the walls, all the large vats (bowls) for holding water in case of fire, the age of each building and which emperor had which building constructed. We saw the thrown, the waiting room, the bedroom, the inner palace guard hall and then found a four star bathroom. I am not kidding, it was rated 4 Star. Compared to most this was awesome: clean with air conditioning, at least on the guys side. The ladies said theirs wasn’t so ‘four star’.

By this point the riders were blown as they had been on their feet for over two hours and most had lost about two pounds in water weight while adding five pounds of water to their clothing. Plus it was time to close and none of us wanted to test what would happen if we stayed longer. Thus we hoofed it at a pretty good clip out of the palace/city. Once we left the gates we seriously got attacked by street vendors. Some had water (I paid 10RMB for mine), some had popsycles, some had postcards and others had watches. These were more aggressive and continually stuffed stuff toward your hands. The watch guy was a good negotiator but was only able to get one rider to bite. He picked up a Rolex (ha ha ha) for 100RMB.

This is when Crystal dropped the bomb. She wanted 30RMB from each person for the tour. Ugh! She did provide a lot of information, heck, she was better than most US tour guides. I just wasn’t expecting to unload so much cash in one day.

Eventually we made it back to the tour bus, after three hours on our feet, and many took naps on the ride. We only had a few near calls which prompted Merlin and I to pay more attention to the road. Most of the cards are under two years old and none of them had any body damage. This surprised us the most as the drivers are crazy here. Plus, there are a lot of French cars: Peugeot, Citroen, Renault.

As we arrived at the hotel we saw Jason getting out of a taxi with his bike bag. He wasn’t happy. Then it was off to a very long dinner (tired people for sure) and then off to the rooms.

Today’s bike work: one chain tension adjustment, two bikes assembled, one bottom bracket overhaul and three tires pumped. Looking for a chain for a rider who needs to replace his funky 1/2 link chain. Oh yes, freak’n Ringle is using 18mm nuts on their rear hubs. 18mm, what the heck…talk about non-standard.

By the way its, the anniversary of Elvis’ death and not a single Elvis sighting or any sign of Elvis mania here.

I am working with the US National Team in Beijing, China at the Olympic qualifier and UCI BMX Supercross event. Mike King is running the program, I am wrenching and the riders are Jill Kinter, Krystal Hime, Mike Day, Randy Stumpfhauser, Kim Hayashi, Amanda Geving, Kyle Bennett and Donny Robinson. Donny has been here since the 1st participating in an Olympic media tour. The rest of us, including about ten other US riders, arrived yesterday.

Things for me got off to a rocky start. The lady behind the United counter was in a bad mood and I received the brunt of it. First there was the excess baggage fee of $110 bucks. That caught me by surprise as the last time I paid this it was around $70. Then she freaked out ’cause my bags were ‘too heavy’. Normally this is just another fee but she was haven’t none of it. I tried to explain that I normally just deal with an overweight fee and she walked away. Freak’n self check in…I had to call my wife to return and collect some of the stuff from my bag.

I met the others in San Fran and we spent the next few hours (12ish) flying to Beijing. Customs was a breeze but for Jason’s missing bike. This meant a long wait in the airport before taking off with the folks from Trek China who had organized our ride to the airport. That’s when we learned that our bodies were on one bus and our bags would follow later on another. You should have seen the worry on the faces of the riders when the left their bikes on the curb and loaded the bus.

The trip to the hotel was wild as our driver spent a bit forcing others out of his lane and being forced to change his lane a couple times. Ken Whelpdale kept us in laughs on the way. Jill fell in love with the ‘toasters’ on the road, mini-minivans. On the way we passed the new ‘birds-nest’ Olympic stadium, the swimming venue, the athletes village and the baseball stadium which is still under construction.

Some time was spent in the lobby of the hotel while we waited for our documents to be taken care of and a couple hours later our bags arrived. Then we hit the buffet at the hotel before Jill, Mike D and I hit the road for an evening walk. Some of the gals were not keen on the food at the hotel. I guess they haven’t traveled much.

We tried everything possible to stay up as long as possible in order to fight jet lag but I couldn’t make it passed 8:30 pm. Most of us woke up once or twice during the night and were able to get back to sleep. Poor Mike K couldn’t go back to sleep.He drank alot of coffee at breakfast.

Side note: before I left I asked Sissi at my office what to expect in China (she’s Chinese). She said she didn’t like Beijing as it is windy, hot and dry. She said when the wind blew you got dirty. Well, she got hot and dirty correct. Its been 90 and probably 110% humidity. Plus this is the worst smog I have ever seen. Yum!

The day began as usual with riders signing in, teams lining up their cars, riders begging for more air and team managers and sponsors preparing their VIP’s for rides later in the day. The difference here was that hundreds of people were milling about the the start line area. Okay, we were stationed on the Embarcadero which is always full of tourists, but these people were all chatting about how they hoped to get a chance to see Lance Armstrong. Not the usual San Francisco tourist discussion.

As riders began to line up the spectators began to quickly move towards the announcing area. Lance was called to the line and the crowd went wild. Riders nervously strolled to the line and the National anthem rang out. This was followed by the gun and a quick mess as the many cars and motorcycles started jockeying for position.

Our car, Mavic Support One, was supposed to line up behind team car number 16 and we were currently sitting about halfway through the caravan. While pulling from the curb. John, my driver, quickly stomped on the brakes. It seems that someone in the 7up/Colorado Cyclist car forgot to close the rear door and a couple bags fell out.

Once on the road the number of spectators began to grow. Comments were heard comparing this to the First Union race in Philly. Within minutes everyone was convinced that the number of people on the course far outweighed that of Philly and these people were on the course earlier.

After a few miles we hit Fillmore Street for the first time. The cars all stopped due to the drop in speed and we soon lost sight of vehicles in front of us. The street got steep and steeper as we went with a flat spot between each block. These flat areas made it difficult to see what was happening above on the 21 percent grade climb. Each time we crested a block, we could see riders up out of their seats pushing to make it up the hill. For some this was steeper than anything they had ever ridden. Many teams had purchased 25 and 27 tooth cogsets in the days before for riders who feared this climb.

As we climbed the hill we saw the crowd had already grown to the size of that on the famed Maniunk Wall in Philly and it was still prior to 10am. The other thing we noticed was that the motorcycles were having trouble rolling after stopping on the climbs. At one point we watched Bart (the moto mechanic) run a whole block up the hill to meet Chuck (the driver) as they couldn’t get the bike to start up the hill with both of them on it.

As the event rolled on and riders began to fall off the back, the mechanics began their work for the day. Some were pushing riders up the hill. Others were fixing radios. On a couple occasions we actually saw mechanics change wheels, though not often. I even had a chance to jump out of the car to do some work.

As we climbed up Fillmore early in the race a call came from one of the Mavic motors in the back of the caravan. John quickly pulled into the left lane and began passing other cars. Right about the time we noticed Mike Creed standing on the right side of the road his Prime Alliance car stopped and we were given the okay nod from the car. As we passed we noticed that Mike’s chain had broken from the stress of the climb. Within a couple seconds his mechanic was banging on our window asking for a bike. We quickly jumped out, pulled one from the car and gave it to the mechanic.

John and I were climbing in the car when Mike came by still trying to get in the toe clips on the pedals and was having difficulty making it up the hill. I quickly jumped out and gave Mike a push while he got his feet in and stood up to accelerate.

As I got back into the car Mike had made it to the top of one flat area and began to climb the last section. It was here that he shifted the wrong way putting the bike in a harder gear. I jumped out and tried to push him but Mike had had enough. We grabbed the bike and he climbed into his team car.

We were now miles behind the race and John fried our horn in an attempt to get back to the caravan. There were so many people along the course that he had to continue honking to let the course marshals know we were coming and clear the road. Within a short amount of time the horn would blare no more and we had to slow our approach. Eventually we made it back to the group and took our place in line.

It was a short time later that two riders went down in a corner and Greg (the other moto mechanic) did a front wheel change. The riders were fine and got back into the group fairly quickly.

These were the only two mechanic services Mavic did the whole day. Based on the conversations on the radio and what we saw I think the total amount of services included seven wheels, one bike and numerous pushes. This was probably the easiest professional race we have ever experienced as far as tech support was concerned.

As the day went on, attrition set in and many riders dropped out. In the last few laps, Mavic had a moto on the front following the break, a car following the chase, another motor following a group of three and then our car following four more. The race behind us had totally blown up with the largest group at five people.

Barely enough riders finished the event to fill each paying finish position. However those who did roll across the line were greeted with screams of joy from people on the line and quickly enveloped by the spectators. Not one rider made it past the rollout beyond the finish line without getting mobbed. Many of the spectators were already hopping the fence in order to get a closer spot to the podium while riders were still coming in.

Many things impressed me this weekend. Most of all the people of San Francisco. I don’t think there was one spot on the course without at least one person watching. We even saw people climbing on window sills in order to get a better view. These people loved the race and this was best seen atop Taylor where so many people lined the block above the race course that it looked like stadium bleachers.

The discussions in the bar that night were all positive as we chatted about the fun that day and hopes of doing this event again.

The Mavic crew this weekend was as follows:
Moto one: Chris Zigmont (Mavic Marketing) and Greg Miller (Sandpiper Bicycles)
Moto two: Chuck (South Carolina event promoter) and Bart Miller (So Cal cat 2 racer)
Car one: John Berlinger (Mavic Support) and Chris Clinton (ProMechanics.com)
Car two: Lance Camisasca (Interbike) and Neil Aldridge (past 7up team mechanic)
VIP: Desira Utzig (Team Earthlink rider)
Wheel Pit: Ric Hjertberg (Wheelsmith creator) and Patrick (past Wheelsmith employee, Local Rep.)