Had a solid weekend of travel back to Canada from down here in Tucson. I have an amazing Grandad back home who is fighting cancer right now and it's been a couple months since I've seen him and my family so it was about time to head home, clear the head and get re-energized even if it was for only 40 hours. Heard some more awesome grandad stories, saw my parents and brother, ate some good food, rode bikes inside and got a speeding ticket. Almost froze my special place too, after going from 30 degrees in Tucson to -16 Monday morning.. I definitely left with some more motivation as sometimes as an athlete you catch yourself sometimes going "this is hurts too much" but you never know whats hurts until something like cancer shows up in your body or in someone close to you. I now have no excuses for ever "not hurting enough" in a bike race or anything I attempt to do. Which may include a eating competition one of these days, but it can't exceed my 2500 calorie daily caloric intake. I raced for my grandad last season, but I now dedicate any and all of my future success in life to him, as he had been like a second father to me. Guiding me down so many different and amazing roads, and of course telling me what not to do, or how to get a sugar momma. As you will all see this season on my bikes "I ride for George Fenton". As it is the least I can do for one of the MOST important people in my life. 

F--- Cancer.

NEW sUPER aWESOME fUN tIMES!!

Well it's like hot and sunny out. Off to Sedona this weekend for some not road bike biking.

A week of bicycling in the desert has been completed, all kinds of weather came with that. Tuesday I decided that 13C was worth shorts and a jersey to ride in, as it felt warm coming from a cold mountain town..Then it started hailing so I put on my arm warmers and small gloves. While it started to slowly get colder I thought pff whatever weather you can't touch me. Then it started raining and I got soaked, then I got cold, then I started shivering, then I had to ride 1 hr in the pissing raining  home. But not without it getting down to 5C and my hands and arms getting numb enough that I didn't know if I was holding my bars or not. So kept looking to make sure when I went over the bumps my hands wouldn't come off the bars and make me fall. I couldn't brake and standing was out of the question as I couldn't lean on my arms. But don't worry I tried to look like a hardman in front of the Tucson population by putting on my tough face..Lucky I didn't flat because I couldn't have even been able to make a call let along change it. Once I arrived home I was lucky my roommates Andreane Lanthier Nadeau and Antoine Caron were home to take off my shoes helmet and jersey. I took the rest off after 10 min of warming up in the shower. Junior movie or hardman Canadian move..I like to say hardman but I didn't sound like one in the shower when my hands were thawing!

 Without the luxury of having my MTB it meant riding road bike bikes all week. Our dear Nova Scotian pal has arrived and decided he would ride on the road with his touring bike and non knobby tires.

Our coffee supply is on an all time low and scary level right now. Which means were gonna have to piano over to a coffee shop to get some stock today. May even swing by the University for some 'sight seeing' as some would say.

On tap tomorrow is 6:30 am riding for some shoot out action then off to the 24hr of Old Pueblo to do some spectating and liquid calorie consumption. Our Canadian boy Kris Sneddon is racing I here, so we might have to shot gun some beer in his honor so we can really cheer for him.

There's some talk going around about a possible Sedona trip next weekend..haha how neat is that, isn't that neat?

Tee dang it's time to make some pancakes

Tucson 2012

This will be year 3 in Tucson. And so far the3 trip has not dissapointed! Each year I have had some interesting stories. Year 1 I had Mono and didn't know until I got home, and I also had nose bleeds everyday which turned me to riding with tampons in my nose to keep the bleeding at ease. Year 2 I thought about giving the cheap cyclist hostel stay a try, but that led to a drunk heroin addict pissing and throwing up all over the room..he also rolled in it. And now year 3 I had my MTB stolen from the garage on the second night. Atleast I can say I can say I will remember this trip. I must also take it as a compliment that there were eight bikes in the garage and my MTB was the only one taken. Either the person was a moron and couldn't ride two bikes away(any smart thief in my mind would take as much as possible..) or he was just some dude that needed transport and couldn't take a $50 bike, he needed like a $7,000 one. There was also some gold coloured stuff in the garage that wasn't taken either..I think if they are going to steal would take the gold stuff just because it's gold. So if your in Tucson and see a certain dude riding a bike with dirty jean shorts and no shirt its most likely not his bike so please contact local authorites (which is myself, taking matter into my own hands!).

On another note the roadie bike riding has been good, so hot yesterday I almost couldn't finish the ride! And today I think I found the road with the worlds most potholes and/or bumps. Great way to kick on the bicycling season on the special place.

I can't believe I just saw this neat video the other day, but tee dang you must give'r a go! Neato :

PS I would recommend watching all the episodes, they only get better!!

House set-up = BOOM sick!

 Planning on conquering these 2 breasts

 Ready? 3,2,1 Coffee!

 Bunking with my Frenchman pal Antoine Caron, As Scott Kelly would say we talking about feelings and stuff 

28 C on Feb 11...enough said.

More Gooder Days

Well I have accomplished two things on my "to do list before I leave Park City". Yesterday I was able to get out and enjoy tube hill:

In the PM there was some people going off some big jumps and doing tricks and getting scored for it. I think it was called Freestyle Aerials..or something like that... Them Chinaman/Chinawomen clean house, but not without our Canadién French ski dude putting up a fight for a podium. I also froze standing there, some places were cold that shouldn`t have been that amount of time.

And today was another summiting of a 10,000 footer. There was some waist deep snow up there, but once you pick a spot to go there is not turning back. We had the fresh tracks and some of the boys ski touring up top were pretty surprised hikers made it that far. Wanted them to drop into the big bowl and see some real skiing but aparently there was avalanche risk..next time I`m taking my crazy carpet so I show those kind of people up.

Well for first time I haven't spend the whole winter on snowshoes, Wednesday was my first one of the year. And since I'm only here in Park City for one more week I think it's time to soak in everything that I have't done. Which means one more 10,000 ft peak, actually snowboard on the hill as there is kinda of snow now, go to Olympic Park and do some skeleton, build a sled track with a 6" high booter and 6" gap to landing, rent a surly pugly and shuttle so I descend 2,000 + ft, go tubing on the gnarly local track, not get chased by another moose. Lot's on the agenda and probably won't have time for much but I will make 1-2 days beyond epic. 

Canada.Lawnmower's.jumping.awesome.eh

Warning course language and awesome Lawnmower jumping.

Winter in Park City

Well, winter has finally arrived which means skiing, hiking, snowshoeing and all the fun stuff. I was even lucky enough to go sledding with the neighbors kids yesterday. Felt right at home building a start ramp, luge track with a jump and massive berm at the bottom. The ratio of work to sledding wasn't perfect but the track is now perfect.

I only have a week and half left in this amazing place so there are a few adventures I need to make happen. With two big mountains to climb with big bowls there is a change that my snowshoes with act like skis if I lean on the back and point down the hill, it would be sweet if a mini avalanche started because then I would feel like Vin Diesel in XXX. It been a great time in a new place this winter, as everything was different, even riding the rollers looking at a different wall was nice.

I was also able to experience SunDance. Lots of the experience came from traffic and grocery shopping, I did learn that people high up in the World of SunDance liked filling their shopping cart with boxes of cereal, super cheap beer and cookies. They also added rice milk or almond milk I believe because it just was in the gluten free aisle and if your important you have to be "gluten free" and make sure people know it! Although I don't think they realized the 6-pack of bakery cookies(that were 300 cal a piece) were not gluten free along with the boxes of Captain Crunch, Honey Nut Cheerios and Kashi GoLean.. It was better when you were at Whole Foods, but just because there is chocolate, cookies and candy at Whole Foods doesn't mean it makes it good for you.. I was fortunate enough to take in more movies in theater's in one week than I took in in all of 2011. I would recommend when Liberal Arts and Robot and Frank come into theater's to check them out!

Next Friday is the FIS freestyle ski Word Cup at Deer Valley in Park City. I am definitely going to swing by and check out the aerial's, I may even learn a few tricks to try and master my back flip on the dirt-jump bike.

On Feb 10 I`ll be heading down to Tucson for year 3 of bicycle riding in the sunny desert. I will be staying some of my favourite french people, I`m going to have to go back 5 years to Gr 11 and try and remember that language that I technically got my second language in. From there it's off to Mellow Johnny's for MTB race #1 of the season, It's not actually at, as Mr Kabush would put it, one nuts ranch as they have changed venues..dang.

Yesterday I was out running and came across what I would call a small cow moose compared to the one's near my house in Peachland..I got nice and close for a picture and it kinda of trotted my way for a few steps and then took off. But it wasn't getting away that easy. I have heard of people getting chased by the moose here but I didn't fully believe it as when I see animals back home I usually taunt them a little. So I turned the IPhone on video and started running towards it and one I got within about 10 ft it turned and started chasing me..It didn't totally occur to me to that before I started chasing it that it was bigger, faster and scarier than me..I tried this herding method back in November and it just ran away, so today I was going for it 100% In my mind a herding success would have been touching it and running away nicely with no problems. But this one turned back as I didn't pre-plan very well with being in a open field, 1 ft of snow and a ways into a good day of working out. This video explains all, but I did nearly trip and get trampled, please ignor my scaredness noises it was only human to be scared shitless while getting chased by a 700 lbs animal that has four legs to run on versus my two. It's actually a shame CX season is over because I felt that was the fastest I've run in years, and the first time my HR was hit 200 in months!

On another note there is all these new "Sh*t __ Say" videos coming out on YouTube..Oh Canada Eh!

                                       

Well SunDance is now in full swing here in Park City. In case you know Is kind of sweet. My grocery shopping is now happening everyday..as I like to watch the important people buy food. The #1 pick seems to be a 30 pack of bud light, honey but Cheerios, and chips. The people need to come bu our place an try out some real food! I would have to figure out a way to be not creepy, different, pretend I don't know who they are and suggest a food eating session. But in a way that's sounds a lot better and not as retarded as I just put it.

It's snowing here too and it's seems that since winter is only just arriving no one remembers how to drive. For example; don't go into a corner with 5 inches of fresh snow faster than posted speeds and slam on your brakes thinking your car will automatically turn and maybe stop for you just because it's AWD. Don't tail gate people on a steep hill and slam on your brakes when you think the guy in front of you is going to "maybe" brake. Don't drive 15 mph in the fast lane, people get agitated and pass you and then crash themselves. Don't start to actually drive conducive to road conditions after you've driven through them and now are on dry roads. Stop sucking at driving and carry on. That is my see, think, laugh, enjoy, get agitated and write down story for the day. Byeeee

Little update from this past week. I watched girls in tight clothes do some cool tricks, went bicycle riding on some snow to see a sweet reservoir and the today I made a tasty lunch. Yum yum yum.

Best of 2011

Well we are into the 2012 and 2011 already seems way back. For myself I had probably the funnest year of my life. Traveling around, enjoying the Okanagan, friends and family..you know all the good stuff.

The travels went like this:
Peachland-Victoria-Peachland-Tucson-Peachland-Vancouver BC-Peachland-Sunshine Coast BC-Peachland-Mt Tremblant QC-Baie-St-Paul QC-Barrie ON-Peachland- Mt-St-Anne QC- Albany NY-Peachland- Canmore AB-Edmonton AB-Peachland-Champery Switzerland-Peachland-Seatle WA- Peachland-Vancouver BC-Peachland-Boulder CO-Peachland-Kamloops BC-Peachland-Toronto ON-Peachland-Park City UT-Peachland-Park City UT. Whoa, there was a few trips this year..So mad I didn't hunker down and get my Elite status with Air Canada.

The year started off with some local snowshoe racing with the mang Aart:

Kept snowshoeing with the attempt to get fit:

It snowed like record amounts so that meant driving was fun and my biceps liked all the shoving too..:
                                     

Spent a week at casa a la Plaxton in Victoria riding bicycles:

I also kept hydrated, as most people forget to throughout the winter:

Then I went to Tucson to ride bikes in the desert:

Team Bike Barn won the Okanagan World Champs, the Ski2Sea (http://ski2sea.ca/):

Riding bikes in the best place on earth!

Spent May in the Quebec and Ontario and had learned to cut hair, raced bikes, watched Caunks loose:

In June I shotgunned beer and raced Super D`s:

In July I was in Quebec, New York and Alberta racing bikes with the National Team while pretending to be hockey players for the flights:

Did some hiking in Canmore, caught some air, won my first Pro race in Edmonton and watched two boys develop love for eachother:

Went to Switzerland in September, racing World Champs, Slept on the floor in an airport, Watched a Catharine Pendral win Worlds, Cheered my voice away, Did a mountain top border crossing with the US of A guys, had coffee explosions, loved life.

In the fall I raced some euro`s in cyclo-cross, raced Axel Merckx on mtb`s, grew mullets and moustaches for cx nationals, moved down to Park City for the winter, went skeet shooting over Christmas:

Well I must 2011 was hard to beat, but I will do my best to make every year better until I can't anymore, which will probably be when I have to start a 9-5 job.. Which means I am looking for some support to help make this cycling thing I do the #1 income and full time job to be fit and race around the world.

Pretty thankful to all my supporters that make this happen, being my parents, grandparents, friends, Rocky Mountain Bicycles, The Bike Barn, Canadian Cycling Association, Cycling BC, Haywood Securities, Canadian Metis Society, some helpful un-named amazing people!

Here is the Best of 2011 highlight video! Check it out and give me some views please!!