Mark's Blog

Saturday through today has been nothing but riding.  Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday the shortest amount of time on the bike each day was about 2hrs. 20min.  I think it paid off on tonights ride, I didn’t die on the ride.  The first Hub ride of the year went pretty well.

The ride was pretty good, I managed to stay about mid-pack for the whole ride.  Once we get to Lost Dauphin rode the pace picked up quite a bit, as usual.  A break formed and I was caught in the back group and tried to cover it but only managed to catch Julie and then work with her for the majority of the road.  Steve D. looked like he was a hurting unit as he decided not to take a turn at the front of the group.  Julie and I were working pretty hard until Nate decided to stop at the De Pere city sign.  After that we just cruised back to the shop.  The whole ride took about 1hr 40min.  I think we averaged about 19 mph.  Not to shabby for the first Hub ride of the year.

You better be at the Flyers ride on Sat. and Sun. at 10 at He-Nis-Ra park.

Later

The weekend was awesome.  Saturday morning I packed up my crap and headed towards good old Green Bay.  We meet in the parking lot and I got to see some people that I haven’t seen since last fall.

Well, once the ride got going it was fairly interesting.  We managed to head towards the south on the frontage roads.  Once we got outside of Wrightstown it was time to start heading back to the north.  While on the southbound leg I finally go to see what Hauser looks like when he was in pain, I could tell he didn’t have the kick of years past.  Well, that is ok since it is only March 6 because I don’t have the high end either.  Once we turn around I start to ride with Steve and just b.s. about different things.  I called him a bastard multiple times for the bike that he was riding on.  I managed to start splitting up the group with a few accelerations up some hills, but once to the top I sat up and waited for them to catch back on.  All in all the ride was good, I heard about 37 miles in about 2.25 hours.  That was the first ride of any season where I didn’t feel like dying or being dropped in a long time.

Sunday would be different.  I went to the roadie’s, a.k.a. Nate’s, house for a ride with a few of his teammates.  We roll out at about 10:15 and head to the south.  I could hardly sit on the seat because of the previous days ride.  The beginning of the season sucks you have to work out the kinks and get ready for more.  I knew going into to Sunday’s ride that it was going to be a faster ride.  The ride into Freedom wasn’t bad, a little on the faster side for me this time of season but able to hold on.  The rest of the ride proved to be a true test, going down some of the roads Chris would get on the front and my heart rate would go rather high, mid 180’s, as he pushed the pace well into the 20’s.  After that it would slow down for a little bit so I could recover and the pace would pick up again.  Then when we were almost home Nate was leading the train when he seen another rider on the road up ahead and he had to chase him down.  This was another spot where the hr was close to a race effort for me.  But the record was when I started to pull Q into the home stretch.  I managed to “pin it”, at least attempt to, and I don’t know what the speed was but I could tell the hr was well into the 190’s.  After we got back I looked at the monitor and it said that the official high was 196 with an average of 163, what happened to just cruising along for spring miles?  Speaking of which this was 42 miles in 2.25 hours.

It was fun for the first weekend of riding.  Time to get out and get some more miles so I don’t die on future rides.

If there is anyone that is a member of sportshooter.com and is willing to sponsor me please email me at: mark@markschindel.com.

Thanks

Well, I have been busy with photographing different things.  Here are some photos that took me a while to get.  Other than that I have been busy with working different jobs and getting ready for riding this spring.

Eagles, Eagles, Everywhere!  These photos took me a while to get, I also have found out that I have to short of a lens.  A 500mm lens would have been the optimum lens, I think.  Money, the thing I need but don’t have, is needed for more equipment.

Here is the proof.

I know that I have been saying that I am anti Canon, until now.  It is true that I have been called a hypocrite in the past and now it will not be different.  After some research in what I am going to need for next summer and fall with the Packers assignment I have found out that Canon is going to be the answer.  After debating if I want to shell out $6,200 for a lens for my Nikon I found out I can buy a used Canon 300mm F2.8 and a 1D Mark III for about $2,000 less.

I will probably not be able to do a lot racing this year because of the camera equipment.  It is extremely disappointing, but I have to make some sacrifices to do other things.

Canon 300mm

Canon EOS-1D MKIII

I am seriously considering getting this lens soon.  I went to go and test out this lens today and got some amazing results.  Here is one of the pictures that I took with it.  Click it for the high resolution version.
This picture was taken at 14mm at f2.8 for the technically savvy people.  The lens cap is what I focused on and the subject was only 2 inches in front of the 14mm lens.  To get an idea of how wide this view is put the bottom of a cup 2 inches in front of your eye and see what kind of view you get.

On another note, I am planning to go out and snowshoe tomorrow at about 1 at the camp.  If you want to go with me just show up and we will head out for about 1.5 to 2 hours of fun.