Back from Trek

I got back last night from my long awaited trip to the Trek bikes factory in Waterloo, Wisconsin for work. I left on Monday, spent Tuesday and Wednesday at Trek with other sales and management types from our stores, spent yesterday morning with more training, took a trip to the Saris factory where they make bike racks and CycleOps training systems and then drove home.

It was a great week where we got the lowdown on Trek's history, operations and product development as well as just getting to hang out with some cool people. I got to have lunch with Trek's President and CEO, John Burke and had a good conversation with pro rider Justin Spinelli who went on some of the factory tour with us. Justin is currently riding for the Kelly Benefit Strategies/Medifast team on the domestic scene but was on the US Amateur team back in the day and has ridden for teams like Saeco and Navigators. His current team lists LeMond bikes as one of their sponsers, hence his presence at the Trek headquarters.

Not only did we get the lowdown on some great bikes that we'll be carrying, but I also got to channel my inner fanboy. The atrium/lobby of the new facility has a few displays of historically significant bikes from Gary Fisher, Greg LeMond and Trek including bikes from each of Lance's 7 Tour de France wins. I have to admit, I was definitely geeked out about two in particular.

The first is the time trial bike that Greg LeMond rode in the final stage of the '89 Tour when he came from behind to beat Laurent Fignon by eight seconds in the closest Tour in history. Greg liked the bike so much that when he switched teams the next season, he took the bike with him, had the new team colors put on it and continued riding it (hence the Z team colors).

The other fanboy bike was the bike that Lance rode in the '03 Tour on the infamous stage to Luz-Ardiden when Lance's handlebar caught a spectator's bag and sent him to the ground only to have Iban Mayo run over him. Lance got up, collected himself and then used the adrenaline to destroy everybody, win the stage and lengthen the lead for the overall on the decicive day. The bike has a visible crack in the chainstay from the Mayo impact and stands as a testament to how brutal that race win was for Lance.

I had a great week and may write more about it as I get the chance, but I've got to get myself to work so I can sell some bikes this evening.

Group Ride

Yesterday I had my first group ride in a long time. In attendance were my supervising assistant manager from work, Brian, my next door neighbor, Dick, two of their riding buddies and myself. The four other guys are all the sort that stay in a fair state of physical conditioning throughout the year and have all logged 50+ mile rides this year while I tend to take about 3-4 months off at the end of the season and hadn't even logged 100 road miles yet.

Things turned out about as I had imagined they would. I was able to hang in for about the first 20 miles until the terrain started rolling a bit more. I knew going in that my conditioning was such that I would be dropped at some point and that I wouldn't have the endurance and recovery to stay with them once we hit some hills.

True to form, we hit some hills and I hung on about half way up before I lost contact with the wheel in front of me. Once that happened, it was all over. I tried to dig in and hang on, but felt my legs give out. I kept pushing to the top of the hill (really more of an exaggerated incline) and the guys already had a pretty significant gap on me. They were kind enough to hold up and allow me to catch up, but I was using time that I would normally use for recovery to catch back up. By the time I would catch up, we would hit the next hill/incline and the situation would repeat itself.

This kept up for five miles or so before I had to turn into town to head for home so that I could get to work on time. I had about 11 miles on my own to regroup and formulate my plan for the rest of the day. I hit Brian's at 11:20, managed to get home at 11:37, showered, packed a lunch and hopped in the car by 11:48, ate and shaved in the car and clocked in at 11:59. I cut it a little closer than I intended, but got there all the same.

I was frustrated but not surprised by the ride. I simply haven't put in the off season work to hang in with these guys. In another month or two, I should be able to hold on in a group ride without being an anchor when the road starts to roll. I keep comforting myself with the thought that they don't have as far to go to hit peak form, so they will not improve over the next few months to the extent that I will. I intend to test that theory by staying in the loop and riding with them from time to time whether I get dropped or not. My best bet for improvement is to continue to ride with stronger, faster riders, so that's what I'll do.

As far as the rest of the day went, I suffered through nine hours on my feet after the most physically demanding activity I had taken on since September. I held together okay, but felt like a zombie for most of the day. By 9:30 p.m. when I got home, I was really ready for some rest.

My Dad's New Blog

Anyone who gives me a chance gets an earful about my dad the artist. Well, now you can get to know him and his work through his new blog here! Dad's worship of God through the world He created inspires Dad's art and inspires my worship as well.

Beauty and creativity interacting to reveal the majesty of God. That is the potential of redemptive, God inspired art.

An Actual, Authentic, All Natural Day Off

For the first time in I don't know how long, I have an entire day with no work, lessons, appointments or other obligations. I find myself paralyzed. I don't know when this might happen again and I don't want to waste the day. But would actually having a full day of rest and watching the NCAA tournament be a waste?

Alright, so I'm really not all that wound up about deciding what I'm going to do today. The weather is such that my biggest decision will be whether to go for a bike ride this afternoon even though it's only supposed to be about 44 degrees out. I did get out on Tuesday morning for a short ride between meeting with Shel at the church and going to work at the store. I only had about 45 minutes, but decided that 45 minutes on the road was preferable to 45 minutes on the trainer in the basement. 11 messy miles later, I had finished my first ride of the year.

Usually I'm good for at least one January/February ride, but this year the weather and my schedule have conspired to keep me off the South Dakota roadways until now. Even though the weather has been better and the snow has nearly all melted, I still have found myself working on the nice days and free on the cold, wet days. It's been a bit depressing, but I think I should be able to develop a rhythm soon.

As for work, things have been a whirlwind. This week saw us pack up all of the cold weather coats and accessories and increased our bike area so that it's about four times what it has been to this point. It will take a few more day for us to get our shop all set up, but we've seen a big increase in bike sales over the last week. We've still got a lot of last year's bikes to move, but it's shaping up to be a fun year in bikes.

Now I have to get acclimated to the "manager" part of my title and figure out what I need to do when it comes to inventory and ordering. Everything is happening so fast that I haven't quite been able to catch how to do all of the things I'm supposed to do. It will come, but it probably would have been better for me to start this job a few months earlier so that I could get settled in before the spring rush of activity. I know I'll catch up, but this week will be another flurry of activity and the two following weeks will see me going to Wisconsin for my Trek trip and attending golf training back in Sioux Falls.

All told, things seem to be settling into a rhythm. Granted, the tempo is a little quicker than I like to function at, but at least I'm doing things that I'm passionate about. Between selling bikes, leading worship and teaching trumpet I'm active in just about every area that I've ever imagined myself working in. Now I just need to figure out how to balance it all.

The Secret and the lie

I was watching the news the other night (Wednesday I think) when CBS News did a piece on The Secret by Rhonda Byrne. The story talked about the ideas in the book and movie and their popularity, complete with testimonials.

The basic idea behind the book is that there are fragments throughout world religion, philosophy, literature and oral traditions that are parts to a great secret that, once understood, allows the individual to use the secret to help them in every aspect of their life including (but not limited to) money, relationships and health.

The testimonials on the news were to the effect of "Practicing what I know about The Secret, I am asking the universe for $100,000 knowing that the universe will give it to me." Groups are forming around this book and the practice of the principles it teaches and apparently even Oprah has weighed in on how great the book is.

The fact of the matter is that this kind of philosophy has been around awhile under different guises, so this is nothing new. It hasn't always revolved around the issues that The Secret seems to focus on, but at its root is the desire to control our circumstances through special knowledge.

The day after seeing the news broadcast, I was reading (Re)Understanding Prayer by Kyle Lake and came across a similar line of thinking in the church known by the monikers "Positive Confession", "Word-Faith", "Name It and Claim It" or "Confess It and Possess It". All are forms of prosperity theology that take verses like Matthew 21:21-22 to mean something a bit too simplistic to be Biblical. Kyle writes:

There are many peculiar ideas and practices in the Word-Faith theology, but what really sets it apart from much of mainstream Christianity is the shift of power, where God must dance to man's attempts to manipulate the spiritual laws of the universe. In my opinion, it's the same song, eighteenth verse. Think: fundamental problem in the story of the Garden of Eden.

The thing that scares me is that whether presented in Word-Faith theology or in The Secret I believe that Satan is only too willing to play along if it will keep us from a true understanding of our place in the creation. He loves for us to believe that God is able to be manipulated and is not the sovereign, holy God that He has revealed Himself to be through Scripture and orthodox Christianity.

In the case of The Secret, Satan's best strategy is to give people what they want and let them believe that they can get what they want without God even entering the picture. Unfortunately, it seems to be working in many cases.

Four Day Weekend

I got a call at about 11:00 this morning letting me know that the store was staying closed for the day. Added to yesterday's reprieve from meetings and the fact that I have the weekend off, I wound up with an unexpected four day weekend. I have to say that I'm enjoying it. I haven't had this kind of a break from work since doing camp last summer, which means I haven't actually had this long of a restfull break since last May.

Xander and I continued our Star Wars marathon today and I was struck by an odd thought. I grew up on the movies and had almost all of the toys (still have some of them). Xander has seen all of the movies, but probably knows more about Star Wars from his Lego Star Wars II Gameboy game.

Because of this, we come at the movies from different perspectives. I come from the linear, "This is the way it is in the movies and the way it will always be (at least until Lucas decides to do another alternate version of certain scenes)" view of the movies. Xander comes from the freeplay, any character in any scene doing anything perspective.

I actually envy him his perspective. If I played the game, it would probably be heavily influenced by the events of the movies. It would never occur to me to use a speeder bike to attack the Death Star. I mean, who does that? My son does. He thinks nothing of having bad guys fight each other in ways that I my nearly thirty years of conditioning will not allow me.

His experience of the movies is totally different than mine which has made it fun to experience the movies with him this weekend.

Quick Update

For the first time since taking my new position, I had a day completely off yesterday. March roared in with snow and high winds and closed school for Xander and at USF on the only day that I teach. It also closed the store early meaning that my 8pm sales training (which was to have been my last session) and 9pm meeting were both cancelled. We also had to opt for a Saturday rehearsal at church instead of our (somewhat) regular Thursday night rehearsal.

Today I head back out to work at noon even though it's still a bit of a mess outside. We live right on a snow route though, so I shouldn't have any trouble getting where I'm going. We'll see if I actually get to sell anything today. We've had several days lately where the weather has been a bit less than ideal which has made work very slow at times. I'm also at a disadvantage because most of the space that I will have to manage for bikes is currently filled with coats. Until the coats move, I don't have much space to play around with my inventory. That will change soon enough.

I've also been spending a bit more time on the trainer in preparation for my Trek trip. I doubt I'll get to do a lot of riding there, but I don't want to be totally embarrassed should the opportunity present itself. It does get a bit hard to drag myself into the cold, cement basement to ride, but the iPod has been helping out a great deal. I did up a playlist with several hundred songs of appropriate tempo and mood to ride with and put it on shuffle. Sometimes I ride with a specific timeframe in mind with specific interval training in mind, but mostly I just ride the tempo of the music. Those workouts are a lot more enjoyable and seem to go by faster.

I was talking with my neighbor, Dick, the other day and he said that he's done 1000 miles over the winter. Overachiever.