Superstar!

Here's the video Kiley made. Isn't she awesome? She normally charges $3,000 per hour for this stuff. Fortunately, she gave me a 10% discount.

Trailers, Photos, Rants...

I rode back up to Lizard Head Pass today, this time with my loaded trailer. I'll tell you, it sure felt a helluva lot slower, but when I got back my cyclecomputer said my average speed had only dropped 1.8mph. I was expecting a much slower time over that distance. Still, how you feel on the bike is more important than the numbers, unless you're racing I suppose. And it did feel like a much tougher ride.

I love my trailer though, and I think I made the right choice not going with panniers. It's a B.O.B. Yak, which is a single-wheeled trailer, instead of the usual two wheeled like the one I took to Yellowstone. The biggest advantages I've noticed so far are a lower rolling resistance and more precise cornering (as the trailer leans into the turn with the bike). The only disadvantage is that it becomes difficult to stand up out of the saddle on flat terrain with speed, because there's a delay between when you sway the bike in one direction and when the trailer catches up. This creates a rather unstable feeling. The only thing to do is to limit the amount of back and forth you allow, which takes more concentration and control. This is less of a problem below about 10mph though, so climbing isn't so bad.

My roommate Kiley took some pictures of me on the bike this afternoon. A few of them turned out okay, but we had the camera set at a slower ISO to try to get a little blur for effect and most of the shots are just blurry, if you know what I mean. Turns out you can't really get that cool effect of a blurry background and a sharp subject with a point-and-shoot the way you can with an SLR. Oh well, maybe I can get her to try again tomorrow. What I'd really like is a good shot that I can put on a business card, which will have my LAF and blog website addresses, that I can then hand out to people I meet along the way. That'll make donations a bit easier.

Kiley has a background in film and television, and she filmed a short interview with me. I'm not sure what we'll use it for, maybe I can post it here. Haven't seen it yet. I was nervous...never been interviewed before.

When you enlarge that last photo, scroll all the way down. See all that loose gravel? If you're not a cyclist you might not realize how big of a problem that stuff can be for skinny tires, nor how many roads actually look like that or worse on the shoulder. So, when you're driving and about to pass a cyclist, please please please give him/her a lot of room so they don't have to ride through that stuff and risk a flat. If you can't move over far enough because of oncoming traffic, it wouldn't kill you to slow down for a few seconds until you can. This concludes my rant on autos vs. bikes, even though I have much more to say on the topic. I don't want to get too pedantic.

Please make a donation to the LAF.

Lizard Head

Today I rode up to Lizard Head pass, almost exactly 16 miles south of town at 10,250 feet. That's exactly 1,500 feet of vertical gain. I mention this because of how amazed I am at how good I felt during and after the ride. Again, I wasn't racing anywhere, I went at a generally leisurely pace, although there were a few times when I put the hammer down, just because I felt that I could. It's a tremendous boost to my confidence because less than a month ago I bonked on a hard climb like that and today I felt like I could have kept riding all day long. I only stopped because I'm trying to excersise self-restraint and not push too hard, which I think will be extremely important when I'm on the big ride. More photos: The Wilsons reflected in a shabby little pond on the side of the road; Down-valley view looking north (the town of Ophir is to the viewer's right, out of frame); Informational plaque at the Lizard Head Pass trailhead; My cyclecomputer/altimeter, which is only 25 ft off. Click on the photos to enlarge.

Please visit my LAF page.

Nothin' Doin'

I had trouble motivating to ride today. Even though it was a bit warmer it was cloudy and threatening to rain all day. Plus, I really want to do a longer ride, getting out of the canyon. Lately I've more or less been riding the same out-and-back routes over and over, and I'm itching for a change of scenery. Even the new road up above the airport wasn't long enough or far enough away to be really satisfying.

So I spent some time today figuring out where to go next, and I've decided (I think) on a ride up to Crested Butte. Sadly, I expect the round trip to take about four days and I have some commitments in town that would make it difficult to do until late next week. It's just as well, I suppose, who wants to deal with the Memorial Day traffic? Besides, it's Mountain Film here; I might try to take in some movies.

I happened upon this really neat site, Runningmap.com, which is a lot like Google maps except you can see mileage on your route more clearly and it even has an amazingly cool and useful elevation chart! Unfortunately, I don't think there's a way to make your lines of travel conform automatically to roads, so you either have to be super diligent when making lines or just resign yourself to a more "as the crow flies" kind of route. Nevertheless, that's how I was able to estimate how long it would take to get to Crusty Butt. The elevation chart revealed a very serious climb that I can now prepare for. It's much more useful than simple mileage, particularly when planning on possible campsites.

I guess that's all for now. I'm kind of digging this new-fangled blogging fad that all the kids are into these days. Now I can finally bug the anonymous masses with the vapid internal monologue that might otherwise go unrecorded!

Here's another Yellowstone photo, courtesy of Mr. Fred Finn.

New Friend

Just returned from today's ride. I was going up to the airport again (quickly becoming a favorite ride because it's a nice climb with mild traffic and only a couple of hairpin curves) and about halfway up I looked in my mirror and there was a rider closing in on me, fast! Now, I'm no Lance, but I've never been passed like that before. Granted, I wasn't riding for speed, but still.

Anyway, this guy rode up along side me and stayed with me for a chat. Turns out he used to ride with the Paragon Cycling Team -- one of the more highly regarded teams in the state -- based here in Telluride. He also was riding a beautiful Moots titanium bike and has a newborn son (the adrenaline from which I assume was fueling him), all of which made me feel better about getting schooled. I'm just kidding, I don't mind being passed. Not really.

As a bonus, he took me up a different road which climbs another few hundred vertical above where I had been going. It was nice because I never would have gone on that road myself, because it's technically private property. We're talking Aldasoro Ranch territory, a.k.a. where Tom Cruise lives. He told me that a little while ago a cyclist got into an argument with a home owner and now no one's allowed up there unless they're on a guest list with the HOA. It's too bad, because it's an absolutely beautiful ride and there's NO traffic. Pretty much the only place around where you've got miles of paved roads that no one drives on.

I didn't take any pictures today, it was all I could do to just keep up with this guy who had slowed significantly to talk to me and wasn't even breathing hard. Meanwhile, I'm huffing and puffing and trying not to swerve into him or off the pavement.

So here's some more photos from the Yellowstone ride. In this one, you can clearly see where my shorts are ripped from an earlier fall.

This one was taken at the campground in the park, when we finally got a fire started and I could start to dry out. I'm wearing plastic bags over my socks to keep them dry. No, it didn't work too well.

This is my erstwhile roommate, Finn. He's the one I rode with and took all the photos of me. This shot was on the way back when we were just getting back into Grand Teton National Park. That's the Grand behind him. I like to think he's giving thanks to the gods here, but he's probably just sneezing or something.



Please make a donation to the Lance Armstrong Foundation.

Self Portrait

I was asked to provide a photo of myself on the bike. This is the best I could do without soliciting the help of a pedestrian. The other shot is a handlebar's view. They're both on the road heading up to the Pandora mine at the east end of town. In the handlebar photo you can see Bridal Veil Falls to the right of the middle peak. It was frozen until just a few days ago. I took some videos on my ride today as well, I think there's a way to put those up here. I'll see if I can figure it out.


Okay, I think I figured out the video thing:
This is me climbing up the hill toward the Telluride Regional Airport. Great views, I wish you could see them better in the video.


This is a panorama from just above the airport. You can see the runway, the Wilsons (aka the mountains used in the Coors label), the Telluride ski area, and assorted peaks.


And this is a short clip taken on the bike path headed back into town. That horrible screeching is just the wind, there was no car accident or any thing. This one had to be real short, because the bike path is in lousy condition and very difficult to ride on with one hand.

Original "Help Me Out" Email Text

This is the original email I sent out to everyone explaining what was going on.

Dear Friends and Family,

Apologies for the mass email (especially if this is the second time you've gotten it; I don't believe it went through the first time). This is actually the most massive email I've ever sent, and for those of you who haven't heard from me in a while I'm sorry I'm so bad at keeping in touch, but this is very important to me. As some of you already know, this August I intend to embark on a bicycle ride from my current home in Telluride, Colorado to my childhood home in Larchmont, New York. I haven't found anyone to ride with yet, so at this point it looks like it'll be just me, my bike, my trailer, and my sleeping bag.

Needless to say, this will be the most difficult task I've ever undertaken, physically and psychologically. Now, there's not much anyone can do to help with the former, but you might be surprised how much each and every one of you can help with the latter.

With the advice of some friends and family, I've chosen to ride not just for myself but for a truly worthy cause. Through their Grassroots Fundraising program I've gotten the support of the Lance Armstrong Foundation. There's a link at the bottom of this email to a simple webpage, from which you can make a donation that will help this foundation in its efforts to fight cancer. If you don't know, the LAF has already raised millions of dollars towards fighting cancer, and I would love to do my part. I know I don't need to beat anyone over the head with this, so I'll leave it at that.

The money you donate will do more than help these people with their important work. Every dollar you give toward the monetary goal will push me a little bit closer to my physical goal. Whenever the going gets rough for me out there I'll remember the support that I've got from all of you and I'll push on.

Some of the email addresses I have may be out of date and I'm sure there are others who should be on the list that aren't, so I would definitely appreciate you forwarding this to those who might be interested in making a donation. Thank you so much for reading this, and I'll be thinking about you all as the miles tick away behind me.

http://www.livestrong.org/grassroots/ridingforareason2007

With love,
--Matt Eisenberg

Chapter 1: Starts and Beginnings

Hi. My name is Matt Eisenberg. I'm originally from Larchmont, NY and I live now in Telluride, CO.

Well okay. It snowed today. A lot. All day. So I took the opportunity to stay inside and begin the process of communicating the details of my cycling project to my friends and family. First, I sent a mass email to pretty much everyone I know soliciting donations to the Lance Armstrong Foundation via my webpage, which is hosted by the LAF Grassroots program.
http://www.livestrong.org/grassroots/ridingforareason2007

And now I'm creating a blog for the first time. I'm notoriously bad at keeping up this kind of communication, so please forgive me if I don't keep updating regularly, I promise I'll make an effort. I'll try to keep you posted on how my training is going and what kind of responses I'm getting to the ride plan. That's all for now. Here's a photo of a much shorter ride I did up to Yellowstone last summer: notice the evident misery as I stand at the top of the Continental Divide after having ridden 20 miles straight uphill in a sleet storm towing a heavy trailer with crooked wheels.