Belize Day 5: Recovery Day

Friday: We are all busted, but had a great night at the Radisson Fort George thanks to the help of our friend and supporter, Jim Scott! We slept a little late today and had breakfast at the bakery (cinnabuns, johnny cakes and scones). After going to sweeten my java, the lid pops off and I dump about 2 cups of pure, fresh Belizian Cane Sugar in my coffee...needless to say I was having a little sugar high for the rest of the morning. We ride out to meet our friends Charles and Tony from Leslie Imports and then out of town for a 30 mile recovery ride on the Western Highway to Hattiville.
After lunch we met up with Roger, Shalini and Christian at the bowling alley and test our skills on the worst bowling lanes in history.
Dinner with Charles at the Stone Grill (Monte opted for the Jerk Beef strips for a little spice) and then visited the Smiling Meats shop with Matthew.

Belize Day 4: Sucki-Suck WINS the KREM Classic Race!

Thursday: Race Day -
Women's Race:
Lori was our lone female team member representing the Hincapie/Gary Fisher/Barkley Team in the abbreviated 60 mile womens version of the race. After a Builder Bar breakfast, her race left at 9:00 combined with the Jr's field. She spent most of her race chasing attacks and breaks with the Jrs in order to form seperation with her other female racers, which included Shalini Z. (winner of the 2008 race). Lori, not known for her sprinting knew that she had to lead out the sprint into town as fast as she could. She took a great line through the round-about and held off her other girls to the line for the WIN! After a little post race interview with KREM Radio and Belize Channel 5 TV, Lori was presented with her monster trophy, prize money, Championship ring, and Sheep (yeap, she won a sheep as a prime on the road!) Big props to good ol' "sucki-suck" for her biggest win to date!!!

Men's Race:
Monte, David and I roll out to breakfast at Melin's house in Orange Walk, eggs over easy, fried ham and tortillas at 5:30am. We leave for the race at 7:00 after I had already made 3 pit stops at the bathroom...a little Montazuma zoom zoom action. Lori's (aka sucki suck) race leaves from Orange Walk so she got a little more sleep time. We stop on the road about 6 miles from the startline at the Mexico boarder and get our bikes ready and suited up. I duck out into the sugar cane fields with a newspaper for round #4. After riding to the start we sign in and go through the pre-race check up and find some shade. Race starts...crazy! Full on cat 5 action. Moto official dumps his bike just in front of the pack, we are bunny hopping speedbumps, dodging chickens and stray dogs, caravan traffic, sugar cane...you name it. Entering Corazal the road looks like a mine field of potholes. Chris and I both loose all of our water bottles, and our sprinter, Mateo flats his front wheel. I dropped back with 2 teammates to get him, but he is nowhere in site and chase back on through the maddening caravan (Repeat step 1 three more times!) After my third time dropping back for my sprinter, I closed the gap back to the field and a crash of 10-15 guys blocks the road. I run off the left side of the road to avoid running into the moto official, and get bogged down in a ditch in the cane fields (this is where my race went south). I spent the next 5 miles or so trying to chase back on to no avail through Orange Walk. Monte is in a 5 man break at this point and the race is going fast into town for the $1000 prime. Monte takes a narrow 2nd for the prime and his break gets caught. David goes back to the caravan for water, eats bumper and crashes into a service vehicle while pacing up. I settle in for a lonley 55 mile ride to Belize City with no water. Marlon (Team Santinos) attacks just past Crooked Tree towards Belize City which puts us on the defensive. Monte and Nery set up a strong chase at 28-30mph for the next 5+ miles but can't close to the leader up the road. They pull the 2nd group of about 20 riders to the line and get passed in the sprint for 11th and 12th place, with Jose Choto taking trophies for 1st master and Chris 3rd place master.

Belize Day 3: Can we race? (Updated)

Did a nice 2-3 hour ride today to Crooked Tree, but our whole gang is pretty stressed out. It was really nice to meet up on the road with the Sugar City Boys team and train together. The roads here are really rough and it was good to have friends, teamates and a support truck to share the ride with. We are running into some opposition down here to letting us americans race. There were some heated discussions at the team meeting last night that lasted late into the evening. We have been going round and round with the Belizian Cycling Association constantly. Their intentions are good, but we are having to scramble to get documentations squared away that we had already sent prior to us buying tickets to race. Foriegners racing in the USA don't have anywere close to the hard time as they evidently do down here with registration. We just want to race! Right now there is about a 70% chance we can race tomorrow, but that other 30% is driving us crazy. Big thanks to our NC/SC Cycling Association President, Vicki Lyons for all of her help in getting us the repeatitive documentation they are needing down here. All in all a real stressful night last night and today. We need to get out and go for a walk to clear our minds. Great Country, great climate, great people, but a totally different approach to allowing foriegn riders to race.

5:30pm: Things look much more promising for us to race tomorrow and we are prepared. Our local friends, Melin with the Sugar City team and Andrew with Acros-Guiness, have taken great care of us while we have been down here and helping us get things squared away with the race. We re-sent all of our documents and are ready for a good race. Our spirits have picked up greatly. I am looking forward to dinner tonight at La Hacinda and a nice team meeting tonight. Everyone is fit and ready, but heat is definately going to be a factor, but we have a good plan and great teammates and support. Breakfast early tomorrow and we head off to Corizal to start the race at 9:00, which runs from the Belize-Mexico boarder to Belize City, 100 miles south.

Someone local at home keep Melissa in the loop, my email is down and I can't get through. Adam

Belize Day 2: "Chicken Slayer"

Woke up today at 5:00am to ride at 6:00...Monte looked outside and proclaimed that is was "pitch ass dark outside" and about 80 degrees. The equatorial Sun soon came up with force and we set out with bellies full of tropical bananas and mini clif bars. We rode 60 miles on the roughest roads I have ever seen to the Mexican boarder and back to Orange Walk with our Sugar City teammates Nery, Bertrain and their director Damion. Basically the roads are a mixture of 1-2" sided gravel with huge gaps between. The smooth sections lack the characteristic mindfield of 2 foot HOLES that the really rough sections have. Monte was having a little trouble with his hands going numb, and I know we will be really sore tonight. We stopped just shy of the Mexican boarder (long story again) and decided to turn around. A quick stop at the local store for some bagged water (chilled 1 quart plastic bags of water, rather than bottles) and Gatorade.
Passed another guy on the bike with a gun (double barrel this time) on our way back to Orange Walk. About 20 miles outside of town went through a pretty rual area (mile of sugar cane mixed with shanty shacks along the roadside with various livestock roaming free in the "yard"). A huge golden chicken was running across the road, and diverted its path straigh towards us. Harkey narrowly dodged the fleeing fowl, but Adam t-boned and ran right over the entire chicken with his bike, both wheels. Feathers flying, know known as the "chicken slayer of belize".
Late 10:00 Breakfast of tortillas, beans, eggs and fried jack pies was a welcomed blessing. We all agreed that we would crawl across a desert of broken glass for the homemade thick totillias from here. We cracked and caught up on some sleep and will head back out tonight for dinner.

Belize: Day 1 Run over the Boarder

We flew out of Charlotte today on the way to Cancun. After the 3 hour flight, we waiting in about an equally long line at customs and immigration. Andrew picked us up and we started our run into Belize. During our 6 hour drive...yeah, I could not help but notice that there are tons of machine guns in Mexico. Military checkpoints every few miles will well armed chaps, heck we even passed a civilian riding a bike with his gun straped to his back. Crossed the boarder out of Mexico (real scary, ask me about the details) and into the "Free Zone" a short area between the 2 countries. Our van was searched as we left the free zone and again as we entered Belize but Andrew definately helped clear us through. Arived in Orange Walk, Belize at around 6:00pm and met up with Melin, owner of the local Sugar City Boys Team. Due to some registration problems, we will not be able to race as our own team. Monte and Adam are racing with the Sugar City crew (Orange Walk is famous for sugar cane), and Harkey and David are racing with the Guiness Team in Thursday's race.
Melin has been a great help and has taken great care of us. We had a nice meal of chicken fajitas and bottled Coke tonight and met on of his riders from Guatemala, Nery Valasquz who just won the climbers jersey in the Tour of Guatemala, who will be racing with Monte and Adam. We checked into the Hotel de La Fuentes here in Orange Walk. Will try to get pics us as available.

KMC Test Chain - 1000 Miles

With just over 1000 miles on or KMC test chain (see original article below), we have noticed some wear to the paint. The outer links on the outer drive side show about 20% wear, mostly on the center portions due to the cassette teeth while down shifting. The inner side of the chain (the side against the frame) shows much more wear with about 50% of the paint gone. As you can see, most of the wear is found on the outer X-Bridge links as well as the hollow pins. This wear is attributed to repeated upshifting up the cassette. Other than the paint wear, the functioning of the chain is still perfect. Shifting is smooth and the wear life of the chain seem unaffected. Look for future updates.

Product Test: KMC X10SL Colored Chain KMC 2009 Official Chain Sponsor

Our friends at KMC Chain sent us a new gift to test out. We are currently testing the new KMC X10SL chain... now in Color! KMC currently offers several versions of single speed chains with colored finishes, but currently only offers their road chains in either silver or gold (see our previous article for pics). In the world of bike bling, who would not want to ride up to their next club ride or criterium sporting a new KMC chain in blue, white, yellow or pink in our case? The color possibilities are limitless. While the team may not be riding pink chains next year, as is our test chain, you may see some red or white versions on the 2009 Gary Fishers.

KMC has entered into their third year as the official chain supplier for the Hincapie/Gary Fisher Team presented by Barkley, during the upcoming 2009 season. We appreciate their support and look forward to an awesome season of wins on KMC chains. Their products are incredibly durable and shift very smoothly. I recommend a KMC Chain as your next bike upgrade purchase.

On Test: KMC X10SL colored chain

Various color options offered from KMC Chain

Our chain is made of an alloy steel that has been powder coated, pink. Over the next months we will be logging as many miles as possible to test the shifting, durability and lasting color finish on the X10SL chain. We will regularly clean the chain with Finish Line Super Bike Wash and Multi-Degreaser, and keep the chain lubed with Finish Line Dry Lube. We cleaned the new chain and applied lube prior to our first ride. During the first test ride we put the chain through multiple shifting through the gears, the chain shifted smoothly and the finish on the chain looked just a good after the ride as it did at the begining. Stay tuned for more updates.

"Missing Link" for easy removal and cleaning

Hollow pins and hollow X-Bridge outer plate

The KMC Test Group! Making your ride a little more colorful!

"How can I get my own colored chain?" Great question...for now you will have to wait if you are looking for a 10 speed version of this chain. However, you can visit your local shop to order a colored KMC chain for your fixie, track bike, single speed MTB or BMX. To learn more, visit http://www.kmcchain.com/ "Don't hate me because my chain is beautiful."

Short-track MTB Race #2: 2 more WINS in the Dark

Tonight was the first of the 2 Nite Races in the Fall Shorttrack series. The course was fast and smooth after 2 days of raining, an suited us roadies well. It was pretty cold and windy, and starting a race in the dark at 9:00pm is, lets say, interesting! Lori and Lisa had a great ride doing a repeat Win and 2nd place. Ol' Adam also had a great ride to Win the Super Sport division. Chris "I like to do squat workouts before racing" Harkey had to settle for a well fought 3rd place tonight after closing a big gap after Justin crashed out of the lead group on the back side of the course. On a side note: Two of our training partners, Danny and Daniel also took 1st and 2nd in the beginner class after riding away from the other racers. Looks like the winter training plan is paying off.
1st - Lori Harkey (Wms Sport)
Adam Little (Super Sport)
2nd - Lisa Preaslar (Wms Sport)
3rd - Chris Harkey (Expert)
Thanks again to our sponsors for their support...even during the "off season".

BARKLEY Pledges 2009 Team Support

After a great season at the Team's presenting sponsor, BARKLEY has pledged continued support of the Hincapie / Coca-Cola / BARKLEY Team for the 2009 season. BARKLEY's support has allowed the team to enjoy several successes on the road throughout the season spreading the word of the benefits of healthy living. We look forward to racing in the Kansas City area, their home base, and connecting the cycling communities of the midwest and southeast. We would like to thank Andy Woolard, IV Whitman and the Senior Staff at BARKLEY for their efforts in allowing us to represent BARKLEY for another great year! Look for great things to come!

2 WINS on the Dirt - Shortrack Race #1

Saturday marked the first of the Harrisburg short track MTB races, so we figured we would get a little dirty...Lori and Lisa started off the winning streak by taking 1st and 2nd place in the Women's Sport categories. Chris, Justin and Darren rocked the Expert race with Chris lapping most of the field of racers for the WIN with Justin 4th. Adam also had a good time on the mountain bike riding to 3rd in the Super Sport race. We look forward to racing in the dark this Sat in the first series Night Race...stay tuned, see you on the trails.
1st - Lori Harkey (Wms Sport)
Chris Harkey (Expert)
2nd - Lisa Preaslar (Wms Sport)
3rd - Adam Little (Super Sport)
4th - Justin Beard (Expert)
8th - Darren Fuller (Expert)

VA Cycling Cyclocross Weekend

Hincape Team Rider, and VA Tech student, Reid Beloni is helping put on a cyclocross race this weekend in VA for all you cross crazy fans. Check it out and show some love. Proceeds go back to the VA Cycling program. Here is the link to the flyer...

The Importance of Sponsorship

Our team could not exist without our awesome sponsors. We would like to take a minute to thank all of our friends and sponsors who helped make 2008 a great year for the Hincapie/Coca-Cola/Barkley Team. A special thanks has to go out to Hincapie Sportswear, Trek, Coca-Cola, Barkley, Speedplay, The Bobby Labonte Foundation, SRAM and VETTA for your continued help throughout the year.

Many thanks to Andy and the crew at Barkley for putting together this promotional video. The support from Barkley has allowed us to further our program and have many successes this season.

We are currently in the process of securing our sponsors for the 2009 season. We are excited to have a majority of our sponsors returning to the team (look for a post shortly to announce 2009 sponsors). If you are interested in joining our program as a NEW financial or equipment sponsor for 2009, please contact Adam Little at http://www.info@hincapiecycling.com/

"Off-season" Update

Now that the official road season has come to an end, we have started to turn our attention to other aspects of life that we have neglected a little by being on the road so much this season. For me that is family. My girls and I have a trick-or-treating date planned, and lots of playtime at the house. Along with this time of year, comes work around the house on those projects that you just never got around to. Mowing, yard work, and organizing the garage...again. However, after you take your traditional week or so off the bike, there still exists the urge to train and keep your body moving around. Luckily most of us can follow a less structured training plan for now with some fun stuff thrown in there for measure.

Most of the team has been playing around with the mountain bikes for a week or so now. We have all taking our share of tumbles, but we are pumped to be out riding in a different environment. There are some short-track races here in Charlotte coming up in Nov. that we plan to tackle to keep our competative bug at ease.

Several of our folks are also having fun with other pursuits as well. Our longtime friend and Regional Sales Manager for Trek/ Gary Fisher and Bontrager, Jeff "eat my dust" Haase took the Hincapie/Coca-Cola/Barkley Team's first cyclocross WIN. Jeff crused to a win out of a pretty deep field of racers in the MSCross masters race 2 weeks ago. Jeff started racing cross close to 15 years ago on an old Schwinn road bike and has been hooked ever since.

Bridgette McClean, our jr womens racer, has turned her Winter training focus to her High School Cross Country team. Bridgette's school won first place in their Conference Championships today at McAlpine Park in Charlotte. Bridgette had a great run, taking 3th herself with one of her best times.

I am sure that on your next group ride you are going to hear guys talking about core training - this, and gym workouts - that, but remember that the off-season is also a time to focus on family, health and home. At least for now...all those workouts will come sooner than later.

Thanks to all of our sponsors, supporters, training partners, friends and family for a great 2008 season. Adam

Interbike Goodies pt 1: New Goodies from SRAM

Rumor was that our friends and long time supporters of the team from SRAM had some new products to introduce for 2009...so we had to check out the buzz. Sure enough, we were pleased to see their new inovations for 2009 and you will be to.

New for 2009 is the SRAM line of wheels. The S40, S60 and S80 wheels are a combination of technology from SRAM and their partners at ZIPP. All three sets of wheels feature a deep carbon rim (40mm, 60mm, or 80mm hence the names) married with an aluminum clincher braking surface. The rims are laced with bladed aero sapim spokes to a ZIPP hub found on the current Flashpoint wheelsets with sealed bearings. Smart and stylish wheel graphics finish off the total package.

Our team has been fortunate to use the SRAM Force groupo for the 2008 season with great success. It was great to see that some of its features have trickled down to the 09' SRAM Rival Groupo. The new Rival hits the streets with a new black gloss finish on all components and carbon brake levers, mirroring the Force groupo.

Those hardcore freeriders out there will also be blow away with SRAM's new Truvativ Hammerschmidt crankset, which uses internal gearing to switch chainring gear ratios while using only one chainring...I know, I had to see it to beleive it too! Even got a chance to ride it. The 1:1 and 1:1.6 overdrive internal gearing give you the security of a single chainring and the shifting abilities of a double. Technology that will prove to revolutionize the ideas of shifting and gear ratios for the MTB crowd and beyond.

The Hincapie/Coca-Cola/Barkley Cycling Team is pleased to continue its partnership with SRAM as our official groupo provider for the 2009 race season. Check them out at http://www.sramnation.com/ and make the leap.

Team takes on the Dirt...and WINS!

We put up the road bikes for a weekend and whipped out the mountain bikes to get a little dirty at the 6 hour and 12 hour Tree Shaker Endurace Race in Rock Hill. Turns out, we had a blast, and did great on the trails. Deb won the solo 6hr race, while we took 2nd place in two 12hr races and 3rd in the 6hr mens duo. Everyone had a blast. Harkey got to take a little swim in the after drifting off course, jumping an eight foot bank and landing in the middle of the river. Blair and Shane had a clear lead of more than 30 minutes in the mens 6 hour duo event, but slipped to 3rd with only 2 laps to go after Blair breaking his chain and having to run several miles of the course.

On the same weekend, John tackled the Poor Mountain Hill Climb. This event was won by, and a record time set by our very own Scottie Weiss back in 2002. The Hill Climb is a mountain bike event with 4000 feet of climbing over 7 miles of dirt road/trail...super tough. Yeah, but not for John, who decided to make it even tougher by racing his road bike rather than a MTB. Other than a 28 cassette and a wider set of tires, he rode his bike stock. John won the "AnyBike" category and took 2nd OVERALL!

Results for the weekend:
*Fastest Lap - Darren Fuller
1st place - 6 Hour Women's Solo - Deb Elliot
1st place - Poor Mountain Hill Climb (AnyBike) - John Delong
2nd place - Poor Mountain Hill Climb Overall - John Delong
2nd place - 12 Hour Men's Trio (Harkey, Fuller, Harkey)
2nd place - 12 Hour Women's Trio (Lori, Lisa, Lauren)
3rd place - 6 Hour Men's Duo (Blair, Shane)

Marianne WINS NC State TT Championship, Bruce takes 2nd

Big congrats go out to our very own Marianne Holt for winning the North Carolina Womens Pro 1,2,3 Time Trial State Championship. A little history here...Marianne won the Masters National TT Championship in 2007 and wore the stars and stripes most of the year. She suffered an unfortunate crash in the Bristol Criterium one month prior to this year's National Championships and broke 2 ribs along with a punctured lung. While still attending Nationals to support her teammates, Marianne dreamed of the day she could get healed up and race again. After a short recovery, and some secret training (don't tell her doctor). Marianne's mounted a strong comeback, taking 2nd place in her first criterium back on the bike (Lexington Crit). The NC State TT was a great chance for her to demonstrate that she is still the fastest gal on the TT bike.

We have to also give a shout out to Bruce Humpries for taking 2nd place in the South Carolina State TT Championships. Bruce had a great ride...you need to check out the custom painted Hincapie/Coca-Cola/Barkley TT bike he used to pilot his journey. Great job Bruce.