It's beginning to look a lot like... well you know.

Christmas (or whatever winter solstice style holiday you choose to observe) is a little over a week away. For those of you who procrastinate and still insist on doing your shopping in brick and mortar stores... I pity you. Myself, I'm done with all my shopping (thanks Amazon!) and am only awaiting delivery of a few small things at this point.

For myself... I couldn't resist. I pulled the trigger on a cyclocross bike. I ended up with a 2015 Raleigh RX 1.0 with an Ultegra drivetrain. I plan on turning it into a 1x build, but we'll see.

I dig it... at least for now

I really like the paint scheme on this bike, along with the kit. I am timid of disc brakes and in my "get off my lawn" mindset wanted to stay in my comfort zone with a Shimano drivetrain. Most of the "entry" level cross bikes I found slapped you with 9spd Sora, which although I don't hate doesn't really excite me. This bike has been used (probably pretty well) but that doesn't bother me in the least so long as everything is serviceable. I also stayed within my budget (of the $ I got for my mountain bike and S32 frame) so Jenny will hopefully not murder me in my sleep. Of course, I immediately want to build some wheels for it... which is not how you stay in budget... but I can dream...

It's been a bittersweet month for me in some ways. There are some new opportunities I'm very excited about coming up next year, but along with them some obligations (more on all that at a later time) which required a split from my long time coach and friend David.  After 5 years of working together week in and week out, it was tough on me, like the "end" of any solid relationship would be. I know (and David agreed) it would likely be good for me, but nonetheless, change is difficult. I'm doing a couple of workouts this week and maybe a few before Christmas and then taking a week or two off to let the batteries recharge.

Speaking of training, Zwift released a custom workout designer in their "workout mode." Something that has been begged for since workout mode was released. With my free time in training I have just now started playing around with this new editor and I like it quite a bit. Paired with my computrainer it takes a lot of the mental aspect out of my training... I just plug in and push whatever watts the computrainer adjusts to.  After I've had a little more time working with it I'd like to give a little more in-depth review of Zwift now that it's out of beta.

Anyways, probably no post next week, if there is it will be short and sweet. (and showing off goodies possibly) So most likely the next update will be a bit before the first of the year.

Thanks so much for reading, I really appreciate it! Happy whatever you celebrate!

looking fly (is that still what the kids say?) at a group ride

- Christopher Morelock