I refuse to put these in a ranked top 5 order, so consider these all equally beloved.

Albums

Caroline 2 - Caroline

At its core, Caroline 2 is just a beautiful album made by a bunch of people who care more about the music than being the star. Instruments come and go when needed. The absolute banger of an opener, “Total Euphoria”, starts like basically every post rock song, with a bunch of instruments playing their own thing on what seems to be their own tempo and beat, and builds and builds towards the moment where it’ll finally come together into a big grand climax… and then at that climactic moment, all the instruments completely fade out into nothing but noise. “When I get home” features a distant beating kick drum like you’re in the bathroom of a club feeling fucked up and ready to leave. The one song with a guest star (of course it’s Caroline Polachek to keep with the band’s name) has a magical moment in the outro where the repetitive chanting slowly changes not only its lyrics but also the singer, nearly imperceptibly.

Lux - Rosalía

How incredibly artistically ambitious must someone be to plan an entire album around the lives of female saints, complete with changing languages to better fit with the saint in question? And even more shocking, she pulls it off! This album jumps all over in tone and sound and lyrics, veering from orchestral arrangements to operatic arias to heavy synths. I heard it and immediately listened to it a second time, and then a third. I listened through with a translated lyrics page open, trying to actually follow along with all thirteen of the languages used here. It’s truly a work of art.

Never Enough - Turnstile

As a teenager, I was super into rock music. We’re talking Shinedown, Chevelle, Papa Roach, etc. I’ve fallen out of it in the last fifteen years thanks to Spotify and an ever shifting musical taste, with a few exceptions like Cloud Nothings that I’m not even sure if they qualify as “rock” versus “alternative.” I was surprised to find out how much I dug this album! It’s a rock album that goes beyond the standard genre tropes to incorporate a huge range of sounds - organs, trombones, flutes, and synths! AG fucking Cook is a producer on one of these tracks (”Dull”). There’s a couple of pure rock bangers, too, don’t worry.

Getting Killed - Geese

Never heard of them until the hype cycle for this album started coming on strong… frankly I think I confused them with Goose, which is apparently a jam band successor to like, Phish. This is the pretentious art rock I didn’t know I needed. I wonder if people in the 70s felt like this about the Talking Heads. The whole band is great, okay, but the thing that really elevates it is Cameron Winters. He does this thing that’s clearly singing, but it’s not like, in key. Or out of key. It’s like musical keys just don’t even exist in his world. It’s grating but riveting at the same time.

Humanise - HAAi

This was such a sleeper electronic album for me. I started off not super into the lead single, “Satellite”, but once the whole album came out I just kept on liking the whole more and more and more. It’s such a cohesive, well assembled whole, which feels like a genuine rarity these days in comparison to albums that are just collections of songs. All the guest features feel like they slot in perfectly, like this album with the collaborators is more than the sum of its parts. There’s even an awesome live performance of the album here.

Honorable Mentions

• choke enough - Oklou
• Revengeseekerz - Jane Remover
• DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS - Bad Bunny
• A Tropical Entropy - Nick León
• How to Win at Solitaire - Sophia Stel

Songs

“Dreams” - jamesjamesjames and Fatshaudi

Absolutely beautiful crystal piano keys combine with angelic vocals to deliver an absolute banger of a trance track.

“Into Dust (Still Falling)” - Four Tet

Only Kieren Hebden would take a soft acoustic 90s track and remix it into an absolute banger of a house track (I guess all my faves are bangers?).

“Play” - James K

Perfect trip hop track, with dreamy vocals and a droney guitar over a rapid drum beat, before breaking out into full on alt rock guitar for the climax.

“Psychoboost” - Jane Remover (feat. Danny Brown)

Absolute banger (drink!) hyperpop track. It's so over the top and a full assault on the senses, and that's before Danny Brown comes in spitting on top of a killer bassline. SSX wishes it could time travel 20 years into the future so it could include this.

“Beers with my name on them” - Asher White

Starts with a soft song about getting ready to go out and party, then the second half of the song is the party. Absolute banger (drink!!) on the level of “Dance Yrself Clean”. When I played this in the car with some friends, both of them were like “What the actual fuck is this song??”.

Honorable Mentions

• “Bikini” - Nick León and Erika de Casier
• “The Field” - Blood Orange (feat. The Durutti Column, Tariq Al-Sabir, Caroline Polachek & Daniel Caesar)
• “9 2 5” - Nourished by Time
• “You got time and I got money” - Smerz

Whether Candy Crush or refreshing social media to see if anything new was posted in the last 12 seconds since the last time you refreshed it, we (at least, me) find ourselves reaching for our phones at any point where we feel the slightest bit of boredom, even if that means while we’re actively walking someplace, or at dinner with friends.

I’ve been reading books recently that have convinced me this really isn’t healthy. They each focus on different aspects of the same core problem, and I’d recommend all three wholeheartedly:

• Stolen Focus by Johann Hari
• How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell
• The Siren’s Call by Chris Hayes

How often are you able to sit down and focus on a single project – whatever it is – for more than fifteen minutes without being distracted and clicking over to social media or opening up some app? Our brains are being deep fried by instant engagement, social media, and instant rescue from “boredom”, and as a result we can’t abide any instant of boredom, which feeds back into the problem. We no longer have the ability to just sit and be bored for even a couple minutes.

We also don’t have the ability to focus our attention on what really matters in life. A friend recently confessed he has to keep his phone in a different room when at home with his infant child lest he “fall victim to the compulsion” (a phrasing I 100% stole for the title of this). Because we’re so used to having ten different distractions available at the click of a button, we aren’t able to focus on anything anymore!

I really love how Hayes’s book frames this allure of the modern smartphone: as a siren’s call. From the Odyssey, Circe advises Odysseus to tie himself to the mast, lest he fall victim to the enchanting song of the sirens and steer their ship into the sharp rocks that surround the sirens (why didn’t he just stuff his ears with wax like the other sailors?).

Anyways, I’m sick and tired of being tethered to this otherwise handy little device in my pocket, and incapable of living and experiencing the world and people around me, even if it can get boring sometimes. So, I’ve been trying to cull this compulsion.

Part of me just wants to go back to a dumb phone, but there are so many useful, utile aspects of a smartphone that I genuinely think are helpful and better! I want to keep those:

• maps and instant directions
• a solid camera (okay, I have recently resurrected my old point-and-shoot too)
• a shared grocery list
• wrangling sixteen different group chats across five different apps (don’t judge me).

So instead, I’m going to try to wrangle this device into being a tool for me instead of an addiction.

Casey Johnston (She’s a Beast [that’s her publication but it’s also true!]) wrote up her strategy that worked for her: creating a dumbphone out of a smart phone via The DIY Dumbphone Method. I like this idea but it feels overwhelming and excessive to completely factory reset (which is the whole point of the factory reset, to truly reset). Maybe I’ll reach that point eventually. For now, I am focused on some slightly smaller steps.

Disabling Notifications

Social media is designed to bombard us with notifications. Someone liked your post, someone who hasn’t posted recently posted, someone sent you a video they think you might enjoy. All of these are to pull you into the app, where badges and instant gratification and infinite scroll await, all desigend to keep you there.

Even if you’re able to resist that allure, that siren’s call, do you really need to have your phone buzz just because someone liked your content? Is that really worth interrupting living your life over? Personally, I thought no.

Johnston recommends (and probably correctly so) just completely deleting social media off your phone entirely, and limiting use of it to a specific room in the house by using an old phone without cell service and a shitty battery. I’m tempted, honestly I should do it, but I haven’t yet.

I started by only disabling notifications and leaving badging on, but I found the badges still caused me to click in and see what it was anytime I noticed it, which distracted me from whatever I had originally opened my phone for (I swear, half the time I open my phone I forget what I was trying to do with it). So I turned them completely off.

I started with social media, but there are so many apps whose notifications really didn’t seem useful. So I keep turning them off if and when I spot one that I’m unhappy about seeing.

There is also a feature on iOS I’ve started using, the scheduled summary. This lets you defer all notifications from selected apps to specific times - I’ve done 8 AM, 12 PM, and 6 PM. I’ve put apps that are important to see but not immediately urgent like email in this, and it’s cut down a lot on the notification -> click in -> get distracted by something else cycle.

Homescreen Layout

I (re) read James Clear’s Atomic Habits recently, and one of the points he makes about habits is that making habit triggers visible (so, for example, leaving floss out on the counter) or invisible (hiding the floss in a cabinet) can make it easier or harder respectively to follow the habits.

With that in mind, I rearranged my phone homescreen to only include the things I actually value my phone for: photos, music, maps, reminders… and the occasional crossword. Everything else is off in the app library, which is still pretty easy to access by swiping over one screen or just pulling down to open iOS’s search feature.

I even got fancy and used an app called Widgetsmith to make a text widget with simple names that open up those apps. A true anti-phone person would make everything grayscale… but I made my background a simple flat color of International Klein Blue (#002FA7).

Focus Modes

One thing Apple has gotten a lot better at with recent iOS updates is customizability for focus modes. For a particular focus mode, you can silence certain apps, or only allow some apps to notify you. More importantly, you can customize your homescreen pages on a per-focus mode basis, meaning I can have a default focus that I described above that is built to be very not distracting, and still have other focus modes (like a Work mode that only shows my work apps) with alternate homescreens better suited to them.

I also made a “Home” focus, with easy access to social media, but I found myself not really caring about using it, preferring to follow through more on not using my phone for social media and instead just using a laptop or tablet in my living room directly.

Me being who I am, I also made a bike focus with all my bike apps (Strava, TrainingPeaks, RideWithGPS) and all the utility apps for the various bike computers and electronic thingamajigs on it.

Sleep Time

Okay, so this is one that I’ve actually been doing a good job of for years. I don’t really have a problem putting my phone away when I’m getting ready for bed. The blue light of phone screens is supposed to be bad for your sleep, so you should put it away for the last hour or so before bed.

I have the iOS sleep schedule set up, so wind down starts an hour before my planned bedtime and automatically enables the Sleep focus mode (no notifications). I set up an automation in Shortcuts to trigger greyscale mode when this happens. Put together, my phone is quiet and boring when I start winding down. It goes on the charger on my nightstand and that’s it for the night.

For people who do struggle more with night phone usage, I’ve heard keeping your charger in a different room can help force you to not be on it until you go to sleep.

Having a good nighttime ritual without screens is huge. For me, I get ready for bed and then read on my Kindle (e-ink is supposedly not bad?) or a physical book, depending on what I’m reading, until I get tired. Then I turn out the light and go to bed.

Screen Limits

I set up screen limits for social media only (though you could definitely do it for any app you find overly addictive). Fifteen minutes total across all social media apps on weekdays, and thirty minutes on weekends.

Unfortunately I think it is really easy to get in the habit of automatically clicking the “One more minute” or “Ignore limit for the rest of the day” whenever it pops up. But I still think it’s a helpful reminder.

I also installed Opal to grey out / block social media during the work day, so that I’m not clicking on them every time I have a free moment. It works surprisingly well! The app itself does feel a bit overly “optimize your life” for my tastes, but it works well enough. If you really need to use those apps, you can take a break… after a short (six second) waiting period.

Besides Opal, I added One Sec that has a popup that opens when you try to open particular apps (limited to one for the free version). The popup makes you take a deep breathe before offering a button that lets you open up the app, or you can click a button saying “I don’t actually need it”. That six second delay has really helped break the compulsion, since so much of it is automatic muscle memory. Having to wait even a few seconds lets me consciously evaluate if I intend to open social media or am just looking for any form of entertainment.

With both Opal + One Sec installed, it is a huge pain in the ass to try and use Bluesky on my phone during the work day. I have to disable Opal, waiting the six seconds to take a break from the focus session, then another six seconds of One Sec’s deep breath interlude, before I can access the app. If I truly need to post something on my phone (e.g. a photo) rather than just use a real computer, I can… but it’s a thirty second effort. Usually, though, I find that I don’t actually need to post or browse, I’m just momentarily bored.

Success?

I had a strong start after adding all these, but it was still very easy to fall back into the habit of clicking mindlessly into these apps, even with all of the walls I put in my own way. It does take actual mental focus and intent too, reminding myself whenever I find myself on my phone to fill up a ten second wait that I don’t actually need to be stimulated right that second. Beating that urge before you get into the attention machine (which is where those filter apps do really help) is critical to actually breaking the habit.

I found that replacing social media on my phone with browsing it in the morning on my iPad worked a lot better. There’s a dedicated device that I can look at whenever I’m chilling on the couch, but I don’t need to access it every single minute of every single day. I’m really debating straight up deleting social media apps from my phone to help myself along.

Unfortunately, that’s also created some more free time, and I’m finding the boredom I so craved to be, well, boring? There’s two kinds of boredom (well, probably more) - the momentary boredom of waiting your turn in line to order something, and the fuller boredom of arriving home after a day of work and not sure what to do with yourself.

The former is absolutely brutal, and it’s so hard not to reach into my pocket and take out my phone whenever I have a couple seconds. This boredom is something I need to adapt to, to regain my ability to sit and just take the world in.

The second feels full of potential, but I have no great ideas on how to waste it. With fifteen to sixty minutes, I just don’t know what to do with myself. I could read more. I could make some music. I could medidate. I could sit and stare out the window. The possibilities are endless, and truly I do know what I could do, but I still find it a bit overwhelming. One downside of breaking an addiction means you’ll need to find other things to do. I’m sure I’ll get there eventually.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have as strong a start to the season as I hoped - my handling was definitely lacking and a couple of crashes in my first race led to me not even finishing in the top 50%! I also missed the first few Back to Basics weekday practice races held out in Golden - in part because of transportation issues.

There was one absolutely horrible race I had, the Amy D CX race on the same paths and trails as the Back to Basics races. I always seem to struggle a bit on the loose dirt corners there, and I ended up going down pretty hard about two minutes into the race and got my bike pretty fucked (saddle was about 30 degrees off center). This cascaded into me not feeling comfortable on the corners, which is pretty tough no matter what but especially at that venue, with so much loose dirt. I ended up crashing a second time about 20 minutes into the race, and that one took about 30 seconds to even get back up and moving (after having a long, serious thought about DNFing).

I was pretty consistenly able to finish in the top 10 otherwise though (a task made easier by ever shrinking CX fields, unfortunately) and did some double dipping into the single speed open races.

Life, though, had some other stuff going on. One of my best friends was having a destination wedding in Spain, and my partner & I took advantage of the opportunity to meander around Europe afterwards. So I was off for about 3 weeks, right after my horrible forgettable Amy D race.

I did get to have a snowcross race, the Wild West CX held in Golden at the JeffCo Fairgrounds. That was a blast, or at least the parts where I could sort of try and ride my bike. There was about half of that, with the other half just being completely unrideable terrain that I was running. I don’t much like running! That’s why I bike. Race was brutal, but I had fun.

Coming into the State Champs / the final Cyclo-X race at Longmont, I was hoping to at least snag a podium. Briefly I was up to 3rd, but I ended up losing some spots in the later laps and finished 6th.

Why didn’t I do better? Idk, reader, idk.

I think I def was a bit rusty early in the season, while my buddy who spent the summer racing MTB instead of crits was killing it. That said, I felt like I was at peak fitness coming into the season!

Progress (Last Year’s Goals)

1. Skills

   I most certainly didn’t improve much over the last year, sadly. That said, I’m moderately happy with my handling skills. I think the area that I need the most work on is off-camber riding, especially turns. The hairpin u-turns on off-camber downhills kill me relative to other riders. I’ve learned the hard way to be cautious on them, but I’m probably overly cautious and could carry more speed if I learn how to ride them better.

   I also need to stop fucking crashing by taking turns too tightly and snagging the posts / tape on the inside apex! I crashed several times doing that, including twice in the opening race at CX at the Velodrome (The Hustle).

2. More FTP / Recovery

   I feel like I came into this season a bit stronger than I was at the start of last year, but I don’t think I peaked any higher than last year. Just was at that level a bit earlier in the season.

   This is still going to be a goal for next year, probably with a bit less focus on road racing to give myself more time to accomplish that.

3. Reach Cat 3

   Nope. I picked up a couple more upgrade points and have the upgrade points to voluntarily cat up, but both were 4th place finishes. I want another podium or two before catting up, since I know it’ll be a long uphill fight to do well in the cat 3s. I’ve watched a couple of their races this year, and it’s basically a who’s who of “people who kicked my ass the last couple seasons”.

Goals for Next Year

So where do I want to improve more next year? I’m keeping the same goals!

I don’t think any of these are very special, they’re basically the two things you need to be good at cyclocross + a results goal of doing well and podiuming so that I can level up!

1. Skills

   More off camber practice, and hopefully mountain biking (I need to buy a mountain bike!) a bit more will improve my general handling skills as well.

2. More FTP / Recovery

   I talked with my coach, we’re going to give this a bit more priority relative to being in race shape for the road season. So hard to race CX and then be sharp in 4 months when crits start!

3. Reach Cat 3

   I’m at the point I could voluntarily upgrade, but I want another podium or two before upgrading. This would be great though, since the 4/5 races are so early in the morning…

Stats

Series Podiums: 1 (Cyclo-X Series, 2nd)

Upgrade Points (towards Cat 3): 2 (+8 from last year, if you count the SSCX win out of 5, which I don’t)

Previous Years

Season 1 (2019): Low Cat 5. Avged bottom 20%

Season 2 (2021): Catted up to 4 bc USAC mandatory is 10 races and I didn’t wanna switch mid season. Probably could have stayed in 5 tbh, idk how much they care if you’re not winning. Avged bottom 20%.

Season 3 (2022): Still cat 4. Still… bottom 20%.

Season 3 (2022): Consistently top 50%, a couple of podiums / near-podiums.

Coming into the season, I planned with my coach to prioritize getting into great shape for cyclocross season over road results, but it still feels bad not making a significant improvement over last year’s racing! (sure feel like I’m in great shape for cross season, though, so nice job coach).

Progress

One thing I did focus on trying to improve this year was getting better at cornering. Last year, I felt like I was slowing up way more than other riders around me, and I paid for it by having to gas it out of every corner.

This year I focused on trying to get more comfortable railing corners without using my brakes. Somewhat hilariously, my final race (Littleton Twilight) I ended up having a leaky rear brake which prevented me from doing as much last-minute panic braking haha. Was fine, I didn’t have any issues! So… don’t brake so much in general, Ryan.

I got a lot better at sitting in and conserving energy, but I did it too well and wasn’t worried enough about moving up at the end of the race. The result was that several races I was just too far back to compete for the win; you can’t win from 20th wheel on the final lap.

Last year’s goals

Better fitness / FTP

Well, these felt about the same. At no point racing did I feel like I was going to get dropped, other than an absolutely terrible decision to try and bridge to the lead group at Boulder Roubaix on a downhill section going 40+ mph. Made it, but burned all my matches to do so & the next headwind section destroyed me.

I think it’s actually slightly better than last year? My peak 1 minute power has gone up significantly (+20%) and I’m getting close (10 to 15 watts below) to some shorter efforts from last year & prior years that were from Intelli aka sea level.

Prioritizing rest during the race

Uhhh I was plenty good at this. Too good. Sat in a bunch & saved energy, then failed to move up at the tail end of the race into a position I could actually finish well from. Gotta work on using those matches now that I’ve gotten them usable.

Finding the right opportunities to move up easily

Yeah, I was okay at this. Needed to be a bit more aggressive, but the overt spread five across everyone’s coasting sort of opportunities were obvious & taken advantage of when possible (sometimes it was TOO wide and there was no room to squeeze past lol).

Put in some break attempts

Did a good job of this! Me and my teammate Brian spent some time doing breaks and counter attacks to try and get breaks going. He even managed to win a solo break! Need to make sure that we’re actually getting a break going instead of sending a solo flyer, though, and just wasting energy.

Figure out how to handle the last few laps & be in a good position for the sprint

Nope. Terrible at this. I think next year I just try to spend the entire race in the top 10 wheels or else, because I’m not doing a good job of timing my attempts to move up after sitting in the pack for most of the race.

Next Year’s Goals

So, what’s the takeaway for next year (assuming I don’t bail on crits and just become a trackie)?

1. Be more aggressive about moving up when I need to

   It’s all great and dandy to sit in for most of the race. But it doesn’t work in the last 5 laps when you need to make up 20 spots as everyone starts accelerating and vying for position. Figure out when it’s time to move up better (or just stay more toward the front) and use those matches if necessary to put myself into a position to actually win from.

2. Shut down solo breaks faster

   Look, I tried my damnedest to get some breaks going, especially when I had willing teammates to counter. But I’m not strong enough or enough of a time trialist that I can just roll away from the whole field and stay out alone and win. So, if there’s not other people in a break with me, give up quicker & settle back into the pack.

3. Merge back into the pack better

   If I’m going for breaks (which I probably will; I don’t think my sprint is super impressive), when I do get caught I need to make sure I still slot back into the pack at a reasonable position. I can’t slide all the way back to 40th wheel & still be in the race, and I can recover just fine in 10th wheel. Surge a little bit when caught, especially if my teammate is countering, so that I can stay toward the front and still be active in the race.

4. Cheat and Copy Good Racers

   Look, every year there’s a few standouts. People who show up & just dominate for half the season. They’re good, they’re finishing top 5 or so consistently. What are they doing? How do they achieve it? Just sit on their wheels the whole time and keep an eye on them!! Bonus points if you can get them to attack and follow them into a solid break.

5. Get Stronger

   Strength isn’t everything, and usually isn’t enough to win races alone. But more matches never hurts. Keep on getting stronger & buy myself a bit more leeway when racing.

6. Race More

   Honestly, the best way to get better at racing is to do it more. Analyze all I want, some things can only be learned when actually racing. With a lighter schedule racing this year (including no Intelligentsia trip), I missed out on some valuable experience. Do more races, especially if I can make some trips to bigger races like Intelli and, say, Tulsa Tough or TOAD.

Stats

Thoughts

Like I said, nothing much improved, results or power-wise.

• Average power: Big drop haha. I definitely had a few races where I ended up feeling like I had matches left, which is never how you want to finish a race.

• Normalized power: Teeny drop. On the bright side, with the drop in average power, you could look at this as spending matches more when I needed to rather than burning them all the time out of corners?

• Points: Surprisingly, little drop compared to last year even though results weren’t much to write home about. More consistent maybe? Highlights were top 10s in the Louisville Crit and one of the weekly CSP practice crits (basically a circuit race, though). Sad I didn’t do better at Littleton.

I got my cornering figured out a little bit better, or at least am more comfortable about taking a corner surrounded by people at high speeds. But now I need to use the matches that freed up to actually put myself into a good position to win.

Previous Years

Season 1 (2021): Cat 5. Bad at racing, relatively strong. Podiumed by riding most racers off my wheel & catted up to 4. Spent the rest of the year (including a stint at Intelligentsia Cup in Chicago) getting destroyed in the washing machine at the back of the field.

Season 2 (2022): Went big on crits. No longer stuck in washing machine, not able to really win either, but could make it to the end of most crits. Raced Intelligentsia, best was 8th place there.

Season 3 (2023): Fewer crits this year, both out of a dying road scene and just a busy life schedule that seemed to have more conflicts with racing. Totally fine hanging in the pack at this point but not great at finishing well. Got some advice that I really sucked at cornering (way too cautious, would slow up too much & let gaps open that I was then stuck closing). Picked up my first upgrade points in the last 2 races of the season, including a 9th at Littleton Twilight that got featured in NorCal Cycling.

Well… I submitted some footage, and he ended up making a video out of it titled “The FASTEST Cat 4/5 Amateurs I’ve Ever Seen”, which is a huge ego boost (the thumbnail even includes “SANDBAGGERS!?”).

I figured it’d be fun to analyze his analysis (or at least defend myself a little bit!) and see the race breakdown from my original race report as well.

Norcal Thoughts

• “That’s a lot of Rs going on :)”
• That start was absolutely fucking painful
• This is just normal CO 4s fitness lmao :)
• It’s all just CO hitters, people aren’t visiting for this.
• “Settles down” my guy it’s 75% through the race and it’s the first time it’s slowed up!
• Rain was a bit scary but didn’t end up being an issue!
• “Not holding a wheel” I was tailgunning a bit haha, it’d always slow into turns 1 and 2
• He’s right that I should prob not take the outside line - I was trying to hold speed and not brake, but I lose the wheel as a result
• That 2 lap to go attack fucking hurt, bad timing. BJC kid did indeed chop my front wheel (juniors, amiright?), somehow managed to keep it upright.
• Burned everything to get up to the break like he said.
• EVERYONE SAT UP!!!! ASDFGGGHHH!
• We grouped back together going into the final lap
• Expected Lane in bright yellow to close up that gap and took me way too long to realize he was cracked
• Absolutely painful for 90% of the race… but still happy to hang in there and pick up a top 10 pack footage

Thanks again to Jeff & Will for reviewing!

Original race report

9/53! Consistently finding my way to the front at the end of the race, which is phenomenal progress from last year when I was getting dropped most races.

This was basically single file strung out for 90% of the race, absolutely rough. And when it would slow down, it would swarm and go like 4 wide into corners that didn’t really have room for 4 cat 4 riders (maybe p12 could squeeze better).

I mostly tried to sit in and draft, focus on really hitting corners & using those to move up a wheel or two if I could.

At one point accidentally scared the shit out of someone moving up the right side, the gap was very much there but I think he shifted to his right right as I got there and he jerked a bit. Whoops!

With like… 3? to go, there was a gap opening up after like 5-6 riders coming across the finish line, I went to jump around rider 7 losing the wheel & a junior also jumped around me, chopped my fucking wheel swerving right like 10 feet before he actually cleared my wheel. Managed to keep it up SOMEHOW (seriously surprised).

Barely made it up to that lead group and of fucking course they’re tired and sit up. I had no legs or I would have tried to come around to the front and keep it away, but we kind of sit in and then the pack catches us around 1 to go? Honestly kind of a blur, the video will show more.

Last lap gaps are opening like crazy as we start railing it, trying to hold the wheels without getting swarmed. Gap opens up a rider in front of me halfway up the road but I figured the junior rider (who’s been cleaning up the weeknight crits) would be able to close it back together. Takes like 10s through the corner for me to realize he doesn’t have the legs & I jump around him, but it’s too late and that group is gone. Sprint with what I’ve got and manage to hold where I was for 9th, but not enough to come around anyone (close though).

I definitely feel like I peaked closer to mid-season. My results skyrocketed (see win + podium) and I was having a blast. I even won a couple holeshots! Then, I think others’ trainings started to catch them up to where I was, and I was having to fight hard to keep in the running. But still managed to finish the season strong, and am looking forward a ton to next year already!

For the first time racing CX, I’m actually feeling competitive, not just racing people in the bottom 25% for spots. Still get my ass beat by juniors half my age, though - some things never change.

And to be completely clear: I still had a ton of fun doing that! There’s zero shade meant for myself or any of the other folks in that boat… one of the reasons I love cross is that you can still find people to compete against, regardless of whether you’re racing for 5th or 50th.

I’m not sure what to attribute this colossal shift to…. I have a few ideas, and the true answer is probably a mix of all of them.

1. Coach

   I’ve been working with Alex from Empirical Cycling since September of last year. Last year, we were mostly focused on making sure I didn’t burn out hard, like I did in 2021 with Trainer Road, and so I just had the fitness I had built on my own in 2022.

   With a full year of training, I feel stronger - my FTP has been built back up to where I peaked in Covid 2020 when I was doing like 3 days of TR Sweet Spot + 2-3 Zwift races a week. But without the insane burnout I got after that year. And (& this is the biggest factor IMO) I think my recovery has improved a ton.

   Being able to smash 400W out of corners in cross, lap after lap, is such a big difference. I’m still tanking lap times between lap one and the rest of the race, but the other laps are remarkably consistent. Almost every race, laps two onwards ended up being within about 10s of each other!

2. Skills

   One thing I felt like was holding me back last year was skills. Towards the end of last year’s season, I felt like I was finally feeling a bit more confident in my cornering ability - til I burped my tire the last race of the year.

   This year, I made sure that I was out doing skills & drills at least once a week. Our team practiced stuff like mounting and dismounting, carrying the bike, and cornering. I will also give a huge shoutout to CXHairs’s Skills, Drills, and Bellyaches: A Cyclocross Primer, which had a lot of stuff I had already picked up in a few years of racing, but also had some wonderful tips on fueling (I now drink a full bottle of carbs before races) and cornering drills.

   Frankly, I think cornering practice is one of the hugest things racers should practice. Dismounting & remounting smoothly without running into barriers is important, sure, but you’re doing that once or twice a lap hopefully, while you corner dozens of times a lap. Being able to corner more effectively and saving even 0.5s per corner adds up a ton! 30 corners / lap * 5 laps * 0.5s saved / corner = 75s saved. Over a minute!!

3. Racing Doubles / Single Speed

Besides that, another thing I did this year was double up races a bit more. Unfortunately, Single Speed 4/5s are ran at the same time as the geared 4s & 5s here in Colorado. So I just signed up for the Single Speed Open! Super easy with my new bike - I can just get into the gear I want & then remove the AXS batteries. With the single speed races, I don’t take them too seriously - I’ll race the first lap or so all out, and then as the field starts to spread out, I’ll start hunting handups. Still race hard besides that, but I’m not stressed if someone passes me because I stopped for a swig of beer or a strip of bacon.

I don’t do super well in them (obviously, it’s the open) but they are some extra race pace practice. Power typically is lower, but it’s surprising how close you can get sometimes to lap times as a single speed. With only one gear, you really tend to burn your matches on slower, steeper features where you get more bang for your buck, rather than sprinting down some straight when you’re already eating a ton of wind resistance.

Lastly, single speed open nets you a lot of placement points! Even getting bottom 25% still earned me more points than a top ten placement in cat 4s.

Progress (Last Year’s Goals)

Last year, I had 4 goals:

1. Better recovery

   This year, I feel like my recover is tons better than previous years. Still tons of room to improve (imagine if I could handle the 290-300W normalized first laps every lap)! But big win here, and I attribute most of that to my coach really pushing longer rides (I did two centuries this year, which is 1 more than I had previously done in my lifetime).

2. Cross-specific drills & practice

   This was the other big win this year IMO! Lots more practice on cornering, and my dismount/remount feels smoother this year, though I do sometimes still stutter step when redlining. Being able to smoothly remount & put in a surge of power to beat someone to the next corner is awesome.

   Still can’t bunny hop for shit; even popping curbs still scares me. And that beach pop-up at Cyclo-X Westminster was definitely rideable, but worried me so much that I ran it anyways.

3. Bit more running

   Lol. No, I did not pursue any running this year. I don’t really regret it - there wasn’t any huge running sections besides Cross of the North’s sandpit. My time was probably rightfully better spent on-bike training.

4. Higher FTP

   This one is a bit trickier - I haven’t taken an FTP test in over a year now. But if I had to guess, I’d say my FTP going into cross last year was probably around 270, and this year was closer to 280-290. Seems to have helped, though I think it’s tough to tease apart better recovery versus higher FTP on performance.

Goals for Next Year

So where do I want to improve more next year?

1. Skills

   I think this is one that will never ever get removed, to be honest. There’s always so much room for improving my handling skills, my cornering skills, my (in)ability to bunny hop. I need to continue practicing weekly, and improve from where I am now to even better handling. Maybe I can mix up the terrain; most of my practicing has been at Valmont Bike Park.

2. More FTP / Recovery

   Goals 1 & 2 are basically the entirety of cross, right? Fitness + handling. Obviously having a higher FTP will give me a faster race, so hope to build next year to even greater heights.

3. Reach Cat 3

   OK, so I know goals are supposed to be SMART & process oriented, not results oriented. And both 2 & 3 are me focusing on the outcome rather than process. But I really do think this goal is achievable. I’m already sitting on a decent number of upgrade points after podiuming (or close to it) several races this year. A single top step finish will likely put me into mandatory upgrade territory, so I’m likely to end up there if next year’s improvements are remotely close to this year’s.

Stats

Wins: 1

Series Wins: 1 (Cyclo-X Series)

Podiums: 1

Upgrade Points (towards Cat 3): 7 (4 if you don’t count the SSCX win)

Previous Years

Season 1 (2019): Low Cat 5. Avged bottom 20%

Season 2 (2021): Catted up to 4 bc USAC mandatory is 10 races and I didn’t wanna switch mid season. Probably could have stayed in 5 tbh, idk how much they care if you’re not winning. Avged bottom 20%.

Season 3 (2022): Still cat 4. Still… bottom 20%.

Recap / Stats

Next year I swear I’ll keep this part shorter.

Season 1 (2021): Cat 5. Bad at racing, relatively strong. Did bad my first two races then the 3rd one was hard enough that we dropped most of the field trying to chase back a solo rider (who apparently dropped “down to 280W, sweet spot, when I realized yall weren’t going to catch me”; my FTP at the time was about 260W). Catted up to 4 and promptly got destroyed at the back of the field.

The first year that I tried racing Intelligentsia Cup, and I got rekt so hard I got pulled every single day.

Season 2 (2022): Really went ham racing crits this year, plus the classic Boulder Roubaix dirt road race. I was struggling to hang onto the cat 4 pack, but I was lasting longer than 2021 and placing in the top 50%. The highlight, other than Intelli, was Longmont Criterium (I think it was the SM state champs, too). I was hanging in the top 10 wheels, launching some attacks, it felt phenomenal, much better than the rest of the races stuck trying to survive the washing machine. Thing is… it was mostly because I was terrified of taking corners 3 wide with the rest of the field, so I’d half-attack and get away for a bit then the field would eventually catch me.

Intelligentsia Cup again, though. Absolute blast. Had been at sea level for about a week and the legs felt godlike. Could sprint over and over and over and still recover for the next time around. I placed really well the first day, 8th, lost some due to being super cautious in my first rainy crit the next day to finish 15th, and then got absolutely shellacked in the easier 4-corner crit.

Season 3 (2023): Fewer crits this year, both out of a dying road scene and just a busy life schedule that seemed to have more conflicts with racing. Still only did one road race (Fountain) which was absolutely obliterating due to huge crosswinds and a guttering peloton.

This season I didn’t really have issues surviving in the main pack until the end of a race, but I did struggle to finish well. The first few races, I would be there til the end and then have such dead legs that I’d slow roll across for one of the last spots in the pack.

One thing I and a couple of friends who helped analyze my GoPro footage noticed was that I was really bad at taking corners. I’d slow up way too much coming into them, costing me a lot of wasted energy sprinting back out of them to maintain my position. Frankly, I was scared of taking corners with other riders around, and it was costing me dearly. I would even notice it, too, but couldn’t get over my mental block enough to quit it, until I finally just said “fuck it” and tried railing corners like I wanted to. No crashes. Totally fine. And it really helped my fear by seeing that it was okay to do. (One tip a good racer gave me was to look out at the line you want, but also keep your peripheral vision on the riders around you so that you can adjust your line a bit to keep from hitting them if they veer at all; I found this worked really great and helped shut up that part of my brain screaming at me when I went through a corner fast.

I also learned from the previous year that I should be moving up more, trying to stay in those top 5-10 wheels to avoid the washing machine. It’s not always possible, but spotting those killer opportunities where the field stalls out and you can carry momentum all the way up is so helpful at making sure you’re there & ready at the end of a race.

Intelligentsia Cup, once again, was my main goal, especially with the state champs crit cancelled (& the state designation assigned to a different race I had a conflict with). I didnt have the same level of sea level adaption, only arriving a couple days before the first race, and I think I noticed it a bit. I also feel like the field this year was bigger - 44/75/70 vs last year’s 28/48/44 and more stacked. With no better legs than the year before, I didn’t do as well, losing the field on the last few laps of West Dundee and finishing 27th in Glen Ellyn. But then I had my corner “fuck it” moment and went way stronger at Winfield, finishing in the USAC upgrade points (11/70, barely).

Following Intelligentsia, I also managed to snag 9th at Littleton Twilight for a second USAC upgrade point.

Thoughts

So, honestly, huge improvement over last year!

From a numbers perspective (yes, numbers aren’t everything, optimize for using the least amount of energy, etc., but it’s still useful especially when there are fitter people out there):

• Average power: Massive spike. Being able to put out 275W instead of 230W is a massive boon

• Normalized power: Very very small spike! This is honestly really fascinating… I’m managing to keep the relative variablity index (normalized / average) a lot lower, meaning my power is a bit more consistent. I think this tracks with a lot less time stuck on the very back of the pack. A lot less time stuck in the washing machine where we’d brake into every corner & sprint back out.

• Points: Progress progress progress! I don’t think these are perfect at describing overall improvements, but I do think they’re a good rough estimate. And these pair well with how I feel like I was racing - the races I feel most proud about are the ones where I got hella points (more than last year).

I remember the first race of the season, I normalized 297W, and I was like, no fucking way. The power meter has to be broken. I changed the battery and calibrated it half a dozen times over the next week until another crit. And wham averaged 299W.

Overall, I feel like this year, I was a lot stronger in terms of repeatability, being able to do those hard efforts out of every corner (mostly bc too far back / bad cornering skills, but still) and it paid off by always being in the lead pack by end of the race.

Still have a lot to work on in terms of preserving energy / legs so that I can be more competitive at the end of a race. I’m definitely getting better at cornering and that’s helpful, but I also need to work on better reading the field: finding the right moments to carry speed & move up a bunch. Especially towards the end of the race, I need to be able to find the right wheels to get up to / stay in the top 5-10 wheels going into the final few laps when things really take off.

I also… don’t think I’ve got that impressive of a sprint. When I first started cycling, I had a powerlifter background (not a good one, but college was mostly spent doing big lifts), so I was able to hit 1200W out the gate, with no endurance to allow me to use it. I feel like that’s not gone up at all (which is fine!) and the highest I’ve managed to actually hit in a race is like 8-900W.

I think it’s a bit premature to try and peg myself as a specific type of rider (breakaway, sprinter, etc.) but I do think that if I want to be winning field sprints, I would probably need to actually break 1k watts and have the right position to use it. Like, Intelligentsia Day 3 (Winfield), I was 8th wheel or so out of the final corner & managed to hang onto that place, but I didn’t have any better legs to actually pick off anyone either.

Regardless, I feel like the last month or so of racing everything really started to click, and it’s a little sad that it was the end of the season.

Next season goals, besides better fitness / FTP obviously, are probably mostly working on prioritizing rest during the race & finding the right opportunities to move up easily and maybe put in some break attempts, and then figure out how to handle the last few laps so that I can put myself into better positions come final sprint time.

The surface level answer is, obviously, to race bikes. I’m heading out for a track night at the Ed Rudolph Velodrome in Northbrook, followed by another three days of crit racing out of the ten days offered by the Intelligentsia Cup. And to see old friends & family from when I used to live in Chicago.

But more implicitly, the question is really “Why aren’t you flying?”.

My copassenger, who apparently cofounded one of the most famous bars on my alma mater UIUC’s campus: Kam’s, was taking the train with his wife to Galesburg, and the flight alternatives for that were horrific, thus the train option. But for me, destined for an airport hub like Chicago, to choose an 18-hour train trip (assuming no delays, and there are always delays) over a two hour flight?

Really, I think there’s several reasons that I picked the train over flying.

First, I can bring my bike much more easily on the train. No need to pack my bike carefully into a bag & hope that it makes it safely to the destination. No need for disassembly and reassembly, I can simply roll the bike as-is, fully assembled, onto the train where it hangs from a rack for my trip. That is, unless I procrastinate booking my ticket & the bike slots fill up, and then I have to try to pack my bike up for the first time anyways into the bag my buddy got me for $20 off craigslist (it is a solid enough bag, Pika Packworks). Oops. But I digress.

Another reason is the looming spectre of climate change. It’s honestly hard for me to go a day without thinking about climate change, whether it’s seeing all the cars spewing greenhouse gasses or another news story of horrific weather: flooding, wildfires, drought, tornados. Half of these I’ve had to personally deal with. Wildfire smoke (local or distant in Canada) chokes the air and makes it unsafe to be outside. Tornados and hailstorms cancelling my singular planned gravel race for the year, Robidioux Rendezvous. While individual action clearly is not going to save the planet, it’s hard for me to come to terms with flying when there are other alternatives like the train.

The passengers also make for a more interesting trip. On a two hour flight, I’m downloading a movie and rushing to finish it before we touch back down. For a nearly full day on a train, though, I would much rather spend the day enjoying the scenery outside from the sightseer car, and maybe catch up on some books I’ve been meaning to read. And maybe even attempting to restart blogging. But when you’re sitting next to people for hours on end, it’s easy to pick up on conversations and chime in, say, about how you grew up in Peoria only 30 minutes from Galesburg. Next thing you know you’re spending the next hour chatting about hobbies, the infamous bar from campus cofounded by your new passenger friend, and explaining the intricacies of crit racing.

Ultimately, taking the train is taking the slow way to travel, and I think that’s why I chose it. Spending a day in transit lets you take a forced step back from life, from chaos, and just revel in the journey itself.

When was the last time you sighed in satisfaction flying? Gotta get to the airport early, through security, maybe grab a drink at the airport bar like so many others are doing while waiting for the plane. Then boarding, hoping your luggage fits in the overhead bin because they charge extra if you try to check a bag, squeezing into narrow seats where you’ll sit for two hours without being able to stretch your legs.

Instead, I’m relaxing, taking in the views, making small talk, and just enjoying this extended liminal experience for what it is. And that makes me really, really happy.

The last couple years, I have been picking twelve goals for the year, one for each month. Not that I’m doing them by month - “January’s goal is blah blah blah”. Twelve just seems like a nice number of goals to have. Half the fun is coming up with enough, frankly. I definitely cheat a bit and reference the goals from the year before.

Anyways, here’s my goals for the year.

1. Read 39 books

I’ve always been a reader. The last few years, my goal has been 52 books in the year. One per week, on average anyways. But things never seem to work out. One book is not quite interesting enough to finish in a week. Another is just so damn dense that it takes me ages to finally reach the end. I’m admitting defeat and acknowledging that it’s not likely that I’ll actually hit 52, and aiming for something a bit more realistic this year. And who knows, maybe I’ll get lucky and end up reading 52 after all.

2. Bike 400 hours / 6000 miles / 300,000 ft elevation

This shouldn’t surprise anyone. I’m a huge cyclist. Bikes are my life. I hope that I’m able to improve year over year by putting in the hours. Trust the process. In 2022, I had this exact goal, but only managed to reach 355 hours (still over 100 hours more than 2021!). This time round, I’m going to be successful.

3. Release 1 EP

Right around when the pandemic started, I ended up getting super into electronic music production. I release tracks whenever I complete them, but don’t ever actually put much into a more cohesive vision / sound. So, my goal for the year is to release 1 EP that has a bit more intent behind it.

I did have this goal last year, but didn’t really make much progress on this. This year, I’m hoping that the Foundations of Electronic Music class that I’m taking provides the push I need to actually accomplish this goal.

4. Keep a to-do list

This is another perennial goal. I always wish I was more organized than I actually am.

This year I’m switching from using Todoist to just using the built in reminders app in iOS. I’m hoping that by dropping a reminders widget on my main homescreen I can actually keep up with it this year, and that it doesn’t just end up being wasted homescreen space that blends into the background.

5. Drink less than 180 days

I tend to drink a lot, which is not great for biking recovery. I’ve done dry months in the past, but this year my goal is just to pull it back a little bit and drink less often than usual. I wasn’t sure exactly what number to go with, so 180 days, half the year, seemed like a reasonable place to start. My hope, though, is that I undershoot that.

6. Learn how to maintain a bike

I spend far too much money on bike repairs for how often / obsessed I am with cycling. Time to suck it up and learn to do my own maintenance better. I’ll still probably keep going to the shop for some stuff (especially if I end up getting tubular wheels for cyclocross).

7. Keep a tidy home

My apartment is not usually the cleanest. My kitchen table is often just covered in miscellaneous bike stuff like sunglasses, helmet, and lights. Dishes aren’t always put in the dishwasher, and pots & pans are sometimes left in the sink for days. I’d like to be a bit better about keeping it tidy enough that I don’t have to panic clean before anyone comes over.

8. Write 12 blog posts

This blog is basically unused. In 2023, I want to do some more writing, and I figured here was a safer bet than a dozen corporate-owned social media sites. An average of 1 post / month seems pretty achievable.

9. Average less than 2 hours phone screentime

I use my phone way too much, and never end up feeling happy about it. Wasting time idly browsing social media doesn’t seem like a fun thing, especially when there’s not even anything new in the five minutes since I last checked it. But I don’t seem to be able to stop it, so instead I’m setting a goal to cap my overall screentime.

Hope I can find something else to do with my idle moments. Frankly, the idea of just sitting with my thoughts terrifies me. But the alternative, being constantly unable to live in the moment without being on my phone (I even check it while watching TV, for fuck’s sake), isn’t really something I want for myself either.

10. Practice Duolingo daily

I started doing Duolingo (en español) at the end of 2021, and kept a near-perfect streak going in 2022. I want to keep that streak alive, and continue to learn Spanish.

11. Cook 1 nice meal a week

I don’t cook much at home - usually, dinner is some form of microwave burritos or a pizza or maybe some pasta if I’m feeling like putting some effort in. This year, I want to cook at least 1 meal that requires effort a week, whether that’s making a pizza from scratch, blending up a soup, or roasting up some vegetables.

12. Meditate three times a week

This last one was a bit of a stretch to hit that 12-goal goal. I want to try meditating as a way of calming my mind and helping me get to sleep / stay asleep better. So often I have a hard time shutting my brain off when I go to bed, and it keeps me up. Maybe meditation will help.

Season 1 (2019): Low Cat 5. Avged bottom 20%

Season 2 (2021): Catted up to 4 bc USAC mandatory is 10 races and I didn’t wanna switch mid season. Probably could have stayed in 5 tbh, idk how much they care if you’re not winning. Avged bottom 20%.

Season 3 (2022): Still cat 4. Still… bottom 20%.

Thing is, I feel like this season I felt faster than I did last season. While courses do change a little bit, there’s usually some Strava segments (& just lap times) that show I was faster. Comparing race avg / NP watts from last year vs now, I’m also up about 10W, at what’s probably a lower (measured, at least) FTP! I am faster, maybe not as much more faster as I’d hope, but still.

So I don’t know if I’m just scaling up at the same rate as all the people I’m racing against, or what. I’d be really curious to see if other races’ power profiles are similar to mine (e.g. I’m either wasting watts or failing on technical skills), or if they’re genuinely stronger than me.

Early on in the season, when I had decent call ups (really hard to do much from row 4+), I was able to get some really solid starts, getting up into the top 5-10 spots. But the problem would always be that I’d get passed (sometimes when I was losing a wheel, but usually just aggressive riders trying to move up), and at a certain point I’d be wholly unable to keep on the lead group.

Especially looking at some of my early races, I remember having massive differences between my first lap watts / pace & later laps. Being able to bring that gap down (hopefully by bringing the other laps up rather than trying to be more deliberate about pacing lol) would get me into a lot more competitive of a position, I think.

Things I’d like to do better next year:

1. Better recovery - While I was able to make it up pretty much all the steep climbs this year (barring a couple technical ones that I didn’t really attempt), I definitely felt like I was too fried to keep up with some of the other riders on the longer climbs (rather than the short, 5-20s punchy climbs). The 3-ish minute climb at one course was the absolute worst - picking off people on some of the technical portions only to have them fly by me as I slowly churned my way back up the giant hill. There were tons of straigh-ish sections that should have been great spots to put down power, but instead I was using them to recover a bit (which should happen more on like, technical sections where you can’t pedal much).

2. Cross-specific drills & practice - Feel like just spending my easy Tuesdays spinning for an hour then spending like, an hour on drills would be ideal. Practicing stuff like mounting / dismounting, sharp cornering, and getting comfortable riding on looser slippy terrain. I did this a bit this season and I think it paid off really well, but starting earlier and being a bit more deliberate about it would benefit even better. Maybe a hot lap or two so I can practice all those things while redlining?

3. Bit more running - So I did a bit of running in August, but stopped once I started having to balance interval workouts and racing every weekend. I think the problem was that I wasn’t ever able to get to a good running cadence, I feel like I stopped while still getting used to running. While running is a minority of CX races, I think being more capable of hopping off & running, whether up stairs, hills, barriers, etc. without completely imploding my heart would be pretty beneficial.

4. Higher FTP - Obviously goes without saying, but being able to recover at higher wattages would help all round. Going harder, recovering while losing less speed… obviously something that will always help.

Sorry for a bit of rambling! But figured I’d rather overanalyze & put into writing rather than forget about something in the future.