Arrivederci'

After much ado about everything and a few last-minute errands (Dave forgot extra tubes, socks, TRANQUILIZERS - not really) we're ready to leave. Next stop ... Nice, France. See you in 15 hours or so. The adventure begins ... oy veh.

26 hours!!

So this is what the Honda looked like on Friday driving to Green Bay. 2 dogs, a cat and all their accoutrements, a bike, a bike box, 2 large suitcases, 2 carryons, Dad's Father's Day present plus various other things to hand over to people in Green Bay. Needless to say, the dogs spent all 10 hours on our laps (they were in heaven) and the cat barely cried (thank goodness). Oh, and when we left, we found out the back tire had a nail in it. Had it blown, we would have been quite a site alongside the road. Thank goodness it didn't.

Made it Green Bay safely. 26 hours to go!!

1 day to D-day

We leave for Green Bay tomorrow and there's still so much to do. We're overwhelmed. Can't figure out if we're taking too much or not enough for a month.

Dave's bike is finally together. Nothing like waiting until the last minute. He just got a new set of wheels so he has 2 sets to take on the trip. They're ROL wheels and look awesome. They're called d'Huez - how appropriate. The guy he worked with at ROL, Sean, was awesome and we can't say enough good stuff about him.

The bags are out. Dave is still "gathering." I've got mine pretty well packed. I'm sure we'll rip everything apart when we get to GB, but oh well.

More last-minute errands to run today while Dave works. Will the prep ever end?

Oh yes, and I've begun freaking out about driving the Mo-Ho. Dave was watching an old Tour the other night and I watched one of the climbs and had to go out of the room. We'll see how this epic adventure turns out....

-Julie

I wasn't speeding, honest!

OK, so I'm driving along in Ian's little VW, minding my own business and concentrating on shifting, clutching, braking, etc. I must have been concentrating a bit too hard on other things and watching the wrong part of the odometer because an officer in Fort Calhoun suddenly turned on his lights and motioned me over. As I pulled over, I promptly killed the car - which may have been to my advantage! "Do you know how fast you were going?" "I thought I was going no more than 30." "I clocked you going 41. This is a residential area and the speed limit is only 25 mph. You were the only one on the hill." "Sorry, officer. Honest, I really thought I was going the speed limit. I'm trying to learn to shift in this car, as you can tell because I killed it stopping." Bless the officer's heart, he took pity on me and let me go, but only after telling me we'll love France (he was in Germany for a couple years while his wife was stationed there), the French people are nicer than people say, and to drive carefully."

Oh yes, yes officer. I will! Thank you!

Needless to say, I went at least 5 mph UNDER the speed limit for the rest of my training drive...
-Julie

Home stretch

We're in the final week. We'll be on a plane flying over the Atlantic exactly one week from today. OK, I just freaked myself out.

Dave was in Denver this weekend doing some riding in the mountains. He said he had some awesome rides with our friend, Marco. I'm sure he also had some great pep talks as Marco and his wife, Jacqueline, are world travelers. It'll be a good sendoff.

I drove again yesterday - by myself this time - and planned to drive today, too. Practice makes ... better. Still not perfect, but I'm feeling a lot more comfortable. The only thing I can't practice are the mountains and those will just have to be trial by fire. The first part of the Tour is fairly flat, so I'm hoping to get use to the Mo-ho before I have to conquer the mountains. Our good friend, Bonnie Ford, who has been covering the Tour for ESPN.com for the last 10 or 12 years (she's GREAT - read her stories at http://search.espn.go.com/bonnie-ford/last-7-days/19) gave me a pep talk, too. She was a wealth of knowledge and, frankly, I wish we could put her in the Mo-ho with us. We're hoping to catch up with her at some point during the Tour.

I guess all that's left this week is to pack, pack, re-pack (when we realize that the luggage is overweight, overstuffed or just overwhelmed) and then stuff the Honda with luggage, bike, dogs, cat and us for our trip to Green Bay.

The excitement builds...
-Julie

1 week to go

The next trip is all about ME ... do you hear that Dave? Costa Rica...Australia...and the bike stays home! Oy veh...
-Julie

Game On

The Lakers won the NBA Championship last night and the College World Series is churning out some exciting late inning heroics in Omaha. Brett Favre is thinking of becoming a ViQueen and surely Tiger is kicking somebody's ass in golf somewhere as we speak. But you know what, I could care less! In 14 days I will be landing in Nice, France, for the adventure of a lifetime. I feel a bit renewed as I actually had a solid ride tonight (3 hours) after work. My legs actually felt pretty fresh. Still a few bugs to work out on the bike but all in all I'm liking the way the Merlin Magia handles and it will be reasonably comfortable with a little more spring than the carbon bike. It doesn't have quite the snap on the climbs but overall I think it will be a good choice for the long miles. I got in 17 hours of riding last week, which was below the 21 I was shooting for. This week will be similar with the added fun of some altitude work with Marco on the weekend.
He always humbles me but is a great riding partner. Julie and our dogs continue their patient vigil as I am freed to ride and concentrate pretty much on work and fitness for now. Lots of love here at the Rogers house. Sleep time!

Countdown continues

We're closing in on the last week-and-a-half before we leave for France. Dave has gotten, and is taking, an opportunity to fly to Denver to see our good friends Marco and Jacqueline Vasquez (and little Marco) this weekend. He and Marco are going to do two uphill time trials Saturday and Sunday. Dave won't ride it competitively, or - thank goodness - take any risks, but it's a good opportunity to get some good ascent riding in before we leave. Needless to say, I encouraged him.

More stick shift driving under my belt, thanks to Ian's little VW GTI. I must say, I did pretty well. Only panicked once when I killed it after a stoplight on the highway and had vehicles behind me. That's down from the multiple panics in the previous drives, even when there were no vehicles for miles! I'm progressing. Dave even gave me a couple "excellent jobs" on my accelerations from stops to 1st gear. Yee-hah!

I actually started "staging" the things to bring on the trip in one of the bedrooms. Maps, books, camera with 8GB memory card, Garmin with European card, small first-aid kit, small backpack for touring, etc., etc. Liz is loaning us her camcorder and dad is loaning us his little binoculars. If anyone out there has suggestions for things to bring or otherwise, please send us comments. We don't want to forget anything as buying it in Europe, if necessary, will be more expensive.

On that note, I did see that the dollar is now at 1.385 Euros (down from a previous high around 1.42). Good news. Keep dropping, please!

Dave has the new Merlin built up, thanks to our Kaos friend Bryan Redemske. It turned out great and Dave said it's a fantastic ride. Stiffer than the Felt. He's still getting a few things dialed in, like the seat, but the ride in Denver will also help him with that. Still needs a few more things - most importantly an extra set of wheels - but the other things are little and he can buy at the bike shops around here or in Denver.

The excitement builds!!
- Julie

Slow Twitch Dave

Preparation for this run at the tour route sure is different than the usual racing focus I have this time of year. The training intensity is down while the miles are up (I should have 380-400 miles for the week). Skipping all the local/regional races with my team to rack up the miles and avoid the risk of a crash has been quite out of character. I really miss the competition and the pre-race jitters, but this year the goals are different so I'm trying to keep the focus. I've been getting in generally 40-70 miles/night during the week and doing my longer rides on the weekend. I'm hoping that having the unique chance to ride without a full work week thrown into the mix will let me feel a bit more fresh. For now I'm feeling pretty worn down. I'm still struggling in my mind trying to comprehend the idea of doing so many successive 100+ mile days. It's uncharted territory for me to be sure. My daughter, Liz, told me tonight that on her recent birthday (23 on May 20th) she twittered Lance and told him all she wanted for her birthday was for him to post a message wishing me good luck in my quest to ride the TdF route. Needless to say he's been a little busy so I'm not expecting any good luck wishes from Mr. Armstrong, but it shows you just how special my daughter is! My good friend, Ian Gray, and his mates from Ciclismo Racing out of Fort Collins, CO, stayed with us this past weekend on their way to Minneapolis for the Nature Valley Grand Prix. Great bunch. Oh to be 20-something again! Also got a chance to catch up on the phone with my friend and former Team Kaos stud Matt Landen. Matt moved to the LA area this winter and is tearing it up for Team Liquid. He was recently pictured in a Rudy Project ad attacking Levi Leipheimer on a climb at the Tour of the Gila. Awesome photo Matt!
Tomorrow I'm going to finish building up my bike for the trip with my friend and Team Kaos mate Bryan Redemske. For any biker types reading I'll be riding a Merlin Magia with Campy Chorus 11 spd. Will work out the mechanical kinks in the next two weeks and get the rig dialed in before we head for Green Bay on the 26th. I'm scared and nervous but honestly, I can't wait to get to France and get this show on the road. Time to go beg Julie for a leg massage! Peace.....

14 Days! 14 Days???

Do we really only have 14 days until we leave for Green Bay? OMG ... where did the time go? Dave got a good ride in last night, but I had to light his way home via car - picking him up in Blair at 9:30 and giving him headlights for the rest of the 13-mile ride to our house. He got 60 miles in. The weather will hopefully hold out for the next 2 weeks so he gets some great long rides.

Time to start setting out our stuff to pack. Guess we can't do our usual "toss everything in a bag the night before" routine (or, as Dave packs, the morning of). Starting to fret about how to pack for a month, how to bring all the things Dave needs (yes, I'm bringing a small first-aid kit!), uncertainty about what we can buy there and how accessible things will be (and how expensive!). I heard diesel is cheaper in Europe, so cross your fingers on that.

Shout out to our biker friend Ian Gray, who left his stick-shift car at our house for two weeks for me to practice on while he travels. Thank you, Ian. It's still in one piece and I haven't ground the gears ... yet.

Picking up a hitchhiker

We found out today that a good friend from Green Bay is possibly going to join us for a few days of our trip. Fred Sheppard was Dave's travel companion when he went to Belgium for the Spring Classics in 2005 and biked the routes of the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix. We have a great picture of Fred feeding Dave a HUGE French pastry from the window of the rental car!! We're looking at picking Fred up in Barcelona and taking him with us through the cruelty of Andorra and dropping him off a few days later alongside the road - or in Toulouse. :)

Fred knows Spanish (along with several other languages) and can also drive a stick, so we're of course welcoming him to the bus! Dave will be glad for the encouragement, I'll be glad for the assistance!!

Euro vs. Dollar

If you haven't already heard, the dollar is sucking big-time against the Euro. Luckily, we've already paid off the two most expensive portions of the trip - the plane tickets and the motor home. Had we been paying off the motor home today, we would be paying almost $300 more than 2 weeks ago. Start praying for the exchange rate to start coming down in the next three weeks or I'm going to be making Mac 'n Cheese in France, too!