Now I'm mad...
Now I'm mad. I was just perusing some information on the internet about the Mt. Washington Hillclimb bike race, where people pay for the priveledge to ride up the Mt. Washington auto road in New Hampshire. Guess who won?? The vampire Tyler Hamilton... Check out the story here:
http://www.velonews.com/race/dom/articles/8727.0.html
I'm mad about this because last year during the Vuelta Espana, Hamilton testing positive for blood transfusions that would increase his ability to ride bicycles at high levels, and was subsequently suspended and kicked off of his team, Phonak, which has suffered other doping infractions pre and post Hamilton's suspension. His teammate Perez was caught doing the same thing, blood transfusions. Oscar Camenzind was busted for taking EPO, and now another former teammate of Hamilton's was just busted last week for taking EPO as well, Fabrizio Guidi.
Now, this is an unsanctioned event and all, but he rode it anyway, even being under suspension. That's just total and complete bullshit really. He doesn't deserve to race a bike right now. He's still waiting for an appeals court to hear his appeal on his doping conviction. And even though it is an unsanctioned event, he should know better than to race this event, and he shouldn't have toed the starting line. Damn, if I was the 2nd place guy, I would have to kick his ass. That's just bad form to ride a race when you're suspended, even in an unsanctioned race such as this. What the hell was he thinking??
I guess that the man has no scruples about taking other people's prize money when as of the writing of this entry, he's still considered a cheater, and has been suspended for it. I might have to write something angry on his website.
http://www.tylerhamilton.com/
I just checked, and I can send in an entry for his website in the guestbook, but it won't get published I'm sure, as it's a moderated site and all, and I'm sure his webmaster won't like what I'd have to say about his "win" this weekend.
I don't like cheaters...
The thing about Mt. Washington though is that it's just a tough place to be. I've been on the side of that mountain in lots of different weather conditions over the years. I've been there when it's been nice, and I've been there when it's been scary bad weather. One of the coolest things I've ever seen though was the night I spent at the Lake of the Clouds hut near the summit of Mt. Washington. This is a hut maintained by the AMC along the Applachain Trail, and of course it's in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. I made some reservations there, hiked up later on in the day in the summer, and slept in the hut that night. Looking out that night though, there was a thunderstorm coming across some of the adjoining ridges, and you have a wide and exposed view from the hut, so you could look across, see the storm moving towards the mountain, see the lightning flashing across the mountains, and splashing colors across the hills. It was awesome, best storm I've ever seen. Then there was another time when I was up on the mountain ice climbing with some friends of mine, and we got socked in first with fog and clouds, and then the wind came. Mt. Washington has the highest recorded wind speed ever, and the location of the mountain itself is right in the way of the intersection of the major weather makers in the Northeast, making it bad weather central. Here are some facts about it:
Elevation: 6,288 feet
Latitude: 44° 16' N
Longitude: 71° 18' W
Highest wind (world record, April 12, 1934): 231 MPH
Average wind velocity for the year: 35.3 MPH
Lowest temperature (state record, January 1934): -47°F
Highest temperature (August 1975, June 2003): 72°F
Average temperature for the year: 26.5°F
Average annual snowfall: 256 inches
Maximum snowfall in a season (1968-69): 566.4 inches
Maximum snowfall in a calendar year (1969) 495.2 inches
Winds exceed hurricane force (75 MPH) on an average of 104 days a year
The summit is in the clouds about 60% of the time
Fog is reported (for at least part of the day) over 300 days a year
http://www.mountwashington.org/
http://www.mountwashington.com/
Of course, the real reason to go up there is to ski Tuckerman's Ravine, which the only way you can ski it is to climb up into the bowl either during the winter, or later on in the summer. In the winter, things can get tricky because of crevasse's and avalanches, and things get tricky in the Spring because large chunks of ice like to fall down and crash into rocks and people.
http://www.tuckerman.org/
http://www.velonews.com/race/dom/articles/8727.0.html
I'm mad about this because last year during the Vuelta Espana, Hamilton testing positive for blood transfusions that would increase his ability to ride bicycles at high levels, and was subsequently suspended and kicked off of his team, Phonak, which has suffered other doping infractions pre and post Hamilton's suspension. His teammate Perez was caught doing the same thing, blood transfusions. Oscar Camenzind was busted for taking EPO, and now another former teammate of Hamilton's was just busted last week for taking EPO as well, Fabrizio Guidi.
Now, this is an unsanctioned event and all, but he rode it anyway, even being under suspension. That's just total and complete bullshit really. He doesn't deserve to race a bike right now. He's still waiting for an appeals court to hear his appeal on his doping conviction. And even though it is an unsanctioned event, he should know better than to race this event, and he shouldn't have toed the starting line. Damn, if I was the 2nd place guy, I would have to kick his ass. That's just bad form to ride a race when you're suspended, even in an unsanctioned race such as this. What the hell was he thinking??
I guess that the man has no scruples about taking other people's prize money when as of the writing of this entry, he's still considered a cheater, and has been suspended for it. I might have to write something angry on his website.
http://www.tylerhamilton.com/
I just checked, and I can send in an entry for his website in the guestbook, but it won't get published I'm sure, as it's a moderated site and all, and I'm sure his webmaster won't like what I'd have to say about his "win" this weekend.
I don't like cheaters...
The thing about Mt. Washington though is that it's just a tough place to be. I've been on the side of that mountain in lots of different weather conditions over the years. I've been there when it's been nice, and I've been there when it's been scary bad weather. One of the coolest things I've ever seen though was the night I spent at the Lake of the Clouds hut near the summit of Mt. Washington. This is a hut maintained by the AMC along the Applachain Trail, and of course it's in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. I made some reservations there, hiked up later on in the day in the summer, and slept in the hut that night. Looking out that night though, there was a thunderstorm coming across some of the adjoining ridges, and you have a wide and exposed view from the hut, so you could look across, see the storm moving towards the mountain, see the lightning flashing across the mountains, and splashing colors across the hills. It was awesome, best storm I've ever seen. Then there was another time when I was up on the mountain ice climbing with some friends of mine, and we got socked in first with fog and clouds, and then the wind came. Mt. Washington has the highest recorded wind speed ever, and the location of the mountain itself is right in the way of the intersection of the major weather makers in the Northeast, making it bad weather central. Here are some facts about it:
Elevation: 6,288 feet
Latitude: 44° 16' N
Longitude: 71° 18' W
Highest wind (world record, April 12, 1934): 231 MPH
Average wind velocity for the year: 35.3 MPH
Lowest temperature (state record, January 1934): -47°F
Highest temperature (August 1975, June 2003): 72°F
Average temperature for the year: 26.5°F
Average annual snowfall: 256 inches
Maximum snowfall in a season (1968-69): 566.4 inches
Maximum snowfall in a calendar year (1969) 495.2 inches
Winds exceed hurricane force (75 MPH) on an average of 104 days a year
The summit is in the clouds about 60% of the time
Fog is reported (for at least part of the day) over 300 days a year
http://www.mountwashington.org/
http://www.mountwashington.com/
Of course, the real reason to go up there is to ski Tuckerman's Ravine, which the only way you can ski it is to climb up into the bowl either during the winter, or later on in the summer. In the winter, things can get tricky because of crevasse's and avalanches, and things get tricky in the Spring because large chunks of ice like to fall down and crash into rocks and people.
http://www.tuckerman.org/
Skiing the steep bowl is pretty unreal. As when you're climbing up it to ski down it, it's steep. Steep as in, standing straight up and reaching your hand out in front of you as far as it'll stretch allows you to touch the snow you're climbing up. It's probably somewhere near 40 degrees or a little more. It's steep enough so that when I was skiing there with my friend Sarah and she fell near the top of the chute we were skiing down, she fell all the way to the bottom of the bowl. There's no stopping once you start to fall on something that steep. Here are a couple of pictures of the bowl at Mt. Washington taken this past Spring. Bear in mind, I think the pictures I put up on here were from March or so of this year. Still a ton o'
snow up there on the mountain at that time. I think they still had snow there on my Birthday this year, June 1. That's a lot of snow to keep around, even in New England in the Spring. My parents never wanted me to go up there and ski the ravine though, they thought I'd get killed, or seriously injured, which is of course a distinct possibility, as there have been people killed there before, and there have been people seriously injured as well, and have had to be carried out on stretchers from the mountain, which is never a good thing. I personally saw one person get run over by what I would call an extremely large chunk of ice one day when I was up there skiing. When someone yells "ICE", you do everything you can to get out of the way, this guy got tossed like a rag doll, and have to be carried out on a stretcher, it was pretty bad looking. I'm not sure what happened to him later on, not sure if he made it or not. I think that he did, I'd like to think that he did, but he got whacked hard. Just in the wrong place, and the wrong time unfortunately. Well, time to go and find something to eat, I'm getting hungry over here. I haven't had anything to eat yet this day, time to go and forage, which means I'll probably get some take out food from somewhere and stuff my gullet. In case you were wondering what a "gullet" is...
posted by giantcu92 @ 1:02 PM
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