Sorry about the lack of activity here lately — we’re moving into new offices at work (which also entails me becoming a laborer for company, doing painting and other remodeling work) , and my workstation hasn’t been up for about four days, and we’re busy helping the local gym get ready for a climbing comp. So, what’s news, what’s news…..

First, I’m back in the hunt (publically now) for a new job. I’m currently conspiring to return to independent consulting, which would mean more time here at home with the family, which would be A Good Thing. It’s funny how my attitude about work has changed since Seb has come along. Before, I really sorta enjoyed working — I enjoyed being challenged, and being able to use my brain and help someone out (even if it was fairly mundane stuff). Now, it has definitely become a necessary evil. I’ve read stories by plenty of fathers saying “it’s good to be able to get out of the house and go work” but I say “phooey” to that. Right now, I’m much happier hanging out with my family. Sure, Jen and I find time to do our thing (she’s at the gym right now), but why would I want to spend 40 hours a week away from family?

Well, there is the whole “no work, no mon-ay” thing, but remember, work is a result of the Fall. But why shouldn’t I try to do what I can to work primarily from home? Plenty of folks do it. Sure it’s a bit scary if the work suddenly dries up, but that’s why God created savings accounts.

So that’s that. Anybody need any web/Java/Perl work done?

Perhaps I should look into this…couldn’t be too much of a scam, eh?

Sad note: this man is currently the example of Christianity that is being broadcast on the national news. I saw his people a few months ago protesting the memorial service for Fred Rogers at the Pittsburgh Theology Seminary. As I rode by on my bike, I was so angered at what they were doing, I wanted to spit on them. Really. I didn’t, but I still they are hatemongers (which I guess, I would have been as well had I actually spit on them).

Posted on 12 November 2003

Petter Solberg has won the Rally Great Britain and with it, the driver’s championship for 2003. Solberg won the final run through Margam Park, and extended his lead over Sebastien Loeb, winning the rally by over 40 seconds. Tommi Makinen finishes his career on the podium, as he won his battle with Colin McRae for third place, aided by a puncture for McRae during the last stage. Francois Duval finishes the rally in fifth place, thanks to transmission problems for Harri Rovanpera’s Peugeot. Freddy Loix had a good first rally for Peugeot, finishing in sixth.

It was a fantastic season for Solberg, and he continued the streak he started this summer in Greece, winning his fourth rally of the year. Loeb had a fantastic season as well, proving he is more than a tarmac specialist, though he has to think about what could have been, especially his poor result in Corsica (which Solberg capitalised on, winning the rally). No doubt these two will be fighting for the championship again next season.

Tommi Makinen finished his career in grand style, and he no doubt is also thinking about what could have been at Subaru. He had a rocky two years there, with some success and much frustration, but as I’ve said before, Solberg owes much to his partner, as Makinen was always ready and willing to help Solberg learn the ins and outs of being a championship contender.

Both Carlos Sainz and Richard Burns will have a long two months before the start of next season. Burns led the points table for much of the season, only to see his chances for the title disappear with a bout of illness before the start of Rally GB. He’s got to be happy to be leaving Peugeot, however, after a rocky two years. I’m astonished at how Peugeot treated Burns, because without his consistency this season, the team would have never even been in the running for maker’s title (though they did lose to Citroen in the end). It will be interesting to see how things work out at Subaru, with Solberg now the clear number one driver and reigning champion. For Sainz, he again saw his title hopes crushed in Wales (just like in 1998). But with Sainz staying at Citroen for one last season, El Matador should be in the thick of things next year.

Peugeot has got a bit of work to do the next few months. The once unbeatable 206 is now quite mortal, and Marcus Gronholm has to hope that the new 307 will be ready for 2004, else it will be another long season. Without a driver of Burns’ ability, Peugeot will not be a likely challenger for the manufacturer’s title.

Ford has much to look forward to next year, should they decide to field a WRC team (the budget is still undecided for next season). The Focus was quick when it was working, and Markko Martin proved he could win, so if the engineers can work the bugs out of the car, Martin should find himself in the thick of the championship battle next season.

Skoda, despite finishing at the bottom of the manufacturer’s points table, has a lot to look forward to next season, even with its limited programme. The new Fabia has become a more reliable car, and with Toni Gardenmeister and Didier Auriol staying with the Czech outfit next season, they should be able to challenge even more for points.

Only two months to Monte Carlo!

Posted on 9 November 2003

It was a generally quiet day in Wales, with Petter Solberg taking a clean sweep of stages (the last state, the superspecial at Cardiff, will be run this evening). He’s extended his lead to just over 40 seconds ahead of Sebastien Loeb, and Loeb has resigned himself to getting the Xsara to the finishing ramp on Sunday to allow Citroen to win the make’s title. Tommi Makinen has put in a consistent day, still holding third place ahead of Colin McRae by about seven seconds. Harri Rovanpera rounds out the top five.

Solberg did have a bit of scare on the last stage of the day, bending his Impreza’s steering on a pothole. It didn’t do much to slow him however, as Solberg still won the stage and extended his advantage over Loeb. It’s just a matter of Solberg keeping his nose clean tomorrow, and that shouldn’t be too hard with only three competitive stages (though one is the tough Margarm Park circuit). I think the most exciting battle will be between Makinen and McRae, as both try to end their WRC careers with a podium finish.

Posted on 8 November 2003

With only the superspecial at Cardiff left on the day, Petter Solberg has a slim 6 second lead over Sebastien Loeb. The two traded fastest stage times all day, with Loeb admitting he’s pushing hard, and Solberg simply going with the flow. Tommi Makinen is having a fantastic final rally, and he’s currently in third place, roughly ten seconds ahead of Colin McRae. Harri Rovanpera has slipped past Gilles Panizzi for fifth.

Some thoughts and interesting tidbits….

As expected, Citroen team boss Guy Frequelin has ordered Loeb to keep things in check to be sure that Citroen wins the manufacturer’s title. Currently, they have a five point lead in the table, and Peugeot’s remaining points-nominated drivers, Harri Rovanpera and Freddy Loix, are well down in the standings, so it’s critical that the remaining Xsaras finish high in the points. Peugeot boss Corrado Provera must kicking himself for promoting Freddy Loix instead of Gilles Panizzi. Loix is just inside the points at the moment, but Panizzi is currently in sixth.

Loeb has proven he can be quick on gravel, but no one really knows if Solberg is going at maximum attack at the moment. The conditions have been drier than usual, but the Impreza still seems just as fast. If things get messy (which they will by Sunday, no doubt) expect Solberg to mount a serious charge to take the lead. A change in conditions would benefit Makinen’s attempt to finish on the podium as well. But will Loeb keep up the attack and defy the team orders? With several top drivers already out of the rally (Martin, Sainz, and Gronholm), Loeb’s got a tough decision on his hands.

Posted on 7 November 2003

It’s been quite a day in Wales so far. First, the bad news. Carlos Sainz is out. He spun his Xsara off the road during SS3, and though Sainz and Marc Marti were unhurt, they could not continue. Markko Martin is also out with mechanical issues with his Focus. He was having problems from the start and was never really in the thick of things. Marcus Gronholm is also out after breaking a front damper.

On to the good news. Petter Solberg is currently 4.7 seconds ahead of Sebastien Loeb, though Loeb has already won two stages. Conditions have been a bit drier than usual, giving Loeb a more level playing field against the Pirelli-shod Impreza. Tommi Makinen looks to go out of rallying with a bang — he’s currently in third place, though well adrift of the leaders. Colin McRae is also poised to make a run at the podium in fourth. Gilles Panizzi rounds out the top five in his privateer Peugeot (which is too bad for Peugeot, since their chances of reclaiming the manufacturer’s title are quite slim with Gronholm’s retirement).

More news as it happens….

Posted on 7 November 2003

The Rally Great Britain begins tomorrow, and the driver’s championship will be decided on the muddy forest roads in Wales. Carlos Sainz and Sebastien Loeb are tied atop the points table, and Petter Solberg is only a point behind. If any one of the three of them win the rally, the championship will be theirs. Fourth place driver Richard Burns will not be contesting the event, however — he withdrew with an undisclosed health problem (Burns was in the hospital earlier this week). A disappointing end to the season for Burnsie — he’s been atop the points table all season, and now he can’t fight for the championship.

I’ll depart from my typical team-by-team preview, and focus mostly on the front runners and a few of the also-rans…..

Solberg has already said he won’t go maximum attack from the start (which has never been his strategy). Typically, Petter gets quicker as Sunday approaches, and I’m sure, especially with teammate Tommi Makinen’s advice, he’ll give a measured drive through Saturday just to see what his opponents do. Solberg has the best shot at winning this rally, though. He won here last year, and the Pirelli-shod Subaru Impreza has always been very quick in Wales. All told, it’s Solberg’s championship to lose.

Expect Sebastien Loeb to go flat out from the start. While he’s generally considered a tarmac specialist, Loeb has been quick on gravel, and his Xsara has proven to be the most reliable car in the championship this year. Loeb will be the underdog going into the weekend, and while I think he’ll be quick, I don’t think he can beat Sainz and Solberg to take the title. Even if Loeb doesn’t finish the event, it’s been quite a year for the young Frenchman, and he’ll be a force next season.

Carlos Sainz has experience on his side. He’s been quick when he needed to be this year, but can he match up with Solberg? Sainz has already said his success or failure is going to be up to what Solberg does. While that’s a bit of a psychological tactic on Sainz’s part, he is right — Sainz needs to keep himself in the rally, ready to take over if Solberg falters.

On to the also-rans….

Markko Martin will be gunning to win this event (he took second last year), and his main challenge will be whether or not the Focus can stay together. Martin has no reason to do anything but go flat out since he’s got no chance at the championship. If his car stays together, Martin will be able to challenge for the rally win, and I’d guess that whichever of the contenders are closest to him will allow him to take it — no need to jeopardize the championship for the rally.

Colin McRae would like to leave on a high note, especially since he may not return to the WRC. I don’t know that McRae can challenge for the win, though, even with his experience in Wales, but he could make things interesting for the championship race.

Marcus Gronholm would like to end this disappointing season on a high note, and the Finn has won in Wales before. Of course, that happened when the 206 was still the car to beat. Times have changed, and Gronholm will have push quite hard just to get on the podium, especially if the title contenders are all driving well.

Tommi Makinen would also like to leave the WRC on a high note. Makinen probably doesn’t have a chance to win the rally, but if the conditions are favorable for the Impreza (which they will be), he’ll have a shot at a high points score, and he could do his part to insure that Solberg wins the title. If Solberg is crowned champion, he’d be wise to heap praise on Makinen — I believe that Solberg’s rapid progress over the past two seasons is due to having such a fine driver as a teammate.

Anyone else? I think that unless two of the challengers retire, the top of the results table will be crowded with the contenders. Perhaps Markko Martin could sneak on the podium, but that will take a solid drive and a reliable car. But…I am dallying with the idea of giving the win to Martin — he can be quick enough, and the contenders won’t pursue him….

My Top Five
1. Petter Solberg
2. Markko Martin
3. Carlos Sainz
4. Marcus Gronholm
5. Sebastien Loeb

Do I really think Solberg will fight tooth and nail with Martin? No. I think Solberg will pick up that much speed by Sunday that he’ll win without driving flat-out (like when he broke his throttle in Finland).

Other bits of rally news….

Skoda will not take part in the complete WRC season next year. They will not join the manufacturer’s championship, but they will run a limited programme, including all the European events. This is said news, especially given the development of the Fabia. With Ford also contemplating axing their team, it could be a bit of a disappointing season next year.

Freddy Loix will get the chance to finish this season with Peugeot, after budget disputes caused his Hyundai team to fold. The FIA has given Loix permission to test and drive Richard Burns’ 206 during the Rally GB.

Some good news for the championship — Mitsubishi is set to go all out next year in the championship, and they hope that the latest version of the successful Lancer will be competitive from the start. With Gilles Panizzi leading the team, I expect they could be a spoiler in the championship.

Posted on 6 November 2003

Matt has posted a few pics of my futile efforts on the Mandala….

Getting started….

Matching in the undercling…

Trying to hit the intermediate….

Posted on 6 November 2003

We just got back from a week in lovely Bishop California. This post will be more of the short of it, just because. First, good news — Seb traveled well. He got a round of applause at the end of our flight into Las Vegas because he quite calm the entire flight. He generally slept well the entire trip, and put up fairly well with being put in layers upon layers of cold, since it was colder in California than it was in Pittsburgh — but more on that later.

The trip, at least for me, could be broken down into three acts:

Act I. The Sickness
I had been valiantly fighting some sort of cold/sinus thing the week prior to leaving, and the cold dry weather in Bishop brought it out in full force. I felt crummy the first few days (to the point that I didn’t want to climb, even), and I really thought the trip was going to be wash for me, climbing-wise. For the first few days, I had a window of about 1 hour to climb as much as possible before it all caught up with me. Typically, this hour consisted of the hike to the boulders, a few warm of problems, then a wasted effort on a project far above my ability.

I had started to feel a bit better by last Thursday, but then the weather took a turn for the worst (see Act II below). Undaunted, Matt and I went to the Buttermilks, where we could see the snow (yes, snow) rapidly approaching, and the wind whipped through the boulderfield. Sounds terrible, right? Well, actually, the conditions were quite good for me to bouted repeatedly on the Mandala. I felt great that day, but paid for it the next.

When the weather stabilized a bit, I felt better, and had more energy, but I’m still dragging a cough around now (which should be worsened by a wet ride to work tomorrow morning).

Act II Hoodwinked by the Weather
As I mentioned above, we didn’t exactly have classic California high desert conditions during our trip. In fact, typically, it was warmer in Pittsburgh. Our average temperature in Bishop was perhaps 55 degrees. They actually had a bit of heat wave before we got there, and we thought we’d get at least a day or two of that, but…..we headed to the Buttermilks on Wednesday, thinking it’d be a cooler higher in the mountains, which it is was. But…the relative exposure on the hillside meant we were blasted by the winds bringing in the cold front. I reckon the wind was coming in at a steady 30 mph, with gusts to at least 45 mph. Not very hospitable, especially when combined with little dust storms. We turned tail to the comfort of the Happy Boulders, and that was certainly better, but my window of non-sickness (see Act I) had come and gone….

We had one more day of relative warmth and wind, and we spent the time tucked in the narrow canyon at the Sad Boulders. It was a bit tough with Seb, though, as we couldn’t lay him down thanks to the gusts of wind and sand. Fortunately, the car is all of 30 seconds away, so we could retreat there to hang out….

And then came the cold…..

The cold front came in and dropped a nice layer of snow on anything higher than 8000 feet. The weather in the valley was not good, with clouds, cold and wind. That didn’t stop us from trying the Buttermilks, and Matt and I spent a few hours suffered to get some burns on our projects.

The weekend brought slightly better weather, though it was cloudy at times, and that brought the temperatures down. Yeesh. A check of the Weather Channel each morning confirmed our greatest fears — it was warmer in Pittsburgh than in Bishop. At least it wasn’t raining. We managed some good climbing time that weekend though, with a day at the Buttermilks and a day at the Happy Boulders.

The weather finally cooperated the final two days of the trip, and we had relative warmth at the Sad Boulders. Finally!

Act III The Climbing
Here’s where I spray endlessly about all the hard climbing I did. That, of course, assumes I did some hard climbing, which mostly wasn’t the case. Thanks to events in Acts I and II, I really only had two good days climbing on the last two days of the trip. Jen and I assumed that we’d be climbing less than usual since we had the boy, but the weather conspired to limit us even more. I think we both went through a couple of days where we just wanted to leave, and in my case, never climb again. But once the weather cleared up, and we could work out a system to keep Seb warm and well-fed, things were good. We still weren’t climbing a lot, but things were good.

So, for those of you that want senseless spray, here it goes…..

I did work on the Mandala. I did not send it. Not even close. But I did manage to do the first part of the crux, and even though I was far from success, it was still good fun, just because the problem is so good.

The last day was my best of climbing. I managed to flash Barnacle (V9) at the Sads, though it felt like V7. But hey, I’m a number whore, right? I also did Pow Pow at the Sads (V7), which gets my vote as the hardest V7 ever. I worked on Beefcake (V10) as well, though it seemed to be beta-intensive, so I wasn’t making huge progress. I also managed to do Chizam (V9) at the Sads, though at the time I thought I didn’t do it, since I did it from the standup. Seems the sitdown start is quite hard and rarely done.

I had my annual failure on Chollos and Acid Wash, and neither felt any easier (though I was in the midst of Act I at the time).

Curtain

I’m sure I’ll post more juicy bits as I have time/remember them. There’s one new picture on the home page, and I’ll be posting climbing images tonight, so stay tuned.

Oh, and by the way — don’t do a red-eye flight with a six month old. Seb was fine on the flight, but only getting four hours of sleep wrecked him the next day…..

Posted on 6 November 2003

for awhile (well, a week at least). We’re packing for our big trip to Bishop. We’ll be leaving behind the cold and rain for sun and warm temperatures. Woo!

Posted on 27 October 2003

Here’s a play-by-play of the rebuild of Petter Solberg’s Subaru Impreza WRC after his shakedown shunt in Corsica. Amazing stuff.

Posted on 27 October 2003