36 Hours and Counting...

We arrived in Santa Rosa in Sonoma County, CA, about 9:00 p.m. this evening after an uneventful flight and nice drive up Hwy 101. Leslie and I went out for a nice dinner at LaCoco's Cucina Rustica in the Historic Railroad Square. I wanted to enjoy a good meal with a bottle of Sonoma wine tonight since I will have to watch what I eat and drink tomorrow night. So I had Veal Osso Bucco (braised veal shank) with a yummy Seghesio Zinfandel (from nearby Healdsburg). It hit the spot.

As Leslie and I sat at dinner we tried to figure out which of the other diners were here for Vineman. It was pretty easy to pick out the hard core athletes. But I'm sure there were others (like me!) who didn't necessarily look the part ;)

The plan for tomorrow morning is to sleep in and then find a local bike shop where I can pick up a few items I left back in Denver. Most importantly, a set of Allen wrenches so I can put my bike back together!

Transporting a bike via airplane is not an simple task. In the past I have picked up a used cardboard bike box -- the ones new bikes are shipped in -- from my local bike shop. But I've never felt like cardboard was sufficient to protect my bike from overzealous baggage handlers, so I broke down and bought a Serfas Bike Armor bike case this afternoon at Bike Source in Highlands Ranch, CO.

I was running late and still had to get home to pack, so fortunately Bob from Bike Source helped me disassemble my bike and pack it in my new case. Bob is awesome. As it turns out, he's a good friend of Eric Schuster, the guy who sold me my bike at the Bike Source in Overland Park, Kansas. I love Bike Source. There are only six Bike Source stores in the U.S. -- three in Ohio, one in Charlotte, NC, one in KC, which was two miles from my house, and one in Denver, which is about two miles from my office. What are the chances?

Anyway, Bob was so helpful I gave him one of the last "Beef. it's What's for Dinner" jerseys out of the original 30 produced, which I happened to have in my car after showcasing it at the Summer Conference. If I have my way, there will soon be Beef jerseys showing up all over the country, spreading the message that lean beef is an important part of a healthy lifestyle!

In fact, one of the Beef jerseys was recently spotted on RAIN (Ride Across INdiana) -- a one-day, 160-mile ride along historic National Route 40. That's my colleague Melissa's dad looking lean and mean on the big ride. 160 miles in one day is HUGE -- longest I have done in a day is 120. Think about it...at 16 miles per hour (which is a swift pace) that's 10 hours of pedaling. That takes some incredible muscle endurance. It's gotta be the beef!

Until tomorrow...

Daren