Quick Update

What's up y'all?
Just a quick hello from sunny St. Charles. One week till I leave for home, been 11 months since I have been back!
School is wrapping up for the semester and the training volume is starting to increase. Last week I had a 4 day camp down in north Georgia. It was amazing riding down there, beautiful landscape and very friendly locals. It was good to get away for a while and ride some nice ling climbs.



At the top of one of the climbs in picturesque North Georgia.

Looking forward to next year, I'm really excited for the collegiate season and hopefully will be able to use it in the lead up to a good season racing over summer. Lindenwood is going to be strong next season, we have bolsted our ranks with some quality riders and an amazing coach, will be a big year for sure. I haven't got a outside team finalised yet, but will know exactly what's happening by the time I get home. Some exciting prospects on the horizon!


What collegiate cycling is all about.

Well I have to get going now (I said it was going to be quick), much school work to be completed in such little time.

Take care,
Chev.

Another Stone Rolls Over

Hi there,

Well I'm safely back in the United States of America after a month in Belgium. My stay in Belgium was amazing, to say the least, I learnt and experienced a lot thanks greatly to the awesome guys I was staying with. The last half of the stay was much the same as first with plenty of kermesses and plenty of sight seeing.

My room...

The lifestyle in Europe was incredible and I should explain the typical day to give you some idea; wake up at the very casual hour of 10am eat a huge breakfast whilst catching up on all the news of the cycling world, if I didn't have a race that day I would go out and train with the boys for 2-4hours (depending on what time the tour was going to start on TV), if I was racing I would bum around the house eat lunch then ride to the race, race, then ride home. Then dinner time was either a rice or pasta dish (I honed my cooking skills somewhat whilst there) and then sit down for an evening of any english TV show we could find.

Dream day in sunny Belgium.

I think I did about 15-17 races whilst there and a poo load of training so hopefully I have some form for the last road races for the season and also for Collegiate Track Nationals. I already miss Belgium, it's amazing beer and chocolate and also the mates I made there but hopefully will be back there in the next couple of years.

The boys: Owen, Peter-Lee, Cammo and Ruan.

It's been a year since I arrived in the States to start college and the time really has flown. I start college as a sophomore this year and it's weird seeing all the new freshman blindly trying to find their way around campus and it's hard to imagine that was me only a year ago.

Well today the Lindenwood team heads out to Sedalia for a crit tonight and then a road race Sunday and should be a good test to see how the form is before Gateway cup in a weeks time.

I have to go pack my bags now so until next time, take care.

Chev.

Bell Jam

G'day g'day,

It's been a while I know so I guess i'll start from where I left off.

Cruisin'

On the 16th of June, Addison (my roomie and team mate) and I packed the car and headed up to Minnesotta to stay for a couple of nights and pack up the RV before heading across to Wisconsin for the Tour of America's Dairyland. After being held up in Minnesotta due to a tornadoe we finnally got into Wisconsin in the wee hours of the morning to start racing the tour. It was going to be 11 days, 10 stages in 9 cities across the "Dairyland State".

A wet day in Waterloo

I won't go through every stage but I was pretty happy with the results considering I was on my back in hospital paralyzed from a virus just a week before the start of the race. I managed to grab afew top 40's and a 26th was my best result for the tour. All in all it was good tour and was a great opportunity to race against some big US teams.

Hanging out in another Walmart

After Tour of America's Dairyland was done and dusted we worked out we had traveled close to 1500 miles in 2 weeks and parked way too many nights in Walmart parking lots. Once back in STL my good mate Matt Camilleri called me up and asked me had I booked my tickets back home yet and if I hadn't I should come stay and race with him in Belgium for a month. I was in like Jim and after a couple of frantic weeks trying to get an international licence and flights sorted out I was stepping of the plane in Brussels.

Matt mid park up on the first ride in Belgie

After struggling with a suitcase, bike bag and the language barrier I finally jumped off the train in Lierde the town that would be my home for the next 5 weeks. I still don't know where Lierde is in relation to Brussels or the rest of Belgium but I'm guessing it's in the south becuase it's only an hour ride and you're into France. The area is pretty much holy ground in regards to cycling with many of the big pro races traversing the roads here and the Muur and the Koppenberg which are brutal cobbled climbs are within 30 minutes ride.

The Muur. This is a brutal cobble climb that features in the classic Tour of Flanders.

Yesterday was my first race in Belgium and was an under 23 race about 15km away. The race went well and after 50kms I pulled the pin as I'm told you don't want to go too deep in your first race because you can end up digging a big hole. It's hard to explain how much the Belgians love their cycling but everyday day there is a race on in a town within riding distance and all the townsfolk will be out to watch the race and grab a wurst and beer.

The streets of Geraadsbergen. A stage of Le Tour went up here a few years ago...

Well I'm off to get ready for another race tomorrow. Until next time keep living the dream and take care.

Chev.

In A Cave

Wassup,

Yeah it's been a while... I don't really get near the Internet for any extended period of time these days but I'll try and update you as best I can.

So the last time I posted I was heading out to Collegiate Nationals. Well lets just say Nats was a learning experience and it was great to see the amount of talent getting about in the sport at the moment. I finished the road race in 58th spot and was the 3rd group on the road. The crit was much more cruisy then the road race and I managed to roll over in 62nd.




Since nationals I have been doing most of the local races. I have been out of the money in the last 3 races I have done which has been really disappointing. Last Sunday night less I went to hospital with a massive headache, fever and a terribly sore throat, and that where I stayed for a couple of days. I guess that explains the sub par results.

I have the Missouri State Road Champs this weekend and then I head up to do the 10 day Tour of America's Dairyland which should sort me out. Then I have two mellow weeks then I'll do the first two weeks of Super Week then I'll fly home and focus on getting fast over 3kms.

I'll try and keep the twitter updates going. Hopefully it won't be so long between posts.
Take care, Chev.

She's Hearing Voices

Howdy all,

So under some pressure I'm updating my blog although no one reads it apart from my mum...It's been a while since my last update so I'll try and bring things up to date.

Two weekends ago the team made the long trip up to "America's Dairyland", Wisconsin. They really take the dairy thing a bit to far as you can buy cheese curds by the kilo almost anywhere, god knows why you would want to eat cheese curds anyway. There are dairys everywhere and out in the farms everything seriously smells like cow shit and I thought Paterson was bad.Anyway enough about cow shit. The road race was on a rolling 80mile (128km) course and we were blessed with some good weather for once so things weren't all doom and gloom. The cross winds and the Marian College-Lindsay Wilson showdown shattered the field about 30miles in leaving about 20 guys left. Owen, Stroot and myself were the only survivors left from Lindenwood. I gotta give big props to Stroot here, as Marian and Lindsey Wilson started attacking each other the group got strung out and I got caught out and had to chase hard which is when Stroot dropped back from the front group and rode me on. A truly hard man effort. I finished the day in 7th in a downhill bunch kick with Owen and Stroot rounding out the top 20.

Bikes ready to roll.

Sundays crit was held in downtown Madison around the Capitol building. It was a really cool course, not to technical and a bit of a hill which is about as good as any crit gets for me. Thing’s were going well until about halfway through when the heavens opened up and it started flogging down. Now before you start calling me soft and asking whether I’m made from sugar I have to explain that the course was on slick concrete so when it gets wet it’s like ice. I crashed twice but still managed to roll over for 17th. Owen got away in a small group just before it started to rain and held on to out sprint the rest of the breakaway for Lindenwood’s first victory of the season.

The Capitol Building in Madison

Last weekend was the Mid West Cycling Conference regional championships and was the last weekend of racing for the season. We had another long drive to Athens, Ohio for the race. The road race was another 80 mile undulating course with two challenging climbs. First lap I dropped my chain completely at the bottom of one of the climbs and had to get off and put it back. I had to chase for the next 10km to get back on and was suffering pretty hard in the hottest day I have had since leaving the Australian summer months ago. The rest of the race was fairly uneventful and I finished 19th after a fairly average sprint.

As about as scenic as it gets in Wisconsin...

Sundays crit was in Columbus, Ohio around part of the Ohio State college grounds. Ohio state is a MASSIVE school and they obviously party pretty hard there as the when we were driving in it looked like a war zone (if said war was fought with beer). It was another hot day and the wind was blowing a gail too, as such not many people finished. After about the halfway mark the group started to feel the heat, and for about 15 minutes there I felt like all I was doing was closing gaps left from the people getting shelled. Finally I made the chasing second group with about 6 others and that’s how it finished rolling over in 10th.

Following and attack by Will Nowak at the Regionals Criterium.

Lindenwood have qualified for Collegiate Nationals which are being held in Fort Collins, Colorado between Friday and Sunday next week. I should be really excited and motivated for these races but there have been some really big distractions here lately and my head definitely isn’t in racing at the moment. After this weekend I’ll be taking some well needed time off to reassess some things.
I’m looking forward to a big summer of racing and seeing more of this great country before going home at the end of July to focus on the track.
(More pictures to come soon)

Just making sure that I did come last in the sprint...

Take care y'all,

Chev.

Keeping Up Appearances

G'day,

Spring Break... I wish mine was as exciting as those teen Hollywood movies portray it to be. After returning from Chicago I had one night stop over here on campus and then took off up north to Quincy, Illinois for a couple of days training in the country at Dave Stroot's house. We had a sweet little set up in Dave's aunty's farm house with all the modern conveniences and pretty much all the food we could eat. The first day we rode for 5 hours in pretty much perfect weather the second day was a windy, cold and very wet 3 hours.

About as exciting as it gets on a five hour ride...

Friday it was back to LU for a quick team meeting then off to Lebanon, Indiana for a weekend of racing. First off was the Team Time Trial, which is definitely our teams strongest discipline, but shortly after the start we lost Stroot due to a broken chain but Owen, Frank and myself still managed to put in a strong effort to come in 3rd. In the afternoon I had to back up for the road race which was held on a very unforgiving course which featured a gnarly steep hill and some sketchy cross wind sections. It's by far the best road course I have raced on with a large crowd on the hill each lap which really had a great atmosphere about it. Owen and myself made the break of the day and spent 5 laps of the front in a group of nine. I ended up 5th in the uphill finish and was pretty pleased with the result.

The team cargo van choc-a-bloc.

Qualifying for nationals has been on all the minds of the boys and is very frustrating because we are clearly one of the top 3 mens A teams in the conference but get screwed by other schools because they have females that by just finishing the womens A race get points that count towards Team Qualifications. I'm not trying to be sexist or anything but it's incredibly frustrating for a team with no females that would easily be racing at Nationals if the sexes qualified separately. Our only hope now is that a few of us can qualify individually, fingers and toes crossed I will make it.

The mighty Mississippi

Can I recommend to any sporting fan or anyone that needs a bit of life motivation that they read Bradley Wiggins autobiography "In Pursuit of Glory". Not only is a great read it's very motivational even a non cyclist can take something away from it. I hardly put it down, and finished it in three days and I have taken some great lessons away from it.

Anyway I have to go and study for a World History test now but as always, take care!
Chev.

When Young Terrorists Chase The Sun

Howdy,


Well it's been a little while since the last post. Much has happened. Well last post I reported I crashed in a race, well turns out I cracked my frame so I have been rolling a shop bike until I get my new bike ordered.


Last weekend the Lindenwood team headed up to Notre Dame (pronounced "note-er day-m") in South Bend, Indiana. We had a great showing in the 70 mile road race with Owen "the butcher" Belton getting 2nd with Stroot and I bringing home the bunch to grab a couple of top twentys. Sunday's crit was a cool 1 mile loop with no corners thus was very fast. With the bunch together with one lap to go I had Paddy on my wheel delivering him to the front but half a lap to go I fucked up and also Paddy's chances on a decent finish. We live, we learn.

Some of Banksy's handywork?

Anyway, we are on spring break now so I took the chance to drive up to Chicago and check out what all the fuss is about. Safely back in St. Charles now, I can definitely say that it's an awesome place and is a really cool city. Heaps of cool shops and places to eat, wish I had a bigger bank balance. Oh yeah, check out the photo above, I ran across it walking back from checking out lake Michigan, I'm pretty sure it's by famous stencil artist Banksy. Can some one confirm this for me? It was also a good chance to put the bike in the closet for a couple of days and just relax.

Mandatory "Bean" photo...

This weekend we are off to Purdue and Marian colleges in Indiana, which is from all reports one of the best weekends of racing on the Collegiate calender. Each weekend we are getting closer and closer to pulling off a victory, the team is really coming together and is only a matter of time despite what some people think.
Sorry about the lack of racing photos but I can't find any at the moment...

Anyway take care everyone,
Chev.

Crusin' for a Bruisin'

Hey Hey!
Some good news to report from the Forest Park Crit on the weekend, my business partner/room mate/team mate Paddy "Crades" Kilmurray secured Mesa's first win of the seaons, HOWAREYA!

Crusing for a bruising

My race was going alright until about 45 mins in I got chopped hardcore and went fanging in to the gutter at 52km p/h! Day over but didn't sustain any bad injuries so as frustrating as it was not to finish I can't complain too much.

"Nice wrist." "Yeah, she's ok."

This weekend we head up to Notre Dame (somewhere up the top of Indiana) for another weekend of collegiate racing. Anyway being a good student calls... (cough cough)

Pretending to warm up

Things got strung out...

Paddy sealing the deal

Till next time, take it easy.
Chev.

Pace Is The Trick

Hey y'all,

Just a quick update, the people in the athletic department at Lindenwood have finally pulled their finger out and updated the cycling site. You can check it out here. You can creep our profiles (look out for Stephens shout out) and keep up to date on our schedule and results.

Take care,
Chev

Busier Than A One Armed Bricklayer In Baghdad

Sup y'all?

Well as the tittle suggests I have been pretty busy of late juggling mid-term exams, showing my mum around St. Louis/St. Charles and not to mention training/racing. Well last weekend we headed off to Greencastle, Indiana for the second round of racing. The weather was almost perfect with temperatures in the mid 20's with not too severe winds for Saturdays 80km road race. Without going into to much detail, we failed to get a man in the break again but still managed to get 3 in the top 20. Saturday afternoon we relocated to the middle of nowhere Indiana for the 5 mile Team Time Trial where we (Owen, Frank, Stroot and I) surprised even ourselves in taking second against some really strong competition. Stoked!

As happy as a pig in mud!

Sunday's crit was a little over a mile pretty much dead flat and not too technical. Although there was tornado and storm warnings out across most of Indiana they decided it would entertaining to see how many dudes would get blown in to the gutter or completely off their bikes. The crit was really tough and I was pretty happy just to finish even though I was chewing my handlebars for the entirety of the race. The two hard men on the team shone in the crit with Paddy and Owen getting Lindenwood some valuable conference/nationals points.

Focusing hard on the day ahead bar Frank obviously.

All the boys form looks promising for the coming weeks and I know that it's only a matter of time till we get Lindenwoods maiden victory. On a side note it's great to hear the Australian cricket team has finally pulled their finger out and have started winning games again!
Also you can check me out here on twitter now as I know you can't get enough of Chevalley.
Until next time. Take care and stay upright!

Chev.

Kentucky Fried Chicken Legs

How's it?

Last weekend Lindenwood kicked off our collegiate cycling campaign with a trip to Kentucky to the south. Well as soon as we crossed the border the stories I had heard about Kentucky being pretty Hillbilly were confirmed when we drove past "Joe Bob's Flower Mart". Anyway to the racing. Saturday was the 64 mile road race (100km (I think...)) and it pissed down rain the whole race, then the rain gave way to ice with about 20 miles to go and then the ice gave way to snow for the remainder of the race. Good times let me tell you. Then there was the wind, as they say it would of "blown a dog off it's chain" and I think thats all that needs to be said about that. I was almost dropped on the second lap of the race but managed to crawl back on and lead Norris out for the bunch kick. Team mate Frank was up the road in a group of 8 and got us some sweet points coming in 7th. From the 70-80 starters about 25 finished the road race just to give you an idea how hard the race was.
Sunday morning we rock up to the crit and were greeted with the most ridiculous crit course I have ever seen. Half a mile (800m) loop with 15 corners, held on what could be best described as a goat track. Some of the bigger schools decided it wasn't worth the trip to the hospital so early in the season but by the gentle persuasion of our coach we lined up. Well once the dust had settled we finished with 5 riders in the top 20 picking up some more valuable conference points. I have to point out here that I was the only Lindenwood rider not to crash in the crit and managed to creep over in ninth, see kids sometimes it's cool to be a pussy.
All in all we had a pretty good weekend, it was a good learning experience for myself and also for the team as six of us are rookie collegiate cyclists. I'm still pretty bummed we didn't get to eat at KFC but we did get to go to a real honky tonk bar which included feral locals that speak a thick southern accent say funny things like "hey boy!" and "getter done!".

My mum is visiting this week and I'm off now to show my her the sights around St.Charles.
Until next time, take care.
Chev.
P.S. Other possible post tittles included:
KFC (Kentucky Fried Chev)
KFC (Kentucky's F*#king Crazy)
Not Getting Lucky in Kentucky

Whoo! Alright-Yeah...Uh Huh

Hello everyone,

Just a quick update from sunny St.Charles. As Australia has been experiencing the worst bushfires and hottest weather in it's history, St.Chuck has been between 10-20c which has made for some pleasant training, or as pleasant as training gets anyway. Despite having a day off this week due to the flu, I should get close to getting 20 hours on the bike again this week.

Posing the new gear outside our favourite brew shop

Only one week left until our first race which will be the start to my US road campaign for the year. Next weekend we have a training camp here in STL and then have a race on the Sunday in Colombia, Missouri.

Part time mechanic, full time giant J-Bo and Cliffy "The Taree Turtle"Lyons

Well the temperature has plummeted here over night and it's now a barmy 1c as I write this so I'm about to jump in to bed and contemplate about getting on the rollers tonight.

Until next time, take care.

Chev.

Franga's Interview

Hey all,
New member of the Lindenwood cycling team, Francis (AKA Frank, Franga, Franklin, Frankston, Frankenstein) just did a cool interview with me on his blog. You can check it out at www.francishamre.blogspot.com I must stress that it's not a very serious interview but it's funny all the same.

Cheers, Chev

Youth & Young Manhood

Howdy all,

Well the last time I wrote I was jet lagged and it was snowing, well I'm glad to report that my body clock has converted to US time and it has finally stopped snowing here. We ended up getting about half a foot of snow which was weird, the only way I can explain it to the people back home is it was like going to school in Perisher Blue (a Australian ski resort). In all truthfulness though if it had snowed like this in Perisher it would have been the biggest dump in decades and every man and his dog would have been screaming down the 'Snowy Way' to get on the slopes but over here it's business as usual.

Stoked!!!

We have some new dudes on the team this semester and now the snow has been cleared from the roads we have been out training as a group getting to know each other. I'm pretty stoked to say that all the guys on the squad are good blokes and are fun to hang around. I think we are going to do well in the collegiate road seasons because everyone is dedicated to riding as a team and everyone is mates, being mates might not sound like a big deal but in a bike race when things are going shit only good mates will bleed for each other.

The boys in action.

I have also received my new ride, it's a Specialized Tarmac Pro SL with SRAM Red componentry (I'll get a photo up soon all you bike pedophiles reading). This bike is so light and stiff it's definitely the best bike I have ever ridden. Also picked up my new Specialized shoes and helmet which are both awesome, the helmet is so light I'm always forgetting that I'm actually wearing it and the shoes are both comfy and really rigid. The new steed got it's first gallop on the weekend and past all the test with flying colours including the one were I blow all the other boys doors off on the in to St.Charles sprint. Even rockin' Robbie McEwen would have been proud.

A new way to hold the bike, Crades seems impressed...

Until next time, take care.

Laters all, Chev.

Aligators and Assholes, meeting the Maxaphone.

G'day,


I have arrived back in sunny St.Louis and was welcomed with a good dose of snow. The trip from Sydney was a dream everything went really smooth and we were able to lounge out across vacant seats on the flight from Syd to LA as there was pretty much no one on the flight. I'm writing this at 4.30 in the morning as I'm jet lagged to the hilt.


Last Friday I went to watch Australia v South Africa in the cricket, although the wrong team won it was an awesome day and I got to meet a few childhood heroes namely Doug Walters and Max Walker. Both these dudes were pretty sensational cricketers in their day and both are legendary beer drinkers too which knocks them up a few notches in my books.

The MaxaphoneAll happening at the SCG Switchback in King Edward Park

I now have a month to prepare for the first race of the season which I'm really looking forward to. I have heard only good things about the collegiate road racing scene and we are all good mates on the team so I'm sure its going to blast traveling and racing around the midwest.

Sorry but thats about all I have for the moment.
Cheers, Chev.

Hammin' & Jammin'

“Do you mean sexually, or financially…?” Mick Jager

Crushin it in the heat.

The last few days have been scorching hot here in the Hunter Valley, as such riding has been done either early in the morning or late in the evening, more often than not the later. When I say it's been hot I mean it's been HOT!!! It was 42 Celsius when I went in to the shop to get things for lunch, that's 108 Fahrenheit! So as such I have a lot of time to kill in the middle of the day to kill and have been creeping Youtube pretty hard so I though I would share some of my latest favourites on here.

Anyone that knows me well, knows that I love watching music videos on Youtube and the first vid is a clip from a 15 piece collective out of San Fran called Still Flyin'. As Crades would say "it's heaps noisy", but it's a pretty catchy tune and has been stuck in my head for weeks.

Second video is from Seth McFarlane who is the mind behind Family Guy and American Dad. I love this video because it sums Christianity, and well every other religion, pretty well.

If anyone can tell me what/where this climb is I'll buy them a schooner (Seriously).

Stay cool, literally.

Chev.

Pots or Pints?

Hey all,

Apologies for the lack of updates lately but I have been away from the net for 2 weeks, BUT I do have stories to tell so listen in.

Well it said riders wanted...

On the 30th of December myself, Cliff Lyons and Matt Cammo packed up the old faithful Toyota Kluger and headed on the 1000km journey south to Melbourne for New Years and Bay Crits. Meeting us down there on NYE was Mr. PJL Kilmurray as this is the second year we have gone down for the festivities and racing and is now pretty much tradition.

Yeah...we had some spare time on our hands. Paddy bench pressing Cammo

It was cool to play tourist in Melbourne for a couple of days cementing my notion that it is definitely one of the best cities I have been to in the world. We did the obligatory dinner on the famous Lygon Street, shopped on the ever so trendy Chapel Street and also checked out St.Kilda Beach. Paris Hilton was spotted shopping on Chapel Street the day before we were there so you know it's good. New Years was again a massive blast, I won't digress but I will say we certainly met some interesting characters on the train that night.

Old Tram on Chappel Street.

Bay Crits...Hmmm. As cricket season is full swing down here in Australia I will use a Tony Greig cliche quote to sum up the five days of racing at Bay Crits "hard and fast!!!". It was good training lets just put it that way as I was able to knock up 3-4 hours each day on the bike so I guess it's not all bad.

Last day of Bay Crits

The whole week around Bay Crits its pretty cool as you are always spotting pros out riding or just hanging out in cafes, sometimes this is a bad thing if you read Paddy's blog you will understand. Another cool thing was seeing Rockin' Robbie turn up on that start line of the first stage in a taxi, quickly build his bike then immediately start the race.

I have to say that the whole two weeks have been extremely enjoyable even if I was getting pumped in the races and hours of hard training thanks to having good mates around.

Cammos best surfer pose at Torquay.

After dropping Cammo at the airport I made my way solo up to the town of Bright which is nestled right in the middle of the Victorian Alps for a four day training camp with my coach Aaron and his squad of hyperactive Tri-Athletes. I have been to bright a couple of times now and I think its probably the best place in Aus to train as there is an abundance of climbs and good roads. My legs were super tired after Bay Crits and throw in 2, 30km+ climbs, 100kms of motor pacing and another 12km climb, I was ready for my coffin. But I can be happy knowing that I have started putting a solid base down for the coming road season.

Bryce (aka Bruce, Cron Dog, Koby Abberton) atop of Tawonga Gap

Two weeks today until I go back to the USA, until then it's more of the same: hang with the family,enjoy lots of good food and wine, chill at the beach and maybe a bit of training.

Until next time, take care. Chev.
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