We have been using so many of the Specialized Designs for Women products. We're using the clothes, bikes, shoes, gloves, saddles, everything. And we've had such a great time with it all. The bikes are amazingly stiff, super responsive, and- somehow very plush. The shoes freakin rock. And the saddles... well, Rasmussen Bike Shop has never had such success with one brand of womens saddles as the Specialized models.

Ladies, if you're looking to change your cycling game for the better please read through THIS CATALOG first.

With Kelli's injury taking her out of the Cat 4 events we decided to bring in rockstar triathlete Chris(tina) Maravelas and have her fly the PRC flag for the weekend. Saturday's road race was way out in Mennonite country and the 13-mile loop was just pounded with low temperatures and a 30+ mph wind. The All 9 Yards team snuck away from us on the second lap but Chris did her work and still pulled in a third place finish for us, turning a 2 minute gap into a 20-second gap at the finish. Ana, Maria, and Emily also did a great job, all taking top 10 spots... just finishing in that nightmare wind is something of high merit.


In the criterium the next day Chris had her paybacks and launched an attack on lap-one-turn-one, and she was never seen again. Maria rounded out the money-takers with a fifth place spot. Ana 6th and Emily 8th.

In the Women's-123 field... all we can say is, in the future- we will seriously consider the consequences of trash talking Sydney Brown. In Saturday's road race her breakaway put about 10 minutes into us and she seemed effortless in lapping the entire field on Sunday. Wow. Great work Sydney. We were knocked down, but we'll be ready to fight again soon. ;)

The media from the weekend:

Photos from the weekend.
Watch Chris establish her gap at Old Cap.
Watch Jen do a handstand on a skateboard.
Fry Guy's Images from the weekend (Buy some kid!)

Mother Nature really wanted us to throw down at our first RACE LIKE A GIRL criterium series, parting the clouds and sun just long enough for us to get in a great night of racing. We had over 700 people line the course cheering on the one of the 216 cyclists competing (if you were one of the people who attended, we are not exaggerating, these numbers are correct, and you must be confused). Here’s the results.

Women’s Scratch Race: 1) Chris, 2) Emily, 3) Kim
Women’s Snowball: 1) Chris, 2) Kim, 3) Emily
Women’s Miss-N-Out 1) Kim, 2) Chris, 3) Emily

Men’s A Scratch Race: 1) Nathan, 2) Chad, 3) Kurt
Men’s A Snowball: 1) Kurt, 2) Steve, 3) Nathan
Men’s A Points Race: 1) Chad, 2) Jerome, 3) Steve

Men’s B Scratch Race: 1) Will, 2) Bruce, 3) Pete
Men’s B Snowball: 1) Steve, 2) Bruce, 3) Will
Men’s B Miss-N-Out: 1) Will, 2) Andrew, 3) Pete

We should note that the folks at registration thought it appropriately casual to not record last names, the race official thought it was silly to record anyone past 3rd place, and our PRC photographer was to occupied to catch any really great images of people racing. Therefore, if you raced and don’t see your name or photo… it’s not because we hate you… it’s because we love you so much we don’t want there to be a digital record of how badly you got spanked. So, feel free to brag to all of your friends about your fourth place finish. Promise we won’t tell.

Many thanks to Steve, Chuck, and Rick for volunteering their time. Much love to Rasmussen Bike Shop for handing out the schwagg.

The next Race Like A Girl is May 22nd. Mark your calendar.

We’ve got stickers! PRC stickers to place on your floor pump, bumper, frame, bedpost, or over your favorite person’s mouth when they find themselves getting a bit too lippy. $5 for each sticker. If you’d like to fly the PRC flag just track one of us down and we’d be happy to sell you one.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK
STEVE: I'm going to ride my recumbent out to watch the races.
JANE: Well, at least the women will know you're not there to hit on them.

Please note: Due to the extremely cold temperatures and potential for lingering early morning snow, the start of the Saturday, April 12 race is being moved to 11:00 am.

We got this notice the Friday afternoon right before we were about to leave for Spring Cycling Classic (SCC) in Lincoln. The snow and extremely cold temperatures part didn’t sound like so much fun, but since we were both scrambling to get everything done before heading out of town, we welcomed the chance to stay in Des Moines on Friday night and delay our drive west until 6am on Saturday morning. Always nice to have a night at home to pack, do laundry and sleep in your own bed. Six o’clock Saturday morning came and we drove through the snow storm past cars in the ditch and a jack-knifed semi.

Near the race course, after driving several miles on some gravel road, we began to question the race flyer directions. So we called up Donny who navigated us there via Google Earth. It was amazing. He pointed out landmarks as we passed them just as though he were right there in the car with us, “you should now be driving past a football field on your right”.

We arrived at the race and were commenting to each other how odd it was not to know everyone there like we would in Iowa. Then several guys still called us by name and talked about our blog. Soon, we felt like locals. Donny, that website is popular so keep doing what you're doing! We also learned that Sydney Brown had posted a blog saying she was anxiously awaiting our competition especially after Jane got her at the Big Creek finish line less than a week before. That of course gave us a boost of motivation as we ventured out to warm up in the cold winds. The 1/2/3 women started in a very large group with the Master's and Category 4 men. Before we knew it, we were off to a racing start and a very fast first lap.

This was the first ride out of a rest week for both of us. The pace poked around for awhile because of the wind so we had a chance to scope out where all the other women were. We worked our way ahead of the other women because if there was a break, we wanted to see them. Then the attacks started. The two of us made the first breaks no problem. There was one a particularly hard and long attack initiated by the strongest guys. We were maxed out for a little while, but of course, the pace always slows up eventually. We realized the other woman had not made the break, which made us want to keep pushing the pace even more.

Kelli was strong like ox. Jane got weenie after that hard effort and started to fall back. (Jane wrote this sentence – she is strong). Some strong guys came up from the back and eventually we both got organized into an 8-10 bike rotation. The guys were very nice and did a great job working with us. Thanks guys! Those of us stronger riders launched a few attacks to shed some of the wheel suckers who weren’t pulling through.

Toward the end, we felt really comfortable that we’d kept the pace high enough that neither Sydney nor any of the other women would be coming from behind. We knew we had first and second place under wraps, so that gave us a great chance to practice leadouts and to use the men for practice. Kelli smartly stayed protected until the final sprint and took a glorious women’s victory with Jane right behind. It was sweet; we got lots of compliments from our fellow riders after the race on our strength. We were disappointed to learn that Sydney had not felt well and dropped out of the race. We’d gone to Lincoln primarily to go after her, but there was also tomorrow.

After staying at the home of our awesome Specialized Rep, Mark Anderson, meeting his nice family and friends and also his dog Goethe, who loved humping Jane’s leg all night, we awoke Sunday morning and headed over to the criterium (which was more of a circuit race). We found our legs very heavy as we began warming up but luckily the weather was a little warmer than Saturday and also more wind protected –yea! The women’s field had about a dozen women including a very strong category 1 rider named Sarah, who had just returned home to Omaha after racing for Penn State at the collegiate level. Again, no Sydney Brown racing. She was there cheering but battling a respiratory infection from Saturday. The race started and we quickly decided to work together and lay attack after attack on Sarah but she was super strong and we couldn’t seem to drop her with the wind. During the race, Sarah teased us, saying, “hey, you guys are totally teaming me”, which was followed by Jane saying, “we wouldn’t have to if you weren’t so strong”. The 30 minute race went quickly and Jane sprinted past Sarah on the uphill finish for another impressive PRC victory.

Thanks to Mark and his family, the other riders and for everyone for the announcing, officiating, pictures, write-ups, directions, compliments, etc. It was a great weekend of Oso burritos, Indian Food and mixing with lots of cool folks. Hopefully we’ll be back in Lincoln again next year but until then… so long.

Tonight's event will start at 5:30pm
Registration opens at 4:45pm
$10 for guys, $5 for girls
Events are insured, no USAC license needed.




UNION PARK IS LOCATED 1 MILE NORTH OF I-235 ON PENNSYLVANIA (PENN) AVE. From I-235 take the Pennsylvania (E.6th or Penn) Exit. Head north on Pennsylvania Ave 1 mile, and the park will be on your right hand side. Here's a map.

The course is a 1km loop with only soft turns and just one slight incline. Everyone will do at least 3 shorter races, giving you triple the opportunity to develop pack riding skills and take home a podium spot.

TONIGHT'S RACE SCHEDULE:

GUYS A: 8-Lap Scratch Race
GUYS B: 5-Lap Scratch Race
GIRLS: 5-Lap Scratch Race

GUYS A: 8-Lap Snowball Race
GUYS B: 5-Lap Snowball Race
GIRLS: 5-Lap Snowball Race

GUYS A: 20-Lap Points Race
GUYS B: 15-Lap Points Race
GIRLS: 12-Lap Points Race

*Order and distances may change depending on available daylight.

RACE DEFINITIONS:

Scratch Race: Just a normal, basic, as-you-should-understand-it, race. Go around the given number of laps, the first person done wins.

Snowball Race: After a neutral lap the winner of the first lap gets 1 point. The winner of the second lap gets 2 points. The winner of the third lap gets 3 points, and on and on. The winner is the person who has the most points at the end of the race.

Points Race: Every five or four laps we will award points to the first three people who cross the line. Those points will be 5, 3, and 1 for first, second, and third respectively. The person with the most points at the end of the race is the winner.

The remaining dates for RACE LIKE A GIRL are Thursdays May 22nd, June 26th, July 31st, and August 28th.

Last night Kelli was caught up in a crash on our local Tuesday night group ride. She was taken to the hospital by ambulance, has suffered some road rash on her face, a fair amount of swelling that has shut and blackened her left eye, lost a tooth, and spranged some fingers on her left hand. Yet despite all of that, Kelli is in good spirits and taking the proper steps of recovery. She has assured us that we will see her smiling face out on the bike very soon. Thanks to everyone who has called, emailed, and prayed with support.

Rather than one post for every single update we have... we thought we'd run a list for you. 1) We got some photos from the Great Dane Criterium, thanks Kristin! 2) We had 19 people attend the Safety & Etiquette clinic last night- Lou did a great job. 3) The Ritual Ride will happen again tomorrow, Ritual Cafe has extended their Wednesday hours to 8pm to accommodate our group after the ride. 4) We've just been told PRC will soon make the cover of a local Des Moines newspaper. 5) The first of five Race Like A Girl Criteriums will be this Thursday. 6) We're headed to IA City this weekend to race the Old Capitol Criterium. ...and that's all folks.

Jane and Jen made the trip to Madison, Wisconsin for the Great Dane Criterium this past weekend. They were treated to a powerhouse field of women with strong representation from the ISCorp and Kenda Tire teams. Jane flexed her muscles, covered the attacks, made the break, and drilled the finishing sprint but was nipped at the line giving her the silver. Jen won the field sprint for 7th.

Congratz to both of you ladies!

She has some of the greatest energy. She works extremely hard. She is always there for her teammates. She sacrifices her time for others. She's caring, driven, giving, capabale, beautiful, and sweet. She's also the tallest person in the room. She's just all sorts of awesome.

From Nebraska Cycling News: "The PRC ladies demonstrated why they are the standard in Midwest Women's cycling notching two seemingly effortless wins. In the Sunday circuit race at Pioneers Park in southwest Lincoln, Riessen crossed the finish line ahead of Sarah Bickerstaff, who battled the Iowa pair for the entire 30-minute contest." READ MORE.

We'd like to invite all of you to join us next week for a clinic on group cycling. The clinic is being led by Lou Waugaman, a category 1 cyclist racing for the Rasmussen Bike Shop Cycling Team. This clinic will cover proper positioning in a pack as well as basic tactics and etiquette. Hope to see you there!

Monday, April 21st at 6:00pm
Paglias Pizza at 5312 Merle Hay Road in Johnston

Sponsored by the women of All 9 Yards and Punk Rock Cycling

SAVE THE DATE!! We've moved our Thursday, May 1st PRC Duathlon to Big Creek State Park. We've upped the distance slightly to a 2-mile run, 12-mile bike, 2-mile run and pushed the start time back to 6pm. Nice flat roads for both the bike and run should make this an ideal course to set a record or two. We're currently working on a new race packet so keep your eyes glued to the website.

These duathlons are the perfect training for anyone looking to perform well at the Hy-Vee Triathlon and/or the Flatland Series. Top female and male finishers at the PRC Duathlon will be awarded with the coveted leader's jersey, plus we'll have some random prizes scattered throughout the field.

Take a look at the preliminary BIKE COURSE (two loops, clockwise) and the RUN COURSE (out and back).

And we're still offering kidsitting for all you parents, no 1-day or annual licenses needed for all you beginners, and we still have a course to suit people of all abilities. This is going to be a great event you shouldn't miss!

We’d like to remind everyone that tonight is the Wednesday Ritual Ride. This is a weekly recovery ride, a social ride, a slow ride, a get-to-know-ya ride… This ride is for the women looking to learn more about cycling and meet some cool ladies while you’re at it.

KIM TALKS ABOUT THE RITUAL RIDE!



MEET US AT:
Ritual Cafe. On 13th St between Grand & Locust. Downtown Des Moines.

TIME:
We will leave at 5:30pm SHARP!

ROUTE:
Through Water Works Park, southwest on the Great Western Bike Trail, toward Moffitt Lake, and back. View a detailed map HERE.

DISTANCE:
Roughly 22 miles once you make it back to the start point.

PACE:
Very social. Casual. Cool. Calm. Relaxed. Have a cup of tea and ride your velocipede like a champion type-of-fun!

BRING:
All bikes welcome, road bikes recommended. Pack the needed tools to change a flat tire. Check the weather and dress appropriately.

AFTERWARD:
Join us for dinner around 7pm at A-Dong Vietnamese Restaurant (a PRC favorite). Located at 15th & High St. Just a few blocks northwest of Ritual Cafe.

If you're looking to read some journals from each of the girls on the team... well we've got you covered! All you need to do is check out the Specialized profiles on their Riders Club page. The girls on the team have updated their page with some of their favorite photos and journals on everything from racing to crashing. You can view the team's Specialized Riders page by the clicking the individual links on the sidebar menu, or you can just start HERE.

And while you're poking around, take the time to create your own profile.

Day two in Lincoln, Nebraska for Jane and Kelli... this time they raced the second stage of the Spring Cycling Classic (a 2-mile circuit with an uphill finish). The Women's Open field quickly filtered down to a 3-woman breakaway with both Jane and Kelli representing the PRC. In the final sprint Jane took the win and Kelli landed third. A great showing by PRC all weekend in the cornhusker state.


Many thanks to Mark for providing housing all weekend!

Kelli and Jane were eager to make their way to Lincoln, Nebraska to race the Spring Cycling Classic. Waiting for them in Lincoln was the hometown favorite, Sydney Brown. In freezing temperatures, 20+mph winds, Kelli and Jane took first and second respectively in Saturday's road race. This counts as Kelli's very first win in the Women's Open category! Awesome job Kelli! Even though the weather in Lincoln was a huge challenge, or to quote Jane- "The most miserable (expletive deleted) 49 miles I've ever ridden", both girls are riding on a high from their performance today and they can't wait to team up again in tomorrow's criterium. Look to NCN for updates!

On April 5th, the day of the Altoona Road Race, we had all six girls together in Des Moines. We scheduled a photo shoot on the rooftop of the Teachout BUilding in Des Moines' East Village. Chris Maharry of Maharry Photography was kind enough to take all the shots, Jen was violently sick, and the wind was blowing everyone's hair right into their face.

Check out that set of photos HERE.

And check out Maharry Photography while you're at it.

You've got to love free hosting sites. Everything PRC does, we do on the cheap. Our website is BLOGGER. Our photos are FLICKR. Our downloads are YUNTAA. Our maps are MAPMYRIDE. We're on MYSPACE and RIDERSCLUB. So it was only a matter of time before we got around and built a page over at YouTube. We've already got a few videos for you to watch. Check'm out, link to them, embed them, whatever. CLICK HERE KID! Over. Out.

We wanted to remind everyone that tonight will be the second Ritual Ride. This is a weekly ride that we're hosting especially for all you women (but nice boys are still welcome). All abilities are expected to attend. Last week we had 32 people join in on the Ritual... 14 of which were women. That was an incredible turnout, really. We hope to see even more out there this week. So bring a friend and have them bring a friend as well.


MEET US AT: Ritual Cafe. On 13th St between Grand & Locust. Downtown Des Moines.

TIME: We will leave at 5:30pm SHARP!

ROUTE: Through Water Works Park, southwest on the Great Western Bike Trail, across to Moffitt Lake, and back. View a detailed map HERE.

DISTANCE: Roughly 22 miles once you make it back to the start point.

PACE: Very social. Casual. Cool. Calm. Fun. Recovery. Whatever you need to tell yourself so that you understand attacks, break aways, and sprints have no place on this ride.

BRING: All bikes welcome, road bikes recommended. Pack the needed tools to change a flat tire. Check the weather and dress appropriately.

AFTERWARD: Join us for dinner around 7pm at A-Dong Vietnamese Restaurant (a PRC favorite). Located at 15th & High St. Just a few blocks northwest of Ritual Cafe.

PRC Women will have riders at the back of the pack. That way no one gets lost or suffers a mechanical alone. We can't wait to see you!!

Jane lands her second victory in 7 days by winning the Women's Open at the Big Creek Road Race just north of Des Moines, and Kelli followed Cat-4 victory on Saturday by racing the Women's Open and taking an extremely impressive third place behind Jane and Team Revolution's Sydney Brown. (The final sprint is pictured). In the Big Creek Cat-4 race Ana was edged out by the A9Y women's team yet still took an awesome third place finish in the sprint. A slap-yo-butt-kicker weekend for the entire PRC crew! See the PRC pictures HERE.

And view/purchase Fry Guy's pics of all the weekend's racing HERE.

The Altoona Road Race was the first time that all 6 of the PRC women got together for a day of racing. Kelli stormed the final stretch of the C4 race to take her first road race victory- CONGRATZ KELLI!! ...while Jane won a gnarly field sprint to take third behind Catherine Walberg and Sydney Brown. Emily, Ana, & Maria all finished in the top 10 of the C4 race, while Jen got wasted sick while she was here (get better JG!).

You can view a collection of photos from the race HERE.
Or play our newest game: WHERE'S WALBERG?
Or comment on WHAT COULD MARIA BE SAYING?

We will be racing the Altoona and Big Creek Road Race this weekend. If you're in Central Iowa we'd love to see you out there racing, watching, cheering, screaming, loving, BBQing, rocking, rolling, texting, emailing, or whatever it is you enjoy doing on a weekend. This is the race flyer... it's got all the start times and directions.

Our long lost teammate Jen will be making her way down from the wonderful waters of of Green Bay to do the races. So we'll have a full roster! This is going to be sweet. See ya soon.

We have been so lucky to work with Oakley for our eyewear this year. And we're absolutely stoked about the ENDURE. This piece is Oakley's newest in their line of sport-specific eyewear for women, and along with the Luna team- PRC will be the test pilots for these glasses. Last Sunday Ana rocked the first demo pair at the Kent Park Classic (pictured)... this weekend at the Altoona & Big Creek Road Races all of the PRC crew will be rollin the ENDURE. These glasses are not yet on the Oakley site, so please swing by and check out the glasses, if you'd like a pair of your own, we're sure Rasmussen Bike Shop will have them available for sale in May.

The weather has taken an ugly toll on Water Works Park and road conditions have become prohibitively bad. The park loops are plagued with new gravel, broken road, and pot holes. We're very bummed to report that tonight's event has been cancelled. Thanks for understanding; we want PRC events to be fun and safe. We will plan for the series to continue in May. We're pursuing alternative locations for the May 1 and May 29 events, so stay tuned.

Have you created an account on the Specialized Riders website yet? Why not, huh? C'mon, you know you want to. All the cool kids are doing it. It's free, and you don't have to own a Specialized bike to be a member. It's a great way to post a pretty picture of yourself comment on other cyclists and hook up for rides when you're heading out of town. Or in town- whatever. So... we hope you take the time to sign up, we'd really appreciate it.


Check out the Punk Rock Cycling Riders Page.

We’d like to remind everyone that tonight is the first Wednesday Ritual Ride. This is a weekly recovery ride, a social ride, a slow ride, a get-to-know-ya ride… whatever you have to tell yourself to understand that attacks, sprints, and go-fast-win-all attitudes have no place here. This ride is for the women looking to learn more about cycling and meet some cool ladies while you’re at it. Guys are welcome but understand that a no-drop rule is in place.


MEET US AT:
Ritual Cafe. On 13th St between Grand & Locust. Downtown Des Moines.

TIME:
We will leave at 5:30pm SHARP!

ROUTE:
Through Water Works Park, southwest on the Great Western Bike Trail, across to Moffitt Lake, and back. View a detailed map HERE.

DISTANCE:
Roughly 22 miles once you make it back to the start point.

PACE:
Very social. Casual. Cool. Calm. Fun.

BRING:
All bikes welcome, road bikes recommended. Pack the needed tools to change a flat tire. Check the weather and dress appropriately.

AFTERWARD:
Join us for dinner around 7pm at A-Dong Vietnamese Restaurant (a PRC favorite). Located at 15th & High St. Just a few blocks northwest of Ritual Cafe.

PRC Women will have riders at the back of the pack. That way no one gets lost or suffers a mechanical alone. We can't wait to meet all of you!!

I plan to do some track races this season and Friday night was my first night on my new fixie (other than the Little 500 bike I cruised around on during spring training camp, but that had a coaster brake, so it doesn't count). I get the bike all set up (a 2007 Specialized Langster Comp), which obviously doesn't take much and take a spin around a parking garage without my cleats on...just to get a feel for it. To my surprise, I had a lot more control that I thought I would, so I slipped on the bike shoes and hit the streets. Now, keep in mind, I am not quite sure how I am going to perform on this bike, so I have to at least make sure that I am sporting the fixie culture look. I'm wearing brown cords with the pant leg rolled up, a Harlot hoodie long sleeve shirt (that says "ride bikes be fabulous"), and my Chrome messenger bag.

Nathan and I head down to Ritual Cafe to try to catch a group ride that is taking off for Jane's big 30 birthday, but we already missed them, so we head to Gray's Lake and then over to Waterworks Park. While in Waterworks, we pull up to a couple stray riders from the group ride (oddly enough, Kim and Lou)...and the first words out of Lou's mouth are "hey look at you...before you know it you're going to have a nose ring...how do like the bike?" Not but about a couple minutes after chatting with those two, we run into the rest of the birthday ride. Obviously they cut the ride short, so we turn around with them. While we are riding, everyone notices that I am on my new fixie and I make sure they all know that I love it. My favorite quote comes from Jane regarding my outfit..."I want to to started dressing like Emily now instead of Nathan"...oh Jane, you crack me up.

Ride continues on. Next stop...A Dong (amazing Vietnamese restaurant. If you have never eaten there, I suggest 119, 16C, 17, 3C, 20C, and 13 (no bone). Just don't ever get the sweet beans. Moving on...after dinner we cruise down Bike Kollective for a gathering of friends to continue Jane's birthday celebration. After a couple drinks and some great conversations, we decided to leave the party around 10pm for a cold ride home. We made a pit stop at the grocery for eggs, cough drops, and frozen yogurt. We rolled our bikes into Dahls and caught the attention of an older cashier who noticed that my bike was a track bike. He shared a handful of stories with us and wished us a good evening. I think he used to ride bikes...I wonder why he doesn't anymore? Hmm.

So the night has ended and I can't wait to be on my track bike again. The only downfall is that I woke up the next morning with very sore quads. And, the next day, they hurt even worse. Fixies are great...everyone should have a one!

-Emily