Monday, August 2, 2010

What's in your closet?

How do you raise the blogging bar?  One theory is to join forces with another writer and hope that the combined output is more dazzling than either could do on their own.  Ah, but an ironic twist this is.  Most endurance sports are individual pursuits - a single athlete versus other athletes or the clock.  But Kovas from Midwest Multi-Sport Life and I have no problem bucking the system.  Are we early adopters of a new trend in blogging?  Or do we just want to be the blogging world's version of Hall & Oats?  Only time will tell.

Today we compare/contrast our equipment and how it is stored. 

Kovas = regular font

Patrick = bold italic font

Some people have a gear closet, others a gear room. Patrick and I suspect that Jeff has a climate-controlled vault with a secret lab for nutrition research. I have space down in the basement, sharing the area with children’s toys and boxes of varying shapes and sizes. Some might call it a Pain Cave; to me, it’s The Corner.

As you can see, it straddles a not very fine line between organization and complete chaos.

I haven't named my area, but it's the front right quarter of my garage.  Save for clothing, most of my stuff (at least theoretically) goes here, and shares the space with tools, a workbench and and a few restoration projects that have not been touched since I've started triathlon. 
 
My bike is a Look 555, with Campagnolo, Bontrager, and 3t components. It is way more bike than I deserve, but as I ride and get stronger, I hope the cycling gods are at least chuckling a little less. My favorite riding gear is my Garneau bib, Bigfoot Triathlon full-zip jersey, and my Sidi shoes. 


In the foreground you can see my Cycle-Ops trainer and riser block, for riding inside. My other bike is a Fisher Rig 29er, one speed to help teach me not to pedal squares. In the future, when I compete in offroad triathlons, this will be the bike!

My bikes (a Specialized Transition TT bike and a Bianchi Mono-Q road bike) take center stage in this little world.  In fact the bikes are the only gear that consistently ends up back in the same place every time.  You can't see it in this picture, but there are various piles of supporting gear strewn around.


If you look close enough, you can see various other bikes in the background: a couple of beach cruisers, Ian's Specialized Jr. BMX bike, and Mary's mountain bike. 

Why is my Xterra Vortex3 inside out? That’s how it came home from the Bigfoot Triathlon and I really like the blue color, so inside out it has remained. If I ever actually swim again, I can’t imagine I’d find a better wetsuit for the price.

Don’t know why the Xterra logo is upside down.

Why is my 2XU SC:2 sleeveless wetsuit inside out?  Because I just finished rinsing it off from this weekend's open water swim.  In all honesty, I HATE rinsing my suit.  It's one of those things - despite the fact that it only takes 5 minutes, it feels like it takes hours and I'm loathe to do it.  The suit is hanging next to a Zinfandel vine that I've had for 5 years that has never borne any fruit.  In fact, this year the vine barely has any leaves.



One of these things is not like the others… I’ve been partial to this line of Nikes recently and I rotate between the Lunartrainers and the two pairs of Lunarglides. Recently, Somnio sent me a pair of Westridge trail shoes to test out and so far they are really great. This is really an embarrassment of riches really, who needs 4 pairs of running shoes?


This high-tech storage system was custom-designed by me, but I believe patio furniture stores sell something very similar. 

As far as running shoes go, I am a Newton man (right).  It makes buying new shoes really easy, I just go get the exact same pair.  There is not any other gear that I use that I am this TOTALLY loyal too, preferring to experiment with new things as I replace them.  That said, I currently wear New Balance 875's (left) on the trails and Zoot 2.0 racing flats (center) when it's go time.

 
In the corner reside the hats and some minor swag picked up recently. As the years go by, there will be more. Oh yes, there will be more.



I don't have a hat/swag section.  Consider those items part of the "supporting gear" that currently lives in various piles.  However, this would be a good time to point out that the laundry service in my house is super-efficient.  Currently drying on the rolling rack is a pair of Louis Garneau bib shorts, the black version of a "Runners High" tech tee (best. tee. ever.), a Tyr one piece tri-suit and a San Diego Triathlon Series cycling jersey.


The remainder of my gear resides in this dresser, organized VERY neatly (some might claim anally): socks and small stuff up top, swim stuff top drawer, bike stuff center drawer, and running at the bottom. Nothing hierarchical about it and I just realized it’s the typical order of a triathlon. There are NO coincidences!

(Sleek and modern, a most useful hand-me-down.)

Storage for the various pairs of shorts, tees, compression clothing, socks, arm warmers and whatever else I have is in an unremarkable drawer in the closet of the bedroom.  Lately I have been obsessed with Capo crew length cycling socks, with the pair below being my current favorite.  I wear them when I ride, but then I keep them on all day.  I like to think that rolling around town with shaved legs in a pair of duo-toned cycling socks gives me a certain "don't-mess-with-me-unless-you-want-a-metric-wrench-to-the-side-of-your head" look.  That's right, I'm an American and I just used the word "metric".


Kovas, is this where I am supposed to ask everybody where they store their stuff?  We never discussed this part...

22 comments:

Big Clyde said...

Is it possible to for one topic to be macho and nerdy at the same time?

LOL

Barbie said...

What a totally fantastic way to blog. A great two for one offer - I love it. Well done guys.

krystyna47 said...

Nice post - I loooove seeing other people's tri stuff.
As for me, when I moved to Melbourne, I realized that I had brought 1 drawer full of tri tops (including bike jerseys, run tops, long sleeve and shortsleeve etc) and 1 drawer full of tri bottoms (run shorts, run crops, bike shorts, etc etc), a boat load of swim suits, some caps, goggles, fins, a bike, helmet, bike booties... and the tri list goes on.
I also noticed that ALL of my other clothing (my day-to-day clothing) fit into 1 drawer and on a couple hangers.
Ooops...?

FLATOUT JIM said...

You guys put me to shame. My "PAIN CAVE" is a complete mess with lawn tools, bike parts, and my trainer all over the floor which is covered in bontragger tyre dust.

My clothes is kept in my walkin closet in a plastic bin. Just stuffed in there in no particular order.

Now that's macho.

valen said...

very cool post! It never occurred to me that all the tri stuff needed to be in the same place.

DRog said...

Great post! I'm with Jim...all my gear is totally unorganized...I really need to get on that! my gear is basement / garage combo all over the place. not good
-D

Big Daddy Diesel said...

My tri cave has everything I need, tv with dvr, portable dvd player for my spinervals, my stable of bikes, dreadmill, inspirational quotes all over the place. I am quite proud of mine.

Johann said...

Fantastic post! I really enjoyed this.

Diana Tries-A-Tri! said...

Very interesting. I agree that it's interesting to see how other people organize their life. I have piles (very organized haha). One for tops, one for bottoms, the swim suit and wet suit always reside in the bathroom and gear like goggles, heart rate monitor etc go in a pile by the bedroom door. It's weird, but it works!

Jon said...

In other words, Triathlete's have too much crap ;)

Good post!

Unknown said...

Hall & Oats? With all that lycra pictured it is more like Siegfried and Roy!

Great job guys, except for the part where you outed my climate controlled nutrition lab.

I like the "Pain Cave" reference b/c it is so true. I have my upstairs gameroom set up as my pain cave and the left side of the garage as the storage area. My car now lives outside so the bikes and other gear can have their own special place!

Kudos to the first collaborative post!

Caratunk Girl said...

fantastic collaboration! I really enjoyed this post.

Pahla said...

Ha, ha!! The blogging multisport Hall and Oates, I love it!
Great post, I will be showin' off my gear soon. :-)

Unknown said...

Great post, guys.

I had to laugh at the comment about socks and shaving legs. Last night, I bought a pair of DeFeet socks for my 9 year old, who then proceeded to ask me if he could shave his legs for cycling!

KovasP said...

Hall & Oates? Siegfried & Roy? I was thinking more Dumb and Dumber, except with cool gear.

KovasP said...

Just noticed that the 2XU logo is upside down on your wetsuit as well. Must be an industry thing.

Rad Runner said...

tomatoe-toemaaaaaatoe?
Either way, the gear is awesome, and you can tell its used.. AND can you believe there are people out there that have these toys/tools and just have them for show? PFFFFFF....

64 CLASSIC said...

Hey, Hall and Oates, Sigfried and Roy, Dumb and Dumber....

Peaches and Herb, Brookes and Dunn, Simon and Garfunkel....

I don't care who you guys are, I love this post.

I'd turn it into a giveaway challenge if I had anything to peddle that someone would like. Coupons from the Sunday paper anyone????

Anne said...

What a fun post! Since I don't do tris, I only have running stuff to organise. But, believe me, that can be a lot! :) My bottom drawer is barely closing. I need to figure out a better way.

Amy said...

The logos on the inside actually aren't upside down. When you're in the process of taking them off (post swim) and you have the top half off but the bottom half on, it's right-side up. Basically, it's advertising for the manufacturer!

Jennifer said...

Great post! I love it. You two are funny and I love seeing the inner workings of other people's spaces. I may have to show mine in my next post! Cheers!

Lindsay said...

nice collaboration! you guys have a ton of crap! but then again... so do i.

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