To Pro or not to Pro?

Here's a question I tought was answered a few years ago with a huge NO..... but thanks to some new rule changes and certain things in the past falling just right I kinda have to make a new decision on this. To fully understand this whole question I think we need to rewind a few yesrs....

When I first started liking bikes I was all about the mountain bike. According to all the bike magazines I was reading at the time, road bikes were for sissy whinners and I was too cool for them, however they did aknowledge that you could get into realy good shape for MTB racing by riding a road bike. So one day I took the money I had been saving up to buy a special edition Shawn Palmer suspension fork and used it to buy a road bike. From there the road bike prety much took over untill I eventualy found myself riding on a pretty awsome team of road racers.

While I was in the midst of road racing most every week I kept up a bit on the MTB and entered a few of those races whenever I could. My first MTB race I skipped over "beginner" class and won the "sport" class so I decided to upgrade right away to "expert". Through the rest of the season I got destoyed by the expert class racers but thanks to the series points counting attendance more than actual results I wound up as state champion just by showing up more than anyone else. The following year I raced expert again but was actualy winning or finising on the podium every race. When it came time for the last race of they year I got the short end of the same stick that gave me the state title the year before and even though I probably should have won the overall, I missed a race and was out of competion for it. Since winning an expert race rewarded the victor with a water bottle or similar bike gear and placing in the top 5 of the "Pro/Semi-pro" class paid cold hard cash I talied up my results over the previous year and upgraded to Semi-pro.

Since I upgraded I've only done 3 races I can think of right now. The first had some very tough competition and I was ridding great to take top 5 until a flat that turned into a 15min trailside disaster, the second I should have had 3rd but squandered a huge lead and got nipped to end up in 4th. And the third race which I did just last year was a total disgrace to the sport as I was putting in lap times that were more on par for the beginner class (I know I would have lost the sport class and maybe wouldn't have even made the podium with the beginners!).

For a couple years I've been toying with the idea of doing a bunch of MTB racing with my semi-pro license and have a goal of eventualy earning my Pro upgrade. The different license wouldn't make any diference for any local races since they all race the semi-pros and Pros together, but it would leave open the opportunity to travel to some national level race and get to toe the line with the real Pros. Not expecting awsome results but more just to be able to someday tell my kids I kinda was cool once.

Now, here we are at the current question.....USAcycling decided to change up the catagories for MTB racing from: beginner, sport, expert, semi-pro, Pro to: 3, 2, 1, Pro. With most catagories being automaticly converted into the new system except for semi-pros being given the choice of being cat 1 or Pro. So I guess the question kind of is: if you set a goal to accomplish something cool and before you do any real work towards the goal, someone offers to just hand out the reward to you, do you take it?

Here's why I'm thinking I shouldn't:

If I show up to some big race as a "Pro" but I ride slower than the weekend warriors on borrowed bikes I'd be totaly disrespecting the guys who really did earn their way to the top.

I might be missing out on alot of satisfaction of working for it and earning the upgrade.

My time is limited these days and I'm already commited to race alot on the road in '09 and if I put off my big MTB race to another year I'd still have to buy my new license next year to get the automatic upgrade and Pro liceses are very expensive to buy and not use.

Here's why I'm thinking I should:

You don't look a gift horse in the mouth.

If I raced a big Pro race I'd still only do it if I trained a ton for it and was totaly ready to make a good showing.

I might not ever have the time to earn the license outright, so this may very well be my only chance.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory wouldn't have been a very good story if when Charlie Bucket found the golden ticket for his factory tour and lifetime supply of chocolate he said "nah, we should give this to a fat kid who could realy make the most of all that chocolate."

Any thoughts?

Roughing it in my own house

The last few weeks have been super crazy, possibly even krazy enough to spell it with a "k"! But fortunatly all this krazyness has been for a good cause, getting our house buoght, modified and moved into (plus for some strange reason my new job gets a bit nuts durring potato harvest which is right now).

To recap on some of the most recent adventures:

Closed on our house sometime around the 15thish of September (I really can't remember now) and we got a good deal on a good place. It was way cheaper than anything good we could have gotten in Boise or even Poky for that matter, we stayed well within our budget and the place is awsome. Sofar AF is quite nice too.

The house was in great shape and had alot of brand new remodeling already done (new wiring, plumbing, insulation, most windows) but it needed a couple changes to make it fit our family just right. What would become Susie's room was joined with the main floor bathroom so we decided to build a wall with a door to split things up. And I needed to do some wiring to make way for an eventual dishwasher and to convert a built-in book case into a nice spot for my new TV.

The wiring went mostly smooth, took forever to fish the wires to where I needed them and I only got juiced once.

The wall was quite the ordeal of its own. Kayla's dad was in town when I started so he was a huge help it getting it framed and most of the dry wall up. From there I still had the finishing and hanging the door to do after work and on one weekend when Kayla was in Boise for the Women's Fitness Celebration. That Sunday night I decided to do a bunch of work and just stay the night at the house on our air matress..... When I showed up I realized I forgot my pillow (I'm very picky about my pillows) so I was a bit worried but not too bad. Then I worked my tail off untill about midnight and decided to go get the air matress ready. Only then did I discover that the air matress was missing the drain plug. So I suddenly realized I had no pillow, no matress, the whole house has hard-wood floors and I was way too tired to safley make the drive back to my bed in Poky.... I ended up dragging a roll of carpet pad up from the basement to go with a nasty set of cusions off the lawn funiture the seller left us (where she would sit to drink and smoke). I slept like crap and between then and now has been one long string of working at my job, working on the house, fighting off being sick and not having time to sleep.

But in the end... we're loving our house and all the projects seem to have turned out nicely.

Since all posts are better with a pic, here's a random shot of me and my wall.