teamkiesan.com - New Zealand

Home

You can click here to go to past News Items.

Latest Report 25th February 2008

SORRY FOR NO UPDATES FOR SUCH A LONG TIME! BUT I AM CURRENTLY IN THE PROCESS OF BUILDING A NEW WEBSITE, VERY EXCITING!! SO HOPEFULLY IT WILL JUST LINK IN TO THE NEW ONE WHEN IT IS ALL UP AND RUNNING. NOT SURE OF THE NAME YET BUT ITS LOOKING LIKE IT WILL BE JOKIESANOWSKI.COM

HOPE TO SEE YOU ALL THERE SOON!

THANKS,

JO.

Worlds in Stuttgart

Hi there,

I raced the World Road Champs in Stuttgart, Germany a coupe of weeks ago. I was very pleased with how the race went for me, just apart from the final 300m!! I made the front group of only 20 girls, so on this hilly hard course I was pleased with how I was climbing. The Italians raced great together and in the final lap Bastianelli got away solo and won by just 6 seconds from my group. I went with an attack just before the last corner as it was a tough uphill finish so I didn't think it would be a normal sprint - I should've waited. I ended up 15th, when we were sprinting for the silver medal. I don't think I had much gas left in the tank! But it does bode well for next year in Beijing as apparently it will also be a very selective course.

I had a great week in Luzern after Worlds, doing some shopping, eating out, staying at flash hotels..click here to see the Hotel Montana - Tanja and I decided to treat ourselves! Also went to the Crowded House concert which was unbelieveable, they played for just over 2 hours straight! I love them even more now. Their new album is cool.

Now I am home in Colorado for a month or so. I just bought a piano 2 days ago, so exciting! Now I'm trying to get lots of music together that I used to play when I was younger. One of my fav pieces is Rondo Alla Turca by Mozart - I almost have it down again.

I have been running up the incline, click here - its such a good workout. Jeff and I are about to go for a mountainbike soon too, we have loads of cool trails near us.

On Monday we are off to Hawaii for a week! Yay, I have never been before so I really looking forward to a relaxing holiday, lots of swimming and sunbathing hopefully!

Thanks for reading,
Jo.

Canterbury Sportswoman.....

Hi there,

Just a quick update to let you know that the Canterbury Sportsperson of the Year Awards were last night and Mum, Dad, Michelle, Ryan, Bec and some of my Aunts and Uncles went along to the dinner.
It was the first time I have been nominated and I won! Cool. Thanks to Dad for saying a good speech for me!
I just got home to the Springs, I will write a longer update here soon.

3 weeks 'till Worlds!!

Hi there,

Well I am well on the way to counting down the days until the World Champs in Stuttgart! My race is on the 29th of September, 133kms, 7 laps of a 19km course. I went to Stuttgart a couple of weeks ago with Michelle to check out the course, it's only a 3 hour drive from Luzern. I really like it when I can picture the course when I am out training and try to find similar climbs to ride up. So until then I only have two more races left. Next Sunday the 15th is the final round of the World Cup in Nurnberg, Germany where our team will try and defend our individual and team World Cup overall win from last year. Nicole has an 80 point lead over Marianne Vos, but in the last round the points are doubled, so it is still reasonably tight with a win giving you 150 points.

2 days after Nurnberg I go down to Italy for the 6 day Giro di Toscana, it finishes just 6 days before the Worlds. I decided to try something different this year with my build up and see how I respond with racing just before. At the moment I am doing a good 2 week training block and also had great training in the month of August. I did a 5 day race in France, Trophee d�Or with the NZ national team. I enjoyed racing with the NZ girls again, it had been awhile! They really supported me in the races and I was 2nd, 3rd, 5th and 5th in 4 of the stages and ended up 5th overall. So at the moment it�s another week of solid training then the fun starts with the racing! .

Here in Luzern it�s beautiful at the moment because we got a good dose of snow on the mountains, it looks gorgeous. But, a little cold for training the last few days, it only got to 12 the other day! I have been very cultured lately and went to a piano concert the other night in the big music hall here. There is a big festival in Luzern for about 6 weeks throughout the summer with all sorts of classical music playing. On Wednesday night I have a ticket to see the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra play, how awesome! The Vienna and London Orchestras are also playing but those tickets have been sold out for awhile. Oh and another concert I just bought tickets to is Crowded House in Zurich a few days after Worlds�.. very cool.

Ok � time for bed.
Joanne.

Making the most of the summertime!

I love this time of year when Switzerland has their sales. I was getting withdrawal symptoms from just looking in the windows so Wednesday and Thursday I had a couple of good days! The best bargin had to be my Diesel pants that were 70% off, score! We have had a really cool week after the Giro finished. On Sunday myself, Tanja and Emma went to watch the Rowing World Cup here in Luzern, NZ did really well and won 7 medals with 4 of them being gold � I hope they do well at the World Champs coming up in about 5 weeks time.

We also went swimming in the lake, the weather here has been so hot for the last week so we have jumped in the lake a couple of times. We found 2 new places to swim here, it really is gorgeous here. On Monday the 3 of us plus Nikki (our new teammate from Oz aswell) went up the steepest cog railway in the world to the top of Mt Pilatus. Quite funny really, we live at the bottom of the oldest cog railway in the world in Colorado Springs so now I will have to go on that one also to the top of Pikes Peak. This one was amazing though, the steepest gradient was 48%, it�s not a good idea to look down if you�re afraid of heights! The 360 degree views were awesome from up there, it was fun seeing the routes where we ride everyday from that perspective. We chose a good day to be up there as it was about 20 degrees and no clouds about. Quite often we look up there and it�s covered in cloud and much colder, that day it got up to 34 down in Luzern though so it was nice to get a break from that heat! After coming back down the mountain we had a yummy BBQ at Thomas and Priskas (manager and teammate) house which is just 20mins from us, she is a great cook so good food and a few drinks were had by all.

I have had some good training rides here in the last week, I�m getting ready to race again on Tuesday at the Thuringen tour in Germany. This will be my fourth time at this race � this time though it starts with a team time trial prologue, only 4kms, so it will be all on from the start. The terrain is really tough in Thuringen, pretty much no flat. The climbs are never that long though, most of them being 1-3kms.

I�m loving my new Cervelo TT bike, I had a great prologue at the Giro d�Italia and was 6th. The Giro didn�t go as good as I might have hoped. I was 5th, 10th and 11th in 3 other stages. I�m hoping for better results next week!! It was cool being in Italy again though. We went down as far as Florence and Pisa which is the furthest south I have been! It was my first time in Tuscany and I can see why a lot of cyclists live and train there, it was beautiful. We stayed a night in Montecatini Terme which would be relaxing place to have a holiday as it has all the natural spas. That was near the start of our 10km uphill time trial that wasn�t that much fun for me! The other stages were super fast and the weather was very hot the whole time we were there. The average for the whole 9 day tour was 39.6km/h with some stages averaging 42km/h!

Well I better get going and get my easy spin in for today and get packed up as we are leaving tomorrow morning for the race, we are based in a town called Zeulenroda and stay at a nice hotel the whole time � it�s about 700km from here.

Talk soon, Jo.

Climbing Mt Evans

On Sunday I decided to go and climb Mt Evans (14,264ft, 4347m) up near Denver. The road is the highest in the U.S and the week before Jeff had done a running race up it � (14.5 miles, 3rd in his age group). After seeing the masses of cyclists riding up it that Saturday I was psyched for a massive ride the next weekend.
Jeff and I drove to Morrison (5700ft, 1737m), I got out and he continued driving to the trailhead of Mt Bierstadt where he was going to climb his 16th 14er (mountains over 14,000ft, we have 54 of them here in Colorado!) So from Morrison to the top it was 77.5kms pretty much all uphill except for a 5km downhill after Squaw Pass and a couple of parts where I got a bit of a rest from going uphill. After the summit I descended into Idaho Springs where Jeff picked me up after his run. So all in all it was about 9000ft, 2740m of climbing in total, loving it!

I�ve also been racing track here too which has been fun, I have racing tonight if the weather holds up � we have had a few thunderstorms here in the afternoons/evenings. Yesterday was a big one, they even had a tornado touch down in a town just 30km up the mountain from us. I think the racing on the track will be great for me with the Giro d�Italia coming up and a lot of sprinters stages it looks like. I�m super excited for the Giro, it starts on the 6th of July and is 9 days long.

Congrats to my Swiss teammates Karin, Priska and Pascale who just got 1st, 2nd and 3rd in the Swiss TT champs and good luck to all my other teammates that are racing their national champs this weekend!

Thanks for reading,
Jo.

Gotta love living in Colorado!

At 2:54am this morning we were woken up by some rustling outside. I got up to see what it was and a big bear was staring back at me! Our window was open but we did have a screen that was saving us from him jumping inside! When he heard me he jumped up into the tree for a bit then just casually walked over to the lawn and sat down. Jeff then opened the door and started to take photos of him so then he climbed up into another tree and just watched Jeff! After another minute or so he went over the fence into the neighbours yard. It was funny because we had a bear a couple of years ago come and tip over our bins and eat all the food but as soon as we made some noise he was off and running. This one wasn�t even scared or worried about us!

I haven�t written for awhile sorry, have been traveling and racing a lot - but thanks Michelle for putting up pics and updates from Tour de L�Aude especially.
I am back here at home for another 2 and a half weeks before I go back to Europe where my first race back will be the Giro d�Italia which I am very excited to do again! I did it in 2005 and just loved it.
So I�ll start with the race in Philly which was just last Sunday. I was 4th, that�s my best placing there so far so I was happy with that - but annoyed to just miss the podium at such a huge and prestigious race. I felt very strong in the race and was always cresting �the wall� in the top 5-10, a couple of times we had a breakaway group but after a few kms T-Mobile or Nurnberger would always bring it back as they both were keen for a bunch sprint.

Montreal World Cup was the Saturday before Philly and my Raleigh team came over to defend Nicoles overall lead. The race was hard and more aggressive I thought this year with finishing down on the flat. It went well for us and Nicole was 5th with Vos taking 4th, so not really digging too much into the lead.
After the race we had a nice dinner out with the team at a Greek restaurant downtown Montreal. The next day Jeff and I checked into the Hyatt Montreal for 2 nights. It�s always fun for me staying in big cities; I love the shopping, sightseeing and good restaurants.
Then my lovely husband had organized 3 nights for us staying up in Mont Tremblant which is a gorgeous little ski resort town just an hour and a half drive from Montreal! It was very relaxing as we were staying at a great resort that Jeff had picked out � Chateau Beauvallon click here I also did some cool training rides there to prepare for Philly, there were lots of lakes and rivers to ride around, very beautiful. It was great to see another part of Canada as I really haven�t visited many places there before.

Well I�m off now to go and make some roasted red pepper hummus with my new mini food processor that we got as a wedding present. I have made a tomato salsa and butternut squash dip so far - mmmmm yummy!!

Jo.

Pics from Philly taken by Zui

You can see me in my black jersey on the left of the pic about to get 4th

Jeff and I before the start of the race

Climbing the "wall"

27 May Tour de L'aude

Another great day for JoJo. She got in a break of 8 riders early on in the stage and they stayed away. She finished 2nd to Ina Tutenberg and ended up 8th on GC, what an awesome effort! On the last climb of the day, Jo had a problem with her derailleur and had to get off her bike and fix it, then jump back on and chase onto the group again.

At the awards dinner she was given the 'malchance' trophy for getting so close in so many stages but never getting a win! To finish top 10 in a tour with the best riders in the world is an amazing effort and shows her class as a bike rider.

She finished:
2nd in the points competition
2nd in the sprint competition
2nd in 2 stages
3rd in 1 stage
4th in 2 stages
6th in 1 stage
7th in 2 stages
8th overall

click here for stage 9 results and final GC.

26 May

Hey, Jo had another great day today. They had a double day, and she finished 7th in both stages and is now 9th on GC. She is a true climber now!

Yesterday, Jo made the front group over the climb and finished in a select group of about 20 riders.

1 day to go... tomorrow will be an exciting stage with 3 major climbs and the tour wide open. Judith Arndt slipped back to 3rd today behind Susanne Ljungskog of Flexpoint and Trixi Worrack of Nurnberger so I'm sure the TMobile team will be out to get the yellow back.
click here for results of stage 8a
click here for results of stage 8b

24 May, Stage 6

Good news and bad news...

Hi there,
I just talked with Jo and she got 2nd in the stage today which is a great result. However, she was really disappointed as she was in a 2 up sprint against Linda Villumsen Serup of T Mobile and came out 2nd best. With about 40km to go Jo got in a really strong break of 6 riders. Linda had a free ride the whole break as her team mate Judith Arndt is in yellow so she wasn't allowed to work it. Nearer the end Linda attacked and Jo was the only one to go with her. So when it came to the sprint unfortunately Linda ended up beating Jo. Still a great result for Jo, but I can understand her being disappointed being so close. And a birthday win would've been nice! She is now 10th on GC. Very impressive.
click here for results

23 May, Stage 5

Just talked with Jo, they had a big mountain stage today, with 2 hors category climbs. She is climbing really well and finished in the 2nd bunch of about 11 riders. She was 15th in the stage and is now 12th on GC. It's her birthday tomorrow so she's hoping for a birthday win!

22 May, Stage 4

PODIUM!!!

Great news, Jo was 3rd in today's stage behind Marianne Vos and Judith Arndt. Check out www.womenscycling.net for results and photos.

21st May

Jo is having a very consistent tour so far finishing 6th in the first road stage, her team was 4th in the TTT and she just finished 4th in the stage today.

19th May Tour de L'aude

Hi, Michelle here, Jo had an awesome prologue finishing 16th, with her team mate Christiane Soeder taking out the win. Check out www.cyclingnews.com for results.

Team Raleigh - Lifeforce Photo Shoot

Team Raleigh - Lifeforce Photo Shoot

Not an ideal home race performance....

Well our home World Cup in Berne, Switzerland didn't go as planned really. Nicole ended up 4th which isn't too bad, but Marianne Vos was 2nd so she is really closing in on the World Cup overall. Now it's down to 56 points difference. 4 more rounds to go though - it's a long season, the last one isn't until the middle of September.
My race wasn't the best. I was suffering from bad stomach cramps for awhile, however they did calm down and I felt fine for the last 60kms. But not good enough to make the front break of 9 that formed on the last time up the climb, about 12kms to the finish. I am so disappointed in myself for not being able to make it, but as always with racing, you live and learn. I was so surprised that some of the other teams that didn't make it didn't chase it down in time. We ended up catching them right on the line so even came in with the same time. I was 15th. Edita Puckinskaite won the race solo, just like when I rode with her on Nobili in 2005 she won this race the same way! Good on her, she is a really nice girl.

We got fresh snow here in Central Switz up in the mountains last night and today! I just got back from training, I waited out the rain for a bit then went out, I still got hailed and rained on, but it was only for the last 40mins so wasn't too bad.
Tomorrow I am going to go to the warehouse and try out my freshly built Cervelo TT bike - very exciting! But I am always nervous jumping on a new bike and changing positions etc etc.

We are leaving for southern France on Thursday morning at 6:15, lucky for us. The drive is 800kms from here. The race starts on Friday afternoon with a prologue and finishes 10 days later. Emma has decided to pull out as she is really just fatigued at the moment so it wouldn't have been smart to try and do a 10 day tour feeling like that! So now my roommate Tanja is going to start in her first big tour. Emma says she will either love her or hate her after it - I will let you know if Tanja is still as excited as she is now on the 27th! I am really looking forward to the racing actually too. We are doing some new routes this year, with some new HC climbs (climbs that are not able to be categorized because they are too hard��) so it will be interesting.

I don't think I will take my computer with me down there as in the past wireless doesn't seem to be the norm.... But all the results will be up on cyclingnews.com pretty fast. Michelle is also at our home in Colorado for 2 weeks, so hopefully she will put a few updates on for me. She has had a great few weeks of racing over in the States. Her team has been on fire! The weekend just been they won the overall in the Joe Martin stage race in Arkansas aswell as a couple of stages.

Hope you are well wherever in the world you are!
Jo.

Changing of the seasons in Italy

Such a weird thing. We drove to Italy and pretty much that same day I started sneezing, having to blow my nose all the time and feeling kinda yucky. Turns out this is very common at this time of year in Italy with the changing of the seasons, and especially this year because of the warm weather we have been having in Europe. You should see all the pollen flying about in the air, it's crazy! No wonder I got so blocked up. That started on Thursday, now it's the following Thursday and I am completely back to normal again after driving back to Switzerland on Sunday night.

Lucky it didn't affect my racing and I felt great on the bike! We were racing at San Marino - this awesome place that is actually the 3rd smallest country in Europe down near Rimini. I loved being back in Italy again and getting to speak the language and of course, eat the food! We all don't know how plain pasta and rice with a little bit of olive oil can taste so damn good in Italy, they really know how to cook.

First day was a 4km prologue. Unfortunately we didn't have our tt bikes or discs so just had clip on bars. Good news with the tt bikes is that we just got the new Cervelo P3 TT bikes, so hopefully they will be ready to ride soon and we will all be styling at the Tour de L'Aude. I was 28th and 30secs down on Marianne Vos who won.
Second stage had just one GPM and was right near the end. San Marino is up high, about 700m, so this race always has decent climbing in it to get back to the city. I was 5th on Saturday; mad at myself that I didn't go earlier in the sprint as it was a narrow finish.
The last day had 3 GPMs - I was very pleased with how I was climbing and made the front group of 20. Ended up 3rd in the stage and moved to 14th on GC. Vos won everything there was to win apart from the intermediate sprints�..

So in only 3 days time we have the next round of the World Cup in Berne which is only an hour away from Luzern so it will be nice not to have a long drive! Then it's on to the 10 day Tour de L'Aude starting on the 17th of May.

Exciting news from my apartment is that we got wireless working last week and just 4 days ago the electrician came to fix a plug that wasn't working so now we have TV! So stoked, we have 35 channels including CNN, MTV, Eurosport and my fav channel - RaiUno from Italy. Cool because I get to watch all the fun game shows every day and just really have it on in the background and listen to Italian all the time!!

Ciao a tutti!
Jo.

No wireless still in our apartment!

I am sitting in Starbucks at the bottom of our hill here in Luzern. We STILL don't have wireless at our apartment. At the moment we are waiting for our router to be delivered to the house as we decided to order it - silly idea now! Anyway, we were poaching wireless and it was working fine for the first couple of weeks. Then whoever owns that line decided to encrypt it I think. But then it comes on and off sometimes so we don't really know what's going on, but I can tell you it's very annoying! So at the moment the best bet is Starbucks using Jeffs account.

I just did a local Swiss race this morning, started at 7:30, crazy! It was just 30kms from where we live so I know this loop we raced like the back of my hand, apart from the 3km steep little climb they added in..... It ended up being a great race for our team and we got 1st with Nicole solo and Priska and I sprinting in for 2nd and 3rd.
On Wednesday just been we raced Fleche Wallone and rode a good race for Nicole. Just had to make sure she went into the Mur de Huy in the front. She had a good climb but not good enough for the win - she was 2nd. The current World Champ, Marianne Vos won - so the overall World Cup is getting a bit more interesting now with her racking up a few more points......

We have had such an amazing run of weather here in Switzerland and most of Europe too. At the moment though it is finally raining, we got thunderstorms yesterday and today but both in the late afternoons which I have no problem with as both days were beautiful mornings for training!

My next race coming up is a 3 day tour in San Marino, Italy starting this Friday the 4th of May. I am excited for all the racing coming up as I really am starting to feel like I am coming into my best form this season. Jeff and I planned a slower start this year and at the moment it has been going to plan. I don't want to be as tired as other years later in the season.

Sorry I haven't updated this for awhile as we have been racing so much lately and driving all over Europe! I worked out one 8 day period I sat for over 3200kms in the car driving from Switzerland to Belgium, back to Switzerland for 2 days then back up to Northern Holland and back again. Hmmmm not that much fun. Although one trip was quite cool when Sarah Duster gave Emma and I a German lesson so that made that trip go by very quickly!

Ok I really better go as Jeff is paying for this time on the internet, he'll get the bill next month I guess!!

Jo.

Easter Sunday in Flanders

Yay, I got to eat chocolate yesterday after the race in Flanders! I'm sure that's what got me through the race - knowing I had a white chocolate bunny waiting for me when I finished!

The race was awesome, I just love this race! This was my fourth time racing it and I had a good race again - rode good position which is so important especially in this race with cobbled sections up to 3kms long and cobbled climbs. Our team was dominant again...... Nicole won! So she is 2 from 2 in the World Cups with the next one on Saturday in Holland. Karin Thurig rode a great race too and was away solo with about 40kms to go and ended up finishing 5th. The 4 of us, Emma, Sarah, Priska and I all finished in the next group sprinting for 7th place just 28 seconds down. So all 6 of us finished in the top 31 places which I think shows just how strong the whole team is at the moment, we were all so present at the front of the whole race.
It's such fun racing when you are on a team like this!

So I just found out today that my next race is on Thursday in Holland. It's a 1.1UCI race in a place called Dwingeloo!
I only arrived home at 10:30 last night straight home after Flanders. Unpacked my bags and did laundry today and tomorrow have to pack up again for another long road trip and probably about 4 nights away this time. The drive to Flanders was about 740kms and the drive to where we race in northern Holland is about 850kms! Yuk, I hate driving.

So the apartment here in Lucerne is great. I have a huge bedroom with lots of space for yoga and stretching! At the moment we are poaching wireless from someone else so that's cool, free is good for now. The signal isn't very strong in my room though so I sit in the kitchen most of the time when I'm online. Today I walked down the hill to the city and had a chai latte from Starbucks. I don't usually like the chai there, but hey, they are the only place in Europe I reckon where I can get soy milk!! If anyone knows of somewhere else, please, let me know!
I went and saw the famous Lion Monument which I didn't know was there 'till today. Looked in some of the shops and decided I want a nice expensive Swiss watch, I better start winning some races though��..
Then I had to walk back up the hill which really hurt my legs after racing yesterday. It was such a nice day here today though that it would've been wrong to be just sitting inside resting!!

Oh another thing I can't wait to do is join a gym here. I have found a few gyms here in Lucerne that teach the Les Mills classes that I do back home in NZ. Will be so cool to be able to go to BodyPump and BodyBalance while I am overseas. I might go check one out tomorrow.

Will give you an update after Holland!

Bis bald.
Jo.

I suffered in Italy!

Well yesterday was hard! My first race back after being sick and I guess I expected it to be like that but man I had to suffer alot. I ended up just finishing in the front group so that was ok. The rest of my team had a blinder of a race, totally dominated and Nicole attacked 6kms from the finish and won it solo by 42secs. Then there was the bunch of us sprinting for 2nd place and Emma had a great sprint to get 4th.
Our next race will be Flanders this coming Easter Sunday. I have done this race 3 times already and it is definitely one of my favs so I'm really looking forward to it.

So I'm moving to our new apartment in Lucerne tomorrow, I moved the first of my stuff this afternoon so got to check it out a little and I liked what I saw! The 3 of us (myself, Annalise and Tanja) all have big rooms and there is a living room, kitchen and bathroom. It's nice, clean and new looking with all new paint and floors in all the bedrooms. We are up a pretty decent 800m climb so I have that to deal with everyday after training. But at the bottom of the hill is pretty much the start of all the shopping and also the lake is right at the bottom also which will be nice for hanging out in the summer! It will be fun to be in a new city and explore some new roads for training.
We don't have wireless internet set up yet but hopefully it won't take long as all 3 of us are internet geeks and won't last long without it, hehe. But as soon as I get it I will let you know how it's all working out.

Until then,
Jo.

Oh and a big congrats to Cath Cheatley who got the bronze medal at the World Champs in Palma yesterday in the points race! It was an awesome effort!

Enjoying the springtime in Zug

Hey there,

It's Thursday night in Switzerland and I am on my computer watching the Track Worlds online. I'm kinda bummed because there is this website that you can watch the track worlds and other big sporting events live online, but unfortunately you can't get it in most countries in Europe!!
So anyway my friend runs www.fixedgearfever.com and he is doing live updates from inside the infield so I'm keeping up with most of it. Sarah Hammer who was one of my bridesmaids at our wedding is racing tomorrow in the 3000m pursuit. She is the defending World Champion and I was there when she won it last year, so exciting! So I am sitting here sending all my go fast vibes to her for tomorrow morning in qualifying.

I have decided to race in Italy this weekend in Cittiglio which is near Como/Varese/Lugano. It should be a hard race, it's UCI 1.1 which is the highest ranked one day race and apparently it might be a World Cup next year. 8 laps of a 15.5km circuit with 2 climbs each lap.
I did intervals the last 2 days in training and they went quite well according to my SRM so hopefully I will be of use to the team!

The training here the last few days has just been spectacular. It is just so beautiful training when the sun is out and there is snow on all the mountains and all around you. I rode up a little higher the past couple of days and even got to see people skiing and sledding down this mountain! It was so cute - all these kids waiting in line to get on the ski lift with their sleds, I stopped and took pics with my phone.

Oh and a big congrats to my sister who won the Grape Ride back in NZ on Saturday! It is a big race (over 2200 people took part!) up at the top of the South Island around a part of the country that I really want to check out more, hopefully with Jeff next time.
Michelle is also racing this weekend in Christchurch in Le Race which is another hard 100km race and quite hilly too so go hard for that one too!!

Ok time for bed here now,
Later, Jo.

Back in Switzerland for 2007

Hi there,

I have arrived in Switzerland and I am staying in Zug again but just for another week until my apartment in Lucerne opens up. I�m finally getting better after having the flu for 2 weeks today! I gave in and went on antibiotics when it went to my chest � I haven�t had to take them for over 3 years now so I guess that isn�t too bad of a run.

It�s pretty cold here, the last few days I have been riding with full balaclava, 2 pairs of gloves and booties and full tights and thermal jacket! But starting from today it is supposed to get a bit warmer with temperatures of 12,13 and 14 predicted.

I stopped in Colorado Springs for 3 days to see my husband! Still sounds pretty funny to me to say husband � but it is definitely a nice feeling to be married. Our wedding day was just amazing and was better than ever expected. Everything went smoothly and the venues we chose were outstanding. You can check out www.joanneandjeff.com for a link to Flickr where we have will all our official photos loaded on soon. Just mind the very appealling photo of Jeff on the front page.....
We honeymooned in Fiji and wow what an awesome place! We stayed at Matamanoa Island www.matamanoa.com for a few nights and then 3 more nights on the mainland down on the Coral Coast at Outrigger on the Lagoon www.outriggeronthelagoonfiji.com
We can�t wait to go back there!

Well that�s enough for today, I will be back more often now that I am online all the time while here in Zug.

Ciao for now,
Jo.

JO WINS POINTS RACE AT NATIONALS!!!!

Hi Michelle here,
We just had exciting news that Jo won the points race at nationals by one point from Cath Cheatley! I spoke to her what must've been just as she pulled off the track as I was talking to Ross and he handed her the phone! Couldn't make much sense of what she was saying but I think she was pretty happy!

CONGRATULATIONS JO & JEFF!

Hi, Michelle here, finally got around to putting some more wedding pics up. There are more on my page also. Enjoy.

25th October 2006

Expecting a blizzard in Colorado!

As I write this there are all sorts of alerts coming across the tv screen as I'm watching one of my favourite series "The nine". We are expecting a big blizzard tonight so that should be interesting, I have never experienced one of those before, they say about 15-30cms of snow might come!!! About 10 days ago we got 10cm at our house, so that will seem like nothing if what they say is coming, does.

I am still on my off season break, only another week to go before I have to start riding again. I always love this time of year doing lots of different things. About 3 weeks ago my friend Pete from the Air Force took me up flying in a little Cessna plane!! I am very scared of flying and especially in small planes, so it took a lot of convincing to get me up there. But I am very glad now that I did it and it overcame my fear a bit. I actually got to fly the plane for some of the time and we flew over our house and 3 different airports including the air force base.

Today I went up what is called "The Incline" with a friend of ours that is visiting from Florida. It's a type of hike that goes straight up the mountain on the old railroad logs. It took me today about 45mins to get to the top, I was suffering quite a bit! Then I ran back down the trail which is about 3.5miles (about 6kms). It goes pretty high � up to 8585ft (2617m) and you start at 6574ft (2004m), a total gain of 2011ft (613m)! And the average percentage is 41% with the steepest part being 68%!! It is definitely the best workout for the amount of time, altogether it took me 1hr 12mins today.

Last night I went to the Evanescence concert in Denver, wow it was so amazing. Amy Lee has such a powerful voice - I am much more of a fan now after seeing them live. The set wasn�t very long, but she is really belting it out every song, so I guess you can only go so long when you are singing like that. �Going Under�, �My Immortal� and �Call me when you�re sober� were definitely the highlights.

2 weeks ago, Jeff and I went to New York for a week. Jeff had a conference for work, so I decided to tag along for the fun of it! I shopped �till I dropped, literally�.. I was out there for hours, so much fun looking around. I visited friends, went running in Central Park and went to some great restaurants. On the Friday we went to the Broadway show, �Hairspray�, it was very colourful and energetic!
At the moment, we are busy organising all sorts of things for our wedding coming up in January, oh man there is a lot to do, it seems things just pop up all the time! It was unbelievable how long it took last week just to choose an invitation��and we still haven�t decided on the wording��..!

Ok, time for bed now, maybe when I wake up there will be a blanket of snow!

Thanks for reading,
Jo.

P.S. Thanks to Ross for writing and politely telling me to update, sorry I have been so slack!

17 September 2006

UCI Women's World Cup Series - Nicole Cooke: Overall Points Winner, Univega: Overall Team Winner.

World Cup Champions

Myself, Emma, Sarah, Pascale, Nicole, Priska after the final World Cup round in Germany.

Jeff and I in Switzerland

Home/Welcome | Joanne | Michelle | Ryan