Rolf Devinci

Happy Halloween! My Q-Ray bracelet arrived today so I am anxious to start my experiment duly noted in my previous blog posting of this month. It will be curious to see if I experience any of the benefits attested too by so many advocates of the ionized jewelry. In all fairness though the bracelet is off to a tough start. Not only did I over induldge with chocolate today but I am grabbing bites of pizza and sips of wine between door bells. In terms of dietary excess I`m off the scale tonight. I picked up a nice Bolla merlot to accompany my vegetarian pizza I planned for supper considering the usual hectic pace of Halloween night. Medium dry and soft...."with flavors of dark ripe cherries, berries and plums." Very nice and well suited to pizza and other full flavored dishes. As a side note I found a vendor on Ebay who specializes in decals. On a whim I ordered my name in white. They arrived today so now my road bike is adorned with my name upon the top tube. Heck...if you c...

Got out this morning for the usual,albeit,colder Saturday club ride. Once again I opted out of the fast group to ride with some intermediate level riders. Since the season is winding down I find it nice to actually ride my bike at a moderate intensity and enjoy the experience. Unlike the fast group the slower groups offer a decent pace without the "drama" and egos. Troy,Michael and I got delayed so we chased three of the ladies out to Laurie Park to get in some high intensity work. On the return to Bedford we had a group of six riders with a 30kph average. The paceline worked well and everyone rode real strong and steady which, frankly, was a treat. Cudos to Susan, Adrien and Venetia. The ladies are quite strong and are riding very well. Had to open 2 disputes on Ebay. Seems one of by auctions got targeted by a troll who refused to honor the transaction. After my patience ran out I filed negative feedback only to have the individual retailiate with malicious comments and ou...

Recently I have been doing some research into the Chinese practice of achieving "Chi", the balancing of the body`s "life force" in terms of well being.The premise being that to have good health one must balance positive/negative energies (ions)to achieve harmony. From what I have ascertained thus far the act of living creates positive ions in the body that need to be countered by negative ions. They attract each other and become as one. Nature, it seems, supplies negative ions through good food, clean air and pure water. The problem is that we now live in an increasingly polluted enviroment where pure food, water and air is at a premium.It is harder for the body to get the negative ions it needs to balance the positive ones that are the byproducts of living.It all reminds me of the whole free radical/antioxidant debate. Are they, in fact, one and the same?One an ancient Far Eastern belief and the other a 20th century scientific standard but both essentially the same...

So it is officially Fall as I have started playing ball hockey on Sundays. Thankfully the Bloomfield recreation centre on Agricola got a reprieve from the city and received a facelift rather than being closed. With new lighting and paint the gym is definitely more user friendly although we are now using official ice hockey regulation sized nets. The are about a foot wider and six inches higher than the pair we used last year. It will take some getting used to and I have to rework my position to cover the angles. My performance today reflected the bigger nets. I struggled for the most part and let in several soft goals. Alas....this too shall pass. If I ever get my (new to me)gloves from Ebay that should help. My current ones are shot and starting to fall apart as the pics show. I`m giving the seller one more week then I`m logging an official complaint. I want my gloves! The cycling club did a Century ride today in what was lovely Fall weather....actually it was quite summerl...

I got to sample some of the wines from Trapiche, an Argentinian vinyard and opted to purchase a bottle of Broquel, a 2005 Malbec that came highly recommended from the sales rep. A very dry red with vivid color and fruit concentration with...."ripe tannins and a long finish." Nice! Heard from Scott today. He is on the road to recovery so that is a good thing. I`ll raise a glass to that! Cheers. Geo

Found out today that a fellow club member whom I cycled with on Saturday went home and suffered a stroke later that evening. His wife is reporting that he is OK and is responding well. The doctors suggest his fitness has helped mitigate the effects and should speed his recovery. After climbing the Fall River Hill I saw Scott at the Sobey`s parking lot where we all reform after the hill climb. I quipped he was so fast on the climb that I didn`t see him pass me.Turns out he said he was cramping in his quad and his knee was feeling wonky so he bypassed the hill and was waiting at the bottom for us. We rode out to Laurie Park together and the next I saw him was as I was driving home and he was cycling back to Halifax.At that point he was biking along at a good tempo. Later that day we chatted via Facebook and I asked how he was feeling. His leg was still giving him grief but he thought it might be from a lack of stretching and overuse. Who knew? To often athletes accept pain and discom...

In beautiful Fall weather that was quite summerlike I managed to finally ride my bike! First time in nearly two weeks! We had a nice turnout for the Saturday morning ride and I jumped in with the fast group with some trepidation knowing my saddle time has been practically non existant the month of September. Unlike a fellow club member who once again caused dissention today I ride with the elites fully aware that the suffering will be great and that they have no obligation to cater to me. That is the nature of the fast group.......the needs of the many outweight the needs of the few. If you get dropped or the tempo not to your liking then suck it up.As a club we send off several groups as part of the ride and you can tailor your day based upon how you feel. With that in mind I pretty much sucked wheel out to Fall River but managed to stay in touch till the Fall River Hill. There I paced Eric up the hill who has asthma and was experiencing some tightness.Truth be told it was in my se...