Training on the west coast has been superb these past few weeks. The achilles tendon is still tender from the 24 hrs of OP and swells up pretty fast if I go hard, so instead it has been alot of long slow base mile rides. The riding in Victoria is
great for this. 3 of the cooler road rides we have been doing are: Up the west coast to Jordan River. This is a pretty nice ride as we spend 2 hrs on the Galloping goose bike path, 1 hr of somewhat sketchy riding through redneckville of Sooke and then a couple hrs on the quiet highway out to Jordan River which is a little surfer paradise. Another great ride is taking the backroads up to Duncan-ferrying over to saltspring island-riding loops around there and then ferrying back to Swartz bay and heading back to Victoria on the Goose. This is a longer 6-8 hr day. The third ride we have been doing is riding our Mtbs to the end the goose at Leechtown and then exploring around on the logging roads up there. And then theres all the closer rides within 2 hrs of Victoria (Waterfront, Penninsula, East Sooke, Highlands etc..) The riding is good out here, but you also need good riding partners which I have been lucky enough to have in Raph, Megan, Dave, Neal and co out here! On solo days its up to the MP3 player to provide the entertainment.
Other then that there has been some great riding over on the Mainland. This was highlighed by two days with our Kona mechanic Dave Mcnaughton out in Coquitlam. Riding out there from Vancouver I would meet up with Dave and then the ride would be in his hands as he toured me around his stomping grounds. The first day we crossed many rivers, some requiring shimying across logs on our asses. Never done that before but it works on the slippery logs out here. The second day we climbed up into the snowline then hiked 45 minutes, falling throuhg knee deep snow. I told Dave it was going to be a gongshow and we’d be walking down the trails but he disagreed and we kept trudging onwards. Eventually we got to the trail with over a foot of snow covering it. I prepared my camera as Dave launched off a Rock into the snow to start the ride. I would have guranteeded a huge endo from him but was dissapointed as somehow the snow held up. This was the start of a really cool ride as we road 90% of the trail on crusty snow. This was real Canadian riding. There was more snow riding to be had up in Squamish with Neal Kindree as well. Th trails need another couple weeks to dry out as we found ourselves riding in 3 inches of snow, covering 
2 inches of mud. Disaster for the bikes and our clothes.
Its been a really different year deciding to stay up here in Canada for training but its been working out great. One things for sure is that it will give me an extra appreciation for the Summer days to come!