Mark Nichols
City of Residence - There are 9 planets in our Solar System, I'm the 10th
Race Category - "At The Front" is my race category

Aliases: Big Mark, The Alpha Clydesdale, Doctor Downhill, and Mr. Special Treatments.
Year of Birth: 1960; two months before the FDA approved the birth control pill…Whew! That was a close one.
Marital Status: Death by a thousand cuts.
Known Children: I'll take credit for five cute ones.
Occupation: Software as a service (SaaS) online file management portal owner-developer…one of those hip Web 2.0 kind of things.
Race Discipline: [Note definition of "Discipline" from Merriam-Webster Dictionary context #4: Training that corrects, molds, and perfects the mental faculties of ones moral character]
1. There is a terrible delight in watching a rival crack and then sink without a trace.
2. I breathe, therefore, I attack.
3. Nothing tastes as good as fast feels.
4. Leading crits is my heroin.
5. Bicycles are not a hobby; Bicycles are a lifestyle.
6. To be able to go really fast, you need to pick your parents very carefully.
7. Don't bring a pocket knife to a gunfight.
8. The Sprinters Creed: I spin a big gear.
9. It's just not enough for me to win; others must lose.
10. Just say "No" to slow.
11. I see no honor in being a good loser, but win or lose, I do enjoy the exercise.
12. My greatest fear is to be confused with another racer.
Race Highlights:
1. First lap race leader at the 1999 World Cup at Skyline Park in Napa and everyone, including my family, heard my name over the event loud speakers by the race commentator, "In first place after lap1 is our race leader, Mark Nichols, from Alamo California…" Lap 1 was the parade lap, but-still, I was the race leader!
2. NORBA National Championship Downhill Series Winner, Clydesdale Division.
3. The Stupid Contest - 1st Place: I registered for that death-march at Pine Flat after Pat (aka Quadzilla) told me not to do it and I justly earned this award for not taking his knowledgeable advise.
4. I had a fantastic, dominating, break-through, and glorious 2nd place "finish" right in front of my children at the Livermore Crit…too bad that was only after the 15th lap of a 30 lap race…oops, my bad.
Riding Machines: You are what you ride. Therefore, I ride one-off and totally custom Ventana frames with Campagnolo groups. Now that's style [Note: Ventana's owner, Sherwood Gibson, personally fabricated Mario Cipollini's 2002 World Road Championship winning frame and I think you can see the obvious resemblance to The Lion King in my riding style].
Favorite Race: Mammoth Mountain - XC, DH, ST, 4X, and RD - it doesn't matter - Mammoth Rules! [Note: The Mammoth Creed - Don't trust anyone under 5,000 feet].
Favorite Training Rides:
1. The rides that I put the smack-down to Chad because he has been remodeling his house all week instead of out training 250 miles like me.
2. The rides that Mark Deterline (with initials of MD what else to you call him but "The Doctor") gets dropped so I have to pull his big-bad CAT P/1/2 self up to the front so he can catch back onto our CAT 3 contingent's draft - again. [Note: I was having coffee with Mike Foley & Adam before the Mt Diablo TT Hill Climb and they told me The Doctor was born two weeks late and - apparently - has never caught up].
3. The Sunday team rides that the CAT 3s show up destroyed from racing the Saturday before and now they don't feel like clobbering us lowly 4/5s for the next 3.5 hours as much as they usually do.
4. The rides around Morgan Territory that are so hard and long it shows I don't need a red corvette to try and prove that I can still get it up.
5. The Love-Hate rides to the top of Mt Diablo on New Years Day…you don't remember how much you hate them until you're freezing your butt off on the way down.
6. The training rides where your PowerTap renames your personal profile appropriately to "Luigi Galvani" [Note: You can go to Wikipedia and look him up…this joke is very clever].
7. The rides that I'm off-the-back, but I remember to remind myself that my bike is dripping with Campy Record and then all is OK in my World.
8. The rides when some clown tries to bury me on San Ramon Valley Blvd at El Cerro, and after playing with his head for a bit by not allowing him take a pull, I shatter him like fine bone china thrown against a brick wall after crossing Livorna. When I get to Rudgear - alone, I send him a post card from "The Front.'
9. The rides when some clown on a white Pinarello and wearing a Death Ride jersey passes me with an authoritative, "ON YOUR LEFT!" at the start of the South Gate Road on his way to the Junction and I put a two bike length marker on him and he then proceeds to attack me 35 times until he finally dies right before Barbeque Terrace and I pull up to him at the first switchback while getting out of the saddle and shifting to my big chainring and ask him,"Well, did you save anything?" Whereas I then ignore any response and sadistically desecrate him to the Junction.
10. The long rides all the way out to Pinole where a banana flavored Powerbar kinda starts to taste like a filet mignon smothered in béarnaise sauce.
11. The really stupid long rides where you can bonk and swear with panache, like, "Same shit - different century."
12. The Saturday late afternoon MTB rides with the kids at China Camp that ends at the A&W for a root beer float in those icy cold mugs…now those are good rides!
13. The Sunday late afternoon MTB ride up Mt Tam's Tenderfoot Trail to Old Railroad to West Peak and then down Rocksprings to Lake Lagunitas and then ½ way up Eldridge to get over to Blythedale to roll into Joe's Taco Lounge and Salsaria for a platter of Super-Chicken-Nachos with extra black beans and a dozen chilled Bohemias to share with whomever was smart enough to accept the invite to make this ride.
14. The ride last fall that I was out training on when the Thursday Night C4 Posse to the Junction led out by Ranger Carl (aka Sheriff Andy) started to catch me at Curry Point and I showed them what a bad sport I am about getting passed, and then he, his bro, and Pat decided to invite me to try out for this team…I overheard crosstalk of, "He has a really bad attitude about being passed, and we respect that, but those Hawaiian shirts he wears with the sleeves ripped-off have got to go."
Favorite Beverage: Lagavulin - neat (don't like to bruise my brown).
Favorite Pre-Race Meal: Thin Mint Girl Scout Cookies dipped in chunky peanut butter with a 16 oz Cytomax Fruit Punch chaser…Man-O-Man, I can feel the pedals turning just thinking about it.
Favorite Flick: Cinema Paradisimo viewed while in-flight on an airplane to Tuscany.
Favorite Book: Don Quixote; when taken into consideration that Miguel de Cervantes wrote it in 1497 I think that speaks volumes - pun intended (I hope somebody got that).
Five-tunes Play List (artist/song):
1. AC/DC - Back In Black (That opening guitar riff is just stinky-bad-ass, and the album is - thus far - 42 times certified platinum. Any questions?).
2. The Isley Brothers - Take Me To The Next Phase (aka The CAT 3 Reprise).
3. Jimmy Hendrix - Foxy Lady (dedication song to my charming and lovely girlfriend).
4. Led Zeppelin - Kashmir (Robert Plant quote: "The whole inspiration for the song came from the fact that the road went on and on and on…").
5. David Bowie - Heroes (Lyrics: "Oh we can beat them - forever and ever, then we can be heroes - just for one day").
Hero/Heroes:
1. Grant Pederson
2. Ned
3. Joe Breeze
4. Greg Herbold
5. Big George Hincapie
6. Thor Hushovd
7. Ricardo ????
8. Danilo Di Luca
9. Jacquie Phelan
10. Ruthie Matthes
11. Julie Furtado
12. Alison Sydor
13. Thomas Frischknecht
14. Bart Brentjens
15. Henrik Djernis
16. Gino Bartali
17. Fausto Coppi
18. Greg Williams (founder of the Downieville Classic & Yuba Expeditions)
19. All unicyclists on Mt. Diablo
20. Batman
Talents, Hobbies, Tidbits:
1. Trash talking.
2. Self-inflating my ego.
3. Indulging in delusions of grandeur.
4. I LIVE for bitch-slapping posers who think they're fast - but aren't - riding Litespeeds with Helium wheel-sets up Mt. Diablo to the Junction.
Blog or website, if any: http://www.AlphaClydesdale.com
If you could ask a dead person one question, who would the person be and what would be the question?: Adam: "Dude! Why the apple?!"
Mary Ann or Ginger? Bicycle racing and romance share parallel universes (e.g. It is preferred to be the 1st man in - rather than 101st), therefore, I pick Mary Ann. While we're discussing fantasy, I'd like to get that date with Mary Ann with her wearing a lacy white teddy, handcuffed to my girlfriend, and pouring me an icy cold pint of Louis Roeder Crystal.
If you were a character in a movie, who would you be? Sir Galahad at the Castle Anthrax
What, if anything, do you have left in life to accomplish? I gotta earn me some of those rainbow stripes to bling my kit - I'm serious at this.
If you were a fruit, what would you be and why? An Italian grape (either the Corvina, Rondinella, or the Molinara) to be made into a bottle of Amarone to be drank amongst friends during a ride picnic intermission along the Bolinas Ridge en route to Tamales Bay.