New CITA Banners

Two new vinyl CITA Banners, just in time for the Annual Meeting at el Bait Shop, 4 PM Saturday, February 9th.

Support Lift the Limit

Help support Lift the Limit initiative. Contact you state representatives and tell them to Lift The Limit. Below is the email that I sent. It is not the best, but feel free to use it.

Hi. I am contacting you to voice my opinion on the need to change the definition of BEER in Iowa’s Alcoholic Beverage Control laws. Currently, Beer is limited to 5% alcohol by weight. This is very antiquated and incorrectly classifies many craft and micro brews as liquor. This law forces beers with higher alcohol content to the state’s distribution system for liquor. While this system may work well for liquor, it does not work as well for beer. As it stands, the current legislation is both cumbersome and oppressive. Many breweries will not distribute their beer to Iowa because of this system. It is not uncommon for beer aficionados to stock up with craft beer when visiting Omaha, Kansas City, Minneapolis, and Chicago, all of which have less onerous legislation for the distribution of beer. Iowa breweries and brew pubs are put at an unfair competitive disadvantage because of this legislation.

While I am not an attorney, I believe that revising this legislation would be rather easy. Chapter 123 of the Iowa Code deals with Alcoholic Beverage Control. Sections five and seven speak to the break point of alcohol that differentiates beer from liquor. Changing five percent to fifteen percent in these two sections would correct this archaic legislation. Perhaps there are additional sections of the Code that will need to be changed. Anyway, I am of the understanding that Iowa District 31 Representative Ray Zirkelbach will be introducing such legislation during this session.

Regards,

Randle Boyd

MLK Holiday

Too many snow days. All my pics over the last 2 months have been of snow trails. I tried to mix it up last weekend. Saturday I did a hard ride on the rollers. Sunday I did spin class at the gym. Today it was warm enough to get outdoors. There wasn't any ice at Center. The trails were ridable, but not very fast. Looking forward to warmer weather. Anyone planning to do Snow Bike #1 this Saturday?

Rogue Monk Madness

Rogue Monk Madness is an American Brown style ale. It is reddish copper in color and hazy. The head is a light tan, very small bubbles, and lasts for a long time. The beer has a malty, licorice, honey, molasses smell (Special B malt), with just a slight smell of citrus. The taste is very malty, with the dark fruit flavors of raisins and plums. There is also a slight vanilla taste. While there is no good hop taste ( think Stone Ruination), there is the hop bitterness and the alcohol warmth in the back of your mouth.

This is not a bad beer, but it doesn't do a lot for me. I like the malt, but I am not a huge fan of hop bitterness without hop aroma or hop taste. With such a malty beer, it might be difficult to obtain a hop aroma or hop flavor. However, I think the hops should have been added much later in the brewing process. Dry hopping during fermentation would have been the way to go with this beer.

Winter Black Label

I wanted to do something a little different today, so I rode roads and trail for about an hour and forty minutes. It was a little colder than I had anticipated, with a slight breeze from the NW.

From my house I went down Fuller, to Valley Junction, to the trail head at Quick Trip on Railroad and First, out past Wall Mart. Between Wall Mart and 86th Street, the trail changed from being plowed to being snow and ice covered. At this point I turned around and backtracked to Ingersoll, up to 42nd st, then back to the trail and home. Total around 20 miles. I don't know exactly, as I rode my Cross Bike, which is not equipped with a cyclo-computer. Still looking forward to riding some Gravel.

Thinking about doing the Snow bike in Ft. Dodge. Anyone else thinking of doing this race? Anyone know about Loomis Park?

Liars Weight Club

Monday, I began receiving emails with Liars Weight Club (LWC) in the subject line. These came from, and were addressed to, a small subset of the DMCC race team. While some people would be offended to be included in such a group, I am thankful. Given my current weight of 15 stone, I can use all the help I can get to slim down to about 13 stone for the upcoming season. Since becoming a LWC member, I have dropped 3 pounds. While I enjoy riding, I have never been very good at avoiding the extra piece of pizza or chocolate chip cookies. Hopefully, the LWC will guilt me into staying on the straight and narrow.

As for riding, I rode J-11, Denmans, Squirrels Nest (x2) and Rhythm (x2). Denmans was icy, with about 1/8 inch of snow covering the ice. Squirrels Nest and Rhythm were both excellent. I saw Pete Basso and Cam in the Parking lot. They are riding Center tomorrow morning at 8:00 AM. I saw Rich Wince and Dave Ertl on the trail, both returning from the 10:00 AM DMCC ride. After my ride, and back in the parking lot, I talked with some guy riding a Redline 925, single, with studded tires. Sweet.

I would like to get in some gravel, but the road conditions concern me. All the gravel around here is very hilly, 35 mph descents. I don't have the nads to ride that when traction is questionable.

IBU Thursday, January 17th

Thursday, January 17th, the IBU will be having its first DRAW of 2008. The DRAW will be at Court Avenue Brewing Company beginning at 4:45 PM. Mike Guthier, the brewer at CABCO, has been brewing up some excellent beers. He may even have a couple of surprises for those attending the DRAW.
Immediately following the DRAW, you can walk the couple of blocks to el Bait Shop, where Thursday evenings mean Jimmy Carter Happy Hour. IBU President, Brian Sabus, will be pouring one of his creations.
So come on out and support CABCO, el Bait Shop, and the IBU, all while drinking some excellent beer with some fellow beer geeks.