Svend Erik invited Leon Straker to come to Gävle for two weeks to layout the frame work for a collaboration on a set of papers, and Becca Abbott will stay on at CBF for an additional two (or so) months to bring to fruition said papers. It has been great to learn about the research areas of both these scholars and to see how they will be blending fields for their upcoming papers. For those of you biomech nerds out there who are reading along, stay tuned for some very cool EVA papers in the near future!
Ok, enough shop talk.
As luck would have it, not only are all three visitors delightful conversationalists and really interesting people in the research environment, all three are also a delight after hours and are quite into cycling! In fact, Becca and her hubby David arrived to Gävle with road bikes in tow: it was a good first sign that we would get along quite well :)
Add to that the perfect timing of the Gastrike Loppet - a road race starting and ending in downtown Gävle - and we had the makings of a perfect Saturday last week!
Before the ride: Leon, the Jacksons, and David (photo credit: Becca)
Becca (with the massive smile) and David lining up for the 100 km race.
[ Note the massive viking in the foreground. He managed to inflict quite some pain on David, and the other race hopefuls, en route to the finish line. You should have seen the calves on this guy ... ]
[ Note the massive viking in the foreground. He managed to inflict quite some pain on David, and the other race hopefuls, en route to the finish line. You should have seen the calves on this guy ... ]
The International English School (IES) were involved with the race organisation and entered both a team of teachers and one of students to the 50 km race. At the last minute, the teacher team lost a member so I ended up riding with them, rather than with Becca. While it would have been lovely to share the ride with her, the plus side was that we got to share the ride with Leon, and I also met some new folks that Richard works with (Ida and Magnus). The other bonus: I suspect I suffered far less than poor Becca who stuck it out in a group with 3 Swedish men for the entire 100 km, never once uttering a word or explaining that she couldn't understand a word they were saying, and dutifully pulling her share through each and every rotation. She and David both had really impressive races and clearly laid it all down on the course given their finish line expressions. Well done you two!
For our part, the race went out a lot faster than Richard had anticipated for our little IES group: Ida proved to be one heck of a tough and speedy cyclist, so we kept a rather blistering pace through the course. And Leon, to his absolute credit, did an amazing job of holding the group for quite some time despite being out on a hefty mountain bike. At the end of the day, the net time for the teacher team was faster than that of the students, giving the teachers an early advantage in the year long 'teacher vs student' battle of outdoor pursuits. Here's hoping none of the kids mention the rather unfamiliar looking teacher that competed that day ;)
For our part, the race went out a lot faster than Richard had anticipated for our little IES group: Ida proved to be one heck of a tough and speedy cyclist, so we kept a rather blistering pace through the course. And Leon, to his absolute credit, did an amazing job of holding the group for quite some time despite being out on a hefty mountain bike. At the end of the day, the net time for the teacher team was faster than that of the students, giving the teachers an early advantage in the year long 'teacher vs student' battle of outdoor pursuits. Here's hoping none of the kids mention the rather unfamiliar looking teacher that competed that day ;)
As you can tell from the pics, the weather was stunning - really, we were just delighted to be out riding! The fact that we ended up getting to test out our legs and push it a bit was just the icing on the cake!
Richard's mascot and tool bag wearing the post-race pendant. Trike, the triceratops, always steals the show, even when adorning Richard's fabulous lugged touring bike.
Since it was Leon's last weekend in town, and it had been such a good start to the day, we suggested a celebratory dinner for the group! We loaded up Smultronik (it really is amazing how well five adults fit into this tiny car) and headed out to a restaurant in Högbo Bruk restaurang, about 25 km from Gävle, that makes particular good food ... and has a dessert buffet!
All pics courtesy of Becca
This week we also were lucky and Leon shared his birthday with us. After a busy day's work we squeezed in a quick sushi dinner, then headed to the Konserthus (concert house) to hear the Gävle Symphony Orchestra take on two contemporary pieces featuring an electric basson (complete with 4 effects pedals - harmonizer, loop, distortion and delay pedals), which I found quite interesting, and mainly enjoyable, followed by Mozart's 40th, which was spectacular. To top it all off, we headed back to casa Jackson for some birthday cake!
Kudos to Dave on his first ever cake
We bid Leon adieu on Friday, but hopefully we will meet again some day... and who knows, with an open offer of a bed in Perth, we might just end up cycling together on another continent one of these days!
Something tells me there won't be nearly as much cake in my upcoming week, but perhaps if I work hard enough, I can remedy that :)
Something tells me there won't be nearly as much cake in my upcoming week, but perhaps if I work hard enough, I can remedy that :)
4 comments:
Congrats on the race. Glad there was a well deserved meal at the end!
I can't believe that triceratops is still around.
You might just have to find a conference in Aus that you really need to come to! We're in Brisbane, the opposite side of the country, but still!
Loved the hiking pics too, looks fantastic.
Thanks, ladies!
@ Kelly: There is an ever growing list of people we would like to visit in Australia, so we might just get around to it one of these days; we will certainly let you know! Also, I think one of my top rated conferences is in Melbourne in about 3.5 years - slightly long terms planning, but it doesn't hurt to dream ;)
Thanks to Jennie and Richard (and Bec and Dave) for keeping me too active for jetlag! and for great company when I was missing my family on my birthday. Look forward to returning the favour in Perth sometime. Tack so mykka (or something like that) Leon.
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