Chu Man Foo

Bike / Triathlon Biography

Note – I haven’t updated this since 2009 – priorities have been forced to change and such but, I found AthLinks.com that tracks races and such. Here’s my race bio from there.

2009 (plans) – New Zealand Tandem Tour – Inaugural trip with Santana Tandems  – we’ll see how it goes… Also… planning on doing the Lotoja race. Hope they don’t start signups while we’re overseas.

2008 – Muckenthaler CX – 40-something place Cat 4 (85 entrants) – first cyclocross race ever. Enjoyable in a painful way – lapped as many people as lapped me. Happy enough with the performance since I’d been bulking up for swim season up until after Labor Day.

sandy run-up with the 50+ age group at camp pendleton 2008

2007 – 2nd place Cat 5 (grp 5100) – Lotoja – (3 states, 2 hundred miles, 1 day, no sweat) Logan UT to Jackson Hole WY – a very beautiful and addicting road race ending along the snake river in Wyoming. I fed the 1st place cat5 guy from my goodies and pulled him most of the race. This was my 6th Lotoja so I got a 1000 mile award too. Taking ’08 off from Lotoja to do ocean swims with daughter.

2007 – 24th place Cat 5 – SLR (Celo Pacific San Luis Rey Road Classic) – our club’s annual road race.

2006 – Lotoja – 4th place Cat 5 heat.

2005 – IM 70.3 (Oceanside Half Ironman) – 5hr 30minutes (approx) – 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, 13.1 mile run.

2005 – IM CDA (Ironman Coeur D’Alene) – 11hr 50min 32sec – 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, 26.2 mile run. This one hurt. 80+ degrees. I will need to train the run harder next time.

Here’s a neat site that keeps track of athletes on its own. Just put in the name of the athlete you want to track: Click Here For Sportstats.ca

These days, Chu Man is mostly riding road bikes. Mostly to work. Mostly on a 1999 LeMond Zurich. Yes, it’s steel. Yes, it has panniers. Yes, it weighs more than 50lb fully laden (water, clothes, lighting, laptop). Yes, it’s 22.5 miles each way. Yes, it makes you strong.

Bike Safety Soapbox

Recommended reading for anybody who rides a bike: BicyclingStreetSmarts, John Allen

Many of us find it hard to admit that we’re novices at something as simple as riding a bike. But to do it correctly isn’t as easy as it looks.

The biggest problem cycling in the real world, is traffic control.

Many cyclists believe that traffic control signs are there only for cars. Because of that, it’s common to see cyclists running stop signs and stoplights here in San Diego County. With guys, the hormones get stirred up and it’s as if there’s a race, everywhere, all the time.

On one commute I was riding pretty hard up a hill along the way.  Another cyclist felt challenged and compensated by riding harder himself. When we got to the top of the hill there was a stop sign. Rather than stopping, he rolled through only to be headed off by a car headed to a parking spot. The cyclist looked just like a rag doll as he head-over-heeled across the car’s hood and onto the pavement on the other side of the car.

All I could do is bring him some of the scattered parts from off his bike while he waited for the ambulance, remind myself that it’s not a good idea to run stop signs, and resolve to tell others of this avoidable cycling hazard.