SRAM RED rider Chris Horner (Astana) washes his team bike post-ride
Astana athlete and perennial American hardman rider Chris Horner spent the past few days hanging around with me in Chicago’s northwestern suburbs. Just like last year had the chance to spend time with this gracious, dedicated, and hard as nails rider who trained anywhere from three to six hours a day on the flat, windy, and open roads of McHenry County.
Horner is not a slob by any stretch, but he is not an overly obsessive neatnick like myself, and that makes him suspect in my book. While Chris spent a good hour cleaning his bike in my driveway on Thursday, did dishes often, and regularly picked up after himself, he also spent hours on my sofa messing up my pillows, which really concerned me, and should concern all of us.
Chris is perfectly pleasant and extremely considerate, nearly a perfect houseguest. In fact his girlfriend Megan made some brownies for us the other night and they bought me chipotle for dinner when I had no time.
But my issues reach a little further, a little deeper, and he comes up way short when it comes to basic pillow arrangement maintenance on my two sofas, take a look.
This isn’t how you found my sofa pillows, Chris!
Okay, so my only real issue relates directly to the sofa pillows, but I don’t care, I have to find fault with the guy somewhere. And if I’m Lance Armstrong or Johan Bruyneel I might think twice about a guy who puts sofa pillows back inches from where they were originally found, leaves handprints on them, forgets to comb the microfiber ones, or even turns them over and exposes the zippers. A bit careless perhaps? Some might even say reckless. Additionally, the order might be random and the furrier pillows aren’t unidirectionally aligned with their patterns. And, in fact on Wednesday one was smushed with a lot of crumple marks. Incredible.
Just crush the corners Horner…my sofa pillows are here for you to abuse! This guy’s unreal….
I know I wouldn’t want to ride in a paceline with a guy who arranges pillows like this, pure chaos.
Chris Horner’s handprint on my favorite fuzzy sofa pillow, might as well be a face print with the mouth open, yelling “I don’t care about your sofa pillows because I’m Chris Horner!”…
No, that’s fine Mr. Horner, my maid will get these wrinkles out…
I don’t have the courage to bring this up to Chris face to face, that would be too confrontational and honest. I’d rather just go behind his back, post it here on the TRD and hope he forgets about everything before he potentially returns next year.
Despite the sofa pillow wreckage, Chris did take time to make several dealer visits in the area, spent time at SRAM’s HQ, ride with staff, and many other concessions. I just want to thank Chris and wish him the best of luck this weekend in Elk Grove Village. Unfortunately I may not make it out to the Tour of Elk Grove as I will likely be straightening, combing, and arranging my sofa pillows, so don’t even worry about it, Chris!
Astana
comments (7)
very funny…now, my question…what did he use to clean his bike?
I interviewed him on this but haven’t loaded the video. Soap and water, garden hose with spray attachment, a kitchen sponge for the chain (scrubby side and scartchy side), mild degreaser, brush for the frame, dry rags to shine it up. Chris keeps it simple.
In the same vein as Donna’s question, but of much more relevance to your audience, what do YOU use to clean your micro-fiber pillows?
Pretty funny, but what’s up with the pallet in the driveway??
The pallet is going away soon, some new furniture I bought was shipped on it. Also, all the stuff is in my driveway because I am just finishing up staining my deck, should be back in its place by this weekend. And to Mark’s question, I honestly have never cleaned my microfiber sofa pillows because I never use them, as I never sit on my sofas, I hate reorganizing them so I almost always sit on the floor or the lounger.
Have you ever considered covering the sofa and pillows in plastic? It would guarantee an especially comfy post-ride couch surfing experience when your all sweated up, not to mention that it would also facilitate couch cleanup with the aforementioned garden hose and spray attachment.
Is he training on carbon hoops? not as hard as nails as i thought.