This morning the alarm went off at 5:00 AM, packed the X-terra, and I was off to Pittsburgh International Airport. Yesterday was pretty uneventful. After Jennifer got home from work, I did a quick spin on the bike before cleaning it up. The airport was crazy this morning. Typically Saturday's aren't very busy, but I'm glad I planned to get here early so I didn't have any check in problems with the bike. It took about 20 minutes to get to a ticket agent (and that was even in the First Class / Preferred line). It's always a huge hassle doing out of town races. I have no idea how the pro's do week in and week out. As I checked in, I had my fingers crossed and was hoping that the agent would wave the bike box fee ($80 bucks), but had no luck. CHA-CHING! Ahhh, the sound of US-AIR taking more of my hard earned cash. I really need to invest in some airline stock!!! See they don't charge you extra if you travel with ski's, snowboards, guitars, or golf clubs, but for some reason flying with a bike doesn't fit in this category. Do they know that my bike only weighs 17 pounds??? I seriously think my golf clubs weigh more than my bike.

After I checked in at the ticket counter, I wheeled my bike to the TSA security baggage check. 50% of the time the TSA guy will open my box which is a major pain in the a$$, but to my good fortune today decided not to open it. I think this was mainly due to how crazy the airport is for St. Paddy's day weekend. I watched my bike get wheeled away, and I'm praying that when I get to Fort Lauderdale (where I'm flying in to) my bike will appear at baggage claim.

I really wish I had a picture of me lugging myself through the airport with my bike box, suitcase, laptop, and carry-on bag. I got many strange stares of course. Well that's that. I'm going to try and take a bunch of pictures today and post frequent updates. I'm really starting to get excited for tomorrow!!!