good times

Its hard to believe this little guy is going to be 3 in march already!

But anyway have not written much because my laptop crashed and the other computer sucks, but with all the great deals going on I finally found a new laptop. So since my last post I met a new friend who likes to do a lot of miles as much if not more than myself and of course throw in a lot of hill climbs. That guy would be Jim Van Deven (sp) He has been around for a while and lives down the street from me, and does not have a problem kicking my ass on a regular basis truly good times though! So in the last 2 1/2 months I have done 7 centuries and a good number of 40 mile night time rides, add in the spin bike and I already have more miles at this point then I did all of last winter. For some reason this year is different it seems the worst the condition the more I want to ride in it, although today's ride hurt.

Riding wouldn't be anything if it wasn't for a great family life and a ton of support from my two favorite people who are always waiting patiently for me to finish my ride. you 2 or the best!

nice weekend

With all of the races and training rides over the last couple of months it was good to get some stuff done around the house and spend some time with the family. Lucas had a blast picking out his pumpkin or at least sitting on it!! He did manage to get one in the wagon and pull it around the whole place, tough little guy.

12hrs of Burnin

To make it more interesting you should read Dave's http://www.furryblackcat.blogspot.com/ Post. I couldn't make this race last year and the 2 previous years I took second to Dave. Last year Chris Ploch set a new course record and that is what I wanted to beat this year. I knew I would need Dave to get there and I would have to beat him to get it. Its funny because when I did the 24 two weeks ago I kept such a good pace because in the back of my mind I was wanting to save some for this race. I knew within a couple of days after the 24 that the legs would be good to go for this one. The strategy is what makes these races so much fun. I had some idea of what I wanted to do and it all depended on how Dave started out the race.



The run went good and I kept Dave in sight, so I knew at this point Dave was probably going to go hard for a few laps to put some hurt on! strategy for me was to keep the heart rate in check and to stay some what close. I figured that going super hard in the endurance series on the first lap would have Dave thinking I would do the same here. My goal was to hit my fastest lap on lap 3. My first lap went great although I felt a little sketchy on the course (should of did a preride) I guess stuff changes in 2yrs.



So going into the second lap I got the ipod going and was planning on picking the pace up a little felt like I had better lines. Things were going great until I noticed some one up ahead with a problem. Mr Breslin was fixing a flat. This made it tough, wish I could of helped him fix the flat so we could continue or race. No such luck from Dave I had to keep going. So now the strategy changes I will have to go hard and make Dave hurt to catch up, this will be a benefit later in the race.



Going into the third lap I backed off instead of going hard I knew Dave would be catching up soon and I wanted to be fresh to be able to hang with him. My pace was still pretty high because I was done with 3 laps in pretty much 3 1/2hrs. That's when things changed for me when I came through they said Dave was out. That was my motivation killer. In my head I had it all planned out. We would go out on the 10 lap to battle for the win we would destroy ourselves, I would laugh and cry at the same time at how great this is as we climb that last climb to the finish pushing beyond anything for the win!



So the 4th lap sucked I had to find some new motivation. I knew I could get 9 laps in no problem along as there was no mech. but I gave up on beating Chris record. I knew at this point I didn't have it for this day and I wondered if I would of had it even if Dave would of not flatted!



The rest of the laps were pretty much samo until the 8th lap. motivation snuck back in and I was having a lot of fun. By the 9th lap I was stoked at how good I felt compared to 2yrs ago when I only did 8 and hurt real bad. The first year I did this race I remember getting to the Dam on my 8th lap my light was crapping out and my legs were cramping really bad, so I decided to lay down in the grass and stair at the stars at that point I knew even though I hurt really bad that I loved doing this. So since then on the last lap of the 12hr races I always find a good spot to sit and relax for a few minutes to think back on the day. And then cruise to the finish.... very stoked at the miles I just did!



I am very stoked on winning this race. There were plenty of other very strong solo racers there. Big congrats to Mitch for taking second and making my bike ride like it is supposed too! would still love to know what happened to Jeremy Bradshaw (sp) we thought there was a mistake when they didn't announce your name at the awards! Major thanks to the DRJ crew for giving me a hand when I needed it even though you guys were racing to (pics and Results)http://www.drj-racing.com thanks Dave for your support it had to be hard to have to watch the rest of the race! I already cant wait for next year, this race is a must for everybody...

Lucas riding his bike

Whats better than riding in a 24hr mountain bike race, watching your little guy learn how to ride his bike for the first time. over the weekend he was figuring out how to get the pedals to turn then today it kind of all came together pedal turn pedal. great job bubby. Maybe daddy will take ya out to chubb. Okay I will at least wait until we take the training wheels off!!!

just getting there!

To start this thing off, the preparation that went into this thing kind of made riding it easy. What bikes to bring, charging all the lights extra tubes extra rims, etc. etc. etc. So once everything was loaded it was off to pick up Mitch to load up all his stuff, between us we had a lot of stuff, but we made it all fit!! Me and Mitch have a lot in common besides bikes of course, so the drive there was enjoyable. Before now I had ridden with Mitch a few times but never had the chance to talk to him, very knowledgeable guy about a lot of good stuff. So we roll into town about 1 or 2 and the first thing we are thinking is getting something to eat. Fazzolis was the choice for our prerace preride meal. Mitch found us a perfect spot along the course, setting everything up and checking in didn't take long and before we knew it we were out for a fun preride of the course. Preride went great took a lot of pics. and just road at a comfortable pace. So by the time we get back a lot of people or starting to show up, we are very stoked at the spot we got and decide to hit the showers. That has to be the coolest thing ever. The rest of the night was pretty basic eat a lot rest a lot more and enjoy everybodys company. Man I was very stoked when Mike T showed up, hadn't had a chance to talk to him so I didn't know if he was coming, He didn't show up until late and I think most of the rain drops already stopped falling. bummer or bummer not I think the rain actually helped the course out, just sucked we had to cram everything under the canopy. With having the camper there it made for a great night sleep, I think it was the best I have ever had before a race. So race morning came and I could tell I was already over excited for this one, would of rather of taken the Mitch approach! It wasn't long and Chad and Nathan had made it here. So we had a full support crew for the 3 of us doing it solo. I wish I could say everything was going smooth, but for the most part it did, I do owe Mike a big thanks for fixing my flat before I ever started the race and Chad for bringing down some extra rim strips. and with that man we were ready to race....

24

First hearing about a 24hr mountain bike race some years back before I even had a mountain bike or for that matter even thought about riding a bike is what eventually got me into riding bikes and then racing them. From my first beginner race in 2003 this was always my goal to do a 24, its kind of funny because this was so much like a beginner race for me. I had some goals that I wanted to make sure I would accomplish and did. I owe the biggest thanks to Nathan Means and Mike Teiber for all there help, you guys were awesome!! and it wouldn't of been near as much fun if Chad and Mitch wouldn't of been there, it was great to get to ride with each of you guys on some laps. Chad I still feel bad I didn't recognize you on one of the laps but it still makes me laugh when i think about it, its amazing how focused you can be. I stayed awake for the whole thing and loved every second of it, did more miles than I thought I would a lot easier than I thought it would be. met some very cool people especially Matt and Josh look forward to riding and racing with you guys again. I felt at one point in the race everybody there was supporting me and that was a great feeling. for everybody that did this race I'm sure you feel the same way I do we all accomplished something great a 24hr race!! when I can feel my hands again I will do a full race report because there is so so much I would love to share...

perfect week off

This was a perfect week to take off, great weather, finally got to see a road race, lots of camping and a cool trip to the zoo...

now its time to get ready for the big race, should be a nice trip through hell!!

Fear of the Dark

So I just downloaded this from mp3search.ru, Fear of the Dark its by Chuck Billy tribute to Iron Maiden. I have had the Maiden version in the ipod for a while now, Chuck Billy really does a great job with it!

I am a man who walks alone
and when I'm walking a dark road
at night or strolling through the park
when the light begins to change
I sometimes feel a little strange
a little anxious when its dark.
fear of the dark, fear of the dark

I have constant fear that somethings always near
fear of the dark, fear of the dark
I have a phobia that someones always there

have you run your fingers down the wall
and have you felt your neck skin crawl
when you're searching for the light?
sometimes when your scared to take a look
at the corner of the room
you've sensed that somethings watching you.

have you ever been alone at night
thought you heard footsteps behind
and turned around and no ones there?
and as you quicken up your pace
you find it hard to look again
because you're sure there is someone there........

A little wet!!

Wednesday evening I headed out to greensfelder for a pre ride of the race course, bummer was it had just started raining when I got there. The cycleworx guys were there and Mike T the ICCC guy, lucky for us we ran into single speed Tom to show us the race course. What a good time! Well Friday the race was on and off a few times because of all the rain we were getting. By Saturday morning things were a little wet but the course was super fast. Race started like normal. This race I wanted to go redline for a bit then recover and do it again just to see how recovered I was from the 12 last week. Got behind a single speed guy off the start which was a bummer cause this course is hard to pass on, still was making some good time. by the second lap pretty much passed the rest of the other classes and it was an open course. Rain started falling pretty good just before the expert cross country race, course was starting to get pretty slick. Did the best I could to hang with some of the faster cross country guys that was a lot of fun! Finished up with 12 laps just a little before 3hrs. The beginner race was cancelled do to rain and the course was in pretty bad shape. This one was tough for the promoters, so a big thanks goes out to them for all there hard work!!



Over the last couple of years I usually had a hard time recovering from back to back races, seems I have that dialed in pretty good these days. 3 weeks 3 races still feel very strong. So up next is some big road rides to get ready for this http://www.grannygear.com/ 24hrs on a bike, ok so probably like 20 or something, should be interesting! only 2 weeks away.

12hrs of Sac

Did this race last year and it was a lot of fun, so i wanted to do it again this year. Left saturday morning at 6am for the 3hr drive to Springfield. After a few gas station stops to load up on ice and some energy drinks and to fill the tank so I didnt have to on the way home I was at the race site. Found a good spot to set up and plan out what I wanted to do for the day, lots of things I was wanting to try out. So the race started like usual line up for the run. normaly I would take my time on the run and just set a easy pace off of the start get into a zone for the rest of the 12hrs. But not this race, this race I wanted to go hard for the first hour and then set into a pace that I thought I could do for the granny 24. So the race started and I jumped up front with Doug Long and Nathan not a real hard pace but we pretty much dropped everybody else pretty quick. This course was totally different then last year they added 1 1/2 half miles of new single track, it looked like they just built it like last week or something! very cool! The course was pretty technical very tight and twisty with some serious fast technical sections.they said it was about a 6 mile loop. So we came in the first lap together witch was hard to beleive the fastest lap of the day. Doug went really hard on the second lap but flatted towards the end or he would of got it. The race went really fast tried out some drink mixtures, (grapefruit juice, gatorade and perpetium with a endurolite every hour and got to have a little NOS energy drink (very bad) but I love the stuff. The race went perfect never any major problems, about 4hrs in I got a flat on the front tire but I got the stans to seal, the only problem was when I got back to the pits to air it up the valve on stans strip blew out. Lucky for me Brian Adams and his wife and there teamate were set up next to me, I owe them big for fixing my tire. I had a extra rim that I put on the bike, and they fixed the flat for me while I went out, I never put that one back on I had 2.3 on there now and it felt better so that is what I stayed with, and since I never used that tire again I stayed pretty much self supported but mentally it was nice to know I had another tire ready if I needed it, thanks greatly! By this time the course was pretty much flat city if you got out of this race with out a flat you should play the lottery!! By 7hrs in I pretty much had a lap or two on the solo field and wasnt to far back off of the teams and the pace felt to good. Every now and then somebody would come from behind and it was cool trying to stay ahead or chase, night time made it real fun, had a few fast laps just to keep things interesting, this course was awesome at night. So I stopped the race a little after 11pm was about 2 1/2 laps up on the closest person. This race was a lot of fun and a good warm up for the 24. These guys put on a great race, give out tons of free stuff and pay big, to big!!

Dedicated

If there is one other place I would rather be than with my family right now it would be with my father in law riding this monster http://www.audax-club-parisien.com/ bottom left paris brest paris, click on english version. He started 5am today.. wish him luck! Hopefully in 4yrs when it comes around again I will have the time and the balls to try it. cykel staerkt og pas godt pa dig selv, Johan... true dedication!!!

CAUTION, possable boasting!

packed the mountain bike this morning just in case i got off work early enough to sneak a quick chubb ride in. Big road ride tomorrow so I only wanted to do a fast single. work went smooth, finished up around 1:30 headed for chubb. My legs was a little tired still from the night ride Thursday but not a big deal, I had one thing to do and that was to get this thing done in 1 hour. others have done it and I have always wanted to. The first time I ever road chubb it took me something like 2 hrs + on my buddys bike. The year before I started racing my best was 1:20 ride time only and I remember after that ride somebody talking about some fast dude who did a double in 2hrs and that was when chubb was technical! Since then I have ridden it more times then I could count, I always stick to the same basic, lone elk straight out and straight back unless I'm riding with somebody else. If I want to get chubb done in less than a hour here's what has to be done, have to be at the tracks in less than 4 min, its a must to be at the start of the big climb in 12 to 13 min. get there to fast and the climb is going to kill me so I always try to save a little. usually go really hard to the rock face and then set in a nice groove to the picnic table, its a must to be at the picnic table in under 20 min. from the picnic table to west tyson is the best, you gotta ride it like its black top and get to the end 28 to 29 min. turn around and do it in reverse. picnic table in less than 42 min. slam the downhill and hall ass through the flats and hopefully save something for the last climb. get to the last climb in 56:30 and well shouldn't be a problem finishing it up in less than a hour! gotta love the chubb.... made it home early, wife cooked up a awesome meal and my parents stopped by for a great evening.

100 miles of hills

I should dedicate this ride to Chris Ploch he mentioned this idea for a ride last Feb. when we did a double at berryman. The road rides from the last few weeks was kind of a building block to figure out what hills would work the best and create the funnest loop. So I headed out a little after 5am with the bike bag packed full, 3 mini bagels half dozen or so jells 5 water bottles total, extra tubes and the other basic stuff. always try to keep it self supported, doesn't always work though like last week, stopped to get a bottle of water, and had some Hoosier lady on her smoke brake wanting to know how much my shoes costed cause they sure look expensive, but she did comment they were pretty as some rednecks gettin out of there big pickup eye in me up as if they wanted to well, I will leave that one for the imagination. So I will leave the gas stations for a last resort. So today's ride went great little over 10 grand of climbing, and had to go about 3 tenths of a mile past my house to get 100 miles exactly. I think my total time for the ride was 6:20. ran into an old friend an chatted a bit and the head wind kind of got me good in a few spots on the loop kept me from doing this thing in the six hours I was hoping for.

does it matter!

The last three weeks have been fun filled. lot of work with the big boss out of town but its all good. I had planned some big rides this month with no races. It started a couple of weeks back with a triple, triple chubb, kept the lap times at avg 1:15 total time for the ride felt really freakin good! got in a good and early ride Sunday, this ride is changing every week, so far I've hit every hill off of old Lemay there are some good ones and some that are a waste of time, the good ones get added to the loop and then doubled, wette rd will always be the favorite. so far the loop is up to 9 grand of climbing in about 5 1/2 hours.. trust me it feels really freakin good!! been getting some good 3hr plus night rides in through the week, pretty much same loop little mellowed out...



So Ive been riding my a$$ off lately, as in for the last 3 or 4 years and for what! because I've always wanted to do a 24. I can only imagine the effort it will take to do this thing the way i want to do it.. every race in time becomes more or less just another race, so i wonder, does this race more than any other really matter!! Riding without racing is freedom, but racing is the motivation to ride for that feeling of freedom... besides I'm a sucker for pain.

so I was checking out some other blogs out there, and its amazing how many races/rides that there is! wish I could hurry up and win the lottery... but there was some that got my attention for next year, this is one of them... http://vaportrail125.com/ They don't take very many people, but this would be an awesome ride.

Going up wedde rd. the top is up there somewhere!

Went out for a early ride this morning since I'm going to skip the binder race. (ride from home, save gas, spend time with the family, get stuff done) so i made it a bigger than normal ride, doubled up on all of the big climbs. got some serious elevation on this one... rode into a couple of guys on old Lemay, at least almost, coming off of sheck rd, you can almost hit 45 if u got balls and I'm sure there's people faster, problem is you have to try and stop at the bottom to make a right on old Lemay, didn't see no cars, but didn't see the bikers either, sorry about that! Hope you made it back to west county alright with the directions i gave you guys.

styrkeproven

"Test of Strength" An endurance race my father in law Johan did in Norway, 540km in 21 hrs total time. The rain had to make it interesting, great job! also big congrats to my brother in law Andreas for winning a time trial race last weekend with an avg 26mph that's seems real fast!! This is a picture of us before a big ride we did last year while we were visiting them...

http://www.styrkeproven.no/

future racers

We have a lot of hills around our house, which means a lot of climbing to get to the park. the way back is much worse, no complaints from the family, Bettina loves playing at the park almost as much as Lucas..

This is a perfect warm up ride for me, added in another 54 miles, made it to the top of old 21 in 45 minutes personal best for myself. 15 1/2 miles 1000ft of climbing, the rest of the ride went great added in another 4000ft of climbing....

.

Teddy Bear Suicide

http://www.myspace.com/tbsmadness This is Bettina's little brothers band, check them out there all pretty young. we went and saw them play at a club last year in Denmark when we were visiting her family. He is the lead singer were still trying to understand what he is saying!!! but its cool, good stuff Lars..

chubb x 2

Well its been a while since Ive been out to chubb and was wanting to see if i was fully recovered from last weekends race. When i was getting everything ready to role supa fast single speeder Jim Krewet showed up so we decided to ride a lap together, great pace, something about only having one gear and having to maintain a certain speed on climbs kept the pace at a nice level. with a whole lot of bs-n we still knocked down the first lap pretty fast great ride'n with ya Jim.


Went out on the second lap by myself, was feeling great hammered it out



in 1:02 finally got a less than 30 minute time trial effort in, funny cause me and Jim was talking about it. now i just got to get this thing done in less than a hour. Goals what would we do without them? cant beleive Im already recovered from the race last weekend...

racing lumberjack

There is what you want to do, what you could of did, but in the end there is only what you did and that is i raced my butt off for a finish time of 8 hrs 35 minutes. a lot of things can happen in a race of 100 miles and im sure a little bit of something happen to everybody at some point!


anyway this is how the weekend got started left work at 4 on thursday made it to the edge of Michigan by about 10 30 that night were I found the rest stop motel, this trip was all about cheap! so i crashed in the back seat. got back on the road around 7 friday morning it was still a good couple of hour drive before i got to manistee, were i found a big K mart to load up on some food and enjoy a big stack of pancakes. I got to the race sight about 11 30. very well organized they already had everything set up and ready for check in. got that out of the way and went for a preride, this course was marked better than any course ive ever been on. got the preride out of the way the legs felt great. pretty much just hung around and ate the rest of friday, camped that night at the race site made it easy for race day.


So race day came very early with the time change i was up at 4am (brain time) 5am local time. ate a bagel was to nervous to eat anything else should of ate more. warmed up on the bike for about 10 or 15 minutes knew the race start was going to be fast, before I knew it we were lining up on the road, it was cool seeing so many fast racers at this race...


The race started pretty fast on the road everybody trying to get a good spot for the single track, the single track came quick and so did the first climb it was hard finding lines through the people pushing there bikes, the climb was pretty steep and sandy very tough to ride. the pace was pretty fast on the first lap just was having fun hanging on! got a stick caught in my derailleur towards the end of the first lap kind of worked out perfect got out of the pace line and in to my own groove. second lap was kind of boring passed a few people had a few people pass me just tried to keep up a good pace. third lap came quick at the top of the climb I remember thinking the race is already half over tried to keep a good pace. under 8hrs seemed possible, by the time I passed the aid station I was feeling really good (about 12 miles in to the lap). Everything was going great and then i realized i lost my water bottle somewhere, not a big deal i still had a camelback. lucky me i got about 2 drinks out of it before it was empty. The good thing was at the time i wasnt really bothered by it figured i only had about 11 miles or so to get back. felt really good picked up my pace was having fun, ever have that feeling of feeling to good? That is a bad thing, that pretty little wall decided it was going to show up at my party. So i made it in from lap three was feeling pretty bad. grabbed 2 water bottles this time and filled the camelback and drank a whole lot, of course probaly to much. Didnt really matter my stomach was pretty jacked up.

So lap 4 started very slow for me, took a long time to start feeling good again but by the time i got to the aid station felt like i was ready to ride again, still kept the pace slow just wanted to enjoy the rest of this race. as each mile got closer i was picking the pace up a little more, was still setting times in my head that i thought i could finish by. it was a great feeling to finish this race, never doubted that i would..... biggest things i was stoked about, never got any cramps, never lost focus, was always thinking what i would do different next time! great experience

very short version

This was a great learning experience for my first 100mile race, finished in 8 1/2, had 75 miles in 5:45 had some problems at the end of the 3rd lap going in to the 4th. very, very bumpy course with lots of sand all single track. felt like the first couple of hours was like doing a dirt crit. wished the climbs would of been a lot longer, other than the beginning climb and the climb at the end of the lap all the others were pretty small. not sure of my placing, im sure i was pretty far back had a lot of people pass me on the last lap (bummer)! I left as soon as i finished made it home in less than 9hrs was in bed by 1am long day!!

lumberjack

http://www.lumberjack100.com/ this is going to be fun, preride friday, hopefully finish it in 9 or 10hrs saturday, drive my a$$ off and get back in time for breakfast sunday!! wish me luck..

cheap music

http://www.mp3search.ru some good stuff!

chasing ghost!

looking at the weather forecast friday for saturdays race wasnt looking good, mostly thinking that i would hate to drive all the way to the race for a cancellation, as for as racing in the mud or rain never is a big deal. I think most of my rides all winter were in crap conditions.

Saturday morning did the usual race day prep, up at 5 eat half dozen waffles the frozen kind, usually on weekends Bettina will make homemade waffles, but there was no getting here up at 5. so i headed out the door around 6 or so wanted to get there early to preride the course, i havent ridden here since the race last year, and with all the road construction! The preride was great, the course was a little slick in spots but nothing any mtb racer couldnt handle. So 9am rolls around and we line up, the difference in this race is were missing a few of the guys i like racing against Chris was in ohio, im not sure were Mr Breslin was? it would of been nice to race against Kurt again strong dude.

So the race start didnt change for me i went hard knowing there was the king of the mountain climb with 20bucks waiting for me at the top of the first climb, Brenden jumped on my wheel for the first half of the climb kinda had me sweating for a bit, once I got into the single track I got into a nice groove felt great about 3 laps in the course got really fast, I could almost see Chris and Dave up ahead around every corner, Kurt was at the top of every climb, you guys were my ghost and my motivation, every training ride i do has them, especially the night rides kind of freaks me out sometimes anyway passed chad on lap 10 he was looking strong and caught up to Brenden on lap 11 looking strong as well he was wondering how close chad was, they had there own battle going on. finishing up the last lap we got a nice little down poor. felt sorry for the beginner race we had a near perfect course and they more than likely at the very least a really slick course. well i finally got one of those cool state jerseys I have wanted since i was a beginner racer. congrats to Brenden Mcnamee for a strong second place and Chad Brixey for a strong third. James and all the guys that help put on the race great job i look forward to that event next year...

Finishing time 3:05 11 laps average heart rate 157 4500ft of climbing if it was accurate!

weekend

Work equals money, more work equals more money, to much work, well you get the picture not much time for anything. so other than working part of the day on saturday it was a much needed weekend with the family. So sunday the plan was to head to grants trail. me and the wife dusted off the roller blades put Lucas in the stroller and headed down the trail, i havent been on roller blades since i played roller hockey back in maybe 2001 and Bettina since the last time we came here to roller blade when we were dating. brought back a lot of good memories and it was fun watching Lucas jog back the last 1/4 mile or so.

Monday morning was a planned road ride, felt weird being on the bike on a monday, i think it took me 2hrs just to get warmed up. added a little to the same loop, few more little climbs for fun, felt good to get a big ride in. Me and Bettina spent part of the day chasing Lucas around on his new little 4 wheeler toy followed by a family bike ride to the park with lots and lots more of chasing Lucas around, the kid has endless amounts of energy...

Paris Brest Paris

Congratulations to my father in law for qualifying for PBP, he did the 600k on saturday in 25 1/2hrs. He did this race 4yrs ago in a total time of 67hrs (45 riding time) not bad for being 57 years young! wish i could be there with ya, hopefully in another 4 years when it comes around again I will have a little more free time.... Best of luck in Paris

fun at CW

2 things i dont like. racing back to back weekends, and working on a roof all week before a race. well i had both of these to deal with before this race plus trying to get some time out at castlewood to help the team get the course ready and try to get a little pre ride in. so friday came and it looked like it could rain at anytime, time being 7am. so i do the usual routine get all the tools out and start building some stuff. The good and the bad, the good being it started raining and now i get to have an easy day inside (perfect pre race day) the bad is its raining. back to the good, it quit before i got to the park. so easy day at work, helped a little with some of the course and then got a good pre ride in.
every race i have to have some idea of what i want to do, this one was easy go as hard as i can for the first and maybe second lap then maintain a good pace. This race brought some serious fast racers in the endurance field, when you line up next to guys like Chris Ploch, Dave Breslin, AnthonyDust and a guy that gets my total respect Kurt Fletcher you know its gonna be fun.
The race started as planned, chris jumped out in front and led us through the maze of sport racers on the first climb (sorry for any contact, cutting off, or anything else i might have done to interfere with the sport racers) so the first lap came and went, chris put a good 40 seconds on me and i had no idea were everybody else was. when i got to the top of grotpeter climb i was just far enough back from chris to hear him yell, i cant believe i got another flat, there has to be some sort of record for that kind of thing! well i figure now is a good time to get in a good pace. things were going good but i could see kurt making up some good time on me, so i thought the wicked downhill would be a good spot to make up some time, wrong the guy was with me the whole way down. so i knew it wouldnt be long before he went by to do his own thing, and that he did. all i could do was maintain a pace i thought i could handle the whole race. The next couple of laps came and went felt good, so im heading into what i figured would be the last lap and somebody tells me kurt is only 40 seconds up. you get to this and you have to ask should i go for it and take a chance of blowing up, cramps you get the picture. or just maintain a pace and finish in a good position feeling strong.... not this time i gotta go for it. i rode as hard as possible looking for kurt around every corner, almost gave up until i saw him on the last climb. brings back memories when i got to this point last year at the cw state race, i saw brian shoemaker (sp) just getting to the top and thinking man i wish i would of rode harder. i think he finished about 40 seconds ahead of me and won state in our age group. anyway seeing kurt got me all kinds of pumped up, i dont think i have every rode that hard in my life, when i passed him he had slipped, so i kept looking back to see if he was on my wheel and then ran into a tree, on a climb, stupid. i was having trouble trying to stay focused my heart rate was jacked at about 185 and all i wanted to do was get to the finish. when i look back on it, kurt was the strongest just came up a little short and i was just lucky to stay focused long enough to make it to the finish.
That one hurt bad in a very good kinda way!

Syllamos Revenge

So we packed up on thursday night and headed out to Blanchard springs, home of the syllamos revenge race. I thought this race would be a perfect camping trip for the wife and kid and so it was. We got to the campsite at about 11 30 thursday night. The sky was starting to clear a bit thankfully, considering it rained most of the way down. So we got the pop up all ready and headed to bed, Lucas was fully stoked to be on his second camping trip.
The morning brought us some chilly temps with a little bit of sun peeking over the trees. finally the rain is gone, so after some cool hiking with Bettina and Lucas we have some lunch and then its off to preride some of the course. So i got in about 2 good hours of riding the legs were fresh and ready to race.







5 am had arrived with the sounds of race day beeps from the heart rate monitor singing tunes of lets get the heck out of bed and race. So i eat a bagel and have my usual NOS its a race day must ok so its now a everyday must. soon after chris shows up ready to do a little pre warm up i can tell he is highly pumped and ready to race, we were definitely feeling the good vibrations! So we do the racer meeting and then head over to the start line, I line up in front with some guys that i have looked up to since i did my first race back in 03 at the very least i actually felt comfortable being up front for the first time.


So the race started off pretty fast with Bob leading us off to the big hill climb then with sum pre planned race tactics i pushed the pace on the climb hoping to thin things out a bit and get everybody a little in the red for the start of the single track, approaching the top of the climb, chris, eric pirtle, and matt long passed me leading us in to the single track. I had no problem with that figuring they would hit it hard and was just wanting to set my own pace and get comfortable for the next 48 miles of single track. Well the bummer was chris was at the bottom of the first downhill with a flat, worst spot of the race for that to happen considering how tight and rocky the single track was. So i kept to the plan and tried to stay smooth, I managed to catch up with eric and saw that matt wasnt very far ahead. every thing was going good until this dude caught up with us and was wanting by in the worst way, no biggie so i let him by, here is the problem though, he would get to every climb and die so i would go by then he would catch up and want by again. the next climb came and so i passed him and eric not what i had planned but this guy was driving me nuts! well in the process i was catching up to matt pretty quick still felt smooth and the heart rate was in check, bummer was i could feel my back rim on every rock, the tire was a little low and figured i better add some air. luckily the air held and i was back in business but in my time down eric had passed by. So i get to the first check point and matt and eric or up by 2 minutes and i am still thinking chris is going to catch back up. well i found out later that chris had a few more flats along with some of the other guys from the team. so my race was going very well considering. well other than running in to matt at one of the road crossings he was stopping his race, never did hear why? i never did see anybody else racing, at the second checkpoint eric had gotten more time on me so i upped my pace a little, by the third checkpoint i was still about the same time back 8 minutes or so, finishing up the last loop the smoothest and fastest part of the race course, i got to the last checkpoint and the time was still the same so i was just stoked to be in second place with no major problems like last year. rolled down the last downhill to the finish for a final time of 4:36. 8 minutes behind first place eric pirtle. after a race like this you usually hear some pretty cool stories, well me and the family were hanging around the finish line Mark Bauer came in finishing up his race claiming that a snake he had gone over had bitten a hole in his back tire and the stans had sealed it up and a fellow racer had witnessed the event. that is a hard one to beat! great job on finishing the race mark and great job to the rest of the team, overall as a team we took 3 of the top five spots and would of had 4 if chris would not of flatted. this is a course that will be beat you down like no other if given the chance and hopefully will be waiting for us all again next year! enjoyed the rest of the weekend camping with the family and chasing the little guy around, finally he ran out of energy on the way home.

chubb

looking to get a mountain bike ride in before the big http://www.syllamosrevenge.com/ race this weekend, chubb is always the first thing that comes to mind. well my goal was to beat the rain before it came, no such luck considering it was raining most of the drive there, but man i needed a ride bad. the good thing was the major downpours waited till i was on my way back from the west tyson side. i have always had a goal for chubb from back when they used to do the time trial. rain, lots of very slick rock, little bit of mud, these are the things that kept me within seconds of reaching that goal. but of course those things or just excuses so as a mtb racer i think i will always be asking myself were can i pick up that one more second!

work was awesome today got a lot of the upstairs ready to start putting the plywood on the roof, got to do a little field framing over one of the bays also, should look pretty cool when its done considering it has 12 ft walls on that section.

interesting ride

tonights ride had a little bit of everything, sun, clouds, little bit of rain, great sunset as i was coming over one of the bigger hill climbs. have to mention the couple of pissed off drivers, but then again there on every ride, its all good though considering i drive rush hour traffic everyday and see the respect people give to there fellow drivers (f--king nut bags)

so anyway the cool thing about riding by yourself, cause i dont live close to anybody that i would like to ride with, is you can try new stuff. tonights fun was seeing how many times i could blow up on the hill climbs and recover to sprint the end, lots of fun! and as always looking for more hills, got in close to 6000ft

tomorrow its off to the big circus, looking for more camper stuff, then to a birthday party.

We built this house a few years ago, we are doing another one very similar, tomorrow we set roof trusses, thats when the fun begins and i will take plenty of pictures. at the present time i am a one man crew since the boss is in the hospital with something! again! wish him well.

tonight was a good ride with the wife and kid along with some fun at the park. tomorrow i am heading out looking for some more hills to add to the route, it would be easier if i could just build a mountain in my back yard.

200k brevet ride

been wanting to try one of these out for a while its part of a series, here is a link to read about it www.geocities.com/stlbrevets/home.html. well i managed to get one of the guys from the team to ride it with me, you can read his blog http://www.brendenmcnamee.com/ me and Brenden started at a casual pace, just out for a nice saturday ride, taking up the rear with style, Brenden got a flat. I have finally found somebody that can change a flat as slow as me, so with the time lost we decided to start putting it down, the casual ride became a kinda fun race to see how many people we could catch. Well about 10 miles left we saw the first group up ahead. so nothing like being 115 miles into a ride and deciding to sprint the last little bit. so we finished up with the group and had a great day of riding, thanks again Brenden, your riding strong man!

your own race!

So i have this idea about a race, 40 miles of road, 40 miles on the mtb with a set amount of elevation gain for the road and then for the mtb. you design your own course based on the set altitude, you preride it as much as you want, on a set date and time the race begins, guess what your the only one on the course. each person races there own course, rules are simple keep the mtb part all single track, keep the road, well of course all road. When you are done you simply compare your times for the winner. Think about this, you could be racing against someone in Texas, Cali, Canada at the same time, you would know there out there at the same time and yet never see them, it would be endless. how much of factor would weather be, it could be hot at one place and cold at another or perhaps raining. Thats what could make this such an interesting race. A true race against yourself on a course that was made for you!

fun day

Well i had 2 things planned for today, get a big ride in and head to the zoo with the family, big ride went something like this, got rolling about 7am. The temp was reading about 35 degrees so i had to dress nice and warm. with a little bit of a head wind, i pounded out the first 15 miles in a time trial manner as usual, then try to settle in for the hills,the hills were going very well, so i had a few extra hills i wanted to add in on my loop. So i managed to get in 57 miles with a little over 5730 ft of climbing, felt very good.

So with the ride outta the way got home in time for lunch and then off to the zoo, the little guy had a blast!

weekend

finally the weekend is here, planning on gettin a little wet tomorrow in prep for a big ride on sunday. going to try to get the pop up ready for syllamos revenge coming up in a few weeks, that is going to be a fun race, nothing like 50 miles of single track at race pace. http://www.syllamosrevenge.com

great life

each day begins usually the same, wake up the little guy, hang out and have breakfast, drop him off, go to work, build some cool stuff, come home hang out with the family, get the little guy ready for bed, hit the weights, spin on the bike or actually go for a ride, play on the computer go to bed, repeat!

what a great life...

ouachita challenge

I didnt really want to do this race again after last year because i didnt like all of the road. BUT thats what makes everything a challenge, so when the race sold out in 24 hrs you bet my name was registered, and thats when i traded in the road bike for the mountain bike on the road.

So the race started something like this,tried to stay up near the front for the warm up to the gravel road, it still amazes me how freaky it is riding in a big group of people, so i couldnt wait for the start of the gravel road because i knew the pace would definitely thin things out a bit, before i knew it we were heading in to the single track i was sitting in about 6 place, very stoked because i was feeling very good, so the rest of the race just kinda flew by, i gave up a few spots to some very fast road guys, got settled in on the womble and started thinking man there is like 190 people that would love to kick my ass and take my spot, so that gave me some good inspiration to step it up a little, other than riding a little sketchy at times, finished with a lot in the tank knowing i could of did more

good ride today

so today was the first day back on the road bike since the end of november, i was still riding alot of road just on the mountain bike to get ready for the ouachita challenge, with a little bit of head wind the road bike felt awesome, added a few hills to my normal training route, so im up to 4800ft in 50 miles, gotta find more hills!

when it started

back in november of 2002 i was out for a ride at cliff cave, blue jeans and all! and i ran in to this hardcore mountainbike racer Mark LaRue who couldnt wait to tell me how awesome racing was, so in march of 03 i did my first beginner race. that is what got me hooked and man that is still one of my favorite races i have done and probaly one of the hardest.