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!