2009 Recap

I have been remiss in posting for sometime, busy getting Team Revolution Peak Fasteners 2010 stuff in order, Helping build the MTBRacenews.com team and traveling for work. Lots of FF Miles recently.

2009 ended up being a better than expected year. The local 40+ expert group just got faster. I actually had a few wins (5-Mile, Jackson) and returned to Endurance racing again. Below is the best of list.

1. best off season trip - January in St George with Fitty Watt and Boffeli has a Posse. Didn't think I would ever see someone get cut off at Olive Garden in St. George, brilliant!!!!
2. best race trip - Laramie Enduro - Team Rev Peak Fasteners was full on in effect, plus got to see BP and actually raced with him for about 1/3 of the course.
3. The 2009 Paz Ortiz Nemesis Award goes to Sam Moore who discovered his climbing legs in 2009, this along with his madness on the downhill makes him a threat to win every race.
4. Perfect Race of 2009 - My favorite Icup venue - Jackson Hole, led from the beginning, kept it smart and easily won, very nice day on the bike, full of Zing and joy.
5. Best Race of 2009 - The Park City Point to Point. The crew did an amazing job, I only did the Duo category as my knee was acting up post Laramie and Mt. Ogden 50k
6. Best training ride of the year - the Flying dog to Deer Valley to PCMR epic done with Shannifer, Hypio, Ken, Pasternak and others.
7. Worst Training ride of the year - Meeting Bart, Alex et al and gorgoza and riding straight up for an hour 2 days after returning from Asia, ouch.
8. CX season - I fully planned NOT to race any CX, but I can't stay away, I ended up racing Single Speed of all things, had a few good results, beat Boffeli more often than not and had a blast, seems I do better at CX when I don't plan on it or train for it.
9. Most exciting part of the year - Being chosen to be on the GT Dirt Coalition, I applied at literally the last minute (a few hours to spare) was picked, got a sweet carbon Zaskar and I hope I was a good ambassador for them.

As always the best part of the season was the community, old and new friends, laughter, grumbles, suffering, smiling = FUN, looking forward to what 2010 brings.

Peace

Excellent Message

The State of MTB Racing in America.

a response to This

UTCX #4

Lots of pics of SInglespeed and Men'sB and a few Men's & 35+ A HERE

Courtesy of Lyna, I didn't come in last

To or not

CX that is, leaning towards not, as not much bike time in 1.5 months, lots of travel and low motivation, Who knows, maybe I'll be ready to rip it in a few weeks, probably not.

Kauai was great, as always, still wanted to stay, of course, I may even ride the shoreline this evening after work, should be fun.

My legs are hairy even. Crazy.

The Season, She is dun

Well, except maybe for a chance at the 24(5) hours of Frog Hollow Halloween weekend. I have been busy with work and life.

Seen a lot of this view for 2 weeks.

Siberia

China

So, they are all cartoon like there.


Phillipines

I have chosen to not race Cyclocross this year, needing a rest. Saturday I rode about 3 hours of Shoreline with Kathy and Shannon while everyone else was suffering, i didn't miss it.

Starting to make Team/Sponsorship plans for 2010. Never too early, always too late.

Have you done trail work yet? Let me know and I will get you on Jamie's list.

4 more days

PC Point2Point race 2009

Nothing but rave reviews of super organization, sweet one track and pain, glorious pain.

Post Laramie I had doubts of being able to make it the complete 75 miles without severe knee problems. The Mt Ogden 50k sealed the deal. So when Ty asked if I wanted to do it Duo, I said, yes. I did waffle back and forth on whether I wanted to do the first or second leg, I settled on teh second, so I could sleep in.

Lyna was the volunteer extraordinaire, giving up most of 2 days to help the registration/race/awards went off without a hitch. To her and all the other volunteers, THANK YOU!!!

Bart and Alex got to Silver Lake in like 2:15, which ramped up my prep timeline, after I helped set up part of the Feed Zone I got dressed, waffled on thermal or regular jersey, as it was raining off and on and cheered on racers and helped feed a few, Chad, who was out checking course markings ahead of the race convinced me to go with just a jersey which was the right move.

Ty and Tanner came in to the transition together and Keegan took off while I was putting the number plate on my bike (It was the 'baton'). I said at that point that there was no way I was catching him, as i am almost 3 times his age.

I caught a Solo guy on the first section of one track and as we crossed the service road I went around him and washed out, oops. No problem, kept going and started up Tour De Suds, this went faster than expected and then on the Guardsman road I came upon Kenny Paper Boying up the road on his belt drive one speed. TG was a blast, Mid Mtn then the brief portion of John's 99 was a blast, Johns trail was hard, but I survived. Up Steps hurt a lot and I tried to conserve for APex and Keystone up above Jupiter, I thought this was going to be the hardest part of my race, alas, it was tame, I was surprised and happy to be to the top so soon, where Erika heckled me. The 6+ Mile downhill was ahead of me, that 6 miles, while fun and fast and only taking 23 or so minutes was the hardest part of the race, my upper body was taking a beating. Fox shoved a dollar at me at the feed station, Ryan and Ty helped me switch bottles and I took off up Spiro, it went pretty well, had one bathroom break and then hit mid mountain 35 minutes later, The gradual rise to the look out went by in about 10 minutes and the next 5 miles went by in 23 minutes, that 23 minutes, I think, was the most fun I had all day, I was flying and grinning and hoping that none of those rocks split a tire, it didn't.

At the Colony aid station, I thought I was going to have to do the whole bibs take down to dissipate discomfort, but it passed, whew, thanks to Hillary for cheering me on.

The climb from Red Pine to Rob's descent was painful, I knew there was one more climb to do, so while Rob's was fun, my mind was reeling for how far down I was going to ride before I had to climb back up. Alas it was 'only' 1.5 miles up and then Holly's down.

I finished my leg just a bit over 4.5 hours. Our total time was 8:01 good for second place, 32 minutes behind the kids.


6 bottles of CarboRocket, 5 Roctanes and a few chomps fueled the day, that a Lyna's waffles.

I won a ton of stuff in the raffles, 2 Canyon's passes, One PCMR pass, 2 fleeces, Winter bib tights, sunglasses, Skullcandy headphones and more.

Shannon, Jay, Brian etc.. did a great job. Free food post race, great prizes for all categories and the Lantern Rouge prize to AL was awesome.

I am tired and sore and do not think I would of finished if I would of gone solo.
P.S. I think TC has some sort of weird obsession with my calves, Dr. X, you need to work this out with her.

The Robbie Project

CLICKY THE SCROLLING IMAGE ABOVE TO GET TO PURCHASE PAGE

Robbie Squire is one of the top U23 Mountain Bike Racers in the USA, he is the former Junior National Champion and took 2nd in this years U23 championship, he is a nice kid and the future of the sport in the USA. As a result of his excellent results, USA Cycling has Named him the the World Championship team. This year the world championships are in Canberra, Australia September 1-6.

However, USA Cycling does not pay his way, as a result, this makes it difficult for a 19 year old to afford.

The Tour De Park City has generously donated some nice swag to raffle off to get Robbie to Australia without gong into debt.

Reynolds Solitude Wheelset
Garmin 605
Rudy Project Helmet/glasses combo
3 energy packages including hammer heed, pro bars, sportslegs, and gels

5 dollars a ticket and the raffle will be held in 2 weeks

Mt. Ogden 50k weekend

Lyna and I took the puppies up to Huntsville for the weekend, I was signed up for the Mt. Ogden 50k race and wanted to have a relaxing weekend as well. The condo was comfy and clean and about 15 minutes from Snowbasin.

I headed up early Saturday morning to pick up my packet and set up the Dirt Coalition Pop Up tent. Went back to the condo to get Lyna and the pups and headed back up, Discovered soon after arrival tha my GPS had no battery charge, oh well, no problem, I warmed up with BZ and headed to the start. I originally signed up as Pro, but then was going to downgrade to amateur, but then realized that with 2 categories, I should race the upper one, only fair.

I think there were around 25 'Pro' men at the start, I was in the top ten at first, and surrendered a few spots on the first DH, as I had not pre-ridden the course. There were several spots on the DH that I had "OH $hit!" moments, but all in all i did well enough, Nate Stowers got around me towards the bottom of the first long DH and I stayed with him as much as I could till the long pavement climb to the lap area. I motored up this climb, putting distance on several riders and grabbed my bottles from Lyna. On the exposed start area climbs I was feeling a bit dizzy, luckily that went away, about 5 minutes later on the rough climb my left knee started to ache, drat, I maybe should have thrown in the towel there, but I kept pushing.

I did better on the DH and then any climb would come and I wanted to go hard, as my legs had it in them, but the knees did not. I was getting passed left and right and was very hot and frustrated, still I pushed on. Finally I made it to the long paved climb to the finish, KC, Adam and a few others passed me here and I was wanting to go with them, the legs said yes, but the knees said no. So I finished, 3 hours 3 minutes 34 seconds. 19th 'Pro' men 24th Male over all, 27th over all male and female.

1st lap 1:25:20

2nd lap 1:38:14

I believe I may have Patellar Tendonitis, need to go see a PT to be sure. The legs, lungs and heart wanna go, but the knees say no.

The rest of the weekend was grand, post race BBQ and awards were fun, I am sure I was one of the few that did not win a raffle prize:). Lyna and I ate dinner on 25th street in Ogden and then hot tubbed it, woke up Sunday and had breakfast at the Jackson Fork Inn, then drove home and hung out at the Tour of Utah crit with the Day's.

Back

Been out having fun, not riding much to speak of, Lyna is back on the bike and hitting dirt regular like, which is awesome. We hit up the Tour of Utah Prologue Tuesday, that was a scary DH finish and corner, missed the Pie feed as a result, which I am bummed about. Wednesday I was gonna attempt the Clarks TT but decided racing in PC would be more fun, we started at Silver Lake down Mid Mountain, up Team Big Bear, Counter Clockwise on Flagstaff, up Deer Camp and Down Nail Driver. 6.5 miles of fun in the cool mountain temps. I took the W in a small field and got a 12 pack of Pro-Bars, mmmmmmm good. Several people took wrong turns, but fun was had by all.

Lyna finished spray painting all the PCPP arrow signs yesterday, even though Ellie chewed up the stencil.

This weekend I head up to Snowbasin to race the Mt. Ogden 50k, which seems to be only slightly longer than a XC race, so should be fun, I have heard great things bout the trails up there.

2009 Laramie Enduro

I have not done anything but XC races since 2005, and that was the Brian Head 50, taking less than 4 hours, I registered for Laramie in February, since it was only 60 bucks and would be easy to walk away from if I decided to pass on it. Well Team Revolution had about 25 register, then we got a block of rooms at the Fairfield, so I became more committed. Having done that, I was convinced that I would have no chance of an overall Expert series win, however, circumstances proved other wise.

Friday morning after breakfast at Eggs in the CIy with Lyna, We loaded up the Wedge mobile with Jim, Steve, Alison and my self and headed to Laramie. We registered and as we were getting ready to go spin on the wild roads of town, the storm started, so we went to feed on pasta with 15 of us, The rain kept up and we hit the sack early.

We woke up at 5:00, headed down for the free breakfast fixins and headed out to the race site. I think I got about a 10 minute warm up in, not that it mattered. My goal was to stick with Brad Pilling as long as possible, We lined up on the 2nd row and when he start went, I took off at a sub XC start pace, there was less than 1/2 mile of service road to one track and I wanted to avoid as much craziness as possible, Brad says 'That was unnecessary!' A quote that would bug me for a while. So for the first 10 miles or so I was in the first chase group, I think about 5 or so were off the front. Brad catches me at about mile 8 and I ask him if I cut him off, he says no, whew. I then get on his wheel, he motors ahead on some flats and I catch back on on the rises. Then he gets a 20 second gap and we hit the Mile 10-20ish headwind fire road section, I get in with a group of 15 or so, Brad is 20 seconds up in a group of 4, In my group it is me and 2 Chipotle Titus riders doing all the work, finally I Jump across to Brads group and we get more people doing work. I felt like I was going a bit too hard, but knew being in this group was pushing me down the road a whole lot faster and would pay off in the end. We broke up as we hit the Singletrack when we looped back to the start singletrack area, I still had Brad about 10-20 seconds up and we were keeping a steady pace. Right before aid station 2 I saw SHannon on the side finishing up a flat fix, I stopped at the aid station to fill up a bottle and Got back on as Shannon went by, I held onto his wheel on doubletrack, rough cow trail and one track for about 4 miles or so, Miles 36-47 or so were the hardest part of my day. I dropped off of Shannon, and started feeding, I wanted to back down because I knew the last 20-25 miles were the hardest. I passed Ryan Ashbridge right before Aid 3 fixing a flat and he blew by me a bit later, as I came into aid 3 he was still there, Aid 3 was where our drop bags were, so I swapped bottles, grabbed my food, grabbed a handful of animal crackers and headed out, Ryan came up on me and I said I was in recovery mode and to get around me, he did, and took off (for a top 10 overall finish). I got passed by probably 15 people in this 11 mile section. I just let them go. Finally, hitting a doubletrack climb at mile 48, my legs came around and I stepped it up, my HR track shows about a 10 BPM drop in those 11 miles, the rest off the race, before and after was right around the same average. Of course, this started the last 20 miles of the race, which was the hardest. The doubletrack climbing was great, I was able to sustain power and go steady, not getting passed by anyone, but, my knees were aching, quads, fine, knees burning, so single track climbing was bad, technical singletrack climbing, worse. Aid stations 4 and 5 included me grabbing boiled potatoes and chips, filled up with water and heading out, at aid 5 I asked when the next downhill was, there was nervous laughter, well there was like 2 screaming fast downhills on service roads, about a miles worth, top speed 40mph, followed by, oh 800 feet of technical, rocky, rooty one track climbing in 2.5 miles, My legs felt great, but my knees were not feeling great, I walked a lot of this section, The decent off the top was a blast and took less than 9 minutes, done, race time 6:02:59. 34th place in the overall Open-Pro. Only 20 minutes behind Ryan who finished 10th, Brad finished 12th and Shannon 15th. The Mile 35-48 lull likely cost me a top 20, but that is how endurance racing goes, good spots and bad spots. My actual moving time was 5:52. I stopped for 4 pee breaks and stopped at 4 aid stations for a total of 11 minutes. But, I never bonked, was well fed and hydrated and had no issues, the Carbo Rocket made the day, 6 bottles of it plus 2 of water. My Fly socks kept me warm in the early am temps and kept my feet happy regardless of mud, water and cowpie. The Zaskar was fast, smooth and flawless.

The course was fun and challenging, countless un-rideable mud (cow poo) bogs, flowy one track, fast fire road, cow trails, waist deep creek crossings. The course was very well marked, if you kept eyes forward, volunteers were awesome, filling my bottles for me, cheering me on. Fellow riders were kind and encouraging, even if they wheel sucked :) The Registration took seconds, the food post race was awesome and they even had industrial strength action wipes for post race cleaning. Jen took second in her group and won 200 bucks, Brad took 2nd Open 40-49 and also won 200. I guess my name was called for a sweet raffle prize, but we had already left.

Everyone on Team Revolution finished and we only had a few flats, the weather was good, sunny skies and the post race dinner at the Chop house successfully put us in a Coma. I'll be back next year.

Now to decide whether or not my knees are willing to do the PCPP race.

2009 I-Cup 40+ Overalll Champ

2009 Icup Expert 40+ Series podium

Thanks Erika!

Meanwhile, I was sufferin with 400 others in the Laramie Enduro, hung with Brad Pilling and recently flat tire sufferers Shannon B and Ryan A till mile 40, when I remembered the last 25 miles of the 67 mile race were the hardest. Ended up finishing at 6:03 34th overall.

More later.....

Jackson Zing

E-Pow picked me up Friday am and we headed out to Teton Village via Evanston-Cokesville-Afton etc... When we arrived, the condo was empty and the skies were opening up rain. I took a nap, it felt good, The rain let up and E-Pow went out for a pre-ride around 3:30, I waited for Ty and Ted and we went out around 4:30 or so, the course was not muddy, actually dusty for the most part, it seemed they had smothed out some of the tech sections while leaving others in place. Friday evening the gang was all there and we fed our faces and settled in for a restless night of sleep (except for Ron, Chad and the other Bobby who stumbled in around midnight or so).

This may very well be my favorite XC course

Woke up around 6:30, ate, embrocated (it was 55 degrees) and headed out to register. I then had 45 minutes to warm up, I did about 1/4 of a lap, came back to the feed zone, took off my jacket and arm warmers and then went and rode up this super steep-loose hill which put me on the final DH of the course, came down and we were staging-perfect. Ed held the start for 10 or so minutes as a pro had to cut the cable lock to get his bike off his rack, no one i know of complained about it.
We had over 10 at the start, including several locals. The start went off and I went to the front and hit the one track first, i then backed off a little, to not go to far into the red and just steadily moved forward. The good Dr. was in second at this point and I knew he could climb away from me, so on the short steep stuff in the first mile or so I put in hard bursts. Then when we broke out to the short Down on the double track to the short double track rise, I put in a hard effort and kept it steady in the first long single track, after that I just alternated between pushing hard and conserving, usually pushing hard on the flats and low grade rises and conserving on the steep stuff, including the dreaded steep service road of the devil. Starting the DH on lap one, I saw Tim heading off course down a service road, he yelled that his drive train was shot(later to be a twisted chain) a bit later I spied the single speeder in our cat about a minute or so behind, so I tured up the speed a slight bit more on the DH and out of the saddled the start finish climb, slowing to get my bottle from Kim Abbott(Thanks) and then proceeded to do it all over again.

I was worried about Arantix Doc surging so I kept pushing after anyone in front of me. a bit into lap 2 we started coming up on the 12 and unders, in the far north woods section I came up on one and warned 'rider' and she proceeded to fall over, I did a combo cross dismount, are you ok? and through the brush and back on the bike, the rest of the passes went well. Then on the steep climb of the devil my rear tire popped off a rock and felt flat all of a sudden, about 1/3 a way up the steep part, I jumped off, dumb, grabbed it, not flat, re-mounted and somehow kept going up the hill.

Lap 3 was uneventful, just kept pushing and trying to catch the guy with the most base miles of anyone I know, who started 2 minutes ahead. Didn't catch him though.

So in the end I came away with W #2 of 2009, about 4 minutes up on 2nd. I spoke of zing last year. Saturday at Teton Village, I had Zing. It was so diametrically apposed to my 2nd place at Solitude the week before, which was the furthest from Zing I have been ever.

Some race stats.
3rd best expert time
Passed all other experts but 1st 19-29 and 1st and 2nd 30-39
Lap 1 - 35:20
Lap 2 - 35:57
Lap 3 - 37:02

Sad part, got a 25 dollar gift cert to Fitzgeralds Bikes, which closed before we got there and was not open Sunday, sold it to the Other Bobby for 15 bucks.

Post race we took a tram ride to the top, hiked around, came back, went to mexican for Ty, went to mangy moose for a bit and crashed out.

Got up and headed home pretty early.

I guess the final race is NOT double points, which I did not know till Saturday, which means I sealed up the series with my win. E-Pow will be my stand in on the Podium next week, as I will be in Laramie racing the Enduro. Can't believe another Icup season is done.

Seriously, I think that was the hardest XC race I have ever done.

Late Edit--Lotsa Race Photos here, courtesy of Lyna

I rode the course quite a bit during the week, including Friday with Newby, afterward I soaked in the creek for 30 minutes (I hear that is a no no though).
Lyna and I got there early enough so I could meander my way to getting kitted up for the warm up. Before the race Chris B said he was retired. I hope that isn't true, I like chasing him. Ty and I headed out up the pavement for a small lap warm up, plus some other openers. I got a good warm up, well it was warm too.

Sam and I had a gap going up the short dirt road/paved road section, I let off the gas as he came around me into the singletrack, not wanting to blow up. Honeycomb and Quenn Bess are painful and I did not want to blow up with the upper service road climbs ahead. BK got around me on Queen Bess. I just setted in, it was gonna be a long day. I made it over the top and headed down Kruzr, BK was on the side of the trail with a flat tire, I told him to get moving and kept going.

I never saw Sam again and never saw anyone behind me either, I just kept trying to pass people in other categories to keep motivated. The curse was brutal, about 4400 feet of climbing in under 22 miles. The DH was rough and my arms were pretty pumped halfway through the race, then my quads got pumped on the DH, on the last 1/2 (really 3/4's) lap I was actually DH'ing alot in teh saddle, The Zaskar absored it well, my quads needed the rest. We had over 10 at the start and only 5 finishers, rough day at the office.

I ended up in 2nd, 3rd year in a row, this time though I was 9 minutes out of 1st, crazy, Sam is on fire right now. The new course is a Brute, not going up the road on the first lap changes the race strategy, the road, while painful, exposed and not fun, did play into my strengths, oh well, it will make me stronger.

Sunday met up with Shannifer, Ryan, Jenelle, Carl and Ty for an extended Mill D loop (3400 feet of climb in 17.7 miles), new Onetrack off the top of Guardsman was a blast, then up Puke hill. Part way up, Ty passes me and grabs my rear brake HARD, well I did it to him earlier on the road. Shannons front wheel then plows into my Rear D and my chain pops behind the cassette, we get it out, adjust the shifting and keep going, then on the last little up before the Spine I shift behind the cassette again, By that time Ty had left us 'to go work on a school paper' whatever, he was scared. Payback is gonna be hell.