2012 Hampshire 100

This past weekends adventure took us out East for the first 100 mile running of the Hampshire 100. It hadn’t been since the National Championships was held at Mt Snow, VT that I’d made it back into the area. The course was a little more challenging than I had thought. After reading the race route preview, it seemed like the course would be a lot of jeep roads and rail trails, boy was I wrong about that.

The first 20 miles of the race is relatively tame and a large group stayed together for the most part. It wasn’t until the steep jeep climb that things began to break up. I held it together though and cleaned it to the top. My memory of the climb and slightly after seems pretty foggy, perhaps that’s because I was breathing through my eye balls trying to keep up. Soon after, we hit the powerline climb. I managed to ride most of it, but there were a few sections I had to run. I was glad it was over. I was riding with Zach Morey and Kevin Carter when I crested the top. The pace seemed manageable. Zach was riding the trails a lot better than I was, but I could power out the flatter less techy sections, so we were working well together.

I managed to get away, and for a long time, I was by myself, battling it out with the demons on what seemed like an endless session of techy, rocky singletrack and rutted out ATV trails. It seemed like the trail would send you through a few hundred yards of slow twisty rocky singeltrack, then throw you up a super steep granny gear pitch. Just repeat that over and over. The trails were slow and wet, and it didn’t look they got much use. At one point I remember walking through waste deep water with my bike on my back thinking this was insane! I remember passing Jeremiah with a flat. He fixed it and passed me right back. He was gone in a flash, and I couldn’t even stay with him for a minute. It was then that I realized how terribly slow I was riding this techy terrain.

Later on near the end of the 1^st  lap, Zach caught back up along with a few others including a very young guy named Dylon. They passed me while I was in full on inner demon battle mode, and I had zero moral to chase, so I let them go. I almost wanted to quit at the lap point, but I knew there was a long stretch of rail trails that I had a chance bridge on, so I kept moving forward. I grabbed my bottles from Janet (thanks Janet), lubed my chain, and I was on my way. I was feeling 20 times better on the roads and trails and went from inner demon battle mode to full on trucker mode. I chase down Dylon, and later on during the cut-off route, I caught Zach. With John Schottler bridging up, we had a group of 3. I was feeling good, so at one the last aid stations, I powered through and went on alone in an attempt to grab the 7^th spot. The trails seemed to flow much better the 2^nd time through, and I felt like I was riding them a lot better, but not better than Schottler. He caught me near the end, and I narrowly pulled off 8^th overall. Congrats to Christian for the win, and everyone else who finished. It was a tough course.

I was happy with 8^th. No crashes, no mechanicals, and no wrong turns. It was a pretty clean race. I lost a lot of time fumbling around in the singletrack, but there’s not much I can do about that. The legs felt strong, and I had power all the way to the finish, so that gives me hope for the next race at… dun dun dun… Shanandoah. Wish me luck. Big thanks to my team mate Greg Witt for traveling with me. We had good times, and it made me realize how much fun I have just sharing the travels to these races with friends. And who couldn’t forget the folks at RBS. They’ve really been a god send this year helping me out with mechanic work and taking care of all the bike needs. Thanks for reading and we’ll see you at Shenandoah for the next one!

Training Block

So after the last 100 mile race in Pennsylvania my 2 weeks looked like this. I was getting dropped on the climbs, so I figured I needed to work out on some hillier routes, plus riding a single speed helps increase power. It's like lifting weights going uphill to build strength, and then spinning the cranks at a high cadence on the flats and downhills to develop the power. Each ride I worked on maintaining the highest average speed I could manage. The gear is a 34-14 (70 gear inches), so 19mph is about a cadence of 90rpm's. So going uphill I might be from 10-14mph, and on the downhills and flats, I'll be well over 20mph spinning like crazy trying to power up the average speed. It's a great bang for your training time buck.

Not to mention riding on the singlespeed is fun! There's nothing I love more than just hammering out long dirt rd rides on my singlespeed mountain bike. With all the new gadgets and training techniques, it's so easy to get carried away and lose sight of the fun factor. Plus I think I ride better when I'm having fun and feeling good.

Wed Aug 1st - 2-1/2hr hilly dirt rd loop on Singlespeed. Averaged 17.5mph

Fri Aug 3rd - 6hr 100 mile hilly dirt rd loop on Singlespeed. Bonked and overheated on the way out to Fox Lake. 93 miles. Averaged just over 17mph.

Sat Aug 4th - 3hr hilly dirt rd loop on Singlespeed.

Sun Aug 5th - 4hr ride on Singlespeed. 1/2 on pavement, 1/2 on hilly dirt rds.

Tues Aug 7th - 2-1/2hr ride on Singlespeed. Did 4 laps of Gen Squire/Bishop/Hough/Mill. Averaged 20.5 mph during the 4 laps.

Rest period.

Sat Aug 11th - 5hrs pavement on Singlespeed. 90 miles.

Sun Aug 12th - 5hr-40min ride on Singlespeed. 100 mile hilly dirt rd loop. 6000ft + of climbing. Averaged 18mph. Pushed hard at the end.

Tues Aug 14th - 1-1/2hr ride on poly-anne/dirt rds. Easy pace.

Rest period

Fri Aug 17th - 1hr easy

Sat Aug 18th - 1hr easy pre-ride course

Sun Aug 19th - RACE!
Hopefully it's enough to hang in there with the front runners. We'll see you out there this weekend.

NUE #7 Wilderness 101 2012

Wilderness 101... I kind of forgot how hard this course was. Just about every muscle in my body is sore today. It was a quick trip. We left Friday, drove 8hrs to State College, did the 100 mile MTB race on Saturday. Then hopped in the car, drove home 8hrs and crashed in bed at midnight. I told one of the young guys here at work what we did, and he was like "I'd be dead right now." No shit.

I thought the legs were feeling good, and coming off the win at Bloomer last weekend, I thought for sure I was in for a good performance. The temps were mild, and the course was a little moist, which I prefer. The race got off to a nice start up the first big climb. I really like that about this course. There's plenty of room and time to sort things out and move around safely without crashing into each other. It seems every year the group that makes it over the first climb gets bigger and bigger. We had a huge peloton. Things pretty much stayed together until we hit the next climb just after aid #1. Justin Lindine put in a dig and I latched onto Jeremiah Bishops wheel. Jeremiah said he was doing about 350 watts. With him at 64 kg, and me at 85 kg, a quick calculation (350/64 = 5.47watts/kg x 85kg = 465 watts!) proves I was well over 400 watts for a good 15 minutes up that climb. No wonder I had a hell of a time recovering.

The next climb comes quick, and Tanguy made sure the pace was hard. I dropped off the back and didn't have the legs to stay with the group. It took me quite a while to recover and I lost a few more spots in the ensuing singletrack. Coming into aid #2, I felt terrible, but I knew in the back of my mind that I could ralley and take back some spots. I just kept telling myself that it's a long race, and those guys were going to get tired at some point. I was with Garth Prosser and Matt Ferrari heading up the big climb after aid 2. I still wasn't feeling well and those two were putting the hurt on me. I dug in though and did my best to keep Garth in site. Coming into the next climb, I started feeling better and managed to bridge up to Brandon Draugelis, but he quickly dropped me in the singletrack. I was riding the trails terrible and I kept having flashbacks to the big crash last year. I had a death grip on the brakes and handlebars. Some of that stuff is like riding on cinder blocks. It's a full body effort just to stay upright!

Garth and I hooked up on the fire roads heading out to aid #4. We were trucking and working well together. I was feeling better and better and I decided to make a big push on the climb out of aid 4. Garth was right on my heels and he even helped me push the pace on the climb. Later Garth put it down and I found myself all alone again until I passed Rob Spreng on the next climb. We descended the "pulvorizer" together. It's a long straight descent over the most jagged rocks you can imagine. It's why I could barely turn the steering wheel of the car on my way to work this morning. It's that rough! The bike survived and I was finally feeling recovered. I took a huge dig on the flat fire roads with Rob Spreng in tow. I managed to catch Garth and Brandon right before the final climb.

Brandon pushed the pace and got away. Garth helped pull me to the top. I was cussing at each ramp as I was now paying the price for the big effort to bridge on the flats. Garth told me to stop being a baby and hammer it out, so I did. We caught Brandon on the descent, but he was too quick through the fisherman trail and got away for 8th. Garth and I rolled in together for 9th and 10th. Thanks Garth for not making me have to sprint for that spot.

So that was it. No flats, no mechanicals, no worng turns. It was a clean race and I did the best I could and I had a great time racing with such cool people. Seems everyone is getting so much faster and we are all upping our game, which is a good thing. Let's hope I can recover now and get ready for the next adventure. Thanks for reading.

Lumberjack 100 2012

I have to admit, I had my eye on this one since the beginning of the year. It’s sort of my home course on the NUE calendar, and its’ flatter profile and fast flow suits my style a little better then say some of the other courses with over 13,000 ft of climbing. I also look forward to this race every year because I get to see and hang out with a lot of my local riding buddies and the RBS team. I’d been on some heavy duty antibiotics for about 10 days before the race due to a tick bite, so I wasn’t sure how well I was going to ride. It felt like I was only digesting about ½ my food all week. The other ½ seemed to like to evacuate at about midnight, 2am, 3am, and 4am each night. I don’t recommend getting bit by a tick. It’s not very fun at all. I know… excuses excuses… blah blah blah…

The race start felt a little more mellow than last year. I stayed right on the front as all 400 of us dodged the van pulling into the parking lot. Barry Wicks took the holeshot into the shoot and I was right on his heels avoiding the crash mayhem which happened just behind us. I was lucky. Wicks pushed the race pretty hard up all the steep rolling climbs. At one point, I let him and Kevin Carter go off the front. I thought if Wicks was going to ride like that all day, there was no way I would survive. Fortunately he let up and a group of 6 formed.

It was Wicks, Tostado, Tanguy, Carter, and me for a while, until Edsall, Spreng, and others bridged up later in the lap. I got caught between groups for a few miles during lap 1 when my seat post slipped down. I fixed it quickly and chased back on.  I was feeling pretty good. The pace felt totally manageable and I was taking a few turns on the front trying to push the pace.

Lap 1, so far so good. During lap 2, Tanguy took a hard pull through Road Monkey until he developed a slow tire leak, then I took over for a while all the way up to the fire tower climb. Then on the ensuing rollers, Kevin Carter came to the front and took a blistering pull. I could tell he was feeling good. Wicks found the hot line and came around Kevin on the rocket launch. The rest of had to run as we slid out on the sandy terrain. At that point, I was really feeling it. The heat and humidity was climbing, and my body was shutting down.

I pulled into the pits and loaded up on ice and a fresh camelback of infinit and tried to recover. I was feeling better, but the group on the front was long gone. I’d try to just keep the pace up and limp in for 5^th. It just seemed to get hotter and hotter. The climb up the fire tower took the last bit of energy I had left. Soon later, with about 3 miles to go, Tostado rolled up. He passed me in slow motion and I had nothing left to stay with him. I would roll in for 6^th.

Not too bad. Could have been better, could have been worse. The heat really bothered me at this one and who knows what effect the tick infection had on my endurance. Big thanks goes out to my wife Mitch, and my in-laws Dan and Sandy for getting me through that 3^rd lap. It is what it is. It’s a points series, you have to roll with the punches and save the best placings you can at each race. And when a guy like Barry Wicks shows up, you know it’s going to be a hard day. I think it’s good for the sport though, and it brings up the pace and the level of competition. Congrats to Wicks for the win and a solid ride by Kevin Carter. I think I’m the first one of the top contenders to finish 4 races, so that’s a huge relief. Even if something bad happens in the 2^nd half of the season, I know I have my 4.

So here’s to a successful first portion of season! Now I’ll hunker back down for the next few weeks and see what kind of condition I can bring out for the summer run of hundies. Perhaps I can better a couple of those lower placings and come home with good series finish. Hope to you see you guys out there on the trails.

NUE #3 Mohican 100 2012

This weeks adventure brings us to middle Ohio for round 3 of the National Ultra Endurance Series. With fast singletrack and ample rolling dirt rds, this race is typically a good course for me. Throw in the cooler temps, and the conditions were perfect. The short 3-1/2 hr drive to the venue was a welcome change from the epic road trips of the first two rounds.

Thanks to Rochester Bike Shop, I decided to utilize my new Superfly hardtail for this race. I figured it would help with all the dirt rds and the agonizing “buggy trail”. It proved to be a good choice. No mechanicals to speak of, although my back is feeling it today. The race got off to a quick start with the hill climb prime just outside of town. Native Michigander Jordan Wakely lit up the sprint and took home the extra $200. I decided to lay low near the front and save my effort for the shoot. I managed to be first into the shoot. The trails were dialed. Not much mud to speak of, which was surprising with the rain the day before. The opening climbs strung things out nicely.

As we made our way into the Mohican Singletrack I found myself struggling a little to keep up with the pace. The hardtail had me bouncing all over the roots. I decided to lay low and let a few guys go. I figured I could catch up with all the dirt rds later on. Christian Tanguy turned on the afterburners in the remaining singletrack and built himself up a 12min lead. I found myself working with Kevin Carter, Chris Peariso, and Jordan Wakely. Kevin kept a nice smooth pace as we motored along. Sure enough, out on the dirt rds, we swept up Brandon Draugelis, and Rob Spring, but Tanguy was long gone.

We developed a pace line on the dirt rds out to Mohican Wilderness. I was feeling good, so I decided I would try and break away on the climb out of aid 3. I had a small gap near the top just as we made our way back out onto the dirt rds. I dug in hard and found myself alone, free to open up the motor on the remaining dirt rds.

I kept getting the time splits from people out on the trail. I’d hear 5min, then 4min, then at the end of the buggy trail in aid 4, my wife Michelle yelled 2min. There was a chance! It kept me motivated. But, it was too little, too late. Once I started hitting the steeper climbs near the end, I could feel myself slowing down a bit and paying for my efforts. Christian was going to win. Perhaps if one of the others had broken away and joined me, we would have had enough horsepower to pin it back.

Even though I was tiring, I managed to keep the motor running and held off the chase pack to finish in 2^nd. I was really happy with the performance. No crashes, no mechanicals, and no wrong turns. It was a clean race, and I felt good the whole way through. I managed to take about 30min off my time from last year, so that’s a good sign for the upcoming Lumberjack right here in my home state of Michigan.

We had a great time after the race chatting up and hanging with all the cool people this sport attracts. Big props to Ryan O'Dell for pulling off a great race. I was starting to get down on myself, and the sport, but it’s funny how one good race can turn that all around… something to remember when you find yourself struggling with the results. Congrats to Christian for soloing out a monster effort and the win. And as always, congrats to everyone who finished. 100 miles is never easy. Thanks for reading, and we’ll see you at Lumberjack.

NUE #2 Silly moe's Revenge

Google maps had Mountain View Arkansas clocked out at a 15hr drive from Oxford Michigan. It was going to take quite an effort to get there and back for round 2 of the National Ultra Endurance Series. This would be my first effort at the Syllamoe’s course, so I didn’t really know what to expect. I’d never been to Arkansas, and it’s one of those places only a mountain bike race would bring you to.

The course is very technical and layered with big sharp rocks and gravel. I was a little off the pace heading up the opening dirt road climb, but I figured I would be able to bridge back up once we got into the singletrack. But of course, shortly after we entered the singletrack, I was hit with flat tire #1. Normally the Nano’s hold up pretty well for me and have proven to be a solid choice even on courses like the W101, but this course definitely requires something a little more beefy. It took a little while to fix it. I found myself struggling with the age old debate of a quick blast of C02 and let the stans do the work, or opt for the full on tube change. I chose the latter, and ended up wasting an entire 40 gram canister. Luckily, Dan K dropped me a fresh C02 and I went to work.

So I’m back to rolling down the trail and I’m steadily picking up spots. To be honest, I wasn’t really riding the techy trails all that well. I felt slow, and a little apprehensive about crashing, so I just sort of took my time and picked my way through the brush. Coming down a short descent, it happened again. Flat #2. This time I was stranded with no tube or C02. Luckily with a little begging, I was able to track down a pump, then a few riders later, another tube. I went to work again and got it fixed. Thanks to those who donated for the cause!

OK, so now I’ve lost so much time, that it’s just turned into the principal of finishing this dam thing. I’m rolling along and about to get to aid#5 when it happens again. Flat#3. Holy hell! I have a tube, a pair of C02’s, and a multi-tool. This time I’m getting mid-evil on this thing. I yanked out the flat tube and bit out the valve stem like some sort of possessed flesh eating monster. I peeled open the tube all the way around. Then I took my new tube and wrapped it inside the carcass of the old tube. Voila! Flat fixed for good.

The rest of my race was just me bouncing off more rocks just waiting for the finish line to present itself, but I got through it. Then as I was sitting in my folding chair drinking my recovery drink, the front tire flatted again. How ironic. It was just one of those races that made me want to quit racing mountain bikes. It made me feel stupid, like I am wasting my time with all this. 14hrs of driving to a Podunk town in the middle of nowhere, silly course, mechanicals… all we needed was a thunderstorm and it would have made it a complete mountain bike experience. But for every 3 bad races, there’s one good one, and that’s what keeps us coming back.

I had a lot of time to reflect on the drive home, and tried to focus on the positives, rather than the negatives. At least I didn’t hurt myself, it was still a good training effort, we got to see the Ozarks… etc. I thought about other sports, and other athletes, who go through the same kind of struggles. I thought about how fortunate I am to able to compete at such a high level, and how lucky I am to truly experience my passion. No, it’s not stupid, it’s not a waste of time, it’s what I love to do, it’s what gets me out of bed on a Monday morning, and after a bad race, it’s important to keep reminding myself of that. I’ll still keep having my special moments on the bike that we all chase after week in and week out, but it just wasn’t in the cards this past weekend. With that being said, I hope to see you all at NUE round #3 in Ohio, right there with me chasing that perfect race. Happy thoughts.  

Cohutta 100 2012

This was a race I was looking forward to all winter long. I was anxious to get back into the 100 mile racing after the big accident at the season finale last year. I put in a lot of work into the off season and I felt ready to go. With Jeremiah Bishop, Justin Lindine, Christian Tanguy, and host of other super strong dudes, I knew this was going to be a tough race, and it was. The new version of the course was epic with over 13,000ft of climbing and added singltrack. I was glad I chose the full suspension bike. My new policy is 100 miles = full suspension… period.

The start was furious right off the gun. We ripped up the opening road climb with a 35 mph bar banging scrum into the singletrack. I tried to be as aggressive as possible without killing anybody, which netted me a top 10 place into the bottleneck. The pace was fast through the singletrack and I worked my way up to the front in the open sections. Later, it was Justin Lindine who pushed the pace on the trail. I hung on for dear life and managed to stay with the lead pack out onto the fire roads where the pace backed off substantially.

The pack grew and grew all the way up to aid 3 at mile 37. I grabbed my bottles and quickly bridged up to the others who had rolled thru the aid station. The pace seemed tame, so I decided to go out on an attack of my own and try to split the group. I soon found myself all alone. The legs were feeling good, so I kept the attack rolling, however, the group chased and quickly brought me back before we reached the top of Patato Patch Mt. Jeremiah put in a dig after aid 4 and split the group a little more before aid 5. Bishop looked really strong.

Rolling into the South loop singletrack, Christian Tanguy pushed the pace and I started to feel my early efforts, but I hung tough and didn’t let Jeremiah and Tanguy get too far. Once back out onto the fire rds, it was down to just the 3 of us as we approached the back side of Potato Patch Mt. I had to let Christian and Jeremiah go as soon as the road turned up. I didn’t seem to have that same snappy power I had the first time up Potato Patch. Lesson learned. Tanguy and Bishop motored away.

I drove on, but the relentless slopes just didn’t seem to give any sort of break. I could see Kevin Carter gaining on me, and soon he caught and passed me. He still looked strong. I had no answer, but to just suffer the best I could to the top. You would turn the corner only to see more upward slope. It was demoralizing. On the descent I chased like crazy. I seemed to have recovered, and was back to putting down the power. I knew Kevin probably wasn’t too far up the road, so that kept me motivated to chase as hard as possible.

Heading through the last aid station, I heard Kevin was close. I buried my head and pushed hard. Next thing I know I’m in some guys front yard and dogs are barking at me. Doh! I turned around, then found myself in another persons front yard with kids in a swimming pool. Double Doh! I finally got myself back onto the course not knowing if anyone had passed me or not. All that hard chasing on the descent was for not. It took the wind out of sails, but I pushed on. The fatigue was really starting to creep in on the final singletrack. My hands and arms were sore. I was happy to see that finish line. 4^th! Good nobody passed me during my detour.

It felt great getting back out there on the trails. I love these events. Well I should say I love the first 60 miles of these events. It’s those last 40 that make me question why I do these things. Congrats to everyone who finished, and to those who finished on the podium. If every race is going to be this competitive, it’s going to be a hard season of racing. But it’s that kind of challenge that makes it fun. See you at Syllamo’s!