Zorro

So, riding has been tough here in Colorado. I mean it's been really hard to get out the door, explore new trail, ride in the sunshine, blah blah blah. You don't want to hear me bragging :) But I got out yesterday with a fellow coach whom I met at the USOC Coaching Seminar in Colorado Springs. Jay G. is from up in Canada country, some province where polar bears outnumber people (he's the Alberta Provincial Coach).

We decided to head over thru Bear Creek, loop green mt and then up the Zorro trail to explore.

The Zorro trail is aptly named as its a crazy "z" across the mt. Picture doesn't look like much but it goes up a few hundred feet, then turns super tech at the ridgeline.

As you can see, we are up there a bit. It was a blast to pick thru the lines and play on the rocks a bit.

We did a bit of climbing as we ascended Green Mt. then Zorro, then back up Green Mt. a few times.

Good thing Lizzy wasn't with us!

This weekend is looking awesome (it's like 65 and sunny right now). I think I'm going to go out and ride the cross bike right now and run lizzy a bit. Tomorrow I plan on busting out the roadie and venturing into the hills for a bit. Sunday though should be a blast, I plan on getting my head bashed in as I enter the Men's Open Cross race. Hopefully I'll last longer than a few laps. At least there's beer. Oh and for more bragging rights, I'm going to the Avs v Sabres Game tomorrow in Denver!!

Beautiful Weekend

Even though yesterday was an incredible day, by the time I got home from the Coaching Summit, I was wiped out. I caught up on laundry and a few other household chores and generally just lounged.

Though Today, I made up for missing out yesterday. I was up early and took lizzy for a quick run around the reservoir. 2 laps x 2 miles. It's her first real run since she broke her pelvis. She did great, I was on the cross bike and had to work a few times to keep up with her. I ended up flatting and that pretty much took us home.

After that I kitted up and headed thru Bear Creek up to do a quick loop on Green Mt. Just put some time in and rack up the kj's.

From Bear Creek and Heil Ranch

I hooked up with the new boss, Frank from FasCat Coaching for a spin around Heil Ranch. After riding at Green Mt. My idea of Colorado trails was blown wide open today. The trails were frigging awesome and super tech. Super rocky and requiring you to really work the bike the whole time. My pics really don't do the trail any justice. It was far too much fun picking the lines and riding the trail, than to stop and snap some pics. I might need to grab me a helmet cam sometime soon!

Ended up with about 2100kj for the day! And pretty worked over. Hopefully the weather holds out

I have no friggin clue why a blue line shows up on my pics, could be time for a new camera. I'm too lazy to go through each photo and touch up in photoshop. Click the link for tons more photos of the day

From Bear Creek and Heil Ranch

From Bear Creek and Heil Ranch

From Bear Creek and Heil Ranch

Another day at Green Mt

So I decided to give it another go at Green Mt. I mean what am I suppose to do other than ride my bike out here on the trails right? After feeling like death yesterday, I kitted up and felt like a million bucks. Didn't feel at all like I was dying or not getting any air in.

I headed thru Bear Creek (quickly) and climbed the switchbacks up the Green Mt. Trail, then descended the fire-road and hit the outer loop. Somehow, I missed the singletrack I rode up yesterday, as that's what I was really looking for as it woulda been a sick descent



Ride time was short, but I did nearly as much as yesterday in almost 40 minutes less ride time! That's a huge difference, plus my wattage numbers were up a ton as I was feeling great.

For the rest of this week I'm down in Colorado Springs for the Coaches Summit. Should be fun, but a bonus is that we are done around 3ish each day and plenty of people to ride with. And the weather looks great!

1st Ride in Colorado at Green Mt!!

I'm now officially in Colorado. Made it here this past Saturday. I've since gotten settled in here with a friend in Littleton and managed to get out for a good ride yesterday on 2 trails that are right outside the door (Bear Creek and Green Mt.) Conditions were great, it was a little bit cool, but the sunshine was warm.





I'm gonna head out the door right now for another quick trip over to Green Mt., then I'm off to Colorado Springs for the Coaching Seminar for a week. Should learn some great stuff to make people fast! Hopefully I'll get in quite a few nice road rides while I'm down there.

Please, send oxygen instead of comments. I'm in need of some until I acclimate!

Busy, Busy

Been just crazy these past few weeks. Don't even know where to begin here on the blog. This past wednesday I did manage to get out for a good ride with the GBC and Hollow crew prior to my departure.

We hit up Shindagin Hollow for a few hours of play. The night prior we had played hard at the Hartman's. Suzanne served up some great chili, then it was time for some pool and mod racing. The mod crit quickly grew into a who could do better donuts. With that, we preceded to open the garage door and try to do them out on the wet driveway.

Needless to say, there was some fun that we had. Wednesday down at Shindagin was a great day. Fall foliage was in full bloom and the trails were in perfect shape.

We managed a huge crew (Jer-Bear, Casey, Der-Kaiser, Hanggi, Fry Guy, Marky Mark, Suz and I) for a wednesday afternoon. Mark was kind enough to lend me his Hi-Fi 29er. I made sure to put it to work hitting some gap jumps, riding 6 ft high skinnies, north shore bridge drops (and subsequent crashes) and tearing up the trails. Could a dualie be in my future?

The past few days were spent at a Coaching Seminar in Ypsilanti, Mi. I learned how to go real fast, and learned boat loads of info. It's going to come in real handy. Next week I have the Coaching Summit in Colorado Springs and plan on learning even more info. Believe me, if you want to be fast for next season, hit your goals, and have fun, there's nothing better than a coach

Weekend Wrap (Full Report)

It was a long weekend of racing and driving in the car. Friday afternoon, I set out for the 4 hour drive north to my brothers place in Malone. Giving me about an hours drive to Whiteface Mt. for saturday's race.

Got there with plenty of time to play with my nephew Peyton, eat some gnocchi with homemade sauce by Grams and watch a movie. I managed to get a great night's sleep in and then get the the race right on schedule. However, I didn't really get a great warm-up in. Being as the race was new and recently scheduled it meant a small field (3 of us in the pro class), but it did mean we were all gonna get paid! That however didn't mean I didn't race my ass off.

The race started with a little prologue section with a climb, then onto the main course and up the access rd. Suffered a bit on the start and was struggling on the first lap, trying to get the legs together. I ended up losing sight of 1st place as he disappeared in the 1st section of singletrack. I surged hard, started to feel better and raced well over all. Race was a bit short at 1:40, but every one of my 4 laps was within 30 secs of each other, so I was at least nice and consistent. I did bag $250 for 2nd!! Everybody better hit this race course next year as it was one of the baddest and best ever!

Sunday (after a long drive home saturday) I headed down to Ellicottville for the Roots, Rocks and Ridges race. I think the last time I managed to do this one was about 5 years ago. There was good number of people and it was a great day for racing. Course started with a road prologue while we were lead over to Holimont and the start of the climbing. Didn't mean it was truly neutral though as we were clicking off a good pace on the road. Knowing the climb was coming up, I got near the front and stayed there trying to shake the legs out from the prior days efforts. Hit the climb and when it turned to dirt a small group of us split the main field. I was sitting at the tail end of the group around 4th/5th and came off on the climb prior to entering the singletrack. I was busy closing the gap to the rider in front of me, when I felt my rear tire was real squishy. I jumped off to throw a co2 in and didn't do much. I decided to tube it and it took me forever to get the valve stem out. Finally go the valve stem out, tube it and the co2 barely puts any air in, WTF!?! I spend forever hand pumping my mini pump (luckily does both), while getting passed by everyone. I got the tire up and ready to go and ended up behind a large smashed together group near the back. It was tight singletrack and I really wanted to get back to the front. Riders were dabbing and falling all over the place, I ended up having to use the "pro" lines to pass quite a few of the riders. After a few minutes being stuck behind them, I finally got free and clawed my way back up. I was surging and flying through the singletrack.

I was actually feeling really great overall. I managed to catch a bunch of riders. I did have to stop at one point and put some more air in my rear as it was still feeling soft. I shot up again and was catching more riders. Any chance I got, I was doing the Big Ring Challenge and hammering through the singletrack. I was creeping way up in position and just was catching 2 more riders when I realized I had a broken spoke. Took some time to get it out of the rotor and bend it around so it wouldn't get caught on anything. I managed to catch and pass back one rider, but ran out of trail catching the other.

Total time according to the powertap lost by flats and spoke: ~8:30. Unofficially according to mom, I was about 9 minutes down on first! I finished in 10th place, which I thought was incredible considering how many riders initially passed me. It was a great course and good ride and was happy to end my season on a strong weekend of racing!

Now it's time for 'cross

Currently playing in iTunes: Revelry by Kings of Leon

Burning Bike Festival

The first ever Burning Bike Festival was held at Ontario County Park this past weekend. OCP has come along ways, it was once just a stopover as the Finger Lakes Trail ran thru it. Now it's being fully utilized and many new (and awesome) trails have been put in, and are in great shape and ready to ride.

I skipped out on the Friday night festivities as it was pouring out and I had no desire to camp in the rain. I got everything together Saturday am and headed over to the park. While a few were out riding, I managed to get a ride in on the singlespeed (with my new Black Ops Carbon Fork!) with Evil Steve and Andy August. After a few loops they dropped off and I decided to put the SS to the test and descend down off the hill and over to Cutler to climb some hills and do some more descending. The fork and the bike ride great and it's a fun play bike.

After the ride it was chow-time and then over to camp. Original plans were for a night ride, but the heavy rains and beer consumption kept that at bay.

The Burning Bike

Evil Steve's Glow Bike

mmmm...tasty

Schwarty having a Yee-haw contest

Schwarty moments later

It poured all night so Sunday was a crapshoot, but after a good hearty breakfast, and some consumption of non-alchoholic beverages, Casey, Jer-Bear and I headed out for a ride. We did a good loop around OCP on the slick trails, then decided to explore a trail we had never ridden. A top secret descent off the park. It was a great descent with a good mix of tech, super steep, super fast and fun. After that we headed over to Cutler and did a quick loop on the orange trail. It was a good day, a bit humid and windy, but much nicer than the prior day's tremendous rainstorms.

This week will be some short rides, wait for the cross bike and prep for the Whiteface Race and Roots, Rocks and Ridges race. My final weekend of XC racing!

back to laying on the couch.....

Back in the swing with the Singlespeed

So it's been 2 days of sleeping and eating loads of comfort food after the Humbler. Seriously think I could have easily consumed 20,000 calories a day if I didn't stop myself.

Yesterday I pulled out the Singlespeed and headed over to glenwood in Geneva to stretch the legs a bit. Temps were cool and comfortable and the trail was in great shape. I had the 32x20 on and was a little bit overgeared for the place. I like the 32x19 a little bit better there. But it was good as I just needed to spin and keep it easy. It was a fun ride to just sling around the trails solo and whip out some laps. I felt really good physically, but didn't feel like going hard at any point.

I did however realize upon inspection that the front fork is bent and the wheel is mis-aligned. Tomorrow I'm going to swap it out with a Origin8 Black Ops Carbon Fork!

Tonight I'm going to pull out the roadie, hit up the group ride, and then get some xtra ride time in with the lights on the roadie.

08 Humbler Slideshow

Yesterday was worthless. I slept for 18 out of 24 hours. I'm still a little bit tired today, but no where near yesterday. I consumed probably 5x my recommended caloric intake also yesterday, and it was great. Eating is good!

Resting up today, then back to the grinder tomorrow

2008 Humbler

2008 Humbler is in the books. I'm completely wiped out today.

111 miles, 14,030ft of climbing, 12:19 of riding, 6229kj, 4 finishers. It took us 3 friggin years to finally complete our grandiose plan of ultimate misery.

Mark, Casey, Hanggi and myself soldiered on for the final loop. Spent, exhausted, sleeping in the middle of roads. We surged, we struggled, we finally slayed the dragon.

I'm exhausted today, far too exhausted to do a full write up currently. Pics and more to come

In the meantime, go buy my bike

Laurel Mt. Classic

Headed down to Northern, PA this morning for a little xc action. Having last weeks SM100 in my legs and a tough week of training, I knew the race was going to hurt.

This little guy gave me one of these so I could flog myself up the climbs

Race started out on a nice long 4 mile fire-road climb. Having never ridden the course, we were told it was about 3 miles. I paced and readied for 3 miles. Group quickly split into about 10 of us, shortly I was in the front group 4 of us and the chasers scattered. But soon, I popped off as it continually went up. The legs weren't comfy nor was the taste of blood in my mouth. I was picked up by a few stragglers and slogged the last 3/4 mile up the climb and into the singletrack about 7th. Picked off a rider right away and set to work on chasing down another.

Headed into a straight down descent, just a chute literally, I was cooking and came up so fast on the rider, I put the brakes on but started sliding into him, had to lay it down. He for some reason looked back, then laid it down also. I managed to get up and drop him on the descent and out into the fire road climb.

Some fire road action and a long, straight fast descent had me increasing the gap. At the bottom was a slow grind against the grain in a techy creek side trail. Criss-crossing the trail and slowly heading uphill. I realized my saddle bag was open and had to stop, took a few secs to get the zipper to close fully and ended up losing a spot. Attempted to chase said rider in front of me, then we headed out to an open grass climb. 2-3 miles of uphill, wet tall grass. I was hating life and hating my legs for not wanting to put out a decent effort and give it a go. Ended up getting passed on the climb by a single speeder and was being chased down by 2 other riders.

I had only 1 bottle and saw an aid station, was super happy to refill and grab a few cups to slam. I had to let the 2 riders slip by, but gave chase. Dropped the 1st shortly, and the 2nd rider hung on. Pushing it in the singletrack and he kept sticking, attacked on the powerline downhill and got a gap, but he shortly closed it. I had to let him go by as my saddlebag was open again. I reached around and put everything in my pockets. (I'm done with saddle bags!)

I closed the gap back on the road, and into the gravel road, I was sitting about 20 yards back. I made a huge surge and caught him off-guard and dived into the singletrack. It was all slightly down and I was flying and floating. Caught and dropped the singlespeeder, and had about 5-10 secs on the rider chasing. Continually surging on the flat fast singletrack to try to increase my gap, it was holding steady. Shortly after though, it pointed down, straight down. I slammed it into gear and just let her rip. All out downhill high speed, flying and floating. Checked over the shoulder, no rider in sight, gotta push incase I flat. Check the computer, I'm close a few k away. Keep pushing, killing it and flying. Hit the dirt road and sprint the last 200 meters to the line. Rider shows up about a minute or 2 later. He was on a dualie, I was on the superfly. He said he never chased on the top because he thought he could catch me on the way down. No chance, nada gonna happen on a downhill at speed.

Ended up 7th overall/6th age group. 1 spot out of the money.

Great Course...Bad Legs

Headed south to Virginia over this past Labor Day weekend for the Shenandoah Mountain 100. Arrived mid-day on Saturday, it was brutally hot. I set up the tent, registered and went out for my pre-ride of the first climb.

Heading towards the climb, the legs were a little stiff from the drive, so I hit a few openers and was feeling great. I was flying up the climb doing my sprints and was 100% ready to go. The first climb was simply the same thing over and over until the top. Climb a little, left hand bend with a slight descent, tight right hand turn into a steep climb. Probably did that at least 10 or more times over. It made a sharp left got a little steeper and a little looser up to the top. I turned around rolled to the bottom and made it back to the campground in time for the free spaghetti dinner.

Hit the tent around dark for the 5am wakeup. After about an hour a little sprinkle started, then a full on downpour till at least midnight. Did I mention my tent leaks? Every few minutes I had to move to keep from getting wet. Finally it stopped, then the fireworks started. After the fireworks were the bullhorn whoooop-whooooooooop just about every half hour right until 5am. Needless to friggin' say, I really got no sleep whatsoever. Knowing my history of racing after getting no sleep due to jackasses, I knew it was going to be a tough day. Little did I know how tough....

5am the gong goes off. I get up with everyone else, bleary eyed and tired. Slam a starbucks mochachinno, and a little bagel. Prepped and to the line. 500 eager racers in the middle of a field behind the lead moto, making a mad dash for a right hand turn onto a road 100 yards later. Announcer makes the pre-race speech and finishes with a "Ok, let's go" Moto wasn't even started yet, half take off, half hesitate, I go. Get to the first climb, feeling pretty good. I'm comfortable in the top 30 or so, perfect where I want to be for my sub 9 hour goal. Climb well, feeling good, yo-yoing in a few spots where I try to keep the effort low if I go to hard, top the climb about 2-3 minutes shy of Eatough and the front group.

Mad fast descent then over to the next climb. Singletrack slogfest, muddy, steep, rocky, narrow. Half are waking a few are riding. I start to feel like crap, no mojo to get going on the climb. Decide to walk, I walk slow and finally get to the top after losing about 50 spots. Start the singletrack descent and saddle snaps out of place. Have to jump off and fix, bolt was super tight, but fixed and got going. Make up about 20 places on the bombingly long singletrack descent. Feeling good and happy about going down.

Hit the dirt roads and picking people off, end up getting into a big group and just roll along. Dump the group shortly after and working with a few riders on the slightly downhill dirt roads and we are flying, picking off tons of riders. Feeling strong, taking good pulls. I'm working with Cheryl Sornson and Trish Stevenson (eventual female 1st/2nd). The 3 of us actually split the group and take off on the road climb and I give them a hand to help chase down Betsy Shogren. I eventually drop them on the road climb and make it to the aid station. They made a quick stop, and I stopped for some food and bathroom break. Never did see them again.

I start the long climb up the 3rd main climb and I'm feeling completely hosed. Wondering if I'll ever even finish. No snap in the legs, barely turning over the pedals. Granny gearing at 50rpm, while singlespeeders are flying by in 32x20. I have to stop and stretch my legs a few times. I finally make it to the top after what feels like forever. I got a sick, insanely fun singletrack off-camber 20+ minute long descent, caught a few people back and I'm having a blast. I hit the road after the aid station, having just slammed a coke. Catch a few riders and as we keep catching the group keeps getting bigger. I realize I feel pretty good on the road and no one else remotely wants to work. I roll ahead without anyone following. Have a good minute lead into the next singletrack climb. I decide to just climb at my pace. I feel good, climbing great. It's super techy and rocky, keeps going and going and going. Continually techy, continually up. I hadn't had any real food in a bit and feel my energy levels low. Decide to sit down and eat a bar. Lose a few spots, but get to the top with a few locals for the descent. According to them it was the best singletrack around. I'm following, riding blind, but not having trouble keeping up. Descent is sick and just a blast of fun. End up getting a little wide in a corner and front wheel washes out. I hit the deck, get up, go back to find the powertap cpu and get started. Get going again, and end up giving a tube to Betsy Shogren as she flatted for the 2nd time (she was waaay out in front early). Even after that, I railed the descent and caught the original riders I had started with.

Aid station, then death march. Long, long false flat on the road. End up pulling the trigger as the coke doesn't settle well. Paved road was forever long false flat, onto a dirt road roller/false flat. I'm feeling spent. I have to stop a few times to stretch the legs and keep from just falling over on the bike. Keep going, and onto a long fire-road climb. It went on forever, literally. I think it was a good 90+ minutes or longer after already having climbed slowly for the past 45 mintues. Make it to the aid station, spent. Looking forward to the descent. Refuel with pizza, and a few bites of food. Get ready to bomb, hit some fast double-track down. Then climb, and continue climbing. WTF! where's the downhill. Keep climbing for the next 45 minutes. Now, I'm seriously dead meat on the bike. I walk for a portion to gain some energy.

Finally the descent starts, feel great, flying down it. Pass a bunch and get to the road, feeling good and flying, final climb. We've been over this already, but the legs again shut down. Don't know what's wrong but keep going as slowly as I can. Finally over the top and hit the fireroad descent. It's almost over. I end up catching another rider, we're riding and chatting. Pretty much all downhill, he suddenly takes off. No idea why really so I follow, we quickly come off the road into a congested area, shit we are super close. I'm following hard on his wheel, into the campground. Whoa, he just railed a crazy jump in the grass, so I nail it too, get some good air. Can hear all the people cheering about the jump. Have to land and start sprinting hard, I pull right up next to him, but carrying so much speed, I can't swing the corner and have to go wide.

79th place 9:46 official. 9:02 ride time. Considering I felt like absolute death, I'm fairly ok with that.

Click thru for full size

Immediately grab 2 beers from my cooler and head to the creek under the bridge and just chill in the ice cold rain water from the night before. I'd been thinking about the water and beer for 99.5 miles!

Naples vids

I was able to get out this weekend and head down to Naples for some more of my favorite trails. While I'm researching proper helmet cams, I took my regular camera and took some video of the stuff I could ride one handed.





The above image is the Altitude graph from the gps on my iPhone. That's right for $2.99 I know have a full fledged gps that I can upload and review in google earth

Also, while I managed to have a great and fun day, I managed to be in the right place at the right time and caught a few guys going off the hanglider jump. It was insane and fun to watch at the same time.



Things are perfectly on track for the SM100, cannot wait. Time to pull out all the stops and throw down!

Wednesday's Moonlight Ride in Naples

This past wednesday saw the band get back together again. Mark, Suzanne, Casey, Hanggi, myself and even Brandon Furber and Chris Frey! We had quite the group. We decided to meet down in Naples and traverse the first loop of the Humbler, aka "dirty thirty". 30 miles of brutal climbing and insanely ripping descents.

We started off attempting to bush-whack our way through a newly built trail that overlooks the Naples creek, but the gang forgot that things grow during the summer and not during winter/spring. It was like Jurassic park, trying to get through a jungle. I nearly ripped my rear der off, and ended up bending the hangar and having a bunch of crap wrapped around my cassette. After we got through and to East Hill, we decided we'd have to skip that section because there is too much work that needs to be done in too little of time. After our usual grind up East hill, we decided we'd do a bomber run down the Hanglider trail (not in the Humbler as technically it's not rideable)

The hanglider is one of the fastest and fun descents around, super steep, lots of twists and turns, mud, jumps, etc. Casey showed us all how not to ride a water bar as he thought the best way to do this was only on your front wheel, with your chest on your stem. He managed get ahold of that bucking bronco, but the trail eventually wrestled him down when a good set of thorns reached out and wrapped around him and tried to drag him into the earth. Luckily; Mark and I were following closely enough and could rescue him. It took some saws and clippers, but we eventually defeated the mutant thorn bush. Casey wasn't the only victim though as Hanggi destroyed a wheel (just riding along!) and Chris flatted.

Our next adventure had us taking the long climb up Italy Hill to clear that trail, and then descend back down. Luckily, the anaerobic olympics had been held earlier this season as we climbed a little easier this time around, but still had quite a few major trees down that we had to clear. At the top after doing some good trail maintenance we managed to catch an incredible evening sunset.

It's awful difficult to explain the beauty, but a nice pine woods backdrop, with a fire engine red, fading to an incredible indigo blue, fading into an inky black, with stars peppering the scene. All this while standing in a tall field of white carrot flowers. It was quite mesmorizing and will stick with me for a long time.

After that, we got to firebomb down the trail with our lights. Descending at night, on high speed tech is just incredibly thrilling. Your reaction times need to be ninja quick at high speed, because you have a flash of a second to react as most likely, you really can't see what's coming up on the trail. Suzanne fell victim to Italy Hill and managed a pinch flat on the way down, after a quick fix it was time for the last climb.

Basset/Brink hill would brings us up to the top and ready for the DEC descent. Our non-chalant group ride quickly turned into a testosterone fest on the final climb. Hanggi took off early and established a gap, while Casey, Brandon and I rode tempo. Upon seeing Hanggi no longer increasing, I started to up the tempo to catch. Brandon followed and we caught Hanggi and accelerated up Brink Hill. As we climbed the steep pitch of Brink, Hanggi dropped off the pace leaving Brandon and I to ride side-by-side down the road, neither of us able to drop the other, nor willing to provide the shelter of a draft. In the end it'd have to be a draw.

The ride finished off with the DEC descent, bone-jarring, cliff-traversing, super tech. All at high speed in the dark. Mark decided to take the lead and I followed. At such high speeds and the light bouncing around, I was truthfully riding completely blind. Working only on instinct and the feel of the rubber to the dirt. After having followed Mark's wheel for the past 10 years or so, one has a good feel for the rider. I trust his lines and followed him and can read his body movements perfectly and adapt to the trail just by watching him and never looking at the ground. We all managed to make it down and out of the trail safely.

It was an incredible ride, and I'm bummed I forgot my camera :(
Best of luck to Mark/Suzanne and Ej and Jimmy this weekend at the Hot August Nights. I'll be finishing off my final weekend of prep work before the Shenandoah 100

Farmall Wrap up

Last night was the series finale at Farmall, put on by RV & E Bike and Skate. Surprisingly there was a small turnout for the X field, but a pretty decent turnout overall. Usual course, usual format, by now I can ride the course with my eyes closed.

My legs really felt like crap, not that they hurt or didn't work. It was weird, they didn't hurt. But I also just couldn't push them to my max, like I was kinda stuck in 3rd gear. No matter how hard I tried the engines only fired at 75%. It was still a good solid hard effort.

My guess is I'm still paying for Saturday's effort and the fact that I'm in a big final push for the Shenandoah 100. MY CTL is ramped up high and so is my ATL, but my TSB isn't super low. Usually if my TSB is in the low negatives, my legs feel like dog poo.

At least my lap times were consistent, almost exactly the same every lap and I did manage to bring home some more hardware. Guess it's been a good week!

In the meantime I want one of these, badly!!

Also, here's a few cool pics from my easy ride on Saturday

Rolling along the sunflowers

The way my legs felt, I should just went swimming in the lake!

Suicide Six

My Suicide Six entry can be found over at the Fisher 29er Crew Site

Farmall Follies

Last night was the 2nd race of the Farmall Summer Series. A bit larger field as the weather was very much nicer than last weekend. I chose to ride the superfly this week in prep for this weekends race, but seemingly everyone there was on singlespeeds. WTF? I rode mine last week, guess I may have to pull it out for next weeks race.

I felt good and ready for the race. For some reason an hour on the Farmall race course seems much harder than some of the xc or 6 hour races. I had gone out yesterday morning for an hour to pull off a nice easy active recovery ride and settle the legs for the event.

Off the line I felt good and made my move in the fast section to take the lead into the woods, was overtaken after we climbed out, but took the lead back on the longest climb of the course. After that I just got into a rhythm and slowly increased my gap till I had a fairly good sized lead. Halfway through the second lap, I was jamming it up a short little climb and my left pedal suddenly snapped off. Examining it I could see a few of the threads were in bad shape and couldn't hand thread it back in on the trail. I limped out of the woods and luckily the Specialized demo trailer helped me out and got er installed back properly.

I hesitated for what I was going to do, but decided I could use the fitness and jumped back on the course to give chase. I finished out the race and did my seven laps. Even though technically I shoulda been DQ's. It was fun though and the course wore in real nice after last weeks rain storm.

Probably head out tonight either down to Naples for some climbing or over to Spencer for some more laps on the course before this weekend.

Currently playing in iTunes: The Stars Are Projectors by Modest Mouse

Poor Lizzy

I was all prepped up Friday afternoon and ready to head to the God's Country Marathon at Ski Denton in PA. I was dialing in the Superfly, ready to put the pedal back on and all would be good. Then disaster struck, literally. My dog, Lizzy, who was sitting next to me took off suddenly. Darting for the end of the driveway at full speed. Mind you, she's a hound mix and in that short distance she'll top out at 30mph. As soon as Lizzy took off, my spidey sense went crazy and I took off after her. I was a bit late as she entered the road she plowed into the side of a vehicle. Yelping and barking, I managed to get her to calm down. An overnight stay at the vet with some major painkillers and she was back home on saturday am, limping and sore. She's still yet to put weight on her right hind leg, but all seems ok from what could have been a major disaster. Guess she is gonna be laid up for a bit and that means no more riding for her for the rest of the summer :(

On a good note though, I did manage to get out saturday after I made sure she was home and settled ok. I headed down to Honeoye Lake where this weekends NYSERS finale, the Suicide Six will be held and put some laps in the newly modified course.




The course is completely changed for the 2008 race. I'm not in agreement with the changes as I thought the course was one of the best ever the original way it was run. The infamous "rattler" 800ft super technical descent has been completely removed and the course is run backwards. This essentially makes it an entirely new course as the trail is hardly ever ridden backwards as the 8 mile loop is almost always run in the original course direction.



I can't complain though, it's going to be an awesome event and after putting in a few laps I was able to get the flow of the course.





Naturally though as I was onsite, I had to take a run down the "rattler" for old times sake.

Sunday, I pulled out the road bike and headed for the hills. I don't think I've pulled of a road century this season? So it was a good time to put in a nice hard one with ginormous amounts of climbing. Having saturdays efforts in my legs left me a little tired and weary, but I managed to drill it for the majority of the day. I headed south to some of my favorite hills into Penn Yan then over Naples for even more climbing.

It ended up being a great day (no pics as rain was forecasted) and by the end of the ride the legs finally loosened up. I was quite a bit tired post-ride, but damn excited as my newborn nephew was in town and I got to hold him for the first time!

Here's hoping the legs are good and the rain holds off for tomorrow nights Farmall XC!!

Farmall Rain Out

I showed up at Farmall on tuesday night, slightly unaware that it was going to rain. Conditions had called for rain possibly later in the evening, but en route, I realized was going to be a massive thunderstorm.

I kitted up, and took the singlespeed out for a few laps on the slightly slick course as it was drizzling a bit. It made for an interesting course. The course is tough enough geared, because if you lose traction you're walking. I did feel a little bit overgeared with the 33x19 and just planned to dismount and run the 3 sections I couldn't conquer.

The few of us that were brave enough to start headed out on the course. I took the early lead into the singletrack, getting off to run. Only to find the off-camber side-hill was unrideable and unwalkable. We pretty much all fell on our asses trying to just walk up the hill. I had a slight lead after the first lap, and was overtaken halfway through the 2nd. I was really struggling on the climbs and could feel the previous days efforts in my legs. About the time we rolled through the 3rd lap, I'd decided I had enough. The super slick unrideable and even unwalkable sections had taken their toll. As the group of us hit the woods, the heavy, heavy rains came down. It was absolutely pouring, the wind kicked up. The trails became super saturated and I actually felt great. I kicked it up a notch and was ready to really race at this point. It was one of those really intense rainstorms where, it's you vs mother nature. As our group rolled to the line, we were yanked off the course.

I headed back to the car, thunder and lightning cracking all around. It was coming down so hard, I had to pretty much change outside and risk my clothes getting soaked, rather than opening the door and flooding the car! I guess I'll be back next week, and with some gears!

Hopefully, the Superfly will arrive by Tuesday. I got word from Fisher that they are getting a replacement out asap. I'll have to pull out the Supercaliber for this weekends marathon race down at Ski Denton. Looks like a good fun course and should be a good test of fitness prior to next weeks NYSERS Finale at Suicide Six.

Meanwhile, that gives me some time to perhaps replace the CD's in my car. I've got a 6 disc and the same ones have been in their probably a year or more. I just hit play and the small amount of driving I do, I let the swap themselves
They are:

• Clap Your Hands Say Yeah: Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
  
• The Editors: An End Has a Start
  
• Dinosaur Jr: Beyond
  
• The Twilight Singers: Blackberry Belle
  
• The Kooks: Inside In, Inside Out
  
• The White Stripes: Icky Thump
  

Missed out on the 6HOP

So I missed out on this year's 6 Hours of Power. Dang, love that race and that course. Wasn't much I could do about it though.

It appears I did some major damage to the Superfly! Ouch. I'm not sure when I did it. Most likely during the Super D at Mount Snow, but very well could have happened sometime prior.

I've got the Supercaliber up and running, but I'm looking to sell it, so I don't really want to put wear and tear on the parts. Guess I'll be piecing the Paragon back together for a short bit or spending time on the Singlespeed when I hit the dirt.

I've been putting time in on the road bike and probably will look to keep continuing that for a short bit. It's nice to just jump on and go for a ride. No loading up the bike and/or driving and doing all the prep work that's behind it. Funny thing is, I pretty much didn't spend all that much time on the road yet this season, so It's all kinda fresh for me right now. Although the terrain around here sucks, I may have to figure out how to scoot out and get some good climbing rides in asap.