Moots Training Camp

If you're on the Moots program (or just own one, or own many) check out the exclusive Moots Owner's Cycling Camp through the Cycling House.


Here in Vermont the weather in the first week of December is really only conducive to drinking, so getting in some miles in the warm weather haven of Tucson sounds pretty enticing.  If I was trying to race through December I'd seriously consider it- even Sven Nys takes a mid-season break from the Continental weather to train in Mallorca. 

For more info check out www.TheCyclingHouse.com or call Jon at Moots- 970.879.1676.

See you there maybe?

Interesting Random Bikes

Here's an assortment of stuff that's caught my eye recently.

First up is the integrated custom carbon awesomeness that Ergon put together for their team rider Irina Kalentieva for the Olympics and World Championships this year (from the Ergon fb page).  It's a an integrated bar/stem/barend/grip combo with special clamp mounts for her brakes, shifters and fork lockout already molded in.  There's also a cool integrated Ergon GS-shaped grip with some thin padding attached.  Nothing actually clamps around it- all of her controls have molded mounting points or are totally integrated into the design.  

Next up is the carbon Zaskar that Cecile Ravanel raced in the first Eliminator World Championship race.  Standard 26" wheels, singe ring up front with an MRP guide, dropper post and American Classic tubeless wheels.  Nice setup.

This one is from the roadie-centric slam that stem.  Not sure what's so captivating about this, but I really like the simple 1 x 10 drivetrain with the two color paint, Reba and Thomson post.  Looks understated and put together- not to mention fun to ride.

And since I put together my Moots Divide I've been checking to see how other guys are setting theirs up.  This one is a 26" wheel version built up by one welders at Moots as featured on their blog.  It's a pretty sweet and versatile setup with a Fox up front, wide Answer carbon bars and sweet matching Answer Rove XC stem.  This is the second one I've seen with a dropper post, and since it's a 30.9 you've got plenty of options including...

The new dropper post from Thomson.  This looks like the usual Thomson fare- well made, machined aluminum pieces that use their existing mounting bolt and clamp configuration.  I don't have a dropper post, and at this point I would wait for this one.

And that would be a cool addition for non-racing outings on my MX Divide.  It's pouring right now or I'd offer a better image than the shitty iphone/dishwasher shots featured here.  I'm still deciding on how I want to dress it up, and since Tomas just sent me the Race Space SDG kit it's now looking pretty dope in green and blue.  The new Moots kit is navy with some green accents so if I can stay on the program next season (please?) I'll likely run it like this.  I'm really digging it right now with the blue topcap, blue seatpost clamps and blue Pro-35 sticker next to the green/white saddle and very vogue green grips.

Here's another angle.

Wilmington Whiteface 100 Race Report

The Wilmington Whiteface 100 is the East Coast qualifier for the Leadville 100.  Leadville has gained broader appeal in the last few years since Lance Armstrong decided to add it to his program, and as a result Life Time fitness has started running a series of Leadville events that culminate with the Leadville 100 miler in August. 

I've had an interest in doing Leadville since I was 19 and read about it Mountain Bike Action.  It was a much different event then, but it's gained a reputation as the premier ultra-endurance event in North America.

The Wilmington course shares many similarities with Leadville, namely that it's a long, out-and-back course on mostly dirt roads, gravel, pavement, a little singletrack and a ton of climbing.  The same elements exist in most 50+ mile races, but in different proportions.  The Wilmington course was very much about dirt and gravel road climbing fitness with very little time on singletrack (less than 8 miles by my estimation) and several riders competed on cyclocross bikes.

Leading up to the event I had some great practice races at Wednesday Worlds but had also been hobbled by intermittent back problems.  My training had been erratic for the past month and I had decided back in February to not put everything on the line to try to qualify for Leadville this year; instead I would do the event for experience to prepare for a run at qualifying next year.

A handful of local racers were also in attendance including fellow Grass Moots team member George LaPierre and Waterbury stalwart Jay-Pro.  I was able to find a local campsite on short notice for small dollars.

If you haven't been to the Lake Placid/Whiteface area it's worth the trip.  The region is beatiful and there are plenty of places to ride on and off road.  I'd only seen Whiteface from a distance, and I have to say that in person it is ungodly steep.

After I settled into my campsite I got to bed early partly because I knew I had to wake up at 5:15 AM and partly because I had nothing better to do.  When I awoke Sunday morning I quickly broke camp, put on my kit and headed to the start.  After a smooth packet pickup and short warmup I headed to staging and lined up in the middle of the corral.

The mood at the start line was positive, and although there was no demarcation between ages or categories there was a general agreement that if you looked fast you belonged towards the front.  As we rolled out onto the pavement I slowly started working my way up, and on the long pavement stretches that followed I recalled my decade old pack handling skills and stayed smooth while maintaining my spot.

A few times I spun out my 39 x 11- which on a 29er with my spin is hauling along just shy of 30 miles an hour.  The first 15 miles were done in about 45 minutes, and it was clear that this was going to be a fast day out.

As we headed onto the first gradual dirt road climb I became aware of my lower back.  Tingling at first, then becoming a dull ache I went from feeling like I could have an awesome day to reassessing my commitment to finish.  The pain started to radiate down my right leg and eventually the light burning and tingling ran from my right kneecap up through my quad, across the top of my hip and into my spine.  Shit.  Maybe I should have gone for the deluxe air mattress instead of the $19.99 Wallymart special that I'd purchased a few short hours before I slept on it the night before.

I settled in with a reasonable group and rolled along trying to not let the discomfort erode my confidence or stamina.  At one point I pulled off the trail and stopped to try to stretch it out, and as I did the small train I had just passed rolled by me.  The whole time I was thinking that if I didn't finish the pace would be irrelevant, so I stretched as well as I could and pushed on.

At a certain point after that the pain stabilized.  I was aware of it, but it went from almost crippling to a dull background ache.  From then it never got any better or any worse.  After I caught back up with the group I'd been riding with I heard that the course was actually a little over 70 miles, not the 58 it had been last year.  Silly me- I'd been thinking it was close to the advertised 63.2 miles both times and had based my pacing and finishing goal around that.  Now I had at least an extra hour's worth of riding ahead of me.

The climbs were long.  The middle of the course was mostly loose gravel so on the out-and-back course that meant that the descents were on the same loose gravel.  Every time the road/trail pointed down I put every ounce of Knight's instruction into reading the trail and made up serious time by staying loose and taking good lines.  Earlier in the race I had been dueling with a guy with aerobars on his Fisher Superfly, and by dueling I mean that he tried to stay on my wheel every chance he got, then would dart around me and get aero when it suited him.  On particularly fast downhill I passed him on the outside of a steep and chundery corner, and took particular pleasure in doing so.

On pavement, gravel and dirt roads there was a consistent theme of long steady climbs and fast descents where I regularly was hitting 40-45 mph.  We worked our way back toward Whiteface and hit the second short singletrack section.  The trails were nice- reasonably smooth with sinewy corners and well-worn lines despite their newness.  I managed to pick off a few more riders on the short sections with some less-than-stellar riding and was back on the pavement and headed for the final climb up Whiteface.

We darted off the pavement and down a quick chute towards the flume at the bottom of the mountain, then the trail turned up.  Slowly at first it got steeper and looser as we went with a particularly sharp and nasty uphill right before the last aid station.  Of the six guys in my group I was the only one who cleaned it.

At the aid station I handed two empty bottles to a volunteer and drank one before he'd filled the second.  I knew the last climb was tough, even if I didn't yet know how tough.

As I made my way out of the aid station and dawdled along in my lowest gear a lone, clean rider rolled down the trail and stopped to wait.  "Hey guys- welcome to Whiteface.  You're almost there."  said the rider who I quickly identified as none other than Dave Wiens.  Cool.

What followed was one of the nastiest climbs I've ever seen: a boulder-filled moonscape of loose rock and gravel that criss-crossed the fall line ever so slightly as it made its way up the mountainside.  I'm not sure how long it was, but it was the mountain biking equivalent of hand-to-hand combat- slow, painful and completely exhausting.  Like most riders around me I rode at most 20% of it, and my pace was so slow that my speedometer kept dropping to zero because it doesn't recognize speeds below 2 mph.

Once I got to the top a hair-raising descent straight down the face of the mountain on the same rocky surface was all that stood between me and the finish.  I passed a handful of riders that were trying to pick their way down as I tried to keep the bike upright.  

In the end I finished in a little over 6 hours.  My original goal based on last year's course was 4:45, but considering  additional 12 miles and how much trouble I had with my back I'll count that as a success.  

Made It

 

Yesterday was the Wilmington Whiteface 100, and as you can tell by the picture I was able to finish.  

I'll post a more in-depth write up later this week with pictures taken with real cameras and not just my iPhone.

Time to Sack Up, Part 2

This week I've been working on polishing my form and getting ready for the Wilmington 100 on Sunday.  At one point I was shooting to qualify for Leadville on Sunday, but after a rough fall and winter I decided to scale back on that plan and just do the race for experience.

Of course polishing said form isn't quite going to plan, either.  During the warmup for last night's Catamount race I wondered how my back and hip would hold up, and as I warmed up a bit I tried to not let it consume my thoughts.

Remarkably I was able to get a good start and went into the woods following some good wheels and riding smoothly.  It was almost hard to believe, but I was holding my pace around corners and through the obstacles.  I was holding my own.  Whoa.

Halfway through lap 1 Grass Moots teammate George politely rolled by at which point I was wondering how the hell I'd managed to stay ahead of him for that long.  As lap 1 wound to a close Marc and Ross passed me and encouraged my effort.  I'm a familiar face at these races, just not with that group and not at that point in the race.

From there my pace slipped a little, but I was able to yo-yo with a consistent group of riders, and all-in I was riding the flat, technical course really, really well- way better than two weeks ago.

I ended up finishing five minutes behind my target, but within a very manageable three minutes there were quite a few riders that I'll be focusing on in the coming weeks.  The biggest change was really the focus on reading the trail.  That's not something I think I do as aggressively as I should, and really maintaining that focus for the full distance takes some discipline.  

My performance on a flat, twisty, bumpy and technical course is not predictive of how I'll do on Sunday's steep, long dirt road suffer fest, but I'm encouraged nonetheless.


I'll leave you with this picture of 2011 Leadville Winner Todd Wells' bike as he raced it on the day (jacked from Singletrack.com- how come nobody scalped that url before?)   

Shirts, Qualifying and Complaining

Last week I picked up this year's Pro-35 shirt order, and once again Cris did an incredible job.  He was able to take my vision from a photograph I'd taken last summer and turned it into exactly what I wanted. 

So what's with the car?  It's been a recurring image throughout the last year, and has become a sort of  allegory for my effort to turn pro.  After all of last year's events I felt like I still had the same potential but had some work to do to get back to being race ready.  The same engine is still under the hood.  

I've been tweaking my position over the last few days and think I've gotten it pretty dialed.  The only problem is that it's not the same position I've been using for the last few months of training.  By all accounts changes as major as the ones I made should be made in the off season when there is time to adapt slowly, but really I didn't have a choice.  My back injury from a late May has been flaring up and I couldn't steer around a sapling to save my life.  Fortunately the tweaks I made address both, but the bad news is that my body isn't used to handling torque with the more upright posture.

The Wilmington 100 is this weekend and although I'm excited about it I'm trying to set realistic expectations.  My heart isn't set on qualifying, it's really just about experiencing the race so that I can prepare for next year.  My back is either going to hold out or it isn't- and there's no amount of worry that can change that.  

Fortunately I have one of these on order and I really hope it arrives soon.

Detail oriented readers will note that I had a 2012 Mooto X YBB in-hand and may be wondering what happened to it.  After waiting for the 2012 version updates (from the warranty replacement from my 26" YBB) I realized that if I was going to run suspension that I wanted some real travel.  My original YBB was a great one bike option for every ride and race I threw at it, but now with the RSL there wasn't enough difference between the smooth 29er hardtail and the slightly smoother short travel YBB.  My recent back issues have only reinforced that going for a longer travel option was the right decision.  Delivery is still a few weeks away but I've been dutifully readying the components so that I can be ready to build once it does arrive.

For now it's taking it easy and getting ready for the weekend.  

One Down, Several To Go

I'm glad my first race of the year is out of the way.

This week was my first Wednesday Worlds, and my first race of the year.  Sure I'd been training pretty aggressively and had some new found trail skills to put to use, but a lot has happened since my last event on August 21, 2011.

I've deliberately avoided posts about training.  Some of that is probably because I can tell I'm improving but still don't have a good handle on where I am relative to last year, and some of it is because I'm a little self-conscious about it all.  Somewhere between the whining about hard efforts and existential crises taken out of context is the day-to-day of riding and training.  Keeping track of my performance has always been a challenge for me and I don't want to add pressure to myself or try to get too grandiose about how bad ass my training has been or how I'm going to take people apart on the race course.

Racing is hard, and although I remind myself of that regularly there's still no way to fully prepare for that all-out effort unless you're actually toeing the start line.  Physically and mentally there's no replacement for racing.

Leading up to Wednesday's race I was nervous.  I've been totally off the local cycling grid and have been riding almost exclusively by myself.  That suits my introverted style, and I push myself, but it makes it tough to benchmark relative to the competition.

So how'd the first Wednesday Worlds of 2012 go?  Overall pretty well, though I was ready to pull the plug halfway through the first lap.  This year's hill course is similar to years past, but somehow it manages to incorporate all of the sharp climbs at the expense of the long diesel ones.  I like the long diesel ones.  They suit my riding style and I know I can dig a little deep and reel people in towards the top.  I don't like the short, sharp ones.  It's tough for me to produce such short, sharp repeated efforts and I have to factor them into my pacing strategy.

I didn't do Flower Power, and I didn't get a full warm up.  The start of the course was similar to what we'd done before, so I anticipated where the hard efforts would be based on that.  I was planning on a handful of short, sharp efforts and was metering my effort accordingly.  My start was good, probably a little too good.  I was heading up the second steep climb with the group I want to ride with but can't quite yet.  I backed off a little and let a couple guys go who I knew I couldn't chase.  After that I got a little too aggressive punching it going over the wall and started to feel the effects of the start right when I needed to be maintaining my pace.  Ouch.

I started to slip a little, but recovered slightly for what I thought was the last steep pitch.  Previous loops had the gravelly slog up to the rockwall as the top of the course- but not this year.  After bouncing over the rockwall it was all new singletrack trough the woods- and a shit ton more climbing.  Barely halfway through the hard part, I was hurting pretty bad and going backwards fast.

From there to the top of the seemingly endless climbs I was essentially soft pedaling as racer after racer slipped past.  At some point Nemesis caught me and we started riding together.  Before long we were in a small group and were trading places with each other for the next few laps.

By that time I was starting to settle in a little, and knowing how much climbing lay ahead I backed off a little on the early steep sections.  That didn't really make it easier but it made the overall pace more sustainable.  Meanwhile my trail skills were totally gone.  I was riding like I'd just crashed (even though I hadn't) and was just losing time on every stupid turn.  Dammit.

On Lap 3 things improved a little.  I'd sorted out how I needed to attack the climbs, knew how long they were and was able to get a little smoother on the turns.  Simon's instructions about falling into my socks were starting to change my actions instead of just rattling around my head like some empty affirmation.  Looking back I think I've just done so many races there that my well-worn bad habits crept back when I was on the rivet.  I had to relax and back off a little so that I could let go of some tension and really feel the trail, and while I wasn't really smooth I was certainly smoother.

Nemesis and I had traded places many times through laps 2 and 3 with some other riders in our group trading pulls periodically.  Somewhere on lap 4 I got a gap and stretched it to 30 seconds by the finish.  Beating him is not why I get out of bed in the morning, but it's a very real performance benchmark.  Last year I had a couple of early season races where I was way ahead, and yet as I thought my fitness was improving he caught right up.  

Really I have no idea how I'm doing compared to last year.  Wednesday's race was a favorable indicator and I'm glad I finished when I really just wanted to quit.  I think my form is pretty good and if I can tweak my pre-race prep a little (by pre-riding the course and getting a decent warm up) with the right pacing I can improve on my performance.

Maybe I'll do Coyote Hill this weekend. 

Moots Mooto X RSL Full Review

After a year's worth of use I think I can legitimately publish a review of my Moots Mooto X RSL.  For an entire season this was the bike I rode in every race, every trail ride and every dirt road excursion.  I even found myself favoring dirt road rides on the RSL over mileage on paved roads on my road bike, so that should give you an idea of how fond I am of this bike.

The foundation of the bike is of course the Moots ti frame and matching 30.9 seatpost.  The RSL family has several refinements compared to their predecessors, namely a 44 mm headtube, Press Fit 30 bottom bracket and a 30.9 seatpost.  Individually those changes add incremental stiffness to the ride, but together they really help to fuse ride quality and responsive handling while still keeping the lively ti trail feel.  Frame weight is 3.4 lbs for a 19, and the overall bike as pictured is 22.5 lbs- pretty svelte considering it's a large metal bike used for endurance races with no sketchy light parts.

This is the 2011 model which is technically designed around an 80 mm fork.  The 2012 has been tweaked to include slightly updated geometry for a 100 mm fork and the downtube now has an additional bend in it near the bottom bracket shell.

I opted to run a full 100 mm of travel, which does slacken the bike slightly.  The geometry table will show it's a pretty steep bike, so it's really not a major change.  When the 2012 came out I asked the guys at Moots about the head angle change to accomodate the additional travel they said that it was nominal and that the (mainly cosmetic) change to double curve the downtube was the biggest difference between the two bikes.


Interestingly Velo News reviewed the same model year RSL with a 100 mm Fox fork and they did not report any negative effects of the additional travel either. 

The 44 mm headtube does allow for a tapered steerer, but that adds to the overall stack height of the front end because the lower race needs to sit outside the headtube.  Since I'm running 100 mm travel I decided to minimize the overall change and run a standard straight 1 1/8" steerer.  In my mind the additional travel was more important than the nominal gain in stiffness.

The seatstays feature the trademark Moots monostay and aggressive shaping to allow for tire clearance.  Even around the Maxxis Ikon 2.2 there's plenty of room.

The chainstays have less tire clearance primarily because the chainrings need to clear the outside of the stay.  There is still room for my 2.2, but it's a tighter fit.  The front derailleur is also pretty close to the tire.  I've done several very muddy rides and races and never felt that this contributed to unnecessary mud build up.

The front end of the bike is pretty low slung.  Most of last season I experimented with my positioning mostly to improve my technical handling skills.  I'd read about using wider bars in conjunction with a shorter stem so I tried that out a few months.  To complicate things even more Moots changed their sizing so to get my usual 24"-ish toptube I would need to ride a 19 and not a 20 like my YBB.  Add in a steep seat angle and the longer travel fork and it was too much for me to geek out ahead of time- I had to experiment after I got it built up.  

 

The good news is that the bike felt pretty balanced and the 90 mm stem was a good starting point.  As bars get wider the reach effectively lengthens (consider how far your chest is from the ground when you're doing push ups with your hands directly under your shoulders versus further apart) so I didn't want to get too stretched out.  

I ran the 90 for several months and it felt pretty good, but when I switched to a 100 mm stem I felt the bike instantly had a more balanced feel.  The short stem/wide bar approach works great for trail bikes or long travel, but the key thing with the RSL is that the rear wheel is tucked in so tightly that it puts a lot of weight over the rear wheel.  As a result I had a few bad falls in wet terrain because I didn't have enough weight on the front wheel to maintain traction.  I could overcome that by aggressively weighting the front end, but that riding style didn't really suit the bike and isn't feasible in endurance events.

The ride quality of this bike is amazing.  I've ridden other 29er hardtails and this one takes the cake with the best handling/smoothness/stiffness combination for cross country racing.  I'm running it with handbuilt Chris King/Stan's Crest rims which are fairly compliant and fit well with the overall feel of the bike.  When I've ridden other wheelsets like the Sun Ringle Black Flag Pro the bike feels quicker and almost shorter (because the spoke windup and rearwheel deflection is minimized), but that also means more chatter on square-edged bumps.

The SID fits well with the overall race-centric feel, but the Reba that preceeded it was a great fork also.  The Reba was easier to setup as the SID is slightly finicky with the STP3 damping cartridge.   Once it's setup it's a remarkable fork and the remote lockout is the best I've ever used.

Overall I would agree with the Velo News review with the exception of their dismissal of the Press Fit 30 bottom bracket design.  The PF30 bottom brackets are certainly the Achilles heel of the bike- they creak and wear out very quickly, but they are also fairly inexpensive and easy to replace.  It's not having a wider crank spindle but rather the larger shell diameter that makes the difference since it allows larger diameter tubes to be welded together.  By doing that the bottom bracket stiffness is remarkably better than standard threaded bb shell ti frames, and to me that's worth the trade off.

PF30 has been adopted by many small builders like Moots because it allows for bigger tubes, and I would suspect that higher quality bottom brackets aren't too far off from companies like Chris King or Phil Wood.  The first generation of GXP bottom brackets sucked too, but they've been improved and I expect PF30 to follow the same path.  And if you really hate PF30 you can permanently glue in an adapter to run a threaded English bottom bracket and pretend this whole thing never happened.

The RSL is not cheap, but it's a great option for a bike that rides well and will hold up.  It's also American made and still offers a lifetime warranty- something that is getter harder and harder to find in mountain bikes.  With all of that said I can say the Mooto X RSL is now my favorite in a long list of high end bikes. 

For more information visit moots online.

   

Anticipation- YBB 2.0

Here's the first shot of the 2012 Moots Mooto X YBB.  As the build kit gets rehabbed and the wheels get assembled I'll be working on this as time allows.  

The bike was supposed to have black decals, so right now it's sitting at home awaiting the black decal kit with the red ones removed.

The build will be many of the parts that made up its predecessor- 10 speed Sram X0 groupset (including brakes), Chris King hubs, Stan's NoTubes Crest rims, KMC X10 SL Ti chain, Easton EC70 bar, Easton EA 70 stem, WTB Devo Carbon saddle, XTR pedals, Moots Setback Ti post and a Cane Creek 110 headset.

I'm still undecided on tires, but I have Kenda Karmas sitting in a box collecting dust so I'll probably run those.

I'll post more updates as this bike comes together.  As much as I'd like to get this done I have neither time nor all of the parts to so.  

Moots Psycho X RSL

So I don't own a Moots Psychlo X RSL nor do I have one on order.  After looking at these pictures of the recently released version that could change though.

At last year's Nationals the Moots guys showed this prototype. 

The most notable difference is that this earlier version has a standard 1 1/8" headset while the newer ones have gone for the 44 mm inset as seen on the Mooto X RSL.

Moots has also developed a new carbon cross fork that's painted to match the brushed titanium finish.  I've been riding the road version of this fork and it's been pretty good so far. 

The fork features the option for a crown-mounted cable stop which is a proven way to cut down on brake chatter.  If you're still running cantilevers then this is the preferred option for brake routing, but it'll be interesting to see what's available as companies are able to offer more sophisticated disc brake solutions. 

The frame is offered with or without disc tabs, but the fork is currently cantilever only.  With the brake options still being in flux I'm thinking I'll wait a little longer to see what SRAM comes up with for 2012- short of the cable actuated BB7 I don't think there are any viable options without ungainly adapters. 

I even like this one with a black saddle and tape- and that's saying something.  

So yeah I really want one, and for now I'm telling myself that the disc issue is the reason to wait (forget that I have neither time nor money to spare in my new "home renovation" courtesy of interiors by Irene).  I'm hoping to race for Moots again next season, so maybe this will make its way into my stable during summer of 2012.

Dark Horse Pics

I'm working on my sponsor applications for next season and rediscovered these pics from Dark Horse.  I'm definitely planning on doing this event next year. 

My full race report is here in case you missed it the first time around. 

YBB 2.0

This is one of the last pictures I took of my YBB.  I was on a trip in Massachusetts and was riding in Lynn Woods, a National Park around Walden Pond where Henry David Thoreau wrote his seminal work of the same name.

Shortly after that ride I noticed that the frame as cracked and started the process of disassembling it and working on a replacement.  Whether it would be covered was never an issue- Moots stands behind their bikes and takes their lifetime warranty very seriously.  

Through my conversations with the guys at Moots I learned that the 2012 YBB was going to take the attributes of my two favorite bikes and merge them: the RSL 44 mm headtube and curved downtube with the added compliance of the YBB suspension back end.  

Fast forward to now and my new YBB is a little over a week away from being delivered.  It's been a rough couple weeks and I've really been looking forward to this.  The RSL is a great bike, but having the option to run suspension is going to be great.  And who doesn't like new toys?

Like everything else in my basement the build kit for this bike was under water for two days and I've been aggressively working toward rehabbing it.  Some things like the derailleurs, XTR pedals and King bottom bracket are completely unaffected.  Others that were open and exposed to the water like the shifters and open rear brake line were less fortunate. 

Stay tuned over the coming weeks as I detail the elements of the build.  It'll give me something to dream about when I'm pounding nails.

Recovery

 

During my recovery ride yesterday I realized I'd been missing the point.   

For most cyclists the recovery ride is a training staple, although spinning along without the need to achieve anything is uncomfortable for some people.  After a 4-7 hour race it's not like I have any matches to burn anyway.

Leading up to the Hampshire 100 the main point I focused on was getting my head in the game, or more accurately staying in the moment.  Right now these rides aren't because my legs that are tired, but the mental focus of staying on task for 6 hours and 44 minutes took quite a bit out of me. 

Now it's time to relax, rebuild.  Preparation for the next event starts as soon the previous one ends.

Hampshire 100 Race Report

Last year, the Hampshire 100 was the focus of my season.  After successful campaigns in '09 and '10 I decided to make it my focus again this season, but you already knew that if you read The Moment post that I published last week.

Going into the event I established some goals for myself.  I wanted to improve on last year's time, but I know from other events that aiming to shave off too much just leads to disaster and disappointment.  With last year's finish time just under 7 hours I figured on a goal of 6:30, but that I'd be happy with 6:45.  Also I wanted to beat my H100 nemesis, the racer who'd won in 2009 and finished one ahead of me in 2010.  It wasn't anything personal, but I wanted to make up that 5 minute difference he had on me last year that kept me off the podium.  

This year is a little different because I've already done 2 decent endurance events, 6 Hours of Pat's Peak and the Dark Horse 40.  My preparation featured fewer long training rides and more racing action.  Sometimes it works out, and sometimes it doesn't.  

Friday and Saturday were pretty laid back but productive days.  I was able to get my bike dialed and round up most of my gear with little incident.  In some ways it's a shame to have a summer Saturday assigned to packing the car, driving and basic pre-race tasks, but it's a necessary evil.  

I arrived at the venue Saturday afternoon and after some deliberation spotted an appropriate spot to pitch my tent.  After a brief debate I elected not to setup next to shirtless guys and instead found a quieter corner away from the commotion of the start line.  I'm sure those guys were decent people, but the fact that one of them was going to ride 63 miles on a Klein Mantra was enough to make me suspicious.  

The tent went up without a hitch, and at 8:30 I had nothing better to do than go to bed.  After thumbing through the pages of Cyclocross Magazine for a few minutes I shut off my lantern, set my alarm for 5:15 AM and attempted to get some sleep.

I'm usually pretty restless the night before a race, especially when I have to get up early.  After lying restlessly and fumbling around for what felt like half the night I decided to get up for a bathroom break.  When I made my way back into my tent I was certain it was around 2:30 or 3:00 AM, but it was only 10:30 PM.  

When my alarm finally went off I slowly started to get ready.  I've done enough races that I have a pretty decent idea of what needs to happen in what order, so I was on semi-autopilot as I got dressed, had breakfast and pulled my bike out of the car.  

The dew was pretty heavy, and everything that had been left out was soaking wet.  I'd learned that from years past and had put the bike and my folding chair back in the car to stay dry.  

 

I was able to sneak in a quick warmup before the mandatory 6:15 AM racer meeting, though I could have ridden longer.  The expert lineup was pretty big and by virtue of lining up late I missed out on getting my preferred starting spot, but I made do.  When the gun went off we rolled away and quickly zipped through the short singletrack that connected the cinder track to the dirt roads outside the park.

This is the point in the race when the fast guys light it up, and everyone else turns themselves inside out to keep pace.  Some groups form, guys work together in pacelines, and many racers bury their chances of a solid finish by burning too many matches within the first 10 easy miles.  

It's tough for me to sit back when I know I can keep up with those guys, but I know what I can and can't sustain, and I have no business wheel sucking when it's just going to bury me later.  This year I kept up a little better than in years past, but my legs felt awful tight, and I was regretting wearing arm warmers after about 15 minutes.  

The miles click by pretty quickly in this section, and it's easy to entertain thoughts that you can finish in under 6 hours.  Really until the 3 mile sand section that's pretty much true, but then reality sets in.  

The race follows a pretty similar pattern every year- flat, fast first half, then two big, steep climbs and then the second half is on broken class IV roads, jeep roads, vague doubletrack and singletrack in that order.  The second half doesn't have many big climbs, but there are many steep power climbs, many of them on loose rocks and with a water crossing at the bottom.  Not surprisingly the second half is where the real race really starts.  

The break point between those two halves is the first big climb- a very steep, long and gravely ascent that takes probably about 15 minutes to climb.  This climb is immediately after the extended soft sand section, so although you haven't been going uphill you have been building fatigue.  Last year I made up some time as I was able to ride most of the climb; this year I rode all of it. 

Photo courtesy of extremilys

This shot was taken near the top where it flattens out a bit but is still pretty loose.  The camera angle makes it look less steep than it is, but more than half of the riders bailed on it because they lost traction.

At the top of the climb is a smooth, fast rolling section that sets you up for the next big climb- the Powerlines.  Steep, grassy and wet, the Powerline climb makes its way up a long hillside just a few short minutes after you've crested the boulder field.  It's steep, and with my 2 x 10 29er I have 3 less gears for tackling extreme uphill grades.  Still, I kept it rolling and went into the red to keep pedaling and reel in some riders where most were walking.

Shortly after the climb is the first aid station, and I made quick work of filling my bottles, inhaling some salt tablets and getting back on my bike.  I don't do well with stopping, so I try to keep my breaks pretty short, but even still I felt like my legs were getting really bogged down as I made my way up first climb.

By this point, the race is fairly strung out and I've settled into a groove within a pretty small group of riders around me.  For me this is where the race really takes shape as I usually aim to have a fast second half.  I'd been feeling alright, but the technical sections weren't really smooth, and I felt like I was getting a little too tossed around on the trail.  After letting some air out of my tires at around mile 35 things started to change.  I felt good.  I was fast, smooth and able to ride both up and down.

At some point I started trading places with a particularly lanky fellow on a Pivot.  He was about my height, but his saddle was several inches higher than mine and his riding style was to pedal roadie style with a flat back and let his big wheeled suspension bike do all the work.  He was light on torque, but his wiry frame enabled him to keep pace on longer climbs.  From behind he looked like a praying mantis with his long legs and folded over posture.   

Last year I ended up racing a fair bit of the last few miles with a guy in a Racer X jersey.  This year I found myself trading places with him a little earlier, and he quickly became my rabbit.  X had rolled away from me a bit and was working with another rider.  I tried to make up some time in one of the steep rocky sections and went over the handlebars while over thinking a roll down.  As I picked myself up off of the dirt Mantis rolled by.  Mad at my momentary lapse of judgment I put in a concerted effort to catch up to X and his partner, and a few minutes later I did.  With some smart line choices I was able to save some matches and pick my way back up to him without burying myself.

For the next few wooded miles we traded places- sometime I'd lead, sometimes X would, and we'd intermittently catch and pass Mantis.  I was running low on water and stopped at the aid station before the second drop station to fill up.  Although it was only 9 miles to the next station I knew 1 bottle wasn't enough.  That gave X and Mantis a couple minute head start, so with full bottles I began to chase back on.

The next few miles after that section feature a fast descent, some climbing under the power lines and more wooded semi-smooth singletrack.  I got within a few bike lengths of Mantis, but X was much further ahead.  We worked our way past some low lying ponds that were right near the roadway, which meant that there were some enormous puddles.

In one spot I slowed down to pop a GU, and looked up to find Mantis riding out of the biggest puddle I've ever seen.  With a clean line in front of me, I rolled into it as the water parted around my front wheel.  At the deepest point my shoes, pedals and lower brake rotors were all submerged.  A few short seconds later I was out of the puddle and accelerating to catch back up to Mantis.  We rode together into the next aid station and readied ourselves for the push over the last 15 miles.

The distance after this last drop station is really where you can feel that it's a different race than the Vermont 50.  That extra 13 miles means you still have to race for at least another hour, and it's an hour at the end of the race when you are already pretty spent and really just want to get off your bike.  It's also where I usually pick off a few more riders who slipped by me earlier in the event.

Shortly after the aid station X stopped to walk up a hill and I never saw him again.  A few miles later Mantis did the same, and I found myself racing with some other riders who had started hard but were fading fast.  We rolled together for a few minutes before I let it all hang out on the fastest, roughest gravel descent I've even ridden. 

I'd promised myself I wouldn't check my watch to see my time until I'd finished, so I poured whatever energy I had left into riding as smooth and fast as I could.  Fortunately the last couple miles were on fairly smooth singletrack so I was able to conserve energy and let the bike do the work.  Without incident I rode most of the singletrack clean, although I walked over a couple of the bridges in the last section just to be on the safe side.

In the end I had good but not great race and finished in 6:44.  I did beat my rabbit, but because of a large number of sandbagging elite riders that was only good for 9th.  Still I'll take it, even though my finishes of 3rd, 4th and 9th seem to show backwards progress but in reality it's just the opposite.

What's probably the most interesting thing for me is that after I found the groove I not only rode better, but I could go faster than I though was possible.  As I packed up my tent I was amazed that although I was tired I wasn't nearly as beat up as I was after finishing last year.

So was it a victory of the body over the mind?  In some ways yes, I think so.  I also proved to myself that I'm stronger than I think I am, and that my training is paying off.  The effort put into big rides and doing other races has made me stronger and more resilient than years past.

There's one more race on my calendar, the 50 mile Landmine Marathon next month, but for now I'm going to be taking it easy for a few more days before I ramp it up again.
  

  

The Moment

This is it.  I've been thinking about this race since August 22, 2010 a few short minutes after I finished.  

And yet somehow I'm finding ways to undermine my own progress .  It's as if I'm uncomfortable with the idea of really rolling the dice to see what I can do.  To be clear, I've never won a bike race.  I don't think I've ever actually won any athletic competition now that I think about it. 

Winning isn't the point for me.  When I fixate on it, I get too nervous and self destruct, yet without the desire to win it's tough to succeed.  For me thinking about winning means I just auger myself into the ground.  The journey is the part I enjoy- the training, the improving fitness, the ability to see my improvement and just the simple act of being outdoors for extended periods of time.  The competition itself is almost secondary.

About a year ago I started taking yoga classes once a week.  My flexibility is pretty bad, and I'm not good about stretching on my own or doing any sort of "core work," so when I had the opportunity to take a class I jumped at it.  I was really looking to relax a little bit and spend some time focusing on recovery. 

There's an interesting concept in yoga that translates into victory over the mind, and it's essentially using your body to get your mind to chill the fuck out.  I've had a couple bad crashes this year, and one of the underlying commonalities is that I was not 100% focused on what I was doing at that moment, and it cost me.  It's easy for me to out think myself, and when riding in the woods it's about split second reactions, not conscious control of every movement. 

More than anything it's about relaxing and paying attention, or being in the moment.  Today as I clean my bike and pack my bags, tomorrow as I load the car and drive to the venue, and Sunday as I line up and put forth my best effort on the course I will try to stay in the moment.

That's my goal for Sunday, and if I do that I'll have my best race possible.  Really that's all I can ask for. 

Dark Horse 40 Race Report

There is a distinct pattern in my preparation for and recovery from an endurance race.  This past weekend's Dark Horse 40 featured all of usual fun, neuroses and caloric intake of my usual endurance activities. 

The week didn't get off to the best start as I had a nasty crash on Tuesday's ride.  I didn't get stitches but probably should have, and I broke a shoe as well. 

The Dark Horse Cycles guys put on a few events that are as well known for their antics as they are for their racing.  To some people antics are more important than racing, especially if you're a singlespeeder. 

The race format was fairly straightforward and consisted of two laps on a rolling 20 mile course.  In high school I did a few races at the same venue so I had some idea of what to expect- fast, rocky technical sections, some water crossings and short but very steep, punchy climbs.  That was mostly right, but since 1998 they’ve built out the trail network to include many more miles of sinewy singletrack under the thick forest canopy. 

When I arrived I was directed where to park and got the sense that there was some sort of regional bias for the assignments, though I couldn’t really gather any empirical evidence to support my theory.  I ran into local Grass Moots rider George and his partner in crime Mark.  We talked about my RSL and geeked out for a bit about Moots and bikes in general.  George is one of those unassuming guys who seems perfectly normal but can ride a singlespeed over anything and is hearty enough that he could probably survive on a diet of lug nuts and tree sap.  I unfortunately am not that diesel and will be sticking to my cottage cheese, chef salads and strong coffee. 

After a brief warm up and several Red Bulls I coordinated with Mom & Dad for the staging of my water bottles in the feed zone.  Dad was kind enough to get up at 5:00 AM that morning to make some of his famous pancakes.  Dad's pancakes are some of the best legal performance enhancers you can find- just ask World Cup racers Adam Craig and Kathryn Curi Mattis. 

I lined up towards the back of my field, which happened to be Men's Elite Open, but only because there wasn't a Cat 1 option.  This doesn't count as making the grade in elite partially because I am still a Cat 1 and also because I got smoked relative to the real pros in attendance.  The air horn went off and the field thundered down the long gravel road.  The dust was incredible, and I managed to be in the optimal position to catch 90% of the spray from the one mud puddle that was on course. 

40 miles is not a distance I've ever done before, so I was unsure how to pace it.  After some conversations with Spinney I came up with a strategy that sounded good based on what I thought I could sustain for the roughly 4 hours I planned on racing.  Together with the 90+ degree heat I was unsure how to meter my effort, so I went for a conservative strategy on the first lap. 

The combination of the heat, race nerves and too many Red Bulls (3) made it hard for me to find my rhythm on the first lap and I ended up bouncing off of most obstacles and letting riders pass me who I probably could have stayed with.  In most of my races that run 6 to 8 hours  the start is the least important part, and the race really doesn't take shape until the second half.  With that in mind I decided to start a little more conservatively and let the course and the heat soften up the field. 

That strategy mostly worked, but the aforementioned cocktail of heat and caffeine made it hard for me to determine my actual effort since I felt like my heart rate was artificially elevated.  The first lap went smoothly enough and I found myself relearning how to manual and using it all the time- the Small Block 8's make the coolest sound when you drop a rock face.  It’s like something out of Transformers. 

As I completed lap 1 I found Mom and Dad in the feed zone and pulled three full water bottles from the cooler that they had waiting for me.  I debated about whether I needed all three bottles, but given the heat I decided to play it safe and bring all if them anyway.  In less than a minute I got what I needed and rumbled back out onto the course for lap 2. 

At a certain point I stopped thinking about the terrain or my pace and just started riding.  Right at that moment things clicked into place.  With very little effort I was taking the right lines, maintaining my speed and pushing the gears I'd expected.  Also at that point the race became a hell of a lot of fun.    

Note the flapping band aids on my left arm from Tuesday's crash. 

The Dark Horse guys also provided a fair number of distractions like attractive young women standing by a keg.  Usually when I'm three hours into a race I'm pretty sick of seeing sweaty, muddy dudes, and Godzilla's sister would look good if she was wearing a tube top.  Fortunately I was able to resist the temptation (of the beer) and kept riding. 

In the last half of my second lap I started to really pass some people- some of them walking, some soft pedaling, and I was making up places that had slid by during my lap 1 freak out.  I was still feeling good and picking good lines as I pushed the pace as hard as I could in the home stretch. 

The last 5 miles for me are often the toughest, but if I'm in the pain cave then I know that I've given it a solid effort.  Right on the last short road section before the last piece of singletrack I got caught by two guys who were clearly in a battle with each other.  The lap was somewhat deceptive because the course went right past the parking area before heading back into the woods for another half mile or so.  Right in this paved faux finish one of them asked me where the finish was.  Great I thought- these guys are team racers who haven’t done a lap on the course but they're hell bent on killing each other right in front of me.  They took turns attacking each other on the trail as I tried to keep contact.  I got gapped on one of the short rock wall sections and they ended up finishing about 15-20 seconds ahead of me. 

After the race I fumbled around and collected my empty bottles then made my way over to the beer tent.  Although I was unable to formulate complete sentences the EMT manning the keg was able to interpret my needs and handed me a cold Harpoon.  It was the best thing I have ever tasted, even if it meant that I was half drunk before I had even taken off my helmet.

Back at the car I put on some clean-ish clothes and managed to sweat through my t-shirt before I stuffed my bike into the trunk.  With decreasing cognitive capacity I made my way back to the beer tent and caught up with George and Jay Pro for a while before sitting down with Mom and Dad in the shade and coming to my senses enough to drive home.  I had less than two beers in two hours, but in my weakened state I felt like a 14 year old that had raided his parents liquor cabinet.  Ironically enough I was in front of my parents. 

I said my goodbyes and sat in the car for a few minutes with the AC cranked to try to cool down.  As my body temperature started to come back to normal I thought about how I would replenish my caloric debt and reward myself.  The answer soon came to me: Doritos. 

After a quick stop for a sandwich and fuel I located a family sized bag of Cooler Ranch and proceeded to stuff them into my cake hole as quickly as possible.  At 10:45 I polished off the bag before I brushed my teeth and went to bed.

I consider that a successful weekend of racing. 

Dark Horse 40

The Dark Horse 40 is in the books for 2011.  Full report coming soon.

Time to Sack Up

It's been over a month since my last race, and I've decided to head to Windham this weekend.

My training and recovery have been going well...sort of.  My form has been good- I set a new PR up Bolton that was 20 seconds faster than by previous best, and I had the rear brake dragging the whole time.

So what's the problem?  In the meaningless midweek training races I haven't had a good day out in a month.  Part of that is by design to prepare for and recover from Pat's Peak, but some of that is attributed to weather and laziness.

Last week I crashed hard on a slick downhill corner in my warmup, and it shook my confidence enough for me to be completely skittish on all of the wet, grassy turns on the course...which is basically the whole course.  This week I did the App Gap/Bolton double on Monday and was still in recovering on Wednesday.  The weather also sucked, and I didn't get a good start or a good warmup, so when I got tailed off the group at the top of the first climb I decided to pull the plug.

Last night I went with the shop ride and set the pace on the climbs (I know, I never thought I'd say that either) but a mechanical problem forced me to walk out of the woods for the second ride in a row.  I never got to test myself, and my real goal was to rediscover my technical skills by following better riders.  

The hard part is not letting these things get to me when I know that I'm in good shape.  It's the mental game of riding confidently and smoothly, and getting back on the horse when you fall off.  Because you will fall off.

This weekend's event is a combination World Cup and citizens event held on the same course in Windham.  The non-UCI event is called "Race the World" and is part of the well-run Root 66 New England series.  Fortunately I don't have to race the world, just the rest of the dudes in the Mens 30-39 Cat 1 Masters field.  

Many times before I mentioned that I'm an endurance guy, and I haven't done a standard distance XC event in three years.  I really don't have any expectations beyond seeing how I can do with decent preparation, so
I'll take my decent from and questionable skills to the start line at 8 AM on Sunday.

As I'm getting ready I will remember what Myles Rockwell had to say about becoming World Champion:

“Let the auto pilot click on and let the red light flash, that is the only way to describe it. Grit your teeth and pin it."