Work, Racing, and Bike Lanes

Hey All,
Let's catch up a bit since the Growler. June has fortunately been one of our busiest months of the season at my job so with limited races on deck I took the opportunity to pick up some much needed banquet shifts. After a long Spring closure and Colorado's unemployment process biting me in the A$$, I pretty much needed to make up some cash somehow to get us through the remainder of June. Our fridge took a crap on us and I also had to grab a new one of those from Lowe's. My advice? Stay the course, brush the stress of your back and good things will come. In this two week period, I was able to make a ton of money working banquets, finally got my unemployment payments squared away, and thanks to Danielle's parents for buying us some condo insurance last year, we were able to get a nice check from them to replace our food and fridge! "Good things come to those who wait?" No, good things come to those who wait patiently.

Now, back to the focus of this blog. Cycling...

I've had two Vail Rec Series races since the Growler. "Hammer in the Hay" at 4 Eagle Ranch and "Berry Creek Blast" in Edwards. The Hammer in the Hay course is infamous for a non-stop "hammerfest" with few climbs but a relentless bumpy course thanks to the horse trails the loop is setup on. It did not disappoint. Hurt as usual and the course was extra bumpy to give your hands a test of endurance. Thank God for the Ergon grips that relieved some of the pain. Gave it a good effort, caught people on the one sustained climb per lap but quickly dropped off the back on the long, windy straights. Tyler Eaton had an awesome ride taking 1st in the Mens Expert group. I finished a decent 10th place.

A couple of days before the Berry Creek race, I had a big crash pre-riding the course. Dumb thing was that I tried "having some fun" and taking a line that I would not ride during the race and the trail took advantage of that mistake. Took a line off of a ledge and the landing was a bit harder than expected. Not exactly sure what happened but all I remember was the massive impact on my back and head, then opening my eyes stomach down in the sage brush. Only took a few minutes to catch the breath, check to see if the body was in one piece and finish the descent back to the trailhead. Surprisingly, nothing was broken. Just a damaged rotator cuff and now a week later, my lower spine still hurts. We'll see how it progresses. Wish I had some video for you from that one!

3 days later, I felt good enough to give it a go in the race. Four freakin' laps of Berry Creek... Gave a little bit too much on the first lap and got dropped pretty bad. Lap 2 was slow, but felt revived a bit for laps 3 and 4 to bring back the pace and pass a few guys before the finish. Finished 9th.

Spent this past week watching every stage of the Tour de Suisse. Despite all the rumors, attacks, and banter in the cycling world right now, that was some of the most exciting cycling to watch on television. The stages in the TdS were incredible, from the views, the course profiles, and the non-stop action the riders gave us. Fabian Chancellara's ability to time trial is simply super-human (no motors required). He handles a time trial bike like it's a mountain bike. Everyone questioned Andy Schleck's form on the stages he was "dropped". Take a look at the stages that he pulled... his form is there, he was running some tests by my book. The guy lost his bike during the time trial in the prologue. There was no reason for him to completely blow himself up in an effort to make that time up. Finally, after a courageous effort by Damiano Cunego defending the yellow jersey for most of the Tour, Levi Leipheimer had an outstanding time trial in the final stage to make up a 1:59 gap and win the overall in the Tour de Suisse by 3 seconds. Of course, the masses came out bashing his ability to ride that fast at that age. But take a look again, it's not like he crushed Fabian's time. He is a very strong time trialist and Cunego's performance was less than stellar in the final defense. Cunego looked worked after 9km. Should be an exciting Tour de France for sure. Not trying to play favorites but Levi and Chris Horner could be a force to reckon with. I'm sure Jonathan Vaughters has some tricks up his sleeve with Garmin-Cervelo. I expect an all-around great performance from those guys whether it be sprints, TT's, or climbing stages.

Next race on the schedule is the Firecracker 50 in Breckenridge. Here is a picture in town this morning... We'll see if the snow is cleared in time, especially up Little French.

July gets busy after Firecracker with Davos Dash, Telluride Full Tilt, Vail Grind, followed by the Breck 68 - All within the same 2 week period.

Until next time, get outside, ride your bike, and be sure to stay in the bike lanes...

bike lanes from Casey Neistat on Vimeo.

64 Miles of Fun in Gunnison... almost

This past Memorial Day weekend, Danielle and I headed down to Gunnison, CO for the 4th Annual Original Growler MTB race. The Growler is an event put on by Gunnison Trails and is a fundraiser for their trail advocacy efforts. Led by Dave Wiens, the event has become quite the contest just to get into. This years event sold out in a whopping 8 minutes! Luckily, Danielle and I got in.

We drove down Saturday afternoon and met up with Paul Gorbold and his girlfriend Kaylee to get a little sneak peak ride in the evening before the race. Temps for the weekend were stellar as it never dropped below 45 degrees, even overnight. Our short 10 mile pre-ride was up the singletrack that led us into Lap 2 of the race. Little did we know what we were in for. To say the climb was steep is an understatement. To add to that, the loose granite texture of the trail made tire grip less than optimal to push a hard gear. With a few power move sections we made it to the top and finished the ride off with Rattlesnake and Sea of Sage trails. To the right, Paul starts ascending the steeper part "Backbone". Only about a mile in length, this trail weaved its way around, to the top of all the rocks you see in the background.

As we woke up at 5:30am on Sunday morning, I immediately opened our hotel room door to see what the temps were going to be like for our start. I was pleasantly surprised to feel a calm 50 degree air flow through the room at 6am. Our start at 7am was about 55 degrees making the wardrobe choice very simple... jersey, sleeveless base layer and shorts.

Promptly at 7am, the sound of a double shotgun blast by the Gunnison town mayor, got us rolling through town with a 2 mile neutral rollout to the Hartman Rocks area. One of the coolest things that Danielle and I got to experience in this race was a mass start and the opportunity to ride side by side for the first 8 minutes or so on the race. Given that is was my birthday, it was a nice treat to begin the day of suffering that was to follow. The neutral rollout was anything but "neutral" as our rolling pace hovered around 23 mph for the first 2 miles. By the time we reached the dirt, the lead group of 40 or so riders were already about 1:30 ahead of me, half way up Kill Hill. As we climbed up Kill Hill it was time for me to get up front as much as possible to avoid the backup as we reached the first singletrack section of the course. I caught up to Pete Lombardi at the top of the climb, chatted a bit, then proceeded forward to gain some time.

The riding pace of everyone around me was very good and there was far less backups then I was expecting. We were cruising at a solid pace and I was able to gain some positions on each of the short fire road climbs each time we ducked out of the singletrack. The first major sustained climb came at what I believe is called "Bambi's", was tough but so much fun. I cannot tell you how much fun the singletrack is at Hartman Rocks. After some tree lined singletrack, we finished the climb on some large rock feature thats had a good mix of "walkers" and those that picked the right lines to keep on rolling. I was able to ride with the latter. One of the sections of trail I had not ridden was the Skull Pass loop, which, luckily I had a good rider from the Epic Endurance squad ahead of me who showed my all the right lines on the steep technical descent. I stopped briefly at the aid station out of Skull Pass to refill some bottles and I must say, I am so happy with the quality and taste of my Infinit Nutrition because the "other" sports drink out there was not too pleasing to the palette.

As I raced through the course, I was careful not to go to hard on any sections in an effort to feel somewhat refreshed as I started lap 2. Not quite sure which is mentally easier yet; knowing exactly what the second half of the course entails, or just racing on one big loop. I guess I'll know after the Park City Point to Point race. I rode into the drop bag section at 3:18:08, 34.5 miles into the race, grabbed a new set of bottles and started the ascent of lap 2. A Honey Stinger rider and I decided that hiking most of that initial ascent was right about the same speed as trying to spin easily up it. By the time I hit Josho's on the second lap, my legs felt only slightly fatigued, knowing that the hardest part of the course was out of the way. As I reached the Bambi's climb again, my legs were revived and ready to start hammering again. At this point, I was only about 10 minutes off-pace from the first lap due largely to the much more technical climb at the start of lap two.

Climbing up Skyline on Lap 1 - MountainMoonPhotography

At mile 48 I was steadily rolling as I crossed the 5 hour mark. The confidence from the possibility of an impressive finish time gave the legs the extra energy needed to finish the final 16 miles. Suddenly, something wasn't feeling right in my stomach. With little solid food eaten, it was not an upset stomach, but more like the feeling I used to get running cross-country in High School when you pushed to hard of a pace. I had never felt this on a mountain bike though. By the time I reached the in-bound aid station I stopped to get some water, thinking that maybe a mix of sugar and carbs were cramping the stomach. I was kind of bummed because as I was about to roll out through Skull Pass, fellow Bach Builder Ken Boyer was just coming out of the loop which meant at that time, I was only about 15 minutes behind him. As I started to descend, that is when the pain started to get intense. I got through Skull Pass and back to the aid station in a bit of pain and had to stop and sit for a little while to try and shake it off. Every bump and jolt on the bike send a searing pain through my abdomen. After about 8 minutes of so I got back on the bike and tried riding. It hurt... bad. And there was still 13 miles to go of less flowy, much more technical singletrack.

The next hour or so hurt a lot. Climbs were not too bad but any chance to gain some time on descents I had to crawl along being careful not to hit any bumps to hard. About half way through I almost threw in the towel. The mental game was getting the best of me knowing there was still 8 miles left and I had to pull over to regroup. I can't remember the last time I have cried, but this almost broke me. Not the pain as much, but knowing that the relentless pain was not going to leave me as I chugged along. I cleared my head, ate some solid food and pushed forward.

Turns out the sugar was just what I needed. As I approached the Fenceline (about 5 miles to the finish) the cramps smoothed out and went away. Started hammering again and with no pain my fitness was great leading into the last 2.5 mile section of the course which is typically brutal if your legs are in any way on the verge of cramping. Stopped real quick to be a good fellow racer and gave my CO2 to a walking racer with a flat and proceeded to the finish. Rode through the line at 7 hours, 21 minutes, and 12 seconds good enough for 86th overall in the mens field.

You never know how things will play out in a race with the what if's, and could've done's. After reviewing my Garmin data, the cramping issue resulted in an additional 32 minutes from lap one over the same 9.5 mile section. Granted you will naturally be slower on the second lap, to put my leg fitness into perspective, the last 5 mile section of the course was just over 2 minutes slower than the first lap. I guess my goal of 6:45:00 was right on par in a perfect race... but who ever has a perfect race! What I am able to take out of that race (my longest race to date) was how well my training has paid off to perform in long-distance events. My legs never cramped once and almost always felt refreshed. Even at the finish of the race, they were ready to keep riding. Recovery has also improved dramatically. No sore muscles or fatigued body the day after.

You know who did have the perfect race? Brian Smith (Alpine Orthopedics) took off hot from the start and never looked back. He won with a blistering time of 5:08:55. Paul Gorbold (Street Swell) represented really well with a 15th overall finish time of 5:52:33. Way to go Paul! Jake Wells pulled out early after lap 1 with some tough luck. He mentioned that everything just didn't feel right from the start. Some technical sections were interestingly tough to maneuver and his pace just didn't flow well. Smart decision on his part, it's not worth taking unnecessary risks just to finish with a chance of making some costly mistakes. Ken Boyer finished right around the same time as last year just over 6:30 and when I met up with him, I saw what his hold up (technically not a "hold up" I guess) was... NO front brake what-so-ever! Crazy! Only a few miles into the race and he lost all pressure in his brake line.

64 mile finishers gift!! Mmm, beer!

Danielle (Team High Maintenance) finished up 16th overall out of 33 finishers in the Half Growler with a time of 4:26:07. She was very pleased because her goal was a sub-4:30 finish. She battled with some cramping issues in her legs but rode most of the technical sections with determination. Most important thing she found, is that she can excel in the longer distance races while managing her blood-glucose level with ease.

Thanks again to Bach Builders and our team sponsors: Ergon International, Infinit Nutrition, and Stan's NoTubes for keeping me rolling fast, fueled, and comfortable throughout the race! Also, thanks to my personal sponsor Venture Sports in Avon for getting me on the fastest bike I have ever ridden!

Up next... Teva Mountain Games in Vail, CO!! Saturday, June 4th.