Coolest 24 hours at Boggs race report by Rafeal

My report:

The course. Much different than the BikeMonkey race. You could definately feel the extra 400' of climbing per lap, and the new rocky section at the beginning was sketchy for a 24 hour race (in a good way, but had many people walking). The second fireroad climb (different and longer than the march event) was a death march every lap, and more rolling singletrack before the run into to the finish. I'd guestimate 3 laps was the same or harder than 4 laps in March.


My second attempt at a 24 hour solo. This time with less (endurance) training, and more xc racing. Its been a long race season for me, and I was starting to feel burnt out coming in, but I gave it a go anyways. The weather turned out to be perfect. Not too hot, not too cold.

My strategy was to ride most of the time, with a 3 hour nap if I was feeling good, and more if I wasn't. I definately wasn't feeling it on the first several laps. On the third lap, my legs were feeling dead, and I definatly wasn't in the endurance shape that I was last year. I thought hard about quitting early and joining mr. jameson at the shiela moon camp. Toward the end of the 3rd lap, I see my buddy dennis getting carried away on the stretcher, but he was in good spirits cracking jokes. (broken hip. ouch, heal up quick buddy!)

By the 5th or 6th lap, I started to just take each climb very slowly, spinning in the granny, and my legs started to come around. I thought maybe I could actually do this. Lap times weren't bad, ranging from 1:10 to 1:20's, so I kept chugging along. I then set the goal to do 10 laps before taking a short nap for the night. On my 8th lap, the wind picked up hard, and it got cold really fast. I was sorta struggling, and just wanted to get into warmer gear. Toward the end of the lap, right around the same point where Ogre crashed, I clumsily veered off the trail, hit a rock and flew over the bars. D'oh. I gathered myself, and slowly rolled in, but it was COLD. As I crossed the line, I was 50/50 about wether I should keep going or not. I thought about checking the scores/leader page, but just wanted to warm up, so I skipped the check. I figured that if I went out and had another bad lap, that could end my race, and I didn't want to see if I needed to go back out, so I decided to just get into warm clothes and take a nap. which I did, a bit early around 11. I down a recovery drink, some cold pasta, a cup of chocolate milk, and some advil first.

Alarm went off at 4:30AM, and I got ready, ate a bit more, and was back on the bike by 5. Surprisingly, the legs felt better than they did at the start of the race, but I still just spun up the climbs slowly. I figured I timed it so I could get 4 laps comfortably, and 5 if I went hard.

I finished with 12 laps in a little under 23 hours. For the first time I checked the scores to see if I need to go out for another, and I see the 2nd place person only did 5 laps. My goal was 14 laps (after considering the increased difficulty compared to the March race), but I am fine with the 12 after how I felt on the 3rd lap. I thought I should just start packing up early since I also needed to do the long drive home by myself too. Only 4 or 5 in my age group. Kind of a charity win, but I'll take it.

I did the race self supported, which I think would have been okay, but I should have brought a camping stove for something warm at night/in the morning (thanks Jen/Kyle, murphy, and the others for the generous offers to share pits). Also, congrats to Kyle and his team!

Totals:
120+ miles
~17,000' elevation
place 1st / 4

Food:
6 bottles of perpetuem
6-8 bottles of water+nuun
4 bananas
2.5 PB&J sandwiches
2 cans of mr. pibb, 1 cans of coke
2 shots of gu/hammer gel
1 pack shot bloks
1 cliff bar
bunch of fried rice and pasta
lotsa twizzlers
handfull of goldfish
4 girlscout cookies
1 bottle recovery drink
1 cup chocolate milk
1 powdered doughnut

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Skyline Race Report by Matt Leonard

Another great race this weekend. This I think is my 4th time at Skyline, but the course was changed a little. Instead of the long fire road, up to the rocky steep climb, we did a short fire road burn and took a little turn in to about a mile of singe track climbing. Everyone was concerned about the Sea Otter style conga line, but I didn't hear any moaning and groaning after the race, so it must not have been too bad. However, I knew that I still had to make it to the front if I wanted a shot at my true goal; beating both John Grover and Chad Arkoff ;-) I consider these guys both to be faster than me, but I have been on a rampage of a comeback lately, and I could see the fear in their eyes ;-) I heard John talking smack in the parking lot, so I approached him and told him I'd take care of his bike while he went and registered. Some how he didn't take me up on my offer, but let me know that "Today I am not racing for the Mouse. I'm registering as 'Team Beat Matt Leonard'." The challenge was gladly accepted.

Waiting for our start, both Chad and John somehow got to the front row, along with our resident SS sandbagger Allan. We take off, and I just put my head down and raced to the single track. By the time I looked up and caught my breath, I was about 5th wheel in the single track, with Allan, John and Chad behind me somewhere. I kept on the gas most of the first lap, making my best effort to stay towards the front, but couldn't keep with the lead guys and people slowly started reeling me in. But thats okay, my plan worked, I didn't get caught behind anyone slower than me, and was able to race my own race for the first half hour. Chad caught me midway through the first lap, but I ran past him before the descent. However, once we hit the S/F fire road, he passed me right back. Crap.

In to the single track climb for the second time I can see Paule ahead and just as I begin to chat it up with him, I can see John Grover coming up the fire road, entering the single track. Crap. Paule slowed up a bit with a a little laugh and giving his teammate a little advantage, but quickly let me by and wished me luck. Okay, Chad is in site in front of me, and John is quickly approaching. I was tired, but not close to bonking. I kept the intensity up, but it wasn't enough. John passed me close to the top and I wished him luck catching Chad. I knew I was still in the top 5 or so, and didn't give up hope. Before the first creek crossing, I saw Chad working on his bike. I guess he had a slow leak and just dumped a CO2 cartridge in to his tire and jumped right back on his bike. Then, here comes Urbina roaring by me, never to be seen again.

Through the rolly stuff, I just kept racing my race, passing a few people here and there, being passed a few times. I sort of got stuck behind someone on the last exposed rocky climb, but didn't have the strength to pass him. All I could think about was that Chad would be on me at any moment. Down all the twisty switchbacks, over the little bridge and the last little fire road climb before the finishing sprint by the RV parking and the gravel fire road. I could see John just at the top of the climb. I gave it all I had to try and catch him, and as I was motoring up the hill, Chad zips right by me. DOH! The chase is on. I stick with Chad through the grass and on to the gravel. John is sitting in behind two guys drafting, and I can see Chad is lining himself up to sit in right behind the 3 of them. For a split second, I had mentally settled on defeat. Then, a quick @#$% that! I put it in the big ring, and kept on the gas right around all four of them on the outside of the uphill gravel turn. Just as I came by, the guy in 2nd wheel decided to jump and make his move. He got squirly almost ate it, nearly taking John out, but one of those two front guys kept his momentum up and got ahead of me. I could tell he wasn't in my age group and just pedaled like hell to stay on his wheel. It all paid off and John and Chad weren't able to catch me.

Going in to the race, I knew John, Chad and I would finish next to each other somewhere in the top 5. But I was figuring maybe 2, 3, and 4, with John, Chad then me. Well, turns out I got 2nd, Chad got 3rd, and John came in right behind us in 4th, all separated by less than 10 seconds. What a great race!!! Now, I need to figure how much I'd really like to go to Colorado for the Mountain Bike National Championships. Katie's parents live about 2 hours away, but we already have a trip planned two weeks prior to visit with her parents. We'll see, if flights are cheap, I can borrow a case to ship my bike, etc., I may actually go.

Matt
2/13 1:41ish Sport Men 19-34

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Tamarancho report by Matt Leonard

I was pleasantly surprised to drive up and park next to Kyle, Jeni, and Justin Morgan. Kyle is always saying he races expert, and I always call him a liar, since he rarely races. Anyway, after some dorking around, lubing chains, etc, Allan and Mike Urbina rolled up. The parking lot soon got quiet as they realized the majority of the heavy hitters from Team Wrong Way had showed up. Okay, maybe not, but it was nice to have a good little group together. The six of us rode up to the camp with the Roaring Mouse gang and we all registered, rolled around the fire roads for a pseudo-warm up and headed to the start. Kyle went off in the first wave with the Pro/Semipro/Cat1 19-34 group, Justin following in the next group (or third), Allan in the third (maybe 2nd) wave, I was in the 4th wave, and Urbina behind me, all of us separated by 3 minute intervals.

As I lined up, I noticed a friendly face to my right. Chad Arkoff spent the past two years kicking my ass, but assured me this year he was out of shape. We all took off, and I settled in to about 5 or 6th. Lately, its always a guessing game of whether or not my legs will show up. I got behind a few guys who were just slightly holding me back, but I told myself thats okay, and just settled in and saved my energy. When the time was right, I got around, and was quickly on Chad's wheel. Same deal, he was just barely holding me up on the descents, but not enough to warrant a sketchy pass. When we hit the first feed zone, I darted in front of him in an attempt to beat him to the next bit of single track. No luck, he quickly regained his lead on the next short climb and we headed in to some more single track.

We rode together the for quite awhile, trading places several times. I knew I could catch him on the descents, but couldn't keep up with him on the climbs. So, I killed myself on the climbs to keep him close, then rested on the descents and caught him every time. In the beginning of the 2nd lap, he pulled over to lend a friend a pump, which I figured gave me 30 seconds on him. Only trouble was we were starting to climb the switchbacks, and had a brutal fire road climb in front of us. I punished myself as I could seem him chasing me up the switchbacks. Up the steep fire road, I passed a few people in my category who were walking, and could feel Chad right behind me. I kept in front of him and got in to the single track first.

After we popped out on some fire road, he regained his lead at the same feed zone where we exchanged places on the first lap and he led the way in to the next bit of single track. This time I sucked his wheel and didn't let him go. With the last bit of single track before the finish, we caught some people and wound up with a WTB girl in between us, and another rider holding all 3 of us up. I politely told the WTB rider that I was trying to get the guy in front of her, and if she could let me by when it was safe, that would be great. A few minutes later, she gave me the green light and right as I started to go by, we all almost piled up. She and I couldn't figure out what was going on, but as we went by Chad, he had broken his chain, maybe a mile from the finish. Bummer.

He was okay, but I didn't have a chain tool, so kept charging to the finish. I ended up coming in alone in 4th with a time of 1:19. Urbina came in shortly behind me finishing 1st in his category at ~1:18. I went back down the fire road to hang out with Jeni and cheer people on. Kyle came through on his 3rd lap with what will probably turn out to be a very respectable finish. All in all, a good time. I think the results were a little screwed up. Allan was pretty confident that he finished ahead of the 3rd place guy in the SS category, and a few other people were confused during the awards ceremony. Hopefully they'll post results soon, I'm curious to see how far out of 3rd place I was.

Matt
4th out of 20ish 1:19.

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CCCX XC # 7 - Mike Urbina

While Rafael, Matt, and Allan were sweating it out at Lake Sonoma, I was representing at CCCX.

The race was at Fort Ord but the course was completely different this time. Instead of going left at the end of the long start straight, we went to the right, onto some trails that were not used the last time.



I talked to Jim, the series leader in our group, as we were warming up and he said the course only had about 400 feet of climbing but was "diabolical". More on that later.

I told him I was surprised that he wasn't racing expert today since he had already locked up the series in the sport class. He explained that he'd qualified for the nationals (by virtue of his 2nd place finish at Sea Otter) and if he raced expert he would disqualify himself. Understandable.

I lined up on the second row but somehow got pushed back to mid-pack by the time we rolled up to the line. No worries- the long, paved start affords plenty of passing room before we funnel into the single track.

Off the start, I went to the front after about 200 yards. I was feelin' it, so I went. Just before the single track I heard someone coming up on my left, hammering, out of the saddle. I didn't even look back, I knew who it was. So I latch onto Jim's wheel as we enter the single track. As we hit the first climb, another rider passes me and I take an alternate line that turns out to be not so good. At the top of said climb we are frieght training wheel to wheel and actually banging bars to get to the next single track downhill section first. This was a RACE! As we hit the DH I wish I'd gotten there first; they are going damn fast but I knew I could go a little faster if I was in front. No matter though, we came into a tight little dogleg section with a berm that caught me off guard. I came into it completely sideways (see photos below), almost saved it till I hit the berm and went over the bars. I got up quickly and managed to catch the leaders again at which time I passed them both and started to pull away.

I was surprised this was happening!

I held Jim off for most of the first lap but he came by me about a quarter mile before the start/finish at the end of the lap. At that point I decided I needed to run my own race and let him go. The other guy we were battling kept creeping up behind me, making me work for my position all the way to the finish. I found out later he was in the 19-34 catagory. I don't know how or why but he was with us most of the race- maybe he missed his start or something. It was good though because he pushed me to go harder than I would have had he not been there.

Anyway, I figured Jim was just playing with me on that first lap but when I checked the times after the race, he'd beaten me by exactly one minute. I know that's still an eternity but it's by far the closest I've been able to get to this guy. Usually he has 4-5 minutes over 2nd place; he's a complete animal!

Granted, I don't think he had one of his best days (I heard him telling someone so after the race) but I'll take it. I think the heat, around 85 at race time, was affecting people. I overheard many saying they didn't take enough water.

I could definitely see why Jim said the course would be brutal. Fast course = fast paced race, and that it was. It was fast and actually fairly technical.

I highly recommend make it out to these races, they are awesome!



Stats: 2/14 (45-54 sport) 1:26:05

20.5 miles.

Mike U

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SoNoMas Race Report- Matt Leonard

A couple months back, I was debating on whether or not to do 2 or 3 laps, not knowing the elevation profile of the race. Then the axed the 3 lap option, and I was thinking, "I should just challenge myself and do 2 laps." Reality set in, and I didn't get a chance to ride enough and decided 6000 ft and 33 miles would be plenty.

Saturday morning I picked up my friend Antonio and we hit the road. We arrived around 9, just in time to see the 2 lap nut jobs take off. I was able to give Allan, Rafael, Isaias, and other "who's who" of bay area cycling a little heckling. After registration and getting my stuff ready, Antonio and I quickly found shade by the start/finish. Luckily, our shade tree just happened to be the front of the starting line. At 9:30 am, it was probably already in the 90s. Now, Antonio has always been a fast guy, but I was able to finish a couple minutes ahead of him at the NVDC, which shocked me. But he has been training. "10 seconds to start!" I was already sweating pretty badly, just standing in the shade. I took off at an average pace, knowing I had a long day ahead of me.

We did 2 laps around the S/F area to thin the crowd out, and I was probably mid pack. I passed a few people, but quickly realized, it was not my day. I quickly set aside my pride and ego and accepted the comfort of my granny gear on most climbs. I was sloppy on the descents, and slow on the climbs, not a good combination for race day. At the first long decent, I felt like my brake pads were showing signs of wear, and when we hit the creek crossing, I knew it was time to climb, and I just let 5 people go by before I even got back on my bike. I rolled with a SSer for awhile who was pretty fit, and we hit mile 13, according to my watch, and the EMTs at the aide station said we were half way there. Um, sorry, you were wrong :-( Close, but not quite, I still had 17 miles to go.

I took frequent several minute breaks and suffered both on the climbs and descents. Although, the breeze during the descents was nice. After we hit the Liberty Glen campground (mile 22ish), it was all familiar trails from last years races. Murphy dumped what seemed like buckets full of ice down my back, and shockingly (for several reasons) down the front of my shorts. I reapplied sun screen, and was informed I had 8 miles to go. Now, the thing that killed me mentally during the race is that we drove up the finishing paved climb, which looked like no fun at all. But, after I left the campground, I put it in the middle ring, little cog and slogged up a paved climb and felt surprisingly good, even passing two people. Maybe that final climb won't be so bad after all! After a 1.5 mile paved decent, back on the dirt, mostly single track and I felt great.

I zoomed through some amazing trails, enjoying both shaded tree covered areas, as well as panoramic views of the lake and the neighboring mountain range. One last steep single track climb and I keep passing people. At the top on the road, I see about 10 people stopped drinking water. But they took off before I could make it back to the pavement. I was able to pass 3 of them, encouraging them that we were on the home stretch, maybe a mile of pavement left. Right turn, and up we go. Same thing, middle ring, little cog. It must have been 115 on the pavement, at least it felt that way. Fortunately, the climb was much less challenging than I had initially thought. I struggled to take my gloves off to keep as cool as possible, and kept turning the pedals over. Right turn again, and up some more with welcoming faces shouting words of encouragement. I made my way through a sea of people, eating and drinking beer, and rolled my tired carcass over towards the finish line.

Maybe 4 hours 15 minutes, somewhere in the back of the pack in sport, but, I feel like I put myself through an extreme test of will, and succeeded. Allan and Rafael were lounging around, and I thought they wussed out. But the race organizers called it a day and didn't let anyone go out for a 2nd lap. Antonio ended up winning the expert class with a time of 3:20ish, and seemed surprisingly rested. It took me at least 30 minutes before I could put together complete sentences, enjoy a beer, and eat some food. What a day.

Matt

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Sea Otter Race Report - Allan Sherlock

Sea Otter Classic
Cat 2 Single Speed
2nd place
1:26

The race started late 8:05 instead of 07:35 more time for the fog to clear out

The race started slow and easy, we started spinning like we do and off around the track



I said hey to Mark D, and I made a bee line to the front has people start to spread out as we round the corner on the track, I notice a spinning like mad racer around a 100 yards out so I announce this and then the pace starts to pick up,



I move in to 6th as we start our descent to the dirt, there's a rut on the right turn and two racers bobble I pass, up the little fire road now were heading down hill, pass two more with speed, keeping my momentum I roll through the rutted section of the trail and pass one more

As we make the left turn off the fire road then right turn on to the single track and the race in front of me brake hard and I go by, this trail is fun with no one to slow you down

I am in 2nd and in the flow of the trail come around bend in the trail and there is the first place guy fixing his bike, I am thinking what the just happen, holly $h#% I am in first at the Sea Otter, well the rest is just passing tandems and rolling,

The next thing I know there is some one is talking to me,

Hey is there any other SS in front of you,

No I say, I think he was fixing his bike back there

We climb together for a while pass Charles J from PB, the racer guy moves buy me, and I jump on his wheel and keep his pace, as we head down the first sand pit he bobbles and I go by, the race is pretty much this guy and me trading spots till the trail turns up for any time the he got some time on me, I see no one other than tandems till we get to the fire road home and I can see the guy in first out around fifty yards I catch the first place tandem and ride with them for a while, just at the top of the clime I hear him and then he pass me so jump on his wheel we drop from the fire road down to the bridge crossing and Right turn and then left on to single track and the guy bobbles and I go by I don't let up till I cross the line yells yea Second Place at the Sea Otter.

A

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Napa Valley Dirt Classic Race Report by Matt Leonard

Man, I'm sore! So I've been riding pretty sporadically lately, and never know what to expect until I actually start turning the pedals over. But, overall, I've been feeling better than expected, and set what I felt was a lofty goal of breaking the 1:50 mark this year. The NVDC always is a special race for me, since it was my first ever back in 2005 where I finished with a time of 2:13:38. In 2006 I cut that time down to 1:59:29, and even further in 2007 where I came in at 1:53:51. So it only seemed right that I attempt to best my previous result. (Missed last years race.)

I arrived around 8:00, registered and started making sure I had remembered to pack everything. After getting ready, I made my rounds and said hello to all the usual suspects. As I was double checking everything, I chatted with two nice young ladies who where unloading matching Ventana single speeds, and had matching Ventana kits, talking about Saturdays road race. Later in the day, I spent the majority of the climb with them, and they both turned out to be good company and motored away from me once the trail flattened out enough for them to keep their cadence up.

I lined up with Rafael and a few other friends, much further back than anticipated. In years past, I remembered more starts. Not this year, we were the 6th start and way in back. DOH! We took off, and almost immediately, one of the juniors on the AC team (who dominated at Boggs) decided he saw a nice hole in the pack, and shot sideways across the road, nearly taking about 3 of us out. We warned him in the future he needs to be more aware of his surroundings, and he could have caused a pretty good pile up. But, no harsh words, just "be more careful next time". Anyway, back to racing, sort of. We hit the first little single track, and wind up waiting in line just like at the Sea Otter.

After some fire road catching up, I caught and passed Hillstrom. Then through the wooptydoos, I could see another TWW jersey. Once in the single track, I was trailing Rafael while we were in the Sport conga line. Eventually, we made our way around people who kept bobbling, but Rafael got the worst of it and continued to be forced off the bike and seemed to be directly behind the rider who bobbled. After what seemed like his 2nd or third hang up, I was able to stay on my bike and keep riding and made it by him. I continued to make my way through the pack, and once we hit the decent, I tried to get around people as safely as possible. Then, staring me right in the face, I looked up and realized it was time to climb. My hopes of using my theoretical 2x9 gearing quickly went out the window, and I was in my granny gear in no time. However, other than two hang ups with people bobbling in front of me, I was able to ride the entire climb out, constantly trading places with the Ventana single speed girls.

Once it flattened out, I was still feeling good, and began reeling people in one by one, continually checking number plates for the number 11, indicating Sport Men 19-34. I think during the last half hour, the only person I passed in my category was someone with a serious chain suck issue on the side of the trail. I let a few people get by me near the airport who were not in my category , but I was still moving at a good pace in my big ring. I tried to catch 2 of them, but no such luck. Then, about 100 yards before you pop out on to the grass field, my front wheel slides out and I prepare to go down. Luckily, my WTB Weirwolf said screw you, bit right in and sent me through the turn and kept me going. With a big smile, all I could think of was that its been a long time since I've crashed, and I'm due for one, but not today. I raced my butt off around the track, half a lap behind the same two guys, but always racing the clock.

I had started my watch while waiting at the start line, and when I crossed the finish line, it said about 1hr 55min. I knew that put me close to my goal, but wasn't exaclty sure. Turns out, I came in at 1:49:28, just barely reaching my goal and placing 6th out of maybe 30 or so people. I am really excited with my result, and even feel I deserved some of the crap I got about not racing expert. Although, five minutes behind the leader, in my opinion, doesn't classify me as a sandbagger. Taking a quick look at the expert results, I would have placed 24th out of 28, maybe more if there was another update with the results. All in all, a great day of racing. I just wish I could have stayed to enjoy the weather and have a few frosty beverages. Oh well, thats life I guess.

Matt Leonard
6/27 or more 1:49:28

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Boggs 4 Race Report by Mike Gin

Holy crap what a day! Perfect weather, trail conditions were great, lots of cool people having a good time, and a nice Team Wrong Way showing (19 total racers in all). First the good stuff - two podiums against some tough competition!!!

1st Place - 2 person Female team - Girl Power - Jeni Brookes and Jessica de Wit 3rd Place - 3 person Male team - Two Fast Guys and a Limey - Kyle Brookes, Allan Sherlock, Matt Walters (Mark Weir's team finished 1st in this category)

I think I've decided that I am only going to race team events and cross this year. The team races are so much fun and a great opportunity for a bunch of us to spend some time together (something we don't get to do very often). Much schmack was flying around which is always a fun thing.

Team Might as Well be Walking - Mike Gin, Bob Lofland, Paul Oellerich. You know a team led by someone who hasn't ridden his bike in 5 months is certainly not going to challenge for much. But we had fun (sounds like the response on American Idol when the judges pan the performance). I hit my goal of staying under 1 hour for each lap and saved my best lap for last. Double Espresso Clif Shot needs to be tested for performance enhancing drugs as this allowed me to power to my best time on the last lap. Good stuff! Paul hadn't done much more riding than me and came in with some respectable times. Mr. Lofland was solid and consistent as usual.

Girl Power - Jeni Brookes, Jessica de Wit. These two rocked it with 4 laps each. Jeni hasn't ridden much either but was very consistent with times just over an hour. And then there is Ms. de Wit. Clearly been riding the bike a fair amount as her times were 54-55 minute range. Smoked her last year's times. And no wedding to get in the way of her performance. No Jessica, you weren't lucky - those times were smokin'!!!

Two Fast Guys and a Limey - Kyle Brookes, Allan Sherlock, Matt Walters. Well what can you say about a team that finished 3rd in a group whose winning team was led by Mark Weir? I'd say that they kicked some arse. Kyle and Allan had some smokin' fast times (46 min range). Matt must have as well for them to finish where they did. Good job to our fast muthas!

Team Low Balls - Rich Davis, Scott Schlachter, Keith White. Led by skinny boy Schlachter, this team did well. But we won't know their lap times unfortunately as they had some timing issues with this team. But they had the overall correct. The Schlachter factor even infected the timing system. Best conversation of the day - Scott - "How soon before the race starts?" Me - "About 5 mins" Scott - "What?! The race starts at 8:15?" Me - "No, 8:30" Scott - "But my watch says 8:10" Me -"Funny, mine says 8:25" Rich - "Yeah, mine too." That explains a lot about Scott's timeliness or lack thereof... :) Keith and Rich whined like they always do but I'm sure turned in some good times.

Team Leftovers - Daniel Abernathy, Patrick Meyer, Jeff Hecox. Disaster struck these team about 500 yards into the race. Patrick and Allan bumped into each other and Patrick went down in a heap. Face down, arms facing backwards, looked like a bad fall. He hurt his thumb pretty good but managed to finish the lap. Might be broken, if not badly sprained. But he manned (boyed) up and completed 4 laps on the day. His moment of glory was tying my 2nd lap time. Dude, you need to aim higher really. But it was a fun semi-battle. Jeff was fast and I think finished his last lap right around 50 mins - nice! Daniel I think was a bit burnt out after spending some time in Sedona but still looked solid for his laps.

Sean Burns raced solo. I met up with him once on the trail and he was looking solid racing his singlespeed. Beat his goal of 6 laps and did 7. Way to go Sean!

Rafael Rius raced solo also. He showed his early season form was no fluke and did 8 laps. Think he might have podiumed had he gone out for that last lap. Still a great performance and 8 laps is just plain stupid.

Matt Leonard was on a team with a friend and had really solid times (most under 50 mins). Good day for him, definitely crushed his times from his first Boggs experience.

Mike Urbina was on a 2-person team and looked fit and I'm sure had some good times too. He did disappear afterwards though and missed the team photo.

John Hillstrom was on 2-person team and came down from altitude (about 3,000 down). John's always is in good shape so I'm sure his times were solid. Sorry John, missed you at the photo op too.

So a super successful day for Team Wrong Way at Boggs. I don't know how many times I have said this, but I'll say it again - this is likely the most fun you'll have racing. Don't miss out on next year's event. You know we'll be there in force as usual.

Good times!

Mike

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Toro race results - KLUNKER and hardtail

Guys

I raced the klunker at Toro with the new wheels Jeff built for me using Sturmy Archer drum brakes. I killed it!

I was on mark to a podium run on the klunker, the bike working great, brakes making a huge difference from the coaster brake race of 2 weeks prior. I was still able to out pace the brakes, getting them to fade often, but the control was so much better. And even through I broke through the lip of a berm I was railing during my race run (costing me ~4-5 seconds, I reckon) I went on to get a 3rd place in the Single Speed class! Now, when one considers everyone else in the class is either on a hardtail SS with front suspension or a full suspension conversion, all with disc brakes, of course, you'll see what a success it was for this old bike.

Then I went on the smoke the competition in the Hardtail class, winning the category and breaking the 4:00 minute mark! Hee hee.....

I bagged my Expert run, though. My body was beat after two races, and the wind speed was only getting worse through the day, gusting ~ 40 mph, a headwind. My left calf cramped up immediately at the start of my klunker run. I just ignored the cramp as best I could in the race, but it did affect me. I'm still a bit hobbled this morninng. My Hardtail time, btw, would have won the Expert class. So it was a good day.

I feel pretty proud.

Check out the pics. I'll have others a bit later from the podium.

Scott Seery

Click here for the full gory details!

CCCX XC#3 Short Race Report

Nice TWW showing with myself, Jeff, Rich, Mike, and Matt.

The course seemed to have an extra climb or two compared to the other Ord races, but the course was still very fast with a lot of downhill pedaling. I stayed with the lead group for the first lap despite one traffic bog/dismount on a little step-up thing. On the second lap, they were still in my sights, but they slowly pulled away. I was trading places with another rider for the last 2 laps, and he opened a gap with about a mile to go, but I was able catch him on the last fast descent and beat on the last climb to make the race interesting.

I thought I rode well, much better than the first race, and I pushed my self, but I still finished way back in 8th. Disappointed in the placing, but happy with my time. Congrats to Matt for the win!

Results

some pics here:

Photos

Rafael

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Grasshopper race report

My morning started out bright and early with a trip on BART to Berkeley to meet up with Blake Von Knopka and Morgan Fletcher. We ended up waiting awhile for an 18 year old Berkeley freshman, and glad we did. The kid had no other means to get to the race, and he appears to be a stud. So its good we were able to get him out there. Anyway, we hit the road around 8 or so and were in Occidental by about 9:30. Morgan kept asking every one about tire pressure, and the more people he asked, the more we realized we were running way too low of a pressure. He went up to 70 psi, and I went up to 55. Oh yeah, we were all on cross bikes.

We went and registered where I ran in to many familiar faces; Paule from Roaring Mouse, Geoff Wilcox from Altezza 40, Jeremy Kimmel and John Blackwell of Sexual Camel, Murphy Mack of Gestalt/Sheila Moon, Dayton Crites from SF Urban Riders, etc. Oh and there was some yahoo in a full blow Maxxis kit with a helmet cam who thought he was all bad ass. Geoff Kabush or something, whatever ;-) Anyway, we roll out for a medium tempo 7 mile or so spin and head towards the first fire road. It was one of the most amazing cycling experiences I¢ve been a part of. I don¢t care for road riding much, but to see 100 people in front of me, and maybe another 100 people behind me, tightly bunched up four wide zooming down the road, well that was a sight to see.

We hit a rather steep dirt road and everyone sort of chugged along. It was great, no assholes, just a really polite group out to enjoy the ride. Once we were done climbing and it got rolly, I was sort of on my own with only a few people around whom I¢d never met. After we got back on pavement, Geoff Wilcox caught up to me and was my guide for much of the day. Neither of us knew where we were going, but he had road tires and I was on 35c and 32c cross tires front and rear, respectively. So I drafted him on the paved stuff for 90% of the time. He is somewhat more fit than I am, and at points it was all I could do to hold on to his wheel. But we had a great time. I was able to heckle John Blackwell many times, telling him not to make the Camels look bad and trading rude comments. For about 10 miles of pavement, Geoff and I ended up leading a train of about 8 people. Luckily, a girl in the group lived in the area and would yell at us when we were supposed to turn. But on Highway 116, Geoff ended up flatting and I stopped to keep him company. We let maybe 15-20 people go by, including Yuri Hauswald (Marin/Bike Monkey) who had a loud blowout about 3 miles in to the race. And then like the tortoise and the hair, here comes Blackwell.

We ended up catching John and passing him, but he was paying more attention and made a scheduled turn and Geoff and I had to do a little u-turn and catch back up. The three of us mellowed out and started what we had been told was the long climb out. It was still paved, but a really beat up road which was more rolly than uphill. But our mellow pace didn¢t last long. Blake was leading a train of about 6 people and Geoff asked if I wanted to jump on. So off we went, hammering again, with about 10 miles to the finish. I almost got dropped a few times, but managed to hold on. Once we hit dirt and started climbing, I said good bye for the afternoon and dropped in to my granny gear (36-25) and began the long climb home. Normally it would have been no problem. But coming out of paternity leave, and crushing myself for 2.5 hours trying to keep up with Geoff, I was spent. I went from laughing and having a good time to realizing I may not make it out without some long rests. It was a true test of will.

I ended up taking a several minute break in the middle of the steepest section and watched a few people go by. Back on my bike, barely turning over my pedals, I slogged on. I came to the last gate and could barely get myself over the 2 ft tall railing. I rested for a minute and Paule rolls up on his single speed cross bike. What an f¢ing animal. I watched him pedal away and started about a one mile gradual paved climb to the finishing decent. Dayton came up behind me and we rolled out together. I could barely talk and thought I was going to puke, rolling at about 5 mph in my granny gear. Once it started downhill, we knew we were done and just chatted and enjoyed the swooping decent.

So, 50ish miles of mixed terrain in ~3.5 hours with perfect riding weather. Jeremy crushed it, finishing 15 minutes behind the leaders in about 2.75 hours. And Geoff ended up putting 10 minutes on me during the climb. Its something I¢ll definitely do again, but with skinnier tires and more pressure. Also, I brought way too much crap. About 16oz too much water, a pb&j sandwich and clif bar which I didn¢t eat (probably should have eaten the pb&j), and two spare tubes. I did eat all of my Clif Shot Bloks which were great. Also, I¢d probably swap my 36 little ring for a 34 and maybe got a 27 in the back rather than a 25 to have just a little easier gear on some of those climbs. None of the climbs really required a 34-27, but it would have been nicer to have at the end. Oh well, lessons learned.

Matt Leonard

134 out of ~190 3:39

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CCCX DH Race Report

Its been quite some time since I have raced a downhill but last
weekend I figured what the hell and headed down to the CCCX DH race
with Rich Davis.

We went down Saturday for some much needed practice. The course was a
good mix. The top section was super fast rollers which went straight
into a section of tight switch backs, the first of which had the
better of me all weekend. On the exit from the switch backs there was
a jump that led straight into the single track. There was even a
little climb towards the end to help the legs reach the desired burn.
As we headed up the first run we bumped into Seery who had a complete
quiver of bikes including a rather cool looking clunker. Practice went
pretty well, I started getting the flow of the course, except the
first switch back.

Sunday morning dawned with some rain, I was hoping that this would
keep the competition away. However it seemed that the fact that it
was dry down in Monterey encouraged people to come out. My main
decision was to select my race category, beginner seemed a little too
much like glory hunting, Clydesdale perhaps but in the end sport it was.

Now it was most helpful to have Rich and Scott Seery down there. On
Saturday my tires were not really performing well. Now Rich being the
good riding buddy that he is lent me pair of WTB, a 2.5 WeirWolf for
the front and a Mutano Raptor for the rear. All of a sudden what were
lines on Sat that if I took I could feel the tires slipping I was now
railing - bloody good tire combo! Scott had also taken a look over
my bike and made a few suggestions regarding the suspension set-up
which made the bike smoother.


We got one flying run in first thing. Again the first switch back was
problematic, but I figured out why. When I am riding the trails I do
my best not to skid but the best way to take that first corner was to
slide it.
After another long trip to the top it was race time. Everybody was
lined up ready to rock - including one TWW geezer in denim and flannel
astride a clunker - way to go Seery. My main goal was to get down
without buggering it up entirely and/or smashing myself up. If I
could achieve that then finishing mid-pack in the 19-34 sport would be
good.

Right, race time. On 'GO' I just sprinted as hard as I could to the
first corner. I heard lots of other racers talking about "fisting"
the top section. Apparently this refers to holding the bars so hard
that you can't puss out and grab the brakes. I managed to "fist" the
first two corners then bottled it on the third and brake checked a
little too much - damn pussy. Then straight into the switch backs. I
had been having problems getting the speed/line combo for the first
corner right and true to form I completely stuffed it this time,
managing to be both off line and kill all my speed. The result being
that the rest of the switch backs didn't flow and then there was the
nice surprise of the photographer sitting right in my landing zone on
the jump - next time I will just run him over! The single track was
all pretty good with me pushing it as hard as I could to make up for
the mistakes. Then the little climb, just flip that Pro-pedal on the
PR23 and sprint. More single track then over the stream crossing,
making sure I didn't crash in it as some did, and hit the line. Well
my time was ok at 3.20. I ended up 8th out of 13 in the 19-34 sport.

The result wasn't quite what I had hoped for but the good news is that
there is lots of room for improvement!!! I will definitely be back
for more it was really good fun with a pretty damn cool crowd of
riders. If you have been thinking of doing a downhill race but
weren't sure then I would highly recommend one of the CCCX.

Matt Walters

Click here for the full gory details!

CCCX XC #1 - Race Report

As I was driving to Fort Ord, the weather was surprisingly clear.
There was strong overnight rain and winds, and my strategy (and only
hope) for this race: pray for lots of rain, and that no one else
shows up. Well, only 7 in my group showed up for the start (Cat
2/Sport – 19-34), and Keith announces that medals only go 3 deep due
to small field (oh well).

A light rain began to come down right before we started, but it
wasn't too bad. Normally the sport/2 does 4 laps, but as it turned
out, we did about 4 and 2/3rds laps. We started with the
singlespeeds since both groups were small, and up the road onto the
single track we went. A group of about 5 or 6 formed the lead pack,
and I fell in line in the back of them. I wasn't sure how many were
geared and how many SS, but at least 3 of them were in my group, and
they were pretty fast up the first couple climbs. I was barely with
them, and pretty close to my max HR the whole time, but still slowly
pulled away right before we got to the finish area for the first of
5 times.

Four laps to go, and the rain starts coming down a bit harder. I
formed another group with someone from my group and 2 or 3 leaders
from the 35-44 group that started 30 seconds back. We stuck with
them for ½ a lap, and then they dropped us. I traded places with
the guy in my group a couple times, but after one of the climbs, he
faded back, and now I was riding solo, with 3 laps to go. I pretty
much rode by myself for the next 2.5 laps (kinda boring actually),
but the course was pretty slick now and rain was coming hard. One
of the climbs that was easy the first 3 times was now very slick,
and I was spinning out and had to dismount. I passed one guy in my
group that had a chain problem on the side of the trail; sweet! I
just moved up a spot, maybe I'm in the top 5 now. I was still
riding by myself, until the last ½ lap when two guys were coming up
pretty quickly (I think the leaders of the 45+). On that one slick
hill, I dismounted and noticed they were in different groups so I
let them pass, ran up, and tried to hang on with them.

They eventually pulled away and I was riding solo again, and
uneventfully crossed the finish. I change out of my muddy clothes
ASAP after the race, and go check to see the standings, and I ended
up in 3rd! Sweet! I'll take the podium despite the small field.
My first ever in Sport/Cat 2.

This was a pretty long course for CCCX (and being the first one
too). Even though it was slick, wet and windy, I can't complain
about the weather since bad weather WAS my strategy. Anyways, I'll
look forward to a couple more, but likely won't be doing the whole
series. Prefer to save the entry fees for other races like NVDC,
Skyline, etc.

Rafael

Click here for the full gory details!

last CX race report

I went down to Aptos High yesterday and raced (if you want to call it that) the last race of the Peak Season CX series. My previous race, #1 of the series at Harbor High, was the one where I had my Brian Lopes spotting and really-lame-fan conversation. I actually felt pretty good at that previous race, and faired reasonably well, getting in the top-half at least with 10/24. It wasn't in the cards for me yesterday though. The course was fun, with a mix of singletrack and asphault through the school - and seemed to be about the same as the course that they ran there for my very first cyclocross race, which I did about 4-5 years ago (in the original Surf City series) - Kat was there for that one, and I had been on my old DeKerf softail mountain bike. Seemed like the weather forecasts had wittled the field down to a hardcore group of 16 (down from 24 at the Harbor High race) in the Mens B 35+ group. As to be predicted though, the weather "prediction" was not to be predicted very accurately - even just the night before they were calling for showers from 4am-through the afternoon.

It turned out that it was actually reasonably nice most of the morning/early afternoon, with partial sun most of the time, mixed with bits with some strong, cold winds. It made it hard to decide what to wear in terms of layers, etc., but really the weather was good, and the ground was perfect - moist by with no sloppy mud anywhere. I just didn't have much steam. I realized this in my first lap, as I watched the leaders just take off. Then, to make matters worse, in the middle of lap#2, something (I still have no idea what) caused my front deraileur to become completely missaligned - spinning on the frame's seattube so that it was loudly pushing on the chain no matter what gear combo I was in. I pulled over and tried to twist it back, but could only move it a tiny bit. I repeated this another two times at various points, each time I gave up another one or two places. In the end, I had to settle with only use of my smaller front ring (which was fine), and with the chain rubbing on the cage whenever I was in any of my lower 3-4 rear gears (annoying). My other bumble was a tumble - a minor crash in the gravel-to-asphault sharp right-hand corner two turns before the finish line. Just a quick crash that didn't really do any damage to me, my clothes, or my bike. Though I discovered later, at the end of the day that I actually had a scab from it on the inside of my left bicept - how does that happen? I finished 11th/16 this time, just barely making the cut-off to complete 6 laps - but I had fun. I stuck around long enough to eat a seriously good $2 Chicken-chile Verde burrito served out of the back of a car, drink a Samual Smiths Nut Brown Ale, and cheer on the kids race, before hightailing it out. My buddy Matt Dunston (from our Weds rides) suffered similarly in B 45+, but Blake Von Knopka absolutely killed it in my catagory - taking 2nd in the race, and 2nd in the series (nice job Blake!).

Schlachter

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Last of the roadie race reports (long)

Last of the road race reports (until track fights in the fall?) and
Series Summary

Sunday was the 12th and final race for the San Jose Bike Club winter
training series. Thanks to the track fights last fall, I decided to
dabble in more road racing. The series is made up of a prologue
(short time trial), 3 Road Races, 2 Crits, 2 Individual TT, 2 Team
TTs, a hill climb race, and a points race. As I learned, these races
are a lot mellower than real races. Similar to track fights, but
with 50 to 100 participants instead of 10-20. A lot of other teams
participate in the series besides SJBC, so I represented the TWW kit.

After the prologue I was placed in the Cat4s (typically 1 to 2 cats
lower than real categories). I didn't do too well in the time trials
(no TT bike, no Rudy Project aero helmet), but learned I was pretty
decent in the sprinting. For the crits and points race, the 4s and
5s went together with the 5s getting a head start. I've watched my
share of TdF sprints, and was able to pick the right guys to draft
and go at the right times to win both crits. One was pretty easy as
2 of us went very early, and the other guy just ran out of gas; and
the other, I barely won by about a wheel. I ended up winning the
points race as well, but definitely not in dominant fashion (1 sprint
win, 2 seconds, a 3rd, out of 6 possible sprints).


The road races were pretty challenging, as everyone raced together
but with staggered start times, so basically the 1's started about 6
to 8 minutes after us (road races were 28 to 48 miles long). The
first one, I was dropped from a 28 mph peloton and finished way back
(I'm blaming this on inexperienced pack riding). The second race, a
breakaway of the strong 3s got away early, and I was the only cat4 to
join them. We held off the peloton until the finish line (well the
other 3s did) where a couple of the ones caught me, but no other 4s
were with them.

The final road race yesterday, and I was leading the cat4s, and in
3rd for the overall. We started with the handicapped head start, but
all the groups joined together about ½ way through the 48 mile race.
Again, the group was moving about 26 to 28 mph, but I hung in there
until we all broke up on the second hill climb. Unfortunately two of
the guys right behind me in the overall race were Cat1s and were with
the lead pack. No 4s were able to hang with the lead pack on the
climb, so three of us stuck together with a small group of 3s, while
the rest of the 4s were dropped behind us. We were all together
until the last hill climb where our group split up and I opened a gap
on the other 4s (one was due to a front derailleur not shifting). I
formed a group with some 3s after the climb and finished off the last
5 rolling miles. So I took the category 4 win. That makes 5 wins
out of the 9 category races. I'll take it!

Overall, it was a fun series to participate in. Highly recommended
for anyone that wants to taste road racing. Also had a lot of people
asking about my WrongWay kit throughout the year. Next year I hope
to do the races that don't conflict with CX.

http://www.teamsanjose.org/ws/2008/category.php#c4

Rafael

Click here for the full gory details!

Skinny Tire (warning) race report

First, as the new member, apologies for the skinny-tire, spandex
reports. I promise this is not a usually thing for me, and I enjoy
riding the dirt more than pavement. I wasn't planning to do this
report, but the race was more interesting than expected, and maybe I
need to think twice about this and stick to the dirt.

I entered the inexperienced Cat 5s (less than 5 starts) at the
Fremont Early Bird Criterium yesterday since it was only 2 miles from
my home. Lets just say it was nothing like the wednesday night track
fights. It was about 15 laps around a 1.35 mile course. There were
probably around 30 or so of us that started in our group. Most were
plenty strong, but there were 2 or 3 that stuck out like sore thumbs
with their bad turns and not holding their lines. Somewhere around
lap 5, I was mid-pack, and we were going about 25-27 mph on a long
straight away, and bam, a pileup happens right in front of me. I had
been cautiously staying on the outside thus far, and I gently drift
to my left, being the first person behind the wreck to safely ride
around them. The sound of the bikes hitting the pavement was
probably scarier than the crash itself. On the next lap, it was good
to see everyone off the road and in one piece with no major damage.


As a group, I think we all rode the next couple laps more cautiously,
but slowly picked up the pace again. With 5 laps to go, we were
going down the same stretch and bam, another wreck happens about 5
bikes up from me. This time there is a rider right on my left and I
gently bumped elbows with him as I drifted, but I held my line and
had an OH S#!T moment. Again, that same horrible sound, and this
time with a bike bouncing right toward me. The handlebar hits me
square on my right leg. Somehow, I made it through the crash and
keep rolling. If I had been 2 inches to the right, it would have
taken my bike out and I would have gone down too. The guy on my left
thanked me for holding my line, so I guess I did something right.

So, after a couple of cautions laps, I was just glad to hear the bell
ring for the last lap. I stayed in the front 10 after the second
crash, and with the last ½ lap to go, the racing started. About 7 or
8 of us pulled away from the rest of the field, and I stuck behind a
roaring mouse guy, but as the line approached, I had already been
going my max I had nothing left to sprint. I finished somewhere 6 or
7th. The finish was pretty uneventful after the crashes. I probably
need to re-think this road racing thing, but I may try to do the rest
of these races since I just paid for an annual license. If anyone
else is interested in this, they are happening each of the next 4 or
5 sundays.

-Rafael

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LARPD CX Race? report

ummm.. not so great.

So, I grabbed the mtb, switched from 2.55 tires to 2.0, and decided
to give this thing a try, not knowing what to expect.

The course is a bunch of twisty turns arounda couple of different
horse fields, stables, etc. A barrier section close to the start,
and a set close to the finish, and a nice run up the stairs. Much of
the course was very soft due to the rains, but there were only a
couple of real puddles.

I entered the C group, with the thought that I should be competive
with that group. (Wrong!) The starter told us we would likely do 4
laps, blew his whistle, and off we went.

The pack almost immediately split into two with about 8 or 9 opening
a gap, so I jumped to join them. We were pulling away from the rest,
but I didn't think it was too bad at first. I kept losing momentum
in some of the tight turns and had to give bigger efforts in the
straights to keep up. The leaders eventually pulled away in the
straights, but when we got to the stairs, instead of shouldering my
mtb, I did a one handed military press and flew up the steps passing
about 3 people, and I hammered trying to catch a couple riders in my
sights ahead. By the end of the first lap, I wasn't feeling too
good, and knew I went out too hard. The start of the second lap, I
almost puked (how's that for a newb), and got passed back by several
people in the longer straight-aways :( I formed a group with 2 others
and tried to recover myself, and maintained a decent pace with them
until the steps when I flew up again, and they were only 1/2 way up,
so off I went by myself. I thought I was probably in 10th or so, and
at the end of the second lap, the bell was ringing, and I thought
huh? So I pretty much rode the 3rd lap by myself with a big group in
front of me, the two guys behind me, and a big group several hundred
yards behind them. I tried to pick it up and catch the group in
front, which I got pretty close to, but couldn't quite catch.

Oh well. I think I ended up 13/27. Not very good, but I guess its a
good wake-up and learning experience. I was hoping to do one or 2 C
races this year, and do B's next year with a real cross bike. Maybe
I need to re-think that. But I probably will do Bs anyways because
the C race was waaay too short (even though I didn't seem to have
enough gas).

After the race, I caught up with a couple of other racers, and they
were saying that the pace wasn't nearly as fast as the B race they
did the week before (huh?). Then a couple of of them lined up for
the B race, and were up toward the front of that race for a bit
before I stopped paying attention.

I guess I am pretty good at the steps (all that hike-a-bike practice)
and seemed to make it over the barriers without tripping or losing
much position so I can take that as a bright spot.

Oh well. Next? I am eyeing the CXSR race on 1/10. Anyone else? The
SC Peak series conflicts, but I may try to make one.

Rafael

Click here for the full gory details!

Peak Season CX #1

Fun course (Harbor High School in SC), and pretty good weather (rain held out). Really well organized grass roots event, and the free hot dogs at the end was a bonus :-) My race went pretty well except for the one water hand off that Shaney attempted with me near the beginning of my last lap - I clipped a PVC pole right afterward and went down quicker than you can say "huh?" Bummer was that I was just in front of a few guys in my catagory, and we had been trading places in the previous laps -they all proceeded to wiz on past. I was only down for a couple seconds though, and managed to still pull off a reasonably good last lap after that - including a sprint for the finish line which I actaully WON (first time I think this has ever happened to me). 10th/24 guys in B 35+. We stuck around long enough for Riley to race in the free kids race at noon - he was the smallest kid, and the only one with training wheels. I was proud of him for just finishing - it was a long lap!

In between mine and Riley's races, we were walking back to our van and I spot Brian Lopes pulling his bike out of his cool travel van (complete with "Lopes" and "55" in cool lettering on the side). I actually stopped accross the street and said "are you Lopes". Doh - what an idiot... He smiled and answered "yep"... So I asked "you're racing cross?". He said it was only like his third race or something, and then I blathered something about how there were a few local DHers getting into cross, and wished him good luck.

When we were taking off for the day the A's were just finishing their first lap - Lopes was at the tail end of the front pack of about 8 guys. Not bad for a gravity freak. I guess it helps to have a whole boatload of World Cup and World Championships under your belt... I now wished I would have looked closer at his bike - I forgot that he's racing for Ibis now, and I heard that they're getting ready to introduce a carbon cx frame. The only thing that I noticed was that he was running riser bars :-)

Scott

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Race report Gluehweinrace 2008

Hello biking folks,

As a few of you guys and gals know, there is a event called Gluehwein
Race (mulled wine race) in my hometown every year. I couldn't join last
year so I really wanted to compete this year.

For the ones who don't know what I'm talking about: It's a race over 10
laps of short distance and without major technical difficulty. After
every lap you have to drink one cup of mulled wine, whereas you have to
carry the cup while you are riding (usually the peeps hang them around
their neck)


The weather this year was exceptionally poor so I was thinking twice if
I wanted to go there. However, I met with a buddy and headed to the
meeting point. Over there I met a lot of biker people I haven't seen in
years so it was very nice to have a little chat while it was raining in
down strings.


Because of the rain and the temperatures around freezing everybody
wanted to start as fast as possible. So around 50 people went off for
the Le Mans start, running to their bikes and start pedaling. The
interesting thing, however, was a abandonend house we had to cross right
after the start, which was a very tight maneuver and so there was quite
a jam in front of it.
Once a lap was complete, you had to jump off your bike and run over to
the mulled wine source to get your cup filled.
The first 4 laps I didn't feel anything from the wine, only my legs are
pretty weak since I didn't have a lot of opportunities to ride in the
last time. My legs became a little better in the following laps but I
could also feel the wine kicking in. Maybe I should also have used my
fast hardtail but I decided for my winter bike, which is 30lbs but does
not even have a front suspension or disc brakes.
In the end I came in top 10, the exact place I don't know since some
guys were too drunk to sign out at the finish line.

But even funnier was the ride back to my buds house, since the wine
needed some time to really kick in. All in all we had a lot of fun and I
hope this race is qualified for the Fox Cup ;-)

So long
Erik

PS: Of course I was flying the TWW colors, see the attachment.

Click here for the full gory details!

Pilarcitos #4 - Golden Gate Park - 11/30/08

Wow - REALLY awesome weather in SF yesterday, combined with a really fun CX course in the middle of Golden Gate Park, to make one really nice way to spend Sunday morning. Shaney and the boys joined me and cheered me on. The course was, as I had heard, a fair amount of single track - which was really niiiiiice. Two spots with barriers on uphill slopes made for forced run-ups, but they were pretty short. As usual, the Pilaritos folks are very well organized, and run a great race. Once again I found myself in a sprint to the finish - once again on a stretch of uphill pavement - and once again I couldn't pull it off. Damn it - I suck at sprinting! It was fun though, and made for an exciting ending.
This sprint started with me being right behind this one guy as we hit the pavement on the final stretch to the finish, but then quickly included my buddy Eric Sterner who saw us from the corner of his eye about to overtake him. Fun ending, but would have been more fun if I got those two guys... :-) Yesterday was my first race on my new tubeless setup - 40psi front and rear was very niiiiice, and had no issues... Results already posted - once again I'm mid-packish in Master Men 35+ B's, but at least this time moving every so slightly towards the top (instead of dead-center mid-pack, which is more typical of me this year): 32nd/73. (missing 30th by probably less than a few 10ths of a second... dangit).

http://www.pilarcitos.com/results/CrossResults/2008/GGP.html

Next race is this Sunday at Coyote Point, which is another fun venue - and has a beach area and a nice playground for the kids and/or picknicking afterwards. I's the last Pilarcitos race.

-Scott

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CCCX CX - Prunedale - 11/23/08

Gin looked at the CCCX CX results from last Sunday and saw my little
sandbagmanship. I've been wanting to check out the Prunedale venue
(Manzanita Park) for a couple of years now, but Riley had a Soccer
tournament game at 11am. My compromise was to race Mens C's at 9am
(at least it's all ages, so includes some guys close to half my
age). I started mid-pack and ended up picking off most of the field
by the third lap, and passing the 2nd place guy (I never even saw the
first place guy the whole race). 2nd place and I actually traded
places a few times in the last lap, and he got me in the final uphill
sprint. Before I bolted out of there, I congratulated him on the
great battle, explained I had moved to B 35's last year, and to tell
the guy who took 4th that he really deserved 3rd :-) (so at least I
fessed up).

Spectactular weather, fun course with some fast DH sections, well run
race - nice way to spend a Sunday morning. Reading on the
bayareacyclocross list, sounds like there were a couple of bad
crashes, including one heli-vac, but sounds like all are recovering
OK, which is good.

I'm digging my CX bike w/suspension...
-Schlachter

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Pilarcitos #3 at Sierra Point - 11/15/08

Bob Roll is one of my favorite Tour day France (France not Frahnce) announcers. Some of the expressions he uses are perfect descriptions of how a cyclist feels. And most of us being cyclists, we can relate. Well, Bobke's expression for me in today's race would've been, "He went deep into the pain cave... and barely made it back out." That was a perfect description of today's race. And this was confirmed as just about everyone I ran into said that I looked terrible at the end of the race. Thanks, love you too... :)

(photo credit - Steve Woo)
I've been sick for the last week to ten days (and still not fully over it). So I probably had no business even racing today. But the cross bug has bit me hard, like a drug, and I need to feed the habit. So I loaded up my frankenMoots and headed to a familiar venue - Sierra Pt - the location of the Track Fights a few months back. The weather of course was spectacular today - actually wouldn't have minded it to be a bit cooler. Low 80's at race time. So much for the muddy cross races fought out in the bitter cold. This was a hot and dusty race.

I registered and slipped onto the course after the 3pm race. It was a bumpy course, but pretty darn fast with only one forced dismount. Couple of steep power ups but all rideable (except when for some fit roadies with no skills were in front of you and lost their balance you dumba$$es). My frankenMoots would be what I thought was a perfect bike for the race - 700c wheels with high pressure, Fox F80X fork in front (no bob), and the excellent Moots YBB rear end with just over an inch of travel. The only thing that concerned me was that I was using my aero road bike wheels with 16 and 20 spokes (front/rear). Oh and riser bars - jeeze, I felt so at home on those riser bars... :)

So at the start it is a fairly wide paved stretch of parking lot and then a bunny hop over a curb onto the dirt. I settled in a few bikes behind Schlachter and was actually feeling good with the pace. But the first lap is always the easiest since things are sorting out, and there is some conga line action going on. Well, on the first little power up, an aforementioned dumba$$ has to dismount and I try to go around him. But I lost my balance as I was way off the good line and that would be the last I saw of Scott. I mean I saw him on the course as it crisscrossed a bunch, but never got to within the few bike lengths to him. Probably wouldn't have anyhow.

For the rest of the race, I fought as hard as I could. But most of the time it seemed like I was getting passed. At one point I was behind a guy who had a front flat and could barely keep up with him. Sheesh. I'd look back at the course where it crisscrossed and didn't see many people behind me. But the leaders hadn't lapped me yet so I still had motivation to push on. Then I hear the bell lap and think cool, I can mash it for one last lap. I probably did my fastest lap of the day and as I neared the finish line I see the lap card person holding up a "1" and pointing at me. I had crossed the line with another guy and he pulled off. I was confused and then a bunch of the Open B's hopped on the course to warm up. I could've sworn I was done, but I decided I better keep going. So I had to work a little harder to pass the B warmer uppers and managed to finish one last lap, thankfully without a sprint finish. Good thing I did apparently. Maybe that was Lorri Lee Lown doing some funny bidness while officiating... I'll teach that Gin... muwahahahahaa!!!

So I'm not sure what the hell happened there, but I was just glad it was over. After being told I looked like death warmed over by my teammates, I went back to my car thinking that if I puke, I would like to do it in private. But that never happened, but man, was I toast. I drank a ton of water, which was about the only thing safe at the time. Sat down because standing up seemed like too much work. Finally after about 15-20 minutes I started to feel somewhat normal again. People said I looked better too. Still very tired though.

My finish wasn't stellar, but I did manage to finish on the lead lap - just barely - I was the second to last guy of the non-lapped guys. 48th place out of 59, not including the DNFers. So actually considering everything going into this race, I was happy to have finished on the lead lap - that was my goal. Schlachter took a very respectable 30th, which included riding a couple of laps with a loose handlebar and taking a pit stop to fix it. I think he was about 2 minutes in front of me. I finished just over 5 minutes behind the leaders.

Thanks to all that were there supporting us - Matt Walters for the occasional feed and his significant other, Kathleen and sons, Allan and Roz, Paul and Jenny, and the other people I knew out there cheering me on (the Meeces and Altezza40 folks). It is amazing how that does keep you pushing forward despite wanting to quit or mysteriously have a mechanical...

So right as I was getting ready to leave, the Open B race started. I said, "Hey Matt Leonard got his first call up to the start line - let's go heckle him!" So we got over to the fence and were positioned about 30 yards down from the start. And they're off! And right in front of us, one guy eats it big time - the ensuing pile up was nasty - I turned away at one point because I didn't want to see the carnage. The sound was enough. Ugly. And guess who got caught up in the crash? Leonard. He wasn't hurt, but his bike became unrideable - the brake boss on his fork was bent and the brake was pushed into his wheel. What a bummer. He was clearly disappointed. We asked him if he wanted another bike. And he said yes. So there was my bike, right there with the same fantastic Crank Bros. Eggbeater pedals, which is what he uses too. I handed him my bike and off he went. He was dead last by a lot but managed to finish pretty strongly. He caught a lot of people but that crash set him really far back in a fast field. Not sure where he finished, but might have cracked the top half. Way to fight back Matt! And the frankenMoots held up nicely under him too. Matt Walters raced the Open B's and did well - he got caught near the end by the lead guys, but nothing wrong with that. Those guys are freakin' fast. Way to suffer with the fast boys Matt!

Full results should be published probably tomorrow. Super fun event - watching the folks race under the lights was cool. Reminded me of the days when we tried to pull that off at Club Moto with the Dirt Crits back in the late 90's. We were so far ahead of our time... :)

Now a nice break from racing - after racing 9 weeks in a row, I'm looking forward to the Turkey Day holiday and some R&R. The body can use a break.

Thanks for reading!

Mike

******************* Race Report by Matt Walters *******************

Ah nice report Mike.

I got there a couple of laps into Mike and Scotts race. I must say it was pretty cool to see all the racers on that tight course, the dust being kicked up and the setting sun made for quite the pic. The course looked damm fast and pretty rough.

(photo credit - Steve Woo)
I lined up for the B's hoping that my race would last more than 5 mins last time, knowing that half way through i would love a mechanical. I managed to aviod, just, the big pile up at the start and settled into the suffering. It basically went something like this sprint corner, sprint, straight, corner, sprint take air out of the bowel, corner, sprint. All in all quite good fun. About half-way though some guy passes me complaining about bloody mountain bikers - and that was the last i saw of Leonard! After that i just kept plugging away, getting lapped towards the end - thank god cause i was dying.

I got to say that i had forgotten how much i love racing cross, definately gonna be doing a fair bit more. Now all I need to do is some training and get fit, or continue to suffer at the arse end of the B's.

Matt

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Livermore CX 11-08-08

Dear Training Diary,

I thought I would take this time to log in my pre-race dinner from the night before to help me better identify on how to improve my results. Here is was my menu:

2/3 of the fried calamari appetizer
1 full slab of baby back ribs
3/4 of the baked sweet potato smothered with butter, brown sugar, and chives
3/4 of the corn bread muffin with just a little butter
3 pieces of roasted veggies to help break things up a bit
Drink - Armold Palmer

Hmm... let me think, probably not the best pre-race meal - but who needs that carbo loading thing anyhow? I'm doing the low carb thing. Claim Jumper rules!


So the next day arrives and well, I'm not hungry at all. Feeling a little heavy, a little tired. Sinuses clogged a bit too. Hmm... maybe just show up and cheer on the teammates. Give the body a break after subjecting it to constant stressing. Good idea.

But the competitiveness in me decides to race anyhow. Allan Sherlock was there, as was Bob Lofland. Jeff Hane even made it out here and wore the old TWW kit (well, at least for his warm up). Scott Seery showed up as well and was our feed boy - thanks! So it was a good turnout and I'm glad I decided to race - after warming up some I felt okay. Thanks Roz also for the feeds and for snapping some photos!

So it is crowded at the start and the Master A's were given a minute head start. Then the mass of B's, B35's, B45's, and B55's followed. Big crowd, good turnout for this category. My goal was to try to stay on the lead lap, to not get lapped by the Master A's again. And once again, I was denied. Freakin' Mark Howland, yes, the guy who won some sort of cyclocross championship back in the 90's and essentially eliminated mountain bikes from cyclocross championships because he crushed everyone while bunnyhopping everything was slumming in the Master A's. He caught me with about 30 seconds left and I couldn't catch him. But that was as deep in the race as I've gone before getting lapped. If I had only not eaten the corn bread muffin... I congratulated him on his finish and then said, "you saw that I wasn't in your group, couldn't you have slowed down right before the finish?"

Overall despite sabotaging myself by being a glutton the night before, I felt pretty good out there (well, as good as you can in a CX race). Kept Allan somewhat close, he probably was about 1.5 minutes ahead of me at various points late in the race - but he stayed on the lead lap so he did well (despite giving himself a tattoo that strangely looked like a gate post). Course was bumpy but tacky and fast. My frankenbike woulda actually been pretty sweet on this course. The rodeo layout is very cool - they added some more turns and dismounts from the previous race I did there. Good stuff!




So I hung out waiting for the results and was disappointed to see an 11/12 finish. Guess the pre-race meal wasn't a great idea. I'll have to try something else next weekend. Still not DFL, but close. Allan took 8/12 in the same category. So the pace was pretty brisk today. Mr. Lofland was 10/11 in the 45B's.

TWW is still in the infancy of the whole cross scene. But we're building nicely off of this and are already looking forward to the '09 season (although this season is far from over).

Thanks for reading!

Mike

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Pilarcitos #2 at Candlestick Point - 11/02/08

Well the weather leading up to the race was quite nasty to say the least. Lots of rain the two days before the big race. I packed tons of clothing, two towels, a tarp, a pump sprayer full of water to hose me off with, and plastic bags to put the muddy clothes in. I was ready.

As it turns out, didn't need any of that extra stuff - the weather conditions turned to high 60's and blue skies, and since we were the last race of the day, much of the course had dried out - there were two spots where you got a little splatter, but hardly any really. Fun course, definitely a power course. Pretty bumpy too.


So lots of familiar faces there, including Matt Walters trying out his first CX race of the year, Matt Leonard, Jeff Hane, Scott Schlachter, and myself. We all were racing the open B category. Big category with some fast muthas. I saw several guys riding bikes with wheelsets that cost more than my complete bike. Clearly they took cross pretty darn seriously.
We didn't get a chance to pre-ride the course but figured with that large of a group, that you would get a chance to test out the course on the first lap anyhow. Myself, Matt, and Scott were near the back so we didn't get a good start - that was okay with me, as I didn't need to get caught up in the melee at the beginning and overdo it which I seem to sometimes do.

I was cruising with Schlachter, feeling pretty good (much better than last week). We were trailing Matt, basically following him. We hit the kinda sorta run-up (only on the first lap due to all the riders). At the top I see Matt W. off to the side fidgeting with his bike - he cobbled it together the day before and well, let's just say that's not recommended. That would pretty much be the end of his day.

I kept up with Scott for awhile, but then lost sight of him probably at the 30 minute mark. I was cruising with Paule of Roaring Mouse for a bit too - he was showing me the good lines - thanks! But then eventually he would pull away as well (he finished 45 seconds in front of me). I think I raced as fast as I could, pretty consistent. But the open B category is probably more than my training can keep up with. At about the 39 minute mark, one of those guys with the $1,000+ wheelset came flying by - he was the race leader. I told him good job and thank you - my race was shortened by a lap! I had prepared in my mind that I was going to get lapped so I wasn't disappointed. Actually pretty happy that it took as long as it did.

Once again, I didn't pay attention to the lap signs, and didn't sprint at the end. I got passed right at the line by one more guy in the lead group - so five guys lapped me. Dude was flying.

So our results weren't spectactular, but of note was that Schlachter beat Hane - that'll teach him to fly some other colors (have to give Jeff some credit - he did race the A's earlier but did a DNF). I wasn't able to catch him but didn't finish that far behind him. The best though was seeing the look on Scott's face when he saw me already finished - "you beat me?!" I said, "yep". He clearly was suffering and a bit delirious - so I let it go for a little longer but then told him the truth. He was relieved.

Results:

52/85 Scott Schlachter
74/85 Mike Gin (avg. HR 180, max 188)
DNF Matt Walters

Hane was in the mid 60's (can't remember exactly), Matt Leonard was I think 25th - nicely done. It was good seeing Jon Heim there too - thanks for all the heckling - nice to hear a familiar voice while suffering (Shaney and Matt W's wife too - thanks for the cheering). Thanks Matt W. for the feeds - guess your DNF did serve the team well in some way... :)

Mike

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Velo Bella Spirt of Surf City Psycho Cross 10/26/08

I think this was stop #2 on the NCNCA cross cup circuit. So there was for sure going to be some competition at this race. And of course I had the worst week of training up to the race - felt sick, worked out on Tuesday and nearly died, so nothing else up to race day. Nursing some sort of virus that had morphed into swollen glands and the dreaded cold sore. Not enough sleep either (although this is somewhat normal for me but seemed really bad with less than 5 hours of sleep for many of the nights).

So with all that in mind I had low expectations but remained hopeful to do moderately well. I took off on the first lap after yelling at Schlachter to get his a$$ in gear since he showed up right at the start line as the race was starting - problems with changing his tire. I got a good position and was probably top 10-15 of the group. Allan Sherlock was on his singlespeed CX bike and was somewhere behind me. Some guy yelled encouragement to his teammate who was passing aggressively on the right - "Go Jimmy!!! Yeah!!!" Then Jimmy was into the tape and did a full on header. His friend was all, "ooohh". Classic.

So this course was similar to the course they did last year - lots of grass, no man made dismounts, a couple of run ups that you could ride up if the line was clear, some pavement, some loose downhills - and of course the infamous "swirly". I was still holding my position for most of the first lap. We crossed the finish line and

I knew then it wasn't going to be a good day. Was pretty much in survival mode after that first lap. Schlachter passed me and then shortly thereafter Allan passed me. I never saw them again. So I pretty much cruised it for the remaining 6 laps or so, getting passed by many people. Figured dang, might be pulling a DFL on this one. Not sure if I got lapped, as some fast muthas were warming up too - I guess once the official results are posted we'll know. Just a little confusion in the end there - didn't know I was on the last lap - might have been able to sprint with a guy in my class but probably not so no big
deal. Guess I should pay closer attention to the guy holding the lap signs at the start finish.

No power today, no nuttin'. I haven't downloaded my HR numbers, but I know the thing wasn't chirping at me near as much as last weekend in Liverwhore. Oh well, can't always be on and know that clearly whatever I had sapped much of my energy. But still had a good time.

I ended up 27/36, so at least not DFL. Schlactosin rocked it with a 9th place finish in the same category. And Allan took a 13th. So a very successful day for the TWW CX crew. Oh and Bob Lofland was there too and took 21st in his category. Way to represent TWW!!!

Thanks to Roz (Allan's wife for the photos and for cheering us on). I will post some of them on our website when I get a chance.

We watched the kid's race and watched Riley Schlachter rip it up on the course - he got a sweet goodie bag and scored a medal! Way to go Riley. Liam was registered too, but in classic Schlachter factor form, missed his start time (he was napping).

The costume cross was of course quite the event - lots of men looking way too comfortable in women's clothing. My coconut bra stayed on fine but didn't feel anything like the lace I'm use to wearing.

Thanks to the Velo Bella crew for putting on another FAB U LOUS event.

Mike

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Livermore CX - 10/18/08

(photos courtesy of the folks doing the Livermore CX)
Dang, I think I'm starting to like this cross stuff. My training up to this event was non-existent however - I traveled to the East Coast for work and did one workout back there on the elliptical. But other than that, nothing much to speak of other than being dehydrated and sleep deprived. So wasn't sure what to expect today.

I showed up and was thinking it was going to be the same course - but it wasn't. This course was routed through the horse riding area - sandy sections, really flat hardpack, some off camber muddy grass, and some more wood chippy area. A really good course which had a lot of variety. Three dismounts too, including two on uphill sections which really hurt late in the race.


I warmed up with Bob Lofland again and he was saying the course was really fast. And that it was. Took about 5 minutes per lap approximately. So we're standing at the start line and I meet an old friend - Doug Jorgensen - he rode for TWW way back in the day and probably the last I saw him was at our trip to Moab back in '98. Good to see him again (plus I beat him :) ). The same start group for this race - Masters A's take off first, then our group about 30 seconds later, the B's, B35, B45, B55, et al take off. I started cautiously but felt pretty good so I shot forward. I was in the top 10 at the start and thought to myself, "sweet! what the hell am I doing?!!!" I had my heart rate monitor on this time and of course it was chirping at me. It would chirp at me most of the day until it got tired of doing that.

The course was tough, it was difficult to really get a rhythm, and the dismounts particularly hurt. I kept a pretty solid pace throughout the race, although I was definitely fading at the end. Got lapped by the bastage National Champ Master A rider again (with about 3 laps to go). But the nice thing about being lapped is that the lap call out goes from 4 to 2 left - sweet!

So we get the bell lap and I tell myself to let it go for 5 more minutes. I try but man I was pretty well cooked. Two guys passed me about midway through the lap and I noted their numbers to be in the same series as mine. I tried latching on but there was no chance. I had a chance to pass one last rider on the last dismount and got ahead of him, but unfortunately that was the first time all day I missed my pedals on the remount. Doh! So I said that was my chance to pass him and I blew it. He smiled and pulled away. Oh well, I don't think he was in my category.

So I cruised in with no one around me, happy the race was over. That was a really tough effort today. The fields were smaller - too bad, they missed a fun, technical course. No real opportunities for drafting, so it was a true test of your skills and fitness.

We sat around for a bit and chatted while we waited for the results. Then they posted them and I see my name in 6th place - right behind the two guys who I saw pass me on the last lap! I was so close to the podium - dayamn! If I could've just tracked one guy down. But I don't think I could've caught them. I was cooked after the race and still feel the effects of that effort as I type. I have to keep telling myself that it is very early in my CX experience and really I don't have a lot of miles in my legs in the past several years. But I'm seeing improvement so that's cool.

Bob scored a podium spot with a 5th place finish - way to go Bob! So overall a successful day for TWW - and it was a lot of fun too! Looking forward to next weekend's Psycho Cross by Velo Bella. Should be a hoot! Come join TWW in the madness - http://www.surfcitycx.blogspot.com/ - and here is a preview of the course - http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/player/4265810 - looks like they took the death spiral out but should still be a great time. Really, it's a big party where some bike racing breaks out... :)

Oh and here are my numbers for the day:

6/9 Master B's 35+
Time - 46:07
Average HR - 182 bpm
Max HR - 193 bpm

See attached image too - pretty consistent effort. I don't think I could've gone any faster. I had hoped to hit the lap button on my HR every lap but was too tired to do that. Figured once I missed the first couple, just to forget about it.

Mike

P.S. - thanks to Spiccoli for coming out and cheering me on - and for letting me drink some of his water during the race. Hopefully he'll have some photos and video to send me.

Click here for the full gory details!

Livermore CX - 10/11/08

(photo courtesy of the folks doing the Livermore CX)
Okay, so this was my second ever CX race - nice to do one here practically in my backyard - the organizers did a nice job. Fall has definitely arrived, with temps in the high 50's and a nasty wind blowing. On a few occasions, practically knocked me over. Tougher course than last weekend with lots of grass. Had that "flat tire" feeling a couple of times zig zagging through the course. Lots of different terrains, from fast hard pack stretches, to wood chip sections, to loose windy turns, sandy sections, etc. I thought it was a good test of one's skills. No run ups but three dismount sections.

Bob Lofland showed up and we rode several warm up laps together. Was nice hanging out with him. They started the Master A's, B's, and the 35+, 45+, and 55+ B's together. Big start line. My main goal was to not eat it at the start and my overall goal was to not be lapped. Well, I accomplished one of those goals.

At some point in the race two fast mutha Master's A's blew by me - those two were motoring, working together, and cranking out the watts. I didn't feel so badly, as one was sporting the stars and stripes National Champ jersey. Then at some point late in the race a couple of B's passed me - not sure if they were in my category or Open B's. I'm thinking Open B's, at least that's what I'm telling myself. So it was a bummer getting lapped but the good thing was I didn't have to do the extra lap... :)

Definitely pushed harder this race having that one race now under my belt. And actually I'm super pleased with my result - 11/16 in the 35+ B's. Bob got a top 10 (10th) in the 45+ B's. Saw a bunch of others TWW friends there too - Mo got a medal, Isaias was still crankin' it with the A's when I left - but looked to be about 4th or 5th on his new steed.

Wanna really race tomorrow now, but that isn't going to happen. Good times. I'm learning more and more. Lowered the tire pressure significantly and that helped (although I noticed that my tire was a bit squishy riding back to the car - there definitely is some kinda leak there). Looking forward to more CX races and hopefully more TWWers joining us.

Mike

P.S. - thanks to Seery for showing up and giving me a couple of impromptu feeds and cheering me on through the suffering.

Click here for the full gory details!

TWW Cross Dressin' It!!! (10/5)

Okay, so decided late last night to give this cross thing a go with Schlachter up in Vacaville. Brought back old memories of the Rockhopper days (but thankfully sans monster hill climbs). The venue was dry, dry, dry - the recent rains didn't do a whole lot to the course. No mud pits and actually it was quite warm in the sun (mid to upper 70's).

I have never raced a real cross race before - I did the costume cross but one can very easily argue if that is a true race. So this was it - my maiden voyage into the cross scene. And you know me - moderation is for the weak - I can't start by doing a C race. Because of the start time and the fact that Schlachter was racing the 35+ B's, I decided I would do the same. Probably not the smartest move but I've been known to make questionable decisions before.

Of course, we're a little stressed out due to the Schlachter Factor, and we arrive about 20 minutes before the race time. Still need to get registered, take a leak, change, pre-ride, etc. We got it all done, and then a couple of minutes later we're getting instructions at the start line. They started the 35+, 45+, and 55+ B's together. Quite a big crowd. Great, more pack riding, but this time on dirt and me on a bike that I have never competitively ridden nor have I even ridden since last year's costume cross.
I figured I would utilize this as a learning experience not having done this before. Just pace myself, get the feel for it, etc. So I didn't go out hard at all and just hung back a little. I passed a few people, but mostly people were passing me. I must say, my cornering on that bike is really sketchy (the 75psi in my tires probably didn't help - hey, I didn't want to pinch flat). My dismounts and re-mounts were actually pretty good, with only one exception where I nearly ate it since I couldn't get my left foot out of the pedal. But I saved it. Fortunately the two dismount sections were at slow spots of the race, so I didn't have to dismount at high speed. I got in some good bunny hop practice on that bike but I'm sure I won't be taking on any of the 15" or 18" barriers.

Oh I forgot to mention I felt this sharp pain on my abdomen on the first lap - felt like a pin pricked me. I thought maybe one of my number pins came undone and poked me. But turns out it was one of those damn meat bees that got stuck in my jersey and got me. Great, thankfully I'm not allergic. So rest of the race was in a zipped up jersey with a tingling bite.

During the 7 laps I would see Scott in front of me and was able to note him increasing his lead on me every lap. But that was cool, I knew he would be ahead of me at this race since he has raced CX more than me plus is in better shape than me (but not my much just give me a little more time buddy). Finally near the end our paths crossed and I cheered him on. He would end up finishing a couple of minutes ahead of me - don't know the exact time since they didn't have a timer going oddly enough.

So overall I'm moderately pleased with my performance considering all the factors conspiring against me - I didn't finish DFL (23rd out of 27, Scott was 17th out of 27). After the race I felt that I left a lot in reserve - I felt more like I did a moderately hard ride vs. a race. Definitely will go out harder in my next one - which btw will be a C race - in Livermore on 10/11 if anyone is interested in joining me. I'd like to get some decent results before I make the permanent jump up to the 35+ B's.

Mike

Official Results

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TWW Dominates the Track Fights #8 Team Competition!!!

Team Wrong Way discussing strategy to crush the competition
(photo courtesy of Kirt Fitzpatrick)
Wow, great night last night - four brave souls showed up to the final race in the Track Fight series. We tried to get organized, and for the most part did pretty good for a bunch o' mountain bikers. The Saunier Duval dude still rocked it and we sucked his wheel a lot, but none of us got lapped and took the next four spots:

2nd - Matt Walters
3rd - Mike Gin and Scott Schlachter (tie)
5th - Rafael Rius

I think we won like 5 or 6 of the Sports Basement primes too (8 available). And several of the point sprints. We easily won the team competition, getting Sexual Camel roadie caps and a case of I think it was Longboard Ale or something like that.
I was really happy with my race - this time I didn't do some crazy leg heavy workout 36 hours before the race - so my legs felt much better. And now that I had one race under my belt, I wasn't nearly as nervous as the first time - I understood a little better what to do. Kirt said I improved and did much better this race. I thought I could keep up with the main pack and not get lapped with fresh legs and a little experience - and I did, so that was cool. I won the very first sprint on lap 1, Kirt called a prime on that lap - my response to him was, "already?!!!"

I think I got a couple of 2nds and another 3rd in the point sprints. I couldn't recover fast enough though to really challenge in the others. But I hung with the group. Winning the prime was a cool thing, but my crowning achievement was taking a 2nd place in front of the surprised SD guy. So I see Rafael take off then the SD guy. I was actually pretty far back but cranked it up big time. So much so that I scared Matt when I flew by him doing my best Robbie McEwen and weaving through the traffic (I probably would've been disqualified for a dangerous sprint in le Tour... :) ). I closed on the SD guy and took him right at the line as he looked over his shoulder. This might be where I hit my top speed of 33.5 MPH. Good fun.

So actually I'm kinda disappointed that these things are over. The Camel boys and girls put on a super fun, low key, no attitude event. Good introduction into the roadie scene, although I doubt you'll see me doing any road races anytime soon. I do though want to hit up the cross scene, so I can utilize some of this fitness other than for kicking Keith's a$$ in our monthly competitions... :)

For you numbers geeks, here is some data:

Average speed: 21.9 MPH
Top speed: 33.5 MPH
Average HR: 177
Max HR: 193

Click here for the full gory details!

Track Fights #7

So I decided that I wanted to see where my fitness was and I wanted to get a taste of the road scene. Fortunately this is a very laid back event and my group was small - 10 racers. Matt the limey told me that the pace is easy for two laps and then fast for one. Rinse, repeat.

Did anyone tell you that Matt is a liar? I don't think anyone let up on the gas the entire time. Ridiculous the pace. I talked to two guys afterwards who said this was the fastest B race that they had done (they did 4 of the previous races). So great, I decide to mix it up with the roadies and I choose the fastest race to date. Good plan. One dude in a Saunier Duval kit just time trialed the entire thing off the front. Dude was strong, should probably move up to the A's.

I was all sketched out leading up to the race - would I crash? Could I sprint? Would I get lapped multiple times? Well, I ended up doing okay, got lapped late in the race. Kept the rubber side down. And took two fourth place finishes. I actually thought I got a second, but apparently I should've listened to the instructions on when your were supposed to sprint. I will be ready for the next one, the finale. I'll prepare a little better too, like maybe drink some water during the day.

Glad to have done this, although my upper hammies aren't too sure about it. I think I ended up 6th. I believe my teammate Matt got 5th, with a big winning sprint on the final sprint. Nicely done Matt - sorry I couldn't help you out more. You rode strong tonight. Met Rafael too, and I think he finished ahead of Matt and I since he didn't get lapped. Way to go!

See attached graph. I forgot to turn on the timer, so I started it after the first three laps were over. Definitely a tougher workout than I've ever done on the indoor trainer.

The finale is a team event, so let's see if we can get a good turnout. Matt,
Rafael, and I are in, probably Schlachter too. Who else is game?

Mike

Discussion on TWW Yahoo Group

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Skyline Race Reports

Yo,

I had reason to be down in the Bay this weekend so was happy I was
going to get to race one of my favorite races - Skyline. I turned up
at the venue around 9, got all setup. I noticed is was pretty cool
out and lots of the expert types were going with just bottles so I
rejiggered my setup - dropped the camelbak and stuffed my 2 C02s and
enormous 29er tube into my jersey pockets along with some food. Note:
I've been having technical issues, particularly flatting with my 29er
this year, so I knew I needed a tube.

Lined up w/ the sport guys and headed off feeling pretty warmed up and
ready - I've been riding a lot lately and I figured the extra 02 in
the air would help me. I quickly passed Leonard and many other folks
and then settled into the single track, feeling pretty good. I road
the wheel of whoever was ahead of me, occasionally getting to pass -
lots of jokers dismounting for really trivial step ups and things
causing the whole race to get a bit jacked up. I think it's worth
going out super hard at this race just to not get stuck behind all the
fast-climbing roadies I think since they are challenged by bumps over
2". I felt like I was moving through the pack pretty well...

Post creek, the descent was going reasonably - the route was different
than the other times I've raced skyline but I was enjoying it.
There's MORE than enough gnarly rocky sections on this thing. It
really requires some sacking up to ride various parts, at least for
me. Anyway, I passed someone fixing a tire 15 feet off trail who
called out "Hey John!" ... not sure if this was causal but I almost
immediately stacked in a rocky section, flatted my front (Stan's
tubeless) tire and ripped open my knee pretty good. Turns out it was
Kirk saying hello... save it for the parking lot next time bro!

Anyway, I put in my patched 29er tube and inflated with one C02, took
a concerned look at my seriously bleeding knee (same spot I got 50
stitches in 6 months ago at La Ruta) and set off, at least to finish
the lap.

My patched tube quickly lost it's air so I was walking and pondering
my pitiful state when I came upon a guy w/ a broken chain who sported
me a 26" tube. I got that in and inflated with the other CO2 which I
now realize are not big enough to inflate 29er tires. I was running
maybe 12 lbs of pressure and I gingerly limped back out to the start,
walking all those fun downhill sections for fear of pinch flatting or
ruining my rim. The bike felt totally wacked out - the brakes were
rubbing and engaging way too early, the steering was off (probably the
low pressure) and just funky.

I rolled into the finish and got someone to pump up both tires (dude
said the back was at 20?!!? lbs which should have alerted me to the
upcoming issue)... I talked with Squeeky Mouse Paulie - he had broken
his seat and I was trying to decide on the wisdom or riding the
shredded knee... decided that it was an okay idea and rolled back out.

The gauge on the pump must have been off b/c I felt like I was on my
road bike the tires were so hard. And I was doing a little figuring
on the climb... if I road the gnarly sections and crashed again on my
knee, I'd really be in pain AND since I would be trying to not crash,
of course I would crash... and I was out of tubes AND out of CO2 and
my tires were having issues apparently... and my knee was really
starting to throb... and I was probably DFL with all the delays so I
decided to just finish most of the climbing and then descend the way I
came, saving my skin for another day.

Chock up another DNF for me for the year. Lame! Great course though
and good to see you folks, if briefly, at Skyline.

The knee looks better than I expected - really just some scrapes - no
kneecap showing or anything.

BUT, I am interested in wearing knee pads now! I'm tired of thrashing
my knees. So anyone have recommendations for a cross-country racing
type of knee pad?

See some of you in Tahoe next week I hope!

-John Hillstrom

*******************************

Skyline Race Report


I ended up driving up with Ty and ran in to quite a few familiar faces. We parked next to Dave and set up shop. I went for a little warm up up the initial fire road and was not feeling it. With the lack of sleep and riding, its been really hard to keep up with the big boys. Anyway, after an hour of goofing off and chatting with people, I headed over to the start with Rafael. Ran in to Hillstrom and said hello. We take off, and I feel like within the fist 5 minutes, I am in pretty close to dead last. There was a long string of people in front of me. Oh well, my plan was to see if I could stick with the fast guys for the first 30 seconds to a minute, and if that was impossible, throw in the towel and just enjoy an great day of riding on some amazing trails.

So I kept chugging along and surprisingly, on the march up the first steep hill, I was able to run around about 5 people at the very top. I kept my moderate pace on the flats, but every time we hit a technical section or a hill, I was able to ride or run around 5 or so people. Midway through the first lap, I was hurting, but having fun. I saw Hillstrom on the side of trail fixing a flat. After getting the signal that he was okay, I kept on the gas. On the big decent, we ran in to some single speeders and got hung up, but I didn't let it bother me. I knew the leaders in my category were long gone. So we got around when possible, and I nailed it on the fire road back to the S/F.

Lap two, more of the same, just less people in my way. I could feel I was falling off the pace a little, but for the most part didn't have people in my way to hang me up on the fun stuff. Some riders I had passed early on in the first lap on the technical stuff came whizzing by me on the climbs. No big deal, just stuck with my race, thinking I'd possibly catch them on the decent. I did, and passed a few. Towards the end of my last lap, I saw Antonio (the Colombian guy) on the side of the trail with a flat and no pump. I decided to let the guy behind me pass and let Antonio grab my pump out of my camel back, knowing very well, that the guy behind me would pass me soon enough now that we were out of the technical stuff. Turns out Antonio grabbed my shock pump and didn't realize it until I'd already jumped back on my bike. Oops.

So on the last little rock steps in the switchbacks, I just didn't carry my momentum and started to slowly go over the bars, but ended up falling on my side in to the nice soft grass on the upslope of the hill. I laughed it off and yelled to the guy with the flag that I was fine. Back to the finish line with a smile on my face and turns out I was 9th out of 15 with a time of nearly 1:48 even. I took a look back at previous results and starting from 2005, my times have been 2:14, 1:50, 1:37, and then 1:48 this year. So about 10.5 minutes slower than last year, but with the kid and a lot less riding, not too bad. Next up, well, not sure. I've once again decided that Downieville isn't in the cards. Some day I'll get up there. So maybe the evening Bike Monkey race is next up on July 19th.

9/15 Sport Men 19-34

Matt Leonard

*******************************

Another Skyline Race Report

Decided right before the pre-reg deadline to enter and race with the
singlespeed in prep for the SSWC. But I wimped out and entered sport
so I wouldn't have to do 3 laps (Ive been on a vacation from training
since the Coolest 24 race). Plus, its only the second ride on the SS
in a looong time.

Saw Matt, Dave, Ty, and others getting ready as I pulled in, so I got
ready and cruised around the parking lot a bit. I warmed up the fire
road climb with Matt which was a good thing as I learned I could make
it with the SS, and also not to go too hard or else I wouldn't make it
to the doubletrack. Was feeling okay after the warmup considering the
lack of recent training.

Once the race started, I settled toward the back of the pack since my
hamster spinning abilities aren't the greatest either, but once the
hill picked up, I was wasting energy weaving around all the guys in
their small rings. Ive never ridden at skyline before, so I found
myself going too hard on some climbs, and not hard enough on others.
I think I passed Dave on the initial fire road, and he passed me back
on the singletrack. Right after one of the small dips, he had a flat.

The techy downhills were fun, but got clogged up on the first lap.
Once we got to the last fire road stretch, things opened up for the
second lap. The second lap was much clearer. I knew I was way back,
and I just paced myself. I pretty much rode the second lap by myself
I cruised through all the downhills on the first lap, but walked the
downhill section where Matt leaned over on the second lap after I
caught up to a SSer that was going through it very slowly. He was a
Sycip rider that had took a spill and had a pretty scratched up chin,
so I finished the switchbacks behind him then passed. I knew I wasn't
gonna catch anyone else, nor be caught, so I just took it easy to the
finish. Maybe a bit too much as I still had some left over at the
end, but I find out my second lap was about 4 minutes faster than the
first. hmm.

I think I needed one more tooth for the techy climb section between
the two downhill sections. Besides the two obvious hike-a-bikes, I
had to walk a part of this section on both laps, but think I could
have cleaned it with a 32x20 instead of 19 (29er). I was warned ahead
of time to lower my gearing, but I got lazy.

Finished sport 19-34, 10th/15 1:57:09.

I think I could have shaved several minutes if I had my geared bike,
but I am happy with the finish considering the SS.

Rafael Rius

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Scott Seery CCCX Expert 45-54 DH Series Champion!!!

Old Lady Seery kicked some serious boo-tay at the CCCX Series at Toro park. He won nearly every race he entered. And to top that off, he took second overall in the Hardtail open category. Way to go Scott!!! Show them young whippersnappers that this old man still has got game. Congratulations on a great effort!

CCCX Series Results

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CCCX #8 Cross Country

Sunday 15th of June
Single Speed Sport
4th out of 6

The day started off real good, Roz and I headed out for Monterey
Drove down to to Fort Ord, park next to Rich H
Went and did the reg thing $35 to go play, head out for a worm up
and to ride the course . Ran in to Erik T(SCCC) and Menso D on a single
man I am glad I chose to do sport single speed.


Race line up Sport 19-34,Single Speed,Clydesdale and were off
I enter the single track around 5th and settle in for the down the trail
first clime and I move up to 4th and than 3rd head down toward the
start finish line I make another pass 2nd place is mine and
the race is going good, next two laps moving along
third lap Francis MTBR catches me and I then stat to push my self
and down in a corner hit the ground hard, the last lap I go all the back to 4th
and that is how it ended good day of racing

o yea happy fathers day
Allan S

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Fairfax Fat tire festival

Race-Single speed sport
Number in cat ?
Place ?

The race was very nice, never ridden up in Fairfax
There was around fifty racers complete for expert, sport/ beginner
The race started in a bunch sprint and someone went down in the middle
of the bunch, slowed everyone down

The trail was loose and technical, down hill fire road to up hill single track
Just great trail to race on lots of rock, roots and low hanging trees
I was told this was just a small sample of what is up there

One hour drive, five bucks for a day pass, thirty five to race
Good time

Allan

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Boggs 3 - 8-hour MTB race

First, the results... well, don't have them all but here are the major
highlights:

1st Place - Men's 3 Person - Team I Coulda Been a Contender (Erik, Loren,
Isaias) - crushed 2nd place by 40+ minutes
1st Place - Men's Solo SS - Ty Freakin' Brookhart - I think I heard 9 laps
3rd Place - Men's 3 Person - Team Pretty Fast Mofos (Allan, Kyle, Jeff) -
suspicious how the 2nd place team passed you up so quickly after your large lead
and then managed to beat you by 10-15 seconds
3rd Place - Women's 3 Person - Team We Ride More Than Just Bikes (Dawn, Jessica,
Jeni) - Jeni's 3 consecutive laps at the end sent them to el Podiumo
4th Place - Coed 3 Person - Team Hella Slow (Peter, Paul, and Mary, err, I mean
Kathleen) - so close, woulda been cool to send Peter off with a "metal"


Of note is Team Reliving the Glory (John and Kirt) would've podiumed as a
3-person team but only finished like 9th in the 2 person team race. That was a
very competitive category to say the least.

Not too shabby for a bunch of schmoes. I'm sure the Ridemonkey folks will have
full results posted to their website in the near future. They put on a sweet
race and you could track your times/standings right as riders came in. Pretty
slick system.

The weekend was a total blast! Allan and Peter were first to arrive and did a
pre-ride. Then I showed up and went on a pre-ride with them. Two pre-ride laps
for our departing teammate the day before the race? Clearly was doing some
secret training as he has lost a bunch o' weight and did perty darn good. The
course was very similar to the Billy Cross Racing course we did back in 2005,
with just some tweaks here and there. Fun course, no major extended climbs -
but not easy by any means 9+ miles, 1,100' of climbing per lap.

Other people started trickling in and did pre-rides. Then we got dinner going
and had the tri-tip and bratwurst food orgy. Thanks Erik for bringing all those
brats. Very tasty. And thanks to everyone for bringing some side dishes
including ruffage. That was key. Oh and thanks to Keith for bringing the wood,
uh, fire wood because without it we wouldn't have had the fireside chats which
in TWW circles have been somewhat infamous. No dancing Bellas this time but
still very fun nonetheless. Once again, I will keep the Mike Gin Quote Machine
turned off to help protect the innocent (primarily myself). But I will dub some
nicknames:

Peter "why did you have to challenge me with that faster lap time you bastage"
Sterlacci
Paul "body suit" Oellerich
Kathleen "way to crush your son" Meyer
Isaias "mountain man" Job
Erik "sausage boy" Trauschke
Loren "food hawk" Thomas
Esther "hey nice camp table" Thomas
Susie "too organized for TWW" Barber
Andi "Pop Tart" Mackie
Allan "proving that a SS is still his trusty steed" Sherlock
Kyle "bad knee my a$$" Brookes
Jeff "Cyclocross Mag poster boy" Hane
Jessica "Wedding Crasher/doesn't handle the tool well" de Wit
Jeni "talk to us in 10 years about the penny jar" Brookes
Dawn "where's the beer?!!! Oh by the way hello" Weathersbee
Mike "let's have a pull up contest" Gin
Dave "lucky winner of the locked the keys in the car lottery" McCrimmon
Bob "Santa freakin' Rosa?!" Lofland
John "trendsetter" Hillstrom
Kirt "I knew you were fast" Fitzpatrick
Scott "you beat Allan on a lap?!" Schlachter
Rich "coffee grind" Davis
Keith "dancing pecs" White
Patrick "hacker" Meyer (sorry, forgot the two other guys names on your team but
we'll just call them Cocky Yute and Quiet Yute)
Ty "Ty was at the race?" Brookhart

I'm sure y'all could come up with some zingers too... :)

Probably the only drawback to the weekend was how freakin' cold it was Friday
night. Must have been in the high 30's and wind blowing. Otherwise race
conditions were perfect, the vibe was great (nice live band playing at the start
finish), plenty of port-o-potties, and good company. I hope that we can put
something together like this again this year. Perhaps maybe at Lake Sonoma if
they have an 8-hour there. But not in July or August thank you very much.

Memo to self - do more than two rides in a year to train for the next Boggs
8-hour race (I doubled my ride total for the last year this weekend). I
definitely plan on being there. You should make plans to be there too. What a
great time!

Okay, I'm tired - time to go to bed. Decided to drive home after most people
bailed on camping. The hot shower felt SO GOOD. Dayamn, I was pretty ripe.

Mike

Click here for the full gory details!

Really, we did race in the past year...

Sorry for the big gap - we raced but stopped putting race reports here. That will change going forward.

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Friends of Tamarancho

indeed there was a race on sunday.

the super chill and low key tamarancho fairfax fat tire festival mtb race. the weather was perfect, mid 70s and clear, the trails were super tight and dry, and the attendance was much larger than last year, about 60-70 riders this year. Course length was extremely short, 6 miles for beginner, 12 sport, 18 expert/pro. I almost opted for the expert ("to get my $35 entry fee-worth") and to see how i'd compare with the likes of mark weir, who showed up to lead the pro pack of riders. however, the organizers indicated the results might be sent on to norba, so in fear of having to race expert for the rest of the season, i wimped out and took 5th overall in sport.

the course doesn't entirely do justice to tamarancho's singletrack, 1/2 was very fast and steep fire roads, but it was sweet to be able to race a course that i know every single inch of. another excellent factor was in having a cold beer immediately post race in fairfax and only a 20 minute drive home.

Friends of Tamarancho 2007 race
Sport
5/35ish

josh

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2007 NVDC Race Reports

Doug Rea * Patrick Meyer * Matt Leonard

Peter Sterlacci's race report:

My result was not what I expected 34/35, but a pretty bad mechanical early in the race kept me on the side of the trail for a good 20+ minutes. I virtually called it a day when all the other race categories whizzed on by as I sat there cursing my bike. I finally got the bike working again and took off. I figured at least I would finish this damn thing.

I wound up passing a lot of people, but then again these were all the beginner classes. I can honestly say that even with 3 years of not racing I am clearly not a beginner. There is a HUGE difference between the beginner class and sport. I was just cruising past people on the climbs, downhills, etc. It was kind of a nice feeling as in my typical Sport races I generally wind up settling into the position I most likely finish in. In any case, I was hoping to eventually catch up with Doug Rea, but alas he wound up crossing the line 2 minutes before me. (Thanks Doug for at least asking if I was OK when you saw me on the side of the trail.).
I was super surprised to see that I actually did not finish last so I must of passed 1 guy in my category. Before the mechanical I was feeling really good and even had Matt Leonard in sight -- about 5 or so bikes up ahead of me. Assuming all else had gone well I may have actually finished in just under 2 hours (my goal for the day) -- but, hey, that's racing!! See you at the next CCCX race on 5/19.

Peter

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2007 Sea Otter Classic Race Reports

Matt Leonard * Kathleen Meyer * Mike Urbina

Peter Sterlacci * Matt Cerkel * Loren Thomas

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Super-D Sea Otter Classic: Scott Schlachter

I managed 8th/37 in Mens Open 40-49 in the Super-D. I'm happy with
that since I know our field included Keith DeFeibre (whos just damn
fast, at one time raced Semi-Pro DH, and currently Expert XC - he
took 2nd), and other Expert XCers. The course was very peddly and
not too technical - very suited to those in good shape primarily, as

long as they had half-way decent skillz (Expert XCers were perfectly
suited - and I'm guessing that many of the podium folks will be from
that background). We hit close to (and maybe over) 50 mph on some
of the fireroad sections. In practice, my buddy Eric, who was going
somewhat slow, registered 46mph on his Garmin.

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CCCX#5 - Toro Park - Isaias Job

CCCX#5 - Toro Park
TWW Fox XC Cup Series - Race#1
March 31st, 2007
Expert 19-34
Results 3/7

Ok, so I've been a roadie all year. I've got 6 road races\crits under my belt. I've been trying to ride my mtb at least once a week to keep my mtb skills honed. Well the proof is in the pudding as they say and wow I proved that although I have some roadie fitness, it doesn't necessarily transfer to mountain biking fitness.



Cause I gots my own blizog...check out my report here.

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CCCX DH #1: Scott Seery

Such great weather this weekend! I'm still sunburned from 2 days of bright, sunny skies.

Just a quick recap of the first DH of the 2007 season.

Arrived Friday afternoon and met up with a few others who had also taken Friday off to check out the course. I brought both a full DH bike (Yeti DH-9) and my new favorite, a Yeti 575 with Fox 36 Talus and DHX 5.0 Air, and DT Swiss DH wheelset. I brought them both, as one never really knows what to expect of a course, and the description on the website convinced me that it may be DH-bike worthy race.

The course essentially ran in a reverse direction on the trails used to get to the start of the race I ran in October '06. It began with a super fast rolling fireroad with two blind ski-jump style steep sections littered with moonscapes of erosion ruts and the like in the down slope transition. You'd approach each with enough speed (40+ mph) to unweight coming over the lip. The road then narrowed as it dumped into a series of tight 'n' twisty single track sections, some small ledges, some small rocky jumps, etc. Finally, the course popped out onto a paved section for ~100 yards, and then back onto single track, including a high speed, cobbly dry-creek crossing just before the final sprint to the finish. Although there were portions where a big bike would have reduced the speed pucker factor, I ended up racing the 575, a good choice overall.

I managed 2 practice runs before the park closed at 5 pm on Friday. The 2nd run I managed to snap a chain at the bottom as I sprinted the final couple hundred yards of gentle rollers on single track before the finish line. In 21 years of mountain biking, that is the first chain I've ever broken, a Shimano item with maybe 10 hours on it. Fortunately I scrounged a SRAM master link from someone at the venue and patched it up before I got kicked out of the park.

Race day came, and somehow I forgot to stop for breakfast before I got to Toro park. Darn it. So I drank tea and ate a few Balance bars and an apple. I saw Kathleen and her son just as I was headed up for my sole practice run, which I did late in the session. I had an early start time (13th racer down) and wanted to see the course in a condition that would be similar to what I would encounter in my race run. I donned most of my RockGardn gear (sans leggings) and full-face Azonic helmet to gain enough confidence for a practice run at race speed. It was no surprise that the tight, technical sections changed substantially from the day before, and so, too, did my tactics. Once seeing these changes in course condition/lines, I decided to race at a pace just fast enough to (hopefully) beat the competition that was there, and no more. I've learned the painful way that you only need to go fast enough to beat the 2nd place guy.

Once back to the bottom, I had just 20 minutes to rehydrate, eat a bit, and start the 30 minute, full-sun, push back to the start. I was already pretty fatigued and it took about 35 minutes for me to get the the top this time. I was drenched in sweat. Drenched. Someone managed to find and drink the water I had stashed at the top for my race run. Great. No shade and no water, and I had just 5 minutes to control the flood of sweat down my face before donning helmet and gloves. Before I knew it (and was ready), I was next to go. Dang.

Well, I overcooked the first loose turn off the high speed fireroad and got caught a moment in the branches of a scrubby bush, needing to downshift twice to get back up to speed. Not a bad mishap, really, but I lost a a good deal of speed. I was cautious through the new lines in the technical sections, but pedaled like a banshee where ever I could, sprinting all the way through the finish line. Soon I was looking for a good place to launch the contents of my empty stomach. My time was good (3:21.86), good enough to beat the guy I knew to be my main competition. I was 6 seconds ahead of him, and was certain I would be the winner, as the others in the class (45+ Expert) were 8 or 10 or more seconds behind as each came in one after another.

And then, I learned that some other guy - Brian Hughes, a Trailhead sponsored rider - had bested me by 2 seconds. None of us old guys knew of him before that day - Dang! Turns out he just moved up from the Expert 35-44 class, his 2007 racing age now 45. Darn upstart, gol' dang whipper-snapper! Although he had been in the top 5 in the 2006 Central Coast DH series, I had actually beaten his time at the October race, so I know I can beat him again. He's my new mark, although I still don't know who he is - he didn't show at the awards!

One down and 4 to go.

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CCCX DH #1: Kathleen Meyer

Our only experience (Patrick and mine) would have to be the GGG in years gone by and watching some of the Sea Otter. Not really sure what to expect...Patrick was excited to go. The only disappointment was not having a couple of his friends to join him. We were hoping to pack the car and get some of these kids out to check into something new. We haven't given up and will continue working on it for next time!

As we were told, there were a lot of juniors there. No shuttle so we started riding to the top in the mist of many people pushing their 40 to 50 pound rigs. The hills in Toro Park, while only a short distance from those at Fort Ord, have climbs reminiscent of Henry Coe State Park...steep! Even Patrick felt the need to walk but he still managed to catch up to me.

Folks were really cool, especially helpful as neither one of us knew what to expect. We met Brett at the top of one practice run. He lives at the VA hospital in Palo Alto. On paper he is just a number among the casualties from Iraq in August 2005. He took up biking as part of his recovery and now is an active on the downhill circuit. Later we happened across the "Brett Miller support team", friends from the VA, they were there to cheer him on.

While watching we witnessed one guy who didn't quite make the last left/right zig past a tree and its' roots. The guy slammed his front wheel into the base of the tree. Physics took over as his body followed and didn't stop until it folded over the front of his bike. It looked painful but the crowd started shouting for him to go on. With that kind of pressure (or support?) he didn't look back as he straightened out the bike and took off for the finish with the cheers pushing him on!

The Miller support team was happy to report it wasn't Brett!

Patrick managed to get in two practice runs before we ran into Scott Seery going up for his. By the time Patrick started up for his race run, the sun was hot just past noon. Patrick didn't have a good run, his time 5 minutes compared to the 4 or less of the others in his group. He was disappointed to have chain suck but as Seery noted, his brakes were rubbing. Still, Patrick had a blast. Enjoyed working on his bike for 6 hours this past week to get it ready and of course there weren't many there racing on a Bontrager Racelite (hardtail). For next time, we will get the Sugar repaired (I finally figured out when to replace the rear shock - when the kids crashes on the bike and it breaks!) and set it up for him.

...having the kid look at over at you on the drive home and say "thanks alot for taking me to the race today"...... priceless.
:)

Special thanks to the guy from TWW who delivered $25 to my door to help me take Patrick's friends to the race. I will be returning the money (and still trying to get the kids out there) but the gesture is a true measure of the kind of guys you are. It's a pleasure to be associated with people that care about kids like that.

Ride on...Kat

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CCCX XC #2: Matt Leonard

Alright, first race of the year! I showed up at around 9:15 and ran in to Rich. We got our stuff together and went out for a warm up lap. Unfortunately, Thursday night I found out that my middle chainring was worn. During our warm up, every time I even tried to use my middle ring, it just slipped like crazy. But the course seemed flat enough that I could just use my big ring the entire race. We goofed around for a little and then I went to the S/F line about 10 minutes before race time.

I lined up with the other 13 people in my category and we took off. I guess I got used to cross where everyone takes off at the fastest speed possible. When we hit the dirt I was in 2nd behind one of the high school kids sporting his norcal mtbing league jersey. He held me up a little on the downhill, but it was early, no rush. Once we hit the first and only real climb in the first lap, a couple of people just went right by us. But I managed to keep up, maybe in 4th or something. Once we hit the road climb, 4 guys were in front, but I was in another group of about 4 or 5 and we caught right up. I entered the dirt in about 3rd and we just kept the paceline going. It kinda sucked, just a bunch of roadies doing their roady stuff. We kept it like that for most of the first lap.

Coming across the line, I was in 7th. As the second lap went on, I kept the front 4 or so within 25 ft or so. They would take off for awhile, but then I would catch up to them on some of the more flowy singletrack. I was sort of bouncing around between 5th to 7th place. But I started to blow up a little on lap 3. I've been working pretty hard on the week nights, but not for any significant length of time. I tried to keep it up, but was really struggling. The little climbs in my big ring were really taking their toll and my legs were starting to cramp up a little. I ended up having to shift down to my little ring for the climb on the last 2 laps.

On the last lap, I caught up to this guy from Columbia and we tried to work together to catch the lead group. We took turns taking pulls on the road, but by the top of the hill, I just couldn't keep up. The last half of the lap, there were a good amount of people passing me. But mostly leaders from different groups. It was much different than last year. With the 30 second start intervals, people were catching me on the first lap last year. Yesterday, I don't think people caught me until the 3rd or 4th lap.

I ended up losing one more spot with about a mile to go and came in at 8th of 14. I was really expecting to do better, but thats the breaks I guess. Allan didn't catch me, so thats good. I think he caught me at every CCCX race last year. I don't know, I felt a lot faster. My new Fox fork was amazing. It felt like I was just gliding over the rough stuff, a huge improvement over my old Duke Race. Looking at some of the results from last year, I was right in it with guys that were beating me by a considerable amount last year. Crap, just checked the results. I was over 5 minutes behind the leader. Well, I was right with them for most of the race, I really must have blown up that last lap. The Columbian dude put 2 minutes on me in a half of a lap. Next time I guess I'll remember my hammer gel and try to pace myself a little better.

Matt Leonard
Sport 19-34
8/14

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CCCX #1: Schlachter

The rain helped create pretty good traction on this nice day down at
the old Fort Ord property, but there were a few mud puddles to help
get the sandy mud all over bike+rider. Drive trains were making
loud, painful noises all over the place.

The good news was that the
sun came out for us, and the day ended up really nice down there.
The bad news for Rich Davis and I was that we both ended up with
HUGE slices of Humble Pie. So much for me being in about the best
XC shape of my life... 18th/25 in Mens Sport 35-44...

During my first lap, I was doing OK, probaby a little better than
mid-pack, when mid-course, 2 guys crashed into each other and went
down right in front me, HARD. I mostly avoided the crash, but did
get a little tangled in my bike as I ran over one of the guys feet.
The other guy hopped up and asked "are you allright?" to the other
guy. When he didn't answer, the guy got on his bike and road off.
Nice. I repeated the question. The guy still didn't answer (just
wincing in pain and staring off in the other direction). I asked
him two more times if he wanted me to get help. Meanwhile people
are flying by us. He finally said "yeah, I think so." I hopped on
my bike and went off. Luckily, we weren't too far from the finish
line, and I told them as I was riding by to send someone for a rider
down. Later I found that they did indeed find him, and he ended up
getting treated by the EMTs - never heard how he was, and I hope he
was OK.

Back in the race, my biggest problem was my back - it was screaming
for the first two laps, and finally near the beginning of the third
lap, when I was contemplating pulling out of the whole damn race, I
finally pulled off and stretched for a few minutes, while what
seemed like loads of racers flew by. After that I was good to go
though - which was nice. I actually got a second wind in the 4th
lap, and passed a few folks that had passed me earlier.

My only hope is that only the hard-core hammerheads come out for
these early races...

-Schlachter
PS - Charles Price was there, and walked away with a 4th place
medal. Thank you to Allan for the cheers, and a few other folks
that cheered the TWW jersey...

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Pilarcitos #5: Matt Leonard

Well, again, I had some goals that didn't get met. But I had a great weekend. Saturday Katie and I went for a nearly 40 mile ride around Woodside and Portola Valley. I think its only her 2nd or third ride since the AIDS/LifeCycle. I didn't think that would affect my race Sunday, but when I told Kyle about the ride, he thought I was nuts, of course it would hinder my performance. Oh well, it was worth it.

So Katie and I showed up around 10:45 and cruised around and got my stuff set up. As I rode around, checking the course out, my parents rolled up with my grandma, and my brother and his family showed up. So already, a good day.

As I warmed up, I kept goofing around, and got 2 flats bunny hopping curbs. Guess I need some practice with that. Once I was done goofing around and riding the course, I went over to the start line and who do I see, Schlachter. The race wasn't even close to starting and he is lined up. Whats going on with this guy? Both he and his bikes have lost a lot of weight. He rolled up on Bob's old redline (I think) cross bike, built up with odds and ends from his garage, and he was early. He said he was up until 4 am putting it together, yikes.

So we chatted it up with Rob, I guy I've met a few times throughout the year sporting the TWW jersey. One of these days he says he'll join up for a wednesday night ride. The guy said start and I felt like I got off to a good start. Everyone bottled up at the hill before the upper parking lot, but I saw it coming and was off my bike pretty quick and running. I think I was in maybe 15th to 20th at that point, which was fine with me. As I came down the hill, I had to be patient and wait for the silly roadies to make there way down, but passed where I could.

I bombed down the hill to the pavement, tight little u-turn off the curb and hammered towards the sand pit. During my warm up, I road it twice, feeling really good. But when I hit it this time, the sand had dried out and gotten more soft. So I just got off and ran with everyone else. When I hopped on my bike, I notice my chain was off. Its time to get a little third eye thingy or something, this has been killing me all year. I probably watched about 15 people go by me, including Scott. I got back on and hit the gas. I was passing people left and right, which was surprising since it was a long road stretch.

I kept on the gas and found my self reeling people in. I was feeling good so I just kept on the gas hard. But about halfway through my 3rd lap, my quadriceps started to twinge. I backed off a hair, but I was headed in to the trees and all of the uphill. I stood almost the whole way, just trying to make up lost ground. But by the end of that lap, I couldn't fight the cramping. I could barely stand on my bike, and was paranoid about the barriers. I was worried I wouldn't be able to bend my legs and get over them. I managed to make it through with out tripping, but on the 4th lap, people started to pass me and Scott had made up ground on me. By the start of the last lap, he was maybe 25 yards behind me heading in the the trees. By the time we ran through the sand and hit the pavement, he was right with me. Even pushing me, literally.

I tried to fight him and a few others off, but after the second set of barriers, he and 2 other guys went right around me at the last paved section. I kept with them, hoping something miraculous would happen with my legs. Scott and Dave from the Ritchey/Lapierre team started to leave me and the guy in front of me, and I couldn't get around the guy until too late. So Scott ended up 2 spots ahead of me, on a bike he pieced together at 4 am the night before. Man, I really had hoped to get in to the top 20, but that will have to wait until next year. Time to start thinking about the 2007 MTB season. The Peak Season races in Santa Cruz are the last races I'll be able to make, and hopefully I can pull out a little better result before I hang the rock lobster up for awhile.

Anyway, It was great having my family there, riding with Katie Saturday, and having a beer with Scott after the race. After my sister-in-law joked about how she was telling me how good my beer tasted as I was racing (they only left me 2 beers out of my 6!), my parents took off and I told them I'd see them at my grandmas. My dad replied something along the line of well, we might see you, but as soon as you get there, we're taking off, kidding as if he didn't want to hang out with us. Scott laughed and commented that its nice to see that the TWW crew doesn't treat me any worse than my own family. Anyway, it was definitely cool to have my grandma out there. Usually its tough to drag her out of the house, so that made my day, regardless of the fact that I didn't get the result I was looking for.

Matt
Cat B Men 34/45 5 laps 48:17

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Pilarcitos #4-Golden Gate Park by Matt Leonard

Well, I kind of threw this race out the window Friday night. Isaias and Ty talked me in to going out in the city to a place called the Element Lounge. Now, I heard lounge and thought that sounded cool. When we showed up, I don't think there was a single person sitting down, lounging, kicking back or anything like that. Everyone was dancing and thats just not my style. However, with the proper BAC, you can get me out on the dance floor. And thats just what happened. So a few too many beers and up till 2:30 or so and I figured my race Sunday morning was all over.

I woke up at 9:30 on Sunday to my phone ringing, still groggy even after a full days rest on Saturday. Ty called to let me know he was too scared to race me in the B's, and he was going to stay home and do laundry or something, maybe wash his hair, I'm not sure. (kidding of course, he would have kicked me "arse" as Isaias would say.) I pulled my self together and got over to GGP around 11:15 and hopped on my bike for a real easy warm up lap, mostly to just check out the course. Man, I was already pretty beat. I came back and rehydrated, and then back out for another lap at a little faster pace. Came back, hydrated, and repeated that one or two more times. The course was nice, really tacky and just enough technical stuff to keep me happy.

So 1:10 rolls around and I'm standing in a pack of 60 or so riders, ready to roll up to the start line. After the callups, everybody moves up, except the guy right in front of me. I probably lost 3 rows just because he sort of sat there and let everyone cram in front of him. DOH! Oh well, I wasn't planning on anything spectacular yesterday anyways. So the guy says go and we're off. I passed maybe 5 or 10 people before the dirt, and continued to do so for the next 1/4 of a lap or so. I knew I was midpack, and pretty content with that. I hit the first set of barriers, and when I went to jump, my legs just yelled at me and told me to stop it. I made it over, but knew I needed to pay close attention throughout the race and not get lazy.

As the race went on, I felt better and started to catch some guys that I've been chasing since the first CX race of the year. That sort of got me going and I began to chase. I was feeling pretty good, but still just having fun. So when Isaias offered up his beer coming to the start/finish with 1 to go, I said why not. Got a good cheer from the crowd and then took off. I ended up passing 3 or 4 of Isaias's Ritchey buddies on the last lap. This has been my goal for the season. I thought I could get up in to the top 10, but I think that will have to wait till next year. So for now, I still have one guy thats within reach, and I hope he shows up at the Pilarcitos finale. He and the Soulcraft guy are the two I'm gunning for. If I can take them in two weeks, I'll consider my first CX season successful.

Well, I ended up getting passed by a Sycip guy with like a minute left in the race, and couldn't catch him. Oh well, I still had a good time. It was fun having Lloyd, Isaias, Mo and some others yelling at me. I kept trying to hand my bike off to Lloyd, but he just wouldn't take my place. Thanks again to Julie for the water feed. I owe her some beer or something. Thats like the 3rd time shes helped me out. Maybe a Big Sky assortment pack of beers. So, 36 out of 61 with 5 of the 7 Ritchey guys behind me. Not too shabby considering my Friday night.

Matt

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CCX DH #4-Bob Lofland

Hard choices, Cyclocross or Downhill, Downhill was the choice. I
figured a couple hours of climbing would be good exercise and I need
it. And Toro Park was only about an hour drive.

I was happy hear the the single track in race #2 was part of the
course. I was a little concerned with the upper freeway. It did not
feel very good in practice. And the climb was over an hour, so I was
only able to get one practice run from the top. I broke a spoke on the
second climb up, and almost called it a day. Did not want to destroy a
wheel. But Scott and crew convinced me that 31 out of 32 was not bad.
When I arrive up top I checked the wheel, no noticable wobble, so I
figured what the heck.

I set my Epic Brain totally soft. And my Terralogic F100X totally
turned out. The suspension was very soft. On my preride I was
concerned about burning up the brakes. Seemed like I was on them a
lot. During the run on the upper freeway I used brakes only twice,
once over a rolling rise and the other into a very fast and soft
corner. It was really clear and steep fireroads. I felt great on the
lower portion, and even launched a couple logs. One little slip on a
corner caused me to dab, but it was nothing. Well maybe that and a one
faster corner would have put me in 7th.

End result was 8th out 14. I was happy considering this was my 2nd DH
race and the 45+ group is not categorized, so it is all expert, sport
and beginner lumped in one. 5th, 6th , and 7th only had 6, 7, and 14
seconds on me respectively. Then the 4th place guy, Rich Davis
finished 8:58, about 30 seconds faster.

Overall I felt good about being so close to the next places. It was a
long course. If I had pushed a little harder, maybe put on real DH
tires? Next time. One more CCX DH and I plan on being there.

And no crash or damage. I think I am going to start doing a little
more DH next year. Providing the venues exist that allow me to use my
XC rig.

Bob

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Pilarcitos #3 - McClaren Park OR "Yes, I finally found my legs!"

'Cause I got's my own blizog, I'm cross posting...
Finally, finally I actually felt like I was racing and not just surviving. In otherwords, I felt like I had game. I had a stratgey, I was collected, I was efficient on the bike and the technical style of the course suited my mountain biker abilties.


http://isaiasjob.blogspot.com/

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Pilarcitos #3 - Matt Leonard

Well, I went at it again yesterday in San Francisco. Katie and I showed up around 11 or so to the 3rd Pilarcitos race of the year in McLaren Park (I think it was really Crocker Amazon park, but whatever). I went to register and ran in to Jeff as he was waiting to line up for his race. After watching him take of in the 35+As, I walked over to the Ritchey tent and said whats up to Isaias as he was warming up on his trainer. After we had scoped the scene out, I went back, changed and got my bike while Katie set up shop with her captains chair, a few water bottles for me and a book.

I went for my first warm up lap and felt like crap. But, I came around, talked to Katie for a bit and drank some water. I went out for another lap before the A men started, feeling a little better. By my third lap, I was feeling okay, but just tired. I wasn't focused and was having a hard time concentrating, which was not a good thing on this course. There was nowhere to recover and just ride. The course was either up, down, through a ton of S turns, or on the pavement sprinting.

I lined up about mid-pack and we took off. By the end of the pavement, I was probably in the top 1/3 or so. Over the first set of barriers and up the run up, I probably came out at mid-pack. But with all the climbing, I was really able to pass people. We got to the top of the hill, down the super bumpy decent, up a little pavement to a run up with a log at the end and there were about 10 of us in a line. I was somewhere in the middle. We all got back on and started riding, but at the first little hill, everyone spun out and we all lost our momentum as the top 10 or so guys just took off. DOH! Oh well. After we hit the paved decent, I said screw this and went to the side and passed about 5 guys. Only problem was, I could stop before the turn. So I sort of rode of the side of the trail and got out of everyones way and watched about 10 people go by me before the 2nd climb of the course. I passed maybe 5 more people before the end of the lap, so maybe in 15th to 20th place.

I started the second lap sort of by myself, trying to catch some people, but that wasn't going to happen. Over the first barrier before the run up, I completely ate it. I just misjudged the height of the barrier and caught my front foot. At least I got a good cheer from everyone. Back on the bike and up the run up. On the first climb, I caught a few more people. I had even caught up to Isaias's Ritchey teammates who had beat me by about 3-4 minutes at candlestick. So I was feeling good about my position. I passed a couple of those guys and was really going hard. But that didn't work out too well again. After the decent before the parking lot, there was a little tight turn and the guy in front of me went wide so I went for the pass. But my front tire slipped in to a rut I didn't see and over I went again. Again, like 5 people passed me. Damn.

I just couldn't find a rhythm. I kept on it thought for the rest of the race. There may have been one person each lap or so for the next few laps that I passed, but nothing significant. Then on the last lap, I dropped my chain and had to stop at the top of the run up to put it back on. Soon after that, a Soulcraft guy passed me, then a guy from organic athlete. I was able to pass the organic athlete guy on the first climb and keep that lead for the most part. He passed me for a second on the last climb, but mentioned he couldn't stay there. And he was right, I stepped on it and he was back behind me. The guy from Soulcraft was in my sights, but I just couldn't get him through the S turns. I popped out on to the pavement with the organic athlete guy right behind me, and the Soulcraft guy maybe 50ft ahead. With everything I had left, I stood up and sprinted, making up maybe maybe 2/3 of the distance on the Soulcraft dude, and the organic athlete guy came up right behind me at the finish line. But it just wasn't enough for him, as his front wheel was about a foot behind mine.

So, all in all, I'm glad I went out and punished myself. I really enjoyed walking the course with Katie during the women's race, showing here where I screwed up and where I passed people. I think a conversation between her and Isaias pretty much summed up my race. Something like this:

Katie: "Matt really doesn't look like he is having fun."
Isaias: "Fun?!? He isn't suppose to be having fun, this is cross!"
Katie: "Yeah, but all the other races, when he goes by he is smiling and laughing."
Isaias: "Well he isn't working hard enough then."

They were both right, I was really suffering. But I felt like at Watsonville, I worked just as hard, but had a blast during the race. Not so much this time, but I think it had a lot to do with just being tired, not thinking clearly and making stupid mistakes. Doing well last weekend made me overconfident and I was too aggressive which forced stupid mistakes. However, I finished 25th out of 33 with 6 guys behind me on the lead lap. At Candlestick, I was dead last on the lead lap. So I'll look at it as an improvement. And looking at the C's, if they did 6 laps, I would have been 5th out of 65. So I'm still feeling good about being in the B's. No sandbagging here. However, I may have to revise my thoughts about a top ten finish. Top 20 would make me happy.

Next week I'll be on a plane to New Hampshire, so no race. But, if the stars align just right, and flights are on time, Katie will pick me up at the airport the following sunday. The Rock Lobster and all my gear will be loaded up in the car, and its straight to Golden Gate park for Pilarcitos #4.

Congratulations to Isaias for a killer finish in the A's. Probably his best finish ever. And thanks to Meredith, Jeff and Shannon for cheering me on. It makes big difference. And of course, thanks to Tim, Julie and Paule from Roaring Mouse for heckling me throughout the entire race. Thats what its all about, making fun of your friends when they screw up. And they were there each time yesterday.

Matt
25/33 B 45:13 6 laps

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