I won.

Me stalking in the background

Now that i have your attention, I will say that there were not that many people in the race. It was a 3 hour endurance race in the "northwoods" of wisconsin. Jane and I were at a friends cabin with several couples (which was awesome), and this race on the WEMS series was only 45 minutes from the cabin. It was the Wasburn Rock and Root, just outside of Rhinelander, WI. Myself and co-conspirator Jack Zabrowski lined up for the 3 hour tour. I hadn't really ridden since the previous race as my bruised/broken ribs have been giving me a bunch of trouble. I wasn't actually sure that I would line up for this one, but after some pre-medding with tylenol, it was doable. I told myself that if I was in pain I was going to shut it down, but at the start I knew I had a chance to win so it was on and I was ready.

My main competition was going to be Jack and some Australian named Owen. I am well aware that you can never trust an Australian as Australia is entirely peopled with criminals, so I made sure to keep a close eye on him. Add in the fact that he is a Cat 1 road racer and lived and raced in Belgium, and his legs were huge......it was going to be a good race. He was however, riding an 26" aluminum hardtail. I knew in a 3 hour race I had the mechanical advantage riding the epic 29, especially because we soon found out the trails were bumpy as shit.

It all started with a 2 mile double track leadout before we came through the start/finish and into the single track. Thank god it wasn't a LeMans start as I still can't run on my leg since I broke it last February. Owen takes off at the gun and I manage to hold his wheel the entire time. We opened up a huge gap right away and my friend Jack later told me that there was no way he was going to go that fast that quick. We empty into the singletrack which was all pretty technical. 100% singletrack the rest of the lap until you come through the double track at the end of the lap (that we started with). Right away I could tell Owen's tech skills were lacking but he had more horsepower for sure. I sat behind the first half of the lap and eventually told him I would lead. As soon as I took over I tried to gap him but it only ever got up to about 10 seconds. We came through the double track at the end of the first lap with him basically on my wheel and he put the hammer down. He immediately opened up 30 second gap. I tried to chase a bit but had to slow it down.

Second lap it started raining a bunch and the trail was getting muddy and slick very fast. I was riding very bad at this time and was suffering. I began thinking that I was just going to have to hold on to 2nd place. However, the last part of the 2nd lap I started picking my head up and looking down the trail like you're supposed to and immediately I start riding fast again. I came through for the 3rd lap and they said Owen was only 55 seconds ahead. It was great, I started riding really fast and was just so focused. I came up on the Aussie within 5 minutes and I knew I had a good chance at getting a good gap. I was getting really anxious to move around and almost crashed. He opened 10 seconds right away but I stayed calm and just rode up to him. I must have been putting on the pressure for him to ride fast because he started making a bunch of mistakes. I think I was being too polite again. How do you handle these situations? If the leader is fumbling around and I'm soft pedaling sticking his wheel, do I ask him to move over or do you just tell him you're going to pass and then try to take it from him? Eventually he bobbled enough and let me go through when he dabbed. With 1/2 to 1/3 lap to go I was out of sight. I was just worried that he would catch me on the double track, but I soon realized he was gone and I had won. I ended up finishing 3 minutes up on him and about 20 minutes over the next closest. Granted it was a smaller race, and not that many people, but I was pretty happy with how things unfolded.

That night at the cabin I ate a shit ton of tacos and it was good. My ribs are in some trouble though. During the race it felt fine, but the second I got off the bike, I could barely move. Still today it's pretty bad. I may sit out next weekends WORS race - we'll see.

WORS - Camrock

Sunday was the latest installment of the WORS series. This time we rode in circles just outside of Madison, WI. It was a new venue to the WORS circuit and it was pretty good. Lots of climbing which is good for me and some technical stuff, also good for me. I traveled to the city of hippies with 2 other La Crosse jerks on Saturday eve to stay at some other jerks house - formerly of La Crosse. This jerk and his wife were gracious hosts and provided us with a pretty good pasta dinner and a homemade sauce that was amazing. We settled in and watched "get him to the greek" which was pretty mediocre. I brought a sleeping bag and a pad and tossed and turned on the living room floor. Awoke at 7am feeling very sleepy, breakfast at some diner at 9, at the race course by noon for our 1:30 start. It was supposed to cool down on Sunday, but it did not. The sun was blazing and it was hot. Not Missouri/Kansas hot mind you, but Wisconsin hot. This means temps in the upper 80's. Although I do miss living in KC, this summer looked pretty stupid weather wise - forget that.

The course started up a long steep grassy climb before you emptied into singletrack. Earlier in the week my legs felt great. However, I could tell I didn't have the pop from earlier in the week during warm up. Still no top end, but enough mid level power to get me through. I was excited though as this was the first race on the epic 29er. All my rides before had been impressive and I was hoping this would be no different.

Anyway, we go and I get a poor start. Not aggressive enough at the start and stuck behind some slower riders. 2 minutes into the race and I'm 45 seconds down on the leaders. This is no new scenario for me and MTB races though. I just have a hard time going 100% for the first part of the race. First lap was good enough though as I was keeping pace with some of the LaCrosse posse, I eventually faded a bit and had to take it down a notch. 2nd lap it started raining and turned everything very slick. There were lots of hike a bikes up the tech uphill stuff. I got caught up at one time, couldn't clip back in from running and lost a few spots. got going, not clipped in and fell again, and bobbled some more. I think I lost about 1 minute and probably 5 spots during this spell. I finally got going and settled down a bit. By then, the rain was tapering and things were drying up quick. I got behind a group of 4 who were apparently out for a Sunday freaking cruise. I stayed behind in the single track as they were holding conversations with each other. I should have been way more aggressive here and ran them off the trail and not waited until it opened up. But once it did open up I told them to move over and quickly dropped them as I put the newly recharged hammer down. A few tried to make the move with me but it was 1/2 lap to go of the 3rd and final lap and I was irritated with lost opportunity. I began ripping some trail on my way to bridging up to and passing 2 more. I got a brief glimpse of what I was capable of when I can ride unimpeded and I knew I was flying. I rolled in 10 minutes down on the overall cat 2 winner. Finished 35 out of seventy something finishers. 7 out of 10 in my age group - which isn't great.

Overall a good race though. Got a little beat up with my falls on the 2nd lap and took some knocks to both knees. The bike was flawless. There were some sections that were pretty rough and a lot of people were talking about how beat up they got. I actually felt decent at the end of my race and could have easily knocked out another lap if I had to. That bike smoothed everything out like butter.

Next weekend we're traveling to the great north woods of Wisconsin to stay at a cabin with some friends. there just so happens to be a WEMS endurance MTB race 30 minutes from where we're staying. So I'll be lining up in the 3 hour solo race on saturday. I hope my upgraded parts come in by then.

there is no going back

I'm referring to the 2011 Specialized Epic 29er that I am now the owner of. There are a few things that I have acquired in my short cycling career that represent huge jumps in performance/fun/going fast. The first would be going to my first carbon road bike from an aluminum framed specialized allez elite. Britton at Volker bicycles helped make that one happen. The Jamis Xenith Race was a great bike. Another would be getting a nice pair of carbon road shoes, again courtesy of Volker bikes. When you switch from plastic road shoes that have zero stiffness - that jump is huge. The most recent jump is riding this new MTB. The combination of big wheels and full suspension is crazy good. The bike is so much more responsive on the front end than my Gary Fisher which was a bit sluggish. Part of that may be due to the larger 2.2 tires on the Fisher. But the rear of the bike just puts power to the ground and it keeps the power there. It's a bit of a lazy mans bike because you can just ride through any obstacle and it just keeps going with momentum.

I rode the cam rock trails last saturday, it was hot and it was the first official ride on the new bike. I got things dialed in pretty good. Sunday I went out to Kettle Morain state forest and rode a shit ton of single track. 25 miles to be exact. and i never rode any section of trail twice - although it would have been nice to, there was some fast stuff. I rode the john muir section then the overgrown connector trail to emma carlin. It was hot and I was low on food. I went through 3 gels and was wishing i had some solid food. Rode back towards john muir thinking I might bonk, but the return route was a lot shorter. Packed up and hit the general store in La Grange which doubles as a bike shop. Had a good lunch and drove the 2.5 hours home. Great day of riding and I was buzzing. I haven't had this much fun on a bike in a long time.