WORS#7: The Sun has burst

We were up early on Saturday, trying to do the nearly impossible. We were planning on getting up, having a nice breakfast out together, driving 2 hrs northwest to my sister’s house in Edgerton for a summer party, then driving 2.5 hrs northeast of there for a Mountain bike race. Traffic getting out of Chicago was terrible, and we ended up having to abort the trip to my sister’s house before we even got past the Edens. It’s a shame because from what my parent’s told us on Sunday, they had a great time on Saturday afternoon whereas my afternoon was rather miserable.

We headed 2.5hrs due north from Chicago and made it to Kewaskum with plenty of time. We toured the Kettle Morraine North state forest for a bit, before circling back south to the Sunburst Ski area where we got the lay of the land, found registration, and I got ready to preride. Morleigh sat under a tree reading a book, and I went out to suffer for 40 minutes. I was pre-riding so I tried to take it easy, but the first mile or so of the course was all up hill, winding in switch back after switchback along the west and south faces of the ski hill. It was not an easy climb. There were a few non-technical loops of single track wrapping around the top like a bad comb-over, but all too quickly the coursed headed down the far side of the hill into the abandoned X-mas tree farm below. The bulk of the course (in terms of distance) distance wise was wrapped like small intestines through the tight rows of trees. There were a lot of straight aways, 90deg or 180 degree turns, and a lot of climbing that didn’t really seem like climbing. They were deceptive because they were not as long as the climb up the mountain, but they were still steep and soul crushing. If Iola took us through the forest of Fangorn, then this course was the plains of Gorgoroth in Mordor. The sun had baked the earth, and it crumbled into fine powder which was projected upward as an aerosol. It was brown, dry, dull, and hot. Of the 40 minutes I spent riding less than 5 minutes was actually enjoyable. It was like the worst parts of a mountain bike race (climbing single track) combined with the most boring yet difficult cyclocross course I had ever seen.

I rolled back over to Morleigh and was seriously befuddled. Was I in such a serious emotional funk that I was incapable of actually enjoying anything? Or was it really that bad? Did I need to ride another lap, or was one enough? I went, registered, and came back, and I decided that riding another six mile loop on that particular course would do nothing for my performance the next day. There were no technical sections that required additional attention. It felt like the best thing I could do for my performance would be to go back to the hotel, get a good meal, and get a good night sleep. As I was changing back into civilian clothes my suspicions about the course were reaffirmed by a group of women who were having a conversation behind me. From what I could gather from their conversation the course was in their estimation both difficult and boring. I felt somewhat vindicated in my assessment, and my decision to not ride a second lap. We drove around the chalet and found a good spot to set up our tent. We staked it to the ground and then went back south to West Bend. We did the normal Saturday night things: we checked into the hotel, and looked for a restaurant. We have had good success with the restaurants in micro-breweries, and our experience was West Bend was no different. They had great food, and even had homemade root beer, and a delicious orange vanilla cream soda. We then topped our evening off with a little shopping. We had both forgotten the snacks that were sitting on the kitchen counter, and needed a few personal items, so we stopped at the Walmart across the street from our hotel. I sure know how to treat a girl to a nice Saturday night.

The next morning we enjoyed our make-your-own-waffles and headed to the venue. The southern parking lot was almost empty when we arrived, so we parked as close as possible to the tent and proceeded to unload. We set up chairs, pulled over the cooler, and started the process of getting ready. I did not bring my camera, because with the compressed timeline of the day I did not want the extra weight (both physically, temporally, and emotionally). So I had a race-only day, and I was able to focus on my preparations. I did help others prepare as well. Amy D from Half-Acre was arriving late, and I helped her with her final preparations getting her to the starting line on time.

Because I was not distracted taking photos I was able to get everything ready, and start a long, slow, early warm-up. I was out on the road by 10:45AM and was able to roll up and down the road for a good 20 minutes, burning hard and working the sloth that was lingering heavy from my legs. I was off my bike because of work on Monday – Wednesday, because of laziness on Thursday, and did a light workout with some intervals on Friday. The one adventure I had with registration was realizing that my pull-tag did not have my number written on it, but was three less than my race number. I went to registration and got a new tag, but then spent the rest of the morning until my flight looking to see if anyone was registered with that number to have them check if they were wearing my pull-tag. I never did find anyone with that number.

We made it down to the starting line, and bantered a little bit before the start of our race. I let one gentleman know that he did not have a number on the front of his bike (I don’t know what happened to him). We pulled up to the starting line, and my though through my strategy again. I was not going to go out hard and try to get the whole shot. I was going to blend in for the first lap, and try to take it easy.

GOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!

With my call-up I was near the front, but it’s always a crap-shoot being in the second line as to who is best to line up behind. I was in 8-10th place after the first turn, and the sight of riders within my wave disappearing egged me onward. But still I tried to keep calm, keep my heart rate down, because I knew there was much work left to do. We made it through the prologue, past the tent of my cheering family, and when we made it around the barrels at the southern part of the course those initial matches that my competitors had ignited at the start, started to sputter and fade. I tried to keep pedaling at a sub-maximal pace, and before the top of the open switchbacks I was in third place heading into the wooded switchbacks. I was happy with that, but my body was not. Before the second set of switchbacks my Garmin alarm started to go off. My heart rate was above 167 which is not a sustainable pace for me. Unfortunately there was no time to recover. We climbed on, climbed on, climbed on.

When we made it up to the top our first opportunity to catch our breath was a downhill straight away along the edge of the neighbor’s soybean field. It was straight and steep, and just coasting we approached 25mph. At the bottom I locked up the brakes, and slowed down as we turned right. I didn’t see what happened, but the leader of our wave (I think it was Jerry) went down hard. The whole line backed up, but he got back quickly and limped up the hill. When the single track opened up into a wide grass patch at the top, he pulled over to re-align his handlebars. I made a move on the C40+ who was in second place and took the lead of my wave. My heart was still thumping loud in my chest, and my garmin was still beeping.

We fiddled about on the top for a short while, and then dropped off the backside on the fast, steep, and all too short descent, and back into the plains of Gorgorath. At that point we had just started rolling up on the stragglers from earlier waves, so I was happy to have the extra space to pass, but I was unable slow down and catch my breath. Whenever I tried to back-off the speed to catch my breath Don, the number two rider from my wave was right behind me egging me on. My Garmin continued to beep. It was like watching the fuse of a cartoon bomb burn down toward the gunpowder. Would Elmer Fudd make it to the finish line before he blew up? Finally I hit my threshold and knew that I had to slow down. When we reached the top of yet another loop that went half-way up the ski-hill, I told Don that he could take the lead and pull for a while, because I needed to “drop 10 beats or I was going to blow up.” He said he was in the same place, so I continued to lead. The second lap was a blur. I was, after 20 hard minutes of riding, able to get my HR back down to about 160, and started to feel like I was in a sustainable place. Then I had to climb the hill again.

The second time up the hill I was able still able to move, and passed some people climbing on the wide grassy slope, and crawled by some people on the steeper uphill. When I made it back to Gorgoroth I had opened up a sizable gap the rest of my wave. I could see Dan and the other riders in my wave as we looped past on some of the longer switchbacks. I had no sense of how far behind they were, but their footsteps were ever ringing in my ears. The second time through Gorgoroth was marked by the degradation of fine motor skills that is associated with low oxygen to the brain. I was taking corners poorly, and was running off the relatively wide track into the grass and trees, and making the small kind of mistakes that would have been punished greatly in the woods. I had to shake my head and tell myself to wake up and pay attention a couple of different times. I came into and through the bulk of the single-speed field during the second trip through the plains.

When I came out of the plains into the “completely unnecessary switchbacks” that separated the plains from the finish line, I was reeling from the effort and from the heat. At the neutral aid-station I took two cups of water, one on the downhill side, one on the uphill side, and doused both of them down my back. I was using my camelpak as much for cooling (suck and spit) as I was for hydration. I took a hand-up of nutrients from my Mom (“Thanks Mom”) and went to face the last time up the hill. It was brutal. My heart rate once again spiked to almost max, and my speed dropped. I was in my granny gear, spinning as fast as I could spin, and it felt like I was not going anywhere at all.

Yet I was still passing people. I even had to burn a match against my will because I was stuck on the step wooded single track behind a rider who was going so slow I had to stop and track-stand at one particular point to keep from running into him. I made my way past, and continued to pass more riders. It was in the third pass through the planes that my systems started to shut down. I had come upon a number of riders, who were kicking up major dust clouds that were coating my skin, my nose, my mouth, and my eyes, but I could not push my way through them. It was feel the dust layering on my cornea, and I could not produce enough tears to wash it away. My core temperature started to rise, and my speed drop. I started to shiver and knew that heat exhaustion was eminent.

I could see the rest of my wave coming up from behind. There were two guys who were closing fast. Jerry from Wheel and Sprocket, Marcus from Titletown were closing as well. I could not hold Jerry. He would not be denied, and he passed me on the “completely unnecessary switchbacks”. Marcus was closing in fast as well. When I got to the uphill side of the neutral aid station, I could see him approaching on the downhill side. It was one thing for one of the older guys to pass me, but another Clydesdale slipping by without so much as a whimper? My pride roared up from within the deep within the pain cave. “Get down here and make him earn it.” I rounded the final switchback, and got out of my saddle and sprinted up the final hill. I looked back as I crested and saw a big enough gap that I let off the gas and coasted downhill into the finish. I was second in my wave, and had suffered for 1hr and 24 minutes straight. My average heart rate was 91% of my maximum over the course of 1.4 hrs, and my max heart rate got to 98% of the highest ever recorded. I didn’t know where I had finished in the pack, but the C40+ (Marcus) stopped by to congratulate me and say he was glad to learn that we were in different age classes. He had been chasing me thinking that I was between him and the top of the podium. He was relieved to realize he was already there.

Setting up the tent right next to the finish line was probably the best thing we did all weekend. I rolled across the course and I was in the shade, with cool water to douse over my head. It felt good to rinse off some of the dust and lower my core body temperature. It wasn’t quite as good as the Post-Gravel metric baptism, but it was very very close. It took a while before I felt human again, and the stress/fatigue I felt was comparable only in magnitude to the Gravel Metric. But eventually I got my feet underneath me, started to clean up, pack up, and get ready to go. I would have liked to stay for the podiums, but I ticket for a 7:07PM flight leaving O’hare, and we had a number of errands to run on the way home. We had to go to the Bike shop to drop off the team tent, then to my apartment to drop off the bike and stuff. We rolled out of Kewasum at 2pm, and I was standing at gate B10 by 6:05PM having accomplished all of the aforementioned errands plus a pit-stop at an A&W for some “to-go” food. Our guardian angels were looking out for us and clearing the way that day. Any number of traffic-choke points or lines at the airport could have left us short on time and me trying to duct tape myself to the wing of an airplane. Instead I was at the airport with plenty of time to relax and prepare for the early beginning of my work week.

WORS#6: Alterra Coffee Bean Classic (Fat Man's Misery)

It's been a busy week.  As start writing this post I am in a hotel waiting for sleep to overcome me before another MTB race tomorrow.  I have not even written about last week's race.  As we have done all summer my girlfriend and I headed to the WORS venue on Saturday afternoon.  We had planned to ride up with our friend Jackie, but other commitments pulled her away so we were on our own.  The race was close, just over the border outside of Milwaukee, so we took our time initially.  We drove up LSD to Sheridan, and followed Sheridan all the way north along the lake, a route that I have ridden dozens if not hundreds of times.  I pointed out landmarks and told stories of recent rides (Ba'hai temple sprints, etc), as we rolled past the endless fields of legitimate mansions.

As we approached Lake Cook we looked at the clock and realized we had better pick up the pace if we were going to meet Jackie at the venue before the "Learn to Ride" clinic which she was thinking about doing again.  We hopped on the highway, and made a beeline for the venue.

We arrived just after 3PM, and we found Jackie (or she found us) as I was starting to pull my things out of the van and get ready.  When I was kitted-up, we headed toward the starting line, and Jackie decided she just wanted to pre-ride the course and not do the whole clinic.  We skipped going down to the start and continued around the first flat section without climbing out of the bowl one more time.

We took a very easy pace, Jackie is still building her bike handling skills, and has enough skinned knees under her belt that she was riding cautiously.  I was in no hurry, having not yet warmed up, so we continued through the first section of single track without incident.  When we reached the citizen cut-off we split up, and I took off on the sport track and we said we would meet up when the courses connected again.  I had the longer journey so I stepped up the pace.

The second section of single track looped long with many straight but very narrow sections, and a few elevated bridges that had to be carefully navigated.  I saw two deer next to the trail, but had no cameras with which to take photos so I powered on, trying to catch Jackie.  The Sport and Citizen trails re-united less than 100 yds after they split (although I had to ride at least a mile to get there), and Jackie was not waiting for me there at the bottom of the hill known as Fatman's Misery.

It was appropriately named.  It's a 8-10% grade of loose gravel that goes straight up for maybe a quarter mile, and has a lip at 12-15% at the top.  It is not a fun climb.  At the top, I did not find Jackie so I continued onward through Murphy's weeds, back to the parking lot.  I looked for Jackie in the parking lot, and then decided, after not finding her, to finish the loop.  I went back over to the steep hill and followed the Sport course around, and then dropped into the first switchback.  At the third switchback disaster struck.  I heard a hissing sound from my front wheel, and immediately pulled over to find a hole punched into the sidewall.

The tires were tubeless filled with Stans sealant so I flipped my bike on it's side and tried to get the sealant to cover the hole.  I've never had a flat with a tubeless tire, so I wasn't sure what more to do or what to expect.  I waited for 5-10 minutes, and the whole stopped leaking somewhat, but  when I tipped the bike back over it started leaking again.  I decided to walk over to the trek tent and seek professional advice.  The mechanic there told me it may or may not seal, no way to predict I could only wait and see.  It was holding air at 10psi, but when I went back to the car and pushed it up to 20psi it started to leak again.  I took it off the bike, and lay it on it's side in the back of the van and hoped.

This was our “one weekend in the big city” for WORS races and I treated my GF to a night at one of the nicer hotels in the city. That night we chose a quick dinner in the hotel restaurant. The restaurant was empty, and the food was okay, but the wedding reception across the hall made was rather loud and boisterous. It was certainly not quiet. Since we were in the big city we decided to go hog-wild and go paint the town orange. That is to say we drove south into the suburbs and found a home depot where we purchased a rubber mallet for smacking in tent stakes, and a 2 gallon yard sprayer to use as a portable shower. The room was pricy, but I went with a package deal and rolled in the breakfast buffet with our reservation.

We woke up early, and went downstairs for a quick breakfast. It wasn’t bad, but it was still not as good as a make-your-own-waffle. We ate, loaded up the car and headed to the venue. We found a row of tents right near the main driveway of the ski area, and squeezed into an open spot and set up our pop-up. It wasn’t the perfect location from a spectators point of view (i.e., not close to the start-finish, kind of on one edge of the course) but it was proximal to parking so there was very little distance to carry things. We set up the tent, and Morleigh ran to the Walgreens to pick up some more ice and some more sunscreen.

My focus was on the front tire with sidewall puncture that I had been wrestling with the night before. I left it in the van, over a tarp, on its side hoping it was going to seal. It held air at 20lbs but started to hiss at 25 lbs. I didn’t really have a choice. I headed to the Trek tent to see what, if anything, they could do for me. After some discussion and looking, they initially thought they were out of the tire they would recommend, and I was like..umm……I need something? After talking about selling me the demo tires, they found a suitable tread in the right size. I helped them with the one aspect of bicycle mechanics I am fully competent (removing plastic that has been lodged in a leather slot), and went back to the tent to wait for them to to do their thing. Morleigh came back with the ice, and two additional folding chairs despite me expressing a belief that they were not required. She said they were on sale for $2.99. It was hard to argue with that price, and completely futile at that point to try.

I had my camera out and took some pictures of the Junior racers scooting by, as well as the citizens, but my main focus was getting my own race prep taken care of. The spot we had chosen wasn’t ideal for photography (rather boring actually), but I wanted to stay close to the tent. I did what I could to get ready (fill camelpak, make energy drink, change into kit), and waited about a half an hour get my wheel. My friend Jackie had started her race by this point in time, I got a couple good shots of her cresting the first hill, and as she came around again she was much farther back than I would have expected. When she came down the hill by our tent I had my camera to my eye and she was not pedaling hard, and stuck out her tongue as she went by. I went back to review the photos after she passed to see if I got any good ones, and it was then that I noticed she had blood streaming down her leg from a cut that was at least 2 inches long…streaming to her sock. She finished the race, headed to the medical tent, and was told she needed to go to the ER and get stiches.

Oh yeah. You can get seriously injured doing this. My shoulder twinged as I made a mental note.

Before long, it was time to warm up. I saw a bunch of people from Chicago as I was tooling around the parking lot and up and down the frontage road including some Kinky Llamas, Half-Acres, and some Spider-Monkeys. It was nice to have a little home town vibe that far away from home. When it was time, I headed down to the starting area and waited for my turn. Don was merciful that day, announcing that the sport racers would be racing only 2 laps (only 5 steep hill climbs as opposed to 7 for a 3 lap race). I’m not afraid of hills, but I’m not a glutton for punishment either. The countdown and the GOOOOOO!!!! And we took off up the hill. I made a move and got to the outside, but did not burn any matches to get into first place at the crest of the hill. I was in 3rd behind Aaron and John. I was surprised with how hard Aaron was going out, but I did my best to maintain a sustainable pace for me. I reeled in around the first bend, and passed Aaron around the second switchback. I was right where I wanted to be, at the head of my wave heading into the single track.

The last feature of the course before dropping into the woods was a sharp and loose-gravelly 180 corner. Last year they had erected a wooden berm to ride up and around. This year there was no berm, so it was easy to cut the corner. The only problem was that I was over-excited from having passed Aaron and took the corner too fast, my front wheel skidded out and I was able to avoid going down, but I was not able to stay on the course. I ended up sliding down the hill into the weeds and almost into the trees. I came to a complete stop, had to step back up the hill, and get back on the course. I might have cut some guys off, but Aaron and Todd got around me. So I was back in 3rd place, flustered, and trying to chase. A few hundred yards down the road I made my second technical mistake catching my handlebar on a tree. It knocked my foot out of the pedal on the right side and I put my foot down, I unclipped on the left and started to run with my bike between my legs. A few steps and I was able to hop up, pull the bike forward, and get clipped back in. It did not cost me any spots, but I certainly lost precious seconds.

The rest of the first lap went pretty smoothly. I was able to squeeze by Aaron before the second section of single track, and started to open up a gap over the rest of my wave. There was still one from my wave in front of me, but he was not in my category so I was less concerned about catching him. I pressed onward. The first trip up Fat Man’s Misery went well. I was seated for most of the climb, yet still passing many of the stragglers from earlier waves. My garmin did not start beeping (above 98% max) until I was near the very top. It took a moment or two to catch my breath, but once around the corner I was moving again. I took full advantage of the open gravel road and passed another half dozen riders before getting into “the Weeds”. In the weeds I ran into the back of a few slower riders, and caught a break as I waited with growing impatience for an opportunity to pass. When we came back around by the parking lot I went off the trail to make moves on at least two guys who were struggling to climb the hill. I made up another few spots on the climb around before dropping into the single track switchbacks.

Here I took it a little easy. The gravel was very loose and I decided it was better to ride the brakes a little bit than it was to lose control. The starting hill represented another opportunity to make up some ground on guys, and I again focused more on keeping my heart rate down than making up time or space. I was starting to really feel the heat, and even at a slow spinning climb I was able to make up ground on slower riders. As we went down the straight away past our tent, I waved at Morleigh and saw out of the corner of my eye that our tent was full. I didn’t actually see him, but as I rolled by I heard the unmistakeable call of a male Mumford, and returned in kind. His enthusiasm energized me and I went and chased down a couple more guys before hitting the single track. I did not repeat my mistakes, passed a few more guys, and then in the extended loop for the second lap I ran into a major pile up. There were eight single speeders who were tooling through the narrow tight single track all in a row. It was at least 5 minutes of going sub-optimal speed before the trail widened enough to get around them. It was good for my recovery, but it was too long of a recover I started to get antsy as I lost more and more time on the field. When I cleared the single speeders I was moving again.

My next barrier to progress was a junior in the 13-14 age category. The thing I remember about him is that there was absolutely no meat on the bones, and hear I am this big Clydesdale coming up behind him looking for an opportunity to pass. There wasn’t one so I followed him through some single track. Then the two of us came up on another ride who was very gracious in making room to pass where there was not any. So little room that he had to slam on his brakes to avoid a tree as we passed him. I thanked him over my shoulder, telling him it was very gracious of him. Yes, I did literally say “gracious” in the middle of a highly competitive mountain bike race. What can I say, it was hot and I was fast approaching delirium.

The rest of the race turned into a blur quickly. I passed the junior at the beginning of my second trip up Fat Man’s misery, and stream onward past a bunch of people struggling on wheels and foot to make it over the steep lip. The double track was again an opportunity to make up places, and as I was coming up and over the hill the last time I once again made visual contact with Todd, the leader of my starting wave. I tried to close the gap by passing people who were moving slower, and when we hit the bottom of the final climb I was within 20 ft of him. But as soon as the ground pitched upward my legs gave out, and I was all out of matches. I conceded the victory to him, and just rolled up the hill to the finish. I was once again the fastest fat-kid in the 3rd grade, but as the results came out I found that I was much farther back in the Sport field than I had been in a while. I was 37th overall, and maybe 5 minutes behind the leaders. I returned to the tent, and as we waited for the Elite men (4 of whom had taken refuge in our tent, and three of which were asking us to do hand-ups for them).

Morleigh was concerned about messing it up, so I stuck around until she felt comfortable with who got what bottle when. As we were waiting I took advantage of the new sprayer we purchased to wash the dust off my legs and off my bike. My Mom and her friend Sue were actually really into the idea of doing hand-ups and were excited about the responsibility. When they were set I snuck away to the top of the hill (picking up my podium on the way) to take what turned out to be some of my best race photos ever. When I had more pictures than I could edit in a few days I returned to the tent. The guys were grateful for the help, and they even took advantage of the extra water to wash off their legs before getting in the car. We all packed up and headed south.

 It was then that Morleigh told me that she actually messed up Mumford’s hand-up. She was in position, bottle at the ready, and as Mumford came down the lane he looked down, looked up and yelled “No!”. Morleigh took a step back and then Mumford reached out for his bottle, but it was too late. He said, “nevermind” with a tone of frustration as he screamed past. Morleigh took off running toward the start/finish area hoping to be able to catch Mumford at the switch back before he made it all the way around the loop. She was able to cut-across on foot and get ahead of the leaders, but no Mumford. She waited and waited but he did not come by.

“Oh no, I’ve killed Mumford!”

she thought to herself. Finally, after standing out in the sun getting overheated herself she returned to the tent where she found Mumford relaxing in the shade. When he looked down at his wheel and said “No” he actually said “Oh-no!” as in, “Oh-no my tires is losing air rapidly” he was not actually trying to wave off the hand-up. He was losing air, it did not seal, and he did not have a tube or anything to repair it, so he walked back to the tent. We returned to Chicago, unloaded the everything, and started to pack for my next adventure. We were getting up at 4AM so she could drop me off at the airport to fly to Philadelphia for work.

WORS#5: FireCracker

I’m a little behind in my race reporting, but it’s been a busy week.

On Friday morning, I woke up in Iceland (but that's a different story).  

Ten hours later I was in a Dodge Town and Country heading away from O’Hare.  My girlfriend picked me up, and our plan was to head back into the city to my Apartment and hang out while the Pride parade went past my house and 200,000 people came to visit my neighborhood.  That was the plan anyway.

I had been in the car for less than five minutes, we weren’t even out of the airport and Morleigh asked me:

“Do you want to go race this weekend?”

Pause.

Shake cobwebs out of head.

"What did you just say?"

Did my Non-cyclist girlfriend just ask me if we would change our plans from doing something that was non-cycling related to going to a bike race?

Yes.  She did.

Best.
Girlfriend.
Ever.

Saturday morning we were up early, loading up the minivan.  We had stopped by Johnny Sprockets on Friday when we got back to my place to pick up the tent and actually pay for my new Carbon Stump Jumper.  The new rocket-ship was officially mine, and I was going to go break it in (again). 

We were about a half an hour “late” leaving the house, but still well within our window of opportunity.  We also had a third wheel with us, Morleigh’s “puppy” Kipper.  We put his mat down on the floor behind the driver’s seat and he slept most of the way enjoying the ride. 

We made it to Eau Claire without incident, unloaded the bike, and I got ready to pre-ride.  I stopped by registration first, and then made my way out to the course.  The first mile was very flat, very open, and I knew it would be very fast.  After a few right turns, we ended up on a novel obstacle, and 200 yard long pump track.  I have to admit, the pump track was more than a little scary.  It reminded me of the pump track that I found in Albany, NY where I broke my collar bone, and the trail in Golden Valley, MN where I almost died.  So I took it easy the first time through.  After the pump track the course dove into an alternating set of swooping downhill single track with short climbs, and open double track with the occasional steep and sandy climb.  It was a long loop, taking about 40 minutes to go from beginning to end.

I found Morleigh sitting on a park bench with Kipper, holding a book, talking to some locals.  When they asked me what it was like I told them that it was like being trapped in an M. C. Esher drawing, it felt like there was way more downhill sections than uphill sections.  I decided since I had not ridden all week (except for the Midnight Ride on Wed night in Iceland), I would take another prelap.  There was also a loop of single track that was marked “2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th laps” and I wanted to hit that section of trail.  I had my first major wipe out of the season on that lap.  The pump track ended, and went up a hill into a banked 90 degree right turn.  I built up a lot of speed on the small straight, and hammered into the banked curve counting on the bank to hold my wheel.  Instead the sand slipped out and I went down on my right side.  I scraped up the side of my knee, and dropped a chain, but no major damage.  I picked myself up, dusted myself off, and carried on when I caught my breath again.  I made my second lap, and started to get tired about ¾ of the way through, I tried to cut onto the citizens course and make my way out, but failed.  I ended up riding most of the way back.  Before we left we set the tent partially up, and marked a spot for the morning along the course.

I wiped off, and we went to find a Pet Smart for some puppy food, and a restaurant for some people food.  We found another small town gem, an Italian place with dated décor, but great service and food.  We went check into our hotel, and found the pet friendly room to also be dated.  But as my father says all hotel rooms look the same after you close your eyes. 

Unfortunately not all hotels are the same at providing a “free” breakfast.  The “make your own” waffles of the Hampton Inn were replaced with foamy pre-formed ones, and the eggs were of questionable origin.  Morleigh’s “yogurt” was an odd mix of food and chemicals, none of which were actually yogurt cultures.  But we made due, and made our way to the race. 

Once there we set up the tent, I changed and got ready for my race.  Having made my preparations I went to warm up, and rode down to the pump track to take some photos.  After the pump track I made my way to the stream and took more pictures.  Unfortunately most of them, the vast majority of them were terrible.  The lighting was awful and the camera couldn’t adjust to the heavy shadows and large patches of direct sunlight streaming into the woods.  Finally I gave up, and made my way back out to the race.  I had some time so I hung out and finished final preparations, warmed up, and headed to the starting coral. 

As I was sitting in a solid third place for the series, I knew I would be getting a call up.  Unfortunately the Clydesdales get called up last out of all the Masters categories that we race with, and I generally get stuck with a second row call up.  It’s not bad, but as one of my strengths is accelerating from zero to 20, it’s hard to be stuck behind some old dudes who do not have the same low-end torque.  But it was pretty windy in the open, so I was content with getting out, and getting to second wheel heading down the first straight away.  I followed the same rider I was following for most of the first lap the week before down the straight away.  When he started to fade out in front I took the lead and pulled the rest of the field down the straight aways into the pump track.  I looked down at my Garmin and we were doing 24mph into the wind, at one point hitting 26mph. 

I was in the lead of my wave through the pump track, and had no issues.  (see 2:25)




Having pushed myself beyond the edge of traction the day before I knew how to ride the pump track, and how fast to exit.  When we hit the post-track single track, I continued to push the pace.  I was not alone out front, there was a C40+ who was still with me, so we drove onward through the first lap.  I took the stream crossing very carefully having watched two different riders wipe out there during the citizen’s race.  Somewhere about halfway through the lap someone went down hard at the end of a man-made banked turn/bridge.  The word came back up the trail “rider down” but at the bottom (I was leading a few riders) we found him sprawled out in the middle of the trail.  I jumped down off the corner of the bridge and rode around him off into the fringe.  The C40+ and I alternated the lead a few times, but mostly he let me lead through the single track.

Before the race, Morleigh and I had talked about possible scenarios for me dropping a water bottle after one lap so she could fill it and hand it to me on the third lap.  At the start Don announced it was a 2 lap race (each lap was 7+ miles) negating our strategy.  When we made it to the start to end the lap, I knew the second lap was going to be really difficult.  I let the C40+ take the lead down the straight aways, and I just clung to his wheel as he pulled into the wind.  At that point we were out off the front by a ways, and catching riders from earlier waves.  I was not as excited about passing riders in the single track as I had been the week before in part because there were fewer safe opportunities and in part because I had a limited supply of matches.

It turned out that there were two parts of the course that were different on the second lap than the first lap.  The first section was right after the start, diving into the woods on some winding single track (which I had ridden the night before) which took us through a mature grove of red pines.  The second was right after the pump track, and it took me by surprise.  When we came out we veered left instead of right.  Out of the corner of my eye I saw a rider heading to the right and paused, but the course marshal told us we were heading in the correct direction.  This loop started out on double track, but the single track was twitchy, a technical rocky downhill and a rock garden. I had not seen this part of the course before so I was hitting it blind. The C40+ and I were still together, and had bunched up on some slower riders, so I just followed their wheel at a safe distance and rolled through everything.  I didn’t really have time to think, just let the 29er do its thing.

The rest of the race was a blur, we hit the double track sections and I could tell my top end speed was down, and my heart was still racing.  There were times when I couldn’t catch my breath and finally I pulled over in the single track to the C40+ to take the lead. I told him I was tweeked, and let him ride off.  I couldn’t stay on his wheel anymore.  I hoped that I might be able to back off the speed and then catch him again, but that was the last time I saw him.  Shortly thereafter I bonked completely, and the race turned into a suffer fest.

It was a good thing that so much of the course was downhill, dropping into the valley because I was at least able to maintain some speed on the down hills.  The up-hills were a struggle, and at times it felt like I was moving backwards relative to my first lap.  I knew I was losing time, but somehow I managed to maintain my place in the race, continuing to pass, but rarely being passed.  I mentally let go of any hope of finishing high in the sport field, and just focused on keeping ahead of any riders from within my class.

When we came to the finish line I was completely done.  I looked back over my shoulder, and was glad to see there were no other riders.  I tried to stand up and make a good effort of a finish, but I went nowhere.  I could not even feint a sprint.  I rolled across the line, into the finish shoot, and then was spit out into the crowd.  I stopped where I was and got off my bike.  I bent over resting my arms and head on the handlebars.  I wanted to do the unthinkable and sit down.  I couldn’t catch my breath.  My heart was still pounding.  But as it tends to do that feeling passed and I started to feel human again (i.e., human = hungry).  I started to look around for the C40+ I had been following to congratulate him on a great ride, but couldn’t find him in the crowd.  I ran into my friend Rich who told me about his race.  He felt like he had a great race and improved in his placing.  I knew my placing, but didn’t feel like I had a great race.  It’s funny how the two are independent from one another.

They posted the preliminary results and I was first in my category.  We didn’t stay for the awards this week.  We headed South and swung by my parent’s house to say “Hi”, and I ended up helping my Mom wash her deck.  When we got back to Chicago I looked up the full results online.  I did not do as well as the week before overall, but did finish 28^th overall in sport. 

WORS #4: The Battle of CamRock

The weekend certainly did not start out on the right foot.  Circumstances beyond our control delayed our departure from Chicago until early afternoon.  This of course meant that we got caught up in traffic getting out of Chicago.  It took almost an hour to get to the airport.  I was also running behind on my preparations for my trip.  Saturday drive to Wisconsin, Sunday drive back, Monday board plane for Iceland.  It was going to be a busy week.  Morleigh was kind enough to drive most of the way allowing me to work on a poster for the conference I was attending.  I made good progress as we headed north.  I did not finish the poster, but I pushed it as far as I needed to before we arrived in Camrock Park #3. 

We got to the park relatively late, at 4PM.  So I got dressed quickly, unloaded the bikes, and went off to try and find Mike and Jackie who were doing the “learning to race” clinic.  I didn’t find them.  I went down to the bottom and traced the gravel path as far back uphill as I could go.  I did not find a group, I did not find them.  When the path crossed the bridge over the river, I dropped onto the course, and road the single track back out.  I passed a wave of clinic goers, and kept on toward the finish thinking they might have been ahead of the kids.  I looped back up a redesigned last climb (switchbacks instead of a straight shot), back up the starting hill, and headed to the car.  They were nowhere to be found.  I did find Morleigh relaxing in the car, resting and reading.  She was okay, but had not seen anyone.  Just as I was getting ready to ride the rest of course Mike texted me.  They were at the finish.  So I rode back down, and caught up with them again.

Mike showed off his mighty steed, a 15 year old Bontraiger mountain bike that he won as a prize for finishing half a hard behind the leader in a race.  It had sat unused in his closet for 15 years.  This was the first time it had seen any dirt at all.  We started up the course together.  The citizen course diverged from the sport course early on, just after the parking lot.  Mike and Jackie stayed on their course, and I followed the signs for the sport.  When I caught up with Mike, Jackie was long gone, and he was taking it very easy.  His bike was twitchy, and hard to control, but he did okay on the climbs and the straights.  We went at his pace, which was slow.  That was perfectly fine, as it was late in the day, short window to recover, and my primary goal was to learn the course.  Mike went down hard once, getting washed out as he tried to pass someone.  His wheel didn’t bite into the edge, so he bit it at a high speed.  I was worried he was hurt because he wasn’t moving.  I doubled back, and he was smiling up at me.  Could I give him a hand?  He didn’t have leverage to pop out of his cleats.  I grabbed his foot and twisted.  He was up and we were going again.

We finished the rest of the lap without major incident.  We went back to the car, and I rode his bike for the first time.  It was REALLY twitchy.  I could not fathom how different his bike was with its narrow tires and strange geometry.  We decided that we would swap out tires from my 26” to his 26”.  Tires from this millennium onto a bike from the previous one.  I could hardly fathom when he told me that we couldn’t just switch wheels.  His brake pads and rims were ceramic.  It was state of the art braking technology before brakes were disked.

We packed up our things, took the tent out of the truck to hold our spot, and then left to Madison.  We checked into the hotel rinsed off, and then headed across the street to the Olive Garden for a nice dinner.  It was late, we were hungry, and the garden was the closest pasta.

When we made it back to the hotel, Mike and I hung out in the parking lot working on his bike.  We took off the tires and swapped them out.  We made short work of it, and the handling on his bike.  We returned to our rooms, and crawled into bed.

The next morning we were up early for breakfast, and out the door before the two Lacross teams and one basketball team cloggled up the single waffle maker.  What kind of crap is that? A single waffle maker?  Even the Best Western in Waupaca had two waffle makers.  Better pick up the pace Madison.  You will lose your status as the crwn jewel fo the state .

After breakfast we headed outside, loaded up the cars, and drove to Cambridge with Mike following close behind in the car bequithed to him by a friendly neighbor.  We made it with out incident, ignoring the potential omen created by the dozen or so vultures circling the dump west of Madison.  When we arrived our spots right alongside the course, reserved by our tent, were still open.  We pulled in, set up the tent, and started to prepare.  We set up the tent, and got Mike ready to ride.  The juniors were coming by soon, so I also got out my camera to snap some photos.  I wasn’t thrilled with the prospect of shooting all of my photos from the tent, but I didn’t want to wander too far before I was more than 90% ready for my own race.  I knew that I wanted to be out in the woods for when my friends raced, looking for the perfect shot.

Mike and Jackie headed down to the start, and Morleigh and I headed south across the parking lot to find the spot where they would come out of the first section of single track.  The course doubled back on itself, and it was the only spot on the course where a person could see the riders twice on the same lap with minimal movement.  I took my camera into the woods and set up the tripod behind a tree.  The “woodchuck” section of trail was pretty white birch trees framed against a beautiful blue sky.  The vision of the shot was better than the execution.  I was hoping the curve I was on would lead to slower speeds, but I miss judged and riders were flying by.  I had a lot of premature and “post-mature” shutter clicks.  Also?  I missed all of my friends.  After the first lap I stepped out of the woods and switched lens because I wanted to guarantee that I got some good shots of my friends.

Jackie came by as expected, the third woman, she was smiling and having a good time.  Mike on the other hand did not come by as expected.  We were standing there watching the guys come by, and Mike did not emerge from the woods.  We knew that he was not planning on riding fast or hard, but when the ambulance sirens started to approach, and Mike still did not appear, I became nervous.

Riders were still streaming by, so it was not yet hopeless, but each as each minute passed I became a little more anxious.  Then across the parking lot I saw the blue Half-Acre kit steaming uphill at full speed.  A few minutes later a smiling Mike came out of the Woodchucker single track, and we got a couple great pics.  After the race he said he fell down more today than he did yesterday, but still had a great time. 

Then it was my turn.  I returned to the tent to get ready, and ran into my Mom.  I told her where Morleigh was stationed, and headed off to the starting line to find my Dad (she left him near the finish).  I found him, and gave him a run-down of the race course (i.e., where to stand), and then headed down the hill for the start. 

When it was time for my wave to go off, I got my first WORS call-up, It wasn’t in the front line because the older guys got their call-ups first, but it was something.  The whistle blew, and we surged up hill.  I did not get into good enough position to get the hole shot, and instead settled in to the number three spot as we headed up the second hill.  The rider in front of me was a C39-, and I knew I would need to get past him at some point, but I was trying to remember that it was a three lap race, and I had plenty of time.  I was content then to sit in third place as we looped past the empty tent, and around the parking lot.  When we came through the Woodchuck I intentionally backed off his wheel.  I knew Morleigh was standing at the end waiting to take pictures of me, and it would not have done well by my photographer to come screaming out the trail eating someone else’s dust.  So I backed off in the single track, smiled pretty, and then hammered hard trying to make a move on the short section of double track before the single track.  I didn’t make it.  I ended up following the C39- down through the rock garden where a year ago I crashed and instantly bruised my leg.  We were moving slow enough that I was able to see the exact rock I fell on (it matches the scar on my leg). 

We were moving slower than I would have liked, but there were no opportunities to pass, so I was content to catch my breath and recover as we switch-backed down the hill.  When we got to the bottom, and looped around to the next section of double track I burned a match and pulled around him.  I caught back up with the leader of my wave on the climb back up to where Morleigh was standing.  We had already caught the tail end of the wave in front of us.

The rest of the race went smoothly.  The rest of the first lap, I stayed behind the 50-54 rider I had been following from the beginning.  The two of us worked our way through the pack together, climbing past the slower riders from earlier waves.  When we hit the second hill at the start of the second lap we switched positions.  I said that I would pull for a while, but instead I pulled away.  The second lap went pretty smooth, but I got pinched in some key places behind slower riders.  I remember almost crashing as I passed Morleigh the second time on the second lap, as the rider in front did not power up a hill leaving me trying to slow down on a steep roller.  I remember being caught behind a slower rider during the very tight S-turns through a small dry creek bed, and having to put on the brakes more than necessary.  But after that I made a move to pass him before hitting “Raseberry fields forever” and found an open space where I was really able to ride my own pace for a while.  I ran into some more riders before the awesomely fun “rip and ride” section of single track, and was not able to pass them until we hit the crushed gravel trail leading back to the start line.  I reeved it up to 24mph and made it past another half dozen riders who were cruising.  The climb back to the starting plateau was much gentler this year, with seven or eight switchbacks replacing a single double track straight up.  The third lap I continued to ride strong, finding more and more stretches where I could ride at my own pace. 

On the third lap I continued to climb up in the field, and felt very good about my race as I started to get into riders who started three and four waves ahead of me.  The lap went smoothly and I was able to finish the race strong. 

I pedaled around the starting area until I could find my Dad, then we both headed back up to the tent.  I sat down to cool down, and then took a ready wipe shower.  I changed and my parents and I headed back down to the podium for awards.  My friend Jackie was sitting there, so we talked about our races (she finished 3^rd), and she introduced me to the friends that she came to the race with.  In a very “small world moment” one of her friends was also the C39- that I passed on the first lap.  I think he was a little disappointed because he didn’t see me pass, and finished the race thinking he was in first place. 

I waited for my call, posed on the podium, and then we all returned to the tent.  I was pleasantly surprised to find a crowd had gathered.  The girlfriend of one of my Chicago CX friends, and the wife and son of another had joined Morleigh in the shade of the Sprockets tent.   They made great company as we waited for their significant others to pass by for hand-ups and cheers. 

With two laps left in the race we had another unexpected visitor.  An exhausted Mumford, as he was riding past our tent slammed on the brakes and veered under into the shade.  He asked me if I had any water or any food, and he was lucky that Morleigh is so good at preparing for races because we had plenty of both.  I filled up his water bottle at least twice, and found in the bottom of our bag of treats some organic animal crackers.  He ate and drank, saying that “He didn’t come to WI to torture himself.”  With a little water and a few calories, we returned Mumford back to the wild.  He ended up finishing thirty eighth. 

On the ride home, Morleigh was cracking up as she described the mental picture she had of Mumford standing in our tent grabbing handfuls of animal crackers and shoving then partially into his mouth leaving some legs and heads jutting out as he crushed their bodies with his teeth.  She also said that it was by far the most fun she had ever had at a race. 

WORS#3: Nine Miles of Dust and Glory

It's been a busy week at work, so I have not had much time for writing about last week's race.  My girlfriend and I went North early, departing on Friday afternoon instead of Saturday.  It was a long enough drive that we wanted to make a weekend out of it.  So she drove, and I spent the car ride working on my laptop.  We made it all the way to Wausau before getting hungry, and ended up in a restaurant/brewery that was decorated with a collection of rare and vintage bicycles.  The one above our table had wooden rims.  It was a far cry from the carbon fiber frame, aluminum rims, pneumatic front suspension, and fat tires I would be riding that weekend, and my bike a gray-market carbon frame with 26" wheels and v-brakes is a far cry from the top of the line 29ers with carbon frames, carbon rims, tubeless tires, and hydraulic disc brakes.

After dinner we retired back to our hotel, kicking ourselves yet again for forgetting swimsuits.  A dip in the hot tub would have been a nice way to relax.  But we were in bed fairly early, and we were up for the hotel breakfast (we <3 waffle bar), and back to the room for lazy a Saturday morning.  She napped, and I put some more time working on a solution concept for a problem at work.  When afternoon came we packed up, and headed over to Nine-mile Forest Preserve to pre-ride the course.  

We found parking in the shade, applied liberal doses of sunscreen, and I saddled up and headed out into the woods.  Rich, one of guys I ride with on Monday and Wednesday night, had been talking up how much he likes riding at Nine-mile since I met him last spring.  It was partly his feedback that led me to choose this race instead of going up to Rhinelander two weeks early for my second WORS race of the season.  He ran into us on Saturday as I was getting ready, and talked about how this year the Sport course was easier than it had been in the past because they were routing us away from some of the most technical rock sections.  

Rich went off to ride some of the non-race trails, and I headed to the starting line to drop into the official course for the race.  It was the first WORS race I had been to when the race did not begin with a hill climb.  It faded downhill, and took a sharp left into the woods.  I tried to keep the pace easy for my first lap, especially the first 20 minutes as I had just gotten onto the bike.  There had been no warm-up.  The forest was deep and luscious as it rolled by, the blotches of shade and sunlight on the trail made it difficult at time to differentiate between rocks and shadows, causing a disconnect between the anticipation of being jolted and the actual occurrence.  Rocks I couldn't see hit me hard, and shadows that looked like rocks faded without so much as a whimper.  As I rode I tried to pay attention to the features of the course, to learn it's ins and outs.  My garmin struggled in the first 10 minutes of the ride to get an accurate bearing.  Ten minutes into the ride my map still showed a flashing question mark in my Chicago neighborhood, but the miles still accumulated.  

I was a little taken aback at the midpoint when I hit a fairly steep climb.  It was unexpected given Rich's assessment of the course.  Then things got a little rough.  Giant freaking boulders rough.  Really skinny guys blowing by me on 29ers while I get the stuffing knocked out of me, rough.  Then things got long.  Normally a pre-ride practice lap takes no more than a half an hour for a five mile loop.  I hit a half an hour and then some.  I was starting to wonder if the course was every going to finish.  As advertised there was plenty of double track, but easy?  I was starting to question Rich's sanity.  

Finally I arrived back at the finish and found my girlfriend waiting at a picnic table with a water bottle.  She had been talking with riders coming off their laps, and everyone had said the Sport course was 5.1 miles.  My garmin said 7.58.  I told her about the problem getting signal, I checked my rear wheel magnet, and shrugged my shoulders.  I reset the Garmin, and returned to the woods to try a second lap.  The course was the same, I was more warmed up but still kept my speed relatively slow.  Again I found myself thinking, "Gee...this is hard" and then "Gosh, this is long."   I finished the second pre-lap, and again my garmin came out at 7.48 miles. I was seriously wondering if I would be able to ride that course 3 times at race speed.  I'd have to go out super chill if I was going to be able to finish with any steam at all.  It was going to be a long race.  

We ran into Rich in the parking lot, and were talking about the pre-ride.  I told him he had a strange definition of "easy" there was at least one serious climb, and some really rocky sections.  Also? It was long, seven and a half miles.  He said "7.48 miles?  You must have ridden the full expert course."  

Facepalm.  

The girlfriend, "I TOLD you that everyone else was saying the sport loop was 5.1 miles".  

Facepalm.  

The next morning we were up early for breakfast, and to the race course by 8:30AM.  I geared up to head out into the woods to find some places to shoot the Juniors in the singletrack, and she stayed with the car to "rest".  I came back after shooting some photos, helping a waylaid Junior with a mechanical get back on his bike, and helping the MTB Patrol get an injured kid out of the woods.  Justin took a handle-bar in the stomach, and was in tears.  We walked him out of the single track, and by the time we got back to double track he was ready to saddle up again.  

I returned to the car, and once again time started slipping away.  I was able to stay better organized this race and not destroy the car, but the decisions about camelpak vs water bottle with hand-up, and getting everything in it's proper place still took time.  My mom arrived as we were getting ready, so there was some greeting and chit-chatting to be done.  

Once I was ready I headed up to the starting line and tried to find my wave.  Things were a little bit less organized this week, and it took a little bit more time to find the rest of my wave.  I was there in time for the national anthem, but not in time to guarantee a spot on the line.  They were doing call-ups, but my name was not called.  Winning the first race and skipping the second did not give me enough points to make it to the line.  No worries though, it was a long race today.  Three full laps of a 5+ mile loop.  

When Don said "GOOOOOOO!!!" and the pack surged forward I maintained my place in about the third row for the first 50 yds, then I made a break to the outside and put on the gas to pull ahead of most of the pack.  When we started to narrow down and spread out there were only two riders ahead of me from my wave, neither in my category.  We all settled in as it was going to be a long race.  I was content holding their wheels, as at Iola both of these men finished ahead of me.  So we looped around, and I noticed that certain features (e.g., the steep climb, the rock garden) were noticeably absent.  I thought I did a really good job of not staying stuck behind slower riders from earlier waves, which was in part pacing myself appropriately so I had energy to squeeze by guys in the single track, and part of having the confidence to know how and when to pass.  Not that passing was a big deal at Wausau.  Half, if not more, of each lap was on double track cross country ski trails, so there was plenty of room to leap frog slower riders.  This of course plays into my strengths (i.e., low-end torque + good legs) as I could spin my way up hills and still make up ground.  I was surprised how quickly we came into the pine trees near the finish on the first lap.  I remember thinking to myself "wow, that was a LOT easier" (than my pre-ride the day before).  I smiled and looked forward to the rest of the race.  I was still dogging the wheel of the leader of the C40+, and was content to follow him around the pine trees and back down to through the finish.  As we made our way through the second lap we were overcoming more and more riders from earlier waves.  The wide double track made easy work of passing and maintaining my momentum, and the single track offered short respites to catch my breath.  

I had a few dicy moments making my way through some of the more gnarly obstacles, with a foot down here, and lost momentum there.  At one point on the first lap the trail curved to the right and I lost my balance and had to put a foot down and ended up straddling a stump just to the left of the trail.  I tweaked my ankle a bit, but was able to get back onto my bike without losing speed, and the guy behind me cheered "That was a great save".  It was not a flawless race, but it was still a fast race.  As we came to the end of the second lap, I still had plenty of gas in the tank and overtook the leader of the C40+ as we made our way past the start.  I burned a little match to get around him, and he did not challenge.  The third lap was about as smooth as the first two.  Not perfect, but was able to maintain speed, pass when I needed, and pick off slower guys on the double track.  As I came back into the pine trees near the finish I came up on another rider from the 45-40 age group.  I followed him through the pines and up around the loop into the finish straight.  I got out of the saddle and started hammering, and he did the same.  We ended the race with a full sprint to the finish, and I took the not one but two riders in front of me before crossing into the shoot and being waved to a stop.  I was huffing and puffing something fierce, but when I caught my breath I had a little time to enjoy the moment.  

I was pretty certain that I was the first Clydesdale across the line, and the results, when posted, confirmed the expectation.  I was pleasantly surprise to see that I had also moved up in the Sport field overall.  Last year when I finished first at Treadfest in my category, I was 96th overall in the sport field, and finished 10+ minutes behind the leader.  This race I was 36th overall, and a scant 5+ minutes off the leader.  I am looking forward to CamRock next weekend, as it will be the first MTB race where I have a direct (contingent on weather) comparison between last year's time and this year's time.  Hopefully I can avoid the crash and injury though.  

A moment of silence

Last Wednesday night I went on my typical Wednesday night date, a group ride with the CCC.  It was typical in pretty much every way.  I screwed around waiting until the last minute to get ready, and get out the door, I arrived at the start about a minute before the group rolled out.  

We rode as we typically do, like people possessed, like men and women who love to ride bikes fast.  We went North, then West, then North again, finally turning south on Green Bay Road.  We cut back east on Winetka Rd, hitting Sheridan just in time for everyone's favorite hammerfest, the Baha'i temple sprint.  We turned on Sheridan, and I remember that one of the guys who is not the strongest took a really long pull for the good of the group, and then fell off when we got to the hill, he burned his match so the rest of us could shine bright.  I had ridden with him before, and was probably exchanged first names sometime last summer, but we reintroduced ourselves.  His name was Mark V.  

Tonight I went on my typical Wednesday night date, a group ride with the CCC.  It was typical in pretty much every way except one.  I screwed around waiting until the last minute to get ready and get out the door, I arrived at the start about a minute before the group rolled out.  This ride was different because Mark V. was not there.  He passed away this week from a sudden heart attack.  He was only 43 with a wife and two young boys left behind.  We rode in his memory, in his honor.  We poured one out for him at JJ Peppers, and then gathered at a local bar to reminisce and to find comfort.  

I have been struggling for 30 minutes trying to find the right words to close out this post.  And now I realize there are no words to say.  I can't help you grieve, I can't help you understand, I can't tell you why he has fallen beyond the thin veiled curtain that separates life from death.  The world lost a father, husband, friend and cyclist, a candle sitting next to an half-empty box of matches has been snuffed out, and there is no reason for it.  There is no answer to the ultimate question, only silence.  

....

An Ode to the Gravel Metric: A dirge in E-flat major

For a bike race that wasn't a race, I sure spent a lot of time on Saturday getting ready for Sunday.  I washed two (cross + road) bikes, swapped  my commuting wheels for my race wheels, tuned my cross bike, packed tools and gear, bought food, bought a new under seat bag for a spare tube, mixed up some of my home brew energy gel + energy drink, and then at 10pm realized I hadn't packed any clothes and my team kit was dirty.  I was hoping to be in bed by 10pm.  It was after 12AM when my head hit the pillow.

My alarm was ringing at 5:45AM, and I was up.  I did finish packing everything the night before, so my to-do list was short.  I had to put on my kit (with a still damp shammy, blergh), have some breakfast, throw on my backpack, and headed out the door with the Falcon.  I was getting a ride from my friend Jackie which meant I had a short pedal to get downtown so I could take the blue line West to  Forest Park.  This time I skipped the Grand stop and took a shortcut across the blue-line loop downtown and picked up a train at Halsted and UIC.  Jackie picked me up at 7:30am, and we headed west to Dekalb.  Traffic was good, the company was even better, and the miles went fast.  We arrived at NCC with what seemed like plenty of time.  Instead of registering right then, we ran to Walgreens for sunscreen and extra water (both turned out to be absolute necessities), and returned to the parking lot at 8:45am, and made it over to registration at 8:55AM.  The race started at 9AM so we cut it a little close for comfort, but I had time for one last visit to the bedroom before we rolled out.

Although I came in late to the line-up I pulled up near the front of the pack off to the side.  I did not want to get shuffled off the back at the start, as I was hoping to ride well, and stay near the front for a while.  I probably should have explained my goals to Jackie prior to the start, who was kind of taken aback when I suggested I take the keys since I would most likely be the first person back to the car.  The neutral roll-out with police escort was really fun.  It was slow, only about 15mph, so there was lots of time to banter back and forth, and we all talked a mean game.  The weather was warm, but the sky was still a little overcast and the sun was still low in the east behind us.

We made it to Twomblee Road without incident, and although the race was supposed to start when the police escort left, we continued to tool onward at 15-16mph.  So we continued down the road like a spark traveling down a cartoon fuse looking for a bomb to explode.  I had never been to this race before, so I wasn't sure at first what that bomb looked like.  I didn't know what was going to set loose the pent up fury in this calm pack of riders.  But as we rode into the westerly wind on Twomblee Rd we came over a ridge, and I saw it in the distance.  A few miles ahead there was a stark line of contrast between the black asphalt and the shimmering white gravel.  That was our bomb.

When we hit the edge of pavement the field exploded forward.  The leaders surged forward the field followed like a stretched slinky, and the road got gnarly.  I was more than a little surprised by the condition of the road.  I was expecting gravel like I had seen before, at the Killer Gravel Road race or on the Des Plaines River trail, but this wasn't a gravel road as much as it was just a pile of loose gravel between two grassy banks.  It was like a river of gravel washing downhill in the lowest spot of the country.  It had a liquid consistency, and was more like riding on sand, big, angry, and sharp pieces of sand, than it was like riding on a road.  Some took to the grass margins to avoid it, but most plowed down the two tire tracks that were available.  I saw it clearly when a rider in red and white moved across from the left line to the right line to fill a perceived gap, and clipped my teammate Robbie's front wheel.  Robbie went down, and I thought about stopping to check on him, but he was up quickly, and was back on his bike in a flash.  In that case the softness of the gravel probably helped in that it moved beneath his hand like sand to "cushion" his fall.  You know, as much as gravel can be cushy.

The field surged on.  We hit our first turn and caught our first breath of tail wind.  The leaders started to push the pace, and I clung to them like a burr on the tail of a dog.  I pushed with them for a solid two miles watching my heart rate climb out of the safe zone into the red zone.  When my turn came I pulled around in front and took a turn pulling, but for the most part I tried to be smart and just hang on, as the gap continued to widen between the lead pack of 11 riders, and the rest of the field.  We opened up a wide enough gap that we felt comfortable stopping even, to take a bio-break at a nice drainage ditch.  It was the last time I would need to relieve myself until I got home at 7:30pm, nine and a half hours later.

Shortly thereafter, my race took a turn for the worst.  It started with the remount.  I revved up my motor and climbed back up to speed quickly, more quickly than the rest of the field and ended up out front.  The course took a turn to the left, and started uphill into the wind.  I was feeling pretty good, so I didn't mind starting out on the front.  Except the front turned out to be a "break away."  So I ended up pulling another rider who went with me on this faux-break (no one really expects the big Cat 3 guy to sustain a breakaway including the big Cat 3 guy), when I was ready to fall back, the field was 100-150yds behind.  So what did I do?  I kept on grinding.  I knew they would catch me eventually.  And catch me they did.  Just in time for a downhill sprint, then a right turn onto the first REALLY abusive stretch of "road".  It wasn't a road really, just two hard-dried muddy ruts over grown with grass through a field.  It was here that I started to suffer, and to fall off the pack.  There was no one within sight, and it was way too early to be riding alone.  I pushed back into the red to hang on.  I fell off for a bit, but we came up on another hill, and the field slowed down, and I got washed out into the lead again.  So I pulled the field up another hill.  This time?  I slowed down.  Way down.  You want to ride the big mule until he dies?  That's fine.  But he's going out on his own terms.  Mumford eventually got twitchy and came out to take the lead, to sprint to the top of the overpass before we dropped down into Creston.

I almost had a big break in Creston.  We made it across IL-38 with only a minor pause for traffic, but as we were leaving town, just as we were pulling up to the train tracks, the lights started flashing and the crossing guards came down.  I was in the lead again (fast off the line again), and I did not hesitate, I slowed a little to see the train was still 300 yds away, and swerved around the barriers and kept riding.  One other guy came with me, and the rest of the lead pack paused.  They head faked twice, and then snuck through before the train.  We found out later that those behind us had to wait 10 minutes for the trains to pass.  If I had a 10 minute gap on the leaders?  Well.  Remember this is a dirge.

The leaders did stare down that oncoming train and sneak through, and as the land continued to climb, I started to fade.  This time I was really fading.  I could not stay with the lead pack and fell off for what I feared was for good.  I was saved momentarily by the first rest stop.  As I pulled up to get some water, the leaders were still there filling bottles and taking in fruit.  I didn't have more than a minute standing and catching my breath before they were off again.  I didn't even get to top off a water bottle. I hopped back on my bike and headed down a freshly grated dirt road.  It was rough, and my efforts seemed in vain.  I fell off the leaders before we made the next turn south to ride into the wind again.  There were a couple other stragglers who I glommed onto for a while as we headed through some very loose gravel, but soon passed them to try and re-attach.  It was then that I saw a forboding sign.

DEAD END.

The route on my garmin ran straight down this so-called "dead end" road onto the next turn.  The quality of the road got poor again, a choice of three ruts.  At one point I remember being in a rut, trying to pedal and ending up catching my left pedal on the edge of the rut and actually having enough momentum to pedal up and over, lifting my back wheel off the ground.  Somehow I didn't wipe out and die.

I kept on riding and when I came to the river crossing, I could see no one ahead of me, so I didn't know what to do.  It looked ride able, and I did not see wet footsteps on the  other side, so I picked what looked to be a clean line to the left, and hit it.  It was rough, but I made it through without tumbling.  Unfortunately I did not make it through unscathed.

PSSSSSSSFFFFFFTTTTTTTTTTTTTT.  The first flat.  E-flat.  

Before I was 20 yds on the other side of the stream my rear rim clanking against the gravel.  I swore, pulled over, and went to work.  I remember that my legs were involuntarily spasming so badly that I could hardly stand.  I tried to breathe, and just do my work.  I got the tube changed, and one of the guys who was there taking pictures came over to help out.  He remounted my tire after I inflated it, while I wrangled stuff.  The kindness of a stranger was enough to get me going again.  I knew I wasn't going to catch the leaders again, not that I was ever going to catch them, but I had only been passed by a handful of riders, and I could maybe catch them again.

So I headed up the hill.  I made up and over the railroad tracks, and when I remounted, I realized my front wheel started to make a metalic crunching in the gravel.

The second flat.  A-flat.  

I was 38 miles into a 62mile race, and my second spare tube never made it out of the my backpack in the car.  In my haste to get to the start I did not dig out out.  So I mentally kicked myself and start walking.  I walked for about 5 minutes before the first rider passed me. I think four or five guys (who I will not call out by name for leaving me to die in the desert) went by without slowing down before a teammate came by and saved my life.  Robbie had a spare tube in his jersey pocket, and he slowed long enough to pull it out and toss it to me.  I had everything else I needed, a CO2 cartridge, levers, I was just just 1 tube short of making a change.

I looked at the tube, and it looked a little narrow, like maybe it was a 20-28mm tube, and thought about my big 32 mm wheels, but it was the only option I had.  So I put it in, carefully checking the inner tirewall for obstructions, and then I used my second CO2 to carefully re-inflate and get riding.

So I started grinding alone again.  Up until the first flat, I felt like I was having a really good race.  Even if I couldn't stay with the leaders until the finish, I expected that we were plenty far ahead of the rest of the field that I could grind it out.  After my second flat, my spirits went flat.  There were a lot of guys ahead of me that I was hoping to beat.  But I didn't give up.  There were only two ways back to Dekalb, the short way and the race course.  We were approaching the farthest point, so there wasn't much difference at the time.  So I ground on.   I made up time, I caught riders, I gained on the field.

The most emotionally painful part of the course was Woodlawn Road.  It was a 4 mile down and back, so as I was grinding up a hill the leaders, guys who I had been riding with 15 minutes earlier started passing me on the way down.  They looked fresh and fast still, and I felt dead and slow.  But I kept riding.  It was a long slow grind up hill.  At some point I realized that I was horripulating and shivering.  My garmin read 98 degrees and I was cold.  Conventional wisdom was consulted and this was not considered a good sign.  I pulled up to the rest station and there was a crowd.  A crowd of guys that I knew including Chris Jensen, PB, the younger Lombardo, and others.  They were still snacking on oranges so I went straight for what I needed, water in my camelpak.  I only had a few minutes before they were ready to shove off so I went to pick up my bike.

The final flat.  B-flat.

My front wheel had gone again.  I had noticed on the way up the hill that the sidewall was rubbing on the brake and had loosened the adjust to make them as wide as possible.  I'm not certain if the tube ruptured and filled up tire (wheels are tubeless compatible) which then leaked because there was no sealant, or what.  But the third flat was a crushing blow.  I was fortunate that the rest stop had a full supply of tubes, and a pump (that was broken) but I was able to sit down on the tailgate, get a tube in my tire, and put enough pressure in it to ride.  Thankfully the worst of the roads were over, I had some spare tubes (so only needed to borrow a pump if the race was going to shift to the key of F minor), but my spirits were broken. 

My spirits were broken, the temperature was in the hundreds, and I was 25 miles from the finish.

In the bar after the race Chris Jensen summarized it thusly: "We came out here this morning to do something hard, and damn it, it was hard."

Those were the hardest 25 miles of my life.

My heart rate which was pushing 160-170 for the first 30 miles would not go above 140 without causing me to feel nauseous and light headed.  My shoulders ached, my sit bones brutalized, and my stomach was full of water, and gels, and energy drink.  I couldn't drink anymore, so I would suck the hot water out of my hose, blow it into my lap, then pull a mouthful of cool water and swish it in my mouth until it started to get warm.  I would then blow it onto an arm, a leg, my chest, or the road doing anything I could to get some heat, any heat at all, to leave my body.

I was able to reel in a few riders on the way back into town, and did not lose ground to any, but it wasn't about placing anymore.  It wasn't even really about finishing anymore.  It had devolved into an exercise of simple physical survival.

I pulled into the parking lot behind NCC, and was warmly congratulated by those who had already had time to cool off and change.  I sat down in the shade for a minute and tried successfully not to vomit.  After sitting for a few minutes I realized I had not, in the hustle and bustle of the morning even bothered to fire off a quick "I love you" text message to my girlfriend Morleigh who was planning on meeting me at the finish.  So I did.  Right then.

"Lpbe you"

Clearly I was not functioning at a high level.  I got up to look for her, dug my phone out of the waterproof bag, and just as I dialed her, I spotted her car under the shade of a tree.  She got out, came over to me, and started nursing me back from the dead.  We walked around the building and found the hose.  It was broken, leaking cool clear water onto the ground, so when it was my turn I just grabbed the break and held it first to my legs, then my arms, and then finally across the back of my neck.  My girlfriend told me after the fact that, at that exact moment I let out a guttural animal growl that kind of frightened her.  All I remember is that it felt sooooooo good.  I washed off my legs, then my arm, and then moved up to splash water over the back of my neck and finally into my hair.  I didn't hog the good feeling wanting to share it with others who straggled around the corner.  Morleigh and I headed back to my her car, and then to Jackie's car.  I had her keys so I was able to change, and we moved back into the shade to sit and cool in the AC while waiting for Jackie to finish.  When she rolled into the parking lot we saw her from a distance, and I got up to go help her, and realized I had dropped the car keys.  After a few frantic minutes of searching I found them under the seat, along with a Coach bracelet.  I kept the keys and gave the bracelet to Morleigh.

Just as I was getting ready to head over to find Jackie she texted me:

"Please go to my car."

I found Jackie at the hose, having just experienced the same baptism and rebirth that I had experienced when I found the hose.  She had just finished dousing herself and was looking like she had just walked out of the ocean in a swimsuit ad.  So I grabbed her helmet and shoes, picked up bike, and walked her back to Morleigh's car.  She was still feeling the effects of the heat, so Morleigh gave her an air conditioned ride for the two blocks to her car while I soft-pedaled her bike.  She changed into people clothes, and we headed off to the bar for post race festivities.  I didn't have my free daisy cutter, but did win a water bottle and a large T-shirt.  A large women's T-shirt.  At that point, I didn't care.  It was time to go to Culvers and engage in my traditional post race debauchery.  Root beer, a buttery burger of some sort, and some cheese curds.  Morleigh and I even split a sundae on the way home.

I didn't win the race that isn't a race, I didn't lose the ride that wasn't just a ride.  Last year's flooding and thunderstorms were replaced by the fires of hell.  The Gravel Metric is nothing if not Epic.