Back in the Saddle

I just got back home today from a week's vacation in Florida. Suffice it to say, the weather down there is much nicer than it is here! It was 75F and sunny most of the days I was there, it's about 35F in Detroit and the sun is nowhere to be found. It was mostly a relaxing trip, but I did manage to do some kind of a workout about half the days I was there. Nothing too hard, but enough so hopefully it won't be a total shock to my body when I really get back at it.

I started cleaning up my diet a little while I was down there so I don't have to go cold turkey next month. Probably had a bit too much beer, but I can manage.

Training "officially" resumes on January 1. I'm really fired up and ready to go!

This year I'm basically going to try to follow a Joe Friel type plan this year and see how it works. At this point, following any kind of structured plan should be beneficial for me. I will post the details shortly.

Bobke II

During my trip to Pennsylvania over the weekend, I had a chance to do some reading (it was 9 hours each way!). My dad had a copy of the book Bobke II, Bob Roll's second book I think. Incidently, I learned it's pronounced "boob-ka" rather than "bob-key" (which is what I thought it was), as the nickname was given to him by Belgian fans.

The bulk of the book is written as excerpts from Bobke's training dairy. Maybe these are his real entries, maybe not, but I know my entries are not nearly as entertaining. Aside from the humor, which you'd expect, there is some pretty good insight into what the life of a professional bike racer is like.

One of the things I've been noticing lately in reading books, interviews, etc from pro cyclists is how hard cycling still is for them. The VeloNews interview with Lance Armstrong had a section where he talked about being so fatigued in a time trial that he just wanted to get off the bike. Bobke II had numerous stories of him just doing whatever he could to stay on somebody's wheel. Certainly my limits are much lower than a pro racer's, but it makes me feel good to know that it's just as hard for professionals as it is for me. Like Greg LeMond said, "It doesn't get easier, you just go faster".

The book has also gotten me pretty fired up to go ride. My original plan was to take it pretty easy in December and crank it back up in January. The break from "structured" training has been nice, but I'm really feeling ready to get back at it. My diet has also been crap this month, I'm not gaining any weight (those that know me won't be surprised), but I don't need to eat as much junk as I have been. It's just going to make it harder to get back to my normal diet.

PA Trip

It's been a while since I've posted. I went out to Pennsylvania for a long weekend to watch my brother graduate. A couple quick photos:

My brother, his wife and the Nittany Lion.

Me and my brother.

I will try to post a few more bike-related things shortly.

Snowbike!

I had a long day at work today and came home (late) in a funk. I lounged around for a while, but that didn't seem to help (does it ever?). I decided that it had been too long since I'd ridden my bike. I haven't ridden since the cyclocross race last weekend, my plan was to spend some time in December off the bike, or at least off the trainer! It was about 8:30pm at this point, so my riding options were limited. I decided to pull out my singlespeed and hit the hill next to my house.

I was a little tentative at first...


But I got over it!

I had a good time (obviously) out there. The snow was deep enough that it was hard to go uphill at all. So I had to take the "shuttle" back up.

My wife's "artistic" shots at the end of my little session. It was nice of her to come out in the cold and take pictures, especially since I'd been so grouchy earlier.

Position Tweaking

I spent the better part of the weekend tweaking my position on my mountain bike. I had two main issues with my position at the beginning of the year. The first was that I tended to feel kind of "cramped" on the bike. The second was that I noticed I sat much more upright than most of the other people I rode with. Part of the reason, I think, is that my bike has a relatively high front end to start with, mainly because the fork is fairly long for only having 100mm of travel.

My position for most of the year was similar to this (although I did have a couple spacers under the stem that aren't in this picture):

My solution was to lower and flip the stem. This definately felt like a more aggressive position, and did get me lower, but I still felt a little cramped. Riding descents in this position (even not-so-tough Michigan descents) was a little unnerving. The bike felt much more willing to flip me over the bars (it never did though). I don't know if this reflected a problem with the position, or if it was just because I wasn't used to it.

Lowered and flipped 90mm stem:

So, this weekend, I "borrowed" a 110mm stem from my singlespeed, and put it on my Kona. Again, I installed it with no spacers and flipped it to keep the negative rise. Sitting on the trainer, this feels much better. The bars are farther away from me, but they are actually slightly higher than with my 90mm stem (the rise angle on the 110mm stem isn't as large).

After studying some other pictures, I also lowered my saddle slightly and moved it back just a little.

So, the position I came up with at the end of the weekend looks like this:

So, now the real test begins. I need to get out and ride the bike like this and see what I think. Unless it's a total disaster, I'm going to keep this position for a while and really try to get used to it.

Bad Santa

Life is hard when you're a cute 7lb dog. People, like my wife, want to dress you up in all sorts of silly outfits.

Lopes Book

I picked up Mastering Mountain Bike Skills by Brian Lopes and Lee McCormack a week or so ago. I had heard about the book quite a while ago, but wasn't going to get it. Over the summer, I saw a bikercross race on TV that Brian Lopes was in; after that I decided I needed to read what he had to say! I finished my first read through it yesterday. If nothing else, it's a pretty entertaining. You know a book is going to be good when it has a section titled "How Good is your Kung-Fu?".

Despite the laid back style of the book, I think there's a lot of good stuff in there. It's obvious that these guys have spent some time thinking about what they're doing and why it works. It's a little overwhelming to think about all at once, so I'll probably go back through it again a bit more slowly, focusing on the basics first. Reading the book has got me pretty juiced up to ride though, I'll have to try to hit the trail sometime this week.

There's a quote near the end that I like, "...most recreational cross-country racers can't turn worth a damn...". Obviously, Brian snuck out to Michigan and saw me ride. I'd love to be able to rail corners the way those downhillers do. Got to begin at the beginning though.

Stony Creek Cyclocross

I raced the final cyclocross race of our local series this morning. It was made more interesting by the 21F temperature and the 3-4 inches of snow we got last night. Despite the conditions, we still got a good turnout for the C-Men field, over 20 racers I think.

I followed my strategy of going out hard on the first lap. I managed to stay somewhere in the middle of the pack, which is good for me, throughout most of the first lap. I think some of the riders rode a bit more conservatively than I did, since traction was an issue for the whole race. I felt I did a good job not letting gaps open up in front of me, and I was able to pass a few people on the climbing sections.



(The field crosses the only barrier section)

Unfortunately, about halfway through the lap, I fell going over what had seemed like a pretty easy section. There was a snow-covered log (or something) in the middle of a corner that had gotten a little slick by the time I got to it. My back tire slipped and I went down. This dropped me back a few places.

(Evidence of one of my falls on my left hip and foot)

Near the end of the lap, we had to cross a long sandy beach. There was enough snow down so that the beach was rideable, but it was still a little treacherous. There was about a 6 inch dropoff that had to be negotiated to enter the beach, and then a 16 inch step up to get back out of the beach. The first time through, I passed about 5 riders that had fallen at various spots.

The second lap was pretty uneventful for me until I hit the beach again. Prior to that, I had done a nice job of maintaining my pace, although most of the racers I had passed on the beach got by me again. I still had other racers close ahead and behind me though. Just before I got to the end of the beach though, my front wheel found some deep sand and the bike went down (I somehow clipped out and stayed up). Still, this was a time-consuming fall and a number of riders went by me.

Going into the third lap, I still had racers to chase down and racers right behind me. I was trying to reel in the guy in front of me on that last lap, but I had one more fall. This one was on a corner that was getting muddy and slick, and I just leaned the bike over too far and went down. This let another two racers by I think. I tried to close the gap back down again, but I just couldn't get it done at that point. The rest of my third lap was pretty lonely, the last racer in the C-men group was way behind me, and I wasn't making any progress on the guy in front of me.

So, despite the fact that I finished second to last, I was very pleased with this race, especially after the bad taste the last 'cross race had left in my mouth. I found out later that most of the guys were running a lot less pressure in their tires than I did, which I think might have contributed to two of my falls (and generally sketchy bike handling). Still, my mountain bike tires were twice as wide as their 'cross tires. This was also the first time I've really done any riding in the snow.

Looking back at my goals for the race, I think I did well. I did a good job of pedaling through the entire course, I basically only coasted when I was cornering. This is something I'll have to stay after though, as I caught myself starting to coast on descents a few times. I generally took good racing lines, although today the line was largely dictated by available traction. My mounts and dismounts were also pretty clean.

One of the other things I was very pleased about was my aggressiveness on the opening lap. It put me in a lot of discomfort, but it also put me well up into the field. If I had not fallen three times, I think I would have certainly finished higher, and my performance on the first lap would have had a lot to do with that.

I also stuck with my 170mm crankarms. I felt much more efficient with them today than I did with my 175's last time. In fact, my wife commented that I actually looked more efficient today. I'm not sure how she could see that, but I'll take it anyway.

The Mental Aspect of Racing

With my final cyclocross race of the season approaching, I've been mentally reviewing my two previous races, looking for anything I can seize on that will help me. As I mentioned in a previous post, my last was especially brutal, due to significant climbing and strong winds.

My overall cyclocross race strategy (assuming a four lap race) is to go out hard for the first two laps, then settle in a little on the third lap and take stock of my position. Then on the fourth lap, if it seems possible to improve my position, I go hard again.

At Munson, my last race, I tried to implement this strategy (it did work fairly well for me at my first race). On the first lap, after a long section of climbing, I was still ahead of several people and not too far behind the rider in front of me. As we turned into the headwind (about a third of the way through the lap), I told myself that I needed to get on this guy's wheel and try to stay there. I figured, if nothing else, I could at least draft off him, which would be an advantage considering the wind. So, I pushed a bit harder, but couldn't really make up any ground. About the time we hit the sand volleyball pit (about halfway through the lap), I gave up on trying to catch him. That was as far forward as I made it in that race.

(Yeah, I ran it.)

In hindsight, that decision was effectively the end of my race. After that point, I was just trying to minimize my losses. As I see it, if you're minimizing losses during the first lap of the race, things aren't going to go well.

The racer that I was chasing ended up finishing less than a minute ahead of me. Looking at the lap times after the race, his first lap was significantly quicker than mine (about 35 seconds), my second lap was actually a few seconds faster than his, and his third lap was about 15 seconds faster than mine. We both got lapped during the third lap, so there was no fourth lap for us.

This all leads me to wonder what would have happened if I had sucked it up and got on his wheel on that first lap. Looking at the lap times, I suspect that I would have been able to stay there and might have been in a position to take that spot at the end of the race. At worst, I would have caught him and blown up trying to stay with him, finishing behind him like I did anyway. At least I would have really been racing.

If I had to do it again, I would have changed two things. First, when I decided to close the gap to the rider in front of me, I should have charged really hard and just gotten it done. I would have definately bridged the gap that way, and it might have done some psychological damage to the guys behind me. Second, I shouldn't have given up on chasing the rider in front of me, that's just an issue of mental toughness. Of course, this is all very easy to say sitting at my nice warm desk, it's another thing to go out and do it.

The race this weekend should be interesting. They're predicting a high temperature of 31F and I wouldn't be surprised if there's still snow on the ground. The race course is right by a decent-sized lake, so I'm expecting a little wind. It should be some proper cyclocross weather!