Night on Bald Mountain

“Nothing is work unless you'd rather be doing something else.”

- George Halas

I had a really bad day at work yesterday; I may get frustrated frequently, but it usually passes pretty quickly and isn't a big deal. Yesterday I was just really angry. I had planned to go ride at Stony after work, since I'm racing there next weekend, but I wasn't very excited about it, which didn't help my mood.

As the day was winding down, I decided to ride at Bald Mountain instead. I rode Bald Mountain a bunch last year, but I hadn't been there at all this year. The trail is much less technical than Stony, but, if you ride hard, you can definitely still get a good workout there.

It turned out that the trails at Bald Mountain were in great shape; sometimes they take a while to dry out after the rain. I didn't see anyone else there on a bike, and just two small groups of hikers. After about 15 minutes of riding, my work stress was basically gone. (This is, incidently, a big advantage of mountain biking over road biking. I can ride on the road for hours and still be thinking about work, but when I ride the mountain bike, I have to focus on the trail, so everything else gets pushed aside.) I felt really good both from a fitness standpoint and a technical standpoint.

I think I'm getting more comfortable letting the tires slide a little, which I think is a key for me to go faster. I'm not talking about big, trail-ripping sliding here, just the little drift that happens when you're near the limit. Someone watching from the side probably wouldn't even see it.

Cross Practice

“Running is a big question mark that’s there each and every day. It asks you, ‘Are you going to be a wimp, or are you going to be strong today?’”

- Peter Maher

Last night I went to my first Rhino cyclocross practice of the year. The club has been doing 'cross practices since the beginning of August, but this is the first one I've been able to go to. It was a tough ride (it was very hot when we started), but I rode a little better than I expected.

A few things I noticed:

- I had trouble going over the low-speed barriers, I was dropping my bike down too soon (on top of the barrier). The faster barriers were OK.

- This year is the year to get rid of the stutter step on the remount!

- I need to work on riding in the drops more. Braking is noticeably better in this position. My hands would appreciate the variety in position.

- I felt pretty good on the technical parts of the course; I thought I was noticeably faster than most of the guys (and girls) riding around me in the techy stuff. I think the backyard MTB stuff helps with 'cross even more than it helps with mountain biking!

- My tires are way overbuilt in comparison to what most people are running.

This is what I've got on the bike right now.

I'm considering switching to something more like this.

Training Week

“Don't do anything in practice that you wouldn't do in the game.”

- George Halas

Last week ended up being a pretty good training week, despite the bad weather. I got in all of my scheduled rides and workouts, and by the end of the week, I felt pretty good on the bike.

This week, I'm going to the Rhino's Tuesday night cyclocross workout, so that will be a pretty good test to see where I stand. My guess is that it won't go so well, but my first cross race is still 4 weeks off, so that's OK.

At the 'cross workout, we usually do several short "races", each is maybe 6 laps of a fairly short course. I figure that two laps on our training courses equals one lap on a real 'cross course. Most people, myself included, don't really treat these workouts like real races though.

I think these workouts are very effective, but I also think I can get more out of them. My plan for this year is to treat these like real races. So, what's critical in a 'cross race? The first thing is the start. Since the race is so short, it's important to get up front early and push hard; coming from behind just doesn't seem to work that well. To that end, I want to start each training race like I would a real race... really drop the hammer at the beginning. I'll try to hold that high pace for the first lap; maybe try to build up to two laps by the end of the year. The second thing I want to work on is to quickly get back up to my cruising speed after I have to slow down to clear barriers, for a corner, etc. It's going to mean that these training races hurt more, but it should also make them more effective.

Hot Hot Hot!

“Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit.”

- Vince Lombardi

I had a tough ride last night. It was about 90F, humid, and I'm still not in good mountain biking shape (my co-workers laugh when I tell them I'm out of shape, but I guess it's all relative). I went over to Stony after work to ride the trails; I realized that this was my first trail ride since the Stony Marathon race in July! As I expected, I wasn't too sharp and was a little more gassed in some sections than normal. While I was generally rusty, my bike handling felt really good in a few spots; I think this was where some of my backyard drills made an impact. I definitely need to keep that up.

So, I only rode for about an hour on the trails, and I was really starting to get tired. I decided that I should probably get off the trails before I crashed into something, but I also decided that I needed to ride for the 1.5 hours I had planned. So, I sucked it up and got out on the road surrounding the lake. I thought about turning around or cutting out the nature trail spur about half a dozen times, but I did the whole thing. I had also forgotten about how slow a mountain bike feels on the road... lots of rolling resistance, bad aerodynamics, the gearing isn't right, you name it!

Anyway, my total ride time was 1:31. It felt like a pretty big accomplishment, even though this is a standard (or even short) ride length for me.

The Real World

“It isn't the mountains ahead to climb that wear you out; it's the pebble in your shoe.”
- Muhammad Ali

Yesterday was mainly sucked away by my responsibilities to the real world. I needed to get new tires for my car (I probably should have done it months ago), so I stopped at the shop on the way home from work. Typically, since I go for higher performance tires, the tire shop needs to order what I want; so I expected to skate in and out in just a few minutes. It turned out that they did have some suitable tires for me in stock, so I waited around while they put them on. Since last night also looked to be the only non-rainy night we might have for a while, I also mowed the lawn (as did almost all of my neighbors). It took quite a bit longer than usual since the grass was so long.

By the time I finished all that, it was about 8:30pm and starting to get dark. So I put on my running shoes and went for a quick jog. It went OK, but I was a bit tired to start with and the right IT band flared up a little near the end. I want to do a few more short, easy runs over the next couple weeks before I transition to hill sprint work for cyclocross.

The Rainy Season

It's apparently the rainy season in Michigan right now. It rained almost the entire day today and yesterday. My grass needed it, but since it was last mowed before I left for Germany, now it's long enough that Suzie is getting lost out there!

I had a cycling first for me tonight on the trainer. I was getting near the end of the No Slackers Spinervals DVD, and I threw up a little. I told Sarah after the ride; for some reason, she thought it was gross... whatever. I'm pretty pleased with myself though. I suppose, in reality, it had more to do with me being a bit out-of-shape rather than going super hard.

I was looking at my race schedule a bit tonight; I'm looking forward to being able to focus on riding a little more than I've been able to for the past month. It looks like I've only got one mountain bike race left for the season (!) unless I feel really good this week and decide to race on Saturday; we'll see how this week goes. After that, I start the cyclocross season. The Rhinos started 'cross practice two weeks ago. I'm not planning to go tomorrow night (if it's a dry night, the lawn will be calling), but I'll start going next week.

Home Again

I got back from Germany yesterday; it was a pretty tiring trip and I'm glad to be back home. I got a little running in one morning and did some strength work another day, but it was generally an inactive trip. We just started work too early and finished too late most days for me to want to do too much.

Anyway, as promised, here are some pictures from the Alaska trip.

Home, For Now

I'm back home from Alaska now. Sorry that the blogging took a nosedive before I left (and since I've been back). I had some very busy days right before the trip, lots of work and a little birthday celebration.

I'll make a separate post about it, but the trip to Alaska was great. Here's a teaser...

I stayed reasonably active on the trip, but I still feel slow and out of shape now. I got home very early Saturday morning. I didn't ride Saturday; I took care of some housework instead. I put in about 1:45 on the bike Sunday; it felt OK, but not great. No riding last night either, but I should be able to get a good ride in tonight.

At the end of this week, I'm heading to West Virginia. I'm tempted to bring a bike, but I don't know if I'll really have much opportunity to ride. I should probably do it... Next Monday I'm heading off to Germany for the week (hopefully it's only one week), and I'm expecting that it will be an unpleasant trip.

I was planning to race again on the 25th, but, with all my traveling, I won't have much solid riding in between now and then. I'll make a decision about it at the end of this week once I see how it goes.

Bump and Run 3

I volunteered this morning for Bump and Run race #3. This one was the longest of the series and went a little over 5 miles. Sarah finished in about an hour and a half. The top time was a little under an hour, but that guy crushed the whole field. Sarah did pretty well for someone who "doesn't like running."

I spent a lot of time waiting around at my station before and in the middle of the race. My diversions included a little running of my own (before the race started), juggling rocks and balancing on a log.

One of the things they gave away in our swag bags was a sample of a product called Power Blast. It's a powder you mix in with water and it makes an "energy drink". I tried it on my ride this afternoon, and I can't say I was too impressed. First, it was very sweet and almost felt like it added carbonation to the water; maybe I didn't use enough water, but I don't think so. I also felt like it made me edgy rather than giving me real energy. A look at the ingredients seems to explain this, there are only 4 calories (all labeled as "other carbohydrates") and the rest is vitamins, minerals and caffeine. Not necessarily bad, but it's not what I'm looking for in an energy drink.

I see Rasmussen is still in yellow. Hopefully Contador, Evans or somebody else can beat him before they get to Paris. The Tour doesn't need another controversial winner again this year.

Rasmussen

I normally don't put too much stock into these accusations of doping by former riders, etc, but this one about Michael Rasmussen sounds convincing to me. Pretty disappointing.

Fundamentals

"Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

A nice quote I stumbled across recently. I'm usually pretty optimistic in the morning, especially if it's a nice summer day. I feel fortunate if that feeling doesn't get completely beaten out of me during the work day though. ;-)

The real point of this post is to talk about mountain biking fundamentals (really, the fundamentals apply to almost any type of cycling). I started by coming up with a list of what are probably "higher level" skills, these would include things like: climbing, cornering, riding over obstacles, etc. From this list, I boiled the skills down to three fundamentals:

1. Balance / Body Position

2. Pedaling

3. Braking

Of these three, Balance / Body Position is the most important. Basically every higher level skill is built off of good balance and correct body position.

So, I've been spending some time working on these fundamentals. I've dropped the saddle on my singlespeed and have been doing a bunch of different drills in my backyard. I haven't done too many sessions yet, and I haven't been out to the trail recently, so I can't say if this is really helping much, but it can't hurt and it's pretty fun. The most interesting thing I've found so far is that I actually can lift the rear wheel off the ground on a bike with flat pedals (leading eventually to a bunny hop). I'm just not very consistent with it yet.

Windy 100

Dad and I rode our first century yesterday. The big story before the ride looked to be the weather. The forecast called for wind (15-20mph) all day and thunderstorms in the afternoon. We got off to a pretty early start (although not quite as early as I wanted). It was pretty windy for most of the ride, but not as bad as I'd feared. The rain also generally stayed away.

We passed the scene of what appeared to be a car/bicycle accident very early in the ride. I looked for some news on that this morning, but I didn't find anything; hopefully everything was OK there. The ride was otherwise pretty uneventful. I was pretty achey in a number of spots by the time we were finished, but I'm feeling pretty good today.

Here are a couple of pictures. Me, waiting for Mom and Dad to arrive.

Dad, after the ride. He doesn't look too tired, does he?

REO Speedwagon

Any other bike geeks (or geeks in general) notice that Kona cyclocross rider Barry Wicks looks like the guy from REO Speedwagon?

Mr. Wicks...

REO Speedwagon dude...

The better question is, how did I know what the REO Speedwagon guy looked like? Here's your hint. The video is worth watching for it's 80's-ness... the comments are also pretty funny.

Weekend

This past weekend was kind of a blur. I was up and out the door for a run by 7am on Saturday; the run went OK, but my IT band flared up again at the end. I took a little break, then mowed the lawn, and then went on a bike ride. Saturday afternoon/evening, Sarah and I went to a wedding for one of her fellow skating coaches.

On Sunday, I was up and out early again. This time, I rode my bike first. I attempted a run again and my IT band flared up within 6 or 7 minutes, so I stopped. I'll rest and stretch and ice today and try again tomorrow. After my aborted run, I ate a quick lunch and then Sarah and I met up with some friends to canoe for a couple hours. We had a pretty good time; we saw some interesting locals (many were short a few teeth) at a "swimmin' hole" along the river. After that, we went to visit Sean and Stacie and their new baby. Stacie made me a birthday cake, which was a nice surprise. July 8 is definitely the earliest I've celebrated my birthday in a long time, maybe ever.

The IT band thing is pretty disappointing. It probably means I won't have the opportunity to be ready for the trail race, but I guess it was a long shot anyway. I'm going to keep trying to resolve it though and we'll see what happens.

Running

I've been taking it easy, sort of, since the Marathon race last weekend. I've sort of decided not to do the 6 hour race at the end of the month. I actually basically made this decision shortly after hour 3 of the Marathon race, I was thinking "How could I ride twice this long?"

So, I'm doing a little riding to stay ready for the century ride I'm doing with my dad next weekend, but I'm planning to keep my riding to a minimum until I get back from Alaska. This should be a nice break and I'll be fired up to ride again in August. I've still got a lot of racing left to do this year.

Even though I'm not riding much, I'm not just sitting around. I've been doing some running instead. I'd really like to get my legs prepared to run the last race in the "Bump 'n Run" trail running series that my wife is doing. This one is going to be 5 miles, and I'm not sure I'll be able to get ready in time. I'll give it a shot though. My left knee, which is the one that has given me trouble the past couple years, has felt great during and after my runs. Unfortunately, I'm having some IT band issues with my right knee after about 15 minutes of running. I've been diligent about stopping once it starts hurting, stretching it, icing it, etc so hopefully it will clear up pretty soon.

Quick Picture

FarmerJohn has some pictures up from the Stony Marathon race. Here's the one of me. It's kind of interesting to look at the other pictures of the guys around me, you'll see that most of them have their heads tilted up just a little more than me. As I recall, I just about bit it after hopping over this little log on the first lap (I'm pretty sure that's where the picture is), I didn't land very square... I may have also cased it a little bit, I don't remember.

The picture of Brien getting over the log is also good. Notice how low his chest is, and how he's got his rear tire in the air already. I'm sure his bike didn't touch that log.

Singletrack Efficiency

Final results from the Marathon race are up. I finished 8th out 11 in my class, but the last guy DNF'd. It was interesting to look at the times from this year's race compared to last year. In general, this year's race was noticeably faster than last year's; this is a little surprising since the course should have been a little longer and a little slower with the addition of the new section in the Roller Coaster. I don't exactly remember what the weather was like last year, it might have been pretty hot last year, and maybe that was the difference.

Even in a race like this, my biggest weakness is still speed in the singletrack. I came up with a new way to think about it this morning, whether it's useful or not. I realized that what I'm after is not so much speed but efficiency. The seeds of this idea were planted in the Bloomer race. The singletrack there is tight and tends to follow a rolling profile, so I was able to stay on a wheel by outclimbing the racer who'd just opened a gap on the descent and the corner. (It may be that I'm at less of a disadvantage in tight singletrack where everyone has to slow down than I am in more open singletrack where I'm considerably slower than the faster guys.) This is obviously an inefficient way to stay on a wheel. I'd be better off using less energy to stay there by maintaining my momentum down the hill and through the corner; or, better yet, using the same energy level, but, having maintained my momentum, make the pass on the climb (easier said than done at Bloomer, but the principle is right).

I had plenty of time to think about this at the Marathon race, as I'd lose a position in the singletrack and then gain it back out on the two-track. I got to thinking about how every time I hit my brakes in the singletrack, it amounted to a bigger gap that I had to close on the two-track. Over the course of a 40-mile race, all of those extra brake touches really add up.

The other thing that occured to me before the race on Saturday was that I think most of the guys I race against have been riding their mountain bikes a lot longer than me. I keep a log of my races, and when I put the Marathon race in, I looked back at my first race, a MTB time trial, also at Stony Creek (end of July 2005). In that race, I averaged 10.2mph over 13 miles. Saturday, I averaged 11.5 mph over the 40 miles (the trails used in both races were basically the same). That's a pretty big difference. So, sometimes I just need to remember that getting faster takes time. It takes time to build fitness, and it takes time to build confidence in bike handling skills.

Stony Marathon XC

Yesterday I raced the Stony Marathon XC; 4 laps of a 10-mile course. I decided to load up my Camelback rather than worry about somebody handing bottles to me... besides, I'm not used to drinking from bottles on the mountain bike. I also packed 4 gels with me.

I did a very short, easy warmup. I figured that the race was long enough that I didn't need to warmup much ahead of time. They started us in waves... with the Expert/Elites going first (they raced 6 laps!), followed by groups of Sport racers. My wave included Sport men from 19 to 40 I think. Nobody seemed to be pushing too hard from the start, and I stayed with my group until we hit the Pines. At that point, guys who were a little quicker in the singletrack started passing me. I held my own out on the two-track, but was getting consistently passed in the singletrack. By the end of the first lap, I was last in my group (which I thought meant I was last in my wave), so I was a little discouraged at that point.

I felt a little better near the beginning of the second lap. On a "two-way" section of the course, I saw some guys with number plates for my class still finishing their first lap. So, I wasn't last in my wave, just the last of the first sepatation. There was a long climbing section near the beginning of the lap (individually, the climbs aren't long, but there are a bunch of them strung together), and I passed about 5 guys at once on the last climb. So, that perked me up a bit, even though most of the guys got by me again later in the lap.

Before the race, I had expected the third lap to be the hardest. I was pretty fatigued at the beginning of the lap, but that had also happened at the beginning of the second lap. It was a combination of things, the laps ended with a long slightly uphill ride through the grass, which was an energy-sucker. The gels also weren't kicking in until a little later in the lap. As with the second lap, I felt better a little further into the lap. For most of the third lap, I was riding with guys who rode more like I did in the singletrack, and I was also picking off a few riders who were starting to fade. Some of the faster Expert/Elite riders also started lapping me on the third lap... those guys were pretty impressive. By the end of the third lap, I was really starting to drag. I took my gel at the end of the lap as usual and waited for it to kick in.

I started the fourth lap pretty fatigued, as seemed to be the trend. This time though, the boost I got from the gel was short-lived. By the time I finished the first climbing section, I could feel my energy level dropping and a bonk coming on. I ate my "safety" gel, and it seemed to help. On that climbing section, I made my last pass on a guy I'd been swapping spots with all day. I told him we'd probably see each other again, but we didn't. I also started having some pain in my left foot early in the lap; it turns out that I got a little blister, but it didn't bother me too much. The singletrack sections were a little dicey the last time through; I didn't have any problems, but I wasn't as focused as I should have been. Anyway, I got through the lap and finished and was happy to get off my bike.

I finished in just under 3.5 hours, which I was pretty happy with. The preliminary results showed that I finished 8th out of 11; although, there might have been a few racers still on the course. I'd hoped to place a little higher, but that's how it goes; I'm not sure what I would have done differently to improve my position.

Despite eating and drinking a lot after the race yesterday, this morning I weighed 4 pounds less than I did yesterday morning.

Bunch o' Pictures

I realize that my blog has been devoid of pictures lately, so I raided my camera, and here's a sampling of what was on there...

A squirrel sleeping on the tree outside the bedroom window.



5th anniversary picture. Suzie wasn't too cooperative.

Our regular crew of Mountain Rhinos at Bloomer.

Steve Balogh's picture of me at the Hines Park TT.

Stony Prep

I've been thinking about how I want to tackle the Stony Marathon XC race this weekend. The race is 40 miles, and will take 3-3.5 hours, so pacing will be key. The question is how do you ration out your energy? When to go hard, when to back off, do you even go hard at all? I feel like I might have an advantage for this race, since I think I have better endurance than most of the guys I race against. That being said, it won't help me if I use my energy at the wrong times, or don't take advantage of the "free speed" opportunities available.

The course is mapped out here. Roughly 40% of the course is singletrack, the rest is two-track. All of the more difficult climbs are on the two-track, although none of them are really that bad (easy to say sitting at my desk, I'm sure I won't be thinking that by the end of the race).

So my plan is basically this: ride at a "tempo" effort on the two-track, and back off and recover a little in the singletrack. The singletrack at Stony is, for the most part, well-suited for recovery. It flows pretty nicely, so you don't have to pedal too much if you stay off the brakes.

Update: I rode 2 laps of the course tonight. I didn't push much at all and was doing laps in the 55 minute range. This is a little slow compared to lap times from last year, but the course is slightly longer than last year, and my lap times include a couple short wrong turns and my crash. I expect to be able to pull my lap times down to about 50 minutes without too much trouble.

So, my crash... it was on a rough descent at the end of the Roller Coaster. Normally, you come off this descent, go across a "two-track" path and into the next singletrack section. No braking is necessary in that case. For the Marathon race, we have to make a hard right turn onto the two-track instead, so you need to do some pretty heavy braking to make the turn. On my first lap, I was on the brakes in the rough part and my front wheel stopped when it hit a rock. The results were predictable: I went flying over the bars. I landed pretty hard and my shoulder and hip, but it didn't do too much damage. I got some "gravel rash" on my hip and elbow and a little cut on my knee. Crashes like that are part of the reason I think it's important to exercise the entire body. Anyway, on my second lap, I braked before the rough section, rolled through it, and then braked again after... the results were much better.

More Bloomer Pictures

Farmer John just put up some more pictures from the Bloomer XC race. There's a good one of fellow Mountain Rhino Brien (I think I'd get that poster-sized if it were me!), and here's a non-poster-worthy one of me.

I decided to take the night mostly off. Even though I slept pretty well the past two nights, I've just been feeling a little run down since the race on Sunday. I worked on some trackstands in the backyard for a while tonight, but that was about it. Tomorrow night I'm heading out to Stony for a few laps of the Marathon course.

Hines Park TT - 2007

I did a road time trial out at Hines Park this morning. This was the Michigan State Championship event, and it was a 40km TT rather than the 20km TT I did last year. I wasn't really expecting too much going into it, my plan was to treat it basically like a hard workout.

I started pretty well, maybe went out just a little too hard (the start was slightly downhill), but I settled into my pace pretty quickly . We had nice weather temperature-wise, but it was a little windy in spots. The wind was really getting to me for the last 15k or so. Since this race was longer, I had more trouble staying comfortable in the drops (I only have drop bars, no aero bars); I tried to only get out of the drops on the slight climbs, but I'm sure I still paid an aero penalty for this. I think for next year, I'll at least get some clip-on aero bars.

So, I finished just under 1:15 (about 19.9 mph). I was shooting for a 1:13, but, given the wind, I wasn't too disappointed. The preliminary results they had posted showed me beating at least 2 guys, although I don't know if everyone was in yet.

Cornering Focus

I rode several laps out at Stony on Saturday; I'm starting to think about the Stony Marathon XC race coming up next weekend. My laps went pretty well, although I'm still having a little trouble riding the uphill logpile in the new section. I'm now convinced that I can ride it, it's just a matter of commiting and doing it.

I had a thought on my way home from the ride about my bike handling. I've been trying to focus on staying off the brakes before corners, with the idea that this will improve my cornering speed. I think maybe this is the wrong approach (at least, for me). I think I need to focus on doing things right in the corner and building confidence in my cornering abilities first. Then, braking is just a matter of setting the speed I know I can handle for the corner. Essentially, I'm just looking at my problem in a different way.

Deck of Cards

On Tuesday I tried out Ross's "Deck of Cards" workout. It looked pretty simple, you take a deck of cards and turn over each card one by one. For a red card, you do burpees, for a black card you do pushups. The goal is to go through the whole deck as fast as possible. Turns out that this was a tough workout. I switched from full burpees to squat thrusts with a jump about a quarter of the way through, and then to just squat thrusts at about the halfway point. I finished in just under half an hour. (I counted afterward, I did 190 pushups and 190 burpees/squat thrusts.) My legs, arms, chest, you name it, have been sore since then. I don't remember the last time a workout has left me so sore. I suppose that's good though...

Last night I rode the mountain bike for about an hour and a half. I didn't have any issues with my saddle sore, and I managed to keep myself from hitting any trees, so it was a nice improvement over my last outing.

As an experiment, I bumped up my tire pressure from 30 to 35 psi yesterday. My impression was that my tires slid a little sooner, but that they were more predictable. I had the same experience when I raced my car. Increasing tire pressure is an interesting exercise in trade-offs. In terms of contact patch, the lower the pressure is, the larger your contact area is, which should translate into more grip. However, at low pressures, the tire carcass is easily deformed which can result in a "squirmy" unpredictable feeling, and therefore worse overall performance. So, what we're looking for is a sweet spot where the tire deforms enough to provide a large contact patch, but is stiff enough to provide predictable behavior. I think I'll stick with this slightly higher pressure for awhile and see how it works.

Update

Looks like I may be heading back to Germany in the next couple weeks, we'll see. No doubt it will screw up some races I have planned. Cripe!

I'm still nursing my saddle sore, but it's just about gone now. I'm not riding today (I'll do a hard workout off the bike instead), but I'll give it a shot tomorrow. This little time off has also allowed most of my Bloomer race and Stony tree injuries to heal up.

Skidding and Sore

I found a cool set of "how-to" mountain bike videos here. Turns out that one of the best ones is the Skidding video. Most books tell you to find a dirt road to get a feel for your tires sliding. I haven't really had much success finding a suitable road out here though. This video provides a clever alternative: they practice skidding/sliding on wet pavement. This is pretty easy to find (or make)! So, next time it rains, I'll be out on a bike with slick tires (and platform pedals I think) sliding around!

On a different note, I've been staying off the bike this weekend while I'm battling a saddle sore. It's pretty amazing that something so small can be so painful. Still, I think this is the right approach, I don't need to be riding a lot this week, and I'd rather not risk this thing turning into something nastier.

I did get some running in both days this weekend and a strength workout this morning. I felt really good running this morning, which was a nice surprise.

Close Encounter

I had a close encounter of the tree kind last night at Stony. I drove over to Stony straight after work last night, parked at the trailhead and went for a short run. (I'd decided I need to get back to running a little bit.) I figured the run would serve as a short warm-up, then I could go ride.

Well, it ended up being pretty hot while I was out running. I'm definitely not used to running anymore, and I guess I'm used to the cooling effect of riding. By the time I was done, I was dripping sweat and a bit more tired than I expected. Still, it was a good run, and I didn't have any knee problems.

I took my time getting changed to ride, had a little snack and some water. I figured I wouldn't have much jump on the trail, but that I'd otherwise be OK. Once I started riding, I found that I was physically OK, but that I was in a mental fog.

I expected to be pretty sharp on the trail, since I ended up putting in a lot of time at the more technical Bloomer trails last week. Almost immediately, I realized that this wasn't the case. I didn't have any problems on the first few sections of Stony, but I didn't feel smooth either.

I struggled through the new trail in the Roller Coaster section. Back out on the old trail, I was descending through a rooty section that I've done many times before without a problem. For some reason, this time, I picked a line closer to some roots that run parallel to the trail (normally, I don't do this, and for good reason!). As I should have expected, the roots redirected my bike a bit, and sent me straight toward a tree. On a different day, I might have still saved it, but not yesterday. I ran the right side of my body into the tree (note that the tree was on the left side of the trail!). I ended up with cuts on my forearm, knuckles and ear (maybe from my helmet?) and a bruised shoulder.

I don't think I've ever hit a tree quite like that before. I've clipped them with the ends of the handlebars and gone down, but I've never run squarely into one. Turns out that it's not as bad as I expected it to be.

Anyway, after my crash, I decided I had better stop, even though I'd only been riding for about 30 minutes at that point. My focus just wasn't where it needed to be, and I thought I'd probably end up crashing more if I continued. So, I took the bailout trail and rode back to the parking lot.

Once I got back in the car to drive home I realized just how tired I was. Once I got home, I pretty much just ate a quick snack, showered, and went to bed.

Upcoming Races

I had a pretty good outing at the track last night. We worked on being comfortable in pacelines and groups, as usual. We had enough people to do a little riding in 4 lines; this was pretty interesting when you were on an "inside" line since you were completely boxed in. We did some "fartlek" style intervals for the last hour or so; my legs didn't really want to go for the first couple efforts, but after that I felt pretty strong.

I'm not doing any racing this weekend, but next weekend I'm going to square off against the roadies. I'm doing the "State Championship" 40km time trial out at Hines Park. I did a 20km TT out there last year, and it's a good location for a TT; the road is almost completely flat with some gentle curves and they close it to traffic for the race. Going 40km will be tough, but it's the same course for everyone. My goal is to complete it in 1:13 (about 20.4mph). I won't exactly be torching the competition with a time like that, but it would be a good time for me I think. Last year I averaged about 20.5mph for the 20km TT.

The following weekend is the Stony Creek Marathon XC race. I had intended to do this long 40-miler last year, but I got sick a few days beforehand so I didn't race. This should be an interesting race for a few reasons.

One is that, at least in past years, it's been a big mass start race. Instead of breaking the categories down by age groups, they started all the Expert/Elites together, all the Sports together, all the Beginners together. Especially for Sport, that's a lot of riders starting at once. So, I'll have to make some decisions about how hard I want to go from at the start; the course takes quite a few miles to get into the tight singletrack, so it may not be too critical to get to the front early.

Two is that it will be a pretty good indicator for how I might respond for the 6-hour race in July (although I expect this race will take just over 3 hours).

Three is the possibility that I might actually get a good result in the race. I hadn't really considered this until Brad mentioned it yesterday. The course is mostly open two-track with some reasonable climbing, so my weakness in the tighter stuff won't hurt me too much; I ride at Stony enough to know the trail pretty well anyway. I think it may also be to my advantage that the race is a little longer; you can see from the lap times last year that guys were cracking after the halfway point. Who knows though, maybe I'll be cracking by then too?

Bloomer XC

I raced the Bloomer Park XC this afternoon. The race went about how I expected, but I was a little surprised by my result. I ended up 6th out 12 (I thought I would do worse).


It's too soon (and too boring) to go through the blow-by-blow, but here's what worked and what didn't for me:

• For finishing in the region of the field where I'm finishing (mid pack or lower), there's no reason for me to go out really hard at the start. What separates me from the fast Sport guys is, in large part, technical ability. What separates me from the slower guys is fitness. I can let the slower guys go out hard and come back to me later in the race.
• I experimented with locking out my fork on the sledding hill climb. It seemed to work well, so I need to consider doing this more often.
• Don't try to pass a little "off trail" unless you're sure you won't hit anything and absolutely can't wait. I attempted a pass like this early in my third lap, and I ended up hitting some more substantial brush than I expected, which effectively stopped me and also caused my chain to drop. Had I waited 20 seconds or so longer, the trail opened back up into a hard little climb, and I would have been easily able to pass there (I thought we were on a much longer section of singletrack). I did apologize to the guy when I finally did pass him; not that I screwed up his race, but I felt like a jerk for my earlier move.
• I need to practice the big switchbacks at Bloomer if I'm going to race there again (I suppose it would be good for me to practice anyway). I never cleaned the first two corners in my pre-rides, so I ran them in the race. It wasn't a big deal to run, but I'm guessing I lost 30s or so each lap. That being said, running was the correct decision for today, it's much faster than crashing.
• I felt reasonably good in the tight singletrack; I know I need to go faster, but I rode about as well as I ride today. Early in the race, I was keeping up with the faster guys, but you could see the gap open when we descended and on the flat twisty parts; I was only staying on their wheels by climbing faster. (Consider that as wasted energy, or at least mis-used energy; it's much more efficient to carry more speed into the hill.)
• My strategy of going really hard on the flats worked, and probably salvaged my race result. I was able to pass a lot of guys on the flat sections, particularly those following climbs.
  

The luv2mtb guy has pictures up already... wow, that's quick!

Bloomer Race Prep

I'm racing at Bloomer Park tomorrow. I went out there last night to check the course out. I'd never ridden out there before, but the course was (mostly) marked, so I figured I could find my way around.

The course was a pretty interesting mix of trail. There's a lot of very tight, twisty singletrack, but also a lot of wide-open two-track trail. I rode two laps, my first took about 55 minutes, but I was going pretty slow and got off-course twice (like I said, the course was mostly marked). I finished my second lap in about 43 minutes... turns out that knowing where you're going helps. Although I wasn't going anywhere near race pace, you can't help but compare: the guys in my class did laps in the low 30's last year, but the course wasn't exactly the same.

On both laps, I had some trouble on a big switchback descent. I'm not sure what my deal is, it's really no harder (in fact, maybe easier) than the "chute" at Pontiac Lake. I think part of the problem was that I was looking over the edge toward the outside of the switchback instead of where I wanted to go. I'm heading back out there again today for a little more practice; I expect it will go a little better. Right after the big switchbacks, there's a long sidehill trail with lots of exposure to one side; I didn't really have any trouble with it, but I'm not used to trails like that where it's a long way down on one side.

Thinking about goals for the race:

1. Hammer on the flats. There are several long wide-open sections on the course; this is going to be my best opportunity to make up time, because the guys that know the trail will drop me in the singletrack.

2. Stay smooth and relaxed on the singletrack. Stay off the brakes as much as my "inner mother" will allow.


In other news, Ned Overend crushed the Vail Hill Climb at age 51, beating, among others, Floyd Landis.

Echelon

I had a good ride at the track with the Rhinos on Tuesday night. We worked on being comfortable riding in a paceline, then some fast cornering in the group, sprinting, and finally on echelons (circular paceline). The echelon work was pretty interesting. Once again I had little idea what I was doing, but the more experienced riders were happy to help.

Fitness-wise, I felt pretty good. I rode with the group right until the end, and by that time, the pace (or other obligations) had whittled the group from about 16 riders to about 8. I was pleasantly surprised to still feel pretty strong by the time we stopped.

Rainy Weekend

It's been a pretty rainy weekend. I still haven't been out today, but I did get out and ride for an hour or so yesterday.

My motivation has been a little low this week. There were a lot of other things going on: work was busy and my father-in-law got remarried. My real problem though is that I've lost focus since I'm not going to be able to race the Stony TT. To help combat that, I went ahead and signed up for all of the races I was planning on doing between now and the end of July.

My knee felt pretty good this week on and off the bike. The little bit of fatigue I was feeling on the bike initially has gone away, as I expected. I actually feel a little stronger climbing with the new position, I think I can apply force more smoothly through the pedal stroke.

Pudding

Is pudding the ultimate post-ride recovery food? Stay tuned...

I just got back from the Tuesday night club ride at Waterford Hills. Tonight turned out to be a time trial night; I didn't know this, but it wouldn't have really changed anything. It's a pretty laid back deal, you just start when you want and time yourself. Fortunately, I brought a bike that had a computer. The TT is 5 laps around the track, about 7 miles total. I did it today in 18:58... about 22mph average. It was a pretty good effort, but I might have gone out just a little too hard on the first lap.

We also did a little 3 lap race on the track. It was pretty cool, but I basically had no idea what I was doing. The first lap was pretty calm, everyone just cruised. I ended up pulling the field for the second lap, which I'm pretty sure was a bad tactic; I just found myself up there after the first lap. After my pull, I didn't drop all the way back, but tucked in about 6 rows deep. I was in the inside lane and still about 6 rows back when things started getting tense. This left me in the fast lane for the first couple corners near the end of the lap, but with very little room to pull out and move ahead. Finally, with about two corners to go, I pulled out and started moving up. It was definitely too early for me to sprint to the finish, but I could see the front of the field moving away and thought I had to do something. I was stuck in the outside lane on the last corner (a long sweeper), but I had moved up to 6th or so. I tried to hang on to the end, but at least one more guy passed me as I started fading. Anyway, it was pretty fun, and riding in the pack like that wasn't as scary as I thought it might be.

This sort of brings me to my next point. I don't seem to have the same cornering issues on the road as I do on the trail. Part of it is that the conditions are much better: I can see through the corner, the surface is predictable, it's wide, etc. The other part of it is probably that I haven't had a real crash on the road. That being said, I've crashed on my mountain bike a bunch of times, and I know, at least intellectually, that it's usually not that big of a deal. I think it comes down to the fact that I generally trust my tires on the road, but I generally don't trust them on the trail.

One other sort of related story. I just about bit it twice tonight in the gravel parking lot. I was riding down the hill from the bathroom and started to make the turn toward the track. The corner was a little sandy, but I really wasn't going that fast, so I didn't think too much of it. As soon as I hit the sand my tires started sliding. Fortunately, I kept the bike up long enough to clip out and get a foot down. Then, I pedaled not more than 10 feet and just about went down again in a second patch of sand. So, I guess I learned that skinny road slicks and sand are not a good combination.

Hmmm... time for pudding...

Update!

Sorry it's been so long since I've blogged. This week, like every week it seems, was pretty busy.

I spent a lot of time this week messing with my position on the bike. I was pretty unsatisfied with my "wedging" process, which I discussed last Monday. Essentially, while my knee was tracking better, I felt like I was using so many wedges that I was treating the symptom, not the cause. I also spent a lot of time browsing through the form articles on Cycling News.

What I ultimately determined, I think, was that my saddle was too high. This was causing me to drop my right hip, which was causing my left knee to move outward at the top of the pedal stroke. So, I dropped my saddle and took out most of the wedges I had put on my left shoe (I kept one, since I did measure about a 7 degree varus on my left foot).

One of the recommendations in the Cycling News articles was that your saddle should be low enough that you are "fluent" at the bottom of your pedal stroke. I had thought I was a pretty smooth pedaler, until I dropped my saddle this week. Dropping the saddle made a huge difference in the way my pedal stroke feels. It just feels buttery smooth now, even in hard gears. This is a major change; I used to get very choppy in hard gears with the old position.

As for my knee, lowering the saddle reduced the lateral movement considerably. If I'm not concentrating on good form, I still see a little movement in the harder gears. If I am concentrating on good form, there's no lateral movement that I can see. I am feeling a little muscle fatigue around my knees, but I dropped my saddle enough that I'm not too surprised about this. I expect it to go away within another week or so as I adapt to the new position.

Once my knee feels OK on the bike, I'm going to start a very basic running program. If nothing else, I want to demonstrate to myself that I've solved the problem. I was a little concerned about running too much during the season, but, as Sarah pointed out, the amount of running I'm talking about here won't amount to much more than a warm-up for me (probably just 20-30 minute sessions).

Wedges

My wedges came in today. Today was supposed to be an off day for me, so at first I only did a quick wedge fitting and test... maybe 5 minutes on the bike at most. I started with 2 on the left shoe and 1 on the right.

I had some dinner and then decided that I needed to do some more extended testing of the wedges. I popped in an easy Spinervals DVD and got to work. After a few minutes of pedaling, it looked like my right knee had more lateral movement with 1 wedge than it did with none, so I took it out. My left knee still had some lateral movement, so I added a 3rd wedge. It seemed to help a little more, but there was still some lateral movement. At this point, I decided to stop adding wedges; my thought was that I may just need to retrain the pedal stroke of my left leg. So, I ended up with 3 wedges on my left shoe and 0 on the right.

So, my impressions:

• Left knee lateral movement is considerably smaller than with no wedges, but it's still noticeable. Remaining left knee movement may be from bad habits.
• My left leg felt much more "free" than normal at high cadences.
• Pedal pressure on my left foot was more uniform. My left big toe didn't fall asleep as it sometimes does, but that may be because the ride was short and I stopped a few times to adjust things.
• Calf tight spot was still present afterward, but not too bad.

The plan now is to ride like this for a little while and live with the new position. I can feel already that some different muscles in my left leg got used, and I wouldn't be surprised if I end up a little tender from it tomorrow. I suspect that I may end up going back to 2 wedges on my left shoe, but we'll see, 3 just feels like a little too much.

Chilly Weekend

I had a pretty good weekend, but it was overcast and a bit chilly almost the whole time. My knee was basically back to normal by Friday, so it didn't affect my riding too much.

Saturday morning, I went out to volunteer at the first Bump & Run trail race. Sarah ran in it and seemed to do pretty well. She was wiped out for the rest of the day though. I manned a pushup station, and everybody but one guy did the pushups. (You didn't have to do the exercises, but you took a time penalty if you skipped them.) The guy that won was crushing the field when he came by me, and he did some of the best pushups too. I think someone told me he was a cross-country running coach.

When we got back home, it was still kind of cold and rainy, so I decided to do a hard trainer ride instead of going back outside. I'd already done one cold and rainy ride this week, and I really didn't feel like going back for more.

I've been thinking a lot about my knees this week after my Wednesday run. My new theory is that running isn't my problem, it's cycling. A lot of things have come together that make me think that the angle of my foot on the pedal is causing poor alignment of my knee while riding. It's very obvious on the trainer (if you're paying attention) that my left knee does not track straight up and down, it moves inward at the top of the pedal stroke, particularly under heavy load. I think my right knee also moves in, but to a much smaller degree.

I ordered some Power Wedges (formerly, "LeWedges" I think), and I'm hoping that they help. I think, at a minimum, I should be able to correct the lateral knee movement. My expectation is that this will also take care of the tight spots I have in my calves. What I'm not so sure about is if clearing all that up will let me get back to running a little; I hope so.

The weather wasn't much better on Sunday, but I decided to get out anyway. I rode two laps out at Pontiac Lake. I came very close to clearing the hill right after "The Chute", but I didn't quite make it. I need to either carry a little more momentum up the hill or be able to generate just a little more force, and I'd be all set. It's just the first pitch on that hill that's tough; if I could clean that, I could climb the rest.

Otherwise, I did a little better about riding the trail more aggressively: carrying speed through corners and rougher sections. It helped on a few corners to really study the corner and realize that there was no way I could possibly blow the corner (usually because of the banking). I also came to the conclusion that it's generally better to ride over rocks than it is to try to go between them. You don't get knocked off line as much and you can maintain your momentum better. I also think it's best to keep pedaling through rocky sections. I had sort of been unconciously coming to these conclusions, but what I was doing finally sunk in yesterday.


I've been following the Landis arbitration hearing a bit. The stuff that's going on there really makes me sick. This VeloNews article sums it up decently.

Grinding It Out

Yesterday was a pretty long day for me. I got up at 4:45am to do my strength workout before work. Then, at work, I was going full throttle the whole day. My boss has been in Germany the past three weeks, so I've been helping out on his project a lot.

After work, I drove over to Stony Creek for a road ride. The weather report in the morning said it would be a little cool, but didn't say anything about rain. So, I only packed a short-sleeved jersey and shorts that morning. I always take arm warmers and knee warmers with me, so I figured I'd be fine.

It turned out to be colder than I expected and windy (it's always windy at Stony Creek!), and, only a few minutes into my ride, it started raining. Fortunately, the rain didn't last long. It was actually pretty comfortable when the sun peeked out. I got rained on again on my second lap (in a different spot); I got pretty wet that second time. I stayed dry on my third lap. I rode for about an hour and a half, and I saw exactly two other people out riding. Usually, the roads of Stony are packed with cyclists in the afternoon.

After that, I went straight over to Bloomer Park (home of our velodrome) to meet Sarah and her Boot Camp group. I'm volunteering for a "trail run" they're doing on Saturday. So, I thought they were going to talk about the race and what I needed to do, then let the people doing the race scout out the course. I envisioned that I would be mostly sitting on a park bench eating my sandwich. What happened instead is that we all ran through the course. It's been a long time since I've done any significant running, but I ended up putting in almost 3 miles before I bailed because my knees were bothering me. It actually felt really good to get out and run, it was too bad I couldn't do the whole thing.

I did some super knee treatment protocol last night, which seems to have helped. I used my stick to massage my legs (last night and this morning), took a constrast shower and took a couple of ibuprofens. This morning, my knees are still sore, but it's not too bad. Mostly IT band soreness.

Interesting point about the massage. I tend to find a tight spot on my calf (both legs); it hurts like crazy to roll over it with the stick, but my legs always feel better afterward. Anyway, I'm wondering if this point on my calf and my knee issues are somehow connected, but I don't know.

Alaska

Looks like Sarah and I will be heading to Alaska this summer. The opportunity came up kind of unexpectedly, but we're going to go ahead and do it. In fact, all of the trip arrangements are basically already made (except for dog sitting). The downside is that the trip just hosed my training schedule. We'll be leaving two days before my first "A" race at the end of July.

So, some re-working of the schedule was in order... I pretty much had to keep my "A" race on this side of the trip, because I'm sure my fitness will drop on the trip (which is fine).

What I'm tentatively working toward now is switching my "A" race to the 6-12hrs of Ithaca. I haven't decided if I want to try a solo 6 hour race or team up for 6 or maybe 12 hours. This is probably going to be as good of a time as any for me to try an endurance race. I'll be doing the Stony Marathon race 3 weeks before (about a 3.5 hour race) and a century the weekend before.

This new, longer, break in July/August also means that I'm going to race a little bit longer into the year. I'm going to add another Base phase in after the Alaska trip and try to race through the full cyclocross season, which ends December 2.

So in terms of bike stuff, I'm a little bummed that I will miss the Stony TT, but I'm excited about trying the endurance race. It will be a big-time challenge for me, particularly if I solo it, which is what I'm leaning toward. I'm also really geeked about doing more cyclocross races.

...leave it to me to spend most of a post entitled "Alaska" discussing bike racing...

Base 3 Test

I was trying to think of something clever to title this post, but I decided everything I came up with was stupid... so, instead, you get "Base 3 Test". Brilliant!

I did my LT field test on Sunday. I was a little concerned about how it would go since I've never done a hard ride the day before. I felt OK on Sunday morning though, so I figured I'd give it a go.

I held back a bit over my first 10 minutes; I mean, I still went pretty hard, but I left a little in reserve. I kicked it up just a bit for the last 20 minutes; I didn't even switch gears, just upped the cadence a bit. The result was a new personal best!

My average power over the last 20 minutes was 254 Watts. That's a 16W improvement over my last test (which, if you recall, I sort of blew). It was also an 11W improvement over my previous PB, which was at the end of last season. And just in case you think it's because I held back on my first 10 minutes, I also covered more total "distance" on the trainer than I did on my old PB.

If you believe these power numbers and the "power profiling" chart, I'm starting to get into Cat 2 territory with my LT power-to-weight number. Fortunately, I've ridden with enough roadies to know that I have nothing approaching Cat 2 abilities. Still, it's fun to track.

So I'm pretty happy with all of that. Right now, I'm extremely confident with my training plan in terms of continuing to develop my fitness. As I posted before though, my real limiter seems to be confidence in my trail riding skills. So I'm going to try to put a little more effort into that for a while.

Mountain Rhinos

This morning, the bulk of the Flying Rhino mountain bike team (me, Brad and Brien) met up and rode the Poto. Brad and Brien took right off and were dropped me almost immediately (fortunately, they stopped to wait every 20 minutes or so). Part of the problem was that my legs just weren't ready to go at the beginning, and the other part of the problem is that Brad and Brien are a little bit faster than me just about everywhere (climbing, descending, cornering, etc), which adds up to being a lot faster overall.

Eventually, they slowed down a little bit so I was keeping up a bit better. The thing that would seem to make the most immediate difference is that I just need to stay off the brakes. I think that I have the physical skills to descend and corner faster than I usually do, but it's just a matter of developing the confidence to do it.

Anyway, we had a good time at the ride, I expect we'll set up another pretty soon. This was the first time I'd ridden the full Poto trail. It's really nice, and it's a treat to ride a trail that's nearly 20 miles long (no need to ride a bunch of loops to get a reasonable ride in!).

My drama, however, really didn't start until my drive home. I had just gotten into the construction zone on US23 when it occured to me that I didn't remember packing my helmet and gloves back into the car. A quick glance to the back of my car seemed to confirm it. I was really ticked off about leaving them behind, the gloves were a bit old so that wasn't a big deal, but the helmet was pretty new and I've been very happy about it. Still, the thought of driving through the construction, turning around and driving back to the trail and then driving back through the construction was too much. Especially if somebody had already picked it up. So, I came home. Because of the construction traffic, it took me about an hour and 45 minutes to get home. (Was this the end of my helmet?)

I was really stewing by the time I got home. Sarah offered to ride with me back to the trail and look for my helmet. I thought about it for a while and finally decided not to leave my helmet behind. We also brought a map so we could navigate around the construction on the way home. Once we got to the trailhead, I saw my helmet almost immediately, sitting right where I'd left it, in the grass just on the other side of the curb where I parked. So my helmet is back home on it's shelf, and I'm happy.

Stone-Faced

Sarah has a triathlon training book that describes hardcore cyclists as "stone-faced quad machines". Ever since I read that, I decided that's what I needed to shoot for. What do you think, am I getting there?

Not quite...

Fort Custer Stuff

A few pictures from the Fort Custer race...

Me, coming to the finish.

Suzie, giving Dad the ol' googly eyes.

Brad, fellow Rhino, and winner of the Sport 30-34 class.

Final results were also posted this morning. I ended up finishing 10th out of the 14 guys in my class that finished. We had 2 DNF's, I'm pretty sure both were from early mechanicals.

Fort Custer Stampede

I raced the Fort Custer Stampede this past weekend. My race preparation started on Saturday; I went over to the trail and rode two loops to get re-familiarized with the trail. I felt more comfortable on it this year than I did last year (which was the first time I'd ridden there), but I still don't feel like I know the trail very well.

Sunday was the race. I was a little concerned about the distance beforehand. This was the first cross-country race I've done in the Sport class, which means there's an extra lap. My other Sport races have been time trials, so just one lap. It didn't help that my plan was to "train through" this race, so my legs were a bit tired before I even started.

I didn't push too hard at the start. I knew I wasn't going to be competitive with the top guys, so I thought it was good form to stay out of their way at the beginning. The fast guys were fast enough that my "strategy" probably didn't matter too much. There was a short open section before we hit the singletrack, and I was probably slightly below mid-pack when we hit it.

The first part of the race was pretty uneventful. I was in a group of about 4 or 5, and we kept swapping spots through the different sections. One thing started to become apparant to me pretty early on, I was able to open (or close) gaps on the flats and climbs, but the guys around me could open gaps on the more technical singletrack. Later in the first lap, our group pared down to three: me, a guy in a SpongeBob jersey and one other in a not-so-distinctive jersey. SpongeBob and the other guy led me for most of that first lap, but I decided that I needed to stay on SpongeBob's wheel, so that's what I did.

We had one incident about 2/3rds of the way through the first lap. Two of the top Sport riders in an older group caught us in a fairly open section. They passed me without incident, but SpongeBob didn't move over. The two guys yelled at him and the second guy smacked him on the shoulder when he went by. Yeah, SpongeBob should have gotten over, but the actions of the other two were really uncalled for. Hopefully SpongeBob got their numbers.

Anyway, at the start of the second lap, my tactic of staying on SpongeBob's wheel paid off. He popped less than a mile into the second lap and so did the other guy. I was still feeling decent and was able to open a gap on them. I didn't see SpongeBob again until after the race, but I'm not sure if the other guy got back by me or not, there were several people from his club/team out there racing. The rest of my second lap was pretty uneventful. I mostly rode by myself, some of the fastest Beginners started coming by on their only lap, but I didn't have any real issues with traffic. I ended up not having much issue with the distance. I was able to really drop the hammer on the last 1.5 miles or so; it was a pretty fast, flat section.

All things considered, I had a good race. My lap times were about 4 minutes faster than my lap time from last year, and I did both laps in nearly the same time.

Given how I felt after the race and the amount of energy I had at the end, I feel like maybe I didn't go hard enough. On the other hand, I did go hard at the places where I could go hard. There were just long stretches of the course where my speed was limited by the terrain (or, my ability to ride the terrain). I know that these sections can be ridden faster, since I saw other guys do it, so I don't know if it's an issue of my ability or not being too familiar with the trail, probably some of both. At least compared to the other guys racing around the back of the Sport field, this technical ability seems to be my big weakness, certainly moreso than any aspect of fitness.

Back to Business

So, I bounced back pretty well this week. I was feeling OK on Tuesday but, unfortunately, the weather didn't cooperate, so I ended up doing my speed work inside on the trainer.

I did a 3 hour road ride on Wednesday night. I was pretty tired by the end, but it basically went OK and it didn't feel as long as I expected. I rode on the roads at Stony Creek, and there were lots of people out, including a couple people flying combat with their R/C airplanes, so that helped to pass the time.

I was feeling fatigued yesterday, but I went ahead and did my Tempo ride anyway. On the last week of a training block, I think it's OK to go into a ride feeling tired. My tempo interval was scheduled for 50 minutes this week, which was almost long enough for me to ride the full loop at Pontiac Lake. I was very close to the end of the trail when my 50 minutes was up, so I kept going hard and ended up finishing the lap in 54 minutes.

For as tired as I was during the day yesterday, I actually rode pretty well last night. The first 15 minutes or so were a little rough, but I sharpened up after that. I actually cleaned one section that I've never gotten before. It's a downhill into a flat rock garden and then up a short steep hill. In the past, I've always lost too much momentum in the rocks and then couldn't make the hill. Yesterday, I pedaled through the rocks more than I usually do, and then I found the hill wasn't too bad since I started it with a little momentum.

Tonight will be a strength workout, and then I need to mow the lawn. Tomorrow I'm heading back to the West side of the state for the Fort Custer Stampede. I'll pre-ride the course tomorrow and then race on Sunday. Fortunately, this should also be the last race for awhile that I'll "train through". It's tough starting a race when your legs are already smoked.

P-Funk Allstar?

After this weekend, I feel like I should be an honorary P-Funk Allstar...



I was in a funk almost all last week and into the weekend. It rained here for most of the week, so I did a couple of hard rides on the trainer. The weekend was nicer, but I was still in a funk both days. I skipped my ride on Saturday, but I got in a 2.5 hour road ride on Sunday; it was nice to get the ride in, but I just wasn't into it. I also decided I need a new saddle for my 'cross bike (which is what I rode), the thing was killing me after an hour or so.

Today is a rest day, and I feel much better. I worked on my mountain bike tonight, trying to prevent the chain drop problem. I tweaked the front derailer just a little and increased the tension from the b-screw adjustment. I'm planning on a fast trail ride tomorrow night, so I'll see if it's improved or not.

Pedals

I've been experimenting with my pedals for the last few months. I've been using Shimano M520's since I started using clipless pedals (a few years ago). I have two complaints though, one is that I had a few incidents last year where my shoe loaded up with mud or sand and clipping in and out became very difficult. I felt like this cost me real time in a few races. The second is that I frequently unclip accidentally, like when my shoe or pedal hits a rock or even just climbing hard. My second complaint could probably be fixed by adjusting release tension, but not the first. So, off I went in search of a new pedal.

I first tried the classic Eggbeater pedal. Certainly the design looked like it would shed mud well, and they're a cyclocross standard, so I thought they'd be winners. Unfortunately, my practical experience with them was not so good. While I didn't have trouble with mud shedding, I did have trouble consistently clipping in to these pedals. I don't know what the deal was, I think I never got the feel for finding the front of the cleat. I felt like I gave them a pretty fair chance though, I used the Eggbeaters all 'cross season last year and for a lot of my winter riding. The other thing I didn't like was that there was too much free float. It was like my shoes were always sliding around on the pedal; I never got comfortable with that sensation. So, last month, I decided that I was done with the Eggbeaters.

The pedals I'm trying now are the Time ATAC XS pedals, another cyclocross standard. These pedals also have a more open construction that looks good for mud shedding, but there's more of a platform than with the Eggbeaters. So far, I like these pedals. I'm using the middle tension setting, and I haven't accidentally pulled out yet, but I have been able to get my feet out in a few "emergency" situations. Clipping in takes a little more force than I'm used to, but I'm adjusting to it without too much trouble. I haven't used the pedals yet in muddy conditions, so I don't know how they'll really handle it, but so far, so good.

Skipped

I decided to skip my ride tonight. For me skipping a ride is always a tough decision requiring lots of justification.

Basically, it came down to this: I've been more-or-less tired since the race, I had to work late tonight and I had very low motivation. If it was week 3 of my training block, I'd probably suck it up and ride anyway, but it's only week 2. If I push now, not only do I potentially wreck this week, I most likely wreck next week too. It's not worth it for one ride.

I think what happened here can be traced back to two weeks ago, my last recovery week. I followed my recovery workout plan, but I didn't do a very good job actually recovering. I was just busy around the house and at work. I could actually feel it the beginning of last week too, I wasn't a fresh as I normally am coming off of a rest week.

Well, it is what it is. Tomorrow should be back to normal. Up early for a strength workout and then a mountain bike ride after work.


Also... a shot of a fellow Rhino at Yankee Springs...

Strength Targets

I've been doing a little more work with my Strength Training plan. One of the things I wanted to do from the beginning is to set some targets to work toward. So, here's what I did:

- Hip dominant and quad dominant exercises: I set this target based on my 5s threshold power target of 837W. Assuming no drivetrain losses and a cadence of 60rpm, I calculated that I'd need to apply 176lb on the crankarms. (Interesting note here, I use 170mm cranks rather than a more standard MTB length of 175mm. The conventional wisdom is that the longer crankarms help for mountain biking because they give you more leverage. However, if you run the numbers, I'd have to apply 171lb on 175mm crankarms rather than 176lb on 170mm cranks... pretty small difference.) Then I made some assumptions about how body weight is supported on the bike and during exercises and found that I should work toward using 95lb of external load for 1-legged hip and quad dominant exercises. A cadence of 60rpm for a 5s test means I should target lifting this load at least 5 times per leg. Right now, my 5-rep max is about 62lb (on a 1-leg squat).

- Horizontal pull and push: For lack of a better criteria, I used Friel's targets. 50-80% of my bodyweight for a 1 rep max. That works out to be 68-108lb. Right now my 1RM is around 50lb. (All weights for 1 arm.)

- Vertical pull and push: I used Friel's targets here also. 40-70% of my bodyweight for a 1RM. That's 54-95lb, and my 1RM is about 37lb right now. (All weights for 1 arm.)

So, I still have some work to do to hit these targets, but at least I have targets to hit now. I do think that my increased focus on strength work is paying off though. I'm noticing it this year on steep climbs where I really have to grind it out. There were a few pretty steep hills out at Yankee Springs that I was able to climb, even at the end of the race, where many of my competitors were walking.

Yankee Springs TT

I raced my first race for the year today, the Yankee Springs Time Trial. Things basically went OK this weekend. Since it's still early in the year for me, and since I hadn't ridden this trail before, I decided to just "train through" this race. So, on Saturday I rode two laps of the course, one by myself and one with Greg; it ended up being about two and a half hours of riding. My legs were pretty tired Saturday night, but riding two laps of a new trail helped a lot from the technical point of view.

When I woke up this morning, my legs were still a little dead. I drove up to Yankee Springs and got situated. They got a really good turnout for the race, I couldn't believe how many people showed up. It didn't hurt that the weather was beautiful this weekend. I did a little warm-up, but kept it shorter and easier than usual given the state of my legs. Then I went down to the start.

The race itself went pretty smoothly. I thought I paced myself well at the start. I pretty quickly caught up to the racer in front of me (maybe two spots in front of me), but I wasn't pushing overly hard. I ended up passing a few people, but a few more passed me. What was a little different this year was that most of the guys that caught me sat on my wheel for a long time, it seemed like usually over a mile. If I know someone is behind me in a TT, I always tell them to let me know when they want by, but today, most of the guys sat on for a while.

I had one little mechanical glitch, I dropped my chain on a bumpy downhill, but I don't think it cost me too much time. I will have to see if there's something I can do about that though. What cost me real time was that my legs blew up with about 1.5 miles left to go. I just couldn't get my legs to give any more.

Based on times from last year, I'd hoped to do the race in under an hour, but I ended up with a 1:02. It looked like our times this year were generally slower than last year, maybe conditions last year were a little better? Or maybe the racers that showed up last year were just faster?

Regardless, for an early-season race, I was pretty happy with how things went. My next race is in two weeks, the Fort Custer Stampede. This will be the first time I've gone the extra lap for a Sport race (the other Sport races I've done have been time trials, so we still do just one lap). Should be interesting to see how that goes.

International Ride

I had intended to meet up with another Rhino last night to ride Pontiac Lake. As it turned out he was a no-show. While I was waiting for him, I started talking with another guy who was also waiting for a group. As it turned out, his group left early, without him, so the two of us ended up riding the trail together.

This guy turned out to be a visiting engineer from Germany named Guenther. I work with a lot of Germans, so I'm used to the accent and we didn't have too much trouble communicating (his English was also very good). Even though he said he hadn't ridden in about a year, he was in pretty decent shape, so I didn't have to go oppresively slow.

I was actually really stressed out before the ride, so things ended up working out just about perfectly for me. I got a relatively easy ride in, and I was distracted from other things by making sure I wasn't dropping Guenther and that he was getting through the technical bits in one piece. By the time I was finished, I felt considerably better.

Stony TT Goal Progress

I rode out at Stony Creek again last night. I rode at a "tempo" pace for the first 30 minutes (after I warmed up). I ended up riding virtually all of the singletrack that's in the Stony TT within that time, roughly half of the total course.

So, assuming that my tempo pace is roughly my race pace, which it should be, I rode at a pace that would get me about a 59 minute time trial. That's 5 minutes faster than my time from last year, but still 4 minutes slower than my target for this year. I suppose that means I'm basically on schedule to hit my target time by the end of July.

Most of the gain I've made so far is coming from better technical skill. I can tell that I'm riding much smoother, and therefore faster, on the singletrack.

The part of the TT course that I didn't ride yesterday is mostly more open two-track, and it also has an extended climbing section. So, speed improvements on that part of the course will come from improvements in fitness.

Sunday Ride

I ended up not racing at PLRA yesterday. Having only been out on the trail once this year, I just didn't feel comfortable racing out there.

I did go out to Stony in the afternoon though; I rode for an hour and a half. I tried out my Kenda Nevegal DTC tires. They seemed to work pretty well. I felt like climbing traction was better than my Panaracer Fire XC's, as was rolling resistance. I don't think they cornered quite as well, but it wasn't much of a drop-off.

As for the ride itself, I pushed harder than I had intended to on my first lap. I rode pretty well, but I was starting to get tired by the end. I backed off on the second lap and felt much better, and, for the most part, I don't think I went much slower. I carried my momentum better on the second lap and picked better lines, so I still went pretty fast but didn't use nearly as much energy.

Base 2 Test - Ugh

Sorry about not posting more, this week's been busy.

This morning, I did my LT field test for this phase. I had expected to do pretty well; I felt very fit going into the test. Long story short, it didn't go as well as I expected.

With the idea in mind of crushing the test, I went out pretty hard for the first 10 minutes. That would have been fine if I was really fit enough to crush the test. As it turned out, my energy started dropping off after 15 minutes. At that point, my average power had fallen to about where I was last month. I felt like throwing in the towel then, but I didn't. I kept pushing through to the end; I figured, if nothing else, it was good practice for sustaining hard efforts (that, and it's bad to get in the habit of quitting).

I ended up improving my average power by 5 Watts from last month, mostly by pushing hard again over the last minute or two. I suppose an improvement is an improvement, but it wasn't what I expected.

Looking at the numbers afterward, it's clear that I went too hard at the beginning. In fact, my speed over the first 10 minutes was faster than I've ever gone on a LT test. I suppose this just sets me up for a big improvement on the test next month.

Snowed Out

I had planned to do a lot of riding over the weekend, but Mother Nature derailed me. We got about 3-4 inches of snow at my parents' house this weekend. Crazy...

We're supposed to keep getting rain and snow this week, which probably means I won't race at Pontiac Lake this weekend. It will most likely be a mudpit and I've only been on the trail once this year.

Where Did Spring Go?

It's cold and snowy here tonight.

OK, just a little snow...

Tempo

I've been doing Tempo rides on Tuesday nights for this training block. Last night was also the first Rhino track night. I had considered going, but they were predicting bad thunderstorms so I decided to stay home and do my Tempo ride as-planned on the trainer. It turns out that I could have gone to the track, it still hadn't rained by the time I went to bed!

Anyway, I had a great ride last night. I did a short warmup, then 40 minutes at tempo, then a short cooldown. My legs felt great for all but the last 5 minutes of the tempo riding. For the past two weeks, I felt like I struggled to keep my power numbers even at the lower limit of Zone 3, but last night, I was able to stay at the upper end with reasonable comfort. It's workouts like that that give me confidence in my training plan.

Unfortunately, the weather is supposed to get pretty bad around here this week. Lots of cold days and rain (and maybe snow!). Sarah and I are heading over to Mattawan for the weekend. I'm hoping I can get some rides in anyway, but we'll see. I'll just have to break out my cold weather riding gear again.

The first mountain bike races of the year are coming up in the next few weeks. The first two are time trials, one at Pontiac Lake and the other at Yankee Springs. I was originally thinking I wouldn't do the Pontiac Lake race, it's on the last day of my Base 2 phase, but I'm starting to get anxious to race. I may treat it as a "fair weather" race: if the weather is nice and I feel good, I'll do it, if not, I won't. I'm already signed up for Yankee Springs.

POTATOEE Wrap-up

Well, Dad and I wrapped up our POTATOEE challenge last weekend. We ended up doing our last ride together, and both of us made it to Cockeysville.

Dad got there faster than me. He ended up with 657 miles, I had 639 miles.

I think that all of the riding has been good for him. He's definitely faster than he was last year.