Run from the Cops 4 HR MTB Race

photo by Preston Scott

It was a Hot Metal day out there today.  This was a great race put on by the Greensboro Police Club and many other sponsors.  Nothing to exciting actually happened during this race for me which was a good thing.  It was more about not blowing up and overheating in 4 hours.  The temperature was around 80 and humid when the race started and by the end was 97 with a heat index of 103.  There were a few people creeping and some standing on the side of the trail nursing cramps.  I was making sure I was drinking plenty of water and electrolytes to hold off the cramps.  I ended up getting cramps on the inside of my thighs on lap 6, and to fight this off I had a gel bottle filled with pickle juice (yes, it sounds gross but it works).  It took about half a bottle and roughly five minutes and no more cramps for the rest of lap 6 and lap 7.  Another trick to keep the core temperature down were ziploc bags of ice that I would put down the bag of my jersey for 2 laps at a time that I starte at lap 3 and it really helped.  One of the trails (Owls Roost aka Owls Roots) is a rough trail because of all the roots and because of this I switched out my rigid fork for some front squish for this race and glad I did.  Really didn't want to deal with the jarring since it was a hot day and wanted to conserve as much energy as possible.  It was a very dry and dusty course and by the end I was covered in dirt sweat.  At the end of the day I ended up putting in 48 miles in 4 hours and placing 6th in the Single Speed Category.

photo by Preston Scott

2012 6 Hours of Warrior Creek

 

This was my first time racing the 6 hours of Warrior Creek and my first time riding the trails at Warrior Creek in Wilkesboro.  The week before the race did not go as planned because of being out of town for work all week and working some crazy hours.  Drive 5 hours back home on Friday then the 2 hour drive to Wilkesboro followed by some camping the night before.  I knew when I woke up on Saturday morning it was going to be a rough race because of how the body was feeling.  Since I wasn’t feeling fast I at least looked fast in the new METAL Kit.  I sucked it up and lined up about mid-pack since I knew the road section at the beginning I would be eaten up by some people with gears.  With the mass start and about one and half miles to sort it out and hopefully make up some ground before hitting the single track.  I fell in with a group of about 5-7 riders and made my passes when possible since some people geared down and spun up the hills unlike I was doing on the single speed and mashing up every hill.  Never riding here and not riding a lot of berms it made for a fun first lap with some learning at the same time.  With each lap around 12.5 miles and the first being slightly longer I was hoping I could make up more ground in the single speed division.  IT was difficult to know exactly where you may be in your division which made me want to not back off the pace on the first lap.  First lap down and as I roll into the pits I let my buddy know that is there as support that I am over geared and should have put an easier gear to spin.  There was a lot more climbing involved then I had suspected.  It ran through my head a few times to take the time in the pits and switch it out, but of course I decided not to do that.  This is where I will start to pay for that decision toward the end of lap three and through lap four.  A little over halfway through lap three the cramps started setting in slowly and I tried to fight them off, but turning the harder gear was taking its toll on the legs.  Lap four was a tough one, but I sucked it up and pushed on until I got to the top of one of the longer climbs and had to stop because the legs were cramping pretty bad.  I ended up rolling across the finished line in 18^th out of 37 in the single speed division.  Not what I had planned, but this was the hand I was dealt.

Curse at the Crab 2012

photo taken by On The Mark Sports

This past weekend I raced the Curse at the Crab 6 hour race at Lake Crabtree here in Raleigh, NC.  What makes this race really awesome is it runs from 2pm to 8pm, so you get at least 2-3 laps in the dark.  Going into the race I knew the course was going to be a fast 6.75-7 mile course.  No major climbing just lots of hammering the pedals.  The Single Speed category was 10 deep with some really good racers in it, so I knew it would be a fight to take a podium spot.  They started us about half a mile down the main road in the park to try and get us spread out.  When we started it was a mad sprint to be somewhere up front since we had about 75 racers jumping into the singletrack at once.  I hit the woods running around 4^th in the single speed category being sandwiched between two other single speed racers, James and Mark.  These are two buddies that I ride with, so I knew what they could do for the next six hours.  Not even 2 miles into the race by buddy was running in front of me and he wrecks, which moved me up to possibly 3rd in the SS Category.  Somehow I came to a stop without leaving him with a tire tattoo.  Then not even a mile later going through some switchbacks I was carrying to much speed into a 90 degree turn and ate it.  I got up and never lost my spot in the four person train we were running since they had no way of getting around me.  Somewhere during all of this 2^nd place fell off and moved me up another spot.  The next three laps were the same with me leading the 4 person train through the woods until we got to this flat straight away that I would use for eating and hydrating.  I backed off and waved them around while I ate some food moving me back to 3^rd place.  Somewhere on lap 5, I moved up to 2^nd place without knowing it.  Then on lap 6 I rolled into the pits and saw who I thought was 2nd place off to the side getting some food or something.  At the time I had no clue that I was now in 1^st place, and tried to pick up my pace or at least stay consistent.  So, in my mind I was trying to chase 1^st place down, but at the same time I was running scared and hoping to not get caught.  Halfway through lap 8  it was time to switch on the lights.  The last two laps were in complete darkness and my goal was to not let any lights catch me and try and catch as many as I could in front of me hoping it would be 1^st place.  I started my last lap 10 minutes before the cut-off time, so I knew there was plenty of time for someone to still catch me.  Lap 10 was uneventful and I crossed the line at 5:58:37 with 10 laps/70 miles.  It was not until I got to my pit that I found out I won the Single Speed Category and when I started looking at the results I learned I had been in 1^st place since lap 7.  Lesson learned:  Hammer it like you are chasing and running scared at the same time.  Stay Metal.

This race like all the others wouldn't be possible without TORC (Triangle Off-Road Cyclists) and all the volunteers.  On The Mark Sports provided the timing and photos.  It was really cool that they did live updates on the website every few minutes and had the photos uploaded within hours on their facebook page.  The trophies were really bad ass also.

I think I have finally dialed in my nutrition also.  I ended up with no cramping or stomach issues for the entire race and that was a first.  More on this in a future post.

2012- what's be happening...possibly

This year is the year that I plan to focus on endurance races.  I have found that is more of my comfort zone (as comfortable as you can be sitting on a bike saddle for 6 hours or more) vs. the shorter cross country races.  Nothing against the cross country races, I just would rather suffer for 6 hrs + instead of 1 1/2 hrs.  Not saying I will not go and suffer for the 18 miles of cross country racing to support my local mountain bike club and trails.  This year I have already hit HTFU endurance rides once and put in some other roughly 20 mile days along with time at the gym.  The weather has gotten in the way somewhat as much as work has.  Excuses...I know suck it up and HTFU, either way the more rides I get now the less suffering to happen on race day.

For the second year I will be racing on the TWIN SIX METAL TEAM!!  If you are not wearing Twin Six then you are missing out.  The quality of their jerseys, bibs and the t-shirts are superb.  Getting some of my fuel for the year from Honey Stinger again, and the waffles are freaking awesome and their gels seem to be very easy on my stomach.

As for the race schedule:
2/12/2012 - Buckwhack Mountain Bike Challenge
2/25/2012 - 6hr Curse at the Crab
3/24/2012 - 6hr Meltdown at Harris Lake
4/7/2012 - 6 hrs of Warrior Creek
9/8/2012 - Fool's Gold 100

There is a 5 month gap there that is up in the air on what races I want to compete in.  It will be my first 100 miler and really looking forward to the suffering.

Huck-A-Buck 2011

The Huck-A-Buck 2011 had another great turn out this year. There was about 20 of us in the Single Speed Category. Today was going to be a brutal 3 laps of 6.75 miles of singletrack and not because of the trails, but 94 degrees and feeling like 101 at the noon time start. We have not had much rain and this trail is mostly sand the closer you get to the lake. I started prepping for this race on Friday by drinking lots of fluids the next two days. I weighed myself Friday morning and was at 178 lbs. The morning of the race I weighed myself again and was 181 lbs. I hit the woods in 6^th or 7^th place and let 2 guys go by halfway through the 1^st lap hoping that they would blow up because of the heat. With a mile to go in the first lap I was cruising through a turn about 15 mph when my tires came out from under me and I ended up 2-3 feet off the trail and ripped open a scab from the previous wreck at the race a month earlier. Had three more guys pass at this point since my arm was hurting and trying to make sure everything else between me and the bike was in working order. Lap 2, coming through the start/finish I hear from the organizers over the loud speakers how sweet the Metal Kit looks and had to be the best looking one on the course. I caught one of the other single speeders and the rest of the lap was uneventful except passing a couple guys with gears. Lap 3, I turned up the pace to see if I could hopefully catch at least one or two more guys who may have gone out to fast. Well, I ended up catching and passing three more guys, but they had gears so that did not help me. I ended up rolling across the finish line in 11^th. After the race a few people asked about the Metal Kit and proudly told them about Twin Six. When I got home I weighed myself and had dropped to 174 lbs, yeah that was a lot of sweating in less than two hours. I may not have finished as high up as I would of liked, but I looked damn good in the Metal Kit doing it.

Minnesota Trippin'

We started our journey to Minnesota on July 1st about mid-morning.  We packed the truck as if we were taking the house with us.  Our first stop over the next two days would be with my some of my in-laws in West Virginia, and to pick up our nephew.  It was just like all of our previous trips up to West Virginia, nothing exciting just six hours of highway driving.  We got to the in-laws some time after 4pm and got out what we needed for the night.  We hit up a Mexican restaurant that night for dinner and I called it a night around 10pm since we would be up the next day at 5am and I was the designated driver. 
The next morning came and we loaded the bicycles on the back of the truck.  Loaded up the kids in the backseat with enough electronic devices from DVD players to Nintendo DS's to keep them entertained for the next nine hours to Cedar Rapids, Iowa.  Our secret weapon that my wife packed was lollipops for when the natives started getting restless.  Of course that would happen when you have a three year-old strapped into a car seat for that amount of time.  After the nine hour drive we pull into Hawthorne Suites, and unpack the necessities for the night.  I get the boys and we unload the bikes and take them for a two mile ride down the Cedar River Trail to work the legs out after sitting for that long. 



Rockin' the Twin Six

 After waking up we grabbed some breakfast at the hotel before heading out for the last four hours to Minnesota.  We pulled into the farm right after noon.  The farm is where my wife's grandma lives in farmhouse that is around one hundred years old and nearly four tenths of a mile off the road.  It is surrounded by a few ponds and corn fields as far as you can see.  After unpacking the truck and grabbing some lunch I headed out for my first gravel ride.  Never done a gravel ride and on the drive in we passed kept passing gravel road after gravel road and I had to put some miles in to see what it was like.  I did a thirty mile ride and was eating up every mile of it.  I was on the Niner One9 and was running a 32x18 gearing which I needed my Fisticuff with the 2x10 to really crank some miles, that will be with me on the next trip out there.

For the Fourth of July we took the kids to the town of Okabena for a parade.  They collected more candy than what they have gotten combined for the last two Halloweens.  The following day we took a two hour trip north up to Minneapolis.  First stop, Twin Six.  Great visiting the company that I am racing for this year and hopefully down the road also.  I was a kid in a candy store with all the T6 gear around me.  The crew there was awesome in giving us the tour and seeing a few things that are coming down the pipe.  We checked into our hotel right across from the next stop at Mall of America.  We ended up spending 6+ hours in there from lunch until dinner.  We covered all three floors and went to the aquarium before grabbing dinner at Tony Roma's.  One of the only places the kids and I wanted to go was the Lego store.  Which we waited until almost last to visit, so that I would not be carrying around the bag of legos the entire time.  They had above the store these gigantic lego scenes that were larger than life.  One was a thirty-four foot robot, another was a helipcopter with lego SWAT members repelling down, a knight fighting this creature with a bull-head.  To believe that all of this was made completely of legos.  Along with this were pictures outisde the store made completely out of legos.  The next day we took the kids to the Minnesota Zoo.  It was fairly warm out that day, but since Minnesota gets so cold right much of the exhibits were inside which gave some relieve from the heat. Afterwards we drove back to the farm to make it in time for dinner. 

I was needing to hit some singletrack and had found this place up in Mankato called Mt. Kato Ski Resort that has mountain bike trails from May to October.  It cost $8/day to ride there.  Being my first experience at singletrack in Minnesota it was good riding.  Any day on the bike is better than none.  I found one of the people in the office there and he gave me the lay of the land on how the trails were laid out and a map.  First trail that you go up is Kato Climb and that is what you do to get to the top where all the ski lifts drop you off in the winter.  My first loop out went like this Kato Climb>Frog Pond Loop>Outlook Traverse>Back Loop>Get Tight>Cedar Climb>Killer Toad Climb>Dead Horse>The Maze>Staircase>Compressor>Cabin Run.  The only trails that really had me on my toes and using a lot of braking on the down hills were Dead Horse and Compressor.  The switchbacks on Compressor had you almost doing track stands to make the turns.  Cedar Climb and Staircase had the tougher of the climbs.  My second loop went like this Kato Climb>Frog Pond Loop>Outlook Traverse>Back Loop>Get Tight>Cedar Climb>Killer Toad Climb>Low Line>The Maze>Staircase>Ridge Run>Back Home>Cabin Run.  After getting out of the new Twin Six Masher jersey and socks I picked up the other day at Twin Six.  I went and got two chicken tacos and chicken burrito from Taco John's. 

Friday we got up at 4am to start our nice 14 hour drive back to West Virginia and that was one hell of a caffeine induced drive.  Had some Little Caesar's Pizza when we got to my brother-in-law's house hit the sack at 10pm and didn't wake until 9am.  That was some good hard sleeping and much needed with another 6 hours of driving to get to the casa.  It was nice vacation with lots of driving, but that is the best way to see this great country that we live in and to see how other parts of the U.S of A is living. 

Briar Patch - TORC #1 2011 Race Series

First race of the TORC 2011 XC Series here in the Triangle was at Briar Chapel located south of Chapel Hill, NC. Great course, very flowy and then they mix in the rock garden sections with each lap being six miles. Racing in the Single Speed division we had three laps and it was going to be a tough day with some of the guys out there. I knew I had to pace myself with the heat being high 80's with 60% humidity at the 11am start time. They have a nice gravel road start that is around a mile to help spread everyone out before hitting the singletrack. I hit the woods in 6^th and it was a good pace that I knew I could hold the entire race. For the first and second lap it was fairly uneventful except having to stop in the middle of a rock garden since the guy in front of me came to a dead stop and left me nowhere to go. I started having a minor stomach issue about two miles into the last lap, so backed it off and popped some chews when I hit the doubletrack climb. Started picking the pace back up when with about two miles to go I catch my front tire in a rocky section going up hill and just eat it hard. Luckily the rocks I landed on were smooth and not jagged, but they were not forgiving at all. I got myself up and the guy behind me who couldn’t see it, but he heard the crash and all the profanity that went with it. I sat on a nice grassy clearing about ten feet away for about a minute to check myself over since my arm was throbbing and bleeding and couldn’t close my hand all the way. One of the other rocks gave me a nice kidney punch when I landed on it. I ended up finishing 9th in the Single Speed Division with a time of 1:51:53.  I must have laid there in the grass longer than I thought since it looks like I lost a good 7 minutes or so, oh well crashes happen. 


Rockin' The Twin Six Metal Kit



All in all, glad I finished the race without a DNF or last. It took two stitches to close my elbow up and hoping to be back on the bike within the next week when I get more range out of my arm.

CCORS Race #1

The first race of the Coastal Carolina Off-Road Series (CCORS) is officially in the books.  Let me start off by saying that just because the race is down east and close to the coast doesn't mean it will be flat and fast.  The race took place in Havelock at the Piranha Pit on Cherry Point.  The course was a six mile loop that was very deceiving.  It was a great day for racing with the weather at sixty degrees and the start time of 2pm couldn't ask for better conditions.
I arrived about an hour before the race, got registered in the Single Speed Category and started prepping for the race.  Once I was finally dressed in the Twin Six Metal race kit it was time to warm-up the engine for the eighteen miles ahead of me.  Hooked up with a few guys from the Raleigh area and we rode about 2.5 miles of the course to get a feel for it since I had never been out there before.  It was time for the racer's meeting to go over the rules and a general overview of what to look forward to in the course.

We finally get the race underway and it starts on a dirt road for about a quarter mile that we are riding down to sort of get everyone spaced out which didn't happen once we hit the woods.  Just because some people think they are fast on the dirt road section doesn't transfer over well to the singletrack.  The first 3 miles of the course was fairly flat and fast.  Only thing slowing you down was the pinestraw that littered the ground which made taking the turns at times feel a little squirrelly.  Then we got to the backside of the course that was along the river.  This is where every momentum stopping root popped up at least every 10-20 yards or so it felt that way.  If the roots were not on the way down the short hills they were definitely on the way up the hills.  A few times it was like climbing stairs going up hill.  Some of the drops going downhill were a good foot and a half to two feet that went into a turn and yes there were skid marks going off the trail where someone went in hot on the turn and over shot it.  Once out of the rooty section it was fairly flat and then you popped out onto the dirtroad to ride the quarter mile up to the start/finish line and turn around to go back into woods.  It was a good place to get some energy gel into you and some liquid. 

I ended up coming across the finish line in 1:45:00 and grabbing the 3rd place finish in the single speed category.  Great race and a great course that was not boring and kept me on my toes.  Not to bad for the first race of the season since I have not been on the bike much in the last couple months because of the nasty weather we have been having.