The Road to SS Hundies

Wheel overlap - bad!

2008-09-28T14:52:00.000-07:00

So it's not a hundie, it's called a century. This weekend I joined a group of friend on MS150 City-to-Shore Multiple sclerosis fund raiser ride. It's set up as a 75 mile ride on Saturday from Philly area to Ocean City NJ, and 75 mile ride back on Sunday.
However, on Saturday there is an optional 25 mile loop, to make it a full century, and a 175 mile weekend.

Needless to say we did the 100 miles on Saturday (and it hurt) and 75 on Sunday back.

It was rather uneventful, but fun and entertaining in it's own way. Rolling with a groupd of good friends, having good time. Seven of us met up at the start, in the early dawn hours, and after waiting thru a long staging we got underway. Having started pretty late (yes, many riders were underway with lights in the dark at 6 am or so) we were moving pretty slowly thru the traffic. Lance had a flat, but after that it was pretty smooth sailing for a while.

On both days, we hooked up with "Brooklyn" branch of Team Jearney. A group of pretty strong well organized riders, that ride at least one of the days in the matching Brooklyn jerseys last year, and in black and white version this year. They seem to always have a very well organized and very fast paceline, moving past most traffic like a freight train. Jumping on their line of already 10-15 riders with our 6 made for an impressive long train, and many more riders jumped on, so on saturday we were rolling a Loooong line!

Dave and Adam, opted to do 75 miles, Brian, Lance, Chris, Fletcher and myself went on to the century loop. It turned out to be a good choice. Lance was checking his computer and for the first 42 miles our average speed was only 16 mph, at the end of the 25 mile loop it was 18. So in 25 miles we increased our pace enough to offset 42 miles of slow moving enough to raise it by 2 mph. That's something. Early in the extra loop we picked up Scott, and 6 of us worked well together in a neat pace line, that must've helped a lot.

Of note and "entertainment" was one incident. I was drafting Scott (a fast rider we picked up on the extra 25 mile loop) in our little 7 men pace line. Either I was rolling a little too fast, or he slowed down a little bit, I don't know, but I let my front overlap with his rear, figuring, i'll coast and drop back in few second. Unfortunately for me, my holding a straight line skills were lacking, and I touched his wheel, disengaged, and instead of touching the brakes to drop back, I froze, touched more, and harder, lost ballance and went sverving into the middle of the road. I was all off balance, and the bike was flying all over the place. I galnced down and braced for the inevitable meeting with harsh asphalt. Lucky for me, fear is stronger than physics! I did not want to hit the ground. Somehow my foot was out of the pedal and I "tripoded" sliding my foot on the ground with both tires sliding all over the place as well. Don't know how I managed to stabalize the twitching handlebars, but in the end I rode it out!

That's about it. I'm not sold on the road riding as "fun", but it can be entertaining with the right group and under right curcumstances!

Pictures are in my buddy Chris's album

Hit the road jack...

2008-09-24T05:46:00.000-07:00

So with the replacement bolt-on axle on my Tinbred sorted out, and a 10mm thru axle in the box awaiting a thru bolt, and only 4 days left before the MS150, I went for my second almost ever road ride with my buddy Chris borrowing his Airborne Zeppelin.

This time we actually hit some hills and managed 29 miles in about 1:40...

Well, road riding can hurt as much as off road! Funny thing was that I had to work REALLY hard to stay with him on the flats, constantly loosing his wheel and then straining to catch up. But on the inclines I seemed to be able to pull away. Oh yeah, and downhills... Forget it! I was a chicken sh$t and he completely disappeared in the distance!

The finniest thing, tho, happened about 50 yards from the house, slight incline, Chris went for a sprint. I tried to answer, but in the haste, lack of control, wrong gear, not knowing what the heck I was doing, my cumbersome jerky power spin resulted in the rear wheel coming up, what felt like 10", off the ground and scaring a living crap out of me!!!

Broken axle update

2008-09-16T17:14:00.002-07:00

Industry Nine rocks! Sent them email last night with pictures around 8:30 PM. Was going to follow up with a phone call this morning, but by 8:50 I had an email from them.

The email said that it shouldn't have happened, and they suspect a bad grain structure in the metal of the axle. Asked for my shipping address, stating that the replacement is on it's way under warrantee.

That's customer service!

When the tire rubs, it might be more than alignment

2008-09-16T17:14:00.001-07:00

Went on a ride tonight. The weather was perfect, things were clicking, felt good to be on the bike. We were moving.

On one rooty step I heard distinct "brrrttt", I knew the tire rubbed on the chainstay. Stopped, looked down, yep, it's not centered in the drops. Strange, it hasn't slipped in ages. Oh well, 45 second stop: 8mm L-long-handle-hex wrench out, loosen, re-center, re-tughten. Done. On my way.

A little downhill, slight rise, and I hear "bbrrrrrttt". WTF?! Cannot slip again! Ok. Wrench out, loosen, re-center, re-tighten, really re-tighten. Make sure it's tight enough. 1 minute 15 seconds later, I'm on my way. 1 minute later "brrrrtttt".

Now, now, there is something DEFINITELY wrong! Stop, flip the bike over, inspect for ANY abnormalities. Even looked for cracks in stays, maybe the frame is out of wack. Take the wheel completely out of the drops.

Oh CRAP! This is what I see:

And this is what I had in my hand... Yeah, that's no good, and will not be fixed on the trail in 45 seconds. Ok, so I'm looking at a long, long walk home. Sucks!

Luckily, couple of guys who I was riding with live really close to the park. Nate, was nice enough to ride home, grab his car and give me a ride home. I was sweating trying to extract the broken piece. For some reason I thought I'd have to unscrew it out. But after reviewing Industry Nine on-line hub service pdf, I realized that the part that was screwed on and was holding the axle in place, was already nicely separated from it. Heh, lucky, I guess. Few gentle taps later I was looking at these nice pieces on my counter:

Already sent an email to Industry Nine. Will follow up with a phone call in the morning. I'm pretty confident, they will take care of me, and even if they do not deem this warrantable, it's only a $50 part. No biggie. Quick order and 2 day shipping and I will be back in the saddle by the weekend.

Stay tuned for the updates.

Hit the road...

2008-09-10T04:54:00.000-07:00

So last night I finally got together with my buddy Chris, who's lending me his airborne for the MS150 ride in three weeks, for a first road ride. Well, technically, it's not my first, but, maybe 3rd, and the first two were far in between and at least 4 years ago! So yeah, for all practical purposes it was my first.

What can I say about it?... Not a fan. But there is no big surprise there. It was mildly amusing and entertaining, for the novelty of it all, playing with it, some semi-sprints, hill pulls, etc. Especially, after I figured out the bike and got a little more comfortable on it and was able to actually stand up and crank up the hills, SS-style! heh

We did just over an hour ride at average speed of just under 19 mph, for a 22 mile loop.

I can see the training benefits tho. Big time. I was thinking about it since last night, but the full irony of it didn't occur to me till this morning. Most people get on SS in the winter in the off season for training to improve their racing/riding on geared bikes. I'm considering getting more often, or dare I say, regularly, on the road geared bike to improve my SSing!!!

At least for me SSing is a lot akin to interval riding, bursts of effort and power up the hills, some hard short spins on the flats, but a lot of coasting on the downhills and on the flats once certain speed/cadence are reached. Thus effort followed by rest and recovery, followed by more effort, then more rest and so it goes. On the road, especially with gears, it's not so. The effort is a lot more constant, even on the flats and downhills, it's still pedaling and working the legs, so it definitely should improve the endurance and stamina. While I still did not like the concept of the road, cars, bike, somewhat boredom, etc... I can and do appreciate the benefits and will try to make it a habit over this winter.

More detailed report from SM100

2008-09-02T08:35:00.000-07:00

The start was even more chaotic than last year. I heard that last year there were just over 300 riders and this there were 530... Wow. So we finally rolled off, and continued up the first long dirt road climb, at the top there was the usual bunch up at the beginning of the slightly technical single track. So many people didn't know how to ride dirt.

First aid station came and went very quickly at mile 10.

I was told that second station was around low 20's, and was wondering what was taking so long, but it turned out it was at the mile 31, which explained that. We were still feeling decent and rolled on pretty quickly.

Somewhere between station #2 and #3, which was mile 48, I started loosing power and Max was occasionally opening slight gaps on me. Thankfully there were some walking jams and other delays, so I was able to keep him in sight.

I think I somehow rolled into #4 somewhere around low 60's mile marker, ahead of Max, not sure what happened there, might've been some safety issues with his bike or something. I waited a little bit, but didn't see him, so I rolled on. That's where my legs basically fell off my body, then jumped up and beat me over my head and in my face saying "that's it, you stupid son of the bitch, we will get back at you and you won't finish". I was getting passed left and right. Max caught up to me. Out of stupid stubbornness I kept moving, knowing that I just had to get to the #5 at 75 and I would have a real second wind, because it was "only" 25 miles home stretch from there. Plus I wanted to get to #5 before 4:20, which was lights cut off. That section also had some longest stretches of flat, or false flat gravel roads, or at least they felt very very very long. I think the worst were ever so slight declined sections, not steep enough to gather enough momentum and coast, but too fast to maintain any sort of spin with my 32X20 gearing... It was mentally exhausting! I was trying to do some mental math to see if I had a chance of making the 4:20 cut off. I was trying to just stay on the bike as much as possible and walk as little as possible, even if my "gravity climbing", basically standing up and using solely my body weight to push the pedals down was all I could master on some of the climbs, and it was painfully slow, but a hear faster than walking and seemed to take less out of me and keep my mental state more focused. Somewhere in that suffer-fest, after downing tons of electrolytes and hammer gel, I started coming around a little and my head was clearing up and getting more focused.

Rolling into #5 I asked for time and, to my amazement, it was 3:24, almost an hour before the cut off and more than an hour ahead of last year's pace! Wow. As I downed some flat coke, had some fruit, got my gel flasks refilled, Max rolled in, he looked good and strong, I knew he'd catch me soon, so I told him that I'm going ahead and will see him soon.

Next stretch was painful but filled with purpose. There were only 13 miles to the #6, and we were on the finishing stretch. I just tried to keep moving, keep drinking and downing the gel periodically and walk as little as possible. And sure enough, #6 showed up pretty soon.

I was going to get my camelback topped off again, but a volunteer told me that it was few rolling miles on the road, followed by 3 miles climb and basically 6 miles downhill to the finish, so if I had half of the camelback, I should have enough water, plus would have less weight to carry. So I just got more gel in my flask. Before I started moving I peeked at someone's watch and it was 5:23... Damn. 12 miles, more than half of it downhill, only one long climb and few miles on the road before it, and just over an hour to sub 12 hour time. "Was it possible?..." What the hell, I went for it. Started off on the road. Managed to stay on the bike and climb slowly the entire 3 miles climb. Was passing several people walking or grannying up the hill, most of those people were the same guys who passed me so recently between stations #4 and #5, on the flat gravel roads, when I had nothing left in my tank. Now they were blowing up and I somehow managed to continue moving at my snail pace, which was enough to catch up to them.

When I saw the top of the climb and the down hill started, I just wanted to roll roll roll into the finish. I think three guys passed me on the first more technical singletrack downhill. Front or full susp were paying off for them. But then it flattened up and rolled up and adown for maybe 1/2 a mile on the old logging road and I was able to get them back. When that road pointed down for the final fast 2 mile decent, I caught up to two more of them, tried to encourage them to not give up and keep the speed going, and few moment later rolled thru the finish line.

Asked for time and was told it was 6:20... That would be 11:50 time! Still waiting for the final confirmation. My name wasn't on the board last time I checked, with the results "as of 6:20", there were times up to 11:42 on the lists, and my name wasn't on it yet. I think there were just around 300 finishers by that time.

Oficial results are up.
11:50:44, 271st out of 510 starters and 436 finishers. What always astounded me was the attrition rate... 114 people DNF'd... that is almost 1 out of every 5 starters!!!
1:20 improvement over the last year. I bet in big part it's due to no mechanicals, last year Max and I stopped twice to repair flats, and I think this year we were a little bit more efficient in and out of the aid stations.

SM100 Part Duex, 2008 edition...

2008-09-02T04:55:00.001-07:00

So the circle is complete, a year had passed, and I was back at SM100 in '08.

I came into the race feeling less then prepared, the legs were tired and feeling very achy and I just generally did not feel strong or ready. A week of camping and hiking in Shenadoah national park right before the race didn't help.

But I started, I suffered, I finished. That's about it. After about 35 miles I had nothing left in the tank and was barelly moving, unable to maintain any sort of cadence or pace even on relatively level paved roads.

Somewhere after 60 miles, just like in W101, some sort of second win... no, not wind, morel ike a whiff, came thru, and I started moving again. Mind you, not fast, not great, but at least moving again. And I pressed on with single purpose to get to the station #5 before 4:20, which was the lights cut off. Max and I managed to do that, rolling in at somewhere between 3:25 and 3:30. That gave me a little moral boost, considering that last year we missed the cut off by 10-15 minutes and had to carry the lights.

After station 5 at 75 miles, it felt like a home stretch. By the time I got to the station #6 at 88 miles, all I was thinking was about finishing SOON! I caught a climps at someone's watch and it it was 5:23... 12 miles left, more than half of them down hill, and over an hour till the 12 hour time... Is it possible?... What the hell, I went for it, and somehow succeeded, finishing at unofficila time of about 11:50, which is over an hour improvement from last year's 13:10!

However, thruout the the race, whenever I was alone and had mental ability and presence to think, I was pondering why am I doing these races? I'm not really racing, I'm not competetive with my times, I'm not in enough shape or form to finish them in style or strong. It's a simple exercise in stuborness and persevirence. For what? Bragging rights of riding MTB for 100 miles in one day? But can I really claim even that? In the end all the sections I end up walking probably add up to good 10-15 miles. Out of remaining 85-90, 60 or so are paved, gravel or at most dirt fire roads. So that leaves really just about 25, MAYBE 30 miles of single track. So what? Anyone can ride 20-30 miles off road in one day. And sad part I don't even get to fully enjoy these trails because I'm so darn tired from all the riding... So why?...

I think the circle has been completed, I started at SM100 in '07, I came back, I improved, I started in 4 100-milers in one year, I finished in 3. I believe this is the end of this road for me. Time to ride more just for fun and pleasure.

Slight nerves

2008-08-21T15:32:00.000-07:00

Not really nerves, but thinking about the SM100 being so close. Just over a week. Wondering if I'm any more ready for it than last year. What can I do and should I do in these last 10 days to get ready?

The Mohican made me scared of what I was doing. The W101 made me feel ready and good about it. The last "enduro" race at the local circuit (MASS) at Iron Hill made me scared again...

Just going to do it and get it over with! 10.... 9.... 8.... Count down began!

DFL

2008-08-16T19:39:00.000-07:00

For some reason I thought that a local "enduro" race, 4 hours of lapping 5 mile course would be realtively easy and I would do ok.

But for few days I've been feeling tired and rode like crap, ending up with a DFL, way off the pace of SS field... Oh well.

2 weeks of rest and easy riding before SM100, and that will be it for racing this year.

One step forward, two steps back...

2008-08-05T06:24:00.000-07:00

Last week I wrote that I was recovering from W101 pretty quickly and feeling good.

Well, more than a week on, all of the sudden, I feel tired and sore again. Legs feel really heavy. And when riding I feel some strange pains and pings in the muscles... Strange...

One thing to do to solve the problem... Ride more! :-)

Less then 4 weeks till SM100. Same plan as always, ride as much as I can up until about a week before the race and then easy off to just easy spins on flat paths. And this week, I think we are going down to VA a week prior to the race to camp around Shenandoah, enjoy the scenery and get ready.

Just one more stop, on August 16 local series MASS will have an enduro (4 hours lapped) race which I will use as a training ride to get the distance/time bench mark.

Recovery

2008-07-30T06:23:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was third day since the W101 and I went for a little ride with few friends. It was supposed to be an easy ride, but it really turned into quite a social ride. We stopped alot, chatted for long bits with friends we met on the trails...

But we still got in some good hard hill sprints and some stretches of nice singletrack. It felt good to be on the bike. And unlike my attempt to do an easy spin on Monday, the legs actually felt really good.

I did notice an interesting phenomenon, same thing I recall happening last year after SM100 for few days. The legs feel almost twice as strong as before the race but can produce that power for half as long.

Two down, one to go...

2008-07-28T05:06:00.000-07:00

So this weekend was my first Wilderness 101 in State College, PA and second time riding in State College...

Holly crap, rocks...

The weather was perfect, warm, but not hot, and cloudy. Anything hotter or sunnier with that much road would've been just brutal.

I traveled to this one again with my buddy Max with a plan to ride it together, giving each other moral support and to kill the monotony or riding the bike alone for 12 hours. It worked great last year at Shenandoah, but no so much at Mohican this year.

Right before the start, we got separated with a last second pre-start pit stop. But I positioned myself close to the front, knowing that at some point in the first couple of miles Max will be passing me and we'd regroup. It worked like a charm. He caught up to me on the first climb maybe a mile or two into the race. From then on we stayed together.

The first split flew by in no time. It was a short, 16 miles stage completely on paved and gravel roads. On the climbs we spun steadily, being happy for our decision to gear down for this race, unlike Mohican, on the flats we grumbled for the low gear, and on the downhills, Max wooped my behind using his weight advantage to do so. I tried to tuck in his draft and that way I could stay on his wheel coasting downhill, but my face was getting pelted by the gravel and I had to let him go, to catch up later when the road level off.

At the aid station #1, we quickly topped off camelbaks, downed few endurolite pills and were off to the first short section of single track. The second split had some little bit of singletrack, but again was mostly gravel, paved and fire roads. So we were very surprised when we suddenly got to the station #2 at 40 miles. Wow, that was one FAST 26 miles. At that point we felt good, and thought we were setting great pace for ourselves. I don't think we had gotten off the bikes to walk anything at that point, which was a great sign. Usually, in these 100-milers, we end up walking way more hills that we normally would on other rides, to save some energy for later in the race. Were we in for a rude awakening and surprise.

After refilling at station #2, we rolled on feeling pretty good. Unfortunately that did not last... The third split had the biggest and nastiest climbs. Some most brutal rocky punishing downhills... Right out of the station #2 it went from 1,000 to 2,100 in about 4 miles, then straight down back to 1,000 in about 2 miles, and back up from 1,000 to 2,400 in another 4 miles. First half of that climb, about 2 miles from 1,000 to 1,500 was not too bad, as it undulated between short steep and then more shallow sections. But the last 2 miles were straight up from 1,500 to 2,400 in 2 miles. That was a LONG hike for us. Not only it was extremely fatiguing, it was also demoralizing. When we finally got to the #3 at 60 miles it felt like the LONGEST 20 miles in my MTB riding experience, ever!

We got to #3 at 1:30, still not a bad pace, 6:30 for 60 miles. Considering the amount of walking we just did, not too bad. Slightly longer stop at #3 to fill up, down a cold coke, more endurolites, and off we went again. Right out of the #3 it went up again. So up a steep dirt trail we walked again. That was starting to get old and really depressing. When would it finally end. I recognised the trail we were on at that point. This section was the same trail as the course of Stoopid 50. And that was the section where I broke my frame last year and had to walk out to the road, so I knew it wasn't too long. We traded positions with few geared guys, when it would level off we would pass them, then it would point up and we would slow down or walk and they would catch up. Got out to the road finally and continued climbing to complete the third long accent from 1,000 at #3 to the last tall summit of the course at 2,400. After that it pointed down again, still on some trails of the Stoopid 50 course, this time in opposite direction, and after descending harrowing section (hike a bike in Stoopd 50, for those who know that course) it somewhat leveled off and then undulated with a bit of singletrack, all super rocky and punishing. Max started hading cramping problems at that point. I, on the other hand, by some magic, emerged from my mental fog and near bonking fatigue to suddenly find my legs again, and able to spin faster on the flat sections and even up the gravel climbs! After a little bit we briefly separated when Max walked for a little bit to recover from cramping, and I kept pedaling at moderate pace to keep the legs moving. I came across a lady on the side of the trail, who said she was cramping badly and to my question if she had any enduralites, she said, no. I stopped to share some of mine, and Max caught up to me again. We started rolling again together, but I slowly motored away again. I felt bad, but was afraid to slow down and loose the "good feeling", so I just kept moving, figuring he'd catch up to me on one of the downhills or at station #4. The second half of the split between #3 and #4 had probably nicest singletrack of the course, not to say it was great, but it was good, much better than rocky punishing downhills or gravel roads.

#4 was supposed to be only 14 miles from #3, and sure enough it appeared very soon. Nicely located under a bridge in a shade. I took my time refilling, taking on more endurolites, few hits of hammer gel. Asked for time, it was 3:20. Ok, not too bad, 8:20 for 74 miles. I kept looking back at the road but did not see Max. So in the spirit of our pre-race agreement, that if one of us would "feel the legs" he should go ahead to try to make it a decent time, and thinking that I only had 26 miles to go with 3:40 to be under 12 hours, I figured I should head out, which I did. After the finish Max and I compared times and at that point he was full 25 minutes behind.

Once again, straight out of the station it went up a steep hill. It was pretty steep and to my surprise I was able to climb the grade without much pain. But I didn't know how long the hill would last for. And at some point where it was straight, I got a glimpse of it continuing much further up than I could see and I realized that I wouldn't be able to stay on the bike to the summit, and there was no reason to blow up with so little to go. So another hike a bike took place. However, after that it turned into a mix of forest roads and singletrack, with shorter not too steep climbs, and short downhills and undulating trails. I was trading positions with a whole bunch of fully suspended gearies again. The #5 was supposed to be only 15 miles away. But it felt like longest 15 miles. One rocky trail was replaced by another, one rutted out rocky fire road by another. My hands and arms were getting pretty beat up by that point and I just wanted to see the #5 with only 12 miles to the finish. Somewhere half way between #4 and #5, my Perpeteum bottle decided to leave me, and from that point on I had no "fuel" so I continued on solely on HEED and Hammer gel. Which might've been good. Cos my stomach seemed to protest against having to digest Perpeteum for some reason.

There was some really sketchy super narrow and super rocky goat path type of the downhill. I took it fairly slowly, picking my line, making sure I did not tumble down the side, because it would've been a very very long and very very painful way down. I kept thinking about the top 5-10 guys really racing for time and position, having to FLY down that hill and taking real big risks. It scared me to just think about it... Then it leveled off, but didn't get any less rocky. I saw a guy on cross bike that we have been seeing on the course throughout the day, and I couldn't help but be impressed with him. Then the trail popped out on a gravel road and he was gone fro my site. Then there was another long flat fire road that seemed like it would never end, bu finally aid station appeared. And I heard someone call out my name. That was Nate, one of our local Philly riding buddies. He seemed pretty beat, and dejected. I got my camelbak re-filled, downed few endurolites, another swig of the gel, asked what the rest of the course was like, got "about 4-5 miles of flat rail trail, then a 3 mile climb, maybe 2.5, not too steep but definitely at the wrong time in the race, and then another 4-5 miles of flat rail trail with just a tad of fisherman trail and singletrack". That didn't sound bad, and I a chance to pass a local rider gave me a boost and I was off again.

After #5 there is only 12 miles left, so I threw everything at it without caution. The flat rail trail was painful, as it was hard to sustain stead high cadence spin at that point, and most not even because of the fatigue in the legs, but more of mental fatigue of the monotony of it. I wished for some false flats to give my some resistance on the pedals and make it easier to pedal. Does that make any sense?!?!? 90 miles in and I was wishing for harder resistance to make it easier?!?! Yeah, those 100-milers will mess with your head. But then the resistance came, that 2.5 mile climb! At this point it was all or nothing, hell with the caution and I was climbing, standing up, spinning hard sitting down, everything, but no walking!!! Passed several gearies crawling in granny gear or walking. Got to the top, and bombed down the straight super bumping fire road. I did not feel my hands or arms, I was taking chances. I did not care, I was close!!! At the bottom it made a sharp turn and dumped me into that fisherman trail. Holy crap!!! A fully suspended gearie passed me but could not stay on the bike, he kept trying to ride thru it, but kept falling. I decided it was better to just walk. Especially considering my legs and arms were like rubbery gel after the downhill. Soon enough the trail became a nicer singletrack, I hopped back on and was on the last section of rail trail in no time. Now the torture began... It was absolutely impossible to continue pedaling at decent clip, knowing that I was inside 4 miles of to the finish, yet not knowing how far exactly, the trail being tacky soft dirt and gravel, absolutely flat and me having 32X20 gearing and no legs left... I had some visions of maybe coming in inside 11:30, but I started loosing the hopes of that realizing how little I had in my legs.
Somewhere on that split there was a long pitch dark old railroad tunnel. Someone say there were no rocks in and it was ok to ride. So I stayed focused on the 10" sized light spot at the end and tried to ride straight not to bump into the walls.
Of note there was also a long skinny bridge. With heavy-duty big ass wooden railing right at the height of my handle bars. My bars are 26" wide, the opening between the railings must've been 27"... I rode the whole length, skimming my hands on each side and bouncing the bars from one side to the other. I have nice sanded off spots on my plastic bar end plugs... Just before that bridge I got passed by a gearie powering hard to the finish, but he fell on the bridge, and then in the following tunnel. So we started talking on the other side. I asked how far there was left, he said we were inside a mile!!! Also he recognized me! Turned out that 2 years ago when Lance and I went up to State College to ride with some locals, he was one of our guides! Small world! He also told me that we were 11:42 into the race, and from that moment it I knew I had to lay it all out to finish before 12 hours. I was questioning myself "can I do 18 minute mile?" Then I tried to do the math to figure out what speed that would translate into, and failed miserable, so I just rode.

The campsite showed up thru the trees... It was sooo close, but there was a creek and we had to go around. Oh what a long way to go around, the last 1/4 or so or that detour around the creek over the bridge and down the street to the finish was torturous...

In the end, it was 11:44:55.

I was beat. I'm done.

To tell you the truth, I don't think I will come back to this one. I probably will do some other 100-milers. I might come back again to Shenandoah, depending on how I feel after it this year. I'd like to redeem myself at Mohican. I would like to check out Lumber Jack 100. But Wilderness?... Neah... There was just now enough fun in it. Too much road. Too little flowing fun singletrack. Too much beating up on boring, straight down descents. Neah. This one, I'm done with.

40th out of 48 SS finishers and 60 starters. 172nd overall out of 251 finished and 321 starters.

The end.

When does racing feel good

2008-07-14T05:06:00.000-07:00

I've been racing on and off since I think '05, when with bunch of friends, we completed almost entire MASS series... Then in '06 I did 12 hours of Allamuchy endurance race solo. And last year SM100. Topped it off with a pathetic showing in Mohican 100 this year...

I liked the 12 hours of Allamuchy and last year's SM100 for the shere sense of accomplishment and personal achievement. But other than that, I did not particularly enjoy recing. I guess I'm not competetive enough. Most races turn into some longish, fastish ride, or into some masocistic survival-fests...

But not the Fair Hill Classic of MASS this year. On the 12th day of antibiotics treatment from Lyme disease, on the still new Ti bike I lined up in SS sport open class for the 22 niles of super fun flowy trails.

I took it easy from the start, letting most of the group spring ahead for the turn into the woods. One guy managed, what looked like, a pretty nasty OTB on the dirt road inthe field before we even hit the trail. Few guys got hung up and slowed down on the first slight incline in the woods. So I had a chance to pick few guys off and start looking ahead to working my way up the field, as the front group of 5-6 riders separated from the field and disappeared in the distance.

I grabbed a wheel of a group of three riders, who kept a decent pace I could maintain without over exerting myself too quickly. We picked few more slower guys. Then one of them got dropped. For few miles it was three of us, cruising a nice fast pace, picking off occasional rider. Legs were feeling good, and I was enjoying the fast pace, and making mental notes when they had to stand up on short climbs while I was able to make the same climbs still seated without burning out my legs (see, here's the lack of competiveness, a real hard core racers would dig a little deeper, pass them right there and push harder) but I wanted to make sure I had enough to finish strong, I saw that their pace was good to keep slowly reeling in riders who went out too hard and were now slowing down, yet, I knew that I could kick it up a notch when the time came to pass them. Good times.

We came out to a long smooth gravel road gradual uphill, with I think another SSer not far ahead of us and couple of gearies. The front guy of my group picked up a smooth steady uphill pace, I followed, we dropped our third guy, and passed everyone who was in sight ahead of us. I thought about trying to pass him, but only managed to mark his pace without blowing up. All good.

For the next 10 or so miles it was just two of us, nice steady fast pace, passing occasional rider. Few times I led for short periods of time, but most of the time Holt, that was the guys name, was setting the pace. Few times on longer smoother down hills he'd open a gap on me but as soon as the trail would point a little up in the singletrack I'd quickly find myself on his wheel again.
There was one pretty steep climb. I was leading at the time, rounded the corner and saw the steep uphill, with few people walking way ahead, including some SS guy. I decided to save the legs a little and walk it, since it wasn't too long and I figured I'd gain more by saving the legs than loosing time by walking. Holt stayed on the bike and passed me. However, as soon as I was back on, I passed the other SSer, and few other gearies, and caught up to Holt. Within couple of miles there were 2-3 more climbs like that, this time I didn't see anyone walking, and the legs felt good, so I didn't have the temptation to walk, I stayed on the bike, glued to his back wheel (actually once I got too close in a techie section and buzzed his tire. :-) ) and we passed a bunch more people.

I started to think that we would come into the finish together like that. Felt strange. On one hand I'd love a strong sprint for the finish for an exciting end of the fun race, on the other hand, I felt thankful to him for setting such a good pace for so long and leading me, so I wouldn't want to pass him in the last few yards.

Miles were ticking off. The legs started feeling a bit tired, and fatigue with lack of electrolites started setting in. We came out to a gravel road thru the field. I usually can settle into a nice spin on the climbs like that and spin steady but hard, there were 2-3 SSers around us, I got by Holt and the rest of them, but as we were turning back into the woods, he was right there on my wheel again. All good, back to our 1-2 trading positions.

At this point I was trying to figure out where were we in the course mileage-wise. The water stations were setup every 5 miles, but for my life I couldn't figure out if we had passed 2 or 3 stations... Finally, we got to a water station, I asked the guy which one that was, he told me that there was just one more. Great, only 7 miles left. There was another tent just few yards down the road with few guys with water guns and cups splashing everyone, I set up on the bike rolled up to the hands free with my both arms up in the air to get maximum hit rate of the water guns! It felt great to cool down, and energized by the thought of nearing finish I passed Holt and couple of more riders along the way right there and kept pushing.

I expected him to catch up soon, but he never did, I learned after the finish that around that time he cramped up badly and had to slow down a lot, actually letting by 3 guys... :-(

From this point on I had to do my own pacing, and let me tell you, I'm not good at it. Pretty soon, I was starting very fatigued and I was afraid of falling off the pace. But I was glad to see that no SSers passed me. The entire race I was doing most of passing, with the exception of few really fast vet geared riders who started behind us.

Well, that's about it. Soon there was a course marshal who told me that there were only 3 miles left, which really lifted my spirits. Around the same point, I was closing in on another SSer, and at the sharp switch back turn there was another course marshal pointing the way, I thanked him for job well done, and I think the SSer heard me and thought I was in another class, because he pulled over to let me pass, but as soon as I did, I heard something that sounded like "oh darn, should've not done that" LOL

That was it, the signs for 2 miles and 1 mile, came quickly at that point. Some where between those two signs, a small group of faster gearies caught up to me, two passed me, and one or two were just behind. The two who passed me, couldn't pull away after the pass. And there was 1-2 other gearies whom we caught up to right within 2-300 yards of the finish.

I must've been high on endorphins, cos within 200 yards I decided to sprint and passed all of them, one withing only 2-3 bike legths of the finish line. Yeah, that was pointless and stupid, since they weren't even in my class, but it felt good! :-)

I must say, after this race, I can understand why people LOVE racing. If you're strong enough and have competetive strike in you, being able to push all the way to the finish, ride hard, see people ahead and reel them in and pass and keep the pace and the effort all the way to the finish line feels good. I don't think I ever had a race like that! Think this was my first race ever when I did not blow up at some point and did not shift into "survival mode" hating the life and not knowing who, where and why I was...

I hope this marks the end of the Lyme for this year and I upcoming Wilderness 101 will feel just as good.

Tho, 22 miles in 1:57 is a pretty slow pace for a 100 miler. At this pace without any stops it would translate into only 9 hour time. But I know there is no way in hell I'd manage this pace.

Lyme

2008-07-08T06:41:00.000-07:00

This will be short and sweet... Well, maybe not sweet.

About a week ago I was diagnosed with Lyme disease. I had a classic bull's eye marks, yes, I had three, and some of the fatigue, pain, lack of concentration symptoms, as well as the blood test which was positive.

They say that on average the bull's eye marks show up 7-14 days after infection and the blood test becomes positive 4-6 weeks after infection. But of course there are variations.

My completely unscientific guesstimate is that I had it for 2-4 weeks. Counting back from the June 26th when the blood was drawn for the test, puts the infection date somewhere between end of May and mid-June. So it's entirely possible that I already had it during Mohican and now I have a plausible excuse for my pathetic showing at that race...

Hopefully, the antibiotics I'm on now will clear it in the next week or so and I'll be back to normal by the 26th for the Wilderness 101.

Mohican 100

2008-06-02T10:26:00.000-07:00

Well, here it came and here it went... I don't want to talk much about it, but suffice to say, that I stupidly opted not to gear down and rode my normal 32X18, which combined with my lack of fitness at this point in the season, proved to be a bad bad choice...
I thought I ran out of gas by the aid station #2 at mile 34, but was convinced by my buddy not to quit. By mile 46 at station #3 I was completely out of it, and thought I was about to die right there.
By mile 72 at station #4, I started feeling like I recovered enough and could actually finish the remaining 28 miles and at least finish the thing, but I was told that I missed the time cut off by about 10-20 minutes...
So there I was with an embarrasing DNF, and crushed ego...

Sucks...

But I learned not to underestimate OH hills and OH single track. There were many many miles of of of the sweetest single track I ever ridden. If only I felt stronger and could enjoy it more.

Putting my head down and starting to "train" for the Wilderness 101 at the end of July.

Here we go

2008-05-27T05:50:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's been a really really long time since the last update. But finally there is something to report.

We are leaving for our first 100-miler of the season this Friday. Well, it will be first one for me and Max, but not the first one for Harlan, who looks like will be driving up with us, and had done the Cohutta 100 already.

Well, i'll have to report later how I did, but I do not have high hopes. The legs don't feel strong, the endurance isn't there... Why do I think I can do 100 miles with 11,000 feet elevation gain, when I'm completely beat after a 26 mile loop of Wiss with only about 5,000 gain?!?! Oh the pain...

The only hope it to gear down to 32X20 from my normal 32X18...

Progress?

2008-03-17T12:47:00.000-07:00

It's been a very long time since last post. I've been busy with regular everyday life things.

I've tried to keep up regular riding, and for the most part I did, but unfortunately the quality and quantity has not been what I would like it to be. Rides been too easy and too short, especially in the last month or so.

However, this Saturday 3 friends and I got out, and they were hauling a55... I had to try to keep up and subsequently, got my butt kicked, which was good!

In other news, about a month or so ago, my buddy Max and I had registered for our three 100-milers this summer, Mohican in OH, Wilderness 101 in PA and Shenadoah Mountain in VA. So there is no way out of it now. Have to step it up and start riding.

Nails

2008-01-11T05:08:00.000-08:00

One of the hazzards of a park in the middle of the city is that some parts of it are on top of old construction left over dumps, or park used city rejected fill to "fix" the trails at some point in the past...

We are all used to seeing non-native rock and chunks of concrete on the trails, but on my last ride I picked up something else. I stopped when I heard a loud slapping on the frame. Turned out I had a 3-4" rusted bent nail in my rear tire. I went thru the tread and out of the side wall!

What a bummer.

Other than that, it's too wet again to go out on the trails... Withdrawal...

Don't send the rescue party out yet!

2008-01-04T07:39:00.000-08:00

The ride was awesome! It felt so good to be back on the bike. It was cold, but not cold enough to be completely miserable. Aside from "normal", for winter riding, numb and cold tips of the fingers and toes, it was rather comfortable. Very unexpected, despite 20 degrees temps.

Ok, so tonight we'll try it again!

The registration is open for all the NUE series races. Time to make the decisions which races to register for this year and which to skip. So far I'm pretty sure I'll be doing Mohican in OH, LumberJack in MI, Wilderness in PA and Shenandoah Mountain in VA. The Cohutta down in TN is up in the air, and I'm suspecting I will not commit to that one.

Whole bunch of nothing...

2008-01-03T05:54:00.001-08:00

To report really. I have been off the bike since before Christmas, and out of any exercise really, with exception of couple of easy hikes.

Itching to get back on the bike tonight for the first time, and of course, it's low 20's that feel like low teens with the wind chill. It's good thing that Santa brought some nice new winter riding clothing!

If I don't post the results of my tonight's adventure by tomorrow, send a rescue party looking for Otzi in Wissahickon!!!

Thanksgiving!

2007-11-26T06:30:00.000-08:00

What a fantastic Thanksgiving! Despite my often grumblings about life, I should be thankful for a lot of things, and I am. This week, was a perfect way to clear up my mind and give thanks. What better way than by riding hard and long.

So the recap of the week:
Monday and Tuesday were a little damp, and a little cold, shortish night rides after work. But in great company.
Had half day Wednesday, the weather was absolutely gorgeous, in 70s!!! So I took the whole day off and rode Wissahickon up and down for 5 hours, probably clocking around 30 miles!
Did a small fun ride on Thursday morning at Clayton, one loop, about 6 miles. Perfect little appetite builder for T-giving dinner!
Took Friday off from riding to do a little TM with few good friends. And it was back in the saddle for and improve, unsanctioned, unofficial "off season training race" with some folks from MTBNJ.com. The trails were super rocky, and the climbs were long and super steep, it was cold in teh morning, but warmed up by the late AM early afternoon.
And to top it all off was the crowning Sunday bi-park ride we pulled off with a fellow rider from PMBA, Wissahickon and Belmont in one day. He had a GPS and made a google earth track!!!

The leaves were down, and one part it was like riding over an oriental rug. The leaves must've been snapped by a cold frost and high winds, because they fell to the ground and were all still pale salad green, bright yellow, and reddish, without any decomp brown colors at all!!! The whole place looked magical!

Drying out

2007-11-20T04:50:00.000-08:00

So I did get to the park and rode last night. But if my buddy, Max, would've said that we were nuts to do it and it was a bad idea and we should just turn around and go home, I would have not put up a fight. If you know what I mean.

Surprisingly the trails drained very well and were in good condition. Just handfull of soft spots, and maybe one slightly muddy section. The rest just very wet slippery mulching leaves covering everything.

It was rather chilly and uncomfortable, due to the wetness and low temps. We were out for about 1-1.5 hours, riding at a pretty slow pace, cos it was that slippery. Plus the myst and fog were so thick at times we could hardly see the trail with all the reflection from the water dropplets from our head lights. Let me tell you. It was spooky at times. And I have no idea how people race cyclocross in the winter in the freezing temps! In that hour and a half, I never warmed up and never loosened up enough to feel that feeling of your body working like a well lubed machine at operating temps. Just felt constricted and tight and cold.

Likily it looks like the rain is going away today. So it might be drier and tomorrow it should be even warm! Back in the 60s!

Rain, rain, go away!

2007-11-19T04:22:00.000-08:00

For various reasons I didn't get on the bike a single time since last Sunday... A week is a long time, yet in a way not too bad, becuase I road almost every day the week before and recovery time was quite welcome.

However, the withdrawal started acting up and I was looking forward to riding today... But despite early favorable forecasts, this is what I woke up to...

Argh!!! They are saying tho, that it will stop by early afternoon, and it's only drizzling, so I might get a ride in tonight. Here's to the hope!!!

Stay tuned.

Trails under the wheels, trails under the shovels...

2007-11-12T04:02:00.000-08:00

What a week was the last week!

Started off with two consecutive days of riding, on Monday and Tuesday. Had to take Wednesday off. But rode with a fun group on Thursday. I really like those Thursday rides. The pace isn't killer, so it is very nice to enjoy the park and trails without trying to keep my lunch down at the tops of the climbs!
Met a new member of PMBA club. He is new to the area and has been exploring the park on his own. We rode most of the trails, until his light ran out of the battery and we had to find the closes bail point riding by my light alone! Then my battery ran out of juice too about 1/4 mile from the parking lot. Good thing by then I was on the main well lit path. And my legs were just as done as my light!!! I could barely turn the cranks on the flat smooth path! That's good week of riding in my book!

And on Saturday we had a great group of dedicated volunteers come out to work on a badly eroded section of the trail. It rained and drizzled on and off thru the night and in the morning. However, a little drizzle and 37 degrees temps in the morning did not deter the spirits and more than 35 people came out to work!!! I'm impressed by the generosity and dedication of our volunteers. Their spirit for giving does not seize to impressed me!
The planning for this project started a month ago, but last scheduled date, two weeks ago, got rained out. So it was rescheduled for this weekend.
There was a bad mud hole which we wanted to fix. Then we looked at the trail leading to the mud hole, and it was getting eroded badly, all loose and just plain ugly. Before we knew it, we had a plan for a section of the trail to be re-routed, and another part of it stabilized and made more erosion resistant.
By the end of the day, we had re-routed and/or revamped 320 feet of trail, in addition of building an enormous (aprox. 10'X12' and 4-5' deep) "french drain" with a beautiful stone "bridge" over it.
Check out the pictures!!!
I believe everyone was as happy and proud of the results as they were sore from all the work we did. I know I was!
It is incredible how much a relatively small group of hard working people can do in one day!

But the week was not over yet. On Sunday we went for a ride at White Clay, and fun park down in DE. The trails are maintained there by the group called Delaware Trail Spinners, and let me tell you, they know what they are doing!!! It was a beautiful late fall day, the air was cool and crisp, the colors were astonishing, the group was friendly, and the ride great! Perfect fun, recovery ride after a fantastic week!

Over and out.

Fun ride, funny crash

2007-11-07T19:38:00.000-08:00

Had a shortish but fun ride with couple of fiends.

We were cruising pretty fast, I was leading as I approached a spot with a little jump, which I've been exploring lately, slowly gaining confidence getting a little air off of it. A friend of mine, who is much faster downhill and enjoys jumping much more than me. I didn't want to hold him up, and didn't slow down as I normally would.
As a result I went off the little jump rather uncomfortably, awkwardly, and too fast.

Landing wasn't much better. Front wheel touched down firts and at an angle with a loud crack/snap noise. One thought went thru my mind "I broke my CF fork's leg at the dropout".

I picked myself up and dusted off. Fearfully examined the bike, only to discover that nothing was broken, except for the low tire pressure. Lukily, as it turns out all I did was burp some air from my Stan's conversion! Phew, what a relief.

Never had that problem before in a long time. I haven't topped off the tires before te ride, so it is possible that they were just a hair too low. From now on, I will always check the tire pressure before heading out, and never ride on anything lower than 30 psi! Lesson learned.

SlackerVille

2007-11-06T06:35:00.000-08:00

Being a lazy slacker SUCKS!

Last night all my riding buddies bailed on me, and I didn't have enough motivation to go riding in the cold AND dark by myself. Instead went out for a bite to eat and a beer. As I was going home afterward, I realized that it wasn't all that cold, and I felt really guilty for wasting a perfectly nice riding night.

To make things worse, today is raining... Figures... That's what I get for being a lazy bum.

In a crappy mood. Just hoping that the forecasters are correct and this rain WILL stop in an hour or so and the sun comes out and dries things up.

Hopeful to get out and ride after work

Slower pace bliss

2007-11-01T19:37:00.000-07:00

For the last couple of months I've been mostly riding with fast guys or by myself. In either case, the rides turn out pretty hard. When I'm by myself, the pace might not be break neck fast, but I don't stop. When chasing them boys, it's almost race pace for me.
And I love the resulting fatigue and pain.

However, tonight I went with a different group, and pace was much more relaxed. What a joy! Noticing so much more beautiful nature around. To say nothing of being able to fly up the hills half way thru and at the end of the ride, because I still have a lot left in the tank, instead of being spent from riding to the limit from the moment of getting on the bike.

New resolution, from now on, at least once a month -- easy ride!!! :-)

Over and out!

Columbus Day rocks!

2007-10-10T19:56:00.000-07:00

Well, I workin private sector, but for some reason my company decided to honor the day, and close the office. Score! The weather was perfect, unbelievable for October, in fact.

I tried to rally some friends to ride with, but in the end only one buddy, who works from home was able to get away to join me for a part of the ride.
I started off in Wissahickon, rode one side of the park all the way, popped on the surface streets for maybe couple of miles to connect to Belmont, where I meet up with Lou, and we did a nice loop in there, before he went home and I rode back to Wiss, to finish up the other side.

All in all, it was probably close to 30-35 miles of gorgeous ride. Too bad my legs didn't feel as fresh and strong as some other days, and I ran out of water. When I came to the water fountain where I was planning to re-fill, I ran into a family with bunch of kids using it in some ways, which convinced me not to use it for drinking water... So I just finished the ride getting progressively dehydrated.

But no worries, any ride on Monday, when everyone else is working ROCKS!

What a weather we've been having, it's completely unbelievable! We finally are getting some moderate rain. This is long over due and very needed. The water will moisten the trails and dumpen all the dust. The end of the week, with stickier trails and cooler temps should see some killer riding conditions!

Trail Maintenance!

2007-09-25T07:18:00.001-07:00

This will be a quick one, but I wanted to mention the TM day we has this past weekend! Over the last 3 months our local MTB club has been gathering momentum on various TM projects, and with help of other local more established groups, we are going places now!

We scoped the location and set the goal, made plans, and prepared. But I still had some doubts about how it would all turn out. It was a rather ambitious project.

But all my doubts were disolved and I was blown away that Saturday. When we had 20+ people ready to work early in the morning, standing in the pouring rain (the forecast was for sunny skies and warm temperatures) and not leaving, I knew it was going to be good! Luckily the rain stopped pretyt quickly and we had blue skies for the rest of the day!

We had 45+ volunteers working throughout the day, loggin total of over 250 man hours!!!
We changed large [parts of existing trail to shed water better and re-routed an approximately 200 feet long section!

Here are some pictures!

High hopes, not too much disappointment

2007-09-17T10:41:00.000-07:00

So I was thinking about attempting to try to push for doing two laps of my local loop for the first time this weekend. As I mentioned in the previous posts, For some reason, after just one loop (~16-ish miles) I'm usually so beat I find it hard to keep going.

But I fell short of that goal. Tho I'm not too disappointed.

We went out for a really hard paced lap in the morning on Saturday, thinking that we would barely have enough time to finish the loop by 1 PM, when we were meeting couple of more friends to scope out and plan the location for the TMD this coming weekend. However, we went so hard that we were done by noon! So we started with the TMD planning an hour early. No biggie.

Then in the evening we had our first PMBA annual party. I killed an hour just hanging out in the park, taking in this gorgeous, crisp, refreshing weather we are having right now. This is how each fall should be. Absolutely perfect!

Lotsa good beer later, and many many hardy laughs, I got home, and promptly fell asleep.

On Sunday, I had to meet with my son's boy scout troops, to go over the preparation for the 33 mile bike trek they will be doing at the end of the month. And I thought that afterwards I'd have time to go an do my "two-lapper".
Well, the meeting went longer than expected -- we ended up going for an easy ride in another park. It was nice seeing how some kids took the bike so naturally and were lofting their, sometimes too big for them, bikes with platform pedals over logs and log piles! Some of those boys are natural!

And that was my weekend, and now for another hard ride after work. Seems like tonight might be the first time I'll break out the lights!

Confused...

2007-09-11T19:00:00.000-07:00

Got out of the work more than an hour late yesterday. So instead of being at the trail head by 5:15-ish, it was 6:30 by the time I was ready to roll. Luckily, I saw a familiar bike on a roof of a car that pulled into a parking lot - a friend I knew from a season of XC racing I did a couple of years ago.
Turns out her SO couldn't ride and she was heading out by herself, I asked if she would mind company.
Man, if I knew how much she would kick my butt, I would've gone by myself at much slower pace! Ha-ha

It was late, and getting dark soon, so we only had time for half of the normal loop. Still about 5 miles of gravel path and then 6 or so miles of single track. She was moving at a pretty good clip, and I had to work hard to keep up!

It was a shortish ride, but a hard one, and it was nice flying thru our trails at 8-9/10th! Trails felt quite a bit different from a more relaxed normal pace.

What really perplexed me was why it felt so hard and I was so tired after only 10-12 miles?! Just a couple of weeks ago I completed SM100. I mean, it almost felt harder doing these 12 miles than 100 miles two weeks ago! Granted at shenandoah, I was pacing myself, and yesterday I was going almost all out, but still...

This is also right along the lines of what I was thinking few days ago. Having ridden 100 miles, why does it still feel almost impossible commit to and ride two complete loops of my regular ride? That would be "only" 32-ish miles...
I'm sure it's possible, but I haven't been able to convince myself to go for the second lap, after finishing first.
I wonder if I looked at the SM100 as n almost "super feat" and thus just threw everything at it, expecting to suffer to no end. I contrast, the regular ride, is just that, "regular" ride, and thus when at the end of the first loop I feel some fatigue, I expect myself to do the "regular" thing, and stop...

Must work on not stopping! After all, 12-16 mile long "training rides" would not help me much at those darn hundies next year... :-)

SM100

2007-09-10T04:57:00.000-07:00

So this was my do or die 100-miler debut.

I was meeting some friends at the race, who went down on Friday. I pulled into the camp site about 5:30 PM, set up my tent, registered, got some food, dropped my drop bag, and settled in for the evening of pre-race jitters. :-)

My goal for the race was to finish. The longer single day ride I've done before the SM was about 75 miles long, and did not have a fraction of climbing we were facing in the race. So needless to say, I was nervous.

The morning of the race, we happily started at the back of the main group, knowing that we would pace ourselves and weren't gunning for the top honors.
However, as we turned off the paved roads into the first jeep road climbs, my buddy and I started picking the spots up. It's always entertaining to me to watch people on the geared bikes spinning granny gear up the hills. I know I'm not that strong and not stronger than the other riders, so I attribute the fact that I'm climbing faster up the hill in a harder gear on my SS than they do on geared bikes, to the black magic of SS.

At the top as we turned into the first section of singletrack, that's where our strategy of starting at the back came to bite us, as we were bogged down by riders who didn't seem to be used to and comfortable with out East Coast rocky terrain.

Luckily, the field was spreading out nicely and before we knew it we were cruising.

I must give big credit to the organizers as the course was just about perfect for a long race. There was plenty of climbing, but the climbs weren't such that they would stop us dead in our tracks and beat us up such that we wouldn't be able to ride past 20-30 mile mark. Flats were good for recovery. Singletrack sections were plentiful and absolutely a blast. Some of the best, funnest (yeah, if that's a word) prettiest singletrack I've seen. The down hills were fast and technical. I'm not the fastest down hiller by any means, and riding fully rigid bike, even tho it's a 29er doesn't help. Tho, I have to admit, it's not the bike that is really limiting the speed, but the rider. My buddy on his rigid 29er was opening a gap on my on every down hill.

I was expecting to barely claw my way to the finish, dragging my lifeless carcass by the sheer will power. In reality, I actually didn't feel half bad thru the race. I must've been better mentally prepared and definitely paid more attention and stayed on top of proper hydration and replenishment of the calories burnt.

Few interesting realizations that came to us during the race. We were looking forward to 50 mile mark as some magic mile stone after which it will be all easier and we would be home free. Despite that mile 50 for us was 6 hours into the ride and we had another 50 to go, and 50 is a darn long way!!! Then we were closing on aid station 5 at mile 75, like it was god sent, and after it, we had "ONLY" 25 miles left... Ha, my normal rides are about 16-17 miles long, and here I was looking at "only" 25 miles, AFTER riding for 75 already, and in these "just" 25 I would have to climb more than I usually do on any of my normal rides...
But still, mind is a funny thing, and it definitely helped a lot to look and think about it that way, "only" 25 left. At aid station 6, mile 88, we had "just mere" 12 left, that's child's play!!! We are home free!!! :-)
At station 6 we were told that if we really push we might be able to finish in the day light without using the lights! So that became our motivation and goal, and it worked out perfectly!

So I completed my first SS hundie. The longest one day SS or otherwise ride I have ever done! I loved every second of it. I'm hooked and will come back for more, much more next year.

PS One observation I made after the race was that to my surprise, during the race I did not think once about pulling out or not finishing. I was very happy about that.

History

2007-09-10T04:32:00.000-07:00

A week ago, yes it did take this long to get around to write about it, I completed my first 100-miler. In the spring of this year I had some visions of grander of doing two of them, Wilderness 101 and Shenandoah Mountain 100. But when the time came to sign up for Wild101, I chickened out.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. This is supposed to be a bit of the history of how I got here. Back in '99 I rediscovered biking, more specifically, mountain biking. I haven't been on the bike since I was a kid, but just one ride had me completely re-hooked, is that a word? I went and bought my first "real" mountain bike and proceeded to ride it fairly regularly for the next 6 years.

However, just like all of us, I had a severe case of upgradatitis! And by '04, after having replaced every component on my bike except for the frame, I was itching for a new bike. I had my mind firmly set on Santa Cruz SuperLight. However, such and upgrade wasn't in my budget at the time. In retrospect, I'm glad it wasn't.

In '05 a friend of mine got a Surly Karate Monkey. And started talking about all the single speeding stuff. I was curious and one day in the fall I went out for a ride, put my gears into 32X15 and didn't touch the shifters for the entire hour or so that I rode that night. I've seen the light!!! Within a week that 1X9 was converted to SS (I got really lucky, because the magic gear on that bike was 32X16, no tensioner needed!) And started researching proper SS bikes.

Within a month or so of reading all the reviews and information I could get my hands on about SS, I came to the conclusion that since I'm going SS, I might as well, and should, go all the way and get myself a fully rigid 29er SS! A little detour from FS 26er geared, don't you say? A little more research and I had placed the order for On One Inbred frame and fork. While waiting for it, I started putting together the components. Finally, in early July of '06 I had my bike together in all it's glory.

However, before I got that bike I got talked into doing 12 hours of Allamuchy. For which I was still riding my old converted Trek. We were going to do it a two man team, but my buddy came down with a bad case of flu or something less than 48 hours before the race, and it was too late to pull out without loosing the entry fee. The only viable option I had was either to find a new partner in crime (didn't happen) or change our entry to a solo ride! Which I did. That was probably the hardest ride of my life! Despite the fact that I did 8 laps, "only" 56 miles, half of SM100! The entire ride was in the rain, mud galore!

And I was not prepared at all, neither mentally, nor physically, nor with nutrition. I was completely spent!!! But I also LOVED it!!! And since then was thinking about what other endurance races I could do.

Thus I was coming into '07 with plans of doing many endurance races. As it turned out I would do only one... SM100. I did attempt to do Stoopid 50 in State College PA, but had to pull out half way thru with a major mechanical.