Running Scared

So today I raced the Baie Saint Paul Canada Cup. It was a real mud race - I'd actually call it a running race.

I had first call up again which was kind of cool, and then hung out in the rain for a while until the gun went off. I had a good start and got into the singletrack 1st, with Marty Lazarski on my wheel. It was technical muddy rocky singletrack right off the bat, and we were able to ride it and everyone else ran it so we got a gap immediately. Marty and I pushed pretty hard right then and got a 10 sec gap. Marty led for a bit and then I passed him back halfway up the singletrack climb. By the top I had at least 5sec on Marty, and rode the descent fairly well and came through the lap with about a 20sec lead.

On the second lap it was getting harder to ride - all the 350 or so riders on the race course were just churning the mud into pig slop, in some places it was 6inch deep peanut butter thickness mud, and in other areas it was thin soupy mud that was hub deep. As the race went on the course got more and more destroyed and it got slower. I was being stubborn and riding as much as possible but I was actually just spinning a lot. There was a lot of trail where I would grab the trees on either side of the trail and pull myself forward.

Catherine running through some sloppy mud.

So eventually when I heard the split times and the chasers were getting closer I knew I had to pick it up. So for lap 3-4-5 I ended up running a ridiculous amount. Now anyone who knows me knows I don't like running, but I had to get'er done and just ran. I was able to stay out front for the whole race and hold on for the win.

Very excited about it and now it is 2 for 2. Catherine wore out her brake pads pretty early on and didn't have the best race to finish 3rd - still a respectable result though.

My mom and I at the end- muddy and happy.

Last weekend I raced Tremblant - it was a great race as well. I had a good start and entered the single 2nd wheel. There was a big group of us and we rode together for the first lap and then Kris Sneddon took the lead and I hopped on his wheel, and Cam joined us. I had good climbing legs and got into the singletrack first and with my Xprezo Sub 5 full suspension I was able to open up a good gap on the downhill. I soft pedaled the pavement at the bottom though, as I didn't want to work too hard yet, and then attacked when I got into the singletrack and on the final climb I was able to open up my gap and then open it up even more on the downhill. This time I pedaled really hard across the open road section and held my gap and grew it until the finish - coming in for the win!

So what was really cool about this race is that Catherine also won, so that meant we were both the Canada Cup leaders, so we got up on the podium together with our red leaders jerseys. At this point Ricky yelled KISS, we want a KISS so Catherine obliged and gave me a quick one right on the podium!

Pan Ams

So I had a great trip to Colombia for the weekend. Everything was great except for my race.

I flew down on thursday - had a nice early start at 3:20 AM, and got into Bogota Colombia at 10PM. There we were met by one of the organizers with a big cube van and a bus. We headed off to our hotel by Chia with an armed escort at our side. Got into the hotel at midnight and had a great sleep.

Friday we build our bikes in the sun. It was amazing! We could stand around in shorts and a T shirt and soak up the warmth and energy from the sun. So nice after a rainy winter in Victoria. Friday was a bit of a long day - we rode over to the race course but weren't allowed to pre-ride until 4pm. When we did get on the race course it was really fun. Basically it had a long climb/long descent, with a few variations in between. Some of the climbing was super steep, and pre-riding it was difficult not to go too hard. The trails more technical than most south american race courses and were lots of fun to ride. After the pre-ride we rode home with a police escort (we followed him but he didn't know where our hotel was so we ended up riding around quite a bit extra).

Saturday a few of us rode over, did a lap, and then rode back. This time we had the route dialed and it only took 30min.

Sunday was race day and it dawned bright and sunny. This was supposed to be the rainy season in Colombia, with temperatures from 10 - 20 deg C, so it was mostly a nice surprise to have 28deg and sun. I say mostly because I did not do any heat adaptation before flying down, and preforming at my best when going from 5deg to 20 and rain is no problem, but 30deg is hard to adapt to. But, on the plus side it sure makes clean up and travel home a lot easier to not have muddy clothes!

For the race we had a pretty good field of competitors - with all the top South Americans on their best form, and a full squad from the US. I had a great start and was in about 10th going through the start loop, then we went up a short hill and past the feed tech zone, then up another short steep hill. I thought that I would be able to handle this effort, but in these first 5mins of racing I completely did myself in. I guess I forgot to mention that we were racing at 2550meters of elevation, and this means one can not recover nearly as well from anaerobic efforts. For the rest of the lap, and then the next 3 I crawled around the race course. I think I would have been better off to stop on the side and take a breather for 10min and then get back in the race. Put it this way - my race laps were slower than some of my pre-ride laps, when I just relaxed up the climbs. I guess I only just stuck it out because I don't quit races and wanted to finish. By lap 5 and 6 I had a little bit of speed back and was able to pass a few people.

In general I was pretty disappointed with my race, I don't feel that I came anywhere close to what I was capable of, and am annoyed that I had to relearn all about pacing at altitude. It was amazing just how slow I went. I guess the lessons learned are that I was too eager just to "pin it to win it"I need to remember to race with "brain over brawn".

Post race some of us rode back to the hotel, and that monsoon that was supposed to happen all week hit. It was incredible how hard it rained for about 10 min, enough so that we couldn't see more than 100m and was bouncing up off the pavement thick enough to look like a fountain.

This Castle at the race course was owned by the drug lords of the area back in the day. Now it is a public museaum. Even though we had a police escort at times we all felt very safe traveling in Bogota.

Island Cup #1

So on Sunday I did the first race of the year. I had to travel all of 35min from my door, so I couldn't really turn it down. It is part of a great series here on the Island; they are very grass roots races, 10$ entry fee, draw prizes, and good times for all.

The race started out with a good climb and king of the mountain got a cookie, so I made sure to lead it out on lap one. By lap 2 I had a solid lead and was getting a little bored and made a mistake and flatted. I had some serious issues with trying to get the valve stem out (it was on my winter bike and had corroded on there after not being touched for 3 years or so), so I had the world's slowest flat change of about 5min (Thanks to the spectator for 'helping me find a pump' on the ground). By the time I was back in the race I was in 6th, however, this made the rest of the race super fun, as I was catching people and really got to pin it. On lap 3 I passed back up to 3rd, and at the start of lap 4 got up to 2nd. For the rest of the lap I chased super hard and almost caught Steve Noble. I ended up finishing 2nd, 3 seconds behind...

Now, the really sweet thing about this race is that Kate Scallion had made cookies for medals. Since I got 2, I did share one with the kid who had bonked and was standing next to me during awards and was drooling. I had to eat the other one to fuel my ride home. Not to worry though, I still got my cookie quota, as Catherine had a great race and won two cookies, and I ate most of hers when she was at work. Awww, tough life hunh?

Maybe I'll make her some cookies sometime...

How sharp are your knives?

So the other day I decided to sharpen our kitchen knives. To test how sharp they are I always try and cut a few hairs off my arm with them, but, since my legs were so hairy I just shaved my legs instead! Yep, the knives are nice and sharp now and my legs are smooth!

Don't try this at home, but if you do, you have to get the angle right and you just slide the knife along (like a razor) DON'T whatever you do saw back and forth with it!!!

Training

So, yes it has been a long time since I have updated. It is not as if there was nothing to write about, indeed, it has been quite the opposite – I have been too busy doing exciting things to update – so here goes.

My Xprezo winter bike with full fenders - Jordan river road ride

Jan - Feb

For Jan and Feb we have been riding our bikes tons. It might be nice to be able to ride outside this much, but man is it hard on equipment with all the rain. I can go through a set of road brake pads in 5 rides (now I bought a different compound).

We had a national team training camp here in Feb. We had Sandra and Jean Ann (now my Xprezo team mates) and Catharine P all staying at our place, so it was a full house. I really enjoyed the camp, and did about 22hrs of riding with Max, Cory, and Sneddon.

When not riding our bikes we are probably eating food, but when we get to do something else, we have been having a lot of bonfires. Or, as Cater calls them, ‘burns’. This last weekend we had a big ‘burn’, since it had rained all week and we had a ton of brush we started it with the propane tiger torch, which works really well. At one point we even got out the leaf blower our and that really got the flames twice as high!

Ride food, mine is on the left, home made muffin, energy bar, rolled apple pastry, baked potato, and a sandwich, then I have a granola bar in my seat bag for emergencies.

Catherine, digging to the ground - 4meters and not there yet.

Dec

For our December “vacation”, Catherine and I went up to Mt Washington to play in the snow. They had the most snow anywhere in the world at that point – with 5 meters on the ground. We arrived in a blizzard and snowshoed out into the back country navigating on instinct (since we couldn’t see anything and there were no signs). We made it where we were planning, it was super hard going as the powder hadn’t settled at all yet, so each snowshoe step was HIP HEIGHT! We dug a snow cave to sleep in, and Catherine dug to timbuck two to try and find ground. She dug 4m (measured with my avy probe) and still didn’t hit ground.

Wading through the snow on day 2

The next day we went for a hike to the top of Mt Brooks. Again, it was super hard snowshoeing, and took us 4hrs round trip. It was blizzard conditions so we couldn’t see anything from the top. Day 3 was super clear, and we decided to take an easy jaunt up to the ridge to get a view. The going was so easy in our packed track that we hiked clear back to the top, took in the amazing 360 views, and then hiked back down, all in 1.5hrs. Then we loaded up our gear and hauled it out back to the car.

At the top, for the 2nd time
Yes, that is snow, green trees and grass, ocean, green trees, and then Mountains on the mainland that you see - a whole lot of different Climates there.

Mt Brooks as we were leaving the area

The next 2 days we did a ton of xc skiing – had to get in our fix for the winter since there is no snow here in Vic.

Panorama

Oct-Dec

A few days after our wedding I headed to Panorama to design an XC mountain bike race course. It was definitely challenging work, as they didn’t want to build too much new trail, wanted to keep most of the DH park trails open during the race, and I wanted it to be fun challenging singletrack with a double tech/feed zone that was appropriate speed and near the middle of the race course. But, I got it all figured out and am looking forward to racing the Canada Cup there in August.

A feature to be built in the new Canada Cup race course

After Panorama I packed up the last load of our belongings from Kamloops and headed to Vic to see my Wife. Yikes, yes it does sound crazy to say that word! She was already working (as an intern in the exercise physiology lab at the Canadian Sport Centre Pacific), so I decided it was time to get a real job too. My landlord and retired MTB racer Carter Hovey helped me find a job, and 2 weeks later I was a working man.

I think I was a bit disillusioned with what my work was going to be. The last 3 carpentry jobs I had were more skill related – I got to build and fix houses, even do finish carpentry, whereas on this job I mostly just carried wood! I was helping frame a super fancy house with 5 different angled roves, concrete floors upstairs and lots of other crazy details to it. The worst day was when I carried the rafters which were 24foot long 2x10`s that were wet Douglas fir up the hill and into the house. I calculated that each one weighed about 110lbs, and that day I carried about three thousand pounds, yes that is 3 tons.

I stuck the job out until late December, and then quit. I was getting super tired from the physical labour as well as training lots.