Recently in race report Category

So apparently, "The Killer Gravel Road Race" didn't quite scare my dad off from bicycle racing. Earlier this summer he expressed interest in maybe doing a mountain bike race too.  When he found out about 12 hours of Potluck, and the informal "Best Dish" award, he announced- without hesitation that he was in it.  To win.  He might even ride a bike too.  

I did this one last year for Fat Tire and have been looking for a good opportunity to do it again. Bikepack to a race, carrying whatever I need for raceday and camping there with me on the bike.  And it goes without saying I race whatever bike I ride there too. 

Miner's Revenge was the perfect race to do this. The race is only maybe 35 miles from my house and a weekend of camping is just part of the event with plenty of nice spots right on site.  Plus it's kind of a technical course with lots of opportunities to hurt myself by riding over my head, so knowing I have to get me and the bike back home under my own power is kind of a good motivator to chill out a bit.

The big plan was to leave Friday right after work and take the long way there, camping along the way someplace.  It's usually a nice idea in theory, but rarely works out for me. Instead, I found myself packing for the trip at midnight and on the road the next morning at 7:30AM.  I was hoping to stick with dirt as much as possible, but a navigational error put me behind schedule a little more than I'd like. (Did you know there's a drainage ditch between Greenland, MI and my house named "Greenland"? My GPS does.)  I hopped out on the pavement for the last 15-20 miles into Mass City and cranked her up making it to registration with minutes to spare.  A side benefit of this was that everybody coming from Marquette for the race that morning now knew me as the doofus that rode his bike to the race. 

The race went well. I started in the back and managed to work my way up a bit on the climbs, but took it easy on the descents. I managed to avoid getting into the red mist of racing too much and had an enjoyable ride, joking with folks on the trail and really enjoying the new singletrack.  Rob and his crew have been hard at work and have built some awesome new trails out there. I wish I could have made it down to help them out this year, but they seem to be getting along fine without me right now.  I also just plain flat out enjoy this event. A lot of traditional mountain bike races are lacking in technical challenges. Not so here, and it's certainly not lacking in aerobic challenges either. You have to be a strong all around rider to excel at this event. Which is probably why I finished way in the back. But finish, I did- with me and the bike in one piece.  

Shortly thereafter, a friend of mine showed up with a cooler full of beer. Maybe it was the heat, maybe it was the Coors Light, or maybe it was just the fact that he had a truck and could haul the twisted remains of me and the bike home if it didn't work out, but I decided to do the downhill event as well.  I figured I was in way over my head when I was the only one at the start line in spandex on a bike sporting a rear rack instead of rear suspension. Nonetheless, I managed to post some not totally embarrassing times. The course was a fun and it was worth the $10 entry fee just to ride in a 6x6 Pinzgauer up the old ski hill to the start.

We set to work on the rest of the beer around the bonfire that night and it wasn't too long before I wandered off and passed out in my bivy sack for the night.  I woke up feeling pretty good, but there was a low point early on that I report with much sorrow. I was handed my first significant defeat of the season by Grandma's Cafe in Mass City, MI.  Usually, there are several foodstuffs that I never really fill up on, I just merely run out- pancakes being one of them.  Well, Grandma's serves a pretty colossal pile and I was forced to admit defeat and not finish them. 

The ride home proved pretty uneventful and I managed to avoid most of the rain.  I'm getting my bikepacking setup a little more dialed in. I think I'm going to need a tent to keep doing this comfortably in the midwest, but I was only an extra pair of bikeshorts away from having everything I needed to keep pedaling for a whole week with me on this trip. I'm looking forward to my next bikepacking trip to Copper Harbor for Fat Tire.  

"Dude, how'd it go?"  

That's what the nice lady on horseback at Forestville State Park wanted to know. 

I mean, there's got to be one heck of a prize involved that would lead 200+ people to race down 100 miles of dusty Minnesota gravel roads on bicycles, right? 

As we were all cramming food down our throats, guzzling water, and making some last minute adjustments to get us through the final 40 miles of the day somebody managed to answer her question- 

"A jar of rocks."  

After previously questioning us on how many we were, where we had been and how far we had come, she was suddenly out of questions.  We were clearly all complete nut jobs who were liable to spook the horses. 

Honestly, I was beginning to question my own sanity a bit too.  I went into this 2010 rendition of the Almanzo 100 with no idea what to expect.  I felt I had a pretty good showing at the Ragnarok 105, but that was over a month ago. I had just returned from my annual week and a half long One Lap of America jaunt where my only exercise consisted of adjusting the power seats in a BMW 335d to encompass my rapidly expanding ass as I hopped from Waffle House to Waffle House across the heartland of America. 

I figured I'd be pretty happy with another 8 hour 100 mile gravel grind, but I wasn't making any bets.  I was packing a little extra water and food in case I was out there for a 12 hour haul.  I had maybe 4-5 solid hours on the bike since I returned from my trip and while I felt strong, I had no idea how my endurance would hold up. So I took a conservative midpack starting position and started easy. 

And then started passing people. 

Lots and lots of people. 

And then I latched onto a group of 2-5 people just slightly faster than me and we kept it up until the ranks thinned out and it was just us out there.  Sometimes we pushed hard, sometimes we kept it at conversation pace. But we kept the pace up and held our position. We'd pick off the occasional straggler, but nobody was getting by us.

That "slightly faster" part stand out at all? Yeah, it became readily apparent to me too by mile 50, but I managed to hold on until the 60 mile checkpoint.  I figured at that point I could let them go and keep a casual pace for the rest of the ride and enjoy it.  Because, well- a self assessment here was not yielding positive results. I was hurting in ways I had never hurt before and had no effective strategy to deal with it.

Now, for whatever reason- and I'd like to think it's because I maybe helped pull for approximately 45 seconds of the 4 hours we had been pedaling thus far, they asked if I was going to continue on with them.  Or maybe it they just felt bad for the fat kid who drove down from Michigan for this thing or maybe just found it kind of funny how I'd occasionally stuff three Fig Newtons in my mouth and then try to keep breathing. 

Anyway, I jumped at the opportunity and almost immediately knew I was in over my head.  I was struggling to hang on to the tail of the group. It was just a matter of when I would get dropped. And sure enough, on a rough climb after the water crossing (Yes, there was a stream crossing in this race. And it was totally awesome. And refreshing.), they started to pull away. 

I gave it a go trying to hang on, as we only had twenty miles left but that was it. I was done. Down to the littlest chainring for a couple of miles. It was all I could do just to keep the pedals turning over.  Surprisingly, only maybe 10 people caught up to me in this time.  I managed to recover a bit and pick up the pace a little on the home stretch with only a few more people making a sprint to the end getting by me. 

Craig Linder managed to get a few awesome pictures of me. 

Just before the pack really started to thin around mile 40:


And about 10 miles from the finish.  With visions of "Grainbelt" brand beer dancing in my head:


I pulled in with a 6:39 finish time.  Good enough for 51st.  Out of 267 official finishers? I'm amazed.  It's enough to make we want to take this gravel grinder stuff really, really seriously. 

But I can't end this story about the Almanzo 100 without talking about the event itself. Having spent some time on the organizer side of the equation once or twice, I'm just simply in awe of what the Almanzo 100 organizer has managed to do.  From the handwritten note addressed to me in my registration packet to the heartfelt handshake from him at the end- it's a class act, all the way. And even more amazing is that he can do this all without charging anybody any entry fees.   I can't say enough good things about this race. 
   

I've been wanting to do this race for a couple years. It's basically a "spring classic" style road race featuring the occasional gravel and sand roads, some bad pavement, but mostly just back roads cruising for 80 miles. 

But hey, I have a new bike.  And you know what I like to do when I have a new bike- race it in an inappropriate setting!  I knew I was in trouble when I took the start line surrounded by 25C tires.  General consensus was that yours truly was either crazy, stupid or both with his 29x2.1s and a 29lb mountain bike.

Really, I was kind of using this as a test to see how comfortable it was over the long haul before the Chequemagon 100. I was expecting to get dropped hard and spend the rest of the afternoon out riding by myself.   I managed to hang on through the neutral rollout, but when the race started- sure enough, I established my residence in good ol' Offthebackistan.   That was cool. I had 60 miles to spin and stuff my face with fig newtons. 

Only problem was, the SAG wagon driver wasn't going to let me....  

He'd told me to get in my biggest gear, get on his bumper and he'd give me a draft to the tail end of the pack.  I seriously considered whining my way into staying in beautiful, yet incredibly windy Offthebackistan, but... well... he was very convincing.   So I let 'er rip in 44x11 knowing that I was on the fast track to blowing up bad, but after a mile or so, I managed to catch a group of riders who had fallen off the main pack. 

Honestly, I'm glad I I did that. The wind was bad. Fighting it with my 710mm bars all by myself would not have been fun.  It was so bad, it literally blew a lady in front of me right over.  I'm glad I had disc brakes. The Jake never would have stopped in time and rolled right over her. 

So now I had myself a pretty jovial group of riders who had no expectation of winning and were determined to help eachother through the nasty wind.  There may have a been a rider or three who bailed on the race early- perhaps to avoid the stigma of finishing with some dude on a mountain bike, but I won't name names. :) 

Towards the end, out little group fell apart.  I was hurting bad.  Really bad.  It's been a while- if ever that I've hurt this bad in a bike race.  But hey, I finished.  Quite possibly dead last or very close to such. But, given the competition at this race- I'll take it.  And I was quite happy to note that I had no comfort issues at all with the bike all day.  Mission accomplished, I guess. 

Maybe next year I need to do something harder.  I'm thinking single speed. 

I have been looking forward to this race all winter.  I didn't have much of a plan going into last year's season and did a lot of the same ol'-same ol'. It was a good season in the end, but I was itching for some new challenges.  When I stumbled across the 'Rök and it's rally style, tulip instructions- I figured I found something cool.  I ended up signing up for most of the Almanzo Gravel Road Series. 

Still, I went into yet another race feeling kind of down.  I've been putting a lot of effort into getting the miles in I need, often neglecting a lot of other things I should be doing (my house looks like a hurricane ripped through a bicycle shop, then drank a few beers and piled dirty dishes in the sink.)  A lot of these miles have been in some pretty miserable conditions.   Furthermore, I'd just laid out a significant lump of cash to fill out and improve the gravel road racing bike arsenal and none of my fancy new toys had arrived yet.  Physically- I was feeling great, but mentally- I just couldn't get my head into it.  

Once I got to Frontenac State Park and put a healthy dent in a 12 pack of Grain Belt, I was starting to come around. Red Wing was for more scenic than I figured it would be, and the weather was turning out to be downright pleasant.  Everything was lining up for a perfect day on the bike.

When I got to the start location the next morning, I parked right next to quite possibly the only WRX wagon as ratty as mine sporting oversized mudflaps and equally brimming with bike shit.  I had apparently found my peoples.  Sure enough, it didn't take long to find the source of all the rally influence on this event- one of the organizers was Larry Warrington, a long time rally competitor. Mingling about that morning introduced me to a whole cast of cool folks. See, nobody turns on the TV and sees a bunch of Pros slogging it out on 100+ miles of dirt with nothing but themselves to rely on.  As such, most of the people at the start line had arrived there on their own, not trying to emulate some preconceived notion about what a bicycle race should be.  The bicycles they rode reflected this. Every kind of frame, wheel, tire, gearing and brake configuration imaginable.   Sure, there was a definite spike around the cyclocross variety of bike, but as the dude on the Pugsley showed- this was all about the rider, not the bike.

So- great weather, 105 miles of great roads ahead and surrounded by some cool people.  Let's do it! 

Now, you probably have some vision of a bunch of beer swilling hippies wandering about the backroads and comparing notes on long reach caliper brakes.  Such was hardly the case, there's some very fast people in the field and they wasted no time getting down to business in the King of the Mountain competition. See, 105 miles is just too easy- the organizers also saw fit to offer another competition over the 8 biggest climbs over the first half of the course.  Actually, I think the organizers just needed an excuse to hang out at the top of some of the plentiful hills just to see the look of agony on our faces as we crested the top. 

Us mere mortals (and beer swilling longhairs) knew our biggest battles of the day would be mainly with ourselves and the course. As such, we hung back in packs and kept it mellow, enjoyed the company and cracked wise.  Now I'm still very much a newbie to this whole bike racing thing and as one who's discovered the joys of wheelsucking, I do so at every opportunity.  Except on this course, I was noticing something- my abilities were not totally in sync with those riding at the same speed as me.  They'd bomb the downhills way faster than me, and I'd be left struggling to catch up, only to hit the next uphill where I'd slow way down so as not to completely ditch them.  But I still couldn't couldn't hang on to anyone faster up ahead.  I was beginning to suspect I might be better off on my own. 

So at the halfway break, I took an abbreviated stop and ventured out on my own.  I was sort of expecting my old pack to catch up with me eventually, but just out of Zumbro Falls, I had the road to myself.  And a beautiful ride it was, along the river and up a two track.  And then?  Sheer misery.  Miles 60-80 were the toughest part of the course.  Gradually going uphill that entire distance and just getting blasted by the wind.  Granny gear territory.  Occasionally, somebody would grind their way up to me and I'd ride with them a bit, but we were going so slow and the winds so strong that drafting didn't really seem to do much. Conversation and riding side by side seemed to help the miles go by a little quicker. 

Finally, at mile 80- we were out of the wind and it was no longer a gradual uphill. It was one steep mother of an uphill- and you could see the whole thing winding it's way up the side of a hill.  Demoralizing as all hell, right?  Well- the weirdest thing happened here- I just got to work stomping my way up that thing and by the time I reached the top- I felt great. Totally rejuvenated.  It's like that climb cleared all the pain and misery out of my legs.  And every time it would creep back in, we'd hit another climb and I could clear it all out. 

As such, I rolled the last 25 miles into town with a smile on my face for an 8:04 finish.  38th out of 76 who managed to complete the thing.  And I missed winning a fancy HED wheelset by one place. This race is definitely on my must do list for next year.  I'm looking forward to riding with these folks again at the Almanzo 100 in May and if the course is even half as good, it'll be a great time.    

Yep. At least 35 miles of it anyway. We'll see how I feel about it after 100+ miles next weekend.  

Have I bitched and moaned enough about how bad ski season has been going for me?  No?  You want to hear more? Great!  

I have kind of a love-hate relationship with cross country skiing on groomed trails.  On one hand, it just seems horribly, horribly contrived.  The sport falls flat on it's face without extensively groomed trails and once you put that much effort into eliminating a couple of variables, well- why not try to tackle them all?  Thus you end up with a sport built on eliminating and controlling as many variables as possible, essentially sucking all the fun out of it for me. 

On the other hand, there is no better exercise than skate skiing PERIOD.  I love the benefits of it.  And well, when you get out of work and it's dark already and those skate trails just minutes from your office are lit and groomed- join 'em if you can't beat 'em or however the saying goes. 

So, inevitably I'll sign up for a few races here and there just to keep myself honest. Gives me some goals to focus on and a standard to measure my progress by. Sometimes there's an innate epic appeal to some of the events like the 50k Noquemanon, and sometimes it's just a local ass kicking I subject myself to. Like this weekend in the Paradise Pursuit. 

I knew I was in trouble right from the get go when I found myself surrounded by spandex clad dorks choosing from quivers of seemingly identical skis. While I can usually identify with some subset of spandex clad dorks, this was definitely not my crowd.  Well, except for maybe the nice lady complaining of a hangover who took the back row of the start with me.

I'm not even remotely experienced enough in XC ski racing to pay attention to any race dynamics other than my own survival. Besides, with a rather small entry field, it wasn't long before I was pretty much by myself and just trying to stay out of the way of the fast 26k racers catching up with me.  I figured I'd be doing pretty good if I could complete one 13k lap before any of the 26k racers could complete two. 

The Tech Trails where the Saturday race was hosted can be very tough. Lots of rolling terrain always has you going up or down without much chance for recovery.  I was definitely feeling it by the end, but I have enough experience with pushing my boundaries now that I knew a nice 5k recovery was all I really needed to get my strength back.  Too bad there wasn't any to be had here, so I pressed on to finish dead frickin' last in the Men's category for the day.  Honestly, there was maybe one guy in the race I might have had a shot at beating, so this wasn't necessarily anything to be ashamed of.  I also managed to avoid getting lapped by any of the 26K racers. 

Ah, but my weekend wasn't over yet- I signed up for the pursuit which had me in a 10K classic race on Sunday out on the Chassel trails.  Generally, I find groomed trails a necessary compromise of being on office drone- I ski them out of convenience.  The Chassel trails, I ski because they're awesome.  Always impeccably groomed through nice, scenic terrain. It manages to hold on to a lot of the things I really enjoy about skiing and remains one of my favorite pre-work ski destinations. 

I've never actually done a race on classic skis, and I'm not even remotely equipped for it. Nonetheless, it sounded like fun, so I grabbed my lightest weight backcountry skis, and donned my gaiters (there's just something kind of comforting about them and I also can't resist getting a few turns in when on these skis).   If I was out of place at Saturday's race, I was definitely out of place here. Nonetheless, the Copper Island Classic has a "guess your time" category that attracts a few more skiers of my caliber.

I willingly gave up my front of the pack start my entry in the paradise pursuit earned me, and took a seat in the back, not expecting much. We started and, holy shit...  I seemed to be going faster than everybody.  Since this was my first classic race I sort of sat back for a second before trying to pass people and figure out if maybe I was pushing too hard or something. Nope, I definitely had an edge on some of these folks. My Fischer Inbound Crowns were kickin' ass on the uphill nature of the first part of the course. 

Once things leveled out, well- I learned why not everybody races on 189cm long skis that are 68mm wide.  They're kind of slow on the flats and really slow on the downhills. There wasn't much I could really do. I felt strong the whole race, but even doubling my effort would only get me maybe 10% more speed- no way I could keep that up. Watching the folks at the front of the pack when I could see them through the trees, I could see I also had a lot to learn about race classic technique. Nonetheless, I managed to fend off quite a few of the "guess your time" folks for another dead frickin' last finish.

So yes, that was two days of finishing dead last.  Sure, on some level I recognize that most of the people I was racing against train at an entirely different level than me and certainly have me beat in equipment and experience. However, this sort of thing does prompt one to reconsider their lifestyle and training plans- and honestly, I've got some room for improvement right now. 

I'm happy to say that I did feel pretty strong. If I can keep on the straight and narrow for the next two weeks and the weather holds out, I'm looking forward to the possibility of a sub 4 hour Noquemanon. 

I went into this one surprisingly calm.  As the CX season progressed, I became progressively more wound up about preserving and improving my place in the standings. Today, it was either go big and try to get that 2nd or 3rd overall, or die trying.  My usual seventh place finish wouldn't qualify me for anything. My goal was simple, go as hard as a I could.   

 

I gotta say- Nevin really cleans up nice.