NH 100 (degrees)

I have waited a few days before writing this recap partly because I have been recovering for the past day and a half and partly because directly after the race I am always in a 'that was the worst thing ever' kind of mood and you have to let the 'race amnesia' set in.

For those who don't know, bike racing is inherently horrible. Every mtb racer has something missing in their brain that tells them that suffering like that is actually not that fun. We are reminded of this during a race but then forget it shortly after thanks to that amnesia...and we keep showing up week after week.

Directly after the NH 100 I was mentally battered, the second 30 miles of that course is demoralizing. Steep punchy climb after steep punchy climb, every time I thought it must be over and the rest is just a cruise to the finish I turned the corner to another 10-15% grade. That combined with the oppressive heat and I eventually just went into survival mode. Its hard to stay out of your head in situations like that and I was getting down on myself because my goals had been to do much better and I was falling far short of my target finishing time.

The numbers are all wrong (they advertise 7,000ft of climbing. where the hell are you getting that other 10,000ft garmin! COME ON!) but look at that elevation profile...I shudder every time I look at it. Shorter steep climbs; the bane of my existence. I would have done better if it was just one giant 62mi climb at 5% the whole way...all those 200-300yds at 10-15% from mile 45-50 over and over? not so much.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/11333676

And how about burning almost 7,000 calories? That's like 3.5 days worth of food for a normal person...burnt in 9 hours. Not really sure how I didn't just vaporize. News Flash: I don't weigh a lot.

In retrospect, my goal was a tad unrealistic. I think there have been some course changes so trying to base a goal off past finishing times didn't really work, and with the added heat I think everyone's time was probably about 1 hour or so off what it could have been. I still am not that pleased with my 8h:57m finishing time, some people beat me that I very typically beat but I can take solace in the fact that this course ruined a lot of people and finishing in and of itself was an accomplishment. All told about 20% of racers DNF'd. I also didn't finish last in Expert Senior II which was a pretty big surprise, I thought for sure I was gonna DFL...turns out I beat 2 other Experts. SCORE!

The race was organized expertly. Huge number of volunteers, course was marked very well and the aid stations were adequately spaced, well stocked and organized. Also got some cool swag just for participating...the standard t-shirt but also a custom pint glass full of stickers and other goodies. Unexpected and very cool.

Okay so there is the overview, now the details as best I can recollect, this will probably all be in the wrong order and completely not accurate. Dehydration does weird things to your memory, go figure:

We started off cruising on dirt roads and mostly flat doubletrack probably for the first 8 miles or so. With some railroad bed and a sketchy old bridge crossing with holes in it mixed in for good measure. Then some gradual climbing (which was actually suited to me and I passed some people here) up and around the side of Crotched Mountain Resort, followed by a sweet descent right down one of the ski trails.

Then we had to trudge along a sandy path for quite awhile that pretty much sucked. Nothing like riding in sand to just completely sap your energy and make you feel like you are going nowhere. After all that wonderful sand we hit a little bump called (I believe) Hedgehog Hill. Not very long but plenty steep. Just enough to kill any mental momentum you had going and remind you that this is not going to all be a cruise. Then they didn't waste any time in taking that loss of momentum and really driving it home.

The power line climb follows immediately after Hedgehog and while I have heard that Mike Broderick rode that section two years ago, he is a pro (literally) and in my opinion that section is basically unrideable. And completely exposed to the sun. I hauled my carcass over as best I could and went in to damage control for the following few miles.

Luckily we got a respite with a screamer descent on pavement where I almost hit 40mph but shortly after that we ducked back into the woods for a very steep wooded climb that sucked the wind right back out of my sails. The next 15-20 miles is where I slowly faded away into a shadow of my former somewhat fast bike rider self.

The terrain consisted of LOTS of climbs just long enough to prevent a sprint push to the top and too steep for me to sit and attempt to spin my 32-34 combo. By mile 40+ I needed a granny gear up front to spin grades above 7-8% the power just wasn't there in that heat. So I ended up sprinting as far as I could get before cramps began to set in and then hopped off and walked the rest...slowly. Rinse and repeat that sequence for a few hours. Somewhere in here I somehow got turned around for a short period (although I could have sworn I saw course arrows telling me I was going the right way) and rode head on into a group of 3 guys one of which I knew from Central NH riding. It was a very funny "Hey Jesse...Hey Kevin...you're going the wrong way...ok" exchange. I also rode through two 'puddles' that were knee deep on the bike and about 100ft long. Yeah frontier track!

Then as the epic slap to the face they threw in the biggest summit of the day in the last 10 miles. At this point I was pratically delerious and just laughing that I was still gaining vertical feet. Every injury I have amassed in my almost 28 years was back to haunt me at this point along with lots of other new pains. Luckily pain was just one of the things my brain wasn't really processing that well at this point. Last rest station was at the summit of the back side of Crotched Mtn. then we had 5 miles back down to the start/finish.

Thats about as best as I can remember it. At some point the only way to get through an ordeal like that is to turn the brain completely off and rely on muscle memory.

For any interested you can find pics and videos from years past here: http://www.hampshire100.com/

I would assume they might have this years pics posted soon? All told I'm glad I did it and can cross one more challenge off my list, any rider looking for a sufferfest should look no farther.

L'Canada? Oui s'il vous plaît

So this past weekend I had the pleasure of attending a bachelor party in Quebec. Ben is one of the early birds in the Zoo family to get hitched and his bach'fest has set an extremely high standard. I almost don't even really know where to begin but I think this post will focus more on the biking aspect of the trip, seeing as that is the primary focus of this blog and that most of the other things that happen at bachelor parties are not 'G' rated. Hi Mom!

We rented a "slopeside" condo at Mont St. Anne (about 30mins northeast of Quebec City) for the weekend to catch the World Cup MTB events and to get some riding in of our own. I had never been to a world cup or up that north into Canada so I was pretty pumped.

Watching the best downhillers in the world was pretty humbling. Those guys go stupid fast into extremely gnarly blind lines. Very fun to watch and I was actually able to snag a few decent shots with my walmart special pink camera. Never saw any crashes up close and personal though, oh well.

l'fast

The whole group was able to snag a ride on the cross country trails surrounding the mountain on Saturday and Dustin and I were the only troopers able to muster another ride on Sunday. To be honest I wasn't too impressed with their XC terrain. I was expecting a lot more but it seems like the resort focuses all their effort on their World Cup courses and I suppose I can't blame them. That is where all the money is for them. At best their XC is 80% double track and 20% single and in reality its probably more like 95% double and 5% single at least from what I could tell by the trails we rode.

But to their credit they really maxed out the available real estate and you can get very 'removed' on a ride and really get a cool adventure feel. Partially lost, partial exploration...nothing wrong with that but I was just expecting a bit more singletrack goodness. And dont get me wrong just because its double track does not mean it was all easy. Lots of climbing and some interesting steep/fast descending with loose rocks and some washout.

no earthly way of knowing...

derrrrr

l'huge

no one will hear you l'scream

it was hilarious how out in the middle of nowhere this hut was

We got a solid 14 miles or so on Saturday with aobut 4000ft of climbing

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/9941464

and Dustin and I followed that up with another 14-15 on Sunday with another 4500ft of climbing

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/9941451

And for an interesting cross reference those two rides combined is almost exactly the distance and amount of climbing that I did in 6hrs at Pat's Peak this year.

So to sum it all up I can't think of the last time I jammed that many activities into an extended weekend. Very little sleep and all kinds of action. World Cup racing, big rides, big raves, historic cities with Euro appeal, epic clubs, and did I mention no sleep? L'Awesome.

Au Revoir!

Pat's Peak 6hr Solo '09

I have mixed feelings about my first foray into endurance racing. Some things went pretty well and some things went pretty poorly, but I guess that's probably the first lesson of the endurance game. Its never going to go perfect so you better be ready for it when things go south.

I got all my nutrition stuff figured out a day or two before and packed up a cooler full of goodies to stash at the race for me to hit in between laps. This brings me to the first thing that wasnt all that awesome. Pats Peak charged $15 for a 'tech tent area' in the start/finish and technically you weren't allowed to put anything in that area without paying. That was probably my only gripe with the organization of the event. Everything else was very well put together. I think a lot of the 6hr crowd was pretty pissed about the setup because really all most 6hr riders had was a cooler at most...not a tent / stand like a lot of the 12/24 racers.

bike race...not an eating contest

I was pretty pleased with how I handled my nutrition, especially not having any kind of frame of reference as to how my body was going to react to a longer effort. Never really cramped or had any bonks of any kind so that was one of the things that went well. I ended up bringing WAY too much food and fluid but I guess thats the way to do it. Certain foods worked and some I had trouble eating consistently. Things taste / go down different when you are in the pain cave.

The venue itself was pretty cool, defenitely had the festival feel.

start/finish tent with obligatory Red Bull inflata-banner

They set up a nice S turny thing down the slope to the finish. got pretty greasy by the end, very fun.

interesting crowd, the DHers were on hand as well preriding the course for tomorrow

The race started with a leMans start, which is pretty typical for an event like this. Basically bikes go across a field, and everyone runs to get their bike then mounts and takes off. Started off fine got in line about mid pack and got to the days business. Traffic was kind of annoying on the first lap, but there isnt much avoiding that. Much easier to just mass start in a timed event like this. About 15mins into the first lap things got 'hilarious'. I feel a sting/bite on my upper arm and look down to see a bee stuck in my flesh. AWESOME. I flick it off and keep on keepin on. Then on lap 2 at almost the same spot STUNG AGAIN. This time on my leg. What am I Dustin?? Completely ridiculous. Luckily I'm not allergic but I'm sure that didn't help my race physiology much.

Then we got to the climbs...oh the climbs. Ouch. I think I can speak for anyone without a granny ring up front at this race that those things sucked. First one was worse...way too steep even for my 9 speed, second lap I was already walking it, couldnt really get any decent power going in the heat. Did I mention these climbs were on exposed ski slopes in direct sunlight? Yeah, I'm not used to heat yet cause its been raining since May. Second one was more gradual and I could get a rhythm going. A ski resort is a tough place to do any kind of endurance racing without a full gear set. Anyone who pulls it off is badass in my book (myself included...kinda).

So of course I have some mechanical issue stories, I think that is probably also a staple of the endurance scene, unless you get really lucky I guess. End of my second lap I was heading down the descent at a pretty good clip (I passed a lot of riders on the main descent, all day really, but more so early when people were close together, pretty pumped about that.) and my best guess is that my low limit screw on my derailleur was set a bit lax and the vibration sent it behind the cassette just enough to get it jammed and when I went to downshift, all hell broke loose. luckily nothing snapped or broke but it was never the same after that. I unjammed it but I think the cabled stretched a bit and threw the indexing all out of whack. Long story short, my 9 speed was now a 3-4 speed off and on depending on terrain and mud as of lap 3. JOY.

Now to lap 4 but still on the descending topic. I was feeling good on the descent all day. Making passes and picking decent lines, smoothness was abundant. Unfortunately certain portions of certain lines were getting progressively more greasy the more riders hit the descent. I found out one portion had gone terminally greasy the hard way. Slightly off camper turn with some roots but nothing that couldn't be handled by just keeping the bike more upright, straightening out your line a tad just for a second and on your way. At least for laps 1-3. Lap 4 that scenario turned into wheels hit roots and immediately are out from under me. They slipped just enough to throw my center of gravity / balance way off but not enough to take me down right there. My wheels eventually caught in the trough of the turn and when they finally hooked up the force was too great for me to handle and by that point I was pointing directly at a tree.

For those keeping score, yes I rammed my bad shoulder right into a tree.

So needless to say descending after lap 4 was substantially slower due both to the mental impact of the crash and the fact that my shoulder was pretty sore and all those jarring impacts were not fun. It kind of eventually numbed itself out and I was able to keep truckin but I'll probably pay tomorrow morning. Only time will tell.

So yeah that was basically it, I managed to snag 3 more laps after my crash for a total of 7. My original goal had been 8-9 so I fell a tad short but I think it being my first time trying this format and the fact that I had a few issues here and there, I'm happy with the result. I didn't give up when I had plenty of pretty legitimate outs. And funny enough when I pulled in on my last lap mentally I was still okay, I probably could have kept going even though I was walking a lot of the course and physically breaking down. I guess that is a good sign? We'll see how the NH 100 goes in a month or so. I think I will like that format a bit better than this.

The Hard Data:

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/8572213

As for results, they will probably be posted soon. I don't imagine I placed very well. There were quite a few very fast individuals taking a crack at the 6hr format...Pro's and Semi-Pro's all over the place. Oh well, I would be psyched if I got top half of the field but I'm not even sure if that is likely...my later lap times were pretty slow, I would imagine the average rider could snag 8 laps on that course. Especially if they have all their gears. I'll post results when Pat's puts them up.

Results:

http://www.patspeak.com/PatsPeak24126Hours2009.pdf

Did a bit better in the standings than I had anticipated. Ended up 17th of 30 (originally thought it was 14th but Pat's Peak printed the numbers wrong saying there was a 4 way tie for 11th, but there wasn't really) almost a mid field placing. And I was only a minute behind 16th and a lot of the riders who finished up with 8 laps were only about a half lap ahead of me and if things had gone differently for me I think I could have been right in there with 8-9 laps.

Wrenching is Fun!

It's been awhile since I've had a decent bike maintenance session, I haven't renovated a dumpster bike for a while (no time!) and luckily my stable of bikes has been running just fine so there really hasn't been a need.

If you've been in New England lately you are well aware that it has been WET. But I still gotta ride my bike and with Pat's Peak on the horizon I have to try and snag as many miles as I can to get myself ready. Monday night's group ride was a wet one indeed; rained hard at first but then let off and then poured at the end. 14 miles in the pouring rain and mud will take a nicely running bike and turn it into a pile of crap pretty fast.

What I thought was going to be a normal boring hour or so in the area, cleaning and dialing things back in got real interesting and ended with me having to take my X7 trigger shifter completely apart.

FYI if you need to get BB5 disc brakes lined up real nice this article is the easiest most succinct I have found. I have had my doubts about disc brakes lately because I could never get the feel I wanted. Part of this is probably due to me being so used to V and being semi resistant to change. I also think that I never really had the discs set up right. After getting the rotors properly aligned things feel a lot stronger...granted I haven't ridden it yet but I think I might start to like them better now.

Got the drivetrain cleaned up and I was ahead of schedule (I have to try and set a time that I am going to work in the manarea otherwise I end up in there for waaaay too long) so I decided I wanted to slide my rear wheel back a tad. My Kona has sliding dropouts so you can set it up as SS or geared. When I set the bike up geared I put the dropouts in the middle of its slide range figuring that made the most sense. I also ride a Redline Monocog and now that I have been riding both bikes for a while I have noticed that I really prefer the Redline's longer wheelbase. So might as well slide those dropouts back as far as they go to lengthen the Kona's wheelbase right? Easy enough, I had an extra derailleur cable and housing in case the distance of the slide was too much for the current cable (it was). So I slid things back, recabled and went to test the shifting. And all hell broke loose. Shifter was completely thrashed, made it half way through its range and then just locked up, levers froze, nothing.

This is getting wordy so I'll skip to the end...I had to completely take the shifter apart and get into the guts. I was pretty worried at this point that I was screwed. When I popped the casing off a spring flew out and I thought for sure that was it. Too many gear mechs, springs and moving parts for me to figure out. Then I remembered that I have two advanced degrees. Played with it for a bit got the ins and outs figured out and came to the conclusion that the thing that was screwed up was the little gear indicator that shows you which gear you are currently in. Weird huh?



All that thing is is a little piece of thin plastic that extendeds down into the ratcheting system in the body of the shifter. There are 'teeth' on the plastic of the indicator that also engage with the teeth of the shifter so that when you shift the teeth on the indicator move with the teeth of the shifter and the little orange piece of the indicator moves down a notch. Turns out that little piece of plastic was getting jammed up about halfway through for some reason and preventing it from actually shifting. Remove the indicator, problem solved (I never look at that thing anyway). And now I know how trigger shifters work (X7's at least, but I would imagine the principle is similar for all).

Not sure how it happened...whether it was caused by moisture in there somehow warping the plastic or if I screwed something up when I recabled it but it was a learning experience and fun in a way.

Pre-Ride from Hell

I think I should have read my biking horoscope for today. I think it probably would have told me that my stars were very much not in line.

The day started off okay, some work I had intended to do around the house was better tackled with two people so I left that and got an early start on the ride portion of my day. I went down to Concord, stopped in the city to get a tux fitting for Jake and Tara's wedding. Got in and out fairly quick everything was running smoothly. Get to Pat's Peak with plenty of time to do two laps or so and still get home before Gina gets home from work...perfect. Until I actually got on my bike.

Right from the get go I could tell my energy levels were off. My heart spiked pretty early into the ride and I had a real hard time getting things regulated. The trails were still very wet from all the rain we've been having. I decided I would just ride the course slowly to avoid causing any damage just to get a feel for the terrain and then head out. For some reason riding slowly and me dont mix at all. I completely lose the ability to ride correctly. Tipped over a few times, got extremely muddy, every time the trail tilted up my heart rate would spike and take far too long to come back down. Not sure if it was the humidity or the sequence of things I had eaten for my last few meals or what, but my engine was not firing on all cylinders.

My troubles quickly spread to my brain and I was unable to follow the course, basically at all. I went off track at least 3-4 times. It's not excellently marked but I was definitely missing some obvious turns. Almost killed myself on a waterbar on the decent, for some reason I didn't even realize it was there until the last second and was barely able to absorb it. After the decent I lost the course again and ended up getting back on track on a previous portion of the course heading back the way I had come somehow. At this point I was so confused/frustrated that I just pointed the bike down the neareast ski slope and got back to the base area and packed it in.

http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/8481733

I lasted about 30 minutes, didnt even make it 3 miles. Quite the waste. Didn't get a workout and didn't even get to see the whole course. But what I did see has assured me that this race is going to be tough and more than likely leave me quite battered after 6hrs.