Moving on

I will no longer be riding for Airborne Bicycles. After two awesome years full of great memories and great opportunities I decided to step down from the team for next year. I leave on good terms with Airborne and the "Flight Crew". Great company, full of awesome people. Thanks for the memories!

Collegiate Nationals

Collegiate Mountain bike season wrapped up last week in Angel Fire, NM.I had this race marked on my calendar since summer but was unsure if I would be able to go due to some class conflicts. Got exempted from class, good to go.

Mizzou had 3 guys make the 15 hour journey down south. When I heard nationals would be held in New Mexico, I thought it would be a nice break from Missouri weather. I pictured desert and temperatures to be hot....I was wrong. Forecast said high of 40's and snow, they weren't kidding. Wendsday night before the Friday XC race it snowed several inches, up to 7 inches at the top of the mountain.

I heavily debated on even doing a pre ride of the course. I read that it was 3 miles up the mountain and 2 miles down, seemed simple enough. I contemplated pre riding and risking a mechanical from the crappy conditions or just riding around town to loosen up the legs and having a fresh, clean, working bike for the xc race. Peer pressure pre-vailed and before I knew it I was ankle deep in mud.

The course was literally 3 miles straight up and 2 miles straight down. The climb did not have one technical aspect to it, other than the mud. Downhill was fun but seemed very short. On the pre-ride the first mile of the climb was not ride able, but once you got higher up the mountain the ground became frozen which allowed you to ride.

I lined up for the Division 1 XC with 80+ other riders from all over the country, pretty awesome. Our race did not start until 12. I would have rather raced at 9 in the morning, when the ground was still cold and there had not already been two races ran on the course. I knew the mud would be worse then pre-ride but I had no idea how bad. The first lap was miserable, with the start of the climb only being .25 miles from the start it was a frenzy trying to get up the mountain. The course was in bad shape and only got worse. First lap, 75% ride able. Second lap, 60%. Third lap, 40%.

My race went extremely flawless. It was a long hike to the top of the mountain and a fun ride down. Other than all of the walking we had to do I had no bike or body mechanical's. I ended up 52/80. Not too shabby considering the last time I rode outside of racing was mid August.

Saturday was short track. I was not entirely excited about this race. Short track racing has never been my strong suit, so I was not too thrilled to be lining up against some of the fastest racers in the country. Lucky for me my race ended after just one lap. I was navigating the switch back at the top of the first climb when some dumba** T-boned my back wheel. I have no idea what he was doing, but he was going straight while I was following the course and turning. Anyways, it knocked me off balance but I just kept going not thinking too much about it other than wondering why someone who clearly can't even ride a bike was in this race. I came around to the start/finish and began pedaling when before I knew it I was on the ground wondering what just happened. Long story short, the guy knocked my wheel a little bit out of the drop outs and when I began putting power into the pedals my wheels basically rolled right out of the dropouts.

Thankfully nothing was hurt, other than my ego. I finished 57/80 with the DNF.

Awesome weekend with a bunch of awesome people. Brent Davidson represented Mizzou with a 10th place finish in downhill and a 12th in Dual Slalom.

Will I be back next year?.........Of course. After cross season ends I am going to take a few weeks off the bike and try and figure out what my goals are for next season. Bike racing has always been something I have loved, but now I need to figure out if it is something I want to fully commit myself to next year or just wing it like this year.

Dogfish Hermann CX Under the Lights

This is by far the best cx race of the year, and always is. Hermann always has a great course that is a perfect mix for roadies and mountain bikers. I was pumped to find out I would not be traveling for collegiate season, so I would be able to race. Some people only like to race cyclocross if their road season or mountain season is over, my mountain season is far from over but it's all the same to me really.

Andy Prunty, Ben Tiefenbrun, Brent Davidson, and myself were the only brave soles from Mizzou Cycling to make the venture. Andy and Ben were scheduled to lose their cyclocross virginity's, while Brent was going to film the night's shenanigans.

I lined up for the cat 3/4 race with 40 other racers, three rows from the front. Not ideal, I wanted to be as close to the front as possible for the first lap. I know how bad cyclocross racers are at staying organized and not crashing for the first lap, so the closer to the front the better. They staged us by bib numbers. Since I had not pre-registered I was stuck in the back. After being staged I realized that the whole right hand side of the front row was completely open. I did not hesitate to move up and fill that gap in. A couple of the guys in the first row did not like that too much, I didn't see a problem with it and neither did the official.

The whistle blew and we were off. The start of the race was a pavement section that bottle necked into a grassy corner. When I hit the grass I was sitting 5th wheel. Half way through the lap I slipped back a couple spots and sure enough there was a wreck, and I got stuck behind it. The leaders opened up a pretty big gap.

The rest of the race went pretty smoothly, I found a pace and hammered for 45 minutes. I was feeling pretty good, so good that the bell for the last lap caught me off guard. I was not ready for the race to end, but I had one more lap to gain a few positions. I passed 3 guys on the pavement and bridged up to a group a 3 guys before hitting the grass. At the stairs I passed two of them and held onto the wheel of the third guy for the rest of the lap. The second half of the course was definitely my strong half. The guy in front of me was not gonna let me pass, after several attempts I figured it was a waste of energy. I knew I would not be able to catch anyone else before the race ended so unlike usual, I decided to race smart. I knew the finish was a pavement section and if I could just hang onto his wheel I could make my move there. I let him set the pace, we hit the pavement and it was ON! We had a pretty close sprint finish, I came across one wheel ahead.

I ended up 17th place. Not too bad considering it's been almost a year since I raced cross last. The conditions of the race couldn't have been better, with a full day of rain leading up to the race it was muddy and wet. Disk brakes on a cyclocross bikes in these conditions was definitely the way to go. I had absolutely no problem braking and plenty of braking power, which was a nice change from canti brakes.

The highlight of my race was not racing at night in a great atmosphere or winning a spring finish. It was watching the awesome videos Brent made.Brent was hard a work filming all night and running around the course. I would say his hard work was worth it, check out the video he made for the 3/4 race

Also, the 1/2 race

LW Collegiate Weekend

Collegiate mountain bike season kicked off this past weekend down in Columbia, KY at Lindsey Wilson University. A 24 mile xc race, short track, and dual slalom was on the menu for the weekend. We had a good group of 9 mizzou racers heading down for the weekend. Unfortunately, training has come to a halt with school starting back up. I can count on two hands the number of hours I had ridden the past 2 weeks leading up to the race.

Saturday started off with short track race, 20 minutes plus two laps. The course was pretty short with a majority of the course being a climb. 20 of us lined up at the start line for the A race. It was pretty awesome to see that many guys in the A race, considering last year there were only about 12. It started off fast, as expected. I knew I wasn't fast enough to contend so I tried to stay mid pack. I ended up 14th out of 20. Not too great but kind of expected considering my fitness.

It was onto dual slalom, since I am still figuring out the whole dual slalom game I signed up for B class. Lindsey Wilson has a ton of dual slalom/bmx racers so their course is always top notch. Conditions were muddy for practice but by race time the course had dried up considerably. I took a couple practice runs but my legs were still feeling it from the short track race so I decided resting up would be a better option then burning up my legs on practice runs. In qualifying I over shot a berm on the last half of the track, which seated me last in the bracket. Round one went pretty smooth with no mistakes I was onto the next round. Round two was a close race but with a time penalty I advanced to the finals. Finals went flawless, I knew if I made it down with two clean runs I would have it. I managed to pull off a 1st place in B class.

Sunday XC, I had raced this course last year and knew it was going to be tough. The course consisted of 3 pretty big climbs, but was mainly flat or downhill. It was 8 mile lap, with A racers doing 3 laps. My legs were feeling pretty toasted from the previous day so I took the first lap easy, riding with Brent. Not too long into the race it began rain pretty hard and wouldn't stop for the rest of the race. The course was super sloppy and getting pretty tore up. Second lap, Andy Prunty and I began pushing it a little harder and started reeling in some guys ahead of us. My legs were feeling great. Going into the third lap Andy and I caught more 2 guys. Half way through the lap I had a link in my chain seize up, I don't know what caused it could have been the clay/mud or rain but either way it slowed me down quite a bit. Pedaling got harder and harder and I was unable to shift out of the big ring up front and had a lot of shifting in the rear. I was not too upset about it, when racing in wet/muddy conditions mechanical's are almost inevitable. I would take a seized link over a flat tire or broken chain any day. I finished 12th out of 20.

Overall, great weekend and great racing with awesome people.

Tall Oak Challenge 6 hour

I had no intentions of doing this race until the monday night before, it's not that I don't enjoy endurance racing I'm just not very good at it. I don't know what it is, my body, my mind, external factors but every endurance race I enter I don't do well results wise. That being said, I find endurance racing a ton of fun and super challenging which is why I keep doing them. Results don't really matter anyways, right?

I knew I didn't have the legs for the 6 hour solo class, so I teamed up with a fellow mizzou cycling team member, Byce to crush and destroy the dusty trails of Jeff City, MO.

It just so happens that my teammate grew up in Jeff City, so this trail was his home turf. I however, had never ridden the trail prior to race day. We decided that Bryce would go out on the first lap since he knew the trail better. Getting a good spot going into the single track and not weaving through lap traffic is key in this type of race.

The race course was only 7 miles, with fast lap times ranging from 30-40 minutes. This "relay" race was different from any other race I have ever done. Usually on team races you have at least an hour of rest time in between laps. For this race you realistically only had maybe 15 minutes before you had to get back on the bike and loosen up for the next lap. I knew it would be a suffer fest.

Bryce started off our team with a solid 39 minute lap time, putting us in the upper half of the field. By the look on his face when he handed the baton off to me, I knew it was going to be tough.

Lap1

I managed to jump into the single track right behind Peat Henry, who was racing the solo category so he already had one lap in him. He set a pace and I chilled behind him for the first couple miles, just to get to know the course and follow his lines. My legs were feeling good so at the first grass field I opened them up and passed a hand full of people. For the rest of the lap I was riding as smooth as butta. I came through with a 35 minute lap. Not too shabby considering the fastest lap at that point was a 34 minute lap. I would later see the results and see my time was crushed with a 31 minute lap later on in the race.

Lap 2

After a short break I got back on the bike for my second lap. Bryce came through with another consistent lap and now it was my turn to throw down with the course. After my previous lap I felt like I knew the trail pretty well. It was a pretty simple course, twisty, with almost zero climbing, and FAST. I came in with a 36 minute lap, a little slower then my first lap but I was still happy with that time.

Lap 3

Bryce flatted on his lap so he lost a little bit of time on his lap, but only a couple minutes. I could tell he was hurting by this point. This was my third lap but our teams 6th lap. It is this point in the day when the previous laps begin to wear on your body. Eating and drinking plenty of water is essential to keep the body going. My legs were feeling a little tight but nothing unexpected. I began losing small amounts of tire pressure through out this lap. Nothing huge but somehow I dropped 5 psi by the end of the lap. I came through with a 37:56, I was hurting. I could feel a cramp coming in my right leg, I knew this was not going to be good, considering I had 2 more laps to go.

Lap 4/5

Bryce came through and handed me the baton, I waited a minute so that I could check up on him and see how he was doing. He was worse off then me, he said his legs were camping pretty bad and asked me to do a double lap. OUUUUUUCH this was going to be brutal. I had a goal of staying under 40 minute lap times all day. I was still confident up to this point I could attain that. Knowing I would be doing a double lap I pulled back the throttle a little bit. My cramp hadn't gone away but it was manageable, I could only feel it when I really mashed on the pedals. I knew there was no chance of it getting better, only worse. I came through lap 4 with a 41 minute lap, I didn't feel like I was going that slow but with the evidence of my lap time I knew my body was beginning to shut down. I lost around 8 psi in both tires, so after quickly pumping up my tires I was off for lap 5.

After riding the course 4 times already I had several spots I could do time splits. I was half way through the lap right on target for a 40 minute lap. I am not sure what happened between there and the finish line but I had the dreaded bonk. My right calf was throbbing at this point from the cramp. I couldn't push it up any sort of incline. I had to make it back in 40 minutes so that Bryce could go out for our final lap, any longer of a lap time wouldn't make the cut off at 6 hours. I was in the final four minutes of the race when I heard the gun fire go off, signaling the end of the race. I was bummed....I came through with a 45 minute lap time, way past my goal and forcing our team's race to end, instead of continuing for another lap.

Overall, the race was a blast I knew I didn't have the legs for this type of race at this point in my season so I am pretty happy with my lap times, excluding the last two. I had 5 laps, somewhere around 35 miles all together although it felt like way more then that. I would compare this race to doing 5 short track races with a 20 minute break between each race. The intensity of every lap kills your body and you are drained with not much of a break before going out again. Definitely putting this one down on my calendar next year!

full results http://midwestfattireseries.com/images/stories/2011results/2011_binder6hrresults.pdf

The leap

For sometime now there have been top secret plans to overhaul the drive train on the goblin. It is now ready for the public to see:

It's quite the change, and something I have been wanting to do for a long time. The stock x7 2x10 rode exceptionally well but was beginning to get tired after almost a year of wear and tear. I am very happy with how it turned out, not only does xx out preform any other drive train I also managed to drop some weight with the upgrade. I've added a few other subtle upgrades over the past couple weeks also. I converted from crank brother pedals to shimano, man have I been messing out. I also said goodbye to the Ergon grips and put on some new ESI grips per the recommendation from Eric McKenna. The goblin is now sitting at a record low weight, 23.08 lbs (without pedals). This bike gets faster as the months go by!

I am finally back to riding after my incident at castlewood and I am feeling great. I did lose some fitness while I was sitting on the couch, but I am back on track.

One step forward and two steps back

I decided to bump up and race CAT 1 this season during the winter. I am beginning to out grow CAT 2 races and I may not be fast enough to contend with the top guys but that's not why I am doing it. It's all preparation for collegiate season this fall. It's a longer faster race with more experience riders, that's exactly what I need to get faster.

I lined up with 16 other CAT 1 riders in the blistering Missouri heat. The course was fairly short but had quite a bit of climbing in it. I choose to ride conservatively up the first big climb to feel out the race and figure out where I needed to be. I grabbed another riders wheel and would stay there for the next 2 laps. I was feeling pretty good. Like always, I started the race off way too slow.

The race was my first real time spent on tubeless tires, and I have to say I am a fan. I have always felt that corning on an xc bike was my weakest link. Tubeless is the answer to my problem. I could confidently push through corners and know that the tires would hook right up, and they did. I still have some adjusting to do with finding the right psi but that will come after I spend more time on them.

The CAT 1 race did 3 laps, on the 3rd lap I decided it was time to try and make my move. I began picking off riders ahead of me half way through the lap. I was pushing it pretty hard, on corners, climbs, and technical parts. I came to the last descent and gave it my final push. I remember thinking to myself that I was starting to lose focus, I was making silly mistakes. However, I ignored those signs because I knew the finish wasn't too far away.

I came to the last turn of the downhill, this part of the trail was rutted out and covered in loose rock. I grabbed the wheel of a rider in front of me with the intention of passing him right after the corner. I am not entirely sure what happened but I leaned in to turn and my front tire clipped a pretty good sized rock that was laying on the trail. The bike began sliding out and I began to fall on the right side of my body. I tried to correct and save myself from falling by turning the opposite way. This however immediately threw me off the bike. I can't remember the last time I crashed on my mtb so I was a bit confused. My left knee took the full blow of the crash onto a rock. Without thinking I jumped back up and rode away. There was around a mile left in the race, mostly smooth flat trail to the finish. I saw a lot of blood coming out of my knee but figured it was just a normal cut that was bleeding a bit excessively.

I finished the race and immediately sat down in some shade to figure out what was wrong with my knee. I was almost positive it was nothing bad or worth going to the hospital for. Not too long after I sat down people started coming over to see if I was alright. I told them all that I was fine and I just needed something to clean it up. I still could not tell how deep the cut was because of the blood.

Karen Holtmann came over and told me she would clean it up. Not too long after she started cleaning me up she said I was going to need stitches. My heart sank, thoughts came running through my head of how long I would have to be off the bike for, if I would have time to get back in shape before collegiate season, etc....

Dan Miller and Carl Hoffman came over with some first aid kits while Karen pulled debris out of my knee. They told me that I needed to get to the ER and that it would take some stitches to sew it up.

Lucky for me Andy Prunty rode his bike to the race so he was able to drive my car up the the hospital. Long story short I got out of the hospital with 5 stitches on my knee. Half the cut was too wide to stitch up so they did the best they could. Doctor said two weeks until the stitches come out and not to start riding until the stitches come out. It definitely could have been much worse.

I finished the day with 13th place overall. I have been beating myself up about the crash since it happened. I feel like I was finally in good shape, riding stronger and then this had to happen. Two weeks off the bike is not the worst thing in the world. I won't lose all my fitness and I will have time to get back in shape before collegiate season. Thanks to everyone who helped me out at the race, I really do not know what I would have done without all of your help!

Photos courtesy of Dennis Fickinger.