This year, I had a unique vantage point at the Transylvania Epic. I started out as a racer, hell-bent on being The Fastest Slow Guy in the field. I trained for hundreds of hours in the frozen dark of the New England winter. By the end, I was alternately a rider, a volunteer and a sweeper. Here are my thoughts and evaluation of this years event.
1. Organization: 10 out of 10. As a racer, everything you need is provided. From the breakfast spread, the bike transport, the never-ending hammer gel and Perpetum to the by-dinnertime results and daily highlights movie the whole week went by without a hitch (Im sure there were hitches, but the Mike and Ray smoothed them out without any of us noticing). The single results issue took about 3 minutes to resolve.
If you are thinking about volunteering, the system is run with military precision by the friends and family of the organizers. Everyone is friendly, and the hours I spent at the checkpoint went by almost as fast as Justin Lindine. Riding behind the group was good too - I met some awesome folks, rode at a pace that allowed me to actually take in some of the incredible scenery and hung out with the moto guys. Who were kick-ass.
It seemed most of the volunteers were the significant others of people racing: if you are on the fence about bringing a date, do it: it seemed like everyone had a pretty good time.
2. Quality/ variety of terrain, stage length etc: 9 out of 10. There were 7 different stages, and each one had its own character and appeal. I would only change 2 things (and I know this is quibbling): the duration/ composition of the TT stage and the amount of fire road descending. The former I feel was a bit too long OR on too much open road, the latter may simply be a function of land access. Want more of my unasked-for advice?
Of course you do.
Maybe break the TT stage into 2 parts: a cx style handling section and a big-watts road section. This way, everyone is happy (except for the folks responsible for logistics). Or just shorten it to make the time gaps less important going into the days ahead. Or just cut out the part where JB passed me and Ben like we were tied to a tree.
The "more single track descending" is probably much trickier. I just know that when someone spends 20 minutes pushing chain up a dirt road climb, they want some sweet, sweet trails on the way down. It dosent have to be Downieville, just some twisty, rocky fun.
3. Food (the "meal package"): 10 out of 10. Easily the most improved area from last year. Every single meal was good. And not just "I rode 50 miles on my mountain bike over Taintsmash Ridge, literally anything is going to taste good" - the food selection, variety and quality was top-notch. There were mom-made cookies. Seriously. And the breakfast was remarkably consistent: no gastrointestinal roulette this time around. Eggs, pancakes, bacon, oatmeal, fruit, cereal - you can't go wrong.
Even the vegan/gluten free options were delightful.
The checkpoint food was well done also: cold coke, Gatorade, heed, ice water, sandwiches, fruit, cookies and bars all laid out for half-delirious bike racers to stuff their face-holes with. And all handed out by a smiling, friendly volunteer.
4. Staff: My opinion of the people behind this event are already pretty well-known. For this race, you show up at a boy scout camp in a part of Pennsylvania where a horse and buggy is considered part of normal highway traffic, ride through some of the most wacky backcountry shit you can imagine and live with a cabin full of hellions (ahem, I mean "respectable cyclists") and somehow never leave your comfort zone too far behind. The staff is responsible for setting the tone, and these guys make sure every single person - from the podium to the back of the pack, from spouses to kids - feel like part of something special.
5. Lodging: 7 out of 10. Ahh yes, ye olde Rimmey camp. Aside from subtracting one star for the ass-sized sag in my mattress and two for the hobbit-sized spider I enjoyed a conjugal visit with, the accommodations were adequate. The toilet struggled a bit, and there was some kind of device in the bathroom whose sole purpose seemed to involve sporadically leaking black water, but overall the commode situation was well within race-tolerances.
The stove was somehow a professional grade, 6 burner monstrosity that applied heat to a pan more evenly than anything I have ever used in an actual home.
Lodging Advice:
Bring fans. It gets sticky, and unless you want to be drained completely of blood by mosquitoes the size of Yorkshire terriers, you will keep the doors closed.
Bring a small cooler or big container to put in the freezer for ice. There is a huge ice machine at the mess hall. Take advantage of this.
Bring something that can make a bunch of coffee for a bunch of people, fast. There is coffee at breakfast, and it is passable, but you may find you need a little something extra on morning 5.
6. Facilities: 7 out of 10. Just about everything we needed was walking distance (after 4 or 5 days, this became "limping distance") from the cabin. The showers were your choice of "single" or "prison-style", and doubled as a washing machine. Just walk over after the stage with your kit on and viola! You now had a clean-enough chamois to decorate the hanging line in front of the cabin. The "individual" showers suffered from a bit of a drainage problem - depending on demand and time of day, you could be wading ankle-deep through a stagnant puddle of other dudes wash water. However, the separate shower bays mostly made up for this problem.
7. Overall Value: 10 out of 10. The most common question I was asked upon my return from this race was "why would you ever go back after all that?".
The answer is pretty simple, but explaining it isnt always so easy.
Of course I would do it again: The whole event is fantastic.
I had a pretty bad run of it as a race but as an overall experience, it was still a hell of a week. The only reason I didnt pack it in and head home on Wednesday with a broken bike and a stomach of anger was the atmosphere and camaraderie fostered by the organizers. I (and the other folks that, through the vagaries of misfortune, also DNF'd) was offered every opportunity to ride, hang out and still be a part of the event I drove 7 hours to get to.
Overall, I feel like I have a better grasp on the event than last year: the Transylvania Epic isnt just a race. It is a temporary community: a gathering of people you know, people you dont know and people you have only read about. It is pros and weekend warriors and in-betweeners like me, all riding the same course, eating and living together. By the end of the week, there arent any more distinctions or awkwardness - just a group of cyclists and their families around a campfire telling stories about what an awesome time they had.
And Ill see you next year.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
The Freshly-Moistened Chamois of Success.
Every year since I started my foray into bike racing I have competed at Pats Peak. The (new) course is awesome, the people are very friendly and the atmosphere is very laid back for such a rough event. This year, I would be going solo for 24 hours. Without any support. On a bike I had never ridden.
What could go wrong?
After a week long Transylvania adventure that didnt exactly go according to plan, I needed to race. And rest. Probably rest a bunch, actually. But hey, most of you already know my unimpeachable record for excellent choices.
I showed up at about 10am, and it was misting. I quickly registered, set up my 35 bottles, 10 sandwiches, 6 cups of rice slurry, bunch of bananas, various bars and gels and went to the rider meeting. At which we were informed of a "high probability" of the race getting called for lightning.
In my crafty race-brain, I had already begun cooking up a strategy:
Go with the 6 hour guys. Hang on as long as I could. Then go with the 12 hour guys. Bury myself in the first half of the race so regardless of when they called it, I would be ahead.
Infallible plan thusly formulated, I made all the final adjustments to my bike and kit. The latter of which consisted of a skinsuit and a rain shell.
Just a skinsuit and a rainshell. This would become important at about midnight.
When it was 45 degrees and pouring.
We huddled under the scoring tent until the last possible minute. Dylan McNicholas, Pete Smith and I talked about how Rowell applied embrocation like bronzing agent at a tanning salon. It was the only explanation of his outward indifference to the cold.
The horn went, and we stormed (read: unevenly trotted) across the field to our bikes. I did everything in my power not to get the holeshot, failed when Dylan slipped a pedal (NOT PRO!!) then succeeded in finding a wheel when I softpedaled to let some random guy off the front.
Things sorted themselves out by the first climb: Rowell (who had ants in his pants) took off in a fury, dropped me, Dylan and Pete and completely imploded the guy who initially got it in his head to go it alone.
I rode behind Dylan (and somewhat farther behind Rowell) for about a lap. Deciding I had done enough big-ringing the whole course, I "sat up" and let Dylan out of my sights. After all, there was still 23 hours and 25 minutes of racing for me.
I lapped the first guy in my field near the end of my second lap. Dylan was about a minute ahead, and I could just about close down the gap on the descent. Pete Smith was staying classy (as always) in the vicinity as well. Despite (or perhaps because of) my lack of support personnel, I made very good eating/drinking decisions: every lap, half sandwich in the bag, gu in the pocket, new bottle on the bike.
Another lap.
Uneventful. Went fast. Hurt a little.
Another lap.
Things were looking good. The course was hellish: every descent was sketchy, all the roots and rocks were greasy, and before every climb there was a football field of 4 inch deep mud that had you grunting as sweating like a fat kid at soccer practice.
Then after the first already rutted-out downhill after the first climb, tragedy struck.
Im running out of metaphors for the many and various ways my bikes fail dramatically during races. Im thinking of setting up a Madlib feature on this thing to let you guys do it for me. For example:
My _________ (expletive)_________ (noun) bent into my _________ (expletive) _________(adjective) __________ (noun) like __________ (name of military officer famous for an incredible failure) at __________ (name of place no one has ever heard of)
Of course, it would be helpful if Cannondale didnt make derailleur hangers out of tissue paper and unicorn farts.
Im 4, maybe 5 laps in. I am at least one lap up on second place. My X9 derailleur is on the wrong side of my chainstay. And Im halfway up a muddy ski hill. Dont panic, old man.
Turning murderous rage into mongoose-like agility I made it to the bottom of the hill without wrecking any more of my brand-new bike. I told the folks in the timing tent that my lap was cut because of a mechanical and ran to my tent. I had a hanger in my toolbox, and like an urchin bearing an empty soup-cup I begged the S&W Sports mechanic to install it.
The only catch to my now-functioning drivetrain was that only one gear out of 10 worked properly on the cassette. In complete disregard for the next 22 hours to go, I rode another all big-ring lap - this time, I had the pleasure of hanging with Dylan.
Dyaln is kind of like Indiana Jones. They are both pretty bad-ass. But while Indiana Jones is afraid of snakes, Dylan MCnicolas is afraid of wet, technical downhills. And while both complain loudly and often hilariously, they both seem to get though just fine.
Crisis Averted. More laps.
It was still raining. Hard. Trying to describe its constancy and ferocity would be like trying to explain the subtleties of landscape photography to a blind person (or bike racing to my mother). Eventually, I started to accept "pissing rain" as my environmental default - during the rare times it tapered off, it felt as though something was amiss.
And by now, it was getting dark: my will (and ability) to keep slogging through the ever-widening patches of sludge was sapped by every spin-out and knee slammed into the top tube. So I started playing the "lets see how far I can get before I jump off and run" game. Within a lap, this game was re-packaged and re-released as the "Fuck It: Its Lap 12, This Mud Sucks, Im Just Going To Walk" edition.
I am generally regarded as a decent rider in the dark. I can keep it upright and reasonably fast; night laps are when I put time into my competitors. This was doubly true at Pats. By nightfall, more than half the field had abandoned (by first light there would be only 2 of us on course!) and the remaining riders were slowing down.
I decided to see if I could turn sub-hour laps through the night.
As it turns out, I could.
My one hiccup was a drained light battery at the top of the last singletrack climb. This resulted in mild pants-shitting and somewhat less mild language all the way down the mountain. I emerged with a gillie-suit worth of vegetation clinging to me, my bike and my camelbak. I told the scoring guy I may or may not have cut the course, so if he wanted to can the lap it was his call.
That was two laps I may or may not have been docked.
One odd constant about 24 hour races is that the most undesirable things get stuck in a loop in your head. Car commercials, U2 songs, mnemonic devices, bad radio jingles - you name it, if it sucks, I was singing it to myself.
Combined with the incessant rain, it was like getting waterboarded at a Lenny Kravitz concert.
Just before dawn, I had done 20-ish laps. I was 6 up on second place, and wanted to see if Jeff would be willing to call a truce and just roll out a few more laps. As it turns out, Jeff was almost as happy as I was to stop racing: his second place was mathematically unassailable, and he wanted a hot breakfast.
So we did a lap together, hung out, took it easy... it turned out he knew a few of my friends and teammates from racing in college. It also turned out that he hadnt eaten in at least a lap, so I gave him what was left of my food and he took a break to keep a catastrophic bonk at bay.
At 8am we got breakfast, hung out in the lodge and started cleaning up our respective campsites. I wanted to watch the carnage (I mean, helpfully point out the good lines) as the two dozen or so first timers began to seriously question their burgeoning careers as bike racers in the mud bog at the bottom of the second climb, but not so much to actually climb my tired ass up there unnecessarily.
Jeff and I went out for a final, slow-as-death last lap at 10am. We walked every climb, talked about lines through the technical stuff and collectively cursed at a few choice obstacles that had wronged us over the previous 23 hours.
We sat next to the bear statues until he finishing horn blew, went through the timing tent together, shook hands and called it a day.
I had won my first 24 hour race.
On my birthday.
Hooray!
Race notes:
- I still dont know how many laps I actually did. I may or may not have been docked 2 (for mechanicals/ course cutting), but I also know I went out for my "20th lap" at least twice. So I estimate that I did 20-24 total laps in about 19 hours or racing.
- The guy in the scoring tent was there ALL NIGHT. His replacement didnt show because of bad weather, and he hung out and kept it going until dawn. Huge thank you, and recognition to the event for having such quality volunteers.
- The official results show 7 starters. By my count at the start area, there were at least 9 (I thought for sure it was 10). Maybe they didnt count day-of reg folks or something.
- I would have podium-ed at the 6, 12 and 24 hour team races. Apparently I had the second-fastest lap (between 36 and 37 minutes) as well
- This course gets better every year. Drainage issues aside, this is one of the best xc courses on the calendar. Such varied terrain really favored a well-rounded rider.
- Before this race, I had never really ridden a hardtail. Or a 29er. I am now used to both.
What could go wrong?
After a week long Transylvania adventure that didnt exactly go according to plan, I needed to race. And rest. Probably rest a bunch, actually. But hey, most of you already know my unimpeachable record for excellent choices.
I showed up at about 10am, and it was misting. I quickly registered, set up my 35 bottles, 10 sandwiches, 6 cups of rice slurry, bunch of bananas, various bars and gels and went to the rider meeting. At which we were informed of a "high probability" of the race getting called for lightning.
In my crafty race-brain, I had already begun cooking up a strategy:
Go with the 6 hour guys. Hang on as long as I could. Then go with the 12 hour guys. Bury myself in the first half of the race so regardless of when they called it, I would be ahead.
Infallible plan thusly formulated, I made all the final adjustments to my bike and kit. The latter of which consisted of a skinsuit and a rain shell.
Just a skinsuit and a rainshell. This would become important at about midnight.
When it was 45 degrees and pouring.
We huddled under the scoring tent until the last possible minute. Dylan McNicholas, Pete Smith and I talked about how Rowell applied embrocation like bronzing agent at a tanning salon. It was the only explanation of his outward indifference to the cold.
The horn went, and we stormed (read: unevenly trotted) across the field to our bikes. I did everything in my power not to get the holeshot, failed when Dylan slipped a pedal (NOT PRO!!) then succeeded in finding a wheel when I softpedaled to let some random guy off the front.
Things sorted themselves out by the first climb: Rowell (who had ants in his pants) took off in a fury, dropped me, Dylan and Pete and completely imploded the guy who initially got it in his head to go it alone.
I rode behind Dylan (and somewhat farther behind Rowell) for about a lap. Deciding I had done enough big-ringing the whole course, I "sat up" and let Dylan out of my sights. After all, there was still 23 hours and 25 minutes of racing for me.
I lapped the first guy in my field near the end of my second lap. Dylan was about a minute ahead, and I could just about close down the gap on the descent. Pete Smith was staying classy (as always) in the vicinity as well. Despite (or perhaps because of) my lack of support personnel, I made very good eating/drinking decisions: every lap, half sandwich in the bag, gu in the pocket, new bottle on the bike.
Another lap.
Uneventful. Went fast. Hurt a little.
Another lap.
Things were looking good. The course was hellish: every descent was sketchy, all the roots and rocks were greasy, and before every climb there was a football field of 4 inch deep mud that had you grunting as sweating like a fat kid at soccer practice.
Then after the first already rutted-out downhill after the first climb, tragedy struck.
Im running out of metaphors for the many and various ways my bikes fail dramatically during races. Im thinking of setting up a Madlib feature on this thing to let you guys do it for me. For example:
My _________ (expletive)_________ (noun) bent into my _________ (expletive) _________(adjective) __________ (noun) like __________ (name of military officer famous for an incredible failure) at __________ (name of place no one has ever heard of)
Of course, it would be helpful if Cannondale didnt make derailleur hangers out of tissue paper and unicorn farts.
Im 4, maybe 5 laps in. I am at least one lap up on second place. My X9 derailleur is on the wrong side of my chainstay. And Im halfway up a muddy ski hill. Dont panic, old man.
Turning murderous rage into mongoose-like agility I made it to the bottom of the hill without wrecking any more of my brand-new bike. I told the folks in the timing tent that my lap was cut because of a mechanical and ran to my tent. I had a hanger in my toolbox, and like an urchin bearing an empty soup-cup I begged the S&W Sports mechanic to install it.
The only catch to my now-functioning drivetrain was that only one gear out of 10 worked properly on the cassette. In complete disregard for the next 22 hours to go, I rode another all big-ring lap - this time, I had the pleasure of hanging with Dylan.
Dyaln is kind of like Indiana Jones. They are both pretty bad-ass. But while Indiana Jones is afraid of snakes, Dylan MCnicolas is afraid of wet, technical downhills. And while both complain loudly and often hilariously, they both seem to get though just fine.
Crisis Averted. More laps.
It was still raining. Hard. Trying to describe its constancy and ferocity would be like trying to explain the subtleties of landscape photography to a blind person (or bike racing to my mother). Eventually, I started to accept "pissing rain" as my environmental default - during the rare times it tapered off, it felt as though something was amiss.
And by now, it was getting dark: my will (and ability) to keep slogging through the ever-widening patches of sludge was sapped by every spin-out and knee slammed into the top tube. So I started playing the "lets see how far I can get before I jump off and run" game. Within a lap, this game was re-packaged and re-released as the "Fuck It: Its Lap 12, This Mud Sucks, Im Just Going To Walk" edition.
I am generally regarded as a decent rider in the dark. I can keep it upright and reasonably fast; night laps are when I put time into my competitors. This was doubly true at Pats. By nightfall, more than half the field had abandoned (by first light there would be only 2 of us on course!) and the remaining riders were slowing down.
I decided to see if I could turn sub-hour laps through the night.
As it turns out, I could.
My one hiccup was a drained light battery at the top of the last singletrack climb. This resulted in mild pants-shitting and somewhat less mild language all the way down the mountain. I emerged with a gillie-suit worth of vegetation clinging to me, my bike and my camelbak. I told the scoring guy I may or may not have cut the course, so if he wanted to can the lap it was his call.
That was two laps I may or may not have been docked.
One odd constant about 24 hour races is that the most undesirable things get stuck in a loop in your head. Car commercials, U2 songs, mnemonic devices, bad radio jingles - you name it, if it sucks, I was singing it to myself.
Combined with the incessant rain, it was like getting waterboarded at a Lenny Kravitz concert.
Just before dawn, I had done 20-ish laps. I was 6 up on second place, and wanted to see if Jeff would be willing to call a truce and just roll out a few more laps. As it turns out, Jeff was almost as happy as I was to stop racing: his second place was mathematically unassailable, and he wanted a hot breakfast.
So we did a lap together, hung out, took it easy... it turned out he knew a few of my friends and teammates from racing in college. It also turned out that he hadnt eaten in at least a lap, so I gave him what was left of my food and he took a break to keep a catastrophic bonk at bay.
At 8am we got breakfast, hung out in the lodge and started cleaning up our respective campsites. I wanted to watch the carnage (I mean, helpfully point out the good lines) as the two dozen or so first timers began to seriously question their burgeoning careers as bike racers in the mud bog at the bottom of the second climb, but not so much to actually climb my tired ass up there unnecessarily.
Jeff and I went out for a final, slow-as-death last lap at 10am. We walked every climb, talked about lines through the technical stuff and collectively cursed at a few choice obstacles that had wronged us over the previous 23 hours.
We sat next to the bear statues until he finishing horn blew, went through the timing tent together, shook hands and called it a day.
I had won my first 24 hour race.
On my birthday.
Hooray!
Race notes:
- I still dont know how many laps I actually did. I may or may not have been docked 2 (for mechanicals/ course cutting), but I also know I went out for my "20th lap" at least twice. So I estimate that I did 20-24 total laps in about 19 hours or racing.
- The guy in the scoring tent was there ALL NIGHT. His replacement didnt show because of bad weather, and he hung out and kept it going until dawn. Huge thank you, and recognition to the event for having such quality volunteers.
- The official results show 7 starters. By my count at the start area, there were at least 9 (I thought for sure it was 10). Maybe they didnt count day-of reg folks or something.
- I would have podium-ed at the 6, 12 and 24 hour team races. Apparently I had the second-fastest lap (between 36 and 37 minutes) as well
- This course gets better every year. Drainage issues aside, this is one of the best xc courses on the calendar. Such varied terrain really favored a well-rounded rider.
- Before this race, I had never really ridden a hardtail. Or a 29er. I am now used to both.
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
Rider Bio: Matt Casserly
Name: Matt CasserlyRacing Age: 24
Categories: Road 3, CX 2
Strengths: Shorter races
Weaknesses: Longer road races / cramps
Favorite Burrito: Anything with guacamole
Favorite Race: Gloucester (raced on my birthday and I got paid!)
The Stable: Spooky Supertouch CX!
Craziest Ride: First time racing Green Mountain Stage race, "gaps" hurt lots
How It All Began: Won a BMX race when I was seven. Several years later I started riding road bikes to get around Boston in college and started racing my senior year.
Rider Bio: Jon Malone
Name: Jon "FJ" Malone
Hometown: Boston, MA
Disciplines: Old school BMX, Downhill MTB, XC MTB, Cyclocross, Road/Crit Racing. Making the best cup 'o coffee.
Categories: Downhill MTB ( Cat 2), XC MTB (Cat 1), Road (Cat 3), Cross (Cat 3)
internet: vivelife.com
strengths: Going downhill and picking great lines
weaknesses: admitting weaknesses
Occupation: Coach and founder of ViVe LLC.
team role: Head game consultant and PR. assistant
style: I create it on the fly
career highlight: Surviving being run over by a large truck
How you got into bike racing: I was bored with my neighborhood and started biking for hours to escape.
first race: Pick-up BMX races as a kid. XC MTB 1995 at Winding Meadows in Farmington, CT.
favorite part of racing with B2C2: I am enjoying getting to know the crew.
favorite place to ride: MTB, Highland Mountain and old trails in CT. Road, Getting lost in VT and NH-long climbs as you know the downhill will be epic.
favorite experience on a bike: Biking on my first BMX bike through the Iowa State Campus as an 8 yr old. I felt so adventurous and older.
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Transylvania epic stage 8: party at rimjorb.
Yes, I have the party listed as a final stage.
Because in many ways, it is also an endurance event.
We finished the last stage. Sweet merciful crap, it was done. Some hugged each other, some sat by the finish and downed beers. At least one person literally pissed himself. For my part, I got to the shower and stood there until the water got cold.
A bunch of us hung out around the cabin waiting for the 3 o'clock dinner call. Weir sent Adam on a pizza run; in the meantime we munched on some onion-y things that Sue had pickled which tasted fine but smelled like a laundry basket full of socks.
The WTB guys broke down bikes, and there was a halfhearted attempt at cleaning up the campsite.
Then the 3 man potato launcher came out.
Unsatisfied with the both the range and potential lethality of simply shooting cans across the campsite, Ben began to fire larger (and pointier) objects. After one or two "misfires" (read: near-fatalities), the slingshot was put away. Besides, it was dinnertime.
Dinner was amazing. The food all week was good, but this was something else entirely: chicken cordon bleu, wild rice pilaf, crab cakes - it was freaking awesome. The awards were fun, though it stung a little to miss out on the finishers medal.
I will comment on the inclusiveness of the event: the organizers, without undue pandering or lame "everyone is a winner" bullshit managed to include and address everyone remaining at camp. Regardless of finisher status (there was a lot of attrition), pretty much everyone left that dining hall with a smile.
Weather that smile was due to the food, the swag or the fact that most people had been drinking since 9am was immaterial: in about an hour, the first annual 3 beer derby was going to test a somewhat different skillset than the racers had been utilizing throughout the week.
Rather than give you a boring play-by-play, I will refer you to this video.
Here are some highlights:
- Sometime before the race started, Ben crashed a motorcycle. At 40 miles an hour. Then he challenged some dogs to a game of fetch.
- I was pitting for Dave "The Drunken Flash" Pryor. That meant I shook the shit out of everyone elses beer.
- Drew Haywood. That is all.
- Hash Apples used the Tiny Bike for this event. Its going to take months to clean the Dreadlocked Garth Balls off that saddle.
- Wicknasty talks mad shit on Tj, RyRy and Jpow. The heckling starts 4 months before cross season.
After the race, I started a fire. You know, to keep everyone warm. The WTB boys went on a fuel-gathering mission, Selene danced a whole bunch and Im still waiting for the footage from the RC car with the Go-Pro on it that Weir kept driving through the fire. Around now I believe Zach received his first Hot Pocket.
With that, I will leave the details of the party to your imaginations.
After all, the first rule of Camp Rimjorb is Dont Talk About Camp Rimjorb.
You will just have to come out and see for yourself.
Because in many ways, it is also an endurance event.
We finished the last stage. Sweet merciful crap, it was done. Some hugged each other, some sat by the finish and downed beers. At least one person literally pissed himself. For my part, I got to the shower and stood there until the water got cold.
A bunch of us hung out around the cabin waiting for the 3 o'clock dinner call. Weir sent Adam on a pizza run; in the meantime we munched on some onion-y things that Sue had pickled which tasted fine but smelled like a laundry basket full of socks.
The WTB guys broke down bikes, and there was a halfhearted attempt at cleaning up the campsite.
Then the 3 man potato launcher came out.
Unsatisfied with the both the range and potential lethality of simply shooting cans across the campsite, Ben began to fire larger (and pointier) objects. After one or two "misfires" (read: near-fatalities), the slingshot was put away. Besides, it was dinnertime.
Dinner was amazing. The food all week was good, but this was something else entirely: chicken cordon bleu, wild rice pilaf, crab cakes - it was freaking awesome. The awards were fun, though it stung a little to miss out on the finishers medal.
I will comment on the inclusiveness of the event: the organizers, without undue pandering or lame "everyone is a winner" bullshit managed to include and address everyone remaining at camp. Regardless of finisher status (there was a lot of attrition), pretty much everyone left that dining hall with a smile.
Weather that smile was due to the food, the swag or the fact that most people had been drinking since 9am was immaterial: in about an hour, the first annual 3 beer derby was going to test a somewhat different skillset than the racers had been utilizing throughout the week.
Rather than give you a boring play-by-play, I will refer you to this video.
Here are some highlights:
- Sometime before the race started, Ben crashed a motorcycle. At 40 miles an hour. Then he challenged some dogs to a game of fetch.
- I was pitting for Dave "The Drunken Flash" Pryor. That meant I shook the shit out of everyone elses beer.
- Drew Haywood. That is all.
- Hash Apples used the Tiny Bike for this event. Its going to take months to clean the Dreadlocked Garth Balls off that saddle.
- Wicknasty talks mad shit on Tj, RyRy and Jpow. The heckling starts 4 months before cross season.
After the race, I started a fire. You know, to keep everyone warm. The WTB boys went on a fuel-gathering mission, Selene danced a whole bunch and Im still waiting for the footage from the RC car with the Go-Pro on it that Weir kept driving through the fire. Around now I believe Zach received his first Hot Pocket.
With that, I will leave the details of the party to your imaginations.
After all, the first rule of Camp Rimjorb is Dont Talk About Camp Rimjorb.
You will just have to come out and see for yourself.
Monday, June 6, 2011
Rider Bio: Claire Nelson
Name: Claire Nelson
Racing Age: 31
Categories: Mountain Bike Cat 1, Road Cat 4
Strengths: technical uphill, muddy and cold and otherwise crappy conditions (on a mtn bike)
Weaknesses: training
Favorite Burrito: pork, vegetables, jalapeños
The Stable: Specialized Epic, Cannondale Cad 9, Flying Pigeon that I brought home from China
Weaknesses: training
Favorite Burrito: pork, vegetables, jalapeños
The Stable: Specialized Epic, Cannondale Cad 9, Flying Pigeon that I brought home from China
How it all began: In Colorado, with a Specialized Rockhopper and a torn ACL
Occupation/job/jobs: Shepard
First race: in Ft Collins with the University of Colorado team
Favorite place to ride: Harold Parker, Borderland, Callahan State Park, foothills of Beijing
First race: in Ft Collins with the University of Colorado team
Favorite place to ride: Harold Parker, Borderland, Callahan State Park, foothills of Beijing
Pre-race Ritual: Letting way too much air out of my tires
Worst/Best Injury: Landing on my nose while night riding with a crappy headlamp in the hills of Beijing
Poignant Thoughts: I'm still working on that.
Worst/Best Injury: Landing on my nose while night riding with a crappy headlamp in the hills of Beijing
Poignant Thoughts: I'm still working on that.
Rider Bio: Ryan Brazell
Name: Ryan BrazellRacing Age: 29
Categories: Road-4, cyclocross-3, track-4, mountain-2
Strengths: track racing, time trial. distance running.
Weaknesses: road racing and gummy worms.
Favorite Burrito: buffalo tofu with brown rice and a wheat wrap
Favorite Race: velocross
The Stable: '11 Cannondale Flash F1, 09' Lapierre, 10' Cannondale Cyclocross 5
Pre-Race Ritual: listening to headphones
How It All Began: made a transition from racing triathlon and distance running.
Worst/Best Injury: outside of a bruised ego and a sprained wrist i have been lucky
Favorite Place to Ride: back home in central ma.
Profession: baker
First race: sterling road race. still hate it.
Transylvania Epic, final stage: Downhill At Last*
*Downhill is a relative term. Type and duration of experience may vary.
So after a long day of being helpful and an even longer night of trying to drain the blisters on my palms and lower the swelling in my knees, I thought I would give riding the ol' tinybike another shot. It seems Im going to need a smaller bike when I get home anyway: my back is so wrecked that I have developed a hunch that would make Marty Feldman look like a cadet at West Point.
We all lined up according to Mullet Staging Rules: Business in the Front, Party at the Rear.
The Business: Top 10 Pro men/ Top 3 singlespeeders/ The One Or Two Guys That Just Wanted To Get This Race Thing Over With.
The Party: All the women - their GC was separated by margins substantial enough that barring a catastrophe, it was settled. And moving up a spot on the podium by a flat tire on the last day is completely lame. The rest of us - were just fucking tired.
I rolled out with Doug Jenne, Dave Pryor and a few other guys with legs emptied of watts and drop bags filled with beer. We puttered happily along, absorbing and depositing riders freely. The long climb didnt seem so bad - nothing is terribly hard when you are riding with guys whose only goal is to get to the checkpoint before all the beer is gone. The downhill separated us out: me and Cush, excited by the prospect of losing perceptible elevation for the first time in a week, got fast and loose (and a little stupid) on the descent.
An already-boozy Ben Cruz awaited us at the checkpoint. We hung out for awhile, waited for the womens field to roll in, then decided that 30 people (some several beers deep) all jamming up the singletrack was not an ideal way to end the week.
About 12 of us hit the trail.
The climb out of the aid station was rough - super steep, pretty loose and littered with guys that stopped giving a fuck 3 days ago. Ben and I made it to the top without walking (I, for one, had quite enough walking for a week) and just kept rolling along.
Riding with Ben was awesome. We had exactly the same philosophy about this last half of the race: Slow up the hills, and get your moneys worth on the descents.
And today, we finally had some "down time".
Im not sure why they saved some of the best descending for the last day. Maybe the relative downhill greatness was simply a matter of perspective: when you spend 7 days going up, having to get out of the saddle for something that isnt another climb feels freaking awesome.
Regardless, we were flying down some of those trails: sadly, where Ben was "killing it", I was just "slightly wounding it" - though back-wheeling some of those turns was pretty god-damn satisfying, the Tiny Bike was a bit overmatched here.
According to Ben, we broke 40 miles an hour on the singletrack next to an electric fence.
We rolled in, got interviewed and showered the last of the Pennsylvania Swamp off me.
(I look ridiculous in that interview: The sun was peeping out behind a tree behind Colt, so I was pretty much blind in one eye. I also use "belt sander" and "taint" together in a sentence.)
My back hurt like hell, but getting to ride those trails again was worth it.
Race notes:
Morgan Miller took advantage of Dickys flat tire to move up to second overall in the single speed category. Hope that felt good, dude.
Justin Lindine won the stage, and finished just off the podium for 4th overall. On a 26" hardtail.
The womens field was all class, with Local-By-Way-Of-Scotland fast girl Vicky Barclay leading them home.
You cant do a turndown with a 120mm stem. You just cant.
I cant independently verify this, but I have sources that tell me that at least 3 camelbaks were filled with beer instead of water.
So after a long day of being helpful and an even longer night of trying to drain the blisters on my palms and lower the swelling in my knees, I thought I would give riding the ol' tinybike another shot. It seems Im going to need a smaller bike when I get home anyway: my back is so wrecked that I have developed a hunch that would make Marty Feldman look like a cadet at West Point.
We all lined up according to Mullet Staging Rules: Business in the Front, Party at the Rear.
The Business: Top 10 Pro men/ Top 3 singlespeeders/ The One Or Two Guys That Just Wanted To Get This Race Thing Over With.
The Party: All the women - their GC was separated by margins substantial enough that barring a catastrophe, it was settled. And moving up a spot on the podium by a flat tire on the last day is completely lame. The rest of us - were just fucking tired.
I rolled out with Doug Jenne, Dave Pryor and a few other guys with legs emptied of watts and drop bags filled with beer. We puttered happily along, absorbing and depositing riders freely. The long climb didnt seem so bad - nothing is terribly hard when you are riding with guys whose only goal is to get to the checkpoint before all the beer is gone. The downhill separated us out: me and Cush, excited by the prospect of losing perceptible elevation for the first time in a week, got fast and loose (and a little stupid) on the descent.
An already-boozy Ben Cruz awaited us at the checkpoint. We hung out for awhile, waited for the womens field to roll in, then decided that 30 people (some several beers deep) all jamming up the singletrack was not an ideal way to end the week.
About 12 of us hit the trail.
The climb out of the aid station was rough - super steep, pretty loose and littered with guys that stopped giving a fuck 3 days ago. Ben and I made it to the top without walking (I, for one, had quite enough walking for a week) and just kept rolling along.
Riding with Ben was awesome. We had exactly the same philosophy about this last half of the race: Slow up the hills, and get your moneys worth on the descents.
And today, we finally had some "down time".
Im not sure why they saved some of the best descending for the last day. Maybe the relative downhill greatness was simply a matter of perspective: when you spend 7 days going up, having to get out of the saddle for something that isnt another climb feels freaking awesome.
Regardless, we were flying down some of those trails: sadly, where Ben was "killing it", I was just "slightly wounding it" - though back-wheeling some of those turns was pretty god-damn satisfying, the Tiny Bike was a bit overmatched here.
According to Ben, we broke 40 miles an hour on the singletrack next to an electric fence.
We rolled in, got interviewed and showered the last of the Pennsylvania Swamp off me.
(I look ridiculous in that interview: The sun was peeping out behind a tree behind Colt, so I was pretty much blind in one eye. I also use "belt sander" and "taint" together in a sentence.)
My back hurt like hell, but getting to ride those trails again was worth it.
Race notes:
Morgan Miller took advantage of Dickys flat tire to move up to second overall in the single speed category. Hope that felt good, dude.
Justin Lindine won the stage, and finished just off the podium for 4th overall. On a 26" hardtail.
The womens field was all class, with Local-By-Way-Of-Scotland fast girl Vicky Barclay leading them home.
You cant do a turndown with a 120mm stem. You just cant.
I cant independently verify this, but I have sources that tell me that at least 3 camelbaks were filled with beer instead of water.
transylvania epic stage 5 is missing?
the internet ate my post about this stage.
it was titled "helpful" because i was very helpful.
I didnt crash, break anything or get attacked by bees, so none of you would find it that interesting anyway.
the takeaway was this: next time you are at a race, and there is some dude sitting at a corner with a yellow vest and a flag telling you which way to go, or you get to a checkpoint and there are 6 people trying to get you a bottle or stuff ho-hos in your dry, gorping face - throw a few hi fives their way.
setting up all that shit is harder than any of us realize!
it was titled "helpful" because i was very helpful.
I didnt crash, break anything or get attacked by bees, so none of you would find it that interesting anyway.
the takeaway was this: next time you are at a race, and there is some dude sitting at a corner with a yellow vest and a flag telling you which way to go, or you get to a checkpoint and there are 6 people trying to get you a bottle or stuff ho-hos in your dry, gorping face - throw a few hi fives their way.
setting up all that shit is harder than any of us realize!
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Transylvania stage 4: Sweeping
So after two full days of leading the "Full Suspension 26 inch BMX" category, I decided the tiny bike wasnt going to cut it anymore. My body was pretty well ruined after yesterday. The doc took a look at me and sent me packing with enough Motrin to shrink Marlon Brando 3 full pant sizes. It helped a little, as standing up this morning was somewhat less dreadful than I feared.
I had volunteered my services (such as they are) to Mike and Ray the evening before, and they suggested that I could pull sweep detail - you know follow along in between starts, change flats etc.
I should probably mention that today is "mini-downhill day", or "Weir Gets To Wear His Hockey Jersey Day".
Im thinking that the minibike is not the best answer for tearing around after the pack while they ride on the road to all the start areas. I notice an old Diamondback leaning against the main office. I ask Mike if I could use it for the day.
It took me awhile to figure out why he said "yeah... sure" with such confusion.
You see, I wasnt just setting up a checkpoint and following the field around on the road - I was following them down each descent.
Pants, meet shit.
They staged everyone more or less according to category. There was a row of racers, some instructions via megaphone, then a Picketts Charge style dash for the holeshot. We (the sweepers) hung out until the last group went, then rolled out. Our job was to help out with flat fixes, broken parts, emergencies and course marker collection.
It was also our job to make it down in one piece.
Standing in the way of the latter goal was Mike Khuns Wifes '92 Diamondback. This once-worthy steed was fully rigid, had some kind of knobless 1.5 inch tires and old style toe cage pedals (without the cage). It did, however, have a suspension seatpost. I was in for it.
At first, things went really well. We picked up a few guys with flats, fixed them, grabbed a few arrows - it was rocky, but nothing too terrifying. I remember it being much worse.
It was.
I have never really ridden a rigid bike. My introduction to mountain biking was well after the advent of functional suspension. True, some people still choose to ride fully rigid bikes. But then, some people choose to watch internet videos of dudes pooping on each other.
My first foray into the good old days of mountain biking was a bone shaking journey down an old stream bed. This quickly became an active stream bed, and I was weaving around like a driver on Marthas Vineyard after the bars close.
I would like to point out that just at this moment, Jeremiahs (actually quite adorable) little boy came up to me and informed me that his daddy was "pooping in the bathroom". Solid work, little dude.
The rest of the day went mostly the same, long intervals of pedaling punctuated by brief periods of abject terror. The guy I was riding with said it looked like one of those police videos where they have already shot out the perps tires and hes still trying to flee the scene.
Dear god my arms got worked. It felt as though I had been running a jackhammer against a the floor of a bouncy castle all day long.
There were a few pant-dampening moments, but I was able to keep it upright and not get Mike in trouble for letting the guy who was most likely to destroy her use it on the most brutal stage.
It was great fun.
We must have fixed a dozen flats, searched everywhere for a missing camera, collected a bunch of dropped bottles, and took down about a hundred course arrows.
Unfortunately, there was more bad news for New England - Justin "Weight Of A Region" Lindine took a rock to the leg pretty hard. He is still looking good for GC, but send him some love... hes going to need it tomorrow.
In other race news:
Adam Snyders Excuse Post broke, so I think Weir is winning.
Weir wore a hockey jersey today. No shit.
Selene Yeager can well and truly kill a holeshot.
Someone in the "epic team" category is wearing a whole family of dead marmots.
I just ate half a chicken and two bowls of ice cream.
I had volunteered my services (such as they are) to Mike and Ray the evening before, and they suggested that I could pull sweep detail - you know follow along in between starts, change flats etc.
I should probably mention that today is "mini-downhill day", or "Weir Gets To Wear His Hockey Jersey Day".
Im thinking that the minibike is not the best answer for tearing around after the pack while they ride on the road to all the start areas. I notice an old Diamondback leaning against the main office. I ask Mike if I could use it for the day.
It took me awhile to figure out why he said "yeah... sure" with such confusion.
You see, I wasnt just setting up a checkpoint and following the field around on the road - I was following them down each descent.
Pants, meet shit.
They staged everyone more or less according to category. There was a row of racers, some instructions via megaphone, then a Picketts Charge style dash for the holeshot. We (the sweepers) hung out until the last group went, then rolled out. Our job was to help out with flat fixes, broken parts, emergencies and course marker collection.
It was also our job to make it down in one piece.
Standing in the way of the latter goal was Mike Khuns Wifes '92 Diamondback. This once-worthy steed was fully rigid, had some kind of knobless 1.5 inch tires and old style toe cage pedals (without the cage). It did, however, have a suspension seatpost. I was in for it.
At first, things went really well. We picked up a few guys with flats, fixed them, grabbed a few arrows - it was rocky, but nothing too terrifying. I remember it being much worse.
It was.
I have never really ridden a rigid bike. My introduction to mountain biking was well after the advent of functional suspension. True, some people still choose to ride fully rigid bikes. But then, some people choose to watch internet videos of dudes pooping on each other.
My first foray into the good old days of mountain biking was a bone shaking journey down an old stream bed. This quickly became an active stream bed, and I was weaving around like a driver on Marthas Vineyard after the bars close.
I would like to point out that just at this moment, Jeremiahs (actually quite adorable) little boy came up to me and informed me that his daddy was "pooping in the bathroom". Solid work, little dude.
The rest of the day went mostly the same, long intervals of pedaling punctuated by brief periods of abject terror. The guy I was riding with said it looked like one of those police videos where they have already shot out the perps tires and hes still trying to flee the scene.
Dear god my arms got worked. It felt as though I had been running a jackhammer against a the floor of a bouncy castle all day long.
There were a few pant-dampening moments, but I was able to keep it upright and not get Mike in trouble for letting the guy who was most likely to destroy her use it on the most brutal stage.
It was great fun.
We must have fixed a dozen flats, searched everywhere for a missing camera, collected a bunch of dropped bottles, and took down about a hundred course arrows.
Unfortunately, there was more bad news for New England - Justin "Weight Of A Region" Lindine took a rock to the leg pretty hard. He is still looking good for GC, but send him some love... hes going to need it tomorrow.
In other race news:
Adam Snyders Excuse Post broke, so I think Weir is winning.
Weir wore a hockey jersey today. No shit.
Selene Yeager can well and truly kill a holeshot.
Someone in the "epic team" category is wearing a whole family of dead marmots.
I just ate half a chicken and two bowls of ice cream.
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Transylvania Epic Stage 3: Consequences
I havent been sleeping well.
Maybe its how sticky this place gets, or maybe the fact that the center of my mattress is at least 6 inches below the part I put my pillow on. Regardless, its long nights that make for long days. And today was a long, long day.
It started off well enough - today was our first remote start, about an hour away at Raystown. I have already described how awesome these trails are here, so instead of filling up valuable internet space with duplicate information about their awesomeness, I will provide you with this picture:
We went off in waves, and my group went first. They started us on a hill to break things up before the start. I wasnt going to contest any sort of holeshot, but I discovered yesterday that sitting and pedalling is very hard on my knees, so it looked like I was going for it. I was "leading" the "chase group" for a bit: a few of us packfodder straining and grunting to get a glimpse of Jeremiahs hindquarters, all impotently praying for more watts, bigger legs and smaller midsections: The Flaccid and the Furious.
Things broke up again, I drifted back when the burly singlespeed leader came stampeding through. Usually more than one creature is required to compose a "stampede", but in this instance I feel justified in using the term. Regardless, I was having a blast. Early on, it didnt occur to me how much I was standing up.
You see, the bike I am currently using is 2 sizes too small. To mitigate these unfortunate circumstances, I have made the following adjustments:
1. Put on a 120mm stem that was in my car.
2. Use my current handlebar (700mm).
3. Extend seatpost well beyond any reasonable safe limit.
4. Slam seat all the way back.
Now if you know anything at all about proper setup on a mountain bike, you will immediately come to the conclusion that this bike is going to handle like shit.
Yesterday on the long road stage, I didnt have to do a whole lot of bike handling - I stood up on almost all the climbs, but other than sore hands and a stiff back, I was fine. Raystown is a different animal entirely.
First of all, there was more climbing (!). 6500 feet in 45 miles, to be precise. Second, there are all kinds of tabletops, bump jumps, berms and kickers mixed in with the standard trail fare. This kind of riding requires a good deal of finesse, something that gets lost when you are sitting bolt upright with your saddle an inch too low.
As I said earlier, I was having too much fun to notice how often I stood up. I hung out and heckled Dicky a bit, trying to motivate him to keep his jersey, caught Hash Apples and yelled at him, rode with Cushionbury and a bunch of other people until Amanda Carey and Sue Haywood caught me.
I hung on to those two for the better part of 10 miles - I was getting a clinic from two of the most accomplished racers in the country. They were effortless. Sue was pumping through the back end of the jumps like a less-bald Weir and Amanda was crushing the climbs in a gear that simply did not exist on my bike. I rolled with them until we caught some other folks, then they made it through and I did not.
Not that I would have survived much longer - my back had really, really begun to bother me. Anytime the trail went up, I stood. Every time I stood, I could look down and be almost in front of my wheel. So began the not-terribly-delicate dance of man vs. bike vs. loose gravel. And to make matters worse, sitting down had begun to enter a new dimension of pain.
I have begun to develop a saddle sore the size of a small Balkan nation.
We will call this nation Oozebekistan.
Its economy seems to be based on selling arms to the insurgents in the muscles connected to my spinal column, because the larger the sore became, the more my back would give me problems. It would also appear that chamois cream, regardless of type or amount, has no effect at all on this grape sized anomaly enhancing the topography of my Gluteus Mons.
It didnt take my knees long to get in on this auto beat-down. Sitting too low strains the patella, and mine were starting to sing me a song.
It was with just about every muscle in my body clenched that I entered the second checkpoint. I was going to abandon. I felt like crap, everything hurt, and I had started making stupid mistakes (more so, I suppose, than usual).
It should surprise no one that I opted to complete the race.
Yes, despite blisters, bad knees, a stiff back and a saddle sore that had Reinhold Messner packing for an expedition I went back out.
It should also surprise no one that things went from bad to worse very, very quickly.
My body, with the few minutes it had to rest, froze up. I was somehow even less flexible than I was before. To be fair, it was like going from Charles Bronson to Boris Karloff, but still. This was getting unsustainable.
Loads of people passed me. I said hi, waved, and crawled back into my hurt-hut. Either me or the bike started to creak (equal chances of both). Then the Topeak-Ergon girl (I totally forgot her name, and am too tired to walk over to the results to check. What a jerk.) passed me, and after we exchanged a trail-hello, literally everything on my body stopped working properly.
The inevitable came when I leaned into a downhill switchback. I was over the front, and when I went to push through the apex, my body did not respond. The result was all one hundred fifty pounds of my weight over the front tire, and exactly zero pounds over the part that needed the most traction.
The back of the bike unweighted, and started to slide around. Luckily, it did not quite make a full 180 degree turn. Unluckily, it was because a tree stopped it.
Good news, everyone.
The bike is mostly ok.
Unfortunately, my spine broke its fall.
And the back tire tore off the rim, ripping a big hole in the sidewall (just for good measure).
Now Im sitting in the middle of the woods, I have no idea how far it is to the end (well, between 15 and 0 miles), Im not entirely sure about standing up, AND MY FUCKING TIRE IS FLAT.
I started trudging away as soon as it became clear that a new tube wouldnt solve the problem. I walked (or rode the rim on some of the descents) the entirety of the "hydro loop" only to get back to a point that I could have just cut the course by 3 miles.
I was now at the point of wanting to take hostages. Furiously, I hopped, limped, tripped and gimped my way to the finish. I walked through the line, dropped my bike, walked behind the bathroom and sat down, wanting to examine the new and exciting blisters that I had acquired over the last 2 hours.
I was leaning on a wasps nest.
Goodnight, folks.
Maybe its how sticky this place gets, or maybe the fact that the center of my mattress is at least 6 inches below the part I put my pillow on. Regardless, its long nights that make for long days. And today was a long, long day.
It started off well enough - today was our first remote start, about an hour away at Raystown. I have already described how awesome these trails are here, so instead of filling up valuable internet space with duplicate information about their awesomeness, I will provide you with this picture:
We went off in waves, and my group went first. They started us on a hill to break things up before the start. I wasnt going to contest any sort of holeshot, but I discovered yesterday that sitting and pedalling is very hard on my knees, so it looked like I was going for it. I was "leading" the "chase group" for a bit: a few of us packfodder straining and grunting to get a glimpse of Jeremiahs hindquarters, all impotently praying for more watts, bigger legs and smaller midsections: The Flaccid and the Furious.
Things broke up again, I drifted back when the burly singlespeed leader came stampeding through. Usually more than one creature is required to compose a "stampede", but in this instance I feel justified in using the term. Regardless, I was having a blast. Early on, it didnt occur to me how much I was standing up.
You see, the bike I am currently using is 2 sizes too small. To mitigate these unfortunate circumstances, I have made the following adjustments:
1. Put on a 120mm stem that was in my car.
2. Use my current handlebar (700mm).
3. Extend seatpost well beyond any reasonable safe limit.
4. Slam seat all the way back.
Now if you know anything at all about proper setup on a mountain bike, you will immediately come to the conclusion that this bike is going to handle like shit.
Yesterday on the long road stage, I didnt have to do a whole lot of bike handling - I stood up on almost all the climbs, but other than sore hands and a stiff back, I was fine. Raystown is a different animal entirely.
First of all, there was more climbing (!). 6500 feet in 45 miles, to be precise. Second, there are all kinds of tabletops, bump jumps, berms and kickers mixed in with the standard trail fare. This kind of riding requires a good deal of finesse, something that gets lost when you are sitting bolt upright with your saddle an inch too low.
As I said earlier, I was having too much fun to notice how often I stood up. I hung out and heckled Dicky a bit, trying to motivate him to keep his jersey, caught Hash Apples and yelled at him, rode with Cushionbury and a bunch of other people until Amanda Carey and Sue Haywood caught me.
I hung on to those two for the better part of 10 miles - I was getting a clinic from two of the most accomplished racers in the country. They were effortless. Sue was pumping through the back end of the jumps like a less-bald Weir and Amanda was crushing the climbs in a gear that simply did not exist on my bike. I rolled with them until we caught some other folks, then they made it through and I did not.
Not that I would have survived much longer - my back had really, really begun to bother me. Anytime the trail went up, I stood. Every time I stood, I could look down and be almost in front of my wheel. So began the not-terribly-delicate dance of man vs. bike vs. loose gravel. And to make matters worse, sitting down had begun to enter a new dimension of pain.
I have begun to develop a saddle sore the size of a small Balkan nation.
We will call this nation Oozebekistan.
Its economy seems to be based on selling arms to the insurgents in the muscles connected to my spinal column, because the larger the sore became, the more my back would give me problems. It would also appear that chamois cream, regardless of type or amount, has no effect at all on this grape sized anomaly enhancing the topography of my Gluteus Mons.
It didnt take my knees long to get in on this auto beat-down. Sitting too low strains the patella, and mine were starting to sing me a song.
It was with just about every muscle in my body clenched that I entered the second checkpoint. I was going to abandon. I felt like crap, everything hurt, and I had started making stupid mistakes (more so, I suppose, than usual).
It should surprise no one that I opted to complete the race.
Yes, despite blisters, bad knees, a stiff back and a saddle sore that had Reinhold Messner packing for an expedition I went back out.
It should also surprise no one that things went from bad to worse very, very quickly.
My body, with the few minutes it had to rest, froze up. I was somehow even less flexible than I was before. To be fair, it was like going from Charles Bronson to Boris Karloff, but still. This was getting unsustainable.
Loads of people passed me. I said hi, waved, and crawled back into my hurt-hut. Either me or the bike started to creak (equal chances of both). Then the Topeak-Ergon girl (I totally forgot her name, and am too tired to walk over to the results to check. What a jerk.) passed me, and after we exchanged a trail-hello, literally everything on my body stopped working properly.
The inevitable came when I leaned into a downhill switchback. I was over the front, and when I went to push through the apex, my body did not respond. The result was all one hundred fifty pounds of my weight over the front tire, and exactly zero pounds over the part that needed the most traction.
The back of the bike unweighted, and started to slide around. Luckily, it did not quite make a full 180 degree turn. Unluckily, it was because a tree stopped it.
Good news, everyone.
The bike is mostly ok.
Unfortunately, my spine broke its fall.
And the back tire tore off the rim, ripping a big hole in the sidewall (just for good measure).
Now Im sitting in the middle of the woods, I have no idea how far it is to the end (well, between 15 and 0 miles), Im not entirely sure about standing up, AND MY FUCKING TIRE IS FLAT.
I started trudging away as soon as it became clear that a new tube wouldnt solve the problem. I walked (or rode the rim on some of the descents) the entirety of the "hydro loop" only to get back to a point that I could have just cut the course by 3 miles.
I was now at the point of wanting to take hostages. Furiously, I hopped, limped, tripped and gimped my way to the finish. I walked through the line, dropped my bike, walked behind the bathroom and sat down, wanting to examine the new and exciting blisters that I had acquired over the last 2 hours.
I was leaning on a wasps nest.
Goodnight, folks.
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