Back Bay Cycling Club - B2C2

B2C2 First Ever The Training Camp

2012-01-18T20:05:00.001-05:00

With an exactly perfect convergence of "days off" and "mild weather", Josh suggested that we do a "mini-camp" of sorts - a three day block of long, difficult training rides. He suggested Wachusett, I threw in a trip up and down the Kanck, and I think Ian talked about the Harvard loop. Upon review of the temperatures in central Mass and New Hampshire, I got it in my head to secure an off season hotel room on balmy, mostly uninhabited cape cod.

In the week preceding our adventure I reserved a hotel room, pored over maps, made cue sheets, cooked enough food to supply a platoon of hungry marines and obsessively checked the weather. Which looked surprisingly mild for this time of year - no precipitation, with temperatures all north of freezing for the weekend. I planned accordingly.

That last bit will be important later.

There were six of us for the trip: me (Mike), longtime teammate Ian, new(ish) recruits Preston, Hughes and Liam, and BU racer Dave. We met before sunup on Friday, packed into 2 cars and drove to West Yarmouth.

In a rainstorm.

Refusing to let Mother Nature pee on our pain-parade, we checked in to our 15x15 habitation cube, liberally applied chamois cream to our still-intact underparts and rolled out - under cloudy, but rain-free skies. The roads were still wet, but it was quite warm. So besides the wheel spray (no one had thought to bring fenders) plastering us with road grit, spirits were high. We figured a little Belgian toothpaste never hurt anyone.

Day 1: Wind

That first day we cruised out toward Truro like champs. We capitalized on a steady (and unbeknown to us, increasing) tailwind and fresh legs to approach 30 mile and hour cruising speeds on the mostly-abandoned rail trail. We had "Bed Sprints" at overpasses and town lines (2 beds and 6 dudes made for hotly-contested events) and energetic pacelines. The first 45 miles felt like the Cape had given us superpowers.

Unfortunately for us, what the Cape giveth, a 40 mile an hour headwind on the return journey taketh away.

At first, it was just a bit harder. Traveling mostly south through Truro, we were hit with a steady front-crosswind. We took turns at the front, rotating through frequently and still cheerfully talking amongst ourselves. The bike path was a bit more sheltered, but the wind was head-on. Preston established that he was somewhat more in shape than the rest of us by playing tugboat for much of the way.

Coming off the rail trail, we were hit with the most vicious blast of wattage-destroying wind I have ever experienced. According to Ians power tap, we were pushing threshold wattage at 12 miles an hour. Occasionally, the wind would shift suddenly, tossing one of us (usually Ian, our lankiest teammate) onto the sidewalk. I had to piss so bad it hurt, but I was sure the added urine-weight was the only thing keeping me from getting picked up and tossed into the ocean.

Never had a ride gone from "enjoyable" to "survival" so quickly.

Eventually, we all made it back. I jumped into the room while the others were still filtering in, hoping to warm up some food for the guys. I got the Tupperware in the microwave, turned it on, started getting our plates out and... blew a fuse. Awesome. I ran down to the desk and talked to the girl at the counter. She got the fuse reset, I plugged the microwave into a different outlet (the one that had a hairdryer attached) and tried again. Same result. Back down to the desk, sheepishly explaining that I was not in fact here to test her patience, but just wanted to heat up food for the six guys sharing the single room I had rented.

She was surprisingly accommodating, offering up the staff microwave to heat the 2 gallons of chicken tikka I had prepared.

Warm-ish chicken and rice stuffed into faces made bright red by wind-blasted sand, we got "comfortable". Preston informed us that the average wind speed was 40mph, with gusts over 70.

Day 2: Getting it right.

We were up early, ate our oatmeal and made sandwiches for the ride. It would be slightly colder today, but much less windy. Dressed appropriately, we struck out on the same path as the day before. We figured that we would want to go inland on the last day - which weather reports made colder and colder by the hour - because we could cut the ride short if temperature dictated.

Saturdays ride was glorious. We followed the rail trail to its conclusion, but instead of wandering aimlessly through the back roads and "transfer stations" (Capespeak for "dump") we followed the marked bike route. There was some wind, but after yesterdays jet-engine hellblast it was eminently tolerable. The scenery was fantastic - riding along the abandoned beaches, rows of empty houses and rolling dunes was a needed change from the familiar sights of the Dover loop.

Idyllic surroundings aside, we were approaching 12 hours of in 2 days - something some of us were more used to than others. Ian and I had just resumed training after taking some time off after a busy cross season, but have several seasons of racing to fall back on. Preston has been training for a run at collegiate nationals since October and has amassed an impressive collection of watts this winter. Dave (until recently a rower) and Liam (a mountainbiker) had never done anything like this before. AND were both on unfamiliar bikes.

Clearly a recipe for success.

Liam made it about 45 miles and needed to pack it in due to back pain. He gamely hung on, but putting in literally hundreds of miles in an entirely new position was only going to do permanent damage. Dave was on a bike he just purchased and had fitted, so it was a bit less taxing. Still, it took him some time to settle in and find a comfortable rhythm.

I would also point out that I (Mr. Experienced Bike Racer) was riding on a Brand New Saddle. Do not ever do this. Ever. For the love of whatever God you pray to. There is simply not enough Bag Balm on this earth to repair the damage.

We got back to the hotel and set about preparing dinner. I had grilled ham and cheese along with orzo and sweet potato salad on the menu, but didnt want to bother the guy behind the desk to heat everything up. So we melted the butter, cinnamon and brown sugar in the coffee pot and poured it over the lukewarm mixture of orzo, sweet potato and goat cheese - it actually worked (really!).

I should at this point say something about the state of the room. Actually, I give you this:

Yeah, six guys in a 15x15 box. The toilet was literally sweating.

Day 3: Necessity Is The Mother Of Repurposed Hand Towels

So with the high temperature on Sunday going to be somewhere between "Witches Teat" and "Welldiggers Arse", we each got to find out exactly which ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL piece of cold weather gear we left behind. In my case, it was a heavier outer shell. In Liams case, however:

Yes. We made covers out of a hand towel and taped him into his shoes.

It was cold. Really cold. And snowing. No one at any point said anything about snow. We rode out to the end of the rail trail, but the roads were so bad that we decided to just do a few laps on the path to get the necessary time in. Here I am with icicles hanging from my beard:

Sometime after this was taken, Dave and Liam took shelter in a convenience store. It would seem that our insulation attempt was an almost complete failure.

We DID make it back though! After thoroughly cleaning the room (the table with the bags of Heed had piles of white powder all over it. This looked... bad) we went over to the Cape Cod Golden Buffet and proceeded to hurt ourselves in ways that made riding 300 miles in 3 days seem like a pleasant alternative to deep-fried intestinal pummeling.

All in all, a great trip!

End of season recap.

2012-01-07T13:20:00.001-05:00

Cross season went by so fast! 23 races didn't seem like 23 races to me. Sadly, my 2nd to last engineering semester was weighing down on me the whole time with all nighters and lots of energy drinks, which are actually just the opposite of training. Regardless, the season was great! I had my first win at Mansfield Hollow, a 2nd Place at Canton and then moved up to the elites for the rest of the season with my first UCI event at NBX. Trust me when I say that it was the best decision of my cycling career to upgrade, and I really mean it. When people talk about going to Europe and really learning how to aggressive and race, I felt the same way about my UCI and elite races, trying my hardest not to get lapped. I rode my bike so very hard. Harder than I ever had in my entire life, just to not get lapped, and I got lapped both days right before the finish! I learned a lot this season and everyone in New England was so supportive of me. Even on days where I didn't race my best, there was truly no place that I would rather have been than out somewhere racing and hanging out with the NECX crew. So unfortunately this is my only post of the season due to school, but maybe next year when I am hopefully employed I'll have a little more time to let the world outside New England know what I am up to.

Goals for next season: Lead lap in UCI. Sleep more. Train as much if not more than this year. Hopefully stay in New England to continue racing with B2C2.

Special thanks to Mavic, Boloco, The Lenox Hotel, Vive, Back Bay Bikes and all my teammates for making this season so amazing.

See you all on the road in march.

Happy End-Of-Cross Season!

2011-12-22T10:33:00.001-05:00

For most of us, anyway.

Now begins the long, dark winter - and a new year for the team.

There has been a bout of radio silence here, due in part to my wedding and subsequent million race weekends (that is actually a lie- it is due entirely to my aversion to typing for any amount of time on this i-pad. The autocorrect feature drives me to fits of violent, white-hot rage).

This will be amended (mostly by stealing my wifes laptop).

There are some good things in store for next season. And I promise to write about them.

See you on the icy roads around Boston.

Landmines, bee stings and competitive eating (GMCX weekend)

2011-09-21T16:37:00.000-04:00

This will have to be short, because I have wedding crap to do.

- the organization and staff (with the exception of the one angry lady) were great. Sadly, the course was somewhat... Uninspired.

- Donny Green hit a land mine in front of me on day one.

- UVM kids make for good crowds, even if they wanted Hamlin to (I think the phrase was) "kick my nuts off".

- Ted King beat me so bad that my mom called to see if I was ok.

- Adam Sullivan is a human tow truck. His watts are mighty. If you combine us, we make an actual bike racer.

- I got stung by a bee.

- I'm going to blame my dismal performance all weekend on that bee.

- greg thusly killed it on day 2.

- in case you didn't know, the cat 3 race is now officially the juniors race.

- we did unspeakable things to the facilities at Motel 6.

- I'm getting married in, like, a week.

Rider Bio: Lauren Kling

2011-07-15T13:55:00.002-04:00

Name: Lauren Kling
Racing Age: 25
Discipline(s)/Categories: Road (4), Mountain (1), Cyclocross (2), Track (4)
Strengths: Power/sprinting, hosting pizza potlucks, baking tasty things for
races
Weaknesses: Turning, having to use the bathroom when being called to staging
Favorite Burrito: Buffalo on a whole wheat wrap with tomato salsa, lettuce,
and NO celery!
Favorite Race: Cycle-Smart International at NoHo for the course, Ice Weasels
for the craziness
The Stable: '07 Cannondale Synapse Fem, '09 Cannondale CX, '08 Specialized
SJ FSR Expert, Icarus custom track bike, IRO haggard commuter mess, a
hardtail that I cobbled together from everyone's used parts bin, and a
flipping sweet bike rack to store them all on.
How It All Began: I told everyone I wanted to race track bikes before I even
had a bike. No one believed me. I got a hybrid, then I got a track bike,
then I raced track bikes, then I was hooked.
Pre-race Ritual: Remembering to use the bathroom before getting called to
staging
Worst/Best Injury: I acquire more bruises and cuts than serious injury, but
on my 2nd or 3rd time mountain biking it was gross and raining and I managed
to slice my ankle open to the muscle with my chainring sliding out on a wet
rock. I had to ride out of the woods to get to a doctor & the worst part was
getting it filled with mud under my skin that all had to be cleaned out
before stitching it up.

Rider Bio: Michael Wissell

2011-07-15T13:54:00.000-04:00

Name: Michael Wissell
Racing Age: 33
Discipline(s)/Categories: cat 2 Cyclocross, cat 1 MTB, Cat 3 Road
Strengths: Making it hurt.
Weaknesses: Burritos
Favorite Burrito: Buffalo Chicken
Favorite Race: The Transylvania Epic
Personal Internets: Neuroscience, Rope.
The Stable: For road racing, I have a stock Cannondale CAAD10 4. In
the woods, I use a mostly-stock Cannondale Scalpel 2. For cyclocross
season I have a Specialized Crux with parts in varying states of
functionality.
Craziest Ride: Stage 2, Transylvania Epic 2010.
How It All Began: at age 30 i thought it would be a good idea to race
bikes. I still dont know why.
Pre-race Ritual: The Tandoori Two Step.
Worst/Best Injury: tie: broken pelvis/ broken knee. Thai boxers are tough.
Poignant Thoughts: It could be that the purpose of your life is to
serve as a warning to others.

Transylvania Epic: Final Thoughts.

2011-06-21T13:12:00.001-04:00

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.

The Freshly-Moistened Chamois of Success.

2011-06-14T13:16:00.001-04:00

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.

Rider Bio: Matt Casserly

2011-06-08T16:34:00.000-04:00

Name: Matt Casserly
Racing Age: 24
Categories: Road Cat 3; CX Cat 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

2011-06-08T16:27:00.000-04:00

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.

Transylvania epic stage 8: party at rimjorb.

2011-06-07T11:28:00.000-04:00

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.

Rider Bio: Claire Nelson

2011-06-06T17:08:00.000-04:00

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

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

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.

Rider Bio: Ryan Brazell

2011-06-06T16:57:00.000-04:00

Name: Ryan Brazell
Racing 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' Lappiere,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*

2011-06-06T14:17:00.001-04:00

*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.

transylvania epic stage 5 is missing?

2011-06-06T13:21:00.000-04:00

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!

Transylvania stage 4: Sweeping

2011-06-02T19:55:00.000-04:00

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.

Transylvania Epic Stage 3: Consequences

2011-06-01T21:13:00.000-04:00

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.

Transylvania Epic Stage 3: Its All Downhill From Here

2011-05-31T19:33:00.000-04:00

... At least, thats what the lady at the aid station told us 15 miles and 3 climbs to the finish.

huh.

As most of you know, I am no longer "racing" the Transylvania Epic. However, one of the nice things about this event is that if some unforeseen catastrophe befalls you (or say, your brand-new bike) you are at least allowed to continue riding and check out the scenery. And holy crap, was this a day for it.

First, I should say that I woke up this morning to the following spectacle:

Ladies, meet Ben Cruz.

Bens dedication to sleevelessness extends well past his waking hours.

I think that this is also a good time to point out that I have more flies on and around my body than I thought physically possible. Its like the streets of Calcutta around this picnic table. I just removed a fly from INSIDE one of my blisters.

So Im not racing. In an attempt to remain (or at least feel) useful, I told Mike and Ray I would ride around with a Go-Pro camera and talk to the folks at the back/ middle of the race. Not that I have ever used a Go-Pro. I loaded up with tubes and bottles and lined up at the back of the race.

The "neutral start" (you will notice I keep putting that in quotes) rolled out of camp, climbed up a dirt road and through the woods for a bit, then deposited us on some of the most enjoyable descending in the race so far. Right after the trail went down, a rider was stopped on the side of the trail. I gave him my multitool. This will be important later.

A minute later I came upon Barry Wicks trying to fix his wheel with a rock.

Big Wicks has the best attitude ever. Hes a funny dude, and even when his GC hopes were getting pummeled out of his wheel by a fist-sized chunk of Pennsylvania shale, he still had a good sense of humor about it.

After I saw Wicks off, Rebecca Rusch came screaming down the trail in a train of very serious-looking women. There was a slightly confusing turn before the singletrack, and they went the wrong way. I followed them for a bit, trying to get some footage, but then I noticed something odd about how my bike was riding.

Remember how I said I lent out my multitool? Yeah, that guy passed me while I was hanging with Wicks. And it just so happened that my handlebar was loose. Apparently, in my haste to put together a functioning ride, I didnt torque the bolts down enough.

I also didnt want to stop in the middle of a singletrack downhill, so I babied it the rest of the way down and waited for another good samaritan. Trouble was, I was ALREADY at the back of the race. Luckily, a friendly straggler was kind enough to let me use hers.

The next victim was Ross Schnell (or "that pro guy with worse luck than me"). His pedal bound up and spun off the crankarm. It took him an hour to get himself out of that mess. After the race, I lent him Caitlins set of Crank Bros. Hopefully he can make it through one stage without incident.

I was way off the back. On the first climb, I finally started to see people. I hung out, talked a bit - it was cool. After every race, all the pros get interviewed - it was interesting to hear regular peoples reasons and motivation for coming out and doing such a difficult event.

It was a completely different perspective for me, as well. I am used to BIKE RACING... not that I am particularly good at it, its just what Ive been doing for the last few years. To look at an event like this as an actual "vacation" is something I have never even considered.

But most of the folks I talked to were doing just that. Many had come down with their whole family: there are ample facilities, stuff to do besides wait for the race to end (they give you this huge packet of local attractions) and it sure as hell beats sitting around in a hotel room. For some of these guys and girls, it was about pushing themselves - to others, it was about enjoying the scenery.

And today, the scenery was pretty amazing.

It was the "mostly road" stage, with seemingly endless climbs and fast fireroad descents. The vistas at the top of the climbs were spectacular, and the rivers and valleys at the base of the hills were cool, dark and quiet.

We went through the center of one town that looked equal parts Restoration Village and Stephen King Novel.

Being toward the back of the race, I was in a good position to pick up dropped bottles, gu wrappers and random bits of things that had fallen off peoples bikes. I didnt realize until I got my kit into the shower (or, "washing machine") just how completely disgusting my pockets were. It was like cleaning honey out of fabric.

Dried, sweaty honey.

At the first aid station, I came across a very sad looking Karen Potter. Despite her until-now awesome results, she was abandoning due to illness. That sucks. New England had been so thoroughly represented, and she had obviously worked extremely hard to have done so well.

After Adams wheel misfortune and Karens sickness, it looks like its up to Justin Lindine.

No pressure, buddy.

I grabbed some extra bottles, thinking if I came across anyone that was running low I could give them out. I didnt realize that SO MANY PEOPLE would run out of water/ hope before that second to last climb. I would start the loose, haggard road climb pretty much out of water. And I tossed my only bar (and tube) at a flat tire casualty somewhere around the fishermans trail (I think).

Soon I came up on Winner Winner Chicken Dinner, we rode to the last aid station and stuffed ourselves with coke, cookies, sandwiches and so on.

This is where we were told "Its all downhill from here".

8 more miles and a bunch of climbing later I caught James Spurk. We rode all the way to the end... well, almost.

Before we hit the last descent I yelled "FOLLOW ME!!" at Spurk. As far as I knew, he did. So I guess its my fault that he wrapped himself around a tree. Sorry, dude.

All in all, not a bad day.

Race notes:

- Adam Snyder has "legburns".
- He is also the leader of the "Excuse Post" category.
- An Amish woman on a horse asked if one of the checkpoints was selling lemonade.
- Sue Haywood makes a mean salsa
- Rays mom made cookies. For everyone.

Transylvania stage 2: Probabilities.

2011-05-30T20:27:00.001-04:00

According to Wikipedia, your chances of getting struck by lightning are about 1 in 500,000.

Your chances of getting struck twice by lightning are one over a number with substantially more zeros.

But if you ask Roy Sullivan, numbers dont mean a god-damn thing.

So what are the chances that I would be back to do another Transylvania 10k?

What do you think?

The race started in the campsite, with a mile or so of "neutral" road. The race got underway on a fast, open (and inexplicably dark) descent. I was in the front third or so, trying to move up through the fusillade of rocks, bottles and bad language flying around like ticker tape at the Macys Thanksgiving Parade.

I felt fine until the first real climb. At which point I felt significantly less-than-fine. Selene Yeager beasted her way up the group that dropped my hurting ass, and I continued to move in a negative direction until I was picked up by Mike Festa. Who I was "racing".

I dropped a gear, stood up, and found his wheel-teat. Which I then proceeded to suckle remorselessly.

I wouldnt say that I felt "better" at any point on that climb: I think the heat was really getting to me. Slow, exposed and gasping for air, we formed a small group with the Masters leader, Ben Cruz and a rotating cast of characters that were either paying the ultimate price for trying to hang in the Bishop Group or Sort Of Fast Guys that reeled us in over the course of the (endless, relentless) climb.

Around now we were caught by a singlespeeder. I have mixed feelings about this. It was the current leader of the admittedly stacked SS field, but still. He was turning over an impossibly big gear at like 40rpm and he still caught us. We all filed in behind him. Then Hash Apples caught up. His Predator Hair looked really, really hot (get your minds out of the gutter, jerks. It was like 93 degrees) but he was flying up the hill. Our group of humid, suffering dudes was looking pretty sorry
about now.

Finally, at the top of the climb, the single speed guy yelled something incoherent (probably thanking whatever god he prayed to for not making that hill any higher) and we were off. A suddenly rejuvenated Ben, who was dropped a few minutes before, screamed past us in a sleeveless hail of gravel. I stood up to chase.

DEAR GOD. FINALLY. SINGLETRACK.

I started out sloppy, but was recovering from the heat of the climb. I dropped Ben and Festa, and started catching guys that had been up the road. There was a WTB rider (Im not sure which one) that would occasionally pop into sight. I made that my target. I was feeling pretty good by now. I was almost 20 miles into the race. I hung out with Dicky for a bit. He has the most aeordynamic mountainbike tuck I have ever seen. He looked like Warwick Davis in a wind tunnel.

Then Adam Snyder caught me with some other dude.

This was awesome. Adam is a fantastic bike handler and it could only help me to follow his lines. I let them by and got on the train.

Right about now my bike broke in half.

Not that I realized it right away: I followed them through a turn (a hard, fast left turn without rocks or any sort of obstacle), my bike at about a 45 degree angle under my mostly upright body. I heard a dull "CLOK". Thinking a pebble had smacked my downtube, I stood up to pedal out and WHAM:

Derailleur Salad.

Sigh.

I tried to mess with it, my chain tool wouldnt push the pin all the way out, then some other (really nice, very helpful) racer tossed me a tool, somehow that didnt push the pin out either. At this point, Im starting to believe in God. And not the nice, touchy-feely Jesusy god either.

Finally, Festa showed up. He said he was done: he apparently wrecked his back last week, and the technical bits were too much for him. He had a chaintool that worked, and I was suddenly the proud owner of a 5200 dollar full suspension single speed. For about a mile, anyway.

This is the part where I realize my bike was broken.

After 5 or 6 times dropping the chain, I stopped on the side of the trail. Wiping away some of the mud (and, incidentally, all hope) I caught my finger on some carbon slivers.

There are literally not enough keys on this board to configure a litany of rage that would accurately describe how I felt while staring down at the offending seatstay. Mobs are more reasonable. Suns have exploded with less fury. Nerds were less pissed when they canceled Firefly. Somehow, through my disjointed homicidal fury, I managed to squeak out a conversation with Festa, and later on some other folks. Mike actually commented on how amazingly calm I was.

If I seemed calm, it was only because I was reviewing a mental list of book depositories.

(You cant call "too soon" on a Kennedy assassination reference. You just cant.)

So I had to run. Again.

Because my freaking bike broke at mile 21 (LITERALLY the half-way mark), I had to run something like 8 or 9 miles to the next aid station. It wasnt too bad at first. Jogging alongside my bike, I tried to think of ways to make it to the end. I could coast the downhills, except there WERE no downhills. Racing in this part of Pennsylvania is like riding in an MC Escher painting.

There is no down.

Unfortunately, it was 21 miles to the end, and hiking that in my torn and bloody socks was not terribly appealing. But then, I did sign up to race for a week. So I ran.

After 3 or 4 miles of pretty steady hike-a-biking, I stepped on the stump of a cut sapling.

I screamed so loud it echoed; like someone screaming back at me.

My sock (one of my favorites, by the way), tore over the back of my heel. I felt like my foot had a hole in it you could see through.

The rest of my "run" was much more of a "trudge". I was crushed: An entire season of planning - most days up before dawn, 7 degree rides in February, scheduling my whole spring at work... an enormous chunk of my life was put into this. Im certainly not going to indulge in a play-by-play of my thought process here: this should be somewhat entertaining, right? Certainly not a crabby bike racer pity-party.

I made it to the aid station after about 2 hours of walking. None of them seemed willing to let me to walk to the end. And lets be honest, another 15 miles of bloody-sock jogging wasnt terribly appealing to me either.

The medic wanted to take a look at my feet, but I spared him. No need for further loss of life (they were heinously swampy, as you can imagine).

I hung out with the Festas for a bit, helped move some baskets around, talked to the stragglers... I cant remember exactly. The support folks were outstanding, even in my somewhat grim mood they were able to cheer me up a little. The cookies helped, too.

I was offered bikes, by the way: and thanks to anyone who did. There is, however, a "finish on the same bike you started with" rule - a rule that really does make sense here: I certainly wasnt going to challenge it from the back of the race.

So thats it. Im done.

Ill be riding the rest of the stages (on Caitlins Very Tiny Stumpjumper), maybe helping out Mike and Ray or Colt with some filming: whatever way I can best be useful around here. This race is still a lot of fun, the people are awesome, and Im sure as shit not going to limp home and stare at wall for the rest of the week.

Im going to clean the blood off my feet.

See you tomorrow.

Transylvania Epic: Stage -1 (Prolouge)

2011-05-29T20:02:00.000-04:00

Well, that hurt.

Im not sure if my legs or my pride got the worse end of the deal.

It started with a super-tight tour of the campsite. I couldnt quite settle down - I felt like I was either way over the limit or just riding along. After the camp, it was 3 miles of fun and excitement on the road. Yes, dear readers, my Least Ideal Circumstance.

And it was hot.

Around this time Ross Schnell (whos name means "fast" by the way) passed me on his borrowed bike. Maybe I should have lent him heavier pedals.

After the seemingly endless paved section, I could keep Schnell in sight through the twisty bits, trying to minimize my losses. Things continued to go passably well until I got to the mid-race climb.

I was dreading it from yesterday when Adam and I took a preride lap. From that small nugget of tactical knowledge I knew that big-ringing it up that monstrosity was simply not going to happen. Around this time Justin Lindine passed me.

I was getting frustrated. It was hot, swampy, my shoes were wet, my ass hurt and I was pushing chain up Heatstroke Hill like a mudslide in reverse.

Look, Im used to getting passed at races. I recognize my place as either one of the slow fast guys or one of the fast slow guys. Its cool. I started bike racing like 3 years ago, and I have no illusions about competing against guys who do this for a living. But today I was passed in the most soul-crushing, ego-destroying ways imaginable. I had just caught Ben "No Sleeves, No Service" Cruz (my 2 minute man) and was feeling ok. Sure, Ross had just ridden past, but I was able to keep him in sight and use his position to dial in my lines (they were still somewhat poor). Oh yeah, and Lindine. But he dosent count. He obviously has alien DNA.

This was way worse:

Ben and I were coming up on the Dirt Rag dude, and at this point I felt better. Man, Im getting this bike racing thing! Then we heard a motorcycle behind us. Thinking it was just colt getting some scrub footage to pad the site, I turned to wave (or yell something) and almost crapped out a live kitten.

The motorcycle was drafting Jeremiah Bishop.

Yes, while my computer informed my that I was traveling at a respectable (for me) 24 miles an hour (on a 26 inch full suspension mountain bike), JB and his throttle-wide-open moto hanger-on Cancellara'd us like it was last years Flanders. Usually, when a guy passes, I can hang on his hackles for at least a few minutes and get some motivation to push harder. All I could do here was empathize with Bram Takink. Ben summed it up better than I ever could:

As the Cottage of Wattage blew by us, he turned and said "Are you fucking kidding me?"

Soul thusly crushed, I traded places with Ben for a few minutes. Eventually I was able to drop him on a climb - he was even more heat-stroky than I was. I think I caught one other guy... maybe... I have no idea. I was peeking out of the hurt box like dog in a handbag.

Adam Snyder passed me also.

At this time, I would like to point out that he has a "soul patch".

The rest of the race was as uneventful as such a thing can be. Other than the mulchy patch of you-have-to-be-shitting-me Tire Velcro, the second part of course was better than the first.

I finished in 1:01:27, 17th place with a whole bunch of dudes within a few seconds of me.

JB finished in 47 minutes.

FORTY SEVEN MINUTES.

dude.

In other race news:

Justin Lindine got second place. Hi five him when he passes you at a verge race.
Weir apparently got "Gravity Dropped".
Colt interviewed me here. I say some insightful things.
Sue Haywood is badass.
Mike Festa and I are only a few seconds apart. He informed me that we are "racing". Whatever that means.

See you tomorrow.

Transylvania, before the TT

2011-05-29T17:49:00.001-04:00

bed, day one

Everyone is arriving. And to my lasting joy, Weirs beard is making a comeback. Some of the best things Ive heard so far:

1. "Dude, thats Sue fucking Haywood"
2. "Mike, is anything on your bike broken" me: "no" Response (disappointed) "Oh... youre funny when your bike breaks"
3. "The entire country smells like cumin"
4. "Wait, JB is here? ...Fuuuuk"

Camp Rimjorb is once again the most awesome of all possible cabins. Proof:

There are huge butterflies. I thought they were birds at first.

Its hot here. Especially coming from No-Spring-For-You New England. This should make for an interesting time trial, as it combines the two things I least love:
excessive heat and interminable climbing (and, well... time trialling).

Everyone here has been super friendly - from the staff (who seem to remember EVERYONE by name) to all the racers. Most of our lodge is filled with repeat offenders, but all the new folks at our lodge are great: there is a husband/ wife pair from Nova Scotia (one of which seems to be some sort of geophysicist, prepare for perhaps nerdier-than-last-time update material), THE ADAM SNYDER, his teammate... WTB_INTERN, and Selene Yeagers Espresso Machine.

Some drama:

Ross Schnell lost his bike somewhere. More specifically, the airlines lost his bike. He was seriously going to go to Wal-Mart and buy a Huffy. Which would be like finding a '78 Pinto, slapping some Nascar stickers on it and giving it to Dale Jr. As hilarious (and kind of awesome) as that would be there was an emergency bike racer Salvation Army set up and he was able to borrow enough gear to race.

The course looks brutal. There is a climb in the middle of the course that will have me seeing (and possibly even believing in) god by the end, and about a third of it seems to be under water.

I love this race.

Pre-Transylvania Blog, part 2

2011-05-28T21:39:00.000-04:00

I admit it.

Ive been AWOL.

It isnt like I havent been racing (I have) or even racing so poorly that I cant even bring myself to write about it (I... well...) - its just that I have had lots of "preparing" to do. Here is a quick run down of the last two weekends of Mike at the races:

Winstead Woods: After sitting in traffic for two-and-one-half hours with Sweetness through scenic East Hartford, we made it to the race (despite the organizers best efforts to keep its location a secret) with just enough time to afffix numbers, stuff some food in our faces and line up with 12 or 13 other soggy dudes.

Did I mention that it had been pissing rain for ten days straight at this point?

The long and short of the race is this: I Shopengarten'd the hole shot, was winning for about two minutes and fifteen seconds, slipped out while trying to encourage the much faster guys that were somehow behind me to pass and blew up so hard that like Goose, I was dead before my shoot was able to deploy.

Did I mention my bike was sucking chain like it was getting paid by the hour?

At this point, the entire race had left me behind. Which was fine, as there would be no witnesses to my wackness.

*aside* I would like to point out that as I am writing this, it sounds like there are 5 chipmunks mugging a cat underneath the cabin.

Somewhere near the end of the second lap I remembered that I was in a bike race, and that I should at least make a pretense of going fast. The problem was, the course was either all up or all down. And the "all up" part was kicking my natural ass.

So I thought I would push it on the downhills. The wet, rutted, rooty and twisty downhills. Good idea.

Turns out it actually was - I passed a few guys near the end of the 3rd lap, and caught one more on the 4th.

I ended up 10th out of maybe 11 finishers.

Weeping Willow: God damn I love this race. Determined not to repeat last weeks dismal performance, I got there EARLY, made sure my bike was working properly, prerode some of the course, and TOTALLY BLEW THE START.

Making my way up the inside, I was trying to pass dudes cause I felt good. Strong, even. I should know by now that any good feelings I have while racing should be mercilessly crushed before they can ruin my day.

There was this little rise on the right. I was going to use it to pass. My cunning plan unraveled when the "little rise" turned into a "gravel pile".

For the second time in as many weeks, I watched the whole elite field ride away from me.

Taking the reverse holeshot into the woods, I had like 25 dudes to wade through (that makes it sound more like a porno than it actually was...) to get back into a good spot. I ended up hanging out with Rooter and Dad Legs, and we rode in the wake of what must have been a spectacular Rowell Implosion, because there was not a soul to be seen ahead of him.

Finally getting some daylight, we Team Time Tri-ed to catch up to someone (anyone) else. I towed those two for a lap or so, crashed like an asshole (so as to block the trail as best I could), chased back on, dropped Dad Legs, felt strong (remember what I said about good feelings during the bike race) towed Colin again, chose some "less than ideal" lines, crashed like a dick again, jammed my bar into the back of my knee, tried to chase colin while yelling largely impotent (and almost completely incoherent) harangues at the back of his bike, got on-your-lefted by a cooked sport rider and then CAUGHT by a suddenly rejuvenated Mike Rowell.

This was going great.

The only place I had to ditch him was the bridge. Ask Colin about how well I had been riding it during previous laps. Somehow (probably cause I felt positively AWFUL at this point) I drilled it through the wet roots, bunnyhopped up the bridge and set whatever fuel I had left on fire for the last half mile to the line.

Result 9th out of 24 (?)

Now, after preriding the Transylvania prologue stage with Adam Snyder, I know not to "feel good" at any point. The idea is to have some kind of handicap, or maybe just something to piss me off enough to actually do well. And to be fair, with the climb in the middle of the course just waiting to stuff my inner nerd into a gym locker, its looking pretty good.

Oh wait... bad. Definitely bad.

5.22.11 - Weeping Willow

2011-05-24T12:41:00.006-04:00

"You're sure you're okay with the fact that your rear tire is flat?" I was asked as we loaded our stuff up Sunday morning. "Yep" I answered, "It keeps losing air after a day or so but it's fine for a race. Haven't had a problem with it yet." The tire in question was my tubeless rear tire on my hardtail. For some reason the tire won't seem to seat correctly on the rim despite multiple attempts, a few trips to the shop to use the air compressor, and a canister or two of CO2. Since it's been holding up on rides/races for the past year, though, I've been adhering to the "don't fix what isn't (entirely) broken" adage and using it anyway. After being berated one more time for using my hardtail cobbled together from various parts from a variety of sources instead of my nice Stumpjumper FSR (what can I say, I'm fond of the haphazard little thing!), we finished packing things up and got on our way.

Willowdale is close to Boston and full of fun trails, so like last year the place was PACKED. Luckily we got there early enough that parking wasn't an issue - muddy fields meant that latecomers were directed to a parking lot a mile up the road. We had pre-reg'd so we didn't have to worry about not making it in because the field limit for the first race had been set to 400 participants, which was reached pretty quickly as day-of riders came in. The later race also had around 150 participants from what I had heard - pretty awesome to see that mass of people milling around at a mtb race!

Sweeney at the front during staging. Photo credit: Jorge @ Toro Loco

The race was 2 laps, 17 miles total and started with some double track before hitting the twisty, turny rooty singletrack that is bike kryptonite for me. I knew the course didn't play to my strengths but I was looking forward to a fun day of playing in the woods with, uh...400 other people. I chatted with some nice ladies in staging while waiting for other categories to roll off. We observed many guys running off into the (poison ivy filled) woods for a last minute pee break. We concluded that they would be sad after. Finally, the women's Elite/Expert field made it to the front and rolled off. I hadn't placed myself terribly well in staging but was able to put down some #SIKWATTS and get around a lot of people on the doubletrack. Seeing as how I knew I wouldn't be passing people on the singletrack, it was important to me to be as near the front and ahead of as many people as I could be. We made a right onto the first trail and as soon as it narrowed to singletrack the woman behind me immediately yells, "On your left!" with no room to pass. Uhhh. I was about to respond that I couldn't move right when I felt my bars getting yanked out from under me as she took out underbrush and me in her attempt to get by. I got thrown off of my bike and a face full of dirt while she, to her credit, stopped to apologize and make sure I was okay. Let this be a lesson, kids. Passing like a jerk helps NO ONE. Now she was still behind me but we had let two women by. A Seaside Cycles girl was keeping Michelle Packer from getting too far away from me, who I knew would be tough to beat. As I worked back up to them, Michelle got around Seaside Cycles and started to open a gap. I caught and passed Seaside Cycles and was trying really hard to get back to Michelle, but wasn't having a ton of luck closing it down. A few minutes later I felt things go very wrong during a slippery, rooty turn. Yep. This is what all that foreshadowing in the first paragraph was about - my rear tire had just burped it's ever-loving guts out and was flat.

I pulled off the trail and watched my whole field ride past while I dumped CO2 into the tricksy tire. It kept hissing out and I was concerned that I had no pump, almost no CO2 left, and would likely need to put a tube that I had no means of inflating in if I wanted to keep riding. The next field, Mens Sport, began to pass me. I found where the tire was not on the rim just as it popped back on. Victory! I emptied the last of the CO2 into the tire (thank you, Big Air canisters) and got back on the course as Stephen Pierce of Embrocation was coming up at the back of his field. He had experienced some tire sadness as well and did a great job of working back up to 6th place finish after fixing his flat. For my part, I concluded that given how many people were behind me and how often I was moving aside for traffic it would be nearly impossible to work up to my field again. I was happy that the tire was holding enough for me to finish, so I was just going to ride and have an awesome time and not worry about racing.

I thought it would be fun to take the opportunity to launch myself off of whatever fun stuff I could find and work on my bunnyhopping. After trying to get some air off of a rock I heard a "YEAHHHH LAUREN!" from behind me. Yay, friends on the trail! A Threshold guy had come up behind me, and we hung out briefly. He passed me, I heckled him for running a big log* that was rideable, and then a few minutes later I tried to launch myself over a little tree trunk. It was wet, and I nearly launched myself into a tree instead. Okay, big air time over! I worked on turning not-poorly in the singletrack, and on the long open fire road sections I worked on catching the people who had passed me in the woods. Somewhere near the end of the first lap I reached for my electrolytes bottle, only to find that it was not there. Sadness. I looked for it during the second lap and did not find it. I picked much better lines the second time around, splashed around in some big puddles, got muddy (yay!), and chatted with a few guys that were hanging out on my wheel. While I had fun, I really was very sad about my missing waterbottle and was happy when the race ended just as I was trying to stave off a serious bonk. Exciting race report over!

I ended up in 3rd due to a pretty shallow Expert Senior field. Michelle rode really well and had gone on for the win, congrats to her! Sweeney was the top-placed B2C2 Elite rider with 4th place while Colin and Mike battled it for 8th and 9th, respectively. Nick did the Novice Veteran race and got a very respectable top 10 finish in what I believe was his first mtb race ever. And then there was a raffle after the race where I WON A SWEET MAVIC CROSSTRAIL WHEELSET!!! Yeah, that was awesome. Take that, tubeless rear wheel that needs a tube, I don't need you any more! Thanks to Weeping Willow race promoters for a fun, challenging course and the great raffle afterwards!

*Post-race he informed me that my heckling encouraged him to ride over it the next lap. Nice!

MD State Champs: Greenbrier MTB race

2011-05-22T17:05:00.004-04:00

So today I did my first MTB race. Let me preface this post briefly. I haven't ridden in about 2 weeks. I have been sick. I wanted to race so bad that I went even though I am not feeling 100%. For all these reasons, I chose the Cat 3 category. I know, I know. Though these seem like "Sandbagging Techniques", my MTB skills are not quite there yet and this was truly my first MTB race.

The race:

I took the hole shot, got passed HARD on the descent and tried to learn as much as possible from said rider's line. On the next ascent, I rode hard and caught the other rider. I might have walked a little. Perhaps a lot. Felt like garbage. Got back on the bike, rode hard.

Next thing I know, I am off the bike again, as my technical climbing skills and a bike that is almost as old as I am is quite the winning combination. I get passed by a different rider from my field. Try my best to get back on the bike on the ascent and FAIL super hard. Again, lack of skills. More walking/running.

Once back on the bike, it took about 30 seconds to bridge up. He has had a mechanical just as I am passing him. It takes him a bit to get his bike back together (according to our post race chitchat). I ride hard, as to not get heckled on the internet for losing a beginner MTB race. I win by 10 minutes over the guy with the mechanical who took 2nd. Hooray. Bike pumps and heed. I am the Maryland state champion of beginner mountain biking. Many people ask what Boloco is. I tell them its like rapture, but for your mouth. But nothing disapears, just tasty. Maybe not rapture. Just tasty burritos. Sadly I am out of state and cannot enjoy them. Please ship me a case please.

Morals of the story:

Listen to your teammates when they say, "You should do CAT 2"

Sandbagging isnt cool, who needs a bike pump anyways...

Heed is disgusting, even when free

Dont race bikes when sick, it is much less fun.

Rim brakes dont work well in the mud.

Bike racing isnt as fun when you dont get heckled by teammates and have to drive alone :'(

I broke 2 spokes during the race, apparently this made my rear wheel more true. Winning.

Answering Some Open-Ended Questions

2011-05-18T16:53:00.000-04:00

In response to Abes question list at the Transylvania Epic Website, I have compiled a list of answers that I hope you will all find helpful.

1) How Many Scary Ass-Tunnels And Bridges Must I Cross?

Ass-Tunnel

Answer: You are a bike racer. Besides being relatively fit, overly weight-obsessed and most likely shaved, part of your job description includes braving some of the least sanitary latrine conditions this side of a Civil War prison camp. You should be ready and willing to engage any ass-tunnel you come across. Also, there is only one non ass-tunnel, and it is awesome.

2) What Exactly Happens After Dark At Eagle Lodge?

Answer: Having spent my entire time at Rimmey Lodge with 10 other participants, 2 squirrels and at least one Frenchman, I am unsure of what they did across camp at Eagle. They did not have the pleasure of bunking with Mark Weirs Beard, so I can only assume it was dull and uninteresting (if somewhat safer).

3) Should I be training for TSE right now? I mean, like, I haven’t ridden my bike in several months, and is there going to be a lot of climbing?

Answer: Yes. You should. You hear me Justin Lindine? You should be putting in at least 40 training hours between now and the start of the race. You need to be ready, right? Prepared. And not at all overtrained. In fact, because of all the climbing, I suggest you try to lose a few pounds by next week. This goes double for Wicks. Seriously, guys. Bread and water.

4) Does chamois cream come in Costco-sized tubs? What about Pepto?

Answer: You can make that happen. It's up to you. It depends on your level of commitment (and how much you are willing to deal with the floor of your living room looking like the aftermath of a porno shoot).

5) Approximately how many rocks and roots will I encounter on the trail?

Answer: 42

6) Is it guaranteed that I will have a great time?

Answer: Talk to me after stage 3.

5.15.11 - Gloucester Grind

2011-05-18T11:32:00.008-04:00

After riding with people who are too fast for me in Harold Parker the week before the Grind, Colin assessed that I don't totally suck on a mountain bike and that I can somewhat hold my own when it requires little to no turning and rocks are involved. He suggested that the Gloucester Grind course might be well-suited to my, err, skillset? and told me to GET IN THE VAN and go to the race with him. So I did.

Lori joined us, with Claire and Will meeting us at the venue. Other B2C2 riders (Mike and Kevin) opted to drive lots more and go Winsted Woods instead. The trip to the Grind involved a quest for Panera Bread and a mini-race with Colin's near-empty gas tank to make it to the venue before the gas ran out ("I swear, guys. I've made it 30 miles with the light on before, we've already gone 9 and we only have 11 more to go! We've got this!") so we got there with just enough time to get our race #s, use the facilities (2 portapotties for a well-attended race sucks. Declaring one ladies-only when there are far fewer ladies is awesome!), get dressed, provide my teammates with socks (I brought 2 pairs of extra socks for warm pre- and post-race toes in case it was cold, Lori and Colin brought none. It ended up working out just fine), and meander to the start. That's cool, I never figured out how to warm up for a mountain bike race anyway other than riding in circles somewhere.

About ten ladies lined up for the Expert/Singlespeed start. They sent us on our way, and I was second wheel to a Luna Chix woman in the Veteran age group. As we hit the first greasy, sloggy, rooty mess of a trail I remembered that I had figured out last year a good way of warming up was trying to ride the first section of trails. I also remembered that I ride horribly when I'm nervous about a horde of people behind me. So, I started out the race by riding poorly and sliding out everywhere. Go me! During this mess, a singlespeed woman and a woman from my category passed me. I had another woman right on my wheel and decided I ought to pull myself together some and get her off of it. By this point, thanks to the genius that is unleashing all Sport, Expert and Elite fields at once, the leaders of the Mens Sport field began to pass us. Sadly, the leaders of the Mens Sport field often includes some very strong road riders who have all these WATTS but are still working on their handling. Trying to shake the woman off of my wheel usually resulted in my getting a bit of a gap, a Sport guy passing me, a Sport guy crashing in front of me, and my having to dismount and run a section, allowing the woman I was trying to politely ditch to come back up and hang out with me some more.

Once the Sport leaders came tearing past, the riders coming up from behind became more spaced out. I started riding better and having a blast. At one point the woman was right behind me, and next time I looked back she was gone and never to be seen again. The last mountain bike race I did (Winding Trails), I used up way too much energy being overgeared all of the time, so I was making an effort to be more conservative, spin more and shift appropriately. My formative riding years in Boston were on a track bike, and I started bike racing on the track. I love my big gear inches and have concluded that multiple gears might be too hard of a concept for me, but I'm working on it! In this case, I think I was going a little too easy. Towards the end of the 2nd lap of 3 Colin lapped me yelling about radness and stuff. By this point I was soaked from the rain that started at lap 2, had no visibility from wet, foggy glasses, and was covered in mud. I love being covered in mud and I was having an awesome time, so when Colin came by I was pretty excited. I tried to get on his wheel and told him that I wanted to hang out with him, and held it briefly through some good mudpit lines and over a sloppy bridge. Then my legs said, "OW" and I fell off of his wheel, but I was still really excited. It was at this point that I realized I had a ton of energy, was 2/3rds of the way done my bike race, and had a few people up the trail that I ought to be working on catching. So then I set about going harder.

whee! (image lifted from the EFTA website)

I didn't catch anyone in front of me in the last lap other than the broken remnants of some Sport men who had gone out too hard. I played in more mud, this made me more happy. I got cheered on by an awesome older dude spectating from his ATV at a mucky, sloppy rock garden for clearing it while I passed a bunch of guys running it. That was cool. I finished second in my category and Claire came in behind me for 3rd. That was cool too. Then we both got paid out (!!!) and that was really cool! Afterward, Colin cleaned himself up by splashing in shallow puddles, I stayed mostly covered in mud, Lori got herself and her bike super clean amid all the rain and muck somehow, and we packed up. We made it to a gas station on the last fumes of Colin's dying tank, and headed home after an awesome (soggy) day.

mud!

Rider Bio: Preston Buehrer

2011-05-16T20:35:00.000-04:00

Name: Preston Buehrer
Racing Age: 21
Categories: Road-3
Strengths: Going up
Weaknesses: Going fast
Favorite Burrito: Yucatan Habanero - masochism doesn't have to end once you get off the bike.

Favorite Race: Penn State Nittany Classic
The Stable: '10 Specialized Tarmac, ' 06 LeMond Reno, '02 Trek 4300
Pre-Race Ritual: About an 40min of trainer time, with many trips to the port-o-potty to relieve the race jitters.
How It All Began: Saw BU Cycling president on rollers, decided I needed to be a part of that
Worst/Best Injury: Thankfully, nothing to report. Knock on wood...
Favorite Place to Ride: In the sun.
Poignant Thoughts: Nothing truly worth doing is easy

Rider Bio: Skip Salo

2011-05-16T20:28:00.001-04:00

Name: Steve "Skip" Salo
Racing Age: 38
Categories: mountain 2. Cross 4
Strengths: Running over roadies who try to ride mountain
Weaknesses: Going up
Favorite Burrito: Summer Steak!

Favorite Race: Oxford Dam

The Stable: 2011 Epic Carbon Comp 29er (Big wheel keeps on rolling....)

Craziest Ride: Following some locals we met in Pisgah national Forest (North Carolina), they had a "great loop" that we could take... They apparently were cats, because they didn't seem to care that this loop took us well into total dark of night

How It All Began: Both my knees got trashed while serving in the Marine Corps. So after I got out, my brother helped me get set up on a mountain bike (1993 Cannondale M700). And finally in 2003 I decided to start racing. The first race was aweful, dead last out of 50 some-odd riders, but I decided to keep trying and have had a blast with it ever since.

Favorite trail: Kingdom Trails! These are in my home town and where I learned to mountain bike. Original favorite trail; pines to widow maker!

Rider Bio: Lori Kohls

2011-05-16T20:27:00.003-04:00

Name: Lori Kohls

Racing Age: 27

Categories: Mountain Bike Cat 1

Strengths: endurance racing
Weaknesses: indoor training
Favorite Burrito: ceasar with tofu
The Stable: Cannondale Caffiene, Cannondale Rush, CAAD 8, Kona Jake the Snake, and a sweet little 3 spd commuter.

How it all began: Started road racing in college, found mountain biking in grad school and was hooked.

Occupation: Physical Therapist
First race: I can't even remember... it was about 9 years ago!!
Favorite place to ride: Kingdom Trails

Rider Bio: Grace Buerger

2011-05-16T20:26:00.001-04:00

Name: Amanda Grace Buerger
Racing Age: 21
Category: Road(4)
Strengths: longer races, hills
Weaknesses: sprints
Favorite Burrito: cajun
Favorite Race: Yale RR
The Stable: (bikes!) '06 DBR Podium 2 (soon to be replaced by a Spooky
Skeletor!!), city SS
How It All Began: Bikes are fun, and racing is awesome. Also, blame
college.
Favorite part of racing with B2C2: Great people
Favorite place to ride: everywhere, all the time
Poignant Thoughts: It never gets easier, you just go faster.

Rider Bio: Ian Schon

2011-05-13T13:45:00.000-04:00

Name: Ian Schon
Racing Age: 21
Categories: CX-3,Road-3
Strengths: Math
Weaknesses: bike racing
Favorite Burrito: Meta Summer burrito… a mini summer, nested snugly inside an original summer. Delicious.

Favorite Race: Gloucester!
The Stable: Cannondale for the road, Schon for the CX
Craziest Ride/s: Raced in Israel for a season with Israel Go Pro… crazy stage races in desert heat.
How It All Began: I raced my trek mountain bike at a cross race when I was in high school. Got beat real bad. Came back with a vengeance…
Worst/Best Injury: 15 stitches in the knee during New Gloucester. Still beat Hopengarten, raced the next day…

Rider Bio: Kevin Sweeney

2011-05-13T13:37:00.000-04:00

Name: kevin sweeney
Racing Age: 33
Categories: Mountain Bike (Pro), Cyclocross (Not Pro), Road (Not Pro)
Strengths: Sucking wheel.
Weaknesses: Power.
Favorite Burrito: Large Classic, no meat, black beans, brown rice, habanero salsa.
Favorite Races: Winding Trails, Ice Weasels, 24 Hours of Great Glen.
Personal Internets: squirtgunshow.blogspot.com
Craziest Ride: Norcross Scurry '09 in hurricane Dan.
How It All Began: I entered a race in 2006, got lapped by a chick, and have been trying to redeem myself ever since.
Pre-race Ritual: Obsessing over grams of carbohydrate/protein ingested in the last 24 hours, tire pressure, hydration, warm up, chain lube, tire choice, shock pressure, stretching, feed zones, ounces of gel in my jersey pocket. Are my shoes tight enough? Is there a little gap between my arm warmers and jersey, gloves and arm warmers? Are my shorts aligned with my tan lines? Did I choose the right socks?
Worst/Best Injury: When it comes to injuries I'm all about quantity, not quality.

Poignant Thoughts: The more you ride your bike, the better the burritos taste. (This is called "pandering to the sponsor.")

Rider Bio: Greg Whitney

2011-05-11T11:43:00.001-04:00

Racing Age: 26
Categories: Cat 2 road, Cat 2 Cross, Cat 1 MTB
Strengths: Creating spreadsheets
Weaknesses: Opening jars, other teams.
Favorite Burrito: I'm picky, I do Goloco.

Favorite Race: Darkhorse 40

Personal Internets: goodenoughst.blogspot.com, twitter.com/gregwhits
The Stable: '10 Tarmac Pro, '09 Epic Exert, '11 Crux Elite times two
Craziest Ride: Night ride at Lynn woods in the rain.
How It All Began: I thought I was hot stuff on a fixed gear, and then did a collegiate road race and got dropped HARD.
Pre-race Ritual: Try to get there without incident.
Poignant Thoughts: Cycling isn't really that hard until it is really hard.

Rider Bio: Colin Reuter

2011-05-11T11:38:00.001-04:00

Name: Colin Reuter
Racing Age: 29
Categories: Road (Cat 3), MTB (Cat 1)
Strengths: Being tricksy cuz I don't want to pedal hard
Weaknesses: Pedaling hard
Favorite Burrito: Original Cajun Chicken with Guac
Favorite Race: Darkhorse 40 any time you don't get poison ivy
Personal Internets: http://untilthesnowends.blogspot.com
How It All Began: My dad had a child seat on his bike and we rode all over the place when I was young. This showed me how dope bike riding is when you can avoid the "pedaling hard" part
Pre-race Ritual: Talk about how great I am to anyone who will listen, forget to warm up, plan blog post explaining failure during race
Worst/Best Injury: Crashed on a night ride and got to see my kneecap. It's really white!

Rider Bio: Nick Maggiore

2011-05-10T18:03:00.000-04:00

Name: Nick Maggiore
Racing Age: 32
Categories: Road (4) Mtn(3)
Strengths: Attacking from the gun, pulling on the flats, gravity
Weaknesses: Gravity
Favorite Burrito: Mini classic Mexican dark chicken w/pickled onions
Favorite Race: Attleboro Crit
Personal Internets: Before I raced bikes, I was a drummer (meaning I paid my rent by playing drums.) I also have lots of tattoos

Post-race Ritual: I started eating mini burritos last year during cross and it was the perfect after race meal.

Rider Bio: Will Crissman

2011-05-10T17:51:00.000-04:00

Name: Will Crissman
Hometown: Jamaica Plain, MA
Disciplines: XC Mt. Biking
Categories: ProOpen Cat 1/Elite, always on a Singlespeed - whatever allows me to race the longest distance
Internet? Love it
Strengths: Long races
Weaknesses: Short races
Occupation: Teacher/School Administrator
Team Role: Dad
Style: neo-conservative-liberal-hipster-prep-goth
Career Highlight: 15th overall at the VT50 in 2010 on a singlespeed
Favorite place to ride: any place that allows me to ride dirt for a long time - these days, the Blue Hills
Favorite Burrito: The next one I can get my hands on
How It All Began: realizing that if I raced really hard for a long time I could eat endlessly
Pre-race Ritual: NSFW
Worst/Best Injury: torn up leg/concussed riding early in the morning before teaching math to 7th graders - still made it to class

Sterling Race Report- Cat 3

2011-05-07T19:57:00.001-04:00

Due to school, this will be short but sweet. Imagine that I took time putting in funny links and stuff…

After almost not showing up to the race thinking it was Sunday and not Saturday, Preston and I rolled out of Cambridge with McKittrick to race the bikes (thanks for the ride guy, wicked pissa). The field looked pretty strong and I was definitely intimidated by my first real 3 race. Cass was also present and "team tactics" were decided upon. The plan was to sit in, see who makes it to the end and possibly assemble some sort of lead out for someone. Tentative, but enough of a plan.

So there we sat, content, staying close to the front and absorbed the hurt of that steep climb over and over again… Cass chased a few down the first few laps and Preston and I sat in. After the fourth time over the climb I started to get my legs and feel MUCH better after yesterday's tempo ride (since I didn't think I was racing today…). Last lap comes around and Preston, Cass and I are all together, towards the front 20ish part of the pack. We were all good position, but as the pace dropped slightly the front was swarmed. There we were, mid 40s about ~2 miles to go, attacks going off left and right. It was time to get to the front.

After some struggling to get out of the pack, Preston and I moved left and he delivered a mega pull up towards the front of the group and pulled off at the base of the final climb. A few people dive the turn and somehow get wayyyy in front of the pack. I put my head down, and dug incredibly deep for a 3rd place in the field sprint and 7th overall finish. I then proceeded to ride 100m, fall over onto a grassy lawn and let the hurt envelop my everything.

Things going through my head during the race…

stay up front, don't crash… mom will be mad if I do

I've almost emptied my Boloco card this week… Delicious

I should be studying for finals… oops

my wheels are out of true… I mean really out of true… so much hopping

Rep the team HARD

Converge-Last Light

Pelican- Mammoth (This seems to be the song for brutal racing this season...)

Bottom line…

Preston is the man and can deliver mega watts and impressive leadouts

Cass, like always, is awesome, and can keep it together at the front… also brings all the watts.

Cat 3 Sterling has unleashed some next level suffering on my legs. This is good.

Blue Hills Cat 4 Race Report

2011-05-02T19:56:00.004-04:00

This weekend Nick and I rode out the blue hills to do some bike racing. It looked like it was just him and I for B2C2 in the 4s, so no tactics were had, just to go hard. General cat 4ness was abound, exploding tubes on the line, uncomfortably expensive bikes, bikes older than I am, baggy kits paired with carbon wheels, hairy legs, etc.

The races started pretty calm with a few attacks here and there. Mike Farrar from Greenline Velo and Charlie Schubert of Cambridge were on the watched list, as I know both of them were equally fast enough to take this one or at least put the hurt down. Mike and I attacked a few times to keep it interesting and put the hurt on some fools who decided to chase. As soon as the pace started to settle the 2nd lap, Nick headed towards the front to set the pace and do a good amount of work. Even without predetermined team tactics, this plan seemed to be working well. Nick would control the pace on the descent and back section while I would stay near the front on the climbs. This was turning out to be a pretty tame and fun ride.

Last lap comes around and then the race really started to heat up… in the worst way possible. A bunch of awkward pack yelling was heard behind me, and all of a sudden, I was being elbowed out pretty hard by another rider (he did apologize after the race, so were cool…). As we approached the last climb I was in pretty good position, yet not good enough to counter the first attack that got away. As he started to get some time on us I realized that it was time to go, and weaseled my way out of the group to start my sprint up the last 500-800ish meters of the climb. Realizing now there was another rider who had gotten between me and the leader while I was wiggling through the group, I sprinted hard in a vain chase for second place with a few riders close behind. I was rewarded for the hard sprint with a 3rd place finish, my best non collegiate result of the season. Sadly there was no podium, but there were delicious sandwiches on the ride home. Fun was had, bikes were raced.

Blue Hills Cat 3 Race Report

2011-05-01T16:02:00.001-04:00

One of my favorite things about road racing is how much time everyone spends talking about team tactics, just to have them all go directly out the window as soon as the race starts.

Take, for example, my internet friend Mr Steve Hopengarten, who went on a mountain bike ride with me a week ago and told me all about how Green Line Velo was going to be all over the Blue Hills Cat 3 field, and how victory was inevitable.

After the ride, this trash talk continued onto the internet. @shopengarten had already made it clear that he was not personally going to win the race, but one of his teammates surely would. And since cycling is a team sport, that would in turn make him a better human than I, regardless of our own personal placings.

In response to this challenge, we mobilized the Back Bay listserve and discovered that all of our riders are apparently Cat 4's. Potentially sandbagging Cat 4's (ahem, Kevin), but Cat 4's nonetheless.

But! I had another trick up my sleeve. My friends Andrew and Joe from MIT were recruited to "guest ride" for us (doesn't that sound PRO??) as part of my plan to fill our Cat 3 ranks from the greater Red Line region, assuming that they would fight their natural enemy, the GREEN LINE, for us.

Kits were hastily procured and we rolled out with 4 riders -- me, Mike, Andrew and Joe. Of course I lined up all the way at the back, and spent most of lap one moving up steadily while learning where all the holes were.

No one had a better idea of where the holes were than Cambridge Bikes, who lost two riders to flats in the first lap, including noted loudmouth and intermittent strongman RMM.

I did not have a plan other than to hide from the wind as much as possible, and hope that any breaks that actually stuck contained Mike, Andrew or Joe. Zero breaks were attempted in the first 2 laps. I was bored. But then, on the 2nd time up the finish climb, someone (Ride Studio, maybe?) rode into the shoulder and then crashed back into the road, making a ruckus and taking out several dudes. In response to this we drilled it, cuz hey, that's what you get for riding in the gutter at the back.

In related news, I didn't see Andrew and his bloody knee again until the parking lot at the finish line.

On the third time up the climb there was a lot of pressure and a lot of single file at the front. There were a few brief separations, but nothing that stuck. This didn't stop me from wasting a lot of energy to hold my position in 10th wheel -- and it's not like I wanted to be near the front to cover attacks, because on the next time up the climb...

...three Harvard guys and a Matt Mitchell from 545 Velo gapped us over the top and it stuck. I looked at the break and decided that I didn't have the legs to bridge to it AND stay in it for the 14 miles left, so I sat there dumbly like everyone else except Cosmo, who recognized a collegiate A TTT/winning move leaving.

But he didn't make it.

And then we chased. Joe and I had "fortunately" climbed well enough on that lap to be at the front and take some pulls, but let's face it -- when I'm driving the chase, the break is sticking. Especially when it's three guys on the same team. We held them at around 6-7 seconds for all of lap five, and for a while I thought we had cleverly gotten the 4 strongest guys in the race to kill themselves for naught -- but when they extended the gap up the finish climb instead of wilting, I realized that we were screwed and started thinking about racing for 5th.

Our only hope lay in Green Line Velo, who had eight riders in the race and hadn't been on the front en masse at any point. Maybe a glorious stream of college kids will roll to the front and chase down the other college kids! Oh yeah, that would be sweet! Man, I feel old.

But GLV never really showed. Steve made a brief appearance on the front, but enough of the field had given up that even his super domestique stylings couldn't really dent the break's advantage. They had fifteen seconds or so as we hit the gradual 2k climb to the finish line, and it was time to GET HURTY.

It's a long big-ring grind to the top which means there's still plenty of drafting to be found -- but you wouldn't know that from some of the surges guys put in as soon as the road pitched upward. Mike, Joe and I were all positioned outside the top fifteen, which was actually a good thing.

As we climbed, various dudes exploded (surely because they were leading out teammates, and not just because they couldn't pace themselves on the SIXTH TIME up the same hill) and other dudes surged forward. The gutter became a place of much yelling as boxed-in dudes got cranky with totally-smoked dudes. It was everything road racing should be.

Eventually the steam of smoked dudes vastly outnumbered the surging dudes, and I realized I had ridden into the top ten with one rise left to ride. Joe was just ahead, and apparently Mike was just behind. In true B2C2 Form we ignored this alignment and decided to all ride for ourselves.

But seriously, there were enough wheels to follow, enough lactic acid involved, and so little time left that a leadout was totally unnecessary. Instead I got boxed in one last time, then squeezed through a gap and HIT IT up the last rise and over the top.

I noticed with some concern that I was going so hard that steering was actually kind of difficult. Yes, this is the first time I've sprinted with carbon wheels. I passed Joe and, it turns out, everyone else, and won the field sprint 10 seconds behind the break. One of the Harvard guys in the break had cracked on the climb, so it was good for fourth place and $75, which I immediately took to the bank, converted to pennies, and filled a kiddie pool with. Obviously.

I still think road racing is kind of silly. And I noticed it's lot easier to have "great team tactics" when your team is three of the strongest guys in the race (Harvard) then when it's a smattering of ability levels and race smarts (everyone else).

But I grudgingly admit I had fun and want to do more road racing, especially if I have teammates to hang out with.

Why Belgium Can Suck It: Springtime In New England Edition

2011-04-26T12:46:00.000-04:00

Part 1: The Quabbining

Weather dot com said 47 degrees and raining. That sounded bad. Regardless Ian and I met at dawn, piled into the team car and drove through the cold, rainy, snowy Morning Before Easter. According to the cars thermometer, it was 35 degrees. Thank you, internet weather. This was going to be rough.

As it turned out, rough was an understatement.

There was snow on the grass in the parking lot. The ground, churned up by cars, cleated shoes and bike tires was a half-frozen, tan crap-stew that stuck to the binding surface of my pedals and braking surface of my rims. It was raining harder; the big, slushy drops stuck to my glasses, creating little fog-rings that distorted my field of vision.

I took the line in the front - I remembered that first “neutral” (read: "terrifying") 4 mile descent from last year. Even though this was my first race in the by-most-accounts well behaved 3s, I wasn’t taking any chances. Which, as it turned out, was sound logic. There was a pretty rough crash behind me, taking out a few guys before the race even started.

By “race” I surely mean “group of underweight dudes huddled together for warmth”. How did the race go?

Let me paint a picture for you.

I am not unfamiliar with discomfort. I have broken (at my best count) 53 bones, was beaten almost to death at least once and held a guys brains in his head with my hands. I have been lost in the woods for more than a week, living on what I could catch and sleeping in shelters I contrived. Ive eaten cat, rat, possum, squirrel, dog, snake, cricket, and if statistics are to believed at least 6 spiders. I listen to Hella.

So when I say “this was one of the worst experiences of my life”, I have a substantial catalog of misfortune to draw upon.

I packed for 45 degrees: a wind shell, jersey and decent underlayer. This arrangement has worked for cross, rainy training rides and early season mountain biking. When we got there, it became apparent that it wasn’t going to be enough. I even applied a spackle-thick coating of bag balm to my knees and thighs under my legwarmers in lieu of embrocating (I dont have any of that fancy leg-shiner. Sponsor gods, I beseech thee...). My shoes were stuffed into watertight covers, and I had the same gloves that were great on the few damp cross and mountain bike rides this season.

Unfortunately that 10 degree difference between My Plan and Gods Great Plan To Fuck With Me turned what should have been a race tailor made for my abilities into a miserable 3 hour death march across a frozen pre-easter hellscape.

My hands froze. The “waterproof” gloves I was wearing became “water-logged” in about 20 minutes. Trying to get food out of my pockets was a minute-long ordeal (putting said food back was impossible - I just stuffed all of it under the front of my jersey). Even drinking was hard: the muscles in my jaw had frozen. Slowly, inexorably, our field shrunk: either by simple attrition or catastrophic collapse of the will. To illustrate the latter, I watched a rider in a black rain slicker to my right start to wobble a bit, while his pedaling slowed... slowed... stopped. He tipped over like a toddler learning how to run. It was the last we saw of him.

By ones and twos they dropped off the back, some even knocking on random doors to get out of the cold.

At 40 or so miles, I had some serious difficulty climbing. I would be near the front, the road would go up, and regardless of my effort, I would find myself dangling off the back. It was awful. When I got home and looked at my numbers, there was a trend: the further along the race, the lower my heart rate.

My max heart rate is somewhere around 204. LT is around 188 or so. If you read this blog, you can extrapolate my zones from there. After 35 miles or so, my average heart rate was 100.

100.

There I was, in the final selection of a category 3 race, and my heart rate was hovering somewhere between watching a “decent horror movie” and “vigorous bowel movement”. Obviously, I missed any and all moves off the front - never mind my physiological inability to chase - my rain-fogged glasses made everything look like a home movie from the 70s. I didn’t even see them go.

In the finale, I tried to stay with the pack. Seated, I tried everything - spinning, grinding, loud cursing. I stood up to sprint back on and… locked up entirely.

It would appear my right leg had a message for the rest of my body.

The guy in the wheel car was heckling the crap out of me. Honestly, that was the most awesome thing ever. I was frozen, haggard, and half my body was unresponsive to my directions, but he told me I was going to bloody finish - that my sorry ass had better close the gap down. I lurched across the line like a frat boy at 2am on Brighton ave, cold-drunk and dead last in my group.

I couldn’t stop shaking for an hour.

Part 2: Omloop Het Vells

I didn’t think I would be in any shape to race on Sunday morning. Waking up wasn’t promising, either. My groaning, protesting body went through the morning motions - rummage for least-offensive smelling (and season appropriate) kit, find bottles without a terrarium inside them, mumble down food - this was going to be a joke. I was hoping to just hang on.

They were going to combine the races initially. That made me sad. I have to work at noon, so my only chance to race a full race is the Bs. Besides, I stink at crits, and with a smiling Jeremy Powers rolling around the parking lot, it was going to be a rough morning. Luckily, there were enough of us to run a single race, and there were a few solid riders mixed in as well.

The plan was simple: set the Schon up for primes, eat muffins later. There was a 30 or so person field.

At this point, I feel I should mention that it is a solid 35 degrees warmer than yesterday. Springtime in New England, indeed.

We started off with the standard B race parade lap, during which I couldnt figure out why I was pedaling so fast. Turns out, thats what the shifter on the left is for. This had already begun poorly.

Of course, a prime (or preem) was called on the second or third lap. Despite this being par for the course, I felt unprepared. Ian was practically attached to my seatpost. I launched early to avoid getting swamped, jumping out of the corner and catching the rest of the field out. Ian took the sprint easily.

I started to feel better.

We repeated again, this time for 5 dollars. I felt better and better. The next prime was more dicey - after the bell, I suckled Mike Briers wheel-teat into the final turn, launched and somehow held it to the line. I had won my first sprint. Ever.

I was psyched. Ian and I were in good spirits; even though I had only a vague idea of how to properly lead someone out (it turns out that looking around to see whos coming - not just blindly going as hard as you can so that your sprinter cant get around you - is a good idea) we had locked up every sprint and split the field. A few laps later I repeated and won a bottle, chased down an escape attempt, sat on the front for a lap, lead out Ian again and went 1-2 on the halfway prime.

As good as this all felt, it was starting to hurt. I pulled in front of Shopengarten and told him I would set it up for him and Ian to battle it out (even though Hebrew Cup points dont apply). Unfortunately I managed to get in Ians way after pulling off and Steve crossed the line first, though a lap later he was making a kosher vomit deposit in the bushes.

The rest of the race was more of the same, but with 7 or so to go a 545 guy took off. He dangled (as they are wont to do) about 10 bike lengths off the front, and we were content to leave him there. With 5 to go, his lead had grown to about 13 seconds; I waited until we were in the wind, jumped, and COMPLETELY FAILED TO BRIDGE. Awesome.

I may be getting stronger, but tactically, Im still a retard.

Looking back, I should have attacked him on the slight downhill, when there was a tailwind. Now, I was the schmuck hanging 10 bike lengths in front of the field with 5 to go. I had to make a decision, and my options were not stellar:

1. Drift back.
+ saves energy.
- not one guy in that race was going to drag me to the line.

2. Bury myself to bridge.
+ possibly work with a strong rider.
- he is at least as cooked as me, plus I will be completely broken when the field catches us.

3. Hang out.
+ if they think Im cooked and just hanging off the front, they will chase me down AND hopefully bring back the 545 guy.
- if they dont, Im going to look like an ass.

Option 3 won out, and I just rode tempo and drooped all over my bike. They made the catch and I didnt respond, just drifted all the way to the back.

1 to go, 545 guy is 5 seconds up the road.

The pace picked up, and I moved alongside the field and found Briers wheel. I launched, Ian in tow, from just past the last corner. The 545 guy was still a long way off, but I was committed. It hurt. Closer now, I could hear people yelling. There was someone just behind me. 545 was cooked, he was just ahead; I could hear his ragged breathing. Coming up even, we see each other. Dig. Keep head down. Throw bike. Got it.

Ian and I went 1-2, with the 545 guy who bravely held on for almost 10 laps holding out for 3rd.

It was the first crit I have ever done well at, let alone won.

"Pre-Marathon Ride" or "Speed Vomit in the House of Rosenholtz"

2011-04-19T13:28:00.001-04:00

This morning I got up at 5 am to roll out from Cleveland Circle with literally every other bike rider/ racer in Boston to ~~compete~~ complete the Annual Boston Marathon Day Running Of The Bike. This ride, which I have participated in for the last 3 years, is an informal event that draws hundreds of local bike folks to ride out to the start of the Boston Marathon and then (taking advantage of the closed roads) race back into town.

But first, a little background.

Last night Caitlin and I went on a lovely dinner date to the very tasty Punjab Palace. Sadly, that hour spent elbow-deep in chicken Saag and pakoras turned into a nightlong game of Bathroom Double Dare. The situation at 5 am was equally grim, but I wasn't going to let a little Tandoori Two Step keep me from doing one of the most entertaining rides of the year.

I ran into Ian on the way to Cleveland Circle; we compared notes on the respective beatings we took over the weekend (me at the hands of the Embrocators, Ian via the ECCC Hurt Mob) and talked about our prospects for the morning. As it turned out, we both wanted donuts.

The ride out was mellow enough, though Nick "The Pace Car" Mashburn has a somewhat interesting take on "leisurely". When Steve Pierce and I took over on the front, our hundred-strong group was whittled down to just a few skinny jerks with racing licenses. I felt like a dick: I had told a bunch of newbie riders to come along, and how the pace out to the start was "super easy", not "cat 2 tempo". I dropped back with Steve to wait for the rest of the group.

Me and the Hopengarten set up shop on the front, and the group grew bigger. Later on we found out that the always awesome and accommodating Matt Griswald had formed yet another group about a minute back. So everything was once again right with the world.

Our group got to the Honeydew Donut Emporium at about 715am. At first, there were just a few of us, and the two (already somewhat harried) employees didnt seem to be terribly flustered. I got my muffin and coffee and turned around and... wasnt able to move. The place had gone from one or two senior citizens quietly reading the paper to a Lycra-clad mosh pit of bleary-eyed roadies trying to get their morning coffee.

Leaving the woefully understaffed donut place to its fate, a few of us went up the road to the start. On our way, we were passed in the opposite direction by the guys who went ahead of us earlier; Mashburn looked like he was still applying an ample amount of hurt to the group. Upon reaching the staging area, I noticed something strange and wonderful.

Question: How can you tell the difference between staging at a bike race vs. staging at a foot race?

Answer: The size and quality of the toilets.

Yes, the mighty and gleaming row of (insulated?!) mobile crappers took my breath away (and not in the manner they usually take my breath away). A far sight from the 4 woefully inadequate port-a-johns you find mobbed by an entire nervous cat 5 field at the start line of a bike race, these were equipped with luxuries:

- Toilet paper, of a type and quality generally found in a restaurant lavatory (few, if any wood slivers)

- A small hook. Because there is nothing on this Earth more awful than dropping part of your kit into a port-o-lats gaping maw.

- No urine or feces on the rim, backsplash or walls. Not sure if this is because these were maintained well, or if bike racers are just bad at pointing their business ends in the right direction.

- Minimal asphyxiation risk. Even downwind, these beauties were an olfactory delight.

Still marveling at the impressive facilities, I rolled back to the start and waited for all 500 Greenline Velo riders to show up. Because there certainly seemed to be 500 of them - they arrived in an impressive formation, with the first bunch of guys sporting helmet or handlebar cameras. We would all be on tape, and the Boston Globe was going to put it on their website. Sounds fun, right? Local Semi-Pro Cyclist Sam Rosenholtz laid down some ground rules, we were off.

The ride was fast. Really really fast. Much faster than any road race I have done: we reached the finish near Copley Square in 51 minutes.

Constant attacks and road interference meant that it was vital to stay at the front. B2C2 was represented by me, Ian and Matt, the latter getting himself into "the move" with Rosenholtz and another GLV guy, the former (me) taking long pulls at the front to cover the seemingly endless stream of ECCC A racers trying to bridge.

It was great fun. McKittrick and his Cambridge teammates animated the hell out of the race (and would argue that he was the "winner") and Natan, Matt Griswald and Mike Farrar killed it with withering attacks as we approached Newton.

For my part, I stayed in the front group and went with attacks as they came. I had almost bridged up to Rosenholtz when we got to Cleveland Circle, but I had to take an outside line around the tracks to avoid a stopped car. Burying myself for another 2 miles, I chased down the leaders with (I think) Hughes Burridge and a Cambridge guy in tow. If my memory is a little fuzzy here, its because I was trying to reel in a 4 or 5 man move that was cooperating on closed streets after spending the last few miles alone-ish on the front.

Regardless, I caught them on the run-in to the finish and...

... Didnt sprint.

You see, there was a wall of people and police 5 deep across the line and I certainly didnt want to get O'Gradied at 40 miles an hour. Mike and a GLV guy (not sure of his name) engaged in what appeared to be a more-or-less legitimate sprint and looked to come up more-or-less even, so Ill let them argue that one out on camera.

All in all, an awesome day.

2011 Tour of the Battenkill.

2011-04-12T11:31:00.002-04:00

Race Report??!!

We left after work on Saturday, dropped off the hound with Caitlins family (who were very, very generous with seemingly endless sheets of pizza purchased for Zachs birthday). Our little caravan headed across the border to Bennington, where the six of us piled into the Shady Pines ~~Murder~~ Motor Lodge. Actually, as far as those kinds of places go, this one was not too terrifying. And better than all of us huddling together for warmth in the car.

There was no real attempt at warming up (its a 64 mile race), so we rode aimlessly from portapotty to overburdened portapotty praying that at least one of them would have a shred of (unused) toilet paper. Nominal success.

Part 1: Cat 4 Katamari Ball.

For some reason, I didnt listen to Ian and left my arm warmers on. 10 minutes in, I was rolling them down as our ~~crash factory~~ peloton hit the first section of dirt road. From the beginning, some team named "Teany" had like 85 guys on the front. It LOOKED pro, but instead of pushing the pace and stretching out the field, one of their guys just sat on the front and rode. Which, I suppose, is fine (we didnt have to burn multiple teammates on the way to the first climb) but seriously: 8-9 teammates in a cat 4 race? There should be 100 panting, cursing bike racers in your wake.

It didnt matter too much anyway, as the ubiquitous Very Large Cat 4 That Gets On The Front For No Good Reason And Hammers was there to pick up the slack.

We hit Juniper Swamp slowly with me, Kevin and Ian all at "the good end" of the race. Ryan was apparently having bike trouble, so the three of us piled up on the front like bike commuters at an intersection.

Part 2: Bike Racing as a Committee: None Of Us Are As Dumb As All Of Us.

The next few miles were so-so. In true amateur bike race fashion, the pace went from "chew on handlebar" to "find things on your bike to fiddle around with" until the next good set of hills. Not sure about the distance (maybe 25 miles in), but me and Pete Reed (breakaway/ifractal) on the front and successfully applied some hurt to our too-big field. I would like to say Pete and I were doling out abuse evenly, but to be honest it was more me trying to keep him within a bike length and my heartrate under 200. For a big dude, he was painfully good at the climbing.

Our efforts broke the field into much less dangerous groups. Kevin and Ian bridged up, as did Petes teammate Ryan and one or two Teanys. We now had a group of 10 or so riders - all strong - and all looking at each other to do the work as the group slowly swelled as pale, haggard dudes clawed their way back up.

Part 3: Welcome to Earf.

By the time we got any semblance of organization going, our little break had almost grown up to be a peloton again. 25-30 guys is not what I wanted to cruise into the feed zone with. I drifted back to talk to Ian, couldnt find him (he was apparently DIRECTLY behind me) and was working my way back up when the rider in front of me was suddenly much, much shorter.

I hit the ~~crater~~ pothole hard, my bottle flew out, someone crashed hard on my right, I somehow caught my bottle between my knee and toptube, there was a yell somewhere behind me and another awful crashing sound. All around me waterbottles were rolling like barrels in Donkey Kong. In the subsequent confusion, the field split again just before the next climb and 10 of us got clear.

Sometime around now Ian tells me he has a flat and is dropping back.

We are at 9.

Another round of climbing and our group is down to 7. There was some hilarity as Kevin "Mr. Crabbypants" Sweeny informed the group that Pete and Ryan were unwilling to work. I didnt catch the whole exchange, but a few miles later they were all friends again. Because holy crap, we were racing now. There were no chasers in sight.

Part 4: The Slightly Overcooked Pasta Of Failure.

At the base of the climb before the feed, I felt strong. I was going to tell Kevin to work with me and trade attacks once we got through. I had a plan. As such, I should have expected what happened next.

ThupThupThupThup

sigh.

I tried to pull over. I say "tried" because there was a reverse waterfall of dropped juniors, shelled cat 4s and one or two seemingly lost 3s all weaving around me up the hill. The wheel car, my salvation visible in its trunk, sat in the middle of the road - it too swarmed by slow, suffering riders, overzealous onlookers and at least 2 leashed dogs.

2.5 minutes.
The chase group passes.

Wheel guy gets out, pulls out a wheel. I duly exchange mine and set it in the dropouts. He pushes me up the hill, and my drivetrain makes a noise that is best represented in type by pressing all the keys on the keyboard at the same time.

Get off. Check wheel.

Campy.

Wheel guy gets out again. Changes wheel. I adjust and check shifting. Passable.

3 or 4 more minutes have gone by. I think most of my field had, too.

Climbing up to the feed, I was heartbroken. True, my big goal of the season is still 2 months away, but I really (REALLY) wanted to do well here. Battenkill, for all the drama and nonsense that led up to it is still a special race, and (almost more importantly) my ticket out of the 4s. My gears were still slipping a bit when I came up on the feed zone and saw Caitlin faithfully waiting with bottle in hand. I didnt need a bottle.

I needed to catch up.

The descent was fast, but I wasnt about to just coast down. I started catching people. I had taken my powertap off to use my "race wheels" - I didnt have power data to aid in my TT effort - so heart rate was all I had to go by. Which was, by any standard, high. In a few minutes, the main group was in view. In a few more minutes, they were out of sight.

Bearing down on the chase, I spotted Uri on the front (no doubt doing the lions share of the work). He dropped a gear and towed my ass for about 5 minutes (for which I am eternally grateful) before drifting back on a climb.

After that hill, I saw Ryan Rapolas on the side of the road. He was bloody, but looked like he was going to get back in. I decided that waiting and working with someone as strong as him was a better option than just banging my head against the wind for another 17 miles.

When he caught me, he told me that he touched wheels with his teammate and went down. You would never have guessed that he was hurting, though. He got on the front and started to shovel dirt on the pain-hole I had dug for myself. We traded pulls for a few miles and I had another potential disaster - my new wheel was going soft.

I didnt want to crash out Ryan (again) with a washy rear wheel on a descent, so I let off the back, pulled over and dumped all the co2 I had into the wheel. I was 4 or 5 miles from the finish.

On the climbs I was able to get Ryan back in sight, but sketched out a bit by my potentially flat rear tire I took the descents very cautiously.

I should point out that at this point I had no idea where I was in the race. Passing dozens of riders (including a Garmin/Holowesko kid - WTF?) and getting only a fleeting glimpse of their numbers/ colors combined with the math-destroying effort I had been putting out to catch back up had somewhat ruined my place calculations.

I came through the finish to a good-sized crowd (a good sign - that means most of their friends or families were still out racing) and Caitlin waiting at the finish. She was not optimistic about my chances: I felt I had made the top 15 or so - she was not so sure. The batten-killed remains of 5 different fields were staggering in with no order or announcement; when the podium is full, no one has a name - just human detritus thanking whatever god they pray to that their ordeal is over.

Kevin did well - 3rd place, in fact. A hell of a ride for him. The top step of the podium was (in my mind) never in doubt - Ill make no "what ifs" for that one. Pete Reed was clearly the strongest guy in the race, from the beginning. Second was Warren st John, one of the 45 Teany riders in our group. Ryan was 7th. Which meant...

I was 8th.

Somehow, some way I chased back into a top 10 - about 6 minutes off the leaders pace.

Sweeny

I guess theres an after school special type of lesson to be learned here. Can you figure out what it is?

Thats right.

Next time use beefier tires for a dirt road race.

Some Off Season Reviews: CX Bike Edition

2011-01-31T20:55:00.000-05:00

Now that winter is here and we are battening down the hatches for another Snowball Earth, Im going to review X (where X = how much snow we get divided by how much trainer time I cant blow off) products I have used, borrowed, broken or have otherwise had experience with this season.

CX Equipment review, bike:

Bike: CruX Comp, 54cm. Retail: 1750

I bought my new cross bike as a complete setup with the intention of replacing most of the parts, but I rode it for a bit as it came.

Frame: Awesome. Almost flawless - the one (very minor) issue is the weight. She isnt quite "fat girl at Tim Hortons" territory, but could probably lay off the ho-hos and go for a run. The handling, however, more than makes up for it. Combined with a decent, no-frills paint job, bulletproof construction and a solid effort at trying to make the carpet match the curtains - 9/10.

Part spec: A little underwhelming, actually. Other companies have bikes spec'd with Rival at this price point, though the Apex performed adequately. The Roval wheels, while heavy, are apparently indestructable. I regularly take this bike on mountain bike rides (with people on mountain bikes), bunnyhop barricades like I was J-Pows retarded younger brother and crash like its my job. I have yet to need to true either wheel. 7/10

Brakes: Front - passable, but not exceptional. Rear - Dreadful (indeed, it is the dreaded Tektro Oryx of Infinite Malajustment). However, that magic brake finger attached to the fork COMPLETELY eliminates chatter and is a definite improvement to any set of cantis. - 4/10 (2 of those points for the magic brake finger)

Drivetrain: Like I said, I was initially underwhelmed by the appearance of an Apex group on a bike approaching 2000 dollars, but i have to say the shifters performed well. I was puzzled by the long cage rear derailleur and seemingly endless gear selection through the cassette - this is a cross bike, a cross RACING bike - no one needs a 34/36 gear combination. Specialized has a bike line that would merit such a range, and its called the Tricross. Fixing the gear selection issue would add up to 150 dollars to the cost, when a simple 105 level 12-25 cassette and short cage rear mech should have been factored into the initial price of the bike. The FSA Gossamer crank is apparently THE entry level BB30 crank - its fine, just (like so much else on this bike) kind of heavy. Also, the rings were kind of cheap. - 6/10

Other bits: I like the handlebar. With a shallow drop and short throw, it is a marked improvement over my old Control Tech bars I tossed on my CAAD9 last season. The seatpost, saddle and stem were all decent. - 8/10

Overall value: This bike rides better than the sum of its parts, largely due to how well the frame is designed. Everything works together well - even that goofy dinner plate 34 tooth ride-the-run-up big cog. It tracks flawlessly, turns with confidence and suits my riding style (which I think is somewhere between "angry retard" and "excited monkey"). - 8/10

RACE SETUP: And now, the bike I spent almost all season on.

Frame: CruX (seriously guys, we GET that its a CX bike. Drop the capS) alloy. -(9/10)

Cranks: Last years FSA SLKs, 46/36. Light and stiff, my only gripe was the fact that the bearings kept failing after last years slopfest. This year: no issues. Other than that, Unnoticeable. Which is what I like. - 9/10

Slightly-used.

Shifters: SRAM Force from last year. Except for lever damage sustained through extensive Hopengartening, I have been happy with these. My only issue is a weird front ring mis-shift that is as intermittant as it is infuriating, though I cant say if that is a shifter issue or some kind of actual curse. - 8/10

Shopengarten'd

Brakes: Avid Shorty Ultimates. Best. Brakes. Ever. Those 2 hours I spent filing down the brake bosses were totally worth it. - 10/10

Shiny-ish

Wheels: Last years Mavic Ksyrium SL tubulars. Some people love 'em, some hate 'em. Two seasons of abuse and lack of maintenance in, and I think its the best wheelset I have ever owned. Not only do they work well in almost any conditions, the support you can get at races is second to none - my freehub was a little sticky at Gloucester and those guys completely took it apart, cleaned and rebuilt it for free. Honestly, if that is the kind of service you get when you buy one of their products, sign me up for a replacement pair next year. - 9/10

Satisfactory.

Tires: Challenge Grifo 32mm. Awful in almost every way. Ok, that was a bit harsh - they ride fine, handle well in most conditions - but holy crap are they shoddily made. Both of my tires arrived unable to hold air (flat in hours from full inflation). 3 weeks and 2 cans of pit stop later, I notice that the tread is pulling free from the tire. Awesome. Glue it back on. A week and a half later, 2 laps in at DECX and my front tire goes flat. Thinking it was a pinch, I filled it with pit stop after the race. Nothing. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that the valve stem just spun freely in the tire. Fail. - 3/10.

Peely.

Pedals: Shimano XT. I have been riding Time ATACs for years, and they are expensive. The XTs work about as well and are half the cost. Plus, you can more easily dial in your cleat postion (and those cleats are a little cheaper). Done. - 9/10

You dont really need a picture of SPD pedals, do you...

All in all, a great bike. The one great failure were the tires - a mistake I will not make again next year. The lesson: buy cheap shit and you will end up spending more that you would have if you just paid a bit more for higher quality. Lesson learned.

OHILTRAB...part deux!

2011-01-03T10:55:00.004-05:00

I'll finish updating one day...

NBX Review - Make way for the heat cannon!
By this point I was feeling pretty beat up and was relieved to have made it to the final Verge race weekend. I was nervous that I wouldn't be able to live up to the previous weekend's success @ Sterling, but I was also psyched that it was the LAST WEEKEND EVER that I'd have to struggle to get a ride to an early race. Colin Reuter of crossresults.com generously stepped up on Saturday to get me to my race since he was headed there early anyway, which was awesome. I thought we had a really nice heart-to-heart on the way there, but apparently he just thought I talked a lot. Oops.

So I get there, and oh yeah. Who wouldn't want to go to a race on the waterfront the first weekend in December? Brr. Luckily, registration and other fun stuff was indoors with these glorious propane-fueled heat cannons of love, so that part was at least warm! I get my # and head out on the course. Rooty, pretty fast and fun. There's a ride-up that's totally rideable but I was worried how it would pan out in traffic. I practiced a few different lines just in case right before staging, and nearly missed my spot again. Go me. I pull up behind a crowd of spectators, cub juniors, and women to hear Mr. Reuter announcing, "...and the last spot in the front row is Lauren Kling." What?! Hell yes! I somehow parted the sea of people and made it to my FRONT ROW VERGE START. And then remembered I was still wearing my jeans, and that I ought to take them off. Iamsopro.

The start is paved and uphill and we take off. Dana Prey of the crossresults.com team is off for the hole shot, and I make sure to stay on her wheel as series leader Emma White is there too. I forgot how soon the turn onto grass came up and nearly swung too wide. Good thing I wasn't leading! It was fast, there was some sand running, and there was definitely some wind. Emma, Cathy Sarvary of Blue Steel, and Kate Lysakowski of Bike Barn got off of the front a little bit and I ended up sliding back a few spots to about sixth due to misfortune and sadness every time I went up the ride-up in a crowd like I had feared. Feet were going down in front of me and I missed it on two laps in a row, which meant that I was chasing a lot. I clawed my way back to the front of the two women I had been riding around and, as I passed by the pit, I hear Colin shout at me to open it up "and not just drag them around!" This seemed like reasonable advice, so I took it and started trying to put down watts or burn some matches or whatever it is you're supposed to do. I ended up riding by myself for a bit, pushed it as hard as I could, made it up the ride-up incident free for the remaining laps and, although unable to catch the leaders, came in third behind Kate and Emma. I was psyched.

Day 2 was a similar course, more sand and still lots of cold, wind, turns and roots. I got a ride to the race with Dan of Threshold, if it weren't for him I would have missed the second day! Thanks, Dan. In the attempt to not be a total chatterbox I ended up falling asleep instead. No wonder it's so difficult for me to find rides! I'm at least 75% sure that I did not drool on myself while sleeping, though. I got there EARLY, before reg even opened up. I missed your warm embrace, heat cannon. As I was forced to ride to stay warm I got lots of pre-riding in. I also made it to my start on time. Just barely, though. Nick and Roger of Newbury Comics witnessed an embarrassing display as I realized shortly before my race that I had to use the portapotty and didn't want to NoHo another start. I tried to take my jacket off, which got stuck on my gloves that were still on, and as they walked by I was stepping on my jacket and tugging with all of my might to free myself. Again. Sopro. Anyway, Nick collected the layers I didn't need while I rushed into the bathroom and then ran to the start, where I had moved to a mid-row position!

I was at the front again after the hole shot, but I had opted to not really sleep at all the night before and I was HURTING. There was some back and forth but Kate got away and I thought I had a comfortable gap over 3rd/4th so I was just trying to maintain that. Cary Fridrich of Embrocation kept yelling at me to not settle and go for the win, etc etc. Damn him. Me and my sad legs were clinging onto second for dear life and he's telling me to go harder?! I tried to rally but I was exhausted and getting bogged down in turns and really just was happy to stay where I was instead of sliding back. On the last lap I took what was maybe my first ever beer feed, which I didn't know what to do with, and came in second. Whee!
Then I took my tired self and hung out by my precious heat cannon for most of the rest of the day and was relieved to be done with full race weekends.

Ice Weasels Review - Payouts and flyovers and cupcake feeds!!!
My parents decided that they needed to see what all the cyclocross hype was about, and fast since the season was rapidly coming to a close. They're awesome and instead of spending the weekend hanging lights and doing other things that needed to get done around the house in South Jersey, they headed up to Boston for the debauchery that Ice Weasels promised to be. I spent Friday smashing things at the race venue (aka helping to put stakes in the frozen ground). I was powered by doughnuts that Chip of Hup provided and hyperactivity due to a lack of sleep after spending the night watching Russian vampire movies and making a bazillion cupcakes for Tasha of Pedal Power Photography's photo exhibit. I was very excited! Also, I witnessed the raising of the flyover by the Goguen clan, which was impressive and I got the virgin ride on the new, stair-free configuration. Then, after the course was set and the sugar high started to wear off, I went back to Boston for a lovely dinner with my parents.

Saturday I was racing in the 1/2/3's and had a gloriously late start. I needed it, because by the time I got myself together, my parents together, my dog together, and dealt with the fact that my 6'1" bearded dad scared the piss out of my dog (all over the kitchen) and then the dog stepped in my bowl of oatmeal while being loaded into the car, I had used up all the spare time I had. Ugh. We got there mid-single speed race and I realized what a wonderfully balmy day it was! I stripped down to my bibs and jersey, cheered the ss race, pinned my #, got a few pre-ride laps in, and was ready to go!

The course was a blast. Dana went for the hole shot again before taking a beer feed or two and then retiring. She told me this was her plan, beer in hand, at the start line. She succeeded. After she came off the front a little, Cathy Sterling of Bikeman.com peeled off the front and was never really seen again. I raced with Hope Strode of Wheelworks all race, making sure to stay ahead of her because I was turning like crap and I knew she'd be faster than me in the tape maze if I let her get ahead. Greg and Hopengarten were great announcers and made my parents very flattered to receive a shout out for trekking up to watch me race. Mid-race I thought I could leave Hope on the power sections and was trying hard to open a gap and break her a little bit. Then she suddenly launched an attack and I realized I was very very wrong. I kept trying to ditch her on the long flats with no luck, and on the start of the last lap she got around me on a gravelly turn before the barriers by taking the inside line when I slid out a little. Crap! She started to get away from me in the turns and I tried to will myself turning being smoother while the gap was growing. As we hit the straightaway under the flyover I stood up and hauled. I caught up to her by the left turn around the field, and as we made another immediate left along the pine trees we were coming up on a lapped rider. Bigger crap! I stayed on Hope's wheel and the minute I came alongside the lapped rider I let her know I was coming over and shot between the two of them, pulling ahead of Hope again. We hit the bumpy off-camber section pretty much immediately after I made that move, so I was relieved and tried to just not mess up any turns for the rest of the race. We came up the run up in the back and it was a fairly straight shot to the finish, so I stood up and sprinted to take second place. I would have a really good shot of this finish, but apparently my teammate Mike jumped in front of my mom and her camera right as I was approaching in his excitement. Now I just have a really good shot of Mike's arm, but as he was still dressed then it's at least evidence that he wore clothing at some point during the day. I ended up second and in the payout, which was super exciting. My parents loved the race, the kegs, the cupcakes, and the ridiculousness and are already planning to come up for Gloucester next year. NECX, thanks for making my parents feel welcome!

On How I Learned To Ride A Bicycle...Pt. 1

2010-12-20T11:43:00.011-05:00

...yet continue to fail at posting on here regularly.

By mid-November, I was pretty happy with how my season had been going. After coming in 4th place twice I was aiming for a podium by the end of the season, getting the remaining 6pts I needed to upgrade, and being an elite-level cupcake baker in the NECX scene. I had 6 3/4 races left in which to earn the necessary upgrade points, and I decided to sit out Plymouth, a 1/2/3-only field, and reacquaint myself with some trails instead. I did a Luna Chix ride with my teammate Lori Saturday in Ipswich, where we rode the Weeping Willow race loop. It was a blast and I remembered how much I love my mtb, but Sunday I reminded myself it was still cx season and headed out to Cutler by myself and had one of the best rides of my life. I learned three important things on that ride: 1) I need to flip my stem and stop riding my cx bike like it's a hybrid commuter; 2) always use the bathroom TWICE when heading out the door in a skinsuit, once is not enough; and 3) I can ride in my big chainring.

Not to discredit the importance of points 1 & 2, but point 3 ended up being pivotal in my race season. Previously, when someone commented to me that they found a course to be a "big ring race" I kinda scoffed in my head and thought, yeah, maybe for you...It wasn't even something I had tried, I felt like I was pushing hard in the gears I was in and I didn't have much more in my legs. I was somewhat shocked and elated to find this to not be the case, and came back from Cutler looking forward to finding out what my new found WATTS and POWER could do at Shedd Park.

Shedd Park Review - I have a plan!!!
Mr. McKitty had told me of the epic run-up at this race (in addition to sordid details of growing up in Lowell and what going to Shedd Park used to involve in his youth), and I was pleased to find after pre-riding a lap that I found it ride-able, although it did require me to shift out of my coveted big ring. I did find everything else to be big ring-able, and was excited/nervous as hell for the start.

The 3/4 race started a minute or two behind the 1/2/3 race, after the Elite women had cleared the track. I was staged in the front row, they give us 30 seconds to go, whistle blows, and off we go. I pull ahead and, as we pull off the grass and onto the track...I'm still ahead. I keep waiting for people to surge around me in my peripheral vision and yet I have this new, odd feeling as I hear the wet gravel crunch under my tires that I am just riding by myself despite being a 40+ women field. We move off of the track, do the 180* turn around the tree and as I'm coming back around I see the field behind me and a Cycle Lodge woman tries to make a move on me. Right, I knew I wasn't in this alone!Ella came from Amherst & made me a beautiful glittery sign, so I had to listen to her!

I had talked to a few people in the days preceding the race about how I wanted to upgrade no matter what, as long as I was eligible. The response I received was less than enthusiastic. I was asked if I had won any races, podiumed any Verge races ("no, not even a local race...), etc and then was told to "learn to win" and stay in the 3/4 field till I knew what to do at the front of a race. Valid advice, but I had season goals! I wanted to suffer! I WANTED TO UPGRADE! And then, suddenly, I find myself on the front of a race thinking, "Oh holy crap, they were right. What DO i do?!" I decided the most advisable thing was to see if I could just pull away from the field, but these two pesky Cycle Lodge women were determined that should not be the case. I was able to pull away a bit after the barriers/first ride-up on the flat, rooty stretches but when we came into the slippery, winding descent before the big ride-up one came around and they both powered up the ride-up faster than me. As I descended back to the fields, I was a little heart-broken by how they had dropped me and I saw my chances at a win riding away 50 yards ahead. Not to be dissuaded, I figured at a minimum I was NOT going to give up my podium spot. I kept shifting into a harder gear and went bombing through the fire roads. And suddenly the blue and white figures of the Cycle Lodge women were getting closer and closer. Whoa.

I caught up to them in the woods and told myself to just sit in. That lasted until we got to the track again and I felt like I could be going a lot faster. And then I came up with THE PLAN! I estimated that I could open up on them in the power sections, and that they were stronger than me in the turns and steep ride-ups. I ought to open up as much space as I could where I could and minimize any damage they would do to me in the aforementioned areas. Then I would sit in on the woods section so that I was recovered and ready to go again once we got to the track. The last lap, if all went well, I could open up and pass in the woods and go all out to the finish. STRATEGY!

...and that's pretty much what happened. I slid out on the last turn of the technical descent on the last lap and had to work way harder than I wanted to in order to catch them in the woods, and they were keeping a close eye on me. I felt strong, though, and launched on them as soon as we took the left turn off the sidewalk to turn back into the trees. I nearly ate it trying to pass a lapped junior on our way out of the woods, I took the looser lower line on the descent and ended up with my rear wheel perpendicular to me in a power slide of doom. Every once in a while all the time I spend falling down mountains proves itself to be worthwhile and I manage some good emergency bike handling, but I did lose the bike length or two I had put into my competition. I blocked them from coming around on a turn and then stood up again. As I got onto the track, I shifted into the hardest gear I could and barreled towards the finish. I was watching the shadows in front of me on the track to gauge how much room I had, and while they were on my tail I was able to pedal comfortably to the finish with the biggest grin I may have ever had on my face. I was absolutely elated. Not only had a pulled off a WIN, but I had worked out a plan, executed it, and felt confident that I could ride in the front of a race.

As an aside, I talked to the Cycle Lodge women (Beth & Lori) post race and they were awesome. I definitely snot rocketed on them (which is gross) and blocked their lines (which is more aggressive than you might usually see in my race) and all they did was congratulate me on my great ride and blow off my apologies for wayward snot streams. Turns out riding at the front means you get to meet kick-ass competitive women! I hope the Elite races live up to the awesomeness of the 3/4 field.

Sterling Review - Hey guys, it's getting cold!
Having never had the time/money to make it through a whole cx season, I was dealing with the first seriously cold race weekend at Bay State Cx. I pre-rode the course before the cat 4s went off but the fields were staged so closely that it didn't really allow for any pre-riding immediately before my race, and I found out the hard way that when the ground is frozen and a 100+ people between two races ride the course before you, things that used to have traction turn into ice sheets by the time you get there. The course was an absolute blast and I was looking forward to racing it but things went to crap pretty quickly. They didn't give us a parade lap on the track on Day 1 so we were pretty bunched up going by the green monster deal and people started toppling almost immediately. As things started to pile up and I was contemplating "What would Nick do?" (member of Newbury Comics/High&Mighty team and expert at knowing when to run a bike) I hear Lily of Cambridge Bikes yelling behind me, "LAUREN! Just get off and RUN!" Well. Thanks, Lily! I dismounted and got around some people on the slippery run-up, bombed the big hill, and set about working through traffic. There were a lot of things going wrong, though, and I started feeling like my hopes of doing well were slipping away from me. A rider slipping/dismounting suddenly in front of me turned into a pedal in my front wheel, and her yelling, cursing and tugging did not aid me in my attempts to free my bike from her, ice patches on the lines I had been riding that morning led to sliding out and unintentional dismounts, and the cold wind blowing me backwards down the power stretches made it rough. Then, as we're in the last lap or two Ryan starts yelling at me that I'm in 4th and I start to see Cathy Sarvary in the Verge Leaders Jersey in front of me. Like, I'm closing in on her. What? My oxygen depleted brain couldn't appropriately process this, considering I had guessed I was barely in the top ten. As I come across the finish I hear Richard Fries announce, "...and riding for Back Bay Cycling Club is Lauren Kling in third place!" and I nearly crashed through the tape at the end of the track in shock. Then there was some bouncing involved as it sunk in that I had gotten a Verge podium AND had enough points to upgrade for next year! Whee. Then I put clothes on, because it was really freaking cold and bouncing only keeps you so warm.

Verge Podi-WHAT?!

Day 2 started out only marginally better. I watched Beth of Cycle Lodge evade death/injury when she got bumped from behind while remounting after the first set of stairs, jamming her right foot between her wheel and seat stay. She was headed for the dangerous drop-off behind the cement wall (that was spray painted DANGER! and we had specifically been told to avoid) with her rear wheel skidding and locked up by her foot. I have no idea how she survived that without injuring herself because she definitely started descending the hill like that with me next to her and unable to get out of the way, but she's amazing, recovered, and prevented us from both going doing/getting hurt in the process. After that harrowing start, I tried to move up. I felt good in 3rd or 4th when Kate Lysakowski of Bike Barn came by me before the second set of stairs, pulling Lori of Cycle Lodge with her. At some point while I was trying to catch back up to them I was behind Cathy Sarvary for a while, and we had a run in at the stairs where our bars got tangled together and I slipped on the ice a bit. Frustrated, I got back to Cathy and we were getting ready to overtake a girl in the NYCross kit when passing a lapped Cub Junior ended poorly. He put his foot down in front of Cathy on an uphill turn and she had to stop. I was right on her wheel but worked around them and then Cathy was next to me, and then Cathy was unexpectedly going down alongside of me. I tried to not run her over and then tried to take off.
I battled things out with Nancy LG for a little while in the last lap before attacking on the straightaway ahead of the turns on the back of the course and opening up a little gap on her, and as I was approaching the last kicker before the track I saw I was coming up on the NYCross girl again. I heard Cary Fridrich yelling at me to toughen up for one more minute, that I could outsprint anyone on the track and I decided that I wasn't going to wait that long. I stood up, cranked as hard as I could, and passed the rider at the base of the little hill. I descended onto the track and started pedaling as hard as I could to the finish to get a 4th place. Kate and Lori ended up in 2nd and 3rd, respectively, which is awesome, though I wish I hadn't let them get by me so easily earlier! Lori also introduced me to a "giraffe hug" and then started yelling at me about being inadequately dressed/putting on gloves/zipping my jacket and it was then that I decided to elect her and Beth to be my 'cross moms. It was still really cold, but it was a great race weekend!

The Ice Weasels Cometh, My Clothes Goeth Away.

2010-12-15T15:06:00.003-05:00

That is all.

The Ice Weasels Cometh - Race Report and General Mayhem.

2010-12-13T10:01:00.003-05:00

How very exciting! The last two years I've had to miss the Ice Weasels for one reason or another. This time, no such luck.

Friday a few of us arrived in the morning to help set-up the course. Wow, that is actually harder than it looks. Trying to figure out where a turn will actually go is a lot different with a blank slate. Zanc, Myette and I put together the part from the barriers to the 180 around the tree, so if you didn't like that you can complain to me.

Arriving early to volunteer, I found that most of the "work" involved drinking beer and eating cupcakes. I plugged my iPod into the PA and assaulted the race with my crap musical taste for a few hours, as instructed.

Steven Hopengarten and I took the mic and did a bit of play-by-play.

I'm hoping this trend catches on. Photo by James Scott

I got dressed and did not warm up, because hey, it's the Ice Weasels and we still wanted to play-by-play the women.

Fortunately, I had a 2nd row start, which I squandered by pulling out of my clipped in pedal in the first few meters. But hey, bike racing! I got to actually ride through the field a bit, which has not happened much this year. Riding in traffic is fun times because it makes you feel faster than you actually are.

Eventually I ride by Cary Fridrich, who said "I'm so wasted right now." Good work Cary.

Toby Wells, John Mosher and I spent some time hanging out. I was leading the group through the flats, sometimes. The ground was so frozen at points that I was losing my front wheel. See, my only tubular front right now is a Tufo Cubus, which is sort of a tractor tread. Maybe I should have heated up the tires before the race.

Wells passed me when I bobbled a turn, and it was Mosher and I for the rest of the race. We battled it out a bit, I was riding a little less conservative than he was and hopping the small barrier, but was a bit sloppy in some slower turns, much to his frustration. I also took a couple of beer hand-up's, but in smaller bite sized cups.

I also lapped Mike in various states of undress at least three times.

And then, for no apparent reason, my contact decided to fly out of my left eye. I actually stopped to try and save it, because it was my last one and did not have any glasses. Someone shouted that I was in 7th place and I realized I could buy new contacts with that money. I eventually found Alec Donahue sort of lying down on the run-up, which led to me doing the same (it was icy hard). He apologized, I said it was okay as long as Cary did not pass us. Then Donahue sort of rode away. But it was okay.

I finished up 7th as promised, fun times!

While I'm glad every race in New England is not like this (I mean, where would the fun be in that?) I'm glad this happens. Ending the season on a high note.

NBX and lessons learned.

2010-12-07T11:45:00.003-05:00

Last Sunday capped off what has been my longest racing season to date. Typically minor things like knee's, pneumonia, and money keep me off my bike in December. Getting to start at NBX this year was definitely a milestone.

Let's backtrack a bit to the previous weekend, where I discovered that I was becoming #BRKZ pack fodder. Sterling had nice cold weather, lots of fun turns and terrain that actually suited me quite nicely. My first day was relatively uneventful, though I traded blows a bit with Jean-philippe Thibault-roberge. Then Adam Sullivan took my lunch money.

The second day I decided I was going to adjust my tire pressure on the line. Unfortunately, a Cubus 32 holds a lot less air than a 26x2.1 MTB tire, and I was folding the tire over on every turn! I switched to the pit bike after getting passed by everyone and the race before me (folding a Tufo creates a rift in space-time). Learning experience achieved.

Shut up Gregs!

I was still riding not so awesome, so it was not a big deal. No lapping occurred, which was good enough for me.

Fast forward again to this last weekend. In the interest of financial conservation, I chose to race only on Sunday. I am slightly upset, because I got to miss the Hopengarten holeshot of doom. I picked an awesome number (73) which staged me in the last row.

Creative Commons licensed photo courtesy of Christopher S. Harrison

The uphill start meant I could actually hang in for a few minutes with what appeared the be the lead "group," and I spent some time hanging out with Adam Sullivan, Stephen Pierce, Amos Brumble, and a few others. I managed to keep up on most parts, but was lacking the snap that I needed to maintain contact. This group eventually broke apart, and I worked to stay with Sullivan and Pierce.

Sullivan and I broke from Pierce briefly, but he eventually opened a gap I could not close. Pierce caught up to my wheel, and while exiting a rooty turn I bobbled and lost a pedal, managing to stay upright. I chased in the sand but eventually lost my legs and Pierce caught up to Sullivan. Chris Hamlin arrived on my wheel (I could tell by the chain noise) and attacked on the road section. I stayed with him, but again lacked the legs to really respond and kept going.

Josh Lehmann reaped me toward the end, probably as payback for the last few races. Thanks, guy.

Not many people saw this while riding, sadly. Creative Commons licensed photo courtesy of Christopher S. Harrison

Keeping an eye on the lap cards, I passed 2 to go only to hear the announcer say "The lead group has 1 and a quarter laps left!" Crap, I needed to at least stay with it and I was beginning to notice I had enough mucous in my stomach to allow for an appropriate "response." Matt Myette kept trying to feed me a twinkie or something, but I only take dollar feeds and managed to grab one off the barriers.

I managed to finish lead lap, hitting the barriers while the race winners were cooling down on the road. Phew, that was close. It turns out I was the last person on lead lap, but I kept a decent pace just in case and also because it is bike racing. My barrier dollar went straight into the Narragansett beer donation cup. Hows that for full circle?

Don't tell the UCI about the hat I bought at REI. Creative Commons licensed photo courtesy of Christopher S. Harrison

It's been a good ride, cyclocross. Now it is time to pack it in with Ice Weasels.

RACE REPORT: Shedd Park 1/2/3

2010-11-22T16:29:00.005-05:00

This year I've only done UCI cross races, and I've missed a few good local ones. Finding myself with a little extra free time, I signed up for Shedd Park, because why the hell would I not do a local cross race 40 minutes from my house?

Preparation time was minimal since none of my bikes are in good shape right now. It was actually quite nice.

I had good legs despite having "trained" a bit the day before. Good as in they were attached to my body, anyway.

My staging order was second row, a first for this season, though I quickly squandered that at the start by missing my pedal.

People went forward and backward, and I eventually settled into a group with Mike, Matt Myette, Sam Morse, Synjen Marracco, Chris Hamlin, Chandler Delinks, and probably Toby Wells. Of course, I decided on lap 2 or 3 that riding in a group was no way to ride, so I attacked the shit out of the group on the running track. This may or may not have been a good decision.

Riding alone is awesome.

The next lap was mostly me coming close to falling off my bike because I now had an empty matchbook and needed to keep it going. Eventually I lost my balance on one turn going WAY too hot and Fred Flintstoned my bike to a stop. I lost a little bit of time. I tried to stay on the group but got super sloppy and burned too many matches. Sam Morse told me to stop riding poorly and I complied. But the group rode away.

With 4 to go I was alone, but looking behind me I would occasionally see Synjen hanging out. I usually pedaled harder when that happened.

He's coming to get ya.

I was continuously offered waffle and beer feeds on the hard ride up, but this is Boston, not LA and the only feeds I take look like currency. Though FourLoko might quickly become a collectors item in no time.

Thissucksthissucksthissucksthissucks

Mike shouted at me from across the course -- something about a pit? Maybe he wanted to barbecue. Turned out he needed my pit bike for the last lap, he had a flat. No problem, I needed to pass one more person anyway!

I saw Synjen coming for me so I sprinted like I almost meant it on the track, for lucky number 13. This is pretty much where I expected to be anyways, though I've yet to best Cary Fridrich this year and it is a bit troublesome. Especially since he parties harder than I do. Oh well.

Shedd Park Media Monday!

2010-11-22T09:26:00.002-05:00

Photos by Caitlin. Click for more!

OHNOHO: Cycle-Smart International

2010-11-09T11:27:00.016-05:00

What a fine weekend for a bike race (Pictures by caitlin)

This one is going to be brief, as pretty much every member of our team with internet access is likely to post up something about the level of awesomeness that was Northampton. Unfortunately, the races level of awesome was inversely proportional to MY level of awesome; that more or less equals 2 days of Mike sucking kind of hard, but having fun doing it.

Day one, Apocalypse 2010: The Enemy Strikes BRKZ.

Man, did I have a good start. How good? Well, I was on Jerome Townsends wheel when he hit the deck in the woods. There was a surreal "Im in front of THAT guy" moment, followed by a few more minutes of "holy shit, Im STILL in front of that guy" until we got to the open stretch after the second ballfield when "that guy" blew by me so fast he took most of my self-worth with him.

Oh, whos that trying to get around me?

I started lap 2 in the top 20. Seriously. I know because people were screaming it at me on the runup (they were as surprised as I was). In the woods, I was with 3 or 4 riders in a very tight "chase group" (meaning they were trying their damnedest to get around my slow ass). In the corner by the gazebo, all 4 of us tried to take the one line through that sketchy turn at the same time. Ultimate fail.

I got muscled into the tree at the apex of the turn, jamming my already-sad thumb and tearing open the slowly-healing wound on my hand. Weak. I wasnt really aware of any ill effects until a minute or so later, when the guys upped the pace and I just couldnt stand up to hang on. I had apparently mangled the limit screw adjustment on my thumb.

There is still some thumb-junk on my hoods.

So I moved backwards the rest of the race, getting passed by (in all fairness) guys that are usually ahead of me anyway. Im not going to lie and say it didnt sting a little when Ryan Kelly left me for dead. Cause it did. Im not going to fault him for having an amazing race, though.

B2C2, meet BRKZ

Day 2, Aiming High For The Middle:

We stayed with Caitlins parents that night, had very tasty breakfast and went back for round two of Northampton. I felt ok, my hand wasnt in terrible shape and I really, really wanted to redeem my performance from the day before. I pulled a "midpack" start number from the magic jar and heckled the 3s before warming up.

Thing was, my start stunk. The guy who staged in front of me couldnt get clipped in, and in the 3 seconds of fussing with it we both lost 20-odd places. Now starting the race in the bottom 10 riders, I had to focus on moving up. And, to my lasting surprise, I did.

In the WBRKZ (Way Behind Ryan Kelly Zone - also an easy listening station in Boise)

BRKZ me once, shame on you. BRKZ me twice...

I started picking off riders almost immediately, moving past Josh and Adam while towing an entire Pain Train out of the BRKZ. I felt great (as great as you can feel at 190BPM) and kept the pressure on, until I had blown up the group I was in and joined a new party.

That party was a little lamer (less shit-talking, more Serious Bike Racing) but we "worked together" (see description above) for 3 or 4 laps to consolidate what had to be a great position. It had to be, right?

I AM DOING SO WELL!!

Well, I had 2 misconceptions about how the race was unfolding.

1. I didnt realize then just how bad my start was and was therefore not privy to the crash that put a HUGE gap into the middle of our race.

2. I thought I was going to make it through the weekend without a mechanical.

So I was putting in the fight of my life for 30th place, and my freehub was starting to make the most hideous screeching noise. Which was fine - I didnt mind sounding like a Tie fighter at all - until the noise was followed by 2 or 3 pedalstrokes of zero engagement. The sand, though otherwise fun, had made its way into the pawls of my freehub - and the subsequent furious pedaling would occasionally drop my chain.

As they say in the ECCC: Braaaaaaaap!

Sometime around now, I noticed Rooter was a few turns back and desperate to get me some time on his "People I Passed Today" cam. Trying to get some power down, but unsure of exactly how to tap into my reserve of BRUTAL_WATTS without disengaging my drivetrain, I slowly lost contact with my chasers. Colin picked me up about halfway through the last lap and rode away - I rolled in a handful of seconds later, still thinking I had turned out a good finish.

Stop looking around Colin, you know damn well you dropped me 5 minutes ago.

33rd.

Yeah.

So, to sum up:
- One of the best races of the season, in every way.
- I (and my greedy insides) fully support what seems like everyone trying to outbake everyone else.
- More proof that the earth will not crash into the sun without the 80% rule.
- Hopefully this weekends casualties (Luca and Philip) heal up fast.
- We stuck around for awhile and helped break down the course; Jeremy Powers handed out pastries.
- Adams interview on cyclingdirt. Awesome.
- Matt Casserly has inherited my "bike curse".
- Ian is a hound-snuggler.

Ian, snuggling a hound.

See you next weekend.

When You Start Your Race in the Toilet...

2010-11-08T21:24:00.005-05:00

your whole race is likely to end up in the toilet.

Day 2 at NoHo was my first 'cross race ever 2 years ago and for some reason I seem to keep having things go wrong at this event that involve having to go to the bathroom. The first time, I didn't drink enough water because I didn't want to have to go to the bathroom on the start line. I knew about the whole "staging by reg order" thing but I guess it didn't really sink in. I looked at 'cross as just a long STXC race, was coming off a collegiate mountain season, and my brain was just going, "HOLE SHOT!" So I drank maybe a half a bottle of water on a lovely warm 70*F day and proceeded to find out what hitting a wall meant. When I think back to the race, the only way I can describe it was that I felt like I was riding through an endless bowl of Jell-O. I hobbled across the finish line after getting lapped and made a beeline for my water bottle, and sat down to drink some water and try to figure out what on earth had just happened to me.

I wasn't able to make it to CSI last year so this year I was excited to be back and hoping to rectify my mistakes of the past. To that end, I was HYDRATED! We got there in just enough time to watch the 4s go off and not pre-ride beforehand, so after I did a bit of an off-course warm up upon arrival (aka take off on a dead sprint across the field for the bathrooms) I set about getting my things in order to be on the course the minute the 4s finished. I heard the first call to staging for the 3/4 women but hey, it's only the first call. I had time and figured I might as well finish riding the upper section of the course since I had no time to get a whole lap in. Seeing everyone milling around the start area as I was heading over, I decided I had time to make one last pit stop at the PortaPotties. And that's about where I gave up on any chance of getting in the top ten.

I came out of the bathroom to see the last rows of my field pull into the start grid. NO!!! I went running towards the grid, dragging my bike and trailing my scarf, sweatshirt, gloves, etc that I had been warming up in. I don't think I even had my jersey back on by the time I got to the starting area. Poop. I started at the back of the 75+ women field and got further held up when someone toppled over before we even hit the first turn. More poop. I avoided putting a foot down then went on the attack. My recent string of bad starting positions has taught me that the womens field usually leaves most of bike width on either side of the course so I went tearing up the side hollering, "COMING UP!" in the hopes of catapulting myself towards the front while I still had a clear-ish path. I hauled ass only to get to...the Meander Up. You couldn't even remotely call it a run up on the first lap. I did my best to make it through traffic in the twisty sections after remounting (and I must say, my field is full of some classy ladies who generously gave way and encouraged me as I came up by them. I like my friends!) and was able to work up to 13th by the end of the race. It was kind of a bummer, I was feeling great and was still gaining on the people in front of me, but holy crap was the course fun! I had such a great time riding that it made everything else okay.

Day 2 I got there earlier and was determined to get all bathroom needs out of the way nice and early. I got a few pre-ride laps in, made use of the facilities, and headed over to staging as soon as I heard the first call. My results from Day 1 at least got me a little closer to the front (yay Verge points!) and I was ready to go! There was another little pile up in the first turn before the pavement that I got stuck in and a group got off the front. I was back in chase mode and set about picking off riders. I could hear over the speakers that Emma White was way off the front with a group of 6 chasers, and I was able to bridge up to and pass all but the chase group, who remained out of sight in front of me the whole race. The last person that I was able to catch was Jen of the Cambridge team, and she has to be one of my absolute favorite people to race with. Not only is she tough as hell to get away from but any time you're near her, whether she's in front or behind you, she's cheering for you. I bobbled a little bit on the run up in the last lap and nearly missed a turn at one point and she was cheering me on, telling me I was doing great, and generally being awesome. She was right on me going down the descent from the top section but I was able to open things up a little in the turns and the sand pit and hold her off to the finish line to get 8th place. I had such a good time racing that I went through the finish and immediately headed back out for another lap just to spend more time on the awesome course.

In other team news, our cat 3 guys did well despite Casserly having mechanicals both days and Ian going covert, disgusing himself in his BU kit to be part of the ECCC competition and therefore rendering him impossible to identify and cheer on mid-race. Ryan happily had his first race in forever where he didn't have a wheel implode or chain fall apart and he was riding around with a big grin the whole time. Mike and Greg had respectable finishes in the Elite races aside from Mike having an altercation between his hand and a tree on Day 1 and Greg riding around half-blind after losing a contact lens on Day 2.

I had a really enjoyable weekend, loved the course both days, ate some tasty post-race oatmeal courtesy of Bob's Red Mill and traded cookies for shifting help with the really nice Mavic mechanic. Also, between Nor'easter and CSI I concluded that I really love the courses Myerson sets up and I definitely love the fact that he gives the womens 3/4 category 40 minute races. Considering the field sizes that we've had this year, doing 30 minute races is just way too short of a time for traffic to get sorted out; getting the extra time on the course makes a huge difference and, in my opinion, makes the race more exciting for everyone. To that end, I will be commencing an email assault on the Sterling Promoter in the hopes of getting them to consider making the races 40 minutes, and I encourage anyone who likes seeing the womens field get to race the time on the course that they paid for to do the same!

Finally, the B2C2 Bike Swap/Gear Sale is coming together nicely and we're also putting together a raffle to add to the festivities. So far on the sponsor list for the event is Cycle-Smart, Chrome, Mad Alchemy, and High & Mighty Beer Co. We're working on a few other fun things and of course, there will be baked goods as well. If you'd like a vendor space for the event ($10 per space), please email backbayc2[at]yahoo.com ASAP. We have a limited number of vendor spots and spaces are filling up!

Canton Cup and Orchard Cross (p/b bag balm)

2010-11-04T21:18:00.004-04:00

Canton Cup!

Cyclocross in Canton from M. Watkins on Vimeo.

Question: What is sixty minutes long, has very few turns, feels like riding on velcro and hurts real bad?

I remember Canton pretty fondly. Its one of the only races I have done every year since I started 2 seasons ago, and I have actually done well every time. During my preride, I wondered what all those good memories (and inexplicably good results) were about - it is almost as if they designed a course to highlight all of my weaknesses.

Long, straight power sections? Check.
Wide open turns where line selection isnt terribly important? Check.
Get off your bike a bunch? Also check.
Completely botched laundry day so I had to wear last years skinsuit that hangs on me like I had gastric bypass surgery? Oh yeah.

Luckily, I saw through their nefarious plan and was able to capitalize on my ability to jump over some of the things they intended me to run. However, turning a waist-high bunnyhop on a trials bike into a 40cm leap on a cx machine is a bit tricky - I opted not to hop the barriers near the pit. My fear of intensive dental work overcame my fear of finishing outside the top 10.

Happytime jumpypants (photo: Doublehop)

I got a front row start, thanks to the wild-west style staging. Not that it mattered - as soon as we went off, I got RMM'ed, grabbed a handful of brake, shot backwards and went into the woods in about 40th position. I believe that this was my third RMM-job of the season. Not that I blame him; the boy has a good start.

I moved up as I could, dodging crashed riders and what I think was a wheel (!) flying past my head. I was able to jump on the Rooter-mobile just in time for him to stuff it in a corner. We take turns holding each other up at these things, you know. Luckily he was bruised but otherwise ok. Catching up to Mr. Wilcox, we (meaning Dave) tried to shut down the rapidly opening gap.

He may have been pouring a little too much lighter fluid on the fire, though. On the first set of uphill barriers, he caught a shoe and went down hard. There was literally no one in front of me at this point (not that I was in the lead, just that the lead was that far away). Sigh. We are only three and a half minutes into the race.

The next few laps were hurty. Adam Sullivan joined me, as did another guy I didnt know. Eventually so did Wilcox and (a recently healed) Kevin Sweeny. We rode together for 2 laps or so, until the pace became unacceptably slow for Dave, who proceeded to head-bob his way to (and then off) the front of our group.

Letting the Wilcox go. (photo: Doublehop)

At this point, I think Adam actually said "Come on, Mike!" and leaped ahead in pursuit. I tried to warn him. I said "Do not follow the Wilcox". He did not listen. Neither did the other guy. I did not follow the Wilcox. To follow the Wilcox is to invite disaster. Nevertheless, off they went, unprepared for the soul-destroying agony that awaited them.

Adam Sullivan was not aware that there is no man on this Earth more dangerous than David Wilcox with 2 laps to go.

I can say with certainty that he has now learned that valuable lesson.

I caught him a lap later; he was ashen-faced and in obvious pain. I informed him that he had been Wilcox'd. I was able to pull a few seconds ahead, and that was that. 11th. Not too bad - I was hoping for a top 10, but the field was pretty stacked (Keough, Lindine and Johnny Bold filled up the podium) and my awful start certainly didnt help. A big hi-five to Synjen Marrocco who landed himself a top 10 - he had a great start, held on to the chase group until almost the end and kept himself hanging a few turns up from me the whole last lap.

Orchard Cross!

Hayride indeed. (all pictures by caitlin)

I wasn't going to race Orchard. Not because I had anything against the race (I had in fact never heard of it), but because I needed some hours at work (cross sure can put you in the poor house). Lo and behold my boss, Mr. Dan Houston, said he wanted to learn how to race cross.

Since we are roughly the same size, his initial plan was to ride my bike. He was obviously unaware that my TEAMMATES regularly turn down my offers to put my bike in the pit for them. Not that it isnt a worthy machine, it just has some sort of curse, hex or bike-leprosy that makes parts inexplicably fall off, go flat or fail spectacularly. I really didnt want MY BIKE to be the reason MY BOSS broke his collarbone.

Also, the man is a pretty solid mountain biker, and has a very sweet 29er. And after riding a few laps on that course, I was kind of praying for a little suspension myself.

That course was a real grundle-buster.

Chattery, loose gravel and broken up farm roads were the order of the day. Combined with fatigue from the previous afternoon and a surprising amount of elevation gain on a lap that never seemed to end meant that my spirits were in about the same shape as my undercarriage.

Hurty, meet arty.

It was cold, but clear and dry. The crispness of the fall New England air seems to make you want to breathe harder. This place was great. The food, the band (!) and the staff were all awesome.

Oh, and Ted King was there.

Yes, the King of Style himself was going to do a local cx race. Now I dont know the man (though I spent about an hour in his wake), but I have to say that it was awesome of him to show up. Local races like this are a big part of what has made the burgeoning US cross scene so successful (to the point where folks are actually complaining about "saturation"), and big-name riders like Ted coming out to support a little race at an apple orchard is great for the organizers and fun for pretend bike racers like me to play chase-a-bike with.

Like I said, I wasn't planning on racing, so my day-of registration earned me a "back row" lineup (there were 3 rows, so not a terrible situation there). RMM showed his very mighty start once again, as I demonstrated how to move backwards (is that possible with a back row start?). According to Colins fancy new (and hopefully still legal) chainstay cam, I moved up quickly - joining him, Bradshaw, Johnny Bold and Mr. King in a hurt-filled group of panting awfulness that lasted about half a lap.

Sample Dialogue:
Colin: Im sorry, Ted King, but I have to get you on video. The internet demands it.
Ted: Are you "Colin R?"
Colin: Yes
Ted: *shifts into a harder gear*

Colin, burying himself so that all of you could watch a ProTour rider in a cyclocross race, finally pulled the chute at the top of the climb before the start/finish. A gap opened up, and I then spent the rest of the race vainly searching for a wheel-teat between 3 and 30 seconds behind Ted King (whose barrier hopping style is the stuff of legend).

GET BACK HERE AND TEACH ME HOW TO BE AWESOME!

Oh, did I mention the course was even less suited for me than Canton?

More terrifying than the pounding my undercarriage has thusfar received was the ominous time splits Caitlin would provide after jumping out of the bushes to snap a picture: COLIN AND RYAN ARE 15 SECONDS BEHIND YOU!!! THEY ARE WORKING TOGETHER!!

Awesome.

In retrospect, the thought of Colin and Ryan doing anything except attacking the living hell out of each other is a little farfetched. But in that oxygen-deprived haze of seemingly endless pockmarked climbs and bumpy power sections, it seemed a very legitimate threat. That, combined with what appeared to be a diminishing gap between me and Ted got me out of the saddle and deeper into the hurt box.

Runup... sucks... so... much

I had no major mechanicals this time (I know), though on all the fast downhills my freehub made a most horrific pterodactyl noise.

You know what? Im cutting the rest of this report short so I can talk about donuts.

Sweet, sweet cider donuts. This place had them in piles (literally). You could get them in almost any form you desired (including as an ice cream sundae) but regardless of what glazed incarnation my chubby little fingers got a hold of they were duly stuffed into my eat-hole like grapeshot into the cannons on Mayres Heights. Nothing brings out my inner fat kid like sugary glaze on a fried dough-ring.

Dylan: eventual winner and Him That Walks Behind The Rows.

All in all, a good weekend: Dan acquitted himself honorably in his first cross race, Ian, Matt and Lauren had great races on Saturday (Matt and Ian less so on Sunday; their Halloween costume was "2 guys with mechanicals") and I got to eat a crap-ton of donuts.

And there was much rejoicing.

1st Annual EVENT : B2C2 Bike Swap and Gear Sale p/b the Record Company

2010-11-01T09:31:00.003-04:00

B2C2 1st Annual Bike Swap and Gear Sale presented by The Record Company

WHEN: November 18, 2010 - 5-11pm

WHERE: 960 Massachusetts Ave, 3rd Floor, Boston, MA 02118 (in the Newmarket Industrial District)

WHY: To sell or buy things.

HOW MUCH: $10 for a selling space, $2 to enter. Spaces can be shared.

WHAT ELSE: Parking is available in the adjacent lot.

View B2C2 Bike Swap p/b The Record Company in a larger map

Nearby Bus and Train -- 8 and 10 bus, Boston Medical Center Orange Line.

facebook event page.

Contact backbayc2 AT yahoo.com for more information.

Race Report : DECX 1 and 2

2010-10-27T13:29:00.001-04:00

Greetings, literates. You might recall last years DECX, my first race as an Elite last year. It was a bit wet and I had a spectacular fail in the pit. After a few mechanical misfortunes this season, I sojourned up this year with mostly dialed equipment and tires filled with air.

I was prepared for a bit of a slog but it turned out this years course had a whole heap of awesome. Turning was essential, though there were still a couple places to layout watts (though not enough for a pure power rider). And I finally had some tubular tires to keep me upright.

Staging was assigned by random lot, and I picked a number that placed me about 20 rows behind the last person. Riding in the BRKZ was not advantageous for the start, but we were informed by the commissar that the 80% rule would not be enforced. The people rejoiced.

Starting in the back gave me an interesting perspective, as I saw the front of the race come by two turns ahead. And then I passed David Wilcox, who's REAR WHEEL was missing. After at least two or three people crashed in front of me, I managed to sneak by and pick up more positions.

Getting up there. Photo by Caitlin.

I spent the first half clawing my way to the front for a bit, and by the middle actually saw myself the closest I've ever been to a UCI point behind John Peterson and at one point Sean Milne. Milne obviously smoked the both of us as he surged forward. I switched bikes since my primary bike did not seem to be shifting right, and I began to lose some steam in the middle of the race as I saw the orange BikeBarn kit fade into the distance.

Don't look at me!

Michael Jenks and I spent a decent amount of time going back and forth after that, which ended with him slipping out on an off camber and allowing me to pass. I rode alone for a while, recovered a bit, you know, because that is necessary in a cross race.

At this point Colin Reuter showed up on my wheel and told me we just needed to finish ahead of Wilcox, who was coming back strong. Colin ninja'ed me in the rad bowl turn by railing the berm -- maybe I should have also raced my MTB more this year -- and while I stayed on his wheel in the flat road section I began to lose some steam in the turns and saw him open a gap. Confident I could at least finish where I was, I applied more force to the pedals with 3 or 2 to go in the hopes that I could at least avoid having to fight for my finishing position. Wilcox came screaming by at this point, shaming myself and my family, and then disappeared again. I saw Jenks beginning to close in again, but I kept it up and finished safely in 16th place.

Day Two

After some deal searching at the Patagonia outlet in Freeport, we rolled over to our favorite place again. By this time, as tradition dictates, the toilets were completely filled with terrible things and required a firm constitution to enter.

The Super8 breakfast did not fill me up completely, and for some reason I did not want to take advantage of the wonderful food available. I found myself drinking bulk hammer gel out of the container 10 minutes before the race to fight a severe bonk, oops!

The course had changed enough to keep me on my toes. I managed to draw a descent third or forth row start, but pretty much blew it anyways, finding myself pretty solidly in the back again. Intent to roll over the awesome rock wall, I found myself in a logjam.

A bit deflated whilst schlepping my bicycle. Photo by Don and Dana McEwen

I caught up to Mike and we rode for a while, but intent to bury my teammate and ride alone I put in the effort to open the gap. Sadly, Colin was solidly ahead of me the entire race chasing the Wilichoski beast, though I had managed to get close to him at one point. Michael Jenks was ahead of me again, and we battled for position, with him eventually going ahead after I bobbled on some turns. I began to see Pascal Bussières and Mike closing in on me, which meant I had start racing bikes again.

I established a bit of a lead, and caught Jenks. He seemed to be fading a bit, and I'm pretty sure I got a bit of a gap on the road section that I was able to hold onto. On the last lap, I got a good inside line after the pit on Cory Collier who seemed to have let out the parachute a bit. I came in alone, again, in 17th.

SO THAT IS BIKE RACING. No flats this time, and I didn't even need a pit bike on day 2!

XDECX: IF YOURE NOT NOW, YOU NEVER WERE

2010-10-25T22:30:00.007-04:00

Day one: Would you believe - The Valve Stem Just Fell Out?

Despite the much-improved course, reduced field, not-at-all bad start and "good sensations" I am going to describe how my race went with pictures of cows.

I was very, very excited about this race. The course was awesome, and I was practically drooling with anticipation.

We were packed in pretty tight at the start. I was somewhere in the back.

The field strung out fast, and I was caught in traffic. I moved up quickly, though - Greg and I made our way to the (gasp) front half of the pack.

Suddenly, I realized something was amiss.

And I had to just sit up and softpedal to the pit.

I chased as hard as I could, but I was so far off the back it didnt make much
difference.

And that was that.

Day 2: The chili/ shallow toilet paradox.

What a difference a clincher makes! Running a tire (in this case, a Mud2) at 35psi instead of 28 or so makes a course with fast off camber sections that much more interesting. I had a decent start this time, getting in line after the holeshot about 25 guys back after drawing the Grim Reapers Number for the second day in a row. Speaking of Reaping, the self-proclaimed Cat 2 Grim Reaper himself - RMM - had himself one hell of a start, cruising out to a few spots ahead of me with Steven "We Take Turns At This" Pierce. That other ex-van dwelling elite racer and I have been back and forth all season. Maybe in response to the Hebrew Cup, we can come up with an "Crabby Old Band Guy" competition.

Serious Roosting. (Photo: Bethany)

Regardless, I had to move up - I sensed a disturbance in the BRKZ, as if millions of voices cried out in terror, and then were suddenly silenced... Oh wait - those voices were Matt and Steve letting me know in no uncertain terms that if I let Ryan catch me, I was driving home alone. Also, Mike was starting to look a little rough.

Caught in its tractor beam. (Photo: Bethany)

I passed RMM and Steve before the turns through the barn. Moments later, I think I actually heard the elastic snap and Mikes legs get very, very angry at him. We have all been there.

I was actually feeling pretty good when Greg caught me. Thinking we could "work together" or something like that, I promptly bobbled a corner and lost a bike length. Awesome. In that moment of panic, I looked around and saw the BRKZ train (with Huff, Huston and 2 or 3 other guys in tow) closing in fast.

And thats how it was going to be for another 3 laps. Greg dangled just ahead of me, while Colin dangled just ahead of him. I kept sliding out on the off camber sections (thanks again, Challenge) and had to make it up by sprinting hard every time I could. Then, despite my best efforts, I was no longer alone.

Some French(?) guy had caught my wheel. I looked back and saw that the BRKZ group had blown apart - Huston and Huff seemed to be there, but Ryan had given up a small gap. The others were nowhere to be seen - I assumed them to be dropped.

Until some guy in a yellow kit steamrolled by me.

Sweet.

Surprisingly, I didnt panic. I actually sat up and waited for the downhill section in the woods and attacked, bridging up to Frenchy-pants and dropping yellow jersey guy. That attack also seemed to have the added benefit of disrupting the chase a little bit, giving me valuable time that I could squander by scrubbing speed in every turn.

The final stage of the race was me and my friend from the great white north trading attacks and generally heaping abuse on one another. He could put more power down on the flats and climb, but I could (to my lasting surprise) out corner him and shut the gaps down.

Synjen is unimpressed with my barrier management. (Photo: Bethany)

Sadly, just before the barn at the last section of the course, he capitalized on one of my many poor cornering decisions and got a gap I could not close. I dangled just a few bike lengths back, unable to push it through the final off-camber turns. He caught and passed a rider in obvious distress, and I pulled onto the pavement about 75 feet back.

Too stupid to just suck it up and coast across the line, I got out of the saddle and sprinted as hard as I could. The guy that the Frenchman had just passed was looking haggard, and I needed gas money.

I lost by a wheel, but I still managed to score enough of a payout to get me home.

Overall impressions of the race:

+ Course. Great use of a (comparatively) small patch of land, especially on the first day.
+ Food. To give you an idea how good the food is, Caitlin didnt want to miss the race - sitting in the car for 4+ hours = a very tasty pie.
+ Organization. Well run, smooth, and with friendly volunteers and officials.
+ NO 80% Rule. Hopefully that horseshit is behind us.
+ Heckling. Noticeably above average this weekend. I guess you have to keep warm somehow.
+ Adam Myersons 1st UCI Win. Respect.

- Shallow Toilets. Hovering over Mt. Flushmore after an hour long race is both difficult and unnecessary.
- Far. But thats not the fault of the race.
- Random staging. Great if you pull a good number, less great if you are staging dead last. Hey USA Cycling/ UCI whatever: PERHAPS USING RULES DESIGNED FOR THE WORLD CUP CIRCUIT ARE NOT NECESSARY FOR A C2 RACE WITH 37 PARTICIPANTS.

Downeast CX Media extravaganza - Day one and two

2010-10-25T07:54:00.000-04:00

Cat 3 Men - Day 2

Mostly Cow's with a couple day 1 Elite Men

Elite Men, Day two

How To Race Yourself Into The Ground In One Easy Weekend!

2010-10-21T21:17:00.016-04:00

WUT (photo: Russ Cambell)

Last weekend was fun. Not in the Chuck-E-Cheese-never-ending-ballpit-and-skiball fun, but pretty awesome nonetheless. 2 days, 3 races and a boatload of SHUT UP LEGS.

Saturday, Mansfield Hollow.

I went to this one because it came highly recommended from people that I care to take recommendations from. And because they had a 2/3/4 race. For some reason, I really miss doing 2 races in a day.

Awesome:

-Cider. Seriously. And free baked goods for the racers.
-Staff. Friendly, very helpful and approachable.
-1/2/3 2/3/4 race configurations.
-Payouts. The fields were relatively small (<45) but they made a point to pay/give (actually good) merch pretty deep.

Not Too Bad But Im Going To Whine About It On The Internet Anyway:

-Course. Aside from some clever use of the beach and a few turns, we raced in a straight line on a more or less mowed lawn in a wind tunnel.
-Gravel Pile. I suppose this could be filed under "course", but it deserves special recognition here, as it very nearly was the end for me and was very actually the end for Manny Goguan.

Race 1.

I had a good start, and was a few bike lengths ahead when I had the bright idea to pump that god damn gravel pile. I launched over the kicker, past the transition, over the gravel and dead sailored my ass into a nose manual that was somehow corrected before corner. Unfortunately, I most definitely did not go into that corner at a reasonable speed and went down like I was trying to steal third base. My mighty 3 bike length lead squandered, I sullenly pulled back in about 5th wheel.

I then suffered most horribly for the next 45 minutes.

There I am, suffering horribly. (photo: Steve Yau)

You see, that crash jammed my brake so that it was always "on". And with my brake "on", I was most assuredly "off". I was all over the turns, pushing chain up the rideup and dying hard just trying to keep in contact with the lead group.

Eventually, one of the Goguans got tired of roosting me and got a bit of a gap that I was unable to shut down, while some crazy guy with a disc wheel left us both behind.

3rd place, not bad.

Race 2.

After discovering my brake caliper situation and resolving it, I wanted revenge (on what, I am not quite sure - but I certainly took out some of my rage on the muffins provided by the promoters). I had blown through any snap or fitness left in my sad legs, but was excited about my second race. The start wasnt particularly fast - especially after the crap tornado that was Gloucester - but I could tell from the getgo that I wasnt exactly going to be a factor in this race.

I passed a crumpled Manny Goguan after the gravel jump; he had also navigated it unsuccessfully. I hear he separated his shoulder, hopefully he will be back and crushing our souls in no time.

Moving from group to group searching for a wheel-teat I came upon Ryan O'Hara. Affixing myself to his power-nipple, I thusly clung (shamelessly) until the end of the race, at which time he righteously buried me in the final sprint.

To bury me any deeper, he would have needed a shovel (photo: Steve Yau)

7th place. Ouch.

Sunday, MRC Cross at Lancaster.

This one was a no-brainer. 35 minutes from Boston and 10 minutes from Caitlins parents? Done. After a tasty breakfast, we rolled up to the field. The first thing i noticed was this:

Holy crap, a flyover. So... happy...

Awesome:

-Flyover. Seriously.
-Best use of terrain I have seen all year. Mulch, sand, climbs, descents, completely insane turning and very well placed power sections.
-Staff. Bucking the early-season trend of grumpy and unhelpful officials, these folks were very nice and approachable.
-Turnout. I feel like I knew everyone there.
-Free stuff. Racers = mooches, and I am no exception. Thank you for the Luna bars.

Crying on the internet:

-Payouts. With field sizes as large as they were, I feel like the payout could have gone a bit deeper.

The race:

My start was kind of awesome: 5th wheel, feeling surprisingly strong. We went through the first few turns - so far, so good. Someone went down in turn 3, I got by unscathed; this was actually going well. I took an outside line and started to put some power down on the climb.

And thats when Nate Morse welcomed us all to earf.

He shot past us, a skinny blur of blue and yellow. I remember thinking, "hmmm, thats weird". Just then I felt somewhat less good (getting dropped by a 16 year old will do that) and began bleeding places. That is the trouble of starting strong: the only place to go is backward. I tried to hold on to the front of the race when a 545 guy crashed in a turn, causing me to unclip and allowing a sizable gap to open up. 545 guy then added insult to injury by chopping the ever loving shit out of my wheel a few turns later.

Things were looking pretty dire. BRKZ dire.

so much trouble in the #BRKZ

Alright, now Im on my way to getting passed by the cat 3 field. But I think Im starting to get this racing thing - I didnt panic, just tried to recover, sit in and use the turns to move up. After a lap of moving backwards, I was able to rally and move up. I caught Nate (we talked a bit about how this was last year all over again - he really is a good kid and a classy racer), moved up some more and caught a Gearworks rider, dropped him and worked on extricating myself from the BRKZ.

Mulchy

The problem was, the BRKZ was mighty today. I think he has been practicing - I simply could not get around. We actually worked together pretty well, we reeled in another rider or two and caught the 545 guy that buried his backside into my front wheel. We were now a group of 4 (or something very much close to 4).

Oh, I guess it was 4

On the last lap 545 got a bike length on us and I gave chase, dropping Ryan and bringing another rider with me. An embrocation rider was closing in fast, and I was tired. I wasnt in any shape to win a 3 up sprint, so I buried myself to go into that last turn on the asphalt ahead of those guys. My oxygen-deprived strategy worked, and it seems sprinting from WAY TOO FAR is something I can do.

Sprintypants

7th place, again.

Caitlin took all the Lancaster pictres

Providence, Night Weasels, and Greg's Gloucester Gamble

2010-10-13T15:30:00.000-04:00

Last weeks racing has most of us sitting around stretching our blogging arms a bit late, myself included. Time to bring you up to speed.

The Great Gloucester Gamble

This year I decided to finally get tubulars. Strapped for cash, I opted to build myself wheels so I could have multiple sets. Strapped for time, I decided I was going to learn to build wheels and glue tubulars in the same week, which happened to be the week leading up to Gloucester.

So, I didn't get the whole "tension" thing right, and it all came unraveled Saturday during the race. OOPS. Fortunately I have a pit bicycle, I grabbed it from the Mighty Nick and continued on. Mavic provided neutral support in the form of a whole new set of wheels, which was fortunate for me because I flatted one turn before the pit. I finished lead lap somewhere in the 30's. My Mom was there, and she was very impressed. Thanks mom!

At least I made some money back..

Sunday was a clincher day, and the Mighty Nick came through again with some wheels for me to borrow. Naturally, I was having an awesome ride before I flatted and rode right past the pit, which lead to me running / riding through the back side of the course and losing like 10+ positions. My ass was B minused by the officials.

Night Weasel's Cometh

I thought I would help out Colin and his Crossresults.com team event by showing up and helping Ryan Kelly figure out how to plug in 1/4 in speaker inputs to Richard Fries PA (hint: they are on the back). We also put a bunch of glowsticks on spikes. It was raining a lot.

Joshua a.k.a. Robot of Geekhouse offered to loan me his mud wheels for the race, since my clinchers were looking very sad. Twenty minutes in, I rolled his rear wheel re-mounting after the barriers. OOPS.

Of course, during that time I still managed to re-injure my thumb from last year. Very pleased about that.

A slight aside

After Gloucester, David Wilcox of Broadway Bicycle School and the Pedro's CX team offered to help me fix my haggard wheels. Things went from sad-face to dialed in a short period of time. I am extremely indebted to this man and probably owe him a lot of Newman O's.

A small consequence of fixing my wheels was that my front tire needed to be removed. Friday morning I did an emergency glue job that ended up holding fine. Almost too well.

Providence

Finally, something timely.

My bike was working okay, but due to my hasty glue job my pads were actually sticking to the rim. Fortunately, a kind gentleman from WheelWorks was easily bribed by Lauren's deadly pandering cup-cakes.

Last year, I had a decent finish (1st) on Saturday. I got psyched on the course because it's tons of fun. Many people seemed to be getting flats, including Meredith Miller while she was leading the elite women, and my whole team. I put a couple more pounds in my tubular and hoped for the best.

I staged nearly dead last since I registered Thursday night. I knew things would change quickly since people were all over the place.

The whistle blew and the gentleman in front of me decided he was going to crash right into the person in front of him, who seemed to not be moving. This was in the grid. I wasn't even on a wheel going up the first hill, and nearly dead last.

Where is everybody?

On the first lap, I worked my way through some people in turns and runs. After running up the wooden stairs, I remounted in a small group and descended into the whoopty whoop section. Blinded by the sun, I had a guy next to me into the uphill 180 around a tree. I faithed it a little bit, and slammed a big root, causing my front tubular to flat. Ruh roh.

I slid back a bit as I rode a flat to the pit, switched bikes, moved up past people I probably should have already been ahead of, and eventually found myself dualing with Josh Lehmann. He passed me and gapped, but then slid back while I did the same. Later on I found out he thought lapping was imminent, but misjudged a bit. Things were getting close, but I realized I was going to be far enough ahead of Johnson to go through the finish line. BUT I was pulled because of the 80% rule. So that was kind of a bummer.

Red bar tape means pit bike

Post-race, RMM gave me a shot of Caffe Latex, which worked for a little bit, but sadly this Grifo was done for. I got in the car and realized that I felt incredibly ill. Fast forward 20-hours later on Sunday and I was finally able to eat my first meal. Naturally, I had to abandon Sunday's race, though I did finish first in the sleeping competition (almost 18 hours!) Remember, kids, cyclocross makes your immune system all janky and weird. Don't take any strange germs home with you.

PVD Tire Death Toll + more

2010-10-11T13:01:00.003-04:00

This has been quite the week of racing in New England.

Newest B2C2 recruit, Boo.

Things kicked off in style at a beautiful race weekend in Gloucester. This has been mostly covered already so I'm not going to go into too much detail, but I will say that I had a blast. When I saw the pre-reg list for the Women's 3/4 topping 100 riders for Day 1 and 90+ for Day 2, I started to get a little nervous and decided to aim somewhere above the top 20ish/ride as hard as I could. My goal was 12th, but the field was pretty stacked. Then I got an email from the race promoters saying that they were listening to rider input and giving the 3/4 Women 40 minutes of race time instead of the initial 30 minutes. Awesome! Bad crossresults.com points from years past had me staged 4 or so rows back from the people I'm usually competitive with, but some strategic running in the downhill hole shot on day 1 and hauling ass over the barriers helped me move through the traffic pretty well. I was pretty surprised after the first lap to see 2 laps to go only 10 minutes into the race. Seemed to me like a ten minute lap for a forty minute race meant it ought to be 3 to go, and I needed the extra time to try and catch people after starting further back, so that was disappointing. The course was great but the long grass sections didn't play to my strength. My Victim/Nemesis (yes, we're both for each other) Christine Fort absolutely blew by me during lap 2 entering a grass stretch after I had just overtaken another rider. I saw her dangling in front of me for the rest of the race, I caught up to her rear wheel after the downhill/sandpit at the start of lap 3 but then we turned onto grass again and I couldn't catch her wheel again. I finished in 15th, pretty happy with the days results. Other notes: Matt Cass is killing it in the 3's, Ian isn't far behind and I believe is leading the Hebrew Cup, Harrison held his own one of his first 3 races despite getting seriously crashed out twice by other people, Ryan epically damaged his DuraAce front wheel after attempting to put his knee through it on a slippery corner, Mike, as he mentioned, got his yearly run in, Greg survived the 80% rule in the Elites, Greg's mom knows exactly what kind of candy to bring to a bike race, and Christine, in addition to killing me on flats, makes an absolutely killer apple pie.

Day 2 went even better for me. It was an uphill start and I got on a solid BikeBarn racer's wheel into the grass. She was taking excellent lines and a few risks that pulled us right through the mess. This day included the run-up and I made $2 on it (thanks, Nick!), which was sweet. En route to the race that morning, Ryan I had told me that I looked strong the day before but maybe a little spinny, could I push a harder gear? Sadly, I found out that I could in fact push a lot harder gear and consequently worked harder/hurt more than I knew possible. The course was more turny with much shorter grass stretches and I tried to carry as much speed through turns as possible, and with 4 laps they legitimately gave us a 40 minute race that day. I caught someone on the uphill finish to end with a 7th place result. I was psyched! Matt Cass finished at the top of his field and in the $$$, everyone else in the 3's held their own and Mike and Greg put in good efforts, though I believe they both had to rely on pit bikes that day.

After feeling like I had a serious breakthrough with pushing myself, I was psyched for the rest of the week. Night Weasels was next. It was muddy. It was on a mountain. It was my first Elite race. Everyone was telling me it was my kind of course. Sadly, I don't know what happened. Lack of solid mud tires and confidence on the course led to a lackluster result. I did manage to thoroughly coat myself in mud and got my first payout (thanks to Colin & crew for paying out so deep!) at 15th, but I never really felt settled in and know I should have done a lot better. Thanks to Jen of the Cambridge team for cheering me on the whole time while racing herself, it made my disappointing bike handling a little easier to bear and reminded me that bike racing is still totally worthwhile even if you're having a horrible day. And I did make some new friends with my cupcake pandering. I'm hoping to redeem myself at this event next year, and also looking forward to whatever ridiculous/awesome/terrifying trophies Leah PB concocts for the winners next time!

Leah giving her (glowing!) creation to Elite winner Meredith Miller

Onto Providence! Managing to not pinch flat on the course was an accomplishment in itself. Sadly, I did not pull it off on Day 1 despite a solid 40 psi. I missed pre-reg, started at the back, had to stop in the beginning of the race when some girl who flatted at the first entry to the grass STOPPED DEAD in traffic, dropped my chain after the barriers on Lap 2 (Jeff Lukach allegedly has photos of me hopping on, heading uphill not realizing what happened, spinning, and then rolling down the hill chainless and backwards), and flatted before the cement stairs on Lap 3. Since I believe destroying a perfectly good wheel is more respectable than dropping out, I soldiered on to the finish with my rear flat. I did some sweet Mariokart-esque power slides on the turns, passed some people running their flats, and got passed by many more people with their tire pressure still intact. This was probably the only instance this year where I was happy to only be racing for 30 minutes, as there was no hope of neutral support or spare wheels waiting for me in the pit. 20th out of about 60, which isn't too bad considering starting last row and mechanicals slowing me down. The only person on our team who didn't flat was Ian. Harrison, Matt Cass, and even Greg with his new tubulars suffered the same fate. Highlights: Thom of Newbury Comics sliced his knee to the bone but came back stitched up and in high spirits, while his teammates had some of their best race results of the year (Billy FTW!). Homemade applesauce makes carrot cake that much better, Starr has agreed to be a new trailriding buddy, spent some time hanging out with Andrew Frasca (former mastermind/builder of October Bikes) and his awesome prototype Crux - that guy is great and I'm glad to hear he's so happy @ Specialized, and there was some sweet barrier hopping action in the Elite race! Fun day despite the wreckage.

Day 2 went better for me and the course was a lot of fun. Big rollers, no brakes, to cheers of "YEAH BURRITO GIRL!" - awesome! Started in the back again in a field of 60ish people and spent the race chasing. Ended up with no flats and 13th place, although I really wished the race was longer than a half hour. I know I've been ranting about this all season but, for paying the same price as everyone else, I really do think they could spare us an extra ten minutes on the course, especially since the Women's 3/4 race has been attracting unprecendented #s of ladies. I also don't know why they used Verge points and then reg order to stage, considering it's not even part of the Verge Series anymore. Get on the crossresults.com staging bandwagon, PVD! I need to register now for all the other big race weekends so I don't get stuck in the back again, especially since I won't be at Downeast and therefore unable to pick up any Verge points any time soon. Another "dislike" for the Providence weekend was very strict enforcement of the "80% rule". Although it didn't affect me, I feel like they were unnecessarily rigid with it. They told us they would be at the start of the race under the guise of making things go smoothly for the leaders, but in reality it seemed they were forced to do this because the races were packed so closely together. I'm basing this on the fact that, for example, the Master's race leaders of the race before mine hadn't even come through the finish while the 3/4 Women were fully staged and ready to go at our 9.30am start time. They couldn't afford to let the back of the pack stay on the course when they had another race waiting, so the riders got pulled. It was a bummer. Seemed to me like better planning on the part of the promoters could have led to more fun for those people who aren't as fast but still want to race. To summarize: PVD, I had some complaints, but Gloucester is hard to follow and your courses are awesome. See you next year.

And there's my super race report for NECX super week. I'm looking forward to taking it easy for the next few weekends and packing in some night riding on the mountain bike before the real cold sets in.

Providence Media, day one!

2010-10-10T22:12:00.002-04:00

Some video's and photo's from day one at the Providence CX Festival.

Cat 3 Men, Day 1

Elite Men, day 1

Night Weasels VIDEOS Cat 3 and 4 men lap 1

2010-10-07T10:47:00.003-04:00

Taken whilst marshaling the course crossing yesterday.

Return of the Revenge of the Curse of Gloucester

2010-10-05T17:58:00.001-04:00

elite starts = fast.

Lets start by saying that Im not a superstitious person. Im not much for prerace rituals, dont pray, and I damn sure dont own a pair of "lucky gloves". However, it would seem that every time I get ready to race at Gloucester, I trip over a black cat while carrying an armful of mirrors.

Day 1: If Its Not One Thing, Its Another.

Last year, you may remember my one chance at a decent result get derailed by a rolled tire. This year, the tires stayed on, but another part of my bike decided to abandon ship at a critical moment.

I had a crappy start. Really crappy. Apparently, Justin Spinelli hooked up with some hay on his break lever and went down hard (I think I saw him after the race in a sling - I hope hes back online soon, Ill miss getting hurt by him in YET ANOTHER race discipline). The offending bale (bail?) went flying into the middle of our holeshot, fouling my entire half of the field with the smell of burning carbon and (at least from the reaction of the rider in front of me) soiled chamois. Cary somehow managed to get around it on my right, but I was bar to bar with 4 guys that were much more content to incoherently yell than work together for a quick escape.

By the time I got rolling again, I was watching Trebon fly across the back side of the course.

Oof.

getting paid.

Honestly, I felt good. Better than I thought I would, though maybe it had to do with the 30 seconds of forced recovery I got in that botched start. I started to chase. Hard. I moved up to the back of the Cary Fridrich/ Greg Whitney group, then that group broke in two. Stuck as I was on the wrong end of that split, I started sneaking (read: badly chopping) my way through. I timed my attack well, and just as we hit the pavement I stood up and unleashed a blistering... ummm... broken chain?

Yes, my dreams of catching up to the "Kind Of Fast Group" had been Andy Schlecked into a 2ish mile hellscape of running and carrying my useless machine on my bruised shoulder. Luckily, Steve had offered his own bike up for my use in the pits, so all I had to do was run the entire course without getting lapped by an absolutely flying Jeremy Powers. No problem.

Ahhh, the 'ol Gloucester 5k.

Ian Schon (who had a decent race of his own 2 hours earlier) produced a very pro bike exchange, and I (for my part) did not crash out in the pit. This was looking up. Except for the fact that Steve had something like 12 psi in his clinchers.

Now, Im not what you would call a "delicate rider" by any stretch, so babying a set of mud2s while desperately trying to catch back on to the elite field at Gloucester had only one practical outcome: destroying 50 or so yards of course tape and getting my sorry ass pulled with 4 to go.

Day 2: Even More Awesome.

Prerides are business casual

On day 1, I my excuse was a broken chain. On day two, I blame whatever ancient wizard I had wronged in a previous incarnation for polymorphing me into a knuckledragging troll with bad depth perception. Thats right. You just read a D&D reference in an elite race report. Its ok. I wont tell anyone that you actually GOT that reference.

Yeah, I rode like shit. No excuse, really. Im sure the video evidence will be available shortly, as Colin had a front row seat as I cat 4'd my way around literally every corner. I dont know what it was - I just couldnt get a rhythm, couldnt respond to any attacks - I couldnt even get my left foot clipped in for a quarter of a lap. Yeah, I was lame (as if the wizard thing didnt clue you in).

SHUT UP LEGS

Lamer than me (if you can believe it) was some d-bag Canadian that had somehow infiltrated our little group. That maple leaf mouthbreather actually took his hand off his bar and pushed me into the tape on a turn, forcing me off my bike. I then had to run the entire section, getting in the way (sorry Collin Houston) and ultimately getting out of the turn before him anyway. Then our friend from the great white north tried to pass ALL of us on the inside, slamming into Collins rear wheel and almost crashing the both of them out. A dick move, but the string of obscenities that fired out of Houstons mouth made almost getting taken out worth it. I was almost in tears, and Mr. Canada had very obviously taken the hint and was burying himself to get away from the enraged Moots rider. I actually caught and passed that knucklehead on the runup. Sucka.

A lap or so later, I caught Greg (who had his own tale of woe) and Bradshaw (who, after the best start of his life, also angered The Wizard Who Does Curse Us With Flats). We rode together for a few minutes and were mercifully pulled before our imminent lapping by an inhumanly fast Tim Johnson.

Me and a post-mechanical Bradshaw trying desperately not to get pulled.

In closing, here are a few things that stood out this weekend:

+ Course design. All the best stuff from last year, plus one or two little tweaks that made for good technical riding.

- Sand. Uninspired on day one, removed entirely on day two.

+ Huge fields. Racing against 90 other elites is very, very different from racing 30 other elites.

+ Prerides with the stars. Riding behind Johnson, Trebon and some of the other pros was very helpful (even if it didnt happen to help so much on this particular weekend). Cyclocross is almost unique in its access to the top talent in the sport. (Try getting on the field at Gillette stadium sometime to toss the ball around with Tom Brady and youll see what I mean)

+ Crowds. Money-throwing, beer-tossing and camera-crazy. When you are dead last and running instead of riding, it makes the difference between exiting under the course tape and limping that extra half lap to the pit.

+ Adam Myerson. Tireless cross promoter and advocate, he is also a stand up guy. He felt that my DQ at loon was unfair, found me in the parking lot and gave me a check for 25th place (there were 24 finishers at Loon). That is above and beyond the call for a promoter (I only wish dudes like him were around all those years I was on tour...).

+ Venue. Easily the best in New England.

- Running the kids race at the end of the 3/Juniors race. This kind of stunk for those guys - you definitely dont need 2 announcers for a group of 5 year olds riding around the gazebo, and the 3s/juniors had really interesting races. Except for the Seaside rider who does not seem to understand why the crowd was yelling "UPGRADE" at him, these were pretty dynamic and exciting events.

+ Mavic/ Pedros Neutral Support. These guys were awesome. Pedros cheerfully inspected my drivetrain and lubed my cables. Always super friendly, always helpful and seemingly at every race, they always come through for a rider in a pinch. Mavic rebuilt my freehub on day 2. Straight up. AND they refused payment. That alone is enough to earn my loyalty to their products (to say nothing of the 2 season old set of ksyrium tubulars that I have yet to put on a truing stand).

+ Two dozen amateur teams: It is fun to yell, but it is more fun to yell in large groups.

The Mayor's Cup!

2010-10-05T12:00:00.001-04:00

Since Gloucester is over, I suppose it would be good to touch on the Mayor's Cup. To continue the trend of doing dumb hard races post-upgrade, I figured this would be a good way to cap off the road season. Also, the logistics of riding 2-3 miles to an awesome race in downtown Boston outweighed traveling to a cross race this particular weekend.

Boloco graciously donated some space in their airstream for my gear, making that whole situation much easier. They are a very big supporter of Hub on Wheels, and I was pretty excited to fly the team colors on home turf.

I managed to get myself on the course and figured out that I could totally do this. We staged and I managed to get somewhere in the middle, which mattered little because once the race started people were hammering.

stole this picture from K Zubris on facebook

So here I was holding on for dear life in a $20k crit wondering, am I in over my head? I was definitely getting shoved in some of the bottlenecks, and pushed out of my line by some more aggressive crit riders (after referencing their numbers they were mostly from New York / New Jersey, which gives some legs to my theory about mid-Atlantic racers being ca-razy on bikes).

In the first 20 minutes or so I found myself near the front of the race, which turned out to be a bad idea. Because things were getting real fast. I slid towards the middle, just to keep from getting pooped out the back. A break of 12 went up the road -- 6 ended up lapping the field about 45 minutes in. WOW.

We went around a whole bunch of times, and with about 3 to go things were going to plaid and I was having a hard time staying on a wheel. I ended up spit out the back, and Colin Murphy and I circled around to finish on the same lap as the pack. My finish was 79 out of 80, which means 50 people were pulled. Hell, I'm satisfied.

Attn: Management Re: The Rules

2010-10-01T11:51:00.008-04:00

happyfun crosstime

I was going to post a race report detailing my adventures in bike racing last weekend. But Ive had lots to do this week, lots of preparing (well, mentally preparing myself for intense and merciless lapping) so I will summarize my weekend in a quarterly report-style presentation.

1. Do Officials Seem More Eager and Less Reasonable This Season Than In Previous Seasons?

- My research into this matter indicates that there has indeed been an increase in callous officiousness (Vogonity index 6.5!), a marked increase from previous seasons.

Examples:

1. Checking tire widths on the start line with a micrometer, the official punctured a competitors tire.
2. Official made a female racer remove her knee warmers because "it was insufficiently cold".
3. The "80% rule" has been enforced with draconian zeal, regardless of field size (is there really a need to pull riders when the field size is 28?).
4. At Suckerbrook, no one was allowed to preride the course until the Elite Womens race. There was rampant flatting in the 3s.
5. We were told at the start of Noreast that "it was 1 degree too cool to allow feeds". We were not clear as to weather the measurement was Fahrenheit or Centigrade.
6. I was disqualified by an official that claimed I had been lapped. I was not lapped. When I politely asked him about when (and how) he tried to pull me, I was threatened with a fine of 200 Swiss Dubloons (or Roman Sovereigns, or whatever). The fine was ultimately dropped, as was my (admittedly less-than-inspiring) result.
7. Security at the aforementioned event was exceptionally overzealous: my girlfriend was most rudely hassled by the staff, one friend of another racer was "escorted off the premises" by "security" - really? At a cross race?

The actions described above have been determined to affect both attendance and productivity.

Dave gleefully crushes my soul

2. Revenue Sharing (They Have Been Listening)

- On the brighter side, revenue has been up substantially (with equal time and payouts for womens fields becoming more and more widespread) and morale on that front is high.

linnea loves this runup

3. Have The Courses Been Getting Harder, Or Am I Just Happy To See Them?

Also, course design has been thoughtful an well-considered: for example, Noreast took a ski mountain and made it cross-able (almost unbearably painful, but still pretty awesome). We got a few more turns and sand-time at suckerbrook, and from what I understand, there was even a day at Green Mountain that wasnt a straight up hillclimb. We thank the management for their time and effort here.

very personal running

We at B2C2 have been looking forward to cross season for about a year now. We trust that these next few months will be both exciting and ruinous on the legs.

Never leave home without your towel

All the Bikes

2010-09-27T09:45:00.009-04:00

B2C2 riders stormed the Northeast this weekend, popping up at bike events all over New England. We had people riding up and down Loon Mountain at Nor'easter 'Cross, supporting our sponsor Boloco by riding for the Boloco team at Hub on Wheels, racing the Mayor's Cup, up in Vermont doing the VT 50, and slogging through the sand pit at Suckerbrook 'Cross. We also have Taylor out in Oregon, kicking ass at his local race series. I believe he has three wins under his belt in the B races already?

For my part, I opted to get my cyclocross on in preparation for the Glouceste r-Night Weasels-Providence "Week of Bikes" coming up and headed into New Hampshire both days, armed with my bike and plenty of pastries.

Nor'easter 'Cross was about what you would expect from a bike race on the side of a mountain. It reminded me of my collegiate days, where all short track xc courses involved copious amounts of steep gravel fire roads and winding around the bases of ski lifts because, in order to have a downhill course, you pretty much had to be at a ski venue. Then I would go down one of the slippery ditches on the downhills and think, "Oh crap, you are NOT on a mountain bike and you do NOT have fork suspension, do NOT hit that rock!" It was also part of the Nor'easter Festival, which meant that I got some free tech wear cleaner from Nikwax, which was cool, but it was really hard to watch the course in spots because you weren't allowed through, you needed "credentials", etc, which was not so cool. Also, Mike had some issues with a pretty offensive USA Cycling official, but I'll leave that for him to elaborate on.

Side note: Myerson, race promoter, gave the Elite women equal payout to 15 places and the 3/4 women got 40 minutes on the course. I believe we rode as many laps at the cat 4 men. It's the first race this year where I've been able to get the same amount of time on the course as the guys, even though we always pay as much as the guys do. I understand the financial logistics of smaller fields leading to shorter racing time, but I appreciate what he did and I made it a point to travel the 2+ hours to Loon to support this race because of it.

I had a great time, though some parts were a bit more harrowing than others. I hadn't pre-ridden the course and I started out in a reverse holeshot when Lily's wheel decided to EPICALLY FAIL on her (carbon rim just crumpled 5 seconds in) and there was a bit of a hold up behind that. I got back into the flow of traffic and the start is some asphalt onto a short stretch of grass before hitting a nice paved path up. I "excuse me, on your left, pardon me'd" my way up into 3rd by the time we hit the next section of grass and was right on #2 going up the first steep fire road, with Nancy riding for Ladies First pulling away in, well, first. I was still on #2's wheel on the first steep winding descent. I was convinced I could descend faster if I could get around her, but my attempts to take the shorter inside line kept getting blocked. Turn, turn, run up, ride down, back on pavement, feeling pretty good and smooth for no pre-ride. Then we come up to a 180 turn onto a short kicker, which to me looked like we were still going straight under a bridge. This is, thankfully, the only time not pre-riding messed me up. I didn't realize that the tape was part of another part of the course, and when I tried to correct my mistake by turning sharply and shifting quickly, my gears protested. I had to dismount, running my bike while turning my cranks to appease the derailleur gods, and then there was a rock run-up back onto pavement. During my frenzy, Christine of the Crossresults.com team got by me and Stacey Moser, my newest nemesis, was gaining. The next part of the course involved uphills and barriers before another downhill, but the grinding fire road climb was gradual enough for me to consider it the "recovery" portion of the course. I was a bit off of 3rd and maintaining my gap over Stacey when I hit the next steep descent, and felt good on the turns. Lap 2 I decided I was a mountain biker, technical turns were supposed to be my "thing", and I was going to get my 3rd place spot back. Instead of smooth turns, though, I pushed myself to go faster than I could handle and spent some intimate time with the course tape. The first time this happened, I was apparently attempting to get down the hill by sliding under the tape on my butt with bike in tow rather than weaving through it. Stacey got came by me (she's very nice, she checked to make sure I was okay while I was trying to wrangle a post off of my brake cable) and I never got back up to her. Another slide resulted in the girl in 5th coming alongside me but at the steep climb I managed to re-open the gap. At the end of the fourth lap I came across Christine and lunged at the pavement to get ahead of her. Not paying attention to the lap cards, it seemed to me that I may have heard a bell going into that lap and it felt like I had been riding for a while, so I was trying to hold Christine off to the finish. I get to the finish area and hear the bell ringing and my team cheering for me, yelling, "1 lap to go!!!" My oxygen depleted brain thought, What? Does 1 lap to go mean I can stop pedaling now? I kept pedaling until I officially concluded that it did not, it meant that I had better keep pedaling and harder, and so I did, and I managed to ride within my limits and stay upright. Nothing exciting happened after that and I got 4th, getting 2!!! upgrade points in the process. 8 more to go to reach my season goal of moving up to the Elites!

Suckerbrook was the following day, it was a fun and relatively flat course with lots of winding through course tape, 3 dismounts for me (1 set of stairs, 1 set of barriers, and one seriously deep sand pit), a fun fireroad that you could bomb, a log to hop, lots of cheering people along the course and the secret pinch-flat divet of doom. I was in 4th, right on 3rd's wheel, determined to get a podium spot, when I came across the divet. Immediate disaster, heard an ominous "Bunk!" noise, and knew I was in for trouble. I meant to ask Ryan at the start to put his bike in the pit for me but couldn't find him, so when I flatted I started accosting spectators I knew (Glowa, the entire Geekhouse team, etc) to find Ryan by the sandpit and let him know disaster struck. Dan St. G, designer of our kits and the Geekhouse kits as well as Geekhouse team member, generously offered to let me use his bike and when that didn't work (wrong pedals), he sought out Ryan for me. Thanks, Dan! In amongst all of this, I did not realize two things: 1) the pit had neutral support, which meant they would give me a wheel and 2) THERE WERE TWO PIT ENTRANCES AND ONE WAS ONLY A FEW HUNDRED YARDS AFTER I FLATTED! I frantically rode right on by the first pit entrance without noticing, trying my best to corner on a rear flat, and spent half a lap on the windiest part of the course trying to go as fast as possible without rolling my tire and losing any remaining chance of hope. New friend/pastry aficionado Joy from HUP rode by me during this, looking quite smooth in the corners. Nice job, Joy! I get to the pit finally and ran in rambling about Ryan and pit bikes to Mark Bowen while scanning for Ryan's bike, not realizing the neutral support guy was trying to set me up with a neutral wheel. Duh. Ryan came rushing in and passed me his bike, and I was off on a mission to regain lost places! I had a lap and a half left, regained 2 spots while trying not to startle the Cub Juniors as I came barreling by, and finished in 12th. Not at all what I was hoping for, but it was a relatively large field and an acceptable result for all the (unnecessary) time I spent riding a flat. I didn't find out about the two pit entrances until after the race, and I've been kicking myself over it ever since, but at least I learned a valuable lesson about how pits work, and know in the future to pay better attention to them. I planned on racing the 1/2/3 race later in the day but getting knocked off my bike earlier in the week by a truck who was apparently unaware of turn signals led to a sore hip, and I called it quits for the day.

I'm really excited about Gloucester next weekend, the pre-reg for the women's 3/4 field for Saturday is nearly double what it was last year (already at 80 women!), and I'm aiming (hoping) for a top ten result. Also, if you like cupcakes, you should probably come and find me at the B2C2 camp at some point this weekend.

GMCX Day 2 of 1

2010-09-22T16:36:00.003-04:00

Historically, I've had bad luck with Green Mountain CX. I've registered the last two years and then, for one reason or another, was shut out of the weekend entirely. After not racing since late August, I've been getting antsy and needed to get my CX going.

Intending to do both races, I realized I had tickets for Pavement Saturday and figured I was, again, going to miss this race, but Colin managed to convince me coming for just Sunday was a good idea. And away I went.

The Race

I missed out on the horrible climbing race the day prior, much to my chagrin. My legs were sort of fresh, I guess, though 3.5 hours of driving was obviously not the ideal set-up. Pre-riding the course I found I could get decent grip with my current "race tires" (last years Mud2's).

Staged second to dead last, I moved up a bit in the field, and in the first 180 down and up passed some people who got caught in the Keough salmoning bit. But then a French Canadian rider wiped out in a turn and took my front wheel. Coming down the twisty section, I was now close to dead last again.

I gained time on the slower climb shortly afterward, which allowed me to connect with a group that had people I wanted to beat. My first go up the log step up was a run, which helped me gain some time in traffic. At some point I passed Cary, and then he passed me, and then he crashed. And then I passed him again. I also passed Colin at some point, too. With at least two milestones accomplished I continued on. I attacked the group I was riding with over the starting climb, but once at the front did not really get away. Some of those people passed me again. Into the pit for water (oh, by the way, it was about 70 degrees), Colin totally left the door open for me, which ruled, though the group had strung out and by the last two laps I was pretty much alone. Sad face. I kept looking back for Tim Johnson, but he never arrived.

The Result

23rd finishing lead lap. This is a satisfactory result, especially since I feel like I'm still building form. However, I did not get a lot of video time on Colin's bar cam, which is really the only measurable result that matters at a race in New England.

Quad Cross. All day.

2010-09-14T18:04:00.015-04:00

After a race, it is important to stretch.

I got to Quad Cross early this year because it seems we have racers IN EVERY SINGLE FIELD except the "crabby old man" group (dont worry, Ill be there soon...). We arrived a bit before 9, in time to give Tammy the shoes she needed to race in and also in time to give the new course a ride-about.

The quad folks seem to improve this race a little bit every year: this time there were more turns, more exceedingly awkward turns, and a gen-u-wine sand pit. Three power sections limited the damage from watts factories, and a choose your own adventure run-up/ ride-up after the barricades made you pick your gears wisely before dismounting.

Getting to the race early also gave me a chance to dust off my somewhat rusty heckling skills. I "raced" teammates and unsuspecting racers alike up the hill, hollered at a few particularly good-looking cat 3s (looking at you here, bramhall), and marveled at how many national champion jerseys were on display at a little race in Bedford.

My race went off somewhat after 3, and because of an ill-timed bathroom break, I was relegated to a back row start. I will say, however, that the quantity and power of the toilets provided for our use were both satisfactory and a welcome change from the norm. Bike racers appreciate the little things. Like powerful flushing.

Best start position ever.

Anyway, Diane came out to give us our starting instructions, which were - more or less - "You are all elite racers. You should know what to do by now". We did, until we got the go whistle. Then things went from "back row start" bad to "I am now completely stopped" bad. You see, RMM somehow got out of his pedal and completely sideways. I was about to offer him some encouragement but then heard someone yell "I AM TOTALLY GOING TO BLOG ABOUT THIS". My start now complicated by bad position AND paroxysms of laughter, I went about the business of scoring a decent reverse holeshot. It was hectic in those first few turns - I got put into the tape by a 545 velo rider with dreams of midpack glory, chopped the ever loving hell out of (I think) Pete Sullivans wheel (sorry!), was mercilessly chopped in return up the first climb after the barricades by a clever combination of Cort Cramer and a tree root and realized that this was a totally different race than I was used to.

You see, in the 3s, you make a mistake - botch a turn, spin out up a climb, play around with the course tape - and you can count on everyone around you to make a similar mistake and not lose too much time. In (at least the front part of) the elite race, you make one bobble and 5 guys that are just as good as you fly by. So to make up the 30-odd spots I gave up in the first 15 seconds of this race, I had to have a flawless 11 laps. No problem.

Here we go.

I actually felt pretty good. I was hurting, obviously, but steadily moving up. By the 3rd or 4th lap I caught Jon Bernhard. The barnyard is known to me, and has traditionally been able to destroy me in races. When I caught him, we had a moment. But I think that moment was different for each of us.

I think mine went like this:
"Wow, I caught Jon! I must be doing well!"

His went something more like this:
"Oh Jesus, I must be riding on two flat tires."

I think I may have subconsciously backed off the gas a tiny bit, satisfied on some level that I caught a fast guy. At the same time, he probably pushed a little bit harder. The net effect of our little game was to keep us at a speed that was slower than the one I was pushing when I caught him, but faster than he was going before my haggard ass found his wheel. Translation: I stopped moving up, and settled in for 8 laps of pass-on-the-grass with Jon Barnyard.

I love this game.

This went well, I suppose. We werent gaining ground, but we didnt seem to be losing any either. On the last lap, right before the final paved stretch, Kerin Wolfson caught us and accelerated. Jon jumped on, they got a gap, and that was it. I couldnt shut it down; I rolled across the line in 13th place. Not too shabby, considering the beginning of my race.

Evan Huff has gone to plaid.

The team did really well:

Ian and Matt rode well together (and I think Ian is currently leading the Hebrew Cup.

Ian is partying like it was 5771.

Here is Matt and someones bum.

Lauren responds to heckles by passing other racers.

Remounting on the sand? Bold move, Ryan...

Harrison rode himself into some sunglasses and a jug of beer

After the race we hung out with the Newbury comics/ Quad guys and broke down the course. Good work, everyone!

Cross season begins, dusting off the ol' metal collection.

2010-08-31T11:41:00.005-04:00

I did the first Lars Practice this morning and let me be (not exactly) the first to tell you, the new course is fantastic. Last year, the only cross event it could really be compared to was the Green Mountain Fat Tire Hillclimb, and lets be honest - that race kind of sucked. Dont get me wrong, I loved falling out of bed before dawn to do grass hill repeats, but lately Im a bit burned out on climbing up a mowed lawn.

Like I said, though: 100% improvement. I will dread eating my cereal in the dark and trying to ride half asleep through Allston and Brookline a little less from now on.

This mornings turnout was light, though it was an off day (usually a wed. morning phenomenon). Its cool to see everyone again - the main thing that attracts me to cross is the people, the "scene" as it were. Dont get me wrong, I still hate the kids, but riding with everyone today made me remember why I made such a frantic scramble to assemble a new cross bike in time. Good dudes all.

Speaking of good dudes, Will Crissman - on a single speed mountain bike - tore our legs off during the second set of laps. After cross practice, he and I went to Cutler Park (where he continued to heap abuse on my legs and sense of self worth) for an hour or so. Greg had to work, so he turned around at the trailhead.

And now it is bike building/ modifying/ repairing time. I have made a "playlist" that I intend on listening to at "no one else is home" volume. Here it is:

Leviathan "the bitter emblem of dissolve"
Mare "sun for miles"
Asunder "a famine"
Khanate "commuted"
Botch "c thomas howell as the 'soul man'"
Burzum "dunkelheit"
Godflesh "like rats"
Coalesce "have patience"
Sisters of Mercy "first and last and always"
The Swarm "old blue eyes is dead"
Spazz "go", "spazz vs. mother nature", "spudboy", "chris pooped at the skatepark"
Fantomas "spider baby theme", "theme from the omen"
Carcass "heartwork"
Darkthrone "transylvanian hunger"
Wolves in the throne room "queen of the borrowed light"
Isis "hive destruction"
Cave in "NIB (cover)"
Acrid "fear and trembling"
Thoughts of ionesco "randall"
At the gates "blinded by fear"
Battles "SZ2"
Converge "love is arson"
Charles bronson "batting a thousand"
Fiesel "ruins of this life (whole record)"

I will now listen to metal.

The 101 on the 101

2010-08-27T11:11:00.003-04:00

Will is afraid of the internet, but he emailed in a race report anyway. Check it out:

This was not an event I had planned on doing. But when I heard that friend Thom P was heading down there and I realized I had an open weekend I started thinking that riding 100 miles would be fun. Why not? Local singlespeed and beer consuming legend Mike Ramponi and I have been riding together all summer and he had raved about the event so then it became a no-brainer. I signed up.

Mike and I ride the Blue Hills pretty frequently and pretty aggressively, trying to punish each other as much as we can most Friday mornings. Keeping up with Ramponi and some decent results racing for the last year gave me some confidence that I might be able to hold my own in PA. When Thom and I managed to convince our friend Greg Montello, former SS winner at the 101, to join us, my expectations ramped up even more. It’s a diffusion thing. The more I started hanging out with really fast people the more I expected some of the speed to diffuse into me. I had the same theory with AP Biology in high school which is why I slept on my text book every night. I’m not a biologist. Let’s see how things worked out at the 101.

The drive down began poorly when my sunglasses fell off my head loading the bikes onto the car and I stepped on them. This is not a good look for me. We managed to get all of our stuff together, totally fill up the Fit and hit the road only a couple hours after we had originally intended. There was much talk of Jens Voigt, some decent Christopher Walken impressions, several stops for food and bladder relief highlighted by a gas station in Connecticut where the attendant informed us that there was no bathroom but that there was “vast land” available behind the station. If by “vast land” he meant a dumpster and sandstone cliffs, he was right. It worked.

We pulled into Coburn with enough light left to get in a quick out and back ride of the last section of the course. Greg gave this inspiring interview right before I butchered mine. I could have done so much better for Ramponi. Greg then butchered this section of the Fisherman’s trail (at the end of this video) and I cleaned it (about 5:25). I should have stopped while I was ahead. We returned to base camp, went out for a crappy mac and cheese dinner, returned to camp again to have a couple beers with Ramponi and friends and went to bed.

The morning starts early. I pounded down a bagel and a cup of coffee and got my bike and gear in mostly working order. About five minutes before the start I decided to put a little extra air in my front tire. My wheels were five days old and thus, a little unfamiliar to me. I unscrewed the nipple on the valve without recognizing that I was unscrewing the entire removable valve core. Air gushed out and I had a flat before the race started. Fortunately, I cranked it up again with a floor pump and rolled over to the start without too much panic. I found Ramponi, a friend I knew I wanted to keep close by and without any fanfare everyone took off.

The start was pretty fast down some paved roads. We maneuvered our way through the field and by the bottom of the first long climb I found myself at the back of the second major group. A 29er crew guy cruised up along the left side of the road next to me looking pretty smooth and comfortable passing people. “I want to feel smooth and comfortable and pass people,” I thought to myself. So I hooked onto his wheel and blasted up through the group. The next thing I knew I was staring at the back of the leaders group about 50 yards up the road. Greg told me before the race that the way to do well as a SS was to hang on to the leaders as long as possible. Greg raced professionally in Europe. I’m a hack. I knew I was doing something stupid. But how can you resist?

Ramponi slid up next to me about halfway up the climb and we settled in a bit, generously letting the lead group go. But we kept up a pretty vigorous pace. The climbs were long and the descents were absolutely ripping. Long and high speed. As we turned back uphill after the first really long descent I panicked because my leg started cramping. Bad sign. I quickly realized I was fine, I had just locked my leg out for so long going downhill I needed a quick stretch. Relief. But the pace Ramponi and I were keeping was aggressive and I soon lost one of my goals for the race when I tasted a good portion of my breakfast in my mouth. Ominous.

Pictures revealed that Mike and I were up near the front of the group for a good chunk of the start of the race. Here you can see me clearing a tricky rock garden right after Thom went through…walking. I had no business being that far up front. I wasn’t for long.

For the first 40-45 miles Ramponi and I cruised along, hopping in with trains of geared riders and giving it our best on all the flats. I got a little jumpy on a couple climbs thinking that I felt pretty good. I broke away from one group on a climb, putting a big gap between me and about ten riders. As I crested the top and realized they would catch me in about 30 seconds I recognized the folly of my ways. I was going too hard. I had never done an event this long. If it were a 50 miler I would have kicked some ass. But I had another 60+ miles to go and I was trying to break away. Dumb.

We rolled into aid station 2 and I stopped to get some food and take a couple minutes to recuperate. Ramponi and I had not let up because we were just having too much fun. Turns out he wanted the fun a little bit more than I did so he started to take off. Eager to hang with him I decided to leave too. With a mouthful of food. Departing aid 2 begins a massive climb. Really a series of massive climbs. I had cookies and bananas and all sorts of crap crammed in my cheeks trying to breathe and hammer up the hill. I blew up. Ramponi took off. I started walking.

A few minutes later Greg passed me and asked “How you doing?”

“I was great five minutes ago,” I replied. A long walk and little riding later I found Greg waiting at the top of the climb. “I’m with you for the rest of the day,” he said. I was relieved. I was in pain.

The rest of the day is a bit of a blur. There were more long, painful climbs where Greg would drop me and I would slowly make my way to the top. The descents were amazing. Ramponi flatted a few times so I would catch up, say a quick hello and then see him again later. At aid four Greg and I stopped to eat knowing that Ramponi was behind us. We joked that he would somehow catch us and sure enough, just as we were about to leave, he rolled in. All of us turned up the last really big climb and I had nothing in me to ride it. I watched Greg and Mike roll away somewhat defeated. Greg graciously waited at the top again, we cruised along, found Ramponi flatted one more time and we all re-grouped at aid 5. With about 10-12 miles to go I finally found my mojo again and I managed a good clean of the last climb and a fun descent to the Fisherman’s trail where Greg cursed vociferously until he got to the turf and exploded down the trail to get to the finish. I pedaled the whole last section on my own and rolled in finishing in 8:45, which would have been a top 10 singlespeed finish in pretty much every other year, but this year it was only good enough for 15^th. Still not bad for my first hundred. I sat in the river for about 20 minutes afterwards, stared into space for about an hour waiting for a massage and finally returned to a baseline of normal sufficient to down several beers and pass out. It was awesome.

Huge props to Montello for carrying me through the second half of the race and for being a good driving companion along with Thom. Ramponi was great company and will be challenged again when we meet at the Landmine or the VT50. And major thanks to the B2C2 team for all the gear support. They’ve made the season a real pleasure. Next race report will hopefully be shorter. And more victorious!