April 2017 Blog Posts (17)

Cathy, Simon and I were very excited to do The Lemurian Shasta Classic again.  Last year was the first year for those two, but I had raced this 28 mile single loop course many times.  Simon would be racing the 8 mile short loop, and cathy once again doing the long course.

We traveled up Friday evening and had a chance to preride Simon's course, which shares common trails with the start and finish of our course.  For him it is pretty much a gravel climb of 800 ft to the slightly…

The Shorty's are everything I love about bike racing. 6 laps on the mountain bike on a course that's half easy climbing and half tight singletrack during a series that consists of 6 consecutive races in the spring. It's a mid week series that doesn't take up the weekend and valuable family time. It's close to home, and it takes me 20 minutes to ride there. You race with your friends (or soon-to-be-friends) in the local community. Plus you get to smash on the pedals! I was out of town last…

Just as I did last week, I rode out to the venue from Novato with some of the Novato/San Marin High School team, providing a nice warm up.  This weekend sees the final NorCal league HS race, so the race would be a great opportunity to add some intensity before a couple days rest going into that race.

No middle school race this week (every other week for the middle schoolers), and so we did not see the crowds of last week.  Some of the High School racers from last week were not in…

Cathy, Simon and I left early on Friday to make it in time for me to race the Short Track at 11:15 on Friday.  The course was very short and flat, with various sections of loose and slow materials ranging from pea gravel to sand.  I guess around 85 people started the race, and I had a pretty good first lap, coming through the finish about mid-pack.  I soon felt the effects of my hard start, and I was overtaken by 20 or so racers over the next few laps.  I think I completed 5 of the 8 laps…

One year ago I took a wrong turn at this race and ended up with a Medal that did not belong to me. It took a while to sort this out with the oganizers but in the end all was made right. As foolish as I felt, finishing this race was something I had to do.

Jim and Shiloh at ACME bikes helped me get my Trek Superfly ready for the fast sandy course. Team mate Mark Buell and I headed down 2 days before the race for a pre-ride. No way I could live down getting lost again. The course is…

  My alarm went off at 3:50 AM Sunday morning. I know it is early and a stressful way to start your morning on race day, but I had a long work day Saturday and wanted to sleep in my own bed. I actually enjoy driving early in the morning because the roads are free of traffic and one can make good time. Although one needs to be vigilant for drunk drivers left over from Saturday night.

  Although I enjoy Sea Otter, the race that I try to peak for is Downieville. Now that the days are…

This would be my 6th year racing the Sea Otter Classic cross country race.  I had signed up in November, as I tend to train more consistently if I have set a goal.  For various reasons, my training plan didn't really play out as expected and I came into the race not feeling real fit or rested. This is one race where base fitness is key, as it is 28 miles where big chunks of time can be gained or lost.  After a warm up that never really got me warm, I lined up with teammate Greg Alsterlind in…

I did a solid block of training after SoNoMas and felt I had enough top-end speed back in my legs for a 90-minute XC race. Sea Otter has been a HC-level international event since last year, which means that it is only one step below a World Cup in terms of prize money and ranking points awarded. This distinction also means that laps must be less than 3.5 miles long to be spectator friendly. The Sea Otter race organizers must have built the course with a lawnmower, because most of what we…

The Summit Shorty is back for its 10th year, and a big thanks to Jim for all the work he puts in organizing this event. For the third time this season, I got to check off another race that I've never done before.  I had been a spectator at last year's series, there to support the Novato/San Marin High School team that my kids are on, and on which I'm one of the assistant coaches.  It's a great event, and excellent mid-week intensity training for the High School teams and anyone else.  Me and…

I had heard good things about the Nevada City Dirt Classic races.  Friends had told me that they were fun courses with a well-run grassroots feel.  I had them in mind when I was building my race calendar for 2017, and their designation as the 3 race series that would determine the USAC California state champion sealed the deal.

Mark GIbson and I drove up past Auburn and into the state forest to throw our hats into the ring in our respective classes, and for a little more training…

I headed up to this race not knowing exactly what to expect as I'd never raced it before.  The area had received a lot of rain over the prior week, so I was thinking there would be some mud, but otherwise I'd just have to figure it out on race day.  

Getting there with not quite enough time to pre-ride the course, I did a brief warm up and took my place at the start line. The racers were sent out in waves: pros, then singlespeed (never really understand why the ss go out ahead of all…

“The Accidental Detour”

We were back at Lake Sonoma for the Bike Monkey SoNoMas race, this time doing a longer loop around the lake counter-clockwise.  The field was a bit different this time, a few of us from the Lake Sonoma Grasshopper race a couple weeks earlier (Carson Benjamin, Barry Wicks, and me), with the addition of more fast xc guys and some very strong roadies.  I'm not sure why this race tends to draw guys who are usually more inclined to race on pavement, but Ted King, Peter Stetina, Sam Bassetti, and…

I’m only 20 miles in to this 35 mile race and I’m cramping up so badly I’m not sure I’ll make it to the finish.  I had a flash back to the pre-race start-line warnings given by Bike Monkey director Carlos about how tough the race is, and there being no shame in using one of the bailout options along the way.  I didn't take those warnings very seriously and they were now coming back to slap me in the face with a big dose of “I told you so”.

Not being quite race fit yet, I had planned…

Sonomas has been lurking in the back of my mind for the past couple of years.  I've talked with friends that have done the race and each of them have said what a hard and unforgiving race it is.  Having done the Grasshopper MTB two weeks ago on much of the same terrain, only in reverse, I knew what I would be up against.  In fact, I had pretty much decided to skip Sonomas.  The mind is a funny thing, it seems to be programmed to forget the suffering and remember the good times, because I…

The hardest MTB race got harder. The heavy rain of this last winter left this course with a lot more obstacles than last year. I was back on my Trek Top Fuel and stayed with the XR1 2.0 tires. I think the smaller tire got through the mud a little easier and was worth a little slower down hill times? My training program called for a rest week heading into this race and I was questioning if that was the right move, as the race out here two weeks ago left me feeling I needed to spend more time…

I learned that SoNoMas isn't a race for position, it's a race of survival. It was one of the few mountain bike races in Northern California I hadn't done, so I had no idea what to expect besides a long day in the saddle. 

I had completed a hard block of training the week before the race and barely ridden in the days leading up to it in hopes of a good result. The list of registered riders, which included the likes of Ted King, Peter Stetina, Barry Wicks, and my teammate Jim predicted…