I was out for a mountain bike ride last night with a couple of friends, hitting some trails I haven't been on in a few years. It was great to get out for the evening ride and just enjoy the trail and competitive feel of riding with friends. The loop we were one was nothing difficult or technical but it had a few short punchy climbs and some 'few minute' climbs. I just kept feeling out of sorts and...... slow. Slow is a bummer.
Typically come April I'm starting to feel 'competitive', but not so far this year. It's certainly discouraging to feel this way. I'm trying to stay focused on the fact that I started training a month later than normal and I've been sick twice. So by default I should be a month or more back compared to normal. On top of that almost all my riding has been base miles, they're necessary but it's hard to get fast doing endurance rides.
In the end I need to keep plugging away at the plan and not get too anxious. I have the 50 mile Endurance race Ridgeline Rampage coming up in two and a half weeks. Then Battle the Bear in a month, again the 50 mile endurance race. I need to keep building the endurance miles to ensure I can survive those races. According to my plan, those will help get me through the Bailey Hundo. Time will tell.
Showing posts with label mountain bike race. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mountain bike race. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
Thursday, May 12, 2011
Where has the time gone?
Wow, it’s been a long time. I haven’t forgotten you all, I just haven’t had time. Changes at work have caused a lot of extra stress and required more of my time. To keep the family and fitness part of my life in balance I’ve had to eliminate the extras. Sorry.
This past weekend I raced the Front Range 60, a 60 mile marathon mountain bike race here in town. A 10 mile loop raced 6 times. This would be the longest mountain bike race I’ve ever done and the longest single ride time I’ve spent in the saddle in the past couple of years, certainly the longest race.
My plan was… well, I didn’t really have a good plan. Having not race something like this before I had no idea what to expect from my body. I ended up felling pretty good that morning so I just let myself ride. I’m sure I was a little too fast the first few laps but I knew everyone would get tired as the race went on so if I could get in some time early, we’d just see how the last laps went. Maybe I could sustain those gains if I didn’t fade too bad.
The course was basically two parts, the eastern part that had two climbs of decent size followed by the western side with relatively flat fun little sweeping sections along a river. The wind was minimal and helped keep the dust away. The sun and temperature, for the first time this year, had us racing without extra layers. Nothing on the trail was overly technical making it fast. I ran my Kenda small block eight tires with about 30 psi pressure, making them pretty hard to minimize rolling resistance. The Cannondale Flash 29er was perfect for this loop. It was fast and the fork soaked up everything. I had no mechanical issues during the entire race.
In the end, I feel like I did well. I had a mid pack finish which wasn’t bad considering there are no categories other than age and I recognized some of the names of racers from faster categories in front of me. Where I feel I did well was with racers that are traditionally a little faster. Last year some of these racers put ten minutes on me in shorter races. I was expecting that they could put big time on me in this long race. This time however I was putting 5 to 10 minutes on them. Regardless, it was fun and I’ve been recovering this week. I'm just not starting to look forward to the next race.
I'll try to keep the blog updated a little more frequently.
This past weekend I raced the Front Range 60, a 60 mile marathon mountain bike race here in town. A 10 mile loop raced 6 times. This would be the longest mountain bike race I’ve ever done and the longest single ride time I’ve spent in the saddle in the past couple of years, certainly the longest race.
My plan was… well, I didn’t really have a good plan. Having not race something like this before I had no idea what to expect from my body. I ended up felling pretty good that morning so I just let myself ride. I’m sure I was a little too fast the first few laps but I knew everyone would get tired as the race went on so if I could get in some time early, we’d just see how the last laps went. Maybe I could sustain those gains if I didn’t fade too bad.
The course was basically two parts, the eastern part that had two climbs of decent size followed by the western side with relatively flat fun little sweeping sections along a river. The wind was minimal and helped keep the dust away. The sun and temperature, for the first time this year, had us racing without extra layers. Nothing on the trail was overly technical making it fast. I ran my Kenda small block eight tires with about 30 psi pressure, making them pretty hard to minimize rolling resistance. The Cannondale Flash 29er was perfect for this loop. It was fast and the fork soaked up everything. I had no mechanical issues during the entire race.
In the end, I feel like I did well. I had a mid pack finish which wasn’t bad considering there are no categories other than age and I recognized some of the names of racers from faster categories in front of me. Where I feel I did well was with racers that are traditionally a little faster. Last year some of these racers put ten minutes on me in shorter races. I was expecting that they could put big time on me in this long race. This time however I was putting 5 to 10 minutes on them. Regardless, it was fun and I’ve been recovering this week. I'm just not starting to look forward to the next race.
I'll try to keep the blog updated a little more frequently.
Monday, July 13, 2009
Improvement.. Maybe
Winter Park Valley Point-to-Point was this past weekend. I've been working on my fitness issues so my expectations were not very high. Basically, if I could have a good clean race without all the agony I had last time, I would consider it a success. It's amazing how relaxing you feel at the start line when your only goal for the race is survive and don't worry about those other guys.
The start is on a pretty good climb. It's a service road used to spread the field out before dumping us into the first single track. Two weeks ago, I knew things were going wrong at this point. This week, I felt pretty good. Hell, I was even moving up... passing people! Sweet. (maybe it helped that I started at the back of the pack this time, I had to pass someone.. right) The first descent I wasn't killing it but I wasn't getting dropped by the guys in front of me. At that point, we started to come across the carnage of the leaders. Dudes off in the trees, crashed or flatted. My teammate Amir off the trail working with his bike, I know he had a good chance to win today but didn't finish.
Across the first long technical "flat" I was hanging "strong", getting passed but also passing folks. Then the yo-yo dropped. I tried to stay calm and just keep pedaling. Get in a short recovery. Food, drink... breath. Things started to turn around. Ok, I started to real back many of the racers that had passed me during my down point. I was right on their wheels during the next big climb. Once over the climb the group in front of me started to pull away. I had never been on this trail before and my courage wasn't supper high. At the next hill I again got within eye sight of my group but the yo-yo feel again, this time on a hill. I didn't see them again.
The last section of the race was on trials I used to ride way back in the day. About 7-8 years ago, we used to go camping up there and ride that area. It was fun, more importantly it was an up section for me. Even after 20 miles of the race, I was going faster over these trails than I used to. When I reach the race finish, I was so glad it was over. Unfortunately I had 6 miles to ride back to the base of winter park and my car. That was like adding insult to injury. I crawled back, passed by some lady on the bike path pulling two little girls in a trailer. I asked the kids if they could push over and let me ride, they looked at me like I was crazy.
Over all, this race was better than the last two. So, while not very good in the results department, I'm calling it a personal ..... better but Improvement Required.
Final stats: 24 miles raced in 2:20. 35 mile round trip back to the car (with warmup). 4948 ft gained, 2694 calories burned!, Avg speed 9.8 mph, max 32.9 mph. Mx HR 174. Oh and the pro that won the race did the exact same coarse in 1:32.. WOW!
If you ever get up to Winter Park for some riding. You have to hit these trails. Phenomenal!
View Larger Map
The start is on a pretty good climb. It's a service road used to spread the field out before dumping us into the first single track. Two weeks ago, I knew things were going wrong at this point. This week, I felt pretty good. Hell, I was even moving up... passing people! Sweet. (maybe it helped that I started at the back of the pack this time, I had to pass someone.. right) The first descent I wasn't killing it but I wasn't getting dropped by the guys in front of me. At that point, we started to come across the carnage of the leaders. Dudes off in the trees, crashed or flatted. My teammate Amir off the trail working with his bike, I know he had a good chance to win today but didn't finish.
Across the first long technical "flat" I was hanging "strong", getting passed but also passing folks. Then the yo-yo dropped. I tried to stay calm and just keep pedaling. Get in a short recovery. Food, drink... breath. Things started to turn around. Ok, I started to real back many of the racers that had passed me during my down point. I was right on their wheels during the next big climb. Once over the climb the group in front of me started to pull away. I had never been on this trail before and my courage wasn't supper high. At the next hill I again got within eye sight of my group but the yo-yo feel again, this time on a hill. I didn't see them again.
The last section of the race was on trials I used to ride way back in the day. About 7-8 years ago, we used to go camping up there and ride that area. It was fun, more importantly it was an up section for me. Even after 20 miles of the race, I was going faster over these trails than I used to. When I reach the race finish, I was so glad it was over. Unfortunately I had 6 miles to ride back to the base of winter park and my car. That was like adding insult to injury. I crawled back, passed by some lady on the bike path pulling two little girls in a trailer. I asked the kids if they could push over and let me ride, they looked at me like I was crazy.
Over all, this race was better than the last two. So, while not very good in the results department, I'm calling it a personal ..... better but Improvement Required.
Final stats: 24 miles raced in 2:20. 35 mile round trip back to the car (with warmup). 4948 ft gained, 2694 calories burned!, Avg speed 9.8 mph, max 32.9 mph. Mx HR 174. Oh and the pro that won the race did the exact same coarse in 1:32.. WOW!
If you ever get up to Winter Park for some riding. You have to hit these trails. Phenomenal!
View Larger Map
Monday, June 29, 2009
Oh my, that went bad!
This past Saturday was the second mountain bike race up in Winter Park, the cross country super loop. I was looking forward to this race, last year this was my first mountain bike race ever. I got second and was dreaming of a repeat performance (despite moving up a catagory).
After my week spent traveling and the stress of getting a big proposal out the door, I was hoping I would be nice and rested. Ready to go.
I wasn't. More than that, I wasn't even close.
Everything went wrong! I would guess that within a minute of the start I was going backwards. Dropped like a stone, a road block everyone wanted to get around. The biggest problem was my back. A few miles in it was hurting so bad, I just couldn't put any power in the peddles. Funny, my back actually started hurting at home before I left for the race. Injury or stress, I don't know.
The course was pretty muddy and slippery. Had to be careful out there. A lot of people went down. The rocks, tree roots and river crossings were treacherous! Despite the coarse, I was seriously deep in the pain cave and never got to enjoy any of it!
Sadly it was one of my worst days on a bike. Despite my utter meltdown, I have to look on the bright side, I didn't finish in last place. Honestly, I was supprised about that.
Time for some training changes. I am trying to stay optimistic. At least I am sure to improve at the next race.
After my week spent traveling and the stress of getting a big proposal out the door, I was hoping I would be nice and rested. Ready to go.
I wasn't. More than that, I wasn't even close.
Everything went wrong! I would guess that within a minute of the start I was going backwards. Dropped like a stone, a road block everyone wanted to get around. The biggest problem was my back. A few miles in it was hurting so bad, I just couldn't put any power in the peddles. Funny, my back actually started hurting at home before I left for the race. Injury or stress, I don't know.
The course was pretty muddy and slippery. Had to be careful out there. A lot of people went down. The rocks, tree roots and river crossings were treacherous! Despite the coarse, I was seriously deep in the pain cave and never got to enjoy any of it!
Sadly it was one of my worst days on a bike. Despite my utter meltdown, I have to look on the bright side, I didn't finish in last place. Honestly, I was supprised about that.
Time for some training changes. I am trying to stay optimistic. At least I am sure to improve at the next race.
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