87% Throttle: Race 3

I finally have some excuses for poor race performance other than I'm slow. I showed up Wednesday night at Solitude hoping for the best but expecting the worst. Instead I fell somewhere in between. I'd been fighting a nasty headcold all week but when when race time rolled around I went with the old adage that if a cold is from the neck up you're OK to exercise. Rhonda and I did a pre-ride lap and I felt OK but I was having some major drivetrain issues. When I got back to the car I gave the bike a close examination and realized I had a severely bent link in my chain that made my rear D ghost shift under strain. If you're counting from home that's excuse #2. Going up the road on the opening sprint I died and settled into mid-pack a few riders behind Wedge. I started getting warmed up on the climb but as I got out of the saddle to power up the first steep pitch my rear D locked up and I had to pull over to free up my chain. 5-6 guys got around me and I mounted back up and tried to remember to stay seated and nurse my drivetrain by spinning. I made a few passes on the climb and re-connected with Wedge at the road. Stood up to try to put some distance into him on the paved hill and the drivetrain popped again reminding me that that wasn't going to happen today. Rode behind Wedge across the top and he hit the decent about 30 seconds ahead of me. After getting completely bitched by Wedge and his 5" at Desert Rampage my goal on the DH was to hold his wheel as long as possible. I lost a little time to him on the real rough stuff but I finished the DH and entered the climb right on his wheel giving me my lone bright spot of the race. Felt OK on the second climb but 3/4 of the way up I cracked. No power left, HR in a downward spiral and an upset stomach full of post nasal drip forced me to back off the the throttle. My time ended up being about 4 minutes slower than my average time from last year. Not horrible considering.

Rhonda led most of her race but the girl who has won all three womens races was playing a bit of cat and mouse. She played with Rhonda by staying in contact behind her the first lap and then stepped on the gas at the end of the final climb giving it just enough to make sure she won. Rhonda held off the girls behind her for 2nd place.

I'm in.

Are you?

Corner Canyon

I met up with Drew and Joel for a little spin around corner canyon today. We were planning on doing the Round Valley race later in the day so we kept things pretty chill and I got to explore some newer trails I hadn't ridden before. Brock's Point will be sweet once it's broken in, the new part of lower Jacobs Ladder is well done. The freeride DH trail that everybody raves about was nice I suppose but it just wasn't my cup of tea. I'm guessing the low bar, high saddle race geometry on my hardtail didn't help matters but I would have had more fun descending ghost or Clark's. The trails were all in perfect condition and the rain held off giving us an excellent 2.5 hrs in the saddle.

Millcreek rain ride

After 6 days of riding the couch I braved the elements and did a Saturday morning MTB ride in the rain. Rode from my house up the road and explored the upper millcreek trails. Dog Lake is fully rideable and GWT is good do go for a couple miles past the Dog Lake turnoff before you start hiting too many snowdrifts to make it worth your time. No mud. Crest should be ready within a few weeks!

Why I'll never be fast part nine hundred ninety four.

When it's June in you'll never catch me doing this:

Or this:

So when last nights race was canceled Ken called to see if we wanted to eat some of this instead:

Well minus the nekkid lady of course. Ken has impeccable taste in food so when he recommended hitting Matsu Sushi for half price rolls (mon-wed) we agreed. The rolls were excellent and for the four rolls we ate plus an appetiser our total bill was under $25. Highly recommended.

Mid Mountain Super Loop

Mark P, Ken, Bob, Jen and Shannon joined me Saturday me for this bad boy.

Over 62 miles of the greatest singletrack you'll ever ride. If you ride Mountain Bikes and you don't live in Utah you're missing out.

editors note: Bob, Shannon and Jen wanted 6 hrs tops so they bailed at Johns trail and didn't finish the ride. Mark P bailed with them. Wedge started the ride with us but locked his camelbak and keys in his car and just rode Flying Dog. The GPS track file shows us poaching the private trails through Pinebrook at the end of the ride. We of course would never do such a thing so please ignore that part of the track.

Move over Mexi-Coke

Now there's something...........American-er?

Pepsi throwback. Made with real sugar just like back in the day. Kind of the same deal as Mexi-coke in that the sugar doesn't overpower the cola flavor like HFCS does. It's also a easier to deal with the empties since the cans can just be thrown in the recycling bin. Just for Fox they also make Mt Dew throwback.

Full Throttle Round Valley #2

Sometimes all the stars align, everything works out perfectly and a MTB racer has a break out race. It happened to me a couple years ago at the final race of the Solitude series. Somehow I needed to beat a much faster racer in order to finish in the money. After getting dropped on the hole shot I clawed back onto the guys wheel on the opening climb and was able to put a small gap on him across the top. I was able to hold him off for the rest of the race and man it felt good. I haven't done much since but that's beside the point. Last night I think Mark had his breakout ride when he decided to race his rigid SS for the first time. The race was a training race on a pretty mellow course, in other words a perfect venue to try out the single. To set this up properly Mark has never beaten me in a race before and I'm pretty sure he's never really even come close. We lined up together near the front and this week my plan was to go hard at the start and enter the singletrack in a good position. I was in about 4th with Mark right there until my legs reminded me that they weren't quite ready for that kind of effort after yesterdays ride. I fell back into around 20th by the time we hit the singletrack with Mark maybe 8-10 places ahead of me. My legs warmed up well and I started making some passes climbing the singletrack with Buzzard hot on my heels but Mark was nowhere to be found. Near the top I saw J-dub right ahead of me and knowing she doesn't like people riding her wheel on the DH I struck a couple matches and got around her. I turned back to let Buzzard pass me before the DH started so I could try to match his mad DH skills but I had gapped him with my big acceleration at the top. Oh and BTW, still no Mark. Since I hadn't caught him yet I started figuring he must have dropped out or something. I caught a few more people on the 2nd lap and finished with a pretty nice time of about a minute faster then last week. Mark was at the finish line waiting and he looked worked over like he had just finished, not dropped out. He killed it riding the SS finishing over a minute ahead of me and he beat his time from last week by over 6 minutes! I don't know what it was but something about the rigid SS brought out the best in him. I have a feeling we'll see him racing DV next Saturday banging with the rest of the crazies on SS's. Well done Mark!

Morgan Valley Roadie Tour

After a crappy weekend of call and house projects, not to mention 5 days off the bike I was blessed with today off. I new a big ride was in order and since most people work on Tuesdays it was going to be solo. I decided the road bike was getting a little lonely and it had been awhile since I did a solo century so that was the plan. So where to go? Well I refuse to drive to ride the road and I'm about sick of dodging cars in the valley so I decided to go over the top of Big Mountain, down into east canyon and tour the Morgan Valley.

107 miles and 8300 ft climbing. The highlight was defiantly climbing back up over Big Mountain with 80 miles on my legs in a rain squall. Oh, and there was a "shart" alert in the middle of the squall but luckily it was a false alarm. It will be very interesting seeing how my legs feel at tomorrow nights race. I guess that's what training races are for.

Sticking it to Bin Laden.....Prius Style

52 MPG, mixed city and highway, all normal driving (i.e. 70-75 mph on the freeway). No wonder GM and Chrysler are bankrupt, they have nothing that compares. There are no compromises for your 52MPG in the Prius. It's comfortable, roomy and has plenty of get up and go when you need it.