P.S. USA Cycling…I’m not 43!!
Not yet, anyways.
This is the time of year, I hate, when I have to tell people I’m a year older than I really am.
I know, I know…
it’s like when my youngest kid has a birthday, and they sound like they are 2 years apart, when they’re NOT,
THEY are only 15 months.
That’s a badge I wear proudly.
Like riding 35 miles in the Franklin Mountains on a 32 x18.
Why would anyone do that insane thing?
Why would you want to suffer anymore than you already suffer when riding in the Franklin Mountains?
Sometimes it’s about the whole picture, not just what we see right now.
Blinders keep us from seeing the whole picture, looking forward into all that is.
Like running the Leadville Marathon and absolutely having the worst time on the hills. The uphills.
I only sign up for the 35, and I plan on carrying everything on my back.
A first in years:
100 ounces of water,
2 tubes,
6 c02’s,
all my food, up to 9 hours.
I believe my bag was somewhere in the range of 20 to 25 pounds.
Again, it’s all about the ‘uphill’.
It would have been nice to see how I would have done, comparing my time to the time I had in 2010.
I have gotten faster.
It would have been nice to see how I would have done, without being bitten by a pit viper.
In the grand scheme of the Annual Training Plan, that’s not part of it.
I wanted to get back home to my babies, the ones that are 15 month apart.
I want to get better at “running” up hill,
I want to get the most amount of work in the least amount of time.
Most importantly,
I have wanted to race SS for an epic mountain adventure.
Answer, 32 x 18 on my 29’er. Why did I convert the Scott? New name:
Crazy Fingers
1.5 pounds, that’s why.
I spend most of the day Saturday, randomly running around, getting everything ready for a slumber in the back of the car, preparing food, dogs to the kennel, showering, etc.
I’m excited to see friends of old and meet friends of new.
Teammates, Connie and Thomas have a room. And Connie is right. I will have little time to hang out unless I stay with them. Oh darn, hotel, with kitchen. Thank you Connie and Thomas for making room for me. I am so happy I got more time to hang out with you, and catch up.
I have no expectations,
The first race in years, I did not clean my bike.
Oh my, that’s probably why…
The first climb, I’m good. Until,
Until,
I get behind, everyone spinning their gears.
What I learned, on mountains you are either, riding uphill faster than geared bikes, or you’re walking. I was forced to ‘run’.
That’s tough work, pushing a 32 x 18.
The days goes on, and I am having quite a good time.
I reach the Barf Threshold for a total of 5 times during the race.
Then, something happens, I’m having a super duper enjoyable time, loving my choice of gears, I run over a cactus flower stem lying across the trail, it grabs onto my bike, gets caught, I drop a chain…
and from that moment forward anytime I put weight into the pedals (which is all of the time) my chain skips.
I’m only 2 hours in. I can’t put any weight in the pedals and I am running a 32 x 18…I have a choice to make.
Either pretend nothing is the matter, or ride lightly.
I’m a die hard. I ride lightly. I decide that if I loose a chain, or worse, I’m stranded in the desert.
The part I’m most looking forward to on SS, the Arroyos, I can only ride about a third of the way up. Then, I ‘run’.
I end up ‘running’ a lot more than I thought I would.
I get up the big Daddy, begin the descent, and I lose the whole kit and kaboodle. One thing is very different than the first time I did this race. I was with people on the back side, very nice.
One of those people, Ivan from Mexico, and my hero, looks at the bike, figures my chain tensioner is loose, so we tighten it and away we go. Well, he went, I was a little more tortoise. Still a wee bit hesitant on how secure my gear is.
I test it more and more, and seems good, I begin going faster, and faster.
I reach the last section, faster and faster. And boom, it falls off and back behind my rear tire.
I have to stop again. Blah. I had to stop a lot, and mess with the whole thing, it cost me a ton of time. A ton.
If I would have known how close I was to the finish, it probably would have been faster, to leave it and run in. Who knew though.
I’m sore like you wouldn’t believe.
I’m cranky like you wouldn’t believe.
So when you decide you’re ready to do a REAL Mountain Bike Race put your Big Girl Pants and race the El Paso Puzzler.
Anything else borders on a road rally.
🙂
I came in about 25 minutes behind my gear bike extrapolation of time.
With everything the Franklin Mountains brought to me on race day, I am very pleased.