Never gonna live this down...

Wifey made Cycling News, here the article, it's under the Oktoberfest write up.

Time to go put my dress on now...

National MTB Oktoberfest

The laundry is started, water bottles are in the dish washer, the fuzz balls are pasted out after four days in doggie jail...and it's snowing outside....really. Perfect time to do a race report.

So what do you do an hour before the start of an eight hour endurance...

A shot down pit row before the madness started...

The Shortbus (the pit box on wheels) packed full of food, water, fuel and bike parts for three...

After a night, and morning of rain we kicked off the start at noon on to a slick but fun ten mile course...and with no Lemans start....thank God, I run like a wounded three legged Hippo.

Harlan Price looking as cool as the other side of the pillow... Tinker...being Tinker, steady as a rock...
And then there's this smuck...
The first couple of laps were pretty slimy, but after an hour or so things started to dry out pretty nicely...other then the last climb that stayed nasty all the way thru.

Trying to clean a little crap out of the drivetrain...
I think this was the point where I realized they I was having a hard time clipping in (other then the mud.) I'd broke both my pedals, I love Eggbeaters...but I've gone thru about 3-4 pair this year alone....mostly I think it's because of my riding style (crappy) pedals are not meant to be pounded on roots and rocks.

The box of spare pedals seemed a little light when I drug it out of the bus...yep, empty. That's when I remembered I put them on the fixed gear a couple weeks ago...nice job jackass.

So back out I went with what I had and things worked out pretty well.

The cut off time for heading out on laps was 7:30...(my laps were in the 38-40 minutes range) on my tenth lap I was kind of milking it as I tried to convince myself to push harder in order to get back in time for an eleventh lap.

Heading into the last climb I knew I had 10 min's till the cut off...and believe it or not I'd convinced myself to head back out. I looked up and saw Wifey making her way up the slick climb, and yell up to her "are you going back out for a lap?" She throws back "we're done, it's 7:40."

I looked down and saw I had the computer on ride time, not the clock. Hell yeah baby, talking about a pick me up...that last half mile was a blur, the knew what was in the cooler.

So seven and a half hours and 70 miles later I threw an eleventh place in the books. Not to bad with the competitors that were there and my lack of training the past month.

Now it's time to get things back into gear...diet, base miles the whole works. Next years not that far away...and this year my not be done yet either.

Results and the return...

drive that is.

Yep, the race is in the books and the Shortbus is 95 northing it as I type...and I still hate driving.

I'll throw a full write up and some pictures up when we get back in the land of the Amish, but here's the shorted version.

I could only pull out an 11th place of the 22 finishers, but with the talent that showed and a couple minor problems I was cool with that. Wifey made up my slack with her first appearance on an endurance podium...if this keeps up I could be down graded to her pit bitch. But the beer is in the pit...that's something worth thinking about.

Huge props to both Jeremiah Bishop and Harlan Price, nothing like having an eight plus hour race come down to a sprint to the line.

The drive...

and I hate driving. But the Shortbus is just now crossing into NC, state number five of the day.

Was an early morning to take the fury kids to doggie jail (they love the kennel...really, they do) met Bikewrench back at the casa to load bikes, gear and asses in the bus....and we're off.

That was six and a half hours ago...and we're still driving.

Probably gonna bail on the night shortrack tonight...forecast is call for heavy showers with 1-2 inches of rain. No point in doing a 45 minute race just to spend double that in clean up time to get the girl ready for the race in the morning.....plus that means I can hang out and have a couple beers to, and you know I'm game for that.

....and the Shortbus rolls on.

National MTB Oktoberfest...

finally, somebody that spells as well as I do....but either way it's on.

Started getting the gear pulled together for Wifey, BikeWrench and I to head down to NC on Friday morning for Oktoberfest. Looks like the weather is gonna be questionable (calling for showers and highs in the 60's) but with the big hitters that are signed up this is just gonna be a fun event for myself (plus we get to see some long lost friends).....but I really got to say I'm looking forward just to being on the same course as this guys. Last time I checked there were three of the top five endurance racers in the country already signed up and I'm sure a few more are not far behind.

Ernesto, Nat Ross, Harlan Price, Sapsford......you figure out yourself which one of these does not belong. Just not sure about this David Juarez guy thou, I've never heard of him....he must be new to MTBing or something....

yeah, that a stale attempt at a joke this morning.

Off to do a final tune up spin of the 29er's with the Wrench this afternoon, till then.

Photo ride...

well half the ride was....then the ride got shortened and the praying started.

Took the fixie out again yesterday for what was to be a 30-40 miles spin...but about 10 miles out the bottom bracket started sounding like someone with braces chewing on rocks. So toward home I turned....and started praying the old girl would hold up till I got home. Did not feel like walking miles and miles in cycling shoes.

But here's the shots I did get...

She's back...

Look at want got pulled off the hook in the basement after an eight month vacation...

Yep...the fixed gear is back in the game. Felt a little strange riding her around with it being in the 70's...but damn I love riding that thing. Only put 25 miles in the books, but I don't want to jump into the deep enf of the pool to fast....again.

Even thou I hate the cold more then I can put into words, I can defiantly say I really dig Fall up here in the northeast. The color change is in full affect right now, thou it's only gonna last a week or so....I'll drag the camera along tomorrow.

I'm back...

not that I went anywhere, but I'm back on the bike.

My two week recovery ran a little long with a sickness (me) the Wifey's birthday (yeah, she's 18 again) and even a wedding anniversary (five going on life.)

So today was the three week mark anniversary if you would of my buns being in a saddle (not counting the 15 mile roll on Monday.) But with a eight hour endurance race only two weeks away it was now or never.

So this morning was a kickass three hour medium paced ride down at Wissa. Things felt so right that I wanted a cigarette once I was done riding....and no, I don't smoke.

So tomorrow I'm hoping to thru down a good 2-3 hours on the road to start biulding the base back up and we'll go from there.

336 hours...

20160 minutes, 1209600 seconds....that's how long it's been since my bulbous (yeah, it's a word) buns have been on/in a saddle....that's two weeks in english.

Maybe I should change the name of this blog to long outside of the saddle?

But the body needed the break.... plus mentally I was shot, dead, useless. We're good on that front now....I've got focus again. Have some new short/medium range goals (more on that later) even thou I'm still lost on next years focus.....Expert XC, back to Endurance.....competitive eating/beer drinking?

Today was gonna be day one of "gearing back up".......but now I've got a freaking cold. WTF! I've not been sick in three years....

TWIN SIX OCTOBER FOUR DAY SALE

The boys over at Twin Six are puttin on a four day sale starting today, swing by and take a look.


They also have the new 09 line up out too, I like this one myself...

The way I'm feeling right now I think this will be my new race day shirt for next season...

Now go see Brent and Ryan, they're great guys.