TIme for Some Scrapple! PA Bound

I am off to PA for some work - this works out well, im going to be able to Race the 4 hour Enduro at Iron Hill with Acura Matt.

I don't know what it is but, I always feel good inside when the bike is in the Car with me......



In the mean time I picked up a small compressor to aid in mounting my tires, this was long overdue and a good investment.





After Destroying my Rohloff Chain Guide, I discovered that the bash guard Deraileur combo works way better for the 1 x 9 setup.





Met some cool people on Thursday from the NEMBA Site and i was pleasantly surprised when they kicked my ass on the trail for two hours and introduced me to many miles of awesome technical single track that I have yet to ride.

"I was totally stoked to meet a group of riders who could turn the screws on me."

8 hours in the Saddle Before Work

Man - I was a bit concerned about the flat lands and motivation to train. Friday i went out with a few of the local road clubs for a century that happens every year on the Friday before memorial day.

The first 50 miles seemed pretty chill and uneventful. We stopped for lunch at a deli, refilled our bottles.

The way back was a very solid pace, consistently above 20 MPH. Some dudes were taking some pretty wicked pulls. I ran out of water and we weren't stopping so at mile 100 I was in survival mode but still took a few pulls....the group winded down to about 20 then to about 4 riders. Even at 4 they were consistently attacking to the very end.

I was Impressed. I was in Pain. I was totally stoked to meet a group of riders who could turn the screws on me.

Refilled some bottles after 100 miles, rolled into the finish....then took the lonely ride home

130 miles

Met a lot cool people.


I took saturday off, went for a short MTB ride on Sunday and worked some bugs out of the Dos niner that have been pissing me off

Monday, I took my wife out for a ride at the blue hills, it was here first ride of the year and she did real well.


I was able to get into the Vermont 50 today. Woot!

Pete

The Crit

There is a local Criterium Training series here in my town, I gave it a whirl tonight, my first road race. 25 laps in Wompatunck, No cars and about 30 Starters. It was Open to Cat 3,4 and 5.


I had never done this before, the fast crowd went off the front super hard, and i thought the right thing to do would be to get on the train.

That was a bad decision. I blew up pretty quick and got dropped, the chase group came rolling by, I hesitated a bit and didnt have the juice to latch on so i got blown off that back pretty quick. I tried to close the gap but it wasnt happening so i slowed up and waited for them to come around again. Its a training race so no big deal.

After that it was really wierd, very easy to hang on most of the time, with a bunch of attacks that led me hanging on for dear life....then i am up front pulling....somtimes coasting.

Well, i figure it out next week.

Passawang

Saturday, joe and I took off from Bazel to endure a 5 hour adventure. We negoitated our way out of town - I had two bottles of water, no food, 100 Swiss Franks and no clue what was ahead of us.....i was a bit concerned about the no food part.





We got a Swiss Map from a customer that rides, it was very easy to navigate, almost every intersection has signs pointing to the next town.




We Hit a grocery story in a small town before we mad our way to the countryside. After 20 minutes of fumbling, and getting someone to understand the word powerbar I found a Tube of this stuff called IsoStar - very similar to Nuun, but it comes in a very big tube.....that and a bunch of granola bars and we were on our way.









As we made our way out of town we found a nice 1000 foot climb that led us to the country side.











We were riding kind of slow coming out of this one town as we were figuring things out and this dude and a girl roll up and pass us. The dude was pulling a trailer with a 50 to 100 pound weight in it. This may not seem signifcant now, but he was killing it on the big climb!



very slowly it started to up


and up





Then it got a bit crazy and steep I stoped briefly to take a picture of where we came from.....out of view is the steep road below. I didnt realize, i was nowhere near the top.




We finally got to the top, over 3000 feet. It was a bitch clibming with the 21 tooth rear cog.






Some really cool bike paths that cut right through the middle of farms.




Water Refill - You can drink out of any fountain in Switzerland which ended up being very convenient.









Thought this was an interesting place to put a rock poster.





The Granola bars werent treating us to well so we had to cut the ride short and refuel. Seriously we should of went for a different fuel source.

Week 2: Basel

We had a pretty successful week of testing in Basel. Roadie Joe and I met up with another Colleague from the U.S. on Friday for dinner followed by Rocking it out to some Awesome 80's tunes in a very crowded bar.

Not much happened on Saturday, but today we got up early to do a 3 hour ride. I cued up a route from the internet but we really didnt know what it was going to be like. As we made our way outside of Basel, we met a local rider who showed us the way to the biggest climb in the area.



I haven't really hit any big climbs since I left California so this was indeed a treat- but it was even better to be able to battle it out with Joe on the climb just like old times, sprinting 6 kilometers to the top passing many riders on the way.













After the ride the sales manager for Europe picked us up and brought us to his house in France for Lunch......and some beverages.


It was good to find an exceptional beer in a can!





After a very big lunch, we took a walk down the Rine river. Here are some Pill Boxes built do defend against the Germans during WWII.

Basel

This Place is about Bikes.....




And some other stuff...



Seriously, everyone seems to ride to work, but Joe and i are the only ones sportin lycra.....

This big green train scares the crap out of me... they run one in each direction with traffic at the same time and I almost blew it out today getting my wheel stuck in the track.....well i learned quick on that one.



So we have been riding to work every day which is fun, but we took a quick spin after work .




we found a short climb with about 1200 feet of elevation gain. it was pretty neat.





You have to buy this insurance sticker from the Govt for like 5 Franks. If they catch you with out it, its a 150 Frank fine.

Luckily there was another US Cyclist working at our customers site and he totatly hooked us up with the sticker...we didn't even ask him.





The plan may be to link up and ride into Germany this weekend with our new friend. Things are getting delayed with the project so if we are here for an addional week, we may take a big trip to check out the Giro D'Italia.

Stay tuned.

Training Camp: Europe

I have to really turn it up. There is some serious training going on in the The Shammy Camp and I am not going to be able to keep up with the lack of elevation around here.

Bags are packed and Im rolling to Basel Tonight to link up with Roadie Joe for some training in the alps.....ok so we are really going to work but we are bringing our bikes.



I left my bike box at my parents and i didnt have time to pick it up, but I still have this bad boy from my move back East.



Its a Trek Madonne Box that Trek ships the bikes to the dealers with - I got it for free from Chain Reaction Bikes in Redwood City, CA.


They actually charge like 20 bucks for the Box, but they werent sure it would fit my bikes, so they just gave it to me.

Its pretty sweet it comes with built in pads and straps.



I got out for a good 3 hour spin at Wompatuck today. It ended with a flat that i couldnt fix, I didnt have a tire lever, and i can barely get the Pythons on with the lever, so i was hosed and had to ride it back. I think its time to pick up a beefier tire, maybe somthing from maxxis.


Good times.

The Mamasita keeps blowing me away

I put another 3 hours on the mamasita today. The 32 17 gearing seems to really fit the the local trail and the Cannondale Lefty is working out nice. I had to ditch the lefty in California as the high speed decents were rocking my world. With the rocky rooty terrain out here im going back to minimal travel.

I am enjoyin it so much that im thinking about getting a new wheel set. I have a salsa delgado up front and its pretty heavy with a tube. Im running a stans 355 with a WTB hub in the rear with no chain tensioner - just pure luck.




I am thinking maybe get a stans wheel built with a lefty hub up front and and Stans wheel for the rear with an ENO hub sp that i can actually use somthing other then 32 17.

I am getting really stoked about my trip to Switzerland next week. I have never been to Europe so It should be wicked sick.

I am bringing my Road Bike and as luck would have it Roadie Joe is my partner on this project so he is bringing his bike too. We are thinking about renting a car on the weekend and heading to the alps for some serious climbing if the weather cooperates. If that doesn't happen, we will probably just end up drinking.

Not Taking any Chances

Training has been good...Can't let a possible Swine flu pandemic slow me down.




I hit the road for about 3 hours today, spent some time exploring the area, found some nice roads. I feel pretty fresh. I think im going to prep for an early ride tomorrow on the single speed. Its funny, they say you need to train on the road, but the dirt is the only place around here i can get my heart rate up and keep it up.

Re-birth of the Mamasita

Two days ago, I busted out the niner sir nine single speed, I hadn't ridden it in a while and it felt really awakward after spending so much time on the Dos niner and the Mamasita. It was clearly two small for me.

So this morning i got up and rebuilt the Mamasita. It has been out of servie since i used all of the parts for the Dos niner.

I planned on using a funky Chain tensioner, but i noticed that 32 18 might be a perfect fit so i broke some links.The chain ended up being too short by a hair. I went into the tool box and wipped out a 17 tooth cog. Perfect Fit!




I took her out fer a spin today and everything held up pretty good. I originally had a rigid fork on her, but after getting beat up real good i figured it was time to throw on the lefty. The lefty wasnt a good choice for West coast single track, but i think its going to do real well back east with the real technical stuff.

I was planning on a 6 hour ride today but ended up cutting it short to 3 hours. It was a tall gear to push and the rigid fork just beat the crap out of me. I do love how on a rigid single speed navigating thourgh some of some of the Rockiest rootiest, gnarly, wet slimy terrain can be done much more efficiently then on bike with some travel but once things start moving fast thats when i start to miss the technology.

Back on the Road

No...Not travlin again, but i got on the Road bike late this morning. I headed out to the blue hills reservation to find the hills in the area. I did a little exploring, then chased down another roadie. He was really friendly and ended up showing me around a bit, and we chatted about the local club scene and some of the rides.


In other news I got the single speed put back together...Im thinking about throwing down some long one geared miles on Saturday.

I dont know what it is about the single speed, but it keeps pulling be back for some pain. Im thinking about busting it out again for some enduros this year even though i just built up the plush dos niner.

Back to Leesburg

So After Zoning out in the Mail Truck for a good 8 hours I made it to Leesburg, VA for the Bakers Dozen. I rolled in to find Matt, Dan Rob, Sarah and dog Dakota suited up for a preride.

Man if it didnt feel awesome to see some familiar faces on knobby tires!


I setup camp and then Brian arrived with Mark B. from South Mountain Cycles. I headed out for a pre-ride with Mark which proved to be a very valuable experience since my rear wheel fell off midway, resulting in the 29er pole vault on to my ass. I think at that point Liz, Josh and Todd Wells Showed up.

After the ride, I picked up my race packet and ran into world famous blogger and Cheif editor/founder of XXC Mag who was setting up with with Bikeman Teammate Brad

We took a quick trip into town for dinner and we recieved a warm welcome at a local establishement that didnt seem to mind that we were in shorts, T-shirt, sweaty and had our race numbers written on the back of our legs despite the dress code sign on the door.


Anyway, I had no particular goals for this race other then seeing some friends and throwing down a lot of miles.....but I think deep down I really wanted to chase after Vegan Rob for as long as i could right from the start.

I started of deep in the pack with Matt, Dan, Brad and Mark close by...the gun went off and there was nasty crash immediately...I was able to avoid it but Matt wasn't so lucky.....I looked back with sympathy, since this wasn't actually war it was okay to leave a man behind. Matt understood.


So I went out and quickly got caught up in the XC BS pace before getting into my own groove, i pulled over and let Brad and a few others go around so i could settle in. About 2 hours in I got lapped By Rob. I thought this was a good opportunity to throw down and see if I could hang, but that only lasted for a quarter of a pedal stroke before he was gone.

The rest of the Race was pretty chill, I caught a lap or two with Matt and Dan, and took a few breaks.

After Seeing Dan and Matt chiling with beers around sunset I started to think about how I wanted to spend the rest of the night. I put on a long sleeve jersey and knee warmers and set my lights up. As i grabed something to eat Mark Rolled in to put on his lights. He asked for a scissor to cut his number plate off. I started to heckle him that this was where Craig Gordon took Chris Eatough during the light exchange, but he was pretty focused on the task at hand.

As i rolled out, I saw Jason and Brad sporting jeans and sweat shirts, sitting in chairs....they were done....Everyone i knew was chilling out. I thought about that for my night lap. I thought about the Sun shower sitting on the roof of the mail truck and that was it.

It was time to put the bike down and chill with some friends. They encouraged me to keep going....but i just saw there lips moving and the beer in there hand....

Good Times!

Leesburg Weather - shapin up!

This is going to be a good One!

Dialed in for a good time

Spent the last few days gathering some stuff for the Leesburg Bakers Dozen, 13 hours of Racing in VA!

Im so stoked to be going down, I like to think of this as my homecoming event. I really didn't think I was going to get the opportunity to move back from California so soon - and everything is clickin with the work schedule allowing me to head down.

Everyone is going to Be there! I am not too concerned about how well I will do - but I am really excited about throwing down some laps with some old friends.

I raced Leesburg, two years ago, the inaugural event and it was the first year I took endurance training seriously and the first and few podiums I ever earned.

I am not sure where my fitness is at the moment, its been an awkward winter traveling a lot. I didn't get in a lot of long rides, but i did get in some pretty good climbs in California so the plan is to wing it and see how things go.

Anyway, I got the Dos Niner Dialed in this week, I mounted up some Hutchinson Pythons on a brand new set of Bontrager Race light wheels, and put on a full Triple Crank and a front derailleur.



I took the new Rig down to Wompatuck to burn the wheels in a little bit. I wanted to make sure the tires aren't going to blow off the Rim. I have never used a bontrager tubeless set up before.

This should be good, its going to be an awesome start to the Season!

My new office - Womatuck

The forecast was awesome today, so after making some breakfast, I threw the blackberry in my pocket and headed to the trail. It was time to make for some lost time for working and traveling to much. Im not going to tell you how long I was on the bike today, becuase iI know the Head writers at The Soiled Chamois, AcuraMatt inc and RSDMag.com are watching my every move and it would give them an unfair advantage down in Leesburg next weekend. However it was a long ride. I was able to stay on top of the work emails.

Things were actually going pretty good until my boss sent me a heads up that he was calling me and things started to begin to look like i needed my laptop...a small emergency was breaking out so I ended up cutting the ride short by an our - it was a bit of a relief, cause i was starting to get tired.

Anyway, it was a good day - and i got a lot of hours in this week before the weekend so I can chase my niece and nephew around while the look for colored eggs..

Later

Putting on the Big Ring

I haven't ridden with a front derailleur in about 2 years. In fact i haven't felt the need for a big ring in a long time but with the Leesburg bakers dozen coming up, i know im going to need it so on it goes.....




I swiped my old XT Crank off of my wife's bike but i didn't realize her XTR derailleur was not going to fit my seat tube....

none of the local shops had the derailleur i needed, so onto Bikeman.com I go.....

well I send the order in and tnen like 2 hours later i realize i need a whole lot more stuff...so i send out another order.....BTW, I was on the phone with bikeman.com HQ in the morning to get my team clothing shipped...so i basically put in three orders in a day...yeah im slow.

Anyway here is the new Steed....it has been treating me well. My ass is welcoming the one inch of travel after spending many miles on a hardtail.






Working from home and riding seem to be going together very well. I think i am going to get a lot of miles in during the next few weeks!

Time to Rock

So I just landed on the East Coast.

I moved into the new crib, Sat around in a lawn chair for a few days awaiting my house hold goods and bikes. I Spent a few days unpacking and getting rid of mountains of packing material.

Once that was done, it was time to get the bike rolling – I have a brand new Dos Niner that hasn’t been ridden due to my crazy work schedule – well pedro is working from home now so there is no excuse.

The local roads

I always preferred riding single track to the road – until I moved to California where it was a toss up since the roads were awesome. I haven’t found the roads very exciting yet out here so we will be staying on the trail until further notice.


The Trail

So I found the local trail and it Rocks! Wompatuck state park is infested with rocks that remind me of Rattling Creek and some good climbs that bring I put about 6 hours on this trail in two days and my body is pretty beat. It felt so natural cranking through the Rocky rooty terrain while my heart was racing – like I never left the East Coast.


There is another trail head even closer then wompatuck that I need to check out – Blue hills. From what I heard its not as technical as wompatuck but, it may have some more elevation gain.

Leesburg Bakers Dozen

I am totatlly psyched to be heading down to Leesburg, VA in less then two weeks for 13 hours of racing. I was hoping to take advantage of the California winter and train my ass off, roll into town and kick some ass. Unfortunately I have spent to entire winter back on the Road with work and unable to train. The main reason Im stoked to head down there is some many friends will be there so even if I just throw down some laps it will be worth the trip.

In the mean time, im doing the 3 week thirteen hour race training program which has me putting in a lot of hours this week. Im hoping I have a lot of base built up from the last 2 years of endurance racing and ill pop into some sort of fighting shape. The work from home schedule is really helping out. I was able to squeeze two hours of riding in early this morning prior to rain rolling in.

Later –
P

Whats in store for 2009?

Well Been looking at the schedule to see whats in store for 2009.


Wilderness 101 (end of July) - This is going to be a priority, its a great race and Its a great opportunity to see some familiar faces.

Platikill 6 hour - My parents have a house near buy, so it will be great to coordinate a Visit with some racing

666 Mountain Bike race - This is a new 6 hour race in Pittsfield, VT - I spent a lot of time in Pittsield during past winters and know a few folks, so it will be great to get up there in the summer for some riding.

Hampshire 100k (August(

Land Mine Classic Marathon

Bradbury 12 hour (September)


Vermont 50 (September)

Maybe a 24 hour Solo?


Anyway, you may have noticed that this is an east coast schedule....well Pete's headed east!