TransRockies - Stage Three

Day three of the TansRockies marks a bit of an turning point in the event.  David and I signed up for the full TR7 which is seven days of stages and riding.  There are two other options in the event, TR3 and TR4.  TR3 includes the first 3 days whereas TR4 is last four days.  TR3 all takes place in and around Fernie and TR4 takes place further north towards Canmore/Calgary.  Today was the last day of TR3 so starting tomorrow we will see a bunch if new faces/riders as TR4 officially starts.

TR3 wrapped up in glorious fashion.  The stage started at the ski resort and took a road aptly named 'lungbuster' to a trail that we traversed over to the next drainage and followed a downhill that kept you fully engaged.  The start was a bit of a rude awakening though.  It got steep and sustained, just continued to give for about 2,200 ft over 3 miles for an average grade of over 13%!!  At least the steep climbing was on a road and did not entail a root cocktail on that climb.
We got to the bottom of the first downhill and followed some nice trail through overgrown bushes and it put us out through a creek crossing.  As soon as went through the creek (fortunately we did not need a paddle and were not yet up ¥£#% creek so all was good), we hit the first aid station and promptly filled up knowing the featured climb of the day was ahead of us.

At the briefing the night before, we were told that grizzlies had been spotted in that drainage so that hovered in the back of my mind.  We left the aid station and followed to contour of the river  via a tight and rooty trail that eventually put us onto a road where 'the climb' awaited.  Let's just say it did not disappoint.  It was lonnnng, steep, and did I say steep?  The view up the climb/ hike a bike were stunning.  The climb just kept on dishing out doses of face slapping and it took everything to get on the bike on the pitches that were "rideable" and keep the pedals turning.  There were large sections that were just barely rideable and you just kept moving up up up.

Along the way, we saw some fresh bear scat.  Man oh man, it was fresh!  The only fresher it could have been was if it was steaming!  It was so fresh that it was still green, and it was definitely grizz scat.  They say the scat turns brown after about 15 minutes so we were in the bear's backyard.  We made sure to make noise and chatter as we tried to dig ourselves out of the suffering as we slowly progressed up the slope.  Fortunately we did not have any bear encounters.

We finally created after some grunting, groaning, maybe even a tear or two (fortunately the sweat rate was so high that tears and sweat could not be distinguished from each other), we crested and were treated to some 360 degree views of awesomeness.  We peaked at about 6300 ft and then eagerly anticipated the downhill of the day that would lead us to the finish.

The downhill is a hiker only trail and was opened up to the TransRockies for the day.  It was fast, steep, and full of switchbacks that were not rideable, which of course did not deter us from attempting fate and trying to clean them.  This would lead to my first fall of the day which made me a wee bit gun shy after for the remaining switchies.  David, on the other hand, felt like he needed to out-do his prios day's falls and up the ante by going over his handlebars and airborne in the superman pose.  He got up and I was a little worried because he stumbled and almost fell back down.  He decided to get going quickly so as to not think about the pain or results of being mortal but acting all super hero like.

But ahhhh, my turn was next!  About 2 miles from the finish I had myself a keeper of a fall.  The trail was so steep that brakes were only partially effective.  I got a little too much speed and then hit my brakes and felt my rear wheel lock up on something slippery which sent me into my own little super hero pose as I rolled into the bushes and slid for about 10 ft.  My shoulder started to bark at me immediately but I hopped rghit back on and rode to ignore the pain and force the mind to think about something else.

Without further insult to injury, we got to the finish and parked our butts down while people looked at us and just commented about how much of a mess we looked....or just maybe they were digging
Hersey's salmon colored shirt?

Day three in the books and it was just just over 19 miles and about 5,300 ft of elevation gain.  They were hard earned but the payoff was amazing.  We did some extra credit miles to get back to the condo so we did an extra 8 miles and about 300 ft of elevation gain.

Tomorrow we take a 4 hour shuttle north and have a late start/finish to the stage.  We might be incommunicado for a few days as we get deeper into bear country - starting at stage 4, bear spray is mandatory!  They are doing a check of the racers prior to the start....

TransRockies Stage 2

After a decent night's rest, it was time to get up and see what body parts ached, creaked, and were generally unhappy. Little did we know that the unhappy bodies would turn to downright surly and ornery after the stage.

Stage two started in downtown Fernie and finished up at the ski mountain. The biggest robbery there is that we climbed significantly more than we got to descend and therefore were shortchanged. That last sentence should set the tone of whine for this entry.
Day two was significantly harder than day 1. If day 1 was hard (which it was), day two was borderline abusive with over 5,700 ft of gain in just under 19 miles. The scary thought is that if day two was abusive, I shudder to think of just how criminal day three will be because it is about the same distance, but includes an additional 1,000 ft of elevation for a grand Mack daddy total of 6,600 ft.

Back to day two biz-nass....we were led out of town by an old fire truck which kept a nice tempo until they sent up us up a side street where our day would start in earnest. We had a punchy climb on pavement until it turned to dirt. At this point the pack was still very much a pack and we had not started to thin the herd out yet. After a couple miles of steep climbing, things started to thin out and the natural order of things sorted itself out. There were a couple of fast, loose, tricky descents that claimed a couple of bad falls for folks.



At the bottom of the first descent, there was a sharp left turn, followed by a sharp right turn. Dave decided to test his brakes on the latter turn and made the mistake of following the rider in front of him who missed the turn. He saw the turn after it was too late and ended up locking his brakes up which would end up having a dominoe effect on Dave. Dave crossed tires with the guy and the next thing I know there is Dave trying to tackle some good old Fernie dirt! I immediately cringed as I knew that Dave's shoulder is not currently attached to his scapula and for as tough as his mind is, and the ability to have a high pain threshold, I also understand his shouler is currently in pain, and landing on it like you are doing a penguin dive into a pile of dirt cannot exactly help matters. He resolved to get up quickly and try to ignore whatever additional damage might have taken place. For those of you who know Hersey you are probably currently grinning while shaking your head saying "yup, that sounds about right".

After the tumble in the jungle, we began our biggest climb of the day. It was steep, technical, and just mean! There were some hike a bike sections especially when it pitched up and simultaneously served up a jumbo size order of roots! At that point I kept thinking how do the fast guys not only ride up this stuff, but they race up it.

After some more hike up some off camber trail that went up a gulley (the views were silly beautimous) and continued the hike a bike conga line until we crested and got treated to some fast and steep (and rooty) descending. By the time we got to the bottom, my hands were aching from holding onto the bars and brakes and trying to control the bike. Any lapse in judgement here would have resulted in a spectacular fall like in cartoons where the rolling would not stop for a while and the little dust cloud would have just added to the scene. With some luck, we made it down without consequences and it was time to think of the next climb...not as long, but more of the same steep hike a bike, rooty, rocky, hard, ego bashing, etc...we took another downhill that kicked us out at the aid station where we stopped and tried regroup. 

It was good timing since DH had lost one of his agua bottles in the infamous ground tackle and he was due some hydration. We hit the roots again and I got to watch 'the tackle part DUH'. Part duh was a little less sensational than its predecessor but the end result was trying to unravel the spaghetti of arms, legs, bike. Once again Hersey brushed himself off and got moving again. 

The next couple of hours were more of the same above....wash, spin, rinse, repeat....repeat...repeat. The last hour of the race started to lay the hammer on me. It was HOT and if I had a dime for every drop of sweat that dripped of of me, I might have enough to buy a new car. I even found my granny gear! I reflected about how long it had been since the last time I used my small chain ring and honestly don't recall. Suffice it to say that granny and I got reacquainted again. We spent some good quality time together and Hersey was relishing watching me have to dig deep!

The final descent came and it was another Herculean effort to hang on to the mostly downhill style descent until we rolled through the finish.

Day two, in the books....it was much more difficult than I had mentally prepared for so it was a bit of an ego crusher but at least we have an even harder day set up tomorrow!

quickie view along the first climb

 green & lush

 someone order up a dosage of roots?

 last climb of the day...

 almost to the crest of the last climb....another 200 ft of elevation gain to go!

TransRockies Stage 1

Tr7 stage 1 is in the books! It was great to get the seven day stage race underway and stage 1 did not disappoint. Stages 1 through 3 are in Fernie and despite their distances, they pack a climbing punch.

Pictures included:
team number: 

0

start/finish area

at the peak:

Stage 1 took us in a time trial format where we were staggered by one minute intervals. We set off up the first climb and knew we had a quick descent only to be quickly followed by the biggest climb of the day. The biggest climb included sections that kicked up 38 degrees in some areas which validates the elevation profile of gaining around 1200 feet of vertical gain in around 1.2 miles for an AVG incline of 15%!!!!! It was all rideable but OUCH! Some of the switchbacks were so tight and steep that you had to go past the switchie to a tiny lollipop where you turned around so you could get going up the switchie.

We climbed until we peaked at around 5000 ft and then started a steep and fast descent that had some tricky areas that you had to pay attention to or else you could end up off trail and head down a steep decline.

The scenery was just stunning! It was so captivating that it caused a little excitement on the descent for me. I was so focused on the scenery that my bike followed my line of sight off trail and quickly enough had me ass over tea kettle. A quick dust off and it was time to get back on track. It took me out of my flow for a little bit but it would soon be time to get the climbing hat back on for a short and punchy climb.

We hit the aid stations quickly and tried to keep moving.

The excitement came circa mile 16 when my team-mate's chain broke and we pulled over to get the chain fixed and get going. We got passed by about 7 people as we got the bike together. In the back of my mind I kept thinking that once a chain goes, it is usually significantly weaker and breaking again is not uncommon....at about the time these thoughts were going through my mind, I heard Dave yell out, "hey T" and I knew exactly what was up...at that point we figured it might be best to keep rolling with the broken chain since we were thinking it was mostly downhill.

Oopsy....so the last 4 to 5 miles were tough for Dave. He rolled the downhills and had to walk/run the flats and ups. We eventually rolled in and I could see the agony on Dave's face. We rolled into the mechanic's tent and they promptly located 3 other links that were cracked and would have blown if we had done a second fix on the chain. The section we fixed, was good but it was just a few weak links short of a strong chain...not so good.

The stage was around 20 miles in length and around 4,600 ft of elevation gain. Day two awaits us tomoorrow and has about the same distance but more climbing in store for us.

Giddy up!

High Cascades100 Thoughts

The legs are recovering and the mind is starting to make sense of the High Cascades hundie this past weekend.

All in all, it was a great event with an awesome course.  The course is generally pretty fast as the uber fast guys were coming in sub 8 hrs!  The singlespeed winner came in sub 9 hours!  The singlespeed category as a whole was fast.  To take that thought a step further, I was the 23rd out of 27  singlespeeders to cross the line and 153rd overall out of 320 (if you count the DNF's).  So overall I was solid mid-pack, but as a singlespeeder I was on the back end.

Gear Ratio - I ran a 32:20 for the race and the legs felt fine throughout the day.  I am thinking a 32:19 is probably a good ratio for the race as you won't be quite as spun out on some sections and none of the climbs were too steep, and the steep ones were hike a bike regardless of gear ratio (unless of course you are not a mortal).

The body hurt more after this race than it has after any other hundie or enduro event.  For some reason, this course beats you up!  There is less climbing than other hundies which for me translated into the legs feeling OK, but the body feeling like it had been put through a meat grinder.  I think it is because you are on singletrack for most of the race and the middle 30 or so miles are technical rocky sections that just beat you into submission with all the lava rock.  The hardtail selection of bike just exacerbated the pain the last 30 miles.

Tires - I was glad I swapped out tires prior to the race and went with re-enforced sidewalls.  I still cringed as I went through the long tech sections that kept popping my tires as I went through it.  Running tubeless is definitely the way to go.

Mudslinger did a bang up job on organization and clean up post-race.  Those guys have this dialed in.  

High Cascades 100 Race Report

After the usual toss n turn night the day before the race, I showed up at the starting line a wee bit groggy from the night of broken sleep.  The 5:30 start came early but it was a perfect start time as it was already daylight and nice and crisp.
I was looking forward to the day (well, sort of considering the dark places that you have to visit while on these journeys) and felt like my fitness was OK, and I had pre-ridden about 2/3 of the course and somewhat knew what to expect.

The starting gun went off and everyone followed the pace car on pavement for about 6 miles.  For us singlespeeders, we got left to our own high rpm spinny cadence.  I saw many a gearie pass me up on the road and took the approach of finding a comfortable cadence to spin and not try to keep up with the guys/gals with gears.
I knew that soon enough, we would hit the dirt and it would be time to start trying to reel some riders in.

After about 6 miles, we turned onto a quickie paved downhill section for about a mile until we turned off onto the dirt road that would take us up to the Larsen trail.  The dirt road helped to thin out the riders and helped us singlespeeders to catch up to some folks.  Once we hit the Larsen trail, we hit a couple of bottlenecks on some 'tek' sections where people were dismounting and walking.
I decided to accept the conga line place and just ride it out until we hit some areas that were more open and would spread people out a little more.
We took the Larsen trail over to Tiddlywinks and up Funner to Wanoga Sno Park where there was the first aid station.  About 1 1/2 hours into the race, I noticed I was cramping!  whhhhhhaaat?  It was weird because I had not been hammering and did not feel like I had been working too hard yet.  I quickly downed a handful of endurolytes and made a mental note to be diligent about popping a couple pills every hour for the duration of the day.

We got to Wanoga and I skipped the Aid station knowing that I had enough water and calories to take me to Dutchman (50 miles in).  There was also another mini Aid station before that so I took the opportunity to keep moving.

Once we left Wanoga, we followed a trail for about a mile until it kicked us out onto a dirt road where we would continue to climb as the road got steeper and sandier.  Once we hit the underpass I remembered there would be some hike a bike for me as a singlespeeder when the road got pretty steep and really soft for about 200 yds.  If I was on a shorter ride I would have tried riding it but part of riding singlespeed is knowing when to dismount and hike a bike on some steep stuff in order to save your legs a little...The sooner you enter that red zone, the sooner you run the risk of bonking and considering we were only about 2 1/2 hours into the day, it was too early to go into the red zone.
We continued up from Vista Sno park until we hit the turn off for the connector trail over to Swampy Sno Park.  We climbed for a little bit until we hit some fast flowy downhill.  Soon enough we came up on the mini Aid station at Swampy and I did a quick water/calorie check and kept moving through the Aid station without stopping.  I had enough to get me to Dutchman....
From swampy, we took a connector trail up to Swede Ridge where we picked up Sector 16 and bombed downhill until we hit Upper Whoops.  Somewhere between Sector 16 and Whoops, I bit it!  My front tire found some soft sand and before I knew it, I was on the ground dealing with a bit of a yard sale!  Doh!  I had been messing around with my Garmin on my bars and got distracted enough to bite it!  My garmin attachment that is held on the bars with rubber bands was not wanting to stay in one spot.  The rubber had stretched and so it kept want to slide to the smaller tapered area of the handlebars where it dangled.  After the wreck I took it off and stashed it in my pack...it would be up to me to guesstimate when I needed to eat, take in endurolytes, etc....I usually go by the clock on the garmin to make sure I eat on the hour every hour, etc...

I brushed myself off, shook off the cobwebs and continued the downhill bombaroo....albeit a wee bit more cautiously.

We caught Skyliners and connected over Towards Tumalo where we would eventually connect to South Fork and work our way all the way back up to around 6,000 ft of elevation - it was time to settle in and find the happy place....I managed to pass several riders as they were spinning up the climb and I was forced to ride the bigger gearing on the singlespeed.  I had ridden this section a couple of times before and knew what to expect so I just kept the cranks turning.
We eventually got back up to Swampy Cabin area where we took a connector trail back over towards the dirt road above Vista Sno Park,  Instead of going back towards Vista, it was time to go the other direction to Dutchman where I had dropped off a couple of bottles for reloading on water and calories.  I remembered climb up towards Dutchman as being steep and loose in a few areas so mentally I had made Dutchman a key point in the day where once we got there, most of the climbing would be behind us.
I got to Dutchman and swapped out bottles, got more water, and did some quick grazing before I hit the  road again....did not want to linger too long and get too comfortable off the bike!
The next section of trail would all be new to me.  We caught the Metolius Windigo trail that goes on the back side of Bachelor (or west side).  This trail was totally different than anything I had ridden in the area and I became very alert to the real possibility of flatting due to all the sharp lava rock and techie trails.  It was slow going in some areas and you could feel the day heating up as the day got hotter and we were not descending back the warm stuff.  After about 11 miles, we hit Lava Lakes and another mini Aid station where I tried to keep moving through.  The next few miles were a grind!
It was a steep climb out of Lava Lakes, with some nice tekkie loose ugliness thrown in for good measure.
Many of the geared guys were hike a biking through some sections so we kept each other company as we talked about what lay ahead....
The legs were feeling decent but the body was starting to break down...I could tell my riding was getting sloppy because my body and mind were getting tired.  I took another spill - a stupid fall that seemed like it happened in slow motion as I hit another beach sand spot that gobbled my front tire and sent me off the bike.  At that point, I knew it was time to dial it back a notch on the downhills and see if I could find the flow again.
We eventually crested the climb out of Lava Lakes and it was time to look forward to the next Aid Station at Edison Sno Park.  This is where I had another drop bag with some goodies for the last 20 miles.  For some reason (probably wishful thinking) I had thought we were done with climbing once we hit Edison Sno Park and that it would be mostly downhill until the finish.

There was a mean climb out of Edison Sno Park that added insult to injury because we were getting clobbered by midday sun and the trail was relatively soft so the pedaling was hard.  We eventually hit the top and once we started heading downhill, I knew that it was mostly down back to the finish.  At this point the body was achey and rebelling on the downhills which made it hard to find flow but the finish kept reeling me in like a magnet.  We headed down Tiddlywinks back down towards the paved road we had turned off of about 10 hrs earlier...ahhh, now it was just 6 miles of pavement back to the finish....the miles went by relatively quickly and when I crossed the finish line I heard the announcer say, another finisher sub 11 hrs!

To my surprise I was able to finish just under 11 hours....now it was time to clean up a bit and hit the food, and most importantly find my finisher growler!.....all in all, it was a good day.  I had a couple of dumb falls but I can't complain about the course or the race.  The race was really well put together, organized, and laid out.

Thanks Mike (Mudslinger) for a great day on the bike!

Grind Mystery Solved

When originally building up the singlespeed bike, I opted to go with a burly Surly cog on the back.  It is a big beefy cog and the idea was pay the weight penalty for durability.  Lesson learned....no reason to go burly because when you replace your chain and chain ring on the drivetrain, you should replace the cog on the rear too.

I took the bike in to Webcyclery yesterday and first off, let me say those guys are ROCK stars.  I walked in when they opened thinking I could drop the bike off and have them take a look at it when they had time.  One of the wrenches said let's take a look at it now or else it might be a week and a half later!  After much gratitude, he put the bike up and started the search for the grinding....he adjust the chain line...no joy....then adjusted the tension....no joy....then swapped out the chain...no joy....then he swapped out the rear cog....happy joy joy!

When he removed the rear cog, it became apparent that it too had worn (despite the burliness of the cog).  So when replacing the drivetrain on the singlespeed, swap it all out!  cog, chain, chainring...fortunately it is a quick fix and not nearly as expensive as doing that to a geared bike.

Webcyclery has definitely earned my respect and business in town.  Those guys were super cool, very knowledgeable and friendly to boot.  Considering they are the singlespeed authority here in town, it only makes sense that they are the bike shop of choice for me.  Another cool bennie is that they give you 10% off purchases if you are a member of COTA...which if you are not, and you live in Central Oregon and ride bikes...then become a member as these guys put in a TON of work with trail access and trail building/maintenance.  Big props all the way around.

Thanks much to Webcyclery for hooking a brother up!  Now to wrap my head around the High Cascades hundie,,,,

Grinding

I did a little test ride the bike to iron out any kinks from the maintenance.  Everything seems to be in good working order with the exception of one little ittie bittie problem....under load, the drivetrain makes a grinding noise.  I need to check alignment of the chain and also put some lube on to see if that will make it go away...if not, time to put on the inspector glasses and try to figure out what the source of that is.  The chain tension is fine so it is not that but it might be a combo bigger chain and smaller chain ring although I think that is doubtful considering it is a niner chainring.

I have 2 days to figure it out so the clock is ticking....

Single Speed Chain/ Chain Ring / Rubber

The mechanical prep for the High Cascades 100 included swapping out the drive train on the single speed and putting on new rubber.

I went with a Niner chain ring - same size (32 tooth).  I had to use the old chain ring bolts as the bolts provided with the Niner set up were not long enough.  I also have a new chain on there now too....now to find some time to get out and ride it a little to ensure all is running smoothly.

The old chainring definitely had a serious case of the shark teeth going on!

As for the rubber....I decided to opt for the slightly burlier sidewall tires in the Conti Mountain King tire for the fronts.  It is about a 200 gram penalty (compare to Schwalbe Raching Ralphs) but am hoping it will provide a little extra piece of mind on the sidewalls as we go through the sharp lava rocks.  On the rear, I will be running the Maxxis Ikon which is not quite as aggressive and should be a good roller.  I am hoping the more aggressive tire on the front will hook up better.

 The Maxxis tire sealed up pretty well with Stan's but the Conti was feeling a little soft this a.m. so I re-inflated and am hoping it sealed up - will have to monitor during the day....

Blog Hiatus

Sometimes you are the hammer, sometimes you are the nail.  The past couple of months I have felt more like the nail and am looking forward to flipping that around to become the hammer.

With an unplanned and un-intended hiatus from the world of blogging, it is time to switch it up and get back to some written diatribe....so here we go...

Despite some craziness over the past couple of months, I have managed to get out on the bike and get some riding in.  The High Cascades 100 is this upcoming Saturday and the bravado (stupidity) of signing up as a single speed entrant back in the winter is starting to rear its little head.  As with just about any endurance event I have entered and trained for, you never feel like you have ridden enough.  This time around though those nagging thoughts are a little louder and wee bit more persistent.  I have managed to get in some longer training rides but have not done the power workouts and intervals that I would have wanted to.

The High Cascades course looks awesome!  I have pre-ridden about 60-70% of it and am looking forward to being on single track for most of the day.  There is a little house-keeping (or should it be called bike-keeping) to take care of before this grand and glorious Saturday.  I need to swap out both tires and my drive train.  I want some fresh rubber and a new chain ring/ chain so that mechanicals are mitigated as much as possible.  That needs to happen today/tomorrow so that the bike can be ridden to work out any kinks on the maintenance.  Fortunately, it is taper week so that means a little more time off the bike in order to be able to take care of said maintenance.

Unfortunately, this taper thing is far from feeling all dialed in.  One of the variables I have struggled with on these enduro events is the taper.  I have not yet found the formula that works best for me.  In the past, the approach was to stay off the bike completely the week prior but the downside to that is the legs don't stay 'sharp'.  You feel super rested, but not super dialed into the flow.  This time around, the plan is to get on the bike for some easy spinning with a couple of short, hard efforts thrown in to get the muscles firing.

The art of tapering....speaking of, time to get back to tapering....