The Lost Valley report that should be lost....

I just raced out at Lost Valley yesterday and this is one report that should be lost in the trash. I pretty much new it wouldn't be a good day from the start. Let me take you back to three days ago when I did five laps out at LV. I was feeling good so I decided to make up for four prior days of no training into one day. In fact I saw TK out there and he told me it my be a little much. Well beyond his better judgement and mine I proceeded to finish the five laps and then went and got a light massage thinking that might help me recover quicker. Now, fast forward to yesterday, I'm not sure if it was because of that ride, but my legs were shot from the start, that heavy feeling was setting in right from the start. I guess if I were riding sport I still would have done fairly well, but now back riding in the expert class, there's no room for off days. These guys, or the trails for that matter will eat you up and spit you out!!!!! which I learned yesterday. For such an easy course it was pretty darn tough, lots of soft, grassy trails to really soak up your power, not that I have any, but what little I did have. Lets just say my race did not go at all as planned. Well, I'd like to udate more, but I'm falling asleep at the wheel so to speak so I'll end it here. I guess I've always got the next race!!!

St. Joe XC race report....

Well, where do I begin. I've finally found the time to update this thing. Last Sunday was the first mt. bike race of the season. I had been pretty excited about it since it is where my roots began and what I really do enjoy. The problem is the road took over and haven't done much off road racing over the last few years. Well, this year my focus is really on road races and mt. bike races and limiting the amount of crits I do.

Last Thursday was a big day for me. I got my PRP shot for my groin and then I strolled over to Ballwin cycles to pick up my new Chris King front wheel. Anyways, I was pretty excited about that, but my leg wasn't feeling that great after the shot. I wasn't even sure if I'd be able to race on Sunday. If you've never had it done, I would recommend it. I had a pulled groin and it was sore from the shot for two days. By Sunday it wasn't even a problem.

Now for the other dilemma I had, "how were the course conditions with all the rain we'd had the previous week?" I really, and I really didn't want to race in muddy terrible conditions and I didn't want to waste a vacation day for that. I asked a few people, got a few responses, but nothing concrete to go on. I had some time on Saturday so me and Jess headed down so I could preride the course and Jess could go for a walk. As I'm riding the trail, I'm thinking to myself "this trail isn't that difficult and there's definitely not that much climbing." I ended up doing it in 57 minutes, thinking that wasn't bad. Booooooy was I wrong!!!!

Sunday strolls around, I'm late as usual. I arrive at the parking lot at 10am for a 10:30 start, dress, put bike together, gather up gels, and head to go register. As I'm registering he mentions were going a little later then expected. No big deal, in fact great for me. So I'm warming up and decide it's getting close. I turn around only to find out the expert field is all lined up and getting ready to roll. As usual, limited warm-up. I really gotta learn to warm up better. I know where I stand in a race so I fall into the back of the line. Race starts and I'm hammering, I'm around 10th or so into the singletrack. Not a bad start for me. I hung with that group for about four or five miles before falling off the pace. I'm really getting warm with my vest on so at the picnic area where I had set my water bottles I took it off and saw my buddy Matt Keevan, I say hello and him and Jess get me back on my bike and away I go. First lap 52 minutes, I'm pleased with that.

Now for the second lap, not much to report, I'm just cruising along at my own pace looking back every once in a while to make sure nobody is coming up on me. I must've passed several other riders from different classes. I also noticed several unfortuneate expert riders either on the side of the trail or walking their bike. I'm just glad that's not me. I'm not sure how long it took me, I forgot to set my splits.

Third lap, I really start to slow down. The course is taking it's toll on me. I think to myself that this is not the same course I rode the day before. I don't remember there being this much climbing. A couple times I could feel the onset of cramping in my legs so I do my best to combat that. I ran about 41 psi in my tires to account for the soft sections, but a lot was already dried out and my back was starting to feel the pain. I thought about stopping and letting pressure out, but didn't want to jinx myself and just toughed it out. Now I'm just thinking to myself, "now after this I get to go to work for 14 hours!!!" I pass maybe one or two expert riders trying to make it through and also get passed in the last mile by a guy who I had seen repairing his bike. I come to find out that he broke his chain and had caught back up with me.

I finish the race with a time of 2:51:08. I'm just glad to finish. I ended up in 10th place, out of 13 finishers. The winner finished in 2:18, insane. This race was kind of bittersweet. I thought my times would be better, but then again, I hadn't ridden my mt. bike but twice over the last four months. That includes my preride the day before. All in all it was a success. It was a good gauge of my fitness which I'm happy with, and I have to mix in a few more mt. bike rides into my training. Up next is Lost Valley.

Froze Toes part 2.......

It's over, the first race of the season is in the books. I didn't know what to expect as far as this race goes, I've heard it's a training race, don't worry about it. Well, I can tell you it was just as much a race as any other race I've done. Early on, I could tell my legs were heavy and that I wasn't really feeling good, I just kept telling myself to play it cool and just hang in there. The attacks went early and often. Finally the legs started feeling good, but now I happened to hit a huge pothole that was so hard I was lucky I didn't flat. It hit so hard the guy in front of me lost his bottle and my handlebars rotated about a quarter inch. As the race played out I was feeling good about my form and was looking for at least a top 20 finish. I was able to stay in the top 1/3 and even had an attack and pulled up a few of the hills. With about 300 meters to go the pace was high and I was moving up. I'd say I was in the top 15 and looking to move up even further when right in front of me several riders go down. I'm forced into the ditch ala Lance Armstrong. Well, that was it, that was my race. I was able to stay upright, but as I got back onto the road I tried to count guys going past, but it was like a streak, I couldn't even begin counting. I was just happy to stay upright. As for my performance I was pretty satisfied, but on the other hand everyone else's looked just as good. As for our team? I believe everyone was satisfied and Jeff and new guy Jose had good finishes. It looks like we'll be well represented at all the races this year. Now time to look to the dirt for the upcoming mt. bike races.

Froze Toes....

I guess you could say the season begins tomorrow. I don't know how tomorrow will play out. I don't even know who is going to be there from our team. Denny is sick, Yielding will propably be there, but that's all I know of. I'm not too worried though, it's just a training race, in fact, I'm not even 100% sure I'll even be there. My fitness is not too bad I guess, I took a couple weeks off, not by choice though. My groin injury is still present, but can tell it's healing. With all the weather we've had over the past couple days they say the race is still on so I guess we'll see who's in good form if I'm even there. It's time to wax the legs.........yeah baby!!!!

The season is fast approaching......

Looks like the season is fast approaching! My injury seems to be making a turn for the better. I was able to get out twice last weekend and get on the trainer for another couple of hours. I wore a groin wrap that helped out a lot. I can still kind of feel though, which tells me it's not completely healed. I woke yesterday evening and went to my first spinning class this season. Last year I had gone to at least a couple a week, but not this year. Today looks like it might get up to 50* outside so I'll be riding outside at some point.

I got a call last night from Denny and he said Hillsboro filled up. Wow, I even had a chance to sign up and was going to do it this weekend, but looks like I'll be watching from the sidelines. It's just as well, I won't be able to get as much time off this year for races because of my schedule. I work every other Saturday night into Sunday morning so it makes it kind of tough to make a Sunday race, which are about 90% of all the races. I'll mostly be concentrating on the mt. bike races and the spring road races, then Superweek up in Wisconsin and then the Tour of KC, and finally the Gateway Cup. I'll also try to fit in a couple Dinoseries(mt. bike) races in throughout the year. My plan of doing a 1/2 ironman looks like it may fall by the wayside, as I cannot even find the time to do all the bike races I want. It also allows for more opportunity of injury which means time off the bike. I think I may do a couple local sprint triathlons, but certainly am not making triathlon any priority in my upcoming season. See you on the road.