True Grit Epic 100- Sunny and DIRT!!

View towards the start
Site of bike set up and first 
dirt tracks of the year

So the True Grit Epic 100 Bike Race would be the first true mountain bike race of the year for me.  This year is looking to be a little different for me as I focus on races across the nation in pursuit of having fun and racing hard with my many new friends I have made over the years now. This opening race was held in warm and sunny St. George,Utah which meant that I would be embarking on a first in my many years of racing, flying to a race.  A week earlier I had sent my bike down to St. George and was scheduled to join it on Thursday before the race.  I flew in to Las Vegas on Thursday evening and stayed there for the night as they have cheap rooms that charge ridiculous hotel fees after you check out!!! 

Zen Loop- Crazy Line
(My Photo featured inSonya Looney MTBR Report)

After sleeping off the flight in Vegas, I was northbound for the sunny desert.  I planned on getting to St. George and taking the bike out on a spin for a little pre-ride.  Got to Red Rock Bicycles who held my bike until I got there (Thanks Guys!!)  and found the bike in perfect condition. Immediately like a kid on Christmas morning I headed out to the start venue where I planned to assemble the bike and head on the pre-ride.  I was so excited to finally be standing in the warm sun with temps over 40 degrees.  Long WINTER!!  I assembled my bike on what would be the start line the next day out of the back of my rental.  Fun.  I couldn’t contain my excitement as I finally got everything together, kited up, and was off on the dirt instead of the snow.

Great View on on Zen
(My Photo featured inSonya Looney MTBR Report)

I decided that I would check out the Zen loop as many locals and fellow racers said this was the most technical of loops and warrented a look. I proceeded up the opening climb for the race which was up a nice and rugged dirt road.  Getting to the top I started to run into all the great folks I like to call friends from the past year.  Getting to stop and chat as I was out for pre-ride was great as it had been a long 6 months since the last time I saw many of these folks.  I proceeded to hit the Zen and was amazed at what I found.  This loop was no more than 1 hr. on race day but it was going to be a tough hour.  The loop was full of slick rock, boulders, and cliffs all over.  The drops were big and terrain technical beyond anything found in Iowa! During my pre-ride I stopped many times to take photos and enjoy the view that I knew the next day would just be a blur.  Also I was stopping because of the technical nature of the trail. I scouted a few lines and found out that many times I needed to trust my bike and skills and just take stuff at speed in order to get down the lines. Well got through the pre-ride and didn’t kill myself so +1 for the first true mountain bike ride of the season!  YES!!!!!!

Zen looking down on
Bear Claw Poppy and Stucki Springs

After the pre-ride, I again chatted with some folks from the great shop 92FIFTY (Elevated Legs Supplier) and proceeded to race check in and hotel lounging.  My night was filled with the normal pre-race jitters as I laid out everything for the next morning.

Race Morning

Woke up after a fairly good night’s rest and was ready to tackle the day ahead.  The temps in the morning was a balmy 60 degrees and I not ready for the high temps, hot racing, and full sun that the day was going to bring.  

Sunny and high’s in the upper 70’s were on tap for the race but the racing was going to be much hotter.  The SingleSpeed class for the 2014 NUE Series looks to be a fun one with all the top finishers from 2013 returning to take up the challenge again and I am sure some new top contenders will also be joining us for the fun this year.  

Race Time

Check out the other photos of the race at
Crawling Spider Photography
http://crawlingspider.com/true-grit-epic-2014/

After a little rolling around for my warm up and getting all the final checks done I headed to the starting line. As I prepared to toe the line the top 4 SS finishers from 2013 were all together once again.  Around me was Gerry, A.J. and Ernesto and I knew that this was going to be hard but fun day with friends. Right from the gun it was on.  Gerry took the early lead up the opening climb obviously wanting to open an early lead to make the rest of us chase him.  That we did as A.J. and myself took a chase position up the road climb working together to rotate and stay out of the wind.  The story of the day was no doubt the wind!!  For most of the day if you weren’t getting a boost from the tailwind you were getting stopped dead in your track with a massive head wind or blown over with even stronger cross winds.  

Check out the other photos of the race at
Crawling Spider Photography
http://crawlingspider.com/true-grit-epic-2014/

After the opening road climb, things came together as Gerry, AJ, Myself, and another SS were right together to enter the Barrel Ride section of trail.  It was here that mishap #1 for me on the day hit.  Unfortunately this being my first time on the SS race bike in 4 months not everything was set up and ready to go. My bars tipped on a nasty rock drop and I had to make the hard decision to watch the 3 other guys ride away as I fixed the bars.  The bad thing was I needed to stop again later to move the brake levers as I mistakenly placed the bars just off.

After fixing the bars I could see Hammer Nutrition SS in front of me so I made a push and worked my way up and past him to take hold of 3rd entering Zen.  During the pre-ride of this section, Zen was very challenging but surprisingly at race pace I was able to make all the drops and climbs with ease and push through very fast.  Feeling good about this I went on in hopes of pulling Gerry and A.J. back.  The next section of Bear Claw Poppy trail was rocking fast.  This section had multiple line selections and was ripping fast but bumpy. I could see why Gerry choose to ride a Full Suspension SS for True Grit due to this fast but rough section of trail that was all downhill. I was able to rock this out very fast and then it was to the nightmare section of Stucki Springs. 

Check out the other photos of the race at
Crawling Spider Photography
http://crawlingspider.com/true-grit-epic-2014/

Stucki Springs would have been an awesome trail with a pretty nice uphill grade for a SS to keep power to the pedals without spinning out but not today as it was into a stiff, possibly 20-30 mph headwind.  This sucked as it was about 1 hr. of riding straight into the wind but grit your teeth and get through it is all I thought. I did swear at the wind a few times as I despise wind in general! Getting through this with a geared local’s help I hit the Rim Runner trail with strength and feeling good.  Barrel Roll Aid station was next where I pulled away from my geared friend and was on my own to get nearly blown off the trail and over a cliff by unbelievable cross winds!!!  This was nasty as many times you would be on slick rock and feel your bike slide sideways because of the wind.  A little unnerving but again in True Grit style, Grit and bear it!!  Got through here fine and back to the aid and heading to what was suppose to be my second lap.

Here the biggest mistake of my day happened.  Unfortunately on this section of trail, a running race had been run the weekend before and had used white arrows to mark the route.  This section of the trail the arrows appeared and seemed to run right with the trail markings for the race which were hard for me to see due to never racing in the dessert, the wind and little orange pieces of tape that were getting blown away by the wind.  So as I crested a hill I saw the white lines so headed on with the fire road type trail not seeing off to the left the hidden sign where we were to enter a washout and head to lap 2.  I rode on, off trail for about 30-35 minutes, literally all uphill and wound up back at Barrel Roll Aid.  Knowing I had missed a turn I did the only logical thing and headed back on trail to find where I missed the turn.  By the time I found the missed turn I had been bumped back and lost about 40 minutes to now 3rd place SS Ernesto.  GAME OVER!!

Finish Line- Not a bad view for a school!

I pushed on with hope of pulling Ernie back in but knew it was not in the cards as I had used alot of effort on the off course riding and now was into the wind and uphill sections of trail that worked me over pretty good.  I did my best to limit my loses on the day.  The second lap was pretty much myself riding with myself.  Rode shortly with Curt Wilhelm of 92 Fifty but I had an adrenaline rush knowing I was finally nearly done so I burst off and towards the finish.  Ended up finish 4th in the SS class and 21st Overall in just over 8 hours. I really do feel that if I hadn’t taken the wrong turn I would have been in under 7:30 but I guess I will have to try my luck next year to see this come to fruition. Congrats to the other three on a strong ride though as they were riding strong for such an early season race. Not quite the start I imagined but what was interesting, the SS class now sits with the top 4 from last year in the exact same positions we ended 2013 in.  Weird but only fitting to lead to one heck of the year.  Next up for myself and many of the top dogs is Cohutta 100 in Tennessee at the end of April. See ya there!!

Garmin File and Other Race Reports
True Grit Bike Epic Garmin File
MTBRaceNews.com Race Report
Pfun with Pfulg Report
A.J. Linnell Write Up
Sonya Looney MTBR Report

PWC 2014- Race that could have went better!

PWC 2014 has come to a close and so has the first portion of my 2014 season.  Pugsley World Championships was the last race in my early season schedule of Fatbike Snow races.  I was going into this race with high hopes of a good finish due to the fact that it was on home course and the snow conditions were looking good.  Hopes and actuality with me often don’t see eye to eye.

Rolling to the start

Race Day

For once got to wake up in a familiar place (my house and bed).  Slept in till I felt like getting up.  As always on a race morning I was jittery and ready to get the day going.  I was able to get a good breakfast in and then it was kit up time and off to sign in for the race.  Upon arriving at the race sign in I was met with not the greatest of starts to the day in that they were pushing back the start due to the snowfall the night before and need to remark the course.  Oh well guess the pre-race tablets I had taken were all for not.  So be it, decided to sit at the Elks Lodge in Decorah until race start and see what I was going on with all the other racers. Was nice to see a couple of new faces this year and of course some of the oldies as well.  Time finally came and we were told the course and time to head out to start line.  Disappointed a little in the length of the course this year at only 10 miles I was figuring it to be about a 1:30 minute course at most.  Gross overestimate on my part.

Waiting for the GO!!!

Race Time

Rolled out to the start line by taking the group of fatties down Water St. (Main St. Decorah) to the odd looks of everyone we passed.  You would think people would get use to us in town with how out there us locals are when riding but I guess not.  The start was located below Palisades park on the gravel (snow) road by the river.  It would be a nice 1/2 mile flat rollout to get the legs opened before it was straight uphill into the lung and leg burners of the Quarry/Whitetail/Clay Hill combination.

The start of the race was a good indication of how the day was to unfold. I went to the front of the pack and started the pace line with Hollywood next to me in another pace line.  I figured being the local I was going to be pushing this line up the hill for a while.  After the long flat rollout it was right and up Quarry/Whitetail. This hill is deceiving as the beginning is paved then turns to good gravel where it starts to go up and then another right and then BAM!!, hits you below the belt hard and makes you want to cry.  That is exactly what it did to me as we hit the gravel Shockey (Local) took the pace lead and pushed it up the hill.  Talking to him later he thought this was a good place to try and separate out some of the racers to see who had the legs. I was feeling fine with this and grabbed his wheel when we took the hard right up Whitetail and pushed as hard as I could knowing that the downhill was icy and going to be troublesome if there was a crash.  

I made it to the top with Shockey and a slight gap on the group of Hollywood, Hollywood Teammate (Sorry Man forgetting name), and Trevor Olson.  Felt good about this so down I went with caution trying to end my race on the icy gravel under the couple of inches of snow from the night before.  It was here that the race was set and the front group of 5 was formed as we got to the end of the decent together and content to work it out over the next couple of miles of gravel roads.  Going up Clay HIll I once again was at the front working to keep the tempo good and stay out of trouble.  The climb up was rough as there were good inclines on this mile long hill that sent my tires spinning because of the ice/snow combination.  I was putting in power only to be caught by the hill with a spin out.  Finally I was content to go with the group over the top due to the fact I knew a head wind was waiting and wanting to catch a break hopefully not on the front.  I was wrong!!!

Went over the top and the refusal of anyone else to go to the front meant I was leading it again.  After about another 1/2 mile, Trevor Olson finally came around and pushed at the front for a little bit.  That was much appreciated!!  After make same 90 degree turns on the gravel on top of the ridge it was down a little hill and back up.  Right after this hill I knew that we would be turning into a tailwind so I took the chance and I jumped.  I put in a strong effort to break away hoping the tailwind would help to hold out front.  Well Hollywood and his teammate didn’t let that last long as about a 1/4-1/2 mile down the road they were back on me but I felt that it was good to separate at least two off the group.

Down the long fast hill to what would be the deciding part of the race.......The Singletrack!!

No Passing Singletrack!!

Well got down the hill just fine and knew it would be a dismount into the singletrack so I was ready in cyclocross style and jumped off the bike and into the snowy foot wide path.    Here I was able to make a little jump again and got around Hollywood after he decided to loose some pressure. I made the decision this year to start off low knowing that some would go high and dump air after entering the trails.  This paid off as I was now in the lead and pushing on.  But then my excitement got the best of me and I was off trail in about 2-3 feet of snow.  It was here that Trevor Olson got by so I jumped back on and pushed on with him. By the end of Iowa Public Television I knew it was going to be a Trevor taking the win, but which one?????

So we pushed on as I ran through the remaining parts of the race in my head wondering how i was going to get around Trevor in order to take this W. I wasn’t able to make anything happen on the open Prairie section as I had hoped as the trail was down to pretty much a tire width and visibility was low due to the snow really falling now.  So on I went following along hoping for a mistake.  After Olson bobbled a little in the Pines East I thought I might get around but no go as I plowed into heavy snow, so back on I went.  I finally made a pass right before entering the Pines West.  Not to far in though I got overzealous and washed out on a corner that has gotten me many time before in snow and dirt.  So Olson was back around. I knew that I had one last opportunity for a pass and that would be from Pines to Little Big Horn.

Made the turn out of the PInes and Olson punched it to keep me behind and I didn’t dare a pass knowing how soft the trail was on the sides.  So I went in behind Olson on Little Big Horn hoping for a slip up by him.  That never did come. We rode tire to tire rubbing often over the next mile or so of trail.  Once we were off of LIttle Big Horn and on Rocky Road, I had to accept the fact that the race was over. 

Down Rocky Road I could have went faster me knowing the trail but with Olson in front of me and nowhere to pass I was stuck in 2nd.  After Rocky it was the Luge and the finish right at the end of the Luge.  2nd place rubbing Olson’s tire all the way in.  I was a little bit disappointed with this finish position because the race was decided by the fact that there was no passing in the last 2 miles of trail even though we were a dead heat!!!  In a race I feel that it needs to be decided like a race and if you are with another guy, a sprint finish. Take us down the opening gravel or at least a few hundred feet of road but don’t let the trail not being passable decide the race!!!!!!  Okay I will stop ranting, still not happy with this though!

So overall the race was not a complete wash but definitely a disappointment.  I wasn’t impressed how my legs felt in the trails section but more disappointed with my riding quality in this section.  Could have done more if I would have staying up right those 2 times.  Oh well race over and on to the actual season.  2nd Place overall in around 1:07 for 11.5 miles of snowy Gravel/Trails.  Olson took the win and Hollywood was 3rd so at least I got Hollywood after last years debacle.  Lessons learned and need to be a little more hard nosed in racing sometimes.  Don’t just let people by.

PWC Garmin File

Actual season starts this weekend, True Grit 100, the opening race in the NUE Series. I am looking forward to this season as I will try and take a podium spot in the Singlespeed Overall. Hope to get off to a good start in the desert outside of St. George,Utah.  Look for upcoming race updates as the season gets going and I tackle the big dogs of the NUE Singlespeed Class!!!  All for now. Thanks for reading.