First Long Ride of the Year!

Larry Warbasse, Chris Aten, and I met up at 10:30AM today to do an endurance ride in the nice weather. I had planned a 70 mile ride, but Larry was up for a century, and I'm not one to turn those down when the weather is warm. We headed out to Dexter, then Chelsea, Waterloo, and finally Leslie. Chris introduced us to a sweet bakery (pun intended) in Leslie where we refueled on pastries and hit the road back to AA. The ride back was especially nice because we got to bear the fruits of our hard work pushing a headwind on the out-leg.

It was a perfect day for a ride. The roads were kind of wet in town, hence the knee warmer line, but they dried up as soon as we hit the countryside. I'm really starting to like the roads to the west of Chelsea - especially those with virtually no traffic.

On a side note, the hairy legs are a temporary, winter-only thing. I got a bit of flack from Larry and Chris from the hair spilling out between my knee warmers and socks. The legs will be shorn in the next few days or so.

Woo hoo!

Winter Training

Winter training has been going pretty well so far. I've been doing some road riding, MTB dirt road riding, and XC skiing.

This weekend was pretty crazy as far as training goes. I went out for a two hour jaunt with Chris Aten, Nick Boswell, Tom Elias, and Alan Antonuck in the snowstorm on Saturday. The unploughed dirt roads were a pretty big technical challenge. A few people went down on some icy / snowy patches, but we all survived.

After the MTB ride, I grilled up a steak and chilled on the couch before suiting up in my XC ski gear and heading out to the Arb for two hours of XC skiing with Nick. The conditions were really great for the Arb.

I came back to the CAF, grabbed some Chipotle, and partied the night away at the first cycling party of the semester.

On Sunday I went out for some more XC skiing in the Arb with Cory Dubrish. The trails had been packed down from all the walkers, so the long downhill path was really fun.

Today I'm pretty tired, (especially with 8:30AM class four days a week), but I'll probably do something easy outside or on the rollers.

The last few months...

Well, I haven't updated this for a few months (busy semester), but a lot of things happened.

During the Fall, I become a mountain biker and competed in the Midwest Collegiate Cycling Conference series. Since I couldn't train as hard or as often (stupid classes) I pretty much coasted on my fitness from the summer. It worked out well. At one point I was ranked #1 in the Midwest for D1. I couldn't attend regionals (double points) because of too much work, so I ended up fourth overall for D1, which I'm really happy with.

After the Midwest season, I headed to North Carolina for Collegiate MTB Nationals. I got a really good start in the XC race, sitting in the top 20 and picking off rider after rider. Having not trained hard since August, I faded really quickly after the first two laps, ending up about mid-pack or so. Unlike last year, the course this year was dry, which meant the race was a lot more riding and a lot less running.

By the time Collegiate Nationals came and went, I was pretty tired, so I took a few weeks off the bike. Recently, I've just been doing either no riding, or fun rides on a MTB on dirt roads. The dirt roads around Ann Arbor are really nice for training this time of year.

In other news, I recently acquired a new pair of XC skis which I'll be using for cross training this Winter, assuming we get enough snow.

As I write this, I'm in the process of resetting my sleep schedule. I got to the point where I would stay up until 4AM and sleep until 2PM. Tonight, to break this cycle, I went to sleep at 9PM and slept until 1AM (when I couldn't sleep any more). When I go to sleep again (which won't be until next year), I'll be back on a more reasonable sleep schedule. This is kind of an obsession of mine (resetting my sleep schedule, that is).

Erie Street Race in Windsor

I raced at Erie Street in Windsor on Sunday. It was fun.

The race started off pretty slow. A few people attacked, which ramped up the pace a bit. I found myself right by Greg Christian (Turin) in the pack so I got on his wheel. He moved up through the pack for a few laps. When one of the small attacks came back, he made a strong jump and I glued myself to his wheel. He looked back to see me and two other guys (Paul Martin of Texas Roadhouse and Graham Howard (I think) of Bissell). For the next 15 or so laps, the four of us steadily gained time on the pack. At one point we had 45 seconds on the pack and the prospects of lapping the field were looking really good.

We kept the pace blistering (I couldn't pull through a lot of the time, so I caught wheels as the other three rotated back). About three or four laps later, the gap had shrunk to 15 seconds. We continued to work, but the pack ended up catching us. Another group of nine got off the front, but they were also brought back.

The finish came down to a bunch sprint. I gave it a good kick, but I was still pretty tired from the break. I ended up 21st which I'm happy with.

August

I've been doing a lot of track and road racing this month, with a mountain bike race thrown in there as well.

The Ada State Criterium Championship was near the beginning of August. It was a pretty fast crit. I ended up 15th or so. Bleh.


The NAS-Track Championship was dubbed "the most strategic NAS-TRACK CHAMPIONSHIP EVER!" Unlike the regular season races, Dale let us pick our Madison partners (prom dates). I originally asked Luke to prom, but then he bailed on me because he was able to convince Rippin' Ronnie to come out of retirement. I bawled my eyes out for a few days and moped around the house, wondering why he bailed on me. Was it because I'm fat? Am I not beautiful enough for him?

Well, after a whole bunch of shuffling of prom dates, I eventually paired with Tom Elias. He looked so beautiful in his blue jersey on the special day. Our chemistry clicked and we did some awesome teamwork to defeat Rippin' and Luke and become the NAS-Track champions by a mere three points! (93 to 90)

Then I raced the BTR Park Criterium. The course was really boring (as usual) and the turnout was so small and the dropout rate so large that anyone who finished got money. Track racing is a lot more fun.

Next, I hopped into the first day of the NAS-Track Six Day. There weren't enough "A" riders so Dale paired us with the inferior "AA" riders. Bruce Carlson and I were paired together. He rode his balls off and we ended up in a respectable third place.

I didn't race the rest of the Six Day to prepare for the real race - the UCI Madison Cup in Trexlertown, PA. Luke and I drove out there Thursday for the Friday night races.

Trexlertown is a LOT different from Bloomer. It's a giant venue with grandstands on either side of the track. I counted (estimated) at least 1500 people there watching! Not only were both grandstands full, but the catered VIP area in the center was packed, and the rail was lined three-deep all the way around. The crowd really pumped Luke and I up.

The racing turned out to be really fast and chaotic. The program consisted of 60-lap, 30-lap, and 100-lap Madisons (equivalent in distance to 100, 50, and 166 laps at Bloomer). Considering the competition we were up against, Luke and I didn't really plan on getting many points. Instead, our strategy was to stay on the lead lap. It worked out well and we ended up in 9th place out of 12.

Garmin-Chipotle (Dan Holloway and Colby Pearce) took the win for the night.

(I'm wearing a Wolverine jersey in the Madison pictures because partners have to wear the same jersey. Don't get any ideas, Luke!)

On Sunday, I raced in the Elite category at Pontiac Lake. I rode hard and pulled off an 8th place (out of 11), proving that I still can ride a mountain bike! Yay!

This weekend, I'll be racing at Erie Street (probably) and Cross Creek (definitely). Then I'll race Grand Rapids and Ann Arbor the next week as a warm-up for Collegiate Track Nationals.

Bleh...

Got my butt kicked at the Stony Creek TT today. We'll see how Pontiac goes. It's road and track racing for now, though.

July

Since there weren't any real road races in July, I've focused mainly on track racing.

The NAS-Track UIV 3-day took place on July 4th - 6th. It was, without a doubt, the biggest race of my season. The competition included a whole bunch of riders from the USA U-23 National team, the Broadmark team, and some pretty fast Canadians.

Luke Cavender and I partnered for the weekend. We managed to avoid the crashes and came out in 4th place.




The 3-day really took a lot out of me. I turned myself inside-out trying to stay with the big guns. As a result, I felt really tired for the entire week following the 3-day.

Luckily, I had a family vacation in Canada planned for the week after that. I spent that week doing easier, longer rides past the hundreds of windmills on the Lake Huron shoreline. (Canada's really started to go all out with wind power. The air there is noticeably cleaner.)

I came back to Michigan to do a Sunday individual race at the velodrome and felt horrible. Long rides can be fun, but they really slow down your leg speed and high-intensity endurance. I won the sprints I contested, but I didn't contest many.

Last night, I raced in a NAS-Track Friday night race. Luke and Cruise Bogedin were paired together, so they had a pretty stacked team. I raced with Cody Brown. We missed an exchange after the sprint in the final Madison with 20 to go and a fresh Cruise attacked. Their team eventually took a lap on the field, but I launched off the front of the field right before they made contact. As a result, Cody and I remained on even mileage with Luke and Cruise, earning us an automatic 2nd place, even though points would have put us in 3rd.

Tomorrow I'll be racing in the mountain bike time trial at Stony Creek since there's pretty much nothing else going on around here. I'm looking forward to seeing how my fitness compares to some of the local MTB sceners.

That's all for now. Thanks for reading.