Saturday, May 30, 2009

Mohican 100 prelim

Race went solid today, 9:23 on a very tough course. Denelle took 4th in the women's field with a FLYING time of 9:36. The Ol'Man did it in 9:32, so you can see how fast Denelle was today. The Ol'Man got 2nd in the Masters. Margaret K. Completed her first 100KM today and looked ready to go for the last 40 miles to get to full 100 miles in.
I felt solid for the day, rode steady and had fun!! Ranking wise, I ended up mixed in with the crowd I usually do...even after last weekends physical decay at the 24 hour race. I used nothing but InfinIT all day and suplemented with 1 pack of Cliff Blocks and 4 tablets of Endurolytes. At the last section of Single Track, I was feeling super strong and outclimbed and passed a bunch of people.

-Shawn

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Friday, May 29, 2009

Outfished

It was pretty funny. In the 10 minutes we sat here, Tinker got outfished 5 to 1 by the kid in the background.
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Readers Choice Award

Make sure that you all vote for your favorite bike shop in town!

BIKE FACTORY!

www.dailyprogress.com/cdp/lifestyles/Readers_choice_2009


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Amish Paradise

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On the road again.

Heading to the Mohican 100 this weekend. After a week of wet, this could get interesting.
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Wednesday, May 27, 2009

hmmm?

Do you ever see something and at first just chuckle....but then realize that it just might be a great idea?

this falls in that category.....

http://www.dominicwilcox.com/stickers.html



-Shawn

Lisbon Urban Course

A bit of video footage from the Lisbon Urban downhill course. Super cool idea for a race and looks like a fun course....I wonder if we can do an XC version of this?

Monday, May 25, 2009

Long Car rides

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Burn 24 hour update

***this is coming from my phone, ignore typos***
The Burn 24 hour is an extreme race. The idea of tackling it in any conventional sense is pointless. You must be preparred fully on all fronts. Sadly, I made some errors somewhere that left me in a sleeping bag at 5am. More on errors in a minute, but first, the course-rootier than last year, by a ton. Areas that were mostly new and smooth last year, had worn into super cool root garden style areas. They were really fun and made for some really good lines and some really bad lines. The course saw rain last week and as such was tacky and mostly non-dusty.
Now to the errors.
Error 1: Keep using a 4 year old fork- While my Reba WC's are awesomely light, They are no longer 'small bump' compliant after so many years. The first fork on the bike started leaking air from the negative air chamber right from the start. This meant that while it would soak up big things like large logs and drop ins, it would not do much if anything for the roots. This made the steering also less than predictable at times as well when the fork would open on one object but then not the next. This fork came off the bike by lap 4 thanks to Jason and Scott-tae who between their laps swapped the fork from my hardtail over. This fork also is a Reba WC that has seen even more miles. While it held air in the air chambers fine, it is due for a rebuild of all internals and is also, sadly, not small bump compliant to a large degree. But it worked for the remainder of the 18 hours I would ride.
Error 2: Don't bring a dedicated pit crew. Our group rallied around the whole thing really well and did what they could to help, but when you come into pit at 3am and there is no one awake, and you can't find a lantern, and you are 'lights out' from the end of your lap where you rode in on another guys light tail: it is physically and mentally really hard. With aching wrists from error 1 and unsure of where my stuff had been moved to it was confusing...which leads to my mext error.
Error 3: switch from what had been working nutrition wise. Up until 11 pm I had been using nothing but Infinit and an occasional Clif block, endurolyte, and water in the pit. At 11pm, I took some extra endurolytes, ate some sun chips and a pop tarts. It was going OK. At the 3am 'Shawn is stumbling around in a lonely stupor' pit, I grabbed a sandwhich, water, and endurolytes. Also, with my wrists, elbows and upper back sore from the fork fight, I grabbed some Advil.
With everyone sleeping in or around the pit, I was coherent enough to realize if I stayed there, I would be asleep also. Leaving the pit 'quickly', I grabbed a bottle and gel for my pocket, and headed out. The bottle I grabbed was not my Infinit though, and I realized this about 2 miles into the lap when I got to a climb I was using as a 'feed point' on the course. Thinkin marginally clearly-I realized that I would need extra calories to offset my plain water bottle. In went a gel...
I am not sure if it was the advil or the sudden change in feeding or what, but by the time I came through and went out on the 4am lap, I was very, very ill. It was not the nausea and uneasiness I am used to on a 4am lap of a 24 hour race, this was real pain. Denelle had gona out on a lap somewhere behind me and found me on the side of the trail...sick. She managed to coax me along and get me headed towards the finish line. It took forever, but we got there. There was no going out again, I was gone to far. So at 5am plus....I was in the sleeping bag pile with 18 laps completed. By midnight 15 of those were done, so you can see where the slide occured.

The team did well:
Denelle took 2nd in Expert Solo women, even with a few naps taken through the night.
Mike an Scott-tae won the duo men for the third year in a row as team 'off constantly'.

Cyrus and Danny-O took 3rd in duo men. There persistance and support of each other throughout was very impressive to witness.

Hippopato-Jason managed to get in 11 laps over several surges of riding intermingled with sleeping, feeding, and generally heckling others along the way. Somehow he managed to even gain places while hanging in the pits....not sure how the math works on that one.

-Shawn
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Sunday, May 24, 2009

All Tucker'd out after BURN 24

This is how we all feel after the BURN 24...
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BURN 24 (aftermath)

We brought down seven people and thirteen bikes and we left with seven people thirteen bikes a first place, a second place, a third place, a ninth place, and a twenty fourth place, oh and sore legs, arms, backs, and just about everything else.

In the solo categories Denelle came in 2nd, and Shawn came in ninth, and Jason came in with twenty fourth and a full night of sleep.

In the duo categories Mike W, and Scott R came in first and Cyrus D and Daniel O came in third.

---
Daniel
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Saturday, May 23, 2009

Hiser feeding, Cyrus hairy

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Prep Time

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"Pit-Crew" recruited?

Meet Ricky,
At least that is what he told us to call him, true disclosures are not allowed under his relocation plan. A few beers, some food, and a promise of cash...he will be jeering us from the pit all night. Wrenching abilities are very suspect though.

-S
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Friday, May 22, 2009

Mini-Me on pit duty.

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The adventures of Mini-Me begins

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BURN 24 HOUR


It is just over 26 hours until we all line up for this race. The weather is looking to be good with temps in the low 80's in the daytime on Saturday and SUnday and lows of 60-65 over night. Some chance of rain....but we all have to ride in the same conditions.
Crew is looking Strong:
DUO Men:
Cyrus and Danny-O
Mike Walling and Scott-tae.

Solo Women:
Denelle kicking ass.

Solo Men
Jason Hiser and Myself.

The barge is rolling out shortly to make a heist of Danny-O from Highschool. I feel like I am aiding the deliquency of a minor in some respects, but hey, he got permission right.

We are gonna try to do some updates from the venue on Saturday and Sunday, so look to the blog for more information and probably party tips from Cyrus. He can, after all, do these races fueled by hot dogs and HEED.......

-Shawn

Friday, May 15, 2009

MS Society Saturday


May 16th is MS Society Saturday at the Bike Factory of Charlottesville.
5% of all Purchases for the day are being donated to the MS Society.
Additionally, there will be a grill running from 1pm-5pm.

All day there will be "Bike Tunes for donations" as well. Volunteer mechanics from Team UVA-Pegasus and Bike Factory Racing will be tuning and tinkering on the porch for donations to the MS society.

Come on out, and help the MS society out!!
The Bike Factory is located at
198 Zan Road in Charlottesville, VA.
for more information:
(434) 975-2453

Saturday, May 9, 2009

Post ride feast!!

Went for 42 today on the Mountain bike with friends. I got to repeat some hills and turn some good wattage. After, in the name of refueling. We stormed the beach at Jimmy Johns and freed some bread. Yum!

-S
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Friday, May 8, 2009

Ouch

What sucks about injuries? Everything. I haven't been able to escape them this year. This time I apparently have an internal hematoma bleeding from my knee from a mishap Saturday on lap 1 @ Lodi. The doc says, "and you raced for how many more hours?" I laughed. You do what you gotta do. It hurts, and I don't like it.


Anyway, its 5 days of Prednisone and little to no exercise for this guy. Pretty glad that Hilbert #2 got cancelled. I guess I'll have time to give the Rigs the loving they need after the mudbath they were subjected to. Hoping that your legs feel better than mine.


Focker...out.

Thursday, May 7, 2009

And the sun came out

Keicy, Denelle and I went riding. It was great!

Go ride,

-Shawn
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Wednesday, May 6, 2009

LODI

Nice Job Bike Factory Racing, looks like all top 10 finishes from the boys and girls in blue, white and black in what turned to tricky riding conditions just before nightfall. Good race. Results I could find from BFR below.

Cyrus-7th -Solo Male
Denelle-1st -Solo Female
Daniel, Kevin-1st -Duo
Daniel, Kevin-1st -OVERALL
Jason, Dave-4th -Duo
Ken, Christy- 5th -Duo
Scott, Esther-7th -Duo
Nolan, Chris-10th -Duo
Michelle, Jeremy, Shawn-4th -Trio expert

guilt free green singletrack

One of the best things about private land is that you can get out and enjoy lush, green singletrack when it's a rainy spring. I can't believe how green it's gotten.















Sunday, May 3, 2009

12 hours of Lodi Farms (aka 6 hours of Lodi mud)

Man.. Lodi was epic.

The rain held off until a little after 6pm. Then it poured.

I started. It was a bad start.. i choose a poor time to pee one last time and ended up at the very back of the field. With probably 200 people in front of me, it was stop and go for the first half hour. People couldn't ride the rooty, washout climbs that were just like my home turf at OHill. This turned out to be a big advantage and I constistently passed people on the first half lap, putting down the 10 mile lap in 1:14.

I think dave was going for fastest lap as he put in a 52? Which turned out to be close to fastest lap, but a few minutes off.

I wasn't ready for him to be quite that quick, so I didn't get to warm my legs back up, and that hilly start hurt bad. This turned out to be a theme, as that start hurt bad every time with cold legs that I couldn't figure out how to warm up even when I knew dave would be there in 55 minutes. My 2nd lap rolled significantly faster as I didn't have to deal with the lap traffic, and I was flowing nicely through turns, etc. 1:07. The bike was setup PERFECTLY and was eating roots like they were tic-tacs.

The third lap was much the same, except some climber type passed me right at the end of the hills. We had a brief convo and figured out that we both had the same number of laps and were in the same category. I was determined not to let him get away, so i threw it down on the back half of that lap and kept him in sight for at least 35 minutes, catching him in the twistiest turniest chunk set of chicanes ever. The switchbacks had switchbacks in them, if you know what I mean. The first time through here I was literally car sick from the turning. Third lap I had a goal and stayed with him. He eventually got away on some climbing to the finish, but I felt good to stay with him as long as I did. I think this was a 1:06 or so.

Dave put in another lap and I was up again. I rode for 15 minutes and then the rain let loose. Not a sprinkle first, but full-blown downpour that sustained itself as a constant rain all evening. About 30 seconds after the rain started I was still carving turns, waiting for things to start to actually feel slippery. I get to one of those rooty climbs, this one having a 12" step-up onto a root. I see two people hiking it, and see it as an opportunity to get in a good pass. I hop up on the root, and the first pedal stroke spun the tire. The bike went backwards and down the root. I'd tried this manuever the first 3 laps without issue, but it turned out to be my warning that things were getting slick. I went over backwards, and fell pretty far down the hill. Landed with the saddle in my back, a major bruise on my left knee, and chainring marks from my right knee to my ankle. Ugh. And, I still had an hour+ in this lap. After checking to make sure everything was intact, I got back on and my superior bike handling skills soon had me passing all kinds of people that couldn't even ride in these conditions. The trail was still pretty firm .. under the running water. But those roots could be killers. I cringed at the sound of my wheels rotating. The last mile of trail was brand new (and apparently built with a leaf blower in a flood plain that was 3/4" above the stream level. It turned into a mud pit by the time i got there. I was very happy to see the cars.

Oh, did I mention all the leafy branches that decided to drop from just-over head level, to handle bar level when the rain hit them? That sucked pushing wet leafy branches out of the way with one's helmet, or face, depending on how lucky you were.

I took a swim (quite literally) in the stream by the parking field. So did my bike.. a little water wasn't going to hurt it after what it'd just been through.

Dave and I had talked just before the start of that eventful lap. We decided he was going to try to do a double, as we could move from 5th to 3rd and get a podium spot if we could use his 50-something-minute laps instead of my 60-ish something. A bit over an hour later, Dave got back and I was dressed in fuzzy warm clothes. He asked how I felt about keeping going. I told him we were here to have fun, and it wasn't much fun riding in this crap anymore. I had bike clothes on under the warm fuzzy stuff, and said I'd go if he wanted me to. He agreed that it just wasn't fun, and we called it a night by 8:30ish.

Between his and my bike handling skills, his single lap still moved us up to 4th place of 24 teams. 3rd place was really only minutes ahead, and they called it quits too. Had we gone out, who knows what they would have done, but I think we could have had 3rd without much problem. Actually, 2nd place never went out again either. They were a lap up on us, but we had 4 hours to turn 2 laps and we could have beat them and gotten 2nd, but no one really cared. There was pizza, beer, a bbq with warm food and warm, dry, fuzzy clothes to be had.. and wet, muddy racers to watch suffer. :) Lap times suffered WAY more than the 5-10 minutes dave and I added to our wet laps. People went from 1:10 to 2:10 on their laps as they couldn't stay on the bike anywhere because of both fatigue and ever-worsening conditions..

I'm not sure about Dave's bike, but mine never so much as mis-shifted in the uber-harsh conditions. Props to good bike maintenance and prep. Props to both Dave and I for being super consistent, even in the less-than-ideal conditions, and calling it quits when it ceased being fun.

I know a lot of other teams did really well too. Chris C. and the N.O.L.A.N were there and we had an unofficial bet on who would win between dave and I and them. Dave and I are officilally ultimate champions of the universe now. Scott and Esther rocked a bunch of laps and seemed super consistent too. Michele, Shawn, and Jeremy did lap after lap until the race finished, go them! Needless to say, K29er and Danny O. put the hammer down early and kept it down until midnight, taking the overall fastest team award and winning a ton of VORS points. The old man took first in SS solo and was only minutes off the overall solo win. Those minutes cost him at the prize table: A $350 light set compared to something from the schwag table.. bummer! His young lady did well and finished 2nd. Denelle, in typically D style, quit way early and still won her category by a lap.

K29er was my ride out there.. and at 1:30 when the awards where finished and he collected his 1st place prize, we were gone. The 12 hour effort and being nearly 2am got the best of him and I drove us the rest of the way back. I got home a bit after 3, and I can't imagine k29er got home before 3:30. At least warm showers and comfy beds where in order.

Today, things aren't so pleasant (yesterday was a circus ride, right?!) I'm pretty bruised and beat up from my crash. I keep finding new spots where i'm bruised or scraped. Further, I had an inkling this might happen yesterday, but I've got some kind of cold/flu thing going. Cough, sneezing, blech. Oh well, it's time to rest and be ready for the next throwdown.

Disclaimer: results are as I remember them, official results aren't out yet.

Wanna know how Lodi was?

Here ya go.
-S
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Saturday, May 2, 2009

Oh yeah, there is another race today

Something with horses of real flesh and blood.





does this strike anyone else as strangely....uninspiring?

Good luck to everyone at the Wintergreen Hill Climb, Middle Mountain Momma, LODI 12 hour, or the Derby.

Wherever you are, ride fast, and ride safe.

-S

Friday, May 1, 2009

Lodi Tomorrow

Yup, we are going. Looking to be a strong crowd of racers. We are bringing the big guns to fend off the competition with (read barbeque and kegs). Really this is gonna be a party for us, a few of our team members are gonna bury the hatchet and fight hard, but many, are out for the birthday cake.
Does this guy strike fear into anyone else.....


See ya tomorrow.

-S

Happy Birthday Dave!!!


"This sucks. Maybe I'll go duo next year with someone who has some talent."