Race Report: 2000 Land Park Criterium

I can sum up today like this: rode in circles, stayed alive, ultimately had fun.

Land Park is the NASCAR of local criteriums, the only difference being we turn right. The course is corner-free and nearly round, so you could conceivable race it without any brakes. Lacking those turns, the speeds are high and breakaways are rare. Basically you race in a tight pack for a while and sprint at the end while trying to avoid the inevitable crash.

I had some extra motivation today because a few friends showed up—Ed, Justin and his nephew. They were going to watch me race and ride afterwards. It's always fun to race for the fans. No autographs until after the race, please.

The race went according to script. We raced as a clump of riders for the most part, and only a few times did someone go hard enough to string it out a bit. Ultimately those efforts end when the instigator tires out and the guys on the front are swamped by fresh riders coming up from the sides. When this happens you can quickly find yourself going from top-three to the back of the pack. Because you are stuck in the middle there isn't a lot you can do about it. Once you get to the back, then you can escape to the outside and repeat the process.

On the final two laps the speed ramped up along with stupidity. There was a lot of elbowing and fighting for position. On the back straight right before we hit the line for the bell lap, somebody went down. I didn't see it, but I certainly heard it: squealing brakes, profanities, metal scraping and the thud of bodies hitting asphalt.

By the time the dominoes reached me towards the back, I had enough time to dive to the inside toward daylight. The guy in front of me went down hard. I hit the rear brakes and went into a (somewhat) controlled slide. When I saw my options were hitting a curb, spectators, a tree or the body sliding in front of me, the choice was easy. I let off the brakes and straightened out right before I hit the guy. Without thinking about it I attempted to bunnyhop him. I managed to lift my front wheel enough to clear his legs but my rear wheel clipped him. Somehow I stayed upright and rode it out.

I would say a dozen to 15 people hit the pavement. The survivors like me tried to wind it back up and salvage the race, but the leaders were long gone. This is why we try so hard to stay on the sharp end of the pack. Crashes rarely affect the guys at the very front.

I felt like I couldn't get going, and looked down to see my rear wheel wobbling around and hitting the brakes due to a broken spoke. I flipped open my rear brakes and slowly spun out the last lap. Guys with bloody knees and elbows and tattered clothing were passing me, but I didn't care. The difference between 25th and 26th doesn't matter to me.

I met up with the guys in the finishing area and chatted for a bit. They asked if I wanted to ride with them. After 16 miles of high intensity insanity, my legs were burning a bit. Still, I was frustrated and thought a short spin might be fun.

I changed into street clothes and did my best to true my rear wheel, and I managed to get it pretty straight. I rolled away with my friends who were all on mountain bikes expecting a short spin around town.

Nineteen miles later we arrived back at our cars after riding all over the city on roads, bike trails and even some singletrack. Somewhere in the middle we had a burger. It was by far the best part of the day.

Races like today make me question my sanity. I enjoy competing, and it's definitely a rush bumping elbows at 30 miles per hour, but the risk is high. I can't remember the last time I raced a crit and there wasn't a crash. Plus, I suck at them. I can climb, descend and handle a bike pretty well. Going around in flat circles just isn't my forte. Maybe that's why I keep coming back. I guess I want to conquer this stupid form of racing.

Later.

Measuring Stick

I went out for a long ride today. Much as I did last year around my birthday, I wanted to see if I still had the right stuff after turning 31 years old. Nothing says you "still got it" like dropping a hilly C-note in the sizzling Sacramento summer heat.

Last year was definitely a bit of a struggle. Working full time at a "real job" for the first time was difficult from a cycling and private life standpoint. Many days, especially during the height of the summer, I just didn't feel like riding after work. I have always been a morning rider. That's when my motivation is highest and my body most ready for adventure. I had to adjust. I had to suck it up and ride in the cold, the heat, the rain. After a season of riding more, I "feel" much more fit. Today it was time to see if that was true.

From my apartment in Sacramento, I rode up the bike trail to Folsom, climbing east up Green Valley Road. I turned north on Salmon Falls Road until I hit Highway 49. I continued north on the highway, past Cool, then dropped into the canyon. This is one of the more entertaining descents in the area, with high speed straightaways combined with tight turns.

After crossing the North Fork of the American River, I turned left to stay on 49 and climbed up the other side of the canyon into Auburn. I dropped down Auburn Folsom Road all the way to Beals Point, where I picked up the bike trail. From there it was 26 miles of mostly bike trail back to my apartment.

All told it was 96 miles, and I felt substantially better afterwards than I did last year.

So do I still have it? Yes. Yes I do.

Later.

Race Report: 1998 Land Park Criterium

There isn't a whole lot to tell when reporting on this crit. It's been 10 years since I have raced in Land Park, but nothing has changed. You ride around in circles, avoid the inevitable crash, and sprint.

Today went true to form. Even though I have been doing more riding with road racer friends, I struggled a bit with the high pace and spent much of the race towards the back. In the last few laps, everyone was trying to move up and of course there was a touch of wheels. A few guys went down and I managed to avoid the pileup.

On the bell lap I was actually in a good position near the front, but again the pace was too high. I faded by the end of the lap. I took 12th in the sprint out of 37 riders.

Not great, not terrible. Top third is pretty good for me I guess.

Later.

Race Report: 1998 Lighthouse Criterium

The Lighthouse course is about the best a mountain biker can hope for in a criterium. It has a small climb, a fun little downhill and many turns.

I did my best to stay near the front most of the race, but there are always other guys trying to do the same. On the last lap the jostling and jockeying and elbowing was pretty intense, and I was mid-pack hitting the climb. I picked up a few places on the hill and sprinted for the line.

I don't know my exact placing. They only published the top seven.

I figure my finish was somewhere around 10th to 12th, another average result on the road bike.

Later.

Thirty

I am turning 30 in a few days. I couldn't be more excited about it.

The occasion is not altogether unexpected. Many people do actually reach this momentous milestone of age and wisdom. If you need any sage advice, I am your guy. Soon.

Today, however, I am still in my twenties and possibly still a little bit young and reckless. At least, my legs may tell you that as I sit here suffering from fatigue, soreness and cramps.

I have been working full time now for about 10 months. It's been fine, I guess. The stable pay and benefits are nice, and the promise of a pension someday is good. The idea of doing this for 25 more years is a bit daunting if not depressing, though.

The transition from slacker student with a cycling habit to industrious worker has been at times very easy and also extremely difficult. It's been almost a year and I haven't missed a single day of work. Yet during each of those days I probably think of faking sick and leaving for a ride 10 times.

All of these things were swirling around in my head this morning when I woke up. The only logical thing to do (according to my pre-wisdom brain) was go on an ill-advised ride in the hills and heat to prove to myself I still had some life left in these aging legs.

I rode from my apartment in Sacramento up the bike trail to Folsom, into the foothills past El Dorado Hills and Rescue, through Lotus and Cool, and into the canyon. I climbed up to Auburn, rode down the long, gradual descent back into Folsom, and spun back up the bike trail to my apartment. I ended up with 93 miles, a mild heat stroke and a tiny bit more wisdom.

The reality is I am still very much a cyclist, but it's now my side job. There was a time when these two things were reversed, and I rode more hours than I worked. Ah, to be young and fit and fast. Those were good times. My brain still holds tightly to the memories of the young guy who could easily ride 100 miles and still have more left in the tank. I really liked that guy.

It is the 12th of July and today's journey was only my second ride of the month. It's been very hot, and I have been lazy after work. To think I could go out and ride nearly 100 miles in the heat with my current level of fitness was foolish. You might say unwise. Maybe in a few days I will think differently. You know, when that wisdom kicks in.

On the other hand, perhaps testing yourself periodically leads to insight and knowledge. Even though the "thirty" number I am obsessing over is merely a human construct based on the way we perceive time, the ability to measure oneself at these milestones has merit.

Though I struggled today, I proved to myself once again that I still truly love riding a bicycle. And that struggle taught me so much more than resting could have. After a trying week at work, spending a long Saturday in the hills was the cleansing journey I needed.

I have to find a balance between career and private life. Right now the scale is tipping perilously toward the work side. I think piling on some riding weight will help even things out and ultimately assist me in finding a healthy equilibrium.

As I read back what I have just written, I see little bits of wisdom. I can't help but wonder if I turned 30 today.

Later.

1996 Tahoe Fat Tire Festival

The Tahoe Fat Tire Festival happened over weekend. We enjoyed some good riding, but the other aspects of the trip fell short of expectations.

We drove up Friday evening after Doug negotiated the purchase of a car. I became entangled in conversation with a random salesman while Doug and Sonyo were signing the papers, so to end the dialog I pretended to fall asleep when he briefly left to get something to drink. He was disappointed. Then I really did fall asleep. I have no idea how long I was out. I was supposed to be watching the bikes, so I was relieved to find them safe in the truck when I woke up.

After a nice drive listening to some Pixies the whole way, we arrived in Tahoe City a little after eight o'clock, going straight to the motel to check in. Doug informed the desk clerk we would be splitting the bill, and she had no problem with that. Doug whipped out a checkbook and I simultaneously snapped down the Visa (It's everywhere you want to be!). The lady informed me that they don't accept credit cards. I was astounded. A motel that doesn't take credit cards? I handed over 56 of my hundred bucks in spending money. No T-shirt for me at this festival, I guess.

After dumping our stuff in the room, we dressed and hurried off to the Naughty Dog bar where the night ride was supposed to leave from. When we arrived, the place was packed, but nobody knew anything about a night ride. Eventually a guy told us the ride was cancelled, but I think he was just trying to make us go away. Doug and I split a pitcher of beer and called it a night. The highlights of the night (lowlights?) included getting our picture taken (we don't know why) and seeing some dude with a pristine 1986 Whiskeytown Downhill T-shirt. I assume he only wears it for special occasions, or perhaps he has a bunch of them.

Saturday we went to the sign-in at a bike shop, and it was typically disorganized. The dude had trouble finding our names on the list, and the swag bags (a $16 value!) were nowhere to be found. We were later presented with them and the swag was composed of two PowerBars, a Stoker bar (yuck), a sticker, and a small bag made from hemp. Yeah, $16 value. Sure.

Sometime later, we finally took off on the the ride. After a warm-up on the road, we hit a trail that Doug and I raced on a couple years ago. The climb just rolled gradually upwards and was never very steep. At the top of the climb we hit the Tahoe Rim Trail, which we would stay on all the way back to the parking lot.

One of the many rest stops on the day.

At first the Rim Trail reminded me of the singletrack at Mammoth. Then some of it was reminiscent of Georgetown. Then it got ugly. We rode probably the rockiest, most technical trail I have ever been on in Tahoe. We climbed up to the top of this place the locals call "Glass Mountain." It was nothing but loose plates of shale—no dirt to be seen—and when you rode over it, the sound was literally like riding through broken glass. In fact, there was no dirt for miles, just volcanic rock. The last couple miles reminded us of the horse trails around Horseshoe Bar that used to eat our  chainrings, except it was downhill. The dirt reappeared but with big boulders to drop down. The ride was good, but would have been great had we not stopped so much. There were almost thirty people on the ride, and some were not so fast on the technical stuff, so the stops became longer and more frequent on the second half of the ride. I would definitely do the ride again if I could ride with fewer people.

After a short post-ride nap, we porked out on Mexican food. After dinner we headed to Squaw to check out the bike expo, but it was all shut down. The brewfest cost $13, so it wasn't worth it to go in because we only wanted one or two beers. We watched the dual slalom for a while, but it didn't hold our attention for long, so we bailed.

This guy ate it hard and bent his front wheel.

Sunday, of course, we did the Flume Trail. What festival would be complete without it? It was the same route as the race course. I definitely recognized the climb on the back side up to Marlette Lake; it was as steep as I remembered. There were about 15 of us on the ride, and everyone was pretty strong, so we waited much less. I actually surprised myself on the climbs. I was in the top 5 people at the top of all three. Doug and I were also smoking on the downhills. I'm sure some people didn't like all the crazy passes we were making, but it's no fun sucking the Tahoe moon dust. The Sprouts like that clean air out front.

After the first section of the Flume, we took off downhill after a short wait. I ended up passing everyone except the dude leading the ride, who was a very strong Tahoe local, but only because I didn't know where I was going. When we hit the second section of the Flume, he was motoring. I had to give it almost everything I had to stay on his wheel. I was hurting. But what he had on me in pure speed I made up with skill; I was better on the singletrack. He would gap me a little on the straightaways, but I would get him in the turns and technical stuff.

When we stopped, he admitted he couldn't shake me, which was cool coming from a stud expert racer. We gapped everybody by a long way. Anyway, the Flume is a cool ride.

The "festival" was a bust for the most part. The organizers were anything but organized, and many of the activities on the flyer never happened. But we did a couple good rides and learned some new trails on the west side of the lake.

One thing I never realized is even though we always start the Flume Ride down at Spooner Lake, you ride way north, and the Flume Trail is actually a stone's throw from my dad's condo in Incline Village. All this time and it never occurred to me.

I'm going to try to get up to the condo for a couple days between jobs to do some riding, and I'll definitely figure out a Flume route I can do right from the condo. That would be too cool.

Later.

G-Town

I had an epic solo road ride planned for yesterday, but I received a better offer: Georgetown.

Doug Page called me Saturday night to tell me that an ABC ride was happening, and I pretty much drop everything for either an ABC or Georgetown ride. This is both, you say? Hell yes.

It rained Saturday night, so the trail conditions were damn near perfect except for a few mud holes. The traction was just awesome. The new WTB Velociraptor tire I just picked up worked great.

Well, these aren't your classic ABC rides anymore where you ride around for eight hours, take one of Greg's "I know a shortcut" trails, get hopelessly lost, and perhaps bushwhack down a cliff. These new guys rip. No waiting. No bullshit. The old guard—Doug, Greg Edwards and I—were typically bringing up the rear. There were eight of us, and three were on single speeds. One of them wasn't that fast, and he held me up on more than a few climbs. One was pretty strong, but the other one was a freaking animal. He climbed almost everything. Evidently, he took 15th overall at the Shasta Lemurian this year . . . on a single speed. I can't remember his name, but he builds frames for Ventana, so that's what all three single speeders were riding. They are only $400 and look pretty sweet to me.

Isaac Chilton was there too. He's riding a Ventana full suspension, so we enjoyed dicing it out on some downhills. After putting some more miles on the Dean since the last Georgetown ride, I was much faster. I don't think anyone else was as fast as me today. But when I wasn't flying downhill, I just hung hung out in back with Page and Og.

One time when we stopped, Page told everybody that I picked the sweetest lines on the downhills and everybody should try riding behind me. Cool. I guess that's something Steve and I were always good at. We could ride on each other's wheel with the utmost confidence that our partner would pick the right line. When I ride behind other people . . . they seem to just pick a side of the trail and stay there regardless of how shitty the line is. I think we have better "trail vision." If we see a cool line 10 feet away on the other side of the trail, we get over there and make up time. 

Isaac is pretty damn fast too. I saw him in the top three of the expert class all year in the results. He is threatening to get a single speed. My guess is he'll rip on it because he already pushes pretty big gears.

Anyway, about the ride itself. It was even harder than last time. Isaac was kind of leading the ride, and he opted out of the normal Bald Mountain route with all the fire road climbs. He took us on nothing but singletrack, and he included every steep climb he knew. I think he was mostly trying to torture the single speeders, but it was hurting all of us.

It was only 24 miles, but so tight and twisty and rough. It was a ride where you wrestled the bike the whole time, both up and down, and at a high pace. I was wasted afterwards from head to toe.

This morning I am pretty blown from riding four days in a row. I don't believe I have done that since summer vacation.

Later.