Mountain biking love

There's something extra special about mountain biking.  I mean, road and cyclocross are fun too, but they will never take the place of mountain biking in my heart.  It all goes back to my roots, I guess.  As a kid I would watch the same mountain bike movies over and over again, then go outside and rip around the local trails, crashing left and right as I tried to impersonate what I had seen in the movies.

My favorites films(and maybe the only mtb movies at the time?) were the early Kranked and New World Disorders.  The best scenes were the "North Shore" segments, where Dangerous Dan, Wade Summons, and other legends would ride these crazy wooden stunts with huge drops to flat.  I just read this article on NSMB that brought back a lot of these memories.

A classic North Shore clip from "Kranked 4:  Search for the Holy Trail."  

There were a couple years as a kid when I too would build ladder-bridges and skinnies high in the trees.  Instead of in North Vancouver, however, my trails were in my parent's front yard.  I really scared the neighbors when I tried to ride one stunt for the first time and ended up tacoing my front wheel and face-planting.  I never did end up riding that one successfully, despite the whole summer of work spent building it...

I feel good knowing that I got all my crashes done early, while I was still made of rubber!  The "North Shore" era of mountain biking may have come and gone, but it will always be an important part of the progression of the sport.

If I keep going on awesome mtb rides like I did yesterday in the Chuckanuts, my cross bike is going to feel very neglected...

Classic under-the-log, through-the-rocks section of Hush Hush trail.

The new Raptor Ridge trail is superb.

 View from Raptor Ridge with Blanchard in the distance.

Fall mountain biking at its best

I had the mountain biking itch this week. It felt great to get out on my Noble a couple times. Steve Fisher and I rode Blanchard on tuesday in short sleeves. After riding the perfect dry trails, it's hard to believe that it's nearly November. On wednesday, I checked out the new and improved SST on Galbraith. Wow, so much fun! People have clearly put in a whole lot of time on the mountain rebuilding and repairing the effects of the logging operation.

Felt great to ride my Noble after all the recent cyclocross riding.

Chuckanut and the San Juans as seen from Oyster Dome.

Bellingham Double-Header Weekend

I am thoroughly wrecked after racing back to back days at home in Bellingham this weekend.

Friday night I helped Ryan Rickerts setup the cyclocross course for saturday's "Killer Cross" event. Motivation to race the next day was not high, but I figured I should give it a go since I helped put the course together. Plus, Whitney and I were able to ride to the venue from home. It's not often I can be a good hippy and not burn a bunch of gas driving somewhere so that I can race my bike.

The race itself ended up being a lot of fun. The sun was out and the lengthy lap had a lot of variety and funkiness, something Ryan's courses are known for. My favorite part was the "bark chip mountain" run/ride-up. Steve Fisher and I battled for most of the race and were evenly matched, as usual, but he had a bit more snap in his legs than me in the end.

Following Steve up "the grassy knoll." Photo: Ryan Rickerts

Today's race was the Lake Padden mountain bike duathlon sponsored by Klicks Running and Walking(formerly RunningShoes.com and still the best place in town to buy running shoes and apparel). For those who don't know, a duathlon is a triathlon without the swim(I can barely swim without drowning). The order of tri's are: swim, bike, run; but in a duathlon it goes: run, bike, run. I used to run track and cross country for fun back in high school and I still like to get out to some running events every once in a while. I had previously raced the Padden mtb duathlon in 2008 and had a great close race with one of my roommates at the time, Charlie Sunderlage.

The race started out hard, but I used some self control and held a maintainable pace. I'm not a serious runner by any means, but I knew that the strategy of trying to stay with the leaders for as long as possible was not going to get me far like it would in a bike race. The first 2.6 mile lap around the lake went smoothly but I had a lot of time to make up on the half dozen guys in front of me.

I started off on my Noble, legs feeling like lead, and one by one caught and passed people. Now I was in my element. The mtb leg followed the same super-classic course as the Padden Pedal mtb race. Having raced and ridden out there for years, I knew all the secret ninja lines on the descents and exactly where to punch it and where to recover. My F4 felt like an all-mountain rig after riding my cross bike the day before!

I came into the second transition with a healthy lead, but knew that the second run was where it would all go down. The pain of the next 2.6 miles was a foreign feeling after so much bike racing the last few years. At about 400 meters before the finish I glanced over my shoulder and saw someone about twenty seconds back. He came by me with 200 to go and I tucked in behind him and and held on for as long as I could. In the end he finished a couple seconds ahead and set a new course record. Turns out his name is Dusty Caseria and he's a damn good runner! I guess he ran a 1:51 half mile recently in college. Wow.

I really wanted the coveted first-place beer pitcher for winning, but I guess I'll have to train harder next year!

Bellingham Herald article here.

Enchanted Traverse

Loren, Mark, Mike, Travis, Eric, Toby and I hiked through the amazing Enchantments area in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness last saturday. It was an amazing day. The Enchantment Lakes area is notoriously difficult to gain access to, both physically and legally(overnight permits must be obtained far in advance). We parked a car at each end-Colchuck Lake and Snow Creek-and hiked the route as a 20 mile point-to-point one-day thru-hike. The golden fall colors of the Larch trees are spectacular. Not many people see such a sight.

Colchuck Lake and Asgard pass-the back door into the Enchantments.

Asgard Pass.

Colchuck Lake.

Sudden hail storm at 7000+ feet elevation.

Upper Enchantments basin.

Toby and golden larches.

Prusik Peak in the distance.

Mike and Travis.

The crew minus Toby - he wandered ahead for a bit.

Snow Lake far below us.

Nada Lake.

Check out the strange water jet below Snow Lake. I have never seen or heard of anything like this before, especially not in a wilderness area. Powerful is an understatement.

More photos on my Flickr page.

Back to School

After working all summer at Gregg's Cycles in Bellevue, I am happy to be back in school and living in Bellingham. Here are a few things I have been up to over the last couple weeks:

Noble Knob ride with lots of Nobles!

Whitney, my F4, and the White River Valley.

Whitney pushing her bike up a steep hike-a-bike section.

Last weekend's Starcrossed and Rapha/Focus GP cyclocross races were lot of fun. Both days featured superstars of the sport from around the world. It was really cool to have the opportunity to race at such a high level so close to home. I had a great race on saturday, finishing 18th. Sunday was going well for the first couple laps, but I blew up hard and went backwards before being pulled.

CX Magazine reports for Starcrossed and Rapha/Focus GP.

Starcrossed start. Photo: Deanna Lloyd.

Long beach run. Photo: Ryan Rickerts.

Leading Aaron and Nick. Photo: Deanna Lloyd.

Good friend Aaron leading on sunday, rain coming down. Photo: Suza Marie Photography

Sand and Lake Sammamish. Photo: Suza Marie Photography

Last tuesday Whitney and I hiked Yellow Aster Butte in the North Cascades. The pictures speak for themselves:

View from the top looking south. Shuksan left, Baker right.

Looking north into Canada. Mt Larrabee, top-right.

Fall is starting to reveal itself.

Capitol 100

Wow, that was a humbling experience. I have a new respect for endurance mountain bike racing after competing in the Capitol Forest 100 mile race yesterday.

My long time friend, Gian Dalle, and I had made plans to ride most of the race together. Unfortunately, that plan only lasted about 5 minutes into the race when I clipped my pedal on a rock and twisted my chain. My only option to stay in the race was to turn around and ride back to the start and hope I could find someone with a spare chain. Very fortunately, a race-support mechanic from The Bike Stand in Olympia drove up and offered me a chain. I am so grateful to have had my bike fixed and been able to get back in the race. Nothing would have sucked more than only being able to race the first mile of a 100 mile mtb race!

Once rolling again, I started to have a lot of fun cruising through the different sections of trail. Capitol Forest has some seriously fun singletrack! The race promotors and Friends of Capitol Forest did an amazing job of clearing the 42 miles of singletrack (Imagine how long it would take to even walk that far, not to mention clearing brush!). About ten miles in, I started to catch some other racers and for the rest of the first 50 mile lap I slowly worked my way through the field of riders. It was really encouraging having so many people in front of me to chase down. The second 50 mile lap was a different story...

I had now moved all the way back up to third place and I was still feeling good, but definitely a bit lonely out there. It wasn't until the one and only fire-road section of the race, an 8 mile climb up Capitol Peak, that the mileage really started to catch up with me. I was beginning to have stomach problems, felt like I was going to puke, and my body was hurting in places that had never hurt before. It was a relief to finally make it to the last aid station, where I sucked down a couple of caffeinated clif shots. Those helped big time, and I found enough energy to push over the final climb and down to the finish. Speaking of feed zones, they rocked! There were nine feed stops, in total, and each time that I stopped I was overwhelmed by helpful and friendly volunteers offering me whatever I needed.

I rolled across the line in second place, about twenty minutes behind Gian. Going straight to my car, I sat on the grass for a while and tried to eat. That was a seriously hard race in a way that I am not used to. I guess the pain is a big reason why racing is so satisfying though, right? Sounds like Gian had a pretty easy race. He waited for me for a while, not knowing how long I had been delayed. I think it would have been a close battle between us, but I have a feeling he may have been a little stronger. It's been a long season of racing for me and I'm ready to take a break and then maybe ride and run around in the mud (for shits and giggles).

9 hours and 13,000 feet of climbing. Ouch.

This event, like the Stottlemeyer 60 miler back in May, was a ton of fun. I think it's really great that there is a new mtb race series in Washington, especially an endurance series. I think a lot of people are more interested in these longer "marathon" style events as opposed to the "olympic format" multi-lap races. Roger, head of the NW Epic Series, is even planning to add more races to the calendar next year. I'm excited to see what the future brings.

Pimped my ride!

Capitol Forest Classic

The Friends of Capitol Forest put on an awesome event last weekend; the Capitol Forest Classic. Saturday's cross country course was a blast, with 100% singletrack and an epic feel. Greggs co-worker/friend Gian (John) Dalle, Loren Hanson, and I rode a lot of the race together, enjoying the fun trails. I attacked on the long downhill about halfway through the race and held on for the win. Gian and Loren finished strong for 2nd and 3rd respectively. Noble teammate, Aaron Mickels had a great ride for 4th place on the new Noble F5. After the race, lots of free Fish Tale local beer and food was consumed. There was even a tequila bar with free shots!

Sunday's Super-D (D for downhill) was a ton of fun. Gian and I decided to ride over 2000 vertical feet up to the start of the course. Long story short, we ended up getting lost and had to burry ourselves up a fireroad climb in an attempt to make our start times. Gian missed his by a couple minutes and I made mine with less than two minutes to catch my breath. All things considered, it was probably the perfect warmup for the race. I had a mostly clean run, with only one memorable mistake. I was later surprised to find out that I had set the fastest time of the day, ahead of some fast downhill racers. Gian was forced to wait on top of the mountain for an hour until he could take a later start time. Unfortunately, he broke his chain mid-run and had to pump extra hard. I bet he would have given me a good run for my money, had his chain not broken.

All-Mountain king and queen.

As the winner of the XC and Super-D, I was also the winner of the "All-Mountain Championship." Gian finished 2nd and Aaron 3rd. FOCF pimped the women's All-Mountain winner and me both out with some goods. The "King" cowbell will be perfect for cyclocross season!