Monumentally Afflicted

Time to get busy.  Leaving tonight for Fruita via Frisco.  Hoping to get a good night's sleep in Frisco, with no kids/dogs to wake me up in the middle of the night or early in the morning.  I have a few loose ends for packing, but I'm pretty much ready to roll. Spun a few miles in Ute today w/ Austin and Kenton.  Did some stretching afterward.  Nothing else left to do, except go have some fun in the sand and sun. The forecast is looking good temperature-wise, but a bit sketchy for precip.  There are sections of the course that are pretty much a big mess when wet.  The mud gets wicked sticky and the bike turns into a giant anchor.  I'm hoping we don't encounter those kinds of conditions.  This mud also wreaks havoc on drivetrains.  With my internally geared hub, I shouldn't have those issues, but I'd still prefer a nice dry course!

Race goals Have fun, but push myself A minimum of 18 laps (60 minutes per lap) Realistically in the 20-25 lap range Goal        Avg lap time 20            54:00 21            51:25 22            49:05 23            46:57 24            45:00 25            43:12 FYI, in past team 18 Hour of Fruita events, I was turning back to back mid 27's for the night laps... Pre race Weigh me in shorts, short sleeves prior to race 200-400 calories >= 3 hours before race (3 scoops of Sustained Energy would work) No solid food in the 3 hours prior to the race Only 16oz of fluid per hour for the 2.5 hours prior to the race. ~40oz total No fluid the last 20-30 minutes Make sure lights are ready to roll - HID on the bars and R2 flashlight on the helmet Remind me to use chamois cream Remind me to start at a super easy pace Hydration/Fuel/Electrolytes Track and make sure I'm doing something close to the following... Sustained Energy 2.5 scoops per hour Water 20-25 oz per hour Endurolytes 2-4 per ...

For anyone who wants to follow my 18 Hours of Fruita progress, or lack thereof…Chris will be sending updates via Twitter.  I may send some updates if I get a bit of downtime.  So, go create an account at twitter.com and follow ctirpak and bbaker22 .   The race starts at midnight (Friday night) and ends at 6pm Saturday. Got out for another short night ride last night.  Used the HID and R2 combo again.  Works well.  26psi is a bit too high for the rear tubeless config.  Gotta remember to go to about 24psi. The HID turns a bit over hard bumps.  Might need to put a thicker handlebar shim under the mount.  For the flashlight, I think the double Velcro strap mount is going to work well.  Last night I managed to get the light aimed up nice and high, so I won’t have to tilt my head up for 6 straight hours. Actually, I woke up to a slightly tweaked neck this morning.  This is a sorta common experience for me, but with 18 hours of biking coming up, it is not cool.  Actually, my neck prob...

Let's just get this outta the way before the race.  Here is a list of exuses for my slacking off during the race (in order of likelihood of occurrence): My back/neck/foot/leg/elbow hurts I need to drink some of the beer before Tirpak finishes it all Sand in my shorts I'm sleepy Mechanical issues Bad weather Bad crash I'm in danger of ending up on the podium

Got out last night for some night riding on the local singletrack and dirt roads.  Tried out a variety of lighting combos.  It looks like the Trail Tech hid on the bars and the Deal Extreme R2 flashlight on the helmet will be choice number one.  Although a helmet mount is key for the twisty type riding at Fruita, I actually may attempt to ride with just the bar light after a while.  I anticipate that the additional weight of a helmet mount light may start bugging my neck.  After a few laps, I imagine I'll have the course figured out, plus I've done the course many times over the past few years. Picked up a couple Geax Saguaro's yesterday.  Replaced the torn up rear Fast Trak w/ a Saguaro and set it up tubeless.  No big issues with the installation and the tire seemed to work fine for last night's riding.   I also weighed my bike last night.  Hugely piggish!  30lbs, which is probably 5lbs heavier than my KHS Team Softail.  I'll be bringing that bike as a backup.  I...

This was a common view for me today! Took quite a few spills while checking out some trail connections from here... Past a bunch of these... To here... This pic is from the same location as yesterday's blog photo. Slight difference in weather, eh? Cloudy, foggy, and about 39 today. Yesterday was sunny and in the 70's. Didn't get in much mileage today, but lots of twisting and turning. :-)

Took a spin in the Monument Preserve today. Trail conditions are great. No mud. Lots of packed sand instead of the normal looseness. Intentionally sought out a rocky technical trail to see how the Notubes installation would hold up. It didn't! Well, that's not really fair. The tire's sidewall did not hold up. A new tear in the sidewall. The sealant spewed til the pressure got really low and then the hole plugged up. Pressurizing the tire would cause it to blow again and it essentially could not hold air. I attempted to do the glueless patch again. The patch worked, but I could not get the bead to seat with the hand pump. So, in went a regular tube for the remainder of the ride. Wildflowers are starting to bloom. Hopefully, all the recent snow will give us a stellar wildflower season...

Last week I successfully set up a WTB SX24 29er rim and Specialized Fastrak tire with a 26" Notubes rim strip. Not too big of a deal, but I had to do a lot of shaking, turning, waiting, flipping, etc. I did quite a few miles (road, technical riding, and trail) and it has worked fine. So, tonight I figured I'd quickly go tubeless with my Arch 29er rim, Fastrak tire, yellow rim tape, and Olympic valve. As usual, things didn't go as planned, but it was a good learning experience. I'll summarize the steps w/ some pics and text...click pics for enlarged versions First, dismount the Alfine hub, which requires a wrench, since it is a bolt-on hub. Next, remove the cable/nut from shifting mech Remove chain and dismount wheel Unmount tire, discard tube Remove old rim tape (two layers of electrical tape...living life on the edge!) Install new Notubes rim tape (25mm) Punch hole for valve stem and use file to carefully remove extra rim tape Install Olympic valve stem Reinstall ...

Apparently, I need a seat bag the width of a wafer thin mint for it to not rub my thighs!  Its not like I have giant legs or anything.  As a matter of fact, they are commonly referred to as chicken legs.  Oh well, the latest config is going to have to do.  I barely touch the new bag, so I don't think there will be any chafing issues, just minorly annoying thigh rubs.  Frame pump worked fine.  Bike creak is still there, tightening the crank arms apparently wasn't the answer... Did a combined Sante Fe Trail / Academy road ride today at lunch with Mary.  I think about 19 miles total.  Kenton and Austin were supposed to join us, but both were too dedicated to HP to make the ride.  Ha Ha Ha!  Anyway, legs felt a bit dead at the start, but better after a bit of warm-up.  Beautiful temps out there today, I think about 75 with just a light wind.

Got out for a ride w/ Gary in Ute yesterday (Tuesday). A nice medium paced, medium length ride. Trail conditions are just about perfect. Little to no mud, but most of the sand is nice and packed, thanks to all of the moisture last week. Tons of runners, hikers, and cyclists out there. I think I have the seat bag issue resolved. I picked up a Cat-1 Pro seat wedge. Skinny, especially at the front, and long. It holds all my tools, plus my tube and does not seem to hit my thighs. I'll do a longer ride today and make sure it's good to go. I also picked up a water bottle mount for my pump and have mounted it to the frame. Velcro strap backup, too. I messed around w/ my lights last night. The combo of the Trail Tech bar mount HID and the MC-E flashlight puts out a sick amount of light and will probably do the job. I have 3 batteries for the HID and will prob just swap out single 18650's for the MC-E helmet mount flashlight. I only get 53 minutes of runtime on full pow...

Got out for a road ride on the mountain bike today. Did the academy loop twice, plus the ride down to Jon's house. So, about 29 miles total. My legs felt pretty wasted for the first loop, then felt a bit better the second loop (was probably going a bit slower, though). Anyway, that will probably be my last hard and long ride before the race. I have a creak on my bike that is driving me bonkers. Need to figure that out. Seems to be from the bottom bracket/chainring/crank area. Same as earlier, but not as annoying as the last time around. I also noticed something weird w/ the back wheel when we were stopped for a brake today. With the back brake engaged, the wheel would still rock back and forth a bit. Turns out my centerlock rotor lockring was loose. Fixed that. I tried Jon's seatbag and still had thigh rub. We then compared seatposts and noticed that the thigh rub on my setup is due to a slight setback post. So, I'll go looking at some seatbags and see if I can ...

Saturday I woke up to a huge amount of snow. Tried spinning the bike around the house. Ridiculous, so I broke out the snowshoes and shoed for a while. The snow kept coming down, but it was above 32F, so it was super messy. Later in the afternoon, I did manage to get out for an hour ride, which was pretty much just disgusting. Sleet, rain, ice pellets, massive amounts of mud and slush. A huge headwind pummeling my face w/ ice at one point. Yippee... I did have fun sledding twice with the kids and even went swimming for a while today at the Y. I have a soccer game later, so I'll get some more exercise for the day. Just hoping to not get hurt in the 2 games left prior to 18 Hours of Fruita. Oh yeah, the ghetto Stan's tubeless setup appears to be holding air. Hopefully, I'll get to take it out for a spin tomorrow and see how it works. It is super sunny today and is supposed to be wicked warm over the next 7 days, so all this snow will melt. We supposedly got about 24...

Spring snowstorm in full effect! Got out for an hour and fifteen minutes of sweet snow riding today. Apparently, this is the application of the 2.7" tires, because they rocked in these conditions. Huge traction and decent flotation. The two mile return on dirt road was a bit messy, but the tires kept on trucking, even up the two steep hills. Pretty disgusting abuse of the drivetrain. Thankfully, the internally geared hub took it all in stride. I like the reactions I get from hikers/snowshoers: "That's pretty impressive!" "Wow, you're pretty bold." "I saw some tracks earlier and I was wondering who was crazy enough to be out here biking." It's really a matter of proper equipment choices and clothing. I also spent some time today installing an old 26er Notubes setup on my 29er front wheel/tire. Surprisingly, it appears to have worked. I'll have to get it out on the trails and really test it, but the setup is holding air after fol...

Kenton and I did a nice ride in Ute Valley today. Did a similar ride to last week's one w/ Austin. Got in a little technical riding and even picked up the pace a bit today, which felt pretty good. We could feel the storm moving in as we rode, with some graupel falling at one point. It looks like we're getting hit by a big Spring storm. The forecast is for more than 24 inches in Northern El Paso County. Wow! Why did I take off the studded tires? For 18 Hours of Fruita, I'm planning on using a water bottle for hydration and fuel. Usually, I ride with a Camelback, but I was thinking I could use a seat wedge to carry my tools and keep my back free of anything. The only problem with this plan is that my current seat wedge bumps my thighs with almost every pedal stroke. Not ideal. I may be able to just duct tape or rubber band the leading edge of the wedge and eliminate the problem...

Had a fairly uneventful commute home with a nice tailwind! About halfway home, I realized tonight was trail work night in the Monument Preserve organized by Friends of Monument Preserve . So, I took the route home past the trailhead and saw a bunch of vehicles I recognized there. Grabbed a McLeod outta Nordby's truck and headed down the trail riding one-handed. Ran into Tirpak and we took off to work on a section of trail near the West edge of the Preserve. We did some basic maintenance, putting in some trail contours to divert water off of the trail in about 5 spots. It looks like we need to go back with a large crew and put in two larger features. So, two sore elbows and one achey back, but its worth it to keep the trails in good condition.

Did the commute this morning on the Cross Check.  About half way through, I glance off the trail and see something moving.  For some reason, my first thought was a monkey.  Wait, I'm not in Thailand!  So, I pull over and realize it is a coyote pouncing on a rodent.  He grabbed it, trotted a little ways off and then watched me watch him.  Pretty neat. I also saw some parachutists, which is always cool.  Its actually a fairly common thing to see on my commute, since I pass right through the US Air Force Academy .

US Air Force Academy in the background Did a 16 mile ride. 2100ft of climbing. Up Mt Herman Rd, then tooled around the neighborhoods. Mt Herman road was a total slush mess above about 7500ft. Majorly messy. I've been looking at cargo bikes. They fascinate me and I think it would be neat to try one out. I think the kids would love to ride around in a bike like the Madsen Bucket . They are getting a bit big to share the Burley nowadays. They are pretty squashed in there, which just adds to the inevitable bickering... Edit: Just picked the girls up in the Burley. Ugh, they are getting too big for me to haul up 350 feet in just 1.4 miles. Too much climbing!

Woke up to a bunch of snow. Wet, heavy stuff. I guess I should have left the studs on the Inbred. Oh well... Li took the dogs out for a hike, then I got out for a short snow/slush/mud ride on the Inbred w/ 2.7" tires. During the ride, the weather switched between snow, sleet, and rain. Thankfully I had put on my fenders, as the dirt road section was a total mess. Mud and slush everywhere! Winter was super dry, but in the past 3 weeks, Mother Nature has been trying to compensate with a bunch of snow. Yesterday's snow had a huge amount of moisture content, which is uncommon here in Colorado. Usually it is light, fluffy stuff. Not this time. After Friday's high mileage, my legs felt great on Saturday. After yesterday's short snow ride, they felt pretty tired. The ride was short, but fairly high effort due to the 6 inches of muck and the 300 foot climb back up to the house.

Spent more time today wrenching on bikes than actually riding. Did some maintenance on my Monocog, Li's Homegrown, the Cross Check , and my Inbred. Put 2.7's on the Inbred, which makes it feel like I'm riding on pillows! Not sure what real application that configuration has, but it is fun. I suppose it would be good for sand and deep snow. Put the new Nashbar mini front rack on the Cross Check. Only $12, so I couldn't resist. The platform is about the size of a six pack and will hold about 15 pounds. I found an old portable DVD bag that I sliced, diced, and zip tied to the rack. It'll hold 4 or 5 travel guidebooks (as I found out during my night time testing). The rack also serves as a great mounting point for the B&M Cyo . It puts the light low and forward, great for bringing out detail on the trail/road. The low mounting point was awesome for my short night ride in the fog. I pulled out a Cree R2 flashlight and handheld it up near my helmet during t...

After commuting into work today and doing some physical labor in the lab, I decided to take the afternoon off and just ride... So, Kenton, Austin, and I headed over to the Air Force Academy to ride the Falcon Trail. At the gate, they told us they'd have to look in the trunk of Austin's car. A bit of a pain since we had a trunk rack and 2 bikes back there. Anyway, we pulled over, unloaded, they checked everything out, we loaded back up and headed over to the BX. As soon as we started riding, we ran into Nordby, who said trail conditions were great (he was right). Tacky, and essentially snow and ice free. Austin, Kenton, and I did a lap together. There is a small 4x4 board crossing one of the streams. No big deal, but I rode across it, which was sorta neat. Austin had a snake bite about halfway through. While Kenton and Austin fixed the flat, I trued both his wheels. They were both out of whack enough to rub the brake pads. When we got back to the BX, Austin and Kenton...

Rode into work this morning via the Sante Fe Trail.  Brrrr!!!  It was 26 degrees when I left the house.  With an immediate 400 foot descent down to the trail, my toes and fingers were pretty darn cold!   Core temp was fine the whole way and eventually my toes and fingers warmed back up.  My face felt a bit like this pic . My Camelback tube also froze solid within minutes.  Good thing I had a water bottle filled w/ Sustained Energy .  I've been using the Sustained Energy drink mix for longer rides and I think it'll work fine.  One thing I've noticed is that I get a sticky feeling mouth just drinking the drink mix, so I think I'll need some regular water also, just to keep my mouth cleansed. Once I got to the flagpole, I saw that I'd have a slight headwind, but it didn't turn out to be anything significant.  I pretty much just cruised into work.  Lots of joggers out this morning, which is a bit surprising considering the low temperature. Planning to go to ride th...

Did a semi-technical ride through Ute Valley Park today with Austin.  See Austin's  trailguru entry for details.  It was nice to do some real mountain biking versus just training.  I've been focusing on getting lots of mileage under my belt, so it's good to casually ride some technical trails. I feel fortunate to have such good trails right at work.  No driving to the trails, just walk out of the door, hop on the bike and ride.  Our work has good shower/exercise facilities, too.  And flexible hours.  Yippee.   Today's ride was just what I needed after spending the last few days creating a technical slide set and then delivering a webinar this morning.  53 attendees and lots of audience participation.  These public speaking events don't stress me out like they used to, but they still wear me out.   Actually, it looks like I'm going to Vegas in June to do a presentation.  I wonder if there is any good riding in the area that will be doable (not too hot) at that t...

Feeling very strong, like a diesel.  Did the return commute today and averaged 1.5mph faster than a couple weeks ago.  Even with a bit of a headwind.  Sweet! Gotta work on core exercises a bit more, as my back has been a bit sore lately after long rides and soccer games.  Nothing terrible, but enough of a nag that I want to head off any problems now.  I've been doing a lot of stretching, but slacking off on crunches, planks, etc.

Did the cyco-commute this morning via the Sante Fe Trail.  Decided to take the Surly Cross Check with the rack and pannier since I needed to bring my laptop into work.  Took the shortcut through the train tracks near Synthes. Near the Old Denver Highway there is a flagpole and the flag was blowing my way.  Yippee, tailwind almost all the way to work.  I started out at a reasonable pace and just kept picking it up.  I churned out the 18 miles of mixed road and trail in 1:03!  Wow, that surprised me.   We'll see how my legs feel on the way home.  Probably a bit tired.  It is supposed to be in the mid 60's, so maybe I'll just take my time and enjoy the weather.

Today I had some errands to run, so I figured I'd get in some utility cycling.  Hooked the Burley up to the Cross Check and hit the road.   Went by Vitamin Cottage, picked up some milk and vitamins for the kids.  Then, I headed over to my parents to pick up their dog, Prince.  I put his little dog coat on him, put his dog bed in the trailer, covered him up with a blanket, and rode back home.  A good way to combine exercise and transportation! While I enjoyed today's ride, it reminded me how cycling is not well incorporated into our transportation system.  In the 18 miles of riding, there might be 2 miles of bike lane.  I don't need a bike lane, but a shoulder wider than 6 inches sure is nice!  On the way to my parent's house, I took a 3 mile detour to avoid riding uphill on Highway 105.  Riding slowly on 105 seems like a sure death wish.  On the way home, I took 105, since it is downhill all the way to the highway and the new sections of road actually have some reasonab...

It seemed like the studded tires weren't going to get many miles this year, but spring has brought a bunch of snowy/icy days.  Miracle of all miracles, Tirpak got off his duff and went out for a ride with me today, in below freezing temps!   Seriously though, it was nice to have his company out there on a day that started out sunny and sloppy, but was cloudy and frozen by the time I got home.  Winds were fairly high, with an average of about 19mph.  We headed up Mt Herman Rd and turned around a bit before the trailhead.  Not nearly as much snow as I had expected, considering we had about 8 inches the day/night before. After Tirpak headed home, I dropped down to Dirty Woman Park to check out sledding conditions and then took the long dirt road home.  Totalled a bit over 14 miles and 1700ft of climbing.  My legs felt a bit spanked for the first half of the ride and then felt fine for the second half. It was nasty enough out that I had some shifting issues with the Nexus hub.  Not rea...

Put in a very hard effort today, riding from work thru Ute Valley, over to Garden of the Gods, up Rampart Range Rd past the shooting range, and back.   Tons of climbing and I tried to keep the pace pretty high.  I'm feeling very strong, which is nice.   I actually planned to take the descent fairly easy, but I caught up to a couple vehicles and got overexcited about passing them and staying in front of them.  Tons of fun, especially hitting the tight dirt turns at high speed! I brought my camera today, so I figured I might as well put it to use.  Here are a few pics... Ute Valley Park...right next to HP's campus (where I work) Pikes Peak from Rampart Range Road Garden of the Gods - the smallish mtb trail section Indian Trail Marker at GoG p.s. 1:15 on the trainer last night while watching Iron Man.  That certainly helped the time fly by...