Skinny #1 Racing

Well I'm coming off a rest week where I got some good mountain biking in and I'm definitely looking forward to the races in Wyoming this weekend. We have the XC on Saturday and the ST on Sunday. Apparently Fort Lewis isn't attending this race so this is a great opportunity for our team to get a lot of points. I decided that I'm going to race my full suspension in the XC. Last year I remember there wasn't a ton of climbing, and there were some downhills were the full suspension would be nice. The Azure is so efficient anyways that it doesn't really matter if I ride it or my hardtail. The only difference is that my hardtail is a lot lighter.

Looks like I don't have much to talk about today, except for how excited I am to be getting my cross bike and all the stuff that comes with it. I'll put up a race report Saturday night and Sunday night after the races. Hopefully I'll be able to throw down this weekend.

Here's the long awaited picture of me with my new earings. I think they look pretty good!!!!! My new diet seems to be working out pretty well. I am staying away from simple sugars and saturated fat. I am allowed to eat ice cream after races, along with soda. Basically the point of not having simple sugars is to maintain a constant metabolism. Hopefully it will make me way faster. I'm getting outbid on all the powertap stuff right now, I'll have to see how much the price goes up before I make a decision or not.

I went skateboarding with Pete today and managed to ride off a curb. After tackling that, I attempted a two set, which was actually pretty big. I went for it three times but was never able to land it. I guess the first time I was pretty close. Hopefully I'll be able to do it when my very own skateboard arrives here pretty soon. I can't wait to get my cross bike and all the other stuff in my care package, too.

I went in to Back on Track yesterday to get some testing done. It's a pretty cool facility and now I'm way into training by power rather than heart rate. I did three tests, a 1 minute, a 5 minute, and a 20 minute. For my 1 minute test I averaged 395 watts, for my 5 minute test I average 303 watts, and for my 20 miute test I averaged 236 watts. The numbers weren't as good as I was looking to get. I wanted to do over 300 for the 5 minute test which I accomplished. The 20 minute test I wanted to get 250, so I ended up a little short. The 1 minute test was just ridiculous, I can't say that I liked it too much.

Right now I'm bidding on a PowerTap SL laced to a Mavic Open Pro on ebay. I have the highest bid right now with three days left, so let's hope that it doesn't get too out of hand. If I end up winning the auction it will be unbelievable, I won't be able to wait until I get it. If not, I think I might end up just asking for a PowerTap wheel for Chrismas. Oh yeah, the wheel I'm bidding on retails for like $1,300 and it's the lighter hub with more features, so it's pretty sweet. I can't wait until my cross bike gets here, I guess it's being shipped out tonight.

Well this weekend went kind of like all the others. I just didn't have a good one. The short track was on Saturday and I was able to suffer pretty well finishing in the top 15. I think I could have done a little better (finish with the next group) because this kid crashed in front of me in the singletrack and I lost the group that I was riding with early in the race. I think I was only about a minute or so off the pace, so I can definitely live with that. Sunday's race didn't go nearly as well. I was riding OK, top 20 or so and just got my legs going when I flatted. I had just given my tube to a teammate so I had to wait to get some stuff from other people.I got going a few minutes later and then about a mile down the trail I hit a rock just right and flatted again. I decided that I'd throw in the towel because at this point I wasn't going to be earning any points for the team and it would be counterproductive for me to walk 8 miles.

I ended up walking back with Danae York, who apparently was coughing up blood. She decided to pull the plug too so we chit chatted on the way back. What I am about to say is absolutely unbelievable, I have no idea why I did this or how I did this. We were walking up the final climb to the start/finish area when I spotted a huge spider by Danae's foot. I was so amazed that I dumped the rest of the Gatorade out of my bottle, and caught it in the bottle. I couldn't believe it, it was a tarantula. I brought it back and showed it to everyone and it was the most insane thing ever. I was talking to Hagen afterwards though, and he told me I should probably let it go because it would be happier in its natural environment. I guess that it would probably be happier injecting its venom into humans that crawling around in a cage so I decided to let the little bugger go.

Today I get to go do some testing. I have no idea exactly what I'm going to be doing, but I know I have to bring my bike and probably suffer a lot. We decided to do it today because my race was cut short yesterday, and Monday is the only day that Andy and the guy from Back on Track are able to work together. Hopefully I'll be able to put out some good numbers and learn a little about my body, too. In order to get faster, I'm going to start eating differently. I started this morning on the AC diet, and I have to say it was all right. The only problem that I came to was when I started eating my pancakes and realized that I wouldn't be able to put maple syrup on them. Looks like I'll have to find something to put on them that still tastes good.

So it's been a little while since the last update. I guess it was because I was waiting to put up some good pictures, but I don't have any so looks like there will be none. I guess the most important piece of news is that I got my ears pierced Friday night. We did this with two safety pins, a lighter, and some hand sanitizer. I carefully cleaned the safety pins and before I knew it my ears were pierced.

This weekend was my worst in a while. In the short track on Saturday I crashed really hard, hard enough that I busted my helmet up pretty good and was unable to finish the race. The cross country went pretty much just as bad, except that I pedalled in for the finish. We're heading to Durango this weekend so hopefully I can turn the luck around and get in some good races.

So it's been a little while since the last update. I guess it was because I was waiting to put up some good pictures, but I don't have any so looks like there will be none. I guess the most important piece of news is that I got my ears pierced Friday night. We did this with two safety pins, a lighter, and some hand sanitizer. I carefully cleaned the safety pins and before I knew it my ears were pierced.

This weekend was my worst in a while. In the short track on Saturday I crashed really hard, hard enough that I busted my helmet up pretty good and was unable to finish the race. The cross country went pretty much just as bad, except that I pedalled in for the finish. We're heading to Durango this weekend so hopefully I can turn the luck around and get in some good races.

Well Wednesday Night Worlds wasn't exactly what I imagined it would be like. Basically it was me hanging on to the back of the pack at 182-187 bpm for 20 minutes before deciding that if I did it any longer I wouldn't be able to race this weekend. I don't understand how people find road rides like that fun. It was on the flattest road with the worst pavement job, and in general it is just a terrible ride. Next week I'm back to my normal training plan, no more of this stuff.

I got an 80 on my Chemistry test, and the class average was a 73, so I'm pretty much the man. My skis also came in sometime while my parents were in Nevada. I think I'll have them bring them to the ski shop with some bindings and have them mounted and sent out here because I'm gonna be ripping the ski slopes in no time. I need to head to REI tomorrow to get a sleeping pad for the race this weekend and also my ski pass. It's hard to imagine that in only 6 more weeks I won't be riding for a while. I think we are going to have a few indoor soccer teams, which should be a lot of fun. Well, I've got to study for a Biology test that I'm going to ace because we already covered like half of the material in high school but apparently a 3 on the AP test is just no good...

This is the award that I won in my outstanding performance on Sunday. In case you can't read it, it says "MOST TENACIOUS RIDER." If you look closely, you can see that there is no tire on my rear wheel.
In the next week, I have four tests. This evening I have a Chemistry exam, Thursday I have a test in Biology, Monday I have a Psychology test, and finally next Tuesday I have a test in Survery of Human Nutrition. I also have a paper due tomorrow and a quiz on Thursday, so I'm going to be pretty busy. This weekend we are going to a race and I don't even know who is hosting it or where it is. All I know is that we are going to be camping, which means that I get to break in my sleeping bag. In the near future I am going to need to go to REI and pick up a pad, I think a ThermaRest is what AC told me I should get. If time permits I might try to go and do Wednesday night world's tomorrow night. I'm sure that will be interesting...

Well I could probably sum up the entire weekend by saying that things didn't go the way I wanted them to. The short track was on Saturday, and I was definitely looking for a good result. I didn't get a good start, but I remained calm and worked my way through the field until at the beginning of lap 3 I had positioned myself at the back of the main (fast) field. I had the momentum from bridging and I planned to go around them and try to make contact with the lead group. As I did this, two wheels ahead of my a couple of guys rubbed wheels, and somebody came over into me and I got whiped out. I got back on my bike and took like 15 seconds to get into my pedals because I had my Speedplays with road shoes, and by that time there was no hope of getting back on. I ended up riding in with a teammate for 17th. The cross country was even worse than the short track however. The morning of the cross country I decided to run a Maxxlite 310 on the back with a Larsen TT on the front, BAD DECISION. I was having a good race, feeling better than I had all season when I flatted. I figured I would fix it real quick and get on my way. I did just that and by the end of lap 1 I had worked my way up to 11th place, not too shabby. I moved up a few more positions in the second lap (after my flat I was cruising) before I flatted yet again. One tube and two CO2 cartridges later (from random people) I was back on my way. By this point I was just going to try and pick off as many people as possible. But, as things would go, I flatted less than 1/2 way through the third lap and ended up walking 7 miles to finish the race. It was a long race, and it was really unfortunate because I felt super good, but I guess that's how things go sometimes.

I have become the very person that I swore I would never become. I am currently downloading a 10 day trail version of World of Warcraft. You might say that it's just a trail version, but there is a reason why it's only a trial. I was out the door with Jeremy planning to guy to Best Buy to purcahse my copy of WoW when Jeremy told me that it would be better if I found out for sure that my computer could run it before spending $3o on the game. He would also get a month free if I end up purchasing the game, which I will if my computer decides to run it.

You might ask why I am playing this game. Well it's pretty simple. There are probably about a dozen kids on my floor that play, and I'm friends with all of them. We are planning on playing together quite a bit, and I'm sure it will be a lot of fun. To play this game, it costs $15 per month, but if you play only 1 hour per day then you end up spending only $0.50 per hour of play time, which is pretty cheap. You could also look at it as one month of WoW play is the equivalent to going to about two movies. Two movies last about 6 hours, and WoW can last as long as you can physically and mentally take.

Well now that I'm done admitting my pure nerdiness, I'll try to sound a little cooler by describing my new lunch ritual. Since Tuesday, my lunch crew and I have eaten in front of the TV (nothing new there) and watched the music videos on BET. When we get a TI song or "Walk it Out" we turn the volume up as loud as it goes so it echoes through the entire cafeteria. It's hilarious because we are some of the whitest guys you have ever seen. Our personal favorite right now is "Shoulder Lean" by Young Dro featuring my main man TI. I think I even have the dance down. I also realized that my aviators looks almost exactly like the ones that TI wears. I guess that makes me pretty cool.

I put on my new tires today. The MaxLites are insane, I couldn't beleive how light they are. I can't wait to race them on Saturday. I put the Larsen on the front of my FS for now, and I think it's going to stay there with the skinny Ritchey on the back to prevent clogging. There are a few stream crossings in the XC and if things get wet the last thing I want is for my rear wheel to not be able to spin. Wish me luck this weekend...

As excited as I am about the collegiate mountain bike season, I think I'm looking forward to the ski season even more. It's wierd because I've never been like this before. I looked for a new pair of skis for a while and two days ago I ordered a set of K2 Seth Vicious in a 189 cm length. They are by far going to be the best skis I have ever had, and I know they are going to be so much fun. This week I'm going to get my Colorado Pass, which lets me access Keystone, Breckenridge, A-Basin, Vail, and Beaver Creek. It's going to be insane ripping the pow once or twice every weekend. Hopefully we end up going to Whister over Christmas break because that would also be a lot of fun and I would probably get the opportunity to ski a lot of big lines.

I'm pretty sure my form is coming along really well. I know that I'm faster than I was last year, but I think my chances of going to nationals this year may be even slimmer. I have decided to not get my expectations up in case I am not selected. Peter Stetina is going to be riding with us this fall, and I'm sure that he is going to be flying. We also have this kid that raced the 100 mile series this summer and finished second overall in the series, so he must be pretty fast. I'm sure Nick (the new President) will be pretty fast, along with Matt. It will be interesting to see how fast Adam and Steve are, because Steve was getting pretty fast at the end of last season. It seems like Adam just doesn't have the build for a mountain biker, he's so big.

I just ordered some new tires that should get me through the collegiate season. I got 2 of the new Maxxis MaxLite 310 and 1 Maxxis Larsen TT. I figure I'll run the MaxLites for the STs, and for some of the XCs I will throw the Larsen TT on the front. I also have a 1.95 Ritchey Zed Race WCS that I'll use on the back for muddy conditions on my full suspension to prevent clogging. All in all I'm sure they will work really well. Tomorrow I need to go get some gels for the races on Saturday and Sunday. In Sundays XC I'm going to make an effort to eat a gel, a packet of gushers, and a whole bottle each lap, along with Coke on the last lap. Hopefully that will get me through the race (2.5 hours I think), and keep me strong the whole time. I'll have to eat tons of bananas to not cramp either. Hopefully I can open up the season big with a podium or two. I'll have race reports (and hopefully pictures) on Sunday night/Monday.