Category Archives: Scott’s blog

Some shots from the past few days. And check out the video on Joe’s most recent post.

New chapter: Riding new KTMs in January. Happy geezers.

Wheels swap, snap some photos, dress up, and RIDE.

Over the moon with how this thing looks. Now I need to learn how to ride it.

Joe carved a short loop in the sand flats so we could catch some simple action shots. Fun stuff.

Sand is fun.

Joe's favorite right hander on the course he laid out.

Day is done.

New stuff is always energizing for me.  Today I received a box from Victory Circle Graphix with a slew of decals in it.  This is our new look and a new chapter in our new team.  I’m stoked.  Thanks big time to AJ at VCG.

We’ve had a few grey and damp Wisconsin days recently. The feel on that kind of day marks the end of the moto riding season for me. Winter is near.

My shoulder is great. I’ve been doing pretty demanding and tiring yard work and not feeling too badly afterwards, despite not spending any recent time in the gym, pool, moto, or bike.  I’m neglected my PT so I could not complain if my shoulder was bothering me.

I’ve got that 9 hour race in the Southeast on my radar and have mapped out a training program to prepare for it over the next few months. No moto riding between now and then but I’m not headed to the 9hr to win; I’m going there to enjoy the warm weather and ride with a smile.

Just made plans to attend A1. Looking forward to that season starting, too.

Sitting on a makeshift bed slash bench seat thing – dubbed “the couch” – in the back of 2010 D16 AA champ Mat Herrington’s van. Joe is here too. We’re headed to Crawfordsville, IN for the Ironman GNCC.

I’m not racing because I’m still on the mend. I wish I was because I’ve had good races at this place. It’s going to be good watching the race – might give perspective and be educating. I’ll be cheering for Joe and Josh Strang.

Saturday, 6:36am

It’s early on race day.  We set up camp and the pit yesterday afternoon in suppressing heat.  I don’t know what the temperature was but everyone on our crew complained about it multiple times.  Our pit is at the far end of pit row and about ¼ mile from our camper.  Joe and I are the only ones up at this hour.  The others are doing what they can to sleep.  The sun has come up and it’s starting to bake again.  Generators from the neighboring campsite are puttering away.  I need to get some breakfast in me before we go bicycle the opening mile of the course.  Race starts at 10am today and ends at 10am tomorrow morning.

Our pit

Hydration for the next 24+ hours is going to be essential.  I’ve been drinking like mad but been pretty careful about what I drink.  I was turned on to a mix called specialdrinkmix.com that helps your body store water on the cellular level.  Before I started using SDM I was doing just water and had to pee so often that it was annoying and, unbeknownst to me, not doing me any good.  Since drinking SDM I’ve feeling a little plump.  I’ve been measuring my hydration level by peeing on a chem stick.  The stick measures water’s specific gravity so the more water that’s in your urine, the better hydrated you are.  So far so good but I don’t expect to stay hydrated for long.  It’s just too hot.

Off to check out the course and then eat breaky.

9:29

Just did tire pressure (11f, 10r) on my Kenda Millvilles, gassed up, new lenses in the Oakleys, and got dressed.  Sitting in the camp talking shop.  Noah is here helping us out.  He knows Mark Junge from road racing at various tracks around the country.  Its awesome to have Noah here.  Thanks, man.

The start line is a chalk line that funnels into ever narrowing ribbon .  The ribbon ends at the woods and then the trail shoots up the hill above timing and scoring.  We’ll do a short loop then join the normal course about 3 minutes into the race.  I didn’t go any farther than that in my recon.  It will eyeopening from then on.

I’m ready.  Not nervous but excited.  My thumb is a little sore from the tumble I took weeks ago but I don’t expect it to slow me down.  I’ve been drinking a bunch and the stick says I’m hydrated.  Up to me (my head) now.

The starting line with my umbrella girl, Joe. My video camera didn't work. Bummer.

11:59

Just did the first stint.  Blew the start and was the last person to leave the line.  Worked my way past riders but followed some guys off course and got lost.  Dumb.  Super dusty so passing was dangerous.  Figured I would be in 15^th in class but came across in 8^th.  Course is one-line and a diverse combination of beach sand, moist woods, open fields and road, double track, and ups and downs.  It will get rough.  Did 4 laps and had moved up to 2^nd in class.

3:11

Bike is running badly and the rear is kicking.  Noah made some adjustments so I’ll see how she does from here.  It is so awesome to get off the bike and have someone take it from you to do the work.  The course is beat now.  Some new lines opening up.  Joe did his stint and kept us in 4^th.  I moved us back up to 3^rd but that’s all we’ll get. The front guys are way out there.  Beside, its not about the race; its about the experience.

My hands are not blistered but they are tired.  My shoulders are tired but by low back is good.  Just changed my clothes so I feel refreshed.  It is hot.  Put new liners in my Bell helmets, grabbed some new goggles, ate a turkey and cheese sandwich, drank a bunch of chocolate milk and sat to write this.  I have 20 minutes until Joe is due back in.  Time passes fast when I’m off the bike.

Noah Mitchell did an incredible job during our race. We could not have done it without him.

5:34

Slowing down some but somehow we are in the lead.  Rough and dusty like I’ve rarely seen. Some chafing on my right underarm and top of my ass crack. That’s from the gritty dust that get in your clothes, I suppose.  Hands are still in one peice.  Top of my head is tender like the helmets are rubbing it. Brave Soldier on my head could solve that?

Carb was full of dust when we made the jetting adjustment on my last off stint.  It was running better from the adjustment but now its running on.  Sticky slide maybe.  Noah is flushing it now.  That guy rocks!

Super fun course now that I know it better.  I’ve been on the bike a total of 4.5 hours.  I figure I’ll do 12 total.  It will only get harder from here.

Lights on this time out.  Joe will be back in at 6:45 so that puts me out there until after 8.  The woods will be dark by then.  Apprehensive about the lights in the dust.  Reflection back in my face will be an issue.

Liz V has been great. Big food spreads every time I get back to camp. Can’t ask for more.

Pit lane had a 10mph speed limit.

1:17

Meltdown.  I imagine the combination of the heat, the pace, our inexperience, and my tendency to get motion sick all crashed down on me at once.  The whooped out trail and limited field of vision really messed with me.  I wasn’t able to ride without feeling nausea and event tossed up everything I had in my stomach just after midnight.  I tried to do single laps with short breaks in between but couldn’t out-will the desire to upchuck.

I did manage to reduce the nausea by adjusting my lights to have a broader spread.  That way I was seeing more of the surroundings when riding down the trail.  It was an improvement but not enough to keep me on the trail.

When I pulled it in for the night we were in 3^rd and over 13 minutes down on 2^nd.  That doesn’t really matter since our goal was to finish and we can still do that.  Joe had the same vertigo sensation that I had so he went to sleep for a while.  Our pit is dark and both bikes are parked.

5:53

I’m up but barely. Hardly slept but feeling better.  My body is tired and my legs keep cramping.  I’ve got a headache and I’m feeling fuzzy.  What should I expect?

Trying to get in some instant oatmeal and I have fresh Moose gear on. That’s helping my morale.  Joe is out on course and Noah has prepped my bike so I’m ready to go when Joe is back.  I expect the trail to be completely wrecked at this point.  It will be interesting to see how the last few laps go and to see what place we are in.

I’m disappointed in myself.  I’ve been planning this event for 6 months and to be shut down but motion sickness is hard to swallow.  On the flip side, the experience has been great.  The waves of emotions I’ve go through are amazing.  I’ve endured crests of feeling like we can win to lows of how much I hate my motorcycle several times each night lap.

Sunday morning early. My hands are still in one piece and would last the entire event unscathed.

Joe takes a break early on Sunday morning.

8:35

Just did 3 laps.  Was good on the opening lap.  Felt rested and had some speed. That’s all relative at this point, however.  Laps 2 and 3 were much slower.  I know the course so I know where to go fast or where to turn but it just feels unsafe to go faster.  My body is too run down.

My stomach and headache are worse than ever.  Nothing tastes good and there’s nothing I can do about the hungover feeling.  It’s getting warm again and that’s not helping.

We are in 5^th just 18 minutes down on 4^th.  If Joe hustles on his last stint then maybe we get in 4 more laps. That might bump us up to 4^th.  Hate to be negative but at this point 10am can’t come soon enough.  A shower and bed are calling me.

Back to that rollercoaster of emotions thing.  This past stint I really missed my family.  Wanted to be with them right at that moment.  Is that because it’s home and safe and comforting and the place I’m in now is so uncomfortable?

We did it. We wanted to finish in the top 10. Done and dusted.

7:40pm Sunday

There have been a few events transpire since the end of the race (that’s why it’s 7:40pm) but I’ll go back to what I was thinking at the end of the race before talking about the afternoon.

Joe’s last 2 laps ended with enough time for me to do 2 laps before the race would end at 10, if I was up for it.  I had barfed when I putting my gear back on so that was when I realized I had a decision to make.  I was nauseous, had a headache, hadn’t eaten well, and hadn’t been able to take on fluids so going back out into the heat was a bad idea.  Crashing might be more risky if I couldn’t think clearly and if I felt bad before riding, how bad would I feel afterwards?

On the other hand I’d put a lot of preparation into getting to this race, as did Joe.  Quitting was not an option but I considered it at one point.  I may only do this race one time ever so not being able to say that I finished it would have been a regret.  While finishing was our primary objective we did lead for several hours and that’s something to be proud of.

Joe came in at 9:15.  I was dressed and ready to go.  It was hot.  We had a short discussion about our race position and if we had a chance of moving up.  The team behind us was 2 laps back.  Joe said we were 24 seconds behind 4^th but it was actually 24 minutes.  I mounted up and headed out.

The course was really whooped and some of the exposed hills felt like a furnace.  I held it steady and sipped from the water I had in my Camelbak.  The thought of knowing that we would finish pushed me along.  In reality it was a race with no reward other than the satisfaction of completion but I had latched on to making it happen; there was no letting go for me.

Timing and scoring showed that we were in 5^th and 13 minutes down on 4^th when I started that last lap.  The crew was standing on the side of the trail cheering me on.  That felt good.  I backed it way down on that last lap and almost completed all my day laps without a single crash but tipped over in a narrow rutted section (dammit!).  I was tired.  I didn’t have any pain other than a small blister on my thumb.  That’s amazing considering how much riding I did.

When I crossed the line at 10:07 we were only 3:58 behind 4^th.  It doesn’t matter but I wish I could have been able to pull off a 25 minute lap instead of the 30+ that I did.  I rode to the line where we had to return our transponders, shut off the bike, pulled off my helmet, and puked.

Again the heat.  While we were breaking down the pit I was a complete waste.  My vision was fuzzy, the sunlight made it hard to keep my eyes open, my stomach was uneasy, my head hurt like crazy, and I couldn’t cool down.  I sat in front of the fan with cold rags on my wrists and an ice pack on my back but that wasn’t doing the trick.  Eventually the crew got the pit shoved back into the van and I hitched a ride back over the camp.  I stayed in the van for the AC for a minute but that didn’t feel right.  Everyone else was discussing the race and I wanted to be a part of it.  When I got out I felt especially bad so I sprawled out on the outdoor carpet under the camper awning.  I must have really looked bad since Joe’s wife Liz asked if I wanted the EMTs.  I didn’t even hesitate.

They arrived and stepped up all the cooling methods we had been using: water, ice, cool rags, the fan.  I had been aware of my environment every minute of the previous 24 hours but didn’t understand how important being lucid was.  The EMT guys asked me questions about where I was and what I was doing and I could answer all of those.  He was trying to get a feel of how far gone I was but mentally I was stable.  Physically I was uncomfortable.  The EMTs called an ambulance and planned to get me to the hospital.

While laying there I was full of thoughts.  I was happy that we finished.  I was somewhat regretting having gone out for those last laps knowing that I was unstable and low on fluids.  I felt bad for not helping tear down the pit and camp.  I felt bad about putting Liz through the anguish of basically ignoring her concerns about my well being.  I image she understands that I was determined to do what I wanted, regardless of the risk and consequence, but it would have been hard for her to not speak her mind or try to stop me. I felt bad for Joe because by calling the ambulance I was delaying our drive home.  Who knew by how much.

So, now I’m in the Clanton, AL hospital.  The ambulance ride was brutal because it was on small, rough roads and I was already nauseous.  But once I got to a bed in the ER things started getting better.  They drew blood and got me hooked up to an IV of saline.  I had been suffering from paralyzing cramps in my legs, groin, and mid back since I got off the moto so they gave me a muscle relaxer.  That started working within 5 minutes.

The ER doc came back with news that my creatinine and enzymes associated with my kidneys were elevated.  I was at risk of kidney failure so they admitted me.  I was somewhat relieved but also didn’t want to stay.  I wanted to get in the van with Joe and head home to see family.

7:50 Monday morning

I’ve got 3 wires connected to my chest, an IV line in my right arm, a blood saturation monitor on my left hand, the nurse call button/TV remote, and my computer here on the bed with me.  I can’t move without something tugging or tying a knot.

I slept okay.  My head is better and I’ve been able to pee several times.  So far I’ve had 8 liters of saline dripped into my body.  I lost 8 pounds of water weight in the race.  My enzyme level is still elevated so they are saying I will need to say another day.

Joe has been hanging out waiting for news about my situation.  I appreciate that beyond words.  We have no set plan at this time because we don’t know when I will be discharged and that’s causing some issues because our work demands that we get back to the office.  To add insult to injury Joe just called to say that a leaf spring on the trailer broke.  It can’t be driven with the broken spring.

1:17 Monday

I’m supposed to have another blood test to ensure that I’m trending in the right direction.  If I’m good then they’ll discharge me.  Joe is on his way to pick me up.

4:53 Monday

I’m out.  My enzyme count was good but I have to follow up with my primary care doctor when I get back to WI.  We’re at a Starbucks waiting for the trailer to be bolted back together.  Probably drive some tonight and finish it up tomorrow.  Whew.

My RM-Z250 was awesome. There weren't very many 250f bikes in the race so not only were we one of the few teams not on orange, we were on different equipment. Wouldn't want it any other way.

I’ve been busy getting ready for the Perry Mountain 24hr Challenge for a long time now but things have really started to ramp up the past two weeks.

The piles of gear that I want to remember to take on the trip have started to accumulate around the garage and house.  There are the usual piles of bike parts, wheels, and spare plastic that I’d talk to any woods race but there are also boxes of bike lights and chargers, generators, 10×10 tents and 120v lights and other odd camping-like items.  I also have food lists and clothing lists to remember to pack up.  Lots to do still.

My plan has always been to get all my training, packing, and bike prep done a week before the race.  That means that come departure day all I have to do is put the stuff in the van and drive.  I’m almost there.  If I get everything done by this Saturday I can spend next week resting and relaxing.  My theory is that racing 24 hours will take its toll no matter what so going in fresh is the best thing I can do.

My RM-Z250 has fresh Factory Connection suspension, fresh Kenda rubber, fresh Victory Circle Graphix, and fresh Vesrah brake pads.  The bike won’t let me down.  Pressure is on me.

I had my last day with Mary the Gymboss today.  We’ve been increasing the reps, weight and duration of the balance and power workouts these past few weeks.  I feel like I worked out hard today but I’m also feeling pretty fit.  Thanks, Upward Spiral, for elevating my confidence and abilities.

I’ve also got some good moto time in lately.  I totally played hooky from work several times and spent the day riding laps at the local mx track.  The repetitive laps get boring but they also help me stay focused.  I know the track so well that I’m trying hard to hit the same line, in the same gear every lap.  But all the jumps make me queasy after about an hour.  I have to fight a little to finish the workouts when the motion sickness sets in.

A few weeks ago I tank swapped, fell and hit my head in a soft section of the track.  My body was fine but I was immediately dizzy.  I felt sick to my stomach soon after and couldn’t safely ride.  I thought my feeling sick was from being concussed but now I know that all the jumping doesn’t help.

Anyhow, I’m feeling fit and look forward to the challenges ahead.  Thanks for reading.

scott

I’ve been spending time in Trek’s gym this past winter.  The workouts have put me to the next level.  Thanks to Mary Grinaker at Upward Sprial Fitness for the coaching, cheering, and morale boosting!

Here’s a snapshot of a recovery drill:

I’m headed to the Roubaix Challenge just like Joe is. Have to pack up my bicycle and ship it on Monday so it gets to the event in time.  I’m not as concerned about the ride as Joe seems to be.  It will be hard, I acknowledge that, but it’s entirely doable.  The distance – nearly 100 miles – is the thing I’m thinking about.  100 miles on a good day is a 5 hour ride but when you throw in some wind, rough roads, fred riders, and narrow roads the fatigue sets in a little faster.

My bike setup is stellar.  Team issue LEOPARD TREK Madone 6 series frame with Di2.  Latex tubes in big volume, stiff tires and fast aluminum wheels.  90psi.  I’ll try to take some Contour Cam footage.

The weather just won’t cooperate here in southern Wisconsin.  Opening dates for the local riding spots have been pushed back.   Feeling frustrated about not getting some riding in!

Did get to the garage last night to install a shorty lever on my Magura hydraulic clutch perch.  Pretty nifty.  I used a hanging fish scale to measure the pull force on the stock lever verses the Midwest Mountain Engineering lever.  Stock required 10lb, 11oz and the shorty was 6lbs.  Feels good.

Randy at LegendaryRandyEricksenFilms put this on-board video together of me racing in the 30+ class at the Rapid City Extreme Indoor Enduro.  Thanks Randy.

I won the race but I sure look slow.  Funny how it feels so much different than it looks.

Hate to bow down to winter but I am tired of the snow and cold.  My job and the great community keep me here in WI but on days like this I’d rather be somewhere warm.  I figure we have about six more weeks of this before the snow and ice start to melt.  Can’t happen soon enough for me.

My training and the team’s summer plan are shaping up.  I feel solid and strong and my body is responding to some of the specific gym workouts I’ve been doing.  I’ve enjoyed the balance and agility drills that come after fatiguing weight lifts.  To get the balance part of the workout right takes some focus and determination.  I’m hoping that will transfer to other activities I like to do on two wheels.

I’m chipping away at getting all my motos up and running.  The RM-Z450 and both RM-z250 bikes have been torn down to the frames and rebuilt.  Both 250s are for sale if you know anyone interested.  My plan is to use the 450 as my practice bike this year and to build up a 2011 RM-Z250 as a race bike.  Will swapping back and forth between the bikes asking too much?  Maybe but I look forward to it.

My race season is starting to revolve around the 24hr race in Alabama.  It’s going to take some planning and effort to make that race a success.  What will I consider a success?  A relaxed final week before event, a calm morning the day of the event, no major bike or body issues during the race, and, of course, finishing.  That is asking a lot.  I can do it.  The most important thing for me to keep in mind is that racing is fun.  I go through all preparation (training, bike maintenance, planning) so that come race day, I can enjoy the experience.  I know the 24hr race will be fun in the end but I can make the time between now and then positive as well.  Woohoo!

To get a moto fix during the long, dark Wisconsin winter I drove across three states to do an indoor enduro.  I’d never done an indoor race before and I’d never done an enduro, either, although this wasn’t a true enduro.  It was more like a very short and intense hare scramble or Scot Trials event.  I’d also never been to Rapid City, South Dakota before so it was a weekend of firsts in more than one way.

Rapid City is just over 800 miles from Lake Mills, WI.  That took me 12 hours to cover.  SD isn’t nearly as barren as KS or NE to me but there are places called Badlands and Black Hills in SD that made me think there’s not much out there.  With less than a million people in the entire state and a nearly dead straight road between the east and west boarders the drive was little lonely at times.

But I made it and met up with good friends from Colorado.  Scott and Steph graciously fed me dinner then we went to a Central Hockey League game at the Rushmore Place Civic Center (which was also the host of an indoor soccer tournament and the indoor enduro that same weekend – big place). Rapid City is a cow town full of hard working Carhartt-wearing ranchers that drive big pickups. They have big, work-hardened hands, roper boots, and hats with worn, dirty brims.  Hockey and cowboys is an odd mix to me but their enthusiasm for hockey was obvious.  Or maybe they just like to see fights.

The next day we drove over early to get signed in and get a lay of the land.  The pits were indoors (thanks heavens since it was blowing a gale and 15F outside) and the course was set up and ready for us to walk.  We chatted it up with the race promoter and learned he’s got a pretty good thing going.  This event is a money maker for him.  That’s no small feat in this economy and for a town in the middle of the “badlands”.

The course had several man made sections that all looked challenging in their own right. A narrow start shoot lead into a pit full of chopped firewood followed by a hip jump that was crowned by a huge log.  Four foot high upright tractor tires were next followed by a loose 180 degree turn and three piles of logs.  A tall mound of jagged boulders looked daunting and parallel logs and a section of railroad tracks preceded a vicious pit of car tires.  Then a small jump and the last obstacle: a forest of evenly spaced, 4” in diameter trees placed just bar width apart.

Scott had never been to this race but he’d been to other indoor races.  I learned a bunch of bike set up tips from him and had spent the nights before I drove over setting up my RM-Z250.  The biggest thing would be getting some decent grip on the logs, rocks, and tires. I did some serious cutting and drilling to my rear tire and ran only 7psi.  The front was altered but not as much.  Seven psi there too.  I didn’t change any of my base suspension settings.

This room was filled with bikes and riders a few minutes after I took this shot.

Scott and I signed up for two classes – 201-250cc and 40+.  We were granted a 10 minute practice session for each.  After the first practice session I learned that warming up was key for me.  I had arm pump and was winded.  I also learned that I needed to do a better job of covering the clutch because I stalled it 5 times in 2 minutes. I did much better in the second practice felt good about all the sections except the tire pit.

If there were 50 racers competing in 7 different classes, every one of us got stuck or fell in the tire pit at least once. Even the winner of the pro class spent time on his hip under a dead bike in the tires.  It would be my undoing in the 40+ main.

I won both my class heats.  I was trying hard and enjoying the riding but I didn’t expect to do that well. I don’t remember much about the cc class win but I remember looking for the second place rider in the 40+ heat and knowing he was far enough behind for me to back the pace down and conserve some energy.  It was the end of that race that my left arm started to get weak from having to feather the clutch so much.  I was using the clutch to launch the bike over logs and tires but where it really got me was in the trees.  The section wasn’t that long but the steering / weaving combined with the barging it took to get through put some fatigue into my left forearm.

We had a few hours to kill between the heat races and the main so we went back to Steph’s for a bite to eat (and for me to ice my arm).

The opening event when we got back to the arena was the kid’s race.  A family of tots all riding electric bikes was inspirational.  Really cool to see a 3.5 year old ride feet up, front wheel in the air over a 4 foot high jump.

Our races would be only 4 laps long but those 4 laps were pretty intense.  The start was critical and hard to get right. They had us stand in front of our bikes with our front wheel between our legs and put hands on top of our helmets.  The bikes were all dead engine.  They would say “go” and we’d all bump into each other and the bikes as we tried to mount, start, and pop the clutch.  I stank it up and was mid pack at best in the 201-250cc main.  I bobbled a bunch before finding some track space and working my way forward. I think, although I have no proof, I passed the leader with only the tire pit and tree section to go.  They claimed I won and I was happy.  I was winded.

Earlier in the night the promoter asked everyone if there was interest in a two-man relay.  Scott and I signed up and planned to ride his bike.  The rules at that time were one bike, two riders, we had to do 2 laps each and we could do the bike change wherever we wanted.  There was no entry fee and they’d hold the race before intermission.

Come race time the rules changed.  The last lap of the relay had to be done with both riders on the bike.  Scott and I made a plan based on nothing special and that fell apart because of the whacky nature of the race.  The race was a hoot and the 3000 spectators got their money’s worth judging by the cheers we could hear during our two up ride.  I ended up being the one at the controls and Scott hung on for dear life as I center punched everything on the course with the hope that momentum would get us over.  Launching the bike from a seated position with an additonal 155lbs of second rider barely hanging onto the back of the bike was tough.  We had fun and we finished, but it wasn’t pretty.

The 40+ class was the only race that I wanted to do well at.  I had decided that during the long drive to Rapid City.  I don’t know why I like doing well in the 40+ class but I do.

My start was dreadful.  There were 15 guys on the starting line and I had first gate pick so I had no excuse for not being in a good place on the line.  I fumbled getting on my bike, swung at the kicker and missed, finally got it started and forgot to put it in gear, finally blasted away from the line, got pinched off at the first turn, and promptly fell in the tire pit.

From there it was frantic.  I caught a few guys but didn’t know where I was in the fray.  I fell when exiting the trees at the end of lap 2 but didn’t lose any spots.  I heard my name over the PA but didn’t understand what was said about me.  I caught a guy that I knew had been fast in the qualifiers and got more hopeful about a decent result.  Then I caught another fast guy and somehow learned I was in 2nd place.  On the last lap with only the tire pit and the length of the arena between me and the finish I flubbed the entry into the tire pit and got hung up.  The bike was upright but straddling a tire and held off the ground. The shifter got bumped so the tranny was in neutral.  Riders that I had just passed retook their positions while I rocked my bike back and forth. My left hand was overcome with fatigue and was nearly useless.  I had to pull the clutch in with all four fingers which meant I had less leverage and strength as I tried to lift the bike off the tires. I didn’t give up but was pretty frustrated with the mistake.  When I did get free I rolled across the line in 5th.

All in all the event was great.  The obstacles were difficult but not overwhelming.  The atmosphere – audible crowd, warm indoor temps, diverse rider group – was invigorating.  When I won the cc class I had a mom come and pat me on the back telling me I did well.  That made an impression on me.  It felt good but I’m such a shit for being so deeply invested in this overblown hobby. Mixed emotions.

The drive home was no shorter than the drive out.  I made it home in time for dinner and some time with my family.  My winter moto jones has been quenched.

Have I been remiss with getting blogs posted or what?!  Here’s a brief catch up and some info to chew on in case I fail to post again in reasonable time.

I took almost all of November off, except for the day Mark Junge and I tested tires at Bill Shepard’s place.  I haven’t ridden anything with a throttle since then and I’m starting to jones.  Getting to use the snowblower twice in the same week almost got me pumped up but that’s only because I didn’t have any unleaded and use some diluted race gas to make the thing work.  Smelled GOOD.

Mark has an ice setup coming from one of the satellite Suzuki dirt track teams based south of here somewhere.  We might get my 450 set up for a few fun days on the ice.  Originally we planned to do the Steel Shoe fund raiser but my schedule won’t have it.  A few hot laps on Lake Koshkonong or the big lake near my house should be enough fun, even without a race.

In early December I started working with a personal trainer where I work (the same trainer as Joe) and had to take a break from that.  I’d given a thorough description of what I wanted from the customized training plan but I was ill prepared to do the work when it came down to it.  All that time off in November killed my base fitness so when I went full hog at the gym I did some massive damage in my forearms and ended up with swollen elbows and limited range of motion.  It took almost two weeks to recover.  Won’t make that mistake again.

Just before Christmas I started training in earnest for an indoor enduro event but then came down with bronchitis and had to all but stop doing anything.  I was laid up for about 10 days and still have a wicked cough and can’t breathe deep.  That will be gone soon.  I’m excited about the indoor enduro.  I’ve never done anything like it but I’ve watched plenty.  It looks damn hard.

Bummer is that Eric Uren broke his leg last September at Pine Ridge.  This is old news but the deal is that Eric has suffered some complications that have made him a bit of an unlucky victim.  This kind of mishap can happen to any of us so thank your lucky stars, you walking talking sticks, and show Eric some sympathy by giving him a call or sending him a pie or a new rear tire or something.  Eric and his family are cornerstones of the motocross community in northern Wisconsin / Michigan UP.

Joe and I held a 2011 planning meeting a few weeks ago.  We waited until our main support had firmed up (thanks Vesrah Suzuki!) and for local racing calendars to be posted before meeting.  One of the events on our calendar is the Perry Mountain 24-hour Challenge in Alabama.  Not sure how Joe learned about the event but I’m glad he did.  We’ve both done 12 and 24 hour bicycle events but never anything on a moto.  I’m pretty pumped up about the race and have been scouring the www for videos and testimonials.  Registration opens on February 1 and the race is in June.  Joe and I plan to enter as a two-man Duo.  We’ll each ride our own bike and swap off after every 2-3 hours of riding.  That means roughly four hours each in the dark!  Better get testing some lights!  Actually, lights are one of the many things we need to iron out – nutrition, organized pit, bike set up and spares, staying cool, and on and on.

It’s January 1 and Wisconsin’s winter is in full force outside.  Today I did a run and the windchill was -1 F.  Tomorrow more of the same but I’m planning to ride my bicycle along the shore line of the big lake near my house.  I’ll be wearing every bit of clothing I own, of course.  I’ve studded up some tires just in case it gets slippy out there.  That alone will make it worth while.

After years of thinking I had the pace and mindset to pull it off but coming up short, I finally won the AA class at the Dyracuse round of District 16’s hare scramble series.  It’s been a lack luster season for me with less racing and mediocre results so winning the last race of the year with the state’s fastest riders in attendance felt great.

I pinned this envelop up next to other trophies I've won over the years. I'm proud of it.

Last year I definitely felt like I could do it but I put too much effort into going fast from the gun and ended up 2nd having faded badly in the closing 10 minutes of the race.  My approach this year was to do a bit more following or at least leading at a slower pace so my finishing laps could be spent putting up a fight for the win if need be.  It all panned out as I had hoped but not without a few close calls in the middle of the race.

As Joe points out in his post about Dyracuse, Suzukis are hard to beat off the start line.  The combination of a Pirelli paddle tire, Factory Connection suspension and Mark Junge engine tuning make a big difference over the competition.  All that put me into the lead as we entered the first long single track section.  I could hear others behind me but no one was pushing me along.  That first narrow section was a bit of a panic for me; I wanted to speed away from everyone and focus on the trail but I had to temper my pace so that I didn’t make a silly mistake or tire prematurely.

At times I felt like I would be run over from behind.  The opening lap seemed too slow but it started to pan out when I got a chance to look over my shoulder in an open section to see that I had only two guys on my tail and neither one was JD Freibel.  JD has been the District’s hot shot this year and is making a name for himself in the National Enduro series too.  When I didn’t see JD behind me on that opening lap I almost wanted to slow more so that when he did catch up I’d have more fight in me.  But I didn’t.

The guy right behind me was Tony Montgomery.  Tony knows Dyracuse better than me and he rides sand better than me and he was on more powerful bike than me.  My only hope was to wear him out.  So I tried to up the pace.

I lead the race for the opening 3 laps.  The course, as Joe wrote, was damn good.  It had everything – demanding sand, mellow MX sections, fast and slow single track, loamy dirt, 5th gear tapped out fire road.  Tony and I put in laps that were just short of 15 minutes.  Quick calculations said we’d do 8 laps total.  That meant stop for a splash of gas at the end of 4.

After the scoring tent we pulled onto the sandy MX track and Tony blasted by me.  My tactics quickly swapped to putting pressure on from behind rather than from the front.  I could hang with Tony in the tight stuff but he walked away from me in the sand and open sections.  That got me a little concerned but it also made me focus harder.

At the end of lap 4, in the last bits of single track before the scoring tent, where my fuel jug sat, the rear of my bike felt odd.  There was a knock vibrating through the foot pegs when the rear end went deep into the stroke.  I’ve never flatted in a race and only flatted 2x in the past 6 years of riding in the woods but I knew right away I had a rear flat.  Tony and I both stopped for gas that time through so we started the lap together but this time with me in the lead.  Now I was the defense because I had no idea how long or even if my tire would last.

During that 5th lap I felt like I had slowed a ton. I was worried about the tire coming off the rim, locking everything up and spitting me over the bars.  And I was worried about how difficult it would be to control.  But it wasn’t that bad.  There were parts of the course where it was noticeably worse than an inflated tire but for the most part I had acceleration grip and braking grip and it was stable in suspension-compressing turns.  At some point I realized I couldn’t wait for Tony to learn I had a problem and I had gone a long way without JD charging past so I tried to step it up and finish what I wanted to do: win.

I dinged the rim in several places having ridden at race pace for an hour. The tire is a complete write off. But there was a surprizing amount of grip and control despite the lack of air inside the tire.

Only once in a while, far too infrequently for me, do I get to the “zone” where I can’t do wrong.  No matter what’s going on around me I’m confident that what I’m doing in the moment is the right thing and that I’ll end up doing my very best that day.  Those closing laps were spent in my zone.  I was fast and consistent and precise.  The flat tire didn’t bother me, although I suspect it was slower than a tire with air in it.  Only in the last 3 or so minutes of the race did I awake from the zone and realize that I had won it. That’s a pretty cool feeling.

But it was close.  Tony stayed on my tail until he ran out of gas on lap 6.  JD had recovered from a scary crash early in the race and was only 7 seconds behind me at the finish line.  If we had to do another lap, who knows what would have happened. I shouldn’t speculate but I had some fight left.  My rear tire did not.

Congrats to Mat Herrington on his winning the District 16 hare scramble overall.  He beat JD by a single point to take the series.  That’s cool. [edit - JD won the overall D16 AA points chase over Mat.]  I finished 3rd on the year.  Pretty happy with that, all things considered.

My wife would chide me bigtime for this shot. "Bald twins wallowing in there adolescence," is what her caption would read.

One last note on fitness.  I’m convinced that the only way to get better at racing a motorbike is to ride more often.  Despite my desperation to train my mind and body to cope with the rigors of a 2-hour event, the only way to get used to it is to do it more.  I suffered at Crystal Falls having spent the weeks prior traveling on work trips.  I hated feeling that bad in the Crystal Falls races, especially because the course is so very good there.  After Crystal Falls I did manage to greatly improve my fitness by spending several days at high elevation riding mountain bikes with world-class riders a but I’m still super sore  (two days) after racing at Dyracuse.  I attempted to get in the gym to find out what exercises I could do to better train the parts of my body that are sore but I’m just too sore to lift any weights.

I’ll be healed up by the time Ironman rolls around, tho.  Looking forward to that one. I’ll be riding with the 40+ A group, that I know, but I’m undecided on if I’ll be on the RM-Z250 or the 450.  Might depend on the weather.  Stay tuned.

What a day!  I imagine some of this will seem a bit far-fetched but I swear it’s true.  I have photos and witnesses to back it up if need be.

I made my way from Madison to Denver on Friday night.  I used to live here so it’s an easy, familiar trip.  I met up with my friends Scott and Richard at Richard’s house, caught up on gossip, current events, then eventually made a plan for Saturday’s activities.

Golden, Colorado’s Thunder Valley motocross track is the host of this year’s Motocross des Nations.  MXdN only comes to the US so often so when it was scheduled to come to the town I call home, I had to go.

AJ at Victory Circle Graphix hooked Scott, Richard and me with a VIP parking pass and paddock passes for the weekend.  We drove straight to a parking spot across from the main entrance.  Practice had started so we watched some of the big jumps from the paddock but mostly took in the sights.

Who knows how many people attended on Saturday but for sure Sunday's crowd will be bigger.

Lunch time rolled around and we smelled food coming from a big tent.  We walked in without being checked and helped ourselves with beverages.  Scott spied a buffet line so we made our way over.  The tent was huge and packed full of people. When we got to the buffet we were asked for our tickets.  We didn’t have any tickets but the lady asking had a handful so she helped us out and ushered us to the food.  When we sat to eat we realized we had somehow sneaked into the VIP tent and ended up with free lunch.  Dunno how we did it but we did.

Trek World Racing’s Andrew Neethling (see a vid of Needles here) made trip to town so we met up with him.  We were all walking past the Alpine Stars hospitality tent and Andrew stopped to say hey.  He’s an A-Stars sponsored rider and knew someone there.  After a few minutes he came back to us with hospitality passes.  Awesome.  Scott felt like ice cream so we ducked into the A-Stars tent and helped ourselves.  Thanks Needles and Alpine Stars!

Then the racing started.  Qualifiers today, main events tomorrow.  The fast guys are amazing.  The amount of time they spend in the air, manipulating the bike into position for the best possible line upon landing and the corner speed they carry made huge impressions on me.   The track has some massive jumps that not all the bikes and riders can easily do.  The dirt and weather were perfect.

We headed back to the pits for a quick pass through the A-Stars tent.  On our way we say John Tomac and his son Eli.  I know John from when I lived in Durango.  It was good to catch up.  Eli is riding a Trek road bike.  That’s good to know.

Team USA was being rushed to the post race press conference when we passed by the Honda and Suzuki haulers.  I saw Ryan Dungey’s agent, Tony, and he asked us to follow them to the press tent.  We talked and walked but then lost each other in the crowd.  Later we met up with Tony again and he invited us in to the Suzuki hauler.  Ryan was there and we chatted about all sorts: cycling, training, the MXdN track, Decoster, Lance Armstrong, Ryan coming to visit Trek, the works.  There were hoards of fans outside the hauler that all wanted a piece of Ryan but we soaked up his time inside the hauler.  We were spoiled and thanked him for spending time with us while the pressure of racing had to be on his mind.  What a super cool experience that was.

Ryan, me, Richard and Scott with Ryan's back up MXdN Suzuki RM-Z450. HA!

Scott, Richard, Andrew and I reveled in how lucky our day had been so far while we walked to the Alpine Stars tent.  They were serving dinner and we had learned from Tony that it was not to be missed.  Sure enough, it was quite a spread – farfalle pasta, salmon, tiramisu ice cream, fresh bread.  On top of that, the tables surrounding us were filled with heros: Mike Gooselar, Mike Alessi, Dean Wilson, Andrew Short, and certainly dozens of others that are surely big names that I didn’t recognize.

After we had soaked up as much superstar presence as we could handle we stepped out of the tent and found Roger DeCoster standing alone.  I know some of his fellow Belgian ex-pats so I risked it and struck up a conversation.  We all gathered around to listen to him talk of days gone by.  He was also very generous with his time.  At first it was hard for me to concentrate on the conversation because I know he’s one of the most influential people motocross has ever known.  Yet he’s standing right there in front of us, shaking our hands and sharing his life with us.  Wow.

I’m still reeling a little from the day.  How can you top a day like that?!  The racing was pretty exciting but it took a back seat to the people interactions we had.  I can hardly wait to do it again tomorrow.

Here’s a video from the day the Trek World Racing team rode Vesrah Suzuki motos.  The moto segment starts at about minute 8:

Thanks again to the Parkins for making the video and taking the pictures and thanks to Jon Sonnenburg for helping us with our day at Dyracuse.

Quick and dirty here (busy with work and family).

I raced at the Uren family owned Valley Raceway hare scramble this past weekend.  I hadn’t raced let alone ridden in way too long so my expectations were low.  High on my to do list was having enjoying the races and soaking up the long laps and technical trails.  I succeeded, I think.  Joe raced too.

Mark Junge graciously loaned my family his mammoth Renegade hauler for the weekend so with wife and kids on board we drove the 5 hours north to just across the WI border to Crystal Falls, MI.  The weather was clear for the drive but it rained hard in the wee hours of the morning and was forecast to rain all day.

I’m fine with mud other than the massive clean up it makes for.  I looked forward to taking it easy in the early laps and picking off stragglers as the race wore on, or at least that was my plan.  I didn’t even try to beat the other six AA riders to the first turn and instead was nearly the last to leave the line on my RM-Z450.  I picked off one guy in the first turn then passed JD and Mat a few turns later.  That immediately put me into 3rd but knew that JD and and possibly Mat would come charging past at some point.  No matter: my mind was at ease enjoying the ride and playing in the mud.  I finished 4th but that might have been by default since an unlucky Eric Uren broke his chain right after passing me in an open field section.

The trail was so wet that it hardly got muddy.  I was soaked after the race but my Suzuki wasn’t as bad as I expected.  I washed it with a garden hose (thanks, Urens!), put in a new filter, sipped in some new Vesrah brake pads, flipped my rear tire around and called it race ready.

The only negative on the day, and it’s a biggie for me, was that Brandon Houts was on the starting line wearing a florescent yellow WIXC tee shirt over his riding gear.  I interpret that as a statement against AMA District 16.  That’s disappointing to me.  Woods riding and racing  in WI is not as strong as it could be.  We need to work together keep land open and land owners interested in holding events.  The current divide between WIXC and D16 is a reality but it doesn’t need to be pushed farther apart than it is already.  I don’t claim to know everything that has happened between WIXC and D16 to make it so that we don’t have one strong race series here in WI but I believe woods racing would be better off if we were working together.  Brandon, I think you did the wrong thing by wearing that shirt the way you did.

On day two of the double header the weather had cleared and the course was drying fast.  We did nearly the same loop as day one so the variable was learning how the grip had changed.  I entered the woods in third position with Mat behind me, Eric and JD in front of me. JD faltered in a slick rock section then Eric stalled in a tight turn so I lead for a while until I stalled and Mat rode past me.  JD eventually hunted me down and put lots of time into me.  JD eventually caught Mat and they diced it out until the final few minutes with JD taking the win.

The grassy fields didn’t have the grip I expected them to have so I was timid on those for a few laps.  The woods had such good grip that my 450 was a handful.  The more tired I got the harder it was to meter the throttle and the easier it was for me to shoot off into the woods or take the crappy line.  I spent a full lap at 60% pace just trying to get some strength back in my hands and learn more about the grip level.  Then I had moments of brilliance in the woods but by that time there was no way I would catch the front guys.  I considered it a small feat just to finish without any huge tumbles with how poorly I was riding in the woods.

I suspect I’d do better on an RM-Z250 but I’ve really enjoyed riding a different, more powerful bike lately.  I just need to ride it a lot more to get stronger so I can keep up with the front guys for longer.

Dyracuse is next then the humdinger finale at the GNCC Ironman.  Those races should be good as long as I get some ride time in between now and then.

While I haven’t ridden my RM-Z Suzukis as much as I have wanted to this summer, the days that I have ridden have been epic. This past week Joe and I rode with the Trek World Racing pro downhill guys at Dyracuse. It was a really good day of riding motos with professional athletes and friends.

It took me a few late nights to prep all three of my bikes. One of the 250s needed the engine installed and the other 250 and the 450 needed routine maintenance, tires mounted and practice plastic installed. It’s a lot of work to keep three bikes up and running!

I contacted Jon Sonnenberg at the town of Rome prior to our arrival and got permission to film and video our day on the bikes. I figured the town might be sensitive to us showing up with a film crew so I asked permission. The TWR team almost always travels with a film crew. Trek likes to document the team’s travel and race events and our day at Dyracuse would be no exception. The video has not been edited yet but I’ll be sure to post a link as soon as it is.

Dyracuse grooms their sandy motocross track on Wednesdays. The conditions were magical. We went through all the gas we brought. There were multiple lap battles going on all afternoon. I had to stop and dump the sand out of my helmet and swap goggles more than once that day. Super fun.

During one stop I smelled radiator fluid but I dismissed it as just hot bikes. The sand is hard on engines. Hours later one of my 250s stalled on the trail and would not restart. When we took a closer look we learned that a radiator hose had come loose. It may have been that I failed to tighten it or that the hose clamp was at fault. The clamp had signs of damage and wouldn’t fully tighten. Either way, something in the top end is damaged to the point of no return. We’ll fix her up and get it back on the trail ASAP!

Rob and John Parkin (of Orpheus Productions) make up the TWR film crew. They deserve credit for all of these photos. Thanks guys!

The Vesrah rig and Justin Leov prep for the ride.

Andrew Neethling is so excited to ride he's forgotten some of his gear. And check out the line up of Vesrah Suzukis!

Neko Mulally eyes up his steed.

Dyracuse's Jon Sonnenberg checks in with our crew before the ride. The crew from Rome, WI was super helpful and helped make for a great day of riding!

Needles checks in with Rob Parkin.

17 year old Neko held off Vet rider Joe V for several laps. The outcome? Smiley, sand covered faces.

(picture says it all)

Normally I look like a squid on a motorcycle but I seem to have my act in gear here. I love my RM-Z450.

Downhill riders can ride motos. Period.

Juzo vs Needles battles happened all day long. Needles puts some sand in Justin's lap in this shot but I bet the favor was returned in the next turn.

The SX track was also a big hit with the TWR gang. Needles handled this kicker nicely.

Needles gets the last bit of water out of the portable shower at the end of a great day of riding.

I work for Trek Bicycle.  We sponsor a mountain bike team named Trek World Racing.  Half the team is cross country mountain bike racers and the other half are downhill mountain bike racers.  The DH portion of the team is coming to Trek this week for a visit and download about their race bicycles.

On Wednesday, I’ve scheduled a day of moto riding with the DH riders.  They all ride motos in their off season so it will be familiar to them.  Dyracuse is the venue.

The TWR team almost always travels with a pair of videographers that make video episodes of team happenings.  Here’s an example. I’m hoping that we will have a video of us all riding together at some point.

The town of Rome, WI manages the Dyracuse.  They know we are coming because I called to ask permission to make a video on their property.  All good.  The local paper heard we are coming and they might show up to take photos and do an interview.  Cool.

I prepped both of my RM-Z250 bikes and my 450 for the day.  Joe has both of his 25o’s up and running so we should be covered.  Everyone will have their own bike to ride.  Woohoo!  Looking forward to it.

Teammate Joe V and I hit a “real” hare scramble race this past weekend.  I’ll get to the “real” aspect later but what I really want to dive into were the reality checks I experienced the day of the race.

The Vesrah Suzuki Offroad compound

I lined up on the AA row at the combined D17 and D16 event.  It’s given that the farther south you go from Madison, WI, the faster the hare scramble and enduro riders get.  Illinois has some fast guys and a deep field of racers.  There were 30 riders on our row and only five of us were from up north.

Before the race started I had look at the course and learned that the woods in IL are dense, hot and endless.  The trail felt tight on my mountain bike.  The only place to pass (if you stayed between the arrows) was on the 2.5 minutes of motocross track you saw each lap.  It seemed a little extreme to me.

When I went to set up my bike for the race I learned that the Tubliss system in my rear wheel had failed.  The bead on the inner tire had rusted, then broke, then burst the inner tube. I’m a little peeved at this since I only use the Tubliss set up on race day and I nearly always take it apart between races so it gets a rest.  I should give Tubliss a call to share my experience.

That's Mark lending a hand before the race. Last minute tire issues.

Vesrah Suzuki’s Mark Junge came to watch Joe and me race.  He didn’t know he was going to be recruited to help change tires before the race.  But after we got that sorted out I headed to the start and sat in the sun with 100 other riders while we waited for the gun to sound off.

Byron’s terrain and the guy laying out the course have reputations for making tight trails so I opted to ride my RM-Z250 and not the 450.  Glad I did that.  I got a spectacular start and entered turn 2 next to another rider at the front of the group.  By the time we left the MX track I was 3rd in line and stoked to be in front of the other D16 riders.  I needed the points on those guys and the narrow trail would make it tough for them to get to the front with me.

Some pre-race banter between Joe V and me.

The guy leading checked out and the guy in front of me was almost holding me up.  I could hear several bikes very close behind me and after only a few minutes in the tight woods could hear some of those guys hooting and hollering.  They weren’t mad but more trying to put pressure on by being vocal.  I blocked it out the best I could by focusing on the trail, keeping my eyes forward and my elbows up.

Thinking about where I'm going to go as we enter turn 1.

13 minutes later we came around to the MX track for the first time and some of those guys squirted by me as fast as they could.  I dropped from 3rd to 5th.  I held my own on the next lap then lost places on the third lap when I stalled it on a log crossing. JD and Matt both got by me that lap.  Shortcut lines started to appear, many of them taking several seconds off each lap.  I tried hard to remember where the good lines were because I knew the leaders were using all the short cuts and I was tired of being passed by riders that took the short way through the woods.

I’m a top ten rider at bigger regional events when I race in the AA group.  When I bring my A game, I can ride close to the front but not at the front.  I think this is respectable since most of the guys I’m racing are 15 years younger than me.  They have better skills, rubber bones, possibly fewer work and family responsibilities.  If I want to win, which is sometimes nice but is not the driving factor behind my racing, I could race in the 40+ group.  But if I do that I might make enemies because I am fast enough to often put that group a lap down.  So, when I line up with the fast guys, I should expect to be beaten and be a gracious loser when it happens.  When I choose to race with the 40+ group, I may make enemies and I may not feel very good about showing up with my A game.

Rounding a bend in the Byron woods tunnel

In the end I was 9th.  I strongly disagree with the manual scoring system that some events have but I’ll leave my comments at that.  A top 10 finish in a field of guys that strong and deep was satisfying, for sure.  But losing points to JD and Matt was a bummer. I’m just not as comfy in the tight woods as those guys are.

Which brings me to my last point: the “real” hare scramble race.  Ryan Moss was the guy laying out the course.  He’s a veteran enduro rider.  While I’ve never done an enduro to know for myself, I get the impression that most enduro events in the midwest make good use of tight woods.

During the race I tossed my hydration pack into the woods and after the race I went to get it.  Ryan was riding sweep and stopped to see if I was okay.  He asked me if I liked the course and I said it sucked.  But, I followed that up with that I thought it was challenging and it reinforced my knowing that I need to work on riding in tight woods if I want to be better.  Ryan said that most hare scramble events used to be more like Byron and less like what we are used to in D16.  I can see that.  It seems that GNCC races have grown so big that the course have to be freeway-wide to accommodate the crowds.  D16 races are rarely as tight as Byron.  If they were we’d have even fewer riders than we do because most of us don’t ride tight woods often enough to get good at it.  I’d get frustrated with being in 2nd gear all race, every race.

A huge job well done to JD for his win in Bryon.  He said we should show these Illinois boys that we can ride fast too when I saw him before the start.  I did not but he sure as hell did.  Congrats, JD!

And thanks to John for the great photos on this post.

I spent a hour doing laps at the tight woods loop near my house.  It poured rain the entire time.  While it was fun and a good skill builder, it destroyed the bike and pretty much destroyed the trail.

Oakley goggles are good but they only lasted 5 minutes in these conditions.

There's an RM-Z250 under there somewhere. It's peat so it won't take much to clean up.

Lucky for me my job sometimes puts me in some pretty cool situations.  Last week I was in Whistler, BC riding a Trek Session and this week I was in France riding a fleet of 2011 Trek mountain bikes.

The Trek Session is 38lbs of downhill fun.  It has 8+ inches of sophisticated suspension travel, hydraulic disc brakes, and relatively big tires so it behaves similar to a motorcycle.  And Whistler is the near perfect place to enjoy the Session.  A chairlift takes you to the top of the hill and you choose the kind of trail you want to take back down.  The trails range in difficulty from a mellow coast back down all the way up to 10 foot drops, 30 foot gaps, and 30mph, rutted descents.  The place is awesome.

I’ve been to Whistler twice now.  It’s a different kind of riding than I’m used to doing since almost all the bicycle riding I’ve ever done has me using clip-in pedals on road and cross country bikes.  On a Session you use platform pedals.  Whistler begs you to learn to jump up and over some pretty big terrain.  The bike can do far more than I’m capable of (just like the RM-Z450) so I really enjoy learning how to make the thing work for me.

One of the cool things about the Session is being able to make suspension adjustments quickly and without any tools.  Spring preload and compression and rebound settings can be changed just by spinning dials.  It’s pretty satisfying to be able to make setting changes that make an immediate, tangible difference in the middle of the trail.

My trip to France was for a 2011 Trek product launch.  Four different Trek mountain bike models were unveiled in front of 37 journalists that had been flown in from around the world.  Trek’s European office made the travel and hotel arrangements for everyone.  The venue was in the French Alps town of Chatel near the Portes du Soleil ride park.  I was flown in with other Trek employees to help relay technical information and innovations to the journalists.

I'm sitting in Switzerland about to head into France. The trail network cross the border several times during our rides.

There’s no better way to learn about the bikes than to ride them.  A local guide hired by Trek led all the rides.  On day one I joined a group of 20 journos on a Fuel EX ride that mixed some very steep and rocky climbs with a few rooty descents.  The loop took us about 5 hours to do but that includes several stops for photos and bike discussions.   It’s tough to find rolling single track in the Alps so we had a few journalists complaining about the steep climbs and descents.  The EX is a great all around mellow trail bike or even a good XC race bike.

Top of the world. Those are French Alps.

On day two I joined the Remedy ride.  The Remedy bike has more suspension travel than the EX and more relaxed geometry so it can tackle more technical terrain.  The beauty of the Remedy is that despite the 6 inches of travel, it still pedals well so you can actually enjoy the climbs before bombing the descents.  We were on the bikes for almost 6 hours because we discovered a ride park that suited the Remedy perfectly.  It was just too much fun to stop.

On the last day we all jumped on Scratch bikes.  Trek offers up two version of this bike – one with air springs and one with coil springs.  The air bike is slightly lighter than the coil bike but both are aimed a park riding and mellow downhill riding.  You can “lock out” the suspension on the air Scratch to optimize pedal efficiency.  The coil bike is active all the time.  The Portes du Soleil ride park has a bunch of trails perfect for Scratch bikes.  I rode with journalists and other Trek employees for about 7 hours doing run after run.  The jumps and turns at Portes du Soleil are not as mature as the ones in Whistler so you have to be on your toes.  Trails marked as easy had massive jumps or man-made structures that we far from being easy.  After a few runs we learned which trails were fun and which ones to avoid.

This is suspension guru Jose Gonzales doing a drop in the Portes du Soleil ride park. Pretty bitchen for a 50 year old guy to be willing and able to rip it up as well as Jose does. Chapeau!

Because I just spent the last two weeks riding almost every full suspension bike that Trek makes, I have a new understanding of how much work Trek engineers and product developers have put into making them work right.  Although each of the models I rode has been made for specific types of terrain, the suspension for each has been tuned to perfection.  All of the journalists I spoke with while in France all remarked on how well the bikes felt on the trail.

One aspect of the past two weeks has made a huge impression on me.  The groups of people I was riding with are all well into their 40′s.  The terrain we were riding and the length of the rides were pretty challenging.  I’ve been riding mountain bikes for close to 25 years and I’m 42.  I see no end in sight.  Places like Whistler and Portes du Soleil keep you young; I’m convinced.

I’m on my way home from France now and I’m anxious to get back on my RM-Z to try and apply some of the suspension tuning I learned while in Whistler and Portes du Soleil.  Most specifically I want to mess with the slow speed compression settings on the rear shock.  I’ll be sure to report back with my findings.

Gary Fisher was along for the ride, too. He was forced to ride 26" wheels and did a great job of keeping his thoughts to himself.

I went out on a limb yesterday and raced my RM-Z450 at a local District 16 hare scramble.  Hixton was the place.  Hixton is notorious for its clay soil, nasty ruts, and confusing trail network.

The risk was that I don’t have much time on the 450 so when it rained 6” in the days leading up to the event the chance of competing on a weighty, clay-laden bike in tight and twisty rutted trails was high.  Although I was happy with the suspension, the ergonomics, the bolt-on woods parts and all, the 450’s weight was what I feared would be the end of me.  The additional power of the 450 was in the back of my mind – and that it could wear me out if I got overly zealous – but I figured I could just turn the throttle less if I got too tired.  Heavy mud added to the weight of the bike was what worried me.

Reality set in on the lap I rode on my bicycle.  The forest floor was so soggy that I couldn’t ride my bike without sinking in and bogging down.  Portions of the motocross track were under water.  On the other hand, the sun was out and lots of open field and road sections were quickly drying out.

Pre race cleaness.

The AA row was a good one.  Ryan Moss and Brian Lenth came up from down south and three other riders from Illinois were there.  Speedy Pete and JD were there.  It was a quality field from where I was sitting.  My anxiety about getting a good start grew.  The 450 starts reliably in neutral but is hit and miss when in gear.  And it takes wallop to get the piston and valvetrain to do a lap before firing up.  Luckily it all worked out and I was 3^rd into the first turn.

I bumped my way into second before we entered the woods and realized I was talking to myself about how a stall or fall would be the end of all this work.  I have been focusing on making fewer small errors.  I recently read that Charlie Mullins has been doing the same thing inside his helmet and you can see his recent string of quality results because of the effort.  Stalling or dropping the 450 would cost me energy I did not want to spend.

A few turns into the woods the guy in front of me fell.  I scooted by and lead a train of riders that were all faster than me in the woods; I could hear them stacking up behind me.  Then I made a wrong turn and heard the riders behind me go the right way.  I cut through the woods to pick up the trail but had riders on my left and right all trying follow arrows that weren’t all that obvious.  We were mostly going the right direction but not really on the course.  I don’t know how many spots I lost because of my mistake.  Worse yet, and something that still confuses me, was that when I did get back on the established and obvious course, I was riding with A group riders.  I have no idea how that happened.

From there the race got spread out and we all found our own pace.  I was having a great time using the 450 power to get up and over stuff and I also enjoyed the heavier feel of the bike to plow through terrain.  The opening hour and half of the race was truly fun.  I kept trying to keep from making mistakes (but I did stall 3 times during the race) and I think that having that goal in mind helped me ride a steady race.

The timing equipment was not working so I didn’t know what place I was in.  I think we did 12 laps total.  I caught JD on about lap 9.  I rolled up on him so fast that I thought he was having a problem or that he might have been a lap down but later learned he was in a funk and had a slow lap.  I tailed him for a while until he fell and l got by then I messed up and he got by me again.  I was having a tough time riding close to JD because we ride so differently.  I was trying to ride smooth and carry speed and he is an on and off the gas guy.  I lost my rhythm by following him too closely and ultimately make a mistake that caused me to lose contact.

At about that same time I started to feel the effects of the heavy bike.  The mud had added several pounds by then.  I started to go into get-to-the-finish-alive mode and had at least one full lap of riding much slower than I had been racing.  By then the ruts were long and deep in several places.  The power of the 450 always got me through – something that I never could manage on the RM or RM-Z250 – so I’m super stoked with learning about that.  Momentum goes a long way with getting through ruts but having the power to give me an extra boost of speed was great.

I finished 3^rd behind Brian Lenth and JD.  That may or may not be the case since the timing wasn’t working and the results were in question for a while after the finish.  Others I spoke with after the race were as confused by the same opening lap chaos that I was but no one had answers for what happened.  No matter – it is what it is.

Big thanks to Matt Herrington for sacrificing his race day to help make the course a success.  Sorry we didn’t get to ride the course he laid out before the rains came.

The 450 isn’t a big bike in size or shape.  It has a lot of GO when you ask it to go.  That GO is manageable and I like it.  The weight is what I felt in the race yesterday and it’s what is making me so sore today.  I bet I could ride that thing a few days in a row and be fine with it.  As it is, I have just over 5 hours on it and 2 of those hours were racing.  I’ll get better on it.  Late in the race I projected having a difficult time getting the bike up on the stand and promised myself that if I could get it up there after the race, I would race it again someday.  I did get it up but it took everything I had left to do it.  Joe can attest to my empty state of mind and body while we packed up and drove home.  I was finished.

Post race mess. And I entirely fatigued.

I’m not abandoning the 250 and I may have to take both bikes with me when Joe and I go to races.  Then, no matter the weather or terrain, I’ll have the right tool for the task.  Stay tuned.

Two new topics today – the van got a facelift and I’ve been putting time on a 2009 RM-Z450.

The van was a perk that AJ at Victory Circle Graphix helped us out with.  Joe and I have often talked about how to grow our presence at races and on the .www and this was one of the ways we discussed.  We might have pushed to do it for our 2008 GNCC series adventure had we thought the bikes would remain in the van.  Ultimately we feared the advertising would draw the wrong kind of people and we’d wake up at some far away hotel with sprung doors and no bikes, or worse yet, no van and no bikes.

My wife thinks I’ve totally lost it.  Now I’m advertising that I spend tons of time and money on the events that suggest I’m wallowing in my adolescence.  But I’m super stoked with it.  Thanks, AJ!

Some of my favorite things.

And the 450.  It’s entirely possible that I’m aimlessly wandering through this whole motorcycle race experience searching for something that’s not there – the perfect set up.  I’ve been on six different machines in six years.  Two of these machines, this 450 included, are bikes that I probably already had dismissed as too fringe for me to ride competitively in a regional off-road series.  Remember my RM144 project bike?  That was the one that had a modified cylinder, pipe, flywheel, and suspension in an effort to give me the lightest woods weapon possible.  Ended up that I can’t ride an engine that small.  I’m too heavy and I never learned to ride a bike in the upper revs the way that bike had to be ridden.  While it was fun to ride, it was not fast for me.

The 450 is on the opposing end of the chart.  It’s big, heavy and powerful.  I definitely had no place for a bike like this in my off-road racing stable just a few months ago.  The RM-Z250 did it all for me – turned like a champ, has decent power, and is reasonably light and flickable.  But at these few opening rounds of the District 16 Hare Scramble series I’ve found myself wanting a little more poop.  I’ve needed more speed on the straights and needed more thrust to get me up the hills.  That translates into me thinking I need more power.

When I dissect what it takes to go fast in the woods it boils down to just a few things: the ability to process everything that’s coming at you very quickly and some combination of physiological abilities.  The quick processing thing comes naturally for the fastest riders.  It’s instinct; they don’t spend anytime or energy processing stuff like balance, throttle control, where to look on the trail.  To be on the higher level physiologically you’d have a bigger and more refined capacity than the rest of us.  You can do more work, more efficiently.  Put fast processing speed and a gifted body together and you get Josh Strang.

I don’t have the natural instincts that the faster, more precise riders do.  Most of what I do on the trail happens like this: I’m in 3rd gear weaving thru the woods, there is dirt under me and trees around me. Hey look, a big log.  Hmmm. Should I go around or over?  Darn – too late, guess I’m going over.  Hope this thing starts when I remount.

Okay, that leads me to why I like the 450, and in case you were wondering, I REALLY like the 450.  While it is heavier than all of the bikes I have ridden previously, it has super friendly power (in my opinion – Joe might disagree with me here because he felt it was ferocious).  If you want it to creep along, it will.  If you want leap up and over a puddle, rock, log or mound, it will.

This is my first experience with a computer-controlled fuel system.  I suspect I’ve joined the masses that are all saying, “how did we get along without it!?”  It really is magical in terms of immediate throttle response, linear power delivery and, clean, clean jetting.  Thanks to Shane Nalley at FMF Suzuki for the CPU mapping!

I less than three hours of ride time on the 450 but here’s what I think.  The weight it is carrying over the 250 is noticeable at all speeds but in different ways.  At low speed – one foot off the peg, body off the center of the bike, reefing on the bars to place the bike somewhere – the 450 is top heavy.  I find that I need to be more careful about where my weight is on the bike at slow speeds because it takes on a mind of its own that is hard to coax back into shape if I get out of sorts.  At higher speeds the weight becomes your friend by creating stability. The bike plows thru trail trash and small whoops rather than being bounced or deflected (Some of this could be a fresh tune on a killer Factory Connection set up.  Thanks FC!).  The 450 feels more settled at speed than the 250 does.

And the POWER.  I might be faster on the 450 just because I love feeling all that acceleration.  Every time I can see daylight I grab a handful and ride along in bliss.

But there are bigger caveats I need to acknowledge.  No matter the machine, I still make mistakes that cost me time.  Stalling. Not getting by lappers fast enough. Trying too hard.  I have to eliminate or at least significantly reduce the number of errors I make in order to capitalize on the benefits I see in the 450.  That all starts now.

The time I have on the 450 is all at Dyracuse.  I’m so familiar with the terrain there that its not that great for bringing demons to the surface. I need to spend some time at Homann’s riding in super tight woods to get a better understanding of low speed 450 challenges.  With luck that will happen this next week and with more luck I’ll be racing the 450 at Hixton next weekend.  Woohoo!

I know it’s totally lame to post without photos when you’re trying to share a cool experience but bear with me.  I feel bad enough for not taking a single photo and I don’t need to be reminded that most people visit our blog only look to at the pictures.

Last Wednesday I met up with three of the professional downhill riders that Trek sponsors.  They were in New York doing a few US national downhill events as well as doing a tire test with Trek engineers.  It’s my job to know what’s up with the equipment Trek’s sponsored athletes ride so I took the opportunity to pay the riders a visit.

I wasn’t able to get to the tire test in time but I did manage to meet up with the riders when they first arrived at a race venue and were doing their course inspection.  The pros take the time to walk the course top to bottom and do a pretty thorough job of looking at every rock, root, turn, jump and anything else that they will be riding down when its time for practice, qualifying and racing.  It was good to walk with them and observe their thought process and watch their eyes as they mapped out possible lines and problem spots.  It was similar to what Joe and I do when we walk or bike a lap at a hare scramble but the DH riders are far more particular with line choice.  They quickly identified sections of the course that would be critical to get right and they spent several minutes walking up and down those sections thinking about how much speed they would need to carry and where the lines would develop and deteriorate and exactly where to put their tires while riding.  It was cool to see them go through the motions like that.

The bigger personal experience I had was riding a Trek Session downhill bike while I was there.  The race was held at Diablo Mountain in Vernon, NJ.  Diablo has a developed trail system that offers up diverse trails all serviced by a chairlift.  It’s just like skiing where you buy a lift ticket, jump on the lift and get yourself back to the bottom of the hill somehow.

It was my maiden voyage on this Session so it took a few runs to get it sorted out.  The fork had come from Trek’s west coast test group and was set up for someone else.  And the fork tube height has a huge range of adjustment but no ideal starting point that I was aware of.  The rear shock needed the sag set and rebound messed with.  After each run I’d make small adjustments until the bike felt more and more comfortable.  Then I stopped tuning and tried to get my head around the DH experience.

Big DH bikes are just like motos yet radically different at the same time.  They’re similar in that there are lots of adjustments that can be made and you have to trust that the suspension can do a ton of work for you (as long as you’ve taken the time to get it set up correctly).  To get the most out of a DH bike you have to stand on it like a moto: be aggressive, look up, react quickly, pay attention and recognize that the consequences of falling will be dire.

But DH bikes are dissimilar, too.  There’s no throttle to get you up and over something or out of trouble.  You have to carry speed everywhere – not only to get over stuff but just to stay upright.  And because there’s no propulsion when you aren’t pedaling, staying balanced on the bike is key.  If you lose your balance you have to make corrections that totally kill your momentum.  The mass and mass’ location are also very different.  The rider is the majority of the mass on a bike, the bike is the mass on a moto.  Because of this the geometry on a DH bike is super relaxed to help keep your center of gravity in the right place.  The relaxed geometry has a massive affect on how the bike handles, especially at slow speeds where the bike becomes sluggish and heavy feeling.

Anyhow, once I got the suspension and geometry settings where I could comfortably ride them, I set out to explore the mountain.  There were trails with 20 feet table top jumps that you could sail through a perfect ramp to ramp arc if you hit it just so.  There were steep trails littered with bowling ball-sized rocks that forced you to hang off the back of the bike and try like mad to keep up your speed and not let the front wheel fall into any gaps.  A few trails had skinny, manmade trellis bridges to ride across.  If you lost your nerve in the middle of a few of those you’d fall 10 feet to a garden of rocks.  Pretty sketchy but I signed the release and knew what I was getting into.

I did 11, ten minute runs before my rear brake crapped out and I had to call it quits.  Air in the line didn’t make it out when I set the bike up, evidently.  I was pretty beat afterwards but I could have done a few more runs.  A Session weighs 38 lbs so it’s not easy to horse around for hours on end.

Again, I wish I had taken time to snap some photos, but I didn’t.  Next time!

I’m short on time this week because of a busy work schedule but here’s the gist of my race experience this past weekend:
•    Pearson, WI is four hours north of where I live in WI. It’s pretty much the great wild north but not quite as far away. I felt like I was in the middle of Canada somewhere.  Joe couldn’t make the trip because of his busy work schedule so it was up to me to wave the Vesrah Suzuki Offroad flag in Pearson.

•    Actually, lots of Canada made its way to Pearson a long time ago by way of ice age glaciers.  The bazillion of watermelon-sized rocks is debris dragged down from Canada.

•    Pearson is famous around here for hosting a solid D16 Enduro event.  The hare scramble I did on Saturday was all I had time for but there was an Enduro planned for Sunday.  The parking lot had lots of vehicles I had never seen before and I caught lappers with license plates on their bikes.  I assume they were the Enduro crowd I’ve never spent time with.  Someday I will because Enduro racing looks like a good time.

•    The trails in Pearson are narrow but have great flow.  Somehow the tight spots aren’t slow there.  My pre-race observation lap on my mountain bike had me thinking the race would be slow and frustrating but it was actually fast and lots of fun.

•    I finally managed to get a good start and entered the first woods section behind series points leader Mat Herrington.  This was the perfect scenario for me: watch, learn, make a plan.  But it wasn’t 10 seconds into that woods section that I clipped a tree and landed sideways in the trail.  My bike stalled and I had the remainder of the AA group passing me however they could just to get by.  To be fair, the AA field at Pearson was thin and it was only Mat, John Strangfeld, Speedy Pete Laubmeier and me racing against each other.  John and Pete take this racing stuff much lighter than Mat and me so there’s getting to be a bit of tension between the guys that are trying hard and the guys that are fast and skilled but racing for the fun of it.

•    I chased John down pretty easily so I started looking for a place to get by but that was impossible.  He’s fast and the trail was narrow and too new to me to try anything risky.  I followed him for the entire first lap then got by right before we went back into the opening tight woods.  Like a total squid, I clipped the same damn tree and stopped sideways in the trail AGAIN.  I have to quit making such stupid mistakes if I want to get any sleep at night.

•    I got going and planned to catch Pete at some point.  I figured he would tire out.  Mat was the one I was worried about.  He’s been fast and has a lot of confidence from his GNCC racing and recent D16 results.  If I wanted to win I needed Mat to have bad luck or I needed to ride mistake-free for the remainder of the race.

•    The trail was 70% tight woods with lots of attention-grabbing stuff like trees at odd angles,  wide trenches that would snag your feet and pegs, and round rocks that were covered with slippery dirt and moss.  The remaining 30% of the loop was scary fast logging road with a single beat-in line that was whooped out. I increased the damping on my GPR-4 damper about half way through the race because the soft suspension I loved in the woods was dangerous in the 5th gear whooped out ruts.

•    More on those rocks.  They were round and buried in the dirt so you tend to deflect off of them.  I found it was best to stay relaxed and let the bike bounce around a little rather than force the bike in a specific direction. This ride loose and hope technique worked pretty well for me and my speed and confidence gradually increased as the race went on.

•    My RM-Z250 was awesome. The Factory Connection settings gave me loads of confidence on the slick rocks and flowy trail.  The only issue I had was missing my jetting a little and I had a slight bog / hesitation when I whacked open the throttle too fast.  It didn’t cost me any time but it was distracting.

•    There was an open field just before the scoring tent where we zigzagged back and forth.  I could see if I had made up time on Mat every time we entered that field.  Some laps I had closed in on him and some laps he had stretched it out.  More than once I felt like I had put in a stellar lap and would come to the field and see that Mat had put time on me.  That was frustrating and it somehow made me try harder.  I have always had a tough time with lappers because I don’t like to push them out of the way.  It’s that I wasn’t getting by lappers fast enough that was costing me time, I think.

•    Finally, late in the race I started to take time out of Mat.  On what I thought was going to be our last lap I was seeing his dust on the trail and getting cheered on by spectators who were saying he was just in front of me.  On a road section with a high speed chicane I carried a little too much speed and lost the rear end.  I slid sideways down the trail and couldn’t get the bike back under me before lowsiding in a plume of dust.  The bike was still running so I picked it up, revved it hard, dumped the clutch and spun the bike around the right direction. But when I leaped on to go it stalled.  It was in 4th gear.

•    I figured that was the end of my race and that 2nd place was as good as I would do.  It took me a few minutes to get back up to speed and I knew I was losing time to Mat while I sorted my self out.  I was kicking my self for making such a silly mistake when catching Mat was within my reach.

•    When we came around we were told to do one more lap.  Wow! A second chance.  I put my head down and charged like mad.  I strung together every fast bit of trail I could and then, halfway through the lap, I caught Mat.  Unfortunately we had already ridden through most of the sections that allowed a safe pass so I was forced to ride behind him and hope for a mistake.  We caught a lapper that let him by but not me and that was enough to let Mat get a gap before we got back to the grassy zigzags before the scoring tent.  I finished 1 second behind Mat.

•    Congrats to Mat on his results and solid race.

•    I’m super stoked with my speed and endurance.  My faster laps came at the end of the race.  I need to work on my early race speed and consistency.  No more dumb errors.

•    Hixton is next.  Woohoo!