This was a quick little spin that Sara and I did from Bowie to the Chesapeake. The ride was 40miles, but it was hot out there. This was a PPTC Tandem ride, but we were not the same speed as the other tandems so we ended up riding by ourselves most of the ride. I think with this ride we figured out Sara's fit issues with the Tandem and it was her first ride with clip less shoes. Hopefully there will be more tandem rides in the future.
8/2/08
First Good Tandem Ride
7/26/08
OMGWTF -08'
This bastard of a ride I did last year with Bruce, Ryan, and Mark, came back to crush me this year. I had done an actual evite for the ride to make sure people knew about it, and put it on their calendars. The ride was a big test for me to see if I was going to do Mountain Momma, and the SM100. Well the verdict is no...... The group consisted of 3 bike lane riders, 2 DCMTB's and like 4-5 bike doctor boys. so I think around 12 people total. We started out, at a conversational pace, and then the hamburg climb came to get us. My game plan was to go at my own rhythm, and see what happened. The climbing wasn't the issue as much as the riding in between the climbs. The bike doctor guys weren't riding hard but just riding, and I think last year we cruised between climbs. Well I had one road not exist for me, so that was annoying but for the most part people seemed to enjoy themselves. Around 25miles in Jud's computer fell off and some of the guys went back and helped him look for it. Then the group I was with I waited for Bruce and Ryan at a turn and then gave them directions to shortcut back. I think rode to catch up with the group, but never saw them again. I ended up doing 30miles of the ride solo. Which was ok with me cause I could go the pace I wanted to go. I also cut out the last two climbs, but in doing my"shortcut" I went up a climb that was pretty tough and then did like a 1+ decent on a heavy gravel road that had a steep gradient where I had to go real slow with the washboards. My legs cramped, but I was able to myself together. I finally made it back to the car with 72miles for the day. I am thinking next year I will maybe do part of the ride and try to combine it with Wild and Wonderfull and make it a ride with some climbs, but more manageable.
7/16/08
Assateague 08' Spin Spin!
I did my yearly ritual Assateague Beach weekend. I end up doing some riding there, while I visit the beach. This year the weather was very nice compared to last year's trip. I rode up in the Element with the Tandem and 3 people and all our beach stuff. I also had two bikes on the hitch rack. I got dropped off at Hebron again and left from there to go to the beach. The route I take is not the most direct but, by going to the town of Snow Hill I know I have a place for a pitstop. Well last year my 72 miles turned into an 80+ mile journey. This year I was determined for that not to happen. The ride started off with me getting out of Hebron going to the small ferry. The ferry ride is fun not sure why they don't have a bridge. I did well until the turn right on SeaTick it wasn't there, but I knew from doing the ride last year that I was going the wrong way. Now in doing this ride, you have to imagine that I have a squeak in my bike, I now know that it is coming from my wheels. So the whole 75 miles I am hearing a noise on all the down strokes when I am pedaling. I Finally get to the rest stop, and the place where I stopped last year, has not cleaned their Port-a-John in a long time so I got out of there quick. I found a Chinese take-out place that sold sodas. I saw they had a bathroom-jackpot! So I went in used the bathroom and then filled my water bottles, and then bought a Mountain Dew from the cooler in the Chinese take out place. I then traveled on to the shore, and hit some massive headwind. I was doing a pretty good avg. speed around 19.7, but with the trolling around Snow Hill my avg. went down. After I went down by the shore I headed up to Berlin, around this point my undercarriage was not feeling great so I would stand out of the saddle to relieve the pressure. I finally got to the Verrazono bridge that goes to Assateague. The campsite was farther than I thought. I finally got to the campsite around 7pm or so.
Some things I remembered/learned on the ride:
Flat road riding has so much spinning!
Flat road riding is really about Leg strength.
7/1/08
Lost River Ride 90miles 8800ft
I was going to do the 12 hours of Cranky Monkey, but a broken bike and the fact I was getting over a sinus infection changed my plans. I saw this ride on the PPTC calendar, and it interested me greatly. I have ridden here some on my mountain bike, and knew there were some big climbs along the route. I found out that Jonathan and Chris would be doing the ride, so I teamed up with Chris to carpool out there. Chris and I got an early start and got to the ride start where there were more people (15+) doing the ride. We started at Columbia Furnace and then went over Wolf Gap. I rode the climb a little slower than the really fast people, so I ended up solo behind them. I had planned this ride to be a long, steady ride. The people in front were pace lining and I could have joined them, but it was going to be a long day in the saddle and I didn't want to blow up. On the way down, Chris caught up with me, and he seemed like he wanted to catch the others. So we took some pulls, and then I asked him if he wanted to catch them again, and brought up the speed and caught the lead group. We were with them for a bit, but then it started to get fast again. I let them go and Chris stayed with me. We did another climb that was on the opposite side of the mountain (WV) of the Liberty Furnace ride. The weather started turning bad, and as we climbed I enjoyed the drizzle. On the way down, I kept it slow so that I wouldn't crash on the wet roads. At the Lost River Store rest stop, we met up with the front group. Jonathan decided to ride with Chris and I, which I was happy about. After the stop, the weather was starting to clear. We rode some nice country roads that had elevation gain that wasn't one climb, but a bunch of rollers going up. Jonathan and I would climb together with Chris following, and we would ride together on the downhills and flats. I won the Mountain KOM points doing a cheeky little move on Jonathan. Chris surprised us all at the VA/WV state line sprint. We passed a rest stop, since the next bigger one was only another 10 miles. My legs were really starting to lock up before the rest stop. We pace lined to the rest stop, and refueled for a long charge to the finish. Joyce said the last part was the hardest. I did agree with her, since we basically rode the ridgeline going up and down these rollers that were mostly going up. Chris fell off the back, and I ended up going on ahead in front of Jonathan. I felt good, and found I still had some hamstring strength, but my quads were pretty dead. I ended up taking a wrong turn, adding like 700 ft. of climbing and 5 miles. After going back the right way I was totally spent—just wanting to get back. The last small steep climb, I planned to ride strong, but my leg cramped, so I limped to the finish. I ended up finishing a bit after Jonathan and Chris. Was a great ride—should help my endurance for future rides.
6/23/08
Mid-Atlantic Cup Rolls On...
After three events and Only two more events left the competition for second place is tight and the first place spot is still within reach. The scoring was modified to have all competing squads on each of the teams. So for Big Bear the scoring was any squads over-all placing, not recognizing what category they raced. The question will be who is racing these next events since only the top 4 scores are used for each team.
12 Hours of Cranky Monkey- June 28th
18 Hours of Scouts Honor- August 15-16
Series Points awarded:
Mid-Atlantic Cup Total Series Points(top 4 scores out of 5 races):
DCMTB/CITYBIKES 725
GRIPPED FILMS/KENDA 455
THE BIKE LANE 430
PEDAL SHOP 190
24 hours of Big Bear:
GrippedFilms\Kenda 250
DCMTB\CityBikes 225
BikeLane 205
- 12 hours of Lodi
Team DCMTB/CityBikes got full points being the only team that made this race. Showing that participation can get you places.
-24 hours of Big Bear
The Gripped Films/Kenda folks stepped and took the Top spot at this race with the DCMTB/CityBikes taking the number two spot, and the top spot for the second placing teams. Bike Lane had a solid showing with their two teams as well. Check out the Website Mid-Atlantic Cup for information about the cup.
Big Bear Break Down:
-Hightest placed squads in each team
MAEC RaceOverAll Team Laps Time
1 12 GFK Racing (M Exp) 16 (12:01:33)
2 13 DCMTB/City Bikes/Continuum Solar (M Vet) 16 (12:41:43)
3 52 Flagellomania (BikeLane) (5 Coed) 14 (14:05:42)
-2nd Hightest placed squads in each team
1b 20 DCMTB/City Bikes - Squadra Intossica (J Fun) 16 (13:19:27)
2b 67 Gripped Films / Kenda - GFK 5 (5 Coed) 13 (13:21:37)
3b 89 Dressed All Over & Zesty Mordant(BikeLane) (5 Coed) 11 (09:38:58)
Points--
24 Hours of Big Bear:
1 GFK Racing (M Exp) 500
2 DCMTB/City Bikes/Continuum Solar (M Vet) 400
3 Flagellomania (BikeLane) (5 Coed) 320
-2nd Hightest placed squads in each team
1b DCMTB/City Bikes - Squadra Intossica (J Fun) 250
2b Gripped Films / Kenda - GFK 5 (5 Coed) 200
3b Dressed All Over & Zesty(BikeLane) (5 Coed) 160
Totals:
GrippedFilms\Kenda 700
DCMTB\CityBikes 650
BikeLane 480
Series Points awarded:
GrippedFilms\Kenda 250
DCMTB\CityBikes 225
BikeLane 205
Total Series Points:
DCMTB/CITYBIKES 725
GRIPPED FILMS/KENDA 455
THE BIKE LANE 430
PEDAL SHOP 190
6/16/08
Big Bear 08'
Short version: worst endurance relay race I have ever done. Long version below…
Well, I went up to Big Bear, West Virginia with Kent, Chris, and Sara. We got there around 4 or 5 pm and set up camp a bit away from the start/finish but with some shade, which we thought would be needed over the weekend. We went and did a pre-ride, and it was good to be on the trail. We started about 3 miles in and ended up doing 11 miles--more then I wanted to do, but oh well. The trail was muddy in parts, then quite rideable in others. That night, people made some good meat to eat along with some asparagus.
We had decided that Matty would do the first lap since he has been riding well and we knew he would rock it. Matty went out, and I was the second man to go. I started off charged up and passed Steve Schwartz, was rocking it, and then hit the first mud/swamp area. I had not pre-ridden this part and BAM! I went into a ditch I didn't see and did an endo over the bars. My bar hit my leg and that did the most damage. I raced the rest of the lap, and my gears were still mis-shifting a little, but I ended up coming in at 1:18. Our team then had Mike at 1:18 like me and Joe at 1:22. So going into my second lap, I was committed to riding smoother. I didn't have the wreck I had before, but I could really feel my back start to hurt the last half of the course where the mud and hills zapped your energy. I came in feeling good about the lap, but found out my time was a 1:24, so was a little upset that I didn't pull a great lap. Matty pulled a fast one at like 1:15 I think. Mike did pretty well, and Joe had some light issues and did a 1:54 or something. So I was a little bummed about our placing at that moment, but was committed to having fun at the race.
So I started my night lap, and I ran the mud bog section (it was faster) and tried standing for all the climbing in the first part of the course to save my back. I got to the down hill stuff and I was really rockin' it for me. I then got to the fast downhill, and I was actually talking to myself out loud, “Darren keep it smooth” and that kind of stuff. So I did really well on the downhill and then in this muddy switchback, I went down. Wasn't a crazy crash but added to the bruise total on the body. I was then riding the longer uphill, and then the downhill to the stream crossing to the muddy slow uphill. Well, I heard a pop, and then my rear tire started rubbing. I thought I had broken a spoke, so thought I might need to adjust my wheel in the dropout. Well, after several on the bike off the bike tries, I finally see in the dark that I have broken my rear chain stay. I was at mile 7 and knew I had 5+ miles to run/walk out. This was different from last year when I lost my derailleur. With that issue I could still ride my bike, especially on the downhills. Here every time I got on the bike, the tire would rub hard. So I was going to have to do a 5 mile run to get the lap done. I started off at a good pace around 5mph and I did that for about a mile and a half. I was then slowing down. So I kept on pushing the bike and running where I could. Funny thing was when I was going up the big climb I didn't see anyone for like 15 minutes. Also, walking up the climb I saw how steep it was and was surprised that I had ridden it the previous two times. Another issue I was having was that with my upper body being so weak, my triceps were hurting from pushing the bike. I would switch sides to lessen the pain, but it was still not the best. Well, I ran in doing a 2:15 lap, which was pretty good considering. Mike did a non-spectacular lap, and I went to bed saying I was done. I woke up to find that Mike didn't want to do another lap, and I had said I would do one if the team would do another. Well, we threw in the towel after Matt's 9 am ride.
The DCMTB Vet team kept their stuff together to do a great ride and finish 2nd Vet for the second year in a row. The team with JJ, Jonathan, Tom, and Lynne rocked the Just for Fun class, cause they were not able to race expert. Next year for Big Bear I vow will not be like this year. I will ether be totally ready to crush it, or I will ride more of a casual ride.
6/5/08
Big Bear Comes.....
This will be my 6th Granny Gear Race, and my 3rd Big Bear. I love the course at Big Bear, but it is not the best for me. I started racing expert last year, so this will be my first Big Bear as an expert racer. I am not in the best of shape right now, so I am hoping that consistent laps will be my salvation. We are competing against the big boys for this race, so hopefully we can not embarrass ourselves. Check us out this weekend with the real-time scoring at http://grannygear.com/Register/show_teams.php?race=bigbear&year=2008&team_name=DCMTB%2FCity+Bikes
I'll Let you know how we do..............
5/26/08
VA IMBA Mountain Bike Festival
This is my 3rd year of doing the IMBA VA mountain bike festival. I have always liked riding these epic rides in the GW forest. When I came three years ago, it was the first time I did downhills long enough for my legs to hurt. This year a lot of the usual folks I ride with did not come, so I went down not knowing who I was going to ride with. I also took down Sara with me—she had not gone camping in a long time, and the weather looked good for the weekend. We got there in the dark on Friday night, set up our tent and then talked with folks and I saw Evan who used to ride with DCMTB there, and talked about riding with him. I know Evan is fast, but he said that he was not going to be going all out on Sat.
-Sat.
We get up Sat, and Sara knew I would be gone for a bit, but she had decided to do a long run to train for her half marathon the following weekend. So Evan and I start out and were trying to meet Joe and JJ at Brailey's pond. Well Hankey is longer than I thought. Evan was going at a real good clip, but I went my own pace and finally caught up to him when he stopped. Towards the top of the climb we were with the group ride that went out that day. On the descent at Dowell's I was not able to let it hang out and had three guys pass me, who I then passed on the uphill. I am still have issues with off-camber stuff. I was kinda annoyed at myself, but tried to ride better. Got down to the bottom and Evan and I turned to Brailey's to meet Joe and JJ. Well we were way late, and Evan's bike was kinda messed up, so we worked on that for like a half hour, and then did Brailey's pond backwards. The group we passed was now coming down the trail, but it was interesting going up the trail instead of down it. It is a totally doable climb, whereas coming from the other way you usually dab somewhere. We get to the top and then go down the stuff you usually come up. I was leading on the climb riding a pretty hard tempo for me, and I told Evan to come around and he was like,"no the pace is good." Going up the climb that way took some fire out of me. Going down the other side is shorter, but more rocky, so more technical in nature. We then pacelined on the road to the store to refill before going up Dowell's draft. The store was closed, so that was almost a ride killer. Luckily for us the weather was so nice in the 70's that I wasn't sweating as much as years gone by and riding with just Evan we were really cruisin'. I saw that I had enough to get back to the campsite, but just enough. On Dowell's we had a hard time finding the trail back up, but we backtracked and found it. Once on the climb I told Evan to go ahead, and I was then able to ride my own tempo, which was pretty good, but then towards the top started failing me. Once we got to the top at one of the summits we met up with Joe and JJ, and then kept on to the campsite. We hooked up with this fast younger guy from Haymarket Cycles and he and Evan rode together. I would catch up to them from time to time, when they stopped, then I would pass them cause I was cooked and needed to keep moving. I did end up wrecking going down Hankey. I don't think it was because I was tired, but I hit some mud that sent me into two trees and I scraped my face on one of them. I got back completely spent. I cleaned up in the stream, and ended up getting a huge calf cramp that didn't go away until I moved my foot with my hand (my foot wouldn't move when my brain told it to). That night was the Potluck and Sara and I made some steaks I brought. The meat turned out pretty good, and I went around and served it to people like a hot dog vender, and the people who were able to get it really liked it.
40 Miles
9 mph avg
Elevation? not sure but 3 climbs that took 45 minutes or so each.
Sun.
Since I had done a big ride the day before, I was going to do a shorter ride and hang out with Sara. Well I went out with the Foley brothers to do the first 25-30 miles of the SM100 course. One thing that was interesting was how much longer Narrowback seems doing it on a normal ride. For me in the SM100 race, Narrowback was the only part I was really racing. It was fun to ride the Cookie trail, without people being in your way so you could ride it all which I think I would have if I wasn't in the wrong gear! Well things were going well, but then at the bottom of the downhill my pedal seized up. So it was ride over for me. I then rode back to the campsite one legged (luckily the way back on Tillman is mostly downhill). I saw Sara on the road running so asked if she would like to do a short tandem ride. She thought that would be fun, so she ran back with me pedaling one-legged. We get the tandem set up, and were going to do like a 15-20 mile ride, since we were to ride the next day anyway. We start going down this road, and we get to an intersection that has rt. 731 going 3 different ways. Well we got back on track, and then the road turns to gravel, the tandem had 28mm tires, which are small for gravel, but I have done it before without problems. So we go down a hill and then blowout! It is always scary when a front tire especially blows out on a tandem, but I was able to keep it under control and then started to change the tube. Well I look at the tire and it is a side wall cut, and a big one.... So I used a sticker from the bike rim to boot it, but it was still slightly bulging. So Sara suggested we walk the bike out of the gravel road (good idea) and then we gingerly rode back to the campsite, which ended up being closer then we thought. We rode the climb into the park pretty good, so we should be prepared for tomorrow's Tandem ride. People were drinking it up that night Sara and I served burritos which was good way to help out. Also we played Bocce ball with Mike, Tris, Jessica, and gang. Jessica, who I think is joining our team, seemed to have a good time riding some epic singletrak.
Mon.
Sara and I had gotten most of our stuff together the night before, and then in the morning packed the car, which Sara mostly did (great job) while I was putting on bigger semi-slicks on the tandem which I should have had on there all along. I had gotten some maps and had figured a route for us to do and figured it was around 35-40 miles, but we could shortcut it a bunch of places if we were tired. The bike now had 40mm tires and the bike had a lot softer ride to it. We got out and rode what we did the other day passing where we got a flat. The tires were perfect because with the route we took we would do paved road, then hit dirt, then paved again. The route I picked riding along the stream was a good road. Once we got on the way back that is when things got screwy. The map we had was wrong after looking at Google Maps when we got back. We ran into some women cyclists who knew the area but not the roads per se. We went back the way we came and then took what I thought to be the route we wanted to be on, and then we saw the 2 miles to the Stokesville Observatory, so we knew we were close, and somehow we were on 731—the road that seems to teleport you to places out there. We got back and really pushed it up the climb into the park, and ended up with a 2.5 hour ride time, and Sara really enjoyed her first real tandem ride. We packed up and left, and then saw the women cyclists on the road, on our way to Bridgewater. So another great weekend, hopefully that 40 mile ride will help out the training for Big Bear.
5/17/08
Another one bites the dust
Sat. May 17th
I had wanted to do a mountain bike ride, but ended doing a road ride because of the rain that week. I did the The Good, The Bad, and the Hilly. A good route that does alot of smaller climbs with the Sugarloaf mountain climb in there to get a sustained effort. Bruce, and Ryan had gotten back after a week of doing mountain biking in Colorado, so they were riding strong in the second half of the ride. It was cool to do ride at the beginning of the day, of Ryan's bachelor party day. The first part of the ride I was riding well, my back has been off since the Greenbrier race, and I have not been putting the miles in needed to ride well. So by the time we get to Sugarloaf I had decided to ride my own pace and not to fight it out with Ryan and Bruce. The second half of the ride, I wasn't feeling it, so I had Ryan and Bruce go ahead on one climb and then on the second to last climb I was able to ride past Bruce, but I am convinced it was because I was running a compact and he had a regular crankset. On the last climb, the boys went up the road, and I just kept my own rythum. The ride was nice with the weather and good company, but I wish I could have been more in the game as it were. The night time action was fun, liked doing the Go-Carts out in Dullas, playing pool was fun as well mostly because of the people I was with. I will say I was sucking at pool, but had one shinning moment when I jumped the cue ball over the other's teams ball and hit my ball in the pocket. I hope to some more rides with the Bike Lane boys, it will have to be later in the season since they are not doing the IMBA VA Festival, or Big Bear this year. Hopefully my back issues will get worked out before Big Bear.
5/16/08
Bike to Work Day 08'
Well another bike to workday with Jon. This was not an easy ride, first my chainring came off my fixie, and then when I jump on the number #2 commuter bike my cross bike it had a flat. After I go the flat fixed off we went. We were running late so we made it to the Roslynn stop, but never go to the fredom plaza stop. Jon has gotten faster these last 2 years riding. The weather was somewhat dreary to start with but then turned nice after the pit stop. On the way home we stopped at Whole Foods for Jon to get one of the reusable bags, and at the same time got some free chocolate for riding our bikes to the store. So was another good Bike to work day.
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