Living with rocks

So I'm pretty much done racing now.  I've got the Rockville Bridge Cross (pre-reg is over... just come and day of reg it), and then I'm done.  Well, actually I'm pretty much done now.  I've basically stopped riding for a while now.  It's time for a break.  It's been a long season.  Right now I'm in the lab, and will be for a very long time.

Home

Samples here drying here...

Samples polishing here

You know.  The normal stuff.  I'm actually looking forward to the race this weekend.  Zach puts on solid events, so everyone should come.  A plethora of food will be provided by my parents, and funds from it will go towards kits for the Fast Forward Racing team for 2010.  So if you've been on the fence about calling it a day on you 2009 racing season, just bite the bullet and come.  The course looks sick and it's for a good cause in the end.

Oh, and also you should spread the word about the 2010 Mid Atlantic Cycling Development Camp.  It's the best.  Sign up.  Throw down.

Driving Home Into the Sunset

I think I had some profound wisdom to lay down regarding this picture, but I can't remember now.  Something about how this picture is like my 2009 racing season; coming to an end.  That was probably it.  It just struck me that I'm always driving into the sunset when I come home from 'cross races.

Anyways... went home last Tuesday for Turkey Day break.  I ate a bit of turkey and a lot of everything else.  I indulged my irrational love of pie.  Then I did some racing...

First up was the PA state cross champs.  I was gunning for this race, and I didn't get quite the result I wanted, but I think it was a good race regardless.  I got the holeshot.  Then what felt like the entire field blew by me once we got onto the grass.  Oops.  Too much.  Took me a lap to recover.  I guess I picked off a few guys, but it was a pretty fast race.  I never regained contact with the group of ten that was off the front (ten?) for the whole race, but I won a tight sprint for 12th.  I pulled the guy around the course on the last lap, then won the spring by the the depth of his deep section carbon wheels.  That makes two (or is it three?) sprints that I have won this year, but this one was by far the hardest.  I almost threw up when I crossed the finish line.  That makes me very happy (not the almost throwing up part, sort of).  After my race, I chilled around and got to watch Bad Andy's commanding win of the elite race, for the fourth time in a row.  Good on him, that was a pretty fast field.  LVG's performance in the women's race was pretty spectacular as well, as was Erica's.  LVG is becoming quite a crosser, and Erica shows skill only learned through years of practice.  Very impressive.  PA is such an awesome place for cycling...

Bang... but too hard

This is the race where I learned to remount my bike properly

Not the sprint, but close

Sunday kept me close to home.  The race was Phelps School Cross.  Total travel time to the race: 10 min, and I took the back way.  Total travel time from the race: 30 min, I rode back home the longish way.  This race looked, at first glance, to be a grassy time trial.  Sucks for me.  I am many things, but time trialist I am not.  The start was a wide downhill straight dropping you into a sharp off camber left hander after about 500 m.  No holeshot was planned for today.  I tucked into the pack as quickly as I could.  But, Gunnar decided it was a good idea to crash into, and subsequently break in half, the stake at the first corner, bringing me to a complete stop.  Bah humbug.  Gunnar went on to win the race.  Go kid.

So I was still somewhat attached to the group.  On one of the steep off camber uphill 180s, I think someone rubbed my rear tire.  From then on it felt like it was about to roll off.  I changed it the next time I saw the pit.  Exited the pit in second to last place.  Goody.  Chase time.  So I chased.  Eventually, by the last lap I caught onto a groupetto which contained Kyle.  I latched on.  There were three.  I overtook them at the barriers, shot right up the middle of the two of them.  We caught one more.  I led into the back straightaway and pushed the pace as hard as I could.  I couldn't shake anybody.  I decided to play it smart and I dropped back to second wheel in the corners after the flat section.  The plan: suck wheel for the short road climb to recover, then drop the hammer hard on the steep dirt climb that brings you back up to the same elevation as the finish. The plan worked very well.  I dropped the groupetto and made the run into the finish alone.  The finish was the whole reason for my plan.  I was sure of my ability to sprint on an uphill, but a long flat sprint on grass?  Don't know about that.  Especially with two roadie looking guys in the group.  The plan worked well enough that I got to sit up before the finish.  Finished in time to watch Kyle grab the second spot in the sprint.  He looked solid, and was only about a bike length off of the guy who won the sprint.  He is becoming quite the rider and it makes me happy.  So 10th on the day.  I suppose not that bad.

It's good to get friends into racing... in the green is the teacher from Westtown I worked bike camps with this past summer.

Sneaking up the middle

Groupetto, although not the traditional group of sprinters

This is one of my wrestling coaches from high school.  He came to watch today since the race was so close.  It was very nice to see him.

Old Place, New Trails

Went and stopped by one of my old haunts this morning.  Just a nice easy ride to start to wake the legs up for this weekend.  About 1.5hrs at good old Marsh Creek.  That place has always been interesting.  It's kinda like the trail at the farm in Marysville.  It used to be that Marsh Creek was off limits during wet/rainy times (like today).  We used to have to deal with huge washouts creating deep gullies in the trail.  Making them damn near unridable for long times after rains.  This time was different.  There were like 5 or 6 miles of new trails there!  Complete with well-built log bridges, teeter totters, and skinny bridges.  Pretty sweet stuff.  The local crew is still doing a good job!

Still gunning for PA States this weekend...

Mercer Madness

Mercer Cup has to be one of the most fun races of the year.  Even though it included lots of running last year, I had a blast.  The vibe is awesome and it's great to watch the pros rip it up.  This year, though, they changed venues.  I must say, though that Saturday's course at the new venue was much less fun.  Part of that was the flatness and part of that was the fact that it was so muddy.  The entire course was just mashing on the pedals, putting down all the power you can to get through the mud.  It was just all out for 45 min.  No good for me.  It should have been good for me, but I was just not feeling it.  Had a bad start position again.  Gotta fix that.  My bike got heavy and covered with sticky mud.  Ended up like 37th coming up from the second to last row.

Barriers

Mud Surfin'

No pics from Sunday's racing though.  I dropped the cash to rent a pit bike from Van Dessel (a G&T) which absolutely kicked ass.  Having a clean bike every lap was great.  Now I probably could have bitten the bullet and rode my Holeshot the whole race as it was near 70 degrees and the course was drying out, but I decided to try out a pit bike.  It was for the better because I rolled my front tire on the second to last lap of the day.  Got a better start, about 5 rows from the back, but on the long off camber chicane section had a little collision with someone which lodged a front brake arm against my tire.  Had to take my brakes apart to fix it.  I was in dead last, behind all the singlespeeders.  Sucks.  Worked my way up to 42nd.  Legs felt pretty damn good.  I was catching and dropping people like they were standing still.  On the last lap I came onto the pavement about 10 seconds behind some guy, poured it on, caught and dropped him to pick up one more place.  My one victory for the day.  Pitted for Myerson again.  Made another chunk of change.  Saturday's pitting was hard work, with the line for the power washer being too long to turn out a bike every lap when he wanted it.  Had to do it by hand and with brushes.

Next up is PA states, which I'm hoping to kill it at.  Maybe I'll actually win a cross race... or podium in something that isn't Iron Cross...

Apparently I can race cross

I suppose that last weekend proved I don't suck at cross.  Beacon and the Cat & Kitten Cross (henceforth known as HPCX) were my first two Eastern Collegiate Cycling Conference races of the season.  Beacon was on Halloween.  So I dressed up... like you do...

Borrowed from sister...

I registered late like always and started second to last row.  Finished 41st overall (my favorite place apparently...

Flowing in the breeze

Gunnar... Word

Head and shoulders knees and toes knees and toes...

This is getting easier

But the big news was that I finished 4th in the Collegiate B men... not that it had a podium or anything.  SOOOO... Sunday I decided to not put up with this mid-pack schist any more and see if I could actually race cross.  I scrummed my way into a second row start...

This is the second row...

Chabanov can ride his bike some

HPCX: a good test for my new Fango's... results: Fango's win!

Money Grab... made a dollar

So I raced myself into 17th overall and 3rd in the Collegiate.  In addition to the dollar I grabbed off the course I made $100 pitting for Myerson.  Good deal.  He's kinda fast so he like got a 4th and a 3rd on the weekend in the Elite Men's races.  Good on him.

Bike Change... Gunnar watches in awe

So that's pretty much that.  Pulled my crankset/bottom bracket apart Sunday night upon Coach's recommendation, only to find that Chris King bottom brackets are the schist.  All the grease inside was clean and some light brown colored water came out.  Yeah good products.

Next time you'll see me is at Mercer Cup... in the B race and in the pits for Jazzy in the Elite race.  Peace

The Queen Weekend

Those of you from the area know it well. Granogue and Wiss. Two of the most storied cross races on the Right Coast. Those that were there this year know how much of a suffer-fest they were.

Granogue:

Up at 5:00. Standing in the mud and rain parking cars from 6:30-9:00. Raced at noon. It was still raining and hovering around a balmy forty degrees. Hazy, hot, and humid as we westtown Wrestlers might say. Marc and Tom gave me a 3rd row call up because I stood in the rain all morning. Trashed another dérailleur. Let this be a lesson to all those wanting to race cross: buy two bikes. It will save you money in repairs.

The rain made the course a suffer-fest, much like Granogue MTB this past spring. The area is especially ripe for muddy races due to the thin layer of soil overlaying a bedrock with very low porosity and permeability. The mica schist which underlies the area (most likely of the Glenarm Wissahickon Formation) is a high grade metamorphic rock most likely from the Lower Paleozoic Era. It formed during the Acadian Orogen and underlies much of the lower part of the Delaware River Basin, including the type locality, the Wissahickon Creek area of Fairmount Park in Philadelphia. The mica schist produces splendidly shiny specimens due to the high concentration of mica (a sheet silicate mineral with one plane of cleavage). The sheen you see in hand sample is due to light reflecting off the single cleavage plane of the micas. This mica schist is most easily visible at the base of the tower (see first picture). Good enough Tom?

Tom's off camber switchbacks of death

Suffer face... take notes Matt

Bike post race

What is missing from this dérailleur?

Wissahickon:

Got to sleep in. Showed up to watch one of my high school

teachers do his first cross race at 9:00AM. He had fun, but suffered much on his mountain bike. I raced at noon again. Got a bit caught up in the pile up at the start. Came out of it clean, but I never recovered and ended up finishing 65th or something. More accurately I won my first sprint ever... for 65th place. Only in 'cross is sprinting for 65th place so cool. I was able to race thanks to C3-Athletes Serving Athletes team director Chris Auer who lent me a dérailleur that I butchered a pulley off of. It worked fine in the stand, but once I got on the pedals, I found that the whole cage was bent. My shifting was crap the entire race, but I survived. I'm still excited that I won a sprint. I had tried to gap the guy in front of me when I jumped him in the off camber drop off right hander after the barriers, and when I hit the road I thought I had enough of a gap that I wouldn't have to sprint super hard. I had just shifted into my big ring when I saw a wheel inching up on my right side. I jumped as hard as I could and won 65th place. I assume the guy I beat was a roadie because he was quite unhappy looking at the finish.

Leading a pack early in the race

Run up action

This is what it looks like when I win a sprint

Wes had a great race today, finishing 8th

Congrats to Sam the Hammer, who killed it and won both Cat. 2/3/4 races this weekend

Picture by Dennis Smith.

Iron Cross in Pictures

Mid IC Lite

Sand Pit

He^b fixing the sand pit for us

Getting good at heckling

Iron Cross VII start, as seen by Don and Donna from the plane

Happy to be done with my lesson in brute-force method navigation in Michaux

Yeah...

Jody gets his hops on at the end of the race

So... took the holeshot in the 3/4 race on saturday only to drop my chain in the first corner. Chased back for 5th. Rode all of Lippencote hitting rim on my front tire with no flats on Sunday and flatted coming down ridge just before Milesburn. Then my crank bolt came loose coming up Hogshead. Finished 77th overall (41st in the Men <40>

See ya'll at Granogue and Wiss!!!

Pics by Don

The Perfect Weekend

This past weekend was just about as perfect as it gets. Nice and relaxing for all parties involved; a much needed break from the hectic lesson-plan writing and geology expeditions of the week. The desire for some relaxation coupled with the amazing weather seemed to just beg one to hit the trail. Since I decided to not to race any cross last weekend (much to Coaches dismay I think), Ms. Geology and I went for a short hike on some AT out to some rocks. Two hours in the woods was all it took.

"Look!" says I, "Rocks ahead!"

Mission #1: Find top of said rocks

Mission #2: Relax... ahhh

Sunday brought some biking-type adventures with the Weiser folk. Eastward was the chosen direction, and some tasty trail was in store for the day. Small crowd, just the three of us, but a rather heavy traffic day on the trails, saw two hikers (yes that's right 2) people on Hail Mary. That's practically a traffic jam in Michaux...

Today's ride brought to you by: 29-inch wheels! See Brett's bike says so!

El Bretto maximizes his rock time...

Favorites... the Vista

So this weekend (a.k.a. tomorrow cause I'm busy and it's already thursday night/friday morning) is going to bring some Meesnow biking action of a cyclocrossy variety with Iron Cross VII on Sunday and IC Lite on Saturday. Looks to be the funness...

New Things

I had not thought about cyclocross season much before 7 Springs so last Friday found me frantically building up my bike for the weekends races. Last minute as usual. I don't really have much to say about the individual races. Found myself mid-pack again both days, 41st at Puma Cross on Saturday and 45th at Charm City Cross on Sunday. Charm City was by far my favorite. A great race run by great people. Congrats to Auer and all the C3 folks who made that possible. You guys rock.

Start Line

Pain face

Gunnar is freakin killing it so far

I love doing this

Last lap charge

Next thing on the menu is not bike related at all. Heading off to do some camping in NJ and CT with some geologically interesting stops on the way as part of the Geology Department Field Trip. Should be a most fun time. Oh and next time you see my CX bike it will be different, but how?