Trying to get back to it

Ever since my crash last week in Danville my knee hasn't wanted to bend.  I've been limping all week but found that I could still pedal a bike.  On Saturday I went up and climbed Thunder ridge and rode around on the parkway.  It's great to have such great road riding so close to me.

Promise land 50K runners coming up over sunset fields, These guys are crazier then me!

The golf ball weather station at the top of Thunder ridge

The Dam on Otter creek.

6hr Mini Angler

  My very first 6hr race ever, which will go down as a great and terrible race.  After my last incident at Danville I wanted revenge! Me and my teammate, Allen, signed up for the Angler's ridge 6hr race in Danville.  I've done events that lasted longer then 6 hours, but never done a lap based endurance race so this would be a learning experience. Even with this I told my wife I intended to get on a podium!

Blackwater tent setup and ready to go.

 Me, my wife and Allen meet up early in the morning to drive down and meet my dad in Danville.  The weather was way colder then we had expected but perfect for a racing.  I was on a test Epic from Blackwater Bikes since some upgrades to mine had gone wrong and were taking way longer than expected. I quickly did some seat/shock settings and do a quick test spin around the green way. Then it was time to line up!

And we're off!

Off the get go the top ten or so riders took off at a heck of a fast pace. I held back not knowing what my pace should be for a six hour race.  I settled in behind what would be the winning female rider and we yo-yoed back and forth for the first couple laps.  Seemed every time I would get ahead and have a bit of a lead on her, the chain on the front would jump off the outside forcing me to stop and fix it.  On the plus side the trails were dry even though they had gotten rain the day before.

The first four laps went good but I started to lose motivation as there were no rider in sight ahead or behind me.  I figured I was probably in 6th or lower place and figured that's where I would stay. As I came around to hand off my bottle to my wife she informed me that I was actually in 3rd place. Sweet I was on a podium! This lite a fire under me wanting to make sure I didn't lose that spot and hoping to catch second place.
       On lap six I spotted a rider ahead that looks like he might be the second place rider. It was hard to tell the solo riders vs those doing duo.  I was slowly making progress on him when he had to stop at the top of a hill for a break. I got ahead and knew that the race was starting to take his toll on him. He seemed to be able to stay with me after he stopped for a minute. I didn't want to slow down thru the start/finish area so he wouldn't get back ahead of me. This would turn out to be my undoing.

  My original hydration plan was the same as what I'd done in previous endurance events. A 70oz Camelbak of water and a bottle of infiniti drink mix only stopping every 3rd or 4th lap. After the first couple laps I realized it would be much quicker to just use the bottle. My wife was acting as pit crew for us and could pass a bottle off much quicker then me stopping to fill the camelback. Also by using mainly drink mix I could get all of my calories/electrolytes with worrying about eating. On the way down we had discussed how I suck at drinking from bottles while riding and the shock on the epic gets in the way when trying to get bottles back in a standard cage.  At the end of lap 6 my wife passed off a bottle to me like a pro. I took a drink and then tried to put it into the cage fumbling it into my foot. For some reason I brake, of course with the front since my left hand was the only one on the bars. Down I went straight into the course gravel and asphalt in the dumbest crash ever. I jumped up as quick as I could telling everyone running to help that I was OK. Ok is a relative thing, I could see that a big chunk of skin under my knee was ripped back and cuts covered my knee.  I was determined to not have another DNF in Danville and get a podium finish.

Bleeding but still rolling.

       My arm and knee were killing me and I could feel blood running down my leg but I kept pedaling.  The rider I had passed earlier had taken another break so I knew all I had to do was hold on for another couple laps and I would get my second place. The next couple laps were hard to focus but I pressed on being glad that the cutoff was 4:30pm and I wouldn't have to do another lap. I got my second place finish with 58miles in 5hr 38mins.

Yay a podium!

Allen came in 3rd in the Single speed class. They all were some crazy fast guys all getting in 9 laps.
















The "medic" on site helped me clean up the wounds on my knee and taped down the big chunk of skin that was ripped out. She said they probably couldn't do anything with stitches and should be ok. I had a feeling she didn't clean it out good enough and probably taping that skin back in was a bad idea. Sure enough two days later it looked terrible so I went to the urgent care place. It was infected and they cut the skin out and found gravel still in the wound. My knee is swollen and I'll be off any type of bike for a while and even longer before I'm back in the woods. Lessons learned, use side load cages and take my time. I have to give credit to my wife getting us bottles handed off so quickly. Without it I would have been 3rd or lower in the standings.

Unprepared epic

 Sunday was the Dragon's Tail race which is a grueling 36 mile race with 6500ft of climbing.  Some of my teammates were doing it but for some reason I just didn't feel like racing it. So some friends headed and I up to the mountains to piece together a bunch of fire roads and trails.  We had all done sections of these trails but never had we pieced them all together. We way underestimated just how hard doing this would be and none of us had enough food or water. In hindsight it would have been easier to do the race, at least then we would have aid stations.

To get us started we headed up a Goff mountain road, a nice fireroad that take you from the valley on up. We had originally planned to turn up the Glenn Wood Horse Trail but Davy thought we should go on up to the parkway and then drop down the horse trail just to add some more climbing.  So up we went all the way to Petities gap where we bombed down a fun section of single track and then traversed across the mountain.

Davy hitting a hard creek crossing on the horse trail.

After the single track we hit Hunting Creek Road and continued on up the mountain. At the top it stops being a gravel road and becomes a nice wide grassy double track.  Way more climbing on the grassy section then I remember but I guess that's because I usually ride it in the other direction.

Chad at the end of the grassy double track

Now we made it back to the parkway at sunset fields. At this point we were at mile 20 and had climbed 4568 ft of elevation. We started to realize that we were going to be low on water and food with one person already being completely out. It would have been a good time to turn back instead of going over the other side of the mountain but, not wanting to cut the ride short, we went on. The next section down Apple Orchard Falls to Cornelius Creek is a super fun and rocky descent going for almost 5 miles. Once at the bottom we head back up the lower section of Apple Orchard which is slightly uphill but with lots of technical rocks to navigate. After about a mile of that we crossed back over to a fireroad to make the final big climb of the day. At this point water was low and the ride had started to wear on some people.

Kat flying through the creek

Some team work had to be used on this crossing

Once back to Sunset fields the call was made that the ride was taking longer then expected, and we needed to find the quickest safest way back to the cars. Everyone was out of water or close to empty by this point. We had planned to go find some single track none of us had done and then climb back to terrapin mountain trail and return that way. Instead we decided to make the 400ft of climbing up the blue ridge parkway to thunder ridge and then descended back to hunting creek road. Even that meant we had to climb back up a gravel road to get to the cars, which proved to be too much for Chad, who was having cramps from lack of food.  He waited at the intersection for us to get the cars and pick him up on the way.  Overall, it was a great ride with 44miles and 7600ft of climbing and I actually felt fairly fresh and ready to keep riding at the end. Whatever I'm doing training wise seems to be working well for me, so let's hope I can turn it into some good race results. Others didn't fair to well with Davy passing out and freaking me out on the drive home from dehydration. I'll be back to hopefully do this ride again but with more supplies next time!!


Strava Over the mountain and through the woods and back without enough food/water

 


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Southern Traverse

   The southern traverse is an IMBA epic ride near Harrionsburg, VA and for good reasons it has it all from beautiful road riding to rock gardens. We usually go up once a year before the trails start getting overgrown.  We park near the end of the trail and do the 14 miles of road riding at the beginning of the loop.  Usually, riding a mountain bike on pavement isn't much fun but this is a beautiful stretch of road runs thru the valley.

Jason, Kat and Kelly riding down the valley.

It's 65 degrees where did that snow come from?

Before you know it the paved road section is over and it's time for the work. The next 4 miles are all uphill on a fire road climbing about 1500ft of elevation.  You've got to climb some mountains if you want the good views and fun downhills. 

















After another mile of single track climbing you're finally on the ridge. You've got 11miles of fun up-down single track. We were surprised to find that even though the temperature was in the sixty's, there were still patches of icy snow on the trail. Combined with the narrow off camber trails of the southern traverse and it equaled some interesting riding and a few short hike a bikes.

View from the trail looking back on the ridge

Look a picture of me!

The last 4 miles are all downhill with some crazy fast sections. This is where I crashed on a loose corner last year, making me get 14+ stitches in my knee. This year I took it a little slower, making sure we didn't have a repeat.

The gang rolling back to the car.

Something other than biking

Work gave me Friday off and my friends were heading to Snowshoe,WV to enjoy the almost 5 feet of snow they have received in March alone.  So I decided to join in and found some great conditions. The silver creek area didn't open til 2pm after being closed for weeks which meant untouched powder.  The far lift was closed but that didn't stop us from doing some hiking and enjoying a untouched powder filled ski run.  We even managed to duck in the woods and follow some of the mountain bike DH trails. Anyway on with the pictures and video!

 Hitting the lift line under the Western express

Even enough snow to go into the trees.

Another shot of the powder at silver creek