Category: Uncategorized

There, finally… I have received a completely random compliment in the middle of the woods while mountain biking!  …. about my socks.

OK, so they’re pretty cool dark neon pink Icebreaker cycling socks that I got for cheap at Sierra Trading Post that I’ve worn the last 4 times I’ve been cycling… without washing (yes, I’m a dirty, dirty cycling gal).  They match the pink on my MTB.  And they impressed gray haired male mountain bikers  *thumbs up*  I suppose I’ll have to post up a photo of my awesome socks one of these days…

Upon the news of two of my QOMs (“queen of the mountain”) getting stolen on Strava, I decided to do a fairly long ride today and try to redeem myself at Happy Jack.  I ended up doing a little over 12 miles according to the Garmin… the Garmin which I fail to “start” after resting a bit (coinciding with the sock love), so I lost my Crow Creek descent (yes, I rode that trail again, oddly enough) and probably a mile.  So in reality, I’d say over 13 miles or so (I love parenthesis).

When I got to Tie City it was crammed full of cars and bikes.  I let out an audible groan, and cursed all these people for wanting to ride my trails on my day to take back my segment records.  Oh, who have I become?!  Knowing that my careful route planning was in jeopardy, I parked at the Summit Trailhead and decided to wing the whole day since it was ruined.

It rained last night, so some of the shadier trails were damp and slick.  Made for some scary moments in which I was very happy that I can unclip without thinking and stick out a leg.  I almost lost it twice on the Middle Aspen trail descent, and was saved only by the grace of my quick legs.

I finally gave up on Strava-ing and just suffered through the miles.  It seemed like an off day, for whatever reason.  But I didn’t want to stop riding!  So after all my loopy loops and segments and Pole Creek climb, I rode Summit to the loop start point and back, and then got on Headquarters.  Damn, I love Headquarters!  I need to make it a point to ride more of it more often.  Saw where Crow Creek was, and entertained the idea of revisiting my favorite mud blog (see my last entry/race report…).  After resting at Haunted Forest/Summit/Headquarters cutoff trail thingy and getting my sock compliment, I decided to take the adventure (and fail to restart my Garmin) and head down Crow Creek.  The trail seemed completely different this time, probably because I wasn’t yelling out obscenities along with two others during a race.  Got lost in the mud blog once again, and managed to fill my shoes up to my ankles in runny mud.

Overall, it was a good ride today!  I’m impressed with the miles I put in, but incredible pissed at myself for turning off auto pause in my Garmin’s settings, leaving the door open for human error.  Yep, I sure did turn it back on 😉  I might do another long ride on Sunday.  Matt has to work, but I have the day off.  Maybe I’ll ride more of Headquarters!

I found a new blog that I have been loving: Passed by a Chick.   Christy just reminds me a lot of myself… I use to drag race cars, so I kinda get the whole motorsports-to-cycling thing all too well.  And I just like her writing style… and hello, I’m a honey badger, too!

I have a love-hate relationship with most of the blogs I read (or I see the person in real life and that just kinda changes my opinion of them), so I’m always looking for new, interesting ones, especially if they’re noob cyclists like me!

Anyways… all for now.  Life is going to get hectic for the next few weeks, but we should be squeezing in a Medicine Bow Peak hike on Monday, and I’ll ride and update when I can!

Best thing about this race?  I beat 6 of the men in the Beginners Men category.  WOOHOO.

Oh yeah, I finished 4th in my own category, too 🙂  Not too shabby for a race where pretty much everybody got lost and ended up in a muddy bog with “potholes” in it from cow hooves on the Crow Creek Trail.  Do I need to mention that Crow Creek Trail has a “tricky route finding” rating?  Yeah… we all know about my luck with tricky to find trails.

I pretty much went into this race with a “honey badger don’t care” attitude.  I knew I wouldn’t win, and after seeing the map I decided I would just enjoy myself.  Heck, it was the last race of the series and I was just overjoyed with myself that I have done three mountain bike races this summer, which is something I never would’ve imagined doing just a mere four months ago.

Doesn’t my Garmin Edge 500 look sexy on my handlebars?!  I sure think so!  I really enjoyed being able to see distance right there in front of me, and not having to worry about where my phone was.  And yay for heart rate monitoring!  A lot of reviews complain about the Garmin premium heart rate monitor and how off it is, but I’m finding mine to be fine with no odd readings.

Anyways, and so the race started… and I found myself passing a surprisingly large amount of people.  Odd.  Until the singletrack owned me, naturally… then I got stuck behind a guy I couldn’t get around unless I wanted to crash into a tree.  This course was funny because it included a buck rail fence that we had to hop.  Did I accidentally sign up for cyclocross?!  I guess it definitely was a race to change things up and add some excitement, yes?

I felt strong on Summit, did some more passing.  The short stretch of Headquarters was rather technical for the beginner’s classes, but nothing I haven’t dealt with before.  A group of 3 of us (two men, and me covered in pink stuff) flew down Crow Creek.   And ended up in a bog?  We had no idea where the trail/course had disappeared to, and realized we were sinking into mud.  Another scramble over a log and back on the faint trail.  Suddenly, HUGE CLIMB OUT OF FREAKING NOWHERE appeared.  Like a straight up kind of climb.  With my rhythm hampered by the racer in front of me, I just decided to walk it versus risking losing all speed and toppling over.  Then there was the final climb of Headquarters off of the trailhead.  Dewey from the Pedal House was taking photos, and suddenly I became really conscious of what my face was doing.  I’m sure I make all sorts of highly unattractive faces while mountain biking, but the horror of having them captured on camera makes me really fret!  So we’ll see how those turn out…

The rest of the race was downhill through Upper UW, Meadow, and the Campground Bypass.  It felt so good to descend!  I got caught off guard by another photog in the trees, and wondered again what my face was doing.  Seriously people!  Enough with photographing my face!  😛  Finally I was back to the final stretch, where Matt had a camera in my face!  ARGH!  I shifted into sprint mode and sprinted towards the finish.  And whew, it was all over!

33 minutes, 42 seconds.  4.9 miles.  4th place.  One mud bog.

What’s silly about this whole experience was that I didn’t even feel tired.  What a change!

I ended up in 7th place for beginner’s women in overall points, which I don’t think is too bad for only participating in half of the races!  If I had done just one other race I would’ve at least 5th place… sigh.

I feel I really owe my abilities to be semi-itty bitty-competitive in racing to my road bike.  It taught me that a 50 foot climb on a mountain bike is nothing compared to 10 mile long climbs on a road bike.  It’s really help me mentally get through climbs.  I still don’t like climbs (but does anybody really like them?), but I can finally see past them when out mountain biking.  The mental change combined with a greater physical fitness level has really changed things, and my granny gear is missing all the attention!

Now I feel sad that mountain bike racing is over for the year here in Laramie.  I feel like I was just getting started!  Dammit!  😦  I can’t say what next summer will have in store for me, but I hope I’d be able to make some of the races!  My big debate is whether I stay a beginner, or move up to the intermediate/advance women’s class.  Totally silly to be worrying about right now, I know…

Fort Collins has a race series that is going on, so I want to try my hand at that next Tuesday since I don’t have to work!  Matt told me a big fat NO, but I wanna!  I wanna!  I wanna!  So we’ll see…

I’m still waiting on photos to start appearing (Matt still owes me last week’s…), then which I’ll make a photo post!

Because yesterday totally didn’t poop me out (which is weird considering I was coming off of 73 miles on Sunday… what the heck is happening to me?!), I headed back up to Happy Jack today for another ride, this time 8.15 miles.  I wanted to play with my Garmin more, and just haul butt on some segments that I had crappy times on from when I first started riding.  It was hot, and I felt sluggish, sluggish to the point I actually checked to make sure my tires weren’t flat . Surprising enough, when I got home and plugged in the Garmin to Strava, I kicked some ass!  Go me!  It was just a fun ride, randomly taking trails without any sort of solid plan.  I changed it up in the fact I started at the Summit Trailhead instead of Tie City.  My cadence/wheel sensor didn’t connect to the Garmin, which was the only hiccup I had.  I’ll have to play with that more… otherwise, I am really enjoying this new toy of mine!

Now for a few days off due to work/life, then probably hitting the road bike more.

Well, needless to say our weekend plans changed for this past weekend, so I did get to do the Ride for Sight on August 12th (last Sunday), which is a charity ride put on by the Sunrise Lions Club in Cheyenne.  My first road biking activity, my first time with rest stops, and my first bib number!  So exciting!

The lack of training was obviously there.  So on Saturday before the ride Matt and I rode 34 miles along Highway 130 and Herrick Lane, which are west of Laramie.  I was surprised at how fast the miles flew by, and it was a really great ride until the monsoon came and pelted me with hail   But it helped us mentally prepare for the fact that our goal of 50 miles during RFS was obtainable.

We pulled into Cheyenne’s North Community Park at about 5:50am.  Early mornings are not my thing, but the excitement for the day overrode my heavy desire to crawl back in bed.  Spoiled by this summer’s stupidly hot temperatures, I found myself freezing in the 55 degree weather, thankful I had my new Primal thermal jersey on over my normal jersey.  We checked in, learned that we wouldn’t get our ride jerseys until about October since we registered so late (SAD FACE! But totally worth the weight, they’re lively and colorful).  They provided bagels, fruit, and juice for breakfast, so we stocked up and headed back to the car where we could huddle up to the heater.

I kind of felt out of place because it seemed like literally everyone else was wearing club or team jerseys.  But that faded away once we started the ride at 7am.  We found ourselves in front of the pack, steadily passing others that I am sure have been cycling longer than I have been alive.  The hardest part was pacing ourselves and not turning it into a race, which was pretty easy to do.  My legs soon found a rhythm and it all became an automatic motion.  The wind was even pretty “calm!”

Once we were out on Horse Creek Road, Matt and I realized that nearly the whole way back was downhill.  This quickly changed our goal from 50 miles to a metric century, which is about 62 miles.  Why not, right?  Our bodies felt good and it was just enjoyable.  Then Matt decided we should shoot for 75… by then we had stopped at our 2nd rest station and my back was started to get aggravated.  I tried to protest, but continued on.

 

The rider traffic had significantly thinned out the further we went (heck, we were seeing people turning around at the 10 mile mark…).  We soon reached the turnaround point, and snapped a few photos, and then started back.  It was going well until the final 10 mile descent on Horse Creek Road where magically the wind changed directions to a strong head wind.  Of course, right?!  By then, I was miserable.  My back kept spasming, and my knees ached with every pedal stroke.  My butt ached, but every time I relieve pressure off of it sharp pains would occur.  I started to wonder why I do torturous things, let alone pay money!

5 hours and 27 minutes after starting, I made it back to the car!  Turns out the return route through northern Cheyenne was different from the start, so I missed 75 miles… the GPS messed up a bit and gave me a final time of 72.7 miles, but originally said 73.1miles.  Whatever, I’m calling it 73 miles!  Matt rode a few extra miles to break the 75 mark while I returned to the car.  Wow, I did it!  Only one month on a road bike, and three months cycling in any form, and I just rode 73 miles!

This is when how tired I was really set in.  My body actually didn’t hurt as bad as I thought it would after I got off the bike.  I was just DEAD tired.  I passed out for a few hours once we got home to Laramie, and still seemed like a zombie through dinner.  Now, two days out from the ride I just have my usual severe knee pain, but otherwise I’m feeling pretty good.  My butt slightly protests having to climb into the saddle, but nothing that is bothersome.

Which is good… because I mountain bike race tonight!  Last race of the Laramie series.  The course is way different and has trails I’ve never ridden before (actually, I never knew one of them existed…) and seems like a lot of climbing.  It is only one lap, so I think I’m just going to sit back and enjoy the ride and just be happy to finish (see my last post about the non-beginner-ness of the beginner class…).  I am mostly excited about getting to use my brand spankin’ new Garmin Edge 500 cycling computer/GPS!!

Yes yes yes… I had to buy another new toy… ever since buying the mountain bike in May I have been using some GPS app or another on my iPhone 4 to log all of my rides.  After the headaches of Runtastic Mountain Bike being stupid, I switched to Strava exclusively about a month ago.  But I started to realize the limitations of phone based GPS apps (and hate how it drains the battery… I luckily finished the RFS with 14% left, Matt’s iPhone 4s battery completely died about 8 miles from the finish.  Since I mostly ride in cell coverage areas, I rely on my phone as being a way to call for help, so draining batteries are bad mojo).  I have also been wanting to see cadence, and hell why not, heartrate.  This little device can track so much, it makes me giddy!

I will try to do a full review after I have some good use/experience with the device.  Last night I rode 0.3 miles with it just to test it out, but that’s all.  Tonight’s race will be a good trial of it and the accessories.  I hope it meets my expectations!

Well, I came back for more suffering!  Finally work/life allowed for me to make it out to another race, and dammit, I am determined to make it to the last two races of the series!  When I saw the course map I was pleased, as they’re easy trails that I am familiar with.  I also have been feeling the most physically fit that I have been in forever, so I was very optimistic about this race!

I finished in 5th place out of 10 women, which I am actually very happy about!  I feel sometimes that racing in the beginner’s category is all about sandbagging… you can be a person who has been biking for 10 years and be stupidly fast, but claim yourself as a “beginner” since it’s the first time racing.  I’m not saying this is intentional sandbagging, just how I see it (and self-justify my results, haha).  So to place in 5th when I’ve only been on a bike 3 months… yeah, I’ll take that!

My first lap was 14:53.  Looking at the results, it seems that we all finished where we were in the first lap.  What is funny about all of this is I swore during the whole race I was in 2nd place!  I think I forgot I had seen more than one person passing me.  But it did make for some damn good motivation.  When I heard someone behind me I would kick it up a few notches, and I just flew on the downhills (and hey, I stayed on my bike this time, always a plus!).  I actually lapped another women in my category.  It was her first race, and she ended up DNF.  I told her good job and to be proud anyway!  Hell, most people don’t try a mountain bike race, so just attempting one is an accomplishment!

Overall, I finished in 30:45.  I out sprinted a 14 year old boy in the end, just because I could.  Beat him by 1 second, which was awesome!  I am not sure of where that extra energy came from at the end… maybe just relief that it was almost over!  My lungs felt like they were being ripped out, and I swore I was tasting blood.  I’m sitting 7th in series points (out of 17), even though I have only done two races, which is neat.

In my usual Strava-obsessed fashion, I managed some new records on some segments!
1- Meadow Trail Climb 3:15 (my former: 3:52)
2- Campground Bypass 1:54 (my former: 2:18)
3- Ridge Trail South to North 1:45 (my former: 1:51)
4- Alder Trail Ridge to Pole Creek 0:45 (my former: 1:03)
5- Campground Hill Climb 1:21 (my former: 1:33)

I won 5 free yoga classes in the raffle.  The perk to this is that I didn’t have to buy Matt and our friend, Eric, dinner since we had a bet going on that if I didn’t win a prize in the raffle, I would buy dinner.  Other than that, I think a few saw me roll my eyes at this win.  I wanted to win a cool jersey, or socks… or something useful.  Sigh 😦  Yoga isn’t my thing… I have never done it, so I know I’m passing judgement for no reason.  I think I am just too Type A for yoga.  I don’t have any zen or calm in me!  I might give it a try, though… can’t pass up free, and who knows, I might end up liking it!

Hopefully I’ll have a few new photos to post up soon… both Eric and Matt took some, along with some others there so hopefully they’ll be trickling in soon.  Other than that… we’re off to Colorado Springs for the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb shenanigans through Sunday (no 50 mile charity bike race *sad face*), so I’ll be off the bike.  Monday I’ll have to ride to get back into it, because next Tuesday is the last race of the series.

Damn, tomorrow is August.  Which might not mean much to most, but it means winter will be here soon enough in southeastern Wyoming.  *sigh*  I am at quite a loss as to where this summer went, and I wouldn’t mind if it lasted much longer!  Just seems a bit unfair that once I actually develop a love for outdoorsy stuff that the time dwindles away so fast.

Left to do:
1)  Climb Medicine Bow Peak (for the 5th time in my life, but 1st over the age of 11!)
2) Climb Grays and Torreys Peaks in Colorado (two 14ers, which would be a first for me)
3) Ride the bikes… lots!

I suppose it is just a bit harder to do things now that I have a job where I only work on Fridays and Saturdays, cutting down on the time Matt and I have for weekend shenanigans.  It’s been a really hard/stressful adjustment for me – working in general, along with being a new nurse – and now that it’s August this weighs on me even more.   I guess it all comes down to making the most of every free day, especially the ones when Matt is home from work!

Unfortunately, I have been doing a terrible job at planning good outings on the mountain bikes.  I thought a trail marked “difficult route finding” and “hard difficulty” with the name of “Double Black Diamond Trail” would be a great idea to ride.  Hmm… We started out on the Headquarters Trail, which was new to us, and pretty darn awesome!  Somehow managed to find the deer trail off to the side that was this “trail” called Double Black Diamond after 3 tries.  Normally, judgement would tell me to just stick to the awesome trail instead of taking off through the trees and sage brush on something not even quite a cow trail.  Needless to say, it turned into a 11 mile horrid ride consisting of mostly walking.  Apparently, elevation profiles on Strava make things look rideable, haha.  I just don’t know what to say, except… yeah, no more “tricky route finding” trails at Happy Jack.  Matt was not amused, and I was all sad that my grand plans turned out to be a bust.  The thing I said about making our days off together count?  Yeah, I need to work on it, for real!

Matt and I have quite been enjoying the road bikes.  I try to go for early morning rides before my evening shifts at work.  I’ve been kicking some butt on Strava, which I find to be highly addicting and a great way to measure my improvements.

I am not sure I will be participating in the charity bike ride later in August like I was planning.  It unfortunately conflicts with the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb 😦  Not sure what to do… I was actually looking forward to suffering through 50 miles on the road bike and getting a jersey!  Time will tell…

Now that I’ve had the chance to ride both bikes fairly a lot… some comparisons (and whining).

Roadie Pros:1. Stupidly light
2. Very fast
3. Fits extremely well, and is honestly a comfortable bike.
4. I like how I can move into different positions and work other muscle groups and relieve sore butt areas with relative ease
5. Look Keo pedals kick ass, definitely like this pedal/cleat system way more than SPD

Roadie Cons:
1.  Have to be careful of branches, gravel, huge ass potholes, massive cracks…
2. Lack of suspension.  Body says ouch.
3. I just can’t get into standing on climbs.  It feels very foreign to me, since I’m use to sit and spin on the MTB
4. I am scared to death of crashing on asphalt.  The mere thought of road rash makes me shudder.
5. Cars and the idiot humans that operate them.

Mountie Pros:
1. It rolls over anything.  I don’t have to be scared of rocks and sticks and holes and whatever else
2. Front suspension is nice on the hands, arms, and the rest of me
3. Mr. Penguin
4. No cars to worry about in the terrain its used on
5. Falling on dirt doesn’t really scare me lots, especially with my OTB fall during my last race.  Dirt has a certain “give” to it

Mountie Cons:
1.  Heavy as hell!!!  UGH
2.  Just feels sluggish.  I know this is a terrain thing, but I notice the bike’s weight on hills
3. Fit doesn’t feel right since getting a road bike.  I notice how my legs don’t extend as much, I feel too far forward… probably because my mountain bike was never fitted to me.
4. The hybrid pedals can drive me bonkers, but I still don’t feel ready to fully commit to clipless full time.  On this subject, my left pedal is way too loose, and the slightest bump will jostle my foot loose.  On the to do list…

Not really a comprehensive list, just what comes off the top of my head.  I really do enjoy both, there’s just pros and cons to each, which is why I have each kind of bike to begin with!

Last Saturday was my first day on my mountain bike in almost two weeks.  Matt and I hit up Happy Jack for a 9.5 mile ride, deciding to finally do Death Crotch from the “proper” side.  First half of the ride wasn’t enjoyable.  I wasn’t use to how squishy my mountain bike is, how heavy it is, and how climbs seem to crawl by.  Mentally, I felt apprehensive with my crash from the race still fresh in my head.  I felt like I bailed off the bike way more than I really needed to.  Just couldn’t find my rhythm… even managed to ride straight into a small aspen tree on Pole Creek, landing in a thistle plant.  I made up for it with some good improvement on Strava segments, including knocking 3 minutes off of my Pole Creek Climb time, even with the fall!  Glad to see continual improvement on my fitness, even if the bike was feeling alien to me.

Sunday was a short, 13 mile day on the road bike, battling stupid Wyoming wind.  Yesterday I hit up Happy Jack again with a high school classmate and her boyfriend, who are both avid mountain bikers.  We did 8.7 miles, pretty much mimicking my ride from Saturday, minus Ridge/Rollercoaster.  Talking about being off my rhythm… my feet just didn’t seem to want to cooperate.  Couldn’t stay clipped in, couldn’t stay clipped out, couldn’t even stay on the pedals.  Not to mention I kept riding into everything… even an open gate I managed to crash into.  Odd to say the least.  However, it was definitely a different experience to ride with someone besides Matt.  Rebecca and Jonah are both experienced riders and quickly left me in their dust, especially on downhills, where I was still fighting mental demons.  Still tons of fun, and I know I was subconsciously being pushed to ride faster the whole ride.  I’ve noticed that on climbs I lean forward a lot more, mimicking what I do on the road bike.  I can feel this helping.  To highlight the day, I broke my Pole Creek Climb time by another 3 minutes, even though we stopped, I stopped, and even hiked up one hill, along with knocking 3 minutes off my Death Crotch descent time.  We finished off the day with a great meal at Corona Village Andale Rapido and Mexican beer.

Today I think I will head out on the road bike after dinner.  Not sure how far I will go, as I’m bad with pushing myself when riding solo.  It will also depend on my knee.  I am pretty sure I am dealing with a nasty case of iliotibial (IT) band syndrome.  Sunday night I ordered a foam roller from Amazon, and also an IT compression band, hoping they’ll help me get on top of it.  I want to avoid doctors as much as possible.  I also picked up some Arnica gel to rub on my knees.  Right now it is my right one that aches constantly (sitting and standing pretty much kill me to do), and my left only mildly hurts after a long mountain bike ride.  I don’t want to back off from riding so much, which is totally due to the gymnast in me that says “work through the pain, cry baby!”  So I am sure I am compounding the problem.  I also have a hard time with getting motivated to start doing the IT stretches.  Matt and I are planning on doing a 50 mile charity ride in August, so I know I need to get on top of my problems before then… sigh.

For the holiday weekend we decided to head up to the Bighorn Mountains in northern Wyoming for 3 days of camping, hiking, sleeping on the hard ground, and s’mores.  For the hike we wanted to find a B-52 that crashed during World War 2, on a mountain that they later named Bomber Mountain.  We didn’t quite make it up there (vastly underestimated the length of the hike…), but still enjoyed an awesome hike!

We lucked out and got one of the last spots in the West Tensleep Lake campground, which made me very happy as it was the closest one to the trailhead for our hike.  Our campsite was just a few feet away from the lake, which made it even better!  Sine we arrived in the late afternoon on Friday, we mostly readied our campsite, and made a quick trip into Tensleep, WY, to find some fire making supplies (I had no idea campfires were still allowed!!).  A moose and her baby calf did make a quick appearance across the lake, which was a nice treat!

Saturday morning we woke up fairly early and set off in search of the plane crash.  Mistake #1 is that we probably didn’t set out early enough!  Right behind Mistake #2, which was not really knowing how to get there!  Bomber Mountain is located in the Cloud Peak Wilderness area, and it did indeed live up to its wilderness name!  Seeing other humans was a rarity!

Needless to say, 7 miles into the hike we called it quits.  The day was dwindling away, and the elusive Bomber Mountain seemed to get further and further away, ironically.  Matt was sad, but I was still really happy that we were able to do such an awesome hike!  Next time we plan on backpacking in with a tent and supplies so we can camp at Mistymoon Lake (which was about a half mile from where we stopped hiking) and then head up the mountain.

In total, we did 14 killer miles in one day.  It really beat up my body, and my hiking boots.  I am very happy that I did the hike with some trekking poles, which saved my knees a lot!  I’m not really sure I have ever walked 14 miles in one day at any other time in my life…

We brought the road bikes along thinking we would ride a bit of the Cloud Peak Skyway.  That never happened… so I wish that we brought the mountain bikes instead.  Gotta get a bit wiser about bike choice now, haha!  All in all, a very nice weekend!  I haven’t been camping in years, so it was fun to sleep in a tent again.

Well, I took the plunge yesterday!  Picked me up a 2012 Specialized Ruby Apex Compact road bike, in black and pink naturally 🙂  I’ve been wanting to cross over into road biking for awhile now, and after seeing this bike and learning it was carbon, I wanted it even more!  Luckily the Peloton Cycles in Fort Collins were having a Tour de France sale, so I even saved a bit of money.

It’s definitely way different riding a road bike!  Steering is way more responsive.  And I have to remind myself I can’t run over huge rocks and go off curbs all crazy.  Definitely very different actually being able to go fast on payment!

Matt and I did a ride up Rogers Canyon Road.  About 21 miles round trip.  Felt like nothing, honestly!  I did get a little out of breath and tired, but not like how I feel after 8 miles of mountain biking.  Going down hills did make me nervous, as I’m not use to 30+ mph on pavement!  I guess it’s all about getting comfortable!  I’m definitely looking forward to riding on the road a lot, and I know it’ll help my mountain biking endurance.

 

Well, here went nothing!  My first mountain bike race!  I was super nervous, and completely psyched myself up to placing dead last… Dead last as in the last one off the trails, hours after the start.  I was fine if that was to happen.

I focused on hydrating well throughout the day.  I wasn’t going to race wearing my enormous Camelback backpack (I seriously need to get a smaller one…), and knew I wouldn’t have time to really fiddle with my bottle cage, so I prepared ahead of time.  I had a light breakfast of cereal, macaroni salad for lunch (it’s my unfortunate weakness), Oikos yogurt, and then a PB&J about 30 minutes before I headed up to the race.

Pulling into the trailhead I wanted to puke when I saw all the other racers.  I was nervous, alone, and felt out of place.  I got my bike off the car, and set off to register.  Paid my $5 and got my number place.  #524, okay, I can live with that… some people were friendly.  I cheerfully told many I planned on finishing last, which confused a lot of people.  Turns out the “leader jersey” for this race series is a squeaky horn, just like Mr. Penguin so people were assuming I was leading my class already!  Whoops!  (I refuse to take off Mr. Penguin, though… it’s not like I’m cheating in any way by having him!)

The Sheriff’s office was out ticketing like crazy for parking, so I rushed to fill out a form for Matt for when he got there (he was just photographing… racing is not his thing!).  Because of all of this craziness, I didn’t have a time to eat some Shot Bloks, which I intended to do.  I shoved a pack in my jersey’s back pocket along with my phone.  Before I knew it we were lining up and were off!

My friend and I immediately jumped out in the lead, for whatever stupid reason, because when the first climb came I got my butt kicked.

My lungs burned, legs burned.  Soon I was on Meadow for a descent.  Unfortunately, I was stuck on the singletrack behind another racer that wasn’t carrying the momentum that I was.  Then the climbs.  I shifted into the granny gears and just pedaled.  The faster racers passed, and I was fine.  I even made a few passes, which put a smile on my face!  Finally in Upper UW the trail turned to the descent, and that’s where I felt my speed increase.  I was finally able to get around one of the racers that was holding me up and I just flew!  Smile on my face!  Few more climbs, but they were as bad as I could carry momentum.  Got to Pole Creek, and powered up the climb to the Campground Bypass.  I was feeling accomplished.  I flew past Matt, giving him my “death smile” (I’m happy, but I’m dying!)  Up through the parking lot, and heard some cheering on which felt good.  Told the first aid station “I feel like I’m dying” on my way past.  First lap done!  Was sitting in 3rd place (I obviously didn’t know that until afterwards) with a time of 22:20 minutes.

Second lap was on!  I grabbed some sips before the climb.  By then my legs were numb and just powering through the motions steadily.  Passed one of the male racers, and found myself along on the trails, just the noise of my breathing and bike switching gears.  I felt damn good, and couldn’t help but to smile.  Then it started to go wrong… I got mildly confused and thought I got off the course so I paused until that male racer I passed came along to confirm I was on the right trail.  Then… well, I ate gravel at 20mph at the bottom of a hill.  *sigh*  I can’t say what really went wrong, except I think I panic braked, and the rear end got wonky.  I went over the handle bars, smashing my head and the left side of my body.  I pulled myself over to the side and sat there in disbelief while two of the girls in my category rode past.  One guy stopped to check on me, which I greatly appreciate!  (Thanks random guy!!!)

I got on my bike and continued on.  I won’t lie, I was feeling a bit dazed and wonky.  I lost a lot of my mojo but powered on, and was super cautious on the rest of the descents.  I came through the Bypass again, with Matt cheering me on, to which I screamed “Don’t you see all the blood?!  I think I have a concussion!”  Powered up to the parking lot, where another girl was cheering me on to the effects of “Good job… oh… holy sh!t, are you alright?”  And finally the finish!

48:22 minutes for the 6-6.5 mile course (my runtastic app malfunctioned on me and only got the first lap successfully saved… otherwise it was saying I was going 38mph in a straight line through the trees… hmmm.  So not sure of actual distance).

I rode over to my friend, who finished 10 minutes earlier.  He noticed the blood and his eyes got all huge.  Matt emerged from the trees and rushed over to see how I was.  Honestly, I was in great spirits!  I finished my first race, my legs didn’t hurt at all (minus where there was missing skin…), and I still finished ahead of two others in my class.  Not bad for my first mountain bike race!  A month ago I could barely ride the smallest of climbs on the Meadow Trail without stopping, and here I was… I made them all without stopping, yelling curse words, or chugging copious amounts of water!

We enjoyed some delicious elk burgers cooked up by Dewey from the Pedal House.  I had no appetite, so it took me nearly 2 hours to eat one burger, which I’m sure looked strange to everyone else.  I chatted with a high school classmate, who races in the Open class.  He crashed, too, so at least I wasn’t alone!  Always nice to see people, especially after 10 years!  They announced the top 3 in each class, drew some raffle prizes, and we then set out for home about 9pm.

I got home and checked the results.  Dammit, I could’ve placed 2nd if I didn’t crash and continued riding smoothly!  Definitely 3rd without the crash… DAMMIT!  But I still got all giddy seeing that I placed 4th in the Beginner’s Women class, and even beat out 3 of the men in their beginner class.  Here I was expecting to take hours, and finishing dead last and I actually put forth a really respectable effort!  I felt damn accomplished!

I was expecting to be extremely sore today, but I was proved wrong.  My skinned knee and elbow hurt the worse, especially when I leave them in one position too long.  My left hip (lovehandle area, LOL) is sore.  I just now noticed that my left collarbone aches a bit.  My chin has a “rug burn” type cut on it from my helmet, and swelled a bit, which looks mighty attractive, if I do say so myself!  But other than that, nothing unbearable!   My tumble at Curt Gowdy a few weeks ago left me in way worse shape.  I do not have any muscle soreness in my legs, which is nice (maybe it means I didn’t pedal hard enough…)

Needless to say, I CANNOT WAIT TO RACE AGAIN!  The next race in the series is in two weeks, and I plan on being there unless I land a job (which I’m really hoping on doing so I can get a road bike!).  I have some redemptive desires I need to act upon!  Until then I plan on hitting the trails more, and practicing more racing style rides (less stopping, less falling?) to build my endurance, especially on climbs.  I also want to continue to familiarize myself more with the trails, especially to learn the downhill parts more so I don’t have anymore panic braking moments.

Matt worked a long day, so I haven’t been able to get his photos, but I’ll most a post once I have some of his!

Today was the day for finding the crash site of United Airlines Flight 409, which I had mentioned a few posts back.  For some background… Flight 409 crashed October 6, 1955 en route to Salt Lake City from Denver.  Deviated from the flight path which was to avoid all the peaks in the Snowy Range (the plane could not fly higher than 10,000 feet due to be unpressurized), the DC-4 plane smashed into the side of Medicine Bow Peak about 50 feet from the top at 240mph.  All 66 people on board were killed, and at that time, it was the worst commercial aviation disaster in the United States (it only had the record less than a year, and remains the 43rd worst in US history).  Because of the stupidly remote, rugged terrain, the wreckage was never fully cleaned up.  The military was called in to destroy what was left with explosives and napalm, but despite all of that a lot of pieces of wreckage remain on the boulder fields below the site of impact.  Frankly, the terrain makes it damn near impossible to haul stuff out, along with it being federally protected, therefore making removing wreckage a felony (fine by me, I don’t need to be haunted by airline passenger ghosts!).

Wikipedia has a good general overview: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Airlines_Flight_409

Newsreel footage: http://www.efootage.com/stock-footage/54245/wyomingMedicineBowpeakpeaksmountainmountains

I’ve always had a pretty peculiar preoccupation with airplane crashes, probably due to what use to be an intense phobia of flying (I still fear being in a plane crash, though I do enjoy flying nowadays).  I’ve read about this crash before, and had heard about it from my parents and others while growing up.  So when I mentioned it to Matt and he suggested we find it, I was definitely interested!  We plugged GPS coordinates to googlemaps, and charted a rough path to get there, hoping we’d be able to find something.

We started out at the Lake Marie trailhead, but forged our own path over the boulder fields that litter the terrain below the sheer cliffs.  It was difficult climbing, and I was oh so thankful to have good boots for this attempt!  We hiked and hiked, working our way towards Lookout Lake, which seemed to be in front of where the wreckage should lay.

We made it out of the boulders to a small lake.  Ran into two guys from Florida that were just messing around and seeing how high they could climb.  We mentioned we were in search of a plane crash, which they had not heard about, and they wished us good luck, but expressed that it was possible it was under snow.

We bid the Florida guys farewell and continued on, hoping we would run into something soon… and WE DID!  A big, shiny, silver metal piece, right in front of us!!!  Could it be a piece of the plane?  I had my doubts because it was so low in the valley… hell, it could be someone’s trash, right?  Then I saw the rivets and other pieces!!  We had found the crash wreckage, and it was way easier than we expected, and looking up the boulders it was apparent that there was a lot more of it!

We continued climbing up, coming across more and more bits and pieces, including one of the engines.  I was definitely feeling a sense of awe over the amount of wreckage still laying on the mountain after 57 years, and the magnitude of the whole event.

We had to stop climbing just short of 11, 000 feet due to the snowfield, which would’ve been way too slippery to continue up.  We ate a quick lunch, and snap photos of the amazing landscapes that were below.  I reflected on what it must’ve been like to smash into a mountain at 240mph… though, honestly, it would be the way to go: a nice, fast, unexpected death.  I’m sure only the pilots saw it coming, and even that can be up for debate.  It also reminds me how much air travel has become safer.

Now the steep descent down the loose rocks… I tucked my DSLR away in my backpack so I would have both hands free.  My knees took a beating, but we slowly made it down, finding more and more pieces of wreckage, including some very large aluminum pieces.

Mission accomplished!  I’m so happy our hike was successful and we found what we were looking for!  I was unsure we would find it, as all we had were some GPS coordinates, and a severe lack of “modern” day information on the crash and how much wreckage was left.  It is really difficult terrain to cross, so I am sure that keeps the casual hiker/curiosity seekers away.  The wreckage does not really reflect sunlight and blends in with the geology well, helping keep it concealed.

Our route back to the car took us on the Lake Trail between Mirror Lake and Lake Marie.  Overall it was a 3.21 mile hike, with about 890 feet of elevated ascended (most of it in the wreckage field, which was nearly a vertical climb at times!).  I’m now hanging out in my new SmartWool compression socks, trying to recover from the pounding on my knees, ankles, and toes.  I do like my new boots, and I love the fact I can walk through mud and water (and lakes!) and the water just rolls off of them!  My feet did swell considerably, which made the boots fit a bit tighter than intended, but that can be solved by not crawling up and down boulder fields!

Matt has more photos, so maybe he’ll share some with me 🙂