Lou's Ultra-Endurance Adventures

On her way to the Counting Coup.....

2011-11-10T10:38:00.000-08:00

Cancer survivor Cheryl P is training hard for the Counting Coup in April

Follow my client/athlete Cheryl P on her blog as she trains for the grueling mountain bike race "The Counting Coup"in Southern California. The Counting Coup is a 44 mile race with over 8000 feet of elevation gain.

Cheryl is truly an inspirational woman who started biking in her late 40s to literally save her life from cancer and serious alcohol addiction.

Check out her blog at: www.rideforlifewarrior.blogspot.com and read her story below:

I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1989 when I was 30 and lost both breasts, followed by six months of aggressive chemotherapy. Seven years later, at 37, I was in for a regular check-up and after a bone marrow biopsy, I was told that 98 percent of my plasma cells were cancer and that I had six months to live, that I had a rare cancer called multiple myeloma. I was hospitalized at once and I lost everything. From 1995 to 1998 I was on high-dose chemo therapy and had two bone marrow transplants back to back. My life was over, as I knew it. I worked hard for six years to finish court reporting school and being a single mother of one daughter. My little girl was only five when my hair fell out the first time. All she knew was her mommy was going to die. I have lost too many good friends to cancer. I had no medical insurance and fought for everything I could get. Several doctors in Newport Beach teamed together and treated me for free, getting the chemo donated to me for the breast cancer. There was Dr. Burns, Dr. Barth, Dr. Long, Dr. Harvey Heinricks, all who took care of me on their own dime. I started a cancer support called the Walking Fish Society, for young adults with cancer from 18 to 40. Why? Because people think fish don’t walk and they think we don’t live.

The doctors are not sure why I am alive today. I am in the 3% survivorship of my diagnosis. I had five years of interferon and 13 years of monthly Zometa, which they are now discovering can cause spontaneous femur fractures.

I had just ordered a new bike for Sea Otter in 2009 and my leg started hurting on my left femur. They could not find out what was wrong. After lots of tests, they said the multiple myeloma was back. Right before a scheduled surgery, they changed their mind and said that it was a mistake. They said maybe I have a stress fracture from trauma and there was nothing they could do. (that trauma was from a mt bike crash) Zometa is a drug that won’t allow your bones to heal. I have been off that drug since March of 2009.

In June of 2009, I was visiting a friend out of town. Somebody knocked at the door. I answered it and my dog run out. The man at the door was very drunk and would not move out of my way. As I stepped around him, I felt something strange and my body just froze in the doorway. Then I could hear it. I said, “Oh my God, I think my leg is breaking”

And it did. My femur snapped in half. 15 hours in the ER – months of recovery, nursing home and painful therapy and the titanium rod on my leg, I got back on my bike!

A friend of mine is Colette McFadden and she rode the Vision Quest in my honor, when the doctors said the cancer had returned. My goal and dream is to finish Counting Coup on my birthday on April 7, 2012.

La Ruta de los Conquistadores 2011

2011-11-06T11:31:00.000-08:00

The 2011 version of La Ruta de los Conquistadores was as eventful and adventuresome as ever!

Day 1 from Jaco to San Jose was a little rough for me. I felt good going through the jungle and mud, but had a major bonk on a long paved climb during the middle of the day. It was very hot and humid and I had a hard time getting enough calories in. Rebecca passed me on this climb, and all I could do was watch her ride away as I was going in slow motion :-) I ended up finishing in 3rd place behind Adriana Rojas and Rebecca Rusch, quite a ways back.

Day 2 is only 45 miles, but has about 11,000 feet of elevation gain, much of it very steep. At times my Garmin was showing 30 percent grade. I felt a bit better this day and Rebecca and I rode together for about 30 k during the middle of the race. It was really nice to ride with her as it kept our pace and motivation up! Rebecca left me on some flat and rolling sections and I ended up about 8 minutes back, finishing in a down-pour weaving in and out of San Jose traffic.

Day 3 is the volcano day! It's a 32 km climb from San Jose to the top of Irazu, topping out at 3015 meters. I was feeling pretty strong and was in 2nd place at the top of the volcano. At the 2nd checkpoint, I was told I was 7 minutes behind Adriana and I was hoping to use the technical downhill to my advantage. After a bit of a traverse, the trail gets quite rocky. It was wet and muddy in spots, but it was really fun. At some point the journalists were on the trail, telling me I was 3 minutes behind Adriana. The day ends with a HUGE drop on a road followed by a few km of a flat section. It is quite sketchy with lots of cars, people, and dogs on the road. I think I lost a little time in the final stretch as I was riding by myself and it would really help to have another rider to work with. I finished about 5 minutes behind 1st place Adrianna. Rebecca came in only a couple of minutes behind me. Jane Rynbrandt with Carmichael Training Systems had a really strong ride and was not far behind us.

The final day of La Ruta features about 4000 feet of climbing in the first 40 km, followed by a paved downhill and then lots of gravel roads as well as the infamous train trestles. As usual, I started out slowly as it takes my legs a while to warm up!! I was hoping to catch some fast riders toward the top of the climb, so I would have someone to work with for the downhills and flats. A mile or two from the top, I did catch Rebecca and we decided to work together to see if we could catch Adriana. We stopped briefly for fluids at the checkpoint and ended up flying down the descent with Adam Pulford from CTS. As we descended we picked up several other riders and soon we had a fast group of about 8 riders as we hit the flat bumpy gravel roads. We were setting a really fast pace and were told Adriana only had 2 minutes on us. It was very hot and very humid and I was working HARD to keep up with the group. There are lots of sharp turns, rail road sections, and stream crossings that are potentials for losing the group, and I knew we had to stay together if we wanted to catch the first place woman. Riding with Rebecca was great. She is a super strong rider who races very honestly and fairly. Adam (CTS) and a Scottish guy were doing a lot of work for the group.

When we hit 83 km someone mentioned that we hadn't seen any signs for a while..... the checkpoint was supposed to be around km 80. We slowly came to the horrible realization that we had missed a turn and were completely lost. As we reached a dead-end with a few buildings we saw some people and a couple of the spanish speaking guys in our group asked where we were. It was all VERY confusing. As I don't speak spanish, I had no idea what was going on. Someone in the group remembered the name of the town with the next checkpoint, and after stopping several times to ask for directions, we were told we were 11 km away. We were all out of fluids, tired, and deflated, but determined to get back on course so we wouldn't be disqualified. Rebecca and I also didn't want to lose our 2nd and 3rd positions in the race.

At one point we stopped at a small store. The Scottish guy had been smart enough to bring money and he bought us all ice cold coke and water!! We continued on, and FINALLY we popped out at the checkpoint. I had 103 km on my Garmin at this point, we had taken a 22 km detour, BUMMER!!!

We were now on a mission to get to the finish. It had been a long, hard, and hot day, but there were still more adventures to come! As we were riding down a long flat gravel road we spotted a large group of riders standing in the middle of the road next to a support vehicle. When we reached them we were told that a rider had been bike-jacked at gun point and that we should all ride the next section together for safety. How scary!! There was also the bee-section where several riders were stung (some 30 times) and 1 rider ended up taking a 30 foot leap off the railroad bridge and into the water below to avoid the angry bees....

The final 20 km we did a lot of beach riding. The group had dwindled to me, Rebecca, Adam, and a guy from Costa Rica. Although it was great to finally finish in Limon, it was a bit deflating since we lost so much time. Oh well, that's all part of the adventure!! I was happy to keep my 3rd place at least.

Still had a great time as always in Costa Rica. It was super fun hanging out with Eric (racing on his single speed), Mark Jeffery, and Dave Engelbrecht who did awesome their first time at La Ruta!!!!

Tahoe Sierra 100- Another Epic Race!

2011-08-14T20:23:00.000-07:00

Jim Northey and Global Biorhythms did it again!!! This time, Tahoe Sierra 100 (ok, so it was a little short for a century) was even more epic with more technical single track and fun riding than in the past! Jim has worked hard all year in order to get permits to ride on the famous Western States 100 trail and this year's edition of the event was a point to point race.

We started at Icelake lodge in Soda Springs just like previous few years. According to the newspaper, Truckee (10 miles away) has been the coldest place in the country for the past several days, so I was prepared with all my cold weather gear. After a slight case of hypothermia in Italy, I wasn't about to freeze again. Luckily, it had warmed up a fair amount; temps were in the low 40s at the 6 am start. A few days before the race, Eric decided he was going to race too. We were both pretty beat up from Ironbike, and hoping that 2 weeks was going to be enough recovery.

The race started off on some fun single track (cross country ski) trails and then did a long drop on a loose gravel road. I was taking it pretty easy, was not in the mood to slide out and crash in the first 10 miles. I skipped the first 2 checkpoints, I had plenty of sustained energy and a camelbak full of water. There was plenty of fun, rocky, and pretty technical single track, but Jim had said that the race didn't REALLY start until 65 miles, which is when we finally got to ride the Western States 100 trail. I stopped to refill my camelbak, mix some sustained energy and lube my chain at the 50 mile checkpoint, and then again at 65. It was getting quite warm, and I was drinking Nuun, eating Margarita flavored cliffblocks (4 times the sodium), and had to take several thermatabs to avoid cramping. I could feel my calves twitching and my hamstring was threatening to cramp at one point, but with my massive sodium intake I was able to avoid a full blown cramp.

The Western States 100 trail was AWESOME!! We went down a really fun descent followed by a 45 minute hike-a-bike section! I was glad to have done all that hiking in Italy, it felt so NORMAL to push my bike up a rocky, steep trail!! I passed a couple of guys on the way up. I was happy to get to the next checkpoint for more fluids. All the volunteers were super helpful and friendly as usual at this race!! We kept on following the WS100 trail, with more fun descending in to a canyon, and some more hiking mixed with a bit of riding back up again.

I was pretty happy to hear that we only had 6 miles to go at the last checkpoint. I had counted on 13!! There was a really steep climb on single track- glad to have my granny gear- and then we finished on a couple of miles on the pavement!! I ended up in 1st place in a time of 9:20, I think I was 12th overall.

I would highly recommend this race to anyone who is in for a bit of adventure and is not afraid of a little hiking. Rumor has it that there might be even more single track on a longer course next year. See you there!!

Thanks Jim and your hardworking family, friends, and volunteers for another EPIC EVENT!!!

IRONBIKE PICTURES!!

2011-08-04T21:03:00.000-07:00

7 days, 450 miles, 88,000 feet of climbing- IRONBIKE 2011

Many hours of steep hike-a-bike

Amazing views of the French/Italian Alps

Lots of long climbs and high altitudes....

Checkpoint at top of one of the high altitude climbs.

Traversing lots of shale and boulder fields, left-overs from avalanches

WWW.LOUKOBIN.COM

2011-05-31T08:20:00.001-07:00

Recently published the website for my "real job"; physical therapy, personal training, massage, and coaching!!

www.loukobin.com

My PT studio on Mountain Charlie

Alaska Ultrasport- 2011

2011-03-08T17:10:00.001-08:00

During my 4th attempt at the Iditarod Trail Invitational it felt like things finally came together. I had my new awesome Fatback, the weather was agreeable, the trail conditions were good for the most part, and I had my eating under a little better control!

The temperature was pretty mild when we started out at Knik lake, and the wind that had been so brutal the day before, had died down quite a bit. Unfortunately, my legs felt super tight and tired and my knees ached at the very beginning... Having done many long races before, and knowing that the body can do a complete turn-around, I tried to ignore how I felt....

Eric and I stopped a few times in the beginning playing with our tire pressure. Not having much experience with the snowbike, it was difficult to know how much pressure to run. We pedaled along at a conservative pace until we reached the first checkpoint at 9:30 pm. At Yentna station we stopped briefly to fill our water as well as eat some of the food we had brought. It is really hard to find good and tasty foods that are eatable in the cold as well as can tolerate being shipped 2 weeks in advance from California.

The next 33 miles to Skwentna Roadhouse took about 5 hrs and we were pretty happy to ride almost the entire way the first 90 miles and make it there in only 13 hrs. Off course the lead guys were long gone, but there were a couple of guys still sleeping. After some tasty lasagna and sourdough bread we slept in a real bed for 2.5 hrs. I had taken an ambien in order to get some sleep, and it hadn't worn off, so I was really groggy when I first got up., but after a cup of coffee and breakfast that seemed to resolve. We took off at the same time as Lance Andre just after 7 am.

Again, the trail was great and we were making good time. We passed Shell Lake lodge about halfway to Winterlake Lodge without stopping. At 1:55 pm we reached the 3rd checkpoint, Winterlake Lodge on Fingerlake. This is where we got our first dropbags. We stopped long enough to eat the fajita-plate they served there, as well as resupply our food, batteries, and hand/toe warmers. Since the weather had been so cooperative, we still had plenty of food on our bikes, and left most of our drop-food behind for other racers to pick through.

The distance from Winterlake lodge to Puntilla is only 35 miles, but this is where the trail gets tougher, with lots of ups and downs. Last year, we pushed our bikes the entire way, but this year we were riding a lot more, even though your are still on and off the bike a lot. This section is where you encounter the Happy Steps, which are a few hills coming on and off the river. They are so steep, you can only push your loaded bike a few steps at a time. You push a couple of steps, put your brakes on for a brief rest, and push again.... My legs were burning from the effort!!!

The final stretch toward Puntilla seems to take forever. The trail is very windy and the milage ticks of extremely slowly. We reached Rainy Pass Lodge just after 11:30 pm. The little log cabin used as a checkpoint was manned by Steve who is one of the 5 brothers of Alaska family Perrins. The Perrins own and operate the lodge, and there is actually a reality TV show about the family's day to day life called "Our 5 sons". After Steve checked us in, he handed us a can of ravioli and told us we could use any of the bunks in the cabin. He put some wood in the stove and then left to get some sleep. I woke up freezing as there was only a sheet on my bed, and I had stripped of all my cold weather clothes. Apparently the fire had gone out... Since I was up, I thought it would be a good idea to wake Eric up so we could take off together with Greg Matyas.

After some oatmeal and coffee, filling our water, and getting everything back on the bikes we left to go over Rainy Pass at 5:40 am. The northern lights were lighting up the Alaskan mountain range with a soft green glow. The first part toward the pass was nice and ridable. It was chilly, but once the sun rose it warmed up. After about 8 miles the trail gets steeper and we had to start pushing. I kept stopping to eat, fiddle with my jacket and goggles, and Greg was getting further away from us.

A safety cabin on the way up Rainy Pass

Close to the summit of Rainy Pass

As we got closer to the summit, the wind picked up, but it was still a beautiful sunny day and the views were spectacular. It only took us 8 hours to reach the top. In the past, the downhill has been completely unridable. We have post-holed, bushwhacked, and carefully negotiated water trying to avoid falling through the snow and getting soaked. This year was a completely different story. The trail was perfectly groomed by snowmobiles, and the landscape was like a winter wonderland. We had a really fun ride down the Dalezell Gorge and reached Rohn in a record 2.5 hrs from the summit.

Coming down the summit

Our favorite checker Rob was manning Rohn as usual! Only Greg was at the checkpoint getting ready to go to sleep in the walled tent. The tent in Rohn has the same distinct smell each year. It is a combination of burning pine, wet clothes, and smelly socks. My glove liners carried that smell the rest of the trip... Rob served up canned ravioli and then brought us our dropbags which were sitting in a big pile outside. After loading up our bikes with new food, changing batteries in headlamps, and grabbing more hand/toewarmers, we took a 4 hour nap. The combination of ambien and earplugs put me in to a coma. It was a great and I felt really rested when we woke up! I knew I was going to need the rest, because the next 90 mile section can be brutally long.

We left again with Greg at 10:15 pm. Lance Andre had come and gone without getting any sleep. I had forgotten how tough this part of the trail is. The snow was deep and it was really hard to ride many of the steep hills. Getting on and off the bike gets tiring after a few hours. While it was still dark, we reached the Post Glacier. It was hard to assess which way would be the best to get up and over it. Even with the screws in my boots, I felt like Bambi on the slick ice. It was almost impossible to get the boots to grip. We could see where someone had lost their footing and slid partway down the glacier. After carefully negotiating the steeply slanted ice we were able to drag our bikes up in the snow on the side of the glacier. Our next obstacle was some minor overflow we had to cross in the dark. It was probably not that big of a deal, just an inch or 2 of water on top of the ice, but I got nervous thinking of breaking through the ice or getting my feet wet. I think the darkness made it a bit more nerve-wracking for me.

It was nice when the sunrise finally came. It gives you a bit of a boost when you have been out on the trail for hours in the dark. About 35 miles from Rohn there has been a walled tent in the past. The tent was used by the Runkel family for bison hunting and was always stocked with wood, a white gas stove and other supplies such as soup and Top Ramen. We asked in Rohn if Bison Camp was still there, but rumors had it that the tent had been torn down by bears and no longer existed. A couple of hours away from the former Bison Camp we ran in to Lance on the trail. He was sitting on a log eating some trailmix, looking a bit dazed. When we rode by he asked if we thought it would be OK to shoot some Starbucks instant coffee and chase it with Tang. Sounded painful on the stomach to me!

At 10 am, after 12 hrs of riding we reached Bison Camp and were happily surprised to find that it was still standing, AND had a white gas stove in it! Jay P got there right behind us and Lance also turned up as we were heating up some water. We made some food before getting back on the trail. Lance decided he was going to sleep for a while but Jay said he was taking off right behind us.

Cold weather gear

After Bison camp the trail gets somewhat easier. After 18.5 hours on the trail we reached Nikolai at 6:45 pm, just before dark. Nick and Olene Petruska along with their grand daughter Stephanie open their home to the racers as a checkpoint every year. I had felt pretty good up until this point, but I was exhausted when we got to Nikolai. It was difficult to eat the spagetti and meat sauce as I was feeling bloated and swollen. Bill Flemming was sleeping when we got to the checkpoint, but got up and sat at the table and chatted with us. We found out that Pete Bassinger was in the lead, with Jeff Oatley just behind. They had not yet reached the finish in McGrath, so we assumed the last 50 miles must be a slow trail. Greg had blown in and out, spending only 10 minutes in Nikolai, apparently still chewing his spaghetti as he sprinted out the door. That is one long push with no rest!!!

I decided that if I was going to be able to make the last push to the finish, I was going to need some sleep. I set the alarm for 12:30 am and slept for 4 hours. Bill was about to leave when we got up, Lance and Jay were asleep on the 2 couches. After our "usual routine" of an oatmeal breakfast etc etc we took off at 1:50 am. It's amazing how long it takes to gather all of your things, make food, and get out the door.

It was a nice night out on the river, but quite cold. My thermometer didn't work, but Eric said it was below -20. We spotted footsteps right away, and shortly thereafter we saw the faint glow from the headlamp of Bill Flemming. We stopped briefly and Bill was clearly not feeling super energetic, but he still had a great attitude and said he was going to "walk it in". 50 miles is a long way to walk... I knew there was just a matter of time before I was running out of energy myself, but I was trying to prolong "the bonk" by eating cookies, a bite of salami, and some nuts. I guess I got lazy and didn't feel like stopping to eat "real food" so instead I tried some sugary brownies. To make a long story short; the last several hours consisted of several bad bonks and a frostbitten right thumb, but we finally made it to McGrath. It was quite emotional to see Bill Merchant on his snowmachine and to reach the finish where Jeff and Greg along with Peter Schniderheinze (Finish-line host along with wife Tracy) were waiting for us. Eric and I got there in 4th place and I was pretty excited to have set a new women's course record of 3 days, 22 hrs and 20 minutes. Pete took his 5th win with Jeff Oatley only 25 minutes behind. Greg (owner of Speedway Cycles) had ridden all the way from Rohn on no rest and took 3rd place!!

Me at the finish on my awesome FATBACK from Speedway Cycles

http://fatbackbikes.com/

As always it was great to see our wonderful hosts Peter and Tracy! They are so generous to open their home to us, feed us, and take care of us when we arrive. Eric and I spent 2 nights at their house hanging out with other racers as they finished. It was great to hear everyone's stories about the adventures they encountered along the trail.

To the Caribbean Ocean- Day 4

2010-11-23T20:56:00.000-08:00

On the last day of La Ruta, we actually got to "sleep in" since the stage didn't start until 7 am. We still had to be up for a 5 am breakfast of rice, beans, and scrambled eggs. Yum yum, just what I crave in the morning!! It was absolutely pouring when we were standing on the starting line, and the controlled start was pretty sketchy on the wet pavement. We still had some pretty steep dirt-road climbing for about 40 km, before the final downhill and flat 80 km section.

The standings were pretty much set for the general classification, unless there was a major mechanical. There was about 30 minutes between me and Angela, and another 30 to Rebecca, but you never know what can happen, so I still worked hard to make sure I stayed with Angela on all the climbs. She is a really strong rider, and does most of her climbing out of the saddle. We crested the final climb together and had 2 other guys with us, one was her teammate....

On the downhill it was again pouring rain, and it was hard to see with and without glasses on. from all the dirty water splashing. The rest of the race was pretty slow and easy for the most part. I clearly had no chance of breaking away from Angela and her teammate, so we pretty much rode the rest of the stage together. At one point I left them behind on the railroad tracks, but as soon as we hit a dirt road they worked hard to catch up again. It was quite annoying that they had 3 support vehicles next to them, handing her buddy drinks and food... She couldn't take any, but apparently he didn't care that he was breaking the rules. It was kind of funny when one of their cars got stuck in one of the rocky rivers :-)

We finished off the last hour riding on a dirt-road paralleling the Caribbean ocean. After the hurricane some of the puddles were so deep the water covered my whole tire. Luckily I only fell over once!!

Rebecca and me with our cool hand carved trophies and La Ruta coffee

It was great finishing on the beach. After parking my bike, I went straight in to the ocean!!

I think the La Ruta organization did a great job this year trying to make sure it is a fair race for ALL riders. I am sure by reinforcing the rules, this race will continue to attract high-level international riders as well as Costa Ricans.

Lico (3), Ben (winner), Alex (2), Rebecca, and me.

Cracking Down on Outside Support

2010-11-23T12:17:00.000-08:00

The start of Day 3 was very interesting. After the presentation of the leaders' jerseys, Pipa announced that one of the top riders would be disqualified from the race because of receiving outside support. According to the rules, riders are not allowed support except for at some of the checkpoints. No more handing out drinks or food through car windows or even having a support vehicle following racers... I think this is a fair rule. Part of mountain bike racing is taking care of yourself as well as of your bike. It makes a huge difference if someone is there to hand you food and drink or clothing the whole day, you don't have to think at all... This has been a big problem in the past, and it seems part of the culture of La Ruta, but in order to make it fair to international racers, the organizers are finally cracking down on racers breaking the rules!!

The announcement started a big uproar, and some of the riders in the front, including Angela Parra (whose husband was getting DQed) turned their bikes sideways, blocking all racers from crossing the start line. SO LAME!!! After a couple of minutes, Ben Sontag, in his leader jersey, dropped his bike and grabbed the microphone. He was clearly angry and stated that he had come La Ruta to race a fair race and that people should follow the rules and not cheat. AWESOME!!! So, the race was on again!!!

I had forgotten that Day 3 also has some pretty steep hills. I felt pretty good going up the volcano and reached the top (almost 10,000 feet) in just over 3 hrs. It was misty and windy at the top, but pretty mild compared to previous years! I found out I was about 4 minutes behind Angela at the top. I stopped briefly at the checkpoint to fill up some water and grab a banana, I knew there was still more climbing to come.

The down-hill of the volcano was in surprisingly good shape. The weather had been dry the past few days, which made the rocky sections easier to ride. This day finishes with a really long paved descent which is super fun. You still have to be somewhat careful, because there are cars, dogs, and people all over the roads. I was very close to running over a chicken coming around a turn at one point.

Interviewed by Wendi Johnson at the finish of Day 3

I finished less than 1.5 minutes behind Angela Parra today, so I was really happy with my effort. Rebecca was in 3nd again.

Day 2- La Ruta

2010-11-23T09:41:00.000-08:00

Had a really good race on day 2 of La Ruta. Today's stage was 47 miles with about 10,000 feet of climbing. A Costa Rican won the men's category followed by Ben Sonntag and Alex Grant riding for Cannondale. In the Women's category, Angela Parra from Colombian won again, but today I was only 3.5 minutes behind. Rebecca Rusch was in 3rd, 10 min behind me.

Today's stage involved some extremely steep climbing, over 30% grade for 2 miles straight. Part of the steep climbing was on concrete with big rocks thrown in so the cars can have some traction. It is super bumpy and hard to climb, even in your granny gear. The course was changed within the last few days, because the hurricane Tomas has damaged the original course and it was unridable because of slides. It was a little tough with the course change, because we had no map, so no real idea of where the checkpoints or climbs were, but that is part of La Ruta :-)

Checkpoint officials

Eric is in charge of managing a check point each day with the help of 3 volunteers. 2 of his guys attend the University that sponsors La Ruta. It seems like a very challenging but fun job. They have to shop for the CP food the morning of the race (which starts at 6) and drive out without a map to find where their checkpoint is supposed to be set up. There seem to be a lot of locals around, and little kids shyly come up and ask if they can have a piece of fruit or a PB and J sandwich. When they are finished with the checkpoint, the locals are so thankful to get the left-over bananas and peanuts, nothing goes to waste here....

La Ruta de los Conquistadores 2010

2010-11-23T09:23:00.000-08:00

Some of the Locals Asking for a Treat at Eric's Checkpoint

Day 1

Had a great (but very hard) time during Day 1 of La Ruta today. There is a strong women's field this year and the organizers are really trying to promote women's mountain biking, which is nice as women's sports in general receive very little attention in Costa Rica.

This stage is typically the longest, 69 miles with about 13,000 feet of elevation gain. After a bit of dirt road the race takes you through the Carrara, which is a jungle preserve. It is always very muddy, and this year was no exception. There is one section of about 12 km which is unridable for the most part. This year there were also many slides because of Hurricane Tomas. I was staying right behind Columbian Angela Parra, the winner of the Pan Am games as well as Costa Rica's Guanaride. Right before Checkpoint 2 Angela, myself, and 2 guys took a wrong turn where there was no marking. We just made a guess where the road split and we where wrong. After some hiking we noticed the other riders were going the other way and turned. It wasn't that far, but still annoying!! After CP 2 Angela disappeared in the distance. I was getting pretty tired and a little crampy so I settled in to my own pace.

Eric was managing the 3rd checkpoint so it was nice to get to see him while filling up my water. As all of my saltpills had turned in to powder, Eric poured a bunch of table salt in to my camelbak. Didn't taste great, but kept me from cramping the rest of the day!

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. Some times it felt super hard, and other times I was feeling pretty good. Angela Parra put some serious time on me, 23 minutes to be exact. I finished in 2nd with Rebecca Rusch about 9 minutes behind me. I'm pretty happy with how the day went overall. My bike worked descent besides some minor shifting issues and a minimally functioning rear brake, but that is to be expected after the jungle!!!

There are some new rules for La Ruta this year which actually seem to be at least partially followed and enforced. No outside support besides at some of the checkpoints. Riders taking outside support on the course are supposed to be DQd.

Tahoe Sierra 100 2010

2010-09-14T19:56:00.000-07:00

BEFORE...

Had a great time at Global Biorhythm Events' Tahoe Sierra 100 again!! I had been checking out the weather prior to the race, and was not especially happy with the cold temperatures in the areas around Soda Springs. Luckily, the forecast changed the day before we left, and it looked like it was going to be sunny and quite warm!!!

Eric and I stayed at the awesome Ice Lake Lodge which sits right on a beach at the Serene lakes. After going for a short spin, checking in at the race, and having dinner at the lodge, we borrowed one of the ancient VHS movies from the lodge and laid in bed and watched it. Perfect pre-race routine!!

5 am came way too fast. After eating some PB and jelly toast for breakfast we drove to the start of the race. There was ice on the wind-shield of my car but the temperature showed 39 degrees. It could be worse. Since the couple of miles of ski-trails were followed by an 8 mile descent, I opted for starting out in my jacket. The ski-trails spread most of the riders out quite a bit, which made descending the dusty fire road downhill much easier than last year. At the bottom of the hill, I dropped my jacket at the first checkpoint. I was never really cold, the temperature was definitely coming up as we dropped below 5000 feet.

I felt fairly strong and had a good ride along the Redstar Ridge. It is just technical and fun enough to keep you on your toes. I didn't need to stop to refill my camelbak until the "Dusty Corner" checkpoint at 51 miles. I also dumped my Ziploc baggie of Sustained Energy into my water bottle and grabbed some Endurolytes. I could feel some twitching in my calves, and wanted to make sure I didn't cramp. The 5 mile single track loop before getting back to Dusty Corner was really fun. At the checkpoint I was told I had about 15 minutes on the next woman, but it's hard to know how accurate that information is, so I kept going at a descent pace.

I kept riding consistently and passed several guys on the climbs. When I stopped at the second to last check point to refill my camelbak again, I was told I only had 5 or 6 guys in front of me. That was a bit of a surprise!! On the last climb, I could see 2 riders ahead of me and worked pretty hard to catch the first one. He was super encouraging and yelled at me to go for the next rider too. The next guy spotted me though, and he wasn't going to let me catch him. When we finally got to the ski-trails, I knew there was only 2 miles left. When I cam up on the really steep climb layered with about 4 inches of dust, I had to push my bike. The rider in front of me was nowhere to be seen. Did he ride the hill???

I was happy to finish in 9 hrs 24 minutes. I ended up first woman and got a 6th place overall!

.....AFTER

Jim Northey put on a first class event as always! Jim is so positive and genuinely wants everyone to have a good time, and his great attitude spreads to all of the racers and volunteers.

HEY MOM, I'm on the BONE!!!

2010-08-20T21:34:00.001-07:00

I think it is time to write about something other than, and maybe more exciting than, mountain bike riding and racing... Well, maybe not more exciting, but certainly DIFFERENT!

Today I actually got the chance to be a guest DJ on San Francisco rock station 107.7 the BONE with awesome REAL DJ Steven Seaweed. On Fridays he has a lunch-time show called "Hey Mom, I'm on the bone" and Steven invited me a while back to be on the show.

I had to pick 12 of my favorite songs, and then someone at the radio station edited my list down to 7.

La Ruta Lou on the BONE

During the hour I announced my songs:

22 Acacia Avenue with Iron Maiden

Beautiful Day with U2

Holy Diver with Dio

Whiskey in a Jar with Metallica

Jukebox Hero with Foreigner

Still of the Night with Whitesnake

We will Rock You with Queen

Jail break with AC/DC

In addition to reading a few adds and chit-chatting a bit, I also got to play the timeline game when listeners have to guess a specific year based on several clues and a song. We played Space Truckin' with Deep Purple.... The year was.........take a guess or go to www.1077thebone.com to find out!!!

Had a fabulous time with the Weedman, what a cool experience!!! Thanks Steven!!

I got Creamed at the Puff

2010-07-14T22:09:00.000-07:00

Not sure what I can add to my previous race reports from the Cascade Creampuff 100. It is still hard, long, hot, and has a lot of GREAT single track!! The course this year was a bit different with slightly more fire road as well as some really steep single track climbing.

I had my first flat ever at a Creampuff, which is not bad since I have been there 6 times now!! 600 miles with only 1 flat, you can't really complain about that!

Here are some other stats from my 6 years of Creampuff:

First year: 2004

Hottest year: 2008 with 103 degrees at the bridge

Missed year: 2007

Best overall place: 9th in 2008

Worst overall place 32nd in 2009

Longest time: 11:55 in 2008

Fastest time: 10:18 in 2010

After 100 miles and 15,500 feet of climbing I ended up in 3rd behind speedy Rebecca Rush and Sonya Looney

Here are some pics of me on the fun single track!

8 Hrs of Cool

2010-05-03T08:46:00.001-07:00

Me, the Summit Chuters, and all the other racers had a great time at 8/24 Hrs of Cool last weekend. Eric was racing on an 8 hr corporate team (the famous Summit Chuters, sponsored by CB Hannegan's of Los Gatos). I was actually racing for Global Biorhythms, which is the organization putting on this race.

The course was almost the same as when I raced there in the fall (the Knickerbocker), but it was definitely less dusty, and there were several spots where the mud was quite deep. The solo racers took off at noon and the relay racers left 3 minutes behind. The weather was really nice, a bit warm, but there was a nice breeze. I felt really good from the start and my lap-times were 56-58 minutes. I was trying to hold off the Summit Chuters as long as possible. On my forth lap Mark Jeffrey came flying by me out of nowhere. I guess you don't get those rainbow stripes for nothing!!!

I was hoping to get 8 laps, but on lap 5 an 6 I sort of lost my motivation, and slowed down a little bit.... I decided 7 laps would be a good ride. I was also looking forward to hanging out at the pit area and especially to eating some of Alex's Ceviche. He had brought all the ingredients and was chopping everything up to make a huge bowl of shrimp ceviche to go with all the beer the guys had brought. Tough racing I have to say....

Happy to Cross the Finish-line

Dave Hokeness doing his pre-race ritual before taking off on one of his laps

When I finished my race shortly after 7 pm, the Summit Chuters were leading the corporate category by over 25 minutes. Even though they were having plenty of refreshments, they took their race very seriously as you can see from the picture of Dave on the trainer above.

After the night laps, the Summit Chuters had pulled ahead of the 2nd team. Apparently this lead made a certain rider feel like he didn't have to race his last lap but could continue drinking beer and bail out early to go to the Sharks' game instead. Alex took his role on the team very seriously and pushed hard to try to get 24 laps and missed it by only a couple of minutes. Good job to the Summit Chuters!!!

The Summit Chuters and me (replacing the missing Shark's fan)

More Ultrasport..

2010-03-14T21:22:00.000-07:00

Rob, the long-time checker in Rohn is awesome. He takes a week of his vacation time to volunteer and help out with the Alaska Ultrasport. To get to Rohn, he has to drive a snow mobile for a couple of days, over the same mountain pass we crossed. Then he gets to sleep in a tent and take care of a bunch of smelly racers who haven't showered for several days. Talk about dedication!!!! Rob has a lot of experience with winter racing, so he know exactly what we all need when we get to Rohn after a 20 hr push!!

Rob fed us more raviolis and after we got rehydrated, we put our sleeping bags on the thick layer of twigs covering the ground. It was nice to be only 3 racers in the tent, plenty of space. Just as I had fallen asleep with the assistance of an ambien, a group of 11 riders came in all at once. We were quickly reassigned new sleeping spots, outside in the snow. Luckily it was really warm!! I was so tired, I didn't really care how long I slept, and we didn't get out of our sleeping bags until 7:30 the next morning. Many other racers were getting ready to leave, but we didn't get on our bikes until 10am due to some minor mechanical issues with my bike, having to dig through our drops for more food and replacement batteries, and me just moving really slowly!

Once on the trail, I felt good. Time seemed to go by really fast. We had to cross some more open water, but in general the riding was fun, fast, and fairly easy. We were making pretty good time.

It was getting dark when we hit the Farewell burn with its infamous tussocks. Some of it was ridable, but sometimes it was faster to get off your bike and walk. All of the sudden we spotted a tail light in the dark and after about an hour we finally ran in to Brij (the super funny guy who moved from India to FAIRBANKS about 10 years ago). We chatted with him for a couple of minutes while taking a little time to eat and drink. As we were getting closer to Nikolai, I was calculating in my head that we could probably just keep riding all the way to McGrath without stopping in Nikolai at all. I can EASILY do 24 hrs, I kept thinking, I feel GREAT!!!! NOOOO problem!! Somehow the low bloodsugar crept up on me. I looked at my GPS and noticed I was going slower and slower. Better eat a few Swedish Fish to get some energy, I thought.... Unfortunately, no combination of food seemed to work. I was getting the tunnel vision, feeling weak and dizzy, wanting to lay down in the snow and pass out. My brain was working in slow motion, and so was my body. The last 3 hrs were torture (especially for Eric) as I was pedaling at a snail's pace, trying not to fall of my bike.

When we finally reached Nick and Olene's house in Nikolai at 2 am, a big group of riders, including speedy Tracey Petervary were taking off. I could barely make it in the door. I'm not quite sure how I got my clothes off, but somehow I made it to the table and had some of Olene's delicious moose-stew and bread.

After refueling, we planned on sleeping for 2 hrs and then taking off to see if we could possibly catch the group in front of us. We got to share one of the bedrooms with Dave Prahmann who was also looking a little rough. I used the little cot, and Eric laid down on the floor to try to get a little bit of rest. As exhausted as I was, sleeping wasn't easy, and after a couple of hours of tossing and turning I got out of bed to see how I felt. Hoping my stomach would cooperate, we decided it was time to get going. Chris Plesko who had been sleeping on the couch got up and was taking off with us. Dave got up too, but as we were leaving, he decided to rest a little bit longer. We were definitely not in a hurry to leave, it was too hot to put our all of our clothes on inside of the house. Chris, Eric, and I were joking around, talking about the race, and taking our time getting out the door.

Once outside, the chilly air seemed to wake me up. I felt ok for the first few hours, but then I started having problems with my blood sugar and stomach again. None of the muffins, cookies, danishes, or candy bars seemed to do the trick. I felt nauseous, and had trouble keeping food down. I tried the last of the mini sausages I had brought and that seemed to work a little bit better. Chris generously shared some peanut butter and cut-up summer sausage, and that was definitely better than all the sweet junk food.

Almost there...

It turned out to be a beautiful sunny day, warm enough I even had to take my hat and gloves off. With about 10 miles to go we spotted 2 riders coming toward us on the river! It was Peter Basinger and Jeff Oatley coming to meet us!! Peter who had been in front the entire race, ended up winning over Jeff by only 33 minutes. We rode together, talking, but with 7 miles to go, I decided I was tired of eating cookie dough and was ready for some man-cakes, so I picked it up for a little bit. After a couple of miles I couldn't see the guys anymore, so I decided to take a nap on the side of the road. They finally showed up 20 minutes later, Eric had gotten a flat tire!!

Peter and Tracy's house was as great as I remembered. Peter was serving man-cakes, coffee, and omelets. The table was covered with home made cookies, brownies, cakes, and bread. We spent a 2 nights there and had a great time. Tracey (who finished about 6 hrs ahead of me AND set a new course record for the women), Jay, Phil, and walker Tom Jarding took off the next day to continue their trip to Nome. Tim Hewitt is also on his way on foot to Nome.

One of the highlights of the trip was when Dara and Kevin, next door neighbors, took us dog-mushing, and show machining. Dara and Kevin have 2 sled-dogs. Together with 2 of Peter's dogs as well as the indoor Chocolate Lab Leo we had a 5 dogs pulling the sled. It was so much fun!! Maybe next year I will just do the Iditarod sled-dog race instead..

Dara showing me the ropes in dog-mushing.

Thanks to everyone who made this incredible trip possible.

Bill and Kathi and all the Ultrasport volunteers for putting on a great event.

Rob and Neeraj at Physical Therapy of Los Gatos, for fixing me up before the race.

Matty (Eric's mom) for modifying our pogies to keep our hands warm.

Peter and Tracy for opening their home to all the racers and feeding all of us.

Dara and Kevin for showing us such a good time while in McGrath.

Peter, Rose, and Jon for your hospitality and help before and after the race.

Eric; Thanks for being the best "team-mate" anyone could ask for!!!!

Ultrasport continued

2010-03-13T12:33:00.001-08:00

Although it is only 35 miles between Winterlake lodge and Puntilla, it took us 15 hours. I didn't even recognize the trail from the year before, it was so torn up from the Irondog (snowmobile race) the previous week. We pretty much pushed our bikes the entire way. The happy steps were brutal going up. It was so steep and slippery, and really difficult getting the bike up without sliding back down.

We finally reached Puntilla around 6 pm. After a can of yummy ravioli, I claimed one of the two beds in the back of the little log cabin and slept for another 3 hours.

While sleeping, a whole bunch of other racers had arrived in Puntilla. When I got out of bed to wake Eric up, there were people everywhere. Someone was sleeping underneath a bed, while someone else was laying down on a make-shift bed out of chairs. I guess I was lucky to get a real bed where it was quite. Sean Grady was up at the same time as us, and took of just a little bit ahead of us. Getting ready seems like a long process. Retrieving your strewn out clothes, filling camelbaks and thermoses, getting dressed, and putting everything back on the bike while trying to eat and drink always takes longer than it should. At 1 am we were finally out the door and on our way to Rohn.

It was windy outside, and Sean's tire tracks had already been blown over by snow. We made our way across the lake, pushing our bikes, trying to follow the reflective markers along the "trail". After a while we could see 2 zig-zagging tire tracks and footprints ahead of us. After a couple of hours, we say 2 headlamps moving around. We kept hiking until we caught up with Sean and Phil Hofstetter who were searching for a hard packed trail and trail markers. It was really difficult trying to find a packed trail and we had to post-hole our way forward most of the time.

Sean Grady's picture of me and Eric pushing through some alder bushes in the dark

When we finally go to the turn-off for Rainy Pass (10 miles from Puntilla) it was already day-light. We stopped and had a little snack before continuing on.

Eric taking a little breather while eating a muffin.

Phil was having some problems with blisters and decided to stop to take care of his feet on the way up to Rainy Pass. It was a hard push, and I was working hard to follow in Eric and Sean's footsteps. At one point we got to a stream of open water. I was so glad we had brought the Neos. I was a little nervous they would leak, it would have probably been a good idea to try them out before the race...

Me carrying my heavy bike across open water on Rainy Pass.

Bike-pushing toward the summit.

I think it took us about 12 or 13 hours to reach the summit. The going down was only slightly easier than up, as we still had to push through alder bushes, do some trail finding, and cross water here and there. At one point we heard the loud sound of avalanches, luckily they weren't near us. This is when my bonking began. I started having trouble eating, and my brain seemed really slow. Eric started asking me questions, and I just starred at him with a blank look on my face. I wasn't sure I could make it all the way to Rohn without bivying in the snow. When we finally reached the river, I was really hoping it was going to be ridable. We were all getting tired of pushing our bikes. We were able to pedal the last 5 miles to Rohn, which we reached 20 hrs after leaving Puntilla.

The Rohn Cabin

Alaska Ultrasport- 2010

2010-03-11T09:40:00.000-08:00

Back in Alaska for the third time... Eric and I, along with everyone else involved in the Ultrasport, had been watching the weather along the Iditarod trail for weeks before the race started. We were all a bit nervous about the warm weather, causing overflow on the rivers, open water, and soft snow. Just the day before leaving for Anchorage our water-proof Neos overboots arrived in the mail.

Some of the food for our drops.

In Anchorage we stayed with Jon and Rose, friends of Peter Basinger. We spent the day before the race building up our bikes, going to the pre-race meeting, grocery store, and picking up some last minute things at REI. In the evening Jon made us the most amazing pre-race meal of grilled salmon (that they caught), mushroom (that he picked) pasta, stir-fried veggies, and a blueberry (that he also picked) crisp with ice cream. I spent hours dreaming about this meal on the trail.

Peter's mom drove us to Knik lake where we spent a couple of hours at the bar watching the US vs Canada olympic hockey game while waiting for the clock to strike 2. We missed the last part of the game, and had to wait until we got to Skwentna to find out that Canada had won in overtime.

The first leg of the race is 57 miles and ends at the Yentna roadhouse. It was slow slushy riding and it took us 10 hours to get there. We saw a big moose on the way there. Eric and I stayed only 10 minutes at Yentna, to fill up our camelbaks and check in. We arrived at Skwentna (mile 90) around 7 in the morning, after 17 hrs of riding. In Skwenta we got a 3 hr nap in a real bed while drying out our wet clothes. We had a great breakfast before taking off around 11 o'clock in the morning.

From Skwentna we had about 40 miles to get the Winterlake lodge on Fingerlake. We made good time, but I felt like I was working really hard to keep up with Eric's pace. Eric was riding his new Pugsley snowbike for the first time, while I still hadn't been ready to give up on my "skinny-tire" bike. It looked like he was riding so effortlessly in the soft snow, and I was going anaerobic just to keep moving forward. I was also getting a little self-conscious about all the comments I was getting: You are riding THAT bike???? I saw your tire-track and thought it was someone out for a little spin!!!!! You would be soo fast on a snowbike!!!! :-)

We arrived at the Winterlake lodge sometime close to midnight. After a yummy chicken/rice/black bean burrito we slept for another 3 or so hours in the walled tent. Thanks to ambien, I could sleep anywhere, anytime!! In "the morning" we replenished our food and batteries with stuff from our drop. There was no need to bring more hand or toe-warmers, as it was so warm I hadn't had to use one yet. After a little oatmeal and coffee, we took off around 3:45.

More to come......

La Ruta de los Conquistadores

2009-11-18T20:30:00.001-08:00

Me and our host Federico Escalante at the starting line Day 1 of La Ruta

After missing my favorite race La Ruta de los Conquistadores last year due to a broken foot, I was really looking forward to racing again. This was my 6th time racing La Ruta!!

After lots of rain, the Carrara (the national park that goes through rainforest) was the muddiest I have seen it. Although the race organizers had re-routed part of the course we hiked through deep mud for a couple of hours. The wheels got clogged up instantly if you didn't carry your bike on your back. I was in second place when we entered the mud, and after a couple of hours I could spot Adriana Rojas, the Costa Rican woman who was in first. She was really strong, and I lost her when we got back on "normal trail". The first day was 64.5 miles with 10,300 feet of elevation gain. I definitely didn't feel my best and at the end I lost over 10 minutes to Adriana! My time was 7 hrs 12 minutes for the day.

Day 2 featured some of the steepest climbing I have ever done, maybe THE steepest. The first climb of the day was a gravel road with 5 or 6 paved corners. The pavement had big rocks in it and was definitely not level. When I looked down at my Garmin, it said 30% and then I was going so slow it turned off!!! I was able to ride the whole section, but sometimes it seemed like it would have been faster to walk. I finally caught Adriana near the top of the last climb and then was able to put a couple of minutes on her on the technical down-hill. Day 2 was 44.5 miles with over 10,000 feet of climbing!!! I finished in 4 hrs 58 minutes.

La Ruta Legend Heart Akerson finishes day 2 with a smile on his face

Heart was way off course when a local guy spotted him and gave him directions back to the race. Heart finished the day in the dark!

Day 3 goes up the volcano Irazo and has a top altitude of over 10, 000 feet. Since we had to be shuttled to the start-line we had to be up at 3:30 again for a 6 am start. I had forgotten how steep the beginning of this day was.... I felt pretty good during this climb and reached the top in a little under 3 hrs. It was a quite chilly on the way down, really foggy and drizzly. After riding through water and mud I didn't take the time to lube my chain because I was trying gain as much time as possible on the rocky down-hill. When I chain-sucked my chain got caught between the big ring and chain-stay and for some reason I had a hard time trying to pull it out. Luckily I finally succeeded and that was actually my only "mechanical" during the entire race, so I can't really complain.

The rest of the down-hill was on wet pavement in the fog and I was taking it pretty easy because I didn't want to crash or miss a turn! I was happy with my day. I finished in first place with a time of 4 hrs 52 minutes. A couple of times I had to stop and ask some locals for the right way...

End of Day 3

Adriana Rojas was still in the overall lead by 4 min 50 seconds with only 1 day left of racing. I thought my only chance to make up the time would be on one of the 2 climbs in the beginning of the day, because the rest of the day is all down-hill or flat.

Me and Heart at the starting line of Day 4

It had rained all night before the start, and it was still raining in the morning. Luckily it wasn't cold. The rain actually felt good as we started riding. We had a long neutral start out of the town of Turrialba. I am usually not very speedy in the beginning of a race (old age), but I was doing my best to keep from getting dropped by the front group. As we started climbing, I knew I was going to have a strong day despite sore and tired legs. I was in a group with Adriana and 5 or 6 men when we reached the first check-point at the top of the first climb. The second climb of the day is on steep gravel and I was able to leave the rest of the group behind. Unfortunately there is a long, gradual paved down-hill after the climb and 3 of the guys caught me. I had no idea how far Adriana was behind me, but I assumed she was right behind the guys, so I sprinted across the first rail road bridge with my bike on my shoulder.

I was able to hook up with 2 other racers on the flats. One was Cory Wallace who rides for Kona. He had some kind of derailleur issue and that's why he was riding near me, he had been racing in the front the first few days. Cory had to stop several times because his chain kept falling off, but he had no problem catching back up. Cory and I lost the other rider at one of the bridges. He was a little nervous walking on the slippery trestles, especially after I almost knocked him over one time. I was wondering if Cory thought I was going to have a heart attack I was breathing so hard trying to stay on his wheel. Meanwhile he looked like he was out for a easy spin...

The last 2 hrs were a combination of rail road trestles and riding through flooded gravel roads paralleling the beach. It rained the entire time. The puddles were deep enough to reach over my bottom bracket, and sometimes we just had to get off and wade through knee deep water.

When I finally crossed the finish-line I knew I had done the best I could that day, but I wasn't sure that I had made up the near 5 minutes. It was a nervous few minutes standing by the finish line hoping Adriana wasn't going to show up. Despite a crappy first day, I was able to recover and win La Ruta for the 4th time! I was so happy to end my year with a La Ruta win!!

This guy lost his saddle during the race, and used a coconut for a seat!!!

Eric and Karen, the official time keepers, had to work long hard hours in the rain.

Many thanks to Roman, Pipa, and all the La Ruta volunteers for making this another great event.

Thanks to my favorite time keepers, Karen Harrison and ERIC (also my favorite mechanic :-)

Thank You so much to my awesome sponsors Magura, Kenda, and PTLG

Federico for being a wonderful host and taking such good care of us while in Costa Rica!

Knickerbocker 8 Hr in Cool, CA

2009-10-11T20:33:00.000-07:00

The Knickerbocker 8 hr MTB race is part of the "Leave No Trace" Series put on by Global Biorhythm Events. The other races are 24 hrs of Boggs Mountain, 24 Hrs of Cool, and Tahoe Sierra 100. After racing at Tahoe Sierra 100 and talking to Jim Northey who is the enthusiastic organizer of all these races, I decided it would be fun La Ruta training to do the Knickerbocker 8 Hr race. Auburn is only about a 3 hr drive from our house, so it was a fairly easy trip on Friday afternoon.

Le Mans start

After a quick Starbucks stop on Saturday morning, we drove the 10 miles from Auburn to Cool. The race started with a very short run to the bikes, and as 200 people hit the single track the dust was brutal!! You literally couldn't see the ground in front of you and I took it pretty easy because I had no intention on crashing. After the first loop the dust settled, and the course was fun! Each loop was approximately 12 miles with 1700 feet of climbing. It was almost all rolling single track, with a few steep sections. There was a checkpoint after 7 miles, with lots of helpful and cheery volunteers.

My goal was just to stay consistent, get a good training ride in, and have fun. At one point I thought I might be able to get 8 laps in, but as I had to stop a couple of times to get my chain cleaned and re-lubed at the check point, I realized that was going to take way too much effort. 7 laps was plenty of riding for me. I ended up with 84 miles and a little over 10,000 feet of elevation gain in 7 hrs and 9 minutes.

Me and Melanie Dominguez who won the overall series and got to ride home on a cool scooter!

Hanging out with Tinker and Roger- my pen pal I met on ebay.

Tinker- who didn't have to ride that many laps to take the overall title of the series, also won a hard-earned scooter for his efforts. He was really excited about the scooter and said he wouldn't think of selling it, because he had to race hard for it. After the race, the volunteers started BBQing hamburgers and we stuck around for a while before heading back home. Jim told me that he only found 3 gu wrappers on the course after the race, and filled 3 bags of recycling, and only 1 with trash. Pretty good for 200 people racing for hours.

BMX at Santa Clara Pal Track

2009-09-29T18:42:00.000-07:00

After checking out Joe Fabris getting schooled by 12 year olds (his own expression), Eric and I decided to join Joe, Lori, and some other brave "old people" at the Santa Clara Pal BMX track last Friday night. For 10 dollars you get the chance to practice for an hour and a half and then put yourself to the test against others on a mini bike. Another dollar gets you a bmx bike and a full face helmet for the evening.

After picking out our bikes and helmets, Lori and I rode one lap outside the track with Joe, and then it was time for business. We got some brief instructions about how the handle the bikes on the pump-track, and then we were off to the starting gate. (It's possible this is not the correct term, but I don't know all of the bmx lingo)

Our Team Kit

BMXing is pretty much the absolute opposite of what I usually do on a bike. I like to race for hours, and this sport involves an all-out effort for approximately 60 seconds. After lining up at the gate and attempting to balance with the front tire on the gate and both feet on the flat pedals, you take off down a ramp as soon as you can after the gate goes down. There are 7 spots at the gate, and I have to say I was a bit uneasy about "racing" 4 year olds. Although they were clearly more seasoned than me, they didn't know much about holding a line. After the initial little down-hill you hit a bunch of bumps where you have to pump your way forward to create momentum. There are 3 banked corners where you pedal like crazy to catch a little speed before going in to the next bump/pump section.

I fit right in with the kids!!!

I was in Moto 22 (for novices)

After riding around for about an hour, I sort of got the feel for what you have to do to pump your way around the track, but it was still difficult to keep the bike on the ground. Eric, who used to race BMX when he was 10, clearly picked this skill up much quicker than me. Even though he rode a rented "cruiser" with a 20 inch wheel (I had the REAL thing, with 16 inch wheel) I had to laugh when I saw him on a mini bike.

Eric lining up for his race in the Cruiser Class

After practice, there was a short break before the races started. I am not sure how they figured out which moto (heat) we were in, but it was all posted on a board outside "the office". It was crowded at the gate with small people who all looked like they knew what they were doing. The kids were all business in their snazzy kits, wearing chest, shoulder, elbow, and knee protection, while I was in jeans and the mandatory long sleeved shirt.

Luckily, there were only 2 other people (adults) in my moto, so I didn't have worry about anyone crashing in to me. As soon as the gate went down I was left in the dust by my competitors. HOLY SMOKES!! What was wrong with my legs??? Oh yeah, that's called lactic acid, and it sets in after about 30 seconds of all-out pumping and pedaling!! I shouldn't have stopped riding after practice!!! Instead of feeling rejuvenated from the little break, my legs felt like lead. And as if one lap wasn't enough, I was supposed to race 3 times!!! Lori Fabris being a few years older and much wiser than me, decided to limit her efforts to the practice. After 2 races I decided that hanging out with her and watching the races was much more enticing than racing myself. Joe, Jeff Townsend, and Eric didn't seem at all bothered by racing for 45 seconds followed by hanging out for 15 minutes. They all completed their races, and kicked some serious butt!! Eric got 2nd in his moto. The guy who beat him must have been a serious pro, because he was performing all kinds of tricks in the air, doing manuals (aka wheelies) and made it look so easy. Joe also placed 2nd in his moto, and Jeff 3rd.

I would highly recommend this activity to anyone who is not too proud to get their butt kicked by a bunch on 12 year olds!!

Tahoe Sierra 100

2009-09-13T17:38:00.000-07:00

After riding an extra 30 miles last year because of a wrong turn in the first edition of the Tahoe Sierra 100, Jim Northey was kind enough to give me a free entry into his race this year. Jim claims I "need to keep my head up while racing, I claim the markings were misleading :-) Whatever the case may be, I was looking forward to giving this race another go.

Eric and I drove up to Soda Springs fairly early on Friday in order to miss traffic, and to get a little spin in before dark. The Ice Lake Lodge where we were staying, is situated right on a lake in a beautiful area. After picking up my race number, we had a nice dinner at the Lodge with our neighbors Steven and Cathy "Seaweed". Steven "the Weedman" was also giving this race a 2nd go after bonking at mile 85 last year. We both wanted to turn our bad luck around this year.

The race started promptly at 7 am, and the group of around 200 racers took off on the dusty 8 mile downhill. I was being cautious because the group was stirring up so much dust it was very hard to see the ground. There were big sharp rocks and loose gravel that could definitely flip you over the handle bars. After 10 miles of gravel road we hit the first check-point where I tossed my arm warmers. I had not looked at the course profile, so had no idea where the climbs where, which sometimes is kind of nice, at least when you are feeling good. I was feeling really strong from all the climbing in Italy.

When we reached the 2nd checkpoint at mile 21, we got onto a really fun single-track for about 16 miles. We were climbing some really steep and rocky trails, and there were actually some short hike-a-bike sections to break things up. The descents were loose, rocky, and FUN!! I felt like I was back in Italy at some points. I think the rough riding there really helped me out in this race. I passed one rider on this section, but besides that I was on my own from this point on.

Even though it didn't seem that hot, I was feeling both of my calves twinging with little cramps, so I kept taking my salt tablets. After more gravel road through national forest, I finally stopped at the checkpoint at mile 50 to fill up my dry camelbak. We went by this checkpoint twice. After the checkpoint there was another fun single-track and then we looped back on a gravel-climb. Having no idea how far ahead of second place I was, I asked at the checkpoint, and they reassured me I was over 15 minutes ahead. I am not sure why I asked, because I have come to never trust any information I get out on the course, whether it is about place or distance.

I have to say that this race was very well organized this year. There were lots of checkpoints and volunteers. The place where I followed the wrong arrow last year, had a flag person pointing us in the right direction. I was relieved after passing that spot. We finished going back up the same 8 miles we had come down. I felt much better than I had expected. Overall, I felt really good the whole time. I only stopped briefly at two checkpoints and my only complaint was that my neck was killing me from all the rough riding.

I finished in 8:57:40, and at the finish line, Jim was very excited to see me in first place and under 9 hrs. Apparently he had a 100 dollar bet with someone about my place and time. He also had bet that I would finish in top 10 overall, but he lost there, because I was 13th!

The men's pro division was won by Tinker Juarez who killed the rest of the field despite a short detour. If Tinker doesn't let his age (48) slow him down, I guess I still have a few more good years in me too :-)

Thanks Jim for putting on a first class event, thanks also to all of the volunteers out on the course!

Podium and Thank You

2009-08-17T12:19:00.000-07:00

Top 3 Women

Me and Luca Rostagno- winner of the Open Men's Category

After a week of hard riding and tough competition, I was able to finish at the top of the podium. I was closely followed by Katia Tomatis, who is a very strong but super friendly competitor. Eric and I had a really great time during our stay in Italy and at Ironbike.

Thank You so much to:

Roberto, Vanna, and Ginny: For having us in their awesome stone tower home and being amazing hosts before the Ironbike.

The Organizers and Volunteers at Ironbike who work extremely hard all year to put on a week of "The world's hardest mountain bike raid"

Magura- Matt, Jeff, and Jude for giving me GREAT forks and brakes that can withstand the rough conditions of this race, and for their support!!

PTLG- Rob, Neeraj, and the rest of the staff to help me out with my aches and pains!!

The Kobins- My parents, Sofia, and Ulrika for coming all the way from Sweden to follow us, cheer us on, and provide support during the race. TACK!!!

All LaRutaLou blog followers- I can't believe how many people are actually interested in my racing. Thanks for your support and for reading my stories!

Eric- For EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!! You are the best!!!!

La Ruta Lou :-)

Mt Chaberton- Final Day

2009-08-13T09:26:00.000-07:00

Up to 10, 300 feet- Mt Chaberton

Helicopter views of Mt Chaberton

Finally!! The last day of Ironbike. After a brutal week of riding, Ironbike doesn't let up even on the final stage. Although there is less than 30 miles of riding, we have to climb close to 10,000 feet in that short distance. This off course, includes the 6000 foot climb up Mt Chaberton to the fort. We started the first special stage right out of the camp. After a bit of a descent, the climb began. The first hour or so was on a quite mellow gravel road. I was keeping a pretty good pace and was able to put some time on Katia. There had been some confusion about the results the previous day, so I wasn't sure exactly how far ahead I was, and I couldn't afford to lose by too much during either of the 2 special stages. As the trail got steeper and elevation higher, I could look down the switch backs and watch Katia gaining on me.

Rocky trail on Mt. Chaberton

When the trail gets steeper and rockier, you have to be a very efficient spinner to carry enough momentum to make it across the technical , loose sections. As the altitude was increasing, so was my breathing. Katia passed me with a friendly "good job Louise" and as much as I tried to stay on my bike, I wasn't able to keep a high enough cadence for riding but had to get off and start pushing.

The trail (if you can call it that) gets so steep that most riders have to carry their bikes on their backs in order to make it up. Pushing seems less energy consuming to me. The trail was so loose and steep that you really had to dig your feet in, to keep from slipping down. Sometimes you had the option of taking switch-backs or going straight up the side of the mountain. I was so out of breath that I chose the switch-backs.

Steep switch-backs

Still able to push the bikes

All I could think about was that I couldn't lose too much time, and I was pushing as hard as I could. My breathing was out of control with the high altitude and effort. When I finally reached the top and saw the yellow arch I was completely done! But, I had made it!! I gave Katia a big hug, she definitely deserved this win, she was very very strong! The altitude and effort made me pretty nauseous and I wasn't able to eat or drink anything, so I took off with Katia and her team mate Claudio for the long bumpy descent.

We were going down the same trail we had come up so at times we had to slow down in order to avoid colliding with the racers still coming up! We descended about 3500 feet to the checkpoint that was the start of Special Stage number 2. I tried squeezing down a little bit of food and filled up my Camelbak, because the second special stage is no cake walk either. Katia and I took off together. We now had a steep single track climb ahead of us. About half of the trail was ridable, and the rest we had to push. I reached the top just ahead of Katia and then we had a technical, steep, slippery single-track to descent. I was feeling good and could ride most of this section. When I reached the gravel-road descent I had dropped Katia and tried to keep going as fast as possible without being completely out of control. We finish with an extremely steep (at least it seems this way after 7 days of hard riding) 10 minute pavement climb through the streets of Sauce D'Oloux to the finish line. I was beyond happy to cross the finish-line!

Very happy to finally finish after 7 days of brutal racing

Katia crossed the finish-line just a couple of minutes behind me.

Stage 6 Pragelato to Cesana

2009-08-13T08:49:00.001-07:00

52 km with 2353 meters of climbing (32 miles with 7765 feet of climbing)

With the end in sight we were all looking forward to our first "short" day at Ironbike. The imposed time for the day was only 5 hrs. The way this race works is that if you finish the whole day under the imposed time, you get no penalty points for that day. For each minute over the imposed time, you accumulate 1 penalty point. During the special stages you are compared to the winner of the stage. Each second you are behind the winner gives you one penalty point.

We all gathered at the bottom of one of the olympic ski jumps and when each of our names were called, we walked up the stairs and started the special stage by riding down the jump. It looked very steep and a couple of people crashed and slid down the jump.

Waiting for the start of day 6

Riding down the ski-jump was the start of Day 6

After riding down the ski-jump (which wasn't as scary as it looked) we started paralleling the river where we had finished the previous day. After a short flat but rocky section, we started a climb which was very steep. There was some riding and lots of hiking. After 4000 feet of elevation gain we finally reached the top. Then we had a really long gravel down-hill toward the end of the time trial. After a while of flying down the road I spotted my dad and figured I must be very close to the end. 6 km later, I finally reached the check-point where the rest of my family was hanging out. My dad had hiked up 6 K to watch us fly by for a split second. He later told us he found a short cut back down, but he had been hiking for about an hour and a half to get up. This hard stage took me 2 hrs and 25 minutes.

A little bike-pushing

The next time trial started right after the check-point. It had a long, but more comfortable dirt climb and finished with a really fun technical single-track. At one point, Filippo Barazzuol, who was in the lead at the time, yelled my name and made a pass so fast rocks were flying around him. Giant rocks started rolling right in front of me. It was pretty amazing how fast he was riding. After finishing the last special stage, there was actually plenty of time to make it to the finish under the imposed time, so I was enjoying the views and sunshine. After a while I passed Filippo who was laying outstretched in the grass on the side of the trail. I asked if he was ok, he didn't look injured, and he said he was just napping because there was so much time...

Finish-line and camp

After only 4 hrs and 20 minutes of riding, there was so much free time to relax! I was actually really tired, the special stages were hard and hot. I was still in the lead, but couldn't afford to lose any time, so I had to race really hard.

This was unfortunately the last day my Swedish family were going to be with us before heading back to the airport in Turin. After a nice shower and the daily massage, I had cappuccinos with them at a picnic table outside the hostel which served as base-camp for the day. I was really sad to see them go, but glad that they had been able to spend almost the whole week with us (even if they only got to see us a few seconds here and there on the course).

In the evening, Eric and I walked into town with Paul Facer and Robert Matusek. Eric, Paul, and I decided to skip the pasta dinner in favor of pizza! It was so good to sit in a restaurant, eat food that actually tasted good, and have a little wine! We got back to camp just in time for the Italian race briefing. There was some very emotional Italian arguments going on amongst the racers and organizers about some of the leaders missing a turn the previous day. From the looks of the racers this wasn't resolved to their liking in the end... Our race briefing was significantly shorter just describing tomorrows stage and especially going up the infamous Mount Chaberton. At the end of the day, Katia and I finished both special stages within a second of each other, even though we weren't riding together!!

Stage 5- Fort and Olympic Ski Jump

2009-08-10T09:24:00.000-07:00

89 km (55 miles) with 4066 meters (13,400 feet) of climbing

I wasn't feeling my very best when rolling out of Torre Pellice, but the race doctor gave me something to settle down my stomach again. Luckily, we had a 70 km transfer until the first special stage even started. We had 2 big climbs, and I was being really conservative, because I wanted to make sure I felt ok by the time we started the time trial. I can't really remember anything significant about this part except for that people at the checkpoints were asking if i was feeling ok: " Tutto Bene??"

The Race Doc following the Ironbike on his Dirtbike

The last climb was 1400 meters (4520 feet) of climbing, and we ended at this little restaurant (see below), where there was a checkpoint. I left the checkpoint with Hamish, one of the Brits.

From the checkpoint we had a long decent before finally reaching the Fort which was the beginning on our first special stage. Eric came up with the idea of bringing zip ties, so I stopped before clocking in with my chip and zip tied the petzel light I was carrying to my helmet. There were conflicting data on if we were going down 4000 or 8000 steps, but there were a lot. We started going through a few pitch black tunnels, and I got off my bike. Even with the light I couldn't see, and I didn't want to risk crashing.

Descending from the Fort

I was able to ride some of the first steep stair cases but it was very rough. My quads felt like they were going to cramp. Once the stair cases started making turns, I had to get off and run carrying my bike on one shoulder. Once you stop, it is almost impossible (at least for me) to get back on your bike. There were some really fun tight switch backs toward the bottom of the hill. i clocked out at 15:58. The Kobins were standing at the bottom of the hill. I think they were a little nervous....

After riding out of this checkpoint, we only had a couple of miles before the 2nd time-trial started. I was feeling pretty good. We had a fair amount of climbing, but for the most part it wasn't that steep. We followed a river and were going up and down without too many long climbs. I finished this stage in 1 hr 1 minute at the Olympic ski jump in Pragelato.

When we finished we each had the chance of riding up the ski-jump for bonus points. For each centimeter we got past the first white-line (see picture) we earned one bonus point. It was actually pretty fun, but hard. You can't quite tell how steep it is from the picture, but it is STEEP! Also, the fake grass covering the jump is super slick. Once you fell off the bike, a couple of guys had to catch you, and help you walk across the slick surface.

Eric making it past the white line..

Barge to Torre Pellice

2009-08-08T20:51:00.000-07:00

Stage 4 from Barge to Torre Pellice- 91 km with 4117 feet of climbing

When we pulled out of Barge in the morning, we had a 600 meter warm-up before the start of the first special stage. The time-trial looked as if it was approximately 10 km on a trail around town. The finish was back in Barge so it didn't seem like it should be that hard.

Right away I missed a sharp turn between some buildings. A couple of ladies were standing next to the turn waving their arms, but I couldn't understand if they were trying to say "keep going" or "turn around". Moments later a couple of riders including Katia came by and made the turn so I stared chasing them. For me, this was probably the hardest time-trial of the whole week. It was super steep and extremely rocky, and I was totally anaerobic from the very beginning. As I came up behind Eric, he could tell it was me from my breathing and he cheered me on as I couldn't say anything because my lungs were about to explode and I was hyper ventilating!! I kept Katia in sight, but I was completely maxed out. After what seemed like forever, we had a pretty technical descent and with the adrenaline pumping, I was flying down the loose, rocky single track yelling at people to get out of my way. I caught Katia pretty quickly, she let me pass, and then I kept yelling "scusi" (excuse me) so people would hear me and let me pass. Katia was able to hang on in the beginning, and I only beat her by seconds. It took me an hour and a few seconds to complete the first special stage.

Steep down-hill section at the end of 1st special stage

My parents and sisters were standing at the end of the special stage. It was fun that they were able to watch us finish. For me, this was probably the hardest time-trial of the entire week, very painful!! After filling up water, Eric and I took off together for the 50 km transfer. We had lots of very steep climbing before we reached the next time trial and Eric and I got separated shortly, and I ended up riding this part alone. It was a really hot day as we were now at a lower elevation (at least in the beginning of the day), but there were several spots to get water along the course. The last 4 km before the start of the 2nd special stage is a hot, steep paved climb that follows a fast, inviting-looking stream. Looking at my Garmin, the grade varied between 15 and 23 percent for 4 km. I was looking forward to the special stage with another "Lou-climb".

Along the 2nd Special Stage

I stopped only briefly at the checkpoint before I took off. Katia was still there, and I wanted to be able to leave before her so I could ride by myself. The gravel road was winding up the side of the mountain and you could look down and see way back down through the fog. Halfway up there was a patch of snow with the famous "IB" road marker. We topped out around 2500 meters before starting a really rocky rough descent. It feels like you are riding down a dry river-bed. After a few minutes of descending, I spotted a helicopter and a bunch of people standing over a rider laying on the ground in a particularly rocky spot with water. It didn't look good at all.... Turned out, this was the leader of the men's race. Seeing that kind of thing, slows you down a little, I wanted to make sure I got to the bottom in one piece. The stage finished on steep pavement, and I clocked out at 1:18:54. We finished the day, which took me 8 hrs 48 minutes, in the town of Torre Pellice.

Our camp this evening was at another sports facility. Half of the hockey rink served as tent-camp while the other half was set up for dinner. After eating some potatoes and rice-mix, I had a long, hot shower and a massage.

Dinner in the Hockey Rink

Tent camp inside the hockey rink

After dinner, which actually included chicken this evening, there was the usual race briefing. Fabri started the briefing by talking about the spirit of Ironbike, the volunteers working for free all year, how sometimes things weren't so professional during the race.... Turns out, at the 2nd special stage the previous day, the first 6 men had not been able to clock out because the helicopter had not been able to get the computer box to the end on time. Fabri explained that the 2nd stage would simply be thrown out for the day. I wasn't the only one disappointed by how they handled this situation. It is hard when you race your buns off for 2 hours, just to hear that it didn't count for anything. I also needed the extra 90 seconds I had put on the second place woman. There was no arguing to be done, the judges didn't speak English anyway...

There was a short awards ceremony after the briefing, I was still in the lead, but not a very comfortable lead.

3rd Stage: Back to Italy: Jausiers to Barge

2009-08-08T08:46:00.000-07:00

103 km (64 miles) with 2659 meters (8775 feet) of climbing

Day 3 started with breakfast in the RV. Ulrika was nice enough to get up at the crack of dawn to make us scrambled eggs. Normally it would have been a delicious breakfast with espresso, bread and cheese, but my stomach was not cooperating this early and I had to force down the food. We started with a long transfer section and within kilometers, Eric ripped his rear tire on a sharp rock. I was riding together with Katia and some of her friends, but wanting to avoid starting the special stage together with her, I took a bathroom break and slowed way down. For me, it is much easier and less stressful to do the time trial alone and at my own pace without having to worry about someone else. I was also still struggling with my stomach so I wanted to take my time and be ready for the first special stage. At the checkpoint I was able to get something from the race doctor to settle down my stomach. I took my time and waited for Katia to go ahead of me. Eric showed up after a while, he had been able to rip a poster of a wall to patch the large tear of his tubeless tire.

The first special stage was a tough one. The trail is rough and rocky and, you are on and off the bike a lot, both on the ascent and descent.

Granny gear climb

Rough downhill section

Lots of rocks

I never did catch Katia during this stage. Eric was able to catch up with me during the extensive hiking section but he waited for me at the checkpoint and we did the long paved descent to the second special stage together.

A little bike pushing...

The second special stage started in a small town. Katia and several of the top racers from the men's division were sitting down, eating and relaxing. I pulled in, but immediately swiped my chip and took off for the time trial. I knew this was another climb that would suit me. Middle chain ring, 12 kilometers, first on pavement, then a gravel road. I felt really strong and was able to hang with 3 of the fast men for quite some time, so I figured I must have put some time on Katia. After a long descent we finished at a checkpoint were the helicopter was parked on a tiny patch of land. The only refreshments that were available was fizzy water, wine, and some sliced salami on a rock. I decided to take off right away since the finish was only 15 km away and it was mostly downhill. I ended up riding in with 3 of the guys.

While I showered, got a massage, and hung out with my family by the RV, Eric had to work on getting a new tire from the mechanics. It is really hard to get done with a long day of racing and then spend hours cleaning bikes, doing mechanic work, and getting ready for the next day in the heat. Luckily we had Jan (my dad) - the master bike washer and tent erector with us!!

We had dinner with Hamish and Paul, 2 nice guys from England. After dinner there was an awards ceremony. I wasn't sure that I was still in the lead, but I heard my name called, got to shake hands with the town mayor, and received a giant basked of wine and food. We were warned that there would be some fire works going off at 10:30 that night. As we were getting ready to go to bed, there was a sound as loud as a bomb exploding. This was the start of the elaborate fire works which went on for about 30 minutes. My parents couldn't believe their eyes and ears, and the fact that this tiny town was able to put on such a show.

Second Stage: To Jausiers, France

2009-08-07T20:46:00.000-07:00

Picture of our Road Book: Stage 2 from San Damiano to Jausiers, France

4 o'clock came very early. Breakfast was served in the camp 10 minutes after the wake-up call. We had the usual Penne pasta with olive oil as well as white bread with either jam or nutella. Yum yum! I forced a couple of pieces of bread down with some coffee, but threw the pasta in the garbage. Fabrizio, the race announcer was standing at the 2 buses, calling out the names of each racer and we had to wait for our turn to board the bus. It seemed like a very slow process. The bus trip was about 30 minutes on a windy narrow road. When we reached the start line it was another long wait for each rider to get their bike. Finally, at 7:45 I was the very last person to take off. We took off in groups of 10, with the person with the most penalty points starting first. We started off with a special stage on a steep pavement climb that turned in to dirt. We had a lot of technical riding and lots of pushing. On the final technical downhill Eric passed me. He waited for me at the checkpoint that marked the end of the special stage. The first stage was a long one; I finished in 4 hrs and 3 minutes.

Steep climbing on the first special stage

The Ironbike Trail marker

After the first Special Stage Eric and I ended up riding together for most of the "transfer". We had a pavement climb that lasted for about an hour before we descended to a ski resort where my parents and sisters were standing cheering us on. My family had taken the first day "off" from the race to drive to the coast since my dad wanted to see and swim in the Mediterranean sea, but now they were back to follow the race. My parents had yet to receive their armbands from the race organizers, showing that they were part of the race and would be allowed to offer support at the checkpoints. I think it was driving my dad crazy that he couldn't hand us water or food during the race.

After grabbing a couple of bananas and some chocolate at the checkpoint, as well as a army jacket-liner provided by the race, Eric and I got on the Gondola where we had a chance to eat, drink, and catch our breaths. After getting off the gondola, we rode down the mountain to a ski lift. The lift ride was slow, long and windy and we had to hold the bikes in front of us. I was glad to have the jacket even though it didn't button in the front.

The second special stage was "my kind of climb". After a long descent of running and riding down a scree field with the helicopter circling above us, we had a middle chain ring climb of about 10 km with 1000 meters of vertical climbing . I felt really good and was able to power up this climb and pass a bunch of guys. At the top of the climb there is a long pitch black tunnel, and there was a volunteer at the entrance checking to make sure we had the mandatory light with us. The light didn't really do much, so you have to just trust that the water filled potholes are not going to be too deep. The stage was finished off by a dirt descent; I was happy with my ride!

We had a short transfer in to Jausiers, France which ends with a steep climb up to some monument. My time for the day was 9:14. Eric finished shortly after me and we rode down to the camp together. While I showered and got a massage, Eric and my dad set up the tent and cleaned the bikes.... I was living the easy life!! We had another pasta dinner at night and waited for the results to be posted. Finally, around 10 pm, they were up on the wall. I had a good day, and even though I was slower than Katia on the first stage, I had made up enough time in the second stage to get ahead by 250 points in the general classification. I was 15th overall for the second stage :-)

This 2nd stage ended up being 104 km (65 miles) with 4976 meters (16, 420 feet) of elevation gain.

Stage 2 Entracque to San Damiano Macra

2009-08-06T07:07:00.001-07:00

Start of Day 1 in Entracque

The first stage from Entracque to San Damiano Macra was 74 km (46 miles) with 2782 meters (9,200 feet) of climbing. We started with a "Special Stage" right at the beginning. It was a mass start on pavement, which turned in to a steep dirt climb after a few kilometers. I thought it was going pretty well and that I had put some time on Katia Tomatis, but when the climb got steeper and rougher she caught up with me. It was a pretty warm day (later found out it was 34 degrees C= 92 F) and I didn't stop at the checkpoint to fill my camelbak so I ran out of water several kilometers from the top of the last climb. With the top in sight, suddenly of my hamstrings cramped so bad my leg completely locked up. When I got off the bike, my other hamstring cramped and all I could do was stand there and grab my legs. I tried to move, but every movement I made, caused my hamstrings to seize up. Around me I saw other riders in the same dilemma. How could I be so stupid?? I asked one of the other cramping riders if I could have a swallow of water, so I could take a couple of salt pills. Within a couple of minutes my cramps stopped and I was able to get back on my bike and finish the stage which was a pretty technical downhill. I hoped I hadn't lost too much time to Katia, and found out later that I was 3 minutes behind at the end of the Special stage.

The Top of the Last Climb of Day 1

In San Damiano the camp was at a sports facility. We put the tents up in a field and after a shower and some food, I was able to get a massage from one of the 4 great massage therapists that were working at the race. Eric and I found a bar in the town which served gelato and we sat down and watched the last stage of Tour de France with several of the other racers.

The 4 massage therapists in action

In the evening we had a pasta dinner followed by a briefing about Day 2. The top 35 racers were being bussed to the start at 7 am with a 5 am wake-up call. The rest of the riders had a 6 am start waking up for breakfast at 4. I was number 36 in the general classification, and both Eric and I were on the early bus.

Ironbike Prologue

2009-08-06T05:37:00.000-07:00

Ciao!! After a very long trip back from Italy (off course consisting of lugging bike boxes and bags through train stations, on to buses, over cobblestone streets, through cities, and at airports) we are finally back home. I was hoping to post some results during the race, since I brought my new fancy IPhone with me, but there just never seemed to be one extra minute at the end of the day.

This year's Ironbike once again started in Entraque, a small town a couple of hours by train outside Turin. Eric and I were able to spend a few days with Roberto Ghidoni and his wife Vanna prior to the race at their home in the village of Ludizzo. Eric knows Roberto from Iditasport in Alaska, and I was very happy to finally meet "the Italian Moose", his wife, and daughter Ghinni. I could dedicate a whole post to our amazing stay with them in their 1000 year old stone tower where they live off the land and their cows but I would never get to the race....

The prologue was pretty uneventful with the exception that I actually missed the 2nd part of the race. The initial race took off in 2 heats and did a loop around the town. I rode pretty conservatively since I knew that the few penalty points I would accumulate wouldn't really matter much in the overall standings at the end of the 8 days. As soon as I we finished (around 16 minutes for me) I took a long shower in the town's swimming facility and then went to check my phone to see if my family had called. My parents and 2 sisters, Ulrika and Sofia, had agreed to come from Sweden to watch us and be our race support. They had flown in to Turin, rented an RV, and planned to follow the Ironbike for the week. Even though I had explained the "slight disorganization and confusion" around the race, I was a little nervous that it was going to be too much for them. The combination of language barrier, Italian culture, bike scene drama.... I was hoping they could handle it.

The rest of the Kobins had made it to Entraque. We met up with them at the start line and headed into town to watch the 2nd part of the race. Last year, the top 30 riders from the prologue had to do a 2nd, shorter prologue to determine who was going to wear the leader's jersey for the first stage. I had no visions of being in the top 30, but when we reached the finish line area I heard my name being called. Frantically trying to find someone who could translate, it was explained to me that the 2nd race was going off in 5 minutes, and the rules had changed: This year it was the top 30 men and top 3 women who had to race a 2nd time. The confusion begins.....

After talking with a few of the organizers I determined that missing the 2nd prologue wasn't going to have a huge impact on the overall standings. This 2nd part of the prologue was mostly to race for the leader's jersey, and according to the race organizers it was OK if I missed it. I really didn't feel like putting on my bike clothes again, running back to the camp for my bike to race for 5 minutes. Instead we watched the race, and then went to our favorite grocery shop and bought food for dinner which we had in my parents little RV.

Ironbike 2009

2009-08-01T22:24:00.000-07:00

We just finished ironbike 2009 yesterday. 7 days of really hard racing, 450 km, over 22,000 meters of climbing. After a brutal race, ended up first female and 22nd place overall! Will post more on the race when we get back home!!!

Cascade Creampuff 2009

2009-07-16T09:48:00.000-07:00

Another fun weekend at the Creampuff.... A few months ago, my friend Sten called and asked if I thought he should enter the Creampuff 100, and if I thought he would be able to finish. He said he has put on a a bit of weight the last year (ok, a lot of weight), drank a lot of beer, not exercised much since his son Quentin was born, and definitely not ridden his mountain bike. For any other person in this condition, I would definitely advice against trying to ride the 100 miles with 16,500 feet of vertical climbing. "YES, YOU DEFINITIVELY NEED TO SIGN UP, STEN, NOOOO PROBLEM, IT WILL BE FUN!!!"

Awesome single-track in Westfir

So, Sten took my advice and sent his entry to Scott, the CCP 100 organizer, and then the training began. Sten would frequently call and ask about nutrition, hydration, condition of the course, difficulty of the climbing and single track. One day I got the funniest voice mail from him, left while driving from Westfir (where the race takes place) to Bend where he lives. He had decided to go and check out the course and getting a practice ride in. He was asking if they issue parachutes at the starting line for when you fly off the 6" single track trail and take a 2000 foot fall off a cliff. He also threatened to carry a gun with one bullet so he could put himself out of the misery during the race, and also claimed he was going to be totally fresh after the race, since he was planning to drop out after a couple of hours. He said he would have never signed up had he known how technical the course was. I was REALLY looking forward to seeing him and Lisa, and meeting Quentin for the first time.

Eric and I left for Westfir, Oregon around noon on Friday. We stopped at Shasta and went for a short spin, had a picnic in a park and found a campground a couple of hours from Westfir. During the spin I found out I had a broken spoke. It's always fun to have to deal with these issues right before a race. After a great night's sleep we drove to Westfir and the first stop was at the local bike shop. We ended up buying a spoke and Eric put it on for me because speed of service doesn't seem to be a priority in small town Oregon. Enough said!!

Sten, Lisa, and Q showed up at the bike shop. I hadn't seen Sten for a couple of years, but he looked exactly the same. He appeared a little nervous, but I couldn't see any hives... (inside joke) After getting the bikes ready, Sten, Eric, and I went for a little spin, and then we did the usual race prep before the race meeting, and dinner at the Trailhead restaurant/cafe. Went to bed early, since we had to wake up at 4 the next morning.

Sten looking focused

After waking up to the obnoxious sound of Scott's blow-horn at 3:50 in the morning, forcing down a little breakfast and coffee, we all lined up for the start at 5:12 am. It was still pretty dark, but it was a neutral start and we had 4 miles on pavement before we started the first 8 mile climb on a fire road. When we started climbing, I noticed my legs were feeling really tight and stiff, but I figured they would loosen up after a bit. It didn't happen on the first climb, my legs felt heavy and I had no power to stand up and climb. At the first checkpoint (CP 2) we got onto a single track which was a bit slick, since it was really misty/lightly raining. I felt really uncoordinated, but sometimes it takes me a while to "get in the grove" so I wasn't too worried about it. After about 15 minutes of descending and being passed left and right, a woman came flying past me. She was whipping around the tight corners superfast!! I heard several guys remark on how fast she was. When we reached CP3 she was just leaving, and it didn't take too long to catch her on the next climb. I was feeling slightly better after backing off the pace, but had a really hard time hanging with the group, including Eric, I was riding with.

The course is in the shape of a figure eight, and we were doing the top-loop 2 times. Each loop took about 3.5 hrs. I had a hard time keeping my blood-sugar level and I kept making stupid mistakes, using my brakes too much, and at one point I went over my handle bars and rolled down a hill. The guy behind me pulled me up and said "Getting tired, huh". I wasn't really tired, just not quite right. After eating a handful of smashed cookies and chugging a little sustained energy I felt better and finally made it all the way down to CP 1.

Feeling a little dizzy...

CP 1 is at the bottom of the figure eight, and is also the finish line. From there, you take a single track along a river, ride up the first climb again, and descend the last 45 minutes on fun single track. As I grabbed a couple of gels, Karen deWolf (the speedy woman who had passed me on the single track earlier in the day) showed up. WHAT!?!? I hadn't really counted on that...

I left the checkpoint seconds before Karen, but as I couldn't make it over a steep rocky section, she climbed like a mountain goat and left me in the dust (or mud rather). I tried keeping a descent pace, hoping I would catch her on the next climb, and be able to hold her off on the single track, but it seemed a little ambitious. She looked so fast on the technical sections.

It took me a while to catch her on the climb, I was eating Gu like they were going out of style; I was so afraid of bonking. I just hoped the climb would keep going so I could make some time up on Karen. I didn't really feel great, but I think the adrenalin kept me going. My last downhill was definitely my best of the day. I finally felt smooth and I think the fear of getting caught after 11 hrs of racing made me more coordinated and flowy around the turns. I finished in 11 hrs 13 minutes, 2 minutes ahead of Karen.

Finally feeling good

Eric finished a couple of minutes ahead of me, he was 3rd in the Veteran category, not feeling his very best either. We were rooting for Sten, but unfortunately he got to CP 1 after the cut-off and wasn't allowed to continue on. He was still happy with how he did, 87 miles on a technical course is not bad, especially when you go from being an out of shape, beer drinking runner to an endurance mountain bike race in 3 months .... There is always 2010!!

The famous CCP clock...

Eddie I. Maiden and Cute Goat on training ride.

2009-06-21T19:00:00.000-07:00

When Marg Fedyna started my blog for me a couple of years ago, I vowed to not be one of those people that write about every training ride they do, talk about the trail and weather conditions, describe how their right calf was twitching at mile 32, record their wattage, heart rate, milage etc etc.

I don't think I have posted anything about a regular training ride before, since I can't imagine that anyone would find that interesting. However, I couldn't resist putting these photos on my blog. Eric and I did a 93 mile ride from our house today and stopped to take a couple of pictures on Stage road which parallels Highway 1. Isn't this the coolest statue you have ever seen? I am sure the artist based it on Iron Maiden's Eddie. How would you like to have this guy guarding your house?

La Ruta Lou and Eddie I. Maiden

This cute guy was checking us out while we were taking the pictures. He lives at the house Eddie is guarding.

Sequoia 200 K and Guy Comments

2009-06-08T10:45:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, Eric and I decided to sign up for the Sequoia 200 K to try to get some distance in before the Cascade Creampuff 100 and Ironbike in Italy. This charity ride starts in Palo Alto and has 3 categories in addition to the 200 K. There were 900 people signed up to ride a mellow 50 k, a hilly 100 k, 100 miles, and 200 K. Pretty inspiring to see so many people out on their bikes. Since we will be racing 100 miles in the dirt at Creampuff, we decided to use our hard-tails for the ride.

As we were passing some of the other riders on the climbs we started getting comments about the advantage of our "easy gearing" (even though we were clearly pushing a harder gear than the people we were passing). This made me think of all the funny/stupid comments I have gotten from guys in races. Many men are clearly not comfortable being passed by " A GIRL" and often feel the need to come up with unprompted excuses for why they are being passed or not keeping up.

Here is my list of The Top 10 Stupid Guy Comments:

10. I am just stretching out a cramp (heard many many times during various races)

9. I lost my water bottle

8. I'm bonking (answer to: Hello!)

7. My shifting is not working....

6. Angrily: I just finished building this bike in my garage last night and something is not working right.

5. OH, I am just taking it EASY today (Answer to: Hey, good job)

4. I had 7 flats today

3. Oh bummer, I just took a drink from my water bottle and now you pass me (passing a guy at the top of a hill and never seeing him again)

2. It must be easy to go up a hill with that gearing (passing a guy on my mtb, in my big chainring on the road while he is riding a carbon fiber roadbike)

1. Riding a Mtb on the road is as stupid as playing tennis with a wooden tennis racket (comment from a guy we passed during organized road ride)

So No Mas "100"

2009-05-18T21:57:00.000-07:00

The So No Mas 100 miles turned into 100 Km about a month before the start. The race organizer (Carlos Perez with Bike Monkey) thought that the 100 mile technical course which consisted of 3 laps around Lake Sonoma would be too much in the heat and too difficult for most people to complete. I was a bit disappointed at first, but after finding out that the temperature was supposed to reach 100 degrees I didn't mind too much.

Eric and I drove up to Lake Sonoma on Friday after work. It was almost dark when we got there after a couple of rest stops in Santa Rosa to stretch our legs and in Healdsburg for dinner. It was still really warm even at sun-set and there were lots of mosquitoes. After picking up our number plates (literally numbers drawn in felt-pen on a paper plate) we set up our tent and went to sleep.

On Saturday morning it was cooking!! I felt like I was baking in the sun at 8 am. Our camp neighbor John Solomito shared some of his great Italian coffee, I cooked up some eggs and had a bagel for my pre-race meal. I realized I had left my hammer gel at home but I was able to get a few Gu's before the race started.

The 100 Km racers started at 9 am while the people doing 1 lap (50 Km) of the course went out an hour later. (In my opinion this race should have started at 5 am). We started out doing 2 short laps around the parking lot to thin out the field before getting onto the single track. I started out pretty slow, thinking that I was going to race in the heat for over 8 hrs. It was hard to pass people on the single track, but I was in no hurry. The course was really fun; smooth single track with steep ups and downs, all power climbing. I passed the 2 women in front of me and then started catching the guys. Everyone seemed pretty laid back, and no one started sprinting after me. After a couple of hours I caught Kurt Levy and obnoxiously yelled at him since we had been joking around before the start about beating each other. Kurt wasn't looking super spry and told me he was cramping. After putting him on to Therma tabs he brought some to the race, but was planning on grabbing them for the second lap. Some people never learn..... (all in good fun)

There were several check points on the course and at the 3rd one I stopped since I had finished my camel bak. After filling up on water and chugging a cold coke at the check point we got onto a road for a short while before dropping back onto a trail at the next checkpoint. I was right next to another racer at this point and we were told we were 11th and 12th. The trail got rougher and was really steep going down hill. After descending for quite some time we spotted a big group of riders coming toward us!!! They said they couldn't find any trail markers and had explored several trails without finding the right way. We turned around and followed them back up the steep hill to the check point. Apparently some joker had taken the trail markers and we were now re-directed onto the road going back to the start/finish area. Most of us were taking it pretty easy since we had been caught by a bunch of the riders behind us. I am not sure how much time the front guys lost, but I was on the side-trail for about 20 minutes. After cruising on the road back to the finish everyone stopped to find out what was going to happen next. Carlos was trying to make a decision about wether or not to call the race off. After a few minutes he decided that the heat was too much for everyones safety and called it off.

So the 100 mile race turned in to approximately 26, which was ok with most people. I think a couple of guys went back out for another lap but were told to go back at the first check point. Better than the race itself, was the post race celebration, but that will have to be another post.

From one Extreme to Another...

2009-04-19T17:52:00.000-07:00

6 weeks after finishing the longest and coldest race I have ever done, my next race ended up being the shortest race of the season in 90 + degree heat at the SeaOtter Classic. Actually, this happens to be the shortest bike race I have ever done. There was a pretty small field of women in the Pro/Expert Single Speed category, and I ended up winning by a couple of minutes. Here are a few comparisons/contrasts between the Iditarod Trail Invitational and the Single Speed Cross Country race at SeaOtter:

Iditarod SeaOtter

Mode of transport: Bike Bike

Distance: 350 miles 19 miles

Finish Time: 6 days, 19 hrs 1 hr 32 minutes

Temperature: -20 degrees 90 + degrees

Race Course: Frozen rivers, mountain Single track, fire road

passes, snow machine trails

no trail...

Terrain: Snow and ice Sand, gravel, dirt

Race "kit": Layers, layers, and layers Shorts and jersey

Eye wear: Ski goggles Sun glasses

Nutrition: Anything with lots of fat and Sports drink and water

calories, cookies, muffins,

danishes, chocolate, trail mix

Race Support: No support allowed The great guys at Magura, Eric

No. of Spectators: A couple of moose Thousands of people

Biggest Challenge: Surviving the cold Not puking from heat

Scenery: Snowy mountains Spring flowers

Fun Factor: HIGH HIGH

New Career????

2009-04-01T12:32:00.000-07:00

This doesn't quite qualify as an Ultra Endurance Adventure, but it was something different, fun, and interesting I did a few months ago with my friend, "ex-boss" and sponsor Rob Naber. Rob who is the owner of Physical Therapy of Los Gatos, thought it would be a good idea to give patients the option to watch a demonstration of their therapeutic exercises instead of just receiving written instructions or pictures. Rob asked me if I could be the "model" for some stabilization and strengthening exercise videos he was making. Patients and others who are interested can go to PTLG's web-site and click on the prescribed therapeutic exercise and the YouTube video will show them how to correctly do the movements.

www.ptoflosgatos.com

Please check out PTLGs web-site. If you or someone you know needs physical therapy, this is the place to go!!! I speak from experience; I have both worked AND been a patient at PTLG.

I know a few people became famous on YouTube, however I don't think it will lead to a new career, fame or fortune for me. We had fun making the videos though, and hopefully it will help show the patients how to correctly do the exercises.... These are some of the videos as posted on youtube.

Iditarod Trail Invitational 2009 - Final Episode

2009-03-12T21:31:00.000-07:00

The Alaska Mountain Range we crossed

Before leaving the Rohn checkpoint we stopped by the main cabin to say hello to Jasper, the cook, and the other Iditarod checkers. It was nice to see the people who nursed me back to life after my hypothermia experience a couple of years ago. Again we were able to take off in the morning light. After a few hours we hit the Post River glacier which is a field of slick ice on a hillside. We had to get off the bikes and hike in the snow on the side of the ice. Even though we were wearing boots with screws on the bottom, it was difficult to make it up without slipping and falling on the ice. Apparently the dog-teams end up going around this section.

View from the Glacier

Hiking up the Post River Ice Glacier

The trail was really soft and mushy and it was difficult to ride without sinking in with our "skinny" tires. Eric weighing a bit more than me was sinking through even more and ended up having to push his bike through long sections. I figured it probably wasn't so fun being forced to push your bike with someone else riding in front of you, so I took off by myself over the frozen lakes. It was really windy on the lakes and it was hard to keep from slipping on the ice where the snow was gone. I had to pedal very gingerly to keep the bike from sliding out underneath me. It also felt a little scary knowing you were riding on ice with water underneath, even if the ice was very thick. Looking down, you could see big cracks deep in the thick ice.

After a while I passed Billy and Aidan who had stopped to make water and have lunch in the sunshine. The last few miles to Bison camp was on rolling hard-packed fun trail and I felt like I was flying down the hills, and I could even stand up on some of the uphills. I was actually sweating when I finally reached the walled tent known as Bison Camp. Bison Camp is a bit of paradise in the snow. Even though is is a simple tent with a wood stove, it provides a warm cozy place to rest on the straw covering the floor. There is no checker at this check-point, but luckily Tim and Tom had been there for a while and the tent was warm from the fire in the wood stove. There was a pot of water on the stove and no shortage of snow to make more if needed. I hung up all my wet clothes on the lines above the stove and just when Tim and Tom were leaving Eric showed up. We found a couple of "cup-of-noodles" in the tent and had a delicious meal with lots of sodium.

We (I) decided that there was no reason to stay too long at Buffalo camp, but thought it would be a great idea to press on to Nikolai which is 45 miles away. When Aidan and Billy showed up we were packing up our gear and getting dressed. It was dark when we took off for Nikolai and the temperature had dropped to around zero. There is a steep up-hill where you have to push your bike leaving Bison camp and then a fun downhill. You are not exactly flying on your bike with all the gear, narrow trail with thick Alder bushes on one side and deep snow on the other, but it's fun to go a little faster than 6 mph. It hadn't been more than 5 or 10 minutes when all of the sudden my cranks locked up. I stopped as soon as I could to try to avoid any major damage, but it was already too late. My rear derailleur had been pulled into my spokes. Eric noticed that I had stopped and turned around. He immediately diagnosed my problem: I had a broken chain link which had gotten caught in the derailleur which was sucked into my wheel. Even in the zero degree weather in the dark, Eric was able to quickly fix my chain , but the derailleur was a different story. It's hard enough to work on a bike when your fingers are stiff and cold and we were on a really narrow trail with snow built up on one side and Alder bushes on the other side so we had no choice but to push our bikes back to Bison camp. I felt terrible for rushing us out of the checkpoint, and then MY bike was causing problems.

I am sure Billy and Aidan didn't exactly appreciate us waking them up when we got back to the tent-cabin, but they were offering tools and advice. After Eric got my bike somewhat straightened out we weren't exactly in the mood to go back out in the dark and cold, so we decided to sleep for a while.

After a few hours of sleep we got up and made a second attempt for Nikolai. It was cold, which was good because the trail was hard. The sun must have melted the snow during the day, because there was a thick layer of ice on top of the snow and it looked surreal in the moonlight. It almost looked like a white mirror with dark trees sticking up here and there. I was glad the moon was out, because my headlamp had broken earlier and I was stuck with my flashlight mounted on my handle bars. It is easier to see the trail when you can turn your head and point your light where ever you want to.

At Sullivan bridge we hit some open water going over the creek, but it was really obvious and we were able to get off our bikes, jump over the creek and pass our bikes across a couple of times. We went through some of the most beautiful sections on the way to Nikolai with Aspen trees on both sides of the trail. Getting closer to Nikolai we were on and off the river. The temperature dropped, and that's when I realized I had left my down jacket at Bison Camp. At first I was trying to stay warm by constant eating, but as Eric was still having to push his bike in the soft spots, I continued to get colder since we weren't moving very fast. Every once in a while I would drop my bike and run up and down the river to stay warm. I am sure I was being pretty annoying with my shivering, running around, and refusing to stop, because after a while Eric offered me his puffy jacket. At 10:30 am we finally reached the small town. Nick and Olene, the couple who host this checkpoint live a little bit outside the town and I am not sure how new racers find their house. They always know ahead of time when racers are showing up because it seems the whole town (50 people) are in constant communication via CB-radios and they are frequently getting updates from neighbors. I guess when you live in a town of 50, a race like the Iditarod Trail Invitational, and CERTAINLY the Iditarod sled dog race coming through your town is a huge event.

The Town of Nikolai

Tim and Tom were already sleeping at Nick and Olene's. We planned to get a good meal, take a short nap on their couch and be on our way. I had 3 bowls of beef-stew and a couple of giant chocolate chip cookies and then laid on the couch and watched the start of the Iditarod on television. The temperature continued to drop outside, and we were a bit worried about continuing the last 50 miles without me having an extra jacket. (or actually Eric, since he would definitely make me wear his) 50 miles doesn't sound like a lot, but if you have to push your bike the whole way, it can take a long time. Also, the majority of this stretch is on an open river and it can be extremely cold and windy.

When Billy showed up in Nikolai I jokingly asked if he had an extra jacket he "would like me to carry" to McGrath, and he said he actually did have a spare coat I could use. His soft shell jacket was completely soaked though, and it took several hours to dry it out above the furnace in Nick and Olene's living room. After taking my first shower in about 6 days, we took over one of the bedrooms and slept while the jacket dried. We had planned on leaving Nikolai with Aidan, but since we had to wait for the jacket to dry, he left alone around 2 in the afternoon. Billy also left sometime in the evening. Eric and I packed up our stuff and left at midnight. It wasn't quite as cold as we thought it was going to be, but cold enough that the trail was hard. After a couple of hours we ran into Aidan on the side of the trail. He said that the trail was so soft during the middle of the day that he had been unable to ride. At 7 pm he had decided to sleep until the trail hardened up so he could ride again. What a bummer, he had left 10 hrs in front of us!! That's the funny thing about racing in Alaska, it's all about the trail conditions.

50 miles have never seemed so long. The river was so boring, and mind numbing. At some point during the middle of the night Eric was falling asleep on his bike and said he wished he had some coffee (I have been trying to get him to drink coffee with me for a long time). I had some chocolate covered coffee beans, but he claimed they didn't do the trick. Soon thereafter I started feeling the same way. It was so hard to stay awake, and a couple of times I laid down on top of Billy's jacket in the middle of the trail to rest for a minute or two. One memorable thing about this section was all the moose tracks on the snow machine trail. Off course the local moose appreciated the snow machine tracks left in the deep snow, since this makes walking around and finding food a lot easier for them. It looked like a herd of mouse had used the trail, miles and miles of it was covered with tracks which made it really bumpy and slow to ride. Eric spotted a "message" on the side of the trail. Someone had used a stick to write in the snow, it said: "F*%$#K MOOSE". Someone (we guessed Billy) must have been REALLY tired.

The river went on and on and on, I felt a little better when the sun came up, but the miles were ticking by in slow motion. The only thing that kept me going was thinking about Peter's mancakes. I was constantly calculating what time we should be at the finish to try to figure out if it was still "breakfast time" so I could have Peter's famous "mancakes". (The thickest, most delicious pancakes you can imagine, covered in whipped cream and syrup) There was a sign that stated that we had 13 miles left to Peter's house, but Eric was convinced it must be wrong. Surely it couldn't still be that far. With 3 miles left to go, we finally hit a ROAD, the first one we had seen for about 350 miles. Even though we only had such a short distance to go and I knew food was within reach, I had to keep eating my trail food (at this point peanut m & m's). I was afraid I was going to bonk and not make it up the stairs to Peter and Tracy's house, or start eating off someone else's plate when I got there.

13.5 hours after leaving Nikolai we finally reached McGrath. Peter and Tracy's living room and kitchen was filled with racers. I barely had time to take my clothes off before Tracy offered me coffee and asking what I wanted to eat. It was so nice to finally get there, and it was great to see everyone else and hear their stories from the race. Jeff Oatley not surprisingly won the race this year, and he was followed by Jay and Tracy Petervary. Peter Basinger who had decided to ski this year "for something different" was first on skis, and off course Tim and Tom were the first walkers (beating me and Eric). Kathi Merchant was also at the house, she was busy updating the web-site, talking to reporters and racer's family members, and was mostly seen working on her lap-top with a phone to one ear while listening to our stories with the other ear.

Tracy and Peter are so generous and friendly and they provided world class service for the tired racers in their home. Tracy was instantly doing every one's laundry, and Peter was constantly adding new food and delicious dishes to the kitchen table. I couldn't stop eating, I was amazed at the quantities of pancakes, omelets, sausages, cookies, and coffee I was putting away. After a short nap, we were back at the kitchen table again for more food and stories.

We had such a great time during the race this year, and finishing at Peter and Tracy's house in McGrath really "makes the race". It is the perfect way to end the Iditarod adventure.

Iditarod Trail Invitational 2009 - Part 2

2009-03-11T22:07:00.000-07:00

Snowbikes at Cabin on Rainy Pass

Eric and I hung out with Bill in the cabin for a few hours and then we decided that it was time to try to make it over the pass and down Dalzel Gorge to Rohn, the 5th checkpoint. By now, the wind and snow had really picked up and our bikes were covered in snow. So were the tracks made by the racers in front of us... We took off from the cabin, and couldn't even figure out how to get to where we had come from. There was just waist deep soft snow everywhere, the wind was blowing really hard, and we barely made any progress. After about half an hour we decided it was pointless; there was no way we could make it all the way to Rohn (about 18 miles) by ourselves, so we turned around to go back. Our tracks had already been blown over. It was so frustrating, overwhelming, and kind of scary that I had a little melt down.

Bill was there to great us when we returned. I got my sleeping bag out and curled up with all of my clothes on, but I was still freezing. As soon as I went for more than 30 minutes without eating, my body totally shut down, and I couldn't keep warm and I had no energy at all. I ate a muffin and some cookie dough that Eric had brought and instantly felt better. Then Bill offered us some freeze dried chicken and rice. It was so good to eat something hot. After dinner Bill produced a bottle of Rumplemint schnapps and I had a shot in some hot cocoa. It was quite a meal we had up at the Rainy Pass Hilton. Thanks Bill!!

In the afternoon 2 other racers joined us, Billy Koitzsch and Aidan Harding. They too decided to try to make it over the pass, but came back after a few minutes. 2 skiers, Peter Basinger and Ed Plumb stopped by briefly, they weren't having too much trouble with the snow and pressed on after only a few minutes of rest. While hanging out in the cabin, Eric took it upon himself to find a tarp and hang it with some giant nails from the ceiling to block some of the wind. It also kept more snow from drifting into the cabin. At least we were a bit more sheltered in our temporary home.

Since there wasn't much to do in the cabin, it was too cold to be out of the bag, and it got dark around 7:30, I continued to lay in my sleeping bag until the next morning. Eric filled me a bottle with hot water and that made my sleeping bag so hot, I ended up peeling off a few layers of clothes. Because of my size I could crawl to the bottom of my sleeping bag and have my entire head inside. With my feet wrapped in my down jacket I was pretty cozy. At 10 pm we were joined by Tim and Tom, the studly walkers from Pennsylvania who were 2 of the racers going all the way to Nome.

We made some oatmeal in the morning and Bill was busy making water for the 6 of us before taking off. There were discussions about what types of food provided the most amount of calories. Billy was eating split-pea soup laced with a stick of butter from a zip-lock bag. He claimed in contained 1400 kcal. Bill told us that he had found dehydrated butter that he adds to his freeze-dried food, and Tim was eating a whole summer sausage. I stuck to the oatmeal and some chocolate.

Breaking Trail on Rainy Pass with Billy and Aidan

The 4 bikers took off first. It was quite a bit of work breaking trail, and all of us kept punching through and falling into waist deep snow. The guys took turns breaking trail, I wasn't really doing much with my little bike. It was hard work and it didn't take long before Tim and Tom easily passed us with their snow shoes. They looked like they were flying! During the stay in the cabin I learned that Tom is a mailman in PA. He has a 12 mile route that he walks every day, rain or shine. Sometimes he runs to and from work (6 miles each way), but most of the time he just does a 10 mile training run after work. Tom has been to Nome 4 times. Tim is a studly ultra-marathoner, whose wife has the fastest female time to McGrath. Tim's daughter was competing at the high school indoor track nationals as he was making his way to McGrath. Tim has also walked to Nome before. Did I mention they are both in their mid 50s?? We were amongst such impressive athletes.

Tim and Tom

Top of Rainy Pass

After several hours we finally reached the top of Rainy pass. And while it was all down hill from there, it was a downhill with 3 feet of snow, alder bushes and willow trees covering the unmarked trail, as well as a small ice and snow covered river running through the gorge. We were hoping to be able to follow Tim and Tom's tracks or see some signs from the riders in front of us, but it was too windy and all tracks were covered by snow. We slowly fought our way down the gorge, getting our bikes caught on the willow branches and lifting the bikes over trees and bushes. At 5 pm, 8 hours after leaving the cabin, Eric was in the front when he suddenly saw a snow machine coming from the other direction. What a sight!! It was Terry, one of the iditarod checkers, making his way through the bushes using a machete. I was so happy to see him, I dropped my bike and ran up to give him a hug.

Terry making his way through the willows with a machete.

After a couple of minutes, 2 other snow machiners came up behind Terry. The 3 guys decided they were going to continue on to see if they could get to the cabin to help Bill out. They told us we had 7-8 more miles to reach Rohn. We still had to walk down the gorge, but at least we had a trail to follow. Just a couple of hours later the Rohn checkers came back. They said it was too difficult and dangerous to make it up the mountain, so they had decided to turn around.

We crossed 3 ice bridges on the way down. The ice bridges are made for the sled-dog teams to cross the river. They are made out of willow trees and branches and covered with snow and ice. With 3 miles to go we finally hit a river so we could ride again. Eric and I reached Rohn at 11:45 pm that night.

The checkpoint in Rohn consists of a walled tent with a wood stove. Tim and Tom were sleeping on the ground, as well as Alec and John Ross. They had planned on leaving at 2 am, but since we woke them up, they all decided to take off a little early. Rob, the checker, was great. He had canned ravioli and clam chowder heated up for us. I checked the food labels, I just consumed 3600 mg of sodium after eating one can of each. WOW!! Sleeping was not easy with other racers arriving, hanging up their clothes to dry, and trying to get fed. I was glad I had brought my earplugs and some ambien!

I had 3 packages of instant oatmeal, some chocolate covered pretzels, 2 servings of hot cocoa, and a cup of coffee in the morning. I was actually full for a couple of hours after leaving Rohn.

Iditarod Trail Invitational 2009 - Part 1

2009-03-11T09:53:00.000-07:00

Eric and I are back from Alaska with all our fingers and toes intact (although Eric did frost-bite his earlobes) We are both healthy, just a little sleep-deprived. After the race it feels a little weird to be back in civilization, but it's nice to sleep in a bed and eat real food. Thanks to everyone who followed our progress along the Iditarod trail. Thanks for all the messages and thoughts along the way.

The race this time couldn't have been more different than last time. I was healthy at the start, for one, which made a huge difference on how I felt during the entire race.

We started at 2 pm on Knik lake. The 46 skiers, cyclists, walkers, and snowshoers scattered across the lake in different directions. It had snowed a ton in Anchorage the day before, so we were a little nervous the trail wasn't going to be ridable, but luckily the trail was fairly hard and we were able to ride. We were right behind a group of riders with snow bikes, and it was easy to follow in their wide tire tracks. Eric and I were the only 2 riders who were still riding snow-cats (the skinnier wheels). It's hard to justify buying a snow bike when you only ride in the snow once a year.

The weather was perfect and the temperature comfortable. I was riding without my jacket and we cruised the first part which was on rolling trails in the trees without wind. After the rolling hills we got onto a lake and river system where the wind picked up and the temperatures dropped considerably. At night time time it was around -20 and several people got frost-bit toes during this section. A couple of people stepped in overflow and had to drop out unfortunately. The first check-point was Yentna station, 57 miles from the start, which we reached at 1:50 am. Yentna station is a simple "lodge" on the river and it was really nice to be able to get inside and to get some real food. The owner made us grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup which tasted wonderful! We were able to share a room with 3 other riders. There was a king-sized bed, a small couch, and floor-space in the small room. Eric found an old foam mattress in a closet which put on the floor for us to sleep on . We "went to bed" around 3 and slept on and off until 7 in the morning. It seems to take a long time to get dressed in all your layers, fill up camel-baks and thermoses, put toe-warmers in your boots, and get out the door each time you stop, but we were finally of at 7:50 am.

From Yentna Station we continued riding the the Yentna river until we reached Skwentna roadhouse at mile 90 at 1:50 pm. Mileage is a whole different story in Alaska. If you are riding at 6 mph, you feel like you are making pretty good time. Worst case scenario, you are pushing your bike at 2 mph. Actually, there were some points when we were breaking trail at 1/2 mph... and that was going downhill...

At Skwentna we stopped only briefly to refill our water and have a bite to eat. I had a couple of frozen roast beef and cheese sandwiches which I put on top on the wood stove to defrost. They made a great lunch. We took off with another rider, Alec Petro , but he was soon pulling away from us with his speedy snow bike. Some time before dark we reached Shell lake lodge where we passed up Alec who had decided to stop for a bite to eat. This lodge is not a check point, so we decided to skip it, as inviting as it did look, in order to reach our next stop as soon as possible. It didn't take long for Alec to pass us back up again, he looked so effortless on his bike.

We reached Finger Lake and the Winter Lake Lodge by 11 pm. There is a walled tent set up for the riders to sleep and dry out clothes. With several racers sharing such a small space and every ones sweaty clothes hanging up to dry it was quite a smell going on in the tent. We went inside to the lodge and were served a great meal of rice, beans, chicken, cheese, and a tortilla. After eating junk food the whole day it tasted extra yummy. We found a spot on the floor in the tent, but it was difficult to sleep with other racers coming and going during the middle of the night. At some point a bed came open, and I was able to get a couple of hours sleep in a more comfortable spot. In the morning, we found our drop-bag, which had been flown out ahead of time by the race organizers and refilled our food and battery supplies, as well as restocked toe and hand warmers. I ate some of the granola I had sent and had some hot cocoa before we took off at 7:30.

From Winterlake Lodge we continued on to Puntilla Lake. The most memorable moment on this section was having to go up a hill so steep it was difficult to just climb up, even more so while trying to drag, push, lift the loaded bikes. We came down the "happy steps" onto a river, and then climbed up the riverbank on the other side. I would love to see the dog mushers getting the teams through this part. We rode this whole section in the daylight and reached Puntilla around 2 in the afternoon. That check point is run by a really nice family with 5 sons. They own a lodge where people come to hunt and fish, and they also have 10 smaller hunting cabins around the area (one of these cabins came in handy later in the race).

At first we planned on just a short rest at Puntilla, but as the trail was really soft and mushy we decided to get some sleep and leave at night when the trail would harden up in the cold. After eating a can of ravioli I slept on one of the beds in the back of the cabin using my down coat for a blanket. I had some instant oatmeal before we took off to go over the infamous Rainy Pass which is 3600 feet at the top. We were trying to get some trail and weather information before we left, but the only thing we knew for sure was that Bill Merchant was trying to make his way across the pass on a snow machine to make us a trail. The Iditarod checkers at Rohn (the next check point) were supposed to make it over the pass from the other direction, but one of the snow machines had gone down through the ice and the driver had to be rescued.

This was my first time over Rainy Pass. Last time there was no trail made, so in 2007 we opted for the 30 mile detour over Hell's gate, taking a longer but less steep way across the mountain range. We left a little after 10 pm and we were able to ride for a short time until we reached the steeper areas when we had to push our bikes. The night was perfectly still with the moon and stars out, it was really beautiful. Eric had told me horror stories about how cold and windy this section can be, how it could take 24 hrs to get across, and how he had to bivy above tree line because of how exhausted he had been. I was singing Swedish Christmas songs to myself as we hiked along in the dark of the night, thinking about how EASY it was and what great time we were making. I couldn't wait to make it to the top of the pass by dawn!! At one point we passed a broken down snow machine along the trail.

Around 6 am, after 8 hours of pushing, the trail just came to an end. The foot prints from other racers all of the sudden were going the opposite direction. Tracker Eric decided we should follow the foot prints back to were he had seen a split in the trail. It was only about a half a mile and in the morning light we could see a small shed looking building in the distance. As the snow was deep we left the bikes to check out the building. We found 7 bikes and a sled leaning up against it and when we opened the door we saw 8 mummy bags on the cots, and on the floor. Every single person in front of us, including Bill Merchant, had also had to stop and seek shelter in the small cabin. After laughing at the situation we realized the roof was blown off the building, and snow drifts were covering the wood stove and part of the loft. We found a broom and cleared a spot big enough for our sleeping bags upstairs.

The Blown-Off Roof of our shelter cabin

Our Sleeping Spot Upstairs

It was impossible to sleep and after a couple of hours we heard all the racers downstairs moving around, making water and packing up. It was a really funny situation, and we were cracking jokes yelling to the others below us. We weren't in the mood to leave the cozy cabin after only 2 hours of rest in the bad weather, so we moved our sleeping bags to the cots down stairs and were hanging out with Bill and listening to his stories. At this point it was 10 below 0 outside as well as inside. Bill had somehow managed to carry an espresso maker up the mountain with him and as we were stranded in a snow storm in the wilderness I had the best cup of espresso i have ever had. It was worth ever step!!

Drinking espresso on Rainy Pass with Bill

Jones' fracture.... what a bummer!

2008-10-25T12:14:00.001-07:00

Only 12 hrs after finishing my Ironbiker race report and really looking forward to going to my favorite race La Ruta de los Conquistadores in Costa Rica, I had a little incident that will keep me on the couch rather than on my bike for a while. Thursday morning as I was stepping out of the yurt, I slipped on the step with my sandal and fell. It seemed really silly, more embarrassing than painful actually, and I thought I would just be able to "walk it off". I hobbled in to the house while telling Eric, "I'm OK, I'm OK, I'm sure I'm OK". After laying around talking on the phone to my sister, not even mentioning the fall since it seemed so minor, I realized I couldn't put any weight on my foot. Well, my plan for the day was a 2 hour road-spin so after painfully squeezing my foot into my bike shoe I got on my bike and started riding. After about 2 minutes I made a U-turn since I realized I was probably not really going to have a good ride.

At 10 o'clock I drove myself to Los Gatos Community ER for some X-rays. I had a feeling that something was broken, but it seemed like such a stupid little fall, that it couldn't be.... About 1 hr later I crutched out to my car, with the x-rays showing the Jones' fracture, and my foot in a splint. A Jones' fracture occurs in an area of the 5th metatarsal (your foot bone that leads to your little toe) with very poor blood circulation making healing difficult without surgery. All I could think about was that I was going to have to miss La Ruta, my favorite race that I have been looking forward to all year.... I was so sad!!

On my way home I called Rob Naber, my friend, former boss, and sponsor who is the owner of Physical Therapy of Los Gatos. He immediately recommended me seeing Dr. Joan Oloff who is the ankle and foot specialist that he co-owns the medical building with. She has worked with many high level athletes including Brandy Chastain. Rob actually called me back after a couple of hours and had already set up an appointment for me to see her the same afternoon.

Since I did not want to sit around and cry and feel sorry for myself, I decided to go to work before my doctor's appointment. My client and friend Linda Higgins (happy hipaa) cheered me up as I made her work harder than usual to make myself feel better. We laughed as she walked me out to my car after her workout, who was the patient and who was the physical therapist??

Dr. Oloff looked at my x-rays, asked if I had researched Jones' fractures, and said that she recommended surgery. Since everything I read on the Internet said you have a 50/50 chance of healing with your foot non-weight bearing in a cast for 8 weeks, I didn't even have to think about it. Dr. Oloff quickly scheduled the surgery for the following afternoon. I am very fortunate to be taken care of so quickly!!

Friday morning I still hopped around on my crutches to work out my clients. I thought about going swimming, but decided against it since I wasn't allowed to eat before the surgery, and I didn't want to bonk. Eric drove me to the surgery center in the afternoon. I was a bit nervous about the anesthesia, since I had a bad experience with it during my elbow surgery in South Africa. At that time I ended up with fluid in my lungs, my oxygen saturation dropped and landed me in the ICU. This time was SMOOTH, I only felt a little dizzy and drunk when I woke up about 1 hour after they put me under. Under fluoroscopy Dr. Oloff had inserted a screw into my 5th metatarsal holding it together so it can heal faster. My foot was completely numb packed into a bandage and a splint.

I spent the night on the couch with my foot elevated per instructions from Dr. Oloff. So far I haven't had to take any pain medication, I am just uncomfortable with the splint and not being able to move around like I want to. It's very annoying to have to ask for help all the time and not being able to get around that well. Eric is a very patient "nurse" but I am sure he is getting tired of hearing me complain and having to take care of me. My follow-up appointment with Dr. Oloff is on Thursday, but she actually called me this morning to see how I was feeling. According to her I can get in the pool 10 days post-op (that would be 9 days from now) and hopefully begin weight bearing (that means trainer) in 2 weeks. If only La ruta didn't have so much hiking, I could maybe still make it......

Ironbiker, Brazil

2008-10-22T18:08:00.000-07:00

Team Ironbike

When I found out that I won an entry to Ironbiker, Brazil for my first place at Ironbike, Italy I had no idea that it included airfare, room, and meals and a chance to hang out with the Ironbike organizers and 4 other racers from team Ironbike. Eric and I decided to go a week early to have a little vacation before the race. We flew in to Belo Horizonte which is Brazil's 3rd largest city, in the state of Minas Gerais. For 5 days we stayed in Ouro Preto, which is a beautiful town that dates back to the Gold rush era. We stayed at a youth hostel at the top of a cobble stone street that was so steep it was difficult to walk either up or down. Little old ladies in fashion shoes and smokers would fly past us when we walked back and forth into town. We spent most of the time around Ouro Preto doing some riding to explore the area and had fun trying to get around without speaking a lick of Portugese. We only ran in to 2 people in a shop who spoke a bit of English, so it was quite challenging reading menus and ordering food, ask for directions, and get around in general.

Ouro Preto

After our time in Ouro Preto we packed up our bikes and took a taxi to meet up with "the Italians" who were staying outside Mariana, the town where Ironbiker starts and finishes the first day. The place we stayed at during the race, Hotel Fazenda Galeria 12, was definitely an upgrade from the hostel. It was a small hotel with a restaurant and pool on a large property. The owner, known as "the Madame" was a energetic little lady who was super friendly and very animated but didn't speak a word of English or Italian.

From the Ironbike organization there was Caesar, the race promoter, Simone and Theo. Those 3 always seemed to have a friendly argument going on, which was very entertaining. Theo, an older italian guy who raced in the first ever Paris to Dakkar rally smoked like a chimney and was in charge of driving the VW bus they rented. They also brought Katia, Piero, Malin, and Filipo to the race, so there was 9 of us crammed into the van which sometimes made it quite challenging getting up the steep rocky hills. The couple of days before the race we did a little touring of the area. One day we went down into an old gold mine where we were able to swim in an underground lake in the mine. The mine had produced gold, silver, and arsenic up until 20 years ago. When the mining stopped, it was producing 4 grams of gold per ton of ore! Sounds like a lot of work for so little gold.

Starting Line

Ironbiker is the biggest Mountain Bike marathon in South America with 1100 riders. There was an elite field of about 20 women. The first day was supposed to be 74 km and we rode the 8 km from our hotel to the start. It was really hot and humid even before we took off. In general, Brazilians seem very layed-back and never in a rush or on any sort of time schedule until you get some wheels under them. They drive like they are CRAZY with no regards for other cars, pedestrians, animals, or speed bumps. This is what I learned on the internet about driving in Brazil:

"Brazil has one of the highest rates of Car accident fatalities in the Americas with 24.2 killed in crashes per 100,000 members of the population. Brazil ranks third in the world with worst road death rate per person, just behind El Salvador and the Dominican Republic. Crashes claim over 35,000 lives year each on Brazilian roads ( shockingly more- 39,000 are killed in Gunshot violence)."

From what I observed in the race, they ride like they drive. There are no straight lines, no looking before you move over, no letting someone faster pass. It was funny but a little unnerving, especially at the start.

The course was mostly on dirt with very steep short hills. There were a few climbs, but nothing over 10 minutes or so. I didn't feel great the first day, so I was happy to hear I was 3rd when the race all of the sudden finished at 61 kms. I thought I had reached a check point or gotten lost when I was told the race was "finito". The last 10 km were not timed and we all cruised in to town and the finish line. Sandra Klompe from Italy won that day, and Erica, a Brazilian woman was 2nd, 3 minutes ahead of me. Rebecca Rush was in 5th about 3 minutes behind me. Eric, with his 1 ride per week training came in a couple of minutes behind me and when he was getting some water at the finish-line a woman started yelling at him in Portugese. Apparently she was trying hard to beat Rebecca, and had a team of guys working for her, pushing and pulling her most of the way. She was mad because Eric didn't want to be her domestique and help her out.

The 2nd day started in Ouro Preto and we were able to get a ride in the VW bus and the Madame brought our bikes in her giant Ford truck (very unusual for Brazil, where only 10 percent of the population even owns a car). The race was scheduled to go off at 8, but when we got there we found out that it had been delayed until 8:30 for unknown reasons. Maybe it was because the Porto-potties didn't show up until just before 8? It was much cooler than the day before. It actually rained very hard the night before and it was still cloudy. I felt much better, the course was more technical with lots of mud, and the climbs were longer so this day suited me a little better even though it was only 55 km. I was behind Sandra and Rebecca but passed both with about 10 km to go and ended up winning that day. It was enough for 2nd place!! Caesar handed me a big American flag to carry up on the stage! They were so happy and excited waving the American flag.

Slightly dirty at the finish-line

We had an awesome time in Brazil thanks to Caesar and Ironbike, Italy! Thank You also to all my supportive sponsors, PROGRESS, Magura, Kenda, Ergon, and PTLG and my team Sho-Air.

An Expensive Wrong Turn.....

2008-09-08T09:05:00.000-07:00

The beautiful and delicious birthday cake Michelle made for my 40th.

I was excited when I found out there was going to be a new 100 mile race in our "neighborhood". Usually we have to travel across the country or world to race something this long, but Tahoe is only a few hours north, so I signed up right away. It was also nice to learn the race had a prize purse of 15,000 dollars, with 2500 dollars for both male and female winners, which is highly unusual in mountain biking.

It's been a busy summer with travelling, racing, home improvements, and celebrating my 40th birthday and I didn't have time to put much thought or training into this race. I figured I still have a good base from Ironbike and I have done a couple of 5 hr rides and a few short but hard rides. We didn't get up to the race until 6:30 pm since I had to work in the morning and then pack for our trip. We quickly registered and then put our tent up and got our bikes and food ready before it got dark. We were sharing camping spots with Bruce Frazier, a nice guy from Elko, Nevada I had met at La Ruta last year and then at Creampuff. Bruce cooked up a gourmet meal for dinner and we sat under the stars and enjoyed it.

The race started at 7 am the next morning. With all the prize money, the race had drawn quite a few fast riders. The race started with a pretty easy gravel climb and after the climb I was in the lead. There were lots of check points with fluids and race food, including the "Robinson's flats" check point which we were supposed to go by at mile 41 and 85... I say supposed to go by, because I only went by it once.

I was having some problems reading the course markings, they were few and far apart, and at one point I turned and rode about a mile back to a checkpoint to make sure I was actually going the right way. The course consisted mostly of dusty gravel roads (hard to avoid in Tahoe this time of year) with fairly easy climbing. At mile 82, Amanda Riley-Carey flew past me. Ooops, I guess I had gotten a little too comfortable with my lead. I quickly got on her and made sure I kept her in sight. The pace picked up and we continued for several miles. All of the sudden she turned around and asked if I thought we were going the right way. I hadn't seen any white arrows telling us to turn and we were clearly following the markers so I didn't see any reason to turn around. We rode together for a long time, and according to my computer we only had a couple of miles to go, when all of a sudden we saw a table set up with coolers and water bottles that we had already gone by earlier in the day..... Oh no!!!!

There were a few people sitting in the shade and one guy said: "Yep, you went the wrong way. As did I". He was the 5th place male. The others were waiting for water, because the coolers were completely empty, except for a bottle of orange nectar.... Amanda and I were so bummed. We were clearly out of the race. After about 15 minutes, Jim Northey, the race director showed up in a truck to deliver water. We got a ride back to Robinson's flat with him, but not before he took us back to the place where we took the wrong turn. When we got there it had been blocked off by a truck because several others had misread the markings as well. Jim was super apologetic and felt really bad but there was nothing he could do. These things happen in races, especially ones where the course crosses itself. There were arrows going in two different directions, and apparently we missed the ones taking us back toward the Robinson's flat checkpoint and the finish line.

After riding around in Jim's truck for a while, Amanda and I decided to get out and ride the rest of the course. We had about an hour and a half to the finish and got over our lost fortune and decided to make the best out of it. I felt bad for Amanda, she had driven 14 hours by herself from Jackson, Wyoming. Eric had been at the finish line for a couple of hours when we finally showed up. He ended up in 18th place in the open men. Not bad for someone who has been riding once a week since getting back from Italy.

We hung out until the next morning and took off after having another delicious meal cooked up by Bruce. Eating Huevos Rancheros after sleeping in a tent eased the pain of "losing" 2500 bucks a little....

Chaberton 3130 meters- 7th and Last Stage

2008-07-31T09:00:00.000-07:00

End of Special Stage 1 at the top of Chaberton Fortunately it had stopped raining the next morning and the sun was out. Unfortunately, several people had their bikes stolen during the night. No one thought to lock their bikes up, since it was pouring down rain. The race organizers decided that the general classification was going to remain the same and that today's stage was not going to count. A few of the unlucky people were able to borrow bikes and still ride that day, but most were not able to ride to the top of Chaberton, which is supposed to be the highlight of the race. There is a bombed out Fort sitting at the top of the 3130 meter high Mt. Chaberton, which was built by the Italians, and destroyed by the French during WWII. From what I understand, the border between Italy and France runs straight across the mountain now.

I rode with Fabritzio, Katia, Danny, and Eric again. It took us approximately 3 hrs to do the 15 kms to the top of Chaberton. This included much hiking. No one seemed to be racing too hard, since the stage didn't count towards the final standings. When we finally reached the top Katia and I crossed the "finish line" together. The first special stage ended here and there was a tent set up with champagne, fancy olives and crackers. This was in addition to the pasta and fruit tarts served off course. We spent about an hour climbing around the top and looking at the 360 degree views. The race helicopter as well as a helicopter carrying tourists kept taking off and landing from the top of the fort.

View from the Fort

Katia and me in front of the Ironbike helicopter on top of the fort at Chaberton

Katia and me with Fabritzio

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. We rode about half way back down Chaberton and then had 2 more hike-a-bike sections followed by boring gravel downhills. We had a short fun single track section leading in to the finish line in a ski town called Sauze d'olux where it started raining again. Thinking that we were close to the finish-line we I didn't bother to stop to put my jacket on. It was raining so hard the streets were flooding and it felt like you were in a shower with lots of water pressure. After a steep 5-10 minute climb we finally reached the finish where people were crammed in under a small tarp. There were lots of kisses being exchanged before heading off to find the showers. Instantly I was freezing, and Eric and I rode an extra loop in the town because we couldn't find the sports center or camp. We came by the finish line a second time and people were clapping again....

I got straight in to a handicap shower with all my clothes on, I was so cold when we found the sports center. I had exactly 2 pieces of dry clothing left in my bag that was sitting out in the rain. I had to wear my plastic rain jacket to stay warm while packing up our bikes. I looked really cute when we met up with "the Brits" for a fun dinner with lots of pizza, wine, and race talk in the evening. We found a nice bed and breakfast to stay that night before taking the train to Torino the next day.

Ironbike was an amazing experience once again. We met some really great people and were so happy to see the same awesome race organizers as 2 years ago. You definitely have to be able to "go with the flow", be flexible, cope with language barriers, race for up to 10 hrs a day, be able to survive on pasta, bread, and jam and little sleep, but they sure do put on a fantastic event and everyone is so friendly, funny, and helpful.

A big Thank You to my sponsors at Progress, Magura, Kenda, Ergon, and my race team Sho-Air for all the support and help this year!!

Day 6- More chairlifts

2008-07-31T08:24:00.000-07:00

It was freezing the morning of Day 6, but luckily the old army jackets were laying around in a pile at the camp. The best part of breakfast was that I was able to get some real espresso. While the racers were drinking instant coffee out of a large vat, the staff was feasting on real espresso and apparently I was looking especially bad this morning, because the cook offered me some. What a treat!!

We rolled out of the campground straight to a 20 minute chairlift ride which was really enjoyable. I sat and munched on a zone-bar, warm and cozy in my army jacket while checking out the amazing view of the ski resort. The special stage began when we got off the lift, went straight back down the mountain past the camp where we had started. We rode next to a big river for a while and eventually started climbing again. After about an hour I caught Katia, Fabritzio, and another guy Danny. We had a great day! Since I was over 200o points ahead, I decided to ride with them for the rest of the day and enjoy, instead of killing myself. Fabritzio continued to entertain us and I was happy to slow down the pace a bit.

We finished the day together at a youth camp in the town of Cesana. No one finished within the 8 hour target time that day. After we set the tent up and stood in line for one of the 4 showers, it started raining. It was actually pouring. We walked down the stairs to the small campground and noticed that our tent was sitting in a huge water puddle and all of our stuff was wet. Luckily, we had the tent we were given by Ironbike, so we set that up in a different spot and were able to keep our sleeping pads and bags from getting completely soaked. At this point I was having some serious stomach issues and had to go and visit the race doctor who have me some pro-biotics to neutralize the bacteria in my stomach. Thank goodness it worked so I could stay off the squat-toilet!

At the race meeting Fabritzio informed us that the plan was still to ride up Chaberton, the 3100 meter mountain between Italy and France, the next day. Unless there was a lightning storm the course would remain the same, and we would find out about that in the morning.

We had a pretty bad night's sleep in our damp mini-tent. I was coughing like crazy and it was pouring rain outside.

8000 stone steps- Stage 5

2008-07-31T07:23:00.000-07:00

Day 5 didn't start out that great. I felt so nauseous in the morning that I couldn't force down breakfast. I had even brought some of my own "fitness bread" to add a little fiber to my diet, but it just did not look very appetizing. My solution was to chug 2 cups of thick Sustained Energy and eat a banana, to get some calories before the 7 am start. We actually started in 3 big groups except for the fastest 10 riders who had to go one at a time. I was very happy to have a 10 km warm up before the start of the special stage. We were all riding at what should have been a comfortable pace but I was feeling so sick. I started to slack behind and Eric stopped with me. After puking up the Sustained Energy and banana on the side of the road I felt slightly better, but I was wondering how I was going to make it through the day.

I actually started feeling better during the special stage. It included a really long, "easy"dirt climb and I was able to ride at a good pace. When I finished the stage in 3 hrs 40 minutes I was feeling completely back to normal. Eric and I ended up riding out of the checkpoint together.

We had a long section to get to the next special stage which started at the top of a castle. There was a very steep pavement climb to get there and I caught up to Katia who was riding with one the funniest guys I have ever met, Fabritzio. I don't want to rip on Fabritzio, but he is a smoker and he couldn't wait to get to the end each day to light up a cigarette after kissing his wife and daughter. He has a full head of curly red hair and a goatee. He was a really good rider and to entertain us during the "non-special stages" he would fly down hill and lay down on his saddle and scream with a "devilish voice". Sometimes he would pretend like his bike was a motorcycle and do wheelies, or he would just yell at or taunt other Italians he knew. Fabritzio's English was slightly better than my Italian and it was really funny trying to communicate in the 20 words we had in common. Super nice and friendly guy.

The next special stage was my favorite of the whole race. We started at an ancient castle which was built on the mountain side and rode down 8000 stone steps. It was absolutely amazing!! We started out going through pitch black tunnels and after the first one I got off my bike, because you couldn't see the steps at all, and they were definitely not evenly spaced. I had a hard time even walking through the tunnels and had to hold on to to the stonewall to keep my balance. After the tunnels the steps continued down the mountain side, but at least you could see where you were going. I am amazed at how well my equipment held up. At the bottom of the staircases we went in to another super-fun section with tight switch backs and finished with a short but steep single track climb up to the check point. At the check point we could look up the mountain and see the old castle. I thought I was making good time, but I actually ended up somewhere in the middle of the field with a time of 30 minutes. I guess I need to practice my stair case riding more!!

We still had another couple of hours to finish the day in Pragelato and I was determined to finish within the Target time that day. I lost both the special stages to Katia that day, she was riding very strong, but since I reached the target time, I still ended up with 27 points less.

At night we walked into the town and had dinner again. The restaurant quickly filled up with other racers, and we dined with a guy who has done the Ironbike 12 times. Eric and I both ordered a hamburger and were a bit surprised when our 7 Euro hamburger turned out to be only the patty. It was still good, but we had to supplement with some additional food.

Stage 4

2008-07-30T21:10:00.000-07:00

Day 4 began in the town of Barge, where we started with a special stage and left 2 people at a time, one minute apart. The person I was supposed to start with was still sleeping I was told, so I had to start alone... Very suspect/Italian... We started with a paved climb right out of town which was nice, because I immediately began catching people that started in front of me. The paved climb eventually turned in to a steep gravel road with some short hike-a-bike sections. We were on and off our bikes for a while, hiking up really steep rocks where we had to carry the bikes on our backs. I usually try to push my bike to save energy, but some of the trails were too narrow and too steep. Then we finally hit a long open downhill and I caught Katia who was stopped at a checkpoint. That didn't last very long, she caught right back up and we were together for a while. I was right behind Katia when the trail turned in to a hike-a-bike section. As we were hiking along I started getting a feeling we were not on the right track and asked if she had seen any blue ribbons. After a while I looked back and way down the hill I could see other riders, we were completely off track. It seemed like forever, but we probably only spent an extra 10 minutes on the wrong trail. When we finally got back to the course we had a technical downhill and I was able to drop Katia and got to the check point a few minutes ahead of her. It was a bummer to get lost, but at least we were together so we both received the same amount of penalty points. One of the Brits later told me he took a wrong turn and descended 800 meters, so I guess I shouldn't complain about a little extra hiking... We were joking that the day was only 80 km and we needed a little extra distance that day.

Eric was already at the checkpoint and we left together with Katia and a couple of other people. To get the the next special stage we had to go up this pavement that was so steep I had to be in my granny gear. I'm guessing it is about 20% grade for close to an hour. Since granny gear riding is not my specialty and I wanted to save some energy for the next stage, I lost the group and Katia had already left the checkpoint when I got there. Luckily the next climb was a much easier grade and I caught back up and passed them and we finished with a long super rocky riverbed downhill where I was able to gain some time. I was so happy to have my Magura fork for this section, it was really rough. I was also amazed that I never cut a tire or had a flat during the entire race. I rode the Kenda Karmas with a reinforced sidewall and I am highly impressed.

That night Eric and I decided we had enough of the pasta and went out for pizza in town. I was so tired and couldn't wait to go to bed when we got back. Just as I was putting toothpaste on my brush at 9 o'clock, Katia and the "california" Italians walk by and tell me that they are going in to town for the awards ceremony and ask if I want to go with them. I had no idea that there was a ceremony that night and that was the last thing I wanted to do, but I hate to be rude and miss my award so I went along. We walked and walked and finally got to a park where a bunch of locals are watching a female singer on stage. Apparently the town is having some little festival and Ironbike is presenting awards after the performances. The singer makes no sign of wanting to quit, so finally Fabritzio walks up on the stage and sort of cuts her off. I think even the staff is getting tired and ready for bed.

Finally at 10:30 I was back at the camp. I was so exhausted I didn't even get my food ready for the next day, I figured I had time in the morning since the race didn't start until 7 the next day...

Stages 2 and 3- My Progress Magic Rocks!!

2008-07-29T09:36:00.000-07:00

On DAY 2, we had to get up at 5:15 am because we were getting bussed to the starting line. Even thought the buss was not supposed to leave until 7:45 we were all required to check in at 7 in order to avoid getting penalty points. The bus Eric and I were on ended up not leaving until 8:30 and I didn't start until 9:45. During this stage we started according to our general classification, with the fastest riders going last. We were spread out 2 minutes apart and started 4 riders at a time. The first special stage ended up going really well for me and I ended up in 17th overall, 10 minutes ahead of Katia. When the special stage was over, we had a pavement descent into a ski town where we got onto a gondola. I was able to grab a couple of pieces of cake and a coke for the ride at the checkpoint . We were also provided with these funny army jacket liners without buttons to wear because it was pretty chilly when you were sitting still. I shared my car with 2 free ride guys who were not part of the race. After getting off the gondola, there was a short descent to the bottom of a chairlift which took us to the top of the ski mountain. The chairlift took over 20 minutes and I was glad I had the green army jacket on!! When I got of the lift I said "ciao" to the lift guys and when they replied "Bon Jour" I realized we had crossed in to France.

The second special stage of the day started in a town and after a short single track climbed up 1500 meters over a very rocky and rough mountain side. The grade was not too bad and I was able to pass several guys. At the top of the climb there was a 500 meter long tunnel without lights. All riders were required to carry headlamps this day for the purpose of riding through the dark tunnel. My small headlamp did little to light up the tunnel which had water puddles and big holes in the ground. At the entrance of the tunnel we were again provided with the army jackets and were able to keep them on for the close to 2000 meter descent afterwards.

The day ended with a 3 km long single track section and we had to get off our bikes to climb up a steep rock to the finish line. The 107 km took me 9 hrs and 45 minutes. It was a very long day with over 4500 meters of elevation gain, but I put over 1000 points on my main competitor so I had a good race. I was very happy to have a such a light bike this year.

During the Ironbike your day doesn't end when the race ends. I finished the race around 7:30 pm and now had to put the tent up, take a shower in one of the 2 outdoor showers, clean the bike and get everything ready for the next day. I actually got a massage after this day as well. Dinner didn't start until 9 pm that night, and the briefing not until 11. I think the race organizers were having too much fun drinking wine...

Day 3 began very early in the town of Jausier, France. The Tour de France were coming in to the town later that afternoon, so there were lots of people and support vehicles around. Again our start time was dependent on the general classification, but this time we started 2 people at a time. I quickly caught up with Katia who started a few minutes ahead of me, and we were close together when we reached the start of the first special stage which began 50 km into the race. Katia was taking her time at the checkpoint, filling up her camelbak, eating, and hanging out. I was too impatient to wait around, so I went to the start where we had to put our chip in front of a reader, and took off. This stage was rough!!! We went up to over 2500 meters over a mountain pass which was extremely steep and rocky and we had to hike-a-bike most of it. I was not having a great day and got passed by lots of people including Katia towards the top. The downhill went down a scree field and was so rough and steep that it was hard to walk and carry the bike. After a while we were able to start riding again, but I still lost 6 minutes to Katia on that stage.

The second special stage went better. After an "easy grade" hour climb we ended with another rough downhill where I was able to drop Katia. I was so happy with my Magura brakes and fork. It was so steep and rough with lots of tight switch backs down a hiking trail where we had to watch out for hikers, but my brakes worked perfectly without overheating at all during the 2000 meter descent. Amazing!! Eric and I were about 30 seconds apart on this stage and I took back the 6 minutes on Katia!!! This day ended in the town on Barge. The day took me 9 1/2 hrs to finish and my bike definitely needed a little TLC afterwards. I had broken one of the teeth on my big chain-ring and needed new cables and housing. After cleaning my bike with the help of the "special Italian solution" and a paintbrush I borrowed from Mauro and Mauri (for the promise of a beer at the end) I took it over to the race mechanic.

The town put on a nice dinner for us this evening. We sat inside of a boccie ball hall and had pasta, meat, tomatoes, and wine. After the dinner there was an award presentation and the leaders got a huge gift basket with wine and all kinds of yummy foods. There were lots of journalists and reporters there but everything was off course conducted in Italian, so I had really no idea what they were saying except for when my name was mentioned. I was ahead by about 1800 points now and I felt like I could relax a little bit.

Ironbike Prologue and Stage 1

2008-07-28T19:18:00.000-07:00

The 5 km prologue on Saturday afternoon had 2 waves and both Eric and I were in the first one. I knew that I wasn't going to feel too speedy on such a short course. The race took off and we made a couple of circles in the town of Entraque, on cobble stone streets, through narrow pathways, over bridges, through parks, and ended in the town square. The prologue is just kicking off the race and lots of people were cheering us on but it doesn't really matter that much in the long run. I ended up with around 200 penalty points, one for each second I was behind the winner. I was 2nd female, 32 seconds or points behind an Italian woman. After this race, the top 20 racers did a second, even shorter race around town, and I am actually not sure why or how the point system worked there. After the races were done we stood around for a couple of hours waiting for the award ceremony which no one seemed to know exactly when or where it was going to take place. Very Italian!!

Around 8:30 it was time for the pasta dinner. A tent was set up next to the town's swim center where we were served pasta, some kind of meat, french fries, and off course red wine. We were entertained by 5 cool teenagers playing accordions. They totally rocked!

We had now moved our tent from the El Basco campground to a field next to the swim center where all racers were required to sleep. Many had support vehicles, but everyone is supposed to stay in the camp and sleep in a tent that was given to us by the race organizers.

Day 1 started with the usual breakfast of pasta with olive oil, bread and jam and nutella. This was the exact same breakfast we got every morning. It is not easy to race all day on that kind of food. I had brought some granola, but it only lasted 3 days. After that I was stuck with the bread and jam, because there is no way I can force down pasta at 6 am. I was also really missing my coffee. I can't believe they served instant coffee in Italy, that seems like a crime.

There was a race briefing right before the race started and this was pretty entertaining. Fabritzio, the head guy yelled everything out in Italian, and then there were translators for English, Spanish, and French all talking at the same time. It was impossible to understand what they were saying, but I figured we were all in the same boat. We did receive a road book which had a course profile each day and the "special stages" and checkpoints labeled. As disorganized as this race may seem, the organizers and sponsors do a great job promoting it in Italy. We were followed by a helicopter every day, were on national TV after each stage and there were tons of reporters filming and taking pictures.

The first day had a mass start and began with a "Special Stage" right away. The Target time for the day was 6 hours and the Max time was 9. This meant that if you made it to the finish line in under 6 hours you got no penalty points for that stage, and if it took more than 9 hours you got 10,000 penalty points. The special stage was around 60 km, and again, we were compared to the overall winner and got penalty points accordingly.

After a 10 km easy descent we started climbing a steep rocky trail and the field of 140 thinned out pretty quickly. The climb lasted over an hour and then we dropped about 1000 meters on a gravel road and as I was a bit nervous about sliding out, Katia, the Italian woman that won the prologue, caught me. We had 2 more climbs during the special stage, the last one a really steep paved road, I would guess at least 15 % grade for an hour. I finished the special stage only a minute and a half ahead of Katia, in 4 hrs 20 minutes. After the special stage we had another hour or so to the finish line, so we cruised together and were able to make the target time pretty easily. We climbed 2800 meters (9200') in 77 km (48 miles).

The day ended in San Damiano Macra, a small mountain town. The camp was again in a small sports center and we were able to set up the tents in the field and use the showers and toilets inside. As I went to clean my bike after the race, 2 Italians were appalled at how I was spraying down my drive train with a hose, and started cleaning it with some degreaser and tiny paint brushes. Mauro and Mauri were riding as a team, didn't speak one word of English and referred to me as "California" for the rest of the race. Approximately 20 times a day I could hear "California" yelled out before the race, during the race, at dinner, or in camp.

Ironbike 2008

2008-07-19T08:27:00.000-07:00

After over 30 hours of travelling, Eric and are in Entraque, Italy and just finished the prologue of the Ironbike. It was no easy feat getting here but well worth it. We flew in to Milan on Tuesday and took a bus to the main train station, each carrying over 100 lbs of luggage including our bike boxes. We took 2 different trains to get to Cuneo which is in the Piedmont district. From there we caught another bus that took us into the mountains and to the small town of Entraque. Once we got there we had no idea where the race camping was, and not many people here speak English. After a few failed attempts at getting a taxi, we walked into a small bar where a bunch of old men were drinking wine. After much loud Italian arguing, one of them produced a car key and one of the men got up and motioned he was going to drive us to Camp El Bosco. We had to take the back seat out of his car in order to fit our luggage into the car, and then Eric and I shared the front seat.

Camp El Basco was a very small private campground up in the mountains, about 1 km from the town. We stayed there for 4 nights before the race started and each day they made us breakfast before we went for the most amazing riding in the mountains. Entraque is right next to the Maritime preserve, which is a huge area with lots of hiking, backpacking, and riding. When we were out we saw a lot of older folks out hiking, way out in the middle of nowhere, so impressive.

Today we had to pack up all of our stuff and the campground owner drove us to the sports center where the race started and everyone will be camping tonight. Today's stage was only 5 km long and went through the town through narrow streets with lots of people cheering. The prologue basically determines your starting position for the first stage. Ironbike is based on the Paris to Dakkar car rally. Each day has a time limit, and you get a penaly point for each minute slower than the limit you are. Also, there are 1 or 2 special stages each day, when your time is compared to the winner of the day. For each second slower that the winner you are, you receive a penalty point. The person with the least penalty points wins. The stages are very very long and hard, and some days no one makes the time limit.

I hope to be able to make more posts, but I am not sure I will have internet access since we will be camping the whole time.

Cascade Creampuff 100

2008-07-01T13:34:00.000-07:00

After a pretty rough winter and spring, I FINALLY feel healthy again. I ended up with bronchitis, the flu, and felt exhausted most of the time this winter and when I had some blood tests done they showed that I had very low iron and almost no white blood cells. After much sleeping, laying on the couch, taking my vitamins and iron, eating red meat and more protein, and not riding that much, I feel a lot better. Who knew that resting could be so helpful??

I wasn't sure I was going to be ready for this year's Cascade Creampuff, but the last few weeks I started feeling back to my normal self and was able to resume my normal training.

Eric and I drove up to Westfir, Oregon on Friday so we had all day Saturday to go for a ride, rest up, hang out, catch up with friends, and get our stuff ready for the race. Most racers and families/friends/supporters were camping on the lawn of Westfir middle school, and we were able to use the showers and bathrooms there. Very luxurious!!

Saturday was really hot and the forecast for Sunday was in the high 90s, so I was worried it was going to be a replay of 2006 when temps hit 104. Saturday night it started raining followed by thunder and lightning, and it was pretty misty and cool when we got up at 4 am. The super friendly volunteers were serving coffee, oatmeal and bagels for breakfast in the school. Scott, the race organizer, was walking around chatting with everyone and seemed very energetic for 4 o'clock in the morning.

The race started a couple of miles away from the school so we rode our bikes to the "starting-line". We took off around 5:30 down a paved road. It felt great to get a little warm-up before hitting the first 8 mile gravel climb. I felt good and my plan was to go out hard so I could get as much hard racing in as possible before it got scorching hot. The course was a figure 8 loop and there were 4 checkpoints that you hit several times.

After the first climb we got on a really fun single-track trail that had some steep climbs but mostly super fun downhill! We did the upper part of the figure eight 2 times, then went all the way back down and finished with one more loop of the bottom part. I have done "the Puff" 3 times before, but this was in my opinion the funnest and hardest course so far. There was so much single track that you could fly down for miles and miles. The trails were in perfect condition!

I felt really good the whole time. I knew I had a pretty big lead on the next woman, but when the support guy on the motorcycle told me I was in 11th place I had to kick it up a gear. I have never finished in the top 10 before so I thought that would be fun. I passed a guy on one of the climbs, now I was in 10th place!! As I descended the 45 minutes or so toward the start/finish/last loop I had a huge smile on my face. I have to say this is probably the best single track riding I have ever done.

At the bottom of the loop, we rode along a river for about 30 minutes before going up the 8 mile gravel climb again. It was probably 2:30 in the afternoon and would have been pretty hot if it wasn't for all the tall trees shading the road. I was surprised at how good I was still feeling. It also helped knowing I got to descend the fun Alpine trail once more. I finished in 10 hrs 55 minutes. It was a really fun race thanks to Scott and all the awesome volunteers. All the check points were loaded with food and cold drinks and the volunteers were really helpful and cheery. After we finished we were served the best race food I have ever had. It was catered by a Thai restaurant that was cooking up gourmet food at the finish line. YUM!!

My bike worked great the whole race. It was nice to be on such a light bike since we climbed 18,000 feet (5500 meters) in the 106 miles (170 km). I felt surprisingly strong throughout the race and was totally happy with my finish!! I am racing at Downieville on July 11th and then we leave for Ironbike, Italy on the 14th. I can't wait!!!

SeaOtter Classic 2008

2008-04-21T13:25:00.000-07:00

The best thing about this year's SeaOtter Classic was catching up with teammates, sponsors, and friends. It is also always fun to see people that you meet at different races. I am so lucky to be able to travel and race and meet cool people from all over the world. I really like racing, but that is only a small part of mountain bike racing. It is all the great people you meet and new places you get to see that makes the experience.

Oh, yeah, I raced at SeaOtter too. I raced in the women's pro/expert single speed
category this year again. Since the 2 to 1 gear ratio seemed to work fine last year, and since that is what I ride, I went with the same gearing again. I was a little nervous before the race, since I NEVER race anything this short but once I was on the starting line I felt fine and it was fun. What can I say about a race that is only an hour and a half??

Well, I almost managed to get lost... At one point I was convinced I had taken a wrong turn because I thought I had already been on that part of the course. I stopped to try to figure out what I should do. After a while the 2nd place woman caught me and I realized I was in fact going the right way. It all worked out anyway. I finished in first place with a time of 1 hr 32 minutes, a couple of minutes in front of 2nd place. I was pleasantly surprised that my time was actually a bit faster than last year even though I haven't been able to ride as much. I think I have to give my bike the credit for the faster time. It is quite a bit lighter than last year with the new Magura fork which is only 3.19 lbs and the Karmas on the Stan's wheels. Or, maybe its all the saddle.....

8 Hrs of Boggs Mountain

2008-04-10T08:13:00.000-07:00

After coming highly recommended by Mario, Eric and I decided to do 8 Hrs of Boggs Mountain as a training race. Neither one of us has been able to ride that much this winter; me because of several bouts with the flu and Eric fell off a ladder and injured his leg earlier this year.

We decided to camp, but since the Boggs Mountain website claimed there were only 20 camp-sites, I called the nearby Yogi Bear campground to make reservations. It was nice to do a race we could drive to, only 3.5 hrs north. It was a great drive with awesome scenery. It was fun driving over the Golden Gate Bridge on a clear day looking back at San Francisco.

We decided to pre-ride the course when we got there just to stretch out our legs after the drive. It was a 9.5 mile loop with 1200 feet of climbing, consisting of fun, smooth single track weaving in and out of pine trees. The only hazard I could see was all the slippery pine needles on the ground.

After the ride we went to the Yogi Bear Campground and made burritos for dinner. The owners of the campground had highly recommended making reservations due to a "motorcycle race" at Boggs Mountain, but as far as we could see there was only one other couple there... In the local grocery store we were also told there was a "bicycle tournament" in town.

Saturday morning when we woke up it was so cold that our water had ice on it. Yes, I know we are California softies, it was just not what I expected in April. I was freezing and decided to start out with my arm and legwarmers and vest. That lasted only the first lap off course.

All I have to say about the race is:

Super-fun smooth single track
Good weather
Fast course
Good fun
Friendly racers
No major incidents or stupid "guy comments"

That's about it. I won the women's pro category with 9 laps (85.5 miles and 10,800 feet of climbing) and ended up in the top 10 overall. Eric ended up 3rd in his category, also with 9 laps.

My Progress Magic was perfect for this course. There was a fair amount of steep climbing and I was happy to have such a light bike. Durin and Marta worked perfect as always and my Kenda Karma's kept me from sliding out and flying in to a tree! Thanks to Ergon I could go back to work the next Monday without hand, arm, or shoulder pain!!! Thank You also to Scott, Ty, and my team Sho-Air for the support.

Vision Quest 2008

2008-03-03T20:00:00.000-08:00

After deciding not to go to Alaska due to my flu/bronchitis/ear infection, I realized I might be able to go down to Orange County and race in the Vision Quest. The VQ is a really fun race put on by the Warrior's society and it sells out almost immediately. A week before the race, I asked Scott Tedro, owner of ShoAir if he might be able to still get me an entry. After a few phone calls and emails and bribing I was in! Thanks Scott!!

I drove down to LA and stayed at the Correa B & B (Mario and Monica) on Friday night. We had to leave for the race at 4:15 Saturday morning since the race started at 5:30. After reading the race info where it said a small LED light was highly recommended, I asked Mario if he was going to use one. Where we live it doesn't get light until 6 but I hadn't thought of bringing a light.... "Just follow someone who has a light" said Mario. At the start I realized everyone, except me and Mario, had a light since it was still pitch black. The race started right at 5:30 and it was not that easy to follow someone else in the mass start. The road was rough with a bunch of pot holes, so I had to take it pretty slowly. PERFECT warm-up!! We started with a long climb, about 1.5 hrs for me, followed by a fun single and double track down-hill to the first check point. It was really foggy, so I took it easy on the downhill, because you could only see a few feet in front of you. Lynda Wallenfels and I came in to the check-point at the same time and I left just a bit before her. Monique Sawicki was nowhere to be seen, but someone yelled that she was only 4 minutes ahead of us.

The second climb was another long steep fire-road and Lynda caught me right at the top and went down the single track ahead of me. As I was flying down the trail a tree branch caught my left bar end and twisted my bike to the side. I flew off my bike!! How annoying! No damage, but after that I had no flow at all!! The trail was pretty rough and technical and had a bunch of tight switch backs, and I was feeling very uncoordinated!!

After check point 2 we had another steep long climb with several stream crossings. Halfway up, the trail gets so steep you have to hike the last 40-45 minutes. Maybe someone was riding, but I sure wasn't. I don't mind hiking, but it was really hard as I was trying to catch Lynda. At the top there is a super fun single track downhill with lots of stream crossings, rocks, and you are also running in to riders and hikers going the opposite direction.

I finished in 6:24, 3rd place behind Monique and Lynda. I was totally happy with how the race went. It is only 56 miles (89.6 km) but has 11,000 feet (3333.33 meters) of climbing.

I was 19 minutes faster than 2 years ago, and I contribute all of that to my awesome bike. It definitely was not due to my fitness since I haven't been able to ride that much this winter.
My Progress Magic is so light and climbs so well! In addition to brakes, Magura is now also sponsoring me with forks, and I was running the Durin Race. It worked perfectly!! Also thanks to Ergon grips my hands, arms and shoulders felt great and the Kenda Karmas were awesome on the loose gravel and rocky terrain.

La Ruta 2007

2007-12-10T20:24:00.000-08:00

This was the 15 year anniversary of La Ruta de Los Conquistadores and to make it more memorable, the event organizers added a 4th day to the race. La Ruta still began in Jaco on the Pacific coast a little afte 5 am, but it started with fireworks going off about 30 feet from the starting line. I was racing on my brand new Progress Magic hard tail (20 lbs 14 oz) with Magura Marta SL brakes, Kenda Karma tires, and Ergon grips. My bike ROCKS!!!

According to the Costa Ricans we were very lucky with the weather because it had rained for 3 weeks straight, but the rain had now stopped. All the rain made the famously muddy climb even muddier this year. 2 hrs in to the race I got a stick caught in my chainrings and my rear derailleur was pulled into the wheel and got stuck. I was able to pull it out, but now my rear shifting didn't work at all. Luckily all the uphill was not ridable anyway and I could slide/ride the downhills. A supporter was able to help me pull the derailleur out a bit more and adjust my shifting so I could use 3 gears in the back. The first day was quite a bit shorter than last year. Instead of a really steep gravel and mud climb toward the end, we did a nice hour long road climb. I was just glad to be able to make it to the finish with my broken derailleur and I finished 2nd behind Sue Haywood, about 15 minutes back. This day was 59 miles and had 14,500 feet of climbing.

The 2nd day was the added day and we started in El Rodeo where we finished the previous day. The race was scheduled to take off at 6:30, but it took a long time for everyone to get to the start and pick up their bikes so we were delayed by 15 minutes. The mechanics had fixed a broken spoke on my bike and tried straightening the derailleur hanger as well as changed out the broken derailleur. I was a little nervous about how the bike was going to work, but the mechanics did a great job, and it was shifting perfectly! The second day was only 46 miles but still had 11,887 feet of climbing. The most memorable section of this day was a 27 km stretch of pavement that was some of the steepest pavement I have ever climbed. On this section I caught up with Sue and we rode together for a while. I tried to drop her on a couple of the less steep sections but she always caught me when it got really steep again, and then managed to drop me completely. On a flat muddy section I was riding by myself through some villages and got confused to where I was. I had not seen any markings for a while so I stopped and tried asking the locals for directions in my limited Spanish. This consisted of me just saying "bicycleta" and putting my hands up with a confused and panicked look on my face. Clearly the locals had no idea what I was saying and was instead trying to give me directions to San Jose. After a couple of minutes I fortunately ran in to a support vehicle and they confirmed that I was going in the right direction. The day finished with a crazy muddy uphill hike-a-bike section followed by the muddiest down-hill I have ever experienced. I was mostly sliding on my feet trying not to fall off the side of the trail. We finished at the Terramall in San Jose and again I was 2nd behind Sue with a time of 5 hrs 16 minutes.

Day 3 started at the Terramall just like last year, went up Irazu to over 10,000 feet and then down the vulcano where it ends in the town of Turialba. This day is the "easiest" with its 8,700 feet of climbing over 41 miles. It took me just over 3 hrs to reach the top of Irazu. I had brought with me a rain jacket but although it was sprinkling on the way down I never got cold. The down hill was in the worst condition I have seen it in my 5 years of La Ruta. The rain made some of the rocky sections a little easier to descend, but there were also sections of mud that I had a really hard time riding through. At the top of Irazu I had Sue within eyesight, but she managed to put a lot of time on me going down. I kept thinking about crashing and did not feel very confident for some reason. It seemed like a lot of people ended up in the hospital with stitches and broken bones and I did not want to be one of them!

The last day it was pouring rain in the morning while we were waiting for the bus to pick us up at the lodge. It was not very motivating to start in the rain and cold. I could not figure out what to wear, but I settled on bringing a vest and armwarmers over the rainjacket. Since we started with a 5 km gravel climb I was not cold at all although it was still misting a little. I caught Sue after a few minutes and we ended up riding almost the entire day together. I though she must be taking it easy since she knew she had the overall win by 42 minutes. I felt really good and it was fun riding with Sue, it was more like being out on a training ride with a friend than racing. People often think the last day will be the easiest one, since it has a 65 km flat section at the end. The fact that we race over railroad trestles, slippery bridges, and through knee deep water puddles still makes it tough. Sue and I rode with one other guy on the paved section which made the time go by faster. This guy kept insisting that we must be done with the rail road even though I told him we had at least an hour more of it. When we finally did hit the endless rail road trestles again, I think he was mentally defeated, because we completely dropped him. Sue claimed that it was all she could do to stay up with me. I guess it helped that I had done this stage 4 times before. I tried to get her to cross the finish line together with me, but she insisted that I had pulled her through the last section and that I deserved the win.

As usual I had a great time at La Ruta and it was an honor to finish 2nd behind Sue Haywood. We raced 222 miles across Costa Rica and climbed over 40,000 vertical feet!!

Alaska Ultrasport 2007

2007-12-10T19:03:00.000-08:00

I have been thinking about the Alaska Ultrasport and wanting to try it since the first time I heard about it over 5 years ago. Even with all the information and stories I have heard from Eric I could never have imagined how brutal this race was going to be. It didn’t help that I had a cold before the race started and the morning before the start I woke up with an ear infection. Luckily I was able to start taking antibiotics right away.

Start at Knik Lake

Janice and Steve Tower drove us to the start at Knik Lake and just getting out of the car I found it hard to breathe because of the cold air. I’m not exactly sure what the temperature was at the start, but probably between -10 and -15. The race started at 2 pm outside a small bar, and the 33 participants lined up by an Alaska Ultrasport sign. At the start signal we started pedaling, skiing, or walking across the frozen lake. On my snow bike I had a rack in the rear with my negative 20 down sleeping bag, 2 Nashbar bags with extra clothes, and my down jacket in a compression sack under my saddle. On my handle bars I had a mount with a GPS and a LED flashlight and I also had 2 additional bags for food, goggles, extra gloves, toe and hand warmers, camera etc. I also carried my thermarest under my handle bars and I had a small frame bag (can’t fit much into the triangle of a 14" frame) with my stove, pot, spare tubes, and nalgene bottle.

Loaded Bike

After we crossed the lake we got onto trails in a forest. We ran into several dog sled teams tuning up for the Iditarod which starts one week after the Ultrasport. The dogs were so quite you could barely hear them. I was so excited about finally riding in the snow I was pushing fairly hard. I had to ditch my jacket and was riding comfortably in a long sleeved shirt and vest. It took Eric and I 5 hrs and 20 minutes to get to Luce’s which was the first CP, 50 miles into the race. It is a weird experience riding on a frozen river in the dark with nothing around but wilderness and all of the sudden you see a neon sign which says "Luce’s". Luce’s was a small bar/restaurant where we were able to refill camelbacks, dry some clothes out, warm up, and use the heated outhouse. I was so pumped up I was ready to leave after downing 2 bottles of juice and eating a snickers bar, and I might have been slightly impatient when Eric wanted a few more minutes to warm up before getting back on the bike. We still only took a 40 minute break before starting back on the river toward Skwentna, the 2nd CP. It was dark and cold, but the river was hard so we were making good time, although I was marveling at how slow we were. It took us 12 hrs to go the 90 miles to Skwentna lodge which is a small bed and breakfast in a town of 11 people. It was nice and warm inside and we hung our wet clothes by the woodstove and then sat down at the table for some food. The guy working the kitchen told us that it was his grandparents’ lodge which is frequented by hunters in the summer. Our cook was 18 years old and had grown up in Skwentna but was leaving for the military next summer. Nice kid, and he made awesome hamburgers and then he offered us a bed upstairs. Although I wasn’t sleepy, I knew we had to rest a little bit and we laid down for a sleepless 3 hours. When we got up at 6 am, I brought in half of a frozen PB and J sandwich from my bike and put it on the wood stove. I had it with a cup of tea as I was getting dressed and got all of my stuff ready.

Shell Lake Lodge

We left around 6:30 in the morning and our next CP was Fingerlake, approximately 45 miles away. Halfway to Fingerlake is another lodge at Shell lake where we stopped to use the outhouse. No reason to go outside unless you have to..... We arrived at Fingerlake at 2:25 in the afternoon. We took our clothes off to dry and sat down for an awesome meal of rice, beans, chicken and tortilla. This lodge is used for cooking classes and is pretty upscale by Alaskan standards. Still no indoor plumbing of course. Here we were also able to get our first drop-bags and I grabbed some ho-ho’s, trail mix, Reese.s cups, batteries, and more toe and hand warmers. Again, I was way too excited to hang out and we left within an hour. Poor Eric, he knew the race hadn’t even started yet, and I was barely sitting down because I was calculating how fast I was going to make it to the next check point..... Riding to Puntilla lake became a bit more difficult with deeper snow and a lot of getting off and on the bike. The constant getting on and off the bike is very tiring when you are wearing tons of clothes including heavy winter boots, have a hard time breathing because of your facemask, and there is a giant sleeping bag to throw your leg over. With 5 miles to go according to my GPS I decided to take Janice’s advice and "when in doubt, let air out". All of the sudden it was much easier to control my bike and I felt like I was flying down some steep hills (at a speedy pace of 7 mph). It got pretty windy toward the end, and had started to snow a bit when we finally arrived at the cabin at Puntilla Lake around midnight. A few people had passed us and we had caught some of the leaders so the cabin was full. People were spread out on bunk beds, a small couch and some cots. The checker at the lodge was great and made me a huge bowl of clam chowder which I wolfed down while laying on a cot. I tried going to sleep on the bunk bed, but after a couple of hours I woke up and my right hand was paralyzed and I felt like the my arm was on fire. It was so painful I had to get up and shake my arm around until the pain subsided and I was able to move my fingers again. This happens to me after almost every 24 hr race and I always attributed it to my camelbak pressing on my brachial plexus. It always makes it impossible to sleep for more than an hour or two.

At 4 o’clock am I climbed up to the top bunk and woke Eric up. I told him I was ready to leave because I couldn’t sleep anymore. Eric said it could be a 24 hour trip to Rohn, the next checkpoint, and that it probably wasn’t a good idea to leave since the weather was pretty bad. Also, there was no trail over Rainy pass because the snow machines had not cleared it for the Iditarod yet. Our options were to bushwhack our own trail for a few miles through the windy and cold pass or to take a 30 mile detour. I spend a few more miserable hours sitting up in bed to keep my arm from killing me. In the morning we were told that we could have breakfast at the main lodge. I was in so much pain I couldn’t think about food. All I wanted to do, was to get going. I was even thinking about going for a hike because it seemed like moving around made my pain disappear. I came to my senses and had pancakes, sausage, eggs and coffee with Eric and 2 other racers, Jim and Jacques. After breakfast we went back to the little cabin and packed up our stuff and left around 10:30 am.

Hell's Gate

The riding up Hell’s gate, the detour, was pretty good. We were riding through frozen marsh-land and since there had been little snow this season the alder bushes were sticking up and we had to ride through them. I was a bit worried about getting a flat or a stick in my derailleur. After just a short bit of riding I realized I could not carry my camelbak, because it was making my arm hurt while riding. Eric took my bladder and I just strapped my camelbak to my sleeping bag. This worked out great except now it was pretty hard to drink, especially after Eric’s hose froze up and we had to stop and open the top to drink out of it. By dark we just made it onto the river and my GPS showed 25 miles to Rohn (as the bird flies).

Eric said we might have to get off the river and bivy before Rohn, but I thought we should keep going for a while to get as close as possible. I was never looking at my watch, so I had to idea what time it was. Time didn’t really matter anyway. It got really cold and at one point I stopped to get a body warmer out and stick it to my chest. It took me a few minutes to catch back up and I kept getting colder and colder. I also realized that I hadn’t had anything to drink or eat for a long time. Eric got my down jacket out for me and I felt warmer at least. According to our GPS we now only had 1 or 2 miles left when we hit some overflow. We could see tire tracks on the other side of the water, but we definitely did not want to risk getting our feet wet, or falling through the ice. At this point I was bonking pretty bad and was just waiting for Eric to find a safe way around the water. My GPS showed 500 feet... We had to drag our bikes up a steep little climb, and then we were 300 feet away.... I was sooooooo exhausted and cold and out of it but I knew I could drag myself 300 feet. Wouldn’t there be some light coming from the cabin?? No, that’s because there was no cabin where our GPS waypoint showed it was supposed to be. Eric thought we might have missed it somehow, so while I didn’t move he went back and looked around. No checkpoint, no woodstove, no hot Tang.... I realized that if we weren’t going to find the check point I was going to have to get in my sleeping bag because I could not produce any heat. I had no fuel in me and I was completely bonking and had trouble seeing straight. Eric told me to run around to try to get some body heat up while he got my thermarest and sleeping bag out. I had no energy to run, so I walked back and forth at a snail’s pace. Hardly enough movement to produce heat. I got into the frozen sleeping bag and was not the least bit warmer. I heard Eric breaking tree branches off to build a fire to warm me up. All I was doing was trying not to panic. We had no idea how far it was to Rohn and there was definitely no one else to help me out. Eric got the fire going and I felt slightly less cold, I started shivering. Then I heard he got his little isbit stove out and heated up water from his camelbak. I was able to turn over to my side and drink almost a full small Nalgene bottle of hot water and then he made another bottle that I put on my stomach. I finally started feeling warmer, but I was still really scared. It didn’t help that we started hearing wolves howling in the dark. At this point Eric had to go and find the checkpoint to see if he could get some help. He left at 6:47 am. I thought I could keep warm in the sleeping bag while he was gone. It is a strange feeling being completely alone in the wilderness, dark, and cold with wolves howling around you. I don’t know if I was hallucinating or dreaming but I thought I could hear cars and see lights and I had all kinds of weird thoughts going through my head.

I must have been asleep when Eric came back because I didn’t hear the sound of the snow machine. He said he found the checkpoint about 1.5 miles down the trail. I really would like to have a chance to continue the race but if I took a ride on the snow machine I would be cheating. I did not want to make things dangerous of more difficult for Eric so I was willing to drop out of the race, but I was so happy when he said I could try pushing my bike. Before I got out of my sleeping bag I mixed a packet of protein powder into the warm water bottle I still had on my stomach. That gave me a little bit of energy and more heat. I was completely exhausted but I was able to get on my bike and start pedaling very very slowly. Eric stayed behind and packed up my pad and sleeping bag. The 1.5 miles seemed to take forever, but finally I saw the little airstrip and then the lodge. Someone took my bike and someone else helped me inside. (As Eric was helping me edit this, he told me he was the one to lift me of my bike and help me inside). I was totally out of it but I sat down and I was helped out of my clothes and served hot Tang out of a mug. As the 2 women of the group took my long pants of, they laughed and said they could tell I was from California from my tanned legs. They joked that they should put me outside in the snow in a bikini and I could be an advertisement on their web-site. When they checked out my hands they noticed I had frost bite in my left middle finger. I had a big blister on the back of my finger, and the fingertip was hard and had no blood flow. Lisa, who used to be an EMT bandaged the finger up and said it might be OK if I was able to keep it from freezing again. Eric also had frost bitten his thumb when he was helping me out that night.

The spot where I had to bivy, was also the section where Eric Johnson fell through the ice up to his waist a couple of days later. He was able to get out of the water and off the river. It was negative 25 when he got into his sleeping bag and blew his emergency whistle. Luckily, another racer behind him, Jose Diego, heard him and was able to take Eric.s location with his GPS and get to Rohn so send for help.

Finally in Rohn

After a little while I came around, but I had lost my voice, and I could only whisper. The Rohn cabin is used as a checkpoint for the Iditarod and the 5 people using it were all checkers waiting for the dogs to come though. There was a giant pile of food for the dogs outside and they were waiting for more supplies as well as veterinarians and doctors to fly in the next few days. There was a tent with a small woodstove for the Alaska Ultrasport racers, but they were kind enough to let me crash on one of the bunks for a couple of hours. We spent the rest of the day in Rohn, hoping I would recover so I could continue on the next day. I didn’t see how it would be possible, since I was coughing like crazy, had no voice, and had a hard time breathing. We had some soup for dinner and went to sleep on the straw in the tent set up for us.

Rohn Sleeping Quarters

At 9:30 pm I was awakened by the excruciating pain in my arm again. It felt like someone was using a blowtorch on it. All I could do was to kneel in my sleeping bag and shake my arm around until the pain subsided again. Since we were in a tent with 3 other people and it was probably negative 20 inside the tent, I couldn’t walk around to relieve the pain so I just sat in my sleeping bag for 2.5 hrs shaking my arm. It was a pretty miserable night, I got up and walked to the out-house a couple of times just to make time pass, but I was glad to be alive.

Around 7 in the morning I hoped the Iditarod checkers would be awake in the cabin, so I got up. They were still in bed, but said they were awake and told me to come inside. Jasper, the cook, made a big thermos of coffee and then started on breakfast. I sat and chatted with Lisa, Jasper, Stephanie, and David, and Terry and learned a lot about the Iditarod and about what they do during the sled dog race. After a little while Eric came inside too, and we had delicious blueberry pancakes that Jasper made. I still had no voice and felt pretty weak, especially since I hadn’t slept much, but it was nice and sunny outside, and I was ready to try to move on, so after goodbyes and picture taking we left Rohn around 10 in the morning. The temperature was 23 below zero when we took off.

Jasper In Rohn Cabin

I moved very slowly. I had no energy and there were a lot of short steep hills that I had to walk up. We had to get up one frozen waterfall and I was wondering how the dogs made it up. Alan Tilling and Jan Kopka who had arrived at Rohn several hours after us were right behind us and passed us pretty quickly due to my snail’s pace. Every so often I had to stop to cough violently, and the stuff that came out of my lungs was brownish green. It’s pretty hard to cough, spit, and blow your nose while wearing a balaclava, goggles with a piece of neoprene glued to it covering your nose, as well as a face mask. This also makes it difficult to eat and drink, especially since I was wearing glove liners, mittens with hand warmers and had pogies on my handle bars. The cold air made it hard to breathe and my lungs really hurt when I tried taking a deep breath. We had hoped to be able to go a little bit past Bison camp, the next unmanned checkpoint which was 45 miles away from Rohn, but after a while it became apparent that my slow pace was notgoing to let us get that far.

On the River

It took us 12 hours to get to Bison camp, which is a walled tent with a big woodstove, a little table, and straw on the ground for sleeping. The tent is there for bison hunters but there is a sign that says anyone traveling the trail is welcome to use it as long as you restock the firewood. Bill Merchant, the race organizer, had flown out the week before and left blocks of ice to melt for water, a cooler with food, and a couple of Coleman stoves with fuel. We were actually lucky to be a little slow, because when we got to Bison camp the fire was going and it was nice and warm and there was hot water on the stove. We shared the tent with Masuro from Japan, Dario from Italy, Jan, and Alan. The grease in Dario’s free wheel had frozen and his cassette just spinning around and he had been pushing his bike almost all the way from Rohn. Eric zip-tied the cassette to the spokes of his wheel so he would at least have a fixed gear. Masuru told us he only carries a 0.5 liter thermos for fluids but that it had frozen on the way to Rohn. He said it was no big deal since it was so cold outside and he wouldn’t dehydrate.... Uh-huh!! The conversation at Bison camp was hilarious with all of the different nationalities and misunderstandings due to language barriers.

Jan, Eric & Lou at Bison Camp

After I had two cup-o-noodles I got into my sleeping bag, as Masuru and Dario left in the dark and cold to continue on to Nikolai. At this time the temperature was 32 below zero. I was very congested but I actually managed to get a few hours of sleep that night. Unfortunately the rest of the group were probably not as lucky, since Eric said I snored louder than a 350 pound man and that I would stop breathing for a few seconds only to snort louder than ever.

In the morning I had a few packs of oatmeal and some hot cocoa before taking off. Alan left just before us and Jan left at the same time. Now we were on the Farewell Burn, which is a large area that was hit by a fire sometime in the past. The Burn is wide open and since there had been very little snow this season, grass and dirt was sticking up and it was really difficult to ride over this terrain since it was very bumpy and rough. We were able to follow tire tracks, but Peter Basinger said he fell about 100 times, because he couldn’t tell were he was going, and there was ice under the thin snow. I kept getting left behind Eric since I was so slow, but he stopped and waited for me. We ran in to Alan after a while and rode with him and Jan. As we stopped for pictures with Jan, Alan got ahead of us, but we soon caught him when he had a flat tire. Not very fun fixing a flat in negative 20. Later Alan told us that he thought the ice on his rims was slowing him down and he decided to get his knife out and scrape it off. His snow rims are drilled (have big holes to make them lighter) and the tube was poking through the whole and he slashed hisown tube!!

Eric and I got to Nikolai just as it was getting dark. We ran into a guy on a snow machine pulling a sled with 2 kids and we stopped to talk for a few minutes. Nikolai seemed so depressing to me. The town has 100 people and is really run down. The homes are mostly little shacks. We rode by "The Nikolai international airport" sign on our way to the checkpoint. Our last checkpoint was at the home of Nick and Olene. It felt good to get inside and it was extremely hot which felt good at first, but was not so good for sleeping. There was a big rack over the woodstove for us to hang our clothes on to dry. Dario’s wheel was also hanging there, without the zip ties, so apparently Eric’s trick didn’t work. Nick said Dario had pushed his bike the whole way from bison camp (43 miles) and he was now sleeping.

Nick & Eric at Nikolai

A few minutes after us, Alan showed up too. Jan got there before us, and had actually taken a shower! I couldn’t wait to eat so I could shower too. Olene heated up spaghetti and moose sauce for us. It was pretty tasty to get some real food, but I was feeling really bloated so it was hard to eat. Olene got me a towel and I got in the shower. As I was taking my clothes off I noticed my legs looked like they belonged to someone else. I had huge indentions in my calves from my socks, and my legs were so swollen they looked like tree trunks. My stomach was really jiggly and I felt like I had fluid in my lungs too. I actually found a scale in their bathroom closet and decided to weigh myself to see how much fluid I had retained. I weighed 120 pounds, which is at least 10 pounds more than I normally weigh.

Eric and I used their daughter’s bedroom. There were no covers or blankets on the bed, but the bedroom was like a sauna so it didn’t matter. We actually cracked the window to cool it off a little. I could not lay flat because my lungs made this crackling sound every time I took a breath and I was so congested, so I propped up my sleeping bag up against the wall and sat for most of the night. I probably had 3 or 4 pretty bad nose bleeds that night, from coughing or blowing my nose. I just sat there and ate cough drops, blew my nose, and marveled at how my lungs sounded. We only had 50 more flat miles to McGrath, but I was worried about all the fluid in my body and what it would do to my heart and lungs. Eric was also pretty restless and coughing.

I got up several times during the night just to walk around. At 4 am, Nick was up drinking coffee and checking his computer for other racers. I was able to use the computer and it was really nice to check the Alaska Ultrasport web-site and get messages from people thinking about us. Kathi did a great job updating the web-site.

Around 7 Alan, Jan, and Eric were all up and Nick made us breakfast of eggs, bacon, and wonder bread toast. Dario was up too. He had decided to scratch since he didn’t have a wheel. He was coughing and looked like he was in pain every time he coughed. After breakfast we got dressed. It was 80 degrees inside and horrible to put all of our winter clothes on. I had bike shorts, thick Patagonia fleece tights on, my windproof tights, sock liners, thick socks, and boots on my bottom. CLEAN tank top, expedition weight underwear, heavy vest, winter jacket, and down jacket on top. I was sweating as soon as we started riding- it was negative 27 when we left- so I stopped and took my down jacket off. It was really hard and painful to breathe because the air was so cold. I had to keep stopping several times to make adjustments of my goggles, balaclava, and add hand warmers, and also to cough. Every time I stopped I was freezing. After about a mile we got onto the river that was going to take us to McGrath and the temperature dropped. I had to stop to put my down jacket on again. Eric asked a couple of times if we needed to turn around, and it was so painful to breath that the thought entered my mind, but I also thought we were so close I did not want to give up. At one point Eric stopped to put air in his tires and when I had one of my violent coughing fits, my nose started gushing blood. I got frozen polka dot blood spots all over my boot and there was bright red blood in the white snow.

On the Way to McGrath

After a few hours of riding it started warming up to negative 15. I was pretty comfortable riding without my down jacket, but now my left knee started to really bother me. It had been hurting on and off since Puntilla, but I was always able to get it to feel better after 15-20 minutes of easy pedaling. I took more ibuprofen and tried using mostly my right leg, but with the platform pedals I was still forced to use my left leg, and my knee was really painful. I had to get off my bike on the smallest inclines because I was not able to push down with my left leg. In Nikolai I had cut up 2 super size snicker’s bars, and I kept eating the frozen pieces and I drank my protein shake. Once I finished my 400 cc Nalgene bottle that I carried inside my vest pocket to keep it from freezing, Eric refilled it with water from his camelbak. We rode for several hours in the sunshine and I was dreaming about steak, baked potato, salad, and red wine. I wanted to ride a little faster but my knee wouldn’t let me. I had turned my GPS off, because I didn’t want to be starring at the distance the whole time.

Sometime in the afternoon we saw an Alaska Ultrasport sign posted in the snow showing us to get off the river. The sign said 9.6 miles, 15 km. After that we saw several signs counting down the distance. I think I cried the last 4 miles. I was just so tired, and in so much pain, and so happy to be finished, and happy to be alive. One reason I finished the last part was so that I wouldn’t have to come back next year and do it again.Around 5 we arrived at Peter and Tracy’s house in McGrath. Jan and Alan were there. Dario had flown from Nikolai. Masuro had made it in earlier in the morning and Jose had been hanging out for a couple of days waiting to continue on to Nome. I took the best shower of my life and was able to put on clean clothes that we had sent out from Anchorage. My pants barely fit, since my legs were so swollen. After the shower I sat down at the dinner table where Peter fed us pork, homemade mashed potatoes, salad, and broccoli. I was also able to get my glass of red wine!!!!!!

Peter & Tracy's House in McGrath

I was still only able to whisper and I didn’t sleep well because of my arm and my coughing and congestion, but it was great hanging out at Peter and Tracy’s. They took such good care of us and Peter made his famous mancakes for breakfast and I drank lots of coffee. We stayed for 2 days before flying back to Anchorage. Although this was the hardest race of my life, it was also one of the most awesome experiences, and I am so happy I was able to complete the race. In the beginning of the race I thought I would be able to ride it alone, but I would not have been able to finish without Eric. It was a really great experience to be able to ride together.

Welcome to my future blogsite!

2007-12-10T18:52:00.000-08:00

I'll post a few past stories and keep you up-to-date on all the crazy epic adventures I go in. Keep posted and enjoy!

Trans-Rockies 2007

2007-08-16T13:13:00.000-07:00

I don't want to bore anyone with a long-winded detailed report from this year's Trans-rockies, but there were a few memorable moments I would like to share.
Eric and I flew direct from San Francisco to Calgary this year and this happened to be the one time on the way to a race we did not receive our bikes. To make a long story short we spent at least 5 hours on the phone to United Airlines call-centers in India and Manilla the day before the race. Somehow between San Fran and Calgary our bikes were lost in space and no one could tell us where they were. We got lied to, hung up on, and were really frustrated by "baggage supervisors" before finally receiving our bike boxes at 8:50 pm the evening before the race started. We were staying with Drew (announcer) and his wife Joanne in Invermere and they offered to loan us their bike so at least we had a backup in case the bikes had not shown up. Eric and I were both really happy when they did show up though, because Joanne's bike was way too big for me, and Drew's bike was more of a freeride bike and too small for Eric...

The first day was fairly short, but had a brutal 50 minute very steep hike-a-bike section which was pretty crowded. We ended up in 3rd place behind Wendy Simms and her husband Norm and a Swiss team we called "the towers". Trans-alps and Cape-Epic have banned towing for safety reasons, but it is still allowed at the Trans-rockies. In my opinion towing is lame, ridiculous, embarrassing, and should not be a part of mountain biking. The stronger team mate has either a pvc pipe with a bungee cord or a dogleash attached to his/her bike and the weaker partner has a hook on the handlebars so that they can easily "hook-up" or unhook depending on the terrain. Many of the mixed teams were using this method, which made it very satisfying to pass and beat them. Wendy and Norm and Eric and I were the only teams in the top 5 not using the towing system.

The second day from Invermere to Nipika Resort was the first day we beat "the towers". We caught them and were riding together in a group with 2 men's teams on the flat road when we hit some small hills a few kilometers before the finish. On the climbs we dropped the men's teams and the towers and ended up beating them by about a minute. Wendy and Norm won again (as they did every day).

Nipika is a really nice wilderness resort owned and operated by a couple from Invermere. The man, Loyd was cooking hamburgers and brats at the finish line which was very welcome, because the food served at breakfast and dinner was quite lacking this year (and that's all I'm going to say about that..) We actually spent 2 nights in Nipika this year because the course had to be re-routed due to forest fires in the area. One memorable event in the evening at the award ceremony was an auction to raise money for Al- the course maker- and his family. Al's 1-year-old daughter has a very rare aggressive form of cancer and the family has had to re-locate to Calgary so she can receive treatments. Al and his family had no idea what was coming. Nipika resort had donated 2 vacation packages and there was a free entry for next year's Transrockies. A helicopter ride across the rockies with dinner at a nice restaurant for 4 people was auctioned off and then Chester and Heinie were generous enough to give a free team entry to the transalps with airfare and accommodations. 20,000 dollars were raised for Al's family, pretty incredible!!

The fourth day went from Nipika to White Swan Lake and in this stage we ended up 3rd again.This time beat by (Wendy and Norm off course) the Silver-towers from Banff. They were super-efficient with the dogleash and this day had a lot of gravel roads which made towing efficient and speedy. We were still in 2nd place in the GC. That night I was so tired I almost missed the award-ceremony, but I was very glad I went. I am one of only 3 participants that have done all 6 years at the TR and this evening we were each presented with a huge Campagnolo corkscrew ingraved with our names and Transrockies 2002-2007. 4 people, including Eric, have raced 5 years and they received a belt buckle.

Day 5 went to Elkford. We beat the silver-towers by only 11 seconds. They were both very good descenders and almost caught us at the end. In Elkford we were able to go out for pizza, a nice change from the race food....

The 6th stage was the longest day. It was 116 km with 2300 meters of climbing. It had 2 long, steep technical climbs and ended with a quite annoying down-hill. The trail was overgrown with bushes that slapped your face and made it hard to see. It was also really rutted and had several waterbars across. The waterbars proved to be the most dangerous obstacle and 4 people had to be helicoptered out during the race after crashing hard. We got 38 more seconds on the silver-towers. The swiss towers had now lost about 20 minutes.

The last day which ended in Fernie was a very short one. With only 930 meters of vertical climbing in 48 kilometers we knew it was going to be a fast start. Since short races are not my forte Eric lined up early while I went for a 20 minute warm-up on the road. The race started out like a total sprint. I was hyperventilating, legs burning, anaerobic for the first hour. FINALLY, after the check point at 30 km we hit a 150 vertical meter hill and we were able to drop 2 fast teams. We were now right behind the swiss towers... We had 8 minutes on the silvertowers in the GC and I was hoping they wouldn't be able to make up that much time. Right when we hit the single-track with 6 km to go my rear-derailleur was pulled into my spokes and my wheel locked up. In a panic I yelled for Eric and he turned around to see what was wrong. I had to run up the trail lifting my bike since the wheel wouldn't turn, until we could find a spot to try to repair the damage. Eric had to take the wheel off to get the chain loose and bend the rear-derailleur out from the spokes. I rode as hard as I could to the finish, shifting only my front, hoping that we hadn't lost our place. We ended up 2nd with only about 2 minutes to spare!!

Great race with an awesome partner. Eric was superstrong after training-camp trans-alps and we had a really fun time, feeling good and strong for the most part with only a few minor spills and not one single flat tire this year.

Trans-Alps 2007

2007-07-16T12:48:00.000-07:00

THE FIRST DAY of the race began in Mittenwald, which is on the German/a Austrian border. Eric and I got there a couple of days early and stayed at a small bed and breakfast right in town. We had a seeded start, which was very lucky since there were 600 teams in the race and it is very hard to pass people for the first hour or so. Usually the stages begin at 9 am, but the first day started at 11. I should have planned for this since I had breakfast around 8 and was already hungry when the gun went off. I felt horrible! My legs were stiff from all the plane riding and sitting around, I was bonking and felt like I had no power. We ended up in 11th place the first day, way slower than we should have been.

DAY 2 started in Reith im Alpbachtal in Austria. Eric and I were staying in the trans-alps camps because we were a bit too cheap and too busy to plan ahead and reserv hotel rooms in all of the towns before the race. The camps are usually very crowded with people packed like sardines on the floor of gyms, parking garages, or giant tents. Staying in camp is fun though, you get to meet a lot of people from all over the world. We brought our own backpacking tent and set it up on a soccerfield in Reith. The 2nd stage was 87 km and had over 3400 meters of climbing which is good for us. On the last out of the 3 climbs, the sun was beating down and it was 40 degrees C (104 F). I was really hot, but I felt much better than the day before, my legs were back to normal and we ended up in 5th place. Alison Sydor and Carsten Bresser of Rocky Mountain/Haywood won this stage for the mixed category again.

STAGE 3 began in the town of Mayrhofen. We started out with a 30 km climb and then it was mostly down hill and flat for the remainder of the 94 km. We were in 3rd place until the 2nd feed station when team Rye Mix passed us with a big group. We were by ourselves almost the entire rest of the time, it was pretty windy, so we lost 8 minutes on the last 30 km, but ended up in 4th this day.

STAGE 4 from Brixen to St Vigil was only 67 km long, but had over 3000 meters of climbing. We had 2 long steep climbs each gaining over 1200 feet of elevation. The day ended with a long descent partly on pavement. We were flying down roads with traffic at 80 km per hour. I tried not to think of what would happen if I had a flat... This was our first day to get on the podium!! I was really tired and starving after this stage so we decided to find a pizzeria. We walked around in the heat for a while before realizing that all restaurants were closed until 7pm. Ended up at a bakery instead. At the "pasta-party" there was finally some protein. We had chicken, lasagna, and tomatoes as opposed to the plain pasta with tomatoe sauce they usually serve. After the daily serving of Gelato we set our tent up outside a small school.

STAGE 5 was another short day with 50 km, (32 miles) but still had 2337 meters (7500 feet) of elevation gain. We had a good day and were able to make up 6 minutes on the 3rd place mixed team. We still had 8 more minutes to make up to get into 3rd place, but we hoped to be able to do this, since the next 3 stages were a bit longer. After the stage which took us 3 hrs and 25 minutes I went to take a shower. Unfortunately there were no facilities for the women and I had to clean up in a bathroom at the hockey arena using a spray hose meant to hose down the toilet. Nothing like power washing your hair bent over a toilet. Needless to say, I got water all over the stall... After my "shower" we rested outside the big tent set up for the campers. This is when I started getting my cold and I was blowing my nose every 30 seconds. After standing in line for an hour we finally got our pasta and then got on the podium again!! This time we received a giant box of cheese for our efforts. We decided to give it to the Magura mechanic, because he helped us out a bunch during the previous stages. We set our tent up in the hockey rink, but because of my cold I did not sleep much that night. I felt horrible at the start of

DAY 6. We started out with a steep gravel climb right out of town. I had no power and teams were passing us left and right. At one point I blew my nose really hard and all of the sudden the trail started spinning and I had to stop because I couldn't ride straight. After a little while my right ear popped really loud and I could see straight again. The steep climb got steeper and we started hiking up a ski slope. I was dying, hyperventilating, and it hurt my lungs to breathe. I saw the Norweigan team pass us as they were hiking straight up the hill whereas I had to zig-zag up. We had 2 more climbs after the first one and during the 2nd climb lots of people passed us asking what was wrong. Poor Eric, I was going so slow. At times I was holding on to Eric's camelbak to just keep moving. During the last climb which was 10 km with 1900 feet of climbing I was able to slightly increase my snail's pace and luckily we had a 4000 foot descent into Predazzo. I could care less what place we got, I just wanted to finish the day. I had such a bad attitude this day. I was having flash backs to Alaska, convincing myself I had pneumonia and was doing my body severe damage.... We got 11th place again and unfortunately lost 20 minutes to team Rye Mix. I went straight to the medical tent since I was conviced I was on my death bed. The paramedic listened to my lungs and said that there was no pneumonia, but that he thought I had an infection in my bronchioles. GREAT!!! He gave me something to losen up the phlegm and told me it might not be a great idea to race with an infection. I agreed but thought I would see how I felt the next day. Marg and Nikki from team Raven saved my life that day. They had rented a small apartment and offered their pullout for me to sleep on. Eric and I skipped the pasta and went out for dinner instead. I loaded up on ambien, cough syrup, and the medicine I got from the race doctor and had a night of weird dreams. Eric said he was sure we would not race the following day because I was delerious and talking in my sleep. I actually felt a bit better the next morning which was good since

STAGE 7 was 103 km with over 3000 meters of climbing. I was a little worried because the day started with 18 flat kms of paved cyclepath and I had a very hard time doing anything anaerobic due to my cold. Starts like these are a bit scary, since everyone wants to be in the front and there are usually crashes. As soon as we started the first 1200 meter climb we were passing teams again. When I could get into a rhythm I didn't feel that bad. There was a feed station at the top of the climb and that's when we caught the Steppenwolf team that were in 3rd for the day. They were very fast descenders so they left us behind but we were able to get into a group on the flat leading to the 2nd climb so we didn't lose much time. We passed team Steppenwolf on the second climb and were able to get another 3rd place finish. We were now still in 4th place overall and gained back 14 minutes on team Rye Mix. Rocky Mountain/Haywood took their 7th stagewin. After the stage we had lunch/dinner at a pizzeria and hung out with some of the teams from Costa Rica. We have been riding close to "team Seven Capital Management" with Dax Jaikel and Castro Daniel. Dax lost his leg in a bike accident 4 years ago and is riding with a below the knee prosthesis. What a stud!!! After the awards ceremony we spent the night in a parking garage. I couldn't make myself eat any more pasta so we just had the apfel strudel and then went out for gelato. Great race food.

The last day started in Folgaria. I knew we had to be quick in the start because after the first short climb there was a single track descemt and if you get there late, you get stuck in the bottle neck. Well, I had only one speed and that was slow, so when we got to the single track we had to walk and were unable to get past anyone. After another climb there was a second technical section that was slightly wider and I rudely passed people on the sides in the bushes or off the trail. No one wanted to step to the side which made it pretty difficult to pass. Most men were pretty annoyed being passed and one guy tried to take a swing at Eric when he went by... The last climb seemed long. It was around 15 km with over 1000 meters of climbing. It was getting very hot and the second part was really really steep. It was labeled "bike path" but I can't imagine who on earth rides those paths... We had a little bit more fun single track on the down hill and finished on flats going into Riva del Garda. We were in a group with 2 other mixed teams but didn't really feel like sprinting for 7th place, so we ended up in 9th for the day. Unfortunalely we did not catch team Rye Mix but we were pretty happy with our 4th place. There is some very strong competition in Europe. Alison and Carsten killed the competition by hours off course. Karl Platt and Stefan Sahm of Team Bulls won for the men and The Klose twins won the women's category.

24 Hour World Solo Championships 2006

2006-09-16T13:09:00.000-07:00

I just finished the 24 hr World Solo Championship in Conyers, GA and wanted to thank all my sponsors that helped make it possible for me to race! It was a brutal race and I was very happy with my 3rd place finish. There were some fast ladies racing this year, probably the strongest competition I have raced against in a 24 hr race.

The 8 mile course consisted of 2 loops that were about 4 miles each. The first loop was fairly smooth single track with mostly rollers. It had 2 steep climbs that were a couple of minutes each. After completing the first loop, the course intersected the field with the pits, which was nice for getting fluids and food. The second loop was much harder, with several short, steep, technical climbs. It was really rough and we had to climb and desend on bumpy, off- camber granite slabs. There were 2 or 3 sections where I got off my bike after the first 6 laps when the course got loser and my legs tired.

My plan was to keep my laps as consistent as possible during the race, and I was hoping that some of the competition would fade during the morning hours. The leaders went out at a fast pace as I predicted. I had a pinch flat on my first lap. It only took a couple of minutes to fix but was still a bit frustrating. Eric and Alex, my awesome pit crew, started out asking what I wanted the first few laps when I came by my pit, but after a while they realized I wasn't planning on stopping. They quit asking and just handed me my other bike so I could switch if needed and always had a new camelbak and bottle of sustained energy ready. The course was so challenging and I was riding so hard it was really difficult to eat. I tried eating a tortilla with eggs, but couldn't chew and breathe at the same time so I reverted to drinking my sustained energy. Before dark I ended up with another pinch flat and asked Eric to pump up my rear tire to 38 psi.

During the night I could feel I was getting a bit weak and realized I needed some solid "food". The only thing I could imagine eating was a Little Debbie Swiss roll, so I went through a whole box of those. That saved my life!! I did throw up once, all over my bike, but it didn't slow me down, I actually felt much better afterwards. Thanks for cleaning the puke off my bike and light Alex.

I never got cold, so I just kept my sleeveless jersey on during the night. When it started to get light again, I passed Monique Sawicki and a few minutes later Katrin van der Spiegel, the Australian national champ. I was still feeling fairly strong and kept putting time on Monique and Katrin to finish in 3rd. Sue Haywood lapped me sometime after dark. She looked incredibly strong and smooth when she passed me.

I ended up with 25 laps. 200 miles with 27,500 feet of climbing in a time of 24 hrs 48 minutes. Thanks to Eric and Alex I never hade to get off my bike during the race. They had everything dialed in perfectly the whole time. Eric was in 2 different spots on the course every single lap, and whatever I needed was always ready! I have never before done a 24 hrs race without getting off my bike for at least a few minutes. I definitely need a little recovery time before going to La Ruta!!

La Ruta 2005

2005-11-16T13:16:00.000-08:00

Wow! Today was a really long day. a lot longer than previous years. We started at 5:15 am (which would be 3:15 pacific time). There was a long neutral start but that didn´t stop people from crashing. i saw a couple of people going off the road. After the paved neutral start we turned off on to a dirt road which was really similar grade and length as Kennedy, so that was fun. After that we had about a 3 hr section with peanut butter mud. On and off the bike the entire time, it was really slick and some sections were hard to hike. I didn´t feel like I was having a really good race at this point. My neck was bugging me, by camelbak felt uncomfortable, and I felt like I was pretty slow. I was pretty sure I was in first place for the women, but it was hard to know for sure since my spanish is pretty lacking. At some point a local yelled something about 4 minutes and later someone else said 8 minutes, I have no idea what that meant, since I never passed anyone. Maybe they meant I was ahead by that much, I have no idea.
After the peanut butter section there was an awesome roadclimb for about an hour. At this point by camelbak was a little lighter, and after I turned my head and my neck made this really loud cracking sound, it felt much better... sounds healthy. The climb was really fun because I passed a ton of guys. Every time I passed a guy they did a double take and started pedalling like crazy for about 20 seconds. Guess the latino men don´t like being beat by a girl.
There were a couple of slow muddy climbs after the paved one. At this point it was raining a little bit, but it felt really good. I though I had a decent second part of the day, but I ended up in 70th place at 8hrs 30 minutes which was WAY behind the male winner who came in right under 6 hrs!!! AMAZING. For the first time there is a non costa rican leader. There are some really fast guys here this year. I´m not sure how far behind me the second woman was, I sat around the finish line for about 30 minutes and then I had to go EAT.
to be continued....

So on day 2 the race started in down town San Jose. Although it was a controlled start again there were 2 pretty major crashes. One because of a pothole the size of a car in the road and anothere one because somehow a car had gotten into the middle of the field and was just sitting there.
the race starts climbing up the vulcano Irazu and although there are a few small decents it pretty much climbs up to 10,400 feet. it took me 3 hrs 35 min to get all the way to the top. I was pretty happy, because that was 10 minutes faster than last year.
There is a long rocky descent and I actually had to get off my bike and walk on a couple of sections because I couldn´t keep my momentum going when the rocks were too big and sharp. there is still some climbing to do before the finish in Turrialba. I ended up in 1st place again, with 65th place amongst the men. Today a Costa Rican man won and Thomas Frischknekt got 4th.
In La Ruta the racing is only part of the adventure. Trying to get back to the hotel, and actually hoping that you are assigned to that hotel can be an adventure in itself. I didn´t feel like waiting around for 3 hrs for the shuttle, so myself and 2 canadian guys asked a local guy if he would take us in to the town. I was so scared. The "road" was like a fire road but with more pot holes, and the guy was FLYING in the pouring rain. In town the road was asphalt and I was sure we were going to hydroplane, but we made it safely!!

On day 3 no one knew exactly when the race was going to start or when the bus was picking us up from the hotel, but breakfast started at 5:15. When we got to the race start it was already hot! The race finally took off at 7:45, which was 45 minutes later than they told us when we got there!! Pretty funny! They also told us that a train had fallen off one of the bridges we were supposed to cross, so last night they had to reroute the course and add 40 km of pavement to go around the broken bridge.
We stared with 3 pretty steep climbs. My legs were really tired, so I decided to be a little conservative. There was one Costa Rican woman in front of me. I could see her on the climbs, but was hoping to catch her. After the last STEEP HOT gravel climb there is a
paved downhill of about 15 k and then the FLAT roadsection began. I was able to get in a group with 8 Costa Rican men and Dan Badger (check spelling) who rides for the adventure team Subaru. I thought this would be perfect. Dan and I tried starting a paceline, but no one wanted to work. As soon as someone else got up front, they sat up, slowed down and rode 3 people across in front of me. then they pointed to the left so Dan and I thought we should turn. As we slowed down to look for a green arrow, 3 of the guys sprinted and took off. We finally realized they were trying to slow us down, so I couldn´t catch the Tica woman!!!
Dan and I pulled away from the rest of the group, and then it was just us two taking turns pulling for about 40 K. It was so hard, but kind of fun. With 20 K to go, the race got back on the original course where we rode on the bumby railroad tracks and then along the carribean ocean. The race ended right on the beach. I wasn´t too far behind the Costa Rican woman, so I ended up in first by close to an hour. The CR girl was so happy to win todays stage that she was crying! It was pretty cool! Guess this means I have to train even harder for next year :-) Thomas Frischkneckt was appearantly working together with 2 Costa Ricans and Jeremia Bishop and ended up 2nd in this stage and 1st overall. Very impressive. My times were 8.32, 5.32 and 5.57 for the 3 stages.

24 Hour World Solo Championship 2005

2005-09-16T13:18:00.000-07:00

24 hr WSC seemed to last a whole week for me, since I had to leave the Bay Area on Wednesday morning before the race. It took about 19 hrs to drive up to Whister, but I stopped between Portland and Seattle on Wednesday night. The drive there actually didn't seem that bad. I was just a little worried my legs were going to be really stiff by the time I got there. Friday before the race I pre-rode the course and thought that it actually seemed a bit easier and more plush than last year. A couple of really technical sections had been taken out due to the 2010 Olympics. I thought this would be a better course for me. On Saturday morning it was raining, but everyone was hopeful the rain would let up and the sun would come out like the previous few days. It was still raining at noon when the race began. I was set up next to Brett Wolfe. His wife Loni had promised to help me out until Alex Wheeler arrived. Alex was flying in straight from Euro-bike to help me out in the pit. Talk about hard-core!!! As I was racing the first few laps I was trying to calculate what time Alex would get there. Due to the pouring rain, I hadn't set up my night bike with lights in case I needed to switch bikes sooner. I was hoping he would arrive in time.. The first few laps I was feeling pretty good, I was staying close to Marg and Monique and worked on staying steady and consistant and not taking any breaks. I had started out on my Giant and was planning on riding my brand new Blur at night.

The course was still fun the first few laps although the roots and rocks were kind of slick with all the rain. I thought the course was holding up pretty well. On my 3rd lap I was going a little fast on a wooden bridge. I hit my brakes, and when the bridge turned, of course my bike kept going straight. Just as someone yelled "careful with that bridge girl" I hit my head on a rock and jammed the end of my handle bars into my chest! It felt great!!! Other than that I didn't have any major crashes or wrecks. I saw so many people flying over their handlebars on some of the technical descents, I decided to be smart and get off my bike on a couple of difficult sections.

After my 5th lap Alex had shown up. I was so relieved. He had off course already set my Blur up, and I switched bikes. I put my other helmet on, which was set up with my Lupine light. Unfortunately, I was having some shifting issues and the chain kept falling off the big cog and I had to stop a few times on the first night-lap to yank the chain back out from between the cassette and the wheel. Not that big of a deal. I switched bikes again while Alex worked on the Blur.

I think it was around 3 in the morning when I started seeing something in the air that looked like snow-flurries. It was getting really cold! By the time I got back to my pit, the rain was pouring down, and I had gotten really cold. I was shaking so hard I had a hard time holding on to the hot soup Alex had made me. David and James, who were Marg's mechanics, came over and offered to give me an electric blanket. They were going to hook it up to a car-battery. Someone else offered me his glove liners because I had run out of long finger gloves. I put my short finger gloves over the liners. After I changed all of my clothes and put my water proof adidas jacket on, I was still cold, but I had stopped shaking. Time to go back out again.

This is when I really slowed down. After the "hypo-thermia" incident, I could never really get warm again, even on the climbs. I also had a really hard time keeping any food down. Every time I tried squeezing a gel into my mouth, or take the smallest bite out of a reeses peanut butter rice crispy treat, I was gagging and my stomach turned. When I did manage to swallow some food, it came straight back up. I tried to force down some eggs that Alex made in the morning, but I couldn't even take one bite. Alex seemed a bit concerned when, after my 15th lap, I came into the pit, and sat starring into space. Afterwards, he said that he couldn't really make out what I was trying to say because I was just mumbling. 24-hr racing is so much FUN!!! At some point earlier in the race,I had been in 2nd place, with about an hour on Monique, according to my pit-crew. But as I was sitting there, starring into space, I see Monique, FLYING by, looking very spry and fresh!! I knew there was no way I was going to catch her, because I was happy just making it around the course at this point. My last 2 laps were pretty much just surviving. I tried chugging a little Ensure, which gave me back some energy. I was so out of it however, I had to slowly walk a lot of the single track. Many other riders seemed to be in the same boat. I was sooooo happy to see the finish-line after my final lap. Drew who was announcing, gave me a big hug and was kind enough to not ask me too many questions over the microphone.

In the end, I rode 17 laps, about 169 miles, and got 3rd place. I was happy to be on the podium again. I know I could not have done this without Alex's help. He was calm but efficient. Always had a second bike cleaned, lubed, and ready for me to hop onto. Batteries charged and lights set up, food hot and ready to eat (I probably should have taken more advantage of this...), dry clothes for me to change into, camelbak filled up. Thanks Alex! Thanks also to my sponsors X-fusion shox, Magura, Giant, and Adidas clothing and eyewear. I could not have done it without all the great equipment and your support.

The race wasn't quite over for me on Sunday at noon. On monday I had to get up (after a pretty sleepless night) to begin my drive back to San Jose. I probably wasn't the safest driver on the road. Every time I had to stop for gas or food, people were giving me funny looks. I had a hard time getting out of the car, I moved like an old lady. My legs were bruised, my eyes swollen, and I kept dropping things because my hands were completely numb. 24-hr racing is a great sport... I'm sure I'll be back next year!