I'm Guessing Not A Lot of Work is Getting Done Today

I was peer pressured into it...

  

It's the day before our holiday shutdown.  Nobody seems all that productive today.

Tuscobia Pictures

The slideshow above is what I ended up with.  Photo albums from other folks are posted below.

Photo Album by Londell Pease
Photo Album by Gail Gustafsen Boushon
Photo Album by Lisa Messerer

Tuscobia Post Race

Gearing up...

6th Place in the 75 mile race nets me my best result of the year.  Total time was 12 hours and 30 minutes.  All together there were 18 cyclists that started and 15 finished.  I wasn't all that fast on the hard pack and ice, but made up a lot of ground on the soft and crusty (there was plenty of soft and crusty).  I had three mechanicals on the trail and probably skirted a fourth by a few miles (bottom bracket kept unthreading).  I bonked about half way through and was never able to really recover from it, regardless of how much I ate.  Oh, and just for the hell of it I dropped my sunglasses in the toilet in Winter (pre-flush, of course).  But hey, I'm pretty happy with how things turned out in the end.

Also gotta say I'm very impressed with how well this event was organized, especially when you consider it was cancelled by the original director and picked up by another pair about a month or so ago.  Big thanks to Helen and Chris for taking over and doing an excellent job!

I'll get some more pics up in the next couple days, and may go into more detail on the race at that time.

Edit:  Corrected the number of starters and finishers

Tuscobia race updates

Tuscobia race updates

Ready for Tuscobia

Well, there's my setup.  Studded the front tire last night but I'm leaving the rear au naturale, with the exception of reversing the tread direction for more grip.  It's looking like it's going to be pretty icy up there, but I have a lot of confidence in the Nates I'm rolling on.  Rim strip was swapped out for a more festive red velvet while I was messing with the wheels, and she's freshly scrubbed down...  Mostly.  Bags are packed with everything but some clothing that's still in the wash and a couple minor odds and ends.  I've done a few test rides with this setup, so everything should be good.  I hope, anyway...

I probably shouldn't have said that last part.

Three Nights, Three Rides

Midnight, clear skies, moon almost full.  No lights needed to follow the white ribbon of gravel as it wound through the hills.  Seven degrees and I couldn't be more comfortable.

When was the last time you chased your shadow in the moonlight?

The Good Hurt

 The landing zone from my perfectly executed Flying-Squirrel to Inverted-Turtle

Last night I went out for a two hour night ride with my new training partner, Charles.  I've done three rides with him in the last week and a half and I've left each one beat up for a different reason.  The first one was a 70 mile gravel ride two weekends ago that had us in a good headwind for the first half.  I fought cramps for the last 40 miles and was ruined for the next couple days.  The next weekend we planned a route around a long section of continuous B roads and stuck to it even though it rained the entire day before.  We walked at least three miles of the six mile stretch of B road muck, our bikes slung over our backs.  Once again, I was ruined for the next couple days.

So anyway,  back to last night.  The highlight of the trip was a frozen B road.  Lesson of the day: don't outrun your lights on sketchy terrain.  I hit an iced over puddle, my front wheel broke through, and I went ass-over-handlebars for the first time this year, landing on my back in the icy puddle.  My entire back side soaked in the sub-freezing weather, we figured this would be a good time to head back.  Luckily most of my gear stayed warm even when wet, the exception being my bibs.  My right sleeve even froze stiff within a couple miles, but for the most part I was ok.  Surprisingly, this was the ride that didn't leave me hurting...  Much.

It sounds like we'll be doing a weekly gravel night ride throughout the winter from now on, and we even talked about opening this up as a social thing that extends beyond gravel after the first of the year.  Think longer distance cyclocross type action...  Gravel, pavement, snow, etc.  Other than that, it's time to start shifting my focus over to the Stormtrooper and the snow.  Tuscobia is only a week away...