My Version of the Ultimate Trail Bike

Yeah, yeah, everyone thinks they have the ultimate trail bike. And, admittedly, mines a bit of an odd duck. It's shortish travel, but still has a slack head angle, dropper post, 120mm fork, and big disc rotors.  It's a bike I can race XC and Endurance races with, and still feel good on at an Enduro. Basically, it's the one bike I can race anything with Plus, it's super fun to ride - which, ultimately, is the most important part.

Things start off with the Zaboo frame. It's a 100mm travel bike with a tapered head tube and a press fit BB. All pretty good stuff. I'd say the linkage is on the stiffer side, tuned towards XC racing. It's one of those bikes that you never feel working, but when you look down at the little o-ring you can see that you've used all the travel. Super efficient climber, and when was the last time a 4 and 4 29er couldn't rally downhill?

Except it's not really a 4 and 4 29er. I've been spending a lot of time on big bikes, and that's influencing my style quite a bit. So, with a nod to that, ordered up a White Brothers Loop 120mm fork with a tapered steerer and 15mm thru axle. Pretty sweet stuff there. I thought I was taking a chance with it, but it's done pretty well so far. Then there's the dropper post. Dropper post on a race bike? Up, all the time. Why, because it's more fun, you can go fast downhill, and it gives you room for error after 50 miles on the bike. Maybe it's a bit overkill for some NE courses, but in NC or out west it's super clutch.

 It's also got some sweet other goodies like an ENVE flat bar (super, super stiff....this thing improves front end handling for sure), a thompson stem, XO brakes with 180 mm rotors (seriously, they're not much heavier), and a whole lot of XT stuff, which is awesome and super solid for a lot less money than XTR.

I did concede with the XTR plus rear deraileur though. Of course, now it's trickled down. But I had to have it. The clutch is awesome. You won't go back. Some other goodies include the ZTR Gold Wheels (I train on Crests with Conti X-Kings), Ergon Grips etc.All in all, it climbs well, rips on flat, fast stuff, and descends like a champ. Haven't weighed it yet, but I'd say it's around 26.5 give or take. Pretty crazy how far bike technology has come.

Home Shop

Like most bike nerds out there, I've been dreaming about having a bike shop at my house for a long time. Really, to this point, the closest I've come is having both a bed and all of my bike tools in my car at the same time. In other words, not that close. But I'm digging into Vermont these days and so clearly that needed to change.

We have a shed at our house, which to this point had been serving as our shed. But it only had a partial floor, making the work space awkward. Plus we lost more than a few bolts and torque wrench bits down through the slats in the old floor, or in the dirt area near the wood.

Enter a rest week without a ton of riding planned and.....

 

.........it happened. Now we have a real wood floor (no more lost

bolts), pegboard, shelving, etc. So sweet to have all the tools organized, the truing stand out, and on and on. Basically to have a well lit, organized, functional space. 

It also means the tool box has lots of room and is therefor way more organized than it was before. Anything that doesn't fit well on a hook goes in in here. By the way, if you don't have a torque wrench, they're pretty awesome and well worth the investment. It should come in handy when I get around to installing those new ENVE bars soon.

All in all a pretty productive way to spend a week if you ask me.

The 12 Hours of Millstone Race Report

The 12 Hours of Millstone was a blast. Great course, well promoted, and a good crew of folks. Always nice to see when promoters do all they can to create a good vibe for an event, and when they're willing to shell out some cash for podium finishers, folks earn it, especially when you race solo for 12 hours.

Nina and I weren't so psyched on the solo thing, but we rocked the Coed Duo class, which was super fun. Riding a couple of laps at a time was perfect. Definitely feels good to notch a win, and we came away with a new light and a bike from Cannondale. For real? Yup. We felt a little bit guilty, but I guess we just lucked out. Here's a link to my MTBRacenews.com report where you can get all the race details: http://mtbracenews.com/news/12-hours-of-millstone-2012-race-report.

We'll be back next year.

Carrabassett Backcountry Challenge Report

Yup, that's Nina rocking the top step of the podium. She also took second overall and was mid-pack in the 50+ miler at Carrabassett this weekend, which was the first stop of the New England Endurance Series. She crushed it - pretty awesome.
I was a little more so so, though it wasn't too bad all things considered. I've been struggling a lot with asthma this season, not sure what's going on there despite lots of tests and even more meds. Pretty crazy stuff just to breath normally. Which I'm still not quite doing, but things have been working well enough to get me to the front end of our local training races the last couple of weeks, so I was hopeful going into the first big-ish race of the year.
The town of Carrabassett has been putting a lot of money into trails recently, and this race is designed to showcase that effort, and to support it by raising money. It's definitely cool to see more towns jump on the "big trail networks are good" train. Especially mountain towns that are seeing revenue from skiing go down in winters like this last one. Trails, mountain biking, and year round tourism are good things if you ask me.
As for the course, it was a total mix. Some super twisty, yet buffed out, new-school stuff, some straighter, rowdier old school trail which was awesome, lots of rough old logging roads and double-track, some hike-a-bike stream crossings, and great views. In general, the climbing really wasn't that bad. Almost all it was on roads or snowmobile trails or logging roads, and none of it was super steep. It was punchy, but not brutally so. The only misnomer is the claim that the course is 50% double track. Technically that's probably true. But it doesn't ride the way you would expect double track to ride. Really, it's bumpy singletrack that runs through a really wide corridor. In other words, there aren't two ridable lines, and it's slower than you'd think double track should be.
As for the race, I started too hard. Hmmmm, how many times do I have to learn that lesson. By the first big climb I'd recovered though and was riding my way into the race. Then came some sweet singletrack and high speed descents. I used my best trail ninja skills and rallied by Zaboo 29er dullie as best I could to catch 4 or 5 guys pretty quickly despite a couple of diggers (The first on a water bar in the middle of a super high speed descent that was not rollable at speed, the second on a unfortunately placed rock on the backside of a blind corner that send me flying mid pedal stroke). Sweet. Not so bad. By mile 20 or so I was in 7th and only about 7 or 8 minutes back from the top guys. For a minute there I though I might even make a go of it. Ha. Not so much.
We hit the days biggest climb, and I more or less went backwards. I didn't really feel bad; I just wasn't riding nearly as fast as the other guys. And that's pretty much how the rest of the day went. Not bad, just not as fast as everyone else. I just settled in, rode my own pace, and had fun. By mile 40 I was firmly established in 11th. Not much was going to change there. And, fortunately, the last 12 or so miles were pretty tame and fast, so I rolled through feeling pretty good in under 5 hours.
Overall, fun course. I it reminded me a lot of the riding I used to do with my Dad in central NH when I was in high school. Good stuff. Hopefully I'll make it back next year and be a little quicker.

The "Epic" Ride

Who says Vermont doesn't have epic rides? A lot of people actually. And while I'm not here to say they're completely wrong, they're not exactly right either.
Look, Vermont ain't Colorado, or Utah, or BC, or North Carolina. It's not the same scale and they're just aren't the remote areas that you can find in those other North American hotspots. Plus, the singletrack doesn't connect as well. It's getting better, but let's not kid ourselves here.
That being said, in many ways I think the epic rides in VT are just as fun as anywhere else, maybe more so, and the potential is HUGE.
As part of the Vermont Mountain Bike Festival Nina and I set out with some friends (and a few super strong folks from out of town) on a 70 mile ride that connected Waterbury and Stowe. It was a mix of singletrack (some of it old school and choppy, some if it newer and slightly more flowing) and old logging roads that are becoming singletrack-esque. Was it the best riding around? Not quite, but it was awesome to connect the two towns, and the ride included sections of the best trails around, so we got some of that too.
But here's the really cool part. Halfway (or so) through the ride Nina and I decided to bail to keep things on the fun and not super hard side. So, we rolled a couple of miles downhill from the singletrack to the Malt Shop in Stowe. Burgers, grilled cheese, and most importantly Milkshakes awaited. Sound like somewhere else, Europe maybe. Post-lunch we had a choice: direct route on the road, or trail most of the way home. We took the road option with the thought that we'd demo some bikes back at Perry Hill.
To me, that's the kind of thing that makes Vermont so cool. You can ride singletrack, drop into town for lunch, and then keep riding. You can't do that in the same way out west. And I also think that's where the potential is.
Imagine a well built, well signed singletrack network that connected Stowe, Morrisville, Waterbury, Moretown, Waitsfield, Montpelier, Middlesex etc. You could do huge rides, drop into any number of towns for lunch, do Inn to Inn tours, whatever. Seems like that's the direction people are working towards, but it's still a long way off. Seems like something that's worth working towards though.

Training Races

Well, here it is mid-July and I haven't raced all that much. I've been training hard, working a bunch, trying to figure out why my asthma is all wacky, but I haven't raced. Which is a problem. For one, I consider myself a bit of a bike racer, which is a hard idea to keep in ones head if you're not in fact racing. The other problem is that I can train as hard as I want, but there is something about racing that's a bit harder. No way to train for racing like racing.
Which brings me to training races. Bottom line: get out and do one. If you've never raced before and are thinking about it, there the place to start. They're fun, less intimidating than a big race, shorter distances, and cheaper. But it's still racing. What's not to like. For me, they're a perfect way to get used to the new bike, get some good hard race efforts in, and get ready for a big block of racing that is fast approaching.
Wednesday night was the weekly Catamount Training Race in Williston. Awesome time. Big fields, lots of good folks hanging out and going fast on bikes, and a good course that had some fun single track, a hard little climbs, and plenty of space to pass. It was a rude awakening on that first lap for sure. I got some some wheels, made the initial selection, and thought I'd have a go of it. Half way through the first lap I knew that wasn't happening. Oh well. Second lap HURT. But I didn't fade back too far, and by the third and forth laps I had the lines dialed in and actually had a good time. Mission accomplished.
Last night I did the smaller, but still super fun, Millstone Training Race but on by the awesome folks at Onion River Sports. Not a lot of climbing but lots and lots of fun, rooty, singletrack. My kind of stuff. Fun to be able to sneak in a win here and there too.
All in all, Catamount and Millstone made for a good little two day block of training. Nice rest day today, big ride Saturday, and the Super D Sunday. My legs might actually come around. Wouldn't that be cool.

First VT Six Pack Super D Report

     Well, the first Vermont Six Pack Super D ride is in the books - pretty fun I must say. Nina and I were a little less than organized, but in the end things went off without a hitch. Stopwatches were purchased last minute, and we managed to sneak in a lap on the "course" (and figure out the start/finish) just before folks showed up. Phew....good thing it wasn't really a race.
      We rolled out of the parking lot with a small crew - six to be exact. Oh well - we figured it would be fun anyway. By the top though we had 8, and word was that there were one or two people chasing to catch up. Then we recruited a few more folks at the top, and by the time we finished up we had 13. Awesome.       We timed the top section of Burning Spear all the way to the main intersections with Joe's. Waaaay more pedaly that we anticipated, but it still required some good tech skills to go fast - a good mix, though next week it'll be a bit more downhill for sure. Funny how when you try to really ride a trail fast it transforms. 

       All the lines change, your braking points are all mixed up, and you pedal so much more than you thought you would. It's a fun challenge and change of pace.
    Top time yesterday was 7:01 - quick for sure, and everybody made it down in less than 15 minutes I think.
     Post timed section we had a nice group ride up to the top of Joe's, and some fun, hollering inducing descending down Joe's Trail to the car, where six packs, the river, and some good hang out time awaited. Good stuff. Hope to see you next week in Waitsfield for ride #2.