Race Results

Thanks to all who came up for the weekend. Hope you all had a good race.
Pictures will hopefully be found soon.

Bikes and Lights
Cat 1/2, and 35 +
Place Overall	Category Place	Category	Name	Team
1	1	1/2	Aric Hareland	Synergy
2	2	1/2	Ezra Taylor	Kenwood
3	3	1/2	Kyle Fry	Cycle Solutions
4	1	35+	John Struchynski	Great Plains
5	4	1/2	Jake Boyce	Specialized
6	2	35+	CJ Faulkner	Crossniacs
7	5	1/2	Harry Anderson	Specialized
8	3	35+	Jay Henderson	Hollywood
9	6	1/2	Kent Throlson	LSC
10	4	35+	Jared Roy	Crossniacs
11	7	1/2	Rick Laliberte	Great Plains
12	8	1/2	Lance Benning	Grandstay
13	5	35+	Matt Stein	Hollywood
14	6	35+	Scott Hale	Crossniacs
Cat 3, 45+, women open
Place Overall	Category Place	Category	Name	Team
1	1	3	Joshua Tesch	u/a
2	2	3	Paul Belknap	Bay City Cycles
3	1	45+	Robert Douglas	Ridley
4	3	3	Dace Schuneman	Peace Coffee
5	4	3	Shawn Gort	LSCC
6	5	3	Thomas Manderfeld	LSC
7	6	3	Mike Smith	Ridley
8	2	45+	Bill Kuster	LSC
9	7	3	Charlie Schad	House of Pizza
10	8	3	Eric Sundstrom	LSC
11	9	3	Rich Bergstrom	Gopher Wheelmen
12	10	3	Joe Schlechter	Ridley
13	11	3	Dan Cleary	LCS
14	12	3	Adam Bier	Velo Rochester
15	3	45+	Dean Gies	Ski Hut
16	4	45+	Rich Whitman	Ridley
17	1	WO	Margot Herman	Ridley
18	5	45+	Todd Trembley	Milltown Cycles
19	6	45+	Dave Langely	Team Beat
20	13	3	Mike Hall	LSCC
DNF	40
DNF	53
DNF	58
Cat 4 men/women, Jr. 10-14. 15-18
Place Overall	Category Place	Category	Name	Team
1	1	4	Mario Hernandez	Vlaam Scythes
2	1	Jr. 15-18	Conrad Roberts	Barraboo Sharks
3	2	4	Scott Nesvold	u/a
4	3	4	David Muecke	Birchwood
5	4	4	Zach Mohr	u/a
6	5	4	Nick Vetter	u/a
7	6	4	Jake Boening	u/a
8	7	4	Richard Dryer	Vlaam Scythes
9	1	Jr 10-14	Nils Bolberg	MnJRC
10	8	4	Taylor George	Crossniacs
11	9	4	Patrick Groupman	SPBRC
12	10	4	Jeff Colbeth	Big Ring Flyers
13	11	4	Nate Swanberg	Synergy
14	12	4	Randall Dietel	Vlaam Scythes
15	13	4	Steve Pippen	MCT
16	14	4	Matt Leizinger	Excel
17	15	4	Gustavo Barradas	u/a
18	16	4	Kurt Martinson	Crossniacs
19	17	4	Curt Cline	u/a
20	18	4	Dennis Liphart	u/a
21	19	4	Clay Kramer	MCT
22	20	4	Danieal Boyles	u/a
23	21	4	Matt Hill	Vlaam Scythes
24	22	4	Jim Redmond	Crossniacs
25	1	W4	Kris Brazil	Milltown Cycles
26	23	4	James Oliver	u/a
27	2	W4	Andrea Peabody-Smith	Big Ring Flyers
28	24	4	Quinn Williams	u/a
29	25	4	Paul Tocko	Synergy
30	26	4	Kenneth Smith	Gopher Wheelmen
31	2	Jr 10-14	Katie Liphart	u/a
Back to School CX
Cat 1/2, and 35 +
Place Overall	Category Place	Category	Name	Team
1	1	1/2	Kyle Fry	Cycle Solutions
2	2	1/2	Ezra Taylor	Kenwood
3	3	1/2	Micha Moran	Grandstay
4	4	1/2	Jake Boyce	Specialized
5	1	35+	Oliver Vrambout	Fahatik
6	2	35+	Jared Roy	Crossniacs
7	3	35+	John Struchynski	Great Plains
8	4	35+	CJ Faulkner	Crossniacs
9	5	35+	Jay Henderson	Hollywood
10	5	1/2	Kent Throlson	LSC
11	6	1/2	Harry Anderson	Specialized
12	7	1/2	Rick Laliberte	Great Plains
13	6	35+	Matt Stein	Hollywood
14	8	1/2	Josh Schwantes	Kenwood
15	9	1/2	Scott Houle	Crossniacs
DNF	8
Cat 3, 45+, women open
Place Overall	Category Place	Category	Name	Team
1	1	45+	Gregory Goblirsch	Ridley
2	1	3	Nikoli Anikin	Coninental
3	2	45+	Rob Douglass	Ridley
4	3	3	Peter Flanagan	FCCC
5	4	3	Shawn Gort	LSCC
6	5	3	Rich Bergstrom	Gopher Wheelmen
7	6	3	Kolyn Kirkham	Peace Coffee
8	7	3	Mike Smith	Ridley
9	8	3	Dan Cleary	LSC
10	9	3	Dave Schuneman	Peace Coffee
11	10	3	Paul Belknap	Bay City Cycles
12	11	3	Adam Birr	Velo Rochester
13	12	3	Joe Schlechter	Ridley
14	13	3	Samuel Meier	Synergy
15	14	3	William Kuster	LSC
16	3	45+	Rich Whitman	Ridley
17	4	45+	Mike Weispfennig	LSCC
18	15	3	Margot Herman	Ridley
19	1	W	Sara Morse	Ridley
20	2	W	Dave Langely	Team Beat
21	5	45+	Todd Termbly	Milltown Cycles
22	16	3	Mike Hall	LSCC
Cat 4 men/women, Jr. 10-14. 15-18
Place Overall	Category Place	Category	Name	Team
1	1	4	Mario Hernandez	Vlaam Scythes
2	1	Jr 15-18	Conrad Roberts	Baraboo Sharks
3	2	4	Scott Nesvold	u/a
4	3	4	Zach Mohr	u/a
5	4	4	Richard Deyer	Vlaam Scythes
6	5	4	Randall Dietel	Vlaam Scythes
7	6	4	Nate Swanberg	Crossniacs
8	7	4	Jeff Colbeth	Big Ring Flyers
9	8	4	Adam Hansen	LSCC
10	9	4	Matt Haggerty	u/a
11	20	4	Curt Cline	u/a
12	11	4	Graham Tolbert	u/a
13	12	4	Matt Liezinger	Excel
14	1	Jr. 10-14	Nils Bolberg	MnJRC
15	13	4	Jim Olives	u/a
16	14	4	Dan Boyles	u/a
17	15	4	Dennis Liphart	Bay City Cycles
18	16	4	Tim Morse	u/a
19	17	4	Sam Fehrenbach	u/a
20	1	W4	Kris Brazil	u/a
21	18	4	Quinn Williams	u/a
22	2	W4	Jean Peabody-Smith	Big Ring Flyers
23	19	4	Peder Morse	u/a
24	20	4	Boh Houle	u/a
25	2	Jr 10-14	Katie Liphart	u/a

Race Time

Hope you've been eating your carrots, it is time to race at night. Finally preparations are getting done, including acquiring lots of beer.
See you all Saturday night.

Off to a slow start.

Today was the much anticipated first cross race of the season. I had felt ready this whole past week. I felt great training up until Thursday and was flying during my interval sessions. As we were driving down today I just mentally shut down after I realized how hard I was going to try and go I think. Never good...As I toed the line I just felt like I was not ready to race, I tired to block that out, but as much as I wanted the thought to go away, they hung out. Despite that it was off, I had a poor starting position and paid for it on the first lap as I tried to get around people to the splintering group. The first few laps went alright, I was hurting a lot, but figured the race would just slow down enough to recover a little. I forgot, it is cross, it does not slow down, ever.
At one point I clipped a wheel, lost momentum and lost my group, slowly I fell further back, ended up with another group, and a small pileup destroyed the rhythm again and I pretty much blew up. This was right around halfway into the race. After reviewing heart rate info I found that I achieved my max of 195 right before I blew up, just an interesting note. For the next few laps I just tried to keep pedaling. At one point my brake hood came loose and would wobble around for the rest of the race, after dogging it for a bit I got caught by a guy moving fairly quick for being so far back, I jumped on his wheel and was racing again. We only caught two guys, but hey, that is just that much better...
The last 2 laps were spent cursing at my pedal, which after the race I found out was very, very loose, some of the internal parts are bustigated, hopefully warranty will cover that!

In the end I just did not feel fast today. Sure the mechanicals did not help, but they are no excuse for riding as slow as I did. I placed worse today, then all of last year, even after burning out. The good news is I can get faster this year, instead of the usual start high end low...
I'm reviewing the training log now, last year before this race I had been sick and took the week pretty easy. This past week I have hit it hard, perhaps that is the reason? I guess I'll find out soon.

Hurting early...

Hollywood is right, I do looked very scrunched. Time to fit it.

Restart to the race.

Hope to see everyone up here under the lights next weekend!

Christmas come early

First off, a quick mention. I rejoined the runner's world on Wednesday when I decided to do one of the trail running races up here in Duluth. Basically a whole bunch of people get together and go race around a different trail each week. With a whopping entry fee of $1, I don't know how many I will be able to go to...
It was pretty fun though, I had not done a running race since cross country in high school. It was really entertaining to run full blast through some rough trail. Including running through a river multiple times. Overall I think there were over 80 people there, including most of the top runners in the area. I had absolutely no expectations of doing well and just did it to see what happened. I was not to far back in the end, just a couple of minutes. I think the course was 8.5 km and I had something just over 35 minutes for it.

Friday at the Ski Hut was a very good day. The energy was high in the shop due to the fact that the brand new multiple $10,000 ski edger was being brought to life for the first time. I guess that will make our life much much easier down in the shop. All I know is that the things inside look like a contraption out of Star Wars.
Well that was being put together by the Companies guy, Jimmy Johns decided that we deserved sample sandwiches and dropped of a very large box of them.
Shortly after that the usual knock on the deliver door came, and to my surprise (I was not sure if they would ever come) and delight our new cross bikes showed up.
For a while the Shop was a complete mess. Boxes, tools, people, bikes, skis, people, dogs everywhere. It was great.
I then proceeded to rip off what I needed from my old cross bike, take all my new parts, and throw the thing together as fast as I could so I could go for a bike ride. However I did also have to put my old bike back together, so those in combination took way too long. Eventually I got it all done and zipped home, got things adjusted and went pedaling. Not until 5:30 though...

I brought a blinky and ended up riding until 9. The moon was really bright and made the roads easy to see, not so much the trails.I am quite please with the ride, it is significantly better than ye old Red Line. And it really wants to go fast. If you look closely you may notice it has SRAM, yes SRAM. It has SRAM because it was significantly cheap than even 105 set, it came from QBP as a cyclo-cross build kit, and Shimano take 2-4 weeks for delivery. This came next day. So far I am still a bit weirded out by the Double tap, but it is not nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be...

Last night I got an email from Kangaroo Jack that told me about a nice long ride with lots of watts that he just did. Due to this, and the fact that my plan to race Chequamegon fell though I had the perfect riding plan for today. Go faster then Mr. Noonan. So that is what I did. I also bonked hard core, had I not come across a group of UMD riders coming home from Two Harboors I may have gotten hypothermia and died due to the cold rain that decided to come with 30 minutes left.

Time to go drink beer.

Oh, don't forget the CX races in Duluth! You better be here for them.

Cross Races!

Here are the flyers. All we are missing are a few sponsors that dont have logos made up yet.
Hope everyone can make it. It will be a great time.