First, I spent all last week up in Minnesota. It was quite a change going from Arizona to Minneapolis. On Saturday, Norma and I went for a ride at McDowell and it was 97 degreees. The next day I landed in Minneapolis and it was 27....that's a 70 degree change in less than 24 hours for me.
Besides the cold weather, I also didn't bring the bike along, so I had to rely on the hotel's fitness center to keep form, but I only went twice.
I did get a chance to visit my family and some friends. I spent Sunday with my family at my uncle's place in Forest Lake.
It was good to see everyone, including my Godson, Andreas, who's grown a lot since I last saw him last fall.
Here he is, not too happy about getting ready to go to bed.
The rest of the week was busy. I met up with Roberto on Monday and gave him some information to get him started on his training plan for 2007. We even did a couple fitness test on him at the gym. Now it's just a matter of him getting on the bike.
The diet of that week wasn't the best. It's hard when all your meals are from restaurants. Besides, I think I drank way too much coffee during the week, so half way through my race on Saturday, after I had return to Phoenix I noticed how dehydrated I was. Not only that but my legs were heavy and slow and the scale had told me that I had brought back a couple extra pounds. All not good ingredients for a hilly race in the AZ Championship.
I am not looking for excuses, but the long flights, including a 3 hour wait in Dallas could have caused the heavy legs. Not to mention, that on the way to the race that morning, some of the roads were flooded...yes it rains from time to time down here and when it does , there are not many places for the water to go. Anyway, we had to find a detour and ended up getting to the race venue just 5 minutes before registration closed. Norma went to park and got the things ready while I registered, then I did a SuperMan clothes change and got less than 10 minutes for a quick warm up. An out and back on the entrance road was all I could manage before getting to the start line.
The start, as usual was really fast, but I did my best to stay with the lead group.
After the pace settled a bit, there were 6 of us in the lead group. I held the last wheel trying to conserve energy, however my lack of warm-up and the events of the week forced me to let the leaders go. I rode my pace for the first two laps and by the 3rd lap I regained a couple of spots. However on the 4th and last lap, my legs started to give up to the dehydration and started to cramp up. I took the pace down and two guys went by me. To my luck, they both had a couple mechanical issues before the finish, so I crossed the line in 4th. Not bad for a tough day on the bike.
Now it's time to put the Arizona State serious on pause and switch to bigger and more important things, such as NORBA Nationals. I hope my system is ready for this one, since it's going to be one of the most important races of the year as well as my first time racing at the National level.
The race itself consist of three races in one. Things start off with an Individual Time Trial on Friday. Saturday we have Super D race, which is similar to the TT but mostly Downhill, then Sunday it's the main event with the Cross Country race at McDowell Park in Fountain Hills.
I'll also get a chance to see some of the top pros including some of the fellow racers from Minnesota like Jeff Hall, so it should be an interesting weekend.
In preparation for the race I did one hard training ride on Tuesday under extremely windy conditions then Wednesday and today should be recovery rides.
Lastly, the secret weapon for this race passed last week's test with great performance during the White Tanks race. I am talking about the new Larsen TT tires from Maxxis. I installed them the night before going to Minneapolis and raced on them las week. However the real test will be this weekend, as the reason I picked them was because they should provide better cornering control on trails like McDowell.
Well see!
Here is how the Trek Fuel looks like with the new "shoes":
That's all for now, have a great weekend and until next time.
Pura Vida!
Jeff
Anyway Ms. No-Chain and I continue along for another 20 minutes. I know my light runs for about 2.5 hours however, Norma is riding a Double-beam Night Rider set that I borrowed from Jared Cooley one of Procon team riders, and I don't know what's the burning time on those. In addition, she is running both lights throwing 15W of light down the trail and almost making my light look dim. We make it to what we call the Long Easy loop of Desert Classic and head back, but by then we had been riding for about 1.5 hours. Shortly after I heard her say "Oh, no!" I look back and her lights switched to 5Watts (reserve mode). She is a the top of a short down hill, so I turn around and point my light at the trail. Now my light looks much brighter than hers. She comes down the hill and as she reaches the bottom the lights go completely out. Her front tire caught a little ridge line on the trail and skidded sideways. Norma falls on her left side, skinning almost the whole knee cap of her already scared filled knee. Ms. No-chain goes no skin either.