Week in Review

Got in a great week of riding last week, before the rain starting Thursday night. Another windy as hell Tuesday Night Crit. The field was already broken up into 3 or 4 different groups by the lap 3. Curb-to-curb echelon up the hill and single file in the gutter down the hill. I never could get any draft off anybody for very long. It sucked. I pulled the plug after 20 minutes and took an extended route home. Wednesday I tried the Hump Day Hill Ride for the first time. It never really fit into my schedule since Wednesday is usually reserved for off-road. Trails were still a mess so why not do something different. I rode for about an hour 15 minutes over to the start at Bates City BBQ. Group finally left and we meandered along for about 15 minutes or so. I've ridden Midland plenty of times, but I'd never ridden that first "Lawrence Hill" so that was new. Nice stair-step climb. My cross bike creaked and moaned all the way up just like my legs did. Still managed to stay with the front group. Next hill was Renner. Longer but nothing steep. The last climb that I did with the group was Woodland. Since I live at the top, and did over an hour of riding before the group ride, I was ready to head home. The climb on Woodland is flat at the bottom, gradually rolls a bit steeper as you go, then finally kicks towards the top. I can't really go easy on a climb, then do a hard acceleration, so I went to the front and rolled on the gas to keep the group under control. About half way up, I really turned the screw and really strung it out. The legs fell apart about 100 feet before the top however. Thursday I got in a couple laps of SMP before the rains hit. Sold my '69 Nova over the weekend. Had it 6 years and just ran out of money, motivation, and knowledge to finish it off. I would have had to turn it over to someone else to finish anyway so might as well sell it and maybe get something else down the road. Crappy weekend for riding, finally got out late Sunday afternoon for a quick spin. Crazy wind for yesterdays ride. Hope that doesn't continue for the Tuesday Night Crit tonite. Probably do the Hill Ride again Wednesday, then maybe ride into work later in the week. Looks like another crappy weather weekend coming up. Great!

I was going to mow the lawn today........

...but something came up.

Season Update - warm, freezing, warm again.....

With the trails still a mess, and the Bonebender MTB race postponed, that means one thing: road racing. Ya, I know: Studnicki and road racing? More than a few people asked me if I even had a road bike, since it's not very often i'm seen on one. Last Tuesday I headed out for a 90 minutes spin (on the cross bike) before heading over to the first Tuesday Night Lenexa Crit. The temperature wasn't too bad when I left me house but it got bad about the time I arrived at the crit. If sub 30 wasn't bad enough, the brutal wind was, and this THAT didn't make it miserable, then only have about 8 guys out there sure did. No place to hide in a group that small. The wind forced the "group" to echelon one way up the hill, then switch sides going down the hill. Being the biggest guy out there, it's tough for me to get much of a draft off of 100lb'ers. Never did feel my fingers the first 15 minutes, and I wasn't up for that kind of effort anyway, so I pulled the plug. Tried to spin a lap by myself then jump back in a few times but that is usually worse. I called it after 40 minutes or so and headed home. I'm MTB fit right now but not road fit (and typically never am). I switched up the routine later in the week and did some shorter, harder stuff. Yesterday I headed out to the Perry Road Race with Joe and Tyler. Not counting the Tuesday Night Crits, I've averaged about 1 road event a year for the past 5 or 6 years. The masters 35+ race was 4 laps with 1 good hill each lap. First lap lolly-gagged along. A few guys squirted off the front and formed a 4-man lead group. They dangled out there only 10-15 seconds till the 2nd trip up the climb. I pushed a good effort up the climb the 2nd time and got a good gap on the field and made it about half way across the gap to the lead group. One guy followed me and we gave it a solid effort across the dam to join the leaders. Once we made contact, the 6 of us worked very well over the remaining 2 laps and we all pulled equally. Coming up the finish climb, I led at the bottom before the flat middle section, before the guys sprinted past me onto the final steep section. I didn't have a whole lot of snap so I just kept motoring steadily along and started to catch back up near the finish. I nipped one of the other 35+ guys back right before the line but coundn't get the leader, so I ended up 2nd. Not bad for a 20lb bike I built up for about $500.

Off Season Over - Devils Revenge Duathlon

After the previous weekends artic blizzard blast, I was looking for forward to some jeans and t-shirt weather. Headed out on Saturday morning at the crack of dawn to Clinton Lake to help with course set-up for the Devils Revenge Duathlon. Had no intention of racing since I rode SMP the night before and just didn't feel good or ride good. Got out there at 7am and spent spent the next 3 hours dropping cones, pounding stakes, putting up signs, course tape, ect. Around 10am I got the wild hair to jump in the bike-only Mtb race, just to get some race time on the new 29er. No warm-up or anything. Just suited up and went to the line. I figured i'd get crushed on the 1/2 mile paved start before the single-track but somehow had my single-ring 32 wound out pretty good and hit the dirt with Tige Lamb leading and Graham Adridge in 2nd. Now I figured I'd just hang on to this train as long as I could then settle in and ride with some guys and have fun. Surprisingly, I stayed on without too much agony. Graham bobbled over a log and I ran past him and got into 2nd behind Tige. Tige was riding well and we were making Graham work to get back on. I led onto the Green Mile climb on the first lap and gave it a good effort. Tige fell away (he also spent 3hrs setting up the course) but Graham stayed with me. He tried a small attack near the top but I went back by him. We came through lap 1 together, then the fun really started. By now the course was choke with duathon riders and we were passing something every 15 or 20 seconds. We stayed together the whole 2nd lap till about 1 mile to go. I heard him go off the course behind and into the bushes. I was not looking forward to a sprint finish and now didn't have to worry about it. Graham didn't exactly get going again quick so I just cruised in. Felt OK but this was a sub-hour race. My cross fitness still lingering. Had I had a 3rd lap to do, things would have felt different. After the finish, I got back into the jeans and t-shirt and it was course tear-down for 3 hours. I'm still on the fence about the Niner 29'er. The single-ring setup is still a hand-full somethings but for 80% of the stuff it's fine. Running tubeless at about 23psi sure helped.