So in my extreme laziness in updating my sponsorhouse blog thing.  There is a reason... my computer died and was without one for a good long while.  I got a new computer... and went to the dark side and started up a new blog which will from now on contain all the updates from my racing and my life. Here is the site:

chicksdiggeologyjake.blogspot.com

Please feel free to visit there any time and check out my life and stuf...

Last weekend brought the 10^th annual 12 Hours of Lodi Farm which was my first attempt at a 12hr format race.  The race was extra special because it started at midnight , completely throwing off your natural circadian rhythm.  I was set to drive down with Zach, Don, Brett, Donna, Rick, and Jill.  We left PA around 8:30 Saturday morning and headed south, arriving at the race in Fredricksburg, VA around 1:00.  Once our Ez-up and tent city was assembled we mounted our bikes for a lap of the course.  I suppose that this course was your typical southern Virginia singletrack, tight and twisty with a lot of short steep root-littered climbs thrown in for good measure. There was nary a rock in sight which was an interesting departure from the Michaux riding I typically enjoy.  I could tell from our preride that the course was going to be hard.

    Preride Fun on the Lodi course

After the preride we ate some dinner, hung out and I started getting my food and drink ready for the long haul.  The plan for the race was Brett, Don, and Zach were doing a 3-man team, Jill and Donna were doing 2-person, and I was solo.  This would be the longest race, by 1 hour, that I had ever done.  Around 8:30 I crawled into the tent to get some sleep and was rudly awakened about a half hour later by the band beginning to play.  Fucking band ruining my sleep and all.  Luckily they only played for an hour so I got an hour nap before the race.  Zach came in and woke me up somewhere around 11, I got dress and rode a few laps around a short piece of singletrack that went right by Tent City.  The 11:45 racers meeting rolled around and the promoter announced that we would not be doing the traditional LeMans start, but would instead be doing a parade-style start being led out by one of the local riders around that short singletrack.  The gun went off and I moved myself towards the front of the group so I wouldn’t get caught in any pile-ups once the singletrack came around.  We rolled back through the campsite and the real racing began, hurtling riders through a short field and into the singletrack.  The race had begun.

I started enacting my plan of “ride conservatively through the night and pick it up in the morning” on the first steep climb.  This consequently caused me to be passed by a lot of people, most of them team riders.  I began sitting in and knocking out laps.  Night laps were interesting, and I started to get tired quickly because of the damn band (side note: I blame this entire race on the band).  The next interesting thing happenned around 3:30AM when I was rolling through one of the field sections on my 3^rd lap.  I had just come off of a steep climb and was in my lowest gear, took two pedal strokes at the top and the crankarms stopped moving and my bike jerked to a hault. I stepped off to find my chain stuck behind my cassette.  It was stuck pretty good and wouldn’t come out, so I flipped the bike upside-down and took the chain apart.  That’s when I noticed that there was a spoke that was completely broken in half.  Joy.  Just what I needed. 3 hours into the race I would have to switch to my backup bike, aka my singlespeed.  Joy.  I was really looking forward to that.  Brett caught up to me and stopped to see if I needed and assistance.  I told him that I could make it to Tent City (about half way through the lap) and he rolled on, pedaling away from his chaser.  I made it to Ten City just fine and decided  not to switch to my SS.  I rode the rest of the race with a broken wheel.

Unfortunately, by the time dawn came, I had completely lost the will to ride.  Must have been something about riding alone in the dark for so long that messed up my mind.  My lap times were getting progressivly slower because I was procrastinating and taking progressivly longer pits.  The sun started rising and I immediately stripped the light off my helmet and went on with my lap, still not wanting to be on my bike.  Consequently I did not turn it up as I had planned.  I stopped eating on the bike and took food and drink breaks.  I would get pissed when I saw someone pass me so I would hammer for the rest of the lap, only to fall off again at the beginning of the next lap.  It was bad.  I had to resist sitting down in Tent City every time I came through.  I rode a fast half lap with Fernando, around 9 or something.  We came in about 15min before his partner expected us.  The moral of the story is that I still had legs, just not the will to use them.  I left for my last lap at 11:30 after much debate on whether to pull myself early and be finished.  My last lap was one of my favorite laps.  I was so focused on getting this damn race behind me that I actually rode consistently attacking the climbs.  After taking my usual long pit, I rolled away to finish my race.  All the sudden I got really angry with myself for not riding a better race.  I started looking to my anger for motivation.  I remembered what I had told the kids and the MACDC camp last March, whenever you think you’re hurting, think of Craig Gordon.  I started repeating Craig Gordon, Craig Gordon, CRAIG FUCKING GORDON!!! over and over again in my head.  I finished my lap about 10 or 15 minutes faster than everyone expected me too.  I was done and that was all that mattered.  All told 9 laps, don’t know my final time or my final place, but I think I was around 7^th.  I suppose that’s pretty good for my first 12hr race.  I will say, though, that this was the mentally hardest race I have ever done.  I look forward to doing it again to get some sweet revenge on this course.  I’m putting you on notice:

12 HOURS OF LODI FARM: I HAVE A BONE TO PICK WITH YOU!!!

Post race face...

Other notable mentions are Jill and Donna who rode a great race to win the womens duo class.  Brett, Don, and Zach of Team Troegenators got 2^nd in the Expert 3-man after an extremely heated battle with the City Bikes Team.  It came down to the very last lap and Zach absolutely turned himself inside out to catch the guy but ended up bonking hard about a half mile from the finish line.  Oh well, they all rode a strong race.  Also worth mentioning is Fernando and Rob of Team Bike Line that won the Men’s Duo by a fair margin.  Everyone had a great race.

I’d like to thank all my sponsors for making stuff that doesn’t break and performs consistently for 12 hrs of hard racing.  You guys rock.  The next challenge is the 6hrs at French Creek this weekend (5/9) which is back in a new, improved, and much more difficult version then before.  This race opens my podium campaign for the Mid Atlantic Super Series Endurance Series and I’m hungry…

                        Peace,

                            Jake

                So I don't know what happened with my last post but I can't see it... if you can please tell me so I don't repost it.  Anymahoo... April 13^th marked the opening XC race for the Mid Atlantic Super Series, the premier mountain bike series in the Mid Atlantic Region.  The race was organized by the local Bike Line team and held at the Fair Hill Natural Resource Management Area in Elkton, Maryland.  Fair Hill has an extensive network (50+ miles) of well-maintained, mountain bike friendly singletrack which makes the most of the rolling northern Maryland terrain.  The course was 7.5 miles long and mostly singletrack.  Judging from my previous riding at Fair Hill I knew it was going to be a fast race.

I lined up with the Sport Senior 1 (age 19-29) class for my first XC race of the season.  The start took us up a short gravel road then down a fast fire road, across a stream, and into the singletrack.  At the bell our group sped off up the course and I found myself in the lead group.  At the top of the rode a rider from C3-Sollay broke off down the dirt road and never looked back.  I hit the singletrack with a group of about six riders, with the leader about ten seconds ahead of me.  Eventually I took charge of the pack and got a little gap, trying to minimize the damage done by the leader in hopes of a second lap attack.  Halfway through the lap the rest of the group reeled me in.  During the second lap a Shirks rider appeared out of no where and broke free from our group to try and catch the leader.  The group of four I was riding with split up, and I drifted into 5^th place, spent from my hard effort the previous lap.  I attacked when the guy following me bobbled the one technical section of course and held a small gap for the rest of the race to finish 5^th.  I am happy with this effort as I am in the process of preparing for my larger goals this season: the MASS Endurance Series, the Wilderness 101, and the Shenandoah 100.

All in all, I had a good race.  The course was fast as predicted; I finished the 15 mile race in 1:04:58.  My bike worked great, which was a blessing.  My next race will be the Greenbrier AMBC race and Nationals Qualifier on 4/27.

Pictures are up now... but I want to change my profile pic but forget how to.  Anyone want to drop me a line here??????????

The official relay results are our from last weekend.  Have a look at them yourselves here.  Look for team 3 Beans and 1 Old Fart.  Yeah.  Fun.



So I think I'm going to actually include my daily training into my blog from now on... so I have an excuse to update more often...



I did a 65mi road ride on tuesday with lots of long hill repeats.  Once up Waggoner Gap (2.2 mi average 8%) and thrice up King's Gap (4 mi average 4%).  It was good and it hurt by the end.  Then I rode MTB for 2 hrs on Wednesday.  Today I trained by sitting in the lab cutting rocks... or a rock to be more specific.  Even though it was warm (hot maybe?) and beautifully sunny and clear.  That's all I have to say.

So before talking about my first race, I'm going to try and recap, hopefully in some semblance of chronological order:

• Super Week was super... but not as super as I thought it was going to be.  I did take my Spider completely apart, and rode my roadie a lot, but not nearly as much as I said I was going to.  I suppose laziness and poor weather got the best of me.  I will say, though, that my Super Week was supplemented/enhanced by a Super Training Weekend with Zach.  We did 4hrs on the road Sat 3/8, followed by a meal and an hour of Super Training X, then I rode for about an hour on a trainer instead of doing a mtb ride because it was really, really, really, REALLY windy out.  The next day was a 5 hr mountain bike ride.  It was good
  
  


• Zach's camp was awesome, even though JB didn't show up.  We had Rob Lichtenwalner instead, which was equally as cool.  And we did a nice long mountain bike ride that rode most of the kids into the ground.  The last day of the camp was a race in Michaux which Zach organized.  We had a good turn out.  After riding the 6 miles from the site of the camp to the site of the race (with the youngest among us pulling the line the entire time).  I managed 7th in the race, which was the first spot behind the pro's/eilte's/expert racers... right where I should be.  Then a few intrepid survivors joined me for a 10 mile mtb ride back to the camp.


• This week of a lot of riding was followed by a week of not riding due to my school schedule... damn it all...


• I have been riding 3-4 days a week since then... as much as school will allow unfortunately.  That is about to increase very soon.


• A few weekends ago my bike went from looking like this:

• I got sponsored by Crank Brothers last week!!!!!!!!  This is super exciting as I have been eyeing a pair of those Ti Candy's for a while now... I just need the form.  I would like to thank the fine people at Crank Brothers for sponsoring me this year.

     Well... not much has happened in my life since I finalized my racing schedule... I've gone on with classes and fitting rides in when I can (I'm up to 3 days a week now with one road ride... woot).  The biggest news that I have is that I went backpacking last weekend, forgoing one day of riding.  My buddy Zach and I decided, friday night, to pack our bags, head down to Caledonia SP, pound out 10 miles of the AT.  It was snowy, and out boots made that lovely crunch-crunch sound as we made our way through the wilderness of Caledonia, then Michaux SF.  The scenery was beautiful and the trail was fantastic.  The camping though (Birch Run Shelter) was less than fantastic though.  First of all, it took us 3 tries to get our fire started with a camp stove because Zach's lighter ran out of fluid, and once the fire was going, we had to put wood on it every few minutes because we couldn't burn anything bigger than a medium sized stick because everything was wet and covered in ice.  Second, it was cold.  Really, really cold at night.  my 20 degree bag was not the correct equipment for the occasion and I was huddled down in there, below the inner drawstring with long underwear and fleece pants and sweater on with my jacket, gloves, and water bottles at my feet.  I woke up at 6:00 (we had a 1.5 mile hike to our car and a 9:00 ride to get to), 45 min earlier than expected, to frozen shoes and pants.  I got a little tiny fire started from the few remaining coals from the night before to semi-defrost out shoes.  When the fire ran out we looked at each other, collectively muttered a "screw breakfast lets get out of here,"  packed up and left.



     In the end, though, it was worth it.  The Sunday morning ride was good cause we did some cool trails (Shake 'n Bake) in the snow.  Monday, I went back to class and did a spur of the moment road ride with one of my Geology major friends.  I had a good climb of Waggoner's Gap and it looks like I'm going to be in good shape heading into the Marathon season.  Especially after Super Week.  Oh, I don't think I've told anyone about that.  Over spring break (Mar 7-17) I will be going backpacking again on the 7-9th, then going home for a few days.  Monday will be a 3hr recovery road ride to recover from a weekend of hiking.  Tuesday will be a 6 hr road ride.  Wednesday 4hr mountain bike adventure at French Creek, hopefully doing laps of the race course (pending the repair/upgrade condition of my Spider).  Thursday will be a 5 hr road adventure.  Then Thursday night I will head back to Carlisle to be a councilor at the aforementioned Zach's junior development camp.  I'm really excited about that because I'll probably spend the weekend hanging out with Jeremiah Bishop.  He is going to be the main instructor.  I think... I don't know if Zach has finalized that yet.  Whatever will be will be...



Peace for now... probably more to come during Super Week!



Jake

So I finally have a race schedule out!  It's fixed!  I've written it in pen on my calender! I will now share it with you!

So I figured I should chime in and say that those new pics of my bike as it is now are not going so well due to some computer issues... I do however have some pics of the thing that went on my bike...







I think that's pretty cool, don't you?



In other news, I'm back in school (yeah?) and working like a fool (ish), so I'm having to physically write training rides into my schedule so that I do them.  It's important that I get serious soon cause April 6th is fast approaching.  That's the first race by the way.  I'm not going to reveal anything else about my full schedule until the good folks at MASS put out a final version, but I've seen the preliminary and it's going to be a great summer.  The final schedule should be out very soon though, so hold your breath...



Oh and I've been selling some old parts (frames, forks, etc) in hopes of buying this once it comes out:







That, along with some bright green cable housing from Jagwire, will make my bike awesome for this year.  I can't wait!



Peace...

Procrastination is a bad thing.  Procrastination is keeping me from cleaning up my road bike so I can ride it.  I'm not procrastinating about the cleaning part, just about the part that I know that I will have to replace the usual parts (chain, brake pads, bar tape, cables, etc...).  I forgot when I bought the bike in July that I would have to spend money on it as well... oops.  I'm just going to have to bite the bullet and spend the money cause I need that bike to start my training, which I unofficially began last weekend with two mtb rides.  The second one was a 3 hour slog through mud and muck that I should have taken my SS on... I spend like 2 hrs cleaning my bike the next day...but needless to say that weekend of hard riding killed me.  I'm more out of shape that I thought.  I need to get back on the roadie to build up that endurance I will need to cut down my time at the 101 and do well at Shenandoah.



Oh and my Ergon Grips will be here Tuesday... needless to say I'm really excited



Oh and I promise I will post up pictures of my bike once the new grips get put on... as well as some hopefully artistic pics of my bike absolutely covered in mud...

    Just found some dates of races that I will be attending this year (hey it's 08 now!)  The races are from the Michaux Endurance Series and the National Ultra-endurance Series.  Dates for the NUE are tentative, but I don't think they will change much.  I will be racing the 50 mile Men <45 class for the MES and the <45 Men class in the NUE.  So here ya go, you will find me at the following races (as well as those of the MASS, which haven't been posted yet) in 2008:



- Michaux Maximus (MES): 5/4/08

-Curse of the Dark Hollow (MES): 7/20/08

-Wilderness 101 (NUE): 7/26/08

-Shenandoah Mountain 100 (NUE): 8/31/08

-Terror of Teaberry (MES): 9/14/08



    So there you have it, a few races that I will be at this year.  The NUE races will hopefully be my big peaks for the season, and the MES races will be smaller peaks.  The rest of my focus will go into breaking into the top 3 of the MASS Endurance Series.



Peace...