Some one turnd the heat off!

And its finally pleasant around here. Riding in this coming week will indeed be good.

Last week it wasn't quite the case though. The WORS series had a meet up event with the MNSCS series for a knock down, drag out fight at the Border Battle in River Falls WI. I had heard a few good things bout the course. Nice flowing single track and a couple wide open grassy sections for ringing it out. I was pleasantly surprised to find that was indeed the case. Trails like this suit my abilities pretty well. What didn't really suit me though was the heat. Air temp upon arriving the night before was...HOT. Just sitting there with the girls and my parents we found ourselves sweating through our clothes. A glance off to the north saw some pretty intense lightening going on. It was my hope that it would make its way south to us. See, I LIKE riding in slippery, slimey conditions. Combine what was already a Marty friendly course with a bit'o rain, and things were looking up! Besides, rain should cool things of, right?

Wrong. It did indeed rain in the night. Hard. In about two hours the course got hit with about an inch or so of rain. The girls and I stayed dry in the tent, thankfully. No getting up wet was good. The temperatures certainly weren't cool though. By the time race start came up, air temp was easily in the mid 90's, and adding the humidity into the mix drove the heat index up north of 100. Good thing I had plenty of water.


image courtesy of Velogrrl
We got the start and off we raced, torwards the only significant hill on the course. Despite the heat, I'm feeling pretty good, and make up several spots on the climb. Once on top, the rains from the previous night show their effects. The open grassy sections are soft and wet. The trails in the woods are snotty and slippery, and I begin knocking off riders left and right. I'm digging it, letting the bike do its thing under me while I just keep pedaling. At the start I noticed that there were at least 14 or so Open SS riders. I noticed the dude on the Carbon Speccy SS. He's a fast guy I have no hope of catching, and two other guys look skinny and fast. I was right, and they took off right away on the climb, never to be seen again.

Back to the race. I keep working my way through the field, passing classes that started before the open guys. Thankfully, the organizers of the race [who also did the 24 hours of Wausau, more on that on the next post] were smart enough to have two water stations on course. Insead of drinking there, I had the volunteers splash me with water, keeping my body cool. That trick seemed to work as I was certainly hot, buy not dangerously so.

Next thing I know, the Elites start passing me. This hasn't happened yet this year, so I'm a bit dis heartened, but keep riding anyways. I'm far enough up though, that I'm also passing a few of the elite female riders, so I'm still doing ok. Thankfully, it was the last lap, and had really figured out the section of single track just before the last passing lane. That section was the most fun, dancing a weaving trail! If you rode it right, you could do it fast, and with hitting your brakes. The trail had dried enough to the point that in this part it was super tacky. Let the tires do thier job, and you could fly. And I did. It was great!

I rolled through the finish, hot and spent. Gobbled down a fair bit of watermellon and waited to see how I finished.

I got fourth! Certainly the best result I've had in a while. It always feels good to be up on the podium. Here's to more this year.


listening to: Shaun the Sheep!

Wausau24 this weekend!

And that means one thing for sure; the shop will be closed on Saturday. That's the unfortunatel thing.

The GOOD thing is that the whole family will be up at the 9 Mile County Forest participating in the Wausau 24 mountain bike race. I'll be racing...er make that "racing" with Team Pugsley. And Lisa will be riding with a team as well too! Yep. Lisa. Race. Same sentence. She'll be rockin' the Singular Hummingbird she's grown to love. Of course I'll have the camera along, trying to get some cool shots. Got the cards cleaned off already. I think we're going to have something like 5 teams in the compound, with numerous children around, keeping the gnomes at bay.

in Singular news, I put an order in today for 30 mediums! I'll find out soon what a rough time line is for getting them in. My rough guess is going to be September at the earliest. I'm down to four Gryphons as well. Email me for size availability.

Listening to: Arcade Fire. And a fan, valiantly trying to keep me cool.

Repair, repair, repair!

And here I am, popping up for air, and releasing a bit of news! We've been having a knock out summer here fixing and selling bikes. Good thing. I like being busy.

To keep me in that way, a nice, pleasant bit of news for you Singular fans! I got resupplied with a few more Gryphons. I now have five of them in stock, ready to ship out. I have one XL, one L and three M's. Same cost and prepwork as always, $590 plus shipping. Give us a call, and we'll get you set up!

In more bike news, the Haro's are starting to show up! They really have put out great looking bikes! The 2011's are to be released on Sept 1, and I'll be there to check them out. Can't wait! With Haro, I'll be able to get adult and BMX bikes, as well as Masi road bikes.

Speaking of road bikes...Got news today that I'm also Focus Bikes newest dealer. Another nice feather in the cap here. Check out Focus' website to find out more about these bikes. The thing I like most about them? No, not that they're all fancy and carbon, but that they happily take nice BIG 28c rubber! The local friendly rep had his bike here, and I popped my Continental Gatorskin 28's in with full on success. I may have a carbon bike in my future...


So if you're after road bike that DOESN'T start with a T, an S, or a G, I am more than happy to provide you with really nice options from Focus, Masi and or course Jamis!

In riding news, I'm happy to say that the local riding season has been flourishing! The Tuesday roads rides are always a good time, the women on Wednesday consistently pull in more riders than the men do, and the classic Saturday am ride simply can't get better. What's really turning my crank this season though, is the Monday mountain bike ride. They're turning into Kids Mountain Mondays! Its fantastic to be seeing kids out in the woods, enjoying the trails. This will certainly become a staple of the riding season for me. They're having fun, and so am I. For them, its not about going fast. Its just about being there, in the moment. Sometimes as adults, we certainly tend forget that.

A well. Off to work some more! Stop on in...I'll be happy to see you.

Listening to: Cicada's singing in the summer heat.

Gryphon Headbadges!

There are five of you out there who got Gryphons with out headbadges. You know who you are! Send ma a quick email with your shipping address, and I"ll pop them in the mail for you!

Yep, Finally got them in!

Chequamegon 100.

Rarely does it make sense to say that a thing was both the hardest, and yet funnest thing you've done. It takes a certain sort of individual to put those two phrases together in once sentence. A tad demented. A little bit off. A glutton for punishment. This is a story of being under prepared. And lucky. Really lucky.

See, I signed up to do this race early in the year when Tim and Joe first announced it. One hundred spots filled up in a matter of hours. I attribute this to two things. One; it was free. Really! Tim and Joe are strong proponents of the grass roots, minimal support[Joe has completed the Great Divide and also puts on the Trans Wisconsin, both free events]. the other reason is its Chequamegon, the king of Midwest single track. They were promising at least 80% single track content. That can't be bad, right? Back then, this event made all the sense in the world. I'm not really the most talented rider out there.

I'm a consistent mid pack finisher in nearly any race I do. Cyclocross or Mountain bike. Always midpack. Oh, I'll have an occasional good race, but overall I'm not particularly fast. I can ride pretty well technically, but I know folks that can ride my pants off that way too!

So I registered for the Chequamegon 100[AND the Lumberjack 100, more on that later], it was early in the year, and of course I could train and be ready for this, right?

ha! right.

I made it down to Austin, TX for a week of riding and racing. That would be a fantastic way to kick off the training. That and riding the Pugs a bunch over the winter months. Should be a good start, right? Sure was.

Problem was, that start wasn't really followed up with anything...Oh I rode my bike all right. Got plenty of road miles in. All in little spurts of 40 miles or less though. Oh, wait! One ride DID get over 60 miles. And it was a headwind the whole way. That should prepare me quite well.

Many of you who read this also know that I own and run a bike shop. This certainly takes up a bit of time to run. Then there's the family commitments too. But this is about bike riding. In the spring, EVERYONE wants to get out and ride, and its my job to make sure folks are able to do that. Spring hit, and here I am busy as all get out, repairing and selling bikes. Riding time took a dive. So I rode when I could.


So the fateful weekend arrives, I find Jeff to graciously cover the store for me and I drive up Friday night to Nater's inlaw's cabin near Spooner. Get there at 11ish after closing the store and leaving town at 6:30. Wake up at 4:15 to get ready and drive up for the 7am start time.

The start went well enough until about 3 miles in. Damned Shimano chain I had on the bike[converted to 1x9 for the race. Not doing something like that on a SS. I'll leave that to the crazies] snapped on me. Never broken a SRAM chain. Never. Why I put the Shimano on I don't know. Thankfully Andy came riding by and had a SRAM link that got me going. From that point on, Andy, Nate and I rode on. We also ran into a few guys from Mpls that were comfortable with out pace too. I think we had a group that changed from 5 to 10 depending on how strong riders were feeling.

The first section of 10 or so miles of single track was a private network that dumped us onto the Birkie trail until we were able to hook up with the Makwa trail for the next 30ish miles. The Makwa was an amazing peice of single track. You could frequently here comments of "THIS is what single track should be like" as we were hauling through the woods. I mean really. The trails there were just fantastic.

After the Makwa system, we were directed on to some forest service roads for about 10 miles. Telemark Road and Rock Lake Road are what you would think would be restful. Problem is that hills on the roads were actually HILLS. On trail, the route is coutoured, so you're never really sure you're climbing that far. Much easier to climb on trail vs. on the road. So that took a ton of energy out of us. The road section took us up to the Namekegon single track loop and the half way point for the full hundo.





We took a nice 15 minute break at the Namekegon Town Hall. Ate a couple peanutbutter/nutella/banana/crasin/honey roll ups and deli sammies. Then got going again. I tell ya, it was hard moving after that break. Took a bit for the legs to get back in the motion of the ride.

The riding was all super fantastic, but it was all starting to look like this to my brain:


After Telemark, we got to ride the Rock Lake Loop. Very appropriately named. Attached to that is the Hildebrand Loop that for me, was where my brain shut down. I simply couldn't handle ANY more input. This was mile 75 or so, of which, the predominant content was rather intense single track.

It was here where I stopped. Made the decision to ride in on the road and took this:

On probably the prettiest section of singletrack the whole day.

The road ride back in was long, but I'm glad I did it. Nate and I finished the loop together for about 85 miles. Something I'm very happy with. I'm glad I had the presence of mind to call the ride before I hurt myself. Or my bike. I'll for sure be back for next year.

Stats from the GPS:
84.56 miles
9.4 mph average speed
34.7 max speed
8:58 riding time
10:50 total time
32.45 uphill miles
40.29 downhill miles
11.3 flat miles
11.5% average uphill grade
10.6% average downhill grade
6:23 average pace

Listening to: Thunderstorm! So nice....

Peregrines, Ready to roll out of the door!

Just a reminder folks! I have the Peregrines in stock, and ready to ship! Smalls, Mediums and Larges, ready to move!

I've been riding my lager a bit here, and am really enjoying its versatility. We have lots of gravel at our disposal here over in Iowa and its seen its fair share of that.





Stable at speed. Comfortable on the flats. Climbs as well as you're able to. Good stuff! Heck, I've even done some single tracking with it, and it does quite well there too. I'd call handling very similar to the old Bridgestone MB's and XO's from back in the day. nice, responsive stuff there.

Price is $725 for the frame, fork, ebb, headbadge and frame prep. A great deal on a quite a bicycle!

Also, if you're thinking about a ti bike, Sam is putting in another order with Nevi for the next batch of Pegasus frames. if you want in on the que, email him! Since these are more or less custom, its best to work direct with him. Cost of these is right around the $1900 + shipping mark.

Don't forget, I've got socks [$10] and T's [$15] here, ready to ship out!

In other riding news, the weather is finally broken, and is coming into summer here. the shop is busy, and the riding is turning out to be fantastic. I raced yesterday waaaaaay up there in Rhinelander on a fantastic course. It certainly harkens back to the old days of big loop races. The course there was and 11 mile monster of twisty, rocky goodness. The Gryphon handled fantastic up there. Quick and agile. And it certainly got its fair share of attention. Guess the drop bars will do that.

I managed to finish 8th in the open SS class, with team mate Eric two spots, and a couple minutes behind me. The race went well over all, I just wish I didn't drop my bottle early in the first lap. So early that I HAD to stop and grab it. Lost a couple SS spots right there that I wasn't able to get back. Guess I'll have to be more careful about the bottle grab next time.

Next up is the Chequamegon 100 on Saturday. This will certainly be a longday on the bike, but one that will be spent with good friends. Some may view it as a race, but for me, this will certainly be a tour. I'lll be getting ready for it all week. Weather looks to be nice, if a bit warm, so hydration will be the theme of the week. I'll have a camera along, so some shots will certainly come out of it!

Listening to: The Current morning show, drinking good, dark, unmolested coffee.

Shenanigans, Singlespeeds and Socks!

This past Sunday was the annual Decorah Time Trials. The traditional [for the past 20 years now!] start of the upper Midwest mountain bike racing season. Deke and crew have always thrown the best event in the small college town in the north east corner of Iowa.

Conditions were typical for spring in these parts. Slimy, slickery goodness. It rained for a good part of the previous few days ensuring a nice slime was coating the trails there. The thing about Decorah is that the area handles moisture well. Almost too well. It makes the trails there really fun. I've always had my best races there in the wet.

From Screen Captures

The course this year was just over 10 miles, with plenty of climbing to be had, as is custom for the Decorah Crew. Two Singular riders went over, Eric racing his Hummingbird, and me on the Gryphon{what are you here on a road bike for ?!]. The lap started out fine enough. An immediate sprint into the rad zone in a 400 meter sprint up to the actual trail entrance, and then a good walk after a slip on a root about 10 yards into the trail. Great. So there I am, walking already. Soon enough we were on top of the bluff, and as I'm edging closer to heading into Death Valley, I here the Shenanigan's portion of the weekend whooping it up.

I get down there only to discover my favorite set up of all time in the middle of the woods. The Beer Hand Up Zone*[that which has been deemed uncouth by promoters of racing in places**{Boulder, CO} where they take racing "seriously".] I ride into the BHUZ, then come to a full stop. I had to. No one filled my hand! Shockey came to rescue though with a 40 of the Highlife that I drained half of. Awesome. Refreshed, I quickly went through the second half of the lap, knowing that I'd have another go at a refreshement. And that I did. Polished off O'Gara's remainder, and then Shockey's again as Skip Berndt was in the back ground spouting something about someone on his megaphone. Seriously, how fun is that?



So I went off to finish my lap. Despite the stop's[probably all of a minute for both of them...] I got second in class! I do like those slimey, slickery conditions...

Eric ended up getting second in his age class too. A big hearty pat on his back too. He couldn't really stick around though. The Goats back on the farm were calling for care!



Oh, and also, I just got some Singular socks in! Got a whole bunch, if you're wanting to show some Singular love, throw ten bucks my way, and I'll mail out some quality Sockguy socks your way.

Oh, and one more. I'll be changing over this blog, and the old website to a new place soon! www.theprairiepeddler.net is the new address. Please make note of this and change me in your favorites! I'm still building it all up, so bear with me as I find time to do it. I'll be mirroring here for a bit, and reminding you all the while.

Thanks!

Listening to: Iron + Wine Shepherd's Dog