The Boys in Red

Pictures from Saturday's RMR. Good job to Kim and Doug on their 1st RMR adventure. They both did well. Russ also made it to the finish without a flat. Good job to all three. AT rode well and learned that a big effort in the middle of the race might come back to bite you later. I didn't make it out in time to race, but had fun watching the family race. I was talking with Sam Moore from the Porcupine Club and my cross rival and he was amazed how many of our family was racing. When I told him this was only some of the family crew, he couldn't believe it. It is cool stuff.

JoAnn gets to come home in the morning so it will be 3 nights in the hospital. She's had enough and is ready to feel better. The surgery went well, but the recovery is no fun. We heard from Erin yesterday and she's already participated in a few baptisms. She's doing really well.

Later,

Daren

Who's In?

So I hear rummers of Special K racing the C's at RMR tomorrow. Is this true? Is Doug considering? I'm 50/50. It all depends on JoAnn's recovery from surgury. If things go well and she gets to come home in the morning, I'm out. We'll see. Good luck to all you racers. If Kim races with Russ, I want pictures of the 180 corner. Kim could give one heck of a lead out if he's near the front at the end.

With the help of a coach, I now have many new ways to enter the pain cave. This week's new ventures included "Fast Starts" and "Alternating Threshold" intervals. The Fast Starts are to help with MTB and Cross racing starts. If you've ever seen either of these races, you know you don't exactly ease into the race. So here's the workout. Warm up then do of 6 minutes all out effort followed by 10 minutes of just below threshold. Recover for 10 minutes, then repeat. Alternating Threshold intervals yesterday were 4 x 6 min Threshold intervals (highest effort you can maintain) alternating low cadence, big gear and high cadence, smaller gear every other minute. Pain is my friend.

We haven't heard from Erin in over a week and we're not too happy about it. The e-mail thing is supposed to eliminate these problems. Apparently not.

Finally, is there a GC connection meeting Sunday? AT was talking about a get together to coordinate training and racing schedules. Let me know.

Also, I bought AJ's old Computrainer and finally got it all set up last night using our old computer. It's a pretty cool toy. It will make the indoor workouts more interesting and useful. If any of you are interested in doing a threshold test, I now have the set up to do easily.

DC

Go Ducks!

How about the Ducks! They looked pretty good against Winthrop, maybe they will make it to the 8. It was nice to see the pictures of you all racing. It sounds like it was a great time. Sorry to hear about your flat Russ. Maybe you can talk Doug into racing some time.

I went riding with the group here on Saturday. There was a race on Sunday, so they didn't go as far. Out in the boonies there are some trailer homes where people create meth and use it. So we are coming along a country road and a big old rottweiler comes running out at us and hits a guy up in front of me. He flips and we were able to move around him. No one else hit the dog. The guys bike is messed up and he is laying there on his back. The owner comes out and is freaking out. He kept saying that he wanted to pay for the bike, then they tell him its a $5,000 bike. He starts crying and saying he'll pay for, but after he pays for it he is going to kill himself. The guy was nuts, definitely on something. I wish I had a video camera, so I could show my kids what drugs can do to you. Other than that it was a good ride. The weather was great. Can't wait until the races start here.

Bubba

RMR Racing

Russ is in the white and red with the S.





Daren in the blue with a red helment and Adam at my side with the big S.





Well, we survived the first RMR race. Adam and I raced in the B group (Cat 3 /4) and stayed out of trouble. The race was fairly uneventful the first three quarters. I covered a few attacks early, but my legs were still sore from this week's workouts, so Adam and I just sat in. The last 15 minutes is always a bit crazy. There wasn't much wind, so it was going to come down to a sprint. The last 3 laps it's a battle for the front 20 spots. I made it to the last corner in about 15th or so with Adam on my wheel. I started the sprint early and got up to about 5th, but blew with 100 meters to go and sat up. Adam got pushed off my wheel in the last corner and finished further back. However, he had no trouble staying in the group and will do well. In fact, our team needs another B rider so Adam is now officially a Porcupine / Specialized guy.


Russ raced the C group (Cat 4 /5) and was doing well sitting in the middle of the group. However, he flatted on the back straight and by the time he made it to the start / finish, it wasn't worth the effort to try to get back on. He was a bit disappointed, but did well in his first crit. It is a very different experience and he learned there are many unstable riders trying to take you out.

Doug checked it all out and decided the risk of injury is greater than the potential fun at this point in life. However, he could hang with the C's. I think he's up for the next MTB race though. The risk of crashing is much less and if you do, it's all your fault.

On the Erin front, she's good. She has a companion from Argentina that speaks no English (yes Russ, she'll now learn proper Spanish). She's in Florida Uruguay, just North of the Capital.

Erin's Off

Erin made it off to Uruguay OK on Monday. Here's a couple of pics.

Her Mission President sent a picture today to give us evidence of a safe arrival.

She was very excited to be going and looked great. It wasn't even difficult to send her off because she's so ready to be gone. It was great to talk with her for a few minutes.

I'm finally feeling a little better. I was sicker than a dog for 3 days last week. I spent most of those days barely able to lift my head above the John. I think I got some bad Mexican food. I did manage to make it out on the Family ride on Saturday. It was pretty cool. We had Doug, Kim, Adam, Russ, the Robbies (both), Tanner, me and Dan Richie. We did a nice 2 and 1/2 loop and everyone did well. Bub, we need you here!

The weather has been super nice and the riding good. We may not have any water this summer, but it's all good now. I got my new Tarmac SL built and I've ridden it a couple of times. I like it. I put Robbie's new Tarmac E5 together last night and he gave it a test ride today. It looks good. Now, all I have to do is convert my old Tarmac into a TT bike and build up the Zebra bike to go on the Computrainer I just got from AJ. Only about 4 more hours of bike building.

Saturday is the opening of the RMR crit series. The weather looks great, so should be big fields. It's a bit like an airplane landing. If you can walk away, it was a good one. Adam and Russ are planning to race and Doug is on the fence. I'm excited and a bit nervous. I wish I felt better, but we'll see. I plan to stay up front out of trouble. If I don't have the legs to do that, I'll just hang out at the back and avoid the crashes. Hopefully, we'll get some pictures of the boys in action. The Porcupine cat 1/2 team is ready to rock and should do some damage. Anything less than a win will be disappointing.

Update

Thanks for all the pictures an updates. It is good to hear that GC Connection is doing well. Daren, congratulations on winning the race. That is pretty cool! You definitely deserve it after all your hard work. Tanner that is an awesome picture of you in the powder. It makes me want to ski/board again soon. Sutt, sorry to hear that you are hurt. I didn't even know you still ski/board.

The last four days have been unbelievable here. It wasn't raining and temp got around 65. Saturday I got to ride with the group. They said they were going easy, but they always say that. It is always a good work out to try and keep up with them. Things are going well here.

Bubba

This photo isn't as cool as T-man cutting up the powder, but it's the best photo I could find.

The bad side to this photo is I overshot the landing and tweaked my back and maybe broke a rib. Thus, I only rode three hours last week.

Great job Doug, Darren, and Tanner Saturday. I hope to join in on the Mountain bike action this year. Although I don't think I'll even get close to a podium finish.

As a side note, I liked seeing Doug sport the GC connection gear (Go TEAM).

Racing in the Sun

This is not MTB racing, but it's a good picture of Tanner ripping the steep powder.

Here's the MTB. This on our pre-ride on Friday. Doug is working hard up a tricky ledge. He got it figured out and nailed it during the race.

This is a cool wash on the 1st climb of the race course. It's a drag race to get to this narrow opening first. No passing in this section. Doug's in front of T-man in this picture.

Here's Tanner coming down one of the steeper decents. The new bike made it back home with no marks. Better than Dad.

Here I am just after coming up a foot and half ledge. I managed to scratch my frame when I laid my bike down to take some pictures just after this.

Tanner on the podium for 3rd in the 13 - 15 sport / expert. Tanner had a great 1st lap, but paid for it later. This was his first mulitple lap race and he's now learning about pacing. He rode hard and really battled the last lap when he was struggling. I was proud of his effort and willingness to try difficult things.

To my surprise, I won the 40+ Expert race. I have been doing base and strength work and expected to get hammered on the climbs. However, I won the drag race to the first single track, opened a gap and held it up the 1st climb. I then opened the gap on the decent and started to get confident. I was able to ride really steady laps (all 3 lap times within 45 seconds of each other) and increased my lead to a 2 and 1/2 minute win. It was my best MTB race result ever. I won 2 races last year, but they were against small fields. This was a good field with some strong guys. It's good to see the hard work from the last couple of years starting to pay-off. The Cross season was a bit of a break-through, so hopefully, this is the start of something good.

Here's Doug in the GC Connection shirt just off the podium with a 4th place finish in the 57+ group. Doug did great in his 1st MTB race and had a really good exprience. He rode very hard and gave it his all. He avoided any serious crashes and is on his way to becoming a true mountain biker. I was really proud of him.

All in all, we had a great time in very nice weather. For years, I would go to MTB races alone and have a good time with my race buddies. However, to race with Doug and T and for all of us to have some success was so much better. I look forward to a really fun year on the bike.

Daren

It's not snowing in ST. G.

Doug, Tanner and I made it to St. George today. There was plenty of snow the first half of the drive, but St. G. is nice. Is was windy and in the high 50's when we got here. We rode the race course and had a blast. There were a bunch of people out riding in preparation for tomorrow's race. Doug and Tanner figured out the tricky parts and should be ready to go. We took a bunch of pictures and I'll post some when we get home.

Tonight, we met Eric R. for dinner and had a nice time. Tomorrow should be a good day. We all are looking forward to a good time and are not too worried about results. I don't think I have the climbing legs at this point of the year to hang with the top guys, but we'll see. Tanner did well today on the first ride on his new bike. He looks good and has made huge progress since last year.

I let you know how things go tomorrow.

Daren

Pic's

Here are some pic's of the bike path that I go along every day to work. I took them a little bit ago when it wasn't raining. The bike path goes along the Willamette River and it goes to the Duck's football stadium. The last picture is of the hill where Steve Prefontaine was killed by a drunk drive when he was out running. There is a little memorial on the hill for him.