Holidays!

So yesterday we had our last little local race. After last weeks one, I was full of high hopes, but my legs did not want to cooperate. It was a hard lap, lots of short climbs and no place to recover. Even the short pieces asphalt were down the hill, so spinning like a mad man.. I finished something like 10th out of 35, which was OK.

And now, holidays! One week to go and then we migrate, like 50% of the Dutchies, to France. Not sure which bike to bring, yet, but it will be good for sure. I hope you all will have a good holidays, hope to see lots of you at SIS or the Worlds SS!

Grenzsteintophy 2011, by phil

Grenzsteintrophy 2011,

I went into this event very confident and mentally strong. This was going to be a practice run for my Tour Divide Race attempt in 2012. GST 2011, so I thought, would be about a 6 – 8 day “race” for me and a new friend from England Paul Errington. We would both be riding singlespeed mountain bikes with a gearing of 32 -18. As it turned out it ended for Paul and I a lot sooner; let me explain in detail.

On Thursday the 16^th of June we drove up to the north German town of Lübeck-Travemünde. All of the starters for the GST would be meeting at a restaurant for some last minute details and a couple of beers. There was a colorful mix of people; all men except one woman with her husband or boyfriend.  Ages varied between 20’s to 50’s; one guy named Rüdiger was 71!

Now, for those of you that are not familiar with the GST; it’s not a race, just a group start to a ride or tour if you will. Some take as a race and try bang it out as fast as their bodies will allow; that was my goal. Some just want to ride it, enjoy the scenery and take two weeks. That’s probably the best attitude.

So Friday morning, 7 o’clock I’m out of bed getting gear packed and trying to wolf down some breakfast; I’m all of a sudden a little nervous. I hadn’t been the whole time leading up to this but on this Friday the 17^th of June, I’ve got the jitters. Normal Paul tells me. He’s an experienced racer, has done races all over Europe and even in Asia. We finish breakfast and head out to meet the other riders for some pictures.  It’s all a easy going laid back atmosphere and I’m not nervous anymore. Just excited to get rolling.

At nine O’clock Gunnar gives us the start signal and we start pedaling. Paul and I were at the front  setting the pace. I’m thinking at any minute they’re all going to roar by us but they don’t.  After less than 2 km we are turning right onto a single track through the woods. A couple riders do go by and we settle into our rhythm which is almost too fast for me. Paul is pedaling a fast cadence and I’m trying to keep up. This goes on for three hours before we make our first stop at a campground to fill up water bottles and use the WC. The terrain for the first day is mostly flat but there are also some small short climbs, we just storm up them.  I started to get tired around KM 80, so we slowed our pace a bit. At Km 90 we had to take a ferry across the Elbe River; Edmund, Walter, Paul and I enjoy the  ride across.

After the ferry, Paul and I hit the next bakery and some pastries and coke. Also two espressos.  The next section, if I remember correctly was along the west side of the river and it followed the bluffs. Short but super steep sand hills that had to be pushed up; probably even the gearies had to push, it was that steep!

Hours later we had dinner at a small restaurant in Hitzacker on the Elbe River.   After we ate we rode to next town where there was a campground, found a good spot near the toilets but not too near! 😉 rolled out our sleeping bags and tried to sleep. I think it was 10 PM by this time. A long day in the saddle but we both felt good and satisfied about how far we had gone.

I couldn’t sleep; I kept tossing and turning in my bag. The mosquitos messing with me.  My bivi sack has a bug net but still i could hear them buzzing around. At some point I did manage to fall asleep for a little bit. But at 12:30 I was awake again, and then it started to rain! I got up to look for some shelter. The building where the toilets are in had a Recreation room that was unlocked, so I went in and laid my bag on the floor. About 5 minutes later Paul came in. Finally I did fall asleep but only for two to three hours. At 4:15 we got up and started packing our stuff for the day. Just before 5AM we rolled out in a light rain. My spirits were still high and I was sure that it wouldn’t rain all day. Through the morning we rode on sandy roads and equestrian trails, luckily it had rained during the night because if it hadn’t the sand roads would have been unridable. It was still hard and it felt like a long climb, even though it was flat. When we weren’t riding on sand we were on the Tank plates that marked the patrol road for the East German border guards. They are not fun to ride on. They are about 8 feet by three and have four rows of slots. The slots are about three inches wide and maybe six to eight inches long. It’s hard to miss them so it’s almost like a washboarded dirt road. Maybe

worse. You can’t really look around and enjoy the country side because of the damned things. Always have to concentrate. As a result you drink and eat less which results in bonking if you’re not careful.

Rene caught up to us and rode together until we hit a town with a little imbiss, a small restaurant where they serve food. Mostly some kind of meat, pork or chicken, also sausages in rolls, and all kind of soft drinks. After our pit stop we continued on; Rene was faster and he took off. The route on day was flat and boring, but because of the sand and the sometimes overgrown tank plates still quite demanding. We wanted to get in at least 200 km, why? Because we wanted to finish by day 8. So pushed through the shity roads and ghost towns where no one was out on streets, and no stores, nothing. Really strange here in Germany to see towns with no people in them. The houses were kept and orderly and cars were in front in driveways but no people.  We weren’t in any need of food or water but it would’ve been nice to get a cup of coffee and a snack. We meet up with Gunnar sometime in mid-afternoon; he was looking for the track. It had wanted to steer us through an unridable section of woods. Sometimes the track just shot off were there was no road or trail. Pretty frustrating; and we just “winged it” and found our own way. Eventually we made it back the official route.

Later in the afternoon we caught up to the “Boss” Gunnar, he started the GST thing. Anyway, he was looking for the right way; the track had us going through a farm field with new crops. We took a parallel road.

By this time the pain in my knee was starting to get my attension; I had been ignoring it so far but now there was no more of that. It just plain hurt. We took a break to eat some food at a pizza place. I voiced my knee problems as the hills were coming up soon.

After dinner it was more flat miles and a strong tailwind, sometimes side wind or full on head wind. The route was constanly changing directions.

We stopped at a store to resupply and meet Stephan there doing the same. We most of looked funny; four grown men buying gobs of junk food. And eating some of it in front of the store. So with full bags and full bellies we headed into our first real climb. It wasn’t too bad except that my knee was screaming at me. I mean, we had only ridden 200 km and had been riding since 5 in the morning. No reason for my knee to hurt. I had to get off and push a little bit. It felt good to work other muscles. Around 8:30 we started looking for a place to bivi for the night. The first had nothing; I asked at a rundown looking house. The man behind looked at me like I was crazy when I asked if we could all crash in his barn, no way! L

On to the next town. We scored there! A school with a sheltered entrance, invisible from the road. This was a cool bivi spot. Everyone set up their stuff; Paul got out his stove and whipped up a cup of tea. By the time we settled in and got to sleep it must have been 11:00 or so. I slept really good except for the noises the neo air pads made when someone rolled over. Like they were lying on a bag of potato chips.

We were rolling by five AM; it was a nice morning with a few high clouds.  There were 50 or fairly flat kms to do before the Brocken Mtn; the longest climb of the whole route. I knew I’d be pushing some of it with my single speed but it didn’t bother me.  At the base of the climb the track took us on a really cool single track, probably the best so far. I had a great time on it.

We had  coffee at a guest house in a town before the real climbing started. After that it was back to some more single track and then the dreaded “Panzer Platen”. It wasn’t too steep and normaly I would have ridden it but my knee was screaming at me again, so I got and walked. Gunnar and Paul left me behind. I can’t remember how long it too but it seemed like forever till I was able to ride again. I came to a reservoir and the view was spectacular! Luckily the track had flated out a bit and I was able to ride; my knee still hurting though, every pedal stroke like a jab of fire through my knee. By this time I knew that my race was over but I still tried to push thoughts away.

After the reservoir  the trail made a sharp left turn and went straight up! I mean up; steep and of course the freaking tank plates again. I was off the bike pushing. The one good thing about pushing is that my knee didn’t hurt.  This time I saw signs showing me how far to the top; the first one said 4,3 km. Shit I thought, that’s  a long way! Another hour of this. The wind was howling and soon it started to rain; ah… I love this weather! It got steeper and the cement slabs became a blessing; using the slots in them for traction; kind of like a ladder.

I pushed my bike more on the Brocken than I did when I rode over Imogene Pass in Colorado, Imogene is 14000 feet! I only pushed up it because I couldn’t get any air. Here it was just too steep. Maybe with no gear on my bike and gears I could ride it but it would be an all out effort.

Then it really started to rain hard and the wind picked up more speed. I couldn’t see very far ahead but I heard the whistle of the train that goes to the top; I knew I wasn’t very far from the summit.  But the hill just kept going.

All this time I kept thinking why aren’t there any switch backs here, it’s crazy! Just straight up! On the trail I saw 1000 meters spray painted on the surface. Good only 142 meters to go. Still no sign of the top. Everxthing shrouded in thick clouds even though the wind was blowing hard.

I couldn’t give up here, no one to resucue me; but I felt like lying down. I was so tired and all of a sudden hungery. Through all of the wind, rain and pushing I forgot to eat or drink. I was on a full on  bonk! Then I saw the buildings at the top, the towers where the Russians and East Germans would listen and watch the West.

When I made it to the restaurant I saw Gunnar’s bike leaning against the wall. No sign though of Paul’s. Gunnar was sitting at a table finishing up his lunch. He said that he lost Paul on the Climb. I just needed some food, so I loaded up my tray with all kinds of goodies. After two large cokes, a bowl of pea soup with Frankfurters and a side of fried potatoes and two pieces of cake I started to feel human again.

Still no sign of Paul; I thought that either he was waiting for me somewhere or he didn’t find the restaurant and just kept going. The top was covered in thick clouds and visibility down to a minimum. Gunnar and I decided to push on; we had a long downhill ahead of us.

Back out in the cold I had one thought; get off of this f..king mountain. The Brocken has some of, if not the worst weather in Germany. Something like over 300 days of rain and clouds! Yikes! It’s a rare day when you have a clear view off the mountain. Good place to watch your enemies, eh?

The downhill off the mountain wasn’t nearly long enough for me; soon we were going up again! On a trail overgrown with huge ferns, actually quite pretty but when everything is dripping wet not much fun. The trail was thrashed too; totally washed out from run-off water. I guess no one here has heard of trail maintenance.

The route got back on the Tank plates and started going up and down; straight up or down.  Almost like a roller coaster ride, except on the uphills I had to get off and push.  Funny, my knee was feeling better after the long push up the Brocken. But soon it was hurting again.

We finally met up with Paul; he was waiting on the side of the trail for us for an hour. It was a good reunion, and I was glad that we were all together again. Later Stephan caught back up to us and we rode the rest of the afternoon together. Stephan was on his way home; he lives in a town not too far off route and he had some things to take care of at home so he wasn’t riding the whole route. We parted ways later in the afternoon and the three of us rode on in the rain, it had started and looked like it wasn’t going to stop anytime soon.

We came to a small town and started looking for a place to hole up until the rain stopped. A man walked by us and Gunnar asked him if he knew of an Inn or restaurant; he did. So we followed him to his parents house where they rented out rooms for the night. What luck!! The woman there was really nice, she even got the wood stove going so we could dry out our stuff. After the fire was going and we got warm it was pretty much clear to me that I would be staying there for the night. My knee again. I knew that I was done; at least for the day. Deep down I also knew that my race was over; and I was pretty bummed about it.

The night went by fast and at 4:30 my alarm went off; I didn’t want to get up! My legs were so stiff and sore! I was slow to get but finally did; I was glad to see that Gunnar and Paul were also moving slow. I think that it was justified after the last three days we had ridden 330 miles in. The first few miles of the days were rough and I kept thinking I’ve got to stop or I might do serious damage to my knee. It was just so hard to stop. Gunnar finally made the decision for me; he had been having issues with his Achilles so when he said that he was done I went right along with him.  I don’t know how long I would’ve gone before tossing the towel but I think it was the right choice.

Looking back on the whole thing and the time leading up to it, I realize that I made some mistakes. It probably wasn’t a good idea to take off two weeks before the start and then hammer the first two days like there’s no tomorrow.  Those were my two biggest mistakes. I didn’t really ride too hard just too long.  Mabe next time I’ll be better prepared. I still have the Divide bug and I’d like to ride it. Maybe not race it, just ride it someday, with a couple of good friends. Take some fishing gear and stop once and awhile and beat the water. For now though I’ll be just riding here in good old Germany racing here there. Having fun, that’s what I want to do now. J

German Single Speed Championships, by phil

I know this is way over due but since it was a good race for me I decided to throw in here anyway. The Kellerwald Bike Marathon is not a single speed only event; they just have a SS category. Nonetheless, I was curroius to see how I would do against geared bikes in a normal marathon. I’ve race SS before at SiS and at Külsheim; both the 12hr. race and the Weißwurst Rennen and have done fairly good but how would it be on a 80 km course with over 2000 vertical meters of climbing? I had to find out. As usual I started out way to fast and paid for it at the end. On the flats I got killed by the gearies but on the hills I could keep my own, even leave quite a few people behind me. There were a few hills that I had to push up, one was so steep that most of the gearies were doing it too. 🙂 I only saw one other SSer during the whole race and he went past me and I never saw him again. When I came in to the finish I was pretty well cooked! But happy and satisfied of my time: 4:23. My second fastest time ever on the course. So my theory was right that on a good day a SSer could be just as fast or faster than a geared bike. I got third place in SS category; I feel pretty good about this because it was a national event. But I have to say honestly that there were only 6 – 8 SSer in the race.

Bergrace Oosterbeek NL

So we have this race series by an independent race organizer, and he happes to have the 4 best race courses of the entire country. I missed the first one because we wanted to do a touring trip that day, the second race was at the same day of a family meeting, but this 3rd race I was free to go. After receiving de Fathers days presents of the kids, mommy took of with the kids for a horse jumping race, and I  prepared for the race today. There are 3 races during the day, one 150 minutes, then the 75 minutes followed by a 105 minutes race. Normally I do the 75 minutes race, short and intensive, but as I wanted to get home in the afternoon again today I took of for the 150 minutes.

As I did not do to much training lately my goal was to finish. Which I did. I  took of last en after the first climb I could pick the right pace and do my thing. I was lucky enough to have one of the guys supporting a friend who kindly offered to hand me some drinks and food during the race, so I could keep going without getting of the bike to pick up bottles and bananas. It turned out I started at a perfect pace, slowly passing lots of riders and at the end finishing 89 out of 143 starts. Of course I was lapped by the fast guys, but I was very happy with this result.

 

Picture by Sikke @  http://www.sikkemtbfotos.nl

Wilfried takes second in Toulouse – another podium for BWR

Our team member Wilfried Beaumes (2nd from left) finished the Raid of Gagnac in Toulouse second place. It consisted of 2km running, 30 km mtb and 6 km orienteering. Congratulations Wil, keep on rockin’!

Final preparations for Grenzsteintrophy, by Phil

Well, time is ticking and the start of the Grenzsteintrophy (GST) is nearing. Yesterday I picked up Paul Errington from the airport in Frankfurt; who will be doing the GST also.  He flew in from the UK, Newcastle to be exact. A super nice guy, we meet on the bikepacking forum. Maybe a new prospect for BWR?? 🙂

On tuesday the 14th of June I flew in from the states after visiting family and friends for two weeks. I didn’t bring my bike, I just did some running to keep the motor warm. I hope it was enough.

So we’re off today to drive up to the Baltic coast to the town of Lübeck, Travemünde. On the 17th the “race” starts. I say race tentativley because it’s not like other self-supported events; it’s what the participants want it to be. We, Paul and I, are taking it as a race. To try and get to the Czech border ASAP. We’ll see how it goes. I’ll post from time to time some tidbits of the race. You can also “watch” me here: http://www.grenzsteintrophy.de/  Click on my name on the right of the page and you’ll be able to see where I’m at.
Have fun watching!

Ciao
Phil

Apparently even though I write drivel elsewhere….

I haven’t done anything here ever. So here goes a little post so I will no longer not have any posts.

A trail in VA, but very similar to what I rode in Ohio! Good times.

The Mohican 100(K) is the last race I have done, and it went well for 55 miles. The last 7 didn’t. I came through the last aid station in 5th (I believe) place after cruising the course because I didn’t want to blow up and get a really bad time. Once I realized my placing I turned the effort up past 10 and took a wrong turn. Okay, the turn wasn’t marked and I had no idea I had gone the wrong way and as much as I want to blame everyone else (and the race organizer does bear some responsibility) it was ultimately my fault for plowing ahead when I thought I might be going the wrong way. Anyway the last 5 miles of the course (because I rode over 11.5) took me two and a half hours. I went through the last aid station at 5:30 and I finished at 8:14. It was not good.

To add insult to wrong turns, I am listed as a DNF in the official results, likely as they think I didn’t do the entire course and rode the road back to the finish line. Not true, I did the entire stinking course and am still trying to get my 16th place….. it hurts to type that because I think I really could have had a 5th place finish. Oh well, next time.

As for stuff that I use from sponsors, my White Brothers fork worked very well. It kept my face from hitting the dirt and soaked up enough of the bumps so my hands, shoulders and arms felt good at the end of the race. Pactimo shorts kept my rear from any kind of discomfort and looked good as I got lost! Lastly My Stans rims (USA is where I live now but the FRMs are very good too), goop AKA Stan tubeless goop, and tape worked well keeping my tires round and me from having any flats.

I will post a bit more as time allows, and as I feel the need. I miss the Euro scene. With luck I will be back for SiS. Fingers crossed. Ed

Tegernsee Marathon 2011 or How to have one of the worst days on a bike ever!

It only looks like I'm in the lead

As someone who’s ridden and raced bikes for 16 years now, I’ve had my share of bad days (i.e. dehydration during a Flint Hills Death Ride at 100+ degrees, bonking during a race in Mid-Missouri so badly a team mate handed me his only food so I could finish, etc.) but somehow, my recent problems at the 2011 Tegernsee Marathon have overshadowed all of them. It could be that it’s just so recent but it might also be due to not fully understanding what happened.

Speeding by... HA!

Here’s the story. For many months leading up to the race, I’d kept planning to enter the D course (the longest with mega-elevation) as a singlespeeder. However, I found out that my in-laws were coming and that we were going to be spending the week before the race on the road traveling through the Alps. In end, I took what I thought was the more intelligent optoin of the C course (68 km and 2600 vertical meters) geared.

As you can imagine, my eating and drinking were way off of my ‘normal’ diet (I’m a business English teacher and travel from company to company so I have no ‘normal’ days). In any case, I made an effort to keep drinking as much water as possible throughout the week previous to the race. By the end of the week, I knew that I had put on a pound or two but nothing out of the ordinary for vacation.

Smiling because I know I'm almost done

Now, day of the race. I got up early, drank a bottle of Carbo Rocket loaded water on the way down to the race, show up, get everything ready and go for a warmup ride. Everything felt good, in fact pretty damn good. While there, I ran into my teammate Christian and his wife Petra. That’s who I’m talking to while waiting for the start of the race. The race started 15 minutes late due to a farmer not wanting the bikes on his land at the last moment but then we were off. For a ‘neutral’ start we took off at about 30+ km/Hr and my hear rate instantly spiked.

My normal racing heart rate is between 155-165 and I was pushing 180. It was about this time that I started to realize that something was wrong. When we were let go and we hit the first climb it became blatently apparent that it was honestly going to be a shitty day and that my only two goals were to not quit and not end up DFL.

Within the first 10 km I started to cramp (I still don’t know why) and it just kind of went downhill from there. The rest of the day involved nursing cramping, fighting mud and people who can’t ride on singletrack and pushing up almost everything resembling an incline. Like I said… It sucked!

Finished..... and finished!

At the end of it all, I accomplished my two goals. I FINISHED and I wasn’t DFL. In fact, I finished 144th of 153 in my Under 50 class and 385th out of the 400 men that they timed. Way off of my previous C course time but I finished.

Thanks to Crema Cycles for setting me up with my awesome Indy Fab. Ti Deluxe 29’er, grips and more. Also thanks to Carbo Rocket for the hydration products and their new CR 333 which was the only thing which made me feel better throughout the day. Lastly, thanks also to FRM for the fanstatic rims and Geax for the tires.

Short track racing in Dutchie land!

My new hobby is short track racing…. Not because I like the short, high intensity part of it, but more because my training intensity is at a historic low…

We have more and more people joining the singlespeed way of riding, resulting in more small, club or internet forum based singlespeed races. Good thing about these is that it is easier to finish on the podium, which was the case with a small race we had at a local club in Ede, Netherlands. Omthe short but very fun track we did a 75 minutes race, which was just short enough for me to finish on the second place out of 20+ riders.

A few weeks later, in the same city, we had a street race, with a very(!) nice course through city centre and some surrounding parks. With lots of small stairs, sandy corners and a very gnarly climb my Big Apple equiped 1×9 Singular wasn’t the best choice for the race after all. Singlespeed would have been better, although I am not sure I would have been able to keep my third place on my singlespeed. The high temperature, fast start and twisty, very technical course made it a very hard race, short but intensive. But hey, podium again, in a year I have been riding half the distance I did last year (or so), so why complain?

So what’s next? Some local races the next few weeks, holidays in France (the Ardeche), then SIS, SSWC Ireland and Eurobike. The next few months will be fun!!

Looking forward to meet quite some teammates again at SIS, let’s smoke some kiddy wheels up there!

Jelle

Heimspiele

‘Heimspiel’ is German for ‘home game’: On the last two weekends we had two races in/around Munich. Since my last race a month ago I was able to do quite a bunch of riding with both the SSP and the shifted bike, mostly in the fantastic surrounding of the Bavarian Alps, so I was curious to see how it would work. Although I will probably never do a race without any mistakes (well, who will?), I would say I had a good time. This is a short version of how it went.

———–

The first race was the Tegernsee Marathon. Other than last year I decided to go Singlespeed and signed up for the B-course. It was supposed to have 55 km and 1.390 vertical meters of climbing but they did some last minute changes because a farmer had blocked the passage through his territory. Well, I said something about making mistakes: I lined up way to close to the end of the field of 706 riders and therefore had to deal with a lot of traffic on the first climb and had to walk singletrack passages I could have ridden (which of course  is one of the most senseless things that can happen to you out on the bike). The rest was typically SSP-tactics: Overtaking on the climbs, being overtaken in the flat passages. When the race was over I had worked myself to place 351. Not too bad I guess.

Hello! Racing is about having a good time!

Big Wheel Racers chatting at the start line.

———-

Last weekend we had the 24 Hours of Munich in the beautiful Olympic Park. My wife Petra and me did the race as part of a wonderful eight-person-team consisting of good friends from Munich, Stuttgart and Mannheim.Riders passing by our camp around midnight. Note the coolest team bus ever, provided by Urs from                                                                       Munich. Note also the guy in front: Troy Lee Helmet + Rocky Altitude from 1997 = coolass!

  My friend Bertram and me having a finisher beer.

It was hot and it was fun. Although you could easily ride that race track on a cross bike I love the course due to its beautiful surrounding and because of all the corners and bridges you cross. We had some good laps, we had some bad laps and we pushed each other with the lap times. 25 minutes 21 seconds was the fastest time physically and mentally possible for me, although that made me eat the same breakfast two times. I also had a beautiful nightshift during dawn.

 I also brought some of our sponsor’s products like these Sock Guys my wife was wearing.

Well, now I am somehow tired. I got a cold from my attempt to find some sleep in a canvas chair just after sunrise at the 24 hours and I still have heavy blisters on the feet from all the walking at Tegernsee. Maybe it is time for a bit of regeneration!

Chris