2010 Wausau24 – 12 Solo – 3rd Place

Posted by joel on August 2, 2010

The [ Wausau24 ] event for 2010 was “inaugural” in name only. For those of you that don’t know, in years past, the event went by “24 / 9″. After changing ownership twice in the past two years, newest management understands the proper way of running this event; start with local support and keep a grass roots feel.

The Wausau24 is a focal point on my schedule every year. I enjoy the venue, atmosphere, course, pretty much everything about it. This year’s course was a deviation over years past in that it was shortened by a about three to five miles. In my opinion, having a slightly shorter course works to a riders advantage in timing water, eating, pitting, etc.

This year, my goal was to ride 12 hour solo and obtain a podium position. Using the WEMS Series as a training mechanism for mileage and duration, I felt my goal was obtainable considering I placed 2nd and 7th in the WEMS races leading up to the Wausau24.

The race started at 10am and I rode the first three laps and felt Ok. After the third lap, Beth and Gavin showed up and had to hang out in the pits for a while. Most of this pit time was to help Gavin ring the cow bell as riders went by. It is amazing how a little pick-me-up like that helps to motivate during a long race. The riders passing him smiled and thanked him on numerous occasions. One rider gave him a high five as he passed!

As the race progressed I dropped to fourth place for while as I enjoyed family time in the pits. After spending a good part of the afternoon in the pits, Beth and Gavin went home. Though, after hearing the results at the next split I knew it was time to get back to the business at hand. I proceeded to get my 3rd place spot back and maintained it for the remainder of the day.

In late afternoon my dad stopped by to help support me the remainder of the day. Any and all help was much appreciated!

After wrapping up my day with 12 laps (one off the lead), 3rd place, and 132 miles, I felt I had a great day.

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Levis Trow 100 July 2010

Posted by joel on July 19, 2010

For Levis Trow this year, I brought my little brother Luke. As in years past I focused on the fifty miler as it works well for training purposes to get in five to six hours of riding on a given day. July 17, 2010 was no different.

The pre-race setup went without a hitch thanks to Luke’s help and his photography skills as seen below.

As for the start of the race, I kept my bike off to the left as I figured I would have a decent run up to the bike. Turns out I was mistaken, I lost my bike in the ensuing chaos!

The picture doesn’t show it here but I felt like I stood and looked at the bikes for about three minutes after the start. <slaps forehead>

The first two laps I was off the lead group by only a few minutes and felt good going into the third lap.

My third lap on the other hand wasn’t as successful. I think I cramped no fewer than five times and didn’t eat right and “bonked”. Sufficed to say I dropped two places on the third lap and called it a day at six o’clock.

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WORS XC#6 Chippewa Valley Firecracker (Eau Claire) Cat 1

Posted by joel on July 12, 2010

Sunday was the sixth race in the WI Off road series, the Chippewa Firecracker. Lowes Creek, although situated on only 240 acres has some great flowing single track that’s well maintained and frequently updated. I drove over to Eau Claire with my fellow Bikeman.com rider Matt Block. Once we arrived the temperature was in the lower 80’s and somewhat humid.

The Niner Air9 was cleaned  and dialed-in after about two hours worth of maintenance and TLC from the day before. The race start was quick as one might expect for a Cat 1 XC race and since I’m not in the top 10-15 riders I had to succumb to the bottlenecking when entering the first single-track section. The trails were in excellent condition for racing with just enough moisture to make them tacky. Though there was a large section of open field (which was dry and dusty) that wasn’t the case for most of the course.

After three laps, I started feeling the fatigue that sets in as usual, but was still able to clear the 50 ft very technical rock section near the lap/finish area on each lap. Feeling hydrated and having popped enough gels, lap four felt good as well. On the fourth and final lap, near the end of the 50 ft rock section I wasn’t sure if I could clear it as I came to a complete stand still / stall. Then, someone in the crowd started yelling in my ear, “you can clear it!”. Sufficed to say that was the motivation I needed. I cleared the difficult rocky section and finished my race. After racing for just over 2hr and 22 mins my time was good enough for 7/16 and 33/65. I was happy with my result and am looking forward to racing at the Levis Trow 50 miler this coming weekend.

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Cycling items for this year

Posted by joel on February 19, 2010

For 2010 I will be using a Niner Air 9 as the chassis of choice. I have been slowly gathering the parts over the past couple of months. I recently acquired the wheel set, seat-post, brakes and rotors, stem, seat post clamp, headset, and a few other key ingredients. Two out standing items remain: a bar and chain guide.

I also decided to replace my road R-Sys wheel set with hand built wheel set consisting of Power Tap hubs (SL+ rear), DT Swiss RR415 rims, and DT Swiss Revolution 2.0/1.5/2.0 spokes. I ended up ordering the spokes from an E Bay vendor and saved about $100. It is counter-intuitive that spoke vendors only sell in lots of 60 – that’s great for a bike shop, not so great for an individual wheel builder! I am still waiting for the hubs to come off back-order (somewhat impatiently). For a backup wheel set I picked up a set of Rolf Vector Comp’s for $130!!

I decided to ditch the roof racks and save on fuel economy by switching to a hitch mount system instead.

Most, if not all these items were purchased through my new sponsor for this year: [ Bikeman ]

Two known events on the calendar for this year include: The Horribly Hilly Hundred and the Dairyland Dare. As always the 24-9 will be added as well.

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Titletown Mashup – 2009

Posted by joel on January 11, 2010

Here is a mashup of riders from the 2009 season, pretty cool! This is courtesy of Gary Smits at [Extreme Photography]. I’m row two, five in from the left.

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