A few pics from O-HI-O!

Ran out of time this AM, but here are a few from the race a couple of weeks ago. Mystery guest is Stephen Huddle, former K-town resident, dweller of Cincy now (race was very close for him) and FINISHER of the continental divide race!!!!!!! Holy crap. That is the biggest mountain bike race ever and he did it- awesome!

No report from Ed yet- I'm sure he is fine and there will be a great story or two!

Winner winner chicken dinner! (again!!)

Went to O-HI-O and threw it down on the beautiful, twisty and oh so flat singletrack outside of Yellow Springs, Ohio at John Bryan State Park. Found this race by accident and it proved to be fantastic. Well run, great trails, great food, super nice people and only 25 bucks!! Bonus was that it was only 25 minutes from where Ed's dad lives (yes, he has a dad that is old, but very much alive and kickin'!) Ended up with just under 7 hours of racing, and 91 miles!! (yes, that would be a 13 mile an hour average!) All that work was good enough for first in the SS class and 2nd fastest total time of all the solo guys. Ed rocked the SS class as well and rode 6 hours and ended up 5th!! Other bonus was the weather was perfect- cool in the morning, maybe 80 during the day- and dry trails!!

Be thinking about Ed- he's at the Fool's Gold 100 today in North Georgia. Go ED!!!!!!!!!!!!

No blogging, but LOTS goin' on!

Been awhile for lots of reasons the main one being that my family sold our house and bought a new one that we are just now getting ready to move into, so sitting at the computer to do this hasn't been in the front of my brain for sure. But riding has. House stuff happened and then we went to the beach- Gulf coast style and luckily didn't have to swim in oil. House we got was over the top and we had a blast, but the best part was the singletrack. Yes, real-deal twisty fun trails within riding distance of the beach house. I had heard there might be trails and took my chances taking the 1x9 29er mountain bike instead of a road bike and was totally delighted. Rode 4 days and most of those were of the 3 hour variety- largely in the woods. I have some great pics but because of moving all of my crap is everywhere and I can't find the charger for the camera- soon come.

Of course Ed is riding and we even made it to yet another race earlier in July, the Iron Mountain 100k put on by our good friend Chris Scott of Shenandoah fame. Race started in Damascus, VA with a few fast miles on the VA creeper, then into the woods for some fantastic and technical singletrackin!! Because they didn't want people racing all the way back into town the actual mileage was closer to 55 miles but it was still great to go race since for me it had been since the end of May. Doesn't hurt that I won the single speed class and was 12th overall!!!!!! Also, even though he has gotten better, Ed got lost on the course but with his ride back into town on the highway still did the same mileage. There was a questionable spot for finding your way because another friend of ours from Kentucky messed up a potential top 3 spot with the "road crossing" at check 3 ( he still got 5th! ). Great day in the woods and great company seeing as how some of the TVB boyz were in attendance as well- Burgess, Talley, Ross, and "Don" all showed and had a great time.

After that was super fired up for ORAMM and a shot at kicking "dicky's" butt, but was totally shocked that with 2 weeks still to go the event had sold out-no exceptions. E-mailed the race director and even though I've given him my money for the Swank a couple of times and given him ORAMM money and didn't show- he wouldn't let me come. Bummed, but procrastination has come to haunt me over the years and this time got me for sure. Good thing is that I learned something and signed up for Shenandoah yesterday instead of my normal week before, because if I couldn't get in that race I might be depressed for a whole entire year (except I bet Chris would let me in cause he is a MUCH cooler guy). Anyway, Ed fired up a 6 hour race last weekend for something to do (since we couldn't get into ORAMM!!) up near Blacksburg, VA. Should have known it might be interesting when we pulled the course info from someones Garmin data and it said the loop was 4.5 miles with 800 something feet of elevation gain per lap!! Needless to say it was steep in spots, but VERY technical and not the most fun course Ed had ever done, but you never know- that's racin' sometimes the courses are good, sometimes only so-so but it always fun to be in the woods, plus he said it was put on by a bunch of college kids from VA tech. so it was laid-back and fun atmosphere- not like some of the bigger races where there are increasingly bigger crowds (I presume like ORAMM but we didn't get a chance to go).

Looks like there is another 6 hour race up in Ohio next weekend and its on a SUNDAY which is great for me, so we will probably go check it out. Wilderness 101 was so close to happening for me, but we are moving into the new house this weekend so that seems like a good reason to stay home!

Lumber-freakin'-JACK

ED has been at it again. This time round 3 of the NUE 100 mile series in Michigan and ED's first attempt at the SS for a hundie!! Of course it was no problem as he finished with a time of 10 hours and 30 minutes!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Freakin' stud-boy. I've told him that he could do it and in some ways riding a SS is easier- lots more coasting and when you're pedaling you are moving on, getting climbs over with faster. To prove that the apple dosen't fall far from the tree, Elizabeth (daughter of ED) went back for another go at the Lumberjack and finished ahead of HIM at 10 hours!!! She was on the podium, but I have limited knowledge of all the details as of right now. Very cool stuff.

Go ED go!

Last weekend ED traveled to Chattanooga for the Cysco Cycles 6 hour race at Booker T. trails in the 'noog. Hot, hot, and hotter lately (still better than cold and snowy!) made for classic Ed- 5 laps, then some car time sittin' in the A.C. with a bit of "recovery". Turns out, he went so fast on those first 5 he was easily keeping up with the other SS racer- yes he's back on the Al stumpy SS-style (the one with the cool ass zebra stripes). Break done, he rode two more laps much to the dismay of said other SS racer and easily won- by two laps over someone more than half his age and supposedly a "pro" riding for Lynskey!!! I'm starting to think that Ed needs the hook-up, especially because if he likes something he will tell everyone about it and if keeps beating people that are "sponsored" he is most definitely worthy. Next stop for Ed is this weekend in Michigan at the Lumberjack 100, round 3 of the NUE series and will be his first hundie on a SS- go ED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sometimes things just work out.....

So, if you haven't figured out by now me n' ol' ED like to do long, dumb mountain bike races. Well, round two of the NUE series was at Mohican in Ohio last weekend and because of scheduling conflicts, etc. Team Ed was not in attendance. I found myself working as a wrench for one of the rest stops at the Tour de Cure, which ended up being alot of fun. Some familiar faces and alot of new ones and its always fun to "save the day/ride" for someone by doing something that is simple but keeps them on the road. Big plus was post-ride food was provided by Moe's!!
Ed found himself at the 8-hour race at Haw Ridge put on by our good friend/mountain bike endurance racing freak of nature dholmes. Ed true to his outstanding form, shunned the geared plastic wunderbike in favor of the Al single-speeder and ended up 2nd in the ss class!! Hot and humid, and a great course for Haw and luckily the rain didn't come till most of the racers were done. Come to find out Ohio, specifically race day, had torrential rain, wind and hail so it sounds like we were in the right places to at least not have another Cohutta-type bike-trashing experience. Hopefully, Ed won't have rain at the Lumberjack.........
Sure would like to hit the Stoopid 50 this weekend but it sure is a long drive for a 50 mile race. We'll see.

Hey Seuss!

And I don't mean the good doctor, I mean it only in the most biblical of senses. I swore up and down that after the last solo 12 hour race at haw ridge (a long time ago) combined with my first big loop event, that the lap thing may never happen again. Part of my love for hundies, especially SM100 is the big loop format- gotta keep goin, no reason to stop. The multiple laps give you a chance to a) get bored and b) quit easier. Not into to quitting, but mentally tougher for me to keep going in the same circle. Anyway, due to scheduling conflicts it started looking bad for another shot at the Mohican 100 in Ohio, so given that I (and ed somewhat) was a fired-up after Cohutta there needed to be something long and painful to fill in the gap. Since I am always looking at race calendars just to see if there is something interesting that we haven't done and because I know a very flexible schedule is the way to succeed in life, finding the 12 hour race at Tsali seemed to be the perfect fit. Only a 2 hour drive, and for me a trail system while very fun, somewhere that I had not ridden in several years which the idea was, would keep the boredom at bay. Thankfully a long-time friend from the neighborhood was going and had done this race before so he could answer all my little questions regarding rules, the start, etc. Plus, he got over there early and got a great campsite and had a giant pile of firewood. Drove over Friday night through a few showers, but it didn't look like it had rained all day, so the hope was trail conditions would be o.k. Nice thing was no pre-dawn start (11 am) bad thing was it rained some before sunrise and a little more before the race started. Oh well, at least once it stopped that looked to be it on the rain, not like at Cohutta where you knew it was coming to kill you at some point later in the day! Silly ass greg lemond start, running up a gravel road for 1/4 mile, then on the bikes to start the 11 mile loop- up county line road (gravel, climbing 3 miles) then around on the right loop (singletrack!). Shaggy of SCO/bike zoo was there also doing 12 hour solo SS, and we hooked up immediately and seemed to be perfectly matched pace-wise. Our pace seemed a little ambitious given we had to ride all day and that it was muddy, but it was hard to go slow- the trail is very fast in many spots, so we just let it rip. Talkin', jumpin' making motorcycle sounds- we were having a blast and I'm pretty sure we were running first and second for those first few laps. We each had small spills, and going into lap 4 finally eased off the gas a bit to try and settle into a more reasonable pace. Bad thing for Shaggy was when he crashed, he caused some cramps and he never was right again- it would have been really fun to have ridden with him all day. Somewhere along the day the 6 hour folks finished- Sean, also of SCO/bike zoo- who got 5th place! and our own ED- who rode SS (no separate class) to 15th overall!!!! He was coming off being sick and was smart about doing 6 instead of 12 and rode the SS just cause (he's a badass). This was good because once they got cleaned up they were around our pit area and helped keep me motivated- funny how doing this makes you tired at some point! Only dumb rule for this race was they had a mandatory time for you to have your light, so I rode two laps with my light but didn't need it at all- not that those few ounces mattered but I'm just saying........ Seemed to be in third, but the guy behind me had some kick left, and I was just riding to at least do a hundred miles (9 laps) and then decided to actually get a real night lap in where I used my light and went out for number 10. Had time to start an 11th lap but it would not have changed my position, so I easily stopped at 10:20 pm for a grand total of 110 miles off-road (new most ever mtb mileage in one day for me) and 1 billion calories burned. Crazy thing was to ride that many miles and it was only good for 4th in SS, but that was 6th overall solo. Fast people out there everywhere! Great event (Gone Riding puts this on) trails got super fun as the day went on and they dried out a bit and I got yet another ultra under my belt- eye on the prize come labor day weekend!