Looking Back

My mountain bike racing roots came way before even stepping a foot on a starting line.  In fourth grade I was introduced to skiing, and by fifth grade I was ski racing.  From fifth grade up to middle school, I was on the Snowstar Ski Team.  I competed in Wisconsin, Iowa, and Illinois. I was a chubby kid and never did well, but I did manage to gain a strong set of legs.  I didn’t know it then, but that was the base of my biking career.  Once I reached high school, I lifted my first weights for football.  I could already squat more than most on the team, and remained the top ranked squatter through Senior year. Unfortunately, I lacked upper strong and wasn’t the fastest runner so I never played, but strong legs plus no upper body, minus fast twitch muscle equals a decent mashing mountain biker. After high school and no longer practicing football, I needed a new outlet so I decided to do a 7 mile hilly running race called the Bix 7. I found my love for long distance cardio. After a year or two of doing this race, all the while still lifting weights, I decided to compete in several short triathletes around the university I attended in Springfield, IL. I didn't have a road bike, so I used the mountain bike I had from saving up money as a lifeguard one summer in 1998. Considering I was racing a hardtail with knobbies on it, I didn't do too bad. When I came home from college I found mountain biking, and the rest is history. Now I'm on my sixth year of racing, and my fourth year of endurance racing in Colorado. All this from being a chubby ski racing kid in the Midwest. Now I hardly find time to ski because I'm mountain biking. Funny how that all worked out.

Back Into Action!

Training week number one complete!  Thirteen weeks to go until the first race.  Every year, I do a performance test the first week of training in January and then another in February.  It's a 20 minute sprint uphill as hard as you can go.  My last test was last February with a solid result.  This year I beat that record with a 2.7% increase in distance!  To make things better, I was 9 lbs lighter last year during the test, so there's lots of room for improvement as more weight comes off.  Also I had my first long day on Thursday.  I had a four hour ride close to work on a Broomfield/Boulder trail system. I typically only ride Jefferson County trails, but because I'm going to be out of town this weekend and really didn't want to ride in the dark this was one of my only options because it's close to work.  It is quite an awesome option to have!  I had never ridden most of the trail, and although it wasn't my beloved JeffCo trails, I had a blast! I even convinced a friend who works in the same building as me to join in for a part of the ride, so even better.  It's a great start to the season.  Oh, and I've officially decided to upgrade the ride!  My bike shop picked up Scott Bikes this year, and the Scale was just too tempting to pass up.  I am saving up, and hopefully will pull the trigger in February.  2013 is being to be awesome!

My Future Bike

Another Trail User on the Trail in Boulder